www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYL3j27sSH8

I took a nice little break there, but truth be told? I was thinking of you the whole time.

SO HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING:

We’re moving out of The Cockpit.

I know. Only a year in this hotbed of debauchery! We had fun, though, didn’t we? …We had fun.

The Short of It: My beautiful roommate is now unemployed and will either be a) moving back to Evansville at month’s end or b) scoring another job, not in Indianapolis. Before all of this went down, we had been talking about moving, packing up for greener pastures… Yes, “We,” as in, totally co-dependent. Or, “We,” as in, sisterly! Or, “We,” as in, not helping those lesbian rumors.

This just… sort of…expedited things.

If you’re playing The TYK Home Game, this is normally the part where my brain goes, “HOLY SHITBALLS &$%*#&@ ABORT ABORTTTTT.” Because, if we’re moving out? That means I’m temporarily moving into my dad’s apartment on the Northside, and while I ADORE my pops (read: Best Guy Ever — Setting an Impossible Standard for Dudes since 1983!), and he’s only there four days a week, and I’d get really, really good at Beatles Rock Band — it’s just not ideal. (WHAT’S UP, RUN-ON?! WHERE’S MY BOOK DEAL, AGAIN?)

I’m not set on signing another lease because, well, I think it’s time to say goodbye, Indy. I just don’t know exactly how or when yet. There might be an opportunity here to start from scratch in a new city.

A girl does a lot of soul-searching at a time like this. <– Gross.

I guess what I’m trying to say is: This is the Time for Thinking Big. See, ever since college graduation, I’ve ebbed and flowed between these pockets of intoxicating courage and crippling self-doubt. (Exhibit A: This Entire Blog.)  I guess I’m speaking specifically to my abilities as a writer/artist/creative-type/whatever whatever.

(POP QUIZ!! Q: How many months of therapy did it take before I could call myself a writer? A: Three.)

I’m not alone in this, right? This: Months of  “I-was-born-to-do-this!” bravado followed by months of, “Billy-Joel-wrote-Piano-Man-at-24-and-I-blog-about-Conversations-I-Have-in-Line-at-Taco-Bell.”

But I’ve bounced between the two so many times that I’ve arrived at this new place, a place where my inner monologue has turned into some twisted pep-talk, like,

“Jenny, if you don’t find a way to use your words, you’re going to die a slow, agonizing death. Is that what you want? No? Then figure it out already.

You have this voice, and it might not be the best voice,  but someone out there wants it. Surely there must be a use for material on getting shunned at the Indiana primaries or that kid that made you the flower pot.

And if you don’t figure it out, you’re an asshole.

Yours Truly (LITERALLY!),

You.

PS: Remember: Even if you fail miserably, you have a network of adoring friends and family. And a fantastic rack.”

And by brief love affair, I mean a fling.

And by fling, I mean I was totally his rebound.

I knew he had a girlfriend (she was studying abroad in Australia at the time) but the sparks between us were pretty palpable. She cheated on him with some Aussie, and on the day they broke up, he showed up at my door, looking all forlorn. HOWEVER, I was getting ready for a date. Ha! I had a date for a frat party. With a Hawaiian theme. “Kamanawannalaya.” (College!)  However, if there’s a blueprint for seducing any dude, it’s allowing him to watch you get ready to go on a date with another dude. Sure enough, a week later, we were making out under the cheap Christmas lights adorning my bedroom in the Varsity Villas. (College.)

The guy was from Chicago, and he was completely obsessed with a little-known rapper named “Kanye West.” “Have you heard of him?” he said, on one of the rare instances we’d come up for air. We were taking a break from “studying for exams,” and had popped The College Dropout into my stereo. It was 4am, and we were on our way to the Waffle House. (College!) “Toooooootally, I looooove him,” I surely cooed in response. A complete and utter lie, as I loved Jason Mraz and Maroon 5. (AT THE TIME.) A few weeks later, Spring Semester was over, and he handed me a cd of Kanye West stuff before we parted ways for the summer.

That thing never came out of my cd player. And it was the only token of that relationship that lasted: He got back with his ex, and I was upset for, oh, about five minutes.

Since then, I’ve pretty much just soaked up everything Kanye West has put down, despite my indie hipstery tendencies. And the cockier he gets? The more I love him. To me, Kanye West has more or less turned into a caricature of himself, and I can’t help but applaud that, because I think it’s entertaining as all hell. So you can imagine my excitement when Yeezy joined Twitter this week. His tweets are either a blatant showcase of his egomania? Or a total fun-poke at his egomania? ONLY KANYE KNOWS. IT’S JUST GOLDEN. He’s been the highlight of my Twitter stream all week. Was there anything better than waking up this morning to find out that Kanye West drunk-tweets?

In other news, UM - NABLOPOMO? PWNED.

31 days. 31 posts.

I DID IT.
AND IT FEELS LIKE THIS:

Just a few minutes prior, Katie and I were waxing poetic and engaging in our typical twenty-something navel-gazing. And with good reason - Life’s dealt my roommate a bit of a blow in the past week, one that’s probably going to be a catalyst for a lot of change at the Cockpit. Things are going to get shaken up for the next couple months, but I have a feeling everything going’s to settle where it needs to.

Whoa, Vaguetown.

[Sorry. I'll fill in the blanks in the next couple weeks.]

My point being - we weren’t exactly the picture of cheer and light-heartedness. However, it was a beautiful Indianapolis night, and we knew that if we stayed inside, we’d just be depressed and moody.So we opted for picnicking and people-watching on The Canal. I was mindlessly popping grapes into my mouth and spying on an obese family in a paddleboat when I saw a dude walk up in my peripheral vision.

