1st Prize One Week in Philadelphia; 2nd Prize Two Weeks in Philadelphia

Ah, Philadelphia, my sweet, vindictive darling. You may continue to taunt me with your insouciant charms, but I know that it's just a test. You've mistaken my aloof demeanor for a lack of affection, and that is not what is happening here. For I adore you, Philadelphia. I am here for you, no matter what tricks you play.

This weekend, for instance, you saw to it that my credit card and ATM card were stolen and used to fund a several-thousand-dollars goods-purchasing party at Best Buy. That was a nimble feint. I respect your attempt to take my attentions away from my true goal, which is to have a winsome and satisfying life here. But fear not, Philadelphia. I am on to you. I know that, secretly, you love me and want me not only to survive here, but to flourish.


Theft is not awesome. The Philadelphia cop who told me stories about being in "Juvie" as a kid for gangwars? AWESOME. He mentioned that, sometimes, it's better to give the nuisance criminals who hang out in the neighborhood "a little thump," rather than waste two hours taking them in and writing them up. ???

To the thief: Did you have to go to Best Buy and buy crap? If you'd gone to a mall and purchased clothing and shoes, I'd have felt better. Maybe it would have been for your kids or your kid sister or something. Couldn't you have gone to Super Fresh, too? It would have been nice of you to feed your friends and family with your newly found bounty (my damned credit card and ATM card). Hell, if you'd even put down a payment on some sort of reasonable car, THAT would have been better than buying crap at Best Buy.







Boo hiss, Thief.


P.S. Cool painting above courtesy of Charles Sabba's website.

Barry Manilow Barbie

This is a picture of a Farah Fawcett doll. I had one when I was a kid. She was fabulous and really, a fine addition to the special cadre of dolls that my friend Laura and I played with when we were little.








Farah was, of course, the star of Charlie's Angels, but some of you may know her best as the blonde woman who startled David Letterman a lot in the late nineties.







Laura and I had no male Barbies. No Ken, no Kevin, nothing. Being traditionalists and five years old, we decided that there should be a boy Barbie to take the gals on dates. I discovered that, by pinching Farah's dolly head pretty hard [see results on left], I could make her face rather narrow and draw more attention to her nose. When I did this, she bore a striking resemblance to Barry Manilow. Hence, the birth of Barry Manilow Barbie. He was a dashing gent who was always available for a date and knew how to treat the ladies right. Though but a wraith of a man, he was friendly with every Barbie we had. A nice fella, to be sure.






Here's a pic of Barry Manilow to help you see the similarity. Barry Manilow Barbie was a wonderful part of our playtime.

Apples

Hey, you like apples?
Oh yeah?
Howya like THEM apples?

Log for first half of August 24th, 2006 show

Log for second half of August 24th, 2006 show



During much of yesterday's show, I was a giggling pile of drool slumped in my chair in front of the controls. It's always good to go on the air so tired that you feel like you've been tasered. Thanks to my listeners for dealing with my cheerful, but overall laisser-faire attitude. Strangely, despite being so sleepy, I really enjoyed yesterday's show. The high point was when Mike requested Junior Senior's "Move Your Feet." I moved my whole body. Then, slipped into a coma.

P.S. Let me know if it annoys you that I make links open up in a new window. I can change that if it's a pain.

Sleep. Eat.

Faster than you can eat yourself to sleep, here are today's playlists:

Log for first half of August 17th, 2006 show

Log for second half of August 17th, 2006 show

Do Not Tarry

Ut oh. I'm having a summer love affair with The Format. Go, immediately, to Amazon so that you may listen to a quick sample of their song, "Time Bomb." Here is the link, Friends. Scroll down to the Listen to Samples section and listen to "Time Bomb." Don't make me get haughty! Their new album, "Dog Problems," which you can download here, has several wonderful songs. One that is facetiously poignant is, "I'm Actual." Listen to the Amazon sample of "I'm Actual" here and/or buy the mp3 here. The lyrics for "I'm Actual" are simple, plaintive, and scathing. I love it.

That "Time Bomb" song has me shaking my rump in my car AND in my office chair. These guys are very young and very serious. They sound a bit like Queen and clearly spent a lot of time listening to and being influenced by 70s monsters like ELO.

Enjoy! I'll play them too much on my show on Thursday. I hope the other songs on the album are this much fun.

Did I already mention that you can buy their album, which includes the aforementioned awesome songs, here?



P.S. The Format hold my hand and we frolick together in a field of flowers. That is what Summer Lovers DO.

Pretty (Ugly Before)

During the first half of yesterday's show, I played a song called "Pretty (Ugly Before)" from Elliott Smith's posthumously released album, "From a Basement on the Hill." You can listen to some samples from the album here. That man knew tenderness and fear like few others.

Clearly influenced by and devoted to The Beatles, you can hear hints of their sound woven through most of his songs. He tended to do a lot of Beatles covers in live performances, which was interesting. He would have been 37 this month.


This entry is a bit sad, eh? Sometimes I feel sad when I listen to Elliott Smith.


Proud as a peacock and as loyal as a dog, here is my playlist from yesterday:

Log for first half of August 10th, 2006 show

Log for second half of August 10th, 2006 show

Loft Bed (I'm Only Sleeping)

This is my fabulous loft bed. It's not quite a full loft, as I wanted not to brain myself each morning when I sat up in bed. It is, however, pretty darned high off the ground and gives me roughly 2.5' of clearance underneath. I have put that space to good use. I believe these photos prove that.

The gent who custom made my loft bed for me is a young man named Maurice Cheng. His company, MC Woodworks, Inc., creates custom-made beds fairly quickly and according to your ultra-anal specs. I'm projecting, aren't I. Regardless, Maurice is friendly and soothing and really wants to get the job done well. He exchanged several sweet-natured emails with me where he gave me lots of options and made absolutely sure that he knew exactly what I wanted. I got a fair price and a bed that I will keep for many, many years, even if I suddenly live in a home with ample storage space.


Maurice is such a dude that, if you order a bed from him and mention my radio show, Thursday Java Time with Sarah or even just my blog, Sit Ubu, Sit. Good Blog., you'll get a $20 rebate. Even cooler (for me), he'll give ME a little rebate for spreading the word. How nice is that? That's very nice.









For sport, I'll show you what a full-height loft bed looks like. There it is on the left, with a desk and stuff under it. That's a photo from Maurice's website. My bed, as seen above, is considered a Low Loft Bed.



I'm really enthusiastic about anything I've spent more than nine dollars on, so I like to brag about my meaningful purchases. Please forgive the advertisey tone. Maurice did me a personal favor that went above and beyond the call of duty when it came to the delivery of my bed, so I really owe him one. Besides, what's more important than having a good bed to sleep in? Well, frankly, a good moisturizer never hurts. We'll talk about that later.

Here It Goes Again

My friend John sent me this spectacular and silly OK Go video from YouTube today. The band does a tightly choroeographed dance on 8 treadmills for the duration of the song. It must have taken weeks to rehearse to the point where they could shoot it in one take.


There's one point where the fella in the red pants nearly loses his balance, but it only adds to the charm of the video for me. I'm sure they all took turns falling down or screwing up. Lordy, I love this video. Way to go, OK Go.



Replete with more songs than you can shake a stick at, here are today's playlists:

Log for first half of August 3rd, 2006 show

Log for second half of August 3rd, 2006 show


Of note: I had the teensiest bit of caffeine maybe three hours ago and am now going to go out and flip over a Lincoln Navigator and eat whomever I find inside. Caffeine makes me rammy.



P.S.