Ok, here’s an interesting little game that I stole from Brett. It goes as follows:

step 1: get your playlist together, put it on random, and play

step 2: pick your favorite lines from the first 25 songs that play

step 3: post and let everyone you know guess what song the lines come from

step 4: cross out the songs when someone guesses correctly

The playlist comes from a little list of my top 3800 or so favorite songs, so there’s quite a bit of variety in there. I’m thinking that given my low readership and the relative obscurity of a lot of these songs that there won’t be many answers but by all means go ahead and surprise me. Oh yeah, and no cheating. To clarify, Google is totally cheating. So let’s get to it.

1. But I’d trade all the memories just have your heart in mine.

2. I still love her, loved her more when she used to be sober and I was kinder.

3. cat man’s a comin’, you better look out

04. breathe, keep breathing. don’t lose your nerve.

05. you say you mean well, you don’t know what you mean.

1. hello to the soft and flutter

2. No hope, no harm. Just another false alarm.

08. This space I am defending in sections is now neverending overgrowth.

1. if you don’t have me baby, God knows you ain’t gonna have nobody else

2. I wrote the words to this song on the back of a photograph

3. But one always reveres what one’s bound to destroy

12. i only live in that one moment in which you die

1. i want a little pick me up, so i won’t stumble down tonight

2. listen to your heartbeat, delete beep beep beep

3. this is a feeling I never want to be without

4. Make me baby, make me know you really care. Make me jump into the air.

17. I can’t turn around cause I long to be forgiven.

1. I’m suggestible it’s true, but only by you.

2. They lied when they said there was no air in space

3. Ain’t no love in here, its just one big cycle here.

4. I’m spread so thin I don’t know who I am.

5. Storms of petals are pouring down, pushing their way through our pink love.

6. Remind me, what was I looking at? Remind me you always had an answer for everything

7. he’ll have set it up to fall, she’ll have set herself up to wait far enough away somehow

25. Last week it was funny, now the joke’s wearing thin.

Comments

Comment by Brett on 2004-12-13 06:13:35 +0000

1. Radiohead – “Exit Music (For a Film)”

2. Elliott Smith – “Everybody Cares, Everybody Understands”

3. The Dismemberment Plan – “Time Bomb”

4. Ben Folds Five – “Steven’s Last Night In Town”

Based on some of your songs, you should be able to get a few more of mine. You can do it!

Comment by Will on 2004-12-16 07:50:30 +0000

Yeah, well I figured out #23, but only because I googled it thinking it was a Tom Waits song and trying to confirm that. So I was way off, and figured I disqualified myself on that one.

Comment by DuncmanG on 2005-01-31 23:00:35 +0000

1. Neko Case – “Porchlight”

Comment by Will on 2005-02-01 08:21:53 +0000

Correct. Wow, that was a surprise. I wasn’t expecting to get anymore answers on this.

Comment by Bored on 2005-06-22 02:17:39 +0000

1. Why Im So Unhappy-Dntel, i realized i had this song on my ipod, and was bored enough to find it so i could get the title etc… oh wow

Comment by Will on 2005-06-22 07:36:50 +0000

Wow, right on. That was definitely one of the more obscure ones up there.

Well, it’s finally happened. Blizzard released World of Warcraft on November 23rd, and with it went the rest of my free time. The quality of this game is rivaled only by its addictiveness (for me anyway). Ever since the days back in high school when I would play text-based MUDs I knew that it was just a matter of time until an online RPG came out that would be completely irresistible. This would seem to be it. None of the other multiplayer RPGs I’ve played before (Asheron’s Call, Dark Age of Camelot, Shadowbane, and City of Heroes) ever managed to hold my interest for long. All of those games seemed to assume that you wouldn’t mind playing the game more than a full time job if you ever wanted to make any progress in them. Long repetitive hours of play would leave you only marginally better off than when you had started, and that’s assuming you could find a decent group of people to play with. World of Warcraft takes a more humane approach and assumes that you’ve got other things you’d like to do with your time when you’re not logged in. I can log in for just an hour or two in the evenings, meet up with friends or go solo and still feel like I’ve actually made progress (to the extent that you can actually accomplish anything in a completely made up world that is) Amazingly, it actually manages to keep a fairly coherent storyline as you progress (something almost completely lacking in other games) which helps to smooth out some of the inherent repetition of the genre. Ironically, it’s that “hey, you don’t need to play me every waking moment” attitude that makes the game so hard to put down. I suppose it’s a good thing this game didn’t come out while I was in college or, well, I’d probably still be in college.

