The Tangibility of Sine and Co-Sine

As Buddy Holly and Belle and Sebastian once sang, it sometimes seems like life and love are like rollercoasters (wait, didn't the god-awful red hot chili peppers do a god-awful cover that had something to do with roller coasters, like much of their career, though, let's pretend that never happened and instead stick with decent bands), and I couldn't agree more. (God, do I really sound like Doogie Howser on my blog?)

Anyway, parenthesis aside, I've been a bit up and down lately. Not just me personally but in every aspect of my life: for one week, I'll totally balance my checkbook, then two weeks later realize I've lost the receipts to half the things I've purchased; for 2 hours at a time, I'll get through an interview that goes perfectly or go through 10 calls that all go great, only to have the next four be like pulling teeth with researching some vast governmental program that no one will ever understand; and love, well, love, it's a motherfucker as "Old School" tells us, so like fucking anything it's up and down.

This has been my mood of late, for anything that goes right, something else goes wrong. Tomorrow, well, in less than 20 minutes, it'll be Friday the Thirteenth. Notoriously, these are bad days for people. In my last 3 to 5 years they've actually been good days for me. If the rollercoaster rule works tomorrow, who knows what I'm in store for, but if the luck of an unlucky day works in my favor, it could be all right.

As Cindy would say, not that you need to know this, but my day tomorrow consists of hopefully talking with a U.S. Senator, a meat salesman, perhaps a couple of people involved in some heavily acronymned projects, before going to meet the local chief of police who (after the news staff I work with) is my favorite person in this state, before going to meet the heavily acronymned crew at their regular luncheon (the college student in me loves free food and the lazy journalist in me loves a good photo op), before writing about said heavily acronymned group, and probably going home later than I wanted. Did I mention that I also have to go through and do corrections on my rough draft of a feature story? This will probably be my life for the next eight weeks, so if you think I'm whining now, you should probably quit reading until St. Patty's Day. Oh, if you don't think I'm a big enough whiner, I have another farm story due mid-next week and another story on the whole medicare thing (prescription drug plan) that I would have liked to work on since Tuesday but instead have been working on other stuff that is less pressing but no less deadline-oriented. Bugger.

To end on a high note, as much as I complain, I love what I do more than anything, and I wouldn't trade anyone's job for mine (except Matt Taibbi's, but I love him and that's a whole other story). Oh, and through XM Radio, which I am still addicted to, I have discovered so many bands about which I'd like to find out more. Plus, I promised Casey that I would come up with a year's best list, and so far, while the pickings are slim, I know of a lot of bands that I wish I knew more about and about 6 albums that I heard that I liked and about 8 million bands who were once good but in 2005 decided to release their most mediocre album to date (ahem, Oasis, The White Stripes, Coldplay). And, why did Amazon put on their 100 best consumer albums records that were released in 2001 or 2004 or any year that wasn't 2005. W the F? And, seriously, I know I mock Bright Eyes, but how did "I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning" finish after the new Oasis and The White Stripes?! Let's keep stroking the egos of people who've long since reached their peak and instead ignore anything interesting that came out in 2005, rock music critics seemed to say this year. Again, as Cindy would say, Bastards. (My list: Coming Soon, much like Brokeback Mountain to North Dakota.)