i know i'm pretty late jumping on the bandwagon, but is anyone else aware of HOW MUCH ASS the apples in stereo kick? i mean, i've "liked" them for years, but lately i've been getting sort of ...addicted. i don't know why. it just happened. one day, i was fine, listening to mixes and being quite happy, and the next, i wanted to listen to the apples and stereo and nothing else. except sometimes it makes me want to listen to the olivia tremor control, and also the beatles. i can't imagine why.(The pockets in the airthat float and turn and hold the flecks of light,the sound of happinesswill show in motions rendered by the nightand dreams of splintered soundswhich played before you silent as a thought,and you'll remember theseare better than the reasons you had lost. -who DOESN'T love that???)i got that decemberists dvd, and, well, i really don't know what else to say about it without sounding like a groupie. houston is cool. fuck, i can't believe i said that. but it's true. sadly. don't get me wrong, texas still scares the shit out of me in a big way, but i guess that the rougly 10-square mile radius (can you have a squared mile radius? i mean, one's square, one's a circle. whatev.) is pretty cool. i've figured out the best happy hours (1.25 lone stars on sunday, although apparently there's a place on the rice campus that's got .75 cent beers), the cheapest coffee (1.50, which part of me thinks is still too much, but they brew each cup individually, which is sweet), and which music venues kick ass (walter's) and which suck (verizon). there's a GREAT asian art exhibit at one of the museums (free on thursday) and lots of parks to smoke and read a book in. none of this has anything to do with music. go fig.apparently, there's a pretty great local music scene, but we've been a little too broke to get into it yet. there's oktoberfest that's coming up, and some sort of block party with a ton of bands that sounds great, maybe kind of like MAcRock, but without a college (although I heard that next year, JMU's not associated with MAcRock anymore, what's up with that?). On Saturday if I can get off work, we're going to see Okkervil River (for the love of god, SOMEONE has to switch shifts with me). Speaking of work, I am now scooping ice cream and selling rich people cake and $18 bars of chocolate at this would-be-bourgeois place called The Chocolate Bar (guess what they sell), which is mostly okay (Brenda works there too, which is fun). On Thursdays, a really great bluegrass-y band comes in called the Sideshow Tramps, and on Tuesdays there's a jazz band. Last night they were both there for a party and played together and it was great; we smoked before work so I was super-into it. They played Rainy Day Women by Dylan and i was just so instantly pleased. Seriously, they had some crazy instruments (something called a saw that was pretty sweet) and I am officially a fan. It's cool that I'll get to see them every week; they play other shows around town with drums, apparently, so I'll have to catch that. We saw the guitar player at a bar after we got off work and he said they're playing at the block party thing, so I have to get off work. okay, damn, this is long.