dixon diction

Moving!

2011-06-14T15:14:00.001-04:00

I'm moving along . . . over to Wordpress. Everything from this blog is there now. Find me!

http://elizabethcdixon.wordpress.com/

Summer in February

2011-02-09T04:27:00.003-05:00

It's really cold here. Negative degrees cold. Multiple feet of snow cold. Hours of car window defrosting, car pushing, snow shoveling cold.

I like the cold much more than I like the heat. And in about four or five months I'm sure I'll be wishing for a little piece of what I have now. But sometimes it's nice to think of summer in the winter, when you aren't actual melting from heat. Just like it's nice to think of winter in the summer, when you don't get a brain freeze just from standing outside.

So with that I present a little mix:

Just some summery songs to listen to when it's really cold, when you aren't actually bothered by heat. And a nice Blingee complete with Justin Bieber and a font made of my own handwriting!

Here's the track listing:
1. Holiday Shores - Phones Don't Feud
2. Washed Out - Feel It All Around
3. Wavves - King of the Beach
4. Animal Collective - Summertime Clothes
5. Surfer Blood - Swim
6. Kid Cudi, Best Coast, and Rostam Batmanglij - All Summer
7. Neon Indian - Deadbeat Summer
8. Wild Nothing - Summer Holiday
9. Mungo Jerry - In The Summertime
10. Best Coast - Sun Was High (So Was I)
11. The Beach Boys - Kokomo
12. Weezer - Island in the Sun
13. Cults - Go Outside
14. Toro Y Moi - Blessa
15. Ducktails and Panda Bear - Killin' the Vibe
16. Washed Out - New Theory

Teen Dream by Beach House

2010-12-14T02:19:00.025-05:00

I hate end-of-year rankings, particularly with music. I've said it before and I'll say it more. But I am dedicating this post to my favorite album of 2010. I'm not ranking anything except this one album, which is my #1. I also don't want to say it's the "best" album of 2010 because I hate that concept. And before the year is up I'll post my favorite songs of the year -- in no order, except for one song, which is my favorite of the year (but that's for later).

So if any of you know me at all, you know that my favorite album of 2010 was hands-down, without a doubt, no contest: Teen Dream by Beach House.

Before Teen Dream, Beach House meant, to me: mellow, sleepy, thick. I really liked Devotion and Beach House but they didn't particularly speak to me. I've never been one for more lo-fi sounds and with Animal Collective and Radiohead making music at the same time as Beach House and Devotion, I just wasn't into more sleepy sounds.
It was around this time last year that I heard about the new Beach House album leaking. I really try to stay away from leaks, especially of bands I really like. To me, possibly sacrificing quality and the intended finished product for sake of getting music sooner isn't worth it (the exception to this was the grand Christmas 2008 leak of Merriweather Post Pavilion because who am I to ignore a Christmas miracle?). My friends don't feel the same way about album leaks and I was slowly being repeatedly told how good Teen Dream was. I listened to "Norway," which was on Beach House's website. I was completely blown away. And I grabbed the leak immediately. I also bought the album the week it came out, which, as I suspected, was on a completely different level. Aside from the accompanying DVD of music videos, which added a whole other layer of interpretation, the quality of the actual album was so much better than the leak. I didn't even think the quality of the leak (a vinyl rip) was bad until I heard how it was intended to be heard.

Teen Dream, though only 10 tracks, is too big and vast in its perfection and my love for it to do it justice just talking about the album in a general way. So this is something I never do; that is, break the album down by song.

"Zebra"

Unlike "Saltwater" and "Wedding Bell," the opening tracks on Beach House and Devotion, respectively, "Zebra" opens Teen Dream with a single, crystal-clear sound: that of Alex Scally's guitar. After his guitar, the sounds delicately layer on one another rather than exploding all at once. Victoria Legrand's voice, Scally's back-up vocals, Daniel Franz's percussion are simple, clear sounds that just move along, meet up with each other, and continue along together. The second verse comes with more pronounced support of Scally's back-up vocals and Legrand sings with a slightly (very slightly) heightened sense of urgency. "Zebra" is all about building. Beach House is gently leading you into 49 minutes of bliss and they're doing it carefully. Incidentally, for a really long time I thought the chorus went "black and white whores." You might be thinking "But the song is called 'Zebra,' why would you ever think 'whores' before 'horse?'" I don't have an answer for you and it probably says more about me than not. The realization that it was "horse" and not "whores" came hand-in-hand with the realization that Victoria Legrand does the main vocals, not Alex Scally. Her voice is so raw and androgynous and that, mixed with me listening to music mostly sung by males without super deep voices (Panda Bear, Thom Yorke, etc), caused me to totally betray my feminist views and automatically assume it was Scally taking the lead and Legrand lending support.
By the time the chorus is finished, Franz's percussion comes boldly sweeping in. At this point it sounds less like the vocals are being supported by guitar and percussion and more like the three are coming at you at once. But all of the elements are still very simple and clear, making it just sound stronger, not chaotic. The sound gets stronger and stronger through the second chorus until there's a beautiful moment where the drums drop out and it's just Scally's guitar and Legrand's voice and very subtle percussion. But as Legrand sings the last vocals of the song, "among us," Franz's drumming again builds up from the background to carry the song with Scally's guitar and Legrand's keyboard until the end.

"Silver Soul"

Disclaimer: "Silver Soul" is my favorite song on Teen Dream. There are lots of reasons for it: the lyrics, the strength of Legrand's voice, how fucking sweet Scally's guitar is . . . but most of all it's how it all comes together to make this amazing, beautiful, sparkly gem. "Silver Soul" really is like crystal filled with fresh snow, but, you know, in song form.
This true for a lot of songs, especially Beach House songs, but listening to "Silver Soul" on headphones is totally otherworldly. I can do it over and over again (and have, and will). Which, coincidentally, is not something I've done since I was a teenager.
Legrand's lyrics have such great imagery without being too concrete. Not that I have anything against super straightforward lyrics . . . that's one of the main things I love about Panda Bear's songs. But Legrand's lyrics let you follow along with her, but she's barely holding your hand the entire time, your fingers are barely touching, so you're having your own entire experience:

The bodies lying in the sand,
They're moving in the dark
It is so quick to get us in,
Feel it moving through our skin

It's a sickness,
Infinite quickness, yea

Also, I don't know anything about guitars. So I can't say for sure what it is about Scally's guitar in "Silver Soul" that gets me. It just rips. It's totally sexy and powerful without overpowering any other elements of the song. There are times when I listen to "Silver Soul" that I just completely focus on the guitar sounds. It makes the song move faster than it does normally and totally underlines the steaming sexuality of "Silver Soul." And I'm not kidding when I say steaming sexuality. When you really listen to it, to the breathy vocals, to the full-on powerful guitar, to the delicate keys, to the light but insistent drums pounding, to the vocals with words like "the silver soul is running through," "it gathers heat without you," and the ever-present "it is happening again," . . . I think to say the song is about sex doesn't give it enough credit. It's about sexuality, sensuality, movement, heat.
In a lot of ways, Teen Dream itself is arguably a very sexual album. But its sexuality is not overt (no lyrical mention of sex or sexuality or any other slang version) while at the same time is, when it's present, is all-consuming. "Silver Soul" is the first really powerful suggestion of this sexuality, which will be really heightened by the time "10 Mile Stereo" comes along.
But sexuality aside, "Silver Soul" is such a great example of how far Beach House has come as a band: in terms of instrumentation and production, it's much more advanced than songs on Beach House and Devotion.

"Norway"

When you're coming down from "Silver Soul" you might notice that the music doesn't stop. The gentle lead-in of "Zebra" is far away now, you just heard Victoria Legrand wail "It is happening again" over and over in your ear along with somewhat inaudible back-up vocals from Alex Scally and you're left spent with only the buzz of Legrand's keyboard. Before you can tell if "Silver Soul" has ended yet, Legrand is back in your ears again with "Norway," being sexy, breathing in and out. And Scally's back, too, with some back-up sexy breathing and a liquidy guitar. Franz's drumming is more tribal sounding here, a constant backbone, even when Legrand switches seamlessly from feminine breathiness back to the commanding androgyny of her vocals. As she sings something that sounds almost fairytale-like:

We were sleeping 'til
You came along,
With your tiny heart

You led us in the wooden
House
To share in all the wealth

Scally's guitar whines behind her and by the time Legrand repeats "Norway," it seems oddly fitting: there's nothing in "Norway" that directly cites the country but, as an American who has never been to Norway (or out of the country at all, except to England), it matches perfectly this vision of Norway as a snowy, otherworldly place, possibly inhabited by gnomes or something.
But "Norway" is sensual, too . . . you can just hear how Scally's and Legrand's fingers are dancing over the strings and keys of their instruments. And you can also hear the song's heartbeat in Franz's drums. When Legrand sings "Where you thinking that you're gonna run to now, with the beating of a tiny heart," it's as if she's giving Franz a little shout out as well as an urge to keep going because she knows we are not going anymore, not in the song, not in the album.
Legrand's ultra-feminine breathing that backs up the chorus is a perfect display of her power as a vocalist. You can have her womanly sounds (which nearly sounds like moaning), but she's not a little woman there to breathe in your ear. Legrand is no doubt a talented organist but her most powerful, and most personal, tool is her voice, especially when she yells out "Norway" amidst some drum bashing and guitar strumming and still takes the lead of all the sounds.

"Walk in the Park"

I think Beach House did a really wise thing with placing "Walk in the Park" here. Teen Dream isn't exhausting; it still has that mellow feel Beach House is known for. But after "Silver Soul" and "Norway," Beach House has taken you up up up up and with "Walk in the Park" they're going to keep you up, but gently.
"Walk in the Park" is also another really great showcase of Scally's guitar. It's deep in the beginning, bass-y even. Paired with Legrand's deep opening vocals, it's a classic build-up to the chorus, which sees Legrand's voice going higher and Scally's guitar getting higher, too, and more complicated. Her voice and his guitar have always been the hand-in-hand driving force of Beach House and here you see just how well they support each other.
"Walk in the Park" really shows Beach House as a pop band. I don't mean "pop" as a negative here, as it so often tends to be with more "indie" bands. The way Scally's guitar and Legrand's voice descend back after the first chorus and ascend when the chorus comes again is so classic sounding. It has distinct parts, which can easily be a bad or boring thing, but of course, this is Beach House, so it's not anything but awesome and beautiful.
I think one of the things that makes "Walk in the Park" so good (besides everything else I already said) are the last repeating lines:

More . . .
You want more . . .
You tell me,
More only time can run me

Which repeat over and over until the end. But really it's just the words that repeat: Legrand does not sing it the exact same way each time and Scally's guitar, again, changes along with her voice. The feeling in her voice changes too: calm, absolute, insisting, almost angry, powerful. Describing the end this way makes it sound completely schizophrenic. But again, this is Beach House. The changes in the way she sings each repeat are super subtle and it's really one of the nuggets of brilliance you find after multiple and close listenings. And the end of the song is fitting, for the beginning: a classic fadeout. Not only is this another pop song signal, but hearing Legrand's voice fade out slowly reminds you of the gentleness of the band you're listening to.

"Used to Be"

Every time the song changes on Teen Dream, you hear the care that Beach House put into the record. The songs aren't just on the record for a reason, they're there on the record for a reason. There's a few seconds of silence at the very end of "Walk in the Park" that clears away for the clean, crisp, light, champagneish opening of "Used to Be." I almost don't want to call the sound a thump, even though that's what it is, because it's so gentle. "Walk in the Park" let you go easily and "Used to Be" isn't about to just throw you into the deep end. And leave it to Victoria Legrand to somehow sing the opening lines both softly and powerfully:

You are coming home,
Are you still alone,
Are you not the same as you used to be

Each syllable she sings is enhanced by a key she's pressing, which makes her words sound even more like crystal or glass. And when more sounds are added (percussion, back-up vocals), they are done so softly. It's a "Zebra"-like layering of delicate sounds, which Beach House has done so well in the past with Beach House and Devotion. And as the first chorus ends comes the build-up that Beach House is also so good at: Daniel Franz's drums come up again, from the darkness somewhere in the background, Legrand's voice gets stronger, the overall sound of the song gets fuller.
I want to devote some space to the vocals after the second chorus, the repetition of "Coming home any day now." I'm not about to compare my own singing voice to that of Legrand's but I can say this: it physically hurts me to sing this part. I'm a 22 year old girl who sang soprano in choir and I can't come close. And yes, she has a naturally beautiful voice (unlike me) and years of training (unlike me) but it just totally blows my mind that her voice can do this. It is so high and feminine she sounds like a fairy singing. This is also another factor in my initial belief that Alex Scally was the main singer: I thought Scally sang the main vocals and then Legrand came in for parts like this one. Because surely someone can't sing so high and so low so equally beautifully. But it's in a section like this how apparent it is that this isn't someone: Victoria Legrand isn't some singer, Beach House isn't some band. If she was and they were, moments like this wouldn't exist. And I can also say, from my own first-hand account, that moments like these are replicated so beautifully and flawlessly live that it's hard to not feel compelled to bow down at Scally and Legrand's feet.

"Lover of Mine"

"Lover of Mine" marks the beginning of the second half of Teen Dream. When you look at the last five songs in a really vague way, you can sense the ultra-slow build that will peak with "10 Mile Stereo," dip with "Real Love" and then level out with "Take Care" on the same plane that "Zebra" started with.
A lot of sounds open "Lover of Mine" and they continue to add onto each other until Legrand's vocals come in and the other sounds step back slightly. The beginning of the lyrics add to the cohesiveness of Teen Dream:

You hear my cry
Lover of mine

No tear in the eye or
Fear in my mind

The forest is thick
And we don't recognize
We parted our lips and
We reached from inside

You've got this imagery, this sexuality, this woodland-ness that the vocals of the past five songs have touched on.
I also think Legrand's voice does something cool with these lyrics:

In a wide open field
We know we can feel
Awake and unreal

When she sings these lines, "field," "feel," and "unreal" sound almost identical, making the lines sort of meld together. The following, repeated line, "Off to nowhere," is more distinct, but is supported by back-up vocals from Scally. I wouldn't expect Beach House to have a song called "Lover of Mine" without sounds and feelings joining together and whirling around. Even when the sound is from a single source (like Legrand's voice) . . . because, after all, no one says a lover has to be someone else besides yourself (though, the lines "Need more people to be satisfied" might suggest that this lone-love is not optimal).
The name Teen Dream is abstract (unlike other similarly-titled albums that were released this year . . . don't even get me started on that) but at the same time so concrete, especially for those of us who were a teen not too long ago (four years for me). But Legrand and Scally aren't old . . . 10 years ago they were both teenagers, too. Ten years is a really good amount of time to provide perspective without clouding memories. To me, "Lover of Mine" might be the best illustration of the idea of a teen dream:

The only thing you've got
You know you're
Better off without it

If you're a lonely teenager and all you've got is this dream of a lover you don't have but cry out for . . . when you look back at it, those terrible, soul-engulfing crushes, they might be embarrassing if for no other reason than their pointlessness. You might even be inclined to realize you're better off without it. Analyzing lyrics, especially ones like this, is sort of silly and don't do the songs justice, in my opinion. But I just can't help, after so many listens, to think about this kind of stuff.

"Better Times"

I really love how "Better Times" starts out. Simple keys, light percussion, Victoria Legrand's voice getting extra deep. And the first verses are a great buildup: the end of the second verse, which is "Thought I wasn't looking anymore," is a great way to start telling a story. Not to mention it's paired with some increased Daniel Franz percussion and the addition of ultra-smooth, bass-y sounding guitar from Alex Scally.
These lyrics:

I don't want to know
I don't want to know
We don't need the sign
To know of
Better times

to me are a nice, subtle continuation of the thoughts behind "Lover of Mine," as the lover in "Better Times" is real, part of the story. Not a teenage obsession, but a relationship that comes out of more maturity. Which I think is a sure mark of better times, in general.
There's a really nice part when Legrand repeats this verse:

Running around cause you beat yourself up
And you made a crack
And the one that you love is gone
How much longer can you play with fire
Before you turn into a liar

and the music sort of pauses (but not completely) a little to let Legrand's voice be undoubtedly front-and-center. And, like any other repeated lines in any other Beach House song, there's nothing identical or over-processed sounding. The second time she sings the lines sounds even fuller and more mature than the first time. Plus she says "fire" like fiyah and "liar" like lie, which, with a voice like her's, sounds awesome.
AND THEN we come to one of my favorite little moments on all of Teen Dream. After "lie," Legrand breathes "huh" and "oh" and then there's a pause. She stops singing but the music doesn't stop completely; it's the same sound here that opens "Better Times" and it's alone for just a couple of seconds before all of the other sounds we've heard in the song AND THEN SOME come back at you along with Legrand belting a long, raw, "I" to begin "I've been around before." It's a really small moment and hard to describe in words, but it's beautiful, goosebump-inducing stuff. My car used to have extra sensitive windshield wipers; the slightest bump in the road could send them off on full-blast. I can't tell you how many times, when Legrand's voice and the rest of the music came bursting out that I would involuntarily bang the palm of my hand against my steering wheel in time with the music and set off my windshield wipers, and startle myself every time.
And one last thing: I defy to find someone that sings the word "smoke" more awesomely and sexily than Victoria Legrand in the last verse of "Better Times."

