Category: helloAryn

I was listening to the song “He’s Simple, He’s Dumb, He’s the Pilot” the other day of the album The Software Slump by the group Grandaddy, and I noticed at around 3:38 you can hear very faintly the main riff from another of Grandaddy’s songs called AM 180. I have located a few examples of these songs, the first He’s Simple is from a youTube montage video someone made for One Tree Hill ( ? )… Anyway you can at least hear the song: [youtube]O_Xhy9Ho7ng[/youtube]

Which at 3:38 if the compression was not crapola, you could hear the reference to the other song AM 180 (from the album Under The Western Freeway or the 28 Days Later soundtrack (when they are in the grocery store)):[youtube]YX-_yLyU1fU[/youtube]

Anyway if you are in need to checking out some new music I would highly recommend The Software Slump, its one of those albums that had to grow on me, but it is now one of my favourites.

I found this little video interesting this morning… You too can learn something today just like me!

[googlevideo]6813529239937418232[/googlevideo]

Micheal Katzif, renaissance man in training, Luddite, and general miscreant, is on the top of his game. He has just come out of a long period of underground studies, where he has been honing his skills in culinary clothing design, and is about to take the West by storm. Hello Come In had the opportunity recently to chat with Michael at a posh downtown cigar shoppe, about his life, liberty, failed pursuit of happiness, and the general trends in media and entertainment.

Aryn: So Mike, whats this I have been hearing about a new clothing line?

Mike: The thing with the clothing line is half accurate.

Only half accurate?

I have been developing new ways in which people can wear clothes in order to maximize comfort and style while at the same time prevent people from having the same styles of clothing. So some of that experimentation has been a clothing line. The other part has been a methodical rounding up or herding of individuals who are deemed redundant and mind wiping their brains.

Is this a sort of ever updated fad chaser that someone can simply put on and not have to worry about looking cool, because the “clothing” does that for them?

The new clothing can be adaptive to its environments, but the mind wipes ensure that no one has a predisposition towards any sort of sameness in the universe.

That sounds a little science fiction to me. What other projects have you been working on?

Well a few things coming up the pipe are a bread baking club; sort of a “choose your own adventure” recipe construction where you never know what you are making until the very end.

Is that a “hip” new term for something else, or are you actually talking about a cooking club? Sounds a bit old fashioned.

I like to live my life dancing between the extreme modern and the horribly antiquated. I call it “digilog.” Or “analogital.” You can choose.

Interesting, I have heard that people only remember the first and last parts of things, sounds like you have revolved your life around that theory?

I really only remember the middle. My favourite parts of calzones were the middles.

I see. Can you tell me your top two presidents (or prime ministers or dictators) from any era, and what their contribution to the fashion world meant in relation to your art?

See most people these days would mention Roosevelt (Teddy) or Taft for their iconic mustaches which have grown increasingly ironic and stylish in the hipster scene, but not me.

Don’t forget Ghengis.

I would say that the most stylish world leaders would be along the lines of someone with killer mutton chops. You cannot deny the influence that style of facial hair has had on the world as we know it. I’d suggest we would not be at war if John Adam’s mutton chops were leading this country, plus it gives ladies something to hold onto in the heat of passion.

How has your facial hair (or lack of) shaped your influence on America and the world? Has it made you a better diplomat?

Well I do have a certain disdain for those with full beards, but i would say I try to be a liaison and ambassador to the fully bearded. I want to work with them to make a difference and cannot get swept up into petty partisanship, whether its with a fashion line of clothing or fishing for lobsters in the Cape Cod.

All right Mr. Katzif, my readers sent me their burning questions, and I sifted through the thousands of letters and got the list down to five, ready?

Naturally.

When did you first feel like a man?

Probably the first time I used a urinal, or any sort of standing while peeing.

How do you tend to rebuild from your many failures as a human?

I find a healthy dose of television tells me all the ways I can become a better person.

