Apparently, I'm not the only one in the building being annoyed by Annoying Neighbor's Screaming Child. (Mind you, I should note that the child just likes to scream, and the parents do not discipline her. This is not an "I'm hungry" or an "I'm tired" or "I'm being beaten" scream, this is just a child who likes to stand there and scream for no apparent reason except to do so.) I was woken up at 7am by the usual shrieking and I was getting ready to close my windows (which would've made it a little too warm for my liking in my bedroom) when I heard "Shut up!!!!!" echo through the corridor between my building and the one next door. Amazingly enough, it worked... at least long enough for me to go back to sleep and then get woken up by my alarm an hour and a half later.

I've gotten the remark from a couple of people that my outgoing voicemail message is "short" and "abrupt." (It says, "Hi, this is Keith, leave a message." That's all.) Quite frankly, I don't see why my outgoing message needs to be longer. If the phone rings five times or so, it's pretty obvious I'm not picking up and you'll be kicked to voicemail, where you'll wait for the tone and then leave a message with your name and, if I don't have it already, your number. So since we've all been conditioned to already know what to do when leaving a message, why do I have to spell it out for you in a long blathering message? So Wendy was doing this five questions thing, and I decided to participate... 1. When did you start blogging? Who introduced to you to it? June 2001. I was actually introduced to it by Aimee. She doesn't look like she's blogging much anymore, though. Through some glitch on Blogger.com, she was stuck on the recently updated page for a month or so, and her blog sounded the coolest of all the ones listed there. So I started reading, we started e-mailing, and she suggested I start blogging -- I think it was to make sure I wasn't a completely insane stalker guy. 2. Alternate Universe: There is only country music. It is the ONLY music there is. Death is not an option. What do you do for a living? I'd be a deeeeeeentiiiiiiiist... sorry, couldn't resist breaking into song there. Um... I guess I'd probably never have left the wonderful and exciting and fulfilling world of public relations. Or maybe I'd have auditioned to be one of the Fantanas. 3. Your perfect day, beginning to end. Sleep late. Wake up next to a wonderful woman. Go out to brunch. Do some kind of outdoor fun activity, maybe mini golf or going for a walk on the beach or something. Then perhaps cooking a dinner together. Then cuddling on the couch and watching a good movie together. Then some rock 'n' roll hoochie coo. Then falling asleep together. 4. 3 songs you can't live without. 3 songs that should have never been made. Oh, evil woman! How dare you reduce my musical tastes to a simple triad of good and evil! I'll give it a shot, but I expect that it'll change in about five minutes. Can't Live Without: 1. Grand Theft Audio - "As Good As It Gets" 2. Handsome Boy Modeling School - "Once Again (To Kick One For You)" 3. Finch - "What It Is to Burn (Radio Mix)" Should Never Have Been Made: 1. P. Diddy - "I'll Be Missing You" 2. Avril Lavigne - "Complicated" 3. John Mayer - "Your Body is a Wonderland" 5. Finish this sentence. The perfect woman for me would be... My best friend, my lover and my partner-in-crime all wrapped into an attractive package. Someone who thinks I'm the funniest guy in the world and who can make me laugh until I have trouble breathing. Someone who can argue with me about something as stupid as the plot intracacies of Super Troopers as well as something as intelligent as politics and philosophy. Someone who likes me for my quirks and little aspects of my personality and who allows for things that I love that she may not. Someone who can sing. Someone who likes rock. Someone who is handy with tools. Someone who makes me want to make an effort to accept her for who she is. If you'd like to be interviewed: 1) Leave a comment by 10pm tonight if you want to be interviewed. 2) I will respond; I'll ask you five questions. 3) You'll update your journal with my five questions, and your five answers. 4) You'll include this explanation. 5) You'll ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.

