Wrapping Tammy’s christmas presents and am really excited that somebody finally started putting a grid on the back of gift wrap!
Merry Christmas 2008
Merry Christmas everyone! This year is a travel year for us. We’ll be heading back to North Dakota to spend Christmas day with my family. We are looking forward to seeing everyone!
If you’ve been checking your mailbox anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Thingelstad letter, or even just a card, you’ve been sadly disappointed on your daily trip to the mailbox. No card this year.
We could be bleak and blame it on the economy. We could be green and hightlight how much carbon we are saving by not sending out more cards and saving some trees while we are at it. We could also highlight that the trend seems to be that we only write a Christmas letter every other year. We had a letter in 2007 and 2005. The even years, 2006 and 2004, seem to fall short. But mostly, we just didn’t get one done and didn’t feel strongly about getting one out.
We’ll store up the enthusiasm though and 2009 should be pretty great! :-)
Coldplay the "Biggest Band in the World"?
I was browsing through Last.fm’s “Best of 2008” coverage. There have been a number of blog posts and articles about the best new music of 2008, and I’ve found some great stuff reading these. Last.fm’s “Best of” is interesting since it is based on analysis and ranking of all the ‘scrobbled’ songs that they track for users. I wasn’t that surprised to find that Coldplay’s Viva La Vida was the #1 album of 2008. It was played by 1,907,044 users a total of 12,584,691 times. On top of all that, it didn’t come out until late in the year!
I was surprised by this comment in the excerpt though.
It’s probably not a stretch to say that Coldplay are the biggest band in the world today.
Now, I’ve always understood that the title of “biggest band in the world” was solely, and strongly, held by U2. So, I figured I’d check out some numbers.
The first place to look is Facebook. Facebook has pages for bands (and anything else) so I checked out the Coldplay page and the U2 page. Drumroll…
Coldplay: 1,175,125
U2: 335,374
How about Last.fm weekly charts. The most recent week’s data ended on Sunday, December 21 2008.
Coldplay: 116,299
U2: 50,867
Maybe Coldplay is the “biggest band in the world”. It also seems this isn’t a new debate at all. It has been debated for 3 1/2 years, U2 vs Coldplay in May 2005.
Are “Hip Hop” and “Rap” really the same genre? They seem totally different to me.
My friend Greg Merkle got his first album on iTunes – it’s really great.
Trying to thaw a frozen pipe.
AirTunes FTW in a big way – blog post to come in the future. Happy camper this morning.
Total meltdown from Mazie staying up an hour after bedtime. Complete FAIL.
git seriously needs tab-completion for branch names.
Getting 5 (!) countertops replaced today. Process starting now.
Guys are here taking large mirrors off the walls to facilitate counter replacements. Hoping to not hear any large crashes.
The 9 1/2’ by 4 1/2’ mirror, with three outlet holes, came down safely. Yeah!
Mirrors all removed from the walls. Counter installer here now to start the replacement. Everyone on time and no hiccups thus far. Great!
The sawsall is going upstairs. Best for me to stay downstairs and not worry.