Yellow is the color of my true love's crossbow

Once again I am heading on a giant road trip across the country, but this one is new and improved - now featuring parents!

What does the addition of parents bring? Well first off, there’s the authentic giant minivan filled with stuff. I’ve managed to carve out a niche for Tippy and me in the back, but that’s about it. I’m pretty sure that five years from now I’ll finally find the stash of ketchup packets I hid somewhere today. Parents also means extra stops for bathroom breaks. If we keep on this pace, I’m confident we will arrive in Milwaukee in time for Halloween, which means we’ll have a couple days before we have to turn around and head back to Tucson for the winter. On the plus side, I’ll have a deep knowledge of every gas station and rest stop West of the Mississippi. Really, it’s fine because what parents really mean is I can type blog posts while they drive, so at least that’s nice.

The iPod has been getting a heavy workout today. So here are a few one sentence reviews of albums I’ve listened to so far. Any of the artists mentioned to feel free to use them as pull quotes on their websites:

The Hazards of Love by The Decemberists - As close to prog rock as I’m comfortable getting yet fun and funky.

Asking for Flowers by Kathleen Edwards - I prefer my Kathleen Edwards with more Bourbon, please.

Changing Horses by Ben Kweller - Ben Kweller goes country and I’m OK with that.

Elvis Perkins in Dearland by Elvis Perkins - I’m really enjoying this new, slightly happier Elvis Perkins.

Almost You: The Songs of Elvis Costello by various artists - This album is an old favorite but Okkervil River's cover of "Riot Act" really stuck out for me today.

Which leads to...

The Stage Names by Okkervil River - I have two albums by this band so it's kind of late for me to name them my new favorite group, but that's what I'm going to do.

We went on a little side trip to the Very Large Array in New Mexico. It's a giant framework (or array) of radio telescopes and it's all very scientific. What's most important to me is it's picturesque. It's like I'm in a science fiction novel!

He forgot his bedside manners

I've been meaning to write about A.C. Newman for the last few days, but I think it's gonna have to wait. He's not that inspiring for me anyway. What I want to talk about today is social networking and etiquette.

Every article I read about this fancy new social network Twitter mentions the correct way one should "tweet." Should you pimp your business? Is it okay to actually post what you're doing when it asks "What are you doing?" My question is, what does it matter?

People can't seem to wait to set down a batch of rules whenever a new form of communication pops up. But isn't part of the fun of the interwebs making up rules as you go along? Sure it's annoying to get Twitter spam, but I really enjoy the diversity of posts from my fellow Twitterers. I get job listings from some, random musings from others and grocery lists from celebrities. If they were all forced to say interesting of informative things or only share links, Twitter would be a lot more boring.

So let's ignore all the advice and just do whatever we want with Twitter. Seriously, it's just 140 characters. How many rules can there possibly be for such a short message?