Comments

Comment by Nathan Hessler on 2005-01-10 14:45:57 +0000

I understand you completely. I bought the game after the quarter ended and in 3 weeks put in 7 full days of gaming. I am going through major withdrawal now that school has started, but the made up world just doesn’t have any good paying jobs. 😀

I got back from Springfield yesterday, and its definitely good to be back again. Contrary to what I thought earlier, even with working in an ER, nothing very interesting went on. Which is mostly a good thing in my mind. I actually spent most of my time in a back room writing code, as exciting as that is. In the time that I spent out on the ER floor, I didn’t see any major trauma. The only odd thing was doing troubleshooting with an occasional scream or moan in the background. I found that somewhat unnerving. This ER was pretty tricked out as far as the tech goes, which was interesting to a gadget nerd like me. They had huge plasma screens to use as tracking boards, and there were tablet PC’s that the doctors could carry around in addition to having computers next to every bed. It might sound a little cheesy, but I thought it was pretty great to see doctors and nurses actually using software I had worked on.

If you should ever find yourself in Springfield, IL I’d highly recommend trying out their local sandwich of choice, the Horseshoe. It’s a gloriously lard-packed open-faced sandwich that consists of a base of texas toast topped by a choice of just about any kind of meat (for instance, buffalo chicken) and then covered by so many french fries you can barely see the meat. On top of all that, a generous layer of beer-cheese sauce is applied. (And by applied I mean flooded torrentially from the very floodgates of heaven.) Wonderful. In general though, I’d recommend that you not find yourself in Springfield just because, well, its Springfield, IL. Not exactly a booming, vibrant metropolis. So how did I end up in Springfield? Well, I’m out here for the rest of the week on a trip to a client site for work, the first such trip I’ve taken. Generally I try to avoid blogging anything related to work, because it’s been shown again and again that mixing blogging and work is often a bad idea regardless of how benign the intentions might be. Also, I think it would generally be pretty boring. However, for the rest of the week I’m going to be working in an emergency room at a hospital (on computers, not people) and I’m thinking that might result in a few interesting experiences. Actually, I’m a kind of nervous that it will be a little too interesting. There are good reasons I decided to work with computers and not in medicine after all. My first shift starts in a couple hours here, so we’ll see how it goes.

Comments

Comment by Dan on 2004-11-10 16:27:18 +0000

I’m sorry, but that really sounds disgusting. If stuff like like that flows from heaven, I’ll have to rethink my goals

Comment by Nathan Hessler on 2004-11-11 15:51:19 +0000

that sounds like it’s right up my alley. as homer always says.

‘mmmmmm. Open faced club sandwhich’. 😀

In the weeks and months prior to the election, I had thought that there would be two important factors that could help tip the close race out of President Bush’s favor. One was first time voters that were registering mainly because they disliked how the current administration handled Iraq. The other was the fact that there are likely a large number of mostly young voters that have only cell phones and no landlines and thus would have been left out of traditional polling. I had assumed those voters would largely break for Kerry (which was purely an opinion and not based on any kind of evidence) As it turns out, I’m a member of both of those hypothetical groups of voters. I’m a young cell-phone only first-time voter who registered to vote primarily because I thought the president had made numerous mistakes and deceptions relating to Iraq. Based on sample size of, well, me I foolishly thought that I was part of a statistically significant unheard group that would play an important part in the outcome of the election. As it turns out, that was not the case and that’s what I find most disappointing. Or maybe there is a large demographic like me but everyone else just couldn’t tear themselves away from their Xboxen to go vote. That could well be, as I had to briefly debate myself about the importance of voting vs. the merits of heading straight home to play in the World of Warcraft final stress test.

Comments

Comment by Kimmee on 2004-11-11 17:42:30 +0000

“I’m a young cell-phone only first-time voter who registered to vote primarily because I thought the president had made numerous mistakes and deceptions relating to Iraq.”

