jazzbo

I'll say Muggsy Spanier. Not one of the real innovators, but he put it out there every time on the line, and you knew you were in for a driving musical treat.

Rick Allen

I hear ya, I find many women attractive, in many different ways. I love beauty! I love my wife too and haven't strayed in the time of our marriage, and have no plans to!

Sure, hardly any attractive qualities. . . .

Carryin' On is a GROOVER DELUXE. Complete with cover BABE!

I'm glad you had a great one! I'm hoping to have a great dinner (at Fonda San Miguel, which is like a vacation resort about ten blocks from my home!) and be home snuggling with Helen in time for the New Year to arrive. I hope all have a great night and holiday.

I won't be complainin'!

Hmmm. . . I'm disappointed that there will be these guest stars; I think she would be better served with an album by her working band working alone. But then I'm NOT her producer!

She just thought that I would be better off smoking filtered cigarettes, and I'm not sure that is really true, but hey what do I know. I was lucky in that I had a very physical job almost all my smoking years and also was a drummer; I never felt lack of breath or had coughing or any other effects that I know of when I was smoking. . . . I feel a lot punier now after a half a dozen years as a desk jockey.

Like some of my first smoking experiments, as a fifteen year old in M'Babane. DON'T start OFF smoking Gitanes! Like sucking a desert wind when you're not prepared for smoking cigarettes. . . Rothmans International were a better "starter" brand, and I discovered that pretty quickly! Starting to smoke overseas was interesting. . . I smoked Rothmans and Dunhills, and Sobranies sometimes (love the white ones in a tin). . . .When I came back to America I occasionally "afforded" these brands, and at the University of Chicago had a Player's Navy Cut habit, but did Camels for a long time, straights, and then at the urging of a girlfriend moved to Marlboro reds (I don't think these were really as good for me as the unfiltered Camels) and then back to the Camels for a while, then Marlboro Lights and then finally, July 1, 1990, cold turkey and never again. . . .

Man, that Gitanes box brings back memories!

Damned good advice Patricia! I will write more! I CAN write More! I CAN! I CAN! I CAN! I CAN! I CAN! I CAN! I CAN! Happy New Year !

Better yet: unfiltered cigarettes from companies or countries don't add a lot of chemicals to their "blend". . . . Best to not smoke though, trust me.

Somewhere in my dwelling I have a few of Minnie's lps. She really was a fantastically gifted singer in all the ways that singers can have gifts. That was her standout tune, but she had paid her dues and she was a major talent. It's worth looking for that tune as an MP3 on the net somewhere and checking it out.

Yeah, I just checked and yes it's by Steven King as Richard Bachman.

A Scanner Darkly is a fascinating book, and a masterwork, definitely, it should be added. PLEASE don't shun me Moose! No, if I'm correct "The Running Man" was from a Steven King novel that was strongly PKD-like.

Bruce, you're right: those three novels certainly deserve to be mentioned as among his best and are favorites too; I just didn't want to provide an overwhelmingly long list! I would have added Dr. Bloodmoney and Clans of the Alphane Moon and We Can Build You as well. . .there are so many good ones! I guess no one has seen the movie!

The Roulette set is amazingly great. . . . I've had the lps and this set sounds better than the lps do to me. And there is an extra cd and a half of the live material at the Roundtable! A great working band preserved here in a wonderful box set; this is what Mosaic is so good at doing!

Wow, that's a harder question to answer than I thought it would be. I bought almost my entire PKD library thirtyfive to fifteen years ago, and added only those that have come out since then. There is a great old paperback collection of his stories on DelRey called "The Best of Philip K. Dick" but it is long out of print. There are five volumes of his Collected stories available, two of which have been reissued to feature "Minority Report" and "Paycheck" in their titles. They are great collections, chronologically presented. . . . That said it is Dick the novelist rather than the short story writer that I am fascinated with. Both his science fiction and mainstream novels I find immensely satisfying more often than not. I'll recommend a few that I think may serve as good introductions to his craft: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. This novel is deeper and more multifaceted in its ways than Blade Runner the movie . . . . The Mercer religion as a subplot just floors me. Confessions of a Crap Artist. The fifties California experience from the dark comedic side. . . . Mainstream novel, only it sure wasn't mainstream at the time of its writing. . .. The Man in the High Castle. A specualtive fiction work in which the Axis powers won WWII, and Germany and Japan split the rule of the USA. . . The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. This is a far out freak fest on one level, a really poignant story of lost love that can never be regained on another, a fascinating work! The Zap Gun. The first of his work that I read. . . . A great book about international politics and the military industrial complex. PKD's worlds and characters hit me hard in a way that hardly any other authors' have. I can't view his work without bias. I hope you check a book of his out and enjoy the read!

Bravo Dmitry, a noble intention and one I know you can accomplish. I did this thirteen and a half years ago and it was the best thing I have ever done for my health.

I use powder too! Oh no I don't. Forget I said that. Don't tell my parole officer. . . .

With Mosaics and most conventionally packaged box sets I put the boxes away somewhere out of the way, keep the booklets separately on a bookshelf, and keep the cds in with the general cd chaos in my "archive."

Glad you had a good one; many more happy ones!

Anyone seen Cold Mountain yet? I went Friday and enjoyed the movie. It suffered a bit from the Hollywood glamorizing syndrome, but I did enjoy the way that the Civil War was represented--no justification or glorification was really applied, you saw the horror of war and no one explained it away with one or another super justification. . . . Basically another reworking of the Odyssey epic by a good cast that turned in a solid job. I was especially glad to see Natalie Portman as I hadn't known she was going to be in the movie, and it was a pleasant surprise. Rene Zelwiger's character was a little over the top and so was she, but I think that was the way it was in the book and possibly the script. . . .The villains were ruthlessly villainous. . . . It's always unsettling to see how awful human beings can be. . . . I'm interested to hear other impressions. . .

Well, Saturday I went to see Paycheck, an update of the 1953 short story by Philip K. Dick for the 2003 movie scene. . . . Overall I think they did a very nice job revamping the story and bringing it to the screen. The police state aspect of the story was definitely dowplayed and rather than a private corporation being a force for good, the corporation was made over into a villain. . . . I predicted just this story change to a friend of mine on the way to the movie! Afleck did a decent job, as did Uma Thurman. Ben's training for Daredevil and Uma's for Kill Bill paid off for them; they did the action scenes quite well. Not a fantastic film, but for fans of PKD a nice cinematic interpretation along the lines of Minority Report.