time to make the donuts, my ass

Rember this?

Those were the days, huh? Well… no more.

I live in Seattle now. There’s no bakeries. No donuts. No cakes. Nothing. This city is devoid of any such luxury. Or so I thought. Until I ran across Aurora Donuts. They’re a renamed Dunkin’ Donuts attached to a Baskin Robbins 31 Flavors (who owns Dunkin’ Donuts).

I was so excited, I got there at 6:30 today to get the best selection and bring donuts to my co-workers. However, apparently “time to make the donuts” is a thing of the past. They were closed, and the sign said they didn’t open until 9am.

Who ever heard of a donut shop that’s not open by 6am (if not open 24 hours).

So I drove by a Krispy Kreme on my way to work, but I just couldn’t stop there. Adhering to some undefined principle, I just couldn’t settle. Not this time.

All there is for donuts in this city are Top Pot, which are way to thick and gross, or Krispy Kreme, which is what it is. There’s no good bakeries and the grocery store donuts are crap. It’s such a shame.

But I finally figured out why. I was at the grocery store sampling the butter creme frosting, and I asked them why it sucks everywhere I go. The woman said it was because they all had to change their recipe because King County outlawed trans fat.

Once again, some dissatisfied busy-body who thinks we can’t look after ourselves has decided they have to tell us what’s best for us. And in the process, deprived me of any chance at happiness.

Oh well, at least we’ll be back in Wisconsin over New Year’s, so I’m going to Lane’s Bakery in Madison and ordering a huge butter creme cake and 10 donuts. MMM.

Suck it, King County.

the racism of the oughts

I, for one, am appalled at all of the racism I saw between 2000 and 2008 from all of the minorities who ever said anything critical of President Bush.

There’s no way anyone of them ever had a legitimate beef with any of his policies. It had to have been because he was white and they hated white presidents.

ramona falls with brent knopf

One of my co-workers, who used to run marketing for a few different record labels, recently took me to see Ramona Falls at the Crocodile Cafe in Seattle.

I was pretty psyched for the offer for a few reasons. I hadn’t really had an opportunity to catch much live music, yet, since I’d moved to Seattle. Also, the Crocodile Cafe is one of those well-known venues that I’d always wanted to get to.

In fact, my friend Eric had used my mini-disc recorder to capture Robyn Hitchcock solo a few years back and the sound was phenomenal.

The only problem was that I hadn’t heard of Ramona Falls, so he lent me the disc.

Ramona Falls is the solo project of Brent Knopf, who’s best known for his work with Menomena, a band out of Portland.

It only took one listen to see this record didn’t sound much like anything else I’d heard of late. I was intrigued, and excited to see the show.

If you have a chance to see them, it’s an absolute must. And I certainly recommend  picking up the album – Intuit.

While listening to them, I was thinking about how people in Madison seem to think that they have some great music scene comparable to Austin. But I’ve never seen a show like this in Madison… OR Milwaukee, for that matter. Not from a local band.

Wisconsin seemed to serve up that same driving guitar punk-ish sound. Otherwise, it was a lot of semi-serious alternative bands with the requisite guitar, bass and over-enthusiastic drummer.

Ramona Falls has a real sound all to itself. The instrumentation is very layered, and the mix is such that you can hear all of it. It’s at once sparse, but full and powerful. Brent uses a semi-distortion on his vocals at just the right moments.

Check out this live clip of my current favorite song by them – “I Say Fever.” It’s very dynamic – both creepy and powerful. And if you can, pick up the disc. You’ll be glad you did.

And here’s “Bellyfulla,” my second favorite song on the album…

remember when…

Remember when all news outlets kept a very public running total of the number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq?

I guess no one is dying there anymore? Or in Afghanistan?

Or maybe it’s just not relevant anymore, now that we’ve driven out of office the guy who sent them there?

how bad are the minnesota vikings?

NFL Films has been release “10 Greatest Games” sets for many of the NFL teams. It was not a stretch, then, to believe that even with some relatively young teams, there would eventually be a “10 Greatest Games” set for every team.

If you’re a Packers fan, you’ll find their set of 10 Greatest Games of particular interest. And if you’re a Packers fan who hates the Vikings (which is probably a redundant statement), you’ll enjoy knowing that the guys at NFL Films couldn’t even come up with 10 great Vikings games.

