que veux-tu

today's title comes from the yelle song of the same name:

warning: i have absolutely no idea what's going on in this video, but i love the song anyway.

other things which i'm listening to:

it's taken me forever, but i finally have studio-quality mp3s of this and every other song they haven't released, which, as you may imagine, makes me pretty happy. 

i got a new phone yesterday! it's just an update of my old phone, and also the same phone that both of my parents have (so telling them apart? basically impossible), but it's still somewhat exciting. 

other than that, nothing too exciting has happened lately. i'm catching up on all the homework/reading i put off this week, so i spent all day reading maigret stories in french, medieval italian poetry (it's growing on me), and a ton of news articles on the wisconsin budget situation/unions. who knew spring break could be so boring? 

oh, and this? this is awesome. go watch it. the end. 

we roll our jeans up (a post about mixtures)

today's title comes from chugjug by family of the year. check them out. no, really, do it. their digital downloads? 100% free, although you can donate if you want to. i actually think i'll ask the parentals to buy the cd for christmas just to support them, since they're pretty good.

anyway, today's post features a lot of mixtures. to begin with, i'm drinking my own improvised version of a peppermint mocha. it involves adding 15 white chocolate candy cane hershey kisses to half a large cup of bold blend coffee and adding a splash of plain creamer or heavy cream. it's wonderful. my nails are a mixture, too - one coat of here today, aragon tomorrow; one coat of cuckoo for this color; and one coat of bring on the bling. the result is a perfect forest green (for some reason i can't find this color on its own - it's always a green with a shimmer or a hint of blue or yellow. why do nail polish manufacturers hate forest green? right now it's my ideal nail polish color) overlaid with gold sparkles. i think it's kind of perfect for the start of the holiday season. my music is a mixture of my own purchases and s-la's, too. right now i'm listening to daylight by matt & kim, gleaned from her during our long overdue music day last week.

all in all, i think mixtures are pretty good things, don't you?

i'm in a very christmassy sort of mood right now. we decorated the house today. well, the tree and stockings and in-house decorations are all up, anyway. we're putting the lights up tomorrow. i had some bad news yesterday, though - my annual christmas ornament purchase broke last year. apparently lulu knocked if off the tree and the momster thought she could replace it before i found out but forgot. everywhere i turn - secrets and lies. i was quite annoyed. i mean, look how pretty it was:

we went to the christmas light show in gaithersburg today. i love that place. it's so pretty. they added prism glasses this year. basically, they give you little paper glasses when you drive in and everything is extra shiny and bright and multiplied by like a thousand and if i were ever to try drugs, i think that's what the world would look like.

in other news, i jumped on the netflix bandwagon today. i was going through our dvd collection and realized that i spend way too much of my pocket money on movies. so far, netflix is amazing. why didn't anyone tell me that they have, like, every movie and tv show ever? it's wonderful. and they have an ipad app! it's like having a tiny, tiny tv with me wherever i go!

i'm now off to marathon torchwood and rewatch doctor who and drool over pictures of boots i'm too poor to ever own on the internet. woe is me, &c. &c.

rise as the buildings crumble

today's title comes from when the world ends by the dave matthews band. specifically, the oakenfold remix, which has been on a playlist a friend sent me ages ago, and which i rediscovered on the car ride home. here, take a listen - it's kind of dark and...layered. like an onion. i don't know, it sort of fit my mood.

you might have noticed my complete absence from all things bloggy last week. that actually wasn't me being lazy - i finally gave in and went to the doctor last week (i've been trying to stay relatively healthy while i'm at school. i'm - pun intended - sick of my immune system imploding) and found out that i let my cold go so long that it turned into, like, a viral infection that settled in the cartilage in my chest. that's the gist of it, anyway. i was busy sitting on the table and trying not to go "ow. my chest hurts. ow. i can't walk. ew, this is gross, i'm so mucusy and why does mucus have to even sound gross as a word?" while they briefed the momster via the phone since, despite resolutely checking the box that said not to inform my parents, the doctor informed my parents - apparently you don't get a say when you're under 18, even when it's only four days (oh. my. god. i turn eighteen in four days. four days! i'm going to be an adult!) under. bastards. anyway, i now have an arsenal of antibiotics and mucus thinners (seriously, doesn't that word just look gross?) and heavy duty painkillers and things. it's wonderful.

you probably wouldn't have seen much of me on the internet, anyway, though, since most of my midterms were last week and i banned myself from the internet (except for liverpool news, but those don't count because i have both the app and device updates texted directly to my phone and anyway it was special freaking circumstances, okay?). the hall-es and i did the math while trying to figure out how to fit all of our stuff in one elevator yesterday, and it turns out that i've written 32 pages of midterm papers in the last week and a half. i hated life a little after hearing that. especially since one of my midterms was to write two essays, due thursday, for my chaucer class (more medieval dream theory and compare/contrasting of chaucer and langland and dante). i, staying at the library with the hall-es until it closed, finished them ahead of time. but when i get to class, i found out that the teacher extended the deadline until wednesday (my birthday!) because she got so many "sob stories". excuse me? i have a chest infection and i got my work done! ugh, i hate lazy people.

