iTunes Song List

A few weeks ago, I chatted with John Lehmann in San Francisco and asked him to forward me some music that I hadn't heard or that he thought I might like to hear. It was nice that he took the time to do this and the list looked interesting; whilst I had some of the singers, I had none of the tracks.

"Good", I thought, "I'll just hit the purchase button and away I go".

No such luck. The songlist was locked. Apparently.

Ok, so let's load them one at a time. This song is not available in the UK. Huh?

Ok, so I searched for each track in the iTunes music store (on the way I learnt that if you copy the list in iTunes, you can paste it into an Excel spreadsheet). I could find all of them but two. They were 79p a track, not 99p as per John's list. Go figure. I downloaded each track by hand, got them onto my iPod and listened. I'll be buying/uploading more (probably Nick Drake and Tim Buckley).

This technology nearly works but it's still impressive. I like technology that let's humans be human. I remember swapping albums with my friends years ago. That's how come I love Dylan's Desire and Steely Dan's Pretzel Logic.

Now all I need to figure out is how to get First Girl I Loved (Incredible String Band) and Morning Glory (Blood, Sweat and Tears).

Another 'cache

We found another geocache today - lots of people have asked what they look like, so here's a picture. We've pretty much run out of ones that are within a mile or two of our house.

On another topic, I followed a Mac pointer to SlamChannel.com (the storyline I followed was all about a fire that destroyed all their equipment but when they dried out the G5, it worked). Seems Austin is even more of a groovy place than I thought - must see some Slam Poetry next time I'm there.

The First Cut is the Deepest

MTP Blues

muffled sounds
make no sense:
tele-confer-ence

Dilbert

Flying home

Here we are in the Virgin Lounge at San Francisco airport about to fly home. Brian's eating noodles.

Gold Dust Lounge, Powell Street

We spotted this bar yesterday. Seedy enough to be interesting. Tonight on the way back from somewhere on the edge of the 'tenderloin' we dropped in and lovely little three piece band (drums, electric guitar and keyboards) were playing.

Parc 55

The view from my hotel window - a bit misleading as it was so early in the morning; the week was gloriously sunny with blue skies.

Thai with Rod

ESCW is not actually open yet - this is a record for Rod and I.

Flying With a Hangover

Spent last night out with Gill, Fiona and Derek. We had a nice Thai meal followed by the theatre (a box at Windsor again) and back to their house. It was Gill's turn to drive. I did the usual drink a pint of water trick before falling asleep but woke hungover. Still, I was all ready for the taxi at 8.15am to the airport. I slept for the first hours of the flight (to San Francisco) and woke feeling very dodgy. Drank more water and felt ok. I think that I'll avoid flying with hangovers in future. Good night out though.

Before Flying

Spending a few minutes playing, waiting for the taxi to pick me up to go to the airport (and San Francisco).

I spent yesterday scanning in photographs from the kid's baby photo albums. Boy that was yesterday and a long time ago (1988 and 1990). Here's one that caught my eye. They're still here, at home, but I miss them as children. I'd give a lot to go back in time and have a cuddle with them at this age. Growing old sucks.