It’s the 100-year anniversary of the National Park Service. As Ken Burns has noted – and filmed – it sure does seem to be “America’s Best Idea.”

Some of the parks pictured here are technically “national landmarks” or such, but still. Visit them all!

Paid off the balance of our house today. Target payoff early 2018; hey, we came in a year and a half early!

Should be a “pop the champagne” moment, but not really.

Had to write a check; got a receipt for said check.

Nothing to sign except the check. No fireworks/sparklers.

Ya know, this is spozed to be the American Dream.

NOTE: The title is a riff on when we negotiated the last mortgage: Our House.

I spent parts of the last several weekends binge-watching (from the library’s DVDs) Burn Notice.

Here’s what I thought of the seven-season series:

• Interesting premise – an extremely talented CIA covert operative is outted – i.e. “burned” – and is left with nothing. He moves (is dumped) back to his home town (Miami) and has to start over. With the help of an old girlfriend and male friend – both highly experienced operatives themselves – they help other people using their unique skills.
• While each episode concentrates on the trio (later adding another operative) helping a specific “client,” there is also an overall arc of the main character (Jeffrey Donovan) trying to find out who burned him. This arc is replaced by other similar arcs in later seasons, but is always there. As the seasons progressed, it became more about the “arc” – the hunt for the bigshot bad guy(s) ruining Donovan’s life – than the per-episode client. I found that less interesting than the clients.
• Overall, the acting from the main characters is pretty terrible. (The exception is Sharon Gless – of Cagney & Lacey who plays Donovan’s chain-smoking mother.) I don’t know if it’s the director’s fault – because I’ve seen Donovan in other shows (Touching Evil, Monk) where he was good – or how their characters are supposed to act. But that acting is very wooden. The worst is Donovan’s friend, and ex-Navy Seal Sam Axe (Bruce Campbell): It’s like he’s just reciting his lines.
• There are some good recurring characters that do a great job of convincing you they aren’t just mouthing lines, notable the money-laundering friend, Barry (Paul Tei) and the CIA Agent Pearce (Lauren Stamile). I don’t know why they wrote the latter out of the show; she was good and it was fun that she never had a first name – just Agent Pearce.
• A very MacGyver-like show – they are always inprovising explosive devices and what-not. The series tab on duct tape alone must have run into six figures…
• Like explosions? Especially cars blowing up? This is your series! Also a lot of car chases, cars rolling over, cars colliding… Oh – and lots (lots!) of gun battles.
• It was very weird that Donovan’s brother, Nate (Seth Peterson), floated in and out of the show as needed. Then he got married, we saw the wife once, then he had a kid, got divorced. Just…odd.
• They did do some tongue-in-cheek things on the show – just quick things that they didn’t dwell on that were fun. For example, Donovan’s character ate a lot of yogurt – blueberry. And they’d introduce a character with Donovan doing a voice-over saying this character was a scumbag – and then they’d show the character, and have a caption on the screen, saying something like “Carlos – druglord scumbag.”
• Overall, I don’t think I’d watch this again. If I did, it would only be the first couple of seasons. Less arc, more on the individual clients. On IMDB, ths show is given an overall rating of 8.0; I’d say it was closer to 6-7. Above average, but nothing special. Rotten Tomatoes gives it a 94% overall rating, which is just plain wrong.
• The last four or five minutes of the last episode were a very nice wrap-up. Well done, there.

While I don’t believe we’ve come anywhere near the long-promised paperless society, one of the milestones that accompanies our always-connected and mobile society is the lack of cords: Fewer cords is good, but we are now slaves to our devices’ batteries.

Over the past month, I’ve been to our local Batteries & Bulb (formerly Batteries Plus) store. They are always helpful, and I’ve almost always gotten what I’ve needed there, but I just don’t like having to buy new batteries every time I turn around.

To be fair, most of the batteries I’ve recently replaced have not been replaced in many years; in some cases decades.