however, there was a silver lining to the week. the momster turned up on campus - again - wednesday to lecture me for not going to the doctor sooner and take me to a "real" (read: not school-employed) one for a second opinion. it was fun anyway, though, because she brought the lulus and two of the hall-es and i got to walk them around campus for a little less than an hour. cookie was his typical adorable self. lulu...well, at least she didn't bark at anyone. she mostly kept walking away from me and michelle to sit in the middle of the path and look cute and pettable, effectively stopping traffic on the campus walk. i guess i'm okay with that, though, since it turns out that dogs are just as good cute-boy-who-like-puppies bait as they are girl-bait. it was a new (and fun) discovery.

we had another nail party during glee, too. lauren the hall-e helped with my nails. they're black with a coat of each different kind of silver sparkle we could find (the sheer one, the dark greyish silver that kind of blends into the black, and the giant chunky ones are my favorites) so it looks like the night sky. lauren the hall-e is quickly becoming a problem. all her spanish music is getting to me (she had a test to study for last week). i've had enrique iglesias in spanish stuck in my head all week. i actually like it. um...can it be less pathetic if it's in spanish? actually, judge me if you will, i'm in love with these two songs:

now that the boring stuff is mostly out of the way, here's an overview of the good news:

LIVERPOOL GOT BOUGHT. it's wonderful. and apparently the new owners also own the boston red sox, which is supposed to be promising. i don't care. as long as it means we get decent transfer funds and a new coach, oh, rafa, i miss you and can actually start winning things, i'll be happy. also, that means i can finally by the new kit. i've been holding off since i didn't want to support the crappy old owners (who are still trying to sue so they don't lose the club) but...well, i really want it. really, really, really want it.

also, i'm home.

let me just say that again. I'M. HOME. it's wonderful. i stayed up until six this morning just running on my wonderful, personal treadmill and watching tv on all the flat screens at once (there's a pleasing echoing effect throughout the house) and emptying my dvr and chewing on ice chips and playing with my dogs and blowing my nose/coughing as loud as i want to and wearing my ugliest, kiddiest pajamas and not wearing any makeup at all and showering without shoes on and...i could go on for a while. i'm just that happy. best of all, the momster's been pampering me. there's nothing like being sick at home (well, besides being well, but we all know that never happens for me). one of the hall-es has gotten into the habit of brushing our hair for us after we shower - it's wonderful, you should all go talk someone into doing it for you, too - and it made me remember when i was little enough to let the momster brush my hair, and...well, i've been bugging her to detangle a lot. yes, i know i'm only four days away from being an adult. i don't care - i like being pampered, okay?

anyway, i'm going to wrap this post up now. we're going to a pumpkin patch and then i have to call husband number two back since i was still asleep when he called earlier. au revoir.

six hours to go...

guess who's not sleeping tonight. yes, that would be me. i'm afraid i won't wake up in time for the game. luckily i have some hall-es to keep me company. we're marathoning angel right now. oh, david boreanaz, how i've missed you.

long as i can see the light

today's title comes from the song of the same name by creedence clearwater revival. it's old and you probably already know it, but i'll post it anyway since i'm bored:

i came home this morning. it's...odd. yeah, that's the best way i can think of describing it. odd and quiet, actually. i guess i got used to always having something to do or someone to talk to or people just randomly popping in to say hi. i almost wish i'd stayed on campus for the weekend, but...air conditioning. and dvr. and a mattress larger than a postage stamp. those are pretty nice things, too. besides, the momster wanted me to visit and...okay, i'm still mad at her and she's still trying to bribe me happy and i don't know if it's going to work this time but...well, i'll give it a chance. at the very least, i have my dogs.

speaking of the lulus, we had a good walk this afternoon. let me correct that - cookie and i had a good walk - lulu sat down in the middle of the sidewalk about five minutes in and had to be carried the rest of the way. i guess that was good for my nonexistent arm muscles. well, it was until she started nibbling on my headphones. then i had to turn off my ipod and put it in my pocket and that was no fun at all. but she is being extra cute to make up for it. i'd take pictures but she's sleeping on my feet and i'm too lazy to get up. maybe there'll be some tomorrow. if there aren't, the only reason she looks cute is because her fur is growing back in so she looks a little less like an alien.

i went out to lunch with all of the parental units. all. you can't begin to imagine how awkward it was. if ever i see any of you in person, you'll get the full story, but until then? well, just picture this:

and then multiply the awkwardness by a thousand. that's pretty much it. i guess there's a reason famiglia sounds like a disease?

anyway, one of the best things about being home is the unrestricted access to music. i've been completely out of the musical loop lately. anyone got any recommendations?

while at school, though, my ipod's been on shuffle 24/7 just so i could have a little variety. i've been rediscovering some old favorites like today's title song and these:

i'm going to go do my laundry (for free! oh joy), grab some ice chips (i've been slowly training the hall-es to remember to pick up a cup or two for me whenever they're near an icemaker, but there's still no replacing my icemaker) and a few snacks, and curl up to my television screen for the night - we've got one in our room, but there's never any time to watch it (and no fios or dvr).

oh, i almost forgot to share the details about my iranian revolution seminar. we're watching a movie about a cow. just about a cow. i don't know either. at least writing the paper will be easy.

