Something I’ve come to love about the most excellent writers (call them “curators” if you must) is how they editorialize links. I think I’ve been slow to accept this because with music writing, it could be monetized in clear ways by publishing through a third party. When you read great stuff at blogs like daring fireball, you marvel at how far a link and an ounce of editorial can take you. Same is true for Twitter follows like David Carr, who just re-shared his insightful interview with Terry Gross on Fresh Air specifically about this topic. Serendipity! It’s what makes the Internet fun and I think that I forgot that somewhere along the way while hoarding links and articles and ideas in Google Reader and Reeder and Twitter and Tumblr and Instapaper and all the other ways we use the web today.

So 2012 at Ramsayings will be about sharing those insights. Brace yourself.

Upgrading the home stereo, too. Thanks to the Wirecutter, we’re going all in with a Pioneer VSX 1021. I can’t wait to take advantage of Airplay like never before and finally get some good use out of my beautiful Axiom Audio speakers I bought back when. Can’t wait!

Importantly, I need to unplug more. It’s one thing to stream music through the home and another to be glued to my iPhone. Need to cut down on that and spend more time away from glowing screens and nonstop newsfeeds. I’m an info junkie through and through, but I need to give my eyes a break and make time for other things.

What are your personal tech resolutions for 2012? Any big purchases on the horizon? Services you’re planning on optimizing?

Favorite app? Currently obssessed with Flipboard. Really changes the way I engage my feeds and browse the web. It’s fun again!

What am I looking forward to? Reading. I’m desperate to embrace digital books because I can’t shoehorn another in our modest home. Hope this screen is addictive for reading as it is everything else.

If you have an iPad and are a fan, let me know what your favorite apps are in the comments!

My fandom crystallized in the fall of ’95, when I watched this performance of “Wake Up Bomb” at the MTV Europe Music Awards while I was on exchange in Denmark.

Click here to view the embedded video.

That to me was their apotheosis of cool. This band not only soundtracked that portion of my life I found most difficult, but as Michael Stipe embraced the role of archetypal frontman, so did I. Rather than withhold opinions or judgement, I just let it blurt. But as much as I enjoyed Stipe’s transformation to extrovert, songs like this one still give me chills:

Click here to view the embedded video.

I still think “Country Feedback” is the quintessential R.E.M. song, what with its false starts and longing, its mood and tone. Those sentiments hit me where I lived for most of my adolescence and I imagine I’m not alone in thinking that when people remember R.E.M., their memories will always be encumbered by the gauzy wistfulness that envelops that time of my life.

I’m in the camp that wishes they called it quits on New Year’s Eve 1999. It would’ve been fitting. Even with a toddling Internet, that was news that I heard in the hinterlands through publications and rumor and I was ready for them to walk away after wrapping the “Up” tour. That knowledge made it urgent that I see them once before they quit so I bought tickets and caught them in Camden (setlist here), where I watched people talk through “Pilgrimage,” thus ending my belief that R.E.M. fans were inherently cool. It was a crushing blow and my devotion to the band waned until Reveal, when whatever passion I felt for the band and their music vanished altogether.

R.E.M. were a gateway to independent music to me as I grew up in the sticks in a town where the Klan rallied at the main intersection while the school bus drove me home. Put another way, I can remember the “modern rock” radio format! It’s hard to believe there was a time when there weren’t infinite choices, but growing up, bands like R.E.M., the Cure, the Smiths and even U2 kept me sane until the pop punk explosion happened and geek culture went a little more mainstream. Can you believe I was once asked if I was a hip-hopper or a punk at school because I wore a 49ers beanie while wearing a used cardigan? That happened!