I’m used to this when I’m with Katie, the dudes walking up. Um hi, have you SEEN my roommate? This happens all the time. It’s like that line from When Harry Met Sally, “People were always crossing rooms to talk to Maxine.” I turned my gaze to size him up. Alright, what does this clown want….

The lad was a tall and lanky blonde, wearing some Ed-Hardy-esque t-shirt and black board shorts.  He wasn’t unfortunate looking, but certainly way too young — no more than 19 or 20. Before I could predict his angle - asking for a cigarette? Commenting on our butterkase cheese, perhaps? - he blurted this:

“Now I’m going to sing you Justin Bieber’s ‘One Less Lonely Girl’…”

But it was so rushed, and all I could think was - “Justin Bieber what now?” — before this dude LAUNCHED INTO A SERENADE.

I AM NOT KIDDING YOU. This kid literally started SINGING A JUSTIN BIEBER SONG TO US. This one:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXUSaVw3Mvk

Nearly choking on a grape, I whipped my head around to look at Katie, who was already glaring back at me wide-eyed and shocked.

There’s gonna be one less lonely girl
I’m gonna put you first
I’ll show you what you’re worth
If you let me inside your world
There’s gonna be one less lonely girl

It was out of tune and rushed and kind of mumbly. “THERE’S GONNA BE ONE LESS LONELY GIRL,” he ended his song by saying, almost yelling. “AND IT MIGHT BE YOU.” He pointed at me. “IT MIGHT BE YOU.” He pointed at Katie.

And then he walked away.

After scooping up our slacked jaws from the ground, we looked down the canal, expecting to see a group of friends that had put this kid up to this. Surely it was a lost bet, or a bro hazing. But this dude just met up with an older gentleman, seemingly his DAD, who seemed completely unfazed by the whole thing as they continued on their walk. UNBELIEVABLE.

“What…just happened?” Katie whispered.

“I…I don’t know. I don’t know.”

We were crying from laughter and disbelief.

Thanks, Universe.

Edited to Add: PS, Universe? If this is the “Knight in Shining Armor” as predicted by my tarot cards….NOT FUNNY.

I’m also delighted that July marked the highest number of pageviews in TYK history. Many thanks to all eleven of you. (Jay-Kay. Jay-Kay.)

We had fun, didn’t we?
If you’d like to commemorate your admiration, please to click on this Facebook Like:

Jenn Kriscunas likes

There's Your Karma

Create your Like Badge

Because I’m a sap.

Katie and Sebastien. Mayday. January 2010.

Just to offset the cloyingly sweet nature of this entry, I’d like to also point out that this was also the night that Jordan fell sleep in the bathroom of a Skyline Chili.

We’re on Day 27 of NaBloPoMo, and some nights the ol’ idea factory is lookin’ pretty spare. If you have anything you want me to write about…PUT EM IN THE COMMENTS, ‘cuz SERIOUSLY. DAY TWENTY-SEVEN.

—————————————————-

Tuesday didn’t start so good. . . .

I wasn’t even sleeping. I was just watching the Demetri Martin special on Netflix when I decided to hit the hay, sat up, and in a split second realized - oh, I actually feel really close to the edge of the bewwwaaaahhhhoooofff. I had my MacBook in my hands, and so instead of catching myself, I held it up like a child, like, “NOOOO NOT MAH BAYE-BEEEE” (I’m Claire from Lost in this scenario.) Who needs a shoulder, or a hip? Not me.

It was just after midnight, so I figured Tuesday had it in for me. But then I heard “Night Moves” on my morning commute, followed by “Pass the Dutchie.” (You know - on the left hand side.)

BUT IT GOT EVEN BETTER:

I MADE A FAYGO ROCK ‘N RYE FLOAT, PEOPLE:

When’s the last time you had effing FAYGO ROCK ‘N RYE. A DECADE, RIGHT? This float was pretty  boss.

OR HOW ABOUT THIS?

We’re getting close to Laundry Day, and by close, I mean, every article of clothing I own is strewn about, dirty. Tonight my jammies had to come from the recesses of my closet, from the Stack of Shirts that I No Longer Wear But Keep Carting Around with Me with Each Move For Some Reason.

AND LOOK WHAT I FOUND:

AW YEAH.

But I’m also, sorta, kinda starting to envy those people. The people with the Heart Walls. I’m starting to wonder if you people have it pretty good.

Is that weird? It’s just that…it must be nice. It must be nice to just write the whole thing off, like, “Know what? Eff this sh*t. Closing up shop! No one comes in!” Deep down you know it’s not good for anyone, but…just for a while, I’d love to feel the RELIEF that must come from completely shutting yourself off so as not to get hurt. Yeah, the force-field of your Heart Wall also deflects all that ooey-gooey lovelight that someone might shine your way, but, you know — love is so short, forgetting is so long. (I didn’t make that up. That was totally Neruda. The last half. Obvie Neruda wouldn’t say “ooey-gooey lovelight.” Or perhaps he did; it just got lost in translation.)

But if this blog tells you anything, it’s that you’ll never seek out my heart only to find a wall. No, pretty sure my heart has a landing strip on it, a little dude guiding your way with those neon-orange light sticks. Or maybe there is a barrier around there, but it’s protected by a chubby, bumbling security guard who’s always falling asleep with donut crumbs on his face and coffee stains on his uniform. This heart’s always on a silver platter.  I’ll ice it like a goddamn cupcake if that’s how you want it.

Enough metaphor for you? Good.

Obviously I’m talking about dudes, here, but really I become enamored with just about anything so damn easily, and it’s exhausting. I’m not trying to get namby-pamby, look-at-me-I’m-a-tortured-artist on you, but that lack of a filter is precisely what drives