It's Like I'm Made Of Magic

     Remember like, two weeks ago when I was all about updating this thing?  Remember that?  Good times, guys.  Good times . . .

     So, I'm sorry if sometimes the titles of these posts seem a little obscure or random.  I usually just assume everyone watches the same television, has the same life experiences, and encounters the same situations as me.  Not that a Sean P. Diddy Puffy Combs reference is particularly obscure.  But, sometimes I get a little sporadic.  Also, back up off.  I'm every woman.

     I've been knitting a lot lately.  I reckon that's because it's been so cold and rainy this month, so i'm inside more.  You know, normally I'm either hiking or hanging out downtown with my friends, but since the rain has just been so relentl- JUST KIDDING!!!!  I don't live in Vermont! Doh! 

     But really, I am knitting a lot.  And it has been a particularly rainy summer, which I lurve.  I've finished a sweater for Kiernan that I have to send out to Sara so she can let me know what needs to be resized on it.  And I'm just finishing up a christmas stocking for The Boy.  I have a few ideas lined up.  Stayed tuned because all of my upcoming projects promise to be just as fascinating as those little jems you just read about.

     Now do you see why I don't update all that often? 


    

    

The Boy and I spent a few days in Vermont last week, visting family and seeing some friends.  It's been really rainy here all summer, and I guess it rains a ton up there, too, but we had some luck with a few nice days.  As usual, Vermont made me happy in my heart.  Even to the extent that I could picture myself living back in my hometown without feeling wierd about it.  Which is totally messed up.

Nothing else is really happening around here.  Part of Chad's birthday present last April was tickets to see Rancid in Providence last night.  It was a cool time.  It was more of a Power Point Presentation that a punk rock show, because some guy was hired to conduct a whole iMovie situation that was projected from his computer onto a sheet behind the band.  Now, I'm no computer genius, but I'm pretty sure it's not that hard to toggle between play and pause while trying to have the images coincide with the beginning and ending of a song, but this guy was clearly not a computer genius either, and at one point, the smooth punk rock sounds of "Journey To The End (of East Bay)" were accented by a giant glowing blue Mac desktop.  Go girl.  Tim looked cute, though.  He's such a wierd mix of like, wino/developmentally delayed kid brother/three-year-old telling a story with his eyes closed.  It's the cutest thing you ever did see.  But, somehow sad.  He should join a comedy troupe.

Today we're just hanging around the house.  And by "around the house", I mean we haven't left the bed except to go for breakfast around 11.  Jammies and movies?  Awwww yeah . . . .


Ps - I'm know I'm going to catch it for this from everyone I know that reads real books, but I just finished Twilight, and it was really, really cute.  Yeah, it's the high school vampire book, and I will read all four.

In.  Your.  Face.

    

Anytime anyone asks me what's my favourite type of music, I usually run through the obvious genres that make up the majority of my ipod playlists, which is basically every genre save for new school rap, and jam bands.  What I never, or at least very rarely, say is the truth. 
  
     Early nineties college pop.

     My childhood was thick with musical influence in that me and my best friend back then, Katrina, both had older sisters who all had very different tastes in music.  My sisters were into Joni Mitchell and The Dead.  And Katrina had a sister that was a bottomless resource for all things hair metal.  Katrina's parents would spend evenings sitting outside, her father reading the newspaper, her mother crocheting fruit-shaped oven mitts (which I would very much like the pattern to, thanks.), and always with the local country music station at a comforting level coming from a radio that was set in the window sill right over their heads.  And, in my house, there was always someone singing.

    But it wasn't until my sister, Jenna, started working at a record store at the mall and bringing home studio-released demo cassetts that I think I finally felt comfortable enough to adopt pop music as a type of music that I could like all on my own and by myself.  It was a fairly grown-up thing for an eleven-year-old, I think. 

     Musically, I had made it through my first decade of life unscathed with little more than some NKOTB trading cards to define what I liked.  CDs had only been available for about four years before I was able to save up enough allowance to purchase one or two. (I just threw up in my mouth a little.) But, through it all remained these tapes.

     I can remember being thirteen-years-old, about to head out one summer afternoon to rollerblade to the park, or whatever the hell it was that kid's did in '93, but being halted right in my tracks by the video for Rancid's "Salvation" playing on the television in the living room of my parent's house.  I remember no one was watching it.  It was just on.  Earlier that day, I was most likely reading the lyrics to Dr. Dre's "The Chronic", or laughing about Snoop Dogg's entire debut album (not ironically).  But seeing this video changed me.  All of the sudden, the cassett tapes stayed in a drawer and I got some new friends that went to shows, and listened to bands like Richard Hell and The Voidoids.  Pop music, although not entirely abandoned, became neglected.

