Good decade, guys! (expanded)

My favorite 24 albums of the aughts!

I decided to go through my music and find my favorite albums of the past decade. I am usually extremely skeptical of "new" music, and the vast majority of my collection is stuff from the 1970's. In fact, I still tend to view anything after 1989 as "new," but I'm trying. It's strange for me to think that a whole decade has passed, and I wonder how future generations will see the music of this time. Here are twenty-four albums that define the aughts for me.

Enough has been written about these albums, and I'd rather let the music speak for itself. These are in no particular order other than an order I find aesthetically/aurally pleasing.

I don't know exactly how I chose these albums. They had to be albums I considered very, very good. Albums I listened to many times over the course of the years. Albums I could see myself listening to in another ten, twenty years. Albums I listen to all the way through on a regular basis. Stuff like that.

You'll notice multiple entries by Radiohead, Porcupine Tree, and American Music Club. I like these bands, even though they sound virtually nothing alike.

I was surprised to find myself posting two albums by The Decemberists, but there they are. I love both of them. Maybe I hold a special place for The Decemberists because of Rachel, since she introduced me to them. I found The Hazards of Love to be a fitting way to end this mix and this decade, as this was the decade of love and loss and marriage for me, and I finish it walking hand and hand with her after all those troubles of adolescence and youth. It's quite romantic to me.

I hope you enjoy the music! I only chose one track from each album, and I hope you find some good stuff here.

Part 1 of 3:

2000 - Radiohead - Kid A


2009 - Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus


2005 - The Decemberists - Picaresque


2005 - Mindless Self Indulgence - You'll Rebel to Anything


2000 - Grandaddy - The Sophtware Slump


2007 - Yeasayer - All Hours Cymbals


2006 - Clint Mansell - The Fountain Soundtrack


2002 - Peter Gabriel - Up




01 - Radiohead - Kid A - Everything in its Right Place
02 - Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus - Fences
03 - The Decemberists - Picaresque - We Both Go Down Together
04 - Mindless Self Indulgence - You'll Rebel to Anything - Straight to Video
05 - Grandaddy - The Sophtware Slump - Miner at the Dial-A-View
06 - Yeasayer - All Hours Cymbals - Wait for the Summer
07 - Clint Mansell - The Fountain - Together We Will Live Forever
08 - Peter Gabriel - Up - No Way Out


Part 2 of 3:

2002 - Coldplay - A Rush of Blood to the Head


2001 - Spoon - Girls Can Tell


2004 - American Music Club - Love Songs For Patriots


2001 - Tool - Lateralus


2000 - Porcupine Tree - Lightbulb Sun


2004 - Dungen - Panda


2003 - Radiohead - Hail to the Thief


2007 - Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet




09 - Coldplay - A Rush of Blood to the Head - In My Place
10 - Spoon - Girls Can Tell - Me and the Bean
11 - American Music Club - Love Songs for Patriots - Patriot's Heart
12 - Tool - Lateralus - The Patient
13 - Porcupine Tree - Lightbulb Sun - Last Chance to Evacuate Planet Earth Before it is Recycled
14 - Dungen - Ta Det Lungt - Panda
15 - Radiohead - Hail to the Thief - There There (The Boney King of Nowhere)
16 - Porcupine Tree - Fear of a Blank Planet - Way Out of Here

Part 3 of 3:

2008 - The Helio Sequence - Keep Your Eyes Ahead


2008 - American Music Club - The Golden Age


2006 - Midlake - The Trials of Van Occupanther


2003 - Porcupine Tree - In Absentia - Trains


2007 - Radiohead - In Rainbows


2003 - Kenna - New Sacred Cow


2000 - Coldplay - Parachutes


2009 - The Decemberists - The Hazards of Love




17 - The Helio Sequence - Keep Your Eyes Ahead - Lately
18 - American Music Club - The Golden Age - The Decibels and the Little Pills
19 - Midlake - The Trials of Van Occupanther - Head Home
20 - Porcupine Tree - In Absentia - Trains
21 - Radiohead - In Rainbows - Reckoner
22 - Kenna - New Sacred Cow - Sunday After You
23 - Coldplay - Parachutes - Trouble
24 - The Decemberists - The Hazards of Love - The Hazards of Love, pt. 4 (The Drowned)


Year distribution:

I was surprised at how well-rounded this turned out, year wise. Every year of the decade had two or three albums to represent it with the exception of 2000, which had four.

