LaurieWrites

Grace, photographically speaking.

My pictures do my best talking sometimes, especially lately. And I don't mean because I'm a technical or a composition genius. What I mean is that they tell the story of my life and the people and events in it much more concisely and in some cases more thoroughly than words can. 

I'm so psyched to be at the beach with my family for Thanksgiving. When I got in very early this morning I was road-wired and couldn't really sleep yet, so I started going through my photo stream from last Thanksgiving until today, and made a set of any picture that resonated gratitude, in the broadest sense of the word.

It took longer than you'd think. It turns out it was a really, really good thing to do.

The mosaic only holds 36 photos. There are way more than that in the set.

A quick scan will show that I am lucky to have a good number of awesome people in my life whom I love very much.

I have opportunities, and a voice, and an itch for travel that takes me to places I would really miss if I never went anywhere. I have a fairly functional sense of humor and a love of shiny places and things. I know myself better now, I think, and while I still have a long way to go, I think I am kinder. I think I am more honest. My life is full of food and music and general every day shenanigans.

I am wearing flip-flops in November in one of my favorite places on Earth.

Jonathan Swift is credited with saying, "May you live every day of your life." I may not always get it one hundred percent right, but there is something to the daily practice, I have to say.

1. Untitled, 2. Final theory paper, 3. Untitled, 4. Untitled, 5. Untitled, 6. Untitled, 7. DCFD, 8. Kirtsy Laurie, 9. my parents, 10. Untitled, 11. My father with a plunger on his head., 12. Proof!, 13. New iPhone, 14. Double rainbow, 15. Untitled, 16. Sonic Success, 17. Untitled, 18. Untitled, 19. Untitled, 20. Untitled, 21. Untitled, 22. Untitled, 23. I love Kristen. Just do., 24. Untitled, 25. Two of my fellow BlogHer editors who are also my fellow friends., 26. Untitled, 27. Engagement photo, 28. Almost favorite., 29. Some people major in biology. I majored in this., 30. Meghan and Mom, 31. Amber and Mom, 32. Since they were little, every single time., 33. He told me to delete this and I will not., 34. You know, just me in an espresso machine., 35. I love this., 36. Suebob and Ms. Potato Head

Giving, thanks.

Hey! It's a mess of a Thanksgiving post ahead, written while I'm dying to get out of my state.

Last year I had this wine for the holiday.

This year I will not. I will miss it. I thought of drinking the remaining bottle last night that I have been hoarding since I brought it back from California this spring but decided against it. It's more of a birthday sort of thing to do than a Thanksgiving eve eve thing, I think.

I just realized that it will be my second Thanksgiving in a row in a coastal city (this time the right one) with some configuration of my extended family. I may be having trouble with a general sense of gratitude at the moment, as I noted below, but I'll be glad to be with them tomorrow. Life is basically a series of choices and activities, moving on from one thing to the next in the best way we know how, and I'm very happy that we have all chosen to be in the same place tomorrow.

I just hope I can scrounge up a relish tray, because without one on Thanksgiving I'm not sure I can carry on.

I wrote a much more articulate Thanksgiving sort of post two years ago and I enjoyed re-reading it today.

I'm praying for wireless in the place where I'm staying because tomorrow I'm kicking off a month and change of birthday posts. I can't even tell you how many people I know who were born from the last week of November through the first of January. It is a crazy number, and it just so happens that this span of time includes the birthdays of some of my very closest friends and family. It's weird. 

And because I'm not such a fountain of joy and light myself as much as I just reflect it back from people in my life who rock, I thought I'd spend the holiday season talking about them. This isn't a revolutionary idea. There are other bloggers who do it all year round (I'm personally a fan of Mr. Lady's birthday posts for her people,) and I'll gladly thank them for the idea in the first place. But this year it has special meaning for me. I will be eternally 39 on December 27 and I know a lot of people in transition. It just seems like the right thing to do.

I'll start tomorrow, assuming that stretch of coastal Carolina has it some Internets.

