Annual Consolation

These are five artists who came close to making my favorites of the year. For whatever reasons, they did not make it.



I like this band, but something is not quite complete yet. If they can keep it together long enough to fill in the hole, good things can happen.



I made the mistake of calling this band the Canadian Posies earlier this year. They've been around just as long. I knew this, but failed to make the connection. It's a very pleasant record, but did not have enough to push the top twenty two.



This is a monster of an album. It could be a Grammy sleeper. That said, I really wanted to embrace it, but it's too damn clean. Every note is programmed, played with expert technical precision. I wanted some spontaneity, this record is missing that.



Close, so close.

Is it me or is the video kinda pervy?



Sondre: I love you. You are the Norwegian son I do not have. You are a talented musician and arranger. A craftsman of your instruments. Son, it's been eight years since I've been following your career. It's time to get a lyricist.

Going to get to work on the obsessive liner notes soon and tweak the order of the year's best over the weekend. Expect the official release in a couple of weeks.

You Love to Surf and it Shows

Readership here is up. November is the fourth highest number of views since I started here back in 2009. Men in Morphsuits has plenty do do with that, it's the fourth most read post here and it's not even a month old. I'm pretty sure the shout out at Buckeyes are Deadly Nuts helped with the clicks, as did posting a link to the Green Men group on Facebook.

I was very amused to see the term "white women poetry slam" as a traffic source.



November is ending, look for the year end CD in a few weeks. The usual holiday angst will turn up soon enough, and then 2012 will arrive.

Thank you all for stopping by this part of the internet. I know you have a lot of choices when it comes to internet entertainment and I appreciate all of you who make a point of stopping by The Mystery Spot.

From the spam folder

"You must have forgot your little sister? Is it so wonderful in Chicago that you neither have time to give me a call nor answer my calls? But I’m clever enough to e-mail you! ;)"

The link is selling viagra.

"Booty Cutie Sexy Dolls wait for your Viagra Falls )))))))"

Ok.

Then there's this one.

"Sex with two women - the first step to having sex with three."

I'll take their word for it.



Forgot to post that picture on Thursday.

Sanford keeps the junk out of the yard

Friends of our asked us if we wanted to go see the Blue Jackets play the Sabres tonight. We were thrilled to say yes. It's true the Blue Jackets have been the doormat of the NHL this season, but their play of the last couple of weeks may indicate that the situation is improving.

I am also a Buffalo Sabres fan, they're my second favorite team. The last time I saw the Sabres and Blue Jackets battle this was the result. I was at this game, which I believe was Pascal Leclaire's last win as net minder for the Blue Jackets.

We had really good seats. The type of seats where your section has wait staff and they show up between periods and hand out the team stats for the game. Impressive.

We were slightly stunned when the home team went up 1-0, and I was elated when Nash deflected a blast from Wisniewski to put them up for good.



The Blue Jackets added to their lead, three, then four goals to nothing by the Sabres. They did not seem to show up tonight. I'm trying to remember when the Blue Jackets chased he other team's starting goalie and I cannot. The Sabres did get one goal back, but Nash scored another goal and the final was 5-1!

Here's the difference maker.



Curtis Sanford has given this team confidence. He's 3-0-2 as a starter for the team, and they played like a team tonight. Players were covering for each other in both zones, they were scrapping, passing well. One Sabre got in a little shot on Sanford after the whistle had blown and The Wiz's reaction was to grab the guy by the neck and nearly throw him to the ice. This grit has been missing from the Blue Jackets for, well, a long time and it's great to see, finally. It's a long season, and one way or the other, anything can happen.

You never know who will show up

When you become part of a meme, the only thing better would be to turn up as the subject of a Downfall video.

Jon Sands did a great feature Wednesday night at Writers' Block. You already knew that was going to happen.

At dinner that night, my wife an I were talking about Scott bringing up Jon to do about five encores last year, nearly killing him. She came up with the idea of Jon reading other people's poems all night. I brought this up to Scott, and he liked the idea so much he handed me a note to have one of my poems ready for Jon to read. The decision I had to make! First off, I needed a clean copy, one that was not edited or annotated since my handwriting is atrocious. Second I wanted to give him a good poem, not a raunchy piece of fluff, like the poem I read earlier in the evening. So I chose David's Rock, and Jon was a great sport.



He also did one of Hanif's poems, which was really long. So long I thought the battery in Hanif's phone would die.

Another sick night at Writers' Block.

Son and Saint Nick

Every year around this time I get the question, "Is your son excited about the holidays?" And I give the same answer, "I do not know."

Since he rarely shares his feelings in a way we can understand, it's hard to know what is going on in his head. I wonder, if he's like Tommy, and does not know what day it is. We do not know if he knows about the concept of Santa Claus. He is nine, and probably on the cusp, or past the time most kids start realizing the truth about Christmas.

A few weeks ago my friend Teri let me know about an event that was taking place at the local mall where she works. It was a Sensitive Santa event, in which special needs children could take in Santa's workshop and visit with him in an environment that is much more laid back and quieter than usual. It happened on a morning in which the mall was not open yet, lights were low, music was turned down and crowds were non-existent. The event coordinator asked me what snacks my son liked, what he like to do, and what could be done to make the visit enjoyable for him. I let her know about the only thing he might enjoy are lollipops.

We got to the mall at the designated time and Teri was waiting for us at the door and took us down. There were crafts they could make, coffee, juice and other snack items available. The coordinators really did a good job welcoming us.

We had only taken him to see Santa once or twice before, there is one picture of him at about the age of two or three screaming in Santa's lap, and we were wondering how he would do now. Here's a pic from his first Christmas, not with Santa.



When we got to Santa, he was seated and N. walked around a little, looked at Santa, put his hands on his eyebrows and gave him a kiss on his forehead. Unbelievably sweet. Santa got out a Tootsie Pop and he took it. He was not interested in sitting on Santa's lap, but sat on the floor at his feet. Santa pulled out a small footstool and my son sat on that.



The mall staff also took some pictures, showed me what they had an printed a couple of them out, for free. Send them to my mother, she's wanted a picture of him with Santa for years. Just wanted to say Tuttle Mall did a really, really cool thing for families of special needs children this year. I commend their staff and thank them very much.

Listen to the words

On Wednesday night, Writers' Block Poetry will be hosting Jon Sands. He's been on this blog before, and is most likely going to be on this blog in the future. Why? Because he's one of the best damn poets I've had the pleasure to know.



Sure, the video is off a blurry phone, but through the Vaseline lens, Sands' work hugs you hard. He's hard to let go of.

Here's Sands with more visual clarity.



Sands' book, The New Clean, is available at the usual places.

He will also be appearing at Writing Wrongs Open Mic in Columbus tomorrow night.