"10 Mile Stereo"

The single, constant percussion thump that begins the first four seconds of "10 Mile Stereo" lets you know what song this is going to be: BUMPIN'. But, more eloquently, this heartbeat-like drumming sets you up for what's going to be the glittery climax of Teen Dream. Though by climax, I don't mean "highest point" and I certainly don't mean it to imply that the remaining two songs that follow are an afterthought or not as good. I mean it in a much more primal, sexual way.
The beginning lyrics contain two challenges:

They say we will go far
But they don't know how far
We'll go

followed later by

They say we can throw far
But they don't know how far
We throw

I think it would be really easy to equate "they" with "critics" and "we" with "Beach House," which I think is an oversimplification but might not be entirely off the mark. By the end of the second challenge Legrand poses to her listeners there's still over four minutes left in the song. To me, more than anything, it's the sense of a challenge that comes with these words that are most powerful and rather than imagining it as Legrand saying "Beach House will be around for a long time," I think it has much more of an immediate effect of "check this shit out." Especially since the sounds build more and more with each line that she sings. Like I've said before, Beach House is not about in-your-face music. They're not going to push you into anything. They're building you up slowly, like the good lovers that they are.
The first time Legrand sings the chorus, it's not quite as grand and expansive as you might expect. She sings it rather softly, for a chorus, and clearly. But by now you should know that just because Legrand sings something one way now, doesn't mean it's going to be same next time she sings it. And the more complex-sounding guitar and keys that follow afterward further suggest to the buildup, as does the line "In the heat of a night, We would cry, You are not mine."
The second chorus comes with the music bumping faster behind Legrand, who draws the words out a little more this time, which really allows her voice to fill the sound. And here a line from the first chorus, "Tear a moment from the days, That carry us on," is changed to "Bright pyramids at night, That carry us on." I just want to say here how beautiful and amazing it is to hear Legrand belt (and she does belt) that line live on the Teen Dream tour with their stage set-up. Though the stage changed throughout the tour there were ever-present pyramidal shapes that stood bright against the usually-dark, usually-nighttime stage.
It's the second and third chorus that the whole climactic feeling is really present, as both choruses are back-to-back. Legrand does not hold back at all when she's singing the third chorus, and neither does Scally or Franz, Scally's guitar sliding back and forth along Legrand's voice and Franz punctuating her words with cymbal crashes. And when she ends the chorus (and the song) with the new lines "Love's like a pantheon, It carries on forever," I can't help but think not of an architectural dome but of the pulsating orgasm that Legrand's voice is emulating here, which not only does not sound like it will end, but you don't want it to end.
But of course, Beach House is not going to just cut you off. Her voice fades out slowly, the instruments scale back, and the song ends in a glittery afterglow. Oh, and also, the album's not even done!

"Real Love"

Before Teen Dream, when I thought of a song called "Real Love," I thought of The Beatles. The Beatles' "Real Love" is not exactly super upbeat (no "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" or "Twist and Shout") but it is undoubtedly optimistic, not dark, and, above all else, a classic-sounding pop song.
But the opening sounds of Beach House's "Real Love" are a different story. And for good reason: after what you've just experienced with "10 Mile Stereo" an upbeat love song wouldn't feel right. You know right away that you'll still be coming down with "Real Love" with the deep, dark, opening piano and the faint sounds of what sounds like clacking crystal in the back. There's some very light percussion in the background, but the beginning is very much just Victoria Legrand and her keyboard. Her voice is, I think, the most soulful it's ever been here and still without being overbearing. And when she sings, "There's someone in that room, That frightens you when they go boom," she does it with such care that she sounds nearly heartbreakingly nurturing, even when she goes on to repeat that frightening "boom."
And you know, the real beauty in Victoria Legrand's voice is her ability to juxtapose such different sounds seamlessly, and to do so both on record and live. When she sings the line, "The color you say is black," it's almost indescribable how she enunciates "black." But it is big and it is powerful and it totally emphasizes the darkness of "Real Love." But she immediately follows it with such a gentle, almost cracking, "Is the one you might lack." Her voice is not scary or diva-ish or even entirely sad (though there are touches of that here) but it's instead just lying in bed with you, trying to discuss your relationship in that emotional, post-sex time (this song does follow "10 Mile Stereo," remember).
There's also a moment (which happens twice, actually) in "Real Love" that is another one of my favorites on Teen Dream because it highlights my love for the English language. I would argue that my confusing "horse" with "whores" in "Zebra" is another instance of this, but that was unintentional, so it sort of doesn't count. What I'm talking about it Legrand repeating "I met you." First she says "I metchu." Then she says, very clearly, "I met you." I can't quite place what it is I love about this. It sounds like something that comes out of a serious talk: she says it once conversationally, blending the words together. But then the repeats it, more distinctly, more profoundly, more seriously. That, followed with a few painful "oh"s, some more sound coming in from both Scally and Franz, and the lines that follow:

There's something wrong with our hearts
When they beat pure they stand apart

brings out the sadness in Legrand's voice, the likes of which haven't really been shown until now, and I'm including in that Beach House and Devotion. This continues with the lines:

Real love
It finds you somewhere
With your back to it

This is certainly not the "Real Love" of The Beatles, who sang:

No need to be alone
It's real love, it's real,
Yes it's real love, it's real

Are you getting really sad?? Hold on! After the second pair of "I met you" and "oh," the tone of the song shifts. The piano gets lighter and higher and some lighter percussion comes in. Legrand ends the song with the lines

You know, you know,
We belong
By the stream,
To the dawn

repeated a couple of times. Though not identical and not necessarily related, the lines "We belong by the stream to the dawn," ties back, at least in feeling if not in a little bit of the imagery, to the lines "With our legs on the edge, And our feet on the horizon," in "10 Mile Stereo." "Real Love" is not a breakup song. It might be a "serious talk" song or a "relationship evaluation" song, but it's not over. And neither is Teen Dream . . .

"Take Care"

It would be unlike Beach House and Teen Dream as a whole to end the album on anything less than hopeful. And so, "Take Care" comes waltzing in as Teen Dream's closing track. Are you feeling a little anxious or a little down after "Real Love?" Don't worry, Victoria Legrand (and her keyboard and Alex Scally and Daniel Franz) is here to reassure you:

Stand beside it,
We can hide the way
It makes us glow,
It's no good unless it grows,
Feel this burning
Love of mine

In fact, I would argue that "Take Care" is all about reassurance. Not necessarily in a super concrete way, though it does have Legrand repeating "I'll take care of you," and it's hard to feel troubled with that being sung into your ears.
There is a sense of longing here as, as always, Beach House is not about to force you into anything: "I'll take care of you, If you ask me to." Beach House is here for you, you know. And I'm sure to say Beach House here rather than just Victoria Legrand because while "Real Love" was very much centered on her voice and her keyboard, "Take Care" has that familiar full-band feel that is not so much supporting Legrand's voice but, as they've done before, strolling along side her.
If I had to use one word to describe "Take Care" it would be: nice. Especially as the song winds down and Legrand adds the further reassurance:

I'll take care of you
Take care of you
Take care of you
That's true

And it is true. "Take Care" is the longest song on Teen Dream because Beach House has just shared this beautiful experience with you and they're not just going to turn you loose. They're going to let you go gently. With each repeat of Legrand's voice and Scally's guitar and Franz's drums reminding you that they'll take care of you, Beach House, which has been holding your hand with varying degrees of pressure for the past forty or so minutes, is giving you a soft pat on the hand. "Take Care" is like lovers saying goodbye after spending a night together: it's over, but it's not the end.

If you immediately begin Teen Dream again after listening to it, it's beautiful how "Take Care" works into "Zebra." It's almost like a mathematical formula: "Love's like a pantheon, it carries on" = Teen Dream = love = "like a pantheon, it carries on forever."

I'm no expert on music but I've listened to a whole lot of it and Teen Dream is one of my favorite albums ever. It is so beautiful and perfect it simply just stands on its own: Beach House's fourth album can't top Teen Dream and can't be a let down from Teen Dream; it's too complete for that.

If you haven't bought (or, my god, even listened to) Teen Dream yet, I urge urge urge urge urge you to do so.

Thank you music, thank you Sub Pop, thank you Beach House, thank you Teen Dream.

The Future Is A Scary Time

2010-12-10T01:12:00.004-05:00

Reading old journals of mine makes me feel like I can tell the future. I've always kept journals, and pretty meticulous ones. When I read back on them and read about something and say now what's going to happen, like seeing a cute boy and wonder if he's going to talk to me ("he won't") or wondering if I'll ever get out of New Orleans ("you will") or thinking of a future that includes all of the friends I had at the time ("it won't").
But another interesting aspect of these old journals, which range from around 1st grade (1994-1995) to present, is the cultural stuff. Music and movies I loved and hated, the evolution of technology. Some of the journals, especially the really old ones, contain illustrations that I'm pretty sure only I can understand. Think of Charlie Kelly's dream journal from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and you'll get a feeling for what I'm talking about here.

I have one pretty long entry from around third grade, complete with illustrations, of this magical box I really wanted. This magical box:
- glowed
- played music
- was a little TV
- had computer games
- went with me everywhere
What I envisioned was essentially a small cube with light glowing out of it that pretty much did whatever I wanted. I alluded to this magic box's impossibility in my journal, but I was so into the idea of having a little music player and TV and computer game thing that I totally bought into it anyway. Along with flying cars and jetpacks and all of that.
Fast forward less than 15 years and I have an iPhone. Which is everything I imagined my magical box to be, except more and better. I didn't really realize this until somewhat recently after re-reading an old journal and laughing at my naivety for thinking some sort of little magic box thing could exist. Until I realized that it does and I own one.
Like most things, since I followed along with technology, the magic box/iPhone didn't hit me because it was a natural progression. I didn't even notice that this crazy magical thing I thought up was real.
Which totally freaks me out in terms of the future. What will be here in 15 or 50 years. It shouldn't freak me out because my magical box dream came true and iPhones are great and awesome. But it makes me wonder what seemingly crazy or outlandish thing I could think of right now that would be embarrassingly far-fetched will be a real fucking thing not too far into the future.
It's like watching an old movie almost. Like Casablanca. Watching it now, it's a World War II movie (and romance and all that, but let's stick with this theme). And now, we (basically) know everything about World War II: what happened, towns that were destroyed, people who died, how it ended.
But Casablanca came out in late 1942, early 1943. When it premiered in New York in 1942, anyone could say "Pearl Harbor happened less than a year ago." Less than a year ago! Casablanca was a movie about World War II during World War II. The people in it, the people who made it, the people who watched it, didn't know what was going to happen. It wasn't a historical movie or a World War II movie. It was a movie.
It's just things like that that make the future and history and time very tangible to me. Tangible and overwhelming.

A music mix for October

2010-10-02T10:36:00.001-04:00

Make custom Glitter Graphics

Ocky-Toby 20-10

LOVE, SO MUCH

2010-09-27T01:01:00.002-04:00

I am madly in love with all of my friends. I'm completely serious.
Tonight is my last night visiting Savannah. I've been here almost three weeks. I had a job interview in Atlanta and then kept on going to Savannah to see Ben and Allie. I got to Savannah on a Wednesday and when the next Wednesday rolled around I figured, might as well stay for the next weekend. My days were filled perfectly: naps, good food, good smokes, awful movies and TV, and most importantly, time with my two best friends. Although I did get food poisoning during my second weekend here . . . from licking brownie batter off a spoon. But even that wasn't so bad because Ben took care of me; after I boarded myself up in the bathroom and lost all color in my face and was covered in sweat, I laid in Ben's bed while he put frozen peas on my head and fed me a bagel and Diet Coke and played a history podcast for me.
I knew that the next weekend a ton of friends were coming to Savannah, but I wasn't planning on staying. They were all coming to a wedding I wasn't invited to and I was a little nervous about it seeming weird for me to be in town but not for the wedding like everyone else. Plus Chase and Lesley were going to stay with Ben and Allie and I didn't want to burden them with putting up three people. But then Robert, whom I hadn't seen in over a year, convinced me to stay. And by convinced me to stay I mean he offered me a place in his hotel room and the thought of seeing him and other friends that I also hadn't seen in over a year sealed the deal pretty quick.
I'm not going to go into details about every little thing we all did because that's boring to those who weren't there. And I can't even describe properly how I felt . . . to see everyone back together again after what seemed like forever and at the same time as if no time had passed. Especially Friday night when everyone was in town by then and the looming knowledge that in 48 hours everyone would be gone again hadn't settled in yet. I can't remember the last time I was so happy. Or had so much fun or was bursting with so much love for so many people. I gave and received so many hugs and kisses and dances and winks and smiles.
Meeting new people and living in new places and doing new things are all great. But it just really can't beat being in the arms of the boys and girls I love desperately. I used to be jealous of people who met their husbands/wives in college since, after a certain point, it was clear I wasn't going to meet a husband in college. But instead of one soul mate, I found a whole group of them.
I love them all. I love that they all love me and they all love one another. And even though the short length of the reunion was sort of devastating, that sadness could never beat the happiness of being together, of everything being the way it's supposed to be.
Pictures of the Special Friend Times
Song of the Weekend

This "man"

2010-09-15T00:52:00.005-04:00

Everyone knows Hitler. I would argue that he's one of the most iconic figures, in terms of looks. Particularly because of the fucking 'stache.
But you know what's crazy? Really looking at a picture of him. I mean really looking. Forget for a second who he is, what he did. And just look.
What's striking is how harmless he looks. He just sort of looks like a dick. But if you take away the stupid mustache he's not super masculine. He's not feminine or anything, but he's a little only the jowl-y side. Especially when he was older. But he doesn't look like a mass murderer.
But then of course, he does look like a mass murderer because he's probably what comes to mind when someone says "mass murderer." But when I look at his face it is so terrifying to me how this man, who was just a man, was behind the Holocaust.

Summer

2010-08-25T00:39:00.007-04:00

I've had these songs on repeat all summer. Download it as a mix.

1. Small Black -Despicable Dogs
2. Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights
3. Washed Out - New Theory
4. Best Coast - Sun Was High (So Was I)
5. Surfer Blood - Swim
6. Wavves - Post Acid
7. MGMT - Flash Delirium
8. Panda Bear - Tomboy
9. Dum Dum Girls - Jail La La
10. Kid Cudi, Best Coast, Rostam Batmanglij - All Summer
11. Kate Bush - Hounds of Love
12. Panda Bear - Slow Motion
13. Best Coast - Boyfriend
14. Washed Out and Caroline Polachek - You and I

Blogspot is pretty terrible for photos. So instead, here's a Flickr set of some choice pictures from this summer. Mostly from New York.

For Ellen.

2010-07-14T22:08:00.005-04:00

Ellen Hinson died two years ago. Typing that sentence, reading that sentence, saying that sentence is completely unreal to me. And I know that it will remain unreal no matter what the number is.
Her death hasn't made me obsess over the concept of death or life or time or religion. When I think about Ellen, I don't think about death, I think about Ellen.
Ellen and I were best friends in middle school. People who knew either Ellen or myself post-middle school might not understand what our relationship was like. And of course, I'm not saying I'm any more important than friends she had before middle school or after. It's just that if you went to Franklin with us it was likely you didn't have a good understanding of what our relationship was like.
But that's also because no one understood our relationship except Ellen and me. There's a line in Stand By Me that goes "I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?" And the answer is no, for better or for worse. Ellen and I were friends the only way 12-13-14 year old girls can be friends. We were fascinated by each other, obsessed with each other. When we met, on the first day of seventh grade, we had both gone to the same school with the same people up to that point. Ellen was still at the same school, Lusher, but I was new. But it was different for Ellen, too; seventh grade at Lusher always saw a substantial amount of new faces. I sat down at her table on the first day of school because there weren't any other seats left. I was terrified and barely talked. But I couldn't get over this one girl, who talked and laughed with everyone, whether she had known them her whole life or five minutes.
Ellen took me in immediately, but our friendship didn't grow out of necessity. On my end, up to that point I had almost exclusively gone to school with the same people from the time I was 5. My elementary school friends were all I had and I didn't know any better. That's not to say they weren't good friends (some of them were, some of them weren't) but I didn't really get much of a chance to make and choose friends.
If Ellen and I were different people we could have easily not be friends. We would have been friendly, sure, because even though Lusher seemed like a metropolis compared to the small town of my elementary school, it was small. But we didn't have to be friends. Our friendship came to be out of our love for each other.
Does that sound over-dramatic? Maybe it is, but everything is when you're a 12 year old girl. We talked for hours. We told each other secrets that neither of us had heard before. We wanted to be sisters just so we could be together all the time. Even our arguments, which were very few, usually had more to do with outside forces than each other and were resolved quickly.
Ellen shaped who I am today. She was so funny, I had never met anyone like her. Our senses of humor morphed together until we were virtually able to read each other's thoughts. Literally, the right sideways glance at her closet door had us laughing so hard we couldn't breathe. Even today I know why we found it funny but I could never explain it to anyone else, because no one else is me or Ellen.
I think it's standard when someone dies too young, especially in an accident, to have issues with the unfairness of it. I was always older than Ellen by almost exactly nine months, but I keep getting older and older than her. She will always be 19, and now I'm 22. It doesn't make sense to me. I'm not supposed to be that much older than her.
By now I've graduated college. I have a BFA. Ellen never graduated college. She should have a degree right now, too. Maybe she'd be in grad school. Either way she would be moving forward.
When I think of what she did and what she was capable of, I feel ashamed. And I hate that because I know Ellen would hate that. She was so smart and was only getting smarter. It's not that I have all of her smarts and I'm just wasting my life away, not doing anything with them; she'd always be an engineer and I'd always be a writer, no matter what happened two years ago. So I shouldn't feel bad. But when I think of all she had done and had the potential to do and when I think of my art school career and these little scribbles I make, I just feel ashamed.
But Ellen would be so mad to hear that. If I had the opportunity to tell her that, she wouldn't even let me finish. She read everything I wrote and begged for more, which says a lot considering she was reading the work of a pubescent girl. She told everyone that I was the best writer and she was proud because I was her friend. So instead of interpreting my feelings into something along the lines of "why her and not me," which she wouldn't ever want, I just interpret them this way:
When Ellen died a big hole was made. Not just a hole in the now, but a hole in the future. The stuff she was going to do can't be done anymore. And nothing can change that. But since I'm still alive I owe it to her to do everything I can in my power to help fill up the hole. I'll never do it. No one will. I'll never come close. But what I do with my life isn't just about me anymore. Ellen and I made promises to each other that we swore we would keep. There was one promise we made to each other the summer of 2001, wrapped up in blankets because of the air conditioning and relishing the artificial cold. When we made this promise and we thought of the future it was vague: it was hard to even imagine graduating high school, much less going to college and having careers and long lives. But we made the promise all the same and I have every reason to believe that even if Ellen died when she was 99 instead of 19 she would have kept it.
Now I'm the only one in the world who knows about the promise we made that night. And I'm the only one who needs to know. Because if our places were switched I know Ellen would feel the same way. And when I close my eyes I can see her sitting in front of me, our pinkies wrapped around each other in making what was as good as a contract in blood.
So Ellen, now and forever: this, all of this, is for you.

Ben E. King - Stand By Me

The Beatles - In My Life

Songs About Literature

2010-07-10T00:13:00.008-04:00

Y'all, I love books. That should be pretty obvious. I love music, too, because I'm a human. So naturally when books and music come together, I lovelove it.
I love when songs are about books. Or short stories or plays or poems. You get the idea. There are a million more than these, I'm sure. These are just the obvious ones/ones I like.

