[UPDATE: see below in comments for a possible, major drawback: namely, Readiris has trouble with PDF’s based on black&white, as opposed to grayscale, scans.]

First, processing really long documents that might be of borderline quality, threatening you with a huge amount of clean-up. (I’m assuming you have decent scan quality, otherwise you should rescan it; but maybe the original print quality was so-so.) You have to spend maybe 15 minutes training Readiris to process the distinctively dubious quality of whatever specific thing you’ve got. But it actually seems to learn. Then the app pretty much just chews through, in 50 page chunks, surprisingly error-free. Not perfect. But better than I had expected. I was on the fence about some projects for making e-editions of old public domains books I’ve got kicking around the place. Now it actually seems like a do-able thing.

But what most scholars need more than the ability to convert whole old books into e-books is the quick-and-dirty (but surprisingly clean) capacity of Drop2Read, which is part of ReadIris. It sits in the dock. You just drag-and-drop a PDF onto it; it creates and autosaves an RTF conversion into the same folder as the PDF original, then opens it for you to check. (You can set preferences about the details of all this.) It works well, often even with multi-column text with figures and illustrations. (It doesn’t preserve and place illustrations for you, but it isn’t driven mad by the presence of such things.) It’s 90%, for formatting and for the text itself. For one measly click, that’s a bargain. Text masticated via Drop2read is more wholesome for feeding DEVONthink. More to the point, for most people, it’s ready for you just to cut&paste, later, when you want that block quote. Keep the RTF version alongside the PDF, which can be used as a reading copy and/or a thing against which you check OCR problems. (Next: I need a faster scanner.)

But what should I listen to while performing these night-time chores? What plangent sounds to soothe my ears, as I watch the scanner weave it’s gentle path of light ‘neath the closed cover? If you don’t like Philip Glass … then you’ll probably hate the Doveman I’ve now got on high rotation. I love the new album, The Conformist [amazon]. (And before that, I liked The Acrobat a lot, too.) You can stream various tracks here. And there are a couple freebies floating around here and here (oh, and don’t miss the Footloose cover.) And if you have listened to that, and want something else breathy and a bit wimpy (but maybe not so Belle and Sebastian tweecore), I notice that Amazon is selling The Zombies, Odessey and Oracle for a lousy $1.99. As I believe I have mentioned: I like Colin Blunstone’s voice. (You like Ray Lamontagne’s voice? It’s like that.) Seriously, this is some classic 60’s slightly not rocking quite enough but still great stuff; right up there with the Beach Boys, Pet Sounds. But more breathy and proto-proggy. Here’s a Pitchfork review of this particular release, with which I am in substantial agreement. (Although I think giving it a 9.3 might be generous.) But it seems like you don’t get all the bonus tracks if you just buy the mp3’s. Hmmmm. Still, a good deal.

Doveman and The Zombies have this in common: the lead singer is basically breathing in your ear, from, like, 3 inches away, sounds like. This could get silly – to say nothing of the threat of looming emo; but instead it’s … steady and consistent. Which may mean that you get a bit tired of it. Me? I’m playing it over and over. [UPDATE: Oh, Pitchfork pretty much agrees about the Doveman, too.)

I turned that page in section B where there was a short item about two El Pasoans slain yesterday in a Juarez bar shooting. Back page stuff. Hidden near the end of the story was the astounding body count: nearly 2900 people, including more than 160 this month alone, have been killed in Juarez since a war between drug traffickers erupted January 2008 . John Wesley Hardin wouldn’t stand a chance.

Jesus. You’re probably safer in Kandahar.

A year ago I was going through a Les Paul phase and posted a nice round-up of YouTube items. It’s fantastic stuff. I suggest you take 10 minutes to remember the father of rock and roll – well, he sort of was. There’s a whole documentary you can watch. I love the idea of idea of this guy with the future of music planted in his head, touring around as Rhubard Red. I love all that corny old stuff with Mary Ford. Corny and elegant and kinda nerd-brainy, and beloved by geniuses for what he let them do. Les Paul. Not a bad life.

Loudon Wainwright III on Paul Krugman.

Davy is assisting me in the performance of various repetitive tasks today, by letting my mind clack happy through the CD racks of memory, trying to pin down all the little influences. And it’s well produced.

I also like the new Bishop Allen album Grrr pretty well. I mention that because I feel they have been unfairly abused by Pitchfork, which has gotta hurt. Grrr definitely deserves better than a pitiful 3.5. I give it a 7. “The Ancient Commonsense Of Things” is damn catchy. (Myspace page here.)

You could also download 6 gigs of free music (perfectly legally!) via BitTorrent.

[1] One of the great irritations of later life, more confirming evidence in this broadcast, is the dawning realisation that Phil Collins might be a nice chap —and one with real discernment.