Don't tell Francisco, but I still don't get the gestalt of The White Stripes. I really don't think they're all that great, and I don't understand why everyone thinks they're the Second Coming of alternative music. Yeah, I enjoy "Fell in Love With a Girl" a lot, and the video kicked ass, but I haven't heard anything else from them that really blew me away. Quite frankly, Meg White can't sing (even though she tries), she has problems keeping a steady beat, Jack White doesn't have that great of a singing voice either, and their songs are not all that good. Someone asked me my opinion of their latest album, Elephant, and I replied, "They've been touting the fact that it took them two weeks to do the album... the amount of time they put into it shows." Anyone can sit down and put together a half-assed record -- and believe me, there's a ton of bands who do -- so how come these guys get to be the darlings of Alternative radio? Anyways, this week's Sunday Most Listened-to Song o' the Week is from a group from San Diego. I think they're actually a Christian rock band, but they're not preachy and talk about God all the time like the other Christian rock bands I've heard, at least not on their debut single. Their record label, however, is preachy about them -- I got literally five or six copies of their single, which put me off since I don't like being barraged. But then I heard the song on this Atlanta radio station I like and dug a copy out of the junk pile and haven't stopped listening to it since. It rocks, and it's got a positive message without being preachy or shiny and happy, which is hard to do. Switchfoot - "Meant to Live" Fumbling his confidence And wondering why the world has passed him by Hoping that he's bent for more than arguments And failed attempts to fly, fly We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? Somewhere we live inside Somewhere we live inside We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? Somewhere we live inside Dreaming about Providence And whether mice or men have second tries Maybe we've been living with our eyes half open Maybe we're bent and broken, broken We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? Somewhere we live inside Somewhere we live inside We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? Somewhere we live inside We want more than this world's got to offer We want more than this world's got to offer We want more than the wars of our fathers And everything inside screams for second life, yeah We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? We were meant to live for so much more Have we lost ourselves? We were meant to live We were meant to live...

Pssssst. Soylent Green is people! I wonder if New York, in all its blacked-out glory, looked like it's portrayed in all those science fiction films -- hot and overcrowded with throngs of people milling through the streets like in Soylent Green, or desolate and ominous like in Escape From New York. Although I did find amusing and a little wondrous that someone was quoted in an AP article as saying, "Tonight, you can see the stars from New York City!" It almost makes me wish I was there to see it myself.

So I don't usually do memes, but after cranking out a 1600-word column for work tonight in addition to all the other crap I had to take care of, I felt it wouldn't be totally out of line to indulge myself. Besides, I pilfered it from Ericalynn, who's cool in ways you don't even know about and who I'm still waiting to journey out to Los Angeles. The original one was mildly female-oriented, so I've omitted the two or three questions that don't apply to males (like "last bra worn" -- had to give you guys an example so you don't think sick things about me, you sickos). 1) Last dream: I was taking a final exam that happened to be about Futurama, which sadly aired its last new episode on Sunday. I was kicking ass on the exam because I was the only person in the room who was obsessed with the show, but then I did something inadvertently to piss off the professor, who failed me before I even finished the exam. Damn, was I simultaneously pissed and scared. 2) Last car ride: Around 7pm, coming home from work. But that was a car drive, not a ride. I can't remember the last time I was a passenger... it's been a while. I'm rarely a passenger. I hate being a passenger, I much prefer to be the driver. 3) Last kiss: Saturday night, somewhere in the vicinity of 2am. 4) Last good cry: Months? Years? Can't remember. 5) Last Missing Library Book: I don't think I've ever misplaced a library book. 6) Last movie seen: Bad Company, with Anthony Hopkins and Chris Rock 7) Last Book Read: Songbook by Nick Hornby 8) Last curse word uttered: fuckity-fuck-fuck-fuck 9) Last beverage drank: Diet Sunkist 10) Last food consumed: baked chicken 11) Last crush: Amy Lee, lead singer of Evanescence 12) Last phone call: to skits 13) Last TV show watched: Family Guy 14) Last Item Bought: Not counting the chicken I had for dinner? The latest Placebo CD, Sleeping With Ghosts. 15) Last time showered: last night. 16) Last shoes worn: my bucs 17) Last CD played: entirely all the way through? Kings of Leon - Youth & Young Manhood 18) Last MP3 Downloaded: N/A... bad bad bad (unless it's paid) 19) Last annoyance: Annoying Next-Door Neighbors' little kid screaming again 20) Last disappointment: That the Placebo CD was $14.99 instead of $12.99 as I anticipated. I could've gotten Taco Bell with that $2! 21) Last soda drank: Aforementioned Diet Sunkist. 22) Last thing written: Aforementioned 1600-word column for next week's newspaper. 23) Last key used: mail key. 24) Last phrase spoken: "Go to sleep, dude, even though sleep at 10:30 is for wimps." 25) Last trip to the bathroom: about an hour ago 26) Last sleep: 2:30am-10am last night 27) Last IM: about 2 1/2 hours ago 28) Last sexual fantasy: ask me realtime, maybe I'll tell you 29) Last orgasm: next question! 30) Last weird encounter: earlier today when some random person started talking to me in the supermarket. 31) Last Store Shopped at: Ralph's for the chicken, and before that, Best Buy for the Placebo CD 32) Last ice cream eaten: uhhh... I think it might be the Coldstone Creamery cake at Fran's birthday party. Did I mention they're putting in a Coldstone around the corner from my apartment? [insert Homer Simpson drooling noise] 33) Last time amused: about 3 minutes ago, when someone told me that there is not a straight man in America who likes all of the following: tofu, wine coolers, a cappella and post-modern feminist theory. 34) Last time wanting to die: can't recall that one... 35) Last time in love: it's been a while... couple of years, I think. 36) Last time hugged: Sunday, when I saw Becky 37) Last time scolded: last night at work by a self-righteous arrogant co-worker 38) Last time resentful: see previous answer 39) Last chair sat in: my desk chair, which I'm in right now 40) Last underwear worn: black Jockey boxer-briefs 41) Last shirt worn: green Old Navy t-shirt 42) Last class attended: Neuropsychology. May 1998. 43) Last Final taken: see previous answer 44) Last time dancing: dunno... it's been waaaaaay too long 45) Last poster looked at: the ominous looking poster of Samuel L. Jackson from Pulp Fiction hanging in the hallway outside my bedroom (it's signed by the man, too!) 46) Last show attended: Nintendo Fusion Tour last week with Cold and Evanescence 47) Last webpage visited: Ericalynn

