but I seem to have so many problems with it. I’ll keep messing with it.

As a kid I listened to pop music and whatever was on my LadyBug transistor radio:

Michael Jackson, John Cougar, Journey, even “whimps” like Boy George & WHAM. One of the first genres of music I discovered NOT on the radio, was metal. It was also the first kind of music that really felt “dangerous” — very rock n roll. I can still remember sitting on my neighbor’s driveway listening to his boombox as he played me his cassette tape of Iron Maiden’s Piece of Mind. We rewound the guitar intro and first lyric of “Trooper” 5 times in a row, “You take my life, but I’ll take yours too!” (You can hear it here.) This kind of thing can blow a little kids mind.

As an adult I’d mostly left my interest in metal behind, but in the last few years I’ve started to revisit my classic metal collection and I was surprised to discover how much I still enjoy it.

Which brings me to Black Sabbath. This Friday the 13th marks the 40th anniversay of Black Sabbath’s debut album.  It’s not a record I heard when I was a kid, and I only started listening to them fairly recently, but it’s pretty awesome stuff that still holds up today. (BTW, MySpace & Rhapsody don’t offer this music for streaming. You’ll have to buy it. I guess its owned by an old UK record company who hasn’t given the rights to any digital distributor.)

As far as I can tell, this record is the beginning of heavy metal. I don’t think Deep Purple, Vanilla Fudge, Cream or anyone else who was supposed to have contributed to this genre sound anything like “metal” to me. Can anyone else show me where “metal” came from if not from these 4 lads? I’d really like to find out if this album is as original as it sounds to me.

I saw Ozzy perform live at Blizzcon this year. The guy is 61 years old and sounded great. I grew up listening to Ozzy, but I never knew he was such a pioneer until I went back to Black Sabbath and the history of the genre. I actually found this book on Black Sabbath’s early material by Paul Wilkinson, Rat Salad. Definitely fun to read if you’re a fan of the band. It’s not a bio, but instead focuses on the music, song by song, of the first six Sabbath albums. One of the BIO notes I did find interesting, is that the origin of their “dark” and “macabre” themes came from the band members noting that people paid to be scared by horror movies. They asked themselves, “How come no one has ever made scary music?” So that’s what they set out to do. When the band was accused of being satanists after the release of their debut album, they actually considered changing direction - which is what led to “War Pigs” - on their next record - an anti-war song, in an attempt to shake the doom & gloom image for a more political, socially conscious stance.

Also, Black Sabbath songs are supposed to be available for download for Guitar Hero 5. I don’t know the new tracks yet. Right now they only have Iron Man (GH), War Pigs (GH2) and Paranoid (GH3).

Wondering why DisQUS Comments appear only on the first post, not the last.

In 2000 I visited my friend in Vietnam and we rented Honda Dream motorcycles, my first experience as an adult on a motorized 2 wheel vehicle. (I vaguely remember crashing a “minibike” when I was 10. I must have blocked out the details.) The Honda Dream was great fun: weaving in and out of the swarms of people, cars, cyclos and other motorcycles, I quickly realized we had settled on the absolute best way to get around Saigon. I was particularly pleased with how I could hand a guy a few dollars, and without insurance, license or any instructions (at least none in English) get immediately on the road. If only things were so easy in America.

Well, it turns out its not that difficult here in the States. I’ve been thinking about getting a scooter since Xmas. I was in Hawaii for the holidays and I saw people renting & riding scooters in Waikiki. Since then I’ve been dreaming of “scooting” from beach to beach with the wind blowing on my face, but alas I’m back in Los Angeles. Yesterday I decided I didn’t want to wait to get back to Hawaii, so I picked up a Sento 50 from Kymco (see a really large pic of it here!) 

I was attracted by its retro styling (not a fan of the Tron-like futuristic bikes), and the small motor (I’ve learned with automobiles that the faster the vehicle can go, the faster I’ll go. I’m not good restraining myself, and thought I’d be safer with a tiny engine). My friends were laughing at me when they heard I wanted one, and they all insisted that a Vespa was the only way to go. They changed their tune when they saw my Sento! It looks a lot cooler than the current Vespa models, and you can’t beat the price. It retails for $2,000 but I got it for $1,400 from NoHo Scooters http://www.myspace.com/nohoscooters  Within an hour I had a helmet, had called up an insurance company, and was on the road.

Taking it home over Laurel Canyon was tough. I was definitely putting along up that hill. My plan is mainly to ride it around Santa Monica/Venice, where there are no hills. I discovered/remembered a few things while driving for the first time in years…

• When on a scooter, as opposed to a car, you are really in the moment. Much more zen.
• You pay attention to the road, the cars around you, people, shops, everything. (Instead of texting (oops!), talking on the phone, listening to music like I do while I drive a car… ).
• Potholes are not good and must be avoided.
• You feel a kinship with MiniCoopers & SmartCars, because they’re small like you.
• You can smell food, car exhaust and everything else around you.
• You want to stop everywhere because its so easy to maneuver, park & dismount.
• You notice that different cars have extremely different sounding engines! 

For some hilarious Taiwanese English about my new Scooter, check out the official Kymco Sento site!

http://www.kymco.com/event/sento50100/#features

Here’s my favorite line: “Sento 50/100 has a refined way of retro styling to integrated the cute image character with the agile of riding can easy afford for the traffic jam in city or dowtown area!”