I WANNA BE LIKE COMMON BLOGGERS - I WANNA LIVE HOW OTHER BLOGGERS LIVE

I've noticed - thanks to my remarkable skills of observation and perception - that bloggers like to post what they're listening to, reading, and watching on tv. I can understand the urge - you want people to think you're cool because you listen to Modest Mouse or you're reading that new book by that one guy that's a really great writer, man, he writes about pop culture and drugs and about growing up in the suburbs but it's really cynical and hilarious, man, it's not like a book at all, it's like a really great magazine with all these little essays in it - but I can't endorse the urge. The fact is, I don't care if you listen to N.W.A. or Amy Grant. You're a blogger, and because of that, you're pretty lame. I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it! It's true!

Or maybe the reason they do it is because they're searching for a kindred spirit, and the broadcast of their current culture consumption is like a beacon to the world at large. Have you ever searched Friendster profiles for a specific town or place? Try it sometime. It's kind of sad. You quickly realize that in cyberspace, there are more lonely, 45 year old lesbians living alone in mobile homes than you might think, and they alone outnumber all other demographics by a *cough* hefty margin.

But again, as happens so often on this site, I digress. My intention is to post for you my own current consumption of pop delights, though to make it interesting, I ask you: which of these things is not like the other?

Listening to:
Iron and Wine - Woman King EP
Jezebel is the best song I've heard in a long time. It's really amazing, and I love how the piano comes in at the end, like it's been woken up by the rest of the song, and it's really slow, a little behind the rest of the song, but it's trying to catch up. Brilliant stuff.

Reading:
Zootrope - All Story
I didn't know who Rick Bass is, but after reading his short story, The Lives of Rocks, I feel like I should. His bio in the back of the magazine reads: "Rick Bass is the author of twenty-one books of fiction and non-fiction, including the novel Where the Sea Used to Be. He lives in northwest Montana's Yaak Valley, where he's active with a number of local organizations seeking wilderness protection for the last roadless areas in the Kootenai National Forest." People like this don't have blogs. They have lives.

Watching:
Dances With Wolves, Collector's Edition DVD
In this historically accurate film, Lt. John Dunbar is a Civil War hero who comes to understand the beauty of the Indian way of life, as he lives and fights with them through many seasons. This film is not only truthful in its representation of the Native American way of life, but it also shows that the white man viewed the Indians as a spiritual, wonderful tribe of people that lived in harmony with their surroundings. Ultimately, the story of John Dunbar is not just the story of one man: it is the story of literally no men who saw the Indians for what they truly were and how they truly lived.