• Garage door opener: We have two – one in the house, and one in the car that goes in our (one-car) garage. I don’t think they have been replaced since we bought the house back in 1999. A button-type battery about the size of US nickel; one was getting weak so I replaced both.
• Rechargeable AA batteries for my wireless mouse: While recharageable, the AAs that came with the mouse finally couldn’t hold a charge. Fair enough: I’ve had the mouse/batteries since 2004. I have other rechargeable batteries, but these are pretty weak batteries (1700 milli-amp); most out now are 2500 milli-amp and up. And the charger that comes with the mouse – a holster of sorts you dock the mouse into – can’t change the other batteries. Pain in the ass to have to keep charging the others in another charger. And – maybe it’s just a false perception – but the higher amp batteries didn’t seem to last as long between changes. Bottom line: got new 1700 milli-amp batteries and all is good.
• Button battery for one of Romy’s watches: You know, those little bitty batteries with a diameter less than a pencil eraser – and only a few millimeters thick. The most difficult part of changing these batteries is getting a grip on the battery so it doesn’t fly off and disappear forever. Again, this battery has worked for … I don’t know how long. Long.
• Phone battery: Romy has an old Nokia candy bar phone, and the battery finally crapped out. Sad to shell out $40 for a phone that’s on its way out (AT&T just sent out a notice that the 2G network this phone uses [yeah, 2G!] is going away soon), but ya need a phone.

Further bulletins as events warrant…

Update: 4/4/2016 – Yeah, battery in TV’s sound bar crapped out. Another $5 ka-ching for Batteries & Bulb.

Also – it’s now Batteries PLUS Bulbs (Batteries + Bulbs), not Batteries & Bulb as listed above. I’ll keep my mistake to remind me to do a little bit better research.

I recently ran across an article that Rolling Stone has on their web site, 100 Greatest Bruce Springsteen Songs of All Time. Yeah, it was posted more than a year ago, but hey – lists are fun.

Looking over the magazine’s list, I realize that I pretty much find that Springsteen lost his touch – for me – after The River. And in reality, whenever I play a Springsteen song, it’ll be from Nebraska or before.

This is probably due to my age – I was in high school when Born to Run came out, catapulting the singer into the limelight (and onto simultaneous cover stories on Time and Newsweek). I saw Springsteen in concert in 1988 1978, when he and the E-Street Band were touring to promote Darkness on the Edge of Town. Best concert I’ve ever gone to. Had eight row center seats, and this was when Springsteen was still wading into the crowd. He stood on the seats right in from of me, and I was one of the many that help keep him propped up while he continued to sing. Amazing moment.

So I’m biased toward his early work (it didn’t help that my college had a slew of New Jersey and Long Island students, who would play Springsteen over and over and over…).

And – to be fair – I’m not as familiar with his more recent work. So there’s that.

But make no mistake: Springsteen is in my Top 10 favorites when it comes to modern rock.

But this list got me to thinking: What would be my Top 10 Springsteen songs?

Here we go, in no particular order, unless noted:

• Born to Run: The Boss’s best song on his best album.
• Badlands: Doesn’t get much better; this is my #2 song – great music, great lyrics:
  

  Poor man wanna be rich,
  Rich man wanna be king,
  And a king ain’t satisfied,
  ’til he rules everything

• Candy’s Room: Rolling Stone has this at 45 – no way it’s that low. This is an exhilarating, crushingly depressing song with killer guitar work. It’s raw, ironic, and ultimately delusional:
  

  She has fancy clothes and diamond rings,
  She has men who give her anything she wants, but they dont see,
  That what she wants is me

• She’s the One: “She’s the One” is to Born to Run what “Candy’s Room” is to Darkness on the Edge of Town. Again, just a powerhouse of a song, starts off slow with just guitar strumming yet quickly accelerates:
  

  But there’s this angel in her eyes
  That tells such desperate lies
  And all you want to do is believe her
  And tonight you’ll try
  Just one more time
  To leave it all behind
  And to break on through

• Thunder Road: Opening track on Born to Run – instead of the title track – it set the tone for the entire album. From fresh-faced childhood quickly turning into moving forward with the velocity of some speeding vehicle (“It’s town full of losers/And I’m pulling out of here to win”). It’s a mad rush to get … somewhere. Somewhere different, somewhere where things will somehow be better for people like me.
• Meeting Across the River/Jungleland: Sorry, these two songs – which close out the near-perfect Born to Run, are really one song. Two sides of the same song, maybe one on each side of the river? And the ending sax solo at the end of of Jungleland/the album? For the ages.
• Highway Patrolman: Just a quiet piece of perfection on the long-underrated Nebraska album. A tale of two brothers – one who becomes a cop, the other a no-good, told from the point of view of the cop. And the irony of the “good brother” always helping the bad one – because “Man turns his back on his family well he just ain’t no good” – well, he’s the bad brother’s enabler. Johnny Cash does an incredible cover of this song; can’t quite say which version I prefer.
• Blinded by the Light: Yes, the poppiest (it that a word?) of the bunch, and most folks will swear it’s not a Springsteen song, but Manfred Mann’s (they took it to No. 1). Still, great hook and crazy – especially for Springsteen – almost stream-of-consciousness nonsense lyrics. Yet how can you argue against the tour-de-force of the following denouncement of common sense, powerfully delivered: “Mama always told me not to look into the sights of the sun/Oh, but Mama, that’s where the fun is” You can’t.
• 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy): Not the greatest of Springsteen songs, but noteable for its quiet, almost soulful sound – which is unusual for early Springsteen (later, in Nebraska and The River he returns to this sound). And, I dunno, it’s just so Jersey sounding – and this is coming from someone who has not done the Jersey shore/boardwalk scene.
• Racing in the Streets: In both subject matter and message, this could almost be on Born to Run (it’s a middle track on Darkness on the Edge of Town). However, it bookends the album’s lead track – “Badlands” (“Poor man wants to be rich…”) with a different message, one of hope lost:
  