Lest it sound like I’m a disappointed fan, R.E.M. don’t owe me a thing. I can’t think of another band that so enriched my life. I daresay their music protected me from more serious hurts as I came of age in the ’90s. They didn’t abandon me as Nirvana did when I was still a vulnerable kid looking for meaning. They wrote songs that I found pertinent to nearly every situation and their earnestness was perfect for a kid who didn’t need more sarcasm in his life. Thanks for so many amazing songs including this one that gave me comfort when I was lonely in Denmark that dark, rainy autumn.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I’m making a few preparations for the trip. I’m going to try the Mapquest app for navigation, ditching the native Maps app because without voice notifications, I’m lost. There’s no way I’m going to be referencing my phone the entire trip. A quick scan reveals that there will be no such functionality added when iOS 5 rolls out later this year, which is a disappointment. I’m a little gunshy about Mapquest based on my experiences with the service some ten years ago. All it took were some bad directions on a particularly stressful U-Haul drive and I’d had enough. Mapquest has been synonymous with bad, dangerous directions ever since. I’m glad I can laugh about it now, but veering across traffic to exit Rt 78 to an access road in a steady downpour is not my idea of a good time.

I’m looking forward to an uneventful drive and a very relaxing week at the beach. I may even do a little reading while I’m down there!

Last night’s show was also very good in that way Thurston Moore shows are good: he’s this dopey manchild with a real thirst for knowledge. He’s pretentious to a fault and last night was no exception. The interstitial poems I could’ve done without, but by the same token, his hilariously overwrought poetry took me back to the place when I first started listening to Sonic Youth. His brand of dorky paternalism, i.e. the “I, character in this song, will protect you, afflicted putatively female character of song, from these dumb jock miscreants.” It’s cute in this totally hackneyed I-can-still-regurgitate-assorted-gender-studies-talking-points sort of way. I mean, I remember the ’90s, too, and sometimes I’m embarrassed for how I acted then. I think Thurston feels this way, too.

When it was over I was mostly saddened that he played “Benediction” without mentioning Jack Rose, for whom the song is supposedly written. Maybe I can blame Byron Coley for the bad poetry.

• Drove wife and son to be with family in northern Va as they prepared to vacation in, gulp, Corolla, NC this week.
• Watched news at mother-in-law’s house. Wondered if Outer Banks would still exist.
• Slept.
• Drove home to Philly at 6 AM. Caught in traffic twice behind terrible accidents. Wondered if I’d be stuck in traffic for hours both times.
• Upon arriving home, made perfunctory gestures at shoring up basement storage.
• Ate hot dog lunch in a light rain at Memphis Taproom Beer Garden.
• Ratcheted up panic by watching national and local news outlets.
• Didn’t eat dinner. Drank a pitcher of daiquiris instead while watching Bourne Supremacy with friends.
• Hid in bathroom, then basement during tornado watch.
• Fell asleep around midnight.
• Awoke to howling rain at 2:43 am.
• Checked basement and ceilings. Found no leaks.
• Tried falling asleep. Couldn’t.
• Stayed awake until dawn when storm relented.
• Walked over to friend’s house for coffee.

I still think the Phillies match up well against any team they could face in the playoffs, but I hate to think that banged up veterans like Polanco or Ibanez could come up short when it matters most.

It was so great to see Mark and Erin out with Elena at almost two weeks and to see Armando and Rebecca with Lily when they were just hours from being parents again. Welcome Rio! Charlie was thrilled as ever to see his aunt Eileen and her puppy Jax as well as his “Damma” and Grandpa, not to mention my mom, who managed not to get too lost in Strawberry Mansion before finding us on Lemon Hill. GPS is a wonder except in some urban environments apparently.

It was so nice to encamp on Lemon Hill for a lovely June afternoon spent with friends and family and food. Bittersweet that we say goodbye yet again to our friends Tony and Katie as they embark on a cross-country trip to Seattle for a few years. Can’t wait to visit! I’ve seen a few episodes of “The Killing” so I just know it’s going to be a beautiful place to live and work.

We’ve managed to survive two years of very little sleep to raise a beautiful little boy and I can honestly say I’ve loved every minute, even when I’m awake at 4 am watching reruns of “Golden Girls” on the couch.

(Confession: I decided to love a team that was even worse than the Phillies. In Pennsylvania. True story.)

That said, it’s a much easier to team to watch when the worst bats in the lineup could still drive a ball into the left field seats. Stay gold, J-Berry!