Unfinished Dad

Phew, Billy Corgan Says My Kids Don't Need The Swine Flu Vaccine After All

Rest easy friends of Unfinished Dad.  I no longer need to worry about vaccinating Annie and Tilda.  Though swine flu is still a serious threat, a government created one no less, Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins fame says this whole national emergency thing is just fear mongering to sell more pharmaceuticals.  You know what, I kind of agree with him.  Well, about the fear mongering part anyway.

"Our American President Obama has declared a national emergency about this virus, which he in his own words said was, at this point, a preventative measure. So, why declare an emergency if there isn’t one? ... I am more focused on the vibration that has us all so fearful: both for how the fear affects our thinking, and how, in our fear, we attract the worst, and, in conjunction with that, how those fears are used by others without integrity to try to create a power against Us to promote discomfort and dis-ease."

I feel better.  You?

Dodging Swine Flu

Swine flu officially has my family surrounded.  I hadn't given it much though until recent weeks, when it dawned on me that Annie probably isn't the only 2 year-old who fails to cover her mouth when she coughs.  We aren't big lovers of vaccines.  We get them - we're not Jenny McCarthy or anything - but we don't run out and beg for them.  Now I find myself wondering if we should take the plunge.

 The first confirmed case in our world was in a 3 year-old class at Annie's school.  For the most part parents are good about keeping their kids home when sick, but the week before, we were sent an email about children showing up just "a little sick." The email arrived with a sharp reprimand from the school's director reminding us that things like swine flu were, you know, kind of all or nothing.

The next day we were sent another email from the director with a second case (also a 3 year-old class) in which a sibling tested positive, and the mother said it was "mild,"  Suspiciously, we weren't told if that particular child had been in school all week.  Two days ago, we received yet another email about a mild case of swine flu, this time in a 4 year-old class.  

Finally, I was out in the yard yesterday when a neighbor told me that the 15 year-old across the street was holed up with swine flu.  Suddenly, I wondered if she had given Annie a high five this week.  Or if she was on the bus with the other neighbors who love to visit Annie and Tilda after school.  Or if her family's dog sniffed my family's dog's butt and...you know the rest.  When Annie went to bed, I was convinced she felt warm.  Is it possible to give someone psychosomatic swine flu?

Now I'm that parent who is convinced his house doomed.  I see swine flu around every corner and I'm seriously considering getting vaccinated.  I know this isn't Captain Trips, but it suddenly seems serious.  What do you think, is this just a shift in my mental state or is it time to run out and get the family their swine flu vaccine?

Reliving Pearl Jam's Discography: Joe vs., Well, vs.

Louie,

As you know, in October of 1993 I was a junior in high school and you were drunkenly running into walls as a freshman at NJIT.  My musical tastes, as I’m sure yours, were limited, scattered, and sometimes embarrassing.  Guns ‘N Roses, Tom Petty, Metallica, Def Leppard, Harry Connick, Jr., A Tribe Called Quest…you get the idea.  Of that strange group only Tribe and Petty still warrant any playing on my boombox.

Pearl Jam had only entered into the mix a year earlier when a funny guy who refused to wear pants in the winter, and made us laugh like no one else before or since, loaned me a copy of Ten (and no, I didn’t make a recording of it by placing two stereos together and playing one into the other).  I should take poetic license here and tell you that I remember how I felt when Ten was popular, but I don’t.  I know that it rarely ever left the stereo in our room and that people hailed it as a new era in music.  But what I really remember are the little things…wailing the lyrics to Alive on the short drive from home to the Highland General Store before work, a friend thinking the lyrics to Jeremy were “Came down on me, the wicked” instead of “King Jeremy, the wicked,” and for the first time loving music like it were a girlfriend or a family member.  I have no points to argue with you regarding your post on Pearl Jam’s first LP, it is a landmark on the musical landscape.  It is Thriller.  It is The White Album.

