My List Of Ten Things That I Do Well

Two days ago I was emailing back and forth with my friend Lesley during a normal, boring work day and we sent each other a list of ten things that we do well. Here's what I came up with:

1) I'm a funny guy that people seem to trust
2) Music - I'm all over that: history of bands and songs, identifying them, contextualizing them in historical ways, linking various bands, basically in another life I'm Alan Cross: a muis geekof the highest degree with a very small streak of inward snobbery
3) My Scottish accent is the envy of all from Dunferline to Aberdeen
4) Ashamedly I'm a very good liar - part politics training, part pure natural talent . . . my mom hates it (see number one)
5) My meatloaf kicks ass. It's so good it makes you wanna slap yo' mama.
6) Hot damn can I dance! - I cut a rug so fine folks swear it's antique Persian
7) I'm very good at keeping cool in stressful situations and communicating effectivly - a year with the juvies teaches you a hell of a lot to diffuse very dangerous situations
8) I can throw a wicked curveball - seriously, this thing has a 12 to6 drop that cascades like a waterfall and snaps like a flag in a stiffbreeze
9) I also know sports - no one ever suspects it but I know a hell ofa lot about the major sports, plus a lot about soccer - I can also play a bunch of them with moderate skill
10) Sarcasm is omnipresent in my life

Now, I'm currently looking for a replacement job and updating my resume, etc etc etc, but how cool would it be to put that list on it - or at least the introductory letter.

"Hello, my name is Andrew and I want to work for you because hot damn, I can dance!"

The offers would fall in my lap like mana from the heavens

Workplace Shenanigans

Alright, you know that work bores the living tar out of you when during the course of the day you can:
- Actively participate in numerous baseball and fantasy hockey pools
- Carry on several different conversations via email during the day
- Send out three emails to my mass email list with attached mp3s
- Stay up to date on all sports related activities in the world by scouring sports site number one, sports site number two, canada's sports site and wherever else I feel like it
- Occasionally visit stillepost
- Read all about the split of the Eastern and Western Roman Empire (I got really bored yesterday and I always wondered about the formation of the Byzantine Empire)
- Download live, public domain Mike Doughty shows (go here, you'll have access to a ton of live shows from a diverse selection of artists - I HIGHLY reccommend it)
- Oh, and update my blog (as I'm doing right now)

So, if anyone has any leads on new employment, send 'em on over to me here. I'd be worried about my employers reading this, but I work for idiots who don't remember my last name (seriously, when I went to the Hockey Show, my boss had my registered as "Andrew Stuart." No word of a lie).

In other news, if you're planning on going on a date and you want a movie to watch, stick with something safe and whatever you do, don't suggest Pallindromes. It's one of the least comfortable date movies that I've ever seen and possibly one of the most offensive. Now, as most of my readership (all three of you) can attest to I am one of the least offendable people on the planet. I won't try to quantify exactly what it takes to do so, but sufficed to say this movie did it for me. The date went well though despite the crappiness of the movie.

Sometimes, the world needs more Aqua


Junior Senior's "Move Your Feet", just popped up on my iPod and I was digging it: a song that is fun, requires no thinking what so ever, and fits into something I've been thinking about for a little while now. Basically,the world needs a little more Aqua. Now, don't get me wrong, I love my music deep, meaningful, songs that says something and makes you think, but threre are often times when this is the last thing you need. You just want to dance your ass off, have a good time, and that's what this gives you. Sometimes music doesn't have to be all serious and though provoking. It can also be joyful, spontaneous, humourous, even light-hearted and for the most part I think that's what Aqua was allabout way back in their heyday. They just didn't care what anyone else thought of their band or the fact that they were singing about being a Barbie girl or Doctor Jones or the Candyman (coming from Bountyland) - even though all the songs were the exact same. They were cartoon characters write large, giving you music that you could just listen to and not care about. Who doesn't remember dancing to the Venga Boys venerable song "Vengabus." Music is often an emotional experience and you don't want your brain getting in the way. Besides, if we took our music seriously all the time there could be dire consquences.

Dire Consequences thy Name be Progressive Rock.

When music is taken too seriously then you get bands like Rush, ELO and Moby Grape filling us with bloated concept albums about Deeper Meaning, Important Issues and other things of Vital Importance. These all have their place at the table, but do we really need our music to be that complex, that layered, that complicated all the damn time? I certainly hope not. It only leads to an entire album that gets turned into a saga of King Arthur and his knights - done on ice. I shake my head at the 70s sometimes.

Have fun with it too. I think that's what I have learned by my forays into DJ-ing. Often it's not about making people think or proving you have much better taste than anyone else in the room. When people hear a DJ, they are generally in no mood to be challenged, they want to shake what their mama gave them. When I DJ I'm not out to change the world or prove what a snob I am, I'm there to get as many of those people out on the floor, and if that takes the Backstreet Boys, Junior Senior, Brittany, or even the Gypsy Kings, it's getting played. That's why I like Aqua and what they bring to the table. Hell, in the current music scene we could use a little more of what they had to offer. They were just happy, bouncy, upbeat songs that you could dance to and not give a damn about what they meant.