Author: Mike P. Lewis

Downtown Owl

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There’s a new novel by Chuck Klosterman who as many of you know is one of my favorite writers.  While his past 4 books were all non-fiction, this new book, called Downtown Owl, is a fiction novel that takes place in 1983 North Dakota.

I think it’s a pretty good book and it definitely captured my attention. My big issue with the book is that it’s all description and details. There is very little interaction or plot.  It’s a 300 page summary of a time and people in North Dakota with some interesting anecdotes.  It’s funny, witty and well-written but it’s not necessarily a story.

That said, it’s very Klosterman-ish and has some great elements.  As usual he explores deeply the frivolous. There are entire chapters about a theoretical fight  between a hulking giant of a boy named Grendal and a smaller, wrong-side of the tracks type kid name Cubby who loves to fight.  With a typical Klostermanish metaphor, the scenario is more than just a “who would win” but a nice little metaphor for what you believe in the world.  Do traits like physical appearance or genes win out in our world or will characteristics like desire and passion?  Peolpe will lean different ways and that debate is by far the best part of the book.

One thing i really like is how he sets up the small town feel.   One character in high school relates Owl to the book 1984 – the Orwell book his class was assigned saying:

“Everyone knew everything. So how was ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ a dystopia? It seemed ordinary. What was so unusual about everyone knowing all the same things?”

“People always say that nothing changes in a small town, but — whenever they say that — they usually mean that nothing changes figuratively. The truth is that nothing changes literally: It’s always all the same people, doing all the same things.”

Discussing the differnce between literal thoughts and figurative is something Chuck loves to do.  He’s typically done it with popular culture but in Downtown Owl he does it with a 1980’s North Dakota town.  And it makes for a pretty fun read

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Music lessons from Seth

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Speaking of music (my last post was), a good blog post from Seth Godin about music lessons. To read it all, go here. The main points were:

0. The new thing is never as good as the old thing, at least right now.
Soon, the new thing will be better than the old thing will be. But if you wait until then, it’s going to be too late. Feel free to wax nostalgic about the old thing, but don’t fool yourself into believing it’s going to be here forever. It won’t.

1. Past performance is no guarantee of future success
Every single industry changes and, eventually, fades. Just because you made money doing something a certain way yesterday, there’s no reason to believe you’ll succeed at it tomorrow.

The music business had a spectacular run alongside the baby boomers. Starting with the Beatles and Dylan, they just kept minting money. The co-incidence of expanding purchasing power of teens along with the birth of rock, the invention of the transistor and changing social mores meant a long, long growth curve.

As a result, the music business built huge systems. They created top-heavy organizations, dedicated superstores, a loss-leader touring industry, extraordinarily high profit margins, MTV and more. It was a well-greased system, but the key question: why did it deserve to last forever?

It didn’t. Yours doesn’t either. Continue reading “Music lessons from Seth” →

What are the top albums of 2007?

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Do you know what the top 10 albums of 2007 were?  Seven years ago the top 10 included ‘N Sync, Eminem, Britney Spears, Creed, Nelly, Backstreet Boys, and Destiny’s Child.  These are all mainstream pop stars that everyone’s heard of and everyone knew that everyone was listening to this stuff.  Last year’s top albums were:

  1. “Noel”/Josh Groban: 3,699,000
  2. “Soundtrack”/ High School Musical 2: 2,957,000
  3. “Long Road Out of Eden”/Eagles: 2,608,000
  4. “As I Am”/Alicia Keys: 2,543,000
  5. “Daughtry”/Daughtry: 2,497,000
  6. “Soundtrack”/Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley: 2,489,000
  7. “Minutes To Midnight”/Linkin Park: 2,099,000
  8. “Dutchess”/Fergie: 2,064,000
  9. “Taylor Swift”/Taylor Swift: 1,951,000
  10. “Graduation”/Kanye West: 1,892,000

In this list there are kids albums (#2 and #6), an album that went straight to Wal-Mart (Eagles), a country album (#9) and an American Idol (#5).  The top album in 2000 sold ~10 million copies.  The top album here had 3.5.  It really is all niches nowadays.  Nobody is going to kill it the way that GNR and the boy bands did.

10 ground rules for women when watching football

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I was hanging out with some girls this weekend who were pretty clueless about the football games going on.  Thus, i thought it’d be a good time to replay an oldie but goodie. Here are The Sports Guy’s 10 Ground Rules for women when watching football with guys.  (i can’t find his link otherwise i’d like to it)

