Snow Day!

We got four inches of snow here on Friday, which is enough to close the whole place down through Sunday. We might not even be able to get out for work on Monday! The governor declared a state of emergency. We've got like 2 snow plows for the whole state, the south doesn't have too many boy scouts I guess. Anyway, we got out for a walk during the day with Noli. We were supposed to have a nice dinner out to celebrate my birthday. To our surprise, the place decided to open so we walked down to Revolution and had a great dinner!

The Purse

Noli loves to play dress up at daycare. She especially likes the purses. So we thought we'd buy her a purse for fun. She picked out the um, least favorite of her parents, but oh well.

Favorite Music of the Decade

In the year 2000 ... somehow that was 10 years ago now. Time to wrap up my favorite music of the decade. Well, past time, I didn't make it before New Years or even before the college football season ended.

Top 10 Albums (in no particular order--it was hard enough to get them down to these 10)

The Postal Service -- Give Up: never get tired of hearing it, even in commercials and in covers

Coldplay -- A Rush of Blood to the Head: still think Yellow is kind of stupid, but this one is great

Radiohead -- Kid A: maybe I should have gone with In Rainbows just to give me an album that came out after 2005

Thad Cockrell -- Warmth and Beauty: sentimental favorite

The Shins - -Chutes Too Narrow: saw them in the US and Australia and wore this album out (wait, I guess that doesn't happen with mp3s)

Okkervil River -- Black Sheep Boy: Mon was close enough at the show in Adelaide to get spit on

Ryan Adams -- Heartbreaker: really hard to choose one album, but this one started it for me

Spoon -- Gimme Fiction: pure fun

Roman Candle -- The Wee Hours Review: most shows seen by one band for the same set of songs :)

The Mountain Goats -- The Sunset Tree: beautiful and tragic

Top 5 Albums I'm Buying After Reading Other Lists

Outkast -- Stankonia
Yeah Yeah Yeahs -- Fever to Tell
The Strokes -- Is This It?
Bon Iver -- For Emma, Forever Ago (I have it, but Laura assures me it's better than we thought)
The White Stripes -- White Blood Cells (love this band, but missed this one)

Mixtape: 2000-2009

I wasn't going to do songs, but Mon challenged me and I've heard some good decade mixes, so I'll try one on the fly:

Arcade Fire -- Wake Up
The Gossip -- Standing in the Way of Control
Ben Folds -- Adelaide
Ben Lee -- Gamble Everything for Love
Loudon Wainwright III -- Daughter
Decoder Ring -- Heidi's Theme
Kanye West -- Golddigger
The Gaslight Anthem -- Miles Davis and the Cool
The Killers -- Somebody Told Me
Maximo Park -- The Coast is Always Changing
The Streets -- Fit But You Know It
Styrofoam -- Front to Back
Z-Trip -- Breakfast Club
Scissor Sisters -- Take Your Momma Out
Jens Lekman -- A Postcard to Nina
Metric -- Gimme Sympathy
El-P -- Up All Night

Half a Dozen Artists I Can't Believe Didn't Get Mentioned Yet

or

A Shameless Attempt to Expand My List

Josh Ritter
Wilco
My Morning Jacket
The New Pornographers
Iron and Wine
The Hold Steady

Criteria

There is it, Mr High Horse himself and his prepost criteria. Preambles are for constitutions and boring books. C'mon Justin, just tell us your 10 ten; we are waiting with bated breath.

Best of the Decade...Intro

Since I'm too late to get my best of the decade list in (according to Mon) I might as well stretch it out a bit.

She already covered most of the big life changes, so I'll focus on music. I started decade with 200 CD spinner and finished the decade with no CDs and a 1 TB hard drive to get all my music back into one place. It became so easy to find and purchase new music, which combined with the fact that I had a real income, led to an explosion in my music collection. I have no complaints about the move to digital music, it just made music a bigger part of my life. My favorite development was my emusic subscription--90 new songs a month for a flat fee and I own them. That's 2 new albums a week!

Unlike Mon, I'm going to be selecting my top albums of the decade rather than just songs. Even with the digital revolution, I still shop, buy, and listen to music as albums. Here are the criteria I used to compile my list:

1. Personal connection -- Does the album remind me of an event, place, or person?

2. Relistenability -- Did the album stay in the rotation?

These first two criteria rule out some arty albums that I can appreciate intellectually but not connect to emotionally. If you're interested in those kind of compilations, see All Songs Considered or AV Music Club.

3. Strong from start to finish -- All songs on the album should be strong; singles with a lot of filler don't count.

Coming next, my top albums of the decade...