Top Ten Internet Downloads 1995-2005

CNET, one of the biggest application download sites on the internet recently listed its top ten downloads of the last ten years:

ICQ
Winamp
Firefox
Napster
WinZip
iTunes
Ad-aware
Skype
RealPlayer
Adobe Acrobat Reader
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Poem: Optimism

click image to enlarge

In our tarpaper shacks,
We build crystal dream palaces
To colonize
When our ships come in.
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Oh S**t! - Rehnquist To Retire? - Selecting The Next Chief Justice And Associate Of SCOTUS

Maybe the craziest part of this whole SCOTUS drama is that The President may actually nominate Attorney General Alberto Gonzales despite the massive, and apparently deep opposition from his own right-wing political base. And maybe the next weirdest part is how the Democrats have claimed Justice O'Connor as one of our own. How far we have sunk!


Robert Novak today speculated that

"Conservatives who have spent more than a decade planning for this moment to change the balance of power on the Supreme Court are reeling from blows delivered by two dissimilar political leaders: Edward M. Kennedy and George W. Bush. Sen. Kennedy has succeeded with the news media in establishing a new standard of 'mainstream conservatism' for a justice. President Bush has put forth ''friendship'' as a qualification for being named to the high court.

In the same article, he writes

"Adding to the tension is word from court sources that ailing Chief Justice William Rehnquist also will announce his retirement before the week is over. That would enable Bush to play this game: Name one justice no less conservative than Rehnquist, and name Gonzales, whose past record suggests he would replicate retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on abortion and possibly other social issues. Thus, the present ideological orientation of the court would be unchanged, which would suit the left just fine."

Who knows how all this will play out? Will it help moderate POTUS's choices? Will he buckle on Gonzales? Will he select an old centrist and a young redneck?
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Painting of Caligula

Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur?

Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo. Nemo enim ipsam voluptatem quia voluptas sit aspernatur aut odit aut fugit, sed quia consequuntur magni dolores eos qui ratione voluptatem sequi nesciunt. Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit, sed quia non numquam eius modi tempora incidunt ut labore et dolore magnam aliquam quaerat voluptatem. Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur? Quis autem vel eum iure reprehenderit qui in ea voluptate velit esse quam nihil molestiae consequatur, vel illum qui dolorem eum fugiat quo voluptas nulla pariatur.

Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur? Nemo enim ipsam voluptatem quia voluptas sit aspernatur aut odit aut fugit, sed quia consequuntur magni dolores eos qui ratione voluptatem sequi nesciunt. Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo. Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum. . .

Painting: Grey Alien No. 7

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Another Missing Kid (From The 19th Century)

Click Poster To Enlarge.

This child, abducted in 1894, is said to "have been abducted by an organ grinder[1] and may be touring the country with and collecting pennies for one of this class."


[1]
A musician who plays a hurdy-gurdy[2] and usually performs on the street. In popular images and accounts, the organ grinder is often accompanied by a trained monkey. The kidnapped child appears to have been snatched to perform the monkey's traditional duties.

[2] A musical instrument that makes music by rotation of a cylinder studded with pegs (like the music boxes you may have had when you were a child).

Instructions From The C.I.A.

Here are a couple of panels (translated) from a manual our C.I.A. distributed in Nicaragua.


The C.I.A. encouraged the Contras, and regular folks to rise up against the leftist Sandinista government at any cost. . .even by destroying and destabilizing the country's infrastructure.
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Audioblog - Poem: The Prevaricator

He refurbished each retelling with new locales and personnel,
Variants and permutations to keep it fresh and new.
He turned the truth and the truth chicaned.
Those tall tales soared into the ozone

And came up gasping for air. When he told a whopper,
Great Moby rolled three times in Davy Jones' locker.
He needed a Croy to map whom he told what to
When and why, who they knew he knew and how,

Who had been where, and with whom when
Or why about whom, where and which,
When they knew what and how.
He peddled wholesale lies

When retail truths would sell undiscounted,
Adding loops and conditions
To those overloaded circuits humming
With crazed electrons. Soon enough,

Like a tree in the woods
When no one hears it fall,
A lie is just a mighty wind blowing
With no one to hear it at all.
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Copyright (c) 2005 by Jack Brummet

Big Star Set To Release New Album In August, 2005

Big Star--Alex Chilton and Jody Stephens, together with members since 1993, The Posies' Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer--have a new album set to be released by Rykodisc.

The great British magazine MOJO have this to say:

"...the resulting 12 track disc has a strong collaborative feel-Chilton sings on six trax, the others(Jon and Ken) split the others-that recalls Big Star's debut #1 Record, and production that mines the spontaneous approach of the Sister Lovers sessions. "We've done three studio albums and all three were different from each other," say Jody Stephens. "The new one fits in with that trend". . .More familiar fare comes in the form of Auer's edgy Lady Sweet, which hints at the old Radio City gem Life Is White-Stringfellow's layered Beach Boys pastiche I'll Turn My Back On The Sun and Stephens's Rubber Soul-inspired contributions February's Quiet and Best Chance We'll Ever Have."

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Poem: Perspective

Step back
And the whole machine
Wheels by
In a Gaussian Blur.
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Free Hitler Heads, While They Last

Click image to enlarge

A Long Ten Years Without The Grateful Dead

Jerry Garcia with The Grateful Dead,
Seattle, Friday May 26, 1995.

Click photo to enlarge



In many reviews, people describe 5-26-95 as the last great Dead show, and one of the best of the 90's after the departure of Bruce Hornsby. It's been ten long years since this final Seattle Dead show. After leaving Seattle, they played 25 more times, with their final show on 7-9-95. In this picture from that day, Jerry looks happy, and healthy (angelic almost, with his halo of white hair and beard in the spotlights); he smiled throughout the show. He was in the zone.

Dave Hokit and I went to the Thursday and Friday shows. Thursday, we each brought our oldest children (then ranging from 8 to 10 1/2). Thursday, The Dead played another good set and played one of my favorites, The Wheel, for the last time ever. Friday we hooked up with a show buddy we'd witnessed with some envy the previous night; we merged our commisaries, with us kicking in copious amounts of gin, tonic, bitters and a backpack full of ice we smuggled in. The temperature was in the 80's and I don't think I ever anticipated a show as much in my life. They opened with the sacred trilogy Help-->Slipknot-->Franklin's Tower. Halftime was a frantic, zoo. And it was on to a great second set and encore.

The music lives on. The band still frequently releases selected shows and DVD videos of the band. There are hundreds of stellar shows, and about 2,900 entire shows available for downloading (legitimate and free) on archive.org.

Setlist for 5-26-95: Help On The Way-> Slipknot!-> Franklin's Tower, The Same Thing, Loose Lucy, Eternity*, Don't Ease Me In Scarlet Begonias-> Fire On The Mountain-> Playin' In The Band-> Uncle John's Band-> Drums-> Space-> Easy Answers, Stella Blue-> Good Lovin', Encore: Liberty
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