Happy Thanksgiving.

All I ever wanted.

I am leaving town tomorrow for a week and a half. I am so excited about this.

It's been a rough sort of month.

I have purchased a bottle of Stoli Vanilla and I plan to go visit my surly friend at the Myrtle Beach General Store from whom I can potentially purchase Blenheims spicy ginger ale to mix with this tasty stuff to make the best beach drink ever, even if it's not going to be 85 degrees on my beach like it usually is when I'm there. I will pretend. I love that beach hot or not.

I have new tires and an engine that should (please please please) work following ridiculously overpriced service yesterday, so in spite of the fact that I have to drive late into the night tomorrow I won't be as in denial nervous as I usually am about my poor little car.

I have, in my possession, all cameras, plus chargers, and also lenses, that I need to function for two weeks, both still and video (this is huge.)

Two of the sweetest little girls I know are waiting to make their birthday cakes until they get back to Georgia from Disney so we can do it together. Please to see the state of my two-sizes-too-small heart before I heard this:

And kind of what it felt like after: 

I'm not very overwhelmingly grateful right now, I'll admit it. I'm very focused on lack, and what isn't going right, and how I'm disappointing people and not succeeding in ways I'd like to. I'm all "my back hurts," because it does, like every day, and "I'm not losing weight like I want to lose weight," and "that person..." and "he...." and "Oh God I need coffee."

I need not to care about that, any of it (except I can't not care about coffee) for a week. I need to drive on other roads and think about other things. I need to figure out what's next while not thinking specifically at all about it.

Isn't that when it's supposed to figure itself out?

Shit MY dad says.

I'm going on a long car trip in two days (to two beaches! Two!) so I figured it would be a good idea to actually figure out if my car would make it after a year of relative neglect. I am currently, as in right this minute, being completely overcharged for service due to the random turnings-on of two lights on my dashboard, and tomorrow I need to get tires.

My mother: Hold on, I'll ask Daddy where the best place is to get tires.

Me: I know where I'm going to get tires.

My mother: Daddy knows the best place to get tires.

Me: Okay, all right, okay. {Sighs, puts on shoes}

My mother: Oh, haha, he said go to Weshittires.com

Me: We shit tires.

My mother: Haha, yes, weshittires.com. But he was grinning when he said it. That's not really a place. The real place is Tires Plus.

Of NaBloPoMos Past

It occurred to me as I sat on the couch tonight and processed my current state of mind that NaBloPoMo makes me a little bit nuts, above and beyond any existing and constant state of nuttiness, of course. And I may be grasping at straws here, but whatever. I thought it was time for a little tour of the archives of Novembers past.

If you are new to this ridiculous magical mystery tour of my life, this will point out that there was life before you, which can be fun and enlightening, or it can just be boring as hell, your call.

Here, I made myself laugh with this bit from November 21, 2006, wherein I rationalized my ongoing and conflicted relationship with yet another 80s cheese rock band.

And now all of a sudden "wacked out and posting" reminded me of the line from REO Speedwagon's "Keep on Lovin' You", a song I've heard repeatedly in random places lately because God hates me, although maybe I should be glad it isn't holiday tunes, because those have taken over most places already. Anyway, you know, the REO song with the line that sounds like it goes, "Instead you left stealin' the rent/ALL HIED UP AND LISTEN'" but it doesn't. It really says "Instead you lay still in the grass/All coiled up and hissin'", which is just weird. And it's important to add that though he knows all about those men, inexplicably he don't remember. Cause it was her, baby, way before then, and they're still together. This in spite of the fact that he's a fucked up stalker with memory loss who compares her to a snake, which I know is how I like my men. Especially the ones who insist that they're gonna keep on lovin' me, and are apparently going to go on cocaine binges to avoid sleeping to do so, even after I've told them to get the fudge out cause I'm watching Montel. Those are my favorites.

