It’s all very irrational; I don’t understand it.

EDIT: YouTube removed the video. How lame.…

The music is not all though; there is much that we can learn by watching the actors and actresses play out their parts in their signature styles, and understanding the dynamics of old-style courtship.

The video above is a classic case-study in romance. Notice the remote serenade — maintaining a comfortable distance is the first step towards securing your loved one. The theory behind this is that close proximity exposes your loved one to your human imperfections…that are best hidden at the start of a relationship. Do you see how the actors are never close enough to be seen together?

The next useful technique is that effortless transmission of sound across the forest that the actor achieves, even when he’s barely moving his lips. This is a classic ninja technique, improved over the ages. The key to this technique is the (apparently) casual manner in which he strokes his guitar and the (apparently) out-of-sync foot movements. With practice, you can generate the right frequencies of vibrations to carry the slightest whisper across the forests and plains, across the oceans if need be.

Finally, notice the effect that the serenade has on the lady, and her orgasmic convulsions. This technique was invented by our ancestors who travelled distant places with no good means of communication, and were forced to come up with something to keep their wives happy remotely. Unfortunately, with the passage of time and the development of modern means of communication and transport, this technique has become an extinct, forgotten art.

To clarify, I’m not obsessed with mpd per se, just the concept of a modularized client-server architecture for playing music. mpd is the server, gmpc is the client that I’ve chosen to use, along with a couple of other components such as scmpc to scrobble my tracks and musictracker to update my Pidgin status. I also found an XFCE applet that can control mpd. As an added bonus, it turns out that I can adjust the master volume by scrolling my mouse-wheel over the applet, something I’ve wanted for a long time. Sweet.

No, it is not an iPod.

The strange thing is, I don’t even know what exactly it should be called. Sure, I could call it an MP3 player, but it does play WMA too. (Regrettably, it doesn’t seem to play OGG files.) I could call it a music player, but it does play videos too. If I called it a media player…would anyone know what I was talking about?  When I say ‘media player’ the first thing that pops into my head is Microsoft’s Windows Media Player. Not the same thing.

Well, on to the details: it’s a 4GB, shiny black thing with USB 2.0 connectivity and rechargeable batteries. Hmmm…why am I telling you all this? Just do a quick search on Google for Sansa e260, and you can get the full story.

In case you are wondering, I don’t plan to use it myself. I had a $50 RadioShack gift card, and a 10% discount coupon, and besides, it was already discounted by 16%, so I decided to splurge. Do the reckoning yourself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ueWVV_GnRIA

This is the score from Schindler’s List, composed by John Williams, and performed by Itzhak Perlman (violin). Look at the way Perlman caresses the violin…amazing.…

In case you didn’t know this already, John Williams has composed several of the finest pieces of music that you could ever hope to listen to.