The End Is Nigh

Next week is finals week. It's going to be hectic. I'm giving finals Monday evening, Tuesday evening, and Thursday morning. Friday my Senior Project student is giving his presentation. Somewhere in there I've got to get the paper cleaned up and sent off and get Ben to the vet for his shots, and I've got to get all the finals graded and the grades turned in by early Friday afternoon because I'm leaving for San Diego Saturday. I have managed to find someone to feed and water the dogs while I'm away; he'll be coming by Wednesday evening to meet the boys and learn the setup.

The extended family has gotten large enough that we've given up on giving gifts to everyone at Christmas; instead, we just draw names. Two Christmases ago, when we started this, we didn't include wishlists; I drew the name of my brother-in-law's brother, whom I scarcely know... Last year we introduced wishlists, and C. gimmicked the drawing so that I got her eldest daughter, who had asked for books by a couple of right-wing authors. (I'm the lone Democrat in the family, and C. thought this was funny. Which it was. Sort of.) This year I've asked for a CD or two. (Options: anything by Santana, the Miracles, or the Beatles; an album by Nena with "99 Luftballoons", by Spandau Ballet with "True", or by Yes with "Roundabout"; America's History album ("Ventura Highway", "Stuck in the Middle With You", "Sister Golden Hair"), the Bee Gees' Idea album (pre-disco, and quite different from their later work), or Gene Pitney's I'm Gonna Be Strong album. Yes, I'm still looking for that last one. Damn Amazon anyway.)

So. One busy and somewhat unpleasant week (I hate grading!) and then a couple of weeks to relax.

On Parametrizing Polygons, 4

Here's the final installment.

( Triangles )

Music and "Buffy"

There are, in my collection, five albums which I bought, directly or indirectly, because of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. In two cases, the link is obvious: the soundtrack of the musical episode "Once More, With Feeling", and "Music for Elevators", an album of songs by Anthony Stewart Head (aka "Rupert Giles"). They aren't what this post is about.

The other three are by singers whose music was used in memorable moments of the show; in each case, I bought the album containing the featured song. (This is a sometimes risky practice, as the album may be otherwise loaded with duds. Anyone want a scarcely-used Cranberries CD?) All three are female solo acts, but it would be hard for them to be more different.

During the (three-hanky) final minutes of the season-two finale "Becoming, Part 2", Sarah McLachlan sings "Full of Grace". On that basis, I bought her "Surfacing" album. She has a smooth and occasionally ethereal voice, and her songs tend to be obscure. Perhaps they are needlessly so; a quick google reveals a website which claims to offer "the meanings" of some of her songs, apparently based on a VH-1 appearance. The meanings presented are brief and not particularly interesting. Despite this, I enjoy listening to the songs. "Full of Grace" is a particular favorite, along with "Building a Mystery" and "Witness".

In the third-season episode "Consequences", after Xander lets slip his one-night stand with Faith, there is a scene showing a devastated Willow, sitting in the girls' bathroom and crying; a snippet from Kathleen Wilhoite's "Wish We'd Never Met" plays. (Ms. Wilhoite is also an actress; she has a recurring role on Gilmore Girls as Luke's sister Liz.) The song appears on her album, "Pitch Like a Girl". Her voice is a little rough, and many of her songs are acidic character studies. They're amusing, the way the bitterest of Saki's stories are. I'm not going to try to describe them any more clearly than that, but I'm thinking in particular of "Olivia Says" and "Yard Sale". (She doesn't spare herself - or, rather, her "implied narrator" - either; "Wish We'd Never Met" is a fairly harsh self-dissection.)

The sixth-season episode "Tabula Rasa" ends with a montage of emotional desolation, as Tara moves out and Giles leaves for England. Michelle Branch appears as a singer at the Bronze, singing (naturally enough) "Goodbye to You".  That prompted me to buy her album, "The Spirit Room". Now, Ms. Branch's voice is a little on the harsh side, and she does strange and terrible things to innocent vowels, but I rather enjoy several of her songs, as much for their energy as anything else. (Their content is on the banal side, full of adolescent angst.) I particularly like "Everywhere".