Sorry. Decompressing. I will admit that "Take it on the Run" is one of my favorite songs of all time (and okay, I like "Time For Me to Fly" too, but not as much), which doesn't allow me to bring the hate on REO Speedwagon without that full disclosure, but one of the best and most humorous stories that Casey Kasem ever spat into the mic (could they not get that man some water? A lozenge? Some freaking hot TEA?) involved the DECADE that it took Kevin Cronin to write "Can't Fight This Feelin'". A decade to come up with "You're a candle in the window on a cold, dark winter's night," and to rhyme "longer" and "stronger", and "show" and..."show." Scary. 

And because this is how my brain functions, this post only makes me wonder how I have never written about Damn Yankees?

Don't worry about it, ma'am. Just them Damnnnnnnnnnnn Yankees.

I know. I can't help it. Seriously, scary visceral memories associated with this song, especially considering I'm a little fuzzy on some of the details of what happened yesterday. Jack Blades (haha, Jack Blades) in mom jeans FTW. IT'S NEVER OVER. (I really really love this song. I'm dealing with this right now.)

It's been three years since I wrote this on November 10, and it's kind of alarming that I could still spit it out almost verbatim:

I over-gave, and it still kind of embarrasses me and makes me want to reach back through the pensieve of the past decade and yank me even further back, so I could turn different corners and tell people to fuck off when actually I said, "Yes, baby. Anything for you." But in spite of this shift inside of me, the one thing that makes a difference is my refusal to succumb to inertia, because even if I'm sitting on my very own single settee for the rest of my days, I want it to be in a cool spot. And I want to say that in the process of getting to be the rotten, hilarious-to-myself, intellectually overstimulated and completely batty yet endearing old woman I know I'll be some day, that I did not stop exercising my capacity to do cool shit, or to push myself to create or to make something better out of where I've ended up. I've been lagging for the past couple years, but it's safe to say that it'll get better from here. And thank God. I'm so on my own nerves.

I'd totally forgotten about this picture that went with the post. That's me on the day trip to San Francisco after my first BlogHer. Melanie Morgan took it. (Where have you gone, Melanie? Where have you gone?) I still dyed my own hair then, all four or more of the colors, poor little girl who never pays attention to the back of her head. It was pretty bad. I also fell in love with the city in those eight crazy hours. Besides going back for BlogHer last year I haven't been again, and I really want to go when I can just be there without the imperative to spend three days immersed in talking to so many great people I don't get to see all year long.  

Sunshine and me, November 30, 2007.

I loved and I miss this silly little dog so much...Look at her with the big bug eyes and the kisses...That was the summer before we left and we did step aerobics and kickboxing every day, which tired her out and actually gave me some arm definition.

And I've never found a better hairdresser either. Damn.

I still haven't, and this picture was taken in 1999. (That's dust on the print, by the way. Didn't bother to edit it. LA-ZY.)

Hanging out with Andrew at an open mic on November 20, 2007:

Me: She's really not bad. But why must every girl who looks like that look like that in the same way?
Andrew: Yeah. The leg warmers. The argyle tights. The harshly cut bangs.
Me: I mean, it's like they go to the same school for it.
Andrew: The bangs.
Me: Those bangs look good on no one. And oh my God, she has him banging that tiny little drum. That's really unnecessary.
Andrew: I was just thinking that that drum was unnecessary. I love hanging out with you. We think the same things. We're the same. Except you like Dar Williams and I like German thrash metal bands.

*************************************
Me: I just had the insane thought that I miss working for Restaurant Digest.
Andrew: Me too.
Me: Yeah, I miss those messed up times when Bruce was alive.
Andrew: Yes. There was a time when Bruce was alive.
Me: And how sometimes he'd give me money when he was alive. And I'd actually get it. That was nice.  Maybe I just need money.
Andrew: It was better when he wasn't crying when he gave me money.

Talking to some students the day before, November 19. 

Exhibit B:

"We have our list."

"Okay, who would you talk to?"

"Joe Francis."

"Who is that?"

"The founder of Girls Gone Wild."

"Oh. Really? Why?"

"Because he made a lot of money. I'd ask him how he did it."