  Some guys they just give up living
  And start dying little by little, piece by piece,
  Some guys come home from work and wash up,
  And go racin’ in the street.

  It isn’t much, but it’s all that they have to hang onto. It echoes Thoreau’s observation that “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation.” This is a very moving, depressing – yet realistic – depiction of many people’s lot in life. Or, at least, how they perceive their lives.

Who missed the cut? Here are a few more favorites:

• Darkness on the Edge of Town: This is a good closure song for the album of the same name, but it’s not as strong a song as “Racing in the Streets,” even though the over-arching tone and subject are very similar.
• Rosalita (Come Out Tonight): Again – more pop than rock. But it’s a fun song, and seeing it live was killer. It was a crowd favorite (people kept calling for it when I saw Springsteen live), and when the band played it, they didn’t leave any stop un-pulled.
• Nebraska: From the album of the same name, the chilling tale of the Starkweather killings. It closes with the ominous lines:
  

  They wanted to know why I did what I did
  Well sir I guess there’s just a meanness in this world.

  At this point, you know Nebraska is not going to be a feel-good album. It’s going to be dark.

• Because the Night: This isn’t an exceptional song, but it exists so co-writer Patti Smith’s version can just make you weak in the knees. ‘Nuf said.

Of couse, there are many others (and I’m sure I missed some favorites), but that’s all I gots right now. Time to spin some Springsteen…

I had heard a lot of the first season of the TV series “Mr. Robot,” so I finally ordered it so I’d receive it on its street date, Jan. 12, 2016 (via Amazon Prime, natch).

I’ve only watched the first three episodes, and they are all so good and so dense that I’ll probably watch them again before watching the rest.

The story is told from a techie’s point of view – a “new to me” Rami Malek playing Elliot – who has virtually no social skills; it’s narrated in part by his voice.

The crux of the story – without spoilers – is that an anarchist, Mr. Robot (Christian Slater, who is great and having the time of his life with this role), convinces Elliot to help him hack the Evil Corp. The twist is that Elliot works for a security firm, AllSafe, that helps Evil Corp. and other corporations stay secure.

Elliot is also a (very careful) druggie, and between the meds and the other damages he’s incurred in life, you wonder just how much of what he sees (Evil Corp? Really? But it’s actually on signs.) and says is all in his head. What’s real and what’s not? Does Mr. Robot (a name never mentioned, just an embroidered decal on Slater’s shirt) even exist, or is he a coping mechanism Elliot has created to help him rationalize his hacking?

Again, this is just after three episodes (the first was put up on the web before the DVD streeted [before the series started?], and is a full hour long – the others are the standard hour show length sans commercials, about 40-44 minutes).

A lot of the tech in the show is pretty much spot on, which is unusual in a TV show. Some of it is a little forced, so the non-techies can sorta understand something that’s important to the plot. However, there is a fair amount of command line syntax spooling out on the screen with the narrator’s voice (Elliot’s) explaining the commands for those not UNIX versed.

So it works.

Rami Malek is a revelation here: Both his acting and voice-overs portray a damaged, extremely introverted individual who pretty much lives day to day – no big thoughts of the future. At the same time, he’s very protective – to an almost dangerous degree – of those few he does care about. He’s already won a couple of Best Actor awards for the first season, and I’m betting there will be more to come.

One of the downsides of the show is the muddied sound. There is a lot of music and sound effects, and sometimes the narration is muffled by the other sounds/music, so you have to crank up the volume to hear the narration, and then the music overwhelms.

This may be intentional, to somewhat illustrate the dissonance in Elliot’s head. But it’s the big negative thus far.

One of the details most people will probably miss is the naming convention of each episode.