A Note on Coldplay:

I am going to admit that I felt kind of lame for including Coldplay not once, but twice on this list. I really lost interest in Coldplay when X&Y came out. I thought it was snoozefest horrible. I realize people thought this about Parachutes and A Rush of Blood, too, but X&Y was just trite and bland and all the other things Coldplay haters said about Coldplay. So I kind of just wanted to leave Coldplay out of this list all together, but I could not deny the fact that I listened to Parachutes and A Rush of Blood hundreds of times this decade. I discovered them like I did most of these bands: their album cover intrigued me when I walked by the music section of some store. I downloaded some Coldplay tracks off of Kazaa or Limewire or whatever we used in those college freshman days to share music and I really liked Parachutes. In fact, I think I might even still like it more than A Rush of Blood, even though Rush of Blood is probably the better album. Unfortunately, the single for Parachutes was "Yellow," which I always thought was the weakest track on the album. Also, the cover for Parachutes kind of sucks. That's what made it all the harder to include in this list, because there are some really great album covers on here. I feel like I'm not living up to my music-geek-audiophile-hipster standards but liking Coldplay, but I do and I can't lie about it. At least, their first two albums (and a compilation I made of bonus tracks and EP stuff). I tried to get into Viva La Vida or whatever that last one was called, and it just wasn't working for me anymore. I liked Coldplay better when they were just trying to sound like early Radiohead, I guess.

A Note on Other Bands I Didn't Include:

I was also a little reticent to include Tool on here, since I only discovered them relatively recently (thanks to Rachel!). I really like Lateralus, but I probably listened to Audioslave's debut album a lot more this decade. I chose not to include Audioslave because even though I really liked it and listened to it quite a bit, I'm pretty sure Lateralus is just a better album and I don't listen to Audioslave straight through as much anymore. Both their covers are excellent, though, and I'm going to post some album covers of other stuff I wanted to include but didn't.

Like Demon Days by Gorillaz. I must have listened to that about a hundred times. It's a great album, but I just couldn't bring myself to remove one of the above twenty-four to include it. Also, David Gilmour's On An Island. I love this album, but haven't listened to it straight through enough to knock one of those twenty-four off.

Reggie and the Full Effect's Songs Not To Get Married To is also great, but a little uneven and kind of a seasonal thing for me. Now Here is Nowhere by the Secret Machines would have totally gotten a spot if I ever listened to anything after the first three or four songs on it. But those first few tracks are phenomenal. Just haven't gotten around to doing the album straight through.

Oh, and Duncan Sheik's White Limosuine. Really good album, but the cover art was just too crappy and I couldn't bring myself to even post a picture. Great music, though.

Happy New Year, people! Can't wait to see what music this next decade has in store.

Audioslave - Audioslave


David Gilmour - On An Island


Gorillaz - Demon Days


Reggie and the Full Effect - Songs Not to Get Married to


The Secret Machines - Now Here is Nowhere


But I pulled you, and I called you here,
And I caught you, and I brought you here.
These hazards of love
Never more will trouble us...

People who add "gate" on the ends of certain headlines...

...are idiots. For instance, the cringe-inducing headline, "climate-gate." Apparently someone hacked into the email accounts of a British climate research center, and these candid emails somehow prove climate change is false. The "gate" thing is just... it's done. (It's a tired reference to the Watergate scandal of President Nixon for those don't know.) It's like there's some mass coverup and these emails prove scientists have all been lying to us for some reason.

I don't care what the rest of the world does, but I don't understand why it's so hard to find another Mormon who gets this stuff...



Anyway, I'm no scientist but I understand how to read. While I haven't read the one-thousand or so pilfered e-mails, I trust others who have read them and reported that while they prove scientists can sometimes be smarmy a-holes, they don't disprove climate change. From what I have read it appears that the general consensus amongst the scientific community is that climate change is real, and humans are influencing it.

