A Fine Day with a Cat and The Captain.

Yesterday began as pretty average, but as the day grew, it quickly shaped up to be the best I've had all week. After dinner I decided to go for a walk, and I took a burned copy of Opeth's Blackwater Park along with me. I've listened to that album at least a dozen times, but it has never clicked with me before in the way it did last night. Somehow, it managed to perfectly suit the mood and pace of my short hike- leaving me feeling relaxed, satisfied, and subtly blown away by a level of musicianship rarely found in any genre. When I got home, things kept getting better. I decided to put Trout Mask Replica on the stereo and play some We Heart Katamari while drinking some chocolate milk and having a bit of an after dinner snack. After the album ended I gave up on the game, and searched around my living room for something to pass the time. Scouring my parents DVD collection, what did I find, but something I had thought lost for over a year- my Speaking For Trees Cat Power dvd. It's basically just a two hour film of Cat Power (also known in the real world as Chan Marshall), standing in front of some trees, playing her gibson while the crickets chirp and the wind howls quietly- making for what is quite possibly the most intimate and ambient live concert DVD ever. Happy and in need of something soft to settle down to after the Beefheart + Katamari double-whammy, I put Speaking For Trees on and let the organic sound of an outdoor Chan sent me into a state of sweet evening bliss.

And to top off a fucking great day- my copy of C4AM95 - III (otherwise known as The Fucking Champs - III) arrived in the mail. Also, I decided to drop my order of Bend Sinister - Through the Broken City & Gang Gang Dance - God's Money, mostly because I knew that I was still going to pick up Cat Power - You Are Free (which I've been meaning to get for fucking ever, seeing as it's my favorite Cat Power album) as well as Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band's Trout Mask Replica, Safe As Milk, & The Mirror Man Sessions (the remastered versions of Safe As Milk and Mirror Man actually contain enough bonus tracks to comprise what was originally intended to be part of a double-album, which combined with what became Mirror Man and Strictly Personal, was meant to become Brought to You In Plain Brown Wrapper, and would have actually been packaged in a brown paper bag- neato huh?).

Well, that's all for today folks. Please, help control the pet population- spay and neuter them.

Peace.

-Christian

p.s. I miss Merlin. I wish we never had to give him to his owner, especially considering he's just going to end up on the street again. Maybe not next year, but one of these days I am going to have a cat to call my own, and he or she will be be so ruuuuuude, he/she will put the Achewood cats to shame!