Many shows have a formulaic way of naming episodes – “Friends” was “The one ______” (“The one where everyone finds out,” “The one with all the Thanksgivings”). For “Scrubs,” it was “My _____” (“My philosophy,” “My dirty secret”).

For “Mr. Robot,” the episode titles are like computer file names:

• eps1.1_ones-and-zer0es.mpeg – Season One, Episode One, “Ones and Zeroes” is the actual title.
• eps1.2_d3bug.mkv – Season One, Episode Two, “Debug” is the actual title.

There is a certain playfulness in the episode titles, as well. The file extensions (after the “dot” [.]) are real file extensions, but don’t seem to have anything to do with the episode.

Also, the file names do substitutions like many do to make passwords harder to crack – Instead of “debug,” you turn the e into 3: “d3bug” that reads in a similar manner, but harder to crack.

Also, the pilot episode is Episode Zero (eps1.0_hellofriend.mov), and “Hello Friend” is an homage to how many write a first program in a new language, by getting the program to echo out (to screen or file) “Hello world.”

So that’s fun, as well.

Again – this is just three episodes in.

I can’t wait to re-watch the three and then watch the rest (only 10 episodes total).

Update 2/2/2016: Watched the entire first season over the weekend (including re-watching the first three episodes), and it’s as good a year of television as I’ve seen. Sure, there are some weak moments, but – overall – extremely strong. And there more than a couple of twists, one of which I saw coming and one of which I totally didn’t anticipate. Dense writing. Note – very dark and very tech heavy. Don’t like either? Might want to give it a pass. I honestly don’t know where they will go in Season Two, but I said the same thing after watching Season One of Damages, and that show did the tightrope act for five solid years. Can’t wait to see what Mr. Robot brings to the table next season.

Last Sunday, Jan. 10, 2015, David Bowie passed away. I didn’t know it, but he had been battling cancer for 18 or so months. I don’t pay attention to these things, so I don’t know if he was keeping his condition a secret or I just didn’t know.

He was 69.

Like him or hate him, you really have to admit that he was a seminal figure in modern music – an androgynous chameleon who helped shape the showmanship style of music.

I was never a huge fan, but I liked his music. I only owned one LP – the compilation changesonebowie, pictured – but when a song was on the radio, I didn’t click away.

Below are my favorite Bowie songs (that I can recall off the top of my head), in no particular order for the most part.

• Space Oddity – My favorite Bowie song. Existential angst meets PR (“…and the papers want to know whose shirts you wear…”), it could almost be a parable for what the life of a celebrity is like. Breathtaking and unique at the time. One of my all-time favorite songs.
• Heroes – Again, larger than life.
• Changes – The stutter is what makes the song.
• Fame – Once again, Bowie comments on the celebrity life
• Ziggy Stardust – One of Bowie’s earliest transformations.

While I do beleive the Bowie was a talented musician and – especially – a solid songwriter, I think he really made his mark by being so far ahead of the curve.

Today, U2 performs in the round with lasers and, I dunno, jetpacks; Madonna/Miley Cyrus keep changing personas to suit their mood/music; ambiguous sexuality today gets a “whatever” shrug. And he was in an interracial marriage for over two decades (to the supermodel Iman), which in the early 1990s wasn’t commonplace.

Back when Bowie was getting started (the changesonebowie album contains music from 1969-1976), bands members were expected to come out on stage with a guitar/bass around their necks, walk up to the microphone and just sing/strum.

Not Bowie – it was not just a performance, it was a production. And you were never quite sure what he’d come out as. A guy with glitter all over his face???

And that – to me – is his legacy.

Overall, Bowie is overall too pop for my taste (Blue Jean, Let’s Dance), but even if he was just a one-hit wonder with Space Oddity, the world would still be richer.

I was tempted to begin this with a “well, this was a weird year,” but aren’t they all? How is this year any weirder than any other?

That said, here are some things that stick out to me for this almost expired year:

