4 Non Blondes, What's Up. Why the song's playing so often during drive-time on some Washington station, I don't know. But it's safe to say the great big hill of hope has been kicking my butt.

Avoiding playlists entirely this morning, I put in the Essential Sly and the Family Stone. Underdog was a great way to start Friday.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution analyzes Britney's Onyx Hotel Tour and, more than any review I've seen so far, gets to the throbbing heart of the matter.

(It's not clear exactly what the Onyx Hotel is; apparently it's a place where the casts of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," Cirque du Soleil and "Cabaret" all hang out and swap costumes and booty-dance with each other.)

'She can't sing for [expletive]," said Kelley Heinsman, 20, an economics major at Emory University. "But her dancing is awesome."

Heading onto the Beltway today: "CHKDSK" on the back of a sporty black car, the color perhaps representing the operating system of the driver's life.

From a March 18 article in the Baltimore Sun:

A little lady dressed in a faux tuxedo of black and white comes shuffling through the noisy crowd in her Easy Spirit shoes like some kind of Super Mario, hefting a tray of stewed tomatoes and fried oyster sandwiches in one hand and a draft beer in the other.

'Two feet high and rising'

Two feet high and rising

I was at a NASCAR race — you could tell by the size of the crowd — but there were Indy cars on the track. I was down at pit road.

For the Star-Spangled Banner, the announcer said they'd sing the song a little differently that day. The Something Mountain Boys and the Somethings weren't there to sing it, so he was going to have his nephew sing it if he did a good job at the concession stands that day.

I apparently was the nephew. But before I could get a microphone and start singing, the whole crowd started to sing. So I sang along where I was standing on pit road.

That's the last time I eat Uno's right before going to bed.

I'm getting you him for your birthday.

Last fall we discussed Pitchfork's review of Ryan Adams' Rock N Roll and vented on life some; now Adams has found the review as well and practically called them up just to talk. The site's posted the interview.

Amit e-mails about Evanston's greatest barber shop:

"i had this ridiculous dream last night. i walked into the Noyes barber shop, and there was some popular song playing (i can't remember which one.. maybe a britney spears one). I then I see Manny, Fred and the 3rd barber singing along with a song, trading off different parts like a medley or something…. ridiculous!"

Saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind last night. Caught the end of Gene Kelly's An American in Paris today. I've got the mind on my mind.

"Paris has ways of making people forget," Leslie Caron's lead says to Kelly. He disagrees: "Paris? No, not this city. It's too real and too beautiful. It never lets you forget anything. It reaches in and opens you wide, and you stay that way."

Three favorite moments of the ballet sequence:

1. When Kelly is in the flower market, he holds the rose away from him and finds the girl's hand falling into his to dance. Trading the idea of the girl for the girl herself, the motion is seamless and unexpectedly human. The moment is quiet but gives the most hope of the dream.

2. At the end of the blue scene, who needs to learn any more about the color? For all the heat of the dancing and steaming mist of the fountain, the pair finish still and apart.

3. The end.

The spotlight closes in on the rose and fades back to Kelly on the balcony. He closes his eyes briefly but long enough to tell the weight.