This is not necessarily a new direction. It's more like a soft left. This weekend I might step up to some adult-sized paper. Cross your fingers for me. Thanks.

I'm unsure about my first taste of Leonard Cohen - Live in London. I desperately want to love it but his damn traveling band... The songs are in there, I just have to get over my preconceived notions, eh?

Also, to be decided: running. How do we like it? Is it worth it? We know for sure that the shoes are ugly. More later.

Some things I don't need convincing of are the Buffalo Springfield catalog (it's good even when Neil isn't singing), Todd Rundgren's Something/Anything (I should have known!), and the remastered Beatles catalog (not yet owned but certainly coveted, in mono & stereo).

I'm not sure why no one told me about it before but I will now tell all four of you: run, don't walk to your nearest purveyor of video discs & rent, download, or purchase the documentary For All Mankind. I did not expect to laugh, cry (almost), or be rendered frozen, unable to eat another carrot nub while I waited for the Saturn V to lift off, but I was. Unbelievable. If I had seen the movie when I was 14 I may have tried to be an astronaut.

- read director Al Reinert's short Criterion weblog entry about the movie here
- Apollo 8's (first manned flight to leave the Earth's orbit & circle the moon) wikipedia page is here
- Apollo 11's (first to land on the moon) wikipedia page is here

Anyone who finds me a copy of the original laserdisc may get a hug.

I'm sure you've often wondered what I might listen to on a sea-green colored afternoon in late July. The answer on this particular day off is Music from Big Pink by The Band. They are 80% Canadian & I find this oddly satisfying. The fact that they have a singing drummer, Levon Helm (the American 20%), is also worth knowing.

If you have a spare moment, you may want to check out the Rotary Connection album Songs which has a really stirring cover of The Weight.