Month: April 2003

Fellow Mac geeks: Thinking of ways to get around the digital rights management encryption of songs bought via the iTunes Music Store? (Just for jollys, not for any evil intentions.) Just channel the sound through Audio Hijack or its pro version. (With the regular version you have to record into AIFF and then convert to MP3 in iTunes; with the Pro version, you skip the conversion step and go straight into MP3.) Works fine for me, and it strips out all encryption and usage limits.

Currently accepting applications for people to go to the Stephen Malkmus show Friday night at Trees with me.

If you’re going to dress up as an Iraqi official, you should at least have a better fake name than Niknak-Padiwak Givudogabon.

The best thing about Apple’s new iTunes Music Store: It hasn’t been around long enough for the recommendations system to make sense. (You know, the “If you like this CD, you’ll also like” thing that Amazon and others get from analyzing customer data.)
If you try to buy a track off 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’, the current number one recommendation is Paco de Lucia & Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez. I had no idea 50 Cent’s bangers were all secret flamenco guitar aficionados.

Oh, and congrats to Molly, who somehow won $800 in a public speaking contest for memorizing her story about my burrito habits.

Gothamist hates Lauren Weisberger. Crabwalk, although inclined by life experience among the Weisbergeresque to agree, takes no formal stance.
Got back from Chicago last night (mad shout-out to my education writer homeez!). Drank a lot of beer. Bought a sportscoat. Drank some more beer. Heard about a newspaper shutting down a reporter’s blog. Silently praised my employers for being more logical. Pledged more regular blog postings to satisfy the five readers left after the CDMOM shutdown. Drank beer.
Oh yeah, here’s my story from today’s front page, article no. 3,573,738 in my endless standardized testing death march.

Just taped a TXCN appearance — it should air over the weekend, in reference to a story that’ll run on Monday’s front page.
Proof that the odds are against guys at bars.
Mistresses are so passe.
The wonders of dollar wine.
Beulah not breaking up after all.
Monica Lewinsky…Monica Lewinsky…why do I know that name? Oh, the handbags! Of course!

I’m off to Chicago tomorrow morning for four days. I used to hang out in Chicago quite a bit in my Toledo days, but it’s been a while. All suggestions are welcome.

I’m not sure I can properly communicate through electronic prose my excitement — nay, my joy — that a reliable boiled crawfish joint has opened one block away from my Louisiana family home. $14.99 for five pounds — a thoroughly acceptable price. I suspect my traditional five-pound gain per home visit will soon reach eight or nine.
Also, here’s my story from tomorrow’s front page, on a rural school district that’s gone from craptacular to rock-star status in a few years’ time. (Well, I phrase it differently in the story.) Notice the he’s-pushing-it use of the phrase “thousands-strong throngs.”

Dallasites, don’t forget! The Colossal Colon is coming to town, April 23 to 26.