A little something on Music

On Friday evening Lesley's company had a Christmas party. Some of this was written on the Crackberry during the dancing.

Lesley's employer is having their annual Christmas party and I am writing a Blog entry. I'll be honest, I can't dance without incurring Lesley's wrath, I'm that bad at dancing, and one day I want someone to explain to me why DJs need to jack the volume up past a million decibels when there aren't 40 people on the hardwood. Guys I'm sitting in the next room, a hundred meters from the nearest speaker and this is not the slightest exaggeration, I can feel my gut vibrating in sync with the sub woofer.

While Lesley loves to dance I value my hearing too much, especially since I know I just do not have the ears I had just a few years ago. Getting older is starting to mean getting less functional and I know my hearing is a lot worse than it once was, that is really upsetting for me. I like Mozart's Jupiter Symphony, I like Beethoven's 14'th Piano Sonata (even if it is cliched), I like a lot of more current stuff too, but my point is, I don't want to end up like Beethoven, unable to even appreciate his 9'th Symphony. Beethoven was so deaf that by the time he got to his 5'th Symphony he had the legs of his Piano cut off and he would compose while lying on the floor so he could feel the music with his chest. By Beethoven's 9'th he was completely deaf, according to Wikipiedia: there is a well-attested story that, at the end of the premiere of [Beethoven's] Ninth Symphony, he had to be turned around to see the tumultuous applause of the audience; hearing nothing, he began to weep. I suppose Mozart had it even worse, although he started composing at an incredibly young age, he died, ironically while composing a Requiem Mass just shy of his 36'th birthday.

I figure I still have a lot to listen to and I don't want my ears totally ruined by badly DJd Reggae. In truth I'm not really a big fan of Reggae even at a reasonable volume, its not bad or anything, I just don't like it that much.

The party, (remember what started all this?) was at the Boulevard Club which I had always thought to be some high end country club in the city. As it turns out, well it may be an expensive place, that I would not know, but it is rather run down on the inside. That place had annoyed me for some time, chiefly because the people driving in and out would cut across my favorite bike trail with a certain reckless abandon not appropriate for someone driving across one of the busiest bike trails in the city. The fact that someone, possibly the city, or perhaps the Boulevard Club, had placed numerous barriers to slow us cyclists and skaters down as we approached the driveway did nothing to increase my opinion of that establishment. Now that I have been inside, I don't hate it so much, I feel more sympathy for all the sorry loosers who paid what I am sure is an astronomical initiation fee and now they get to finance some pretty hefty renovations, I just wish they would learn how to drive.

Yesterday, Saturday the 8'th my friend from Rochester came in, as promised he brought me a complete DVD Set of the HBO TV Special, From the Earth to the Moon. Inside was a coupon to a free admission to any IMAX show expires December 31, 2005, oh well! Also to arrive was fresh cat litter, yes I have to import my cat litter from America, the stuff we have in Canada doesn't meet the standard my boys, excuse me, cats, require. (Actually I have an electronic litter cleaner that requires fine grained crystal litter and I just can't find it here in Canada.) Well there I've just devoted too many sentences to cat poop!

My friend, Lesley and I went to see our new house and the doors were locked which was a shame, last time I was inside they were tiling the kitchen and bathrooms. I think this place will be really nice, I just need someone who wants to rent the extra bed rooms. (If you're interested give me a call, or post a response here with a hotmail or some other free mail address and I'll write you back, its about $350~450/month, room includes personal washroom and free high speed Internet, utilities to be split in thirds. Location is Queen and Woodbine.) Of course the place is still under construction and we don't get to close until the end of March, but given how lousy the weather's been lately its probably for the best.

This morning I went to Scooters after all, Sigrid (see Sigrid Ziegler on the blog roll at the right) asked if I could drive her. Up to that point I was sort on the fence about going to Scooters, but I decided it would be nice, since the drive is a lot more pleasant if there is someone to talk to on the way there. I spent the majority of the practice on the inside working on cross overs and turning. Ironically that was probably one of the most productive practices I have ever had. Perhaps because I am just such a lovable kinda guy, or perhaps in return for the ride, actually probably just because it was a decent thing to do Sigrid gave me some really helpful coaching on doing turns. After Sigrid's advice Georg (no blog or web site to my knowledge) commented on the improvement in my technique. So this paragraph is a big shout out to Sigrid.

NASA has scrubbed the launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis (STS 122) until January 2 at the earliest. I wonder what will happens to the astronauts up in the space station. Aren't some of them supposed to return with this Atlantis mission? For all the joys of space travel it must get rather dull being confined to what is little larger than a small apartment for months at a time.