Can of Worms

1.

This is John Cusak as Rob in "High Fidelity". In this scene he is organizing his albums autobiographically. Meaning, as he says, "If you wanna find 'Landslide' by Fleetwood Mac you have to know that I bought it for someone in the fall of 1983 and then didn't give it to them for personal reasons".

That's the sort of thing single people can do.

When I was single my albums were sorted. Nothing sophisticated, just a tidy row of records arranged by genre and then by artist within the genre. It wasn't even alphabetical, just a convenient way of accessing quickly the music I wanted to hear, when I wanted to hear it.

I'm not naming names or pointing fingers here but those days are gone. I've tried but no matter how many cunning storage boxes I buy, no matter how clearly I label, regardless of how streamlined the order, despite how easy I try to make it for these people it still takes me 5 minutes to locate the "Moulin Rouge" soundtrack because it never gets put back under "Soundtracks".

Today I 86ed the storage boxes and moved everything into a more easily accessed bookcase. Not that it will change anything. Stacks of CDs will still pile up on the stereo until a) they fall over or 2) I can't stand it anymore. Whatever. Sometimes I leave the lens cap off the camera and that bugs other people.

2.

It has come to my attention that more than one of you are fans of Tom Waits. That's ok. I love you anyway. I don't hate Tom Waits. Chalk it up to overexposure: a too-long "writer's workshop retreat" and a self-important stooge that was trying to woo me. It's not Tom's fault. I get that.

3.

I feel about Tom Waits the way I feel about clams.

There's nothing wrong with either of them, in small doses. I once nannied for a week on Martha's Vineyard and pretty much all we ate was clams. It took decades before I could even think about chowder without my throat getting small.

4.

By the way, both The Child and I totally get direct and indirect objects now. Thanks for your support.