I'm going to stop right there, because I know that last sentence is already a cause for argument.

Some people out there say that no, scientists aren't even in agreement over anything and really it's the liberal media that claims scientists agree. Again, I haven't researched the opinions of scientists exhaustively, but I have found enough trusted sources that make this same claim, and so I believe it. For example: Politifact.org and Factcheck.org have both stated something to the effect that there is a consensus among scientists on the reality of man-made climate change. Both those sites pride themselves on being un-biased, apolitical entities. Heck, if you want proof look at a poll conducted by CNN and this article by Fox News. They both report that most scientists agree. The American Association for the Advancement of Science, The U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and the American Meteorological Society also say that there is a consensus amongst most scientists. (There is a well-documented and fairly long list of scientific organizations that agree that climate change is real and human-influenced in this Wikipedia Article.)

I understand that SOME scientists don't believe climate change is caused by man, and that some don't even believe climate change is taking place. My assertion is that, from what I've read, MOST scientists believe climate change is real and caused by man.

Can we at least agree on this?

The reason I'm laboring this point is that this is one of the (main) reasons I personally accept man-made climate change as a fact. I understand that just because lots of scientists believe something it doesn't mean it's true, but how is this issue different from so many others? There are many things I believe about the world at large that I have not researched on my own but that I accept as fact. I guess that might sound really naive, but isn't it how most people function?

At what point can we really know anything is even true? There are people who believe the earth is flat, and they have seemingly good science to back them up on it. There's lots of people in America that believe 9/11 was perpetrated by the U.S. Government (if this is you, go here). There are people that think autism is somehow linked to vaccines. Yet, most experts agree that the earth is round, 9/11 was a terrorist plot, and vaccines are actually good for you.

9/11 Conspiracy Theories 'Ridiculous,' Al Qaeda Says
***

In this brave new world of unlimited information and opinion, it's actually quite easy to find people who believe in pretty much anything. With just a few clicks you can start making it your life's work to get people to stop drinking McDonald's milk shakes because they contain melted plastic. It doesn't matter that millions of people disagree with that "fact." With the internet, anyone can write and publish anything! Even me!

***

If all these educated men and women are lying to the world about climate change, the next question that naturally arises is "Why?" What's their motivation for lying to us? I heard some of my sophomores talking about how Al Gore was making bank off of selling carbon credits. Is that what this is all about? Al Gore is orchestrating all this to get rich?

I don't know how much money the "clean energy" people have, but don't you think big oil and coal might possibly have a bit more? If it's all a hoax to make money for Al Gore and the clean energy people, how on EARTH have big oil companies not exposed them yet? Their resources are unimaginably vast! They own entire countries! How on earth could measly start-up green corporations even hope to stand up against the leviathan of big oil?! It's madness! They would be obliterated by big oil if they were just making crap up to get rich!

And then, what about scientists and researchers who have no connection with Al Gore? How do they benefit from lying to the world? Using this logic, ask yourself another question: what do manufacturers of fossil fuels stand to lose if climate change really is caused by them? And why is it that studies funded by oil companies tend to show that the climate is not affected by C02? Their conclusions are different from almost all the others! Doesn't this seem the least bit suspicious? Consider this quote: "It appears from the details of the [e-mail] scandal that there is no relationship whatsoever between human activities and climate change." Who made such a bold statement? Saudi Arabian climate negotiator Mohammad Al-Sabban. Weird. Why would a member of the Saudi government make such a sweeping statement about climate change based on some e-mails he never read?

I realize we can play the "who stands to benefit from this?" game all day. (For example: the big pharmaceutical companies don't want you to know that autism is caused by their expensive vaccines! That's why they suppress this information!)

I know, I know, there are lots of people who don't believe climate change that AREN'T connected with fossil fuel profit, but I kind of suspect that they just think this way because of Fox News and talk radio. What if George Bush and Rush Limbaugh had been the first to come out years ago and tell the world about the dangers of climate change? Would the deniers still be denying?

