Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1406
Recap of my holidays, which is kinda boring, I admit. I mean, I had a great time but no one wants to read about other people's "activities." Back to regular mundane programming tomorrow, promise.
Good morning! Hello! Welcome back. Good to be back. Man, I was getting a little loopy, not writing a GMHHAY for two weeks. Does weird things to my mind. Makes me question my purpose as a human being, makes me all restless and antsy. Unpleasant. Does this raise questions about my mental state, that a daily newsletter about nothing keeps me sane? Nah. I suspect 90% of humanity would be in a better mental state if they wrote a daily newsletter about nothing. Anyway, good to be back.
Jane was so excited to go back to school today. We were third in line. A new record for us. Got there at 7:08. I like it. I have realized it is better to spend 22 minutes in the car talking to Jane than to spent it running around the house and getting ready. Better QT. No complaints.
Update on past items: I shared with you my starred tracks playlist, but then emptied it out for 2025 and moved them all to a “2024 Best Tracks” playlist, so I brilliantly shared with you an empty playlist. Here is the 2024 Best Tracks playlist. Apologies.
Anyway, ‘twas a lovely vacation. Did lots of things that people do on vacations. Though it has occurred to me that that is not why you’re here, to read a catalog of “interesting activities,” because otherwise, well, you’d read the newsletter of, like, a club kid or politician or something. Instead you’re reading the newsletter of a dude who putters around his house and fights his ambition like Saint George fought the dragon. So we will but skim over all the exciting things I did. But, list them we shall:
Early Christmas in NC with the fam including the Mother-in-law. Very nice. Joyous to watch Jane open presents.
Got to Boston after a harrowing 17-hour drive, where we got ‘round DC with nary a problem (a Christmas miracle!), but then the snow started around Trenton and kept us company the rest of the trip, giving us a nightmare GWB crossing, an hour’s standstill delay on I-84 and another on the Mass Pike. Super fun. Jane handled it like a champ, though.
Had one big night out where I went to the Silhouette to see a Stooges cover band dressed as Santas filled with dudes I have known for 20+ years, but also don’t really know because it was young dude band years and young band dudes are terrible at sharing their feelings. Saw lots of old friends, knew the bartender still even though I hadn’t been to the Silhouette in decades. Hit three bars. Stayed up way too late. Had a great night, the kind of night you want to have when you go to your “home town.” When I lived in Boston, I lived for these holiday nights where everyone that ever left Boston came back to visit. They were great. Great on the other side.
Hangover was a bitch though.
Through what I think is the 18th annual Rick Webb Commemorative Christmas Eve Party for Curmudgeons, Jews and Atheists (or something like that, the exact name has shifted a bit through the years methinks). It was great, saw lots of old friends. Thank you to Abby who kept the party alive for the ten or so years I couldn’t make it. Psyched to be making it again. Lots of kids playing in the corner and lots of holiday merriment and some sadness. Humanity.
Life Day Christmas was lovely, everyone indulged me and let me do my Christmas tradition, which is to watch all 13 hours of all three of the Lord of the Rings extended editions. They did their secret Santa near me, and I did not participate since I profoundly dislike secret Santas and may have an actual phobia. Or maybe I just don’t like them. I don’t know. Last year they all did it upstairs and I was alone watching Lord of the Rings, which is not exactly bad, but it turns out it is much nicer to watch it with people. Will this tradition continue another year? Tough to say, but it ain’t gonna get replaced by a holiday viewing of War of the Rohirrim, cuz that movie blew.
There was a big brunch that we and Sean and Jussi (our best friends and upstairs neighbors to our Somerville apt) threw in both houses, organized by Meghan and Nick, our NC fellow friends who also comprise this new, second-year, holiday tradition. It was great. Maybe 20 people came by. Abby and Emily brought their friend Gina that I hadn’t had a good talk with in, oh, 20 years, so it was good to catch up with her. Got to spend some QT with Ivelise. Met Richard’s new girlfriend, she was great. Basically, everyone ran around both houses and the playground next door and I just sat on the couch and had nice ling talks with anyone who sat down, while watching YouTube music videos. It was borderline the perfect day, save for not getting to write a GMHHAY. Just wonderful.
Got to go to a second show in the form of Sean Drinkwater playing a show with Andre Obin and Telelectrix and it was just great. Personally knew about 80% of the audience, which was just so comforting after all of those shows in North Carolina where I don’t know anyone unless I go to the show with them. Really is a night and day experience. Both have their merits but… man, it’s nice when everyone knows your name. Sean’s band was a real hall of fame of old friends — Kenji and Ashley and Nick and Jarod and Eric and and and. Just fantastic. The show was at a place in Medford called Deep Cuts which was a live venue, restaurant, bar and record store. Also had a solid pinball selection. You could buy records and put them on your bar tab. Excellent venue would attend again, if I didn’t live 750 miles away.
After the show I got to go to Man Ray. Only went once this trip, wish I could have made a heroes but it wasn’t in the cards with the babysitting, let Emma go the one night we could pull it off. Man Ray was great, lovely to dance and see everyone, though it was 90’s night and they played “Divine Thing” and “Groovy Train,” and, boy, I have opinions. Followed four nineteen-year-olds into the club, they were just so excited to go to Man Ray their first time, and I watched them walk out during Divine Thing, sad. Jussi loves the night because it caters to our youth but also… I did not love The Farm the first time around, okay, yeah, I mean, I kind of liked that song but come on.
