2002-08-21 - 0:24

Black amour

Okay, I feel more inclined to write tonight. Hmm, I guess I haven't really updated since last week, have I?

The weekend was pretty decent. After work on Friday, all of us but Greg (who was otherwise busy), went to Steve's for a barbecue. Not to be outdone, I had another barbecue at my place on Sunday, inviting Aaron and Loralei over.

My scam of getting free food from invitees continues. Not only that, but . . . well, let it never be said that Loralei is one to allow a running joke to die. In addition to a batch of cookies, she also brought over a replacement pig, to make up for the one that the former owners took with them (as previously described).

I've mainly been sticking around the house lately, which felt okay after being on the go the first two weekends after moving in. I'm working my way through a few books that I bought the other day.

Most recommended is Everything You Know Is Wrong, a collection of very interesting essays about topics such as globalization, the CIA's war crimes in Vietnam, and the failures of antitrust laws (and that's just in the first forty pages). The essays are more reasonable than you might expect for an alternative publication. (I've already seen a couple that I thought were flawed, but the point isn't to agree with every article.)

Also surprising is that it isn't strictly a left-wing book. The last essay that I read presented a convincing condemnation of anti-hate groups, demonstrating that they lie, exaggerating situations to ensure funding. I had actually been looking for the first book in the series, You Are Being Lied To, which wasn't in; but I'll be sure to track it down in the future.

I also picked up Bertrand Russell's Why I Am Not a Christian (obviously up my alley, plus Russell was one of my favourite writers from my philosophy class), a couple of Bukowski collections (I guess I'm still on an essay/short story kick), and Glen Cook's latest novel.

Everything should be quiet this week until the Tool concert on Saturday. Things could be picking up, concert-wise. Neko Case has a Friday night show in Montreal in September. Suicide is supposed to be playing a Saturday show there, as well, on a different weekend, although I had been thinking of hitting Toronto on that same date to see Trail of Dead opening for Queens of the Stone Age. We'll see.

Unfortunately, Dose will not be returning to Ottawa when he tours as part of Themselves. The Toronto and Montreal dates on that tour are Tuesday/Wednesday, which might be tricky.

In less definite news, Public Enemy is planning to include Canada on their fall tour, which may feature Blackalicious as openers! PE and Blackalicious would rank among the most amazing concerts of the year. Any way that it shakes down, Public Enemy would be great to see.

And I'm hoping that Buck 65 will be back after Square is finally released in September.

There might have been more, but I lost my musical train of thought when I put on Barry Adamson's new single, "Black Amour." I can't wait for his new disc, which also drops in September.

Hmm . . . this is an excessive amount of writing about nothing, isn't it? In future, I'll try to restrain my periods of mopiness and lethargy, so as to be more inclined to write, resulting in equal amounts of fluff, but divided into more consumable portions.

J.