Two Reasons I Find Facebook Annoying

I nearly called this post "Two Reasons I Hate Faebook," but as a point of fact, I don't hate the site. I think it's clever enough for social networking, but past social networking, its usefulness stops. There are some things you can't do on facebook, and the fact that you can't just annoys the crap out of me. The main one that I want to do and can't involves music.

Now, I understand why they would not have this functionality. People would abuse it by uploading their favorite song, Facebook would get into copyright litigations, record companies would complain that their schtuff is being spread all over the internet even worse than before, yadda yadda yadda. Well, that places us poor schlubs who actually write music and legitimately own the rights to it in the hamper of paying the price for everyone else's irresponsibility. Strangely, Facebook allows videos, which means I just copy the song I want to post into the soundtrack of a series of titles, and boom, postable.

The second thing that bugs me only came up this morning. I don't know if this blog allows this, but I'm going to try. I wanted to post this graphic in honor of Friday:

When I uploaded the little gif to Facebook, I got me one static graphic. No movement at all. You can see here that it's an amusing little loading screen. The fun is lost if it doesn't move.

No no loading graphic on Facebook. Apparently, photos means static photos only and no animated gifs. Again, I suspect this has to do with rights and the fact that most social networkers aren't programming graphics. Facebook probably also didn't want a slew of animated gifs mucking up their walls and such.

Oh well, there's the rant. I have one workaround and I just posted the graphic here. For fun, here's a second, similar graphic I found. That's all for now, though.

A Musical Mutt

I've probably mentioned it before, but I listen to a wide range of music. I know it's completely pointless, but this is my blog, so I'll post whatever I want to, pointless though it may be. Just for grins and giggles, here is everything I listened to in the last 24 hours. Yeah, I knew you'd be thrilled. At the same time, it paints a little bit of a picture of just how wide a range of music I listen to. It's one thing for me to say I've got so many thousand songs on my iPod, but a lot of people have a lot of music. How much do they actually listen to? Well, in my case, these are the specific songs I heard off my iPod since yesterday afternoon according to the "Last Played" column in iTunes.

The list is laid out as title - artist - album - year (which isn't always there or accurate) - genre

Everything - ZZ Top - Antenna - 1994 - Rock

Misty Morning (Instrumental) - Narnia - Desert Land - - Christian Metal

Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough - Michael Jackson - HIStory: Greatest Hits, Vol. 1 - 1979 - Pop

Inside Out - Bryan Adams - The Best of Me - 2001 - Rock

In The Summertime - Elton John - Reg Dwight's Piano Goes Pop - 1994 - Piano Rock

Faithless - Rush - Snakes And Arrows - 2007 - Classic Rock

Carla Etude - Elton John - To Be Continued - 1991 - Piano Rock

More Than A Woman - Bee Gees - Saturday Night Fever - 1977 - Disco

Snow - Kamelot - Epica - 2003 - Progressive Metal

Natural Science - Rush - Permanent Waves - 1980 - Classic Rock

Hosanna - JCS 1970 OCR Cast - Jesus Christ Superstar - 1970 Album - 1970 - Rock Opera

Blitzkrieg - Metallica - Garage Inc. - 1998 - Heavy Metal

Anthem - Rush - All The World's A Stage - 1976 - Classic Rock

Bond Look Alike - John Barry - Octopussy OST - 1983 - Bond Soundtrack

Pig Juicer - Charlie Clouser - Saw III - 2007 - Soundtrack

Warm Love In A Cold World - Elton John - Victim Of Love - 1979 - Piano Rock

Jailbait - Aerosmith - Rock in a Hard Place - 1982 - Rock

Children's Corner - 3 Serenade for the Doll - Debussy, Claude - Complete Works For Solo Piano, Vol. 2 - - Impressionist

Eyes Of Time - Ayreon - The Final Experiment - 1995 - Progressive Metal

Something's Gotta Give - Aerosmith - Nine Lives - 1997 - Rock

The Rain Song - Led Zeppelin - Houses Of The Holy (1994 Remas - 1973 - Blues

Big Man On Mulberry Street - Billy Joel - The Bridge - 1986 - Piano Rock

Over The Hills And Far Away - Nightwish - Over The Hills And Far Away - 2001 - Symphonic Gothic Metal

Vital Signs - Rush - Moving Pictures - 1981 - Classic Rock

Casino - David Arnold - The world is not enough OST - 1999 - Bond Soundtrack

Bahama Island - Michel Legrand - Never say never again OST - 1983 - Bond Soundtrack

