Pandora for the holidays

One of the most interesting (and useful) sites to come along in 2005 is Pandora. Using the power of the Music Genome Project, the program slices and dices songs into their essential components, and makes surprisingly accurate guesses about what else a user would like, based on what song or artist was entered. You may not think of Hanson‘s music when you’re a Todd Rundgren fan, like Peter is, but it turns out they have a song very similar to some of his work.

What’s especially interesting this time of year is that you can get any sort of holiday music out of Pandora that you’d like. I entered “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” by Harry Connick Jr., and discovered a Louis Armstrong holiday song (“Christmas Night in Harlem”) that I’d never heard of before, and currently have jazzy Christmas music streaming across my work computer.

And if the ads on Pandora didn’t give it away, you can buy any of the songs you hear through iTunes. In other words, Pandora is just a really, really smart (and portable, if you register with the site so you can pull up the stations you create from any Internet connection) record store listening station.

Neat.

The first birthday cake

Every month, the Daily Press sends over a birthday cake on behalf of all of the birthday boys and girls of the month. It’s a ritual that makes a lot more sense at the Daily Press than it does at the Hesperia Star, which is a three-person operation, and thus unlikely to have 12 months worth of birthdays.

This month, though, we’ve got one. Just three years and 18 days to get my first novel published.

The Holiday Music Top 40

As played on my iPod:

1. Joy to the World – The Butties
2. The Christmas Song – The Raveonettes
3. Father Christmas – The Kinks
4. Jingle Bell Rock – Brenda Lee
5. Frosty the Snowman – The Charms
6. Christmas Island – Jimmy Buffett
7. Joy to the World – Moses Kahumoku
8. Jingle Bell Rock – Ozzi Kotani
9. Fight Tonight – The Ramones
10. Christmas Wrapping – Save Ferris
11. Please Come Home for Christmas – Unwritten Law
12. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Mambo – Alvin Stoller
13. Baby, It’s Cold Outside – Dean Martin
14. Blue Christmas – Elvis Presley
15. White Christmas – Elvis Presley
16. I’ll Be Home for Christmas – Elvis Presley
17. Jingle Bells – Jimmy Buffett
18. A Sailor’s Christmas – Jimmy Buffett
19. I’ll Be Home for Christmas – Jimmy Buffett
20. All I Want for Christmas (Is My Two Front Teeth) – Nat King Cole Trio
21. Winter Wonderland – Peggy Lee
22. White Christmas – Tina Sugandh
23. Navidad – Austin Pendleton & Rene Lavan
24. Frosty the Snowman – The Beach Boys
25. I’ll Be Home for Christmas – The Beach Boys
26. Hey, Santa Claus – The Chesterfield Kings
27. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas – Chris Isaak
28. Feliz Navidad – Davie Allan
29. Let it Snow!/Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer – Eddie Dunstedter
30. Silent Night – Elvis Presley
31. Here Comes Santa Claus – Elvis Presley
32. I’ll Be Home for Christmas/Baby, It’s Cold Outside – Jackie Gleason and Jack Marshal
33. Merry Christmas to All of the World – Jean Beovoir
34. Up on the Housetop – Jimmy Buffett
35. Mele Kakalikimaka – Jimmy Buffett
36. Merry Christmas, Alabama – Jimmy Buffett
37. Silver Bells – Led Kaapana
38. We Wish You a Merry Christmas – Leonard Kwan
39. Exotic Night – Martin Denny
40. The Christmas Waltz – Nancy Wilson

I’m reasonably sure almost all of these can be found on iTunes. Merry Christmas, happy Hannukah, joyful Kwanza, happy Festivus!

Danni wins Survivor: Guatemala

Well, another Survivor is in the can and it’s hard to argue with its winner, Danni Boatwright, who played as smart as anyone could who didn’t tell everyone up-front he was a used car salesman and win anyway.

But seriously, if we ever see Jeff Probst superheroing his way to the reunion show again, whether it’s waterskiing in, parachuting, digging his way up through the earth after being buried alive, or whatever, I’m killing him with a shovel, as well as any CBS execs I can find.

The most wonderful time of the year

Snow has settled on the mountains west of Hesperia, framing the Cajon Pass. This despite the snow-free mountains to the east of Hesperia, which are only a little shorter, relatively speaking. The snow on the western mountains — I can never remember which San ________ Mountains they are — will last until late spring. They were still on the mountaintops when I first began working at the Hesperia Star back in April 2004.

I’ll try and shoot some pictures of the mountains in the next few weeks. Maybe if we get lucky, we’ll have another perfect weekend of snow like we had last year.