want to live in a fantasy?

surprisingly enough, my silversun pickups kick hasn't ended in the twelve or so hours since i last posted. this post's title comes from:

so right now i'm midnight munching on one of the two dishes i actually know how to make from scratch - stuffing. yep, glorified bread and seasoning is my specialty. i'm sure you're all surprised. i even got fancy and added broccoli to it. this whole quest i'm on to attain a few basic survival skills seems to be going well.

like s-la, five is my new favorite number. it's nice to see your hard work pay off, you know? or, in my case, it's nice to see my serious dedication to caffeine in all its many forms pay off. it's all the same in the end, right?

i watched the espys on espn for the first time ever. yes, i was only watching for the usmnt. and, yes, i'm aware that the link i just posted leads to stu holden's twitter (look, i'm even linking it again - just click it already) and not the usmnt's website or twitter or blog. the twitter is better, okay? it's got pictures.

i've got a highly shameful confession to make now...i'm in love with the twilight movies' soundtracks.

take a deep breath and reread that sentence. yes, i said the soundtracks. there's no need to worry for my soul/sanity/sudden loss of intelligence. look, i can even form semi-complete sentences! capital letters, sadly, are still beyond my power.

some of you might already know about my sad, sad predilection for indie-but-not-really bands. i try and try to hide it but...well, i figured now was the best time to come out about it. hopefully these two songs will sway you to the Dark Side:

i picked these two songs because they're from bands that i've previously pimped on this blog, but i've actually liked a lot of songs from these movies. just the songs, though. oh, and the unintentional humor. watching kristen stewart try to show emotion is definitely better than 99.9% of the shows on tv right now. however, i would like to recommend recasting taylor lautner and foot-face pattinson with a pair of soccer players. none of them can act, either, but at least their abs look better. feel free to make player suggestions in the comments and make them spanish because the fewer players they have for euro 2012 the more like germany is to win.

and -- oh, fine. i've tortured you with enough horrible twilight-related things. here, have another poem:

That crazed girl improvising her music.
Her poetry, dancing upon the shore,

Her soul in division from itself
Climbing, falling She knew not where,
Hiding amid the cargo of a steamship,
Her knee-cap broken, that girl I declare
A beautiful lofty thing, or a thing
Heroically lost, heroically found.

No matter what disaster occurred
She stood in desperate music wound,
Wound, wound, and she made in her triumph
Where the bales and the baskets lay
No common intelligible sound
But sang, 'O sea-starved, hungry sea.'

-- yeats

happy birthday america

i'd post about watching the fireworks in dc/the hellhole that is the beltway, but it's late and i'm tired. ditto for why there isn't another world cup picture post waiting for you. instead, i'm just going to leave this here:

it's true and it's sad and i'm not allowed a third dog yet but in the unlikely event that any of you are looking for a new pet...well, you know what to do.

every night i go sneaking out the door

today's title comes from mama do by pixie lott. i've been listening to her a lot lately. i'm not really sure why - maybe because her style reminds me of amy winehouse who is obviously not singing because she's... indisposed? anyway, listen to it:

since this blog has pretty much replaced my actual diary, i've been thinking that i should have posted about my last few days of school or how i only had to take two exams or how utterly depressed i am that school is ending. i should talk about those things, but i won't, because i've gotten all my nostalgia out already. besides, there's only one thing that really matters right now:

so, with that said, i'm going to turn off the computer, walk my dogs, and wait for the germany game to start.

sit and contemplate your day

today's title comes from brand new colony by the postal service, also known as one of the ten songs guaranteed to turn me into a gibbering pile of mush. congratulations, ben gibbard.

i'm just playing on the computer until glee starts. american idol is on mute in the background so sometimes i look up and catch the top three making funny faces. i started my reflective essays for lit, too. and by "started" i mean that i haven't actually written anything yet - but i reflected! oh, yes, i reflected my butt off but not really, i'm still doing yoga and squats for that and now i can't feel my legs and discovered that i don't actually know how to reflect. at first i thought it would be a little like meditation, so i waited until no one was home, put some music on and plopped on the couch, waiting for thinky thoughts to come to me. unfortunately the only things that arrived on the thinky thought train were song lyrics and random things like "gee, all the toes on my right foot look bigger than the ones on my left foot if i turn my head just so and squint a little."

i could have put that in my essay, but i've got a feeling that tonight's gonna be a good oh dear god i'm quoting the black eyed peas, where did my life go wrong? that my teacher would have been all:

so i decided to cut the music and actually use my brain...it was hard. i think it might have atrophied from disuse since i've been afflicted with senioritis for several months. hopefully i reached some conclusions that'll make for a halfway decent essay. and if i haven't, well...at least i have videos of cute kittens to keep my company. like this one:

See more funny videos and Cute Animals Videos at Today's Big Thing.

while i was wasting my life doing homework and looking up cat videos and waiting for glee (which just started - neil patrick harris is singing on my television screen!) a trailer for freaky friday came on. i'm not actually sure why, since lindsay lohan is about as relevant as swiss cheese at this point in her coked up career, but it was still there. somehow or another it got me thinking about th-- oh my god. neil patrick harris and shue are singing dream on! 

