workin on grad school applications. How the FUCK do i find out what my undergraduate GPA was? I feel like i had better things to do when i was still in school than agonize over my grade point average - like, um, learning. And studying. And writing. And organizing. Why do we categorize academic value through numeric constants, and why do we care about the fact that i blew off natural hazards because it was a ridiculous class as opposed to the fact that -- oh, never mind, i'm going to come off sounding like an asshole no matter how i phrase this particular rant.



It really sucks that iTunes doesn't have Sam Cooke's original of "A Change Is Gonna Come." I'm even more righteously indignant about this than i am about the fact that i am supposed to know my fucking GPA.



iTunes does have like 30,000 versions and covers of Curtis Mayfield & The Impressions' "People Get Ready," which was probably most famously covered by Bob Marley and The Wailers and was interpolated into his most famous version of "One Love," (that which appeared on Legend.) I didn't know that Dandy Livingstone (probably best known by Americans for writing and performing the song "Rudy, A Message To You," which The Specials later covered,) had done a version. And indeed, so did Burning Spear, who gets my vote for the most inventive reggae interpretation of this particular incredible curtis mayfield song. (Sorry Bob.)



The Rod Stewart/Jeff Beck Version, and this may be my longstanding aversion to Rod Stewart born of the fact that by the time i started listening to popular music, he was making a huge amount of very cheesy crap like "The Motown Song," strikes me as mechanical, formulaic, and cheesy. And Beck's riffage at times adds to this stiffness. But then, you can't really judge a song by its iTunes snippet. Which gets me back to GPAs.