1. I am sick of all this 9-11 hysteria. It's more than 2 years later; it's got to stop. I'm not talking about forgetting about what happened because it was horrific and we should never forget what happened, I'm talking about all this special eerie significance that people seem to attach to the number sequence and date. I was listening to the radio on my way into work today and right before a song started, the DJ said, "I wrote down today's date [Ed. note: 1/16] on a piece of paper and left it on a table, and then I came back later and happened to see it upside. It kind of wigged me out... think about it." Give me a fucking break. Yes, it was 911 when you looked at it upside down. So what? Do we have to be terrified of every single instance of those numbers? We bombed Hiroshima on August 6 -- and that one incident was more horrific than any terrorist act so far because it killed more than 200 times the number of people that were in the World Trade Center and did unspeakable damage, not to mention the fact that it was a weapon that the world have never seen before. But does that mean that the Japanese are scared of the number 86? Have they banished all of the 86th floors from the buildings they built since 1945? If they look at "98" upside down, do they talk about it on the radio? 2. There's a new station in town, Indie 103-1. I think they're pretty decent. Yes, Clear Channel has their hands in the station in that they're selling the ad time, and I know they're involved in the programming even though they're not supposed to be. There's a movement in town of people -- mostly people who, I think, seem to believe it's cool to hate anything that's corporately-related and not cutting-edge-to-the-point-of-bleeding like KCRW (a.k.a. "too cool for the room") -- who are railing against it simply because Clear Channel is involved, so therefore they believe it sucks. Does it really make that much of a difference? It's still playing great music -- when was the last time you heard Catherine Wheel or X or Frank Black or Phantom Planet or The Pogues on the radio? The fact that Clear Channel is involved does not make the playlist any less good. So shut the hell up and let me enjoy my music. You can tell it's been a pretty bad night, haven't you?