(From across the room) "Isn't he in jail?"

(Me) "He's incarcerated? And you want to know how he accomplished that?"

"Yeah, but he's got a lot of money, and it's only for eight months."

"You can't interview him. I'm not signing off on what I'd have to sign for that to happen. Also, you'd have to do it through a glass window."

And finally, from November 26, 2006, Movin' On Up. 

 Note to self:  First of all, good morning, sunshine.  Second of all, when you get the bright idea to make the Jefferson's theme song your primary ringtone, please remember to turn it to Edelweiss or just fucking OFF before you go to bed, so when the phone rings at 4:00 a.m., you do not go shooting across the room in a crazed, suddenly-awoken frenzy.  Thanks.

I have eight days left of this. Whatever shall I write about? No, seriously. WHATEVER SHALL I WRITE ABOUT?

I'm hoping the sun is out next week.

But if it's not, at least there will be an ocean-view balcony and beer. (Counting the minutes at this point.)

I was going to write today, I swear.

But then I didn't feel very well when I woke up.

And then I spent too much time catching up with people when I told myself I should be working instead of working.

And then I felt better and I knew I was going to go out tonight to a place with great food, and then another event with copious shellfish, award-winning shellfish, even, and significant amounts of wine. White wine, because it's shellfish, but wine, all the same. So I thought I should walk, or do some kind of physical activity because I appear to have almost attained my late summer falling-off-the-wagon weight and that pleases me.

So I did that, and now I have two minutes before my last possible time I was going to allow myself to start getting ready, and I have nothing. Nothing except more pictures.

Laura Mayes came to town to add some color to D.C.'s gray, verysuperserious landscape with, well, herself, and the Kirtsy Takes a Bow book.

It's beautiful. You should get one.

The love part was totally my idea, by the way.

Joanne signed mine, and then did unspeakable things to it.

There were hydrangeas, which I love, and chocolate-covered pretzels, which I love more.

Amie and Sarah were there too, because they are Kirtsy editors and book contributors and also it appears that whither they goest lately, there goest I, or some similar horrifying and archaic grammatical construction.

It was fun. And that part I'm SO not phoning in.

Flickr

I hardly knowr.

Except I do.  

I became a Flickr pro member on November 20, 2005. (Haha, I wrote a "1" as the first number in that year. Like I can remember anything happened more than nine years ago? Also I just had to erase eight to type nine, so obviously I don't know what the hell year it is at all, much less century.) I have 782 pages of pictures. 782. My current photo total is 14,057. That's crazy. Look! Look at the crazy picture lady!

Anyway, this was my first picture I posted on Twitter. It is utterly unremarkable in every way, except 2005 was a horrible terrible year when I tried to leave town as much as possible (LIKE THAT HELPS, HAHA, the universe laughs!) So I guess it signified something. Whatever. 

I also wrote that this was the first picture I posted on Twitter. Do you see that? I'm not changing it. This is not going well.

 

I still take pictures of clouds every time I'm in a plane if I'm in a window seat, can't lie. Also, if you're next to me and drooling, game on, Mr. Stranger Man.

 

My most recent posted photo is a blurry iPhone shot of Chuck D. that I used in the post below so I won't belabor the point, and the one before that is of a kid wearing flip-flops with socks on the Metro, also off the iPhone. Hugely unremarkable, and I should most that stuff to Tumblr but I'm getting photo/blog application attention deficit disorder and I have to get it under control. I have some engagement photo session shots to post and some stuff from the Kirtsy party last night but I'm running out of time to eat and sleep so posting is slow going lately. This weekend is going to be full of fun stuff too so maybe Sunday I can just sit and dump it all.

I do wish there was more traffic on Flickr again. I miss it. I don't know what's going on, if it's the groups I belong to or my failure to tell people I have a Flickr stream (not so, I link it more than my blog, actually.) I think a lot of applications are in flux. Or maybe it's me. I don't know. I like having the application on my iPhone, so I'm thinking that'll encourage me to use it more, or differently, or...yeah, I really don't know.