What is your favourite luxury item to bring along on a camping trip?

The typical answer would be high class escort…

I take it your not a typical person…

… and while that would be nice if one was sans girlfriend, I expect that camping is better with them, so if and when I have lady friends on trip, I’d bring a fine cheese, maybe an Edam or Gouda of some sort.

What would you choose if forced : a) spilled milk b) turtle on its back c) one clean, one dirty sock , and how would you respond to said problem?

If I was confronted with any of these, I’d probably choose the turtle on its back and here’s why: Spilled milk is not the big deal the mainstream corporate media wants you to believe it is. While devastating on a personal level, it really helps our American farmers sell more milk.

The one clean sock, one dirty sock issue is easy. I hate dirty socks, and for that matter dirty clothes. If there is even chance that a sock is dirty, I might consider just buying new socks or drop everything and launder it.

The turtle seems like the easiest fix emotionally. I once saw a dead turtle next to the road. That was more sad.

You have such refined analytical skills. How were those obtained? extensive training? Sudoku? inherited?

Cereal box prize.

Nice.

It was.

And the number one burning question from all of your hundreds of fans out there…

Dont over sell me, I only have dozens of fans.

What school are you going to donate your fortune to, and what college programme will be created? i.e. (The Katzif school of monogramming, or Mike’s Trikes, School of three wheeled vehicles)

Hard to plan for my own demise, I’m not really sure what legacy to leave.

It could be anything.. what would you most like to be remembered for? Contributions to science? Good will towards man? Hygiene?

… but Gonzaga does have a decent bread resource facility in Finland… While hygiene is important, I’d say that I’d like to be remembered for being somewhat of a renaissance man, a lover of things, and a doer of other things.

Well , thanks for taking the time to speak with me today Michael, is there anything you would like to add before we go?

Just a reminder to the children around the world to support your local superhero, whether its Carpetman, Fluorescent Avenger, or the Bubble Bathtubman.

Great!

Katzif has a new book coming out “Pursuits in Technical Accounting : A Numbers Game that could Save You MILLIONS!” which chronicles his knowledge and experience playing the stock and tax market game. Mike will be available for book signing this weekend at Borders Books on the corner of Pine and Walton.

Hello friends and readers, as you may or may not know, I have been working for the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners training college students to serve as Polling Place Administrators (PPAs) on election day. The city of Chicago obtained new touchscreen voting machines by mandate from the passage of HAVA (Help America Vote Act) requiring that there be a way for people with certain dissabilities (blind, quadrapalegic) would be able to vote with privacy and without assistance at the polling place on election day.

Anyway we got a bunch of those new machines, and the Judges of Election (the folks that run the polling places) had TONS of problems running and using the machines during the March primaries. The board or elections decided that something had to be done to save their jobs and make the elections run smoother. Their solution was to recruite and train 2000 college kids to be there and know how to setup and run and troubleshoot the voting machines.

Well as you can see by this handy graphic from the Chicago Tribune , there was a marked improvement between these elections and the primaries in March: So as you can CLEARLY see from that graphic, my friends and I single handedly saved many people their jobs and helped this election to go forth successfully.

We spent election day (from 5:00am until 10:00pm) answering call after call taking down complaints from voters, and helping judges and PPAs solve problems. Some of the more comical calls we recieved (comically scary maybe) were from judges wondering when we were going to be bringing them coffee and donuts (sorry we don’t provide) or wondering why there was not a television included in their equipment so they could watch their training video to learn how to run a polling place (yikes!).

The majority were about little problems with machines where we would talk them through how to change the paper, get out a stuck voter card, help them realize that the machine is in fact unplugged and that is why it won’t work, and generally run them through the simple procedures they had been trained and were outlined in their handbook they should have had with them. There were a few calls from frustrated voters about judges who were generally disrespectful and had an obvious disregard for the election process and the voters privacy. For those we sent out investigators to hopefully smack some common sense and respect into these people.

