san diego student protests

the english class that i am currently subbing in has 2/3 of the students absent today. most likely it's because these students are out of school protesting a congressional bill that will make it a felony to be an undocumented immigrant. the san diego u-t has an article here.

today i'm at samuel f.b. morse high school, which is located in the skyline neighborhood. the campus can almost be described as lonely because the buzz of a regular school day that i'm used to here has been reduced to a low murmur.

this generation isn't used to group protest, and these times might prove to be an opportunity for excellent teachable moments.

"it's an expression of wealth and power through possession of a material object."

that's what dr. bill osgerby of london metropolitan university said regarding the reason why men like big televisions.

when it comes to remote controls a man owns, dr. osgerby said that they're "phallic accessories," and that they "shore up your sense of manhood."

dr. osgerby's telling it like it is.

apparently there's a wonderlic test. it's a test that's suppose to measure a pro football player's intelligence. interesting. here are a few questions from this wonderlic tool (source signonsandiego.com):

Sample questions

The Wonderlic test contains 50 questions, which get progressively harder. Players have 12 minutes to answer as many as they can. Here are five sample questions:

1. “The eleventh month of the year is: 1) October. 2) May. 3) November. 4) February.”

2. “Familiar is the opposite of: 1) friendly, 2) old, 3) strange, 4) aloof, 5) different.”

3. “Assume the first two statements are true. Is the final one: 1) true, 2) false, 3) not certain?

“Bill is the same age as Mary. Mary is younger than John. Bill is younger than John.”

4. “Are the meanings of the following sentences: 1) similar, 2) contradictory, 3) neither similar nor contradictory?

“It is always well to moor your ship with two anchors. Don't put all of your eggs in one basket.”

5. “In printing an article of 24,000 words, a printer decides to use two sizes of type. Using the larger type, a printed page contains 900 words. Using the smaller type, a page contains 1,200 words. The article is allowed 21 full pages in a magazine. How many pages must be in the smaller type?”

of the many bands i saw at south by, the essex green are one of them that are still stuck in my mind's ear. maybe it was there infectious pop sound? sure it was. so i went to myspace and found their page, and on it is THE song that i liked the most from their performance at the merge/sub pop day party last friday. go to their page and listen to "this isn't farm life."

i just finished reading an article about young african-american men in the united states, and the outlook doesn't appear too promising. let me offer up some stats from the article (source nytimes.com):

• in 2000, 65 percent of black male high school dropouts in their 20's were jobless by 2004, the share had grown to 72 percent, compared with 34 percent of white and 19 percent of Hispanic dropouts
• half of black men in their 20's were jobless in 2004, up from 46 percent in 2000
• by their mid-30's, 6 in 10 black men who had dropped out of school had spent time in prison
• in 1995, 16 percent of black men in their 20's who did not attend college were in jail or prison; by 2004, 21 percent were incarcerated
• in the inner cities, more than half of all black men do not finish high school

south by southwest: the debrief

bands, beer, barbecue

the three b's are definite easy-gets in austin, but it's pushed to the brim during sxsw.

for a first-time visitor, ausin is an amazing musician's playground. stages seem to be everywhere and anywhere. empty lots next to neighborhood bars host mini woodstocks, and the neighbors seem to take it with nary a protest. rockers and rock fans occupy many of the public spaces i visited. sxsw is such a big magnet for touring bands that their vans (ford econolines mosly) are literally everywhere. (it appears that hooking-up a cube trailer on the back of your tour van is a great way to make more room for stretching out in the cabin.) sxsw is diy rock's mardi gras.

lone star and shiner bock are the two most readily available beers in texas. they're not bad, too. they're both light tasting beers that have good flavor. (rock and beer compliment each other.) many bands that play sxsw week receive only beer for their efforts. most, if not all, of the performing bands don't get paid because the amount (and quality) of exposure to new audiences is payment enough. it's almost like an investment into a band's brand marketing that requires no direct cash payout, and that's probably why most bands make the sxsw pilgrimage. lots of cold beer, too.

i liked the barbecue ribs and chicken the best. i ate brisket, too, but beef just doesn't do "it" for me the way smoked ribs and chicken do. texans love their beef, and that's probably why a lot of brisket is served there. barbecue restaurants in austin are as prevalent as taco shops are in san diego. menu prices at these barbecue emporiums are relatively cheap, too. when you leave a bbq restaurant there you take away a certain smokey aroma with you. but if you're into that kind of thing, it's all right.

Pollard at the merge/sub pop day party at sxsw

akimbo (seattle) at the jackolope are up, and jello biafra's hosting

genghis tron's playing now. Hardcore/electronica

The essex green of brooklyn (at merge/sub pop party)

yesterday (night): saw boss martians (not up my alley), the frauds, rob dickinson (formerly of catherine wheel), twilight singers (greg dulli formerly of afghan whigs), the new amsterdams (former member of the get up kids). today (day): the merge record party with bob pollard! tonight? an embarrassment of riches!

Yesterday day: longbranch inn (zine party) saw rye coalition & a few more whose names escape now.

texas chili parlor! real tx chili: no beans with shredded beef. Spicy!

i saw three band that i really liked wednesday night, the first official night of south by. they are meneguar, ex-boyfriends and the rebel. i bought cds from each of them. the rebel are similar to the country teasers.

saw also art brut and the towers of london (both from england)

austin rocks

Die die die at ms bea's, a cool little place here in austin.

my next panel discussion is called "internet resources for musicians." three guys are on the panel and they're mostly talking about the digital delivery systems that have replaced the physical delivery systems of the past (press kits, cds, records, etc.). two of the guys are from emusic.com and cdbaby.com.

Home state

landed in austin around noon. mike and tony picked me up from the airport. had a late lunch at the salt lick. the acutal official shows begin tomorrow evening.

Salt lick is the bbq place

the web site for south by southwest is here. whose there and where they're playing is here (whoa).

read my coverage of sxsw here.

(entry) sippin' tea and waiting for my 6 a.m. taxi pick-up to the airport.

paul krugman wrote this today: "The truth is that everything the new wave of Bush critics has to say was obvious long ago to any commentator who was willing to look at the facts."

in his ny times op/ed piece (sub. required), krugman points out the hypocrisy of former conservative bush lovers (i.e. bruce bartlett) who in the past assailed those of us on the left for speaking out against the bush admin's penchant for untruths, its misguided policies, and their general nastiness. according to krugman: now that these new bush bashers are saying what they're saying, they've become heroes of open-mindedness. 100% bunk.

noam chomsky appeared on robert mcchesney's media matters show last sunday. listen to the one hour conversation, with listener call ins, here (in realaudio).

prof. chomsky, a progressive intellectual and professor of linguistics at mit, talked about the war in iraq, and political issues of import.