by

Seven Christmas Songs I Love (part 5)

Ever had one of those songs that you hate, until you hear a version that makes you love it? That’s how I feel about Loreena McKennitt’s “Good King Wenceslas.” I don’t know what about most versions that turns it into an instant turn off, save that it’s normally enough to get me diving for the off button.

Loreena McKennitt’s rendition, though… it just feels festive, and happy, and there’s something about this one that strikes the right nerve that none of the others have. She recorded this on her A Winter Garden EP back in the day, although when looking up a YouTube link for the song, imagine my surprise to see that she’s since gone back and recorded eight additional tracks, paired them with the five from the EP, and released it as the full-length’s album A Midwinter Night’s Dream.

I guess I know what I’ll be getting soon…

by

Seven Christmas Songs I Love (part 3)

Tori Amos’s “A Silent Night With You” is another original song, but there’s a personal story behind this one and how it ended up on my favorite list. I was a big, big, big Tori Amos fan back in the early-to-mid-’90s. Bought all her albums and singles, absolutely devoted to her output. And then, as time went on… her later albums did nothing for me. Maybe it was her, maybe it was me, maybe it was a combination of the two. But I’d burnt out on Tori Amos, and in mid-2009 when her new album came out, I listened to it streaming online and decided not to buy it.

Then, a few months later, she released Midwinter Graces, and it did for me what her last couple couldn’t; drew me in and grabbed my attention. It was a lovely reminder of what I’d liked from some of her earlier albums, and was nice to know that she could still create something that felt like it was especially for me. (Interestingly enough, I also think it’s not like anything else she’s done, so that made it all the more impressive.) Anyway, this is a simple but lovely song from the album that just makes me feel like I’m in front of a fireplace with snow coming down outside. Good stuff.

by

Seven Christmas Songs I Love (part 2)

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” is my all-time favorite Christmas song; it says a lot that there are multiple renditions of this song I could pick from, and most of them are quite excellent. But of course, it’s only appropriate in this case to go straight to the source with the original. Namely, Judy Garland singing it in Meet Me in St. Louis.

Keen observers might note that the lyrics are slightly different than a lot of the later versions; when Frank Sinatra covered it he changed the lyrics to be a little more happy/cheerful. Personally I like the original better, but to each their own…

by

Seven Christmas Songs I Love (part 1)

Like so many people this time of year, I’ve gone and dredged up a playlist on my iPhone that normally gathers dust for 11 months out of the year: my Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe playlist.

No no, just kidding, it’s my Christmas playlist.

Anyway, it’s a great time of year for music, so I thought it might be fun to share some of my favorites… so, seven days of Christmas songs! Let’s see if I can really pull this off.

First up, Aimee Mann’s “Calling on Mary.” It’s an original song from her One More Drifter in the Snow album, and I just love her deep, soulful voice on this song. So many original Christmas songs stink (let’s be honest, they really do) but this is one of the few exceptions to the rule. It’s hard to keep from humming this song after you listen to it.

by

It’s Time

I know I am hardly the first or last person to post this — I think I’ve been watching it over and over again every time someone puts a link to it online over the past week — but I’m sticking a copy here so I can watch it whenever I am feeling sappy. Which is often. Really nicely done commercial from Down Under.

by

Awesome Autumn

So, so glad that autum is really here now. (I’m not quite as zen as Earl in this strip. I’ll admit to having a favorite season.) I had to skip my plans for making more butternut squash chutney on Saturday, but that just means I’ll tackle it this upcoming weekend instead. Cannot wait.

by

Can-Can

I’ve been wanting to start canning for several years, but this August was when I finally took the plunge. My recent interest in canning began in 2009, when my friend Julie and I bought a Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) share at a local farm. Suddenly I was getting all sorts of exciting, fresh fruits and vegetables, and sometimes at a rate faster than I could use them. It was a different experience than shopping at the Arlington Courthouse farmer’s market, where it was easier to make sure to only buy what I would absolutely be using over the next few years.