I'll stick with it, though. I still kind of love it.

Here's my set of favorites.

 

Here are a lot of my favorite people and portraits.

And here is my self-portrait madness.

This Web site really is one of my favorite things online or anywhere, and now that I'm marking my time in Flickr time, I really cannot believe it's been four years.

Most of my heroes don't appear on no stamps

I take music really seriously. I always have. It punctuates my life more than most other things. I have never ever been solely tied to one type or another, although my social identity in certain periods of my life has been. I shared new wave/Brit pop as an adolescent, hair metal as a teenager and young adult and then songwritery type stuff from then on with friends and people who went to shows with me. It was just the way it turned out, but I could easily have left a Metallica concert and cried over a John Denver song on the way home.

I mean, I don't remember a specific time when that specific order of business occurred, I'm just posing a hypothetical to illustrate that It's hard work, this being me thing. 

I went to an all girls high school that was racially and culturally integrated in every way for as small as it was. I developed an appreciation for hip-hop there that I've never lost, and because it's D.C. I learned about go-go too.

My friend from high school called me yesterday and said she had a ticket to Public Enemy and because I'd never seen them live I went. 

Awesome. 

Long may you run, Chuck.

 

Also we've come a long way from convent duty and the It's Academic team, respectively, I'd say. Better now than we were then, by a long shot.

I kind of am about fighting the powers that be when it comes down to it, really.

I mean, it's a different of power than Public Enemy was talking about but I'm takin some liberties there.

A high school friend contacted me today and said she had an extra ticket, so here I am, posting from Lisner Auditorium so as not to fail NaBloPoMo because I'm just that dedicated (I.e. and also, controlling what I can at the moment, which as we all know is next to nothing.) Also this is now appearing like the longest text message in the world so I'll stop. But I will give apologies for fussing about Typepad because this mobile interface rocks, and say that sometimes, my loves, we just need to live our damned lives and as for the rest of it, all the garbage? (Because I had to contend with some garbage today, again.) And the expectations? And etcetera? Just, you know, fuck it.

Because on that random day you'll find yourself in the auditorium of an overpriced private university in DC with a dying iPhone battery and Chuck D in the building, and a PG County dude will hand you a double-shot rum & Coke and the guy next to you in the bar line will be wearing a Yo MTV Raps t-shirt and your friend'll be all "fight the power!"

And you won't even mind that there's a documentary before the show.

In 11 minutes I can tell you:

I am going to eat jalapeno-stuffed olives right now and it is far too late to do that but I'm hungry and I can't sleep when I'm hungry but it'll probably make me sick.

I watched the Caps win while I was on the treadmill at the gym tonight and I felt rather self-important when a man came over and asked me what channel number it was and I knew. And then I felt like a real dork when they scored and I clapped and made some sort of exclaiming noise like I wasn't in a room full of 25 people. It was just a sweet goal.

I've stopped at 7-11 twice in the past two nights because did I mention I'm going to the gym again and I've done 90 minutes of cardio both times in an attempt to get things going back in the right direction, and I know this is what works for me when my metabolism needs a jolt. I'm feeling exceptionally dehydrated from this however and like I need to stop for water on the way home, like the Beltway is the Sahara and I'm about to drive my camel onto the ramp and I need provisions.

Anyway, I still feel like I'm stopping at 7-11 to buy cigarettes, because that is what going there means to me, apparently. I would be really shocked if I ever buy them again (and please, let this not happen, because as much as I would smoke my face off right this minute if I could, I need not to do that much, much more) but that's what I feel like I'm going there to do.

I don't think that makes sense. What I think I'm trying to say is that today made me want to smoke and so did 7-11, and I somehow expect people to care about this.

I had to have a conflict-laden sort of conversation and that makes me want to smoke. And drink. And cry. I dislike it. I have opinions out the ass and I will happily share them with you (although I really will try to make sure you have some interest in them first) but that's different from wanting to argue or bicker with you, because generally speaking I don't want to do that.

