Nerd Band

The most recent issue of Rolling Stone featured an in-depth article on none other than...(let's have a massively elaborate drum roll please, complete with such flourishes as chimes, crotales, timbales, and melodic cowbells)...RUSH! And no, they were not critical this time, but finally objective enough to say,"Music taste aside, the scope of Rush's achievement is undeniable - 18 studio albums, more than 35 million records sold worldwide, a legion of fans as loyal as Deadheads and the Kiss Army. Still, much of the world ranks Rush somewhere just north of the mullet. Their hypertrophic musicianship is mocked by critics, their lyrical pedantry spoofed by hipsters, their singer's voice a subject of churlish speculation..."

Wow, "just North of the mullet," huh? That is an insult I have never heard. But no, I have no qualms with the article. So, I will move on, and include some snippets that I found interesting. I'll do it this way, I'll pose a question, and answer it with quotes from the article. In fact, I'll keep all the questions geared on the undeniable stimga that Rush is a "nerd band."

What is your stereotypical Rush fan like?

"Under bright houselights, the 17,000-capacity venue is quickly filling with fans of the Canadian rock trio Rush - many resembling the two young men I find sitting 10 rows from the stage: brow-fringing hair, utilitarian glasses, sprouts of chin whisker. They look straight out of an '82 yearbook photo of the after-school D&D club - a suggestion neither finds insulting. 'We fully embrace that,' says Sam, 21, an electrical-engineering student with a Ziggy Stardust tee and Harry Potter tattoo. 'That's definitely our lifestyle, the whole nerd thing. We play video games and listen to Rush, we play video games about Rush. That's what we did all last night in preparation for this.'"

So, Rush fans are nerds?

"The American-Nerd Age is nigh. Today, everyone from the bed-headed club promoter to the siliconed spokesmodel calls themselves a "nerd" because they play Sudoku or can operate an iPhone. But 34 years ago, when singer-bassist Geddy Lee, guitarist Alex Lifeson and drummer Neil Peart first emerged on the music scene, the n word had teeth. And if you were heavy into Rush - three skinny Canadians with a fixation for sprawling rock epics and Tolkien references - you had found your home."

So, the members of the band are nerds too?

"A ruddy 55-year-old with a Robert Mitchum-ish brow, Peart stands drinking bottled water, dressed head to toe in a ninjalike black suit topped by a black tarn bearing the logo from Rush's 2007 album, Snakes and Arrows. One pant leg is cinched by a bicycle clip. His feet are in dancing shoes. "

Yep, you heard it here. Neil Peart dresses like a Ninja with dancing shoes.

"'This is to absorb the sweat,' Peart says of his outfit...'They're so you get the dance and glide on the pedals like you get on a dance floor.'"

That's it though, I mean, they never look like characters out of some fantasy novel, right?

"With his long hair, soul patch and round sunglasses, the 54-year-old Lee suggests either a French semiotics professor or an abstract expressionist. He's often noticed but frequently misplaced. 'For some reason, Latino people think I'm Ozzy Osbourne,' says Lee. 'I don't know-big nose, long hair? Others say Bono.'

When Rush emerged as a hard-rock power in the Seventies, Lee entered the history books as one of the genre's truly sui generis frontmen: gimlet eyes, ectomorph frame, noted proboscis. Robert Plant may have sung about Tolkien's mystic realm of Mordor; Lee looked like he'd been there."

It's true. The man really looks very witch-king-like.

But does he act nerdy too?

"Sitting under Toronto's former Sky-Dome, Lee recalls Rush's U.S. debut, at Pittsburgh's Civic Arena in 1974. "They asked us if we wanted anything in our dressing room, so I asked for some Southern Comfort," he says. "I read that rock singers drank that before they went on. So I had this little shot when we go on, and I'm like, 'Holy mackerel!' I've got all of 26 minutes to play, and I'm dizzy for half of it.' Behold Rush's entire history of onstage intoxication."

Now while some might argue that any rock stars that are responsible enough not to get into the drug/alcohol scene at all must be nerds, I think that what I'm really aiming at here as evidence of the nerd factor is the phrase, "Holy mackerel!" Now, that's pretty nerdy.

How was their luck with the ladies?

