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Well, it is sad when important figures leave us, but I think we can also celebrate the impact they had on our lives through creating great works. In Vonnegut's case, I think he had sufficient time to say much of what he wanted to say, and that is also something to be glad about. I'll definitely revisit a few of his novels in the next few months. I often wonder if I will be able to complete even a fraction of the projects I would like to get through, and it seems unlikely. As of right now, my "legacy" is a handful of co-written articles for work that I am reasonably proud of -- and a few poems published in very obscure poetry magazines. It just doesn't seem to be enough, and yet even this is more than many people achieve. I will make more of an effort to do some creative writing, but I am fooling myself if I think I can complete anything major in the next few years. My children are very young and it is far more important to me that I spend time with them now than to lock myself away and write. But I will see if I can cut down on some of the procrastination...

This is so fucking sad and disturbing. The newest accounts suggest that this kid did in fact make a number of bomb threats. More important is that he bought one gun, waited thirty days to buy a second one (legally) and then went on a rampage. So this was pre-meditated at pretty much every level. It is so hard to know what goes through people's minds, but you have to be totally sick and basically devoid of normal human emotions to be able to plan to murder dozens of people.

I'm pretty sure that as long as you pay 100% of last year's tax, even if you have a very good year the next (which has happened to me for at least the past 2) you won't get hit with penalites. For my state taxes I have to fill out 1/2 of their underpayment form (the easy parts), before hitting the magic line that says I owe no penalities or interest. Why I have to do this in a dozen lines when 1 saying "did you pay 100% of last year's owed" would do the trick is beyond me, but that's tax authors for ya! I then up the estimated for this year's to 100% of last. Only in bad years do I get a refund. You just never know. When you have capital gains, you are supposed to be setting some aside or paying estimated taxes all along the way, but unless I paid an enormous amount of attention, I really wouldn't know until the end of the year, when I get the final statement from the broker, by which point it is pretty late. This year is particularly strange as I am filing F1116 and F2555 and am including and excluding foreign income, so it certainly looks fishy.

Maybe it is just around the corner, but when I download mp3s I don't get liner notes or credits. That does piss me off and is probably the main reason I think mp3s are inferior (that and the fact you are pretty much screwed if your hard drive/ipod goes down). Maybe it is on the web but I don't want to have to be connected everytime I am trying to find out something about a particular recording. The music industry seems to be doing fuck-all to address this, and it does add to my residual resentment against an industry that treats all its customers as potential thieves.

I make about half my income from investments, but don't even know under Dec 31 what the total will be, esp. if the market dips in Dec. So I always owe quite a bit. I haven't been hit with any penalties yet, but it is only a matter of time. I'll go ahead and pay a bit more in estimated taxes for this year.

Depends on how much house you got.

Almost all white collar employees have to sign statements that they will not use racial slurs or sexist language, discriminate and generally they will behave themselves. Violating this policy is grounds for dismissal, particularly on 2nd or 3rd offense. That's how I view this, not as free speech issue, but an employer deciding to cut his losses.

Context always matters, but I think you are vastly overestimating the communities even within the Black community where you could get away with this kind of language (even nappy-headed). In my wife's circles, if you say this to someone, you are looking for a real fight. Sure there are ignorant rappers who bring everyone down to their own level, and that is tragic in its own way. But someone in the media as long as Imus has to know the codes and chooses to ignore them, and is now playing dumb.

While Richards rant was incredibly ugly and indefensible, at least it is in the context of being heckled. Out of nowhere Imus and his producer start calling the Rutgers players ho's. There is no call for that, and despite the fact that Imus is pretty out of it, who really doesn't know that even in rap that term isn't just thrown around but is applied to "no good women" who aren't doing anything to get out of the ghetto. In any case, Imus was going on about how he can be trusted to keep his word and clean up his act, and Clarence Page brings up this pledge that Imus agreed to YEARS AGO that he would stop making racial slurs on the air. So he has already had plenty of chances.

I guess he does want to focus on the US homefront, but I didn't really think we needed any more WWII documentaries after the World at War (just starting to get into this set).

Hate the 1999 version. Just find it painful to listen to. When I want to listen to the concert I pull out the 1985 version even if it means missing a few songs.

I've generally had pretty good luck. In Chicago I mostly go to Jazz Showcase (crossing fingers it will reopen soon), which has a strict no talking rule, and HotHouse where people are generally pretty cool. I haven't had too many problems at the Green Mill, though I don't go nearly as often. I guess it does depend on the venue and price. I try not to get too bent out of shape unless I have paid $20 or more. I was, however, at a Sarah McLaughlin concert in Toronto where one guy in our group was a little tipsy and sang along to most of the songs. We tried to quiet him down, then had to keep him from getting into a fight when someone else objected to him singing along. So that was embarassing and the last time I went out with him anywhere.

