Album Capsules; Finishing a Semester

Well, I just finished sending off student grades for the fall semester, which means no work until February 10th.  So that's nice.  Grading 160 final exams at 40 questions each comes to 6,400 questions, unless my math is wrong, which is likely because my brain is mush.  It would be nice to have a robot to do the grading for me.

Me: See that stack of paper over there?

Robot:  I do.

Me:  Grade them.

Robot: Master, before I begin, I should inform you that considering my limited abilities at reading human script, as well as my unfamiliarity with the principles of microeconomics, I estimate that I can complete the task in 214 hours, with a per-question error rate of 86 percent.

Me: Sounds good.  Before you get started, put a case of Heineken in the fridge.  As far as I've seen, your per-beer error rate is excellent.  If you need me, I'll be on my laptop killing zombies.

Robot: Yes, Master.  [Whispering]  Fuck my life.  Seriously.

. . . Because the only robots that I'll be able to afford in the future will be the ones with attitude.

Well, it's the end of the month, and I've picked up a few more albums recently.  They're all pretty good.

Local Natives

Hummingbird

78/100

Atmospheric, shimmering indie rock.  At its worst, it sounds like background music.  When you're done with it, you don't remember what it is that you just heard.  A few more plays and the beauty really comes out.  This band sounds like a healthy mix of Band of Horses, the National, and Destroyer.  While it is hard to identify any standout tracks, you get the feeling that the band is only going to get better, despite the fact that a few reviewers have claimed that their previous album was even better than this one.  Well, that's nice to hear.  Check out "Breakers."

Ex Cops

True Hallucinations

77/100

A collection of bubblegum pop tracks over half an hour, and many of the songs lasting just two minutes, this album really flies by.  When it's done, you feel like you've just done a tour of what pop music has sounded like over the decades.  I imagine that this album will become insanely popular, and soon Rolling Stone will be declaring them the newest version of the Strokes, or something equally gagworthy.  Anyhoo, bonus points for experimentation.  Below is "Broken Chinese Chairz."

Nosaj Thing

Home

81/100

I can't tell whether this album is instrumental hiphop or experimental dance music, or neither of these, because it doesn't make me want to dance, and I can't picture someone rapping over it.  Although it isn't mellow music, it sounds like it should be played at night.  Where Flying Lotus is so chock full of ideas crammed into songs so that you feel like you're about to be trapped in an avalanche, Nosaj Thing is a polar opposite, which is nice because music by Flying Lotus makes me nervous.  Home has three really good songs--"Eclipse/Blue," with singing by Kazu Makino; "Glue," which you can hear below; and "Try," featuring Toro y Moi.

Overall, a very good week for music.  Below, you can find all of the albums that I have reviewed this month. They are listed top to bottom from "very fun" to "lacks humanity."


Foxygen--We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic (88/100)

Yo La Tengo--Fade (85/100)

Wooden Wand--Blood Oaths of the New Blues (83/100)

Nosaj Thing--Home (81/100)

Parquet Courts--Light Up Gold (80/100)

Mountains--Centralia (78/100)

Local Natives--Hummingbird (78/100)

Ex Cops--True Hallucinations (77/100)

A$AP Rocky--Long.Live.A$AP (72/100)

California X--California X (70/100)

Pantha du Prince & The Bell Laboratory--Elements of Light (67/100)

Widowspeak--Almanac (67/100)

Brokeback--Brokeback and the Black Rock (57/100)

Everything Everything--Arc (46/100)

Album Capsules--California X

California X

California X

70/100

As far as I can tell, this is a new band that sounds like Dinosaur Jr.  They are Dinosaur Jr. on a happy day.  If you have ever listened to Dinosaur Jr. and thought, God, I wish they would cheer up--well then California X is your wish come true.  Dinosaur Jr., by the way, is still making albums.  And they are better, despite their relatively sad tone.  But after listening to "Pond Rot" below, maybe you will disagree.  Maybe you will think that California X are the god-kings of Dinosaur Jr.  Interesting observation on your part.  Now I doubt everything I've written here.  (Meanwhile, you're sitting there wondering what the hell a Dinosaur Jr. is.  If so, think of indie rock with lots of lead guitar, loud and fuzzy.)

