hello all, it's been ages. what's the word? it's thunderbird. I know that, I was just making conversation. anyway... don't despair, todd herrmann. I had your exact job at the university of maryland many moons ago. this kind of thing will put hair on your chest. worked for me. if I'm not mistaken and the job hasn't changed too much, aren't you pretty much the mailmeister for the dorm? no time for crying over music differences when you've got that much power. it would be a damn shame if chickyboom lost her keys and that care package full of sweets and money from mom and dad in the same week, wouldn't it? back in my days at university, when dinosaurs regularly hogged the front row at the hoff's midnight flick, the mail system there was incredibly reliable. I once wrote a friend's address on a sock with a magic marker and dropped it in the mail just to see if they'd send it. I was not disappointed. oh the stories I could tell! christopher told us about his good friend robin williams. I have that kind of relationship with steve buscemi and steve martin, both of whom I've yet to meet. so I've never had my picture taken with them, but in one of my many many spy dreams steve martin and I were being chased by the baddies, and while hiding underwater in a swimming pool together, he asked me to marry him. imagine my involuntary giddiness when I watched that omnibus on him the other night and found out he's single again! alas, I'm not. doesn't that just figure? our timing's always off, me and steve. we're like two ships. the lambchop and pet sounds box set stuff on the soundtrack of that show helped check my spiral into depression. I'm with trousers, the royle family is indeed fantastic. sometimes I can't make out immediately what ricky tomlinson's saying. on this week's show I'm sure I heard him exclaim 'mick cooke's grazing in the grass, my ass.' he's not wrong. that fabulous song was originally made hugely popular by hugh masekela in 1968, it's sold millions of copies. in 1969, the friends of distinction did a cover of it that stayed in the charts for weeks, adding crazy groovy words, like 'grazin' in the grass is a gas baby can you dig it!' this version with lyrics is the one I'd really love to hear mick and friends do. can I get a witness? to kick off october, the hubby and I went to audition a chi-chi turntable at a hi-fi store yesterday afternoon. after the salesman doesn't recognize the records you bring (what!? no hotel california? good god man, where's the pink floyd?) you get to sit in a big room by yourselves. there's a big black leather couch, a coffee table with a bigass bowl of mints on it, and a door with windows so the salesguy can keep an eye on you and his overpriced stuff. and way up there ahead of you sits a turntable and an amp and some speakers, apparently at the optimum distance away to hear it all perfectly if you're sitting exactly in the middle of the couch (knowledge that will come in handy if mike and I ever move to a park or a large auditorium). the stylus cartridge alone was £800, which doesn't really meet my needs. after a boozy night out sometimes I need to drop the needle on the mat a couple of times before actually finding the edge of the record. naturally we took along some of our favorite records. we listened to 'ease your feet into the sea' really fucking loud and then that thing happened where everything was perfect and right in the world, and I said to myself, self, you should post to the list that brought you and the hubby together in the first place and introduced you to lovely and hilarious people and paved the way for you to have that sexy dream about peter miller. awwwww. and then someone, I'm not naming names, ruined the mood by putting a 15-year-old seven inch on by everyone's favorite Effeminate Futurists. From The Eighties. the salesguy, not passing up his only opportunity to bond, stormed in with an excited 'hey I have this album!' our makeout session on the big black couch was over, just like that. next week: we test-drive a porsche armed only with a fourth generation tape copy of tigermilk! I'll let you know how it sounds. xopam +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the reborn Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". WWW: http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "jelly-filled danishes" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+