I was fortunate to catch Jon Stewart’s appearance on CNN’s political “debate” show, “Crossfire,” yesterday afternoon. Stewart gave the hosts, Paul Begala and Tucker Carlson, quite the smackdown, calling them “partisan hacks,” and at one point calling Carlson “a dick.”

When Carlson gave Stewart a hard time for asking John Kerry “softball questions” on The Daily Show a few weeks ago, Stewart said it was crazy to compare a show on Comedy Central with a show on CNN. “You’re on CNN,” Stewart said. “The show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls. What is wrong with you?! You have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably.”

It’s a must-see.

Here’s a link for the video, and here’s a link for the transcript.

I hope this gets some legs.

Oh — and Doug Varone’s rehearsal yesterday was great. It’s a really good piece, and his structure compensates beautifully with the somewhat lacking structure of my score.

I think AJ & I are going to make a painting for my living room today. I’ll keep you posted.

Last night, I had dinner with my high school sweetheart. I hadn’t seen her for probably 12 or 13 years. Although I’m sure she looks completely different now, my brain did this “auto-update” thing and, to me, she looked exactly the same — only with better hair. (Don’t get me wrong; she always had nice hair, but I think I would have noticed if she had a 1990 haircut today.)

Isn’t that interesting how your brain does that? Unless somebody gets really fat or really skinny, they don’t really seem to age, even after 10 years. I found that at my high school reunion, too. People totally looked the same. Well, except for the ones who got really, really fat.

It was really fun seeing her again and catching up on the past 12 years. I’m looking forward to catching up some more. (It’s hard to fit 12 years into a few hours.)

I have a rehearsal this afternoon with Doug Varone. Doug chose one of my scores (it’s not a brand new piece), and has choreographed it as a duet with Michael Trent. They’ve been working on the piece for several months, but this is the first chance I’ve had to see it. I’m excited, and will post more info about it soon.

It’s been a while since I last posted. I would say that I’ve been busy, but in fact, I’ve really just been laying low. Since I finished the new score, I’ve been pretty fried. I kind of feel like these entries should have something to do with music, and I just haven’t felt like thinking about music for a few days.

Over the weekend, AJ & I had a tasty brunch, during which we talked a little about the piece I’m about to start. It’s a wind ensemble commission for a consortium of college bands, and it’s being organized by a guy named Scott Weiss, who is the director of wind ensembles at Lamar University. Lamar is in Beaumont, Texas.

Scott wants a concert opening — something between 5-8 minutes long. I’ve been wanting to write a big, loud, vulgar polka. Fun, right? Thing is, it’s hard to write a 6-minute polka. That’s a lot of polka. So, it needs to be a polka and… I don’t know. My other wind piece, “Redline Tango,” is a fast, slightly-crunchy showpiece on the outside, and a weird little tango in the middle. But what to do with a polka?

When I told AJ that Lamar is in Texas, she suggested a western theme. Why not combine them? Why not have western-meets-polka? Country music uses a lot of two-step, which isn’t far removed from polka. But what could I call it?

“The Alamo Polka.”

(AJ suggested the political-wonk subtitle be, “You Forgot Poland!” The idea of tying Texas to Poland struck me as hilarious, but I’m not sure how many people would get the reference.)

Will that be the piece? I don’t know yet, but it’s a funny idea. The piece could start with a “call to arms,” and then gradually somehow transform from country music to polka. And then maybe back again?

I’ll brainstorm some more. (Rather, I’ll ask AJ for more help. I don’t know what I’d write without her. The past three pieces would be a whole lot different, ie, lame, that’s for sure.)

Tonight’s agenda: haircut, then dinner, then the presidential debate.