First Live Poker Memory

I didn't start playing live poker until I had been playing online for a couple of years.  I had heard that live poker players were supposed to be worse than online players.  The comparison that I frequently heard was that winning 10c/25c NL players could crush a $1/$2 NL live game.  Well, I was able to win at 25NL online, so I brought three buyins--$600ish--to Harrahs in Council Bluffs (near Omaha) and gave it a try.

Because I didn't know much about live poker--except from what I had seen on TV, which didn't give me much guidance--I didn't really know what was abnormal about my first game.  I guess I was too nervous about doing something wrong.  But it turns out that two things were quite strange.

The first thing was Seat Ten.

I bought in for $200, which I believe was the maximum (perhaps $300?  It has been a while) and observed Seat Ten go all-in about every third hand.  At a passive table.  The action would begin with three or four calls, then ten seat would go all in--maybe $90 into a $10 pot--and everyone would fold.

On 10's third all-in attempt, one of the limpers called and turned over something like ace ten.  Ten Seat had QT.  Anyway, Ten hit his lucky queen and suddenly he had a stack again.  I had the feeling that a few players were deflated by the outcome.  They wanted Seat Ten off the table so that they could resume limping and seeing flops.  Personally, I loved Seat Ten, because I was sitting in seat one.

Meanwhile, I kept waiting.  I recall raising a pair of tens and getting one caller.  On an ace-high flop, I chickened out, lost, and resumed folding for an orbit or so.  I was so nervous that my VPIP might have been 5 percent.

Things settled down for a bit until Seat Ten turned on his randomizer again.  A few players called, Ten declared all in, and the action folded around to seat eight, a young guy with a shaved head and a really old looking t-shirt who had a similar stack.  Shaved Head quickly said, "Call."

His trap had sprung!

Before the flop, Seat Ten flipped over pocket aces, and Shaved Head went quiet.

But when the flop came 3 3 2, Shaved Head exposed A 3, whooped, and that's when the second strange thing happened.

Shaved Head, as white as they come, started some kind of wannabe gangsta trash talk.

"That's how I do!" he exclaimed.  "You can't come with rockets against this," he said loudly, touching his chest.  "Oh no, you can't.  This is how I do.  Quads.  Gimme quads.  I don't win without quads."  He said all of this in a tone of voice that previously had not belonged to him.  He suddenly sounded inner city.  But not exactly inner city.  He sounded like a white kid who has measured his toughness by a single visit to the inner city during which he had not been beaten up.

Anyway, quads didn't come, Seat Ten departed with a surprising amount of grace, and I, on my first trip to a poker room, was too nervous to win at the softest live table I have ever found.

Ah, the Joy of Giving Final Exams

I will do you the benefit of NOT making this a whine post about final exam week.

I thought you might be interested in something, though.  If you were educated in the developed world, you probably went through a curriculum that developed your analytical skills.

You know--you were asked the question "Why?" a lot.  Or "How?"  As you thought deeply about the question and supplied an answer, neurons fired and new connections developed in your brain.  You became smarter.

It's funny how I take that for granted.  In the UAE, as well as in the former Soviet state Uzbekistan, memorization is emphasized instead.

So when I give a final exam, the students tend to do really well with questions requiring an answer that they have already memorized (if they've studied).

But every exam, I like to add a question that tests basic common sense.  I either do that or else I add a question that requires students to follow basic instructions.  Here's the one that I gave this year:

There are three lines below these instructions.  On the top line, write the number 57.  On the middle line, write the number 16.  On the bottom line, write the number 4.  Once you have followed these instructions, you have finished this problem.

______________

______________

______________

Simple test of common sense.  Can my students follow instructions?

. . . Any guess at the percentage of students that got this question right?

Well, since I'm making a blog post about it, you're probably guessing a low number.  Yep.  Fifty-eight percent of students got this one right.  Hello, F.

[Edit: I graded a second class.  They scored 86 percent on this problem.  Six out of 7 got it right.  Maybe the first class was unlucky?  Overweighted with dumb ones?  Not sure.]

What did the other 42 percent of students do?  They added the numbers.  They subtracted them.  They put them on the wrong lines.  They put them side by side on the top line.  Or they left the question blank.

To be fair, I have failed at these common sense questions too.  In high school, I got handed a "test."  At the top, it read:

Instruction: Read all of the problems before doing any work.