Unless, like on Saturday, you punch someone on a Metro train in front of me, someone in your apparent group of friends, so hard that he bleeds. And at that point I've had just enough liquid courage to get up off of my ass and stand in the open doorway of the Metro train and demand that you GET OFF THE FUCKING TRAIN (that's what I said, sorry) and expect you to obey me. 

And of course you don't, so I have to get off the train or get stuck in the door and then go up to the booth to report this altercation with a short Latino man with a backpack close at my heels, more traumatized apparently than I was by the situation and looking at me in some form of dazed admiration because I appeared as though I was going to kill this jarhead idiot who punched his friend on the train. You know, with my MIND.

These are the times when I wonder who has stolen my life and put this in its place.

These are also times when I do conflict. And also lose my wallet in the process, a wallet they informed me was found today, due to Metro's neato online lost and found application and my amazing powers of depressed hungover internet research. I really can't believe I had the presence of mind to look it up, actually, and I'm so happy that I don't have to go to the MVA for a replacement license, so happy, in fact, that I Tweeted at Metro to thank them.

I changed the subject, apparently. Just as well.

On Friday it will be four years since I started posting on Flickr. Four years. I am graduating from Flickr University (although to be true to form, it would have to take me like another year and a half, for undergrad anyway.) When I think of my favorite shots, these guys still come to mind first. I think I love my whole Vietnam set the best, actually, while still considering it the most wasted opportunity to share images of a country where most journalists don't ever get to go, not on duty anyway. 

I still can't believe I was there.

And finally, really? THis is some pre-Thanksgiving madness, I'm serious.

On my mind.

Today was not good with the exception of one good thing, which although it was good was offset with some irritating things and an upsetting thing or two. I'm ready to get out of here for awhile. Although there are a few very fun things coming up this week and I'm happy to see some good friends, I'm more ready to head south and hit the reset button, and see some people who make me smile.

Stuff on my iPod that I can't skip over

I got this post idea from DiSnazzio, who I met this year when I met up with a bunch of lady bloggers in a  Baltimore bar that played deafening techno music, again, as you do, (also I'm old and deaf) and who is now one of my favorite writers who doesn't write nearly enough. No pressure, I get it, I'm just needy that way when it comes to good writers.

She posted several songs on her iPod that she can't skip over if they come on, even if she's heard them ten times that day, and I figured, because I like to talk and think about music, and oh this month of daily posts is so very long, I'd steal the idea, because I'm that original. 

I also love that we can not only share an interest in cheese metal but also in Gillian Welch because Revival was a life-changing album for me, and I'll tell her sometime maybe about how I wrote a research paper about the Dixie Chicks and politics, and how I had a few episodes where I channeled Natalie Maines while I was driving my car.

Anyway. Here you go.

American Idiot in its entirety, Green Day, although mostly focused on the half-hour from Jesus of Suburbia through Give Me Novocaine. I don't know what happened but this has crawled into my head and it won't leave and I listen to it constantly. I may be the only college counselor in the world who has a picture of Billy Joe on the cover of Inked magazine tacked up by my desk.

**I never promised to be normal.**

Jealous Again, The Black Crowes. One of the best songs ever written of the "you must sing me" variety, and not just because I'm fond of the "always drunk on Sunday" concept. I went to several iterations of the Horde Tour when I lived in Ohio - basically repeated jam band sorts of things that usually featured the Black Crowes and Blues Trav'ler (sic) - and I have some very fun, very hazy memories of same. If you're with me I will probably not rock out the DON'T YOU THINK I WANT TO DON'T YOU THINK I WOULD part like I do when I'm alone, and I feel sorry for you, because by the time it gets to "AM I JUST PLAIN LAZY AM I EVER EVER EVER JEALOUS" and it sounds like Chris Robinson says "lever" instead of "ever" there at the end, that shit is ON. SORRY. "Loose lipped and laughing" was also my AIM status message for a very long time a few years ago. Dork.

