Hrrrm.

A friend recently reminded me of my favorite joke, which I now share with you:

A man walks into a bar and half his head is an orange.

He sits down, orders a drink. The bartender eyes him warily, but gets
him what he wants. The man sits sipping the drink, idly watching the
soccer game on the bar television. After a while, he runs dry and
orders another.

"Tell you what," says the bartender, "this next one's on the house --
but you've got to tell me what happened to your head. I don't mean to
be rude there, but..."

The man smiles. "No, not at all. I get this all the time.

Well, it started with the Gulf War. I was a young kid fresh out of
high school, but I was poor. I needed money for college, and the Army
looked like a good way out of the ghetto. But then they shipped me
over to Kuwait. My platoon took some heavy fire during Desert Storm,
and I was separated from them.

I wandered the desert for days, with only the contents of my pack to
sustain me. I ran out of water, I ran out of food. I was desperate, on
the virge of death -- when suddenly, I saw a glint of metal in the
distance...

I forced myself onward, hoping the shining brightness was a glint of
gunmetal from my platoon, or a city on the horizon, or anything. When
I finally reached it, it was a piece of metal half-burried in the
sand. I dug around it and excavated what appeared to be an old Persian
oil lamp.

There was an inscription on the lamp, too covered in dust to read. I
rubbed at the embossed lettering -- and then, a swirl of smoke and
light surrounded me. Suddenly, before me, stood a ten-foot tall being,
dressed in traditional Arabian garb, arms crossed.

'I am the Djinni of the lamp,' said the entity. 'For releasing me, I
shall grant you three wishes. What is your first wish, my master?'

I was incredulous, of course. I deduced I must be hallucinating, that
this was desert madness. I decided to test the mirage. 'Alright,' I
tasked it, 'I wish for a wallet with a million dollars in it, that I
can never lose, and whenever I take any money out of it the sum is
immediately replenished.'

'Your wish is granted!' boomed the Djinni. I felt a bluge in one of my
uniform pockets. Reaching in, I pulled out a new wallet, stuffed to
bursting with crisp, new American bills. I counted them -- sure
enough, it was a million dollars. I ripped up the bills, cast them to
the four winds, and threw the wallet as hard as I could. The moment it
was beyond my sight, it teleported instantaneously back to my pocket,
refilled with another million dollars.

'What is you second wish, my master?'

I pondered the notion for a long moment, assessing my needs. 'Djinni,'
I said, 'for my second wish, I want to be transported to a cool,
abandoned palace, into a harem room with a hundred beautiful young
virgins who will all fall madly in love with me at first sight, before
a buffet table set with a feast fit for a king.'

'Your wish is granted!' Poof! I found myself in a royal harem, escaped
from the heat of the desert. All around me, nubile girls eyed me with
keen interest. In front of me, every conceivable type of meat was
roasted to perfect tenderness, set with all the appetizers,
side-dishes, salads, soups, and desserts of the four corners of the
globe.

I dined until I was near-bloated, and then I had a lot of sex. I mean a LOT.

Several hours later, laying upon a bed of feathers, brown and blonde
and red haired beauties nuzzling into me like puppies at their
mother's underbelly, the Djinni stood before me, looking down in
satisfaction at his work so far.

'What is your third wish, my master?'

I thought long and hard. Truly, this last wish tasked the very limits
of my imagination, my beliefs, my ethics, my philosophy. Hours passed
in silence, save for the gentle snoring of the ladies surrounding me.

At last, I spoke.

'Djinni, for my third wish, I want half my head to be an orange.'

My friend Siva has an annual showing of her art aprons - all handmade, often representing a theme. And every year, I forget to bring my real camera, and end up taking the photos with my iPhone.

(download)

Click here to download:

siva-s-aprons-2010-kGyjixyorldabgogaxFe.zip (13.11 MB)

All I want to do is be able to link on the web to a song for people to listen to.

I don't want to risk having it taken down or having my hosting taken down, so ripping/posting my own mp3s is out.

I don't want listeners to have to sign up for some service just to listen.

I want them to be able to listen to the entire song.

I have yet to find a service that lets me do this. Do you know of one?

Update: To clarify: I'm looking for a way to not violate copyright but still tell my friends "here, you should listen to this".

I'm aware there are a bazillion options for hosting an mp3 I upload, heck I can do it right here at Posterous. But that's still violating copyright. I'm hoping to find a service that has a license agreement for music, and will let me point to a song. Hell, I'd link to the iTunes or Amazon purchase page for the song if the previews weren't cut down to 30 seconds.

I'm informed that lala.com used to do this. You could link to a song, and someone could listen to it once all the way through. Subsequent listens were just a 30-second preview. I'm fine with that. Too bad Apple bought them and shut them down.