Radical Face

The song of the day is The Crooked Kind from the 2013 album The Family Tree: The Branches by Radical Face (Ben Cooper).

Tom Odell

The song of the day is 2014's Heal by English singer-songwriter Tom Odell (Thomas Peter Odell). The song is in the 2014 film If I Stay.

Motörhead

I’m not a fan of heavy metal rock music – not since the days of Iron Butterfly and the original Steppenwolf: two bands that, while not heavy metal, paved the way for it. But when I read that Lemmy Kilmister (Ian Fraser Kilmister), founder and frontman of English heavy metal band Motörhead, had died on December 28, 2015, from an “extremely aggressive cancer” that had been diagnosed only two days earlier, I thought I should post a song of the day that features him performing.

The song of the day is Overkill, an extended version of the song from Motörhead’s 1979 album Overkill. The song has been covered by several bands including Overkill, a band who took their name from the Overkill album by Motörhead.

December

It’s been a messy, messy day. Rain and gloom all day long. Here in central Virginia, the day before Christmas Eve, the temperature is a balmy 72°F. The average high here in December is 50°F. The forecast calls for rain and thunderstorms through Christmas Day, then overcast for the weekend, then rain and thunderstorms next week. Wonderful.

Ever wonder why December is the 12th month, even though its Latin root decem- means 10? In fact, the same situation exists for the months of September, October, and November, which mean 7, 8, and 9, although they are our 9th, 10th, and 11th months.

It’s because the ancient Roman calendar had 10 months. The year started on March 1 and ended in December. At some point, January and February were added to the end of the calendar and became the last two months of the year. The calendar continued to evolve and by the time the Julian calendar was instituted by Julius Caesar in 46 AD, the starting date for a new year had become January 1. The original 10 months were pushed toward the end of the year by the two new months (January and February) but they kept their names. So December, originally the 10th month, is now the 12th month.

We no longer use the Julian calendar – we use the Gregorian calendar, named after the man who introduced it in 1582: Pope Gregory XIII. The Gregorian calendar kept the same months in the same order as the Julian calendar. Primarily, the Gregorian calendar changed the way leap years are calculated in order to make the length of a year more accurate.

Now you know. Aren’t you glad you asked?

Chairlift

The song of the day is 2011's Amanaemonesia by synthpop duo Chairlift (Caroline Polacheck and Patrick Wimberly). The song is on their album Something released in 2012.

M.I.A.

The song of the day is Borders by English singer, songwriter, director, and rapper M.I.A. (Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam).

Maya was born in London but was raised in Sri Lanka during a fierce civil war that lasted 25 years. Tens of thousands of Sri Lankans left the country to escape the violence. Maya’s English birth certificate enabled her and her mother to return to England as refugees. Maya learned English quickly, completed primary and high school, and eventually earned a degree in fine art, film, and video in June 2000 from London's Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design.

Maya points out that the West’s film and music industries have long promoted a vision of life in the West that is very attractive to people trapped in difficult places around the world. Many of those people have decided, “Okay, yeah, I want the dream.” In a recent interview, Maya asked, “If the West is so deliberate in promoting its brands and is using art and culture to inspire people’s dreams, how can the West then turn people away?”

JoJo

The song of the day is When Love Hurts from the 2015 EP III (pronounced Tringle, a triple single EP) by singer, songwriter, and actress JoJo (Joanna Noëlle Blagden Levesque). JoJo’s debut album, JoJo, was released in 2004 when she was 13. Her debut single, Leave (Get Out) , reached number one on the Billboard pop songs chart, making her, at 13, the youngest solo artist to have a number-one single in the United States. Between 2006 and 2014, problems at her record label prevented her music from being released. In 2013 she took legal action against the label and was released from her contract in 2014. She is now signed with another label. More on the return of JoJo here.

Scott Weiland

I happened by chance to read in the news that Scott Weiland died this month, on December 3, from an accidental drug overdose. During his career he had been frontman for both Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver as well as a successful solo artist.
 
The song of the day is Sour Girl from the 1999 album № 4 (sometimes referred to as No. 4) by Stone Temple Pilots. Sarah Michelle Gellar, who appears in this video, posted a tribute to Weiland on her Instagram, saying “Your music will always be remembered.”

Melanie Martinez

The song of the day is Carousel from the 2015 album Cry Baby by singer and songwriter Melanie Martinez (Melanie Adele Martinez).

Shawn Mendes & Camila Cabello

The song of the day is I Know What You Did Last Summer by Canadian singer-songwriter Shawn Mendes (Shawn Peter Raul Mendes) and Fifth Harmony’s Cuban-born vocalist Camila Cabello (Karla Camila Cabello Estrabao).

Lauren Alaina

The song of the day is Girl Crush by country artist Lauren Alaina. This song was a #1 hit for country vocal group Little Big Town and was released as a single from their album Pain Killer.

Beyond Mars

I read a review of Louis Friedman’s new book, Human Spaceflight From Mars to the Stars. (Friedman is the executive director emeritus of The Planetary Society, which he co-founded with Carl Sagan and Bruce Murray in 1980.)

Friedman is optimistic about human space exploration, but he is quite certain that humans will not travel beyond the orbit of Mars in any significant way.

He says that human space travel beyond Mars is too expensive and is unnecessary; we can send machines to gather data, and virtual reality can give us the illusion that we have made the trip. He also says that space colonies – cities in space orbiting the sun – are impractical and unnecessary, a science-fiction idea that is not in our future.

I was at once reminded of Arthur Clarke’s First Law of Prediction: When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.

I don’t know what time scale Friedman has in mind. If it’s the next 20 years, then he’s very probably correct. If it’s the next 1000 years, then he’s very probably wrong.

If a human of 300 years ago had been asked about the feasibility of going to the Moon, or of building a city full of skyscrapers, or even of building a network of paved roads like America's interstate highway system, he would surely have thought all of the ideas were far-fetched and unlikely to ever become reality.

Sending humans to the Moon? Not only impossible but completely unnecessary – until the invention of rocket technology and computers made it possible and a space-race made it necessary. A city of skyscrapers? Impossible – until inventions like structural steel, elevators, and electric lighting made it possible. A continent-wide system of paved highways? Impractical and unnecessary (for horses) until mass-production of motor vehicles made paved highways essential.

It’s impossible to predict future technologies and what they may enable humanity to do. It’s impossible to predict what our descendants may want to do or what they may need to do. However, we do know one aspect of the future: some of the things our descendants will do will be, to our eyes, indistinguishable from magic.

Zara Larsson

The song of the day is 2015's Lush Life by Swedish singer-songwriter Zara Larsson.

Barbarossa

The song of the day is Bloodline from the 2013 album Bloodlines by London musician Barbarossa (James Mathé).

Lisa Hannigan

The song of the day is Home from the 2011 album Passenger by Irish singer, songwriter, and musician Lisa Hannigan.

Buffalo Salmon Wings

After reading one of my recent blog posts in which I joked about salmon wings with Buffalo sauce, my friend and fellow blogger CyberDave pointed out that Buffalo salmon and Buffalo salmon wings are real things.

At Epicurious there is a recipe for Buffalo salmon. The recipe uses a salmon fillet that is breaded with panko (Japanese bread crumbs) and baked.

Food Network also has a recipe for Buffalo-style salmon that uses a salmon fillet.

A company called Seabear offers a kit containing a pouch of bite-size nuggets of wild Alaskan salmon in a light panko and flour coating and a separate pouch of Buffalo sauce. The kit is called Wild Salmon Buffalo Wings. Their recipe calls for the salmon nuggets to be cooked on the stovetop. I’ve never tried Buffalo salmon wings but they sure look tasty.