Radiohead - Exit Music (For A Film) - My favorite songs that are about literature are the ones told from the perspective of one of the characters. This one is particularly good because it's not in your face about Romeo and Juliet. But it is . . . Thom Yorke wrote is specifically to play at the end credits of Romeo + Juliet (hence the song title). But what I really love about this song is that it could be sung from the perspective of either Romeo or Juliet. I think we assume Romeo because Thom Yorke is a man, but there isn't anything in the lyrics that define sex. Both Romeo and Juliet had shitty parents, so it can be about either of them.

Peter Gabriel - Family Snapshot - This is based on An Assassin's Diary by Arthur Bremmer. It's sort of easy to write a song about a love story. Peter Gabriel wrote a song about someone who wanted to assassinate a a racist politician.

Taylor Swift - Love Story - This is a stretch. I admit it. BUT I LOVE TAYLOR SWIFT. Don't try to understand it. Just go with it. About Romeo and Juliet, this is written from the perspective of Juliet . . . that is, if Romeo had "talked to [her] dad" before their marriage and they grew old and happy together. I also like the addition of The Scarlet Letter ("You were Romeo, I was a scarlet letter"), which in the context of the song doesn't really make sense. BUT I DON'T CARE, I LOVE IT ANYWAY.

Aimee Mann - Ghost World - Pretty sweet song about a pretty sweet graphic novel. I'm not sure how many songs there are about graphic novels. I'm not talking about comic book series, though, and I am ESPECIALLY not talking about any of the terrible terrible terrible songs written about Superman.

Fear Before the March of Flames - The Lisbon Girls, Oh The Lisbon Girls - I probably shouldn't count this because I hate this band and I hate this song. But I love the lyrics! And it's about The Virgin Suicides, my favorite novel. If only this song were in the hands of an artist that isn't absolutely awful.

Steve Forbert - Romeo's Tune - Another fairly upbeat Romeo and Juliet-based song. It doesn't explicitly change the story to happy ending like "Love Story," but you'd never know Romeo and Juliet was a tragedy based on this song.

David Bowie - 1984 - An appropriately dark song for 1984. The lyrics don't really explicitly describe specific events or characters in the book, but it does give a decent view of a dystopia/shitty world. "They'll split your pretty cranium and fill it full of air." Sort of wish there was a lyric like "They'll strap a caged rat to your face."

Fleetwood Mac - Rhiannon - This isn't quite based on Mary Leader's Triad, but it's not originally based on the Welsh goddess Rhiannon, either. Stevie Nicks wrote the song after she read Triad but really only used the name Rhiannon from the book, not much else. BUT the song is amazing, so who cares.

R.E.M. - Falls to Climb - The real benefit of having a singer like Michael Stipe sing about a short story like "The Lottery" is that he totally stays true to the nature of the story. If a scary or intimidating sounding guy sang the song it would really betray the subtlety of the story. And Michael Stipe has such a nice voice that really lends itself to the naivety of the main character. Also "The Lottery" is one of my favorite short stories, so there.

Bright Eyes - Tereza and Tomas - This doesn't have specific elements to the song that scream I'M ABOUT THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING, but would that even be possible? If you aren't familiar with novel, the song would really just seem like a love song, presumably about two people named Tereza and Tomas. And really, you could argue that The Unbearable Lightness of Being is just a love story about Tereza and Tomas, too.

Simon & Garfunkel - Richard Cory - My high school English teacher in my senior year didn't believe me when, while reading the poem for class, I told her that there was a Simon & Garfunkel song based on it. "Who would write a song about a poem about suicide?" Well, I don't know, Paul Simon I guess. It's a great poem and a great song, which is not told from the perspective of Richard Cory (or even the second person, like the poem). My English teacher had never read Lord of the Flies, though, so she was really in no position to talk.

Panda Bear - Bonfire of the Vanities - So the only lyrics to this song are "Don't you think that I cannot be sorry/It's always such a stupid thing that I can't deal with," which are obviously too vague to really pinpoint it as being about Bonfire of the Vanities. Especially since it could actually be about that other bonfire of the vanities. Noah Lennox's lyrics are usually pretty literal, so I would guess that they're at least inspired by one (or both?) of the two.

Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights - AS IF I would ever forget to include this. This is one of my favorite songs of all time. What I like the most about it is that it sounds like a love song . . . a character begging for her lover to come home. Except in Wuthering Heights, Catherine is dead and her ghost calls to Heathcliff from the window. So in the song when she says "come home" and "let me grab your soul away," it's a little creepier when you put it in the context of the novel. Also the first lyric is "Out on the wiley, windy moors." PERFECT.

Bonus video: THE MAGICAL KATE BUSH

UNCHAINED MELODY

2010-07-02T05:27:00.002-04:00

Here's a video of Bobby Hatfield of The Righteous Brothers emerging from darkness to break/melt your heart.

This has got to be one of my favorite songs ever. Granted, if I had to make a "favorite songs ever" list, it would be huge and impossible to rank, but still.

But what I really want is for Beach House to cover this song. It sounds weird at first, but think about it: Victoria Legrand doing those vocals, with all the lows and highs. And Alex Scally's guitar making it all sexy. So from now on I'm just going to send them telepathic messages regarding covering "Unchained Melody" and just hope.

Also, THOSE CHEEKBONES.

The Righteous Brothers - Unchained Melody

On "Best of the Year" stuff

2010-06-23T00:31:00.005-04:00

Even on a personal level it's usually sort of difficult for me, at the end of the year, to figure out what I liked the best out of that year. Again, this is especially true for music, for whatever reason. Last year was easy, thanks to Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion. And 2010 will also be easy, thanks to Beach House's Teen Dream.
It's June, we've still got half a year to go. And, maybe more importantly, a new PANDA BEAR album to be released (Tomboy, in September). And it's true that I can't even really think too long about Tomboy because I get too excited. And it's true that I may end up thinking it's a better album than Teen Dream. But it would be really really tough for it to push Teen Dream out of my Album of 2010 spot.
Why? Because Teen Dream (like Merriweather Post Pavilion in 2009) was released in January. It leaked even earlier (also like MPP). I have listened to Teen Dream over and over and over and OVER again since it leaked and since it was released officially. I have listened to individual tracks over and over and over and OVER again. I have sung the songs in my car and in the shower, I have hummed them while I walk, I have had my own dreams with Teen Dream providing the soundtrack. This is still true almost exactly 6 months after it was released and I don't imagine it being untrue 6 months from now.
For me, Teen Dream will be The Album of 2010 because it's been here with me the whole time. Even if Tomboy leaks right now, it'll still only be in 2010 for half the year. So it would almost have to be twice as good as Teen Dream to make it my Album of 2010, which I can't even quantify because of my aforementioned inability to do so.
So there you go, done and done. Teen Dream all the way for me.

Although I'll probably vomit everywhere out of happiness the day Tomboy is released.

Beach House - Silver Soul

Graduation happened and it was like this

2010-06-11T21:09:00.002-04:00

Much has happened in the last few weeks. I guess I'll start with "graduating college."
The week leading up to graduation I sort of thought I was going to die. As relatives trickled in, I was taken out to eat for almost every meal everyday. Which is AWESOME, DUH but was also a little overwhelming and I sort of feared for my well-being (though not enough to turn down free meals).
During this week, I had finals. Is this normal? SCAD's last day of classes is on a Thursday and then SCAD graduation is on Saturday. Not much downtime.
The day before graduation was "graduation rehearsal." Except it was more of "everyone sit down while we explain shit you already know, including how to put on a cap and gown." They never covered how you get to the stage, in what order, who gives you your diploma, etc etc, which I didn't realize until right before I had to go on stage. Also bought my cap and gown the day before graduation (whatever). "That'll be a hundred dollars," said the Herff Jones woman. "O.K.," I said, dying inside a little bit. "Cash only. Don't you have cash?" Yeah, that's true, you're right, Herff Jones woman. Let me whip out five of the many twenty dollar bills I carry around with me all the time. Had to go to the ATM. Annoying. But really, $100 for a fucking cap and gown? That is a lot of money for some pieces of [ugly] [hot as hell] shit.
We had to be at the Savannah Civic Center at 7:15am. Because of having to bathe myself and also picking up Victoria, I had to wake up at 5. That means an hour into commencement, I was ready to die.
Commencement was at 9 and Isabella Rossellini was our speaker. Do you guys know how gorgeous she is? She is way gorgeous. And her speech ripped. I was at commencement last year when Glenn Close spoke . . . but in my opinion, Isabella Rossellini was better. I usually roll my eyes at actresses talking about being insecure about how they look, even though I know everyone gets insecure no matter how hot you are. But then when Isabella Rossellini said, "When your mother is in Casablanca, you never feel beautiful enough," I had to hand it to her on that one.
Graduation was broken into two ceremonies and mine was at 1. Not enough time between commencement and graduation to take a nap, as I so desperately wanted to. Instead Ben and I went to Wendy's.
Do you guys get sick when you're really tired? I hadn't slept well the past two nights, plus had been up since 5. When I get really tired like that, I start to feel way sick to my stomach. And sitting in the last row at graduation, I was teetering on feeling like I was going to throw up and feeling like I might pass out. Seems like graduation took longer this year. Sort of sad, since the reason it seemed that way is because I'm friends with more people who graduated a year ahead of me.
One of the last people to see us before we walked on stage was Wyc, who was our academic adviser for the whole time the major has been around, save this last quarter. Wyc is awesome and super nice and super positive and seeing him nod to each of us with a "Hey y'all" or "Aw, congratulations, girl" was a nice boost of chill. When the girl before me walked onstage, I stepped forward and the woman at the stage stopped me and said, "Wait." But then she never said anything else. I waited for her to say "Now," or something of that nature, or to push me forward, but she never did. So I got really nervous and just said, "Uh, O.K., I'm going now," and just sort of walked forward.
I had been warned about pronunciation problems at graduation, so I went to my graduation auditor twice (in addition to the original meeting) about how to pronounce my middle name. My middle name is Carea, but it's pronounced Carrie or Carry or Carey etc etc. But everyone thinks it's Korea. And without fail, despite my efforts, I was announced on stage as "Elizabeth Korea Dixon." Whatever.
I also realized I took more pictures at last year's graduation (a couple dozen) than I did at my own (zero). Was more concerned about getting it done, I guess.

recent polaroids

2010-05-22T15:41:00.008-04:00

Polaroid got fucked up, turned into a picture of burnt cheese
With a baby Diet Coke and fake tattoo on 4/20
Using face masks in Asheville before seeing Beach
House
Ben took this really awful Polaroid of me, but instead of getting rid of it forever I turned it into a BLINGEEEEEE
Dash took this Polaroid in my car at night without the flash . . . THANKS DASH

Have you guys ever had Wild Irish Rose? It's $2 and tastes like whiskey mixed with cheap wine. DELICIOUSThis is how 22-23 year olds play dress up

Revisiting Movies I Shouldn't Have Seen

2010-05-08T17:19:00.002-04:00

When I was in fourth grade one of my teachers asked my class, "What is the one thing you wish you could do but can't because you're not old enough?" Looking back, I'm surprised no one said anything jackassy; everyone had pretty legit answers: stay up late, drive a car, get married. I triumphantly answered, "See R-rated movies," to an explosion of laughter. A few kids thought that was just a stupid answer while others bragged that their parents already let them watch R-rated movies (doubtful, in retrospect). But it honestly was my answer.
I was never rebellious in the way that if my mom said "Don't touch that," I felt compelled to touch it. I listened. Where I was rebellious was if my mom said "Don't watch that," or "Don't listen to that." If I was told not to watch a movie/TV show or listen to something, I immediately needed to know why. And since my mom couldn't ever be that specific (for instance, she couldn't say that she was more concerned about Minnie Driver miming a blowjob with a beer than the language in Good Will Hunting), it just made me want to know more.
This is where my different methods of viewing specific material came in. If I wasn't allowed to listen to something, that was a lot easier to do in secret, via the radio or my older sister's music collection or other means. Watching forbidden things were more of a challenge. The easiest method was, if my sister was in on it, to watch things when my parents weren't home. This worked particularly well for Kids in the Hall. Another method was sitting really close to the TV so I could have the volume on as low as possible, with either Nickelodeon or The Disney Channel programed on the TV remote's channel return button in case of close-by parents. Those two tactics didn't work very well for movies, however. My go-to method for seeing forbidden movies was wait until someone in my family rented it. After I was expelled from the living room so they could watch it, I snuck back in using a series of crawls and hiding places until I reached my spot behind the couch. Our couch also had recliners, so there some big spaces left open, big enough for my child self to get a clear view of the TV.
It would make sense if I continually did this only to find that the show or movie in question was in fact tame enough for me to handle. But that was almost never the case. Except for Kids in the Hall, pretty much everything I watched that I wasn't supposed to traumatized me in some way. Such as:
Jerry Maguire - There's a sex scene in Jerry Maguire that's really not long at all but completely fucked up my vision of what sex was. I always imagined sex had something to do with a bed, lots of sheets, and a guy on top of a girl, kissing her. I wasn't sure on the details. But in Jerry Maguire, the sex scene in question takes place not on a bed, but (I'm going on memory here) against a bookcase. And there's sitting involved, not laying. And the lights are on, and the girl sits on the boy's lap. I didn't know what this was and for many years changed my views on lap sitting.
Jaws - I didn't sneak watching Jaws. I watched it with my family when I was relatively young, if I remember correctly it had a lot to do with whining and bitching about how I was never allowed to watch anything. For 95% of the movie I was fine . . . a little freaked out, but Jaws really doesn't show much for most of the movie. But in that final shark showdown, when Robert Shaw is getting chomped from the bottom up while spewing blood from his mouth, I sat up from the couch, turned around to face my parents, and burst into tears. I couldn't handle it anymore. For the next few days my mom and sister had to continually convince me that no one actually died on the set of Jaws and that there are crazy magic capsules that actors can chew to make fake blood come out (I didn't believe them). I didn't see Jaws again until college.
Murder of Innocence - I went into more detail about this in a previous post. I don't really remember the actual viewing of this, only my nightmares about it afterward. But I would bet money I hid behind the couch while my mom watched it, because I was stupid.
Scream - I saw Scream for the first time last night since I was about 10. I originally saw Scream as a child with my friend, who brought it over after her older sister rented it, when I was home alone. I wanted to see it so bad to see what all the fuss was about. Needless to say, by the time Drew Barrymore is hanging from a tree with her intestines hanging out (no more than 10 minutes into the movie) I was sobbing. And for SOME REASON I still watched the rest. This led to my inability to answer the phone when home alone (which may or may not have manifested into my current inability to answer my phone when I don't know the number). It also made me think that boys might actually all be evil killers who don't just want to pressure you into having sex with them, but want to pressure you into having sex with them so they can murder you afterward.
A Clockwork Orange - I don't remember how I saw this one, either. But I was in either sixth or seventh grade and watched it alone, without sneaking it. I'm pretty sure it was a Jaws-like situation: after much begging and whining about how I'm way too mature to be denied any movie, I think my mom just might have just let me watch it. I don't think I talked about it for a long time afterward because I didn't want to admit that it was possibly the scariest thing I had ever seen and couldn't stop obsessing over it. Upon multiple viewings + aging past 12, I now see it as much more funny than it is scary, but at the time if someone told me it was supposed to be funny I would probably assume they were a crazed rapist. It also permanently changed the way I felt about the song "Singin' the Rain," which my dad would sing to me when I was really little while he washed my hair.
The Silence of the Lambs - Back when my family were patrons of Video Plus, a local video store before Blockbuster came to town, the shelves were arranged in such a way that to get to the new releases, you had to walk through horror. On the end of one of the rows was The Silence of the Lambs. I'll never forget the first time I saw the VHS cover. It was by far the most terrifying image I had ever seen. After that, I always walked in a long circle to bypass the horror shelves to get to the new releases. If I caught a glimpse of the cover, my day was fucked. When I was in middle school, I finally felt ready to watch the movie. Surprisingly, what fucked me up more than anything was when Buffalo Bill opens his robe to reveal his tucked penis. I did not know a penis could do anything but just be there, so at the time I thought this was revealing that he was actually a woman. When I asked my mom about it, she gingerly explained about penis tucking, the thought of which made me think of male genitalia as absolutely freakish and terrifying. I maintained this feeling until I saw a real one for the first time in high school, which pretty much caused me to a complete 180 on my personal views on penises.
Those are just a few. Interestingly enough, some of the most traumatizing movies I saw weren't forbidden at all, such as Sleeping Beauty and Ernest Scared Stupid. And when I eventually saw Good Will Hunting when I was about 13, the language didn't faze me and I didn't understand what Minnie Driver was doing, so I just sort of forgot about it.
This curiosity bled into books, which I was never forbidden to read. That's why I first read Lolita when I was 14 and am eternally grateful for it. So I'm glad I was fueled by my intense curiosity now, though at the time it was a major source of sleeplessness and stomach aches.

