CELEBRITIES WITH CATS

Thank you, Savannah.

Last night while watching the monstrosity that is the stage play of Tyler Perry's I Can Do Bad All By Myself on DVD with Ben and Kevin, a huge huge crash came from down the street. It sounded like a giant pane of glass being dropped on concrete from a really high distance. What it actually was was a car crashing into the side of a house a few houses away, on the corner of Drayton and Jones.
No one died and it didn't seem like anyone was hurt, really. We went and looked at the giant hole in the house, talked to a mutual friend who saw it happen, and then eventually went back inside to finish the play.
A few hours later, after police tape was put up and the car and people and the cops were all gone, this is what was there:

Someone looked over there and saw not the place of a terrible car accident, but the opportunity to live out a dream.

And really, haven't we all had that dream? To be in a situation where making a sign of the Kool-Aid man breaking through a wall would make sense?


Whoever is responsible for this is an amazing angel.

UPDATE: SEPTEMBER 15, 2010
My previously mentioned friend Kevin, who was present for this event, has published the journal comic chronicling the event:

Unnecessary Hats

I want to take the time to address a startling trend that is also one of my biggest pet peeves:
Unnecessary Hats.
I'm really lenient with hats and what I would consider necessary, like:
1. Hats needed for warmth
2. Hats needed for coolness (blocking sun)
3. Hats needed for other weather (rain, snow, etc)
4. Hats required for employment
5. Hats required for sports (baseball)
6. Hats required for costumes
7. Kentucky Derby
8. Tea time
What else does that even leave? Nothing. Nothing necessary, that is. Hats that serve no purpose are annoying and look stupid. Especially when you wear them inside. I am particularly pointing out fedoras, newsboy caps, and berets. It's possible to have a need to wear them. But it's my experience that the majority of the time that people wear fedoras, newsboy caps, or berets, they are for no reason other than to make their heads bigger.
It would be easy to say that a lot of this blame can be put on those who consider themselves hipsters or otherwise fall into the hipster category, but it's not that simple. Many non-hipsters wear hats for no reason, including other subcultures like goths and bros (there is a reason another name for the "bro" is "white cap").
If you truly feel like you need to wear an unnecessary hat, whether it's due to peer pressure or just stupidity, at least take them off inside. This goes for some necessary hats, too.
There's just no point. And you look dumb.

Lullabies: from kid to adult

Ever since I was a kid, I've had a serious nightmare problem. I still do, but it mostly stems from vivid-and-lucid-dreaming-producing medication I take, as opposed to genuine all-encompassing fear, which was the cause when I was little.
Anyone who knows me knows that I tend to have more problems now staying awake than falling asleep. But that doesn't mean that when it comes down to bedtime, especially if I'm stressed or excited or nervous, I don't have problems sleeping. So I've been turning to the magic that helped me sleep as a child: lullabies.
There was one lullaby tape I had when I was little. Eventually it turned into a CD, then into computer-played mp3s, then to an iPod playlist, and has currently settled as an iPhone playlist.
This is the tracklist:
1. Roger Wagner Choral - Wiegenlied (Lullaby) Op. 49, No. 4
2. Academy Of St. Martin In The Fields - Pachelbel Canon in D
3. Tzimon Barto - Nocturne in E-flat, Op. 9, No.2
4. Academy Of St. Martin In The Fields - Dance of the Sylphs
5. Christopher Parkening - Sheep May Safely Graze
6. Aldo Ciccolini - The Girl with the Flaxen Hair
7. Debussy - Claire de lune
8. Bach - Air
9. Nancy Allen - Reverie
10. Christopher Parkening - La Filla mal marxant / El Noi de la mare
11. Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra - Dance of the Blessed Spirits
12. Alexis Weissenberg - Kleine Studie (Little Study)
13. Tzimon Barto - Cantabile (Andantino)
14. Satie - Gymnopedies 3 & 1
The structure of this album is really important for me. Listening to it out of order makes it almost irrelevant. And it's almost exactly an hour long, so it doesn't usually stop before I've fallen asleep.
That album has really stuck with me. It's hard for me to listen to Claire de lune without getting really really sleepy. But recently I've been listening to another lullaby playlist that's actually been more effective. I think it's because the music is actually more lulling, plus it's more catered to grown-up me, as it so far is exclusive to Animal Collective and Panda Bear:
- Animal Collective - Did You See the Words?
- Animal Collective - Flesh Canoe
- Animal Collective - Bees
- Animal Collective - Banshee Beat
- Animal Collective - Daffy Duck
- Animal Collective - Loch Raven
- Animal Collective - Seal Eyeing
- Animal Collective - Visiting Friends
- Animal Collective - The Softest Voice
- Animal Collective - No More Runnin
- Animal Collective - I Remember Learning How to Dive
- Animal Collective - Baleen Sample
- Animal Collective - It's You
- Panda Bear - Search for Delicious
- Panda Bear - Ponytail
- Panda Bear - Untitled 3
- Panda Bear - Untitled 7
- Panda Bear - Mich Mit Einer Mond
- Panda Bear - O Please Bring Her Back
- Panda Bear - Winter In St. Moritz
- Panda Bear - Liebe Auf Den Ersten Blick
- Panda Bear - A Musician and a Filmmaker
Shuffle is important here. Plus the playlist is over 90 minutes long. This playlist nearly single-handedly kept me from crying on my recent plane rides from Champaign to Detroit, Detroit to Atlanta, Atlanta to Savannah because I was so sick and in ear pain. I couldn't sleep without this playlist. It is beautiful, really.
I don't really know of anyone who denies the power music has over people and their thoughts and emotions. Amazing.

After finding something called FUDGE DIP:

Me: Look at this stuff! Fudge dip!

Ben: What would you put in fudge dip?

Me: What WOULDN’T you put in fudge dip??

. . . .

Me: Kevin! Look at this stuff! I showed it to Ben and he said, “What would you put in fudge dip?”

Kevin: What WOULDN’T you put in fudge dip??

. . . .

Me: Allie! Look at this stuff! I showed it to Ben and he said, “What would you put in fudge dip?”

Allie: What WOULDN’T you put in fudge dip??

Handwriting font

After hearing what Rob Carmichael said I was inspired to make a font out of my own handwriting via this website: Font Capture

It's awesome. I want to get all of my friends to do it so I can have fonts of their handwriting, too.