Top 10

1. Grendel Drone Commander
2. Louie
3. Leyland Kirby’s Eager to tear apart the Stars
4. Into the Labyrinth
5. The return of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia
6. Presonus Firestudio Pro
7. Carne asada
8. The Clock of the Long Now
9. Raxxess rack for my music equipment
10. A long weekend of sitting on my ass watching TV

Bottom 3

1. The horrible, horrible, HORRIBLE Doctor Who specials running on BBC America featuring US celebrities narrating and commenting on Doctor Who (a la I Love the 80s, etc…).  It’s blatantly obvious that these idiots couldn’t name a doctor other than Matt Smith.  I love Doctor Who, but those specials make me want to hate it.  Way to go, BBC America–you’re ruining the only hit you have.
2. The new Amy-narrated opening to this season of Doctor Who that foregrounds the show as about THIS doctor and these companions in the exact way those horrible specials do.  I wonder if they’re showing that opening in the UK.  Please FSM, tell me no!
3. Republicans (of course)

Top 10

1. New Tim Hecker album!!!!
2. Parks & Recreation is back
3. Valerie and Her Week of Wonders
4. Egypt
5. The Omega Factor
6. M-Audio Fast Track Ultra
7. Mixcloud
8. Pitchers & Catchers reporting…
9. Grape Vines
10. Cats

Bottom 3

1. Trish Keening’s passing.  RIP
2. Republicans
3. Budgets

Top 10

1. Free time
2. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia
3. Rewatching Babylon 5 on Netflix
4. Altered Zones
5. Moog Filtatron
6. Mika Vainio, “It’s a Muthang”
7. Mixcloud
8. Beatles boxed set (got it for Xmas)
9. Ham sandwiches (Honeybaked Ham!)
10. Democrats getting stuff done

Bottom 3

1. Republicans/Fox News (tie)
2. Wasting free time on crap
3. UCLA sports (what the hell, guys?  Can’t anyone win?)

1. Pye Corner Audio Transcription Services, Black Mill Tapes Vol. 1
2. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia
3. Anything Ghost Box
4. Kaossilator
5. Whistle and I’ll Come to You
6. “Best of” season (lots of good recommendations always emerge out of those artificial lists)
7. Pizza!
8. Cataclysm
9. Emeralds, Does It Look Like I’m Here
10. Sleep

Bottom 3

1. Republicans
2. Any team I support (Seahawks, UCLA, Angels, even LA Kings lately–they all sucked this year)
3. Plagiarism

Top 10

1. Pye Corner Audio Transcription Services, Black Mill Tapes Vol. 1
2. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert (for the rally that makes me hope that the US isn’t entirely filled with morons and suicide bombers)
3. Darkstar, North
4. The Walking Dead (awesome premiere–can’t wait for the rest)
5. Candy
6. Snorri Sturlson
7. Shain Erin
8. Everything released by Belbury Poly
9. Kanye West’s 808s & Hearbreak (only hypnagogic pop anyone’s every actually heard of)
10. Artificial Owl

Bottom 3

1. Republicans
2. The idiots who canceled Caprica
3. The lack of campaign finance reform

Top 10–New York Trip Edition

1. Coney Island
2. Hot dogs at Nathan’s
3. Other Music
4. Strand bookstore
5. Pizza in Penn Station
6. Black & white cookies
7. New York Public Library’s original Winnie-the-Pooh collection
8. Breakfasts at Holiday Inn Express
9. Not having to sit through US men’s world cup loss because I was at a wedding reception
10. The Cloisters

Bottom 3

1. Coney Island Museum (just plain sucked, even if admission was only 99 cents)
2. Humidity
3. Forbidden Planet New York (big letdown after the London store)

Top 10

1. iPad (software still iffy but device is amazing.  Watching Netflix in my office between classes is awesome)
2. M.I.A. (new album should be interesting)
3. Sly and the Family Stone’s Fresh (have been listening to this a lot–forgot how awesome it is)
4. Wind (hey, in the desert, when the wind goes away, the heat arrives–and stays)
5. Vernor Vinge’s A Deepness in the Sky (even better 2nd time around)
6. Emeralds, Does It Look Like I’m Here?
7. Mutek 2010 (damn–I’ve been wanting to go to this for 10 years, and I haven’t made it yet.  Perhaps next year…)
8. BBC America (has replaced Comedy Central as my default channel)
9. Steak (mmmmm)
10. John Scalzi’s Whatever

Bottom 3

1. Lost finale (massive cop-out to turn the flash-sideways into purgatory.  I never thought I’d say this, but Star Trek: The Next Generation kicked this show’s ass as far as complex, intelligent finales)
2. Angels (Kowbell’s broken leg encapsulation of the season)
3. Oil

Top 10

1. Barak Obama (finally, health care!)
2. Opening Day (Go Angels!)
3. iPad (though since I ordered a 3G model, I won’t be getting mine until late April)
4. Joanna Newsom (yes, I will review Have One on Me–when I have a spare second)
5. Lost
6. Parks & Recreation
7. Caprica
8. Ableton Live
9. Top Gear
10. Ham

Bottom 3

1. Fox “news”
2. Teabaggers (the crazy kind, not the John Waters kind)
3. Spring (where I live, spring is the gateway to the hell that is summer)

A First-Draft Version of FW

Top 10

1. Angels baseball–doing well despite the injuries/tragedies of this season.
2. Mapsadasical–my latest source for excellent music recommendations (and some nifty photos to boot)
3. iPhone 3GS–32 GB storage space means waaaaaay more music in my pocket at all times.  Plus it’s faster and the video camera is excellent!
4. Landon Donovan–Redlands-born US national team player and LA Galaxy star just had a phenomenal Confederation’s Cup and is the dominant player on the US side.
5. Finnegans Wake
6. Pizza Chalet
7. Sleep
8. New Doctor Who
9. Feedly
   
10. Adult Swim in all its glory (from Squidbillies to Venture Brothers to everything else–awesome weirdness galore)

Bottom 3

1. Summer heat (it’s 111 today in El Centro, and it’s not even July 4.  August is usually the hot month)
2. Republicans
3. TV networks that spend more than 5 minutes on Michael Jackson’s death

Yes, this is the new Inkbottle, now hosted by WordPress (that is, by me, since WordPress runs on my own server).  Take a look around and tell me what you think!