And yet, when I listened to vs. in preparation for this post, I sort of wondered what the hype was about for Ten. Their second album is sonically richer and lyrically more strident.  And unlike Ten, I have a strong recollection for the purchasing of, and listening to, of vs.  It was the first album that I ever bought in which I gave significant thought to the packaging, a trend that Pearl Jam would take to a whole new level on subsequent releases.  The cover art depicting a crooked toothed sheep with its face caught in a fence was just the right amount of disturbing, violent, desolate, and badass to get a young man contemplating things.  Now, when you read about the often combative recording of the album, the cover makes perfect sense.  I wonder if the band knew this at the time or if they stumbled upon that little moment of photographic irony?

The cover art segues perfectly into the evil sounding bass line and subsequent reverb that kicks off Go.  You are instantly in the grip of something powerful.  This may be the best opening effort in Pearl Jam’s history.  Like a good leadoff hitter, it sets the tone and lets you know what’s ahead for the next forty-five minutes.  You should be prepared to pay attention.

I remember when the band played Animal on the MTV Video Music awards.  This was before it really sunk in that seeing them there was ridiculous.  Vs. started a decade of commercial hiding and, more often than not, fighting.  After the craziness of the Jeremy video (I read in Spin that there was an uncensored version Eddie really wanted released, in which you see the boy actually put the gun in his mouth), and the chart longevity of Ten, the band released no videos for vs.  Animal would not have been the one, but in hind sight, just playing it on MTV must have entailed some kind of wrangling amongst band and label.

When they released Daughter as a single, you know before mp3’s, you had to listen to the radio to hear it.  I can see myself driving around the lake by our house waiting for it to come on and being so pumped when it finally did.  I’m pretty sure I didn’t run over any pets on those mile long loops, but you really never know.  There’s something to be said for how much more you had to work to hear music back then.  When was the last time you found yourself on line (Online, hah! Get it?) waiting for the record store to open in order to buy an album?  I’ll bet the answer is Guns N’ Roses Use Your Illusion.  Even now I order my hardcopy of Pearl Jam’s albums from tenclub.  They pop through the mail slot in my door in a cushy manila package.  I don’t even see the mailman.

We could sit here and talk about every track on vs., top to bottom it is the most consistent album in the band’s career.  Yet we forge ahead to what would later become the best live song I ever heard the band play.  A song that, upon release on one little disc in an entire tour worth of official “bootlegs,” was played no less than 10,000 times on my stereo.  Rearviewmirror is one of those transcendent songs that every Pearl Jam fan finds a certain solace in, a musical escape.  For me, that escape comes from the show at Jones Beach in August 2000, when Mike McCready’s guitar solo is more of a finger tapping reverb-fest than a true solo and when Eddie squeezes in that little something extra in the lyric "I am not about to give thanks, fuck off, or apologize."  That night everything built up for what had to be five minutes before Eddie came back in behind Jeff’s bass with the closing lines…Saw things, saw things, saw things…Nine years later and—goose bumps.

Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town (how’s that for a title that sticks out in a catalogue) is a song that I somehow forget when listing Pearl Jam’s best songs.  It’s so simple and straightforward.  But does any other song give you such a warm, comfortable feeling?  It’s a musical blanket, instantly recognizable with Eddie’s vocal intro, and it unashamedly makes you think about your family.  I wonder if they loved playing this song along with Daughter during those recording sessions.  They are the first two acoustic songs the band ever released, and in relation to the anger that marks the rest of the album, they provide a release for the listener; maybe the band too.

Vs. closes with two tracks that, upon casual listen, seem buried.  But for devoted fans everywhere, Leash and Indifference hold their own special places in our collective heart.  I have a theory that you are either a Leash person or an Indifference person.  You can like both, but you can't be both.  You either identify with the simple “Get outta my fuckin’ face” attitude of Leash, or the more nuanced fuck off attitude of Indifference... “Í will stare the sun down, until my eyes go blind.”  In the end, they mean the same thing.  Pearl Jam got together in the midst of the chaos that was life after Ten and produced something so angry, so hostile, so fuckoffable, yet so beautiful, that I defy you to name a better album.  Period.