Sometimes - Britney Spears - Baby One More Time - - Pop

Midnight Creeper - Elton John - Don't Shoot Me I'm Only The Piano Player - 1973 - Piano Rock

Savior - Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication - 1999 - Rock

The Dream Sequencer [Reprise] - Ayreon - The Universal Migrator Part 1 - The Dream Sequencer - 2000 - Progressive Metal

Mary Lou - Bruce Springsteen - 1998 Tracks - - Folk Rock

Love Letters (With Bonnie Raitt) - Elton John - Duets - 1993 - Piano Rock

Boogie Man - AC/DC - Ballbreaker - 1995 - Hard Rock

I Want To Break Free - Queen - Greatest Hits II - 1991 - Classic Rock

Sudona Sunrise (Pump Demo) - Aerosmith - The Very Best Of Aerosmith - 2006 - Rock

Delirium Trigger - Coheed and Cambria - The Second Stage Turbine Blade [Bonus Tracks] - 2005 - Progressive Metal

Death of Vesper - David Arnold - Casino Royale [Expanded Score] - 2006 - Bond Soundtrack

Metal Heavy Lady - Lions - Guitar Hero 3 - 2006 - Rock

Beyond Beautiful - Aerosmith - Just Push Play - 2001 - Rock

Damned For All Time - Various Artists - Jesus Christ Superstar 1992 - 1992 - Rock Opera

Last of the Big Time Spenders - Billy Joel - Streetlife Serenade - 1975 - Piano Rock

Not My Slave - Oingo Boingo - Boi-Ngo - 1987 - New Wave

Highwayman - Willie Nelson, Waylon Jenning, Johnny Cash - Highwayman - 1985 - 80's Rock

It's All About Feelin' Good - Paula Abdul - Straight Up (Greatest Hits) - 2007 - Dance

Reptiles and Samurai - Oingo Boingo - Nothing to Fear - 1982 - New Wave

Climbing From Inside - Eric Johnson - Souvenir - 2002 - Rock

Pour le piano, 3. - Toccata - Debussy, Claude - Complete Works For Solo Piano, Vol. 1 - - Impressionist

Gotta Love It - Aerosmith - Get a Grip - 1993 - Rock

Wait - Various Artists - Sweeney Todd Soundtrack - 2007 - Soundtrack

Brothers Under The Bridges - Bruce Springsteen - 1998 Tracks - - Folk Rock

Go It Alone - Elton John - Leather Jackets - 1986 - Piano Rock

My Name Is Jonas - Weezer - Guitar Hero 3 - 1994 - Rock

The Great Suburban Showdown - Billy Joel - Streetlife Serenade - 1975 - Piano Rock

Thunder Underground - Ozzy Osbourne - The Essential Ozzy Osbourne - 2003 - Heavy Metal

The Siren - Nightwish - Once - 2004 - Symphonic Gothic Metal

She's Got A Way - Billy Joel - Cold Spring Harbor - 1971 - Piano Rock

Largo (Klavierstück) - Op.P2 No.5 - in Eb (BI 109) - Fryderyk Chopin - Chopin- Complete Piano Music - - Classical

Long Long While - The Rolling Stones - Singles Collection - The London Years - 1989 - Classic Rock

Barracuda - Heart - Greatest Hits [1998] - 1998 - Rock

Danger Zone - Kenny Loggins - Billboard Top Hits: 1986 - 1986 - 80's Rock

Everythings All Right - JCS 1970 OCR Cast - Jesus Christ Superstar - 1970 Album - 1970 - Rock Opera

Finale: Pesante; Presto - Fritz Reiner - Bartok: Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Percussion & Celesta; Hungarian Sketches - 1955 - Classical

How Many Tears - Vanden Plas - Accult - 1996 - Christian Metal

Start All Over - Miley Cyrus - Meet Miley Cyrus - 2007 - Rock/Pop

Someday - Mariah Carey - MTV Unplugged (EP) - 1992 - R&B

Holiday - Scorpions - Box Of Scorpions - 2004 - Hard Rock

True Friend - Hannah Montana - Hannah Montana 2 - 2007 - Rock/Pop

Préludes - Livre II, III - La puerta del Vino - Debussy, Claude - Complete Works For Solo Piano, Vol. 1 - - Impressionist

We Built This City - Starship - Billboard Top Hits: 1985 - 1985 - 80's Rock

Walking In The Air (live) - Nightwish - Over The Hills And Far Away - 2001 - Symphonic Gothic Metal