I ain't afraid of ever. Losing faith in you. 

You bastard.

Mistaken I.D., Citizen Cope. His debut album was a thing of beauty and I love this song. 

For Whom the Bell Tolls, Metallica. Kind of a tie with this and Master of Puppets so maybe I'll just say both. Sure. I could tell you why this is but then I'd have to kill you, right?

Der Kommisaar, After the Fire. This song and Come On Eileen should be on any existing 80s compilation. I don't know what I'm saying when I sing it but whatever, and that dadaDUHDUHDUH guitar business and the tambourine? It's just a weird, awesome song that makes me feel like I should punch someone or do something otherwise very aggressive but I don't know why. Why is she riding with the others in the subway singing? I have no idea, but it's some heavy shit. And by the time they start yelling what sounds like "CHOP!CHOP!CHOP!" at the end, I just don't even know.

Home Sweet Home, Mötley Crüe. I've been on a weird kick with this one. Again. I do not own hairspray (haha, hairspray) at all anymore but the video makes me wish I did. And then I remember it's only 1989 in my mind.

Levon, Elton John. I can't help it. Like I can skip a song that starts off with "garage" said the British way? I'm not that strong. I'm not going to talk to you about "Tiny Dancer," though, except to say that one of my very favorite Tweets ever was "Get the fuck AWAY FROM ME, tiny dancer."

Digresssing. I'll save my Elton issues for my next therapist. 

Red Dragon Tattoo, Fountains of Wayne. People who think Stacy's Mom is the best thing they ever did make me cry. I mean, not really cry but...almost. They could have stopped with Utopia Parkway, the cd this song is on, and that would have been fine. Perfect, stupid pop song.

John Saw That Number, Neko Case. There is nothing wrong with anything she does in my opinion and this song makes me want to go to church. And nothing makes me want to go to church.  

New Religion, Duran Duran. This summarizes everything that was awesome about them, that's all. If you don't know I probably can't tell you. Stop distracting me.

Ramble On, Led Zeppelin. This is one of my favorite songs of all time as I believe I've recently mentioned. It's on my exercise playlist and unlike some of the stuff on there that I'm sick of I don't ever skip it. I think the length of this list indicates just what a creature of habit I am.

Change, Blind Melon. Shannon Hoon broke my partially-grungy little heart when he died and I never even really liked No Rain (except for the fact that it's a super depressing song lyrically and it sounds so bouncy and happy, which is somehow appropriate for the time and the genre.) This song stays very relevant to me. I'm a fan.

Hem, Reservoir. They are not well known and so therefore unappreciated for what is absolutely beautiful music, and this is the only song that works when I feel like it's all done. I can't listen to it in public because it usually makes me cry. Funnel Cloud is an amazing, amazing record and anyone who cares about songwriting and a voice that is the last one I want to hear before I die should listen to it. This particular song is about Pittsburgh, and it makes me feel like I'm from there even though I'm absolutely not. 

Peter Piper, Run D.M.C. I do not have to be intoxicated to perform Raisin' Hell in its entirety. I mean, really perform it. I can nail this one. No, I don't know how I happened either.

Sweet Child of Mine, Guns 'n Roses. I will never turn it off, not ever, unless it's the radio version that cuts off the guitar in the beginning because that's a version that shouldn't exist. Like that band ever needed to hear less from Slash. Not a good idea.

Lodi, Creedence Clearwater Revival. My father was a CCR freak and I'm guessing he must have listened to this on repeat because I have no other excuse for my love for it other than I like downbeat stoner hippie music. NOT THAT I DO. Maybe it's just a metaphor for my life. Oh Lord, stuck in Lodi again. I've never been there but that's a small detail. Suburban Maryland, Lodi, whatever. I think I just like songs that have that final crushing poignant lyrics/music moment, because the part at the end, "If I only had a dollar for every song I sung," kind of punches me, Centerfield notwithstanding. (Because no. No no no, on every level no.)

