Wheel of Misfortune

Darn Good Time

Ig Nobel

There are some great shows coming up. Who wants to go? Drop me a line.

2/23 (Sat) Bedouin Soundclash @ Mohawk Place $16
2/26 (Tue) Medeski Martin & Wood @ Town Ballroom $25
3/8 (Sat) Black Lips @ Mohawk Place $12
3/9 (Sun) MSTRKRFT @ Tralf $17
3/17 (Wed) Justice @ Toronto
4/1 (Tue) Stars @ Tralf $16
4/4 (Fri) Stephen Colbert @ UB $40
4/11 (Fri) Haale @ Tralf $12
4/30 (Wed) Tokyo Police Club @ Soundlab $15
5/6 (Tue) Reverend Horton Heat @ Tralf

Rock!

Scandalous Scrabulous

Not fabulous?


Too much of my long weekend was wasted playing online Scrabble. Hit me up on Scrabulous; my name is TomServo0 and I just finished a 6-game win streak. Don't worry, I'm really not that great. Now if you'll excuse me I'm going to memorize all the 2-letter words.

Speaking of streaks, how about Barack Obama? Tonight he just won Wisconsin and it looks like he'll take Washington too. Not only did he win Wisconsin by a bigger margin than McCain did on the Republican side, Obama got three times more votes than McCain. I should name my first kid Barack Schrock. That would rock.

Bear Attack!

The Truthiness about bears

ePhone

I leave the worst phone messages. Isn't talking to a machine defeating the very reason phones were invented anyway? That and having to wait for a return call when you expected an instant reply can make messages more nerve-wracking than actual calls.

Anyway, the other day I signed up for a free trial at GotVoice.com. Now (and for the next 14 days) the service will convert my messages to .mp3s and E-mail them to me. The convenience! This also allowed me to download some messages I've been saving. Here's one from last summer: my roommate slept through his alarm and didn't show up for work. His job called his mother, and his mother, fearing he'd been murdered in his new apartment in Buffalo, called me.

Finally, an oldie but a goodie. A friend of my brother's once called and forgot to hang up after leaving a message. Ten years later he's a born-again Christian but the recording lives on. This takes forever to load, but turn it up and check it out.

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My other messages are either too private or--you know who you are--were drunk and called me 24 times one night so now they're deleted. To fill the space, here's David Lee Roth's cartoonish singing without Van Halen's help, and then the new video by the Melvins. If you can figure out what the hell that video is about please let me know.

Lincoln Log

Today would have been Abraham Lincoln's 199th birthday, and though I forgot to buy him something nice I did visit the Historical Society for festivities. What constitutes "festivities" is a matter of opinion, but hey: here's a mold of Lincoln's face!


Irony #1: To celebrate Lincoln's birthday they displayed a replica of his casket. Irony #2: To celebrate Lincoln's life they held festivities on the site of another president's assassination. Irony #3: A Lincoln impersonator re-enacted the Gettysburg Address in front of people dressed as Confederate soldiers. They applauded.


Abe laments the Buffalo weather


Celebrants


I got an awesome head shot of Lincoln from the balcony!


Kenmore East high schoolers whistlin' Dixie


BULLSHIT


THAT'S more realistic.


An action shot of the miniature train set. The end!

80 Minutes for 10 February 2008

Valentine's Day is coming, so I went through the old hard drive to find songs to find songs with the word "baby" in them. I found 255 tracks. Then I shortened it so songs that started with "baby" and cut those down to one CD. It seems that "baby" is a poor litmus test of how romantic a song is, because it's also a term of condescension and loneliness (eg., "my baby left me").

But that's too much work to give up on, so here's my mix tape. Since the Grammys are also coming up I gave awards to each song. You can download the whole list as a .zip file or each individually. Hit me up if there's anything you're looking for!