Dancer in the Dark aka DO NOT WATCH IF YOU ARE SUICIDAL

2010-04-17T13:01:00.002-04:00

Before yesterday, the last time I had to go off by myself just to sob uncontrollably after watching a movie was after seeing Atonement. I had to go straight from the screen to the movie theater bathroom, wait in line with as much of a poker face as I could manage, and then lock myself in a stall and just let the sobbing rip for a good few minutes.
But yesterday I watched Dancer in the Dark. I had never seen it but I hadn't avoided it. I didn't even really know what it was about, all I had really heard about it was that it was a musical and Thom Yorke was on the soundtrack. Then a few weeks ago I saw Antichrist, which was amazing and blew me away immediately moved Dancer in the Dark up on my Netflix queue. I wanted to see more of Lars von Trier and I love Bjork, so it made sense.
I had heard that it was depressing. A few times I heard the phrase "soul crushing" used to describe it. But for the first hour or so I felt like everyone must be a wimp. It was bleak, sure: really cute, sweet, innocent Bjork works her ass off to keep her and her 12 year old kid barely above the poverty line in the early 60s. But Catherine Deneuve played her French, motherly BFF and it didn't seem that bad. I still thought this after the ominous money tin is shown, as there's no way a movie is going to show a woman stashing all of her life's savings into a tin if something's not going to happen to it. And I still thought this after we learn that Bjork is going blind and the money isn't going back to Czechoslovakia to her father but rather to pay for an operation to cure that same blindness-causing trait in her son so that he'll never go blind, too. And EVEN STILL I thought this once David Morse started getting creepy and I figured he would probably rape her something.
Well, he doesn't rape her, in the literal sense. In fact, Dancer in the Dark is probably the most depressing movie I have ever seen about injustices done to an innocent woman that don't involve her getting raped. I still had hope that maybe it wouldn't be that depressing after she gets the money back and before she is arrested. I thought maybe she'd get away with it, or something.
BUT FUCK THAT. She doesn't come close to getting away with it. Snippets of her actions and conversations from before everything went to shit come back to haunt her big time during her trial (like talking about the importance of sharing later causing her supervisor to testify against her that she was a crazy Communist). What's almost worse is that I can totally understand where everyone is coming from. If your husband is robbed and murdered by someone whom you considered a close friend, whom your husband accused of trying to seduce him, and who's poor as fuck, it's easy to see why remembering certain conversations the way the wife does would lead her to believe that Bjork is cold and calculating.
BUT SHE'S NOT, OF COURSE. She is ADORABLE and completely innocent. The only time I really disliked her at all was her refusal to tell the truth in court because of a promise she made to the dead man that ruined her entire goddamn life. It reminded me of The Reader in that way (Kate Winslet, I know it sucks that you can't read, but don't let that get in the way of you being wrong accused of operating a hardcorely evil Nazi march thing). But still.
So Bjork is sentenced to hang, which to me is like sentencing your grandma to hang. Then there's this terrible, punch-you-in-the-face glimmer of hope that her sentence can be changed, that she won't be hanged at all! Which is quickly taken away once Bjork realizes the money she saved for her son's operation would be used to pay the lawyer and because SHE LOVES HER SON SO GODDAMN MUCH and SHE FEELS GUILTY FOR HAVING HIM DESPITE THIS BLIND THING she refuses the attorney and basically re-sentences herself to death so her son can have this operation, that isn't even life-saving.
This is when it's really all about Bjork that gets you. It's a really fucking depressing situation, no doubt about that. But to see cute, sweet, innocent Bjork sobbing from the loneliness of being in solitary confinement, sobbing herself to sleep the night before she's to be hanged, unable to stand up to walk to the gallows, sobbing and screaming about how scared she is to die, screaming her son's name . . . holy fucking christ. It's almost embarrassing, that's how intimate von Trier gets us with Bjork in her last moments. And then when she's happy after Catherine Deneuve tells her minutes before she's going to die that her son had the operation and he'll never go blind, it's just like . . . holy fuck, Bjork, you are so pure and innocent and you're about to die for no goddamned reason. And then the evil prison guards hang her without warning in the middle of her song.
Another part that got me about this was thinking of the son, of his fate after the movie. Can you imagine living your life knowing what your completely innocent and selfless mother did, just because she felt guilty for giving you life because she didn't want you to go blind? The guilt you would have. Christ. Christ christ christ.

Really good movie, though!

PB BALLZ

2010-04-16T08:36:00.002-04:00

I just made this. It's a recipe for peanut butter balls. They're pretty awesome.
Pluses:
- They taste good
- They take something ridic like 5 minutes to make. This is very important to me for breakfast since I am both sleepy and starving.
- They used just enough condensed milk to finish up the can I opened a couple of days ago to make horchata
- They used the last bit of my peanut butter that's close to expiring

In other words you should probably make these.

I have decided . . .

2010-04-13T02:56:00.003-04:00

I think I might hate music criticism. I don't know what it is about music more than movies or books or art or whatever, but it's definitely something.
I love all kinds of different music. Some for specific reasons but mostly because I like it. I know in discourse you have to defend why you like something, but I don't know. This makes me feel like a simpleton. Can't we just like what we like and dislike what we don't like? If there's music I don't like, I don't listen to it. I usually don't freak out if someone else is listening to it.
Recently a girl in the computer lab I was monitoring was playing music out loud (ie no headphones). This is against the rules but since I've never exercised my authority as lab monitor before PLUS we were the only two people in the lab, I was hesitant to say anything. First it was "Don't Stop Believin'" which is awesome. Then it was "Genie In A Bottle," which made me wince a little but then came that stupid Owl City Postal Service-rip off song. That prompted me to tell her to turn it off. That's the only thing that really comes to mind where I've hated on someone's music. And in that instance I can put some of the blame on the computer lab rules.
Maybe it's because music is so accessible. Movies and books take a certain amount of time commitment, so I can sort of see why people look to reviews. I don't know enough about art or art criticism to really have an opinion on it, honestly. But music I feel like you can just listen to. Interested? Listen! Don't like it? Stop! Like it? Don't stop!
Maybe it's easier for me because I've never really worried about music critics on a personal level. When I was in 7th grade my way-cool TWO DISC CD player held Radiohead's Kid A and NSync's No Strings Attached. I loved them both in different ways for different reasons but never really thought about it or thought that it might be weird or anything. I still have that same sort of thing going on now when my iTunes lists Animal Collective, Taylor Swift, Beach House, Jay-Z, and Vampire Weekend among my most played artists.
The last time I attempted to defend one of these artists against a HATER was when I was talking about people hating on Vampire Weekend. Dude in my class chimed in that he hated Vampire Weekend. I asked him how much of their music he listened to and he said "I heard 'A-Punk' on the radio once," "A-Punk" being a song off their first album and they have since released a second. That's fine. Hate Vampire Weekend, don't listen to them, don't care, WHATEVER. I don't care. It all just seems stupid.
I'm oversimplifying all of this and there's all kinds of shit that goes along with criticism that I am not even going to think about touching on because it's 3am. This is just something I think about a lot.

Benjamina, Age 8

2010-04-09T17:10:00.006-04:00

My best friend Ben Frisch has a fascination/obsession with child beauty pageants. It’s hard to say that to anyone who doesn’t know him without making him sound like the biggest creeper ever and/or a pedophile. But his love of child beauty pageants is strictly limited to its comedic value.

These pageant girls all have Facebook pages and Facebook fan pages made by their mothers. One of these girls, Taralyn Eschberger (who has appeared on TLC’s Toddlers and Tiaras) is holding a photo contest on her Facebook fan page. Ben decided to enter himself. He took a picture I took of him with his cat, Oedipuss, and glitzed it up. This is the result.

The original photo. Ben with Oedi on his head.

The glitzed version.

The final product on Taralynn's Facebook.

There are lots of reasons why I love Ben and this is just another addition to the list.

What's up, baby? :(

2010-04-03T01:38:00.005-04:00

This is Lewis Powell:

Also known as Lewis Payne. I personally think he's a total Hottie McHottersons. He died in 1865 when he was 21. How, you ask? He was hanged. Why, you ask? Because he was one of the conspirators involved in the Lincoln assassination.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

In an interesting turn of events, Powell/Payne is a character in the new movie Robert Redford directed, The Conspirator (which was also filmed here in Savannah . . . everything comes full circle!?!) and the guy who plays him, Norman Reedus is (in my opinion) way less hot than the real historical figure. How often does that happen?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying Norman Reedus (that's him up there) is ugly. He's hot, too! I just think the real dude was hotter. Too bad he helped kill Abe.

In anticipation of Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married Too?

2010-04-01T16:17:00.002-04:00

Wikipedia's entry for Tyler Perry's Why Did I Get Married is so amazing. Not only does it clearly point out the stupidity/incoherence of the script, but some of the phrasing used . . . it's just perfect.

The four couples, who are also best friends, converge on a house in the mountains for a week-long retreat that has become their ritual of sorts to help work out their marital problems and ask the question “Why did I get married?”. Though the couples have committed to being physically present for the week, some of them have not been emotionally present in their respective marriages for quite some time. The week is not planned out in a well-programmed sequence, so the events unfold somewhat spontaneously, beginning with their “adventures” in getting up to the mountain retreat.

The first couple, Dianne (Sharon Leal) and Terry (Tyler Perry), drive up together and argue most of the way because Diane (a lawyer) refuses to leave her job at the office. She takes calls on her BlackBerry or makes calls instead of talking to Terry.
The second couple, Angela (Tasha Smith) and Marcus (Michael Jai White), take public transportation. Angela constantly argues with Marcus and with anyone who dares to interrupt them.
The third couple is Sheila (Jill Scott) and Mike (Richard T. Jones). Sheila is made to deplane (because of her weight and the requirement to purchase two seats) and drive the long distance in the snow; while her husband Mike continues on the flight with Sheila’s single friend, Trina (Denise Boutte).
The fourth couple Patricia (Janet Jackson) and Gavin (Malik Yoba) arrive by limo cab. Their journey is not documented. However, right before they leave to go to the retreat, Gavin shows up to pick up Patricia at a lecture she was giving (she is the author of a book called “Why Did I Get Married?”) and artlessly dodges a question about her own marriage.

Dianne falls asleep not long after arriving with her BlackBerry close at hand, and when her secretary calls while she is asleep, Terry tells the woman not to call them while they are on their vacation. When Patricia arrives, she goes up to wake Dianne while the men bond over the wine that Terry has poured for his wife.

The sound of arguing signals the arrival of Angela and Marcus.

When Mike arrives without Sheila, the other wives berate him and Trina, for having left Sheila to drive alone. Sheila’s husband shows clearly that he does not care for his wife at all. Her friends try to reach Sheila by phone but get her voice mail only. Sheila is persistent to get to the retreat because she wants to make her marriage work. Providence leads her to Sheriff Troy’s (Lamman Rucker) office. Due to weather the roads have been closed for the night and she has no choice but to spend the night. That same night, Mike tiptoes—not unseen by Angela— to Trina’s bedroom. Sheila arrives at the retreat house the following morning with Troy in tow. She introduces Troy to the others and tells them she has invited him to breakfast. Troy fast becomes a threat to Sheila’s husband Mike, not because of Sheila, but because of Trina, with whom he is having an affair. Breakfast is a noisy affair with the arguing couples and Angela insulting Trina, the only single woman on the retreat, whom she instantly disliked.

Throughout the few days spent on retreat, there are spontaneous revelations. The infidelity of two of the husbands leads to a discussion by the men of the 80-20 rule. This rule states that most men get 80% of what they need from a marriage yet they tend to go after the 20% that someone outside can provide for them because it appears to be more to them when it really isn’t.

The secrets that come out in their heated discussions lead the couples toward a path where they can either choose to reconcile or to separate and the latter is what happens to Sheila and Mike. Mike makes it clear he is not attracted to his wife any longer and when it is revealed he is being unfaithful, he simply tells her he wants a divorce. The vacation is cut short when all the secrets come to light, as the couples suddenly decide they cannot stay in the house any longer. Sheila checks into a local hotel to recover from the shock of her divorce and the realization that Mike has drained her bank account. She is in a depressed state when Troy goes to visit her. He takes her up to a mountain where she cries and mourns the loss of her love and the only life she knew.

The other couples head back home. Patricia and Gavin are barely speaking to each other - he called her stupid because she didn’t strap their son in and he died in an accident - but he eventually forces her to face the situation. Patricia breaks down emotionally in his arms, they reconcile. Angela and Marcus are still fighting, especially when Keisha (Marcus’ ex girlfriend and child’s mother, played by Kaira Whitehead) shows up at Angela’s salon and disrespects Angela. Marcus finally stands up to both his wife and his ex, and then frightens Angela into realizing she is wrecking their life with her constant arguing by not showing up for a couple of days. Dianne and Terry fight again right before they leave the mountains because he had a paternity test done on their daughter. They fight again on Terry’s birthday at their home because Dianne forgot about his birthday, and did not tell Terry about getting her tubes tied. Terry tells her he is moving out. Patricia meets up with Dianne and Angela, moping over their husbands and gives them the counseling they need to get back on track telling them to make a list of the good things and the bad things their husbands have done. The men drown their sorrows in the bottle.

In the mountains, Sheila is settling into a new life working for Troy in the general store his father owned and getting to know Troy and realizing her own self-worth. The two of them bond.

Angela cooks dinner for her husband when she is finished with her list, but he suspects she is trying to poison him. Eventually she explains, they make up and set conditions of the new order.

Dianne goes to see Terry and begs him to come back after crying over her list. He plays with her head a little to get back at her, but they eventually reconcile too and all the couples converge on the gala celebration for an award that Patricia has received for her work. Dianne, Patricia and Angela are shocked when Sheila introduces Troy as her husband. Ex-husband Mike, although he is still with Trina, is very jealous of Sheila’s newfound bliss and tries to weasel his way back into her good graces, but she tells him to go enjoy his “20”, referring to the 80-20 rule.

Also worth mentioning is the Production and Development section:

Perry decided to take out much of the church and message scenes because wanted the film to be “on a whole ‘nother spiritual level—there’s a whole ‘nother connection to it.” He said his writing has improved since the play.

That last line is a lie, Tyler Perry.

Thoughts from my high school self part II

2010-03-22T20:04:00.003-04:00

I guess this is sort of self-centered of me. BUT OH WELL.
August 31, 2003: "I asked my mom why gay men tend to get AIDs more often than other people, and god I really didn't think she'd know. She explained stuff I really didn't need to know about anal sex and semen." Comment from Camille: A little while ago I asked my mom that question! It got really complicated and I changed the subject. The same thing happened like a month ago when my mom and I talked about sex changes. From now on, I'm going to avoid all thsoe topics with her.
September 7, 2003: I hope some terrible disaster occurs at Franklin overnight or tomorrow morning that would prevent us from going to school. That would be awesome. [WHOOPS.]
September 9, 2003: Okay, I could really go for some natural disaster targeted at Franklin right now. Flash flood? Fire, perhaps? [WHOOPS AGAIN.]
September 22, 2003: 82 years ago today the Band-Aid was patented. Just thought I'd let y'all know because Band-Aids are awesome.
September 26, 2003: Okay Robert Palmer and George Plimpton died. Geez. What the hell is going on?
September 29, 2003: Three months from today I'll be sixteen. Also, Elia Kazan died.
October 2, 2003: Today is the Radiohead concert and Gandhi's birthday. Cool.
October 22, 2003: So Elliott Smith killed himself. God. Why would he do that?? I can't stop crying!
October 27, 2003: When Chris Anderson read that my essay topic is why gay marriages should be legalized, he said I was disgusting. I told him to fuck himself. I was proud.
November 5, 2003: Last night I watched Rock the Vote, this thing on CNN that had the democratic presidential (sp?) candidates answering questions from younger people. Very informative, that was. Someone asked if any of them had honestly smoked pot. Some said yes (Howard Dean woo!), some said no, and the woman said "I'm not going to answer that,". Pleeeeease. That pissed me off. I don't want her to win.
November 24, 2003: Funerals scare me. A dead body over here, sobbing people over there.
December 6, 2003: my mom and I watched Marathon Man. Hella good movie, but now I'm more scared than I was already of dentists. And of Nazis.
December 23, 2003: I also guessed Tina Turner when Camille goes "MY HUSBAND BEATS ME!" [we were playing the charades part of Cranium)
January 30, 2004: He peer reviewed my essay in English and butchered it. On one of his comments, he wrote "Your essay is wonderful" but then crossed out wonderful and wrote "just ok". What the fuck man, I can still see the wonderful.
February 15, 2004: I'm really tired, but if I go to sleep, I'll wake up and it'll be Sunday, the day before school. And that sucks.
March 13, 2004: We also read Rolling Stone at WRBH. It was so funny, I had to read about Yanni and his album called ETHNICITY (come onnn) and she had to read about R. Kelly and his child pornography and his album named Chocolate Factory and we couldn't get through it without laughing. She really had to edit like six minutes of us just trying to do it and then just laughing our asses off.
April 7, 2004: Not too sure about that geometry quiz. When I turned it in, Mr. Taylor raised his eyebrows at it and I couldn't tell if it was a good eyebrow raise or a bad eyebrow raise.
April 9, 2004: Some woman who identifies herself as "mama" keeps leaving messages on my phone looking for "Sheldon" because his friend "Edward the mechanic" has been looking for him. I should probably answer the phone next time so she knows it's the wrong number. But I don't know, they're kinda funny. She just keeps talking until the message stops her.
April 11, 2004: Early this morning it stormed like crazy. It was sorta cool, but my bed is up against my window and I couldn't sleep, since it was so loud. It started hailing, too. I wish it had flooded Franklin. What a break that would be. [WHOOPS PART III]
April 16, 2004: And then my mom picked me up and we went straight to the theater. Then we saw...KILL BILL VOLUME II. My God. Words cannot describe how fucking amazing it was. Seriously, I can't even talk about it.
April 25, 2004: I couldn't figure out why my ice cream tasted weird, but then I realized it was because I had chewed mint gum not long before. I don't recommend doing that.
May 1, 2004: In English my class exploded into discussion about things such as infinity and zero. It was strange, funny, and annoying. I was talking to Brad after class, and we were the only ones in there, and as we were walking out, Luetz [my 10th grade English teacher] said, "Hey, you two" and we stopped and he said, "There are negative numbers in math, right?" I thought to myself that surely he was not asking some weird obvious question, and that it must have some underlying meaning. Brad and I looked at each other and I said, "Like...negative numbers?" and Luetz said, "Yeah, you know, less than zero?" and Brad said, "Yeah" and Luetz said, "Well, see, try to comprehend that" and I said "Well, we hadn't been arguing about it" and he said, "Oh, I know"
May 5, 2004: Josh described To Kill a Mockingbird as being so good, he wanted to punch someone in the face. And that's how listening to [the recording of the Radiohead concert in New Orleans] makes me feel.
May 8, 2004:I have a headache. But I'm blasting Radiohead through my earphones. "These go to 11".
May 10, 2004: I had to write five lines of "We Didn't Start the Fire" about 2000-2004 with Maurissa in history today. Oh that sucked. She insisted we put "Bennifer" as a major event of the past four years. Bennifer? At first I didn't even know what the fuck she was talking about. Comment from Sarah: What the hell is bennifer? My comment response: It's the whole Ben Affleck-Jennifer Lopez thing. And she spells it "Benniffer". COME ON.
May 18, 2004: [after renting all of Alias with my mom] Exam week was not a good week for Alias.
May 30, 2004: [from a survey] Anime: Freaks me out. Affirmative action: God, I thought this was the death penalty for waaaay too long.
June 28, 2004: I just stood in front of my microwave for five minutes trying to figure out how to heat up my muffin.
July 8, 2004: [from a survey] hidden talents?: Uh. I can detect flat Diet Coke by looking at it from afar. Favorite television show(s)?: The Daily Show and My So-Called Life you ideal bf/gf: Jude Laaaaaw. When's the last time you cried?: Yesterday. Over Freddie Mercury.
July 14, 2004: I flirted for about 15 seconds with a guy who ended up being fourteen. Man, when guys hit puberty, age gets so damn ambiguous.
July 17, 2004: At some points I found Harold [of Harold and Maude] incredibly attractive, and other times really creepy. Comment from Camille: I've been compared to Harold in one of those online test. My comment response: Makes sense, since I often find you incredibly attractive, while also being really creepy. Camille's comment response: Oh dude...that is me...IN A NUTSHELL.
July 27, 2004: Under Student Progress Dr. Beier [my Creative Writing teacher from ADVANCE] wrote: "Elizabeth was reluctant to participate in class discussions unless asked but her answers were always intelligent and her writing was elegant and quite ambitious. I feel that in her quiet way she made good use of her experience in class."
August 5, 2004: The sole purpose of this guy's journal is to POST SCARY PICTURES OF HIS WEIRD CIRCUMCISED-OR-SOMETHING-I'M-NOT-TOO-SURE-WHAT'S-WRONG-WITH-IT PENIS AHHHHHH.
August 5, 2004: I just spent an hour in my room with Rufus Wainwright, Franz Ferdinand, and lots of nail polish. [Also, I ended this entry with the following quote: "I am the biggest whore in Western Asia. Or Eastern Europe...there's not really a line there, pretty boy." I have NO IDEA where this is from. Google did not help.]
August 7, 2004: my mom donated blood and it made her really tired. They asked her if she's given someone drugs or money to have sex with her and she couldn't stop giggling.
August 16, 2004: My mom made me watch a lot of men's gymnastics because she's in love with the Hamm twins. She keeps talking about their red hair and how Morgan Hamm told Paul Hamm "You're up, pal".
August 19, 2004: Creative Writing is okay. I felt like an idiot, because she had this paragraph thing and said "Give a parable of this in good writing" and I had NO idea what the fuck parable meant. So I just wrote some bullshit thing about how you should know the meaning of the word 'parable' to be a good writer.
August 24, 2004: Last night I woke up and had a weird panic attack about cockroaches being in my bed. I was moving around really fast and hit my head on the wall. Things got kind of fuzzy after that.
August 25, 2004: I was on my way back to Kansas' room and I accidently walked into Dr. Hightower's. Everyone just stopped talking and looked at me and I just slowly backed out of the room. That was pretty embarassing. [GOD I remember this. It really mortified me.]

