Andyland, USA

In a nasal monotone voice, the four year old walked up to me and said “Anmy, will you put together my Frozen Elsa Play Set Castle?” It was during the clean up of said child's birthday party at my aunt's house. Ripped shreds of Frozen wrapping paper littered the floor. Disney had made a profit. I, being the kind and lovely human person I am, agreed to put together the play set. I had no choice, as all of my family were glaring over at me with a warm look, but a look that also said “You're the only one you can put this crap together, we did our time when you were a kid.” The box the play set came in stood about three and a half feet tall, and around half a foot wide. Easily it was the largest gift the party, I picked the box up and took it to the four year old's bedroom before I began to unbox all the stuffs inside it. Carefully cutting through all the tape and glue used to seal the box with a pocket knife, I looked inside to see its contents. Glancing it ove...

I like records. I like records a lot. This is not a shock to anyone who knows me, nor is it a shock to anyone who has been a longtime reader of this column. It's been fascinating to me that over the past two years records are becoming more and more commonplace, again. I love it, personally. You can tell too that the music business has embraced the return of vinyl whole heartedly. Last year, for the first time since iTunes launched, the sale of digital music slipped. CDs sales were, not surprising, down too. What didn't slip? Vinyl records. Not only did vinyl records not slide in sales, they reached an all time high not seen in nearly two decades. In 2014 the sale of new vinyl records increased 49% from 2013. Nearly eight million records were sold last year. I've been a—and I don't particularly like this term—serious collector for a good decade or so. I've seen the growth first hand. I've seen record shops expand and grow. I've seen the demographi...

I write this week's column in the last few days of 2014, with New Year's Day coming at us in four days or so. With that in mind, let me begin by saying GREETINGS FROM THE PAST! What is this wonderful new world of 2015 like? Are there not flying deloreans yet? (Side note, y'all do realize this will be the year we are flooded with jokes about “Back To The Future, Part Two” right?) This week's column will be a little bit more introspective than usual, the column that runs around this time of the year usually is, as it coincides with my birthday. This year things feel slightly different, the usual introspection has been going on since late summer, because the week this column comes out, will be the same week that I turn 30. The nature of it being my 30 th is why I think this whole year my birthday has been on my mind quite a bit. Birthday's don't really bother me, so it's not the idea of getting older that is on my mind. I've seen people I went...