MAY DAY! MAY DAY!

Hey you kids, stop playing with my Maypole!

And this morning I learned that the term “May Day” when used as a call for help has nothing to do with May 1st, but instead comes from a similar sounding French phrase for “Help me.” The more you know…

Manchester Orchestra Once Again Strikes The Right Chord With Me
I’ll admit it, I’ve been a fan of Manchester Orchestra since first hearing their EP “You Brainstorm, I Brainstorm, But Brilliance Needs A Good Editor.” Last week the band released a new record (album, cd, whatever) “Mean Everything To Nothing” and I finally remembered to purchase it this week.

To summarize… I love it. “Mean Everything To Nothing” builds upon the foundation laid with “”You Brainstorm, I Brainstorm, But Brilliance Needs A Good Editor” and their first full-length LP “I’m Like A Virgin Losing A Child.” This record is packed with good rock songs and signature solo pieces from Andy Hull.

You can download “Mean Everything To Nothing” from Amazon for $7.99. Do it!

Oh Hello Creative Loafing, It’s Been A Long Time
Wow, it seems like forever since I picked up a copy of Creative Loafing. When I first moved to Atlanta I would pick up the new edition every week on Wednesday (before they moved publication day to Thursday) and would plan my weekend around it. The rise of the internet produced a decline in my Creative Loafing reading, and my readership declined further when the Loaf declared bankruptcy and reduced its distribution.

As I exited Tin Drum at lunch yesterday the stack of Loafs caught my eye and I grabbed on. I’m looking forward to perusing it this weekend for old time sake.

ITP Flickr Pic
While walking around the Inman Park Festival I noticed this shoe sitting in the street.

Shot blind with the camera resting on the ground.

Question: In looking at the shot I’m wondering if I should have removed the stick. Would you have?

RealiTV Update: Hell’s Kitchen – “We Polled One Hundred Chefs And, According To Them, You Suck”
Down to the Final Three on Hell’s Kitchen? CUE THE FAMILY AND LOVED ONES!!! Boo hoo, I’ve missed you. I’ve been gone for two months, boo hoo. Thankfully their visit was short.

Ramsay reminds the cooks how good they are (lies!) and prepares them for a big challenge. Each chef is to prepare one dish for one hundred distinguished guests. My first guess was that the guest would be Miss America contestants, and then I realized that would only be fifty women. What about bringing in Miss USA candidates? United States Senators aren’t working much, maybe they’ll be the guests? It turns out that the one hundred guest are top chefs (but not Top Chefs) from the Los Angeles area. BOOOOOORING!!! And then I quickly thought “Could we assemble one hundred good chefs in Atlanta?”. After all of the food was served the guests picked the dish they liked best and the one they liked least. Seventy-six percent voted Danny’s dish as the worst, Seventy-six percent voted Paula’s as the best, and the rest voted Andrea off the show — Kidding! Ramsay would do that later. Whoops! Spoiler!. For her victory Paula got a makeover and surprise guest shot on “Good Morning LA” (or some similar godforsaken morning show).

For the elimination challenge the cooks had to take turns running the pass. If you’ve ever watched Hell’s Kitchen before you know that Ramsay instructs his minions to sabotage dishes/orders brought to the pass, so why contestants don’t check everything baffles me. Paula and Danny seemed timid and nervous and had rather weak performances. Andrea went last and messed up a first and then turned into a tyrant; in fact she got so bad that sous chef Scott seemed genuinely pissed at her. Of the three Andrea did the best, but even that wouldn’t save her Swine-Flu-free bacon. Whoops! Spoiler!.

So now we’re down to the Final Two (in case you missed my two spoilers Andrea was booted) and they’ll settle the score next week. Of course I won’t be able to watch next week’s show in real time, so feel free to spoil it for me.

Stats & Goals
Daily
Current Mood – fat
Current Music – listening to yesterday’s “Buzz Out Loud” podcast from C|Net
Website Of The Day – Along the same lines as yesterday’s WOTD I present to you a website that does one thing and does it well. Let’s see if you can guess what d-e-f-i-n-i-t-e-l-y is about before you click the link.
Mode Of Transportation To Work – my car
Exercise (b)Log – nothing

Monthly
Foot Mileage – 0 miles, Wheel Mileage – 0 miles
Consecutive Days Of Bed-Making (Longest Streak) – 1 (1)
Vegetarian Days – 0, Carnivorous Days – 0
Marta Rides – 0

May Goals
Whoops, I didn’t even consider this. Perhaps something will be here on Monday.

2009 Goals
– Reduce my weight to 190 pounds (today’s weight was 199.5 pounds)
– Completely read the book 1001 Paintings You Must See Before You Die
РEarn at least $150 through photography sales in order to cover the cost for the renewal of the Jalape̱o Beach SmugMug account I opened the other day.
– Save $500 for the sole purpose of donating to charitable organizations of my choice
– Attend at least one professional photography workshop

The Unmeasurable
– Continue backing up all data, including the off-site storage
– Become a proficient programmer in Objective-C (iPhone development) and Ruby on Rails (Black Sheep web page concept)
– Do not create a solution for something which is not a problem

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]