The 5 Royales - Baby Don't Do It
*Best Use of Saxamaphones

unknown - Baby Girl Motion
*Best Sample of an Actual Baby
*"Found in my System Files" Award

Barbara Lewis - Baby I'm Yours
*Best Female Backup Singers

Bob Dylan - Baby, Let Me Follow You Down (Bootleg Vol 4)
*Angriest Fans Award

Danko Jones - Baby Hates Me
*Best Use of One Note in a Riff

The Echoes - Baby Blue
*Best Example of Stuttering While Spelling

Elvis Costello - Baby Plays Around
*Most Depressing

Four Tops - Baby, I Need Your Loving
*Best Use of Strings in a Pop Song

Fratellis - Baby Fratelli
*Best Song to Skip Along With

G Love & Special Sauce - Baby's Got Sauce
*Grooviest

Jan & Dean - Baby Talk
*Best Legal Suggestion of Underaged Romanticism by an Adult

Jimmy Reed - Baby, What You Want Me to Do
*Most Generic Blues Progression

Led Zeppelin - Baby Come On Home
*Best Reason to Plop Down $100 for a Box Set to Get Only 4 Unreleased Tracks

Liz Phair - Baby Got Going
*Best Song Overheard on an Episode of Felicity

Ol' Dirty Bastard - Baby C'mon
*Best Lead Vocals by Someone Who Can't Sing

Pavement - Baby Yeah [Live]
*Simplest Lyrics Award

Pizzicato Five - Baby Love Child
*Best Song You Think You Hear After a Blow to the Head

Raja - Baby
*Best Use of the Word "Baby" in a Non-English Language

Rufus Wainwright - Baby
*Mopiest
*Most Unoriginal Title (Tie with Raja)

Shirelles - Baby It's You
*Eeriest Piano Award

Sir Mix-A-Lot - Baby Got Back
*GREATEST SONG BY ANYONE EVER ABOUT ANYTHING

Sonny & Cher - Baby Don't Go
*"Happy Harmonica" Award

Squirrel Nut Zippers - Baby Wants A Diamond Ring
*Most Swingin'
*Lindy Hoppiest

Travis - Baby One More Time (live)
*Best Cover of a Britney Spears Song
*Only Possible Way to Enjoy a Britney Spears Song

Ween - Baby Bitch
*Bitterest Song Award
*Most Sarcastic
*"Normal for Ween" Award

The Bunny Hill Show

Yakety Sax

I skied, all by myself! And I only hit the fence once!

The Whigs at Mohawk Place

Tonight I checked The Whigs at Mohawk Place. Solid show! I didn't know anything about the band except for their recent Letterman performance but I left impressed. I also can't hear much now, but what I did hear beforehand was pretty good.



Local rock/blues band Handsome Jack played after The Whigs, which didn't make much sense to me. Still, they ripped it up. Heck, they were almost as good as Sloshy's Super Bowl halftime show. Wanna see?



For the heck of it, here's The Whigs on Letterman.

Eli Manning's Miracle Play to David Tyree in Super Bowl XLII

My original prediction was Giants 31, Patriots 28. Close enough!


Bonus: Highlights from Puppy Bowl IV.

Pictures of Paintings

Today I got into the Burchfield-Penney for free. Don't ask how! Also don't ask why I took pictures of what I saw and combined it into a slideshow using retro J-pop pioneers Pizzicato Five. Soon I will post a mixtape of songs whose titles start with "Baby," but I had to get this tune out of the way.

Queen City Roller Girls

Sports aren't interesting unless someone's getting hurt. That's why the Rainbow Rink in North Tonawanda was packed to capacity tonight: Mardi Brawl at the roller derby! My pictures and video don't do it justice but the official site might.






This was my first time at a roller derby so I had a lot of questions. What are the rules, anyway? Why are the announcers wearing costume gowns? How do you score points? Why are loaves of bread thrown into the stands during intermissions? Not all of my questions were answered but who cares? You only watch to see the crashes, anyway. It's like NASCAR . . . on wheels.