Showing posts with label nerds. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nerds. Show all posts

Thursday, October 15, 2015

Tonight's vinylpalooza


I'm cheap enough that paying $15 for this 1959 stereo release gave me serious pause at the LP bins of an Old Market antique emporium.

On one hand, I'd rather find a gem for a song at an estate sale or something.

On the other hand, the records from this vendor are usually in marvelous playing condition.

On the third hand, a stereo rock 'n' roll record from 1959 -- the mono version of Bobby Freeman's Do You Wanna Dance album came out the previous year -- and from an indie label, no less. That's likely on the rare side, making the $15 price not a rip-off.

I'll say!

BEFORE LISTENING to this early-rock classic this evening, I did a little Internet price checking for the stereo version of Do You Wanna Dance . . . Jubilee 1086 for all you record geeks out there. And the low price I found it being sold for was something like $29.95. The high price (on eBay, of course) was . . . was . . . gulp! . . . $110. I understand a mint first pressing goes for $200.

Mine seems to be a second pressing. Sigh. I coulda been rich.

Now note that amid all this "What's it wurf???" nerd-o-mania, not a word was written about the actual music, which was great despite following the rock-album convention of the day for a hot act. That would be:

SIDE A
  • Cover something.
  • Cover something.
  • Cover something.
  • Original that'll never be released as a single.
  • Cover something.
  • Hit record we named the LP for.
 SIDE B
  • Cover something.
  • Cover something.
  • Original that you'll hear nowhere else. Ever.
  • Cover something.
  • Original that sounds exactly like the big hit on Side 1.
  • Cover something inspiring. Or something.
That is all. Good night, and good listening.

Friday, April 19, 2013

Because I'm a geek . . .


. . . I get all excited about procuring a 1962 Pioneer FM multiplex stereo adapter to go along with my monophonic 1960 Voice of Music tuner.

I did have a pretty basic V-M multiplexer hooked up to it, but the Pioneer is sooooo much nicer. And better. And you can adjust the stereo separation -- cool!

I just lost you, didn't I? My wife's eyes glaze over at "FM stereo multiplexer."

But she did perk up  at ". . . and I got in on ebay for about $150 less than these things usually sell for."

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Payback by the bottle


You know how it's said that all of life is high school? Here in Nebraska's 2nd Congressional District, even the elections are high school.

Republican congressman Lee Terry and Democratic challenger John Ewing were schoolmates at Omaha's Northwest High. Ewing was a football standout, while Terry played another role for the Huskies.

A
ccording to Ewing, our nerdy member of Congress was "the water boy." Terry prefers the term "equipment manager," says the Omaha World-Herald:
The two high school friends were a grade apart. Ewing started taking digs at Terry a few months ago when he referred to the incumbent congressman as the football team's “water boy,” while Ewing was starting at tight end and defensive end.

Terry on Tuesday acknowledged he had been the school's “equipment manager” and said the race between the two would be, in his words, "interesting."
I'LL BET it will be. Whatever the case, it's pretty obvious that Mr. Touchdown never saw Revenge of the Nerds.

By November, though, I'm pretty sure the county treasurer who wants to be a Big Man of Congress will be feeling the "liquid heat"

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Because you can't make this $*!# up


October 2010: Conservative nerds air their dirty romantic laundry during a panel discussion on C-SPAN.


JANUARY 2011: Science nerds from The Big Bang Theory air their dirty romantic laundry during a panel discussion on CBS.

Sorry about the tardiness of this observation. The real-life nerds, I remembered from a year ago; The Big Bang Theory, I've only recently gotten into.

Let's just say that when I saw this episode, it was a true Bazinga! moment for me.

That is all.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

The trouble with translators


It started in 2006 out of necessity for American soldiers in Iraq.


They needed a microphone and a clunky laptop running a new speech-translation program to tell scared Iraqis "THIS IS A RAID! WE'LL TRY NOT TO KILL YOU!" in the middle of the Babylonian night.

Now all you need is a Google Android phone to live dangerously and
"presione 2 para español."


ONCE AGAIN, we have achieved Star Trek.

We are on the verge of the "universal translator," and it will lead nowhere good. Klingon opera, anyone -- in English?

College radio awaits.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

The secret lives of nerds


Jonah Goldberg is fond of railing about "liberal fascism" -- in fact, he wrote a whole book about it called . . . wait for it . . . Liberal Fascism.


No doubt, there are liberal fascists. No doubt, there also are conservative ones -- including lots of people Jonah Goldberg likes to hang out with. No doubt.

But what about more interesting social and political forms of deviance. Like, what if Jonah Goldberg put together a panel of conservative policy wonks -- and we're talking a regular right-wing version of the Adams College Tri-Lambs here.

And what if one of Jonah's nerds was hell-bent on, er . . . revenge.

We now join Conservative Sadomasochists, already in progress on
C-SPAN 2. Is this a great country, or what?

Remember, boys and girls, these folks write articles and books aimed at getting people like you to think all the right -- and Right -- things.

Saturday, September 11, 2010

When geeks do hype


If we all paid as much attention to making actual good products as we do to bullshit, we wouldn't have to worry about how we'll ever manage to learn Mandarin.

So we can converse with our new Chinese overlords.

This is the Windows Phone 7 team celebrating, no doub
t, the inflicting of yet another so-so Microsoft product upon the world. Oy. So geeks think they can dance?

THEN the WinPhone peeps had a "funeral" for the iPhone. And took pictures with an Android phone.

Oops.

Thus, the story of America today. All hype, no substance. All hat, no horse.

All bullshit, no side of beef.

How about this for a revolutionary, countercultural thing for tech hipsters to embrace? How about, when you make a new product, you make sure it's a good one, OK? And then you could, like, shut the hell up about it.

Celebrate by lifting a couple at the neighborhood tavern. Tell someone "Attaboy!"

Or "Attagirl!" We're not sexist.

JUST QUIT giving us reasons to think your mad tech skillz may be
, in reality, just as lame as your choreography. And your parade planning.