...okay, it's done. i just lost my train of thought, but i'll leave that paragraph as is so that you can all appreciate my difficulties in focusing long enough to do anything productive. aren't you all amazed that i've almost successfully graduated from high school? 

here's another random thought: if you switched bodies with someone like in freaky friday, would you think of the mouth on that body as yours? i know that i would, but that one scene from the movie (also known as the only scene that i remember, since the rest was a horrible mess of lindsay lohan - who can't act - and chad michael murray - who's like 30 - pretending to be high school students) where the mom-character and the daughter (who were otherwise so forgettable that i don't actually know their names) are driving somewhere and the mom-in-daughter's-body says something about not letting the daughter-as-jamie-lee-curtis eat french fries since they'll go from her mouth to jamie lee's thighs. 

that whole paragraph was one rambly stream-of-consciousness way of giving you all homework. someone tell me if the fact that disney and i agree that even if you were magically transported to a new body, your mouth is still, well, yours makes sense. i got into an argument over the phone with a non-blogger-who-shall-not-be-named about this, and i want it settled. 

so i just looked away from the television screen for like three seconds to finish that sentence and the momster walked in and turned it off. apparently she thought i wasn't watching it. can you believe that? it's glee. and she turned it off right in the middle of a neil patrick harris scene! 

i'm going to stop blogging and protect my right to the remote now. wish me luck, kids.

you think it's endless, endless, endless

today's title comes from sleigh bells' crown on the ground. i can't find a decent version on youtube so you're just going to have to look it up yourself.

my econ exams went well. kind of. the macroeconomics exam was fine, since that's the unit we just finished learning. microeconomics wasn't that bad, either...not until the free responses, anyway. even after travis and i murdered a tree printing off past free responses to study, this year's was still a mystery. i put down a few nonsensical terms and busied myself drawing pictures. lots and lots of pictures. my personal favorite was a goldfish rendering of the high school cafeteria map in mean girls - i made the asians sushi rolls.

at least our teacher fed us. it figures that my worst exam(s) would have the best food. my favorite parts were the costco box of twizzlers (i still have a bunch in my bag), peanut m&ms, and buffalo chicken kickers for lunch. food just makes everything better, you know? in the mean girls cafeteria hierarchy i think i might be one of the girls who eat their feelings. oh no.

blossom is my favorite. who's yours? also, do any of you even read the captions? can i just start saying strange things in these or trying to brainwash you via subliminal messages embedded in the photo/gif captions or... i'm feeling kind of pinky and the brain today. don't judge.

oh, look, jon stewart has a teddy bear. that's nice. watching the daily show is a horrible distraction when one is trying to complete homework. blogging and watching the daily show, on the other hand, makes any hopes of finishing homework nonexistent, so...at least i can accept my fate? which will probably include staying up to an unhealthy hour finishing it or waking up really early and finishing it or taking it to lit and finishing it?

i don't know, don't expect anything sensible from me tonight. all i've done today is binge on sugary snacks, take two giant tests, and nap. my brain is still warming up. or shutting down. i'm not entirely sure.

in case you hadn't noticed already, my preferred exam time music tends to have a lot of the same songs/genres as my nighttime playlists: quiet or acoustic or old. makes sense, right? who wants to sleep or study or slit their wrists shrieking "why me?" and cursing college board and everyone who runs it to, i don't know, rap or death metal or club remixes? not me. (well except for the title song. but that was part of my special New Music exception). so if today's songs seem sort of familiar in tone, there's a reason...i'm a creature of extreme predictability (or not. i'm not entirely sure about that, actually. the momster says i am, but most other people say i'm not. what do you think?) and i listen to the same playlists while i blog or put of doing homework or pretend to study or attempt to sleep. in this case, the playlist features a lot of someone s-la likes to call "ray lamontage". for future reference, his name is ray lamontagne. you've all probably heard of him since he's awesome and coffeehouse loves him. in case you haven't heard the correct way to say his name, it's ray la-mon-tane.

my favorite:

a cover! we all know my weakness for those (in case you're wondering, the cover songs smart playlist is at 989 songs). the original is (unfortunately) one of the momster's favorite songs, but we've managed to compromise on this version for the car (usually):

and another cover!

200! (stay tuned for the spartans)

so, i made it through 200 blog posts. i feel accomplished.

i put off writing this post for a few days because i wanted to blog about something really interesting for my 200th post. then i decided to look back at my 100th post for inspiration. this is my 100th post. clearly the bar isn't all that high. also, i'm still waiting on my purple grape suit.

i did get this today, though. it's my second romper! i'm kind of in love with it.

i like it, but not as much as i like the books i got with s-la yesterday after a busy, busy day of learning things and laying under trees in the school parking lot waiting for the momster to drop off my smoothie (i've been rediscovering my smoothie love with the warm weather - they're yummy and they make me feel healthy...ish). it was painful having to narrow my to-read list down, but eventually i settled on breakfast at tiffany's, everything is illuminated, and prodigal summer (which was written by barbara kingsolver!). and then i got locked out of the house and went home with s and learned that nbc has other funny shows besides 30 rock and the office. it was exciting.