My Friend of Misery - Metallica - Black Album - 1991 - Heavy Metal

The Bells Of Notre Dame - David Ogden Stiers, Paul Kandel & Tony Jay - The Hunchback Of Notre Dame - 1996 - Pop

Stravinsky: Firebird Suite (1919) - Finale - Seiji Ozawa: Boston Symphony Orchestra - Stravinsky: The Rite Of Spring, Firebird Suite (1919) - 1993 - Classical

Simply Irresistable - Robert Palmer - Addictions Vol. 1 - 1989 - Rock/Pop

Every Breath You Take - The Police - The Police - 2007 - Rock

Fear - Bon Jovi - Keep The Faith - 1992 - Rock

Heresy - Rush - Roll The Bones - 1991 - Classic Rock

Valley of the Damned - DragonForce - Valley of the Damned (DEMO) - - Power Metal

Take me Home - Narnia - Enter the Gate - 2006 - Christian Metal

I'm Gonna Be A Teenage Idol - Elton John - Don't Shoot Me I'm Only The Piano Player - 1973 - Piano Rock

Long Time Comin' - Bruce Springsteen - Devils & Dust - 2005 - Folk Rock

She's Always A Woman - Billy Joel - The Stranger - 1977 - Piano Rock

(Everything I Do) I Do It for You - Bryan Adams - The Best of Me - 2001 - Rock

They Don't Care About Us - Michael Jackson - HIStory: Greatest Hits, Vol. 1 - 1995 - Pop

Away - Nightwish - Over The Hills And Far Away - 2001 - Symphonic Gothic Metal

Stairwell Fight - David Arnold - Casino Royale [Expanded Score] - 2006 - Bond Soundtrack

Callin the Shots - Quiet Riot - The Collection - 2002 - Heavy Metal

Flinstone Boy - Elton John - A Single Man - 1978 - Piano Rock

The River - Bruce Springsteen - The Essential - 2003 - Folk Rock

#9 Dream - John Lennon - The John Lennon Collection - 1974 - Rock

Angels Are Crying - Narnia - Desert Land - 2001 - Christian Metal

Street Boogie - Elton John - Victim Of Love - 1979 - Piano Rock

Stravinsky: The Rite Of Spring - Part 2: Sacrificial Dance - Seiji Ozawa: Chicago Symphony Orchestra - Stravinsky: The Rite Of Spring, Firebird Suite (1919) - 1993 - Classical

My Love Will Not Let You Down - Bruce Springsteen - 1998 Tracks - - Folk Rock

Runaround - Van Halen - For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge - 1991 - Rock

(Just Like) Starting Over - John Lennon - The John Lennon Collection - 1980 - Rock

Gonzales takes a drive - Bill Conti - For your eyes only OST - 1981 - Bond Soundtrack

Beauty And The Beast - Nightwish - Angels Fall First - 1997 - Symphonic Gothic Metal

el cuadro hologramas - Héroes del Silencio - Stormy Days - - Latin

Radio Song - Superbus - Guitar Hero 3 - 2005 - Rock

Cities On Flame With Rock And Roll - Blue Öyster Cult - Guitar Hero 3 - - Rock

Out Of Time - The Rolling Stones - Singles Collection - The London Years - 1989 - Classic Rock

Stones Throw From Hurtin' - Elton John - Sleeping With The Past - 1989 - Piano Rock

This Means War - AC/DC - Blow Up Your Video - 1988 - Hard Rock

Write Me - Aerosmith - Aerosmith - 1973 - Rock

The Grand Illusion - Styx - Greatest Hits - - Rock

Préludes - Livre II, VI - 'General Lavine' - excentric - Debussy, Claude - Complete Works For Solo Piano, Vol. 1 - - Impressionist

A Man I'll Never Be - Boston - Greatest Hits - - Rock

Thank You For The Music [Seyfried] - Mamma Mia Movie Cast - Mamma Mia!The Movie Soundtrack - 2008 - Soundtrack

Stick To Your Guns - Bon Jovi - New Jersey - 1988 - Rock

Western Flyer - Eric Johnson - Live From Austin, Texas - 2005 - Rock

Étude No.17 - Op.25 No.5 - in Em - Fryderyk Chopin - Chopin- Complete Piano Music - - Classical

There. That should make your head explode.

How To Relay The Obvious

This was a hard one. You know, I use a lot of straight logic in what I do, and sometimes, people don't quite understand logic past their own function in life. Such is the case with this problem with a printer. Paper insurance forms come in two varieties at the moment: red and grey. The printing difference here is that the red forms print just text on pre-printed forms that are colored in red (or actually, pink) and the grey forms print the text and form in its entirety.