Perhaps all this activity will flag the higher ups and this will get corrected by Monday, so if you are at all interested, you probably should jump now. But definitely thanks for the heads up.

Sweet!! I went and looked at the Best Buy website, and they have a 30 day price guarantee: So I called and asked for the $30 rebate and they gave it to me. So if you have pre-ordered, go ahead and call the 888 number and you should also get the difference. I know Best Buy is generally evil, but they did ok by me today.

I'm torn. $39.99 was a good price, but now I feel I missed out on an even better deal. But it would be way too much of a headache to return the box (already on its way) and to order again. Plus, I can't imagine the price will last too long before they catch this.

What about Blues Brothers? The (car) body count is through the roof on that. Or maybe it doesn't matter if they're just cop cars?

Yep. I have Seasons 1-3, and will get the rest in the next few months. What will be particularly interesting is that I watched the first two seasons regularly, then moved to a place where I didn't have a TV. I really didn't miss it except for Northern Exposure and had a friend tape those. But inevitably I missed many of them, so the later seasons will be almost completely new to me. It should be kind of exciting. Anyway, I stayed away from TV for pretty close to 10 years throughout the 1990s, but then got into Futurama. I even started to arrange staying over at my girlfriend's place to watch that show. She did marry me, so I guess she didn't think that was too obsessive. There's usually just one show I really like, and I won't watch anything else, though for a little while I was splitting my loyalties between Arrested Development and My Name is Earl, but that has been resolved now.

Next Select will almost certainly be Hutcherson, though I might wait and get Cohn, Newman and Green as well. Not sure about the next big set -- I'm interested in the Ellington, Nelson and Gillespie -- and all should be around for a while.

Yes, whenever they are not having really good deals on cds that we want. I thought we were just supposed to boycott the stores themselves. I'm not setting foot inside of a Best Buy. Or maybe it was just buy the loss-leader CDs like this one, and then not buy anything else from them. Anyway, I'm not going to lose too much sleep over it.

Honestly if my wife knew what enablers you all were, she would figure out a way to block this website. But anyway, the Best Buy pre-order price for the box set is very good ($10 better than CD Universe) and so, of course, I went ahead and bought it. At least this is music that she will enjoy as well, though she probably wouldn't have bought all 7 CDs.

Just saw Cezanne to Picasso - Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avante-Garde. This is at the Art Institute of Chicago until May 12. It is about the collector Vollard who really made some of these artists famous and kept their careers going. If you are in the midwest and like this era of painting (generally my personal favorite), you will probably want to see the show. To be honest, the Picasso paintings are a bit disappointing, aside from a cubist portrait of Vollard. However, the Van Gogh, Cezanne, Derain and Gauguin selections are quite good. (Obviously Vollard didn't help out Van Gogh very much, and he also had a bad relationship with Gauguin, but he had a very good relationship with Renoir and Picasso and apparently Cezanne.) This makes the second time in my memory that "Starry Night over the Rhone" has been shown in Chicago (first was a Van Gogh - Gauguin show). That alone is probably a good enough reason to go see the show. It is pricey, however. Around $15 I think. I ended up getting a membership so I can go back to the show three or four times before it leaves town. There is also an upcoming Jeff Wall exhibit that I am looking forward to, so will use my membership for that as well.

Awesome! There's a guy in my office that keeps going back and forth to Indianapolis, and now I'm a little bit jealous. It's really great news, and maybe I will be able to make it out to see the Jazz Kitchen.

I guess I'll find out pretty soon what I think about this CD (Hated Music). I was inspired to dig around and found a on-line record store (weirdorecords.com) that seems to carry a fair number of the Funny Rat artists. They had a used copy of Hated Music for a very decent price, so I picked it up. By the way, a few of Flaherty & Corsano's newer releases are on emusic.

Maybe already mentioned but emusic has Who is this America and they have just added Security. I already had dl'ed one and will probably dl Security this month (long story but I forfeited last month's dls because of moving and getting swtiched to a lousy internet service and am still a bit steamed over it).

I thought that too until I had a 2-year old that liked to squirm out of my grip when we were walking. He hasn't yet tried to run into the street, but I wouldn't be surprised if it did happen. This is particularly a problem in places like Chicago with narrow sidewalks and heavy traffic. In my view, the leash is a compromise but it is better than strapping him into a stroller everywhere.