Shooflypie

It's the first Sunday Shuffle without a football game to watch later in many months (the Pro Bowl is stupid), though there is a Bulls/Heat matchup this afternoon. I have lots of irons in the fire in any event, so let's get right to today's ten... 1. Top Of The World/Shonen Knife (2) - "Such a feeling coming over me.." 2. The Look of Flowers That Are Looked At/Irving (3) - "In the evening, after noon, feel so tired cause there's nothing to do.." 3. So Well/Dawes (9) - "I am an old old sailor with a future much shorter than his past.." 4. Sweetie/Josh Rouse (3) - "Hazy dreamers on a winter's night making plans for the spring.." 5. No Surprise (For Wendela)/Midnight Surprise/Lightspeed Champion (2) - "Keep the lights on.." 6. Iron On/Superchunk (6) - "When I woke up this morning it was raining.." 7. Phone Sex/Superchunk (6) - "Rosy cheeks and rolling eyes on a steamy Sunday night.." 8. Nu Br...

I'm looking forward to today's championship games...I sure hope they're entertaining. Other than that, it'll be the usual Sunday routine of Sports Reporters , cleaning, laundry, and the rest. So, let's get the day started with today's ten... 1. I Want to Love You in My Room/Irving (2) - last played on 5/20/10 2. Sunday/Yuck (14) - last played on 12/14/11 3. Echos Myron/Guided By Voices (9) - last played on 1/16/12 4. Holy Holy/Wye Oak (10) - last played on 12/15/11 5. Everybody Knows Everybody/Earlimart (3) - last played on 7/21/11 6. St. Joseph's/The Avett Brothers (3) - last played on 2/23/11 7. Come Closer, Sisters/Bowery Boy Blue (4) - last played on 10/16/11 8. Failsafe/The New Pornographers (6) - last played on 7/20/11 9. When We Two Parted/The Afghan Whigs (9) - last played on 12/31/11 10. God, Please Let Me Go Back/Josh Rouse (3) - last played on 11/20/11

There are many reasons why I was a huge fan of Starman in the 90s but today I will focus on just two. One is that James Robinson took the villainous Shade and made him into a character of great nuance and endless fascination. The other is the use of a storytelling device called "Times Past," in which Robinson would devote occasional issues to tales of the history of various Starmen or Opal City. These issues were derived from the journals of the Shade himself. Currently, Robinson has returned to the character a 12 issue series titled The Shade and #4 takes a break from the main story to bring us yet another "Times Past." It's set in 1944 and features a threat from the Nazis, the heroics of Vigilante, plus a new adventurer named Madam Fatal that you have to see to believe. It's a fun story. What makes the issue great is the art team of Darwyn Cooke and J. Bone. This is cartooning at its highest form. We get quiet moments, action set-pieces, darkness, and so...

I've managed to read 2 books so far this year, The Ecstasy of Influence by Jonathan Lethem and The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson. Before I talk about the books, I thought I'd talk about my book goals for 2012. I've joined the Books on the Nightstand 12 in '12 Challenge for the year; my 12 for the year will be books from 2011 that I didn't get around to reading last year. In addition, I've also set a goal of 52 books on the year, which works out to one a week. Obviously, I'm already behind that pace...but it's also early in the game. Lethem's The Ecstasy of Influence collects a wide variety of his work, mainly non-fiction in nature, though there are some scattered pieces of fiction throughout. He talks about his brief days at Bennington and short friendships with Donna Tartt and Bret Easton Ellis, an interview he did with Bob Dylan, his thoughts on the book critic James Wood, Philip K. Dick, book reviews, super-heroes, movies, and so m...

This has not been the greatest of weeks. I did finally get some things read, so I'll get a post with actual content up soon. For now, let's get to today's ten... 1. Advance Cassette/Spoon (13) 2. Same Kooks/The Hold Steady (5) 3. You Are A Light/Pavement (5) 4. Mothers Of The Disappeared/U2 (1) 5. Motion Suggests/Pavement (6) 6. Keep Yourself Warm/Frightened Rabbit (4) 7. Frankenstein/Tokyo Police Club (12) 8. Had/Portastatic (3) 9. Towers/Bon Iver (5) 10. Back of My Mind/Matthew Sweet (3)

No other posts this past week because there wasn't much to say. I'm still in the middle of The Ecstasy of Influence and haven't read anything else. I did watch all of Homeland , which was great. No new music or anything like that either. Not much else to say right now, so let's get to today's ten... 1. You Turned My Head Around/Dean & Britta (7) 2. Ester's Day/Guided By Voices (7) 3. When I Was Running Out of Time/Joseph Arthur (3) 4. Buffalo Boots/Luna (3) 5. Stranded/The Walkmen (9) 6. People In The Sky/Sloan (5) 7. Plus Ones/Okkervil River (2) 8. Before It Gets Better/Earlimart (6) 9. Fisher of Men/M. Ward (3) 10. The Abduction of Margaret/The Decemberists (4)

Welcome to 2012 and welcome to the first Sunday Shuffle of the year. I hope everyone had an enjoyable night ringing in the new year. This year will see me finally graduate from college and maybe get a full-time salaried job for the first time. This is also the year where my son will leave middle school behind and start high school. Other than that, who knows what 2012 will bring? I'm looking forward to finding out. One thing I know for certain is that I will continue my Sunday Shuffle posts, where I pull up my iTunes, put it on shuffle mode, and tell you what the first 10 songs are that pop up. Last year this blog was mostly Sunday Shuffle; this year I plan for a wide variety of posts, but more on that at another time. For now, let's get to today's ten... 1. Spaghetti Western/Hoodoo Gurus (3) 2. Territory/Two Hours Traffic (6) 3. "Further Complications."/Jarvis Cocker (3) 4. The Crooked Line/Elvis Costello (5) 5. White Collar Boy/Belle and Sebastian (6) 6...