That was a lot, sorry. And I'm probably the only one who finds this the least bit amusing or interesting in any way. But reading all of this stuff is like TIME TRAVELING.

High School Livejournal.

2010-03-20T02:46:00.002-04:00

I have rediscovered the LiveJournal I kept in highschool, from summer 2002 to spring 2006. It's kind of amazing, in a very strange way. Some favorite insights so far:

Dec 10 2002: There's a French sophmore at Franklin who's name is Guillome. I've decided that's probably the coolest name ever.
Jan 20 2003: We got DSL and it takes like two minutes to download a song now.
Jan 25 2003: Is ABBA Swedish?
Jan 25 2003: I still haven't really figured out if I left my No Doubt tape in London.
March 9 2003: I don't even know if I'm for or against this thing with Iraq. More worried with passing math, really. Nuclear war is a scary thought, but so is being a freshman twice.
March 10 2003:
Things That Suck:
Life (occasionally)
School
Math
McNabb [my geography teacher]
Term papers on damn cities no one gives a rat's ass about
People who make fun of people
Food
Hypocrites
Hangnails
Ulcers
Ms. Lew [my algebra teacher]
Christina Aguilera
Fatness
Fuckin liars who tell me I'm not fat
Pop-up windows
Spending four years of your life liking someone who doesn't look at you
My stomach
Regular coke
When *69 doesn't work
Drugs
The name Eunice
Bloodshot eyes
The Backstreet Boys
When someone ignores you
Mass murders
Li Po
A shitload of other stuff
March 20 2003: So, apparently we're at war. That sucks. I got into geography fifth period and CNN was on with Baghdad on fire and I felt really bad that we bombed them, but oh well it wasn't my decision.
May 3 2003: Anyway, I guess I should attempt at my goddamn project. Sudan can go to fucking hell. [I had a big geography project to do on Sudan]
May 14 2003: When I was walking home this afternoon I found a rosary on the ground and I picked it up and took it home in case it's a sign from God. If it is, I don't know what the sign means, which makes me hope it isn't because if God is trying to give me a sign, I don't want to be the person who goes down in history as the Girl Who Ignored God.
May 29 2003: I just remembered...in exactly seven months I'll be sixteen!
July 27 2003: I LOVE The Flaming Lips and I LOVELOVELOVE The Big Lebowski!!
July 30 2003:

[

music

Sigur Ros - Track I

]

I talked to this guy who's friends with my Pentacostal cousin and he freaked out because I've never heard of Stained. Who the fuck is Stained? He hasn't heard of Radiohead, so fuck him.
August 2 2003: I'm going to send Ross Hull (of Are You Afraid of the Dark? fame) a birthday card. I had such a crush on him when I was like five.
August 7 2003: I'm liking this band Sigur Ros in a big ole way. Yep. Shit's gone down down to Chinatown with Daniel/Mike. Fuck them. I love this Radiohead album to death. I like Sigur Ros.

This is all pretty great. It's fun to hear my old self, especially at age 15. I just wish I could go back in time and tell my old self not to worry about 95% of the shit I worried about.
I am so glad I am not a teenager anymore.

FUCK.

2010-03-19T15:43:00.002-04:00

FUCK MY LIFE.

FUCK.

O.K. I don’t want to be a total buzzkill.

BUT.

I was looking at old pictures on Life’s website from World War II. When I saw this thumbnail, I thought it would be an American soldier holding up drawings he found from prisoners. But no. This is the caption:

Buchenwald Concentration Camp
Amer. soldier holding tanned pieces of tattooed human skin taken fr. the bodies of prisoners chosen to be killed by the inspector wife of the Nazi camp director, because she liked their tattoos & wanted to use them to make purses & lampshades.

Alright. Going to go throw up/kill myself now. Oh, Holocaust, you never fail to shock me! (but seriously I'm going to be haunted for about ever now)

God Mobile

2010-03-17T19:15:00.003-04:00

Every year in Tuscola (where we moved after Katrina and where I graduated high school and where my mom still lives) this booth is set up in the park during Fourth of July, a big deal in Tuscola.

I failed the test.

What takes up my iTunes?

2010-03-02T18:59:00.002-05:00

Right now, my iTunes library looks like this:

10,540 tracks
28.8 days of music
51.25 GB of music

These are the artists I have the most of. It's a good list:
1. The Beatles (207 songs)
2. Radiohead (157 songs)
3. Animal Collective (139 songs)
4. Paul Simon (118 songs)
5. Bright Eyes (80 songs)
6. Death Cab for Cutie (74 songs)
7. Panda Bear (70 songs)
8. Cat Power (68 songs)
9. Sigur Ros (62 songs)
10. The White Stripes (58 songs)

Celebrity deaths I've cried over

2010-03-02T18:27:00.002-05:00

1. 1997 - Princess Diana (I was 9)
2. 2001 - George Harrison (I was one week shy of 14)
3. 2003 - Elliott Smith (I was 15)
4. 2008 - Heath Ledger (I was 20) (cried hardest)
5. 2008 - David Foster Wallace (still 20)

This is what happens

2010-03-01T02:12:00.002-05:00

When I put iTunes on shuffle:

I.
1. The Beatles - Doctor Robert
2. KC & The Sunshine Band - That's The Way I Like It
3. The Beatles - Love You To
4. Girl Talk - Shut The Club Down
5. Radiohead - The Gloaming
6. Feist - Mushaboom
7. Eagles of Death Metal - Speaking in Tongues
8. Cat Power - Water & Air
9. M83 - Highway of Endless Dreams
10. The Notwist - Boneless

II.
1. Sigur Ros - Untitled 1
2. Spaceman 3 - Lord Can You Hear Me?
3. Alex Gopher - The Child
4. 311 - Don't Stay Home
5. Elton John - Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word
6. The Beach Boys - California Girls
7. Kiss - Shout It Out Loud
8. The Big Pink - Dominos
9. Rilo Kiley - Go Ahead
10. Fever Ray -Seven

III.
1. Tom Waits - Ol' 55
2. Kate Bush - Aerial
3. The xx - Basic Space
4. Sam Cooke - You Send Me
5. Third Eye Blind - Blinded
6. Jackson Browne - Running on Empty
7. Deerhoof - +81
8. Bat for Lashes - Sleep Alone
9. Panda Bear - Winter in St. Moritz
10. Wavves - Cool Jumper

Movies That I Love But Also Make Me Want to Kill Myself

2010-02-28T17:12:00.003-05:00

- Atonement
- Revolutionary Road
- The English Patient
- Scenes from a Marriage
- The Little Mermaid
- Steel Magnolias
- Requiem for a Dream
- Schindler's List
- Dead Man Walking
- Titanic
- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
- Sophie's Choice
- The Notebook
- Million Dollar Baby
- Brokeback Mountain
- Old Yeller
- The Green Mile

Nice Anna!

2010-02-19T12:36:00.008-05:00

Anna Sui Fall 2010 RTW:
Not only are the clothes and shoes pretty fucking cool . . .

But homegirl used both Animal Collective's "I Think I Can" from Fall Be Kind and Atlas Sound + Noah Lennox's "Walkabout" from Logos!
SWEET.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEN!!!

2010-02-12T11:50:00.003-05:00

Today is the 23rd anniversary of the birth of one of my grandest bestest friends in my personal history:
BENJAMIN PAUL "FATTY" "JUMBO" FRISCH

Last year I posted this video on his birthday when he was in France and because I still think it's HILARIOUS I'm posting it again:

To make it more appropriate for today I'm going to add this little gem, too:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEN!

Better than Jesus

2010-02-11T00:13:00.002-05:00

I would like to dedicate this video to Charlie:

Fuck the Grammys

2010-02-02T16:14:00.003-05:00

Well, the Grammys are pretty much a joke. I haven't actually watched them since the days of NSync and Britney Spears. And I didn't watch them this year, either, but the next day I looked over the nominees and winners. And . . . wow. I want to do some comparisons real quick.
Spin's Top 5 Albums of 2009:

Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion
Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz!
Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
Grizzly Bear - Veckatimest
Girls - Album

Spin's Top 5 Songs of 2009:

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Zero
Phoenix - 1901
Girls - Hellhole Ratrace
Animal Collective - My Girls
Kings of Leon - Use Somebody

Rolling Stone's Top 5 Albums of 2009:

U2 - No Line on the Horizon
Bruce Springsteen - Working On A Dream
Phoenix - Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix
Jay-Z - The Blueprint 3
Green Day - 21st Century Breakdown

Rolling Stone's Top 5 Songs of 2009:

U2 - Moment of Surrender
Jay-Z & Alicia Keys - Empire State of Mind
Bruce Springsteen - Outlaw Pete
Miley Cyrus - Party in the USA
Phoenix - 1901

Pitchfork's Top 5 Albums of 2009:

Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion
Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca
The xx - The xx
The Flaming Lips - Embryonic
Raekwon - Only Built for Cuban Linx . . . Part II

Pitchfork's Top 5 Songs of 2009:

Animal Collective - My Girls
Dirty Projectors - Stillness is the Move
Phoenix - 1901
Bat for Lashes - Daniel
Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks

Top 5 Selling Albums in US 2009:

Taylor Swift - Fearless
Beyonce - I Am . . . Sasha Fierce
Nickelback - Dark Horse
Twilight Soundtrack
Hannah Montana: The Movie Soundtrack

Top 5 Songs in US 2009:

Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow
Lady Gaga - Poker Face
Lady Gaga - Just Dance
Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling
Taylor Swift - Love Story

Grammy Album of the Year 2010:

Taylor Swift - Fearless - Winner
Beyonce - I Am . . . Sasha Fierce
Black Eyed Peas - The E.N.D.
Lady Gaga - The Fame
Dave Matthews Band - Big Whiskey and the Groogrux King

Grammy Song of the Year 2010:

Beyonce - Single Ladies - Winner
Lady Gaga - Poker Face
Maxwell - Pretty Wings
Kings of Leon - Use Somebody
Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me

What this tells me is that the Grammys are not for the best, they're for the best selling. Not all year-end lists are going to agree, true. And Phoenix did win Best Alternative Album (among nominees Yeah Yeah Yeahs, David Byrne & Brian Eno, Death Cab for Cutie, and Depeche Mode). And I love Taylor Swift. I'm not saying every nominee/winner is bad.
But even the more nuanced categories were filled with artists that no one cares about anymore, or at least are not making exciting, new, different music (except for the drones at Rolling Stone, also quickly becoming [or maybe has become?] irrelevant): Stevie Wonder (Best Male Pop Performance), Seal (Best Male Pop Performance), Bon Jovi (Pop Performance by a Group with Vocals), The Fray (Pop Performance by a Group with Vocals), Hall & Oates (Pop Performance by a Group with Vocals), Madonna (Best Dance Recording), Bruce Springsteen (Solo Rock Vocal Performance), John Fogerty (Solo Rock Vocal Performance), Prince (Solo Rock Vocal Performance), U2 (Rock Performance by a Group with Vocals), Green Day (Rock Performance by a Group with Vocals) . . . I could go on and on.
Again, I'm not saying these artists are bad (personal opinions aside). What I'm saying is: where was Animal Collective, Grizzly Bear, Phoenix (aside from their one nomination), Yeah Yeah Yeahs (aside from their one nomination), Dirty Projectors, Flaming Lips, etc etc? This all can be written off as me being an indie hipster, I know. But wouldn't it be nice if the Grammys were exciting? Relevant? Showcased more than big sellers?
Just a thought.

CELEBRITIES WITH CATS

2010-01-28T17:19:00.038-05:00

Thank you, Savannah.

2010-01-23T17:17:00.007-05:00

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

2010-01-17T23:18:00.002-05:00

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

2010-01-10T14:17:00.004-05:00

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:

2010-01-03T16:50:00.003-05:00

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

2010-01-01T00:43:00.003-05:00

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.

I could be worse!

2009-12-29T14:02:00.015-05:00

I had an e-mail exchange today with Rob Carmichael, the graphic designer that designed:
Animal Crack Box (Animal Collective) Bitte Orca (Dirty Projectors)

Merriweather Post Pavilion (Animal Collective) Water Curses (Animal Collective)

Red, Yellow, & Blue (Born Ruffians) Strawberry Jam (Animal Collective)

Peacebone Single (Animal Collective) Person Pitch (Panda Bear)

Gulag Orkestar (Beirut) Feels (Animal Collective)

And he told me that the font used for a lot of the Animal Collective stuff (seen above on Peacebone and also on the inside of Strawberry Jam as well as a load of posters and stuff) was based on Dave Portner's (Avey Tare) handwriting. He said there's a program that generates fonts based on handwriting samples you submit. They decided not to use it after Strawberry Jam.

SO WHAT I'M SAYING IS: for all those people who say my handwriting is illegible, that may be true (or not) but it's not as crazy as Dave Portner's. That's all.

I'm sick so this is how I'm spending my 22nd birthday.

2good2betru??

2009-12-23T23:57:00.003-05:00

Nope. It's really them.

I LOVE THIS.

2009-12-21T17:58:00.001-05:00

A Winning Miss.

There goes the last of my hope . . .

2009-12-08T18:53:00.002-05:00

How deviantART describes itself:
The world's largest online community of artists and art-lovers!

And they might be right, as the site as over 10 million members. Luckily for all of us, deviantART does not leave out writing.
If you mosey on over to the poetry section, you'll find the top rated poem ever posted on deviantART.
And here it is.
Downfall
And in this dark harvest of season
My life has completely lost reason,
For which or against to decide.
All lost in a savage and endless, bleak tide

In sadness and in kindness
In light and in darkness.
In a boat made of hope
I shall sail to tomorrow,
In a winding hurricane
Made of treachery and sorrow.

There’s a spear, endless, and colossal spear...
Piercing, slashing though my head.
Starting somewhere in heaven,
Ending somewhere in hell.
Fighting, burning, crying, crashing.
Are the armies within.
In my head they are all thrashing.
On the heaven’s and hell’s whim.
To be light or to be darkness.
A perpetual array.

It’s not merely my choice,
But the choice of the way.
It’s an option of the voice,
It’s a thin line of gray.

Is it a choice forced by fate,
Is it a pre-set time and date?
Or a choice to which I myself sway?
But here’s our story anyway….

“Nothing that I do will matter.
As all things will merely shatter!”
All my hopes thus darkness scatter,
As it shoves me a decree.
As it simply wants to win,
And to just take over me.

“Have a purpose, bend the world,
Act out upon your wishes, and ______ will love you a lot”
That’s what light then says to me,
Because it wants to set me free.
Winning slightly over me.

“But this cage of gold so shiny, it will shield you from untrue
And protect you from the odd,
Nothing inside its walls can harm you,
In your own little world!”
Whispers darkness in my ear,
“Only me you should now hear,
And with me you will survive,
And with my help you will strive,
And achieve your paradise,
In illusion’s disguise!
With no hardships and no pain,
Every task you will then tame!”

The light sternly yells at me:
“These are lies as they can be!
If your world is built on lies,
Then yourself you will despise.
And illusion’s paradise,
Will fall down on you.
Crashing, burning, dying, crying are your dreams
And uprooted is your tree!
And no longer will you see
Where to go or what to be!
When you face your final trial, what will the judge say to thee?”

“These are lies and mere dogma,
Based upon the fear of death!”
Darkness then just yells at me:
“You have your right to disagree!
Make a lovely pact with me.
I will offer you salvation,
No more fear or deprivation!
If you would me then just hear,
You have nothing at all to fear.
Since we do not have a soul.
There’s nothing with which to pay a toll!
Sign here, over there.
In the name of pleasure and hope.
In the name of revolution,
Let your path be just a gentle slope!”

Its arguments are winning over me,
And thus with darkness I agree,
And so I sign the decree,
And with a treacherous and jolly glee
Darkness enshrouding, standing over me
“With the light here once and for all undone
You and I shall become one!”