***

What bothers me most about all this is how many LDS people are opposed to even the idea of man-made climate change. It seems like something we should understand better than any other people, and yet, we don't. There's nothing in the church doctrine about opposing climate change, and I don't remember President Monson or the general authorities issuing any statements on it, and yet the consensus among church members is that climate change is a myth.

Weren't we all taught since our youth that in the last days, the earth itself would experience great upheavals, storms, earthquakes, hurricaines, floods, and all manner of calamities?

Don't we also learn in church that the Lord doesn't necessarily just destroy things Himself, but allows the fallen state of human nature to kick in and do it for Him? Jeremiah and Lehi and other prophets prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem in 600 B.C. Then, it got destroyed. It wasn't God Himself who came down with a bazooka and a Abrams tank! He allowed invading armies to come in and wreck the place. Same thing happened when Christ prophesied the destruction of various cities. He didn't come back with a flamethrower; they got leveled by other military forces. This is also how blessings often work, is it not? God doesn't necessarily come down and give us stuff, He works through the good will of others.

That's another reason why climate change makes so much sense to me! We've been told for millenia that the world will eventually end in great calamities. Isn't it perfect that the industrial revolution, which brought unprecedented wealth and ushered in a new age of light and truth (and subsequently much sin and darkness) will be the very thing that causes the earth to destroy itself? All that progress came with a price, and now that we are very comfortable with this quality of life we refuse to do anything to sacrifice even a little bit! So we'll keep pumping greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere, the earth will keep retaining heat, and then ocean currents will change, weather patterns will change, crops will die, famine will ensue, and we'll have a mass die-off. Lovely.

Maybe the problem is that Mormons know the end of the world is inevitable, and so there's no point in even trying to curb emissions? But if that's the case, we should know better. Yes, there's always sin and pain in the world. Doesn't mean we shouldn't try to make it better. At the very least, we can admit that it's actually happening and that it will end the world. I realize we are a peculiar people, but we don't have to look like such idiots on this, agreeing with whatever conservative news tells us to believe.

Here's something from President Ezra Taft Benson:
In Matthew, chapter 24, we learn of ‘famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes. . . .’ (Matt. 24:7.) The Lord declared that these and other calamities shall occur. These particular prophecies seem not to be conditional. The Lord, with his foreknowledge, knows that they will happen. Some will come about through man’s manipulations; others through the forces of nature and nature’s God, but that they will come seems certain.
- Ezra Taft Benson "Prepare Ye" Oct. 1973 General Conference

Note how he said some will come about through "man's manipulations." I realize he may not have been talking about climate change, but he understood that the calamities could just as easily be brought upon ourselves. Also, he does say that they're certain. So maybe we can't necessarily stop them, but can't we at least acknowledge the possibility that climate change IS indeed happening?

Here's a great quote from President Joseph Fielding Smith regarding the calamities at the end of the world:

"Talk to them; hear what they have to say—these learned men of the world. ‘We have had worse times,’ they say. ‘You are wrong in thinking there are more calamities now than in earlier times. There are not more earthquakes, the earth has always been quaking, but now we have facilities for gathering the news which our fathers did not have. These are not signs of the times; things are not different from former times.’ And so the people refuse to heed the warnings the Lord so kindly gives to them, and thus they fulfill the scriptures.”
- Joseph Fielding Smith, General Conference Report, Apr. 1966, pp. 13, 15.

Holy crap! Doesn't that sound just like the people who go around saying how we're actually in the end of an ice age, and how things are just as cold as they've always been, etc?

I have this personal theory that people will put their political beliefs even before their religious ones. I can't prove this, but I think that if the prophet himself came out and said that climate change is caused by man, people in the church would not listen. They'd find ways around what he said, or make excuses. It wouldn't matter. All that matters is what Fox News and talk radio say. Their prophets are Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity and whatever other political entertainer is currently popular. I don't mean to pick on Republican/conservative types, I really don't. This just seems to be an issue where I don't agree with them.

***

So what if it really is all a bunch of B.S.? The scientists are all completely wrong/lying to us, and the world is fine. Or what if yes, the climate is changing, but there's nothing we can do about it because it's completely natural and out of our control?

