How old is "Gradtuated High School"? 1990 I was 17 so I'll take that.:

5. Vogue, Madonna 13. Pump Up The Jam, Technotronic 46. Ice Ice Baby, Vanilla Ice 56. U Can't Touch This, M.C. Hammer 81. Everybody Everybody, Black Box

I really don't like Pelecanos, BTW, I think he's like a literary version of Tarantino without the breathtaking stylistic flourishes that make QT so great. I sort of thought this based on his books, but his episode in S1 of The Wire (the penultimate one where Wallace gets got was so catastrophically bad that it brought it into sharp relief; his lame pop references and were shoehorned into a cliched and melodramatic plot that switched the show's usual icy naturalism for trad Hollywood story beats ( Samuels' pep talk to McNulty, D confonting Stringer about Wallace, the final "Catch You Later" line ) and shameless sentimentality.

Sufjan Stevens doing the Star Spangled Banner at the South Street Seaport in NYC: [link]

Now Playing [link] a bunch of Volcano Suns rarities. Why haven't their early LPs been reissued on CD? Especially with all the Burma activity.

How old is "Gradtuated High School"? 1990 I was 17 so I'll take that

Egads, I find out I'm six years older than Corwood AND Jim in one pass through the thread? How distressing! Or, what JZ said.

Jim just broke my heart...if it was Sunday I'd say he broke the truce.:) I thought that episode had for-real emotional weight, although Simon is mos def more subtle and even made me feel sorry for Snot Boogie for carrying his horrible moniker through life because of one day's runny nose. The Tarantino comparison is apt enough however, that I won't cross the country to homewreck...sigh. Corwood, am I a big sap?(assuming you read the Wirehead spoiler font) Maybe just a forgiving fangirl...I live in an overgrown cowtown that sometimes pretends it's a metropolis... we take our cool where we find it. Oh! From my list yesterday, forgot the Neville Brothers' "Everybody Plays The Fool"

The thing was that stuff was wildly out of character. If you look at, say, Rawls's "This is coming from a guy who hates you" speech, or the scene when McNulty finally visits Kima or, most of all, that last scene with Bubs ("Mcnutty...don't tell her") which had me in floods of tears, it was in the same tone as the rest of the show.

That isn't fair. Bubbles ought to have a side endorsement with Kleenex; very few emotional moments could compete with that whole ruined, quiet dignity thing Bubbles has going on. That scene you described...my god...I'd hate to meet the person that didn't get affected by that. I suspect we "elected" him twice. (And I'm a geek, because it is very early here and I'm still taking time to give props to Andre Royo..."Wire" fiend, much? Yes, complete with "withdrawal".) Although my "Rescue Me" fandom at times does make me suspect that maybe I'm soft, playing hard, so it's okay that we disagree about that. I won't be coming into the thread heavy or anything, even for my fake literary boyfriend.

God, 'ruined, quiet dignity' is a stunning description of Bubs.

Thank you. (even if your heart's a rock...does that sound like letting it go...really nsm. Sorry.)Out of all the deaths there could be, that's the one they'd scrape me off the floor after, which is funny, cause it would be hardly unexpected, with both heroin and the Bug to worry about, and the snitching and all of his stupid little "capers", but it is still true. I'm not sure why.

Frank Sobatka, too, could rip out my heart and hand it to me.

I think I'm much more pop radio tolerant than most of you are -- what can I say, NPR still bores me stupid half the time -- but here are the songs from the Top 100 from 1996 that wouldn't make me change the station, anyhow. (Also? All DC radio sucks now, but the rock station, DC 101, is mostly borderline tolerable, as is the adult contemporary station 104.1.):

6. Give Me One Reason, Tracy Chapman
7. Tha Crossroads, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
12. Missing, Everything But The Girl
13. Ironic, Alanis Morissette
15. Follow You Down / Til I Hear It From You, Gin Blossoms
17. How Do U Want It / California Love, 2Pac
18. It's All Coming Back To Me Now, Celine Dion (The ONE Celine song I can stand, seriously. It's just sexy somehow.)
24. Name, Goo Goo Dolls
25. Who Will Save Your Soul, Jewel
28. Counting Blue Cars, Dishwalla
29. You Learn / You Oughta Know, Alanis Morissette
30. One Of Us, Joan Osborne
31. Wonder, Natalie Merchant
39. Breakfast At Tiffany's, Deep Blue Something
42. No Diggity, BLACKstreet (Featuring Dr. Dre)
44. 1979, The Smashing Pumpkins
56. Wonderwall, Oasis
66. Theme From Mission: Impossible, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen
67. Closer To Free, Bodeans
68. Just A Girl, No Doubt (In 1996, I hated this song, but I have since mellowed.)
78. Jealousy, Natalie Merchant
79. I Want To Come Over, Melissa Etheridge
99. Only Wanna Be With You, Hootie and The Blowfish (Entirely for the lines stolen from Bob Dylan)
100. Don't Cry, Seal

A lot of this is the kind of mellow Lilith Fair-y stuff I don't buy, but nonetheless find soothing.