Collected Thoughts 09-30-09

• Eagle Rock Music Festival set-times. More on CGT, probably tomorrow. You must go on Saturday, though. Best free event of the year.
  

• SOS has a Letting Up Despite Great Faults download. The new album is purty.
  

• I don't think I ever properly reviewed the Meat Puppets show at The El Rey. I know I tweeted the balls off it.
  
  The El Rey was, as most people predicted due to the large number of ticket giveaways, dead. I mean dead. The Meat Puppets were perfectly fine, but that room sucked-out any exciting energy they might have had. The songs sounded fine.

• After I ranted about the collapse of social networks and how I constantly run from one to the next, I saw this. That's interesting. I never noticed myspace becoming more "black" (whatever that means) myself, but even if race specifically plays no role, I think likening the loss of relevancy of social networking sites (R.I.P. Friendster) to suburban flight is absolutely apt.

• And just after I suggested the internet makes us sharper, not dumber, Salon runs an interview suggesting the same. I do think in the information age our brains have evolved from information keepers to information catalogers. "I know where to find the answer" has replaced "I know the answer". This is perfectly okay because as society has advanced we've accumulated far more knowledge than any one brain can old. It's a healthy evolution, no doubt.

• 80's toy ads are a guilty pleasure of mine. Who wants to play with toys whose chief function is to cry?!

• "Being in the military, he was used to seeing robots and to talking to them." (Robot helps end standoff)
  
  (The Singularity is near!)
  

• Researchers have made anti-WiFi paint.

• Lovely, cops. Lovely.

• The Colts' Freeney is out 2-3 weeks. Ugh, but if I were going to pick any stretch of the schedule for this to happen, this would be the exact stretch. Also, lest I get too excited about the Colts' prospects, Bob Kravitz has helped me re-live the heartbreak.
  
  God, that fucking AFC Champ game against the Steelers in '05 still stings. Idiot drunk kicker.

• Bummer that Colts-'Hawks goes down at the same time as Pats-Ravens, which is probably game of the week. But Saints v. Jets is the afternoon game, which should be outstanding.
  

• Yes.
  
  "The best America can do is to treat Iran the way it treated South Africa or Communist Eastern Europe, building an international consensus among democracies on isolating them while offering an olive branch to keep local populations yearning for change. Already, America's recent conciliatory stance on Iran, and Iran's aggressive responses, have put us in a stronger diplomatic position."