If you could trade places with anyone in the world -- assume their looks, their life, their fame/fortune/popularity/whatever made you want to take their place -- who would it be and why?

I've gone and done something dumb again. I'll just chalk it up to continuing a streak of a long line of dumb things I've done. It's not the end of the world, but I'm not a dumb person and I don't like coming off looking dumb. So, anyone want to tell me a joke to cheer me up?

I'm happy that our government is spending millions of dollars to strengthen airport security, especially given that the second anniversary of 9/11 is coming up, reminding us all about how vulnerable we are. But while our Fearless Leader is relaxing on his ranch in Texas, I'd like to remind him that bombs can be delivered in other vehicles... oh, like ships and cars. Is Homeland Security checking ships' manifestos and crew as closely as they're checking airline passenger lists? Because it'd be pretty easy for Al Qaeda to dock a ship in New York Harbor and blow it up. Haven't our brilliant experts thought of this yet? In other news, there ought to be a law against Princespeak unless you're Prince. If you're IMing or e-mailing me, the letters "u" and "r" had better be contained in words and the numbers "2" and "4" had better be in number sequences. Otherwise, in 20 years, we'll wake up and everything will be like Newspeak in 1984 where everyone is rewriting the language. And I reeeeeeeally don't want to be that cranky old guy who goes around talking about "how it used to be in my day." I'm already doing that, and I'm too young to be doing that.

Lots of things running through my mind right now... not too much I really want to talk about though. I'll just go ahead with my Sunday Most Listened-To Song of the Week. Catherine Wheel - "Crank" Love my superstitious games Running circles 'round my brain when I'm left smiling I love to steal this living steam My head in someone's dream I'm tired of sleeping Call me crank, my idea Crank, so super Crank, my conscience clear I build my canopy of steel It fulfills my sense of real A chrome protection Call me crank, my idea Crank, so super Crank, my conscience clear It's clear In this small partition, like a prison Explode time bomb If you know where I come from You call me crank, my idea Crank, so super Crank, my conscience clear Please call me crank, it's what I need Crank, my mind in seed Crank, my dream complete Lay down, lay down, lay down...

Excerpted from Songbook, a soon-to-be-released collection of short essays by Nick Hornby revolving around 30 or so of his favorite songs: I don't dislike classical music because of its cultivation -- I'm not an inverted snob. I dislike it (or at least, I'm unaffected by it) because it sounds churchy, and because, to my ears at least, it can't deal with the smaller feelings that constitute a day and a week and a life, and because there are no backing vocals or bass lines or guitar solos, and because a lot of pople who profess to like it actually don't really like any music (or any culture) at all, and because I grew up listening to something else, and because it does not possess the ability to make me feel, and because I don't need my music to sound any "better" than it does already -- a great, farting, squelching, quick-witted sax solo does the job for me. In that vein, here's five songs (in no particular order) for a beautiful summer Saturday night in Los Angeles where your date has cancelled on you and you have no other plans except to sit home and see what's on TV because your friends either have other plans or are nowhere to be found. 1. "Drinking in L.A." - Bran Van 3000 (no comments about the triteness of this choice; yes, I'm in L.A.; yes, I'm 26 as it says in the song; I really don't care) 2. "Strange Condition (Rock Version)" - Pete Yorn (this version's been reworked from the one on the album -- I think it's much better and prefer it very much to the original) 3. "Letting the Cables Sleep" - Bush 4. "Hello Time Bomb" - Matthew Good Band 5. "405" - Death Cab For Cutie