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  1. No PDA.  If you’re allowed to watch with your boyfriend and his buddies, don’t rub his head, don’t kiss his neck, don’t scratch his back, don’t cuddle…don’t do any of that stuff.  By the way, the only thing that makes guys more uncomfortable than public affection is fighting, so if you feel the need to re-enact the limo scene from “What’s Love Got to Do With It,” do it on your own time
  2. There isn’t a single acceptable situation for the question “Is this game almost over yet?”  Not one.
  3. When you boyfriend’s buddy calls to discuss a game in progress, don’t shake your head and definitely don’t mutter spine-crumbling comments like “God, I hate your voice when you’re talking to your friends.”  Needless phone calls are a crucial part of the viewing experience.  They remind us we aren’t the only ones wasting our Sundays.  So leave us alone
  4. Don’t complain about incessant remote-control flipping on Sunday.  We know when to flip and we where we’re going.  In’s an innate gift.  And we do it for a reason: We’re trying to catch as much football as possible.  Consider yourself lucky to be along for the ride
  5. Laugh at our jokes.  Just pretend you’re the bandleader on “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno.  Guys are easy.  If someone’s laughing with us, we like having them around
  6. Don’t belittle our gambling or fantasy football.  Comments like “You have a bookie?,” or “I can’t believe you guys pick players and pretend you’re the coach,” or, my personal favorite, “You guys need to get a life” are all guaranteed to make us hate you
  7. We’re easily bribable, so bring something…even if it’s a bag of chips.  If you cook something, even better (Rice Krispies Treats are always a winner)
  8. Corollary: Whenever you get up, ask, “Can I get anyone anything?” Makes us feel like manly men. Plus, we don’t have to get up
  9. Know your stuff.  the moment you say something like, “Wait, I thought Drew Bledsoe was on the Patriots,” you might as well put a bag over your head. If you’re clueless, keep it rudimentary observations like “That was an unbelievable catch” or “This announcer is annoying.”  Never say, “Jon Gruden’s so cute. He looks just like my old high school boyfriend!” Save that for the next “American Idol.”
  10. Along those same lines, an understated approach may just win our eternal respect.  A few years ago, i was in Vermont with some friends.  On a Sunday afternoon, while the boys were watching the Steelers, the girls returned from the slopes with their adorable ski bunny friend (the one who caused us to jostle in our seats to sneak peeks when she wasn’t looking).  The ski bunny notices the game, sits down and asks, “What’s the score?” Typical girl question (right up there with “Who’s playing?”), but since she was cute, we threw her a bone and gave her the score.  Then, she drops this one on us: “How come Tomczak’s in the game? Did O’Donnell get hurt?”     Nobody said anything. We did a collective quadruple take, eyes bulging out of our heads like Marty Mornhinweg.  We were floored.  Finally i answered: “Yeah, he’s hurt.  By the way, my name’s Bill.  Will you marry me?”   Turned out she had a boyfriend.  The great ones always do

Afoot and Light-hearted for the New Year

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The poet Billy Collins once observed that all babies are born with a knowledge of poetry, because the lub-dub of the mother’s heart is in iambic meter. Then, Collins said, life slowly starts to choke the poetry out of us. This it too bad. With that in mind, i thought i’d post one of my favorite poems that i like to read at the beginning of every new year. It’s Walt Whitman’s Song of the Open Road:

AFOOT and light-hearted I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.

Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms,
Strong and content I travel the open road.

Continue reading “Afoot and Light-hearted for the New Year” →

Steve Martin's Standup Life

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I got Steve Martin’s new book Born Standing Up: A Comic’s Life for Christmas and plowed through it in 2 days. It is a good quick read about Steve Martin’s early life and standup career. The most interesting part for me was hearing about how hard he worked at developing his craft. He did a routine 4 times a day, 5 days a week while also attending college. He is a very smart guy and spent every waking minute from age 18-30 working on his material and trying to get better. While doing this, he became known in the industry and used those connections to eventually “make it.” Performing on stage (magic and comedy) was a passion for him and he consumed it wholeheartedly. It’s no wonder he became successful. It’s the same with any profession. If you live it and breathe it and work intelligently on it, you’ll be successful and this book is just another example of that.

I never knew Steve Martin during his standup days, but apparently he was incredibly popular – selling out arenas of 40,000 people at his peak. I was exposed to him only after he had moved on to movies (The Jerk, Father of the Bride, etc.). Towards the end of his standup career, he described how the success was bittersweet, isolating and resulted a less enjoyable life. It’s too bad that this is often the case for the uber-famous. It sounds exhausting. For better or worse, i’ll never have this problem but i can certainly sympathize with him as it does sound like a big pain in the ass. He does write, “Many celebrities are ridiculed for wanted fame only when it is convenient for them and not any other time. This is absolutely true.”

It’s a good book and recommend it to anyone who likes Steve Martin or standup.

Caffeine No Longer Required

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Sell your stock in Starbucks everyone – here’s an article in Wired about a new drug that removes sleepiness. You snort a brain chemical and it removes the effects of lack of sleep.  It’s working in monkeys but may not be on the shelves in the US for another decade.    I can’t wait!

The article:

Snorting a Brain Chemical Could Replace Sleep

In what sounds like a dream for millions of tired coffee drinkers, Darpa-funded scientists might have found a drug that will eliminate sleepiness.

A nasal spray containing a naturally occurring brain hormone called orexin A reversed the effects of sleep deprivation in monkeys, allowing them to perform like well-rested monkeys on cognitive tests. The discovery’s first application will probably be in treatment of the severe sleep disorder narcolepsy.

The treatment is “a totally new route for increasing arousal, and the new study shows it to be relatively benign,” said Jerome Siegel, a professor of psychiatry at UCLA and a co-author of the paper. “It reduces sleepiness without causing edginess.”

Continue reading “Caffeine No Longer Required” →

Cities of 2007

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I was just reading these two blog (here and here) posts about where people have been this year. I thougtht i’d take a moment at look at my travels in ’07. Here’s what i did (below). Not too shabby. I hope to put some new cities on the list in ’08.

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  • Minneapolis, MN
  • Chicago, IL
  • Key Largo, FL
  • Boston, MA
  • Washington, DC
  • Philadelphia, PA
  • Pocono Lake, PA
  • Westerly, RI
  • New York, NY
  • San Francisco, CA
  • Los Angeles, CA
  • Denver, CO
  • Las Vegas, NV

International Cities:

  • Bucharest, Romania
  • Targu Mures, Romania
  • Budapest, Hungary
  • Vienna, Austria
  • Athens, Greece
  • Tréguier, France
  • Mykonos, Greece

Animals at a strip club – crazy video

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Saw another video that was sent to me via VSL and it is indeed worth a view.  It’s an Orangina commerical which has a bear and deer involved in a seductive dance that spirals into an all out stripper montage with animals throughout the jungle.  I don’t really know what to say

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=kHA9Ig7HOGA]