Muggsy's Brain

I've been on Facebook for a while now and I have come to the conclusion that it is just a gigantic marketing tool. In fact, the Pirate and Zombie and Werewolf applications were invented by marketers to see how the Facebook community works and how they could exploit it. It must've worked because Mark Zuckerberg, the inventor of Facebook, recently sold a small percentage of it to Microsoft for $246 million. Still, it is a handy way to keep in touch with friends and I'm not going to delete my account anytime soon. One of the applications (or apps) that I use for movie review and sharing is Flixster . I am consistently amazed at the stupidity of some of the users. I understand that taste is subjective and that one person's trash is another person's treasure, and that's not what I find so odd. No, it is people who give a 4-star rating to movies they don't like, or the people who rate a movie based on the attractiveness of the leads, like this one, an actu...

Yes, yes, I know I asked for it when I got a kitten. Kittens very quickly become "tweens," which is roughly equivalent to teen-age years in humans. When your cute, playful little kitten becomes a "tween" he becomes the Devil. Frank has decided that toilet paper is the enemy and must be destroyed. My roomie bought one of those bajillion packs of TP, Frank broke into the cabinet and attacked the outside of the package. After we opened it he somehow attacked all the middle rolls. They are almost completely shredded and are pretty much useless. In the process a paperback book that must have gotten a little too close got a some collateral damage as well. I put an 8 lb. weight in front of the cabinet door. He won't be shredding any more packs of TP anytime soon. Last night I heard a noise coming from the bathroom (he seems somewhat fixated on the bathroom) and I went to see what the hell he'd gotten himself into this time. He had managed to get himself up...

Now that trivia is over I can start concentrating on learning the music for Bridge. Nathan, Jeff & I had our first real sing-through on Saturday night and we got together with some of the horn players on Sunday. Unfortunately, I am fighting a case of the "creeping trivia crud" and my concentration and vocal ability were left wanting. I've spent the last few weeks getting "So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright" and "Song for the Asking" under my fingers, they are by far the most challenging things I have to play. Most of the album is pretty simple from a basic musical standpoint, Simon was and is a folk singer, after all. He throws a curve at you now and again, but if you know basic folk and blues chord progressions you can find your way through most of the music without too much trouble. The challenge is going to be finding the nuance within the song and to try to recreate it live -- instantly. They spent months in the studio perfecting each song, we ...

And so, we begin another project. This time it's the brilliant album by Simon & Garfunkel, Bridge Over Troubled Water. Since this is going to be a major event, and a great challenge, I thought I'd start blogging about it, starting with my general thoughts about the album. In 1970, when BOTW was released, I was only six years old. Seems strange to see that number in front of me, I hadn't really figured it until now, I thought I was more like eight. I remember listening to it a lot, seems like it could have been daily. Sometimes I'd listen to it alone under headphones -- big, ungainly, late 60s headphones that pinned your ears to your head -- sometimes I'd listen with my brothers and sister. We learned every word, which was easy, because they were printed on the back of the album jacket, and sang along. We'd argue about who got to sing Simon and who got to sing Garfunkel. Basically, everyone wanted to sing the lead. The music spoke to me, not in the p...

$429.90 for the tie rod ends. Running total so far: $1381.34. And I will eventually need to replace the head gasket and one of the axle seals. That will run another couple of hundred. Meh, better than buying a $1500 car and having to put in $900 in repairs... Powered by ScribeFire .

I bought a new car on the day after Xmas. It's a 1992 Ford Tempo with about 173,000 miles on it. The Tempo replaced the Fairmont and preceded the Countour. It was the grandfather of the Taurus. Whatever. I found it in the newspaper listed for only $495, it was on some land a little north of St. Cloud. A guy named Larry sold it to me. When I said I wanted to buy it he insisted that we transfer the title immediately. He said he had a couple of things happen that convinced him that was the best way to go. One car he sold wound up in the Hennepin County impound lot before the title got transfered. Another car was involved in a drug bust. He drove me into Foley and we took care of it right away. It cost $38.50. When we got back to his house he said he would knock $20 off the asking price because the muffler needed to be replaced, but that he wanted cash. I only had $75 on me so I said I'd go home in the vehicle I drove out there in (Jeff's van) and return with the rema...

I went to see Michael Johnson in concert at the Pioneer Place on Fifth last night -- what a thrill! I remember seeing him for the first time in the Stewart Hall Auditorium back in the mid 80s and sitting a mile away, last night I was in the front row. He hasn't lost a thing, although his voice was a little weak at times, but that's understandable seeing as he just had quadruple bypass surgery only 4 1/2 months ago. His guitar playing, on the other hand, is still up to snuff, in fact it's beyond snuff, he's one of the best guitarists I've ever seen. He played an Irving Berlin song that I simply must learn, but I forgot the title (grrr!). Berlin wrote it for the woman he loved, but back in those days it was unthinkable for a Jewish man to marry a Catholic woman. It's something like "That'll Do" or "It'll Have To Do," I just can't remember -- I even asked him after the concert, but it was gone by the time I got home. Sometimes i...