The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day
System of a Down, "Lonely Day" via iTunes (T.L.A.M.)

Commentary: Welcome to The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day! We shall shortly be exiting italics for purely stylistic reasons. What is to follow would logically be considered part of the commentary, but I'm not fond of lengthy passages of italics. I love italics and feel that they are best used sparingly, thus preserving their cachet. To wit:

The two most significant differences between the late "BTW South Song of the Day" and the nascent "The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day" are: a) At BTW South, the Song of the Day was a gloriously relentless project. The new Song of the Day program will be much more haphazard. Will there be a song every day? Absolutely not, unless I get bored. (So, really, there's nothing absolute about that not.) Every other day? That's the plan, mirroring my "workload" with the BTW South Song of the Day. If a day is missed? Boo hoo, how shall we ever recover? And b) Nominations! Most of you have terrible, terrible taste in music. You remind me of the lyric, "If it wasn't for bad luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all." Substitute "taste in music" for "luck" and that's you guys! But, almost in spite of yourselves, some of you do like some good music. So, email me your nomination(s) for The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day and subject to my completely arbitrary ruling your song may become the Song of the Day. And, what's more, you'll be duly credited! That's right, your codename will be cited for having contributed in a meaningful way to the unrivaled brilliance that is The Secret Base of the Rebel Black Dot Society! If you don't have one of my several email addresses, welcome, complete asshole stranger*, feel free to leave your nomination in the nearest comments section. So, nominate today and be the first kid on your block to bask in the glory of The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day!

*Remember when we talked about "complete asshole stranger"? It doesn't mean I think you're an asshole.

To get back to commenting on the actual song, the inevitable loneliness stemming from the Mountain's departure has yet to hit me in any substantial way (good things come to those who wait), but even so "Lonely Day" seemed apropos to the moment.

"The most loneliest day of my life."

Lionel Hutz presents "The Truth (glare)" and "The Truth (smile)"
To my dismay, I watched the "documentary" Control Room this evening. Rubbish, utterly disgusting rubbish. It wasn't a documentary, it was propaganda. All the politically-themed "documentaries" I've rented through Netflix have turned out to be propaganda films. When I added Triumph of the Will to my queue, I did so knowing it is not only a propaganda film, but the most famous/infamous of all propaganda films. I thought Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room and Who Killed the Electric Car? would be documentaries, and based upon their description as such I think my expectation was not unreasonable, yet both were nakedly pushing a highly political agenda. Mayhap I've fallen out of synch with the times, but isn't a documentary supposed to present the bare facts, not a highly selective and carefully manipulated subset of the facts? I guess my disillusionment with modern documentaries stems from a simple misunderstanding: I believe in the now radical notion of the truth, that there is a single objective explanation of any given incident, while modern documentary filmmaking is premised on the notion of relative truth, that the only "truth" is whatever jaundiced interpretation of events that you can sell to your confederates and fellow travelers. The documentary is dead, and given the degenerate state to which it has fallen I say good riddance.

The Endurance
After a seemingly business travel-induced spell of infrequent and irregular communication, I am returning to a posture of guarded optimism. She rang last night at after midnight on the Eastern Seaboard and we spoke for an hour. I see in this good tidings. Codename: PANDORA shall yet be mine!