"Now for the sex. This wont take long either. Lifeson is married to his first girlfriend, Lee is married to his high school sweetheart, and Peart was with the same woman for 22 years until she passed away in 1997. Of Rush's 150-odd songs, not a single one concerns that rather popular rock & roll topic: chicks - which, when compared to the likes of Kiss, makes Rush more or less the AV Club of 20th-century rock."

Songs without chicks are probably pretty nerdy. What did they write about?

"When Peart signed on as Rush's drummer, he also took on the band's lyric-writing duties, beginning one of the most infamous oeuvres in the entire rock canon. Peart did not write like a lyricist. He wrote like a philosopher. A German one. In translation. 'I was ambitious and had wide interests,' says Peart. 'So I kind of tried writing about everything: autobiography, science fiction, fantasy, social commentary and junior philosophy.'"

Did the fans like it?

"...Rush dived off the deep end of prog with Caress of Steel. The album, whose five songs contained the 12-minute "The Necromancer" (which drank deeply from the well of Tolkien) and the 19-minute "The Fountain of Lamneth" (about a search for the fountain of youth), tanked. The band went on an internally dubbed 'Down the Tubes Tour'...But at this rock bottom, Rush found their moment of clarity...

The result was 2112, widely considered Rush's masterwork: a seven-part, dystopian fantasy complete with interplanetary war, robotic vocal effects, instrumental fireworks and clerical bureaucracies straight from the Dune trilogy. With a theatrical pitch somewhere between Jesus Christ Superstar and Pink Floyd's The Wall, 2112 portrays a galaxy controlled by one Red Star of the Solar Federation, whose Priests of the Temples of Syrinx dictate all cultural life. In the titular year, a young hero discovers an ancient, mind-freeing relic - yes, an electric guitar - and brings this Promethean gift to the Talibanic priests, who promptly wreck it and ground him, sending him off to his bedroom, where he presumably smokes bud, bums out and eventually kills himself. After which a coup brings a new galactic order and completes the most heroic rendition of the cranky-adolescent-male consciousness ever committed to vinyl.

2112 went multiplatinum and won Rush their independence. But it did more than find an audience. With philosophical touchstones in Orwell, Nietzsche and the band's acknowledged hero, Ayn Rand (whose politics got the band members labeled cryptofascists in the late Seventies), the album played a role analogous to that of L. Ron Hubbard's Scientology-launching book, Dianetics - eventually amassing the most die-hard, detail-obsessed rock fans in history."

I think that that paints a pretty good picture of this author's initial claim that Rush is a "nerd band." And perhaps this is why the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame overlook them time and again, despite their obvious success. "Nerds have no place in Rock and Roll!" I can hear them protest. Or, perhaps they have something against Canadians. Anyhow, I like that the closing remarks of the article reflect the bands' feelings about this well-known rejection into the hall of fame.

"Self-effacing poise may be rare to arena rockers, but like Green Party candidates and Nascar heroes, the members of Rush have adjusted to both idolatry and disregard. Just prior to tonight's dinner, they were once again snubbed by the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, which instead inducted no greater rock luminaries than the Dave dark Five. But Rush seem convincingly unfazed. 'I just keep saying we're too young to be in there,' says Lee.

'Yeah,' says Peart. 'Unlike all those other people, we're still working.'

'I think it really upsets our fans,' allows Lifeson. 'It's a big issue for them.'

It's true that Rush doesn't mean today what it did in '76 or even '96. It may mean more. Back when Peart was lost in America, Lee remembers knowing that his friend's path back would be through music. 'Because that's who he was,' Lee says. 'The quickest way to health is to be who you are and do that thing that you love to do.' And if today's Rush stands for anything besides dazzling chops and heady abstractions, it may be that simple, oddly courageous conviction: doing what you love - whether it gets you called a nerd, spurned by your label or turned into an icon."

So, if you've read this far, you've basically read half the article. But here it is in full. And if you've read this far you know the message I want to leave with you. Do what you love! Be who you are! Even the n word, just like Rush, but the n word with teeth.

I SEE YOU

Imagine that you are walking the bustling city streets of Manhattan. Usually you tend to ignore the giant billboards, whose bright colors, through over-exposure, have amazingly become as bland as hospital walls to you. But today you pass a digital billboard, with crisp high definition advertisements that seem to change just as someone new passes by. Your interest piqued, you take special notice in walking past it, and see the advertisement suddenly change to one for your favorite restaurant. And the featured image happens to be your favorite dish.