today has been less interesting. i spent a few hours studying in the yard, enjoying the sunshine, and getting bitten by bugs. having deemed my suffering to be great enough for one day, i came inside and played with makeup. specifically, this look. after a few unfortunate mistakes i managed to work out a very toned down version for school and a slightly toned down version for everywhere else. i love looking at fun makeup but i'm just not enough of a risk taker to actually wear it, you know?

anyway, here are my songs of the day:

here's a warning for this video. if you haven't heard already, it's pretty graphic. the song is pretty good, though, and the video is interesting (although i did have the worst desire to laugh while watching it. because, on the one hand you have a hypothetical police state attacking people to the tune of techno hip hop, but on the other hand...gingers):

M.I.A, Born Free from ROMAIN-GAVRAS on Vimeo.

watch the last wall collapse

today's title comes from matt nathanson's sooner surrender. it's such a cute song, go listen to it.

i've been absent for blogging lately. surprisingly this was caused by neither surprise illness or a sudden binge of tv-watching (although i am watching the daily show right now. i love sesame street michael steele). nope, i've just been too lazy or silly to blog.

you see, as a result of the momster only having to pay around $2000 for college, life has been very, very good lately. and by 'good' i mean that she's been dropping me off at fair oaks after school with a credit and a commandment to play. which i have. among other things i bought a ton of books - i just finished reading elizabeth kostova's the historian, more on that later - and clothes and sandals. mostly, though, i spent my money on makeup.

here's my favorites:

clockwise, from top: smashbox camera-ready concealer, guerlain insolence primer, makeup forever mat velvet foundation, estee lauder nail polish in pink champagne, smashbox lash plumper mascara, urban decay eyeliner in zero, sephora eyeshadow in milestone and mad for macaroons, and urban decay eyeshadow in baked

i'm pretty happy with my haul. the weather lately has been making me really want more bronze- and gold-toned makeup. plus i had the people at MAC and sephora do my makeup and pick my foundation, which saved me a lot of indecisive "does this one or this one match me better" wavering in front of the mirror.

i had a few other adventures at the mall, but i'll save them for another day. i know, i know. cop out. but i'm tired - stupid calc homework/flashcards. they took so long last night. it wasn't even hard - i just had no idea what to include on the cards since the descriptions were so vague. ugh, i don't even understand why we still have to go to school. can't we just graduate already? there's still another quarter to go.

anyway, there's one more joyous piece of news i wanted to share with you. i'm going to get fat! and i don't even mind. this is why:

yep, those are panera sandwiches. and salads. and soup and green tea. not pictured are the giant baskets of bread and pastries and cookies from them that are filling up our kitchen.

it's all the momster's fault. once a month her real estate firm does like a conference-type thing and panera caters it. but since they're all talking business no one ever eats anything and the people in her office split up the food. yep, that's right - all of that's a fraction of the original mountain of food. nevertheless, we won't be able to grocery shop - well, for anything besides ice cream/freezer food and dry goods - for a week. it's going to take forever to eat all of this. i'll try anyway. and by try, i mean that i'll open my fridge and do this:

now, just a quick note on the historian, which i mentioned earlier in this post. it's awesome. it's great to read a fun book that's actually well-written. it's wonderful to find an entertaining book that's better written than, say, the average dan brown novel. i guess i'm really just happy to read something about vampires that are actually scary. Comrade S-la, i hope you've inferred from this paragraph that this is going to be the latest addition to the communist book collective.

this is the song that i stole the title of this post from. listen to it, it's pretty:

and here's the song that i'm listening to now:

it's getting tragic now

so today's post has actual points and topics and things, but i thought i'd just start off with a question. you know when you're dunking cookies in milk and the cookie breaks off and sinks to the bottom? yeah, that just happened to me. three times in a row. and the momster was just in the kitchen to give me a weird look for getting a fork out to fish my cookies off the bottom of the cup, so i think i'm going to have to resign myself to losing those three cookies forever. my woe, it's a tangible thing.

(standing in the way of control - fat segal)

topic the first: life sucks. then you go to yearbook. and slit your wrists. today was pretty awful as far as deadlines and homework are concerned. our yearbook spreads are due wednesday and gina and i have...nothing, actually. well, we have our stories (i finished mine today), but that's just about it. i have this prediction that most of this week is going to be spent on yearbook things. yippee.

(as serious as your life - four tet)

don't worry, this post has happy parts. like this:

this, in case you were wondering, is the cast of skins. it's a show on the e4 channel in england which the momster bought to cheer me up because operation: read instead was kind of killing me this weekend. it's not a show that would ever be on american television (and i do mean ever, since the fcc would possibly implode if it had to deal with the things this show gets up to), so i'm not counting it. don't judge me, i need some form of outlet.

(star guitar - the chemical brothers)

remember how i said that the secret life of the american whatever is the most unrealistic, pointless excuse for a television show i've ever seen? well, think of skins as the answer to it. they have real problems! and those problems aren't usually tidily resolved at the end of the episode! people screw up and are different and look healthy and...i love the british. i really do. everyone but steffi needs to start watching skins, like, right now. (s-la, sorry, but they're so far from g-rated that you'd be better off staying away)

(totally wired - the fall)

also, the music is awesome. i love that their music directors blog about their song choices - it makes finding things so much easier and the things they have to say are pretty interesting. i never really thought about why television shows use the music they do. actually, all the songs i listed today came from my brand new skins playlist. 

