Sometimes You Have To Let Someone Else Drive

I want to throw a big thank you out there to my man D, who because he's been fortunate enough to meet a woman he wants to marry, had provided us with a chance to have a bachelor party in Vegas and all that entails. At the culmination of a fantastic weekend, D gave each of us a particular handcrafted parting gift, which I have to say has served me very well over the past few days.

This week, business has me driving from the Valley to Beverly Hills to the Valley and back again. That's a lot of time logged in the cockpit during peak LA rush hour traffic. But the cool thing is that D's gift was a mixtape. Not just any mixtape, but a double disc mixtape. There is a certain art to making a mix that's slowly being lost in this age of shuffling ipody playlists. And in this case, D's a true artist. He told me that he meticulously picked each track and mixed them together in a way that was meant to be played from start to finish in the order he has chosen. To insure a pure listening experience, D covered the track listings on the back of his intricately photoshopped cover with a sheet of white paper, asking us not to remove it until we've listened to the cds. Clearly, a lot of time and effort has gone into making this collection of music.

About 99% of the time, I am in control of the music I listen to. I'm always moving about my iPod, listening to music I'm familiar with. Music that I've chosen. I like to drive. But I've learned that sometimes you have to sit back and let somebody else do it for you. And so I've been doing what D wanted me to and listening to his mixtape without looking at what song is going to come next.

Bra. Vo. D! Bravo. It's very cool. Songs mixed into other songs which mixed into quotes from movies. Each song sounded good against the next one. I was so happy that Paper Panes from MIA had found it's way onto the mix. As well as Beck. Fatlip. Chemical Brothers. The Streets. There were songs that I had never heard mixed with just enough songs that I know. Freakin' Barracuda. Well played good Sir!

Even though leaving tonight's seminar I had a half an hour's drive home and even though it was 10:30, as the mixtape pumped loudly through my car's stereo, I decided to take the long way home so that I could keep listening to it.