The only thing missing from the picture are the celery sticks.

The Old Skillet

When I was a kid, I usually prepared my own breakfast. Sometimes breakfast was bacon and eggs cooked in a cast iron skillet. There was a grease keeper on the countertop beside the stove. It had a filter to trap cracklings and particles of bacon. With the advent of microwave ovens and Teflon cookware, the cast iron skillet was almost rendered obsolete. It was down but not out. 

Many people have taken to using cast iron skillets again. I recently decided to use my old skillet to cook bacon and eggs again. The bacon doesn’t taste a lot different, but cooking the eggs in bacon grease opens up a whole new world of taste. Actually, it’s an old world of taste. Now my eggs taste the same way they tasted to young me, and to my parents and grandparents and great-grandparents. The iron skillet is an antique, but it cooks as well as it did when it was new.

I’ve relearned how to season an iron skillet and what screws up the seasoning. I’ve learned how to clean a pan with salt and when it’s best to just wipe out the inside of the pan.

Teflon and ceramic pans aren’t supposed to be heated past medium heat, but cast iron skillets can be used on high heat (don’t immediately rinse them with cold water – the skillet could warp). Cast iron skillets are extremely durable. At most, you might mess up the seasoning and have to re-season the pan. Not a big deal.

You can fry, bake, and sear in an iron skillet. You can go from the stovetop to the oven to the grill with the same pan. There are many recipes for cast iron skillet meals. For starters, there are 27 recipes at Southern Living, 17 recipes at Rachael Ray, and 10 recipes at Food Network.

And if you’re wondering what you can do with the bacon drippings (assuming you cook bacon), Christy Jordan at Southern Plate has some ideas.

For me, there is something satisfying about cooking in a cast iron skillet. It’s organic, elemental – the opposite of unnatural, artificial. You can use metal utensils when cooking; if you scratch the seasoning, continue cooking and the seasoning will heal by itself. Teflon gives off fumes that are highly toxic to birds. Cast iron does not. Try serving food from a thin Teflon or ceramic pan; the food will be cold before the meal is finished. A cast iron pan stays hot a long time and keeps food warm.

There is one caveat: a cast iron skillet is heavy and its handle will get hot. Use a potholder or oven mitt. If you grab the pan off the stove with a bare hand, only to realize it’s burning you, you could get a burned hand and a broken foot at the same time.

The Month of Meh

I’ve not been very active in the blogosphere lately. The days between Thanksgiving and the New Year are, for me, the Sargasso Sea of the Soul, the Doldrums of the Spirit, the Zone of Apathy in which all of my get-up-and-go has done exactly that: it got-up-and-went. I don’t know where it went, but it left a hole in my psyche – a hole that can only be filled by inserting the proper amount of junk food and excess calories into my diet. And I’ve done that successfully, according to my bathroom scale.

One of the things I do with this extra time is read a lot of news. Some of it is eyebrow-raising. For example, I read that the Food and Drug Administration has approved the sale of genetically modified salmon. Yes, mad scientists have tinkered with salmon DNA and created something unnatural – unnatural in the sense that the fish now have, uh, “features” not found in nature. I think they’ve taken these genetic modifications too far, but no one asked me. These unnatural Franken-fish are not necessarily a bad thing. I hear those same mad scientists are now working on a new Buffalo sauce to go with the new salmon wings.

“Waitress, an order of wings, please.”
“Chicken or salmon?”

Just kidding. I’m pretty sure the new Franken-salmon will not have wings. Nor will they glow in the dark.

Yet.

Anderson East

The song of the day is Only You from the 2015 album Delilah by rhythm and blues/pop musician Anderson East (Michael Cameron Anderson).

Days of Gloom

These are days of gloom. December lurks just around the corner. Today, the sky is dark and full of rain-laden clouds. The air outside is cold and moist. A little bit of drizzle falls constantly. Now and then it strengthens into rain for a while, then falls back to a drizzle. It will be like this tomorrow and the next day. Gloom and drizzle, the perfect connector between November and December. Many trees have shed their foliage and are mostly bare now. Some of the trees that keep their leaves are showing off their winter colors.

With the advent of autumn, my appetite always turns to carbs, and like a squirrel putting on fat for the coming winter, my body starts putting on pounds. In the past two months, I’ve gained 10 pounds. It’s a “winter is coming” thing. Over thousands of years of evolution, humans who put on weight as winter approached had a better chance of surviving winter. So I’m okay with adding a few pounds. I tell myself the extra pounds have nothing to do with will power – it’s all evolution’s fault. It’s out of my control; it’s my DNA. Plus, it’s now too cold to go outside and do the walking and other exercise that I had intended to do during warm weather but never got around to doing.

Yesterday I went to BK and bought a Whopper and fries. Upon leaving the restaurant, I bought their 10-chicken-tenders-for-$1.49 special deal and took it home to eat. What better way to finish off a Whopper and fries than with a bag of chicken tenders?

The day before yesterday, I went to a nearby Chinese restaurant. A banner over their door proclaimed “$5.95 Lunch Buffet” and I took full advantage by eating three plates of Chinese food. It made me happy – and a little bit guilty as the plates stacked up on my table.

Fattening up for winter is the best part of autumn. I just have to remember to avoid mirrors. And to drive to Wally World and pick up a couple more pair of knit pants with elastic waistbands. If I’m overweight and feeling guilty about it, at least I can be comfortable.

Zwette ft Molly

The song of the day is 2015's Rush by German DJ/producer Zwette with vocals by British singer-songwriter Molly (Molly Alice Smitten-Downes). An album, Rush (The Remixes), includes remixes by AirDice, Marcapasos, and Rich Vom Dorf.

Redondo & Bolier

The song of the day is Lvndscape’s remix of 2015's Every Single Piece by Dutch tech-house DJ duo Redondo (Freek Geuze and Johan Jacobse) and Dutch DJ and producer Leon Bolier (Leendert Wouter Bolier) featuring Brooklyn rock band She Keeps Bees (vocalist/guitarist Jessica Larrabee and drummer Andy LaPlant). The original mix is here.

Black Friday

The day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday in the US. I thought everyone knew why Black Friday is called that, but I’ve recently realized that many people don’t. So allow me to enlighten those of you who don’t know, and probably don’t care, how Black Friday got its name.

Many retailers operate at a loss, or in the red, for most of the year and they depend on Christmas shoppers for much of their yearly profit. The Christmas shopping season begins on the Friday after Thanksgiving. That is the day that many retailers begin operating in the black.

The phrases in the red and in the black stem from the terms red ink to indicate a loss and black ink to indicate a profit. But where did those terms come from? Why is a loss called red ink, and why is a profit called black ink?

Before there were electronic calculators, there were mechanical adding machines. These adding machines were big and heavy and were filled with gears and cams and levers (I’m imagining here, as I’ve never actually taken one apart). The only operations they could do were addition and subtraction, but that was enough for most business owners, who needed to know how much money they had made or lost. The business owner would enter the amounts of money taken in that day, adding each amount to arrive at a sub-total, and then subtract the day’s expenses, to arrive at the total profit or loss.

Mechanical adding machines had an ink ribbon that enabled printing the numbers onto a spool of paper. The ribbon had black ink on the top half and red ink on the bottom half. Normally, numbers were printed in black ink. However, if the result of a calculation was a negative number, that number was printed in red ink so that it would stand out and not be mistaken for a positive number. So, a loss was printed in red ink, while a profit was printed in black ink. Though mechanical adding machines have been obsolete for half a century, the phrases red ink, black ink, in the red, and in the black, live on.

Sam Feldt & Kimberly Anne

The song of the day is Show Me Love from the 2015 album Show Me Love by Netherlands artist Sam Feldt featuring English singer-songwriter Kimberly Anne.

