I ate too much garlic hummus and celery at lunch and my breath smells. Also, I just looked in the mirror, and my dumb long hair and glasses make me look like a scary mad scientist.

In other news:

The new Neil Young is glorious.

Also.

I listened to the new Pearl Jam streaming on aol music. It's pretty good, but, more importantly, it gave me a great idea. I'm going to start a Pearl Jam cover band. Not really a cover band, more of a cover solo-act. I'll do all acoustic guitar versions of Pearl Jam rockers. And I'll call myself Pearl Jim.

See you in the Billboard Top Ten suckers!

What a whirlwind of a trip. Whirled wind. World wind. World wine. Let me tell you something. The Hamilton's are two fantastic people. Diamonds in the rough. God-sends. Two true friends. If you get the hankering, I highly recommend making the trek out there. They are definitely worth it.

I would walk 500 miles, and I would wallk 500 more just to be the man who walked 1,000 miles to fall down at your door

I feel like we're still trying to recouperate. (L. is passed out on the couch as we speak... or type) My brain doesn't seem to be functioning properly, but I will relay this little anecdote.

Andrew has developed a strange and hilarious rivalry with a neighborhood squirrel. This fellow (or f%#&ing varmint, as he would call him) has taken to digging in the family potted plants and uprooting the rosemary, cacti, et al. Every morning when we walked out of the house, A. would catch the little rascal digging and begin swearing under his breath. This, of course, did nothing to hinder the squirrel-intentions (squirrels don't speak english and definitely not anything as vulgar as what came out of A.'s mouth) and the whole thing seemed to escalate to an almost Caddyshack-esque battle by the end of the weekend.

Lucky for both parties, A & A will soon be moving in to their beautiful new house (jealous) in their beautiful city (boise:jealous) but this is fitting, because they are two beautiful people. Here's to you guys. Thanks for being our friends.

Classes are done. Work is done (for one). Album is done. Websites are done (mostly).

We're off to Yosemite for some fishing and relaxing. Then we head to visit these two beautiful hiding friends.

Let the celebration begin!

Recently, Momma 1 and Momma 2 have both found the blog. While Momma 1 is being discreet and hasn't mentioned it yet, Momma 2 sent us an e-mail saying how much she enjoyed it. She thought it would be a great way to hear information about us, and "get to know my son-in-law a little better." However, she was confused by a lot of the "darker sentences that didn't really make sense."

We love you Momma 2, so here's some straight ahead list-based information I've been thinking about lately.

So, in no particular order:

Things That I Would Like to Do Before I Die
{items with lines through them have been completed}
1. Go to the Kentucky Derby
2. Live on a farm
3. Travel cross-country in an RV
4. Go sky diving
5. Learn how to fly a plane
6. Speak at least 3 languages fluently
7. Get my master's degree
8. Have children
9. Go on tour with a band
10. Perform in front of a crowd in the tens of thousands
11. Perform on Saturday Night Live
12. Act in a movie, tv show, or commercial
13. See a bull fight (preferably in Spain)
14. Live in a foreign country for at least a year
15. Visit every major league ball park in the United States
16. Go with Mike Sycz to a premium batting cage in Glendale soon

That's all I can think of for now. We hope that was informative for everybody. As the years go by, we'll scratch off those we complete and add those we can think of. We suggest you do the same. In fact, go ahead and start by doing a short list in the comments if you feel like it. That would be fun for the whole family. Adios.

Do you remeber these things? I had one of the smaller ones that only held 10 cassettes, but I remember friends who had the bohemoth 20 or 30 cassette ones, and I was so jealous. 30 tapes! That was twice as many tapes as I even owned. Imagine the hours to be spent in musical pleasure with 30 glorious tapes!

Then, around 5th grade, my dad got a portable CD player. Portable CD Player! It was fantastic. It weighed only 5 pounds. It hardly ever skipped thanks to the giant black caddy with its somewhat effective shocks. And not only that, but with his 50 disc CD case, the musical euphoria was virtually endless.

Fewer than 10 years ago, when I got my first car, I was one of only three people I knew who had am in-dash CD player.

My how times change. Now everyone has music at the tips of their fingers. Our pre-teen cousins Chase and Charlie each have their own iPod with thousands of songs. Hundreds of albums. Days of music. Days! I recently "cleaned out" my iTunes music Library and I still have 3.6 days of music. 3.6 days of continuous music! That is insanity! And that's modest compared to some. None of the Shared Libraries I'm connected to at work has fewer than 5 days of music. The largest has almost 16! 16 days of nonstop music! Pretty soon, all the music in the world at your fingertips.

Speaking of all music: All Music Guide my favorite site for research and general music nerd trivia fodder got a little redesign today. Check it out.

The future is now!

Incredible Machines!

2 - ah ah ah

2 Websites down, 2 to go.

Visit the new timmycurran.net

and, while you're at it buy Timmy's EP for 6 bucks.

6 - ah ah ah

and, while you're at that

5- ah ah ah

put 5 dollars in the piggy bank for Mouse & the Billionaire's {our} debut EP Begrimed & Blinking available for purchase on-line shortly.

Counting is fun!

Lately, we've been enjoying some minty summer refreshment. Our huge crop of mint is fueling many a Julep. I like to think of it as gentleman's drink. A southern gentleman at that. A drink Walker Percy would have liked. A perfect drink for sitting on a porch on a hot day and talking for a few hours.

Some history: Julep probably comes from the Arabic drink "julab" that was made with water and rose petals. When it was introduced in the Mediterranean, many people substituted the rose petals for the more popular mint leaves, and we can thank the American South (particularly the Kentuckians) for adding their bourbon to the drink. {side note: Apparently these first juleps were often imbibed in the morning (like coffee) - for a quick pick-me-up (also like coffee) hence the aptly named Early Times brand of bourbon}

Here's some more history for you.

Most recipes are for large quantities of Julep(s), so here's a self-invented recipe for a good one-off Julep.

2 shots of kentucky bourbon (not scotch, you traitor)
handful fresh mint leaves (washed lightly)
splash of bitters
1 tablespoon water
2 tablespoons sugar

Heat the water and sugar in a small pan until the sugar disolves.
Remove syrup mixture from heat and pour into a glass.
Chop mint leaves and add to glass.
Crush mint leaves in the bottom of the glass with the back of a spoon
Add bourbon and bitters, cover and chill in the fridge for an hour or so.
Add crushed ice.
Garnish with a sprig of mint.
Put on a white suit.
Sit on a wrap-around porch.
Drink and talk about the weather.

Enjoy!

One website and one album down. Three websties to go. After that we get to go visit the Hamilton's in Idaho-land. I'm looking forward to vacation-time with no work to do (though to be honest, I'll probably only finish two of the three websites. The soon-to-be-unveiled mouseandthebillionaire.com will more-than-likely be finished later.)

Three cheers to Cold War Kids for inviting us to dinner in San Diego on Wednesday, only to follow it up by rocking us so skillfully at the Casbah. And another 400 cheers for every song on their fantastic new EPs, but especially Saint John from the Up in Rags EP which will definitely be included on April's Mouse and the Mixtape.

That is all for now. We'll try to be a little more prolific. Thanks for the patience.

Play Ball

Great new commercial. Really speaks to the environmentaly minded.

via