PSA: William J. Vader III is born.

That's right, everybody: I basically have a new computer.

I say basically because in terms of externalia, William J. is the same compu-box (Toshiba Satellite Some-Numbers) I've been using for the last year and a half; but after a thorough-going repair and restore (or "store," since William J. II was always running Vista, and therefore was never fully "with it" to begin with) project run by my very own Prince Certainpersonio, William J. Vader II ceased to be in any relevant sense, and has given way to William J. Vader III, complete with Windows 7 and a new (much bigger) hard drive.

William III, I have to say, is probably the best William yet. He's faster and more capable of getting things done -- in part because my old tagalong/whiner/two-years-expired Norton antivirus is now completely gone and doesn't interrupt everything I try to do (including making formatting changes on a Word document) -- and actually seems significantly friendlier than the old, irascible William.

The end result is that I can now do things like save documents and download pictures from my camera, which may then be put on my blog.

And we all have P.C. to thank...or blame.

Huzzah.

Local Trivia: In which I become obsessed with headstones (predictably)

Lately I've been touring cemeteries in search of letterboxes related to some actual, practical artisans of colonial times -- that is, the guys who carved the lunettes at the tops of colonial (and post-colonial) tombstones.

One letterboxer in particular includes in the clues a side-trip through the old cemeteries he plants his stamps in, to view the work (gravestone-carving work) of particular artisans, and tells you a bit about each artist in the process. It's that combination of historical detail and actual, real-life experience (of the art, in this case) that makes for grade A letterboxing, in my opinion.

That letterboxer has definitely piqued my interest in wandering through ye olde cemeteries -- if you're the morose, Byronic sort, you might also get a kick out of this kind of stuff (a kick into the wind, that is, in reaction to the futility of life and the meaningless of passion and emotion in the face of that futility -- and yet you can't NOT kick, because what if some attractive women are watching, and how will they know you're thinking such deep thoughts otherwise: a Byronic kick, in other words), and so I offer you a bit of tids here. (Not just one tidbit, but a few.)

A lunette is the semi-circular part of the tops of vertical tombstones. (See more info on the parts of gravestones here.) You can see an example of an hourglass lunette here (because I took this picture of it):


This stone is from Mount Feake Cemetery in Waltham, MA and memorialized George Barker Pope and Sarah Mason Pope, both born in 1842. I'm planning on putting a letterbox version of this image nearby in the cemetery, as part of my letterboxing internship. (More on that later.)

This particular stone, as a(nother) clever blogger better informed than me pointed out, is somewhat rare, as the winged hourglass usually shows up as part of the lunette image but not the entire thing. I was less impressed with the rarity when I found that it was, like the stone mentioned by said other clever blogger, not a colonial-era stone, but crafted in the early twentieth century in a "colonial revival" age of tombstonery. (Sarah died in 1929, George in 1899.)

On the other hand, this stone and others like it, with that old-tyme-but-updated feel, certainly seems better to me than some of the contemporary gravestones I've seen: one shaped like a snare drum, one with a VW Beetle carved in relief, one with a long-haired guitar player depicted on the top. It's a bit like seeing a graveyard for hippies, but more "camp" than that.

At any rate, I imagine in 200 years someone's going to come across the long-haired guitarist, or the VW stone, and feel they've won the jackpot of tombstones. I wish I could know whether people in the early 1900's thought the "colonial revival" stones seemed pretentious and tacky.

In the meantime, I might wander Byronically around local cemeteries, seeming (but not being) pretentious and tacky.

Local Trivia: Behold the unicorns!

In search of my "Goodwill items" from a nearby city's Goodwill last week -- that is, the items I'll make stamps of, which will be planted near the Goodwill store I got said items from -- I hit the motherlode.

That's right.

Unicorns.

Not just any unicorns, though: these two identical unicorns, painted on a slant, on mirrors, by a surprisingly talented artist, are simultaneously reminiscent of The Last Unicorn (for those of you who wept at this movie when it was televised in the late 80's) and Charlie the unicorn on his way to Candy Mountain. (To those who wonder how I could have bought these, therefore, I say "Shun the nonbeliever. Shunnnnnnn.")

The first one is obviously an ode to that candy mountain: I call it "happy unicorn."

The second I call, for I think equally obvious reasons, "unicorn in Mordor."

Awesome.

PSA: No time for cameras, we'll use our eyes instead.

P.C. and I, after inexplicably missing Friday's show in New Haven, are going to see Matt & Kim tonight in Rhode Island.

Huzzah! I love going to see Matt & Kim in other states, as you may recall.

I also love it when they have new albums, and though I'm not sure how they could top Grand in terms of albums I loved to hear was out and loved to hear in general, Sidewalks seems like a pretty good next album. The "single," if such a thing exists for the indie scene, appears to be "Cameras," which nicely epitomizes both the hipster-indie aesthetic (and objection to mediation) and the evolution of new-new wave music.

The cover art also lends itself very nicely to carving into a stamp -- say, a commemorative stamp of the going-to-the-show, perhaps to be planted in Rhode Island.

Go listen to the video and be jealous of us.

Local Trivia: Welcome to 4:30 at night

Well, Daylight Savings time shenanigans have hit us again, leaving southern New-Englanders in the dark starting at around 4:30 p.m.

I know it's coming every time, but it's always a strange and confusing experience to look out into the pitch black and then look at the clock and realize it's not even dinner time yet. It's made all the more poignant this year by my letterboxing-related desire to be outside during daylight: darnitol, you Daylight Savings and your time changes, you are messing up my schedule -- and it wasn't that awesome to begin with.

In related news, I wonder if the 9:30 club in D.C. changes its name to "The 8:30 Club" for this portion of the year. Probably not, but I think they should consider it.

Local Trivia: Nutmeg-related crisis!

No, the crisis is not a lack of nutmeg, the spice -- after all, I mistakenly bought a second little jar of that last year, even though I'd never used or opened the first one -- but rather a lack of Nutmeg, the local cable access TV station.

It turns out that when I got the internship position I need to graduate this term at Nutmeg TV, that it didn't really exist; it was being granted to me by someone who didn't have the authority to make that decision; the staff member who hired me was fired soon after and left no records of the interview or his agreement to take me on as intern; and it's impossible to do the internship anyway because the station is shut down while they move to a new office. The move won't be finished until mid-December, which is exactly when my term ends.

I found this out today because I emailed said staff member last week asking when I could begin my internship, and indicating that this week would be a good time for me to start.

I have about four weeks to cram in 100 hours of required interning time. And I have no place to cram it.

I've sent frazzled emails to everyone I know who could possibly be or have a media contact; since my focus is on visual studies, it would be nice to intern at a TV station (which is exactly what I was thinking when I sent my resume to Nutmeg).

But at this point, I'm gonna take whatever I can get.

Suggestions are welcome.