There were about 20 problems.  Number 1 required me to solve 6 x 8 + 6 - 18 / 3 * 21 without a calculator.  Number 2 was similar.  Then the latter problems got progressively harder.  I marched right down the page, answering them all . . . until I reached the final problem, which read:

20.  Do not answer any of these questions.  Just write your name at the top of the page and hand it in.

Oh . . . right.  I guess I wouldn't feel like such a doofus if I had bothered to follow instructions.

Oops.

Ehow.com Teaches Me How to Write a Music Review

Ehow.com is awesome.  I don't do much of anything without consulting it first.  Today, it will teach me how to write a music review.

"1.  Listen to the CD a few times. Write down how you feel while you listen. Be objective. Research background material about the band. Read the album cover."


Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon."  When I listen to it, I feel relaxed.  Then I feel like I am high as a fucking kite.  I also feel scared of the screaming lady at the end of side 1.  Then I go through the relaxed, high, scared emotions again on side 2.  The album is a picture of a pyramid.  


"2.  Start with the facts: who the band is, what type of music it is, past albums, how many tracks the current CD has and song titles. Opening with your opinion is not a good idea; you want readers to read your entire article, not just the first paragraph"
.

This is Pink Floyd's eighth studio album.  It has ten tracks.  This band is British.  It is space rock.  Their past albums are not as good.


"3. Bring your impressions and point of view alive. Give examples. Use poetic language. Select specific tracks that you feel strongly about, and share which tracks disliked too."


This album is chasing me down the street, wanting to give me a joint, a massage, and a knife through the ribs at the same time.  It wants to get me high as a fucking kite and then toss me in the air so that I land on the knife.  I liked "Us and Them."  It involved lots of death, but it made me sleepy.  I like to be sleepy.  I liked the sleepy tracks.  I disliked the tracks where I got disemboweled.


"4.  Form an opinion about the music. Write specifically about the CD you are reviewing, not as much about the band itself or its past CDs."


In my opinion, this album will never be famous.  People tend not to like getting stabbed by music, especially when they're sleepy.


"5.  Expand on your ideas. Make comparisons to other musical acts, if appropriate. Summarize your thoughts about the album in the final paragraph, so readers leave the review with your feelings clearly stated."


Fuck.  Okay.  In my opinion, this band will really never be famous.  Honest.  The album that is chasing me is gigantic.  Two stories tall.  I am afraid.  I am very afraid.  Then I am sleepy again.

The end

Thanks, ehow!

Band No One Listens To?

In an earlier post here, I made the ridiculous claim that Yo La Tengo is a band that almost no one listens to.  Turns out I was--am?--living in the hollow of a tree.  Turns out that in their first week after releasing Fade, they hit #26 on the Billboard 200.

If that link doesn't work--it probably changes each week--here's the screenshot:




People have taste!  In my opinion, no band deserves the sales more.

Blogging into Nonexistence

I started blogging back in 2004 or so.  Back then, I had a poker blog called Government Cheese, which was full of wise-ass posts about horrible microstakes players on PokerStars.  It was tremendous stress relief.  Some forumers on twoplustwo mentioned it in a post or two, and suddenly my readership skyrocketed.

When I say skyrocketed, I mean moving from 20 views per day to 400.  Not a lot of views in either case, but a big jump nevertheless.

After I killed that blog, I started a second one, the Epileptic Chihuahua.  I think it was an imitation of the first, with the only real difference being that my number of readers ended up being 75 percent less than my first one.  Eventually, I killed that one.

This blog has been going since April, and my number of hits are ninety percent less than the second blog.

I am blogging myself into nonexistence!  Call me an American success story in reverse.  If you want to be depressed, watch the movie of my blogging life from beginning to end.  (It's a short movie; you won't finish your popcorn.)  If you want to be happy, play it backwards.

Start a fourth blog, with the goal of one reader?  Awesome.

I am imagining a blogger who has posted daily for a couple of years and has never had a reader.  Sad?  Funny?  I'm leaning to the funny side on that one.  Nevertheless, I should count my blessings.

I mention all of this not as a complaint of any sort.  In fact, all of this makes sense to me, with the way that I keep changing my subject matter.  It's awfully difficult to blog about poker when I don't play anymore.  And my current subject matter is, in my opinion, less interesting than my poker content.

Maybe I should've taken that Emirati student up on his offer to play heads up poker with him last semester . . .

In any case, thanks for reading.  I'm having fun with it.  I must be; this must be my fifth post of the day.  Either I'm having fun with it or else I've developed a new obsessive-compulsive disorder.