(I stole this, by the way)

Scenario 1: Climate change is fake and we do nothing about it.
Awesome! Non-crisis averted, everything is fine!

Scenario 2: Climate change is fake and we make all sorts of crazy laws and stuff.
This sucks because it will hurt our economy and potentially lose everyone a lot of money.

Scenario 3: Climate change is real and we make all sorts of crazy laws and stuff.
Awesome! Crisis averted (hopefully!) everything is going to be okay!

Scenario 4: Climate change is real and we do nothing about it.
Mass destructions, dead zones in the ocean, hurricanes, droughts, immense famine, the end-times, irreversible damage to the planet, mass die-off of human race.

So from a "risk assessment" point of view, which is more risky? Scenario 2 or scenario 4? That's what it comes down to. If it's all a hoax, we will lose money and our economy will suffer, but economies can recover eventually, right? If it's real and we do nothing, we basically kill ourselves all off.

I do believe the world will eventually end. I take the scriptures quite literally in this sense. Does this mean I should hasten the end along?

I won't lie: I really hope climate change is all B.S., personally. Because this crap scares me, and I don't want to be held responsible in the afterlife for doing nothing while thousands died needlessly. So don't think I have a personal interest in climate change. I just wish more of us used critical thinking skills, or could give me answers to these questions.

Middle-earth Radio: It's a Middle-earth Christmas!!

Part 1 of 3

01 - South Park - Woodland Critter Christmas - Christmas Time Comes Once a Year
02 - Weird Al Yankovic - Polka Party - Christmas At Ground Zero
03 - Bobby Lloyd and the Skeletons - Christmas Party With Eddie G. - Do You Hear What I Hear?
04 - Augie Rios - Christmas Party With Eddie G. - Donde Esta Santa Claus?
05 - Mannheim Steamroller - Christmas 1984 - Deck the Halls
06 - The Beatles - Christmas Record '67 - Christmastime Is Here Again
07 - The Jackson Five - Jingle Bell Rock - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus
08 - Pac-Man - The Pac-Man Christmas Album - Snowflakes and Frozen Lakes

Part 2 of 3

09 - The Ramones - Brain Drain - Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight)
10 - Bob and Doug McKenzie - The Great White North - 12 Days of Christmas
11 - They Might Be Giants - ...In Holidayland - Feast of Lights
12 - Aqua Teen Hunger Force - Have Yourself a Meaty Little Christmas - Feliz Navidad
13 - Jimmy Eat World - Happy Chrismahanukwanzaka! - Last Christmas
14 - Levi Buffum - The 8-bits of Christmas - We Three Konami
15 - Levi Buffum - The 8-bits of Christmas - Super Jingle Bros.
16 - Snoop Dogg - It's a Hip Hop Christmas - Santa Claus Goes Straight to the Ghetto ft. Ice Cube

Part 3 of 3

17 - R2D2 and C-3P0 - Star Wars: Christmas in the Stars - R2D2 We Wish You a Merry Christmas
18 - Shonen Knife - Do the Knife - Space Christmas
19 - David Bowie and Bing Crosby - BBC's Merrie Olde Christmas - Little Drummer Boy
20 - They Might Be Giants - Lincoln - Santa's Beard
21 - Linkin Park - Reanimation - My Dsmbr
22 - The Fabulous Thunderbirds - Christmas Party With Eddie G. - Merry Christmas Darling
23 - John Lennon - Happy Xmas (War Is Over) - Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
24 - Trans-Siberian Orchestra - Christmas Eve and Other Stories - O Come All Ye Faithful

This is my setlist for December 18th, 2009. KGPR, 89.9 FM, 7:30 to 9:00 PM.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

It's Christmas in Middle-earth!

My Christmas media traditions!

We have lots of Christmas traditions in my family. Here are some traditions that specifically involve movies, music, and other media.

Christmas is:

It's A Wonderful Life


Is it a cliche to watch and enjoy this film at Christmas? According to other movies and TV: yes. But I grew up without this film, only discovering it as a sixteen-year-old high school student. I watched it and truly loved it.