MS MR

The song of the day is Criminals from the 2015 album How Does It Feel by indie pop duo MS MR (vocalist Lizzy Plapinger and producer Max Hershenow).

Panthers Edge Past Redskins In 44-16 Squeaker

"No fair!" Redskins say. "The other teams keep taking advantage of our interceptions, fumbles, and miscues."

Redskins owner Daniel Snyder was rumored to have summed up the 'Skins frustration this way: "How in the world are we expected to win games if we have to play teams that are better than us?!"

Well said, Danny-boy. For the 'Skins, there's always next week, when the 4-6 Redskins meet fellow division powerhouse, the 5-5 Giants, to determine which team will be runner-up to the second-best team in the NFC East.

Meanwhile, for the Panthers, the game was another dismal showing in which the team's offense again failed to put 50 points on the scoreboard. If this humdrum string of Panthers' wins continues all the way to a ho hum Superbowl victory, the only course of action may be to disband the team. That would be a shame. Let's hope they learn to play better.

Blinkie & Alahna

The song of the day is 2015's Don't Give Up (On Love), the debut single by English producer Blinkie, featuring vocals by Alahna. The dancer is Olivia-Mai Barret, a recent graduate of Italia Conti, the world’s oldest theater arts training school. The video was shot in Barcelona. It begins by exploring heartbreak but turns into an uplifting homage to summer, love, and dancing through the streets.

The Mendicant Issue

Not long ago, I was approached in the grocery store parking lot by a homeless man who wanted money to buy food. HIs name was Roy and he said he was traveling to Miami. I told him that I couldn’t give him money but I would buy him a meal. I took him to the store’s deli and bought him a simple meal: a hoagie, a bag of chips, and a soft drink. He seemed happy.

Today, I was approached in the same parking lot by a young man who said he came to America three months ago and didn’t have a job. He said his name was Isaac and he was from Romania. He was living at the Salvation Army shelter with his wife, his two kids, and his parents. He said he didn’t like living there because many people smoked and drank and it wasn’t a fit place for his family. He reiterated that he didn’t want money but he needed food. He said he was having a difficult time finding work because of the large number of “Spanish” people who were taking all the low-paying jobs.

I took him into the store and bought him a meal: chicken tenders plus a side of something he picked out, and a roll. I wished him luck and told him he should take any job he was offered. I told him not to be choosey if he was offered work, and that he had to start at the bottom and work his way to a better job. He seemed grateful for the food and several times he wished God’s blessing on my family. I didn’t tell him I don’t have a family.

I never feel I know what is the right thing to do in these situations. I don’t give money because I don’t want to enable bad behavior. But I also don’t want to ignore someone who is genuinely in need. Maybe he was telling the truth, and maybe he was running a scam, but I feel sorry for anyone who has to approach a total stranger and ask for food.

Sigala

The song of the day is Easy Love by British tropical house producer Sigala (Bruce Fielder). The video was shot in Los Angeles and features 12-year-old Canadian/Filipino dancing duo Lucky Aces.

Jasmine Thompson

The song of the day is Do It Now from the 2015 EP Adore by English singer-songwriter Jasmine Thompson. As a solo artist, Thompson has recorded 3 EPs, 2 studio albums, and 3 singles. As a featured artist, she has recorded 3 singles: with German DJ Robin Schulz, with German DJ Felix Jaehn, and with British group The Six. Thompson started out recording covers in 2010, with several becoming worldwide hits. Thompson turned fifteen this month.

Syrian Refugee Numbers

I read this headline on a right-leaning website:

United Nations says 72% of Syrian “refugees” are MEN, only 13% are children!

I’m reasonably sure that other right-leaning websites offer similar numbers.

In order for refugees to be considered for admission to the United States or other countries, they must first be registered with the UNHCR – the United Nations’ Refugee Agency. On its website, the UNHCR provides a demographic breakdown for 2.1 million Syrians registered by UNHCR in Egypt, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon, and 1.9 million Syrians registered by the Government of Turkey, and more than 26,700 Syrian refugees registered in North Africa. Here are observations drawn from their data:

• 49.7% are male and 50.3% are female.
• 38.4% are under age 12.
• 51.2% are under age 18.
• 22.1% are males of “fighting age” (18 – 59).
• 70% are women and children under the age of 12.
• 76.6% are women and children under the age of 18.

You can view the data here. These figures may change over time. I am using the latest figures updated on 11/17/2015.

To reiterate: over three quarters of Syrian refugees are women and children, and seventy percent are women and children under age 12. These are people fleeing devastated cities and neighborhoods that are being bombed on a daily basis. They just want to live a life somewhere, have jobs, raise families, go to school – things we take for granted. Could a terrorist sneak into the US along with legitimate refugees? Conceivably, yes. But a determined terrorist could sneak into the US regardless of whether the US accepts refugees. Sneaking in may be difficult, but millions of people have already done it. Banning immigrants is like declaring a theater or school to be a “gun-free zone”. It only stops those people who obey the law.

Pentatonix

Pentatonix had the top-selling Christmas album of 2014 (That’s Christmas To Me) – an album that was also the #4 album, across all genres, of that year. For this Christmas, the band has expanded that album with the addition of several more Christmas songs. The new album is titled That's Christmas To Me (Deluxe Edition). One of the newly added songs is Joy to the World. The new music video was released today.

A Great Big World

The song of the day is Say Something from the 2013 album Is There Anybody Out There by indie pop duo A Great Big World (Ian Axel and Chad King) featuring Christina Aguilera.

TV on the Radio

The song of the day is Trouble from the 2014 album Seeds by indie rock band TV on the Radio.

Robin Schulz & Francesco Yates

The song of the day is Sugar from the 2015 album Sugar by German DJ and producer Robin Schulz featuring vocals by Canadian musician Francesco Yates. Schulz began DJ’ing at age 17 and by age 20 he owned a nightclub, which he ran for two years before deciding to produce his own music. Yates began writing music at age 11 and signed to Atlantic Records at 16.

David Guetta

The song of the day is 2015's Bang My Head by French DJ, record producer, and remixer Pierre David Guetta featuring vocals by Australian singer Sia (Sia Kate Isobelle Furler) and American rapper Fetty Wap (Willie Maxwell II).

ABBA

The song of the day is Dancing Queen from the 1976 album Arrival by Swedish band ABBA (Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad). From 1975 to 1982, ABBA’s music topped the charts worldwide and made them the second best-selling music group of all time, after the Beatles.

Lucy Hale

The song of the day is Jolene by actress and singer Lucy Hale (Karen Lucille Hale). Jolene was originally released in 1973 by country singer Dolly Parton.

Ella Henderson

The song of the day is 2014's Glow by British singer-songwriter Ella Henderson (Gabriella Michelle Henderson).

The Lumineers

The song of the day is Ho Hey from the 2012 album The Lumineers by folk rock band The Lumineers.

Leona Lewis

The song of the day is Bleeding Love from the 2007 album Spirit by British singer, songwriter, and animal welfare campaigner Leona Louise Lewis.

Dung Beetle Research

I just found out – by reading Internet news – that dung beetles use celestial chromatic gradients to navigate. They must be pretty smart beetles. Most humans can’t spell celestial chromatic gradients, let alone use them. If you’re a dung beetle, you don’t need a GPS to navigate. You only need the – what I said before.

Here’s a question: why do we care?

So dung beetles can roll a ball of dung in a straight line without visible landmarks. I’ll give the beetles their due: that’s very clever of them.