Instead, they give us “Minnesota Vikings – 5 Greatest Games.”

It should have been subtitled “and even that’s a stretch…”

the most useful opinion on the current healthcare debate came from 48 years ago

It’s interesting to me that in 1961, Ronald Reagan talked about the origins of socialized medicine, and in 2009, he’s still got it exactly right.

It’s also a shame that in 2009, Ronald Reagan is still the most important and effective leader of conservatism, if not libertarianism, that there is.

As much as Obama has achieved on the nearly impossible task of uniting the Republican party, there is still no effective leadership. Just an effective ground game.

If you have time, you should listen to Reagan’s entire 10 minutes on health care. If not, just check out the first 60 seconds…

an ideology based on hypocrisy

Surely you’ve seen this picture around by now. It’s apparently turning up in downtown L.A.

When I saw it, my first thought was “how long until people are aghast at how mean, unfriendly, unfair and unproductive the imagery is.” I was wondering how long it would be until we started hearing about how such art would bring the level of discussion down and how that’s no way to treat our President.

Well, it apparently only took about a day. Here’s a quote from the L.A. Times article about the posters…

“But the President’s supporters have condemned the image, calling it ‘mean-spirited and dangerous.’

A spokesman from the Los Angeles urban policy unit said that depicting the president as demonic and a socialist ‘goes beyond political spoofery.’ “

Now obviously, it’s nearly impossible to identify every single supporter and get an honest assessment of what they thought about artwork like this when it came out:

But I think if we’re all being honest with ourselves, depictions of Bush as the joker – from 2008, or the “world’s number one terrorist” were considered appropriate, accurate and important.

In one of the comment boards regarding the Obama picture, someone wrote “Somewhere in Kenya, a village is missing its idiot.”

I’m waiting to see “Obama lied, the economy died” on a bumper sticker.

Again, the point of this is not whether or not I agree with the assessment of either, but I’m always fascinated when the everyone who thought all of the overwhelmingly constant belittling of George Bush thinks anyone who makes fun of Obama is somehow sick or lowering the level of our discourse.

For the record, I think all of it IS the discourse, and both spur conversation. And I’m good with that.

passing on the left

Everywhere I’ve ever lived or spent any time, from Wisconsin to California to New Jersey, there’s always been one driving rule upon which you could generally trust – slower cars drive on the right and faster, or passing, cars go on the left.

Ever since I’ve lived in Seattle, I’ve noticed that most cars can be found in the left lane. There are slightly fewer in the center lane, and then nearly no one in the right lane.

Yesterday, I drove to Portland and I found this to be true the entire way there AND back.

I’m not sure if they just don’t teach the concept of the left lane as a passing lane at all in Washington schools. Or maybe everyone thinks they’re going REALLY fast.

I also noticed, during my drive to Portland, that when you pulled up behind someone in the left lane who was clearly going slower, and the middle lane was open, they would NOT move over.

In Wisconsin, there are signs posted all along the highway saying quite clearly, “Slower traffic keep right.”

But this is the other thing I’ve noticed about driving in Washington – REALLY fast on the 60mph highway is about 65. I can’t say I’ve ever lived anywhere in which 10 mph over the posted speed limit wasn’t just a given for drivers.

So, it took a while to adapt, but where I was once a left lane driver, I’m now finding myself firmly located in the right lane.

The only problem is that there are a few drivers on the road from anywhere else who drives by the same rules (slow to the right, fast to the left), and so they clog up the right lane from acting as the de facto passing lane.

All in all, this might be the main cause behind driving in Washington being too slow and a little too chaotic.

start your weekend in a hong kong garden

I love it when I rediscover a classic song. Not a hit or something that was once popular. Just a song that I knew of, or used to listen to a lot, that resurfaces after 10 or more years.

Just heard “Hong Kong Garden” by Siouxsie and the Banshees while at my friend’s house. Now I can’t get it out of my head.

Classic video, too…

why obama’s better than bush

When George Bush was President, it was hard to figure out who voted for him – even though he won twice. It seemed that no one actually wanted to take credit for voting for him.

At least Obama voters, through Facebook, bumper stickers and vocal political exhibitionism, are clearly labeled.

In other words, at least we know who should be apologizing to the rest of us. Now I’m just wondering where the line forms.