Mine In Mono

Back when our local newspaper, The News & Observer, was more of a going concern, I used to dig following the columns from Craig D. Lindsey. Lindsey, AKA Uncle Crizzle, had a keen eye for culture and finding overlooked treasures. When the paper let him go as part of broader cutbacks, I considered it a real setback to their coverage of the arts.¹

I remember reading on Lindsey’s Tumblr around the time of this dismissal from the newspaper that he was going through a time of real struggle. This was right around the time that the nation was facing a particularly strong sense of outrage about the treatment of minorites by the authorities. He felt a lack of self-worth. The demand for those in his profession was abating (at least in the sense that they could find paying work). Frankly, I was worried about the guy.

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For this Friday Night Video, we’re going back a way, to the mid-nineties. Smashing Pumpkins had released Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness a fittingly grandiose title for an ambitious and widely varied double-album. At the time, I heard the first single, the “rat in a cage” song, and I thought this latest effort wasn’t for me. I actually went out and sold my Smashing Pumpkins CDs, which I had been collecting since shortly after the release of their debut, Gish.

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Anna Kodé has a piece in the New York Times (gift article) about the early Space Age Googie style of architecture. The article is filled with eye candy and visual delights from the style, some prominent artifacts of which were still around when I was young. It brings a tremendous sense of nostalgia.

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Nick Heer from Pixel Envy points out that Dell hasn’t lost its branding charm. When configuring a laptop on the website, he got an error message, “Composite Rule Error: Invalid selection in Processor Branding.” He was further informed about the error:

The Chassis Option requires the matching Memory size. The 16gb Memory is only available with the Ultra 5 236V/226V and Ultra 7 266V. The 32gb Memory is only available with the Ultra 5 238V and Ultra 7 268V.

I have often marveled at the challenging model names that PC manufacturers give their products, which starkly contrast to those from Apple. Everyday people can remember the names of their Apple devices. Not so for most of what PC manufacturers come up with.

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Maybe it’s a bit early to be making New Year’s resolutions. Though this used to be a popular practice, many now don’t even believe in setting stretch goals just because the calendar changes. I confess that I have waxed and waned in my observance of making annual resolutions. This year, though, I have something lined up that I think will actually improve my life in meaningful ways.

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Not too long ago, I posted about a shoegaze cover of a music charts staple from decades ago and, well, I was sorely tempted to do it again. 

I came across a YouTube channel for a service called Musora which bills itself as “the ultimate music lessons experience.” Musora offers a subscription which will help you learn to play an instrument and your favorite songs. For $20/month (with an annual subscription), you gain access to a suite of interactive practice tools and a community of like-minded students. 

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One of my all-time favorite films is John Huston’s The Man Who Would Be King. I was first introduced to the movie adaptation of the Rudyard Kipling short story from 1888 by my English teacher in my senior year of high school. Kipling’s novel encapsulates some of the folly and hubris of the British adventures in Afghanistan in the 19th century by infusing its characters with the attitudes of empire. In the film, Michael Caine and Sean Connery play British ex-military who dream much and doubt their abilities little. They set their sites on bringing the martial prowess learned in their earlier days to a remote area of Afghanistan known as Kafiristan to form their own kingdom.

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