     Years later, when owning my first car with a tape deck, these cassetts resurfaced, and were enjoyed mostly by myself because, just like I don't like The Goonies because I didn't see it until I was twenty-seven, anyone who wasn't there when Material Issue's Destination Universe was released just wouldn't understand.

     Early nineties college pop still doesn't make up even a third of my current musical selections, but I can still appreciate it's sound.  And at the risk of sounding unbearably hokey, I really do see the tragedy in it, and the really great songs can still make me cry.  These bands had little more than pegged jeans and broken hearts, and buried somewhere underneath all the fashion scarves and low-cut Chuck Taylors, there's a realness you just can't find in Fall Out Boy.

     Here's a few suggestions, if you're interested:

We're in the middle of quite the little onslaught of visits from old Vermont friends.  Let me clarify a few things.  By "little", I mean small.  And by "old", I mean we've known them for a long time.  Max came to stay with us on Tuesday and left on Wednesday, and Alan is en route. 

     Here's some stuff on the former.  The latter . . . that will be another post entirely.
  


     He's out on tour, working with a truly awful band, and they had a few days off to spend in Boston.  We took him straightaway to Ye Olde Salem Willows for some hotttt arcade action.  You'd think, by the following two pictures, that Max is quite the tough guy, what will all the guns and . . . handmade fanny pack?



     But, as it always does, The Salem Willows took the cool that Max projected outward, crumpled it right the crap up, and lead him to the place where all his traveling and free-spiritedness doesn't fool anyone . . .






ps - a picture blog?!?!? I know!  I think I like it.  I'll try and do it more often.

I'm spending today at home, cleaning, organizing, and throwing stuff out.  Lately, The Boy and I have been on this possesions binge, and we've whittled our possesions down to essential furniture (couch, kitchen table, etc), clothes, books, yarn, and bike parts.  It still seems like a lot.  I think our apartment doesn't really allow for organization.  Each room is an open square, with windows and doors placed in such a way that our options for furniture position are severly limited.  In addition, we're on the top floor, and the majority of the rooms are sliced in half by the roof's peaks.  While our kitchen might be big, we can only use about a third of it. 

While I've been unhappy about this apartment, not immediatly, but since the time it took to really get to know it, we know now that, instead of trying to leave and find a new place, we should really try to make the best of it by decorating, and organizing in a way that makes the most sense both asthetically, and comfort-wise.

     So that's what I'm spending the day doing.  It's likely I'll begin cleaning, turn on the television for some background noise, and end up watching an entire Golden Girls marathon in a spotless living room while the rest of the house still resembles the inside of a hobo's pocket. 

     I.A.L.A.C.

Whaddup!!!

I've updated the links on the sidebar.  Some of the blogs and sites are no longer active, and I wanted to add some more useful jams like weather.com, and imdb.  I can do that now, update I mean, whenever the crap I want because I am now the proud owner of a second generation PowerBook G4.  YAAAAAAY!!!!!!!!!

My friend, Beth, sold me hers for way cheap because she wanted to get some sweet new Mac-tion.  It's exactly the computer that The Boy rocks, but way prettier because I haven't had a chance to eat Annie's Mac and Cheese over it's keyboard yet.

In other news, Chad's got a break from work coming up and he said the words, "spend the week in Vermont".  Now, I'm not an attorny, but I'm pretty sure that's a verbal contract and if he doesn't honor it, I'm going to have to take him for all he's worth.  Which, as it stands now, is a 42" television, and some old film school textbooks.  Still not any closer to implants, but what's more important is, neither is he.

Domestic partnership.


     Unrelated PS - if any of you have some back issues of ReadyMade, check out issue 29.  That Stoneyfield Farm ad for SWIFT?  That's Sara.  She's America's Next Top Model, and also, My BFF.

Thought I'd check in and say hi. Things are going well, not a lot that's new. Chad is working a super lot and I'm still kicking around beverly trying to get over burlington. Just for now. Just until the next time we're there and I notice that burlington is looking really good lately. It's a bit more toned now. And is doing something different with it's hair. It looks good. I'll think about burlington when I'm back in beverly, laying on it's beaches and trying to convince it and myself that I'm happy and that this is where I need to be in my life right now. But we'll both know . . .

     Chad's working on a job in Boston that lists a certain action film icon among it's talent, and for the first time in our relationship, I'm starstruck.  And Chad's worked with two out of the five New Kids.  And Marky Mark.  I don't know what it is about this guy (*coughthinkDieHardcough*), because I get that he's kind of sleezy and like, puts out the kind of vibe that makes him seem like he might hate women, but the guy just does it for me.  

     The Return of Bruno, indeed.