No other movie inspires me more to the beat the crap out of an old man in a wheelchair, as Mr. Potter is like the bastard of all Christmas. It starts me off with a healthy dose of Christmas cheer, which becomes intense rage, and then devolves into blubbering tears at the end. This movie is kind of like being an alcoholic!

Mr. Krueger's Christmas


This is the spiritual successor to It's A Wonderful Life, also starring Jimmy Stewart. I like to imagine Mr. Stewart is playing the same character from Wonderful Life, only many years later. .. And with his name changed to Mr. Krueger for some reason. He's a tired old widower now, working as a custodian and living in a basement. You may have never heard of this one if you're not Mormon, as it was made by Brigham Young University in 1980. It's been on video at Church Libraries ever since. It's totally cheesy at times, as it is part of church doctrine that all BYU films should be (D&C 198:4-6). But the corniness is completely forgiven because this is Jimmy Stewart we're talking about. The man has got ten lifetime passes, and he makes it genuine and touching. The ending is quite un-corny, and it amazes me that this was shown on CBS. Nothing so overtly religious would make it onto the airwaves today. This is another one that just breaks me down and makes me weep at the end.

Here's a low-quality, stretched-out version of the movie.

Or you can go here and order the free DVD


P.S. I actually met Clarissa (little girl with mittens) while I was in New York, at a ward function. She was very nice, and had a daughter that looked just like her.


Harry Potter movies


I'm not a huge fan of Harry Potter, but I find the movies more than tolerable. I guess because the first ones came out at Christmas time, they got themselves a spot on this list purely by association. The movies aren't particularly entertaining to me, but they act as a kind of pleasant Christmas opiate. There's always one or two of them on TV at my parents' house, and it's nice to lounge around watching the exploits of familiar, comforting characters and their whimsical world. They're mostly forgettable, too, so they feel new to me every time I watch them.

A Christmas Carol (Specifically, a Muppet Christmas Carol)


I love A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Apart from being an entertaining story, it's a great example of how you can have a good story with an important moral and not make it overly religious or overly stupid fluff. Most of the time, "secular" Christmas stories that try to teach something absolutely fall flat. They're so generic and blandly moral that they just look retarded. Take one of the dozens of movies about Santa Claus that's come out in the last decade. They all treat Santa Claus as if he's the Messiah Himself. He has a mission to bring joy to the children, but ONLY if you believe in him! You must believe, and then you will receive the Spirit. The CHRISTMAS Spirit! And be rewarded with gifts! But Santa needs YOU to bless and poor and lowly. You see, he blesses them THROUGH you. And if you will just believe, Santa will come again... Next year. Barf. Santa is Santa. He doesn't give a crap whether or not you believe in him. He gives you presents if you've been nice, and shuns the naughty. That's a Christmas story I can get behind. I don't need Santa to be Jesus.

Anyway, I digress. A Christmas Carol rocks. I grew up with Mickey's Christmas Carol which was terrifying, and watched A Muppet Christmas Carol in theaters when it came out. I actually enjoy several versions of the film, and have made it a tradition to watch one of them in my English classes before Christmas.


1. George C. Scott Scrooge
I think his version is my personal favorite, although it has issues. Ghost of Christmas past is kind of a Tina Turner / Mon Mothma mashup.

The scene with Scrooge's girlfriend could have used a little more feeling. Ghost of Christmas future is probably the scariest in this one, though. That thing is scary.


2. Patrick Stewart Scrooge
This one is also good, although sometimes baffling. This one has the best Scrooge's girlfriend scene. Captain Picard is really quite broken up over this memory. I also liked that this tried to remain very faithful to the story, although the "comic relief" is odd at times. Also, Ghost of Christmas past (shown above) is... Really rather freaky looking. He looks kind of like the zombie child of Legolas and wax sculpture of Michael Jackson.


3. Michael Caine Scrooge
Michael Caine is the man. When I was young I just took the Muppets for granted in this. They were just other living characters. Now I find it a little odd that Mr. Caine had to act alongside puppets. It's all good. Love the Ring Wraith / Future Ghost. The songs really make this one awesome.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation


There's not a lot that needs to be said about this movie. It's Chevy Chase at his very best, before he lost his mind.