(up where we belong - joe cocker)

so that's all for today. i have to go do my lit, physics, and calc homework. what joy. 

i wrote a poem!

no, really.

i'm serious, guys, stop laughing.

i mean, yes, we all know that i like to read poetry, not write it. actually, we all know that my attempts to write poetry are usually...laughable failures, actually.

jeni's reaction probably summed it up the best: Wow...Seriously? That's kinda crazy. See what cabin fever's done to us.

(side note: doesn't she have wonderful grammar and punctuation in her texts? it warms to cold, dark cockles of my heart.)

well, i take no responsibility for this mess. blame s-la. she said e-mailed something that both annoyed me and reminded me that there's a fine line between an editor and a critic. usually i try to avoid being the latter.

anyway, now that i've given you that lovely long introduction to get your laughing well and done with, i present That One Poem Rachel Wrote While Watching The First Part of Miss Congeniality and Waiting For American Idol. that's it's working title, anyway, i'm open to suggestions (and lots and lots of criticism - i'm quite obviously an amateur when it comes to poetry) in the comments.

Poem With the Really Long Title (See Above)

your step falls on the snow,

feather-light, 

smooth like the glide

of a feather on wind.  

and like a bird

your gestures are small and

all-encompassing

(and say, look, 

look at me, i want to go south

for the winter).

your coat is red, red, red.

the birds (that have gone south for the winter) 

approve of your plumage,

glowing bright against the snow

as you walk up the hill. 

(up, up, up. 

you remember reading a book once,

long ago, 

about falling up

and wish it would happen now)

there are books in your bag,

the bag on your back , 

slung over one shoulder 

like your mother told you not to, 

but the book in your hands

is something precious. 

you think:

soon, soon. 

soon you will be in school and the room will be warm.

and maybe you will read your book, 

when the teacher's back 

is turned

soon you will be sitting

quietly

sneaking peaks out the window 

and hoping the snow will melt 

(it doesn't)

and soon, soon you will be leaving,

red coat on, 

backpack slung over your shoulder

to begin the walk again, 

up the tall hill

and back down again. 

and your step will fall on the snow, 

feather-light. 

will be back (and blogging for real), after american idol, which starts in two and a half minutes (yes, i love this show. no, i'm not ashamed)

hold us at the center while the spiral unwinds

guess what? today's title was stolen from bright eyes' four winds. i know, i know - you're shocked. i love this song so much. almost as much as i love florence + the machine.

florence + the machine is and isn't a new love. i got kiss with a fist from the jennifer's body soundtrack (dear itunes, i hate you for making new perspective an album-only purchase even if the rest of the soundtrack was good) and liked it. so then i hunted down the rest of her album and liked it enough to listen to it a few times, but it never really reached earworm status with me. of course, due to the snow week i've had nearly unlimited music-listening time, so i started listening to it again and realized how amazing it is.

i wonder why that happens? i almost never like something the first time i'm exposed to it. the first time i heard kings of leon i made a face and paused the album to put the strokes back on; cobra starship had me reaching for my midtown cds before half a song had finished; even four winds, the song i've been relentlessly plugging for most of the last week, gained a 'meh' reaction the first time i heard it.

there's probably a moral in that last paragraph, lurking in the gaps between sentences. don't judge a song by its album art, or something along those lines. i don't know, it was just a stray thought that crossed my mind. we all know that this blog is more stream of consciousness than anything else.

i've been making good use of my free time this week. i'm currently watching gilmore girls, which is always enough to bring on a minor fit of nostalgia - how is it already rerunning on abc family? not to be completely cliche, but it seems like just yesterday that i was hurrying to finish my homework in time to sit on the couch and watch the latest in the rory-jess-dean-marty-logan saga.

well, no, that was a lie. the boys were pretty and rory was wonderful but everyone should have watched the show for all of the minor characters. especially paris. because she was awesome.

surprisingly that little tangent had an actual point. see, i finally got around to watching the latest episode of bones only like five days late and wow. i hadn't thought there was a show on the air that could beat gilmore girls' nostalgia factor and then bones gave me david boreanaz genuflecting and talking about demons.

i will admit that, at first, my reaction went a little like this, since said buffy the vampire slayer/angel flashbacks were 'brought to you by The Most Ridiculous Plot Since Twilight':

but then i took the time to reflect and recall that, even though the plot was a little silly, it was angel david boreanaz. recalling his good ole badass vampire days/demon hunting. sort of. and then my face was more like this:

because it's angel/seeley booth/david boreanaz on my television and i miss the buffy-verse so much. i don't even care that it takes one of the most ridiculous plots in five seasons of bones to bring back a flash of that. it was perfect. i am just barely resisting the urge to dig out seasons two and three of buffy to rewatch. barely. 

i will probably be giving into this urge in the near future, especially since it's still snowing and isn't supposed to stop for a 'good long time' according to abc news. 