Obligatory Pumpkin Pickin' Pics

We went to Butler's Orchard this weekend with 20,000 of our closest friends.  Somehow, the sheer volume of people was not an issue.  Those Germantown Butlers have been pumpkin farming since the last ice age 1950—they had that place freaking humming.

Amidst the throngs we...

Potato sack slid...

And tended the fields.

We warmed the pumpkins...

And got frisky when we thought nobody was looking.

And finally, said, "Hey sheep, howya doin'?  You're a sheep right?  What's that all about?  Well, say hi to your motha  for me."

I Have Enough Chores Already or Please Don't Forward This To My Wife

This guy is killing me.  The below link is just a snippet of how an at home dad's complicated life grows more so by the day.

Since she is “handling certain areas of the relationship” like making most of the money, he said, “you’ve got to handle your business.” By “business,” Hayes means sex. “You’ve got to be creative. You’ve got to be good!"

So You Think You Can Dance: Top 20 Selection Show

Em,

We found out who was in the Top 20 tonight, and in the usual SYTYCD fashion, there were lots of twists and turns.  I'm both satisfied at my picking prowess and sad because my favorite dancer was cut, sort of.  The show started out with a revamped intro featuring the best of last season's dancers.  It was kind of strange, but I suppose I'll get used to seeing dancers I know instead of the old faceless ones.  Stop the presses by the way, Mia shaved her head.  It's tragic.

Okay, let's do this.  I will give the rundown on everyone who made it.  For the record, here are my remaining picks: Mollee, Bianca, Paula, Sasha (woops, she wasn't even on tonight's show), Russell, Billy, Jamal, Victor, Diana (woops again), Nathan, and Jacob (my last minute addition).

First up, Nathan, and he's in.  I'm batting a SYTYCD one thousand.

Next we have Katherine.  I've never heard of her, and when she cries her voice is crazy high, and I sort of like her.  Technically I'm still 1 for 1.

Ariana, never heard, and she didn't even get a montage.

Elena.  Ditto.

Mollee Gray.  Another one of my picks and despite the fact that Nigel told her she danced like a 14 year old they select her.  I'm worried about her getting a routine like Jeanine and Jason's ripped dress routine...uncomfortable silence will ensue.  Oh, 2 for 2 baby!

Noel, who is Mollee's best friend, makes it in as well.  Mollee was smart, she gave it the old reverse jinx and predicted the producers would give them the Kaytee and Natalie treatment.  Take that Nigel.

Billy.  So easily in.  He made Adam cry with a solo and Juilliard gave him the semester off.  I wouldn't be surprised if they told him ahead of time that he made the show so as not to screw up his education.  3 for 3.

Russell the crumper is in.  He's the first ever crumper to make the Top 20 and, other than his total bullshit story about a lack of training, I like him a lot.  4 out of 4 makes me a genius.  Oh, and Mia gave him this speech in which she said that lately things weren't going her way but that's about to change because she picked him for the top 10 very early on.  Whahuh?

Kevin Hunt.  In the immortal words of my nerdiest neighbor, "He's a hip hopper," and he's in.  I've never seen him though.

Bianca is the tap dancer who tried out with Ryan K.  She is the first tapper to ever make the show.  Which doesn't bode well for the two tap dancers who are up next.  Now I'm 5 for 5 and scaring myself.

Phillip is the second tap dancer in the Top 20.  Kind of weird that they did this.  Although he really is good.  The judges did give him some advice on not being such a douche, but they chose him anyway.

Peter is the third tap dancer to ever make the show, um, in the last five minutes.  Cooky.  They must have something planned that's all tappy and full of tappy lingo.

Victor got the Kupono treatment and was told to cut his hair.  I told you early on that he was great and since he is nowhere near as annoying as Kupono...good things to come.  6 for 6.