Will, i was one of those people too.

Today, for the first time in my life, I voted. How about that. In retrospect, I don’t know why I waited so long. It was easy, and yeah it even felt a little good to feel like I was doing something important. Maybe it doesn’t matter, but at least for a little while I’m deciding to feel like it does. I had expected maybe there would be long lines, but that wasn’t the case. I was in and out in about 10 minutes. Mission accomplished. Nothing to do now but watch the results trickle in on CNN. Regardless of who wins, I’m faced with the depressing prospect that I’ll be 30 by the next presidential election. However, I think I find it much more depressing to think that George Bush could still be president until I’m 30 though. I’m hoping that’s not the case.

Comments

Comment by Phil on 2004-11-03 03:16:20 +0000

Amen, brother. Amen.

All I can say about the next four years is, God help us all. Nay, God help the entire globe.

Living in Canada is starting to look a lot more attractive.

P.S. The word ‘w.o.r.l.d’ is ‘questionable content’?

Comment by Will on 2004-11-03 06:38:13 +0000

Hey, watch that profanity! What place does “world” have in polite conversation? Oops, looks like MT-Blacklist got a little overzealous there. I toned it down.

Anyway, I’m certainly disappointed by the (almost certain) result of the election as well. But hey, America is still America and the system worked this time. And all it means is that there’s four years to find a guy who’s better than Kerry to run. I mean, honestly the best thing I liked about John Kerry was that he wasn’t George Bush. So here’s hoping that in 4 years either party (or any other party) manages to field a candidate that I actually like and want to vote for on their own merits and not based on who they’re running against.

Comment by Phil on 2004-11-03 12:19:02 +0000

Yeah, but let’s just hope Bush doesn’t squirrel in a way to abolish term limits, or else we’re gonna be REALLY screwed.

And, for the record, I don’t think Bush won because Kerry wasn’t a better candidate. Bush won because the American public is brainwashed, and Kerry couldn’t deprogram them all.

Comment by Ben Lewis on 2004-11-03 21:41:39 +0000

Yeah the nation is brainwashed by a liberal media to vote for a Republican President … That makes sense.

Jolayne and I made the trip up to Lawrence yesterday to catch RJD2 at the Granada. We got there around 5, because I had read online that it started at 7pm (which seemed odd and as we found out later was completely wrong). In the time before the show we walked around Lawrence, got dinner at the Free State Brewing Co., and I bought some cds. Afterwards we walked down to the Granada where we found that the show didn’t actually start until 9. As we were walking away to go find something to do in the meantime, the side door at the Granada opened up and RJ stepped out. At this point, I should mention that 1. RJ is originally from Columbus, OH and 2. Jolayne had met him several times there because he had been dating one of her good friends for a while. So RJ steps out, Jolayne said hi, he remembered her and they chatted briefly. As he was heading back in, he offered to add us to the guest list. That’s right, my fiance’s got the connections going on. That was really awesome for him to do though, and he seemed like a cool guy.

After hanging out in Lawrence a while longer, we went back to the Granada where we found we were on the guest list, as promised. The opening act was Hanger 18, another Def Jux artist that I thought was pretty good but not one of my favorites. On the other hand, RJD2’s set was fantastic. He had 4 turntables, a sampler, and a laptop on stage and he was running around like a madman the whole time, switching records at an insane pace. I have no idea how he does it. Musically, it was an awesome mix of Deadringer and his most recent album. Everything just moved fluidly from one track to another, with familiar samples popping up everywhere. In the background a giant theatre screen was showing a bunch of interesting video sequences, in case you didn’t think it was entertaining enough to watch RJ work the turntables. The film was definitely cool, and it even featured a few quick shots that Jolayne and I were able to recognize as being from around Columbus. It’s good to see the Bus get some love.

Comments

Comment by Nathan Hessler on 2004-11-01 20:16:50 +0000

wow, I thought this site was down. I haven’t been here in several months. so first off…. CONGRATS!!!!! and it seems like you guys are having plenty of fun. 😀

BTW – I’m back in school and just declared my major in CSE so if you have any advice to send my way I would appreciate it.

