Mr. David Bowie is back in the news, with a new record after a 10-year hiatus (beating the break John Lennon took to bake bread and watch the wheels) and a fancy new museum retrospective.

Re the latter, here’s part one of an interview with the curator of that show, “David Bowie Is,” which opens Saturday in London to massive publicity and record (couldn’t resist the pun) ticket sales. (Thanks to Rich Roesberg for sending me that link.) The show runs through August 11, should you find yourself in London. (In fact, it will run through August 11, whether or not you’re in London. Which I will not be.)

Re the former, on the day of its release, the new Bowie CD, “The Next Day” was happily found on my kitchen table, having been shipped by Amazon and delivered by a competitor of the USPS. I like it very much, and find it full of surprises. One of the surprises: the prominence of saxophone, an instrument I’ve never much associated with Bowie’s work. Another: that it’s a rather stripped-down album, mostly straight-out mid-tempo rock music featuring vocals, guitars, and drums. That’s rather traditional, but in the Bowie oeuvre, I think of that as rather untraditional. In some ways, this sounds more akin to the two Tin Machine albums, when Bowie decided to try to be a regular bloke in a band with three other guys, but more palatable. I miss the odd textures and surprises, circa the work he did with Eno, or on “Scary Monsters” or “Outside” (which features the fantastic “Heart’s Filthy Lesson,” one of his best songs and one of his best-produced songs).

What I haven’t enjoyed in all the recent press coverage are the blithe claims that this album is a return to form for Bowie, the implication being that he’s been off-form. I wonder how many of these people have heard his last two albums, “Heathen” and “Reality.” “Heathen” had many of the fine qualities I’m missing from the current album — which, seemingly alone, Sasha-Frere Jones noted in The New Yorker, in praising that disk — and “Reality” was a truly, truly fine pop album. I like both of them a lot, and play them frequently, and they’ve lived in my wife’s CD rotation for more than a year. Moreover, we saw Bowie on his last tour — which may have, indeed, been his last tour, but we’ll see — and he was in fine form then, too. The songs sound good on record, and sounded great live. It’s easy for critics to paint the picture that after 10 years away Bowie has had a magnificent re-emergence, but the two disks he did before stepping away bear further listening. They don’t deserve the criticism.

p.s. I hate the cover art above. Deeply. Strenuously.

If you’ve always got a disaster, then the disaster is you.

Applies to someone whose latest Facebook status notice I just saw, and too many other people I’ve known.

Make sure you turn on the sound when you check out this bizarre thriller. The music just adds to the sinister ambience. Much like the video itself, it’s seemingly cute — but laced with menance.

Here are twenty obsolete words that should make a comeback.

However, for the lack of one of my favorite antideluvian words, I must contemn this list.

Demonstrating again the overwhelming power of the belly rub.

I just spent another frustrating 30 minutes trying to find a room for this year’s Comic-Con. Yes, it’s four-and-a-half months away, and there’s nothing available. The only — only — hotel I can find with any available room for four nights is seven miles from the convention and not on the shuttle route. What this would mean: a minimum 30-minute drive each way, crawling through blocked streets, to get to the Con. I may have to take it. The catch: They also want it paid in advance.

After attending this convention for 26 years, I was feeling pretty crummy about this situation. For years and years, my friends and I were able to book a suite with no problem — and we were being extra-considerate of the needs of others by stuffing seven guys into that one room. I have to admit to thinking that we deserved some sort of special consideration after the, well, billions of dollars we’ve dropped in San Diego over the years. The sequester is nothing compared to the impact of pulling us out of the San Diego economy. But then I found out that Len Wein couldn’t get a room. If the co-creator of Wolverine, Swamp Thing, the Human Target, Nightcrawler and Storm can’t get a room, who am I to complain?

What did I do in similar situations when I was a teenager? Just sleep on the floor through the all-night movie screenings. But now they come and roust you. At this point, I’d settle for a stable.

File this under “shoot me first”: Here’s your chance to see the band Yes perform not one, not two, but three of their incredibly tedious, wandering, and self-indulgent albums, all in one night. Their lead singer (replacement for Jon Anderson): the leader singer in a Yes tribute band. This will make for their second lead singer drafted form a Yes tribute band.

I saw this band last year (with the previous tribute-band-singer) and feared mightily for the health and well-being of drummer Alan White, who looked to be in serious need of immediate medical attention. I said to that to my friend, but she was more concerned about another member she felt “looks like he’s at death’s door.” I’m not saying they’re bad because they’re old — the Beach Boys are older, but they were terrific in concert last year — I’m saying they seemed sick. And bad. And boring.

Tonight was a workout night: My kids were at karate, while I went to the gym. They practiced beating people up, while I metaphorically rowed across the English Channel.

When I picked them up, the discussion in the car was colorful.

My 10-year-old played around on my iPad, exploring Google Earth. “Hey, I found St. Joe’s!” he exclaimed. (His mother works at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center, aka “St. Joe’s.”) “Look!” he said. When we got to a red light, I looked at the screen and saw California. “That says ‘San Jose,’ ” I said. (Note to his teacher: A little more reading comprehension, and a little more geography, please.)

We made a left and passed in front of a McDonald’s. My high-school-age daughter said, “It’s McDonald’s that has the pink slime, and Burger King that has the horse meat, right?”

I had nothing to top that with. But I did relish it.

Thought I’d share this. The shot above is of the sinkhole in Florida that consumed a man five days ago.

Sinkholes are evidently more common than I thought — as you can can see in this slideshow of the most alarming examples in recent years.

I remember the one that opened about 20 years ago here in Los Angeles on Vermont Avenue. The cause? Construction of the Red Line subway system. And I remember a narrow but deep chasm that opened in my back yard following the 1994; it was eerie looking into the inner workings of the earth. My then 3-year-old son was pretty shaken by that. He wasn’t alone.

Glad I saw The Beach Boys last year when I had the chance (and in one of the flat-out best shows I’ve ever seen), because now Brian Wilson is saying sail on, sailor, to the notion of the band ever getting together again. Wilson made the announcement last night while accepting a Grammy for the band’s work last year, announcing the end of reunions.

At one point, I would have been glad for that, because the thing touring the U.S. as “The Beach Boys Band” is in no way The Beach Boys — it’s Mike Love, Bruce Johnston, and some other guys, with nary a Wilson brother in site. (Let alone founding members Al Jardine or David Marks.) But last year’s tour, and the accompanying album of new music, were surprisingly strong. Now, though, there are no good vibrations left among the true Beach Boys. The 2012 outing will be their last, and That’s Why God Made the Radio will remain their career-capping recording. But don’t worry, baby, there’s a lot of great music still out there, and a fine legacy to look back on.

Surf’s up.