Those of you who know me know that I am completely addicted to the Internet comic strip Goats. It's intelligent humor pushed to the point of lunacy, which is completely up my alley. While I hate going on and on about the same topic, the strip from Friday was just too good not to share with all of you because I know there's many of you who are following the lunacy going on in California and who are also Harry Potter fans.

Everyone else is having their eeeeeeeeee!, why can't I? Four hours of Denis Leary tonight on Comedy Central. Oh yes, four hours. Eeeeeeeeeeee! (And no, you may not make jokes about how that sounds like Mini-Me when he gets stuck on the ceiling of the moonbase in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me... even though I'm having similar thoughts.)

The media pundits are having a field day with this recall election in California. Nicknames about Arnold I've heard so far today regarding his bid to be governor: - Conan the Campaigner - The Governator - Total Recaller - The Last Political Hero - The Running Man (well, duh) The scary thing is that I was watching Demolition Man last night (which was filmed in 1993 but is supposed to take place in 2032), and there's this scene where Sylvester Stallone and Sandra Bullock are talking about how Arnold Schwarzenegger's popularity grew to such a level, Congress passed the 51st Amendment allowing non-native born citizens to become President -- and Schwarzenegger was elected President. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Arianna Huffington and Gary Coleman are all in the running to be the next governor of California. No wonder why we're the laughingstock of most of the country. It's times like these when I think that Maynard James Keenan of Tool was right. Tool - "Aenima" Some say we'll see Armageddon soon I certainly hope we will I sure could use a vacation from this Bullshit three ring circus sideshow of Freaks here in this hopeless fucking hole we call L.A. The only way to fix it is to flush it all away Any fucking time, any fucking day Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona Bay Fret for your figure and Fret for your latte and Fret for your hairpiece and Fret for your lawsuit and Fret for your Prozac and Fret for your pilot and Fret for your contract and Fret for your car It's a bullshit three ring circus sideshow of Freaks here in this hopeless fucking hole we call L.A. The only way to fix it is to flush it all away Any fucking time, any fucking day Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona Bay Some say a comet will fall from the sky Followed by meteor showers and tidal waves Followed by faultlines that cannot sit still Followed by millions of dumbfounded dipshits Some say the end is near Some say we'll see Armageddon soon I certainly hope we will 'cause I sure could use a vacation from this Silly shit, stupid shit... One great big festering neon distraction I've a suggestion to keep you all occupied Learn to swim... Mom's gonna fix it all soon Mom's comin' round to put it back the way it ought to be Learn to swim Learn to swim Fuck L. Ron Hubbard and fuck all his clones Fuck all those gun-toting hip gangster wannabes Learn to swim Learn to swim Fuck retro anything Fuck your tattoos Fuck all you junkies and Fuck your short memories Learn to swim Learn to swim Fuck smiley glad-hands with hidden agendas Fuck these dysfunctional, insecure actresses Learn to swim Learn to swim 'Cause I'm praying for rain And I'm praying for tidal waves I wanna see the ground give way I wanna watch it all go down Mom, please flush it all away I wanna watch it go right in and down I wanna watch it go right in Watch you flush it all away Time to bring it down again Don't just call me pessimist Try and read between the lines I can't imagine why you wouldn't Welcome any change, my friend I wanna see it all come down Suck it down Flush it down...

I love the fact that the story reads Team of Seven Marines Lands in Liberia. It's like someone said, "Well, it's a small third-world country, we're Americans, send over a group of guys -- let's say, 7 -- and they'll be able to take care of business." Hell, using that logic, you can send the Backstreet Boys over to Burundi and they'd be able to conquer the entire country in a week.

Want to see a grown man cry? All you'll have to do is, in my presence, use the words "Avril Lavigne," "original" and "creative" in the same sentence without using them in a way similar to this: "My 98-year-old grandmother is more original and creative than Avril Lavigne."