You come at the King, you best not miss...

Inspiration is a cruel mistress. And an ironic one at that. Derrida is what got me on this philosophy path for real and now that I'm required to write on him...of course I'd be tired of writing. Yet I need to write it. Perhaps more because of the thought that it evokes than for the actual paper itself.

It's a paper about mourning. It came out of the questions I had concerning mourning after Justin died. What exactly is this work of mourning that was so horrible and yet so necessary? I work through the feelings of narcissism, denial, and self-delusion. I am not alone in this. But the paper's generation out of the expiration of that beloved friend only marks it as a betrayal. The confinement of genre betrays the expansiveness of who Justin was, of the plurality of relations he had, of the entire world that he worlded that is no more. So I betray my friend by trying to keep faith with him.

He'd have said my paper wasn't that good anyway. And then beat my ass at halo...with grenades. Always grenades

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The Wire is the second best television show I've ever seen next to Deadwood. Arrested Development comes in third. The pattern that emerges from these three shows is that I enjoy complex plot maneuvers, fully developed characters, and deep content. Exception being AD which doesn't offer up the deep content but rather mocks it and mocks it well. I like my TV to make me think and not just be something passive. That's what videogames are for.

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"Just because you surround yourself with interesting things doesn't make you an interesting person" wrote Ben Gibbard in Paste earlier this year. No, Benji, it doesn't make you interesting but it doesn't hurt you either. I like to surround myself with excellent things. Or at least I want to be associated with excellence. It won't make me a good scholar or a better philosopher. Won't hurt either. And maybe just maybe I'll get to come back at Gibbard with a quote by Ricky Bobby.

"I piss excellence."

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There really are too many arbitrary new web mooblies to make hardly any of them matter to me. Sorry friends, organizing data just aint my thing. Give me a good book, a good cup of coffee, and a few hours to talk about the ideas that make this world such a wonderous place. DB is okay I guess.

2008: The year that kinda wasn't in music

So I'm still in love with the music from 2007. It was a cultural onslaught unlike any year of music and film I've experienced. So much good, so much to be excited about. Unfortunately, this year has been a bit more stale. I've only gotten excited about a handful of music and as a result I went back to stuff I had missed. This was the year that I discovered My Morning Jacket and The Hold Steady despite their best albums being made in 2005. They both had records come out this year and I like them both. But nowhere as good as Z and Boys and Girls in America. So here are two lists...first what I actually listened to the most this year courtesy of Last.fm and followed by what i thought were the "best" records of this year.

Last.fm List
1. tie (Bon Iver: For Emma, Forever Ago, Minus the Bear: They Make Beer Commercials Like This in Heaven)

2.The Album Leaf: In a Safe Place

3. Fleet Foxes: Fleet Foxes

4. mewithoutYou: Brother, Sister

5. Tie (Sufjan Stevens: Illinois, Pedro the Lion: Control, Headlights: Some Racing, Some Stopping)

6. Owen: At Home With Owen

7. Marvin Gaye: #1's

8. The Swell Season: The Swell Season

9. Explosions in the Sky: The Earth is not a Cold, Dead Place

10. My Morning Jacket: Z

I'm surprised at how many times i listened to minus the bear but that ep really is damn good. Some of these I swear I just left the computer running while I went out for the day...lame I know. Anyway, here's my personal list.

1. Bon Iver: For Emma, Forever Ago
2. Fleet Foxes: Fleet Foxes
3. M83: Saturday = Youth
4. Broken Social Scene Presents Brendan Canning: Something for all of us
5. Deerhunter: Microcastle
6. Headlights: Some Racing, Some Stopping
7. Paper Route: Are we all Forgotten EP
8. Old Crow Medicine Show: Tennessee Pusher
9. The Notwist: The Devil + You and Me
10. Stars: Sad Robots EP

i think i'm a big believer in the ep as this list attests. honestly, the only music i got really excited about was the first two although m83 has been coming on stronger with each listen.

Honorable Mention: MGMT, Colour Revolt, Sigur Ros