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Arthur Witles
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Music Lost to History Archive
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Stuff I Made
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My coming of age story.
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Latest Humorous T-shirt Slogan:
"You Wish!"
This one has to be taken in context to be appreciated. The girl wearing this belly shirt was maybe 5'0" tall, with a muffin top going on, despite the fact that she was clearly in her third trimester of pregnancy. In addition she was wearing a thong that came up past her low-rise jeans and pushed her muffin top down over the edge to really emphasize the roll. I'm not in perfect shape so I don't expect that others should be, but when you are wearing that shirt, along with the rest of the outfit, you open yourself to scrutiny (and perhaps random looks of horror).
It's fun to hate:
The Soccer Moms who insist that they drive gas-guzzling SUV's for the safety of their children despite the fact that they are 6 times more likely to be in a rollover
accident than any other vehicle. It's like beating your child unconscious with the butt of your gun so that he will remain on the floor, thus making him less likely
to be hit by a random bullet coming through the front window.
When Shadowtwin reigns supreme:
There will be mandatory, passive birth control required to participate in any form of government assistance. If you can't afford to raise your child on your own we are here
to help you, but we must first make sure that your reproductive organs are adequately contained. If you don't like that policy all you have to do is support your kids your
damn self!
Vote Shadowtwin!
Your Horoscope:
Sagitarius: 11/22-12/21A typographical error in your Church's newsletter will lead to you performing sex acts on dozens of anonymous strangers in your pursuit of "oral highground."
Capricorn: 12/22-1/19The stars did recently tell your wife to "listen to her heart" regarding whether or not she should leave you. The stars did not intend for you to listen to her heart. But once you used that bonesaw on her sternum (not trusting the stethoscope which just responded with a cryptic thumping sound), we're pretty sure she made up her mind anyway.
Aquarius: 1/20-2/18The stars would like to apologize for stating in their last prophecy, "Be wary of the stranger you meet at beach this weekend. The stars aren't sure why, but they don't trust him." Through a cosmic hiccup, that information was supposed to be released this month. The August prophecy should have read, "A dark and handsome stranger will approach you on the beach, profess his love for you, and sweep you away for a jetset marriage. After which you will lead a long, happy, prosperous, healthy life as the Queen of a small island nation." We apologize for any inconvenience this error may have caused.
Pisces: 2/19-3/20Your new stopwatch will allow you to time how long you can hold your breath underwater down to the thousandth of a second. Unfortunately, poor planning will mean that you are not able to actually share the information with anyone.
Aries: 3/21-4/19Your innovative new device for beauticians to use while giving pedicures can be wildly successful and make you quite wealthy IF you change the name. Trust us, no one is going to buy a "Ped-O-File".
Taurus: 4/20-5/20Your Mother always told you to wear clean underwear just in case there was an accident and paramadics had to see them. But as you board that plane today, the stars want you to know that you needn't worry about it. The debris field will be more than 8 square miles, making it impossible to find most human remains. Not to mention that the ensuing fire burned so hot that it disintegrated not only all fabric, but most of the thin metals aboard as well.
Gemini: 5/21-6/21You just had to get that genital piercing, didn't you? The stars tried to warn you not to, but you went ahead and did it anyway... Now all your worst fears will come to bear when, at a campground this weekend, you run afoul of this guy:
Cancer: 6/22-7/22The less traveled by areas of the Grand Canyon's north rim offer some of the most breathtaking views of this natural wonder. You will soon find out they also include some of the worst footings and none of the handrails. They do, however, provide equally awe-inspiring, terminal velocity impacts.
Leo: 7/23-8/22The stars heard your pleas, begging for someone who you could share your love with and embrace for the rest of your life. If you are still single, throw your arms around the closest person to you at 3:44pm GMT on Dcember 9th -That'll be the one. Trust us, you won't have time to be picky...
Virgo: 8/23-9/22The stars have piled up most of your things on the front porch. You can stay at a friend's house, but you aren't coming back home until you admit what you did and apologize. The stars' Mother was right about you... (you must have really pissed them off; the stars were in tears while they told me this)
Libra: 9/23-10/22The stars have been doing a little thinking and a lot of math. The population of planet earth is roughly 6,796,590,704. That means that roughly 566,382,558 people share each astrological sign. About 18,620,796 have the same birthday. Based on average life expectancy as many as 248,277 people were born on the same day, in the same year, for every zodiac sign. How can one statement possibly predict the future of all of them? Ehh, fuck it. "A full moon while Venus is rising is an omen of good things to come."
Scorpio: 10/23-11/21They say you never know how you are going to react to a crisis. After a home invasion this weekend you will: You will scream, "Do whatever you want to my wife, but leave me alone!" You will then create a distraction by throwing your newborn at the assailant as you dive through the window to safety. Now you know.
Music lost to history:
Aerosmith - Dream On When I started doing these, I could never have imagined that I would be putting an Aerosmith song here. Since I was born in 1974, this song is well before my generation. It was recorded in 1972 and released in 1983 on Aerosmith's Self-Titled Album, but to read the information on it at Wikipedia most of us would become familiar with it from a re-release in 1976.
Like most of the music being released in the late 60's/early 70's that was pushing the rock-n-roll envelope, Dream
On relies heavily on solid composition and and melody. Before the era of the modern effects processor, these bands
had no distortion to hide behind (or very little), and synthesized instruments hadn't yet made their way into music. In
that way the music always sounds more raw to us today because, quite simply, it was. While it seems laughable to think
about today, music like this was so far removed from the bubble-gum pop of the 50's that it still wasn't accepted into the
mainstream. As the baby-boomers became the target demographic, the rock-n-roll movement really started to pick up speed,
with bands like Led Zeppelin and Aerosmith clearing the path for the much darker and heavier bands like Black
Sabbath.
While I (and most of my generation) are probably far more familiar with the Aerosmith of the late 80's and early 90's, the
reason this song makes it onto my MLtH page comes down to one thing: Age. Not necessarily the age of the song; In fact,
as I sat down to do the research for this today, I had no idea when it was released, but would have guessed (closely) the
mid 70's. Tyler was born March 26, 1948, meaning that this song was written when he was only 24 years old. I'm not sure
why, but I have always thought this song was pretty amazing given his age at composition. I suppose it is human nature to
wax poetic about the days of yore and the imminent passage of time, but the melody sets a mood that makes you feel it
right along with him. As the song nears the end and his lyrics become more more frenzied, you can almost feel the pain
(longing?) in his voice. Listen to it with headphones and no distraction sometime, you'll see what I mean.
I wrote a short bit some time ago about Kelly Sweet's cover of this
song (see the video on Youtube). While I have since gotten over
the initial hatred I felt towards the cover of the song, I still just can't like it. The words are there; she hits the
notes; but I just can't hear it in her voice. As if there is somthing very personal about the song and Tyler's
deliverance of the lyrics that just can't be duplicated. At least to me.
That said, I have heard Aerosmith doing the song with an orchestra, and it also seems to lack the passion of the original.
So perhaps the thing that I like so much about it is the under-produced, raw sound of it, or it may be that I am still
hearing it through the ears of that impressionable youth that heard if for the first time in a dusty old Van with my Uncle
Art. Either way, it seems it is Lost to History.
I Can't Believe it's Not Porn!
WhorePresents.comYep, it's not porn. It's not a site with gifts for sale either, which is probably a good thing since I can't imagine that any woman would be at all flattered to get a gift -no matter how nice- in a box that says "Whore Presents.com" on it.
Daily Reading:
BlackChampagne
Magazine Man
Shane Nickerson
Wil Wheaton
Boners
Hoyazo's Poker Blog
My reading list changes from time to time, and there are many sites that I visit that are not on the list.
They are listed in the order that I visit them, enjoy!
Site Upgrades
I have had the site hosted through Gate.com since I created it in 2005. Gate was, at the time, about the cheapest thing going, and while I had a pretty good working knowledge of html, I really had no idea how to go about getting a site hosted and building it from the ground up. Gate had been fine for me at the time, since I was only concerned with basic html hosting, but they have become annoying to the point of extreme frustration as of late.
I attempted to set up an sql database on Gate some time ago. Just as I wanted to find an embedded mp3 player that I could load directly to my server for the Music Lost to History segments, I wanted to get a blog publisher that I also had complete control over. Blogger has been so hit and miss with connectivity since I started using it, and even when it does work, it will often take ten minutes or more for it to actually get a post uploaded. That, more than anything, is why I post so infrequently; I actually dread having to stare at the screen while I pray to my pagan gods that it will complete the transfer.
Gate theoretically had sql databases available for quite some time, but when I tried to set it up a while back (I think it was in August) I just couldn't make it work. I just gave up and moved on. But Gate recently "upgraded" my user account to make sql and php work better, so I decided to try it again. Once I set the sql database up and tried again to get wordpress working, I was getting an error that the database didn't exist. So I emailed Gate.com's technical support asking them to verify for me the sql database name, and my user id for said database. Their response, days later, was "the database is working properly. We do not offer support for third party programs".
That pissed me off.
The second I got that reply, I bought hosting at GoDaddy.com, and started ftp'ing all my content pages to that server. The GoDaddy hosting plan I bought comes with wordpress pre-installed, and it was operational within about 4 hours after I updated my name servers at Gate (another annoyance at Gate was that the scripts to run the "upgraded" user controls fail as often as work, and when I was trying to unlock my account to transfer it I just kept getting, "an unexpected error has occurred" messages. I actually paid an extra 3 bucks a month for the first six months to get a dedicated IP address at godaddy so that I would be able to ftp my files there immediately. I would have had to wait until the nameservers were updated otherwise.
So for now the site is on GoDaddy. What you are seeing now is an exact copy of my old website, but on a new server. Over the next, well, as long as it takes, I am going to be pulling the front page down as I edit the wordpress settings. I know very little about css, so it is a guess and check type thing. Unfortunately, the page that runs the wordpress database shares a name with the regular main page of the site, so I have to take this one down to play with the other one. The downtime should be minimal, as I am removing the wordpress file from the directory when I am done editing it for the day, but just in case you happen to hit the site and see it when it is virtually blank, that's why.
I hope to have the brand new site launched within a week or two. Wish me luck.
Archives
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Site design was stolen directly from Blackchampagne.