My Top 5 Songs

OK, my final class for graduate school is...a bear. I am struggling, but persevering. Besides that, things are going OK.  I am feeling good physically - I am working out, not indulging too much in chocolate or sweets (my kryptonite), and taking care of my back.  I have to see a doctor next week for a persistent problem in my throat, though - it's like a cold, but without a sore throat or other symptoms.  I only have a restrictive passageway at times (trouble swallowing food), and phlegm.  Isn't that just sexy?  But it's not a cold or a virus or anything - antibiotics don't work. That's it for now - gotta hit the books. Music.... Late this month, but that's OK. I am pretty sure the monthly Top 5 the way it looks now is how it would have had I updated it at the beginning of February.   Another entry by Mastodon!  This may not be the last one (it is currently the fourth) from the album.  There could be at least one more Top 5er. ...

Things are getting scary across the globe.  Europe is following the same path it did prior to WWII, pretty much.   Maybe not.  But the wave of anti-muslim feeling continues to grow there.  I can't speak for anyone in Europe - I do hope that it's directed toward the asinine extremist terrorists. I always loved the German word for that - "terroristen".  Those people are just crazy.  How can ANY devotion to a religion have you act that way?  I understand the Koran (I don't care how it's properly spelled at this point) is loaded with directives for antagonism against infidels and non-believers in Mohammed and Allah (or something like that).  There are the know-it-alls:  "well, the Bible does that, too".... No, no, it really does not. You can take anything out of context. Or, out of the Old Testament. Show me where Jesus deliberately, explicitly said "yea, kill them", where it was not part of an illustrative fable He was preaching. I am not...

Very late this month.  The chart movements are true to where they would be had the chart been completed at the beginning of this month. School ended - it was a difficult semester. There were A LOT of hours spent trying to complete assignments, tests, and projects.  At the end of it all, I did not complete the final four homeworks - I just was so far behind that I could not get to those chapters.  The final test was BASED ON THOSE CHAPTERS, though - so I was working on the exam as I was seeing the material for the first time. I thought I did very well on the exam.   But...through some misunderstanding that will hopefully be cleared up, the test was not counted (in effect, a ZERO), which killed my grade and gave me a D! This is wrong - I hope to set straight this situation, which is too complex to explain here. Needless to say, I have been under stress waiting for the instructor to get his mind off vacation mode and act on correcting what he thinks is a late exam...

Autumn descends on us. The nights are chilly.  I love this time of year.  I generally do not like winter, but do like autumn and in more recent years, summer.  Spring is tough because its generally rainy, humid, and how do you dress comfortably in those months?   It's cold in the morning and much warmer in the mid-day and afternoon. Yea, that's very interesting - my talking about the weather. I am listening to a posting at The Demoniacal, a website that collects and blogs daily different videos and articles on the paranormal, UFOs, and the like.  The current entry is a podcast where Bob Cranmer is interviewed.  He was a former county commissioner in Pennsylvania, and recently released a book about his family's haunting.  Listening to the guy is startling - he firmly believes this and explains the situations so matter of factly.  Maybe I should mention things in the world that are greater than my stupid little world and my problems...

HAPPY NEW YEAR! I can't allow myself to ramble the same things I said in 2010 and 2011. I had a few ideas about how to express myself here, but after a glance at my 2010 and 2011 January posts, I decided to spare myself the monotony. I'm just lonely, and living an unrewarding life. Don't preach, or give advice. I am simply a miserable person, trapped in this life. It's not my own choice, really. I would like nothing more for contentment and satisfaction, but there is something much more at play here. Who knows exactly what it is. Well, one thing could be that I just let the world (and people) get me down. No, I don't LET that happen, but it does. "Thin-skinned" might be the proper term. So sue me, that is how I am - overly sensitive. I can't help it. Music is everything to me. How someone can take an idea, concept, or just a casual fiddling around and create a song to me is amazing. Lately I've been interested in Tool, even though back in the da...