Jacob was the biggest shoo-in of the night besides Paula.  I don't mind telling you now that she made it simply because he is on the same level as her.  He's that good.  The two of them put me at a seriously impressive 8 for 8.  I should be a guest judge.

Pauline is the girl who sprained her ankle and couldn't do the last two rounds in Vegas.  She made it anyway.

Legacy, the ridiculously annoying break dancer, made it.  He is this year's Phillip, without the charisma or style.  No idea why he's here.  In one of the previews Mia tells him he's an asshole (she's growing on me).

So now the show comes down to four people for two spots.  In the best So You Think You Can Dance Top 20 twist ever, two of the people are married.  Putting aside the fact that having married people on the show would be boring and totally not sexy at all, I think you know how this one turned out.  They took the husband and paired him with the more congenial ballroomer who was most certainly not his wife, and tears flowed freely.

But wait, I told you at the outset that this was a topsy-turvy episode and that my favorite dancer didn't make the show.  In one of the craziest "I want to be a star moves" ever, Paula turns the judges invite down in order to do a "movie".  If it isn't porn, then it's late night on Cinemax.  I went from loving her to hating her in an instant.  No loss there.

That's it Emily.  The Top 20 looks remarkably strong and on Monday we see them all dance.  

Lastly, I fudged my batting average a bit.  If you count the two people that weren't even on the show any more and the loss of Iveta and Jonathan last week I was 8 for 12.  Not bad,that's .660.  Suck it A-Rod.

Till next week,

Joe

Reliving Pearl Jam's Discography: Lou Tackles Ten

Jopie Joe,

 

I have a problem.  Over the past month have I’ve spent more time with my good friend Eddie Vedder* than that of my boss and children combined.  Well, that might be an exaggeration, but I am sure you feel the same way after our side project of rating and ranking every studio-album song that Pearl Jam ever put to compact disc.

 

*I have a pick of his and therefore consider him a friend; or rather I had a pick of his before our sister, Katie, filched it with some puppy dog eyes.  I know, as well as you, that Eddie tossed it to ME specifically during the Letterman show.(Editor’s note: The Letterman show, a private concert for 400 Tenclub members that took place in 2006, was attended by all four Poulas children who can be seen freaking out in the front row)

 

It was an exhausting task that I attacked as if it were my profession, which opened my eyes in two ways.  First, I wish I had a job I loved, and second, wow—did I fall in love with PJ all over again.  Such painstaking labor should never go unrecognized, and I thought I would take the first action of putting my thoughts down in html.

 

I propose to spend some time reviewing each of their nine albums—do we both review all nine or take them turn in turn, maybe with comments on previous submission?—and follow it up with a grand finale including excel sheets, graphs, formulas, and scientific notations. (Editor’s note—Easy nerd, Unfinished Dad’s readers don’t know he spends his time doing things like that.)

 

First up, the Classic Ten

 

Track List

1-Once  

2-Even Flow  

3-Alive  

4-Why Go  

5-Black  

6-Jeremy  

7-Oceans  

8-Porch  

9-Garden  

10-Deep  

11-Release

 

I will forever be in your debt for introducing me to Pearl Jam* though I don’t recall when that was exactly.  The album debuted on August 27, 1991 but didn’t become popular until almost 8 months later, and didn’t peak on the charts until the fall of 1992.  Ten was still so popular, that in 1993, when their second album Vs. was released, it was still outselling it at years end.  I am guessing that fateful day of introduction occurred between the fall ’92 and winter of ’93.**

 

*And Stephen King’s Dark Tower series for that matter.  Quite amazing when you think about it—the two most import cultural loves in my life are due to my little bro!

 

**And as long as I’m dishing out the praise, I might as well continue with that thought and thank you for Weezer too.  I turned on the “Genius” functionality for my new iPod where it makes compilation playlists that “go great together” and Weezer and Pearl Jam are always linked.  At first, I didn’t understand—I was hearing good music that I couldn’t remember who the artist was.  Low and behold—Weezer four or 5 times now.(Ed’s note: Word)

 

Almost 450 words and still no review to speak of—I will keep this one relatively short then.  Ten is widely recognized as the band’s best album, and one of the most influential albums of our lifetimes.  For now, let’s say I agree with the latter and if we want to include cultural impact in our rankings Ten would easily be #1.