I was familiar with the idea of canning well before then, mind you. My mother has made and then canned her homemade preserves every year for as long as I can remember, and it’s always a joy to open up a jar and dive into those delicious tastes of summer no matter what it’s like outside. My grandfather on her side of the family was also into canning, using the jars to hold his applesauce, tomato sauce, and green beans.

Butternut Squash ChutneyWhen Charlie and I moved to Takoma, some sort of switch finally flipped in the back of my head, and I took the plunge: I bought a pressure cooker that could be used for canning, as well as some supplies, and checked books out of the library on how to can.

Since then I’ve made quite a few batches of tomato sauce (each batch tasting slightly different than the one before), hot pickles, pickled okra, and most recently—my favorite—butternut squash chutney, which with its cinnamon and cardamom and cumin flavors just screams autumn to me.

I can see why people do it. Not just because of being able to preserve an excess of produce, but because of getting the pride and joy in grabbing a taste and smell of a specific seasonal food and getting to halt it until later, and inevitably share it with someone else. There’s a great article on NPR right now about a woman who decided to make and can blackberry jam for everyone at her upcoming wedding. Reading the article, not only did I understand her happiness in doing so, but it brought back my own memories of picking blackberries for my mom in exchange for both blackberry preserves and pie.

I’m already plotting out my next canning ideas, as well as planning on making some more butternut squash chutney (it’s amazing as a condiment on sandwiches!) quite soon. And if I run out of room in the pantry? Well, half the fun is giving the finished jars to other people. I don’t think that’ll be a problem either.

by

Thirty Years of Music

There’s something pretty cool about (most of) the response to R.E.M. breaking up. I’m not referring to the people who are saying, “Who’s that?” or “About time,” of course, but rather the number of responses talking about why the band meant so much to them, and their favorite songs. (My friend Chris Butcher has a nice write-up of why he loved R.E.M., for example.)

But here’s the thing that I find the coolest, at least for me. Every time someone has said, “And here’s my favorite song,” I’ve started nodding along… and then realized that once again, no one among my friends appears to be picking a duplicate. I guess when you’ve got 15 full length albums (plus EPs, soundtrack contributions, and bonus tracks for compilations) it’s easy to hit that.

I won’t pretend I’ve got anything deep to write about the band—I first started paying attention to them in the mid-80s thanks to a co-worker at Giant Food, plus my friend Kira in high school—but I too have loved a lot of their music and thought I’d pick three favorite songs; one from the ’80s, one from the ’90s, and one from the ’00s. (I’ll be nice and include 2011’s Collapse into Now into that final grouping.) I tried to pick non-singles as well, if only because they’re great songs that you may not have heard.

Continue reading Thirty Years of Music→

by

Operation: Read ‘Em All

A couple of years ago, I seriously cut back on my book buying; I started using the Arlington Library much more often, shifting what I bought to books I felt I’d actually re-read, or ones that just were not available at the library. (A lot of limited edition comics and art books, for instance.)

And then, of course, two years ago I got an e-reader and the number of physical books entering my home shrunk again. But all of this did nothing to change the number of unread books that I have owned, waiting for that day where they got tackled. So once we moved, I created one or two bookshelves with nothing but unread books, and now I’m going to try and make my way through them. The majority of them are ones that once read I’ll be giving away, so there’s added incentive to get moving through them.

(More importantly, having them all in one location makes it easier for me to hear their siren call, “Read me, Greg, read me.”)

So far I’ve finished off one book (Twinkle Twinkle by Kaori Ekuni) and am almost halfway through a second one (DC Noir edited by George Pelecanos). Loved the first one, and am enjoying the second one. Now, I don’t see myself blasting through the multiple “to-read” shelves anytime soon, but it is gratifying to finally start tackling them. But heck, I’ve had that copy of Twinkle Twinkle for eight years now. It was time to finally cross it off the list. Between that and finally watching my copy of The Prestige from Netflix (which sat on my coffee table for several years, waiting)… well, I might make it 2010’s books by the end of the decade. Such progress!

My one consolation, of course, is that I bet at least half of the people reading this have similarly groaning to-read shelves… possibly more. Admit it.