Everybody tells me this is crazy; yes, I know it.

I should be marking. But, updating the neglected blog with random crap is a better option right now.

1) I came across the new Neko Case single "People Got A Lotta Nerve" this weekend. It's all sorts of awesome. You can download it here: http://www.anti.com/media/download/708

I also like the cover art for the single.


I also like that there are two Neko tour dates in April. Can't decide on whether I want to see her on a Friday night or a Saturday night. Decisions, decisions. (Edit: after consultation with my probable-Neko buddy, I went with the Saturday night option.)

2) I got front row tickets to see The Joel Plaskett Emergency at Massey Hall in May. I'm very psyched about that. Also, they are releasing a triple (!) album in March.

3) Right now two of my new year's resolutions are going well. One involves me doing a little bit of scheming, and the second one is reading 52 books in 2009. I'm on book #5. Book #4 was amazing; I read it in less than 24 hours.

That book was "The Bookseller of Kabul" by Asne Seierstad (as you can no doubt see from my side-bar). It's about a family that a journalist lives with in post-Taliban Afghanistan. One of the passages that really stood out to me was a description of a math problem from a Taliban-era textbook:

"Litte Omar has a Kalashnikov with three magazines. There are twenty bullets in each magazine. He uses two thirds of the bullets and kills sixty infidels. How many infidels does he kill with each bullet?"

Not only was I obviously appalled by the context and content of the problem, but I never thought that you could kill more than one person with a single bullet. (Of course I did the math; I got 1.5 infidels/bullet as my answer.)

One thing I love about reading is that you can go on so many different journeys with every book that you read. I had read Khaled Hosseini's "One Thousand Splendid Suns" late last year, and it also takes place in Afghanistan. In books about Afghanistan, I am always struck by the lack of control (before, during, and after the Taliban) that women have over their own lives. Just the thought of a fifteen year-old girl being forced to become the second-wife of a fifty-year old man makes me incredibly thankful that I was lucky enough to be born in 20th-century North America.

The book I'm currently reading (The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant)takes place in 15th century Florence. The teenaged main character is married off to a forty-five year old man who is having an affair with her older brother. Again, I'm so thankful for the setting of my life.

4) This post was actually started hours ago, and then I was interrupted by visitors, and had to entertain said people and serve them hot beverages. So, no marking got done tonight and I'm prolly gonna get in trouble by the kids for it tomorrow but oh well, they're not the bosses of me. ;)