(and yes, i can overuse italics if i want to. i am having a flashback to my thirteen year old self and she was quite, quite fond of the 'slanty-word-effect')

munching on tacos right now. it was fun to actually leave the house. less fun? coming home to see snow already falling. oh well. 

okay, gilmore girls is no longer on but i didn't get to live-blog through the end because i was busy bawling a like a little baby. lorelai's letter about luke. and christopher's reaction. and luke's face. the whole ending of this episode just kills me. obviously. 

here, even though this is a stream-of-consciousness post (can we even call this a post? it was like an uninterrupted stream-of-fangirling instead), i'll try and give this some closure. i've liked a lot of things since i was a kid. i've latched onto fads and trends and scenes, then one day got the idea (at the same time as everyone else did) that i was going to be an 'individual' and only like things that no one else did. it's taken me a long a time to admit to liking the things that i do, not because they're cool or popular - because god knows most of them aren't - but because i think they're amazing. because they inspire me. and because i want them to inspire you, too. 

maybe that's why it took me so many tries to like the things i mentioned earlier in this post. sometimes you're so busy trying to be someone else that you miss being able to discover new things. you think, 'gee, that's niceboringsimpleaverage' and move on to whatever someone else has told you is cool. 

and maybe growing up means admitting that you'll never really grow up at all. 

on that note, i'm going to leave you with my favorite picture of the day. thank god for the internet.

on the way to cassadaga to commune with the dead

today's title was, once again, stolen from bright eyes' song four winds. in case you couldn't tell, i really like it. go listen to it or i will cut you.

oh, and in case you were wondering, one communes with the dead via pictures. be warned, there will be a lot of them in today's post. i wish i could create a nifty little sign to warn you properly. it'd be all fancy and yellow and have lots of stick figures spelling out 'hit the back button' a la YMCA. after seeing this picture, though, i'm afraid that no sign i create will ever measure up:

i really have nothing to blog about. no thing. all i've done is put the emergency groceries away - doesn't it seem like everyone and their mother went grocery shopping today? - and watch my snow fort melt slowly in the sun. thankfully nature is going to rebuild it for me since, you guessed it, we're in for more snow tomorrow. to which i say:

in case you were wondering, a good portion of this post will be pictures or links. this is mostly because, as a result of the snow week, i've spent an unhealthy amount of time on the internet. pity me. 

as a result of my boredom i even offered to drive myself somewhere. me. driving. voluntarily. 

in case you were wondering why this is such a novel event, my native american name is actually Fears Car Gets Crushed. 

and, of course, after bravely attempting to overcome my fear of the car, the momster's reaction went like this:

and then my face, it did this:

and then for the rest of the day i was about .00092 seconds away from becoming this person:

okay, that's all folks. i'm off to watch david letterman and curse all of jay leno's ancestors and descendants for removing coco from my television. 

and we thought our dreams were weird

picking up where we left off, or a post in three parts

part the first: idol.

(tv family - the rocket summer)

the good: simon and kara and posh.
the bad: recognizing the beegees song which played during the auditions. oh, mother, will you never stop ruining my life?

part the second: they call me ishmael rae rae rachel.
(our life is not a movie or maybe - okkervil river)

"That's a lovely idea, Diana," said Anne enthusiastically. "Living so that you beautify your name, even if it wasn't beautiful to begin with . . . making it stand in people's thoughts for something so lovely and pleasant that they never think of it by itself."

- L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Avonlea

aren't names strange? think about it - everything we are and were and will be, all summed up in two or three words. in the course of my admittedly short life i've wished to be called violet, cordelia, ray (or rae), princess serena/sailor moon, and, according to the endlessly amusing shameful second grade journal i found a short time ago, lulu. yes, like that lulu. at least the origins or her name aren't so mysterious. i always did wonder how we went from calling her chocolate chip to lulu.

i am feeling distinctly poisonwoody today. and, yes, i am perfectly aware that poisonwoody isn't an adjective. it's a noun, referring to a state of being in which one's mind has been invaded by the spirit of vengeful AP literature teachers who have assigned piles and piles of novel-related homework. to take the positive view of things, at least it's only the homework and not the actual class that's painful. my discussion group is focused on adah, who was my favorite. even though i'm finally learning to appreciate rachel, i don't think i would have been able to cope with discussing her in class - how would i know if someone was talking about me instead of the character? i tell you, sharing a name with a main character in english class is hard work. i think all english classes should only read books about people named karrenhapuch or hermione or aya.

part the third: them furry doggies and other random thoughts.
(passed your place, saw your car, thought of you - butch walker)

in no particular order, these are some of today's most random thoughts, which were considered too off topic to be enshrined in Notey the Second (s-la is a slacker who has yet to mention Notey the First's retirement):

1. do you ever feel like your dogs are the cutest in the whole world? like, you know that you're probably biased, since other people clearly are when they're talking about their dogs being the cutest creatures in existence, but then you look at their fuzzy little faces and think 'but my dog, now - my dog's special'. 
2. i really want to sit all those nerds who dress in too many layers of hot topic and spend all their free time watching anime and playing video games down and impart a Very Important Life Lesson to them: doing those things doesn't make you unique, or witty, or interesting. it makes you just like every other nerd doing those exact same things. quit trying to pretend you're a special little snowflake or you're super misunderstood. 
3. i'm wearing pants and even though there are giant holes in the knees, it's just weird. i'm thinking it'll be tights and a dress or sweats tomorrow. 
4. it's time to repaint my nails. i really want to use one of the colors from that stupid nail polish names blog. too bad i don't know where to find any of them. 