And so, I enter into the storm of shadows.
As pitch-black as the depths of sea.
Become a mere castaway, amidst the weary crowds.
Consumed by somber, ashen clouds,
With heavens frowning over me.

A storm of ice and fire, dancing all around with a glee.
A ring chrono-storm encapsulating me.
Just like a stove turned up to high degree.
Tearing up roads, buildings, picking up debris.
Into the air it takes me.
My wings have turned to blackened ash
The pacifying, freezing fear taking over
My heart is covered in frost
And all I wished, is to be free…

I am ashamed for my art and generation.
And because I'm sure you are, too, here's a picture of Charlie watching Mad Men with me to ease your pain:

Oh, Animal Collective!!!!

2009-11-23T20:33:00.005-05:00

Radiohead and Animal Collective: two bands I can really count on. For different reasons, but they do have the one big reason in common: THEY ARE ALWAYS AWESOME.

Ever since Sung Tongs came out in 2004, Animal Collective has followed the pattern of: release LP, release EP, release LP, release EP. And by EP I don't mean singles (although they do that, too), I mean EPs: little baby jewels that aren't full-length albums, but are not just records of tossed-aside B-sides. Not only that, but every year there's something new:
Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished LP in 2000
Danse Manatee LP in 2001
Hollinndagain Live LP in 2002
Campfire Songs LP in 2003
Here Comes The Indian LP in 2003
Sung Tongs LP in 2004
Prospect Hummer EP in May 2005
Feels LP in October 2005
People EP in 2006
Strawberry Jam LP in 2007
Water Curses EP in 2008
Merriweather Post Pavilion LP in 2009
It's still 2009, but MPP came out in January and leaked on Christmas 2008. Which makes one wonder about the next EP . . .
Oh but here it is!! Fall Be Kind. Digitally out now, for real real out December 8th.
Does it sound anything like any other EPs or LPs they've done? Not really. Hints of Feels and MPP, but it's clearly it's own thing. This is one of the things I can count on Animal Collective for: always changing. Don't get me wrong, I think there is a place for a band that can consistently make good music without changing up their formula too much. But how much Animal Collective changes but remains AWESOME, ALWAYS, ba-lows my mind.
What I'm saying is that if you have ANY brains or want to remain/become my friend, it's pretty imperative you sink into Fall Be Kind. I'll break it down a little for you:
1. Graze - A.) Perfect opener. B.) Avey Tare and Panda Bear both sing, which I love. C.) THERE ARE PAN FLUTES.

2. What Would I Want Sky - A.) Did not cut out intro that they played live when I saw them back in June, but they did clean it up and make it even better. B.) Has first ever licensed Grateful Dead sample C.) Has one of my ALL-TIME favorite Animal Collective lyrics: "I should be floatin,/But I'm weighted by thinkin."

3. Bleed - A.) Avey Tare's voice goes nuts and it's BEAUTIFUL B.) Panda Bear does something I love: becomes a crazy/sorta scary angel voice that haunts the background of Avey Tare

4.) On A Highway - A.) Maybe one of the most coherent Avey Tare songs (lyrically) B.) Sweet sweet sweet breakdown C.) Has the line "Jealous of Noah's dreaming" which is JUST CUTE.

5.) I Think I Can - A.) The Panda Bear show

I am in love. AND LOOK AT THIS PICTURE. SERIOUSLY:

CRAZY FOR FISH BOWLS!

2009-11-20T10:08:00.003-05:00

Photo used for Hanes' 50/50 Crewneck Sweatshirt:

Is a prop so necessary that you have to make it . . . a fish bowl?

Do not watch while eating

2009-11-18T18:35:00.002-05:00

These three things are hard:
1. Finals
2. Being sick

3. Watching Salò

So I'd be willing to go ahead and say that all three at once is triple-hard. And it's true.

I first saw Salò in high school for more or less the same reasons I read Lolita in 8th grade: I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. Lolita was beautiful, mesmerizing, forever rewarding. Salò made me vomit. Literally.

It's not a bad movie. The director, Pier Paolo Pasolini, was an excellent director and extremely smart. He knew exactly what he was doing and he did it better than anyone else before or since. And I am including in this:
Alfred Hitchcock, for Psycho and Rear Window
The Creators of The Blair Witch Project
Tod Browning for Freaks
Gore Verbinski for The Ring
Michael Powell for Peeping Tom
Michael Haneke for Funny Games
. . . among others. These are all great films. Scary, moving, thought-provoking. They all, in some way or another, have to do with watching. The consequences of watching, of being a voyeur. Haneke gets pretty meta with it, but they're all, in a way, a statement on the role an audience plays. That is, if these terrible things happening on screen are so terrible, why are you watching it?
With Salò, Pasolini took that idea and made a movie that is the ultimate test in how-much-can-you-standness.
Rape, murder, eating feces (own and other's), eating food laced with nails, nipples and penises being burned off, tongues cut out . . . all of this is in Salò. And I mean IN Salò. In front of you. Pasolini doesn't turn the camera away when he's supposed to. You want to watch what he produced? Then fine, you're going to fucking watch it.
It's brilliant, the way he takes film to a new level this way. So smart. And after 34 years no one's come close to touching him. And it lends itself to feminist film theory, which focuses so much on scopophilia, of voyeurism, of women being watched by men. Which in turn lends itself to be a perfect candidate for my final paper in Literary Criticism, which is why I proposed this topic, a feminist critique of Salò, to my professor weeks ago to much enthusiasm.
And it's why it's so hard to write. I'm sick. Whatever I have, a cold I think, has made my gag reflex go berserk with sensitivity. I can't watch Salò for more than ten minutes at a time without salivating in preparation for vomit.
Which makes this paper particularly difficult. In 24 hours it WILL be written. It WILL be turned in. Finals WILL be over. I WILL be free for weeks.
But right now, I'm just being mad at Pasolini and trying to write about Salò from memory as much as possible.

Puts Pounds and Inches of Weight On Skinny Figures

2009-11-10T00:12:00.003-05:00

A celebrity-endorsed ad from 1969 . . .

And from 2008 . . .

I'm living in the wrong year.

terrors of my childhood

2009-11-05T05:36:00.002-05:00

I've been sort of obsessed with this recently in that way that you can't help but scare yourself, like watching scary movies. I'm sure there's a logical explanation(s) for it, but it freaks me out.
In a roundabout way, thinking about being freaked out suddenly made me remember this memory that I honestly think I repressed in some way. It was of some movie that I had seen on TV and all I really remembered about it were:
A.) Bloody children
B.) Parents cradling their dead, bloody children in a school
C.) A mother was the one that came and killed the kids
D.) A bloody guy crawling around on a floor
E.) it scared the absolute fucking shit out of me.
I don't know when I saw this movie but I know I was young and it was at the height of my childhood nightmares and inability to sleep.
Thinking about that, I set out to find this movie. It wasn't that hard. It's Murder of Innocence. I just watched it on Youtube. As a movie, it sucks. Super dramatic music, weird editing, not the best ever writing (although, based on the real case of Laurie Dann, pretty accurate). But when it got to the end, when all the shooting starts, it still sort of made my heart drop in fear. As it turns out, I naturally remembered stuff wrong, as the shooter wasn't a mother of any of the kids and the scene that I seem to remember so vividly of parents cradling dead kids isn't in there at all, so I guess I made that part up in my head. But the bloody children in the classroom, the bloody guy crawling across the floor (which, when I watched it, was almost disturbingly accurate with the way I remembered it) were all there. And was still fucking scary.
The movie aired in 1993. In the later half of 1992, Pearl Jam's Jeremy video premiered. Because of my sister's obsession with Pearl Jam, I also had a weird 7 year old's crush on Eddie Vedder and liked (or at least pretended to like) their music. But that video . . . you all know the one I'm talking about, with the kid and the gun and the classroom and blood, absolutely scared the fucking shit out of me.
How did I see all of this somewhere between the ages of 6 and 8? I don't know. Probably sneakiness. I was always trying to sneak into watching stuff I wasn't supposed to, most notably Kids in the Hall and Jaws (that second one was a big fucking mistake, jesus). Sort of along the lines of my absolute determination when I was in sixth grade to see A Clockwork Orange, which I did see in sixth grade, and which was also a huge mistake. Now as a near 22 year old, I love the movie, think it's brilliant and funny etc etc. But when I was 12 . . . it was just a big scary rape movie.
In all, I'm really glad I watched that TV movie again. I was actually really scared to because it's late and I'm in the apartment by myself (as always) but I was sincerely hoping that it wasn't as scary as I remembered. And it wasn't, and it was sort of amazing to compare the filmed images to the images in my mind, from how spot-on my memory was to how I completely made up stuff.

It also helps to watch something scary like that with the lights on and Charlie snoring next to me.

music goodies

2009-11-03T12:17:00.002-05:00

I want to be cool and say something like "here's what I've been spinning lately" but that would imply that I'm either A.) really hip or B.) at least have some knowledge of how to use a record player (which I don't).
Either way, here are some good songs in modern digital-age mp3 format:

Christmas Island - Twenty Nine

Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me (WHAT. SUCK MY DICK.)

La Roux - Bulletproof

Au Revoir Simone - Shadows

Au Revoir Simone - Shadows (Tanlines Remix) (both versions are awesome and sound completely different)

Washed Out - Feel It All Around

Neon Indian - Deadbeat Summer

Monotones - What Would I Do

I guess you could call it fate.

2009-10-20T21:58:00.004-04:00

Found a notebook with
Elizabeth's Second Diary
written on the cover with Sharpie.
Here I am reproducing an entry detailing my intense love for a boy in my class, Robert. He turned out to be a huge fucking prick, by the way. Also, all misspellings are accurate to how I spelled in my diary, not typos. Twelve years ago, (almost to the day) when I was 9 years old:

10/17/97 11:37 p.m.

Well I got him back. I was moved behind him. But, today I walked into class and I think my heart stopped beating. Robert was moved to the front, by Lauren, which is good. But I can't help but feel lonely. Robert is second in the row, I'm fifth. I remember when he sat his pack down on his desk, he glanced at me and frowned alittle. Although being a frown, it comferted me. He actually felt the same as me. The morning looked up in Music Class. My friends Lauren and Kelly were determened to get me leveld with him. At first, it was pretty much handled. I was first in the girl's line. Robert was first in the boy's line. But I turned my head. And when I looked back, he was gone. He was way behind with Randy and Alex. Luckily, so were Kelly and Lauren. They let me cut them so I was once again set. Then he decided he didn't want to sit there. So he moved ahead. We moved ahead. I finally ended up sitting next to him. I was also saved by Mrs. Radcliff's mood. She gave us activity sheets to draw and color. So we got out of our seats and sat on the floor, using our chairs as tables. His crayons spilled, we both made horrible drawings and laughed through the whole class. I guess you could call it fate. Or luck. Or maybe even love. We were laughing and playing. I whatched were my hands went, hoping to get through to him. But I held his hand once again for a split second. Stupid Alex spoiled the moment. I could have ringed his neck. Things also started to look up that afternoon in resource. It was I.E.P. day. First we had to all this stuff that I could care less about. But, we acidently bumbed into each other. I was finished. I was also alone. Robert only had a little to finish up, so I decided to wait for him. I had a plan. I asked Mrs. Wells if I could play Oregon Trail, our fave computer game. It took alittle while to get the computer ready, so he suggested that he and Taylor would do puzzles instead. This was the last thing I wanted. But, with luck, we did it.

Well look at me. Pining over a boy who didn't like me back. Obsessing, stressing, over-analyzing. Man, was I silly!

grandest literary discovery of our time

2009-10-16T23:43:00.004-04:00

Ladies and gentlemen:
Today I found my first ever published piece of writing. It appeared in the November 1998 edition of Harte to Harte, the Alice M. Harte Elementary School Newsletter, page 5, in "Classroom Action" Reports:

STAYING BUSY IN 5TH GRADE
by Elizabeth Dixon
In Mrs. Majeste's 5th grade class, we have been doing many things. We are still doing "Flat Stanley" and, so far, in 1st place is Abby Podratz, in 2nd is a tie between Morgan Ramey and Michael Reiser, and in 3rd is Lauren Woodcheke. Everything will get turned in on October 30th. In Math, we have been studying adding and subtracting whole numbers and decimals. Like most years, the second chapter in math is easier than the first for most people. In English, we are studying singular and plural possessive nouns. In Reading, we are reading stories about animals. In Social Studies, we are busy working on our state projects. And in Science, we are studying sugar and nutrition. On October 30th, we will have a Halloween party with chicken nuggets and nachos, courtesy of Ms. Jan Lore. I hope that everybody is doing good and enjoying the year. Happy Halloween!

Now, I'm biased, but my column was pretty much the best one. Adam's favorite line is "In Reading, we are reading stories about animals," as it really showcases my minimalist style. I personally like my reflection (perhaps subtle metaphor) on math. I wish I knew what the fuck "Flat Stanley" was, though.

O.K. and here's an mp3 post

2009-10-06T01:49:00.002-04:00

The following have been stuck in my head for quite some time for various reasons, though they have one common denominator: they're all awesome:

Diamond Rings - All Yr Songs

Wavves - Cool Jumper

Department of Eagles - No One Does It Like You

Phoenix - 1901

Javelin - Vibrationz (from the album Jamz n Jemz, such a good album title as well as cover art)

Simon and Garfunkel - Bookends Theme (made me cry as a kid)

Pictureplane - Goth Star

Jackson 5 - The Love You Save (general message: don't be a slut, guys don't like damaged goods)

Bat for Lashes - Daniel (about Ralph Macchio, no joke)

Bat for Lashes - Daniel (lo fi) (this version is so good for being a gangsta around Savannah with Sascha's bass turned all the way up)

Atlas Sound - Sheila

Beach Boys - Make It Big (thanks to Ben, Jeff, and Jenny Lewis)

Air - Sing Sang Sung (aforementioned)

Cat Power - Half of You

Murs - Better Than The Best

Phoenix - Long Distance Call

Phoenix - Love Like A Sunset (Animal Collective Remix) (might as well be AC b-side. deakin's back, y'all!)

sing sang sung

2009-10-05T12:33:00.000-04:00

I had such a weird dream . . . all I really remember about it was my locker. It was about my locker I was assigned my first day of high school in New Orleans and had until I left for Katrina. I never went back to it to get whatever I left in there, actually. Books, notebooks, photos, ponytail holders, and at least one can of Diet Coke is what I can remember. It's weird though, I have my own apartment and my own car, both of which I love and decorate the way I want. Yet I still miss and feel nostalgic for my high school locker?
This makes me happy though. Air is so reliable for being awesome. And relaxing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuSPRu4lzag

BACK

2009-09-04T01:55:00.003-04:00

Tragedy struck a few weeks ago . . . Thom, my beloved Macbook, passed away unexpectedly. It was pretty devastating.

On the bright side, I have come out on the other side of weeks without internet or a word processor or music to be here now, on a brand new Macbook Pro, complete with Snow Leopard. It closely resembles a beautiful diamond.

And so now summer is winding down, and it has been an absolutely insane summer. Good and bad. I'm really just excited to graduate and write (not necessarily in that order).

PICTURES, RECENT

2009-08-12T11:01:00.018-04:00

Dash came back to Savannah, took an obligatory nap on the Funk Junction couch
He also opened the refrigerator and dropped a coconut cream pie (not sure how that happened exactly)
While I was being influenced I put on Dash's hat and my head is obviously bigger than his because I think it cut off the blood to my brain?
Tandy and I went to a bar, found a box of chocolate muffins hanging out in City Market
Charlie loves Dash Dash and Elgin being dudes watching Wheel of Fortune
Sleeping with my niece, a very good sleep accessory
Charlie and Calvin had a slumber party!
A mosaic of Nelly at a restaurant in New York
In New York, Tandy, Sara, Adam, and I hung out with Cynthia McFadden doing her Nightline thing
Ben sporting a candle ash soul patch In a photobooth in Hell's Kitchen with Tandy and Will Brumley
And finally, Ben has a lot of life lessons for Coleman and Jack

CAN'T GET OUT OF MY HEAD

2009-08-02T16:22:00.002-04:00

The following have been stuck in my head almost constantly for at least two weeks:

Atlas Sound and Noah Lennox/Panda Bear/My Love - Walkabout

St. Vincent - Actor Out of Work

The Dirty Projectors - Stillness is the Move

Lykke Li - Breaking It Up

Matt & Kim - Daylight

da bell jar

2009-07-21T23:59:00.002-04:00

Ever since I got back from New York, while unemployed, I've kept up a pretty strict regimen of reading and writing. I've tried to alternate between reading new books and re-reading old books that I read when I was a lot younger. The last one I finished was The Bell Jar.
The copy I read was the copy I first read from when I was 12. What made this so good are all the great notes and markings I made. Such as underlining a passage and writing "WOWEE!" because I was fucking 12. Or underlining a passage about categorizing people not based on gender, age, social status, etc, but rather on whether or not they were virgins, and writing "Thank god," because I specifically remember being comforted by the fact that I was not the only one who thought this. It was pretty cute getting little glimpses into my 12 year old self. What was also weird was how when I first read it, I hadn't had my epic mental collapse yet, but I think I still felt a connection with some of the things she said, like there was a part of me deep down that sensed what was going to happen eventually.
And then there's this passage, from Chapter 20:
"To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is the bad dream."
And then a few pages later:
"I wasn't sure at all. How did I know that someday -- at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere -- the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn't descend again?"
Re-reading The Bell Jar was scary and emotional. I knew that the book was good. But now that I've been through what Plath/Esther Greenwood went through, it's absolutely terrifying how completely spot ON Plath was about what happens. It doesn't matter that it was the 60s and I was in the 00s or that she was 19 and I was 17, it's the exact same thing. And when she gets (successful) electroshock therapy in the mental hospital and suddenly feels the bell jar lifted, and is amazed at how much clearer the world is . . . it is identical to the way I felt, also in the mental hospital, when my antidepressents kicked in for the first time and I could just breathe. I could stop crying and breathe and think.
So if you ever wonder what it's like to go nuts, get better, and still live in fear of going nuts again, read The Bell Jar.

plane adventures

2009-07-10T01:27:00.002-04:00

July 2nd - Early morning flight going from Savannah to Dallas . . .