Saw Eggers’ Nosferatu at the Coolidge Corner Theater with Richard and Sean. Hadn’t been to the Coolidge in ages, there is a whole new lobby that is really nice. Film was on 35mm, which was awesome, boy, I missed the little reel-change signals in the top-right of the picture. Except at one point they forgot to change the reel and the lights went up. That was fun. But really, it was just such a nostalgic rush to be in that room. They used to have (maybe they still do?) I used to go to a Vampire Film Festival back in the 90’s in that same room. It’s the theater I first saw Andy Warhol’s Dracula in that room. First saw Near Dark, The Fearless Vampire Hunters, first saw The Hunger on the big screen in that room. Was very fitting to see a vampire film there.
(Short review: Too dark, but for a reason, first half drags a bit, but excellently cast and acted and the second half is nearly perfect).
Drove to Salem to see Annie and Bill and we had delicious Japanese food and talked lots I got a bottle of Xioxing wine for the Somerville apartment and we went record shopping, since I only had two days to buy records (big record update coming tomorrow). I am listening to the copy of David Gilmour’s Luck and Strange that I bought at the excellent Residency Records right now. Tried to buy the records on my top-ten list that I posted for you last friday. He did not have any of them that I did not already own, and the proprietor and I have very similar musical tastes. It is absolutely insane how much new music there is these days.
New Year’s eve was spent in-house, did a kid new year’s for Jane and her friend Ada at 7:30 in Animal Crossing, very cute, very fun. Bought them party poppers and some Martinelli’s. Then me, Emma, Jussi and Sean re-watched the first season of The Good Place which holds up, and Sean and I caught up on Star Wars Skeleton Crew which I am enjoying now. We finished all that just shy of midnight, did a countdown, everyone hugged, and we went to bed. Being old is kind of awesome. Insane to think about all those hotels and clubs and parties I used to go to. Would I do it again? Yeah, probably. They were fun, not gonna lie. Being young and crazy was pretty fun. But then so is being old. Except for the old part.
New Year’s day there was a brunch upstairs, transplanted from Abby and Emily’s. We all ate Chinese food and watched Chitty Chitty Bang Bang which is insane and way too long and includes a lot more weirdness than the flying car that you remember and also was… written by Ian Fleming? I have so many questions.
Chilled all day the second and then we drove home the third, hitting another snow storm, an absolutely insane, hard core flash blizzard while on the DC Beltway? WTF. Only lasted an hour, but we basically white-out conditions. Emma was driving. So stressful.
Notably, both of these storms were not forecast, and we chose our driving days precisely because the weather forecast said it would be clear so, you know. That sucks.
And now we are home and it is so good to be doing chores again I am so excited for chores, my god, chores rule. Couldn’t do many chores up there, owing to the size of the apartment, the crammedness with the house guests but mainly also the weather: any staining, sanding, etc has to be done outside. There are so many chores I want to do in that apartment, but they’re gonna have to wait till spring. You know how much I love chores, so this was very hard on me. Lotta taking trash and recycling to compensate. Reader, it did not cut the mustard.
(I am using that phrase because it is in “The Cutter” by Echo and the Bunnymen and Emma told me yesterday she had not heard it before. Huh.)
Was great to be back in the Somerville apartment, I love it so much, we have done a great job making it homey, Emma especially. The floors are loud as hell, thump thump thump. I feel like such a troll. Fi Fi Fo Fum. Old houses do not use construction adhesive, screws and nails on their floors, they really half-assed it back in the day. Haha. Counterintuitive. We built some sturdy pink bunk beds this trip for Jane’s room and she loves them. I love love love my re-paneled 3-season room that readers may remember me remodeling last summer. It is just so great. I finally got to sit at the work bar in the front room, working on my laptop, looking out onto the street and it was exactly as great as I hoped. Oh! And I got a new shower head for the place. Wirecutter still has it, man. I just bought the top-rated shower head from Wirecutter and it rules. Such a good massager. Need one for home.
Oh god this is already so long I said I wasn’t going to do this and just recount past adventures and here I am. I have so many other things to talk to you about. I am positively bursting with topics. My topic list runneth over.
But I guess I will wait till tomorrow. I have so much to tell you but I suppose I better dole it out little by little.
As part of my year-end rituals, I started listening to the 2024 Best Tracks playlist and, man, the music is so good! My entire music-listening system (which is undergoing a re-work but that’s a topic for another day) has one flaw, which is that by December, I have not really heard the best songs from January of that year much. Then in January I move them all to my main Best Tracks playlist and they get worked into the shuffle rotation. But right now, these tracks are fresh – haven’t heard them in a year. And I know listening to a 1,000+ playlist of the best tracks of 2024 might be a tall order. So for a few days here I am going to give you a few “early 2024” playlists. Enjoy this one.
OK until tomorrow. Boy I missed you guys. You guys are the best. I hope your holidays were just dandy.
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Thanks for reading.
And hey! Maybe buy one of my books!
Good Morning, Hello, How Are You vol 1.
i miss the heart function from ye olde site, so i will just hafta write it out: HEART!