Link: http://www.savethebarleycorn.org/

This might not mean much to you-- okay, I'm pretty sure it won't mean much to you. But it means something to me.

The first San Francisco bar that I ever went into and immediately felt at home, like I would be happy to live next door to it and stop by every day, was the John Barleycorn. It had wooden pews by a fire, board games and novels along the back walls, a knowledgeable and friendly staff, great scotch and great people.

And now their building just got bought by some lady who wants to evict them & the pizza place next door (which the bar staff at the Barleycorn would order from, if you wanted a pizza). No renegotiating of lease, no raised rent, just "get out."

Do me a favor, if you would, and take a minute to sign the online petition they've got going to spread the word that the Barleycorn is loved and would be missed by the neighborhood it's in. Take a look at the photos on the site and I tell you, if you're in San Francisco, I'll be happy to take you around there & introduce you.

I live an hour and a half away from this place, but it feels like a second home every time I visit.

So there's that.

Christmas was awesome, actually, thanks for asking. I got a copy of the movie I had been waiting for the most on DVD (Talladega Nights) and the wife got me a Playstation 2, so my productivity levels in anything not related to the digital realm has dropped to ZERO.

Which is probably not a big change from where it normally was.

I wanted to maybe throw together a top 10 list of singles or albums or something, because I've never done it, but the problem I run into is that I'm not a music critic. I don't get promo cds all year, I don't know the cutting edge stuff. A lot of what I find (and what makes it into the Signal mixes) could be a few years old. Or many years old.

And if anyone wanted to know what I really dug this year... well, the mixes speak for themselves.

Anyway. 2007 is coming. Anyone feeling optimistic?

I didn't know that Tommy Smothers and Bill Cosby had a feud back in the day that ended with Cosby punching Smothers in the back of the head at a Playboy Mansion party.

I guess Tommy's lucky that the feud happened before someone created a machine that clones Cosbys.

We figured out how to turn comment moderation back off. It's morning again in America. We ain't afraid of no ghosts.

For quite some time, I thought people stopped visiting Signalstation because all the comments dried up. I should have had more faith.

I found out last night that somehow comment-moderation got turned on on the site and everyone's comments were sitting in a queue waiting to be approved.

We're going to have to figure out how to turn comment moderation off, but while we wait for that... it's good to see you all commenting! Sorry about the technical difficulties. I hope you weren't thinking we were being jerks about not publishing your comments.