Was seated next to lone traveling boy, who at first glance, I placed around the age of 13, given his short height, cracky voice, lack of Adam's apple, and hairless legs. He struck up conversation with me almost immediately, which I tried my best to wiggle out of, though I admit I probably could have done more had I not expected whatever he was going to say would turn out to be gold (though I still think I underestimated it).
He made a first glance age judgment on me, too, which I suspect put me in the 10th-12th grade range (especially when, while waiting at the gate to board the plane, a crew member called for all unaccompanied minors to board first, and the woman sitting next to me nudged me to remind me that they had called for me). He stumbled around with his words a little bit when I told him I was a senior, in college, after he had asked for my opinion on AP classes, and said that he was "Uh, well I mean I'm 15, about to be a sophomore, you know."
I was reading Lolita (ironic? misleading on my part?) and he said, "Hey, if you like reading so much, wanna read this book for me and do my book report?" It was Gulliver's Travels. When I turned him down he kept talking to me ("Where I come from, we shoot what we want - but not with lethal weapons,") while I kept ignoring him. A baby cried a few rows ahead of us and he said that SURELY that baby was HIGH perhaps on MARIJUANA and that to SHUT IT UP the best tactic was OBVIOUSLY to give the baby ALCOHOL although he was quick to inform me that when HE drinks alcohol he actually gets LOUDER so mayhaps that's not the BEST solution.
These comments, along with the throwing in of a "fuck" more often than even I feel is necessary made me a little suspicious that he was flirting with me. I never think anyone is flirting with me, I'm not the kind of person who gets looked at and then is sure that I'm being flirted with. But it didn't seem completely crazy that if anyone was going to flirt with me, it would be a prepubescent (or at least brinkpubescent) boy.
I sat on the aisle seat, he sat on the window seat, and about halfway into the flight he tapped my knee (which he had already grazed a few times searching my seatback compartment for the in-flight magazine that he clearly had a copy of in his own seatback compartment) to indicate needing to get out of the row to use the bathroom. I scooted and manuevered accordingly, not ever really taking my eyes off my book. But I could sense him standing in front of me, instead of moving toward the back to the bathroom. I looked up at him, glanced really.
"Want to join me?" His intentions, at this point, completely baffled me and my first thought was that perhaps I had completely misjudged this person, maybe he was handicapped in some way and expected my assistance.
"What?" I said, leaning forward a little and squinting, looking for signs of gimpiness.
"You know, join me in the bathroom. You know." About halfway through this sentence was when I realized what was actually happening was this child was propositioning me to have sex with him in the airplane bathroom. Immediate reaction: laughter.
"Are you kidding?"
"Well I mean I thought we really hit it off here." I'm going to be honest. Not often do people hit me up for sex, or even hint at wanting to hit me up for sex. This leads me to consider every offer, at least for a second, despite grossness/consequences, mostly out of fear of it never being presented to me again.
However. This was the first time that I can recall being so outrightly offered a sexual encounter and without even the tiniest nanosecond thought of consideration. Instead I sort of stared at him, said "No," and kept reading. Essentially, that ended that.

july forecast

2009-06-29T14:34:00.002-04:00

As of right now, the high is supposed to be 97 degrees when I arrive in Austin on Thursday. This is not good. However, the high is supposed to be 85 degrees when I get to Tuscola next Tuesday, and that's not too bad.
I am basically going on a flight extravaganza:
(this is what happens when you must book cheapest flight, ie lots of layovers)
Thursday: Savannah-Atlanta-DFW-Austin
Tuesday: Austin-Chicago-Springfield (then 90 minute drive to Tuscola)
Tuesday next: (90 minute drive out of Tuscola) Springfield-Chicago-Atlanta-Savannah

So many planes. I will be gone a total of twelve days, which translates to twelve days of no Charlie. I am very sad about this. And twelve days without Savannah friends. But . . .

it also translates to five days of Robert and a week of mom/Katie/new lil baby/kittens at home. So it will be worth it. But I will be exhausted when I come home. And really really really hot.

In other news not related (yet intimately related, really) to me, the new Animal Collective video for "Summertime Clothes" is out and it is totally goofy but at this point I'm not sure they could do wrong.

And as a special bonus, the Page 6 blurb from the day we had lunch in Michael's in New York:
http://www.nypost.com/seven/06192009/gossip/pagesix/sightings_174956.htm

Just got this Facebook message:

2009-06-24T20:07:00.002-04:00

[caption] i recently cut my hair off

hi my name is michael. im a nice sweet genorous and loving person ill b 20 this week. i have a 19 month old son im single, and im looking for a a nice woman who is very respectible, independent but also not afraid to ask for help when needed. just someone who is beautiful in the inside. im in the process of becoming a police officer. email me and we can get to know each other a little better. my email is xx@gmail.com. im really just looking to find my true love

I should feel flattered that for some unknown reason this person felt compelled to send this to me. Instead I feel self-pity because of the kind of person I apparently attract (this message is not a first of its kind, for one example, recent terrible dates for another example) which leads me to have a feeling of insurmountable bitchiness for being so judgey.

Oh well!

NEWYORKNEWYORKNEWYORKNEWYORK

2009-06-20T23:11:00.000-04:00

Listen friends:
So much happened this past week in New York that I do not even know where to begin, how to describe it, etc etc. I learned so much, experienced so much, laughed a lot, cried a little, drank a lot, got lost a lot, was in awe of everything most of the time and basically it was unbelievable and amazing. I don't even have more than a handful of pictures from the week - very strange for me - because I was so enamored with everything that was happening that I continually forgot to document it in any way other than in my Moleskine.
Now I'm in a writing frenzy. And it feels so good.

Whoa, I've got a niece now?

2009-06-13T19:46:00.000-04:00

It's true, I do indeed have a niece. Natalie Lillian Zimmerman. That's 9 syllables. I haven't met her, but I will in a couple of weeks. She seems tiny tiny and I'm actually genuinely excited to fulfill my role as "cool aunt," which I've always wanted over "[any adjective] mom." A couple of pictures:

I have not spent any amount of significant time with a child under the age of 1 (maybe under the age of 5, even? no one comes to mind) so it should be interesting.

Church on a Monday

2009-06-12T21:34:00.005-04:00

Disclaimer: Corny stuff/NERD ALERT ahead:

I'm not a religious person and I guess I never have been. Even when I was too young to really be self-aware enough to know whether or not I was religious, I hated the idea of church and Sunday School. So early in the morning . . . so goddamn boring . . . and I specifically remember feeling sort of silly the entire time for whatever reason. Though, again, if I were religious I'd probably think church was cool (or at least bearable).
That being said . . . Monday night I stood right in front of a chanting figure towering over me and white linen cloth, so unbelievably grand that I could hardly look straight at Him at first . . . all three figures made me stand with my mouth open in awe, made me sway, made me choke up, made me feel so content and O.K. and made me the most consistently happy since January. There were moments when He flipped up His wet hair and His sweat landed on my skin, when I heard Him mutter things to Himself ("goddammit" "1, 1, 1, O.K."), when He knelt closer to my level and I could feel waves of His body heat. And even better, there are THREE He's in this situation, raising and lowering their voices together, moving together in sync and sometimes too fast to even be seen. And the He that towered right above me . . . I stared and stared at Him, absolutely loving Him and every single move He made, bewildered by how He could possibly do what He was doing, humbled by being so physically close to Him. I really was worshiping Him, all of the Hims, and for the first time I think I might have understood how some people can really lose themselves and go crazy in the presence of a power that they give themselves up to.
Basically what I'm saying is . . . Monday night's Animal Collective concert was unbelievably amazing, best concert I've been to. There was a moment in Brother Sport, which, naturally, seemed to go on forever, where I could literally feel Panda Bear's voice pumping through my heart (I can't emphasize enough how close I was to him) and I got this feeling, sort of lightheaded, that I could only describe as, "open." To be absolutely completely honest, the last time I had that exact same feeling was when I lost my virginity, still less than a year ago. It was weird, I would never have even been able to remember that exact feeling from then if that moment in Brother Sport hadn't happened. I could not care less how melodramatic/dorky/corny all of this sounds because the entire experience was so amazing, I don't know how else to describe it.
Geologist (far left of the stage)

Avey Tare (middle of the stage)

Panda Bear (far right of the stage - right in front of me)

Absolute Porn Faux Pas

2009-06-06T23:05:00.003-04:00

Advertising something on a box of porn . . .whether on the front of the box or the back of the box, that is nowhere to be found anywhere in the actual pornographic video, is really a terrible crime against all of humanity and should be regulated and stopped now, for everyone's sake.

When Jon Penn and I start our porn box business (he designs, I write descriptions) this will never ever happen.

P.S. Our company is to be called DixonPenn. It works on so many levels.

Forecast for June + Graduation

2009-06-02T16:11:00.004-04:00

June:

8th-9th: St. Petersburg with Ben and Coleman for Animal Collective

10th: Move Goblin Manor couch into our apartment, so no more sinking into our couch and getting poked with stray springs

11th(ish): Sister has a baby

14th-20th: New York with Adam Davies + 3 other writing students

22nd: David Sedaris book signing

LONG AWESOME MONTH.

In other news, many of my friends graduated. Including, but not limited to: Ben, Allie, everyone at Goblin Manor, Colleen, Katie, Lesley, Kendall, Dash, Tandy, Dan Hood, Charlie (boy, not cat)...basically a shitload of friends. Bittersweet, really.

Therapy?

2009-05-23T01:47:00.003-04:00

Quick list of modern voices I find soothing:

- Thom Yorke

- Noah Lennox

- Wayne Coyne

- Jónsi Birgisson'

- Jeff Tweedy

- Sia Furler

- Rufus Wainwright

- Jenny Lewis

- Hope Sandoval

- Ed Droste

- Owen Pallett

- Kevin Drew

- Ben Gibbard

- Chan Marshall

- Tracyanne Campbell

- Kevin Griffin

- Ben Folds

- Maria Taylor

- Andrew Bird

all for now.

Oh, a curb

2009-05-18T23:29:00.011-04:00

I hit a curb today and got a flat tire. The real tragedy was that I was meeting everyone for dinner after Nonfiction III and was subsequently hungry as fuck. I was rounding around a corner of a square onto Bay Street when two large tourists stepped out right in front of my car. I stopped and turned a little, hit the curb, and heard a pop. I don't actually know what happened. A valet from a hotel across the street ran up to my car and I rolled down my window.

"You got a flat tire?" He wasn't asking me, but he raised his voice at the end of the sentence enough.

"Are you serious?"

"You hit that curb?" So I pulled into East Bay Inn, called AAA, and got really angry. The whole ordeal took close to two hours and also decided to happen on the one day in May in Savannah when it decided to get cold and I had to stand outside in said cold while my tire was changed. I instantly thought the tire-changer was cute until:

Tire-changer: Whoa, how old are you?

Me: 21.

Tire-changer: Oh man, I thought you were like 17.

Everyone thinks I look 15!!! This is a great improvement, really.

Also the last Goblin Manor party occurred on Saturday. Theoretically it was bittersweet but it was actually so fucking fun.

Choice PIXXX:

GoblinManor4Ever

Friends and AC

2009-05-14T00:42:00.006-04:00

Look at these friends!!!:

A BOBCAT KITTEN AND A FAWN.

COLEMAN AND BEN AND CHARLIE.

DASH AND CHASE AND BRIAN AND JON PENN.

Also on Monday NPR's All Songs Considered streamed an Animal Collective show in DC. Some people (Ben) don't want to listen to it because of possible spoilers, but may I just say it was . . . amazing? They played Banshee Beat, the first Animal Collective song I ever heard. If I heard that live myself, I would probably cry. Especially the way they played it. This is where you can hear it:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103811402

Besides making me feel so happy, it made me infinitely more excited to see them in June. I didn't think it was possible to be more excited than I already am for it but AC is just full of surprises you know!

Also also might be making a breakthrough on that license plate business. Details when I get them. Adam Davies (novelist/professor/sucker) made a bet with me that there are regular, personal license plates that don't begin with an A or a B. Oh how it would sting to lose a bet to one of your undergrads.

Watergate Pt. II

2009-05-07T00:34:00.002-04:00

O.K. you heard it here first: I am about to blow this shit out of the water.

Recently I have noticed an alarming trend with license plates. I know it seems like any trend with license plates can't be all that alarming, but this is too much. I started noticing that every Georgia license plate I've seen (Chatham County and otherwise) that is a personal vehicle that does not begin with numbers either begins with an A or a B.

Not included:

The aforementioned plates that begin with numbers

City/state vehicles

Disabled plates + any other specialized plates

That sounds like a lot of exclusions but really, it's not. Back to the issue at hand, why do all of these plates begin with an A or a B? Why not any other letter? Why do other states have a complete range of letters?

Well I went to the DMV. Yeah, I did. I stood in line with all of the angrys in order to find out. And what did I find?

"What?! I don't know! What are you even talking about?"

"I mean personal vehicle plates in Georgia. All beginning with A and B."

"You don't have any other business here?"

"No."

"Next in line please."

That was my conversation at the DMV.

My next plan of attack was via the telephone where I might come off as less crazy. I called the state department of motor vehicles, which directed me to several other offices. I ended up calling all the DMVs in the county and I either got referred to another office or got the response of, "I don't know." Until I got this response:

"Oh, we're not authorized to discuss that information."

Oh. We're not authorized to discuss that information. I see. I see. What information? Why wouldn't they, people who work in the office of the DMV, not be authorized to discuss it?

I need to find out. Maybe there is a vast statewide (nationwide? worldwide?) conspiracy that I am on the brink of uncovering. Maybe this is the start of the sequel to All The President's Men. All I know is, I'm determined. If for anything to prevent me from obsessively scanning over license plates while I drive.

I wish I were friends with Sting right now

2009-04-29T23:59:00.002-04:00

This has always really bothered me. In the song "Don't Stand So Close To Me" by The Police there is a lyric that goes:

Her friends are so jealous

You know how bad girls get

Does he mean Bad Girls? As in "Bad girls, you know how they get." Or does he mean, "You know when girls get jealous, it gets bad." Lately I've been thinking it's the latter but growing up I always thought it was the former.

I think about this a lot. If I ever meet Sting, I will ask him this.

Also, unrelated, but am I the only one who thinks that swine flu just kind of seems like flu flu? The name sounds much worse, as I, like most people I'm sure, would not want to contract any illness with the word "swine" in it. But from what I've read (which is not a lot) it's bad for kids and old people and people with weak immune systems and has "flu-like symptoms." Is that because it's, how do I put this, the flu? I don't know. If I die from SWINE FLU everyone can make fun of me during my funeral's after party (not during the funeral, though, that's just in bad taste).

Office Life + Cherry Pie

2009-04-21T15:59:00.004-04:00

One interesting thing about working at Savannah Magazine is that it's my introduction into office life. The set-up reminds me of a cross between The Office and 13 Going on 30 (underrated). There are unfinished pages tacked on the walls along with pages from past issues and different, current magazines filled with flags and circles. I also have to keep all of my projects and information about the rest of the year's issues under lockdown to avoid leaking information to the magazine's competition. A little more high stakes than I had expected.
I have my own cute little office space, complete with desk, computer, and highly-complicated phone. I hate this phone. Cell phones don't work in the building, as it is hurricane proof (ha!) so I have no choice but to use my office phone. It's cute because I have my own extension, but the novelty ends there. I have to dial a million different numbers to dial out of the office, a million more to dial out of state, and if I pause between digits for too long the phone automatically calls whatever extension the numbers I've already dialed make up, meaning I call some random person in the office (of 300+ people) and either have an awkward exchange or hang up (I go for the latter, usually and unfortunately). My editor suggested I personalize my desk, but that feels too awkward. Instead I've sort of adopted my drawers as something akin to my high school locker: filled with Diet Coke along with earphones and maybe some M&M's sometimes.
I'm currently working on two articles right now, one really dry and one actually very interesting (at least the research is). I'm basically going to have a Fat Cat resume after this internship is over.
In other news, I had probably my best visual-based critique yesterday, magically in 3D Design. It was for our second project, which was to make a food product out of clay. When they had my professor, Ben made a frog, Allie made matzo, and Chase made a box of Oreos (which Coleman disappointingly tried to eat during a Goblin party a couple of years ago). I made cherry pie. The fact that I hate cherry pie was an advantage as I wasn't overcome with hunger every time I worked on it. Although it did cause me to have Warrant's "Cherry Pie" stuck in my head for the past two weeks or so. I made a whole pie with a slice cut out, and then a slice with a scoop of ice cream:

The project went over really well. For the first time in a non-writing critique, I did not want to kill myself and not only that I, wait for it, was actually proud of my work. Sounds silly, but it was worth something.
I also enjoyed celebrating 4/20 last night with Allie, Ben, Jon Penn, and Dash along with Charlie and Calvin (Charlie's favorite holiday happens to be 4/20) and lots of snacks and Tetris Attack. I have the scratches (Calvin) and red eyes (not blinking during video gaming + other factors) to show for last night's activities.

robots and tears and missed connections

2009-04-08T00:17:00.005-04:00

I'm in 3D Design right now. Our first project was to make a kinetic toy entirely out of paper. I made a robot.

His hands and feet move and he stands on his own. It took approximately a million hours but I feel good about it.

Charlie, Robot, Me.

In other news, a missed connection was put out for me. This happened last year but this time it's not a "hey you're cute," one.

Sad

It says:
animal collective bumpter sticker - w4w (downtown sav)

hey i saw you a few weeks ago in a white car around wright square. you were crying. i remember thinking you had a weird bumper sticker but couldnt remember it. i saw you again yesterday, i think on bull street and i made it a point to look at your car's bumper stickers and remembered it was an animal collective one i was thinking of. anyway i've never seen anyone crying so hard like that in their car and it really stuck with me and who ever you are i hope things are better for you now then when i first saw you. try and keep your chin up and remember even if you feel really alone you arent.

In case you hadn't guessed, I drive a white car with an Animal Collective bumper sticker. And I do cry in my car moderately often because I kind of forget that people can see in. If this isn't proof that I am just sad, sad, sad then I don't know what is.

recent successes

2009-04-04T00:34:00.002-04:00

I started my internship at Savannah Magazine. It's cool; I get my own cubicle/desk/computer/phone extension/email/official signature line. It's all very office-y and official. It's a good mix of fun and boring and I appreciate that Annabelle, the managing editor whom I'm interning for, wants me to get real experience, not just get coffee for people.

