Lovely and Excellent

Ah, the internets can be quite a lovely place when nice people say such nice things.

Sayeth John Darnielle: "Suffrage gave woman the vote; Betty Friedan gave them hope, and the power to dream, and in so doing she brought us all a step closer to liberation. For if we tolerate a world in which our mothers — and our sisters; and our daughters, and our wives; our closest friends and dearest companions — are not free to follow their dreams and to chase down their passions, in short to seek out their true selves, then that world is a paltry thing, and our own lives within it are greatly diminished."

Sayeth Alex Ross: "Mozart did not come from nowhere. He was the product of a society that was avid for music on every level, that believed in the possibility of an all-encompassing musical genius. The society we live in now believes otherwise; we divide music into subcultures and subgenres, we separate classical music from popular music, we locate genius in the past. Today, a young man with Mozart's abilities would very likely labor in obscurity, and perhaps give up in frustration. As I once wrote, if Mozart were alive today, he'd be dead. If you really want to celebrate Mozart's world, Mozart's culture, Mozart's life, you would ignore the man himself and listen to music by a living composer. . . . Celebrate Mozart another time, when he's not being rammed down your throat."

Sayeth the rabbit: "You see what's out there, the stupid messages, the dumb comments, the countless people who don't get it, who want to tell you how you've failed, how they're better than you because they've been locked into the same rigid concepts and followed the same prescribed path from the time they were infants. You see all of that and you say, 'That's the way it is. Fine. Whatever.' And then you move on to what you are - separate from all of that. None of that shit has anything to do with you. Fuck the statistics. You have a great job, you look good, you're pretty happy. . . . [G]et out, open up, own how great you are, stop apologizing. Fuck the statistics. Fuck the sad stories. Nothing is standing in your way."

Excellent food on Friday at Pizza D.O.C, excellent lexicographical silliness on Friday night with the birthday boys and crew, excellent Matthew Kerstein / Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin / Catfish Haven show at the Subterranean Saturday night, excellent drinking and carousing even later Saturday night at Club Foot. Most excellent indeed.