The Griswolds are like the archetypal American family. Family = comprised of completely dysfunctional / borderline deranged people. If you haven't figured it out yet, that's basically what families are. The beauty is how we make it work anyway.

LOTR


Ah, LOTR. I missed the Fellowship of the Ring while serving my mission, although I did get to see snippets here and there in commercials and at members' homes. I returned to Montana on December 18th, 2002. It was the debut of The Two Towers.



To celebrate my homecoming, we rented the Fellowship of the Ring and we all watched it downstairs. I was captivated, in every sense of the word. I've always been kind of obsessed with Tolkien, and this was like being in heaven. I loved films. For a long time I even wanted to be a director. I had TWO YEARS of no movies other than Johnny Lingo, and then The Fellowship of the Ring in all its glory. The second it finished, we rushed to the theater where we watched The Two Towers. The place was packed. I remember the almost reverential feeling that swept over me hearing those first few strands of music while the scene sweeps over the mountains. I still get chills watching it.



I'm going to say that watching the Fellowship and Two Towers was the single best movie-going experience of my life. The build up to the Battle of Helms Deep, the arguments and fear, everyone waiting in silence for the orc army to arrive... And then it starts to rain. I recall how the crowd erupted into laughter when you hear Gimli say, "You could have picked a better spot..." The audience desperately needed a little comic relief because we were all so tense.

Ah, the memories! What a great, great film.

Consequently, that experience spoiled me for months. I couldn't watch any other movies after that because they sucked so bad in comparison. I even tried renting Attack of the Clones (I missed that one, too) and shut it off halfway through. It was unbearable.

I associate LOTR with homecoming and Christmas now, and hope to make viewing the trilogy over the course of Christmas Break a tradition for my kiddies. Just look at those pictures. How can you not love this film? If you don't love this film, then quite frankly, I don't want to know you.

Gaming (video and board)


As if I need Christmas as an excuse for video gaming... But there really is something nice about staying up late on Christmas break and playing games all night. This "tradition" started with Super Mario Brothers 2 and continues to this day (ask Sabrina about our awesome Bubble Bobble event on New Year's Eve!) In recent years I've really gotten into board games, too, and there's nothing quite like a beautiful board game set up with all the pretty pieces, some Mountain Dew, and some eager players...


(a nice family enjoying Talisman)

It just sounds heavenly to me. Hopefully I can bother enough people to get at least one good bout of Talisman... Maybe some Risk, too. Heck, I'll even settle for some Phase 10 at this point.

Town Pump Christmas Eve


Not technically a media-related tradition, I thought I'd bring it up anyway. In Montana we have a ubiquitous convenience store called Town Pump. A few years ago we all went down there on Christmas Eve. We said we wanted to go visit the nice folks who had to work that night and wish them a Merry Christmas, but mostly it was an excuse to buy junk food and Mountain Dew. We did it again next year, calling it "tradition," and it has been that way ever since. I love this tradition.


The Crappy New Year's Eve dance

What would Christmas Break be without a crappy New Year's Eve dance at the Stake Center? The tradition here is to get all nice and dressed up, go to the New Year's Eve dance, complain about how utterly and completely horrible it is and how they used to be way, way better, and leave at about 10:30. Drink Martinelli's at midnight in our pj's.

I think this photo of the refreshments table, taken with my cell phone, sums up the New Year's Eve stake dance experience.



An empty table, two sad balloons, a warm cup of generic 7up, a ziploc with a few muffins in it, and an unopened bag of Funyuns. Par-tee-down? YES!


And finally, weird/awesome Christmas music!

What's Christmas Break without an insane soundtrack? I love weird/crappy/stupid/awesome/unique Christmas music. I have amassed a little collection, and this year I'm doing a special edition of Middle-earth Radio: IT'S A MIDDLE-EARTH CHRISTMAS!! (Dec. 18th, 89.9 FM, 7-9 PM!) I'll post the play list here soon. It's my personal gift to YOU.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, BUON NATALE!! HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!