Keeping it short. Glad to see you kept this up and and updated. It’s always fun to read up on what you’ve been doing. You would have made a great journalist if not for your l337 h4x0r skeelz. 😉

In the well-its-about-time department, it looks like Verizon is finally rolling out services that involve bringing fiber optics straight to your home. That seems like a good way to go about using up all that unused bandwiths laying around on the telecom backbones out there. Wow, my very own fiber optic connection is so close I can almost taste it. Its only going to be available in 9 states so far (and Missouri isn’t one of them) but I sure hope it catches on. The amazing part is that you’ll be able to get 15 Mbit/sec down and 2 Mbit/sec up for just a little more than what I pay right now for 3 Mbit/sec down and 300 Kbit/sec up via cable.

Comments

Comment by Phil on 2004-10-25 12:30:13 +0000

Oh man, I can hear it now….

“Storage Whore Strikes Again!”

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Local Best Buy store is relieved of all its mass media storage devices by a diabolical cad known only as the self-proclaimed “Storage Whore.” A note left at the scene says, “What do I need a 15Mbit/sec connection for? Downloading the ENTIRE INTERNET! Woo hoo!” Police are currently baffled as to the Whore’s current whereabouts.

Comment by Posko on 2004-10-25 17:33:14 +0000

Yes, but will it keep you regular?

Comment by Ben Lewis on 2004-10-27 21:43:27 +0000

Yes but that is nothing compared to frosted mini-wheats. It has both fiber on one side and frosting on the other … OH, fiber optics I knew I should have read the post first.

Comment by Will on 2004-10-31 12:47:45 +0000

Phil – you may have been joking but I think you’ll seem oddly prescient in the near future 😉

I went to go see The Decemberists last night, on a week night and all the way over in Lawrence (about an hour away). It wasn’t fun dragging myself out of bed for work this morning, but it was totally worth it. I ♥ The Decemberists. They played at the Jackpot Saloon, a small new venue which is unfortunately crammed into a storefront on the main “college town” street in Lawrence. It was packed, and if I’d gotten there any later than I did I wouldn’t have been able to see the stage at all. Norfolk and Western opened up, and they were pretty good but I didn’t really get into it that much. Once The Decemberists took the stage though, the place just livened up. They played an awesome set, though unfortunately too short and they didn’t play quite a few of my favorite songs. However, I like so many of their songs that they could have played their entire discography through twice and I still would have been just mostly satisfied. They did come back and do one song for an encore, a cover of The Smith’s “Ask Me” which certainly didn’t lose them any points with me. Smith’s covers may be a little cliche, but I sure never get tired of them. I managed to stay awake while driving home too, which I thought was a nice bonus.

Just got back from seeing Death Cab for Cutie at the Beaumont. It got out pretty early as far as shows go but it wasn’t really too short. It was just one of those odd shows that actually started on time and had a really short setup time between sets. Of course, that was likely due to the fact that apparently on Friday nights the Beaumont switches over to line dancing at 11:00. Welcome to Kansas City, I guess.

Anyway, Travis Morrison opened things up with some of his recent solo stuff. It was pretty good, but after his stuff with the Dismemberment Plan it’d be hard to exceed expectations. Even without the Plan, he knows how to keep things interesting and entertaining. He’s not afraid to drop a Ludacris cover in there, and he pulled it off pretty well. Nice. Death Cab was excellent, definitely the better of the two shows I’ve seen of theirs. Of course since their most recent album is some of their best stuff yet that’s not surprising. It’s crammed full of sing-alongable awesomeness that just comes off great live. The only thing that could have made it better, as Jolayne pointed out later, is if they had slipped in some Postal Service covers here and there.

Comments

Comment by Brett on 2004-10-16 09:08:25 +0000

So what you’re saying is…if Travis came solo to a smaller venue you wouldn’t feel obligated to check it out? He’s stopping through the Grog Shop and I’m debating whether or not to go.

Comment by Will on 2004-10-16 17:11:07 +0000

Hmmm, that’s a tough call. I think I would probably still go as long as it was pretty inexpensive show (which I think the Grog Shop usually is, right?) Musicially it may not be up there with the Dismemberment Plan but Travis is just such a funny energetic performer that it’s still worthwhile in my opinion.

Comment by Brett on 2004-10-16 22:09:12 +0000

Word.