But who pays for research that studies how they do it? And why? And who is this researcher who thinks, “Let’s see, I have a pot of money, what can I do with it? I know, I’ll study how dung beetles roll balls of dung in a straight line.”? I don’t get it. Wouldn’t almost anything be more interesting? With less eww-factor?

The one thing this new study suggests to me is that we’re running out of things to study.

I could be wrong. For all I know, dung beetle research makes a fascinating conversation starter at a party or on a date. “Let me show you my dung beetle photos.” Nah, I don’t see it.

Other scientists probably call this researcher “dung beetle guy.” I kid dung beetle guy. I know how very important dung beetle research is to the world of science and national security. If you have extra research dollars, please consider studying the impact of global warming on dung beetles. It’s probably the only facet of global warming that hasn’t been studied to death, and you could earn your PhD with it. Quick, before someone else steals this idea!

Cheryl

The song of the day is Parachute from the 2009 album 3 Words by English singer and dancer Cheryl (Cheryl Ann Fernandez-Versini, formerly Cheryl Cole). Cheryl’s dance partner in the video is 5-times Dancing with the Stars champion, Derek Hough.

Alesha Dixon

The song of the day is The Way We Are from the 2015 album Do It for Love by English singer, dancer, rapper, and model Alesha Dixon.

Flight 9268

Recently, a Russian airliner, Metrojet Flight 9268 flying at 31,000 feet, broke into pieces and crashed in a remote area of Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, killing the 224 people on board. An official from the airline said the crash must have been caused by “an external influence” because planes don’t break apart in midair.

The same official, Alexander Smirnov, also said, “We exclude technical problems and reject human error" as possible causes of the crash.

Why would an airline official reject human error as a possible cause of an accident? According to an FAA report, 70 to 80 percent of civil and military plane crashes are due to human error. Sometimes the pilot makes a mistake. Sometimes maintenance people make a mistake.

In 1985, Japan Airlines Flight 123 experienced explosive decompression when an improper repair to the plane’s aft pressure bulkhead led to failure of the bulkhead which then blew the vertical stabilizer off the airplane. The plane  subsequently crashed, killing 505 people. The pressure bulkhead had been damaged seven years earlier during a tail strike. A tail strike happens when the plane is landing or taking off and the pilot rotates the nose too high, causing the tail of the fuselage to strike the runway. A repair was improperly made, and for seven more years the airplane flew without problems, until the defective repair failed.

Like the Japanese airliner, the aircraft called Metrojet Flight 9268 experienced a tail strike that caused significant damage. Was the repair made improperly, causing the aft pressure bulkhead to fail years later? While a few planes have been brought down by “an external influence,” the number is very small compared to the number of planes that have crashed due to technical problems or human error. Ruling out the factors that have caused 99 percent of all airplane crashes – and ruling them out at the beginning of the investigation – is wishful thinking in the extreme.

Magna Carta

The song of the day is Airport Song from the 1970 album Seasons by English progressive rock band Magna Carta with vocals by Australian Lyell Tranter.

Halloween Again

Today is Halloween (All Hallows’ Eve, All Saints’ Eve), the yearly celebration which uses “humor and ridicule to confront the power of death,” according to Sam Portaro in A Companion to the Lesser Feasts and Fasts. Are you now at work in costume? Did you pack a brown paper bag with soul cakes and an apple for lunch? Did you bring a thermos of hot apple cider – made with a dash of cinnamon? Me neither.

Tomorrow is the Gaelic festival of Samhain, marking the end of the harvest season and the beginning of the darker half of the year. Samhain starts at sunset on October 31 and ends at sunset November 1. From sunset until sunrise, this is a liminal time of year – a threshold in which the supernatural beings that walk amongst humans can more easily enter our world. Tonight, you should sit near a bonfire with your friends. It will help to keep away the Aos Sí – the survivors of the Tuatha Dé Danann – whom you certainly don’t want to anger or insult. To learn more about Samhain, the Aos Sí, and the Otherworld, consult your neopagan handbook. Or Google. Whatever.

Tasmin Archer

The song of the day is Sleeping Satellite from the 1992 album Great Expectations by English pop singer Tasmin Archer. This extended version video was edited by DJ Rafa Burgos (Rafael Burgos Hernández).

Pentatonix, the Album

After winning the third season of NBC’s a cappella talent competition, The Sing-Off, the singers of Pentatonix moved to Los Angeles to begin their music careers. Winning the competition meant the band had won a recording contract with a major record label, Epic Records. A week after moving to L.A., the label dropped them, telling the band, “An a cappella group will never make it in the music industry.”

Pentatonix didn’t agree. They forged ahead, posting songs to YouTube that garnered views – hundreds of millions of views. They distributed music through a small record label called Madison Gate Records. Their success attracted the attention of RCA Records, which bought Madison Gate’s contract with Pentatonix.

From 2012 to 2014, Pentatonix released three EPs, a compilation album, and two full-length albums of Christmas music. In 2014, their second holiday release, That's Christmas to Me, became the highest-charting holiday album since 1962 and the fourth-best-selling album in the United States. The band, with producer Ben Bram, won Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella for "Daft Punk" at the 57th Grammy Awards.

Last week, Pentatonix released its latest album, self-titled Pentatonix. This week the numbers are in for the Billboard 200 album chart, and Pentatonix made history. Their album is the first a cappella album to debut at number one on the Billboard 200 chart.

In less than four years, Pentatonix have gone from hearing they “will never make it in the music industry” to being a Grammy-winning, multi-platinum-selling band. One could list a number of reasons for why it happened: talent, skill, astuteness with social media. But as important as any other reason, it happened because they believed in themselves. Congratulations, Pentatonix.

The Iran Deal

Iran deal.

In 2009, a week before Obama took office, Republican Senator Mitch McConnell said, “Say no to everything he does, no matter what it is.” Is this the way government is supposed to work?

In 2010, when Obama issued a postelection invitation for Congressional leaders to join him for dinner to discuss “how we can move the American people’s agenda forward,” not one Republican from the House or Senate showed up. They said they just didn’t have the time.

Six countries have jointly negotiated a nuclear deal with Iran. Those countries are the five permanent members of the UN security council (China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States) plus Germany.

What does the deal require of Iran? Iran must eliminate its stockpile of medium-enriched uranium and reduce its stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 98%. For the next 15 years Iran may not buy any new uranium-enriching or heavy-water facilities.

A new poll finds that 59% of Americans support making a deal with Iran that restricts their nuclear program in exchange for loosening sanctions. Two thirds of Democrats and 47% of Republicans support a deal.

It isn’t just Obama that wants a deal; it’s also the other five world powers who have been negotiating with Iran. The deal is supported by 60 nuclear security experts and by more than 100 American ambassadors.

The deal requires Iran to get rid of 98% of their enriched uranium, reduce their number of centrifuges from 20,000 to the 6000 oldest centrifuges, and allow constant monitoring of their two big reactors. One of those reactors is inside a mountain and would likely not be destroyed by an air strike.

If we don’t do the deal, many of the sanctions are going to go away anyway, because the other countries are not going to continue them. So do the deal and get all the above, or do nothing and get nothing.

Ronald Reagan tried to trade weapons to Iran in return for hostages. We took Iran’s side in the Iran-Iraq war. We took Iraq’s side in Operation El Dorado Canyon. We shot down an Iranian airliner, killing 270 Iranian civilians.

Do nothing, do the deal, bomb, or invade are our four options. If we do the deal, the last two options are still available. If we do the deal, maybe we won’t have to use those last two options.

MØ

The song of the day is 2015's Kamikaze by Danish singer and songwriter MØ (Karen Marie Ørsted). The song was written by MØ for her upcoming second studio album and was produced by Diplo and Jr. Blender.

