No Sex or Drugs, and Not Even That Much Rock'n'Roll

If you're looking for something similar to Hammer of the Gods, then do NOT read David Byrne's new book How Music Works . . . there are no sordid tales of fish-sex, drugs, and hotel orgies . . . instead Byrne offers his theories on how the context and setting of music is just as important as the composer, and he peppers his insights with anecdotes from his long, varied, and very experimental music career . . . here is an exercise that his dance choreographer, Noemie Lafrance, used during dance auditions, when they had to whittle a room of fifty hopefuls down to three lucky winners:

Rule #1) Improvise an eight count dance phrase to the music playing;

Rule #2) Once you have an eight beat phrase you like, then loop it . . . repeat it over and over;

Rule #3) When you see someone else with a stronger phrase, copy it;

Rule #4) When everyone is doing the same phrase, the exercise is over;

Byrne said it "was like watching evolution on fast forward" . . . the room started in chaos, and then pockets of order formed, and finally certain pockets "went viral" and within four minutes, the dancers were moving in perfect unison . . . and I feel like I could use this in class -- maybe with verbal chants and/or hand gestures rather than dance moves -- and it also sounds like a fun game to play at a party or in a bar (if you could get everyone to participate) and I tried to search on YouTube for an example of dancers doing this, but I had no luck . . . so if anyone has any ideas on how to implement this in a classroom, or does the exercise at a party or in a discoteque, please inform me of the results.

Meta-Debate

I missed the presidential debate last Wednesday -- The Walking Dead trumps politics . . . and remember, there won't be any politics once the zombies come . . . as Sheriff Rick says, "This isn't a democracy anymore" -- but I did enjoy the aftermath of the debate, especially the debate about who won the debate, and I even started a debate about who won the debate about who won the debate.

New Jersey Is Not San Diego

Every summer, I make grand plans for our back deck; I envision installing a retractable awning, or screening it and adding a roof, or even simply buying a pair of those giant, heavy duty umbrellas . . . but I never get to it, and then summer ends and I realize that the weather in central New Jersey is so disgusting that there is never a good time to sit on the back porch anyway . . . it's either too hot and humid, or too damp and humid, or too buggy, or too cold . . . and so we have this wonderful back porch, but the only resident who uses it much is the dog, who isn't as particular as the rest of us, and there's no way I'm buying a thousand dollar umbrella for him.

PAH!

As of now, I am still the sole member of PAH! (Parents Against Halloween!) but please take a moment and reflect: are we really going to do this again? the sugar meltdowns? the costumes? the aimless wandering around the neighborhood? the eating of all the extra candy? the diabetic comas? . . . and I'm willing to negotiate with the children . . . I'm willing to offer them firecrackers and BB guns and an go-carts, if they are willing forego this "holiday" . . . I'll even buy them a couple of candy bars-- but let's put our collective feet down -- they're only children and we can stand up to them and give All Hallow's Eve back to the witches and satanists . . . I'll even carve a jack'o'lantern . . . but I just don't want to deal with that giant bowl of processed sugar . . . I can't handle it and neither can they. I'll even give them 100 bucks!

Sometimes You Need To Let Your Head Breathe

I don't have a problem with wearing a visor, and you shouldn't either.

Exotic and Spicy Mystery Story

Last weekend, we got Indian food delivered from Delhi Garden, which is usually very accurate and reliable with to-go orders and delivery . . . but this time, when I brought the food inside, I noticed we were missing our uttapam, our nan, and one of our samosas . . . and so I sprinted out of the house, accompanied by my faithful dog, and caught the delivery guy before he drove away; I told him the story and showed him what we had, and so he called the restaurant, and then he called some of the other houses on his delivery run -- thinking that he gave someone an extra bag of food, but no dice-- and so he had to drive back up Route 27 to fetch the rest of our food . . . and the next morning, Catherine "solved" the mystery when she found a bag of Indian food in our vestibule; she assumed that one of the neighbors realized they had an extra bag of food and left it on our front porch, and that I had stupidly put it in the vestibule -- which already smells awful because of the piles of shoes, cleats, neoprene braces, and shin-guards -- but she assumed that when I got up to walk the dog that I didn't think about the malodorous combination I was creating, and instead of tossing the old Indian food into the garbage, I lazily chucked it into the shoe pile . . . but this was not the case . . . no one returned that bag of food: it was there the entire time, and then I remembered that I was late getting to the door to pay for the food, and the delivery guy opened the screen door and went into the vestibule, and then I opened the door, and the dog was running around, and in the confusion of the transaction -- I'm not really sure when, he must have put that bag down, or dropped it, or I put it down to pay him, and then we both forgot about it . . . I'm not sure if I ever noticed it at all, and he certainly must have forgotten that he handed me two bags, but that fact of the matter is that Delhi Garden was reliable in its order and delivery and we got an undeserved sack of food . . . but unless they read this blog, they will never know the truth.

