i'm writing the words to this song with a poisoned pen/i'm turning the straw into gold and then back again

I'm going to be bold here.
In a year full of great albums by Aimee Mann, Ben Folds & Coldplay? It's going to be really difficult to top this one:

Yup. So far, IMHO, Brendan Benson's THE ALTERNATIVE TO LOVE is the album to beat. I fucking LOVE it. Like, we play it at work, yet I come home and listen to it some more. Like, I could've had the promo we play there, but I had to buy it and have it home to listen to all the time.
Benson is, much like a lot of the artists I seem to like, described as having a Beatlesesque kinda sound. Honestly, a lot of the music on the disc reminds me of one of my all-time favorites, Aimee Mann's WHATEVER. (Hear that, Shawn? Go sample him!!) At times he also brings to mind Elliott Smith, particularly the FIGURE 8 album. I love the tinkling drip drop of "Cold Hands (Warm Heart)". I love the Wall of Sound explosion of "The Pledge", the dizzying lyrical rhymes (another Aimee Mann-esque trait). I thought my favorite song this year would never be anything but the title track, "Alternative to Love", until I decided that it's probably "What I'm Looking For". Either could be my official theme song.
Go to itunes, amazon, *wherever* you sample music. And for you lazy motherfuckers, I even put a link to Brendan's website in the title of this post, itself a lyric from "The Pledge". So go listen, already! And we'll meet again in 6 months to discuss whether or not I heard an album this year that I liked more.

(in other news- the Harry Potter books? they were locked in the upstairs men's room. aka the Clean/Empty men's room. after closing one night, our manager brought us all upstairs, led us to the bathrooms. I was like, ok is tonight when we have to have the B&N orgy? It wasn't exactly the cream of the crop that night, very few cute guys. Well, one. I digress. It wasn't to have a Barnes & Noblesome, but rather, he was showing us the cases & cases of Harry Potter stacked about as high as my nose, filling up the men's room from the back stall to the hand dryer at the front. Go figure, I guess they thought keeping them there, locked up was safer than keeping them in the back where their evil employees had access. Imagine how much you could get for a case of HP 3 days before it's official release date! In a related story, while I hardly ever have to pee at work, wouldn't you know that the very next night I had to? It was the disgusting, crowded downstairs bathroom for me...)

rick
had no pictures in his e-mailbox this morning & felt like he woke up on Christmas morning without a toy to be seen.
...Insert evil grin here...

in the dvd player: A Very Long Engagement.
in the Queue: Cracker: Series 3, Disc 2/New York City: Episode 4