Outrage

People are outraged again, as is the fashion these days. This time the outrage is over a school resource officer who arrested a female high school student. The student was disruptive and refused to leave the class when asked to do so, so the officer was called to make the student leave. The officer asked the student to leave several times, but the student refused. So the officer tackled the student to the floor, handcuffed her, and took her away.

When I was a kid, that kind of thing wouldn’t happen. Every student knew that “acting-out” would result in a phone call from the teacher or principal to the student’s parents, and that phone call would result in the student being punished by a parent. Back then, punishment didn’t involve time-outs or being grounded. Punishment was corporeal and usually involved a leather belt or a switch.

But we live in more enlightened times and corporeal punishment is frowned upon. So what should the officer and/or teacher have done? It’s simple: make the student want to leave the room. Give her motivation. There are so many ways. A few that come to mind, from least to most unpleasant, are:

Encourage her to leave by giving her a wet willy. In both ears, if necessary.

Tell her, “If you want to stay, you can stay until your parents come and pick you up. They’ll love that.”

Threaten her with summer school.

Threaten her with a cream pie in the face. Show her the pie.

Put a tarantula on her desk.

Make her watch reruns of Hee Haw and The Brady Bunch until she begs for euthanasia.

With a little thought, anyone should be able to come up with a long list of effective motivations. When a teacher asks a student to stop misbehaving and the student says, “No,” – what the student is really saying is, “What’s my motivation?”

And if these motivations fail, well … did you know a cattle prod can be had for as little as 25 bucks? Batteries not included.

Broccoli Again?

The World Health Organization says processed meats like bacon and cold cuts cause cancer in humans. A 50-gram portion, equivalent to 2 or 3 slices of bacon, increases your chance of getting colorectal cancer by 18 percent. And cheese and sugar are as addictive as a drug. (There goes pizza and cola.) And don’t get me started on hotdogs. Too late, I already got started on hotdogs (see previous post).

Oh dear. What can we eat?

Doctors say, “Just replace all those bad things with broccoli.” It’s a healthy food and will “help you maintain a healthy weight and a thinner waist line.” Well, of course it will. Because every time you want to eat, you’ll look at your bag of broccoli and you’ll decide you’re not really that hungry. “Broccoli again? I’ll eat later … maybe.”

My advice is: eat what makes you happy. Life is a terminal condition. No matter how healthy you try to be, you’re going to die. You might as well enjoy yourself on the way to your funeral. Just keep in mind this line from Andria by 2nd century B.C. Roman playwright Terence: “Moderation in all things.”

Hot Dog News

In the news recently: a company called Clear Labs has been studying food using genetic analysis. The project is called Clear Food. Their first study was on hotdogs. If you love hotdogs, you may want to stop reading now.

Ok, you’re still with me. Here’s the result of their study: of 345 hotdogs and sausages from 75 brands analyzed for the hotdog report, 14.4% “were problematic in some way.”

Ten percent of vegetarian hotdogs contain meat. The study I read didn’t say how much meat.

Some hotdogs contain meat not listed on the label. Three percent contain unlisted pork. That doesn’t bother me personally. If a turkey dog contains a little chicken, I’m okay with that. If a beef hotdog contains a little turkey, I’m okay with that. If a hotdog contains cat or dog or armadillo, that is a problem.

Human DNA was found in two percent of hotdogs. I assume that’s from people coughing or sneezing or spitting on the meat. I’m not okay with human DNA in my hotdogs. On the other hand, it would not surprise me to learn that a lot of restaurant food contains human DNA.

Some companies exaggerate the amount of protein in their hotdogs by as much as 250 percent. My reaction: meh. People don’t eat hotdogs because they want protein. People eat hotdogs because with the appropriate toppings, they taste so darn good. Chili-with-onion dogs taste better than chili with onion. Slaw dogs taste better than coleslaw. You wouldn’t eat hotdog relish out of the jar, but put it on a hotdog and you have a tasty treat. And isn’t that what it’s all about?

Bottom line: enjoy your hotdogs. Don’t spoil the occasion by thinking about what you might really be eating.

The 1975

The song of the day is 2014's Chocolate by British rock band The 1975.

What’s In A Name

Today I was listening to a television news journalist and I heard, for the first time, someone correctly pronounce the name Fukushima. (Fukushima is the Japanese city that had a nuclear disaster after it was struck by a tsunami in 2011.)

It doesn’t surprise me that people mispronounce names. But in the age of Internet search engines, it’s so easy to learn the correct pronunciation of a word that it’s almost a mark of laziness when people don’t bother to do so. Especially if your job involves speaking to millions of people.

Ever since the nuclear accident, most Americans have pronounced Fukushima this way:

fuu kuu SHEEE ma

I suppose people do this to make it sound similar to another widely mispronounced name: Hiroshima. Most Americans pronounce that name this way:

hero SHEEE ma

Both pronunciations are wrong. Fukushima is correctly pronounced this way:

f’KUU sh’ma  (KUU is lightly accented.)

The schwa is an “uh” sound represented by the symbol ə. I replaced it with an apostrophe because Japanese speakers put so little stress on those syllables that the schwa sound virtually disappears and you only hear the consonant.

Similarly, Hiroshima is pronounced this way:

hih ROH she ma (The 1st i sounds like the i in sit; ROH is lightly accented.)

If you’re on television, try to get it right! It’s why you’re paid the big bucks.

Alessia Cara

The song of the day is Here from the 2015 EP Four Pink Walls by Alessia Cara (Alessia Caracciolo).

The Mohorovičić Discontinuity

Its name sounds like an episode of The Big Bang Theory. It’s a real thing. It’s a very real thing, though no one talks about it any more.

The Mohorovičić discontinuity (usually called the Moho) is named after Croation scientist Andrija Mohorovičić who discovered it in 1909. During the 1960s we planned a trip to the Moho. We spent several years and millions of dollars trying to get to the Mojo. But we failed. Then we decided that a trip to the Moon was easier and more photogenic. And perhaps for the planet, a whole lot safer. Who can say for certain what would have happened to our planet if humans had succeeded in getting to the Mojo? Nothing good, probably.

Oh, we’ll try again. Even now in some laboratory there is probably a scientist making plans to go to the Mojo. He’ll need funding from the government, of course, and the budget is tight, so we may be safe. Unless – he puts together a coalition of mad scientists to convince Big-Money Corporations that money can be made by going to the Mojo. If that happens, our planet could be screwed.

Reading over this post, I can’t help feeling like there is an important part of the story I’ve left out. Oh well. Hitting the Publish button, now.

James Bay

The song of the day is Hold Back The River from the 2014 album Chaos and the Calm by English singer-songwriter James Michael Bay.

Neon Trees

The song of the day is Songs I Can't Listen To by rock band Neon Trees.

Lawson

The song of the day is 2015's Roads by English pop rock band Lawson.

Awolnation

The song of the day is Sail from the 2011 album Megalithic Symphony by electronic rock band Awolnation.

Miami Horror

The song of the day is 2010's I Look To You by Australian band Miami Horror featuring New Zealand singer Kimbra.

Headlines

Headlines used to be informative. A headline would tell you what the story below it was about. Now, it seems, too many headlines are written just to sucker you into reading the story.

Headline: We spoke with the astronomers who discovered the 'alien' megastructure to find out if it's fact or fiction

Reality: No one has discovered an alien megastructure. There is a star named KIC 8462852 that is 1500 light years from Earth. This star’s brightness undergoes “irregularly shaped, aperiodic dips” of as much as 20%. An alien megastructure around the star is one possible explanation for the dips in brightness, but there are also possible natural causes, so the star’s changing brightness is not evidence, much less proof, of anything artificial.