 

My power tracks on the album are Alive, Black, Porch, and Release.  The introductions to both Alive and Black are instantly recognizable to a wide variety of musical tastes, but Black is a hair better and may be the single greatest PJ song of all time.  The classic lyric, “all five horizons revolved around her soul” is a badge of wonder to all fans and as far as I know, the band has never come out and explicitly provided a meaning to the verse. 

 

I could listen to the 1:30 through 2:22 section of Porch over and over, and in fact, regularly do just that.  I love Matt Cameron, but my favorite drum riff in any PJ song came courtesy of Dave Krusen, ending at 2:22.

 

However, if I were beached on an island and could take only one track from Ten with me, it would be Release.  I can’t quite put into words why this song is so potent for me.  I guess you would call it a power ballad, and it slowly builds Eddie’s vocals and wonderful guitar work, and who among us has never exactly related to the line, “I’ll ride the wave where it takes me”?   It is the perfect track to listen to when in the mood to recall strong emotion—whether joyous or tearful, Release will recall it to memory.

 

Remember the Bear Share days?  We have a bootlegged live version of Release that perfectly states how PJ fans feel.  Listen to the first few moments of that song, for what I assume is the moment that Eddie, or maybe most of band walks out on stage—chills and waterworks.  It’s as simple as that.

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Once, Even Flow, and Oceans are also 4 out 5 star songs, and while I no longer have a taste for the most overplayed song in PJ history, I at least recognize that Jeremy is in fact a very good tune.  The beauty of Ten is that even their lesser known tracks—Why Go, Garden, and Deep—are all good, making Ten the band’s deepest album.

 

Hopefully this gets the ball rolling!,

Lou

Feel like sharing your thoughts about Pearl Jam's original album?  Let 'er rip in the comments below.  We'd love to here your memories.

Sufjan Stevens Shows Some Love For The BQE

Feel like it's time you devoted yourself to a highway for a little while?  Wish that you had the chops to write an orchestral ode to a favorite stretch of pavement that runs through your hometown?  Wait, no?  Hmmm, I think your love of home can be called into question.  And that doesn't even take into account the accompanying movie that you're afraid to make.

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Beef Stew

Cold, rainy days that bite at your bones are for cuddling on the couch and making warm, rib-sticking meals like beef stew.  When the weather gets to be too much, and the kids haven't been outside in a week, you know it's time for this meal.  This recipe is basically an amateur emulation of a what my mother, a veritable a stew-whisperer, taught me.  I simply adjust her recipe to whatever vegetables I have on hand.  You can pretty much throw anything in and come up with a great result.

Start by dredging your beef in flour and then browning it with a few tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat.  You'll know it's done when you see a little blood poking out.  Turn the beef and brown the other side in the same manner.  Set the meat aside as you work in batches, adding olive oil as needed to keep the pan from drying out.  For this recipe I used a dutch oven, but a skillet will work just fine.  However, if you are using a skillet, and are transferring your ingredients to a slow cooker, you will need to adjust your cooking time (see below).

In the same pan, add one large chopped onion, a little more olive oil, and cook for about ten minutes, stirring occasionally.  You're done when the onions are a starting to brown and your spouse yells from the other room, "What smells so good?"  At this point add a can of tomato past and coat the onions.

Some of the brown yummy bits from the bottom of the pan will have come up by now, but just in case, add a cup of red wine and deglaze the pan.  Simply said, when the wine hits the pan and immediately boils, use it to scrub all the flavor off the pan's surface and onto the onions.  This step happened with a freshly wakened Tilda (it was probably the aroma) in my arms, so there is no picture, but trust me, it's very, very easy.