I always submit stuff to The New Yorker, usually poetry because they accept it unsolicited and via e-mail. And I always get rejected a few weeks later. This cycle happens every few months. My logic is that the worst that can happen is they not publish me, which is what happens anyway. I always get the same rejection e-mail that's along of the lines of, "Thank you for submitting, unfortunately . . ." etc etc. But Wednesday I got a different e-mail. It caught my eye first because it was a Re: e-mail when usually it's a new e-mail with a subject something like "Your Recent New Yorker Submission." When I opened it, I re-read it about a million times. Not only did they use my name ("Elizabeth, . . ."), but it wasn't the standard rejection e-mail. It said that my poetry was accepted for the first tier of submissions, that they enjoyed reading my work, look forward to hearing from me in the future, and that they would let me know if my work would be accepted for publication. In my mind, The New Yorker is the tippy top of publication (mostly because David Sedaris is a frequent contributor), so the fact that they even typed my name nearly made me scream.

There's a few reasons that this is awesome. There's the obvious reason: it's the goddamned New Yorker. Then there's the fact that I recently did not get into SCAD's student literary journal, Artemis. My professor assured me that it was because my work is too vulgar/funny/real/good, which I appreciate hearing, but when the New Yorker takes note of some of the same work I submitted to Artemis, it makes me feel a million times better (and also is a "fuck you" to Artemis). Then there's also the fact that I personally have felt over the past few months my poetry has hit a new plane. That sounds pretty artsy, I know, but it's true. It's probably due in part to the overwhelming despair that has taken over my life the past few months, but I know it also has to do with my maturation as a writer. And finally, all of the work I submitted to the New Yorker is about (some more directly than others) my relationship/breakup with Robert. There's that idea that if those pieces get published it would be a sort of personal triumph, but even more than that it's comforting to know that through everything I was able to create these little pieces that people, from friends to classmates to professors to editors at the New Yorker, have been able to identify with, appreciate, and (on some level) enjoy.

I knew it

2009-03-28T03:13:00.002-04:00

"Better to have loved and lost/Than never to have loved at all," is a line from a poem so overused it has transcended itself to phrase-status, which automatically lends itself to Cliche. That being said, for as long as I can remember knowing that phrase (I first remember reading it somewhere when I was 7) I have thought it was absolutely, completely false.

A million people have told me the phrase is true and a million more will continue to tell me. Most people tell me this along with the guarantee that "someday" I will learn. And I realize I am young with less life experience than people who believe in that saying. But I still maintain my original standpoint that to have loved and lost will always be completely worse than never loving at all. After Robert, after Professor Fucker, after Conor, after etc etc etc, I feel that my belief only gets stronger and stronger. So there.

[sand]traps

2009-03-25T19:33:00.002-04:00

Some people like sand. Most people don't notice when the ground is particularly sandy or grainy for whatever reason. Most people don't have much of an opinion on sand at all because why should they?

When I was a baby/toddler/kid I would vomit instantly if I touched sand or salt or anything similar, be it with hands or feet. Over time I've learned to control the insta-vomit, but I still have to avoid it. I've been to the beach. Besides the heat and salt water and overall boredom that I feel comes with a beach trip, there is the sand. Usually if I walk on sand now, I can sort of prep myself mentally and gingerly walk and just feel extremely sick. Being older I'm never really in a situation where I have to be on a beach. Although now, of course, I'm in enrolled in the required (for writing, mind you) course of 3D Design, which includes a mandatory field trip to Tybee Island to participate in SCAD's Sand Arts Festival. How does one explain to a teacher that they can't go on a mandatory beach field trip because if they touch sand they throw up? Or should I say, how does one explain this without sounding like a lying jackass?

Today a terrible thing happened. My Nonfiction III class was moved to Wallin Hall. I've had one class there before during the winter of freshman year. When it was cold. When I didn't wear sandals. As it is now springtime I wore sandals today, really cute ones, too. I got to Wallin Hall, expecting class as usual. But when I stepped out of the car, my foot sunk.

I don't know what makes me sicker in these situations: the sand or the dread that comes along with knowing vomit is imminent - not only imminent, but imminent when you're already a minute late for class and will inevitably be made later. I tried to walk as carefully as I could through the parking lot, which suddenly looked fucking huge, but naturally I still got sand in my shoes. The wave of sickness and the nearly uncontrollable need to kick my feet came over me and by the time I walked into class (last one in), red-faced and with a sour throat all I could say was, "The parking lot is full of sand." Luckily my professor was already in the know about my situation and though everyone laughed, I put my stuff down as fast as possible and ran (on my tiptoes so as not to clank down the hall) to the bathroom and just threw up. And throwing up is terrible; the watering of the eyes, the clenching of your abdomen. I felt sick all of the rest of class and could barely pay attention, though we luckily watched a movie. Of course my professor still called on me for something and I was so focused on keeping my stomach settled and trying to keep the feeling of graininess out of my head that I couldn't answer his question with anything besides "I'm trying not to throw up."

I hate throwing up, but there are certain situations that are better than others. When I'm hungover or have food poisoning, I at least feel productive by throwing up. But because of sand? Sand? It's just stupid and useless, a really good way to ruin my class period and the rest of my day.

recent

2009-03-19T01:37:00.006-04:00

Coleman, Goblin Manor, High Life, and hot dogs

Jon bought me a beautiful headdress in Istanbul

Coleman and Charlie cuddle time!

River Street on St. Patrick's Day

Giving Charlie a belly rub

really germany?

2009-03-14T19:41:00.004-04:00

Really?
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,612684,00.html

reasons charlie = me

2009-03-10T22:00:00.003-04:00

Over the past few weeks I have discovered that Charlie is basically me, in the form of a male cat.

- Charlie is always ready for sleep. I have long thought my mutant power was the ability sleep at any time in any location and I think Charlie shares this power. I know this seems like average cat behavior but here's an example to illustrate what I'm talking about: yesterday a fly was in my room. Charlie saw it. He was laying on my bed and when the fly flew by him he lifted his paw to swat at it. He missed (the fly was about a yard above him) and fell back. He fell asleep like this within a minute, on his back, one paw extended.
- Charlie likes to cuddle and hold hands. It's almost impossible for me to lay down in my bed without Charlie coming up to snuggle down next to me. He usually ends up sleeping next to me, facing me, head on my pillow, with at least one paw extended out and on me. Also, if I have an open palm, he'll put his little paw into it.
- Charlie is security-conscious. If I leave during the day, when I come back he's on my chair. But if I leave at night, he's always under the bed when I come back. When I walk into my room, he meows from under the bed. If I don't answer him, he stays there but if I do, he comes out.
- Charlie might have OCD. I take medication for my OCD so that I am not constantly shaving my legs but I still have symptoms that come up. Charlie's food is in a dual container, with food on one side and water on the other. Instead of doing that, though, I just put food in both sides and put his water in a separate bowl. Charlie will not start eating the food out of the right side until every piece of food is eaten from the left side. I watch him do this again and again and even tested it by putting a couple of pieces of food in the empty left side. He saw them, stopped eating from the right side, ate the pieces on the left, and then continued on the right.
- Charlie does not have a keen sense of space and distance. Anyone who has seen me park knows that I am not great in judging distance and space. This is evidenced by me parking within inches of the car in front of me, with about 10 feet between my car and the car behind me. I am also bad at judging when it's appropriate to cross the street (in a car or on foot) because I can never quite seem to tell how far away a car is. Charlie seems to be unable to tell where the bed ends and the floor begins. He has fallen off of the bed twice (that I know of) and I nightly have to catch him from rolling off. This always happens in his attempt to get comfortable, which involves rolling over and over again.
- Charlie likes Animal Collective. I play a lot of music in my room that Charlie does not respond to whatsoever. The one artist he does respond to, though, is Animal Collective. The first time he did this I thought it was a fluke. I played a live version of Brother Sport and each time Avey Tare whooped, Charlie sort of squeaked/meowed/whooped back. I played it again and he did it again. When I play Animal Collective or Panda Bear he almost always makes a noise back at the song. So far his favorites seem to be Brother Sport and Bros. Maybe he identifies with brotherly songs?

And just an image to leave you with: this is a picture I took the other morning of Charlie. His face was about three inches from mine. This is what I wake up to almost every morning.

things I hate in porn

2009-03-05T00:32:00.002-05:00

I love porn. Most people know this about me: friends, acquaintances, classmates, professors. I somehow mention to bring it up whenever I can because it's really a great thing. And a truly great thing about porn is there is something for everyone. A single bit of porn, whether it's a full-length movie, an online video clip, a picture, a story, etc usually tries to incorporate more than one element. Example, why have a naked girl giving a naked guy a blowjob when you can go ahead and have a girl in a schoolgirl uniform giving a blowjob to a guy in a suit? There you've got the original goodness of a blowjob with some teacher-student fantasy thrown in for good measure. And really, a porn film is not that different from a standard film. It's hard to find a movie that is completely without fail strictly one genre: a horror movie without any comedy, a comedy without any poignancy, things like that. So it only makes sense that a porn film incorporates more than one genre, it's just that a genre of porn isn't quite the same as a genre of standard film. No matter the plot (if there is one), your average run-of-the-mill heterosexual porn film will almost always contain: oral, vaginal, and anal sex along with a lesbian scene (if the movie knows what it's doing).
I watch a lot of porn. That and everything else being said, watching a lot of porn comes with stumbling across things I don't like nestled in something larger that I do like. I know these elements aren't just there for the hell of it; they do something for somebody. Just not me.
In no particular order, here are some things I hate coming across when trying to enjoy porn:
- Heel sucking. I really don't mind shoe licking. It's not the greatest thing ever, but it doesn't take me out of the moment. What does take me out of the moment is heel sucking. I understand the phallicness of a stiletto heel seems hard to pass up, but when I see this (almost exclusively in lesbian scenes) it just kind of grosses me out. It's a heel, so you know it's not that sanitary. And it's pointy, which just seems dangerous and much more gag-inducing than a penis. It's just kind of gross.
- Giant fucking (usually plastic) shoes. Having sex with shoes on is not unheard of. In porn it can actually be hot (a cheerleader still wearing sneakers comes to mind). But those are only certain situations. In other situations, most situations, having sex while wearing giant, ugly, painful shoes just does not make sense. Wearing them at all hardly makes any sense, but having sex with them on? That's just stupid and implausible, really.
- The wearer of a strapon moaning in pleasure from the strapon getting sucked. This used to just be really confusing to me. I wasn't sure how a strapon worked and I assumed there must something hidden on the other side that, when there is pressure from the attached dildo being sucked, provides pleasure. And maybe that is true on some level, in that the pressure can be pleasureful for the wearer. But it's not a blowjob. It's a strapon, not a penis. Seeing it get sucked might be hot, and yeah sure maybe you moan a little or whatever because of the hotness. But moaning and thrashing around as if it was actual oral sex instead of oral sex performed on a piece of plastic attached to you? Stupid.
- Holding onto a neck during a blowjob.This is an element that I've seen come up in both straight and gay porn and always bothers me. Granted, I know that a good number of people think it's hot, especially since it's usually accompanied with rough sex. But having personally been on the chokee's end, seeing it just reminds me of how shitty it feels to have a hand around your throat while you're extremely preoccupied with a penis going down said throat already.

That's all I can think of right now. I'm sure I'll think of more some other time, but I've done enough damage for one post.

PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN

2009-03-03T11:53:00.013-05:00

BECAUSE THIS DUDE IS PREZ:

but in all seriousness, I'm in love.

this was strange

2009-03-01T22:40:00.002-05:00

I was turning the corner in Wal-Mart today and ran my cart into another woman's cart. I do this a lot as I am generally not the most coordinated person, especially when trying to navigate a place devoid of space and time with a giant metal contraption. I said, "Oh, I'm so sorry!" and she said, "That's okay!" As we passed each other she held out a $10 bill and said, "Here you go." I knew I had a ten in my wallet and, though I hadn't opened my purse, assumed it had fallen out. I said, "Oh, thanks, did I drop this?" and she just looked at me and said, "No, but I can tell you are a child of Jesus." This really caught me off guard. I said, "What?" and she just nodded knowingly and said, "God bless," and walked away. I checked the bill for drugs or disease-ridden needles but it appears to be a bona-fide $10 bill. I felt a little guilty at first, since I am most definitely not a "child of Jesus" or blessed by God, but it's not like I ever said I was. I was just doin' my thing, trying to get cat litter for Charlie. It's not going to get me to find God all of the sudden, but at least now I have $20 instead of ten.

we're fucked

2009-02-27T10:56:00.002-05:00

This giant stingray was caught in Thailand:

Stats:
771 pounds
7 ft long
7 ft wide
10 ft long tail
What this tells me is that no human on the planet could possibly survive a rumble with this thing. So when glaciers melt and everything floods these guys will pretty much rule the planet. I hope I'm dead by then.
In other news, March 12th is the last day of Winter Quarter 2009. Fucking thank god. This has possibly been my worst quarter ever. Not that everything will magically change during Spring Quarter, but at least all of this bullshit will be behind me (kind of).

MEET CHARLIE

2009-02-23T01:43:00.002-05:00

I met him while volunteering at the Humane Society. I started going everyday just to see him so last week I did everyone a favor and adopted him.
He's super chill. His tail is mangled and he has a little piece of one of his ears missing back from his hardknock life days on the streets. He is obviously a lover, not a fighter. One of the best parts about him is that when I play certain Animal Collective songs loudly, he meows back to Avey Tare's whoops. We're soulmates.

take it to the MAX

2009-02-21T16:24:00.002-05:00

I mostly like this because it looks like the 1950s version of people in the future:

look at this chandelier made of gummi bears

2009-02-19T23:59:00.001-05:00

seriously, just fucking look at it:

stuff michael jackson is auctioning off

2009-02-17T23:57:00.003-05:00

includes:

FUCK. I WANT IT ALL.

2009-02-17T00:33:00.004-05:00

Being sad would be much easier if I weren't intelligent. Intelligence fucks up sadness with other layers, mostly (for me) of guilt and self-loathing. But if I were more stupid, less self aware then I wouldn't have any of the guilt or self-loathing; so maybe easier isn't the right word. Pure would be better. If I were stupid I could be purely, plainly sad. But as it turns out, I cannot be sad without being followed by the guilt-ridden fact that some people are worse off than me. It's nearly impossible for me to not counter any sadness I feel with an immediate reminder of other situations. Dropped my keys on my foot? At least I'm getting an education. Textbook got lost in the mail? At least I've never been raped. Got pulled over for crying so hard I swerved between lanes? At least my mom is awesome. Got fired? At least I have plenty of clean clothes and shoes. Best friends out of the country for a few months? At least I don't have credit card debt. Fainted and got a black eye? At least I'm not a drug addict. A child says I'm ugly? At least I know how to read. Was in love with a boyfriend who didn't love me back and subsequently moved 1,000+ miles away seemingly without warning or any emotion? At least I'm not starving to death.
All of those things have happened to me, nonstop, since the very first day of 2009. They've all been bad, ranging from frustration to nearly crippling despair but its pretty hard to nurse these ranges of terrible along with the sense that they're not that terrible.
It's not hard to hate something you don't understand, and I will be the first to admit that I do not understand myself. I'm not a complete mystery; there are certain things that I do know and I actually like some of them, but there's enough dark matter to scare me into hating myself. It's the easy way out. But with all of that unhappiness and loneliness and guilt there's only so much I can handle at any given time.
My life will get worse than this. That's easy for me to imagine. It will get better than this, too, though that's harder for me to see. I've cried a lot. But I have to get through it, and by myself, no matter how badly I want to drag him into with me. What other choice do I have? It's just another shitty turn my life has suddenly taken and I just have to deal with it. But this is the kind of situation feminists point to. It will make me sadder. It will give me more writing material. And it will be one more item to take off the "At least" list to add to my guilt.

happy birthday to a bffl

2009-02-12T09:25:00.000-05:00

my mom is so cool

2009-02-10T12:53:00.002-05:00

I just received this e-mail from my mom. The hippest mom ever.

Subject: gotta love You Tube!

WILCO & Fleet Foxes!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmZfV6tqbTU

--
"Knit on, with confidence and hope through all crises."
Elizabeth Zimmermann 1910-1999

that knitting quote automatically goes on every e-mail she sends out. just in case I forget she's my mom when she sends me e-mails like this.

recently seen on church signs

2009-02-09T22:08:00.003-05:00

tybee island, georgia:

"A lifetime on your knees gives you steady footing."

savannah, georgia:

"Forbidden fruits make the best jams."

I am in love

2009-01-25T21:40:00.002-05:00

I wrote this

2009-01-23T22:29:00.000-05:00

http://www.scaddistrict.com/?p=1234

my girls video

2009-01-21T13:26:00.000-05:00

New Animal Collective:

Scary pink mouths! Flying Doritos! Panda Bear and Geologist and Avey Tare!!

To all of my boys in France:

2009-01-09T14:25:00.000-05:00

It's my birthday

2008-12-30T00:18:00.000-05:00

I'm 21.

That's the first drink I bought myself. It's a mango martini. I couldn't order it with a straight face. But it was reallyyyyyy good.

CHRISTMAS MIRACLE

2008-12-25T21:22:00.000-05:00

The new Animal Collective album has leaked. Several people have asked me what I've gotten for Christmas...and nothing else comes to mind. Who gave this to me? The fates? Some dude off the Animal Collective message board? Yes and yes. Some songs I already heard, either live at Pitchfork, bootlegs, or leaked tracks. But nothing, NOTHING beats it all together, in all of its produced glory.
I pretty much gave up on Christmas back when I was 8 or 9, when I found out Santa Claus wasn't real. But I see now that perhaps Christmas is worth celebrating after all...

caught in the act

2008-12-17T15:23:00.002-05:00

There's one red light camera in all of Savannah, and it CAUGHT ME. And then sent a letter to my mom containing the proof.

thanksgiving

2008-11-28T00:11:00.000-05:00

my boyfriend woke me up early to drink coffee and watch the macy's thanksgiving day parade with him. although it was way too early and the parade is dumb and his house is always really cold, it was very sweet and it made me happy.
and then we got to go to funk junction and have delicious, delicious food! (I made potatoes and pumpkin pie)
allie made the turkey, undoubtedly the best turkey I've ever had:

OBAMA

2008-11-05T09:21:00.001-05:00

THIS DUDE JUST BECAME OUR NEW PREZ:

I have been very unhappy lately, but now I am SO happy.

art school has taught me

2008-08-04T22:14:00.001-04:00

that jon wolfe and I are very talented. dedicated to coleman scott engle: