Brain on Fire » Blog Tim McCormack, distilled

WordPress is nice, but some of the plugins I've installed really boost the user experience (and mine!) I thought I'd share what I've gathered.

As a geek, I'm sort of expected to own a cell phone (or two!). But I don't have one, and likely won't in the near future. The truth is, I'm a bit of a curmudgeon when it comes to new technology. I'm happy to acquire, play with, and disassemble the latest gadgets, but I won't trust them until they've proven worthy. So what's my beef with cell phones?

I've heard people complain that they "don't want to pay $5 to watch a PowerPoint presentation" or that they "already know about that" or that it's "preaching to the choir". Okay, fine. If you're too poor or too lazy to pony up the hour and five-spot to watch a damn fine movie, I'll reimburse you for the ticket price. (Up to $6, first 5 takers, first-time watchers only, payment in exchange for receipt or ticket stub. Scout's Honor, folks.)

1. An Inconvenient Truth: I don't care if it appears to be based on a PowerPoint presentation. It's a damn fine documentary and call to action on global warming, plus you finally get to see Al Gore's humorous side.
2. V for Vendetta: It's not another mindless action film, as I had imagined -- instead, it is a commentary on what could happen if the current gov't-led terrorization of its own populace were to be carried too far. Plus lots of good action scenes, and an inspiring ending.
3. Supersize Me: Morgan Spurlock puts his life on the line to see just how bad a steady fast-food diet could be. My eating habits improved drastically after seeing this.

Edit: I'm in Ohio for the semester, so C'ville folks might not have the opportunity to be reimbursed unless they send me a ticket stub through the mail :-(. I hate mail-in rebates too, but what can ya do?

Excellent free music I've collected over the semester:

• Soundtrack of a video that was produced simply to show the richness of the available free music: The Urban Tale (compilation), try tracks 3 and 9 especially
• Dark chocolate laced w/ adrenaline: L'Onomatopeur: Always Beating track 1
• Trip-hop/experimental jazz/electronic: Manuzik
• Lazy-listening smooth synth (sort of): reClock
• drum/base/tribal-like: dambo
• Heavy-beat electronic: Saelynh
• Classical-ish and related: Ehma
• Chill/fusion/electro/ambient: Greg Baumont
• Electro/techno: Isotope Lab (try Clean Room, Freeze v2, Infection, and Repentance)
• Meditation/oriental/ambient/nature: Phoebus (the Feng Shui Project album)
• Spoken word/story/surrealist: 2NU (This is Ponderous, Crossroads (Chaos), Then Again (4 Adlemi), A Father's Day, The Legend, She 04)

Edit 2006-3-4: I've added a few more excellent artists to my collection since this post. Following are some more album recommendations.

• Tribal/trip-hop/energetic: Amalfi: aucun
• Industrial/electronic/ambient: Binary Mind: CD2
• Electronic/trip-hop/synth: Bleacher: third
• Smooth, beautiful trip-hop: LEGO: indélédébile
• French female vocals over crisp synth/pop/rock: Lonah: Pièces (if you listen to nothing else by Lonah, listen to "Fractale" or "Smoking")
• Highly melodic layered electronic trip-hop: Realaze: L'acte Sombre
• Instrumental and synthetic electronica: Silence
• Electrojazz groove: solcarlus: primarius
• Indie mixture, electrofolk: t r y ^ d: Public Domain (this is from an entirely online collaboration of artists, sharing and mixing sound)