If you haven't already chopped your vegetables, now would be the time, and fast.  I just do this before hand so that I don't have one of those "I'm trying to make up for not having the super fast, finger keeping knife moves of a pro and now everything is going to Hell right in front of me, because I need fifteen minutes to chop veggies" moments.  

In this case we have about a pound of multi-colored potatoes, three turnips, a few long red radishes for kick, baby carrots, the aforementioned onion, and a few sprigs of fresh thyme.  For proper culinary shout outs, the starch was from Trader Joe's, the thyme was from my garden, and the rest came from the CSA we belong to called Good Fortune Farm.

At this point you need to add your broth.  I used three cups of beef broth and then threw in about a tablespoon of kosher salt and a bay leaf.  No, I have no idea what bay leaves impart on this meal or any other for that matter, but I still use them.  Now I like a sticky, less watery stew, so my dutch oven will soon be covered and transfered to the oven at 350 degrees.  If you like a more soupy stew and plan on transferring your food to a slow cooker, you will only need about two cups of broth.  Oh, go ahead and take that beautiful plate of beef and add it back to the pot, mixing everything into a savory mass of goodness.

You are now ready to "cook" everything.  Cover your dutch oven and bake the whole thing for about three hours.  The slow cooker version will take about four hours on high, or if you did all of this before noon you can cook it on low for, well pretty much forever, but eight hours should do the trick.

When the time is right, take the lid off and stick your head as close to the pot as is reasonably safe, inhale, and voila!  Beef stew with a side of childhood memories.

Ingredients:

3 pounds beef (chuck or bottom round, nothing too lean or fancy)

1 cup flour (maybe more)

1 pound potatoes

3 medium turnips

3 long red radishes

1 large onion

1/2 pound baby carrots

3 sprigs fresh thyme

1 Tbs. kosher salt

1 Bay leaf

3 cups beef broth

1 cup red wine

6 oz. can tomato paste

So You Think You Can Dance, Vegas Day 2

Dear Emily,

I have a new theory about this whole back to back seasons five and six schedule.  Based on what I saw last night, I think season five may have been a throw away for FOX.  They knew the ratings would matter more in the fall so they held back the better dancers (excluding Brandon, Janette, etc.) in order to wow new viewers.  In short, the dancers in last night's top 77 looked incredibly skilled.

We started the show with two married couples still in the competition.  They broke one of them up early and all I could do was give a hearty Nelson Muntz Ha Ha.  It seemed like a cheap way to entice us and I didn't want to see it come down to the two of them for the last spot.  But wait, by the end of the show we still have the stronger married couple of Ashleigh and Ryan intact.  You can bet that they will be this season's Kaytee and Natalie.

The rest of the night was highlighted by ankle injuries and most of my top 20 sailing through.  Both Mollee Gray and Pauline Mata (season five) twisted their ankles, with Pauline's looking like someone fit an apple under her skin.  Mollee danced the rest of the night, but Pauline is out for the duration, though the judges haven't told her to go home yet.  I'm guessing she's in.  Sadly, I lost Iveta last night.  There must be another ballroom dancer waiting in the wings.  Damn.

I noticed something last night that sets this season apart.  We are getting a streamlined version of the audition process and it makes everything a bit tighter.  There were no two hour city shows and the whole of Vegas will only encompass three hours, including next week's selection of the Top 20.  They are forced to give us the best dancers and none of the silliness.  Oh wait, there was a gratuitous pool scene last night with some of the female contestants.  But, you know, other than that.

So my top 12 now looks like this: Mollee Gray, Bianca Tapdancer, Jonathan Litzler, Paula Van Oppen, Sasha Mallory, Russell Ferguson, Billy Bell (Adam cried [a lot] during his admittedly fabulous solo last night), Jamal Jackson, Victor Smalley, Diana Drexler (though I think she's out and I didn't know) Nathan, Iveta Lukosiute.  

I would also like to add a note that Jacob Karr is an absolute shoo in for the final 20.  He looked superb last night and somehow managed a Broadway routine in skinny jeans.

Looking forward to re-watching it all on DVR,

Joe