The way our program works is that you select red or grey, which in effect selects whether you want the lines or not. This individual was having a problem with the grey lines printing over a red form. Logically, there are only so many ways this can actually happen. Either they have selected the grey form option or its a problem outside of our control.

I watched them pull up a window showing just the text lines of the form with no grey outlines and they hit print. It printed with the grey lines on top of the red. Total weirdness, right? This means that the problem was outside of our program's control since once it passes the image of the claim into Adobe Acrobat Reader. It's actually the Adobe program that does the printing along with the local printer hardware and printer driver.

I was left with two answers here. Either they had some weird paper loaded that had this goofy outline on it already, or something in this ancient printer preprinted the grey lines of the form. Well, they got their IT guy over there and he determined that he had to switch out the printer since it was misbehaving. It is good when people listen.

The Sets Grow

So last night I was origianlly going to play piano with the guy who plays drums, but he was still getting in from his business trip, so we're looking at tonight. Instead, I played on Rock Band and Guitar Hero. Yeah, both of them. I recently ordered from eBay at a killer price a Rock Band Guitar (that's pink for the Queen and Princesses) and the Guitar Hero drums.

Now these drums were a little tricky until I discovered that the orange and yellow cymbals were labeled left and right and I switched them. Now, it works much better.

So I quickly jumped it from Hard to Expert, and found that while pretty much any song will work all right on guitar, some songs should not be used for drums. Since I can do the expert level, I like to think I'm a pretty capable player, and when it comes to some of the easier tunes, I can nail them to the wall. Such was the case with the first song of this particular set. I got five stars on it.

The second song was called "Some Might Say" and it's by Oasis. I don't know what it was about this song, but I could not get the beat at all. The pattern on screen was very, very easy, but I couldn't lock that beat for anything. I would get in a groove, and then the beat would go away. I have one suspicion here: the drummer on Oasis wasn't consistent. They were able to map the song easily enough, but I imagine I would have to pay almost deadly attention to the little dots on the screen to get it down, just because the tempo is inconsistent enough to not let me zone out and play. It's just not good for us human metronomes.

Admittedly, I did kick into that one after playing Rock Band for an hour and a half, but for the encore song of that set (after I narrowly got through Some Might Say), I got 99% and five stars, so I'm pretty sure it isn't me.

So at this time, I have two guitars, drums and mic for Rock Band, and one guitar, drums, and mic (which is the same Rock Band mic) for Guitar Hero. My second GH guitar gave up the ghost. Well, actually pieces of both guitars died -- the strum bar on one and the green and red buttons on the other. So I took the neck of one and the body of the other and put them together. All I need is another GH guitar and I'll have two complete rhythm games.

To top it off, the Rock Band drum pedal works as the second bass pedal for Guitar Hero. Unfortunately, it won't work as the primary pedal for some reason. Can't figure out why. I woudl use it as the primary if I could thought. The GH pedal sucks. It feels flimsy, and it's really easy for it to accidentally slip on some of the harder songs and register an unintended bass hit, which spoils the streaks. On the bright side, it appears to be a cheap midi drum pedal, so it is possible that a better constructed electronic drum kick pedal will work on it. In addition, the cymbals just plug in to the kit using 1/8" jacks, just like a electronic drum kit does, so it's also possible that you could get some real electric cymbals to use with it. The red, blue, and green drums are fixed, though, so they aren't going anywhere.

The most interesting aspect of the GH drums is the MIDI port in the back. Yeah, a MIDI port. I suspect that you could hook this toy up to a MIDI sound generator and use it as a simple drum kit apart from the video game. It's not a bad little set. The cymbals are raised, and the drums have a more durable pad to them than the clickety-clack construction of the Rock Band drums. Where RB clicks, GH thuds.

That being said, they're still both equally fun, and the extra drum and different layout is taking some getting used to. The most significant change is that on RB, the crash cymbal is usually the green, but on GH, it's the raised orange - green is just another tom. Hence "Enter Sandman" is a totally different experience on GH than on RB.

It's too much fun, and I ended up playing for about 3 hours last night, so I got nothing done that I actually wanted to, like practicing the real guitar. I played a little piano and a little guitar, but I recalled that I hadn't checked the music stores this month for new stuff. I was going to do that "real quick," and ended up playing for a while on RB. Well, an hour and a half later, I thought I'd see if GH had any new stuff "real quick," and once I reviewed the store, I played another hour and a half. Oh well.