My obsession with the Jayhawks is deepening. Bought two of their old CDs ("Tomorrow the Green Grass" and "Smile") yesterday. Wow. Gosh. Wow. I know I should have gone straight to "Hollywood Town Hall," but it's almost like I'm saving that for dessert, you know? I'm learning some of the songs on guitar, lots o' fun. They change their band lineup so much that, hell, maybe if I keep practicing they'll ask me to be on the next album. I can dream.

Very disappointed in my lunch today. I bought it at Soho, a takeout place in my building that's a big buffet where you pay by the pound. Usually pretty good, but today I choose poorly. First, the fried chicken. Oh lord. Basically just chicken in Chinese-food style breading. Ain't right. But I could overlook (though not forgive) that if not for ... the hair. Yes, this was the hairest chicken I've ever seen. Not people hair that fell in or something, but, you know, chicken hair. SO MUCH chicken hair. Poking out all through the breading, definitely attached. A marvel to behold, a horror to even think of eating. Fun to show around and gross out your co-workers, though.

I would like to note that May 30 came and went with nothing bad happening to me. It seems that day is my designated lifetime Very Bad Day. Three years ago on that date was when I had appendicitis, and one year ago on that date was when my car was stolen. I considered staying home from work this year and hiding in the bathtub with a mattress over me, as Geoffrey suggested, but then I figured the building would burn down or something. So I went about my normal routine, thankfully unmolested by catastrophe. Maybe it's just every other year, though, so next year might be the in-the-bathtub-with-a-mattress year.

So the FCC today voted 3-2 to relax rules limiting how many media outlets in a given area one company can own. Kinda weird that that was approved, because it really seemed like everyone -- Republicans and Democrats alike -- was against it. Except Clear Channel, of course. I'm sure they're thrilled. I don't see any advantage to this for regular folks (and someone please correct me if there's an argument for it I've missed), only for big corporations that own media outlets, and even only for the biggest of those. So radio will go from 90% of stations playing Top 40 songs to 98% of stations playing the Top 20 songs. See yuh, indie artist hoping for radio play. See yuh, new bands. Hello payola, bring on the boy bands! Maybe all the artists who don't fit the Clear Channel mold can find "real" jobs by looking in the classifieds of the "Clear Channel Times," soon to be everyone's hometown newspaper. Speaking of news, oh this is bad for it. Local news coverage already is shrinking, shrinking (and stinking, stinking), and having every paper run from Gannett world headquarters isn't going to do much to help that, I suspect. Doubt it'll do much for the job situation in journalism either, as it just feeds the trend of news being mass produced by one anchor/production crew feeding dozens of cities. Can one copy desk shoving the same words into dozens of "local" papers be far behind? Oh, ha. I just read a wire report about the vote, and it specifically mentions Gannett being thrilled. Well, yay. Everything's going to be OK (and Franklin Gothic Condensed on a seven-column grid).

In other news, Eric Rudolph was caught this weekend. This is my newest (rekindled, really) news obsession. So he's been where we thought he was the whole time? Amazing. Amazing story. Too bad there's already been a gag order (sooooo First Amendment) clamped on it, so we'll probably never know. Doubt he reads this, seeing as I try to avoid spewing racist, anti-gay, anti-foreigner rhetoric here, but in case he tunes in: Eric, hey. Watch your cornhole, buddy. You fucker.

LISTENING TO: Lots o' JAYHAWKS. Looking forward to new STACEY EARLE and new GILLIAN WELCH tomorrow.