Belle, Al Green. It's a weird song. I have no idea what he's talking about, Jesus or his boyfriend in some kind of love triangle with a woman he's dating, but I apparently don't care. 

All These Things That I've Done, The Killers. I can wear this whole cd out and I know I love this song a lot partially because it was so great live. Nothing like a room full of people screaming "Don't you put me on the back BURNER-ER-ER," there's really not.

The Winner Takes It All, Abba. I have opinions about Abba songs, yes, and this one is actually really pretty and really sad. I could talk about Waterloo too, but I won't.

Heavy Metal Drummer, Wilco. This doesn't sound anything like the title, but infectious it is.

Silver Lining, Rilo Kiley. Just because. It always puts me in a better mood.

(I'm skipping songs but I'm stopping because I'm compulsive about lists and I need to stop because it will be 287 songs long and no one wants that, really, no one.)

Lancaster

I don't have a lot today besides pictures on the brain but November marches on and here we are.

Earlier this month I was in Lancaster, Pa., where I drove around and creepy-stalked Amish people although I'm mostly afraid to take their pictures because I don't think it's nice.

I was obsessed with their clotheslines. Whatever, I'm obsessed with subcultures. 

I ate real pumpkin pie ice cream (holy holy hoLY, so good.)

(If you look closely you can see I ate some already. I couldn't help it.)

I also, with the help of Yelp - ha, the help of Yelp, that was an accident - found some really good sushi and a very, very good Mexican restaurant downtown. I will spare you a treatise on migrant patterns and why people are moving to places they previously would likely not have lived and are opening restaurants. I'll just say you need not eat only Bob Evans and, um, other indigenous Pennsylvania foods, crap, my mind is completely blanking on Amish food right now, I suck. Anyway, I'll leave it at that. 

I did a little bit of shooting too. 

I'm a sucker for record stores, and carne asada tacos.

Also sushi.

The guy who created the Evolution of Dance was a speaker at the conference I was at (don't ask) and I did not come away a huge fan, have to say. I will not lapse into slander here. I will only share the following, in a moment of silence.

You're excused.

My parents are awesome

I'm planning a post elsewhere about this site, My Parents Were Awesome, a Tumblr joint consisting solely of photos submitted of parents, presumably by their children. There is a call for stories on the site as well so I'm not sure what the plans are to expand it in text, and I haven't watched the videos that would probably tell me more, given my current weird allergy to online video.

I spent part of the night scanning some old photos, with the aim of submitting something of my own parents. I can't find the ones I really want to use of them alone but I've been loving this one of them with me on my Christening day.

I love old snapshots with a deep and abiding love. I love their haphazardness, their scratches, their odd, dated borders and their bottomless pit of history. My mother's mother is probably responsible for my intense love of photography, particularly of people and relationships. She had stacks of photo albums in and on her coffee tables, and I looked at them almost every time I went to her house, which was often. When my father's mother died I took the big picture books and her wedding album because besides the ring she gave me, a few Boston Terrier figurines, the pictures were all I cared about. I had everything else I needed in my head.

My project for the forseeable future is turning our family photos digital, and I think I started today. 

I like this picture specifically because it's really the first version of our family - the ten years before my sister was born - writ large. My parents were so young, 21 and 23, but they're in this shot who they have always been to me. Plus I'm always very interested in what babies might be thinking, and I'm sure that even though I was nine months old here, I wasn't talking yet so who knew? 

Yet. Oh just you wait, you poor people.

Given the post I wrote just the other day, I thought this was an interesting image to bring up just now, of the day they brought me into the church. You can be as angry as I am about what I know now that I didn't know then, which is everything, but things don't start out political.

Hence the Flickr caption:

"Someday, Mother and Father, I will write a rageful blog post about this organization while enjoying a glass of nice Spanish red. Apologies in advance."

I kind of like the idea that I look like I'm pre-drafting it in my head, like I just wasn't so sure about all of this. Oh yeah, just hanging out here in a dress, waiting on my next meal. What's up?

And those pants, Daddy. Those pants.

We're not usually in church anymore.