Circadian Shift

I really found myself struggling with the mood board this week.

Using a grid is easy to do, and yields pretty good results most of the time, but it does make it hard to keep the look fresh. I tried going back to the more free-form style, like what I was doing in the spring and summer, but it just looked like crap.

Anyway, it's December now, which means that my monthly 40 MP3 allotment from eMusic was there for the taking. I got three albums.

• Thievery Corporation - The Cosmic Game -- I already have five other CDs bearing the Thievery Corporation name; I just can't get enough of that lounge-y downtempo electro goodness
• Frankie Bones - Act Like You Know -- house-y dance tunage to get up and go to
• Steve Reich / Alarm Will Sound - Tehilim & Desert Music -- Steve Reich, of course, looms large on the scene of Minimalist Classical composers, whilst Alarm Will Sound is an instrumental ensemble with an eclectic repertoire (most recently, they covered music by Aphex Twin); the resulting combination yields a work that rewards repeated listens

For those of you doing the math, those three selections actually topped out at 42 MP3s, so I had to dip into my "Booster Pack" for the extra tracks.

The "Booster Pack" also got depleted a bit more, as I downloaded a bunch more of those ambient music/noise recordings that are supposed to do good things for your brain -- Brain Power, Deep Learning, High Focus, and Increase Creativity all got some significant play while at the office this week. They actually seemed to help, as I was able to buckle down and plow through some sticky points in what I've been working on.

In terms of other media consumption for the week, I saw the documentary film March of the Pengiuns (IMDb info) on DVD. It was a good movie -- who, after all, does not enjoy watching cute flightless seabirds (and fluffy baby birds!) waddling around -- but you may, perhaps, argue with the attempt to ascribe too many human characteristics to them. Still, is was great fun to watch, and the Antarctic vistas in the background were truly spectacular.