• Politics — We’re knee-deep in politics right now with the presidential primaries about a month away. If you thought the 2012 Republican primary season was a mess, well, this year’s follies make the 2012 race look sedate. Donald Trump as the #1 for six months running? I didn’t even think he’d get into the race, much less lead it. And what the heck happened to Jeb! Bush? He was the presumptive nominee with a huge war chest, and he’s in the single digits. I guess he – and so many others – got Trumped. On the Democrat side, Hillary Clinton is getting some heat from a Socialist senator (Bernie Sanders – VT), but is still the most presumptive non-office holder in recent times (presidents running for re-election, or sitting veeps, tend to have clear sailing to the nomination). It’ll be interesting to see how things shake up once people begin casting votes, as opposed to responding to a pollster.
• Terrorism, International — The rise of ISIS and other, smaller, terror cells were certainly a black spot on this year. One of the more chilling aspects of this is the plight of those caught in the crossfire. Especially in the US – mainly due to politics – humanitarian aid and acceptance of refuges has made a terrible situation even worse. We gots to adjust our moral compass.
• Terrorism, Domestic — While the politicos love to scare the crap out of voters by capitalizing on the terrorist acts in the US, there have only been about 30 deaths due to terrorism in the US since 9/11. And while even one death is too many, perhaps we should at least be looking at the 30,000+ deaths per year in the US caused by guns. Just look at the math.
• Vacation — Romy and I hit the Colorado Springs, CO, area this year. Pikes Peak and the Garden of the Gods were highlights, but it was not what I was expecting. I guess I was expecting more craggy peaks and alpine meadows. Not so much. But it was nice to get away from the suburban life, even if for only a few days.
• Apple Watch — Introduced in September 2014, the watch became widely available this year – yet I have yet to see one in the wild (on an actual person). See a lot of Fitbits – virtually all on people 50+ years old.
• Technology — Overall, this was a boring tech year. Smartphones are getting to the point where, like desktops, there are only incremental upgrades, not a seismic shift like the first iPhone. The same is true of most technology; nothing is matching the “this changes everything!” excitement of the World Wide Web or mobile technology overall. Some people are betting big on Virtual Reality (VR); isn’t this just 3D TV but using an (awkward) headset? Sure, it may have uses, but how niche will that market be?
• TV — If you like watching TV, there’s a lot of really good stuff out there, mainly on non-network channels: Netflix, HBO, Amazon…this is an interesting arena. In some ways, the new tracks to get a TV show does change everything. No more three-network tollgates. Toss it up on YouTube, get a deal with Hulu or Showtime or Amazon. We’re really starting to see the disruption to TV that the internet did to newspapers. Oh, and in 2015 more than ever, streaming reigned. No looking to see what time show X is on, it’s on whenever you want to stream it. Side note: Apple, again, failed to nail TV the way it has in so many other areas. It’s perplexing, but I guess that can be chalked up to: TV is hard.
• Music — Every year when the Grammy nominees/winners are announced, my reaction is “Who are these people?” No different this year. And – in a year sorta dominated by Taylor Swift (yeah, I’ve heard of her) – the year in music, to me, was pretty much meh.
• Year of Celebrity — I don’t follow the celebrities at all, but it sure seems like the news, Instagrams, Twitters and so on were full of people who are famous for … being famous. Whatever.

I’m sure I missed some things that I should comment on, but this is what I’ve got right now.

Spirits, New Year’s Eve 2015/2016

Update 1/2/2016: Spirits shared to bring in the new year:

The wine – a Chateauneuf Du Pape, which never disappoints – was good but not *amazing*, which is unusual.

The champagne – a Perrier-Jouet (very dry) – was exceptional.

Had some nice cheeses – including a really biting (in a good way) Bleu cheeese – but we really don’t do the New Year’s Eve celebration like most.

Littleghost.com

Geistlinger.com

I’ve been on the internet for a long time – before the World Wide Web was popular. I first went online in 1992 or 1993, and while Sir Tim Berners-Lee had made public the first web browser in 1991, this was more of an academic tool. Not for your average user.

I had an dial-up account with Delphi because I had read about this internet thing and it sounded interesting. It was all command-line, and – though I didn’t know it at the time – I was doing UNIX commands. It was a very primative space, with a host of strange protocols and functionalities: Gopher, Finger, Archie, Veronica.

Want to download an image? Go to a Gohper or FTP site, download the image, run it through a UUDECODE program, and then direct that output to the appropriate image converter so it will display correctly (JPG, GIF was about all there was at the time). Not exactly as user-friendly as Flickr, that’s for sure!

My Delphi connection? Over a 1200 baud dial-up modem. I quickly upgraded to a 2400 baud modem, and then the format wars intruded. To get a fast (5600 baud), you had to choose between an X2 or Kflex flavor of modem. Some ISPs supported both, some just the one. What a mess…

I mention all this just to show that, as far as connectivity goes, I’ve been through most of it.

And if I had to pick the inflection points – where things really changed online – here are the points I’d pick.

Well, it was the “official” Halloween day in our fair suburb, and the weather was pretty crappy.

About 60° (tops) and rainy – never a pelting rain, but, at best, a misting or drizzle.

We still got a fair amount of kids, however.

And tomorrow AM we switch to Standard Time (for all of four months). What a cluster.