At Least There's a Name For It

I was going to look up the weather on the internet -- to prepare for my son's soccer game -- but, as usual, I forgot where I had planned to drive on the digital super-highway, and I got lost on a back road and found this incredibly appropriate sniglet . . . Netheimer's: when you go to do something on the internet but forget what you were going to do.

Tracy Morgan Is NOT Tracy Jordan (Or Is He?)

The actual comedy of Tracy Morgan has very little to do with the endearingly bumbling sack of non sequiturs that 30 Rock calls Tracy Jordan . . . or at least that's what I surmised from Morgan's show at The State Theater in New Brunswick last week; Morgan's material is too profane for me to quote on this blog, and while it was very funny at times, and Morgan is astounding mimic -- whether he is singing Michael Jackson or the theme song from Good Times -- the show also had some remarkable low points . . . some strange Michael Richards-esque rants (which Morgan is known for) and a monologue where he came off as just shy of crazy (he seems to sincerely believe that the Moon landing is a hoax and that dinosaurs never existed . . . and there were no punch lines to this portion of the "comedy" act) and while I didn't love the show, I did love the conversation Connel, Craig, Anne and I  had at Tumulty's after the show . . . but that was even filthier than Tracy Morgan's brand of humor, and so I can't transcribe it here either . . . but there was plenty of discussion about bestiality, swinging, and this amazing Dear Prudence column (also, Morgan's body refutes the old wive's tale that the camera adds twenty pounds to one's figure . . . he looks much fatter in person).

Stop Reading This And Go To Bed!

Here are some of the things I learned while reading David K. Randall's book Dreamland: Adventures in the Strange Science of Sleep . . . and while his lessons are often commonsensical, he provides descriptions of how these truisms were scientifically proven:

1) We often dream about what bothers us;

2) We often dream the same thing over and over;

3) While dreams don't have symbolic meaning, they can help us solve actual problems in a creative fashion;

4) Better to sleep than to cram;

5) The West Coast team has an advantage when playing Monday Night Football;

6) You need sleep to synthesize new information;

7) If you are deprived of enough sleep, you die . . . from lack of sleep;

8) Friendly fire deaths in the military are most often caused by fatigue;

9) The biggest hurdle in the military is not technological, it is sleep deprivation;

10) If you didn't get a full night's rest, take a nap;

11) You can kill someone in your sleep, and depending on the interpretation of the law, you might either get life in prison or get off scot-free.

12) Teenagers have different Circadian rhythms than adults;

13) Highschools that pushed their start time to 8:30 had higher SAT scores, better attendance, less fights, and a number of other quantifiable improvements;

14) Some popular prescription sleeping pills don't actually improve sleep all that much, they just give the sleeper temporary amnesia, so that it improves the perception of how one has slept;

15) The electric light, the TV, and the computer are enemies of sleep, because they fool our brains into thinking it is still daylight, and thus ruin our Circadian rhythm;

16) Before the advent of the electric light, the computer, and the TV, humans had two sleeps: a first sleep from when the sun went down until around midnight, then there was an hour or two of wakefulness, where people often ate or fornicated or talked, and then a "second sleep" until morning;

17) Sleep apnea is scary . . .

and the final thing to take away from this book is that sleep is really, really important for humans-- important for our health, our minds, and our stress levels-- yet even though we know this, married couples usually share a bed that is too small for the two of them and sleep together despite snoring, flatulence, kicking, blanket-stealing, late night reading, and general disruptions . . . and studies found that women primarily do this because they want to feel safe and that men do it because you never know when you might get lucky, and nothing improves your luck more than proximity.

Sweet Dreams Are Probably Not Made Of This

Last Wednesday night, when I checked on my children to make sure they were tucked into bed, doing some reading before lights out, I found my younger son reading a large age-inappropriate biology text . . . and he was studying-up on vampire bats -- there was a photo of a vampire bat sucking on the teat of a cow and several repulsive close-ups of squashed vespertilion faces and pointy vespertilion incisors -- and so I gave him a kiss on the forehead and made a quick exit . . . I don't need to look at stuff like that before bed . . . and then I crossed the hall to check on my other son, and he was reading a book called Gross Body Facts and he told me he was looking for the chapter about "stinky armpits" and I pretended  to be proud of his curiosity and inquisitive disposition, and then beat feet out of his room as well . . . and I am happy to report that neither child had a nightmare . . . nor did I (but my children never have nightmares . . . even after catching giant spiders and then reading books about giant spiders . . . which makes me wonder if they are actually part spider; that would explain a lot).