i miss paula

idol's on.

i'm sure you've been waiting for this (with bated breath and quivering lips)

(can you guess why i used this picture?)

today's post is going to be a little different. instead of throwing in a paragraph about what i'm listening to and why i'm listening to it at the end of the post, i put my itunes on shuffle and am going to include whatever comes on during this post. i think it'd be pretty interesting if you could figure out why i like certain songs or artists. even if you know me, i think there'll be a few surprises.

(shoot your gun - the 20-20s)

so remember when i was excited about finishing the yearbook spreads due before break? or how i thought that meeting this deadline would be easy to meet because cory, gina, and i only had one spread due?

yeah, i was wrong.

(shadowfeet - brooke fraser)

it turns out that when you have a spread on activities that happen before school, getting pictures and interviews for said activities has to happen...before school. that time when you have to wake up early. and not forget your homework in the kitchen and turn around on three minutes from hay road to go back and get it. and remember to check out cameras the day before you show up at 8:30 to take pictures.

now, i know what you're all thinking. it probably goes something like this:

but gina and i honestly didn't think it would be this hard to coordinate everything. so far this one spread has required more crazed text messages, preplanning, and actual effort than the last four did. combined. (i do believe in italics! i do, i do!)

our infographic ideas for it are pretty awesome, though, so hopefully the result will be proportional to the effort placed in it. and even if it isn't, gina's layout design for the spread is one of my favorites, so maybe people will just be happy with that and not bother reading/looking at the infographics.

(bottle it up - sara bareilles)

oh, and i'm thinking it's time gina got her own label. i don't know what yet, though. it took me forever to find the post i linked to at the beginning because it didn't have a yearbook label, so i went through and labelled everything properly. i'd be kind of sad to have to go through and label all the gina posts, but i suppose one must suffer in the name of organization. besides, i've actually finished my homework before midnight - how better to celebrate than by blogging and catching up on all my recorded shows and movies?

yeah, i know. my life: it's boring.

(when doves cry (cover) - damien rice)

speaking of shows i've recorded, the new episode of make it or break it on abc family is at the head of the queue. go ahead and judge me, since i freely admit that my favorite television shows are the most ridiculous. proof? i watch jersey shore. apparently the rolling stone staff does, too, which is the justification i use whenever someone tries to call me on it. however, i will never, ever (and you can quote me on that, mr. frost) watch the secret life of the american teenager. just hearing people try to describe the plot to me makes me want to wash my brain out.

(amon hen - howard shore)

i did record last night's premiere of chuck, though. i've heard enough people tell me about how wonderful it's supposed to be that i couldn't resist.

of course, now that i've said that, i'm going to watch it and be hopelessly disappointed. such is life, right? although i'm thinking it's a good sign that the cast is so pretty and the episode opened with a flashback. it makes things easier to underst- holy james bond briefcase, batman. the scene with the television started out funny and has turned interesting. although i would really hate to have scenes relating to george bush flash through my mind every time i turned on the news.

(better off dancing - the donnas)

(kerosene - miranda lambert)

i'd blog more but my day was pretty boring. school. learning (of a sort). homework. as per usual, i felt like the AP government vocabulary was a slight to the collective intelligence of the senior class. half of the terms overlapped with terms from the last quarter of apush - do teacher's really assume our attention spans are that short? are our brains supposed to auto-erase knowledge after a span of six months? i just set my email account to do that - yay auto-emptying trash and spam boxes! - but i don't think it's possible to recreate the effect in my mind. oh, and the other half of the terms could be defined using common sense and a basic knowledge of current events (CIA? cold war? gee, what's next, "define: president"?)

(slow dance - senses fail)

okay, this post has dragged on forever. i'd like to say this is proof of my ability to write about any topic however uninteresting (in other words, my 'blogging is an academic exercise' essay for random scholarships fastweb likes to email me), but we all know that it really just shows how much i excel at bullshitting.

i'm going to drag this on just a little bit longer to impart one last bit of news. i hit the ten thousand mark on itunes today. actually, that was a lie. i bought my ten thousandth song last night but then i had to go through my library and cull the songs i no longer like/see myself listening to. i thought i'd pass my excitement on to you: if you guess what songs 10,000 - 10,009 were (well, the album or artist, anyway) you get to pick the topic of my next post. i'll even pull a j. k. rowling (oh, how i miss her, i wish she'd write something new) and give you a hint: RDJ.

(sons & daughters - the decemberists)

oh, and excluding the length of this post, how do we feel about the new format? keep the shuffle songs or go back to the original here's-your-giant-run-on-sentence-of-music-go-ahead-and-skip-it-steffi paragraphs?

(dramamine - modest mouse)

this is the last thing. really: the cast of chuck has its own car commercial! with ipods! and they're adorable! i need to download seasons 1 & 2.