No, that could never happen...really, you might think. In reality, it may actually happen in the not-too-far-distant future. In reality, this technology is underway. In reality, something like it exists today. According to an article in The New York Times, some billboards are being equipped with cameras that are gathering information, about YOU. Okay, perhaps not your thoughts, feelings, and inner-most shames and wishes, but in the very least it is capable of tracking age, gender, physique, and interest in the billboard (by gauging how long you look at it).

The article claims that the makers of these devices are not using actual video recordings, but software that can determine these characteristics of individuals by such sophisticated means as calculating the distance between facial features, among others. At present these measures are designed to distinguish gender, but in the future it may be used to distinguish race as well. If you ask me, I think that this is much creepier than regular ol' video recording. Can you imagine the price of this magic billboard? Though, of course, they are trying not to invade the public's privacy. "Phhfff," I scoff.

And just as the scenario suggests, the goal here is to target the ad specifically to the passers-by. Yeah, and you thought ads at the movies ticked me off. They do. However, this is going too far, to dangerously...dystopian proportions. At least, it would be if the profiling technology could become as accurate as a retinal scan. AND if the advertisements tempted us to our damnation. That is of course if you don't have too much trouble picturing CEOs with pitch forks, horns, and a tail. Hmmm, maybe this IS something to worry about.

Although I hope you've gotten a disturbing glimpse at what advertising has become, you ought to know that I like to be over-dramatic at times, and that I hate marketing. But if you are interested, I suggest you check out the article.

Am I the only one that can hear

the voice of Sauron piercing my brain?

"I SEE YOU!"

No End In Sight

Recently I've become a member of Netflix, and I love the service. In fact, I've actually been renting documentaries lately, as I'm acknowledging a bit of a shift in my interests the last few years. Yes, I like non-fiction, and yeah, documentaries rock. But it's not a very popular genre at the video store or on Redbox.

Anyway, this weekend I got No End In Sight in my mailbox. If you haven't heard about it, it is a documentary featuring clips and interviews with those involved and opposing many courses of action in the war with Iraq. I wish I had seen it sooner, and I wish it had come out sooner, honestly. I knew that things with the war weren't going well, and a lot of suffering on both the part of Iraqies and our soldiers seemed very needless. But, I admit, I didn't know very many details. I admit also that I generally stay away from the news. I had a professor a while ago who kept up very well with what was going on in the world. Each day when I'd come into work, I'd ask how he was. And often he'd say, "Terrible! ___ people died in ____ today." It made me depressed. I didn't want to feel terrible about something I couldn't control.

Anyway, I feel no worse after watching this documentary. Once again, I knew things were bad, I just didn't know details. After watching, I was irrate to discover that so many bad decisions were made by people who did not consult with others, especially those with much more experience in the matters of their decisions. Here's a few things that particularly upset me:

1. The decision to disban the Iraqi military was very arbitrary, unsupported, and the results devastating. Thousands of soldiers no longer had money for their families. You can't really afford to live without money.
2. The Pentagon alone was responsible for post war reconstruction, and none of them really knew what they were doing. They ignored most of the proposed ideas, in several well-prepared volumes, by those who had experience.
3. President Bush did not even read the Executive summary of the report written on the state of the people in Iraq. It was one page long.
4. 18 billion dollars was proposed to help the reconstruction efforts to provide the people of Iraq with food, water, electricity, etc. A year after the proposal only one billion was spent, and very little after that as well.
5. One of the men they interviewed on the street said that things were bad under Saddam, but that things were worse now. Now, that's a comment that ought to put things into perspective!
6. The government knew where a large storage facility of weapons were being kept, but they "didn't have enough men to guard it." In consequence, the opposition in Iraq who were angry with us were able to get a hold of these unguarded weapons. And unfortunately, many US soldiers were killed as a result.
7. Donald Rumsfeld...wow, what an @** ****.

However, the efforts of the mass majority to do what is right in the matter of this war is also very apparent. There are many more people to praise than criticize for certain. However, when the control lies in the hands of those who made mistakes, and these mistakes affected the lives and well being of so many people...one can really only focus on the negative here.

It's a documentary I feel everyone should see. Check out the trailer.

And I will make an effort to keep up with the news now, for crying out loud! Also along these lines, I also apologize to my dad for having made fun of him for only watching C-Span. I'm pretty sure I was watching crap like Saved By the Bell in those days. Wonderfully patient fathers...I love my dad :)

Finally, My Own Computer

Hooray, I finally can use the internet whenever I want! It really was frustrating to be restricted to only using it when I was on campus. That actually is a lot more often than you might think, I do have plenty of time to use computers at work, but I don't get to do the fun stuff. You know, listen to music, and watch videos, etc. (basically everything that makes noise). And depending on the keyboard I use, or the class, sometimes even typing is too noisy. At least, whenever I do much of that I have to use semi-cautious keystrokes. Boy, it's fun to bang on that that spacebar!

Anyway, I got this computer about a month ago from my sister. It was full of viruses to the point that the internet wouldn't even run, meaning that anti-virus programs weren't going to run either. So, we had to erase the hard drive. Supposing that someone in my family had some Windows XP software, I wasn't too concerned about the extreme of erasing the hard drive. No one had it. I don't really think they provide those anymore with new computers. I guess it's a good thing. I think that the license agreements on the cd roms include being able to put the software on two computers, though. I don't know. But, since I couldn't do it this way, I had to buy some. At least I did't have to worry that I bent any software agreement ethicalities.

Until then I had some Windows 98 on it (these cds were still floating around), which almost irritated me more than if it had no operating system at all. I'm a jerk, I complain about my parents' computer still having it pretty often. Anyway, when I first got the computer home, I tried to connect to the internet. However, all we have here is wireless, and Windows 98 didn't even have an option for that. Once I installed my XP, I again tried to connect to the internet through the little wizards, and it wasn't working. I spent too long trying to figure that out, actually. All the wizard seemed to tell me was that I was "missing hardware."

"Thanks, Mr. Wizard," I thought. "Your vagueness was helpful."

Then I remembered that one of the options for the wizard had a picture of a usb device. So the next day I decided to get me a USB wireless network adapter from Best Buy, and poof, I found my network and was on the internet.

Then there were still more problems to solve. When I turned on the computer for the first time I wondered what I could even do with it right away, and I thought that listening to a cd is simple enough, right? I stuck in a Rush cd, and...nothing. No sound. I went to the Control Panel, and there wasn't even an option to adjust the volume. Now, I just had a useless box that wouldn't even play a cd. However, once I got on the internet last night I was able to find a driver that downloaded in less than a minute, and there was sound! It was awesome.

The next really annoying problem was the appearance of webpages. They were huge, so large that there was this horizontal scroll button that I had to use to see the whole right side of the page. I wasted some more time screwing around in the Control Panel and Internet Explorer Options to try to fix it, but once again, all it took was a quick little download of a display driver and it was normal.

So, technically the computer wasn't entirely free. I had to buy some software and a usb adapter. But, I am very satisfied with myself that I was able to fix everything that was wrong with it myself. Now, if anyone needs help with old/used computers, or if you have to erase your hard drive, I might have useful suggestions.

1. If your Network Systems has no wireless connection option (despite windows having a wireless conncetion wizard), you're not going to be able to connect wirelessly without installing a PCI card internally, or getting an external usb adapter.
2. If something goes funky with your sound or visual, you best look into downloading drivers instead of wasting your time with the Help Glossary. There are free services on the net that scan your system and figure out what drivers need a boost.

I don't know much about computers at all. So, these are only suggestions...not true blue trouble shooting tips. They are just personal discoveries that helped me get my computer going yesterday. Once again, hooray!

No Reply

Though my job is usually stress-free, once in a while I get upset by a lack of good communication. Going back to my complaints about the computer age as far as communication goes, I feel ignored. That is, because I don't get responses. You see, we have to fill out these facilitator reports for each class about any problems that we had, etc. In one of my classes, the same problem happens each class period where the distance sites can't see the video from us in Logan, or any other sites besides Vernal and Roosevelt. Can't you imagine how annoying it would be to never be able to see your instructor?

Now, it is especially weird for video to be locked on two sites. When it's just on one, all that needs to be done usually is to adjust the "host" on the connection back to Logan, and restart the system. Anyway, every time this class starts I end up having to call the operations center, and they act like everything is working fine, because as it turns out, they happen to see everything just fine. In the midst of their confusion and me trying to convince them that, "No, we really can't see what you see," it takes about twenty minutes before the problem is miraculously solved. I say miraculously because I'm not sure what they do, and they don't tell me. All I end up figuring out is what I hear being whispered between faint faraway voices at the op. center. Once I heard the word "bridge"...so I included in my report that I believed that the problem was with the bridge. For each report, I describe the problem in detail, and then try to guess what was done to fix it. It's not really my job to explain why something weird happens, so much. I'm more behind the What?'s than the Why?'s in a lot of situations. But, I figure that if it really is so confusing to them, they might want a clue of how to fix it if it happens again.

But my report doesn't ever seem to do anything, because the next day the same problem occurs again and I'm back on the phone trying to convince some other guy that I've tried all the stuff he is recommending and suggesting, and that none of those things will work. If someone just remembered what they did to help, or made a report of their own, this wouldn't be a problem. And a waste of time. And a frustration. It's a bit like the movie Groundhog Day, but even worse because it isn't really the same day repeating itself over and over again. No, it just feels like it. Even if the problem could not be permenantly fixed, I think that I deserved a reply email to that effect. But, no reply. However, this class just ended today, so I don't have to deal with that nonsense anymore. Although, at least I finally found out what the culprit was, sorta. The guy I talked to today vaguely remembered hearing about our problem a while ago, and told me that two bridges were involved in the connection, rather than one. He didn't know what to do about that, though.

On top of this, yesterday I proctored a test out in the hallway. Somehow, other departments seem to be unaware of the schedule for Distance Ed., or that we are in their buildings doing classes, or that we even exist. First of all, I've seen a few occasions myself when a group has booked the same room at the same time we are doing a distance class, and they say that those who they made arrangements with claimed that the room was free. This is what happened yesterday. Not only could we not use the room (which for a distance ed. class requiring the cameras, mics, ect., a specific room is important), but it was a test day and the tests hadn't been delivered to the room as usual. "Great, my own manager forgot about me," I thought. And flustered and blushing I told the students that I would go to the computer lab and print out their tests, and that we would move to another room. For some reason, they wanted to take their tests in the hallway instead. It was kinda funny. We were all in a circle. After the people in our room left (after an hour!), I stole a coke out of the cooler they left in there. Ha! Luckily, the students didn't miss any of the lecture following the test, because the room was cleared by then. And it was a final exam review, so, I would have had an angry mob on my hands if they missed it. So, the double-booking of the rooms is just the one thing.

Another reason why I'm pretty sure no one knows about our class schedules is that last summer they started closing the library at five after the on-campus classes were over. Realizing that Distance Ed. still had classes going in the library well after five, I asked one of their employees about it. She said, "Classes are over."

"No," I corrected. "Distance Ed. classes are still going."

Once again, an oblivious reaction. Unfortunately, upon discovery of this fact, we evidently didn't have enough power in our department to warrant the library being open a few more hours. Incidently, the air conditioning wasn't going for a couple weeks either. So, it sure did suck when I had a class that started at eight, and I had to get there at five so I wouldn't be locked out (and to let everyone else in, of course). Seriously, I spent hours alone in the hot library because of it. That was kinda fun, though. I set up a scavenger hunt with cute little poetic riddles. And at the end was the book The Quest for Utopia, which in turn directed you to a pile of quarters. Ooh, it was a treasure hunt too, I guess.

Anyway, this is likely the only blog entry that I will write about work. For this job, at least. I was just a little irritated, so that's why I wrote it. I know it doesn't entertain much. I guess that getting ignored has always been a hot-button issue with me, from work to home, to friends, and of course, the government.

Actually, I'm so tired right now partly due to this issue. Not only am I tired from working a 12 day (still in the process), but I also walked a few miles this afternoon in the hot sun. The kicker was why I had to walk in the sun so much. I was waiting at a bus stop for twenty minutes and when the bus came the driver didn't see me, and passed by! It was so stupid, but it made me...sad. Ignored again. But, I did stop by a lemonade stand that I saw on my way home to get a drink...and I've been thinking just recently about how I'd like to pass by one of those. Huh.