That Look . . . You Know, That Look . . .

I am sure all of you are familiar with the sensation of getting "that look" from someone who passes you by in the hallway at work . . . that look that says: hey, there's something off about you, but I'm too polite to say what it is, and so you'll just have to interpret this look and figure it out . . . so you inspect your nose for boogers, make sure your fly is zipped, and ensure that you don't have semen in your hair (a.k.a.  "There's Something About Mary Syndrome") . . . but when I received "that look" last Tuesday morning from a colleague, it was directed at my chest and so I was able to dismiss the usual suspects and instead assumed that I had a stain on my shirt . . . and when I looked down, I did see an odd "U" shaped stain on the right breast of my burgundy golf shirt . . . but upon further inspection, this turned out to be stitching-- I was wearing my shirt inside-out . . . and neither my wife nor several other teachers noticed this, and if it wasn't for "a look" from a random dude, I would have taught first period wearing my shirt in this ridiculous manner (because once you start teaching with your shirt on inside-out, there's no turning back . . . because though it's embarrassing if your students tell their parents that their teacher wore his shirt inside out, you don't get fired for doing that, but if a student goes home and tells his parents that their teacher took his shirt off in class -- whatever the reason -- you are getting the axe).

The First Rule About Fight Club Is You Do NOT Blog About Fight Club

Read any article about how to write a successful blog and the first tip will be something like this: STAY ON TOPIC or CHOOSE A UNIQUE TOPIC or DECIDE WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO BLOG ABOUT . . . and perhaps that is why Sentence of Dave is not particularly successful, because the Topic is "Dave" and that's not very specific . . . but there are certain areas where Sentence of Dave excels -- according to the Blogger Statistics-- and so here are the most popular searches that lead to this godforsaken corner of the internet: trigonometry, peccary, Chatham Bars Inn, balls, emo, Andrew Strong, giant wasp, and . . . drum roll please . . . elephantitis.

You Never Know How Big A House Is From The Outside

After my son Ian surprised me with his ability to read a rather difficult book out loud, he explained, "My head is little, but my brain is big."

Horror and Meta-Horror All Wrapped Into One Movie

The Cabin in the Woods is the horror movie you've seen a million times before, except that it's not . . . so don't be fooled by the B+ actors and B+ plot . . . this movie turns out to be what The Hunger Games should have been; it's in the same satirical genre as Scream, but I liked it better, mainly because of two memorable scenes: one shows what happens when a confluence of elevators arrive at a particular floor-- a confluence of elevators full of an astounding bestiary-- and the other juxtaposes a celebration of technicians and hilly-billy zombie beatdown in a ironic cinematic kaleidoscope; nine mermen out of ten.

Anticlimactic Clinking

My wife was in a "I'm-going-to-get-a-lot-of-shit-done" mood over the four day Rosh Hashanah weekend . . . and in the midst of getting lots of shit done, she decided to take our two big jars of change to Stop and Shop; they have a CoinStar machine there and if you choose to get a Stop and Shop gift card, then you don't have to pay the 9% counting fee . . . you receive one hundred percent credit for the change you dump in the machine, an admittedly good deal, but this defeats the purpose of a change jar -- which is supposed to be "mad money" to be used for something frivolous (such as a pet monkey or the world's largest chocolate bar) -- to spend it on food . . . especially mundane grocery store food disappointed me (perhaps if we spent it on some kind of exotic food, like a dozen century eggs, then I would have approved) and so to make the event slightly more exciting, we all guessed how much money the jars contained: Alex said fifty dollars, Ian said sixty, I guessed two hundred and twenty dollars and Catherine -- ever the optimist -- estimated three hundred and seventy five . . . but when my wife returned from the store, she said that the machine was broken, and she couldn't cash in the change, and I am regarding this as an omen, and hoping that we will get to use the money for something more fun . . . perhaps I will finally get this (and if you don't think the title of this post is a great name for an indie band consisting of two nerdy percussionists, then you are a fool and I pity you).