It was my first election that I worked, and I think everything went pretty well. Our boss was very happy with the work that we did, and asked if we were interesed in doing this again in January for the next elections. Only thing I need now is to finally recieve the crapload of money that they owe me, this elusive check that is mysteriously floating around the county building just out of reach. I will call tomorrow and they will probably just tell me “Friday at the LATEST”, which is what we heard last week, and the week before, and the week before, and the… sigh.

Tomorrow is Nov. 7th, and we all know that Nov. 7th = voting day! So don’t forget to get out and re-elect or elect your favourite candidate in whatever city or state you are currently registered in. IF you.registered_status = false THEN shame on you. ELSE IF you.registered_status = true AND you.vote = false THEN you have no room for complaining. So go out and vote away, at the very least so that you can complain when that jerk that was elected does something that you don’t agree with. Plus its fun, those new touchscreens have in-vote movie systems… so you can now watch commercials why you vote and you don’t doze off while paging through 11 pages of judges you have never heard of ( at least in Chicago ). Good luck heroes!

I saw clap your hands say yeah! last night. some thoughts.

openers:
takka takka – weak sauce.
architecture in helsinki – pleasant surprise, this was one of those bands that I had heard the name of for years (from the KSU archie kids ) but never quite listened to. They were quite spastic, but put on an entertaining show. It was almost like a fiery furnace diet type of band,but you could feel the definite influence of the clash and talking heads / david byrne

clap – they put on a pretty rocking show. granted it was fairly pretentious (basically no interaction with the audience, and what little he did say was incomprehensible) but I liked the way they played their first album’s songs live, and some interesting newer songs.. the one that stood out to me contained the word satan being repeated over and over. It sounded like it might have some promise. The first of the newer songs they played I wasnt impressed by at all, and it was annoying how they opened the show, really only because they played “gimme some salt” and I think kind of bastardized the song for the sake of bastardizing. I dont know if the harmonies just didnt work, or what but I was really hoping to hear it played the way it was on the record which I really like. but those lows were quickly quelled as they kicked ass the rest of the show..

they did play the opening track “clap your hands” which was pretty neat, complete with megaphone gimick..
one last thing, I kind of dont see why they need to be a 5 piece, I would think that the reduction of one of their members would open up some of their songs and make them sound a little better live.. but oh well they must be doing something right.. we’ll see if they have the sophmore slump, then time will tell if they are truley a quality band.

Sue recieved a letter in the mail from unicef a month or two ago. It looks like a pretty standard solicitation for donations except for one angle that I hadn’t seen before. The inclusion of a shiny new nickel on the inside. The nickel is placed so that you can see a little part of it through the address window on the front. I know its not everyday that an organization that is out there helping people has time to send cash money to random people, so this must be one special letter. On the right side of the address window with the previously noted shiny nickel is a blue box with an arrow pointing to the shiny nickel that says ” This Nickel could save a child’s life!” , below which our other roommate wrote the ever so witty phrase, “Then why did you give it to Sue?” Which brings up an interesting point, because Sue has un-willingingly accepted this nickel, she has prevented it from saving a child’s life. So way to go Sue! …maybe we need to lay low for a few weeks until the heat from this blows over…

I was at the good ol’ Cub foods last night, really itching to find that perfect product that defines me as a person. Not just any item will work, mind you, as I am constantly on the lookout to make that “deep” connection with companies and their products. I want to have a personal relationship with the items that I use in the consumeristic world that is my life, because if I cant have personal relationships with other people (not true), then why can’t I have personal relationships with all the wonderful companies out there. I mean they have my best interest at heart, so I decided a long time ago that if its printed on a box, it is most definitely true.

I needed something to cover up my leftover meals, and for baking cookies , and keeping out the aliens from my brain. So I scoured the store, searching for that PERFECT product that can truly define me as a person, and lo and behold, I found it.

I feel more like a man now.