Two iTunes Sets for the Price of One!

I was really busy last Friday, but I meant to post something on Friday night. Never got around to it, and then I forgot about it over the 4-day weekend. Oops. That just means more to write about now.

Part of the reason why I didn't get a chance to post on Friday night is that I got home so late, thus not leaving enough time to post here and still do the other things I wanted to do. I stayed late at work, for starters, then I stopped at 7-11 for some hot chocolate/coffee. While I was taking care of that, I heard someone else by the coffeemaker mention the big backup on I-70 East. This, of course, was just the sort of thing I don't like to hear, since about 60 miles of my 62 mile afternoon commute is on I-70 East.

Luckily, I knew a back way. A few years ago, back in the car pooling days, my car pool colleague and I were faced with an insurmountable backup on the road leading to I-70. The 7-11 guy working there at the time gave us directions to get around the backup, but we missed a turn and ended up on a 2-lane road that had us running parallel to I-70 for 25 miles before ending on the interstate. We also missed a turn or two that would have gotten us on I-70 a lot sooner. Remembering all this, I used this route.

I had been planning on getting on I-70 fairly soon, just after the first mountain (now that I knew that it could be done) and past where the backup was reported to be, but I found the back road to be pretty relaxing. I drove past cornfields and small towns that are unseen from the interstate. It was kinda like that scene in Cars. So I opted to go the entire back road to I-70. It got me home pretty late, but it was fun. Sometimes you have to slow down and smell the roses. Or corn, in this case.

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M and I saw Downfall on DVD last night. It is a dramatic re-enactment of the final 10 days of the Third Reich, mostly taking place in Hitler's bunker and mostly based on the recollections of his stenographer. It was very well done and very depressing. It was also fascinating to see how fanatical the Nazis could be. People fighting a suicidal fight solely because they made an oath to the Reich. And Frau Goebbels poisoning her children because she firmly believed that a life without National Socialism is a life that her children should not have to suffer through. Very sad.

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On a lighter movie note, M and I went up to Harrisburg, PA to see Superman Returns on IMAX. Was it worth the $15 tickets and 3 hour round-trip? I suppose so. The 3D scene selections were OK. None of them were of Mad Magician caliber, however.

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It recently occurred to me that I never posted about the Walk for Autism we did about a month ago. As many of you - if not all of you, depending on who reads this - know, my nephews are autistic. M and I thought it would be a good thing to do. We didn't find out about it until a day or so before the event, so we didn't have any money raised or anything. People who raised $100 got a T-shirt. I just paid the $100 myself. They were out of XL by the time I got to the T-shirt table, so I had to settle for XXL. It was still worth the $100, as far as I'm concerned.

Clearly, a lot of people were more prepared than we were. There were a lot of teams with their own T-shirts, many of which had the picture of a kid they knew who had autism. They had team names like "Walking for Bobby" and such. One team was called "I Like Elephants" and it had a drawing of an elephant done by a kid whose particular fixation is elephants (my nephews' fixation is letters and numbers).

There were a lot of autistic kids there, covering the spectrum from the mildly autistic to the almost-completely-shut-off-from-the-world autistic. It showed me just how relatively social my nephews actually are, especially the younger one.

The walk itself was a couple laps around the rec field and University Union at the college I graduated from. Along the route were signs giving facts about autism, such as how many kids are diagnosed with autism each year, how many more boys are autistic than girls and how little funding autism research gets. It was very interesting.

I need to remember to add some links to autism research sites and such on this blog. And you be sure keep an eye out for autism walks in your area!

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Since I missed last week's iTunes Friday, I'll be listing 42 songs, instead of 21.

1. "She's Not There" - The Zombies
2. "The Last DJ" - Tom Petty
3. "The Last Time" - The Rolling Stones
4. "Don't Know Much About History" - Sam Cooke
5. "Number One Blind" - Veruca Salt
6. "Learning To Fly" - Pink Floyd
7. "Walking Contradiction" - Green Day
8. "Words" - Missing Persons
9. "South Side" - Moby
10. "Love Me Tender" - Elvis Presley
11. "She" - Green Day
12. "Pepper" - Butthole Surfers
13. "Tears Are Falling" - KISS
14. "In My Dreams" - REO Speedwagon
15. "Wolf" - Veruca Salt
16. "Brown Sugar" - The Rolling Stones
17. "Heartbreaker" - Pat Benatar
18. "Breaking The Girl" - Red Hot Chili Peppers
19. "Graduation Song" - Vitamin C
20. "Stand Back" - Stevie Nicks
21. "From Me To You" - The Beatles
22. "Lady Picture Show" - Stone Temple Pilots
23. "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" - Creedence Clearwater Revival
24. "Cherish" - Madonna
25. "Thank U" - Alanis Morrisette
26. "Take Five" - Dave Brubeck Quartet
27. "Mother Mother" - Tracy Bonham
28. "The Metro" - Berlin
29. "Hit" - The Sugarcubes
30. "World Where You Live" - Crowded House
31. "So Far Away" - Dire Straits
32. "Now We're Getting Somewhere" - Crowded House
33. "Rockin' Robin" - Bobby Day
34. "Up Around The Bend" - Creedence Clearwater Revival
35. "Time Capsule" - Matthew Sweet
36. "Bittersweet Symphony" - The Verve Pipe
37. "We Want Da Funk" - George Clinton and Parliament
38. "Sabotage" - Beastie Boys
39. "Cum On Feel The Noize" - Quiet Riot
40. "Take Good Care of My Baby" - Bobby Vee
41. "Ain't That A Kick In The Head" - Dean Martin
42. "Waiting" - Green Day

* Normally, if two songs from the same artist came up so close together, I would skip the second song, but I liked the second Crowded House song, so I let it slide.

* Still getting a lot of re-runs from week to week. I'm tempted to make multiple lists and use a different one each week.