Headline: City of Sodom Discovered: Archeological find gives insight into story of destruction

Reality: It’s true. Archeologists recently discovered a buried city in southern Jordan, along with a large sign that reads Welcome to Sin City and a smaller sign that reads Sodom Chamber of Commerce. Just kidding! It’s true that archeologists discovered an ancient city that was long buried. But hasn’t this happened before – lots of times? Anyway, the director of the archaeological team says he believes the city is the Biblical Sodom. Take that news with a grain of salt.

Headline: Gigantic Buddha statue on Mars ‘proves intelligent life existed there’

Reality: There’s no statue of Buddha on Mars. There are only rocks. The real question is: does intelligent life exist on Earth?

And of course, there is the entire field of UFOs and the endless conspiracy theories about how “the government” is hiding proof that aliens are visiting Earth. Like this tantalizing headline:

A bronze pyramid UFO has appeared over Sao Paolo in Brazil – prompting fears that the aliens from semi-popular sci fi series ‘Stargate’ are invading Earth.

Wow – a pyramid shaped UFO! That must be something to behold. But then, buried in the article, we find this sentence:

We should also point out that the UFO was captured using a Nikon P600 zoomed to 60 times, so there is a small, but significant, chance the UFO is the size of a pigeon.

Which is more likely: the UFO is a kid’s drone, or the UFO is a craft from another star system? If you can’t figure this out (hint: the two scenarios are not equally likely), then there is a small, but significant, chance you wasted your time reading this post.

Lights

The song of the day is Second Go from the 2009 album The Listening by Canadian musician, singer, and songwriter Lights (Valerie Anne Poxleitner).

Snakes

The Gadsden flag (named after American general and statesman Christopher Gadsden) depicts a coiled rattlesnake on a yellow field with the words “Don’t Tread On Me”. The flag was popular during the American Revolution. And it is popular now.

The flag is so popular that the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles offers a Gadsden flag license plate. It looks like this:

I’ve seen a lot of these license plates lately. But now that the Revolutionary War is history and We the People live in a Constitutional Republic, I’m not sure what displaying a rattlesnake on one’s car is supposed to mean. Perhaps the driver wants to send the message I’m a snake. Snake is slang for someone who is treacherous and deceitful – a backstabber.

At any rate, it’s dangerous being a rattlesnake. People usually kill rattlesnakes when they see them. People go out of their way to kill rattlesnakes that are just minding their own business and not bothering anyone.

West Texas is a particularly bad place to be a rattlesnake. This year the town of Sweetwater, Texas, held its 57th annual rattlesnake roundup. A few years ago the roundup would bring in about 5,000 rattlers. Because of the drought, the snake haul is down to about 1,000 rattlers. The snakes would probably like to say (or hiss), “Don’t tread on me,” but the humans do far worse than tread on them. The humans lob off the snakes’ heads, strip their skin off, disembowel them, cut out their still-beating hearts and their gall bladders (which are set aside to be sold to China where they are used as aphrodisiacs) and finally the snakes’ bodies are thrown into a fryer to be cooked and sold as edible meat for $4 a plate.

Gadsden fans: you don’t want to be a rattlesnake. Be something truly terrifying. Be the absolute terror of the animal kingdom.

Be a human.

Passenger

The song of the day is Let Her Go from the 2012 album All the Little Lights by English folk rock singer-songwriter Passenger (Michael David Rosenberg).

Shawn Mendes

The song of the day is 2015's Stitches by Canadian singer-songwriter Shawn Peter Raul Mendes.

Disclosure & Lorde

The song of the day is Magnets from the 2015 album Caracal by English electronic music duo Disclosure (brothers Howard and Guy Lawrence) featuring vocals by New Zealand singer-songwriter Lorde.

Pentatonix

The song of the day is Can't Sleep Love from the self-titled 2015 album Pentatonix by Pentatonix. Fans of the a cappella group may enjoy their Behind the Scenes video showing the making of Can’t Sleep Love.

Zeds Dead & Oliver Heldens

The song of the day is You Know by Canadian electronic music duo Zeds Dead and Dutch electronic music producer Oliver Heldens.

Fono

The song of the day is Real Joy by Fono. The band formed in the UK under the name Seven but has been based in San Diego, California, since 2000. The band’s vocalist, Del Currie, has released a solo album under the name Zoo Seven.

Odd Stuff

I like my house, but odd stuff does occasionally happen in it. I’ve seen lamps turn on and off by themselves. I’ve heard loud noises of various kinds, from  loud bangs to loud, metallic clattering that sounds like a cascade of pots and pans falling to the floor. Inanimate objects have teleported instantly from room to room. My friends tell me there are reasonable explanations for these things.

Yesterday, I picked up an empty cranberry juice bottle, and I picked up its cap, and I screwed the cap onto the bottle, and I put the bottle on the floor out of the way. I turned around, took two steps, and I heard a noise. I looked back at the bottle and saw that its cap was now lying on the floor beside the bottle.

Today, as I sat at my computer I heard a noise very close to me. I stood up, looked around, and quickly found the source of the noise: a flashlight that had been standing vertically on the fireplace mantle had fallen and landed in a wicker basket which I had placed at that spot an hour earlier. The flashlight had been on the mantle for days. There had been no vibrations from passing vehicles, no air currents – nothing, as far as I know, to disturb the flashlight.

It doesn’t bother me. But if there is a ghost in my house, I wish it would do something useful – like, teleport the dust bunnies under the bed into the backyard. But then, ghosts don’t work that way. I’ll have to clean up those dust bunnies myself. In fact, I’ll do that now, while I’m thinking of it.

Till next time.

Ifwe

The song of the day is 2012's My Coast by St. Petersburg, Russia, dream pop band Ifwe (Misha and Sasha Pletnyov, and Dima Zvezdin).

Moral Equivalent

Recently, news outlets told the story of a drug called Daraprim, which is used to treat a life-threatening parasitic infection. Turing Pharmaceuticals, a start-up founded by 32-year-old former hedge-fund manage Martin Shkreli, bought the rights to make the pill and immediately raised the price of the drug from $13.50 to $750 per pill.

Obviously, many people won’t be able to pay that price, and some people who do will face financial ruin. When this was pointed out to Mr. Shkreli, he responded in a tweet, “aint my fault.” By this, he probably meant that it’s not his fault that poor people are not wealthy.

This story reminded me of another story in the news a number of years ago. A woman was raped; her rapist was caught. At his trial, the rapist’s defense was that the woman voluntarily chose to have sex with him. He admitted he told the woman that he would kill her unless she had sex with him. The fact that the woman chose to have sex rather than die, the rapist contended, made the sex act a voluntary choice rather than rape. The jury didn’t buy his argument and he was convicted.

Most people will try to pay any price demanded of them if the alternative is death. If people choose to pay an exorbitant price rather than die, that does not mean they are not being victimized.

According to dictionary.com, a profiteer is “a person who seeks or exacts exorbitant profits, especially through the sale of scarce or rationed goods.” Profiteering is illegal. When a hurricane or earthquake strikes, government officials will sometimes warn business owners that profiteers will be prosecuted. Taking advantage of people facing a life-or-death situation is widely considered immoral.

So why do drug companies get to do it?

Dreamtrak

The song of the day is 2014’s Contemporary by Londoner Dreamtrak (Oliver Horton) with visuals by UK artist Binster (Martin Binfield).

Poldoore

The song of the day is Ain't No Sunshine covered by Belgium artist Poldoore. The song was first recorded by Bill Withers in 1971 for his album Just As I Am. Other artists who have covered Ain’t No Sunshine include Michael Jackson, Joe Cocker, The Temptations, and Nancy Wilson. Poldoore samples Withers’s vocals throughout this cover. Other artists who have sampled Withers’s version include DMX and 2Pac. Withers’s version can be played here.

Delta Goodrem

The song of the day is Touch from the 2012 album Child of the Universe by Australian singer-songwriter Delta Lea Goodrem.

Walk The Moon

The song of the day is Shut Up and Dance from the 2014 album Talking Is Hard by Cincinnati-based indie rock band Walk the Moon.

Crossing the Milky Way

I was pondering this thought: how long would it take to cross the Milky Way (our home galaxy) in a spaceship under a constant acceleration of one standard earth gravity (1 g or 9.8 meters per second per second). Imagine we start on the edge of the galaxy and accelerate to some final velocity at the opposite edge of the galaxy.

There is no known practical way to produce a 1 g acceleration for the long time required to make the trip, so this is a thought experiment or (from German) a Gedankenexperiment.

An initial velocity of zero makes the formulas we need very simple:

d = 1/2 * a * t²   where d is distance, a is acceleration, and t is time,

and

v = a * t   where v is velocity, a is acceleration, and t is time.

The constants we need are the speed of light (3.0e+8 m/s) and the diameter of the Milky Way galaxy (100,000 LY).

I’ll skip the math and get straight to the answers.

Accelerating at one standard earth gravity, the trip would last four and a half centuries. How fast would our spaceship be traveling after undergoing four and a half centuries of acceleration at one standard earth gravity?

The answer is: 1.362e+11 meters per second.

How fast is 1.362e+11 meters per second? It’s over 450 times the speed of light! Oops! Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light! Obviously, we need to account for the effect that traveling at relativistic speeds will have on the mass of the ship. The closer the ship’s speed gets to the speed of light, the more massive the ship becomes.

The mass of an object at relativistic speeds is computed as
m = m₀/((1 - v²/c²))^1/2 where m₀ is rest mass, v is velocity, and c is the speed of light.

Assume the ship’s mass is 1000 kg. As its speed increases, so does its mass. In the table below are some sample velocities with their associated relativistic mass.

Percent of light-speed	Mass
0	1000
10	1005
50	1155
90	2294
95	3203
99	7089
99.9	22,370
99.99	70,710
99.999	223,600

What we need is not constant acceleration but constant propulsive force. For our thought experiment, that force will produce an acceleration of one earth gravity at the start of the trip, but acceleration will decrease as the ship reaches relativistic speeds due to the increased relativistic mass.

Let’s re-compute. Our spaceship is going to cross our galaxy, starting with zero velocity, and with a constant propulsive force that produces a 1g initial acceleration. How long will the trip take? How fast will the spaceship be traveling when it reaches the opposite edge of the galaxy?

In order to take into account the constantly changing mass at relativistic speeds, the computation requires integral calculus. There is one more complication. There are two frames of reference: the stationary frame (centered on the galaxy) and the acceleration frame (centered on the spaceship). As the ship reaches relativistic speed, it not only becomes more massive but the passage of time slows aboard the ship. This time dilation is described by the Lorentz transformation.

With a constant force producing a 1g initial acceleration, the trip will appear to earthbound observers to take 100,000 years, but to an observer on the ship the trip will appear to take 11.8 years. Our final velocity will be 0.99999999995 of light-speed. The ship’s relativistic mass will be five orders of magnitude (100,000 times) larger than its rest mass.

Despite the optimists who create science fiction space adventures, it appears that galactic travel is not in the cards for humans. Even if we invent a way to travel significant distances in our galaxy, everyone back on Earth will be long dead by the time we reach our destination and return. (We have to accelerate outbound and also decelerate outbound, and then accelerate on the return trip, and decelerate as well.) Earth could send out galactic explorers but we wouldn’t hear from them for millions of years. And if it takes that long to hear from them, would Earth send them out in the first place? In a million years, humans will have evolved into something not human, or else we will have followed the dinosaurs into oblivion.

JJ Cale

The song of the day is Call Me the Breeze from the 1972 album Naturally by legendary singer-songwriter JJ Cale (John Weldon Cale). The video shows a live performance from 1986. Like many of Cale’s songs, Call Me the Breeze has been covered many times by an assortment of musicians. Cale died in 2013 at age 74.

Paula Cole

The song of the day is Where Have All the Cowboys Gone? from the 1996 album This Fire by singer-songwriter Paula Cole.

ROZES

The song of the day is 2015's R U Mine (StéLouse remix) by ROZES.

Cooking the Fish

I cooked a fish filet for lunch today. I tried pan-frying the fish, but the cooking oil splattered everywhere. Tiny droplets shot straight up into the range hood and rained down onto the stovetop. I decided to abort the operation; I would finish cooking the fish using a different method. So I put the partly cooked fish on a plate, covered it with a paper towel, and put it into the microwave. I gave it one minute.

Did you know fish can explode?

It’s true. This fish exploded in only 55 seconds. I knew then that the fish was done. When I lifted the paper towel, it looked bad. Little fish-bits caught by the paper towel littered the exposed side of the fillet, so I turned the fillet over to hide that side. I put salt and butter on it, and it was tasty. And it was completely cooked.

I’ve written about the disaster called carving a chicken. I’ve written about filling my house with smoke from the toaster. I’ve even written about breaking the toaster – which I wasn’t even using at the time, although I was near the toaster and attempting to prepare food. Apparently, the area around me while I’m engaged in food preparation constitutes a kind of danger zone.

I imagine my neighbors sitting in their living room:

(A faint boom is heard.)
Husband: Did you hear that? I wonder what it was.
Wife: It was just the guy next door cooking something.

I should probably stick to fish sticks baked in my oven. And for a side vegetable: a bag of potato chips. It sounds like a bullet-proof meal, but I’m confident I have the talent to screw it up. I’m that good.

Fabio XB & Liuck

The song of the day is Back to You by Italian producers Fabio XB and Liuck (Fabio Carrara and Luca Facchini) featuring British DJ and vocalist Christina Novelli. This music was remixed by Tunisian DJ Wach (Oussama Mlaouhia).

Charli XCX

The song of the day is Famous from the 2014 album Sucker by English singer and songwriter Charli XCX (Charlotte Emma Aitchison).

House Ghost

Something just happened that begs to be shared.

I’ve been trying to get started on a house-cleaning project all week. I want to do a thorough, top-to-bottom cleaning and sprucing up of my house. It’s the kind of job that is probably going to require a week, maybe two, and it’s been my intention, every day this week, to get started on it. But my powers of procrastination are greater than my desire to clean, so the cleaning project has been on hold. I’ve watched TV, I’ve surfed the Internet, I’ve blogged; in short, I’ve done anything but the cleaning that I’ve known lies ahead of me.

This morning I got out of bed and walked to the living room. I sat at the computer and checked email, video-chatted with a friend, and read the news. I watched the first half of the Texas-TCU game (TCU outscored Texas by 30-0 in the first quarter!). Once again, my procrastination was winning.

Then something strange happened. I got up and walked to my bedroom. I walked through the bedroom doorway and I sat down on the edge of my bed, thinking how nice it would be to take a short nap. I happened to glance toward the open bedroom doorway and I saw, on the floor in the dead center of the doorway, a can of Ajax cleanser. It wasn’t there 10 seconds earlier. I know this because if it had been there when I entered the room, I would have seen it – and if somehow I had not seen it, I very likely would have stumbled over it and probably kicked it across the room.

No one besides me has been in my house all week. I have not touched the can of Ajax today – or even this week. How did the Ajax get from the bathroom to my bedroom doorway? House ghost? Poltergeist?

I knew what was happening. The house wants me to start cleaning and put the Ajax in my doorway as a hint. So I grabbed the Ajax, took it to the bathroom, and cleaned the tub. Thanks, house. It was the push I needed.

I have to stop here. No more blogging for me today. I have cleaning to do, and the house is waiting.

Uppermost

The song of the day is Flow, the lead track on the 2012 album Control by French electronic music producer Uppermost (Behdad Nejatbakhshe). The full album can be played here.

Joaquin

It’s raining. It rained yesterday. It rained the day before yesterday. And the day before that day. And so on. Today is the eighth consecutive day of rain in central Virginia. More is on the way. Days more.

At the moment, Joaquin the Hurricane is lolling amongst the Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean. Those who study such things say that soon Joaquin will leave that area and head northeast, paralleling the East Coast, though it may – may – veer into the Carolinas or Virginia. There’s a small chance Joaquin could pass right over my house, like a blimp, though with considerably more wind and rain than you get with a blimp.

I imagine a few brave airmen (and possibly brave airwomen) have been flying airplanes into Joaquin to study the storm so that weather boffins can make more accurate predictions about it. (These brave aircrews are called hurricane hunters. Five aircrews have been lost during such missions since the missions began.) Thank you, brave airpersons.

My small city has seen multiple hurricanes during the last decade. In 2012, a nearby house had it’s metal roof peeled back like the lid of a sardine tin. Trees were toppled; some fell onto homes. Electric wires went down. Grocery stores ran out of food. Ice machines ran out of ice. Gas stations couldn’t pump gas. And that storm, called Sandy, only grazed us. When it came ashore in New Jersey, it was so destructive that it earned the nickname “Superstorm Sandy.”

What will Joaquin do? Weather boffins say, “It will probably go this way, but it might go that way.” Translation: “It’s too early to say.” Those who might be in its path will stock up on food, fill water jugs, check flashlights, fuel their cars, charge mobile phones. And then … wait.

Garbage

The song of the day is Temptation Waits from the 1998 album Version 2.0 by alternative rock band Garbage with vocals by Scottish musician Shirley Ann Manson. This performance was recorded on June 20, 1998, at the Rockpalast Open Air Festival in the Freilichtbühne Loreley (Loreley Open-Air Theatre), an amphitheatre located on top of the Lorelei rock in St. Goarshausen, Germany.

Daya

The song of the day is Back to Me from the 2015 self-titled album Daya by 16 year old singer, songwriter, and pianist Daya (pronounced “Day-uh”).

Kelsea Ballerini

The song of the day is Dibs from the 2015 album The First Time by singer-songwriter Kelsea Nicole Ballerini.

Fast Food Fail

Sometimes I’m in a mood for fast food. Not often, but sometimes. I like Burger King’s Whopper but I rarely buy one. On the few occasions I’ve eaten at my local BK, the food I’ve gotten is never hot. In fact, it’s usually near room temperature, and room temperature burgers and fries are not appealing. I could ask an employee to warm my meal, and I have, and they will do it without complaint. But if I have to warm my food, I may as well order to-go, take it home, and warm it there. And warmed-over French fries are fairly blah. Scratch Burger King.

My local McDonald’s seems to try a little harder; the food I’ve gotten there isn’t hot, but at least it’s usually warm, and warm beats room temperature. I can live with warm, but it won’t send me out of my way for a meal. Scratch McDonald’s.

I was told that Wendy’s has a new menu item that is good: a barbecue sandwich. I like barbecue so I decide to drop in and try it. At 3 PM the place is empty; I’m their only customer. I order the barbecue combo, which comes with fries and a drink. The order-taker asks which sauce I want on the barbecue. I ask what flavors they have and “sweet, spicy, and smoky” is his answer. I don’t care for sweet barbecue sauce so I request spicy. They have to heat up the barbecue meat and the bun, and after a short time he again asks me which sauce I want. This time I say, “Anything but sweet.” He asks me three times while the cook is preparing the meal, and each time I tell him the same thing: “Anything but sweet.”

The sandwich is finally ready, but now they discover they don’t have any French fries so they have to cook up a batch. I wait a bit longer and the meal is finally ready. I pick up my tray and walk over to the drink machine and dial up a diet cola. I stick a straw in the drink cup and go to the condiment counter. I squirt ketchup into a tiny plastic cup and then sit at a table. I dip a French fry into the ketchup and pop it into my mouth. It’s hot and tasty! I unwrap my sandwich and take a bite. The BBQ is excellent; unfortunately, it has sweet sauce on it. That doesn’t surprise me a whole lot. You don’t get rocket scientists for what a sandwich maker is paid. And it’s partly my fault. I had told them, “Anything but sweet.” I should have anticipated that of those three words, the word they would remember would be “sweet.”

I finish my meal – very good, despite the sweet sauce – and stand up, tray in my right hand, drink in my left hand, and walk to the trash bin next to the condiments counter to dump my tray. I put my drink down on the condiments counter because I need my left hand to hold open the flapper door on the trash bin while I dump the tray. Then I place the tray on the top of the trash bin and pick up my drink cup. I want to top it off and put a lid on it so I can take it with me.

I walk to the nearby drink machine, pour more cola into my cup, and set the cup on the shelf in front of the machine. I reach for a lid and I’m about to put the lid on the cup when I realize my straw is missing. Where’s my straw? I look over at the condiments counter and there sits my drink cup, its straw sticking into the air as if to say, “Here I am.”

Wait. What just happened? If that is my drink, whose drink is this? Didn’t I just walk over here with this drink? I am still the only customer. This mystery drink was not at the drink machine when I got my drink, yet no one entered the restaurant while I was eating. Nor did I see, at any time, a second drink cup on the condiments counter. Where did this drink come from?

I have a moment of “this does not compute,” but I know what has happened. I just experienced a reality shift. I put down the straw-less drink, grab my drink, and quickly exit the restaurant. I know I am in a wobbly-reality zone and I want to get away from it before reality shifts again. Another reality shift might do something bad, like turn my car into … oh, I don’t know … a twenty year old Jeep.

I’m not fast enough. I reach my car, and guess what – now it is a twenty year old Jeep. That’s how reality works, sometimes. I could tell you a lot about reality, but you wouldn’t believe me because … reality is just that strange.

I bet I never get my Lamborghini back.

Rock City & Adam Levine

The song of the day is Locked Away from the 2015 album What Dreams Are Made Of by Saint Thomas (US Virgin Islands) musical duo Rock City (brothers Theron and Timothy Thomas) featuring Maroon 5 lead singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Adam Levine. Rock City (aka R. City and Planet VI) told Billboard the song’s story is based on their parents: “Our dad [was] locked up for five years and our mom [held things] down while he was gone, and still to this day.” Toni Tennille gets a writing credit thanks to the melody’s similarity to Do That To Me One More Time.

Andrew McMahon

The song of the day is Cecilia and the Satellite from the 2014 album Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness by indie pop band Andrew McMahon in the Wilderness with vocals by singer, songwriter, and pianist Andrew Ross McMahon.

The Chainsmokers

The song of the day is 2015's Roses by NYC-based DJ-songwriter duo The Chainsmokers (Andrew Taggart and Alex Pall) featuring vocals by Philly-based pop singer ROZES.

Little Big Town

The song of the day is Girl Crush from the 2014 album Pain Killer by Little Big Town.

Imagine Dragons

The song of the day is I Bet My Life from the 2014 album Smoke + Mirrors by Imagine Dragons.

Jeff Healy

The song of the day is 1989's Angel Eyes performed by blind Canadian singer, guitarist, and songwriter Norman Jeffrey "Jeff" Healey. Healy’s albums included jazz, blues, blues-rock, and rock music. He died of cancer on March 1, 2008 at age 41. Angel Eyes is on the 2009 album Songs from the Road, released over a year after his death.