A wide variety... take your pick.

First things first, I have gone ahead and changed the video of the week, despite the fact that it is in fact Thursday as I write this, and I originally said that I would be changing it on Fridays...

It's likely that most of you out there won't be seeing this until Friday, so it really doesn't matter, but I just thought I'd let you know as a courtesy.

This week's selection is the song "Over My Head" by The Fray.

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Since we're already on the subject of music, I'm going to go ahead and go on a little musical rant. This time I'm taking on broadcast radio...

People (generally ones who don't know me particularly well,) frequently ask me what kinds of music I listen to. I have a tendency to give the standard, pat answer, which goes something like, "Oh I'll listen to just about anything," but the fact of the matter is that while my musical taste is diverse, it is not all-inclusive.

I am the first to tell anyone that despite my Midwestern upbringing, country music does absolutely nothing for me. (Neither does most rap/hip-hop music, but that's not really something that I can parallel with my upbringing... Unless you want to credit my extensive work at the ghetto pools during my tenure as a city lifeguard... But I digress.)

The fact is, that I know what I like, and I know what sounds good to me, and I know what I think is total rubbish. A large part of the music on popular radio stations, in my humble opinion, is rubbish. This is not to imply that music that isn't widely broadcast over the air waves is not rubbish as well... A lot of that is crap too, you can be sure.

The fact is that broadcast media is controlled by corporations, and thus we get a VERY VERY limited view of the spectrum that is out there. This won't be a rant against the corporations or anything, but I just want to say that if you were to go out and buy the whole album of all the artists a radio station plays in any given hour, I can promise you that 9 times out of 10, the best song on the album is not the one you heard on the radio.

(Go ahead, tell me I'm wrong... I'm not.)

I've gotten off track again...

Anyway, what I'm most upset about is the fact that radio stations are force-feeding us CRAP. The worst perpetrators of this force-feeding, are the so-called "Mix" stations. Any radio station advertising itself as "THE MIX" will typically utilize the following programming schedule in any given 1 hour span:

5 minutes of DJ banter that is not funny.
2 songs (totalling about 8 minutes) that are on current pop charts.
10 minutes of commercials.
1 song (4 minutes) from a bygone era, (i.e. - something by Flock of Seagulls, REO Speedwagon, or Journey)
7 more minutes of commercials.
3 minutes of unfunny DJ banter.
2 more songs (another 8 minutes) that are on current pop charts.
4 minutes of commercials.
5 minutes of incessant DJ blabber.
4 minutes of commercials.
And finally one more song from current pop charts.

It should be noted that there were only 6 songs played in that hour-long time span. One of them was a proven winner from back in the day, and the other 5 are the songs designated by whomever to be the ones in heavy rotation.

And they are not kidding when they say HEAVY ROTATION.

Mix stations are perhaps most infuriating because they seem to have the same six songs on a constant loop... occasionally they will slip in something else, just so they can keep up that whole "MIX" pretense, but honestly, who are they trying to kid.

Basically radio infuriates me, and I always turn back to my extensive CD collection rather than suffer the inane blabber and advertising of commercial radio.

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On another musical note, this little video clip gave me quite a good laugh. You really do need the audio to truly enjoy this in all it's hilarious glory. [Special thanks to Leigh]

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On a completely different subject, I feel the need to address a problem that I am noticing in increasingly epidemic-proportions.

One of the cardinal rules of friendship is that you are as close as you can be when you and your friends are single, and when you happen to find a new significant other, you put forth a serious effort to maintain your friendship... Translation: When you find your sorry ass a new boyfriend, don't you dare go ditching your friends for him. After all, your friends are the ones who tolerated all your whining after you broke up with the last miserable fucker who broke your heart.

Well, as some of you know, Mendez found herself a man a couple months ago. She then proceeded to violate this rule an extensive and excessive amount.

Example: Her boyfriend is 24 years old... by all rights, a big boy. He got a new apartment. He decided to sign the lease for this apartment on Tuesday October 11... (My birthday.) Mendez had previously planned to come over to my apartment on my birthday... She didn't call. She ditched me to go with her boyfriend while he signed his lease. Please note that she is NOT on the lease, they don't live together, and this was something that could've been handled by one person, specifically the person who is actually going to inhabit the place... Needless to say I was a little upset by the reasoning for being ditched on my birthday.

Last night I called her out on it. I finally got her on the phone after two week's worth of attempts to get in touch with her. I said what needed to be said, which was something on the order of, "I am sick of being ditched for your man... I know you love him, and that's fine, but you come into the city EVERY DAY and you have not been over to my new place once since I moved in. And that includes being ditched on my birthday... If I had a dick, this would roughly be the time when I'd tell you to suck it."

She was in denial for much of the conversation saying that she hates girls that do that, and that she was most definintely not one of them... I continually reminded her that she WAS one of them.

Today I got the following message:

"Thanks for snapping me out of my little rut! I needed to hear what you told me. Someone else said the same thing to me shortly after you did. I'm thirsty, on a totally unrelated note. Also, I had a crazy dream about ghosts. Well, at any rate, I will see your goofy ass tomorrow at 2!"

Let's hope the message sticks.

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My computer is still in the shop, and I'm starting to get a little bitter. But that is really neither here nor there.

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Being in need of a computer, I have resorted to venturing to campus and using the ones in the computer labs... this means that I have to deal with a lot of BS that goes on at the university. Today's feature: ARTSALIVE! Bacially everyone who thinks they have some kind of performing talent is out in full force PERFORMING.

That's all well and good, but they insist upon doing it at incredibly irritating volumes. (And a great many of them had better have a business degree to fall back on, because I'm pretty sure that the performing thing isn't going to pan out for them... If you catch my drift.)

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Dave, the guy who I knew and loved for several years, the same guy who broke my heart back in February, is now ignoring me. I think that's cute.

I IMed him the other day just to say hello, and that since it was likely that he still wasn't talking to me, to have a nice life. He promptly added me to his block list. Because that's what grown-ups do.

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Damn, this turned out to be a lot longer than I thought it would be.