How To Not Read George R.R. Martin

So I am still on extended leave from the new George R.R. Martin book, A Dance With Dragons-- I am three hundred pages in but I keep picking up other entertaining titles that keep me from Westeros . . . the latest is a four hundred page thriller by Gillian Flynn (who is far cuter than George R.R. Martin . . . I know this because when my eyes get tired, I invariably open to the back flap of library boks and look at the author . . . and I'm aways amazed when someone cute has written a book, because you'd think they'd have better things to do) and I read this rather thick novel, called Gone Girl, in two days-- partly because of a quad pull, but mainly because it's a true literary page-turner; the book is detailed and realistically written; the narrators have sharp, witty, and unreliable voices; the chapters are short and always significant; the prose is perfectly written; and the plot is preposterous . . . you know the twists are coming, but they are difficult to predict in their entirety, and in the end, despite its realism, the book is good macabre fun: ten Punch and Judy dolls out of ten.

Dreamy Coincidence

I was up early reading Dreamland: Adventures in the Strange Science of Sleep, and I was reading the chapter entitled "Sleep On It," which detailed the research on how our brain often solves problems creatively while we are sleeping . . . there were anecdotes about Jack Nicklaus realizing his grip was off in his sleep, Albert Szent-Gyorgi figuring out how to isolate vitamin C in a dream, August Kekule dreaming of a snake with its tail in its mouth and relating this to the structure of benzene, Paul McCartney waking in a girlfriend's bed with the entire melody of "Yesterday" in his head, and -- of course -- Samuel Taylor Coleridge rising from an opium induced nap with the poem "Kubla Khan" in his brain (though he was interrupted by a visitor while he was transcribing his masterpiece and forgot the ending) and just as I finished this chapter-- coincidentally (or miraculously . . . that's for you to decide) my son Ian stumbled down the stairs, half-asleep, and mumbled: "I had an awesome dream . . . I have an idea for art" and he grabbed a piece of paper and drew a many-headed hydra-like beast, and he did this even before he went to the bathroom, the urge to draw what he had just seen was so strong . . . and the moral is, of course, if you need a good idea, take a nap.

Possum Week

I was walking my dog early in the morning-- before sunrise-- and it was foggy, moonless, and still; suddenly he lunged at a gray cat on the sidewalk . . . I was able to yank him away before he got too close-- but this cat reacted oddly, instead of arching its back and hissing, the cat collapsed into a lifeless lump, and upon closer inspection, I realized it was not a cat, but a possum, and it was actually playing possum . . . I had the urge to kick it, to see it come back to life, but I couldn't get any closer because my dog was going bananas . . . so later that day I told the tale to my kids, who were fascinated with this odd marsupial that lives among us, and then two days later-- miraculously-- when my wife and children were visiting "Field Station Dinosaurs," a leafy park in Seacaucus filled with animatronic dinosaurs (I couldn't go because of my stupid pulled quad muscle) my son Ian was selected to "play possum" during a live action dinosaur show; according to my wife, the MC asked for a volunteer who knew how to "play possum" and Ian raised his hand and he was chosen to come on stage . . . and when the MC asked him to "play dead," my wife said Ian closed his eyes and stiffly fell over backward and then never moved, despite the investigations of a giant T. Rex . . . and though Ian claims he wasn't scared at all, my wife has her doubts (and, if you look at the above photo of Ian being nuzzled by the T. Rex, that thing is damned scary).

Immobile Dave Is Useless

Over the four day weekend, I was laid up because of a pulled quadricep muscle, and this gave me time to reflect on my life . . . and I realized that the only good I do on this earth is contingent on me being ambulatory: I am not wise enough to teach from a chair, so I try to be animated for my students; my coaching skills rely on modeling-- I play with the kids to show them how to do it; and my chores around the house consist of things such as walking the dog, teaching the kids tennis, taking the kids for bike rides, taking the dog for bike rides, carrying the laundry baskets up and down the stairs, and watering the garden . . . so when I can't walk, I am a major detriment at home, at work, and on the field . . . and so if I ever come up permanently lame, I guess it would be best to take me out back and treat me like Old Yeller.

Dave Pays For His Stupidity

So after spending eighteen hours last weekend at a travel soccer tournament, and then coaching five days of eighth grade boys try-outs, two travel practices, and one travel soccer game, I decided a fun way to relax on Sunday morning would be to go over to the turf field and play some pick-up soccer . . . and, of course, I snapped a muscle in my fucking quad: why didn't I take a walk? or go roller-blading? or take a ride on my stand-up paddleboard? or a bike ride? am I that stupid?