Random Day Random Eleven

Jesus The Mexican Boy - IRON & WINE
The Natural Night - NEDELLE
Take Me Out - THE RED HOUSE PAINTERS
None But Shining Hours - THE BOOKS
Með Blóðnasir - SIGUR ROS
Mountains Of Mourne - TARKIO
El Otro Lado - JOSH ROUSE
The Legionnaire's Lament - THE DECEMBERISTS
Yard Of Blonde Girls - MICAH P. HINSON
Love Love Love - THE MOUNTAIN GOATS
Mud Hands - FINGERS CUT MEGAMACHINE

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AFA Objects To Profanity On 9/11 Documentary - or -Longing For The Days When Death And Terror Came With Clean Language. And Short Hair.

Open letter to the American Family Association:

Dear AFA,

You people are stunningly senseless.

Love,
Normal People

PS - In a way, I guess I can understand the kind of pain you might go through if you were to settle in with your wife and kids in front of the tube for a comfy showing of the heartfelt and uplifting documentary "9/11".

"Now kids, while you're watching 3000 people die, ignore the nasty language. Pass the popcorn."

Really though, after watching firefighters in New York wake up to a beautiful day in New York city, and after seeing planes hit the twin towers, and after watching people jump to their deaths, and hearing their concussive blasts as they hit the ground all around the rescuers assembling to charge into the towers to their doom, I say imagine, if someone saying "Holy Shit!" were to intrude on your enjoyment of the otherwise wholesome fare.

It's absolutely insulting that CBS would allow cuss words to ruin an otherwise perfectly suitable production about our collective innocence-shattering national experience.

The big galoots. Why, I oughta....

Imbeciles' Call To Action

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Random Day Random Eleven

Two Of A Kind - SYD BARRETT
Lay Me Down - FOREST SUN
Deborarobed - T. REX
The India Song- BIG STAR
X-Ray Style - JOE STRUMMER
Loving You Too Long - BILLY BRAGG
Lay Me Down - THE FRAMES
St. Augustine - THE HORSES
West Of Her Spine - BELL X1
Words For Two - SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE
Original Air-Blue-Gown - THE MOUNTAIN GOATS

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Geography Teacher Displays Foreign Flags: Stampede Kills Eleven - or - What Are All These Other Shapes Doing On My Globe Of The U.S. ?!

There was no stampede and nobody died, but I got a kick out of my own headline(s). Isn't that what blogging is all about? Giggling like a mentally diminished 20-year-old who has just discovered toes? Exactly.

But seriously... and I mean seriously in a not-funny way: A Geography teacher got it into his head that displaying actual flags of actual foreign countries was still legal here in the United States of All That Matters.

Boy, did he get schooled.

In other news, math teachers in Colorado can no longer use Greek symbols in their equations.

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Pluto Demoted. Immediately Files Grievance. - or - Horoscopes The World Over Are Wrong! ... Still!

For a couple days last week I was pretty excited about the prospect of suddenly having 12 planets in our solar system. I was ready to welcome our newly adopted planetary brothers and sisters, Ceres, Charon, and the unnamed baby.

Preceeding this week's International Astronomical Union meeting in Europe, a subcommittee had made some recommendations that would have elevated to full planethood Pluto's moon Charon, producing a binary planet system, along with the asteroid Ceres and the still to be properly named 2003UB313, which originally was hailed as the tenth planet.

Well, now the IAU has done its work. Its evil, dirty work. It has finally, after thousands of years of skygazing, settled for us, on a proper definition of a planet.

And Pluto is out. Dwarf-something, Transneptunian has-been ball of ice just like the rest of 'em. And 2003UB313 is out too. Way out. It will get a name but likely not a planet's name.

This is really all Michael Brown's fault, anyway. He and his group discovered the iceball formerly known as the tenth planet a few years ago, and since the distant body was larger than Pluto, this whole question of what a planet actually is has simmered like a Jovian eye up until week's meeting.

Personally I would just kind of hate to be the guy who dispatched the 9th planet by discovering the 10th. This would be a great joke if Mike Brown's real first name was Charlie. And the IAU was Lucy. And the ball - well, you get the idea.

However, lo and behold Mike Brown is pretty OK with all of this. In fact he explains in quite a clear and convincing manner exactly why the final definition approved by the IAU is correct and proper, here.

In brighter news, it just became 11.11% easier to memorize all the planets.

Story at Bad Astronomy Blog

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Random Day Random Eleven

Off With Yr Hat - THANKSGIVING
Fast As I Can - ERIN MCKEOWN
The Scarlett Tide - ALISON KRAUS
Hold The Fort - BILLY BRAGG
She Will Have Her Way - NEIL FINN
Sing A Song For You - THE MAGIC NUMBERS
Walk Real Slow - LADY & BIRD
I'd Like That - XTC
A Plain Morning - DASHBOARD CONFESSIONAL
Decades - JOY DIVISION
Uncorrected Personality Traits - ROBYN HITCHCOCK & THE EGYPTIANS

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Random Day Random Eleven

I'm not going to promise, but I will say, as a way of forcing myself to do so, that I will be supplementing these "randoms" with regular posts soon. "Regular", as in "consistent". Really. I don't promise, but...

Lazy Little Ada - COLIN MELOY
Hammers Sitting Still - DANIELSON FAMILE
Hopi Profiteers - TIM KINSELLAS
Bodybuilder - ANDY WHITE
Tahuti, Splendid Scribe - IMPOSSIBLE SHAPES
Wish You Well - PHIL MANZANERA
Disembodied Voices - FINN BROTHERS
First Kiss - BORN HELLER
Rolling Suitcase - ROSE POLENZANI
Is This Home On Ice - CLAP YOUR HANDS SAY YEAH

... if I stop demanding clever and insightful pieces from myself, I'll actually post something. So I'll leave the heavy lifting to the committed bloggers. I'll give up my quest for a Pulitzer and just start offering the detritus currently cluttering my Drafts file. Good luck to you all.

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Random Day Random Eleven

Throw Me A Rope - KT TUNSTALL
The Biggest Lie - ELLIOT SMITH
One Step Ahead - SPLIT ENZ
The New Sane Scramble - JANA HUNTER
A Phoenix & Doves - DIANE CLUCK
Grass - ROBERT WYATT
Drink To Me, Babe, Then - A.C. NEWMAN
Sold! To The Nice Rich Man - WELCOME WAGON
Swim - ANI DIFRANCO
Now That I Know - DEVENDRA BANHART
Belle Of The Woodsman's Autumn Ball - THE SKYGREEN LEOPARDS

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Random Day Random Eleven

Song For A Sleeping Girl - DEVICS
Clear Spot - PERNICE BROTHERS
The Sweetness Lies Withing - HEFNER
Stockholm Syndrome - YO LA TENGO
Blundering Blood - NEDELLE
Gold As The Color - LOS HALOS
North Atlantic Sand - DON PERIS
Long Time Ago - GOLDEN SMOG
The Good Times Are Killing Me - MODEST MOUSE
I Wish That I Was Beautiful For You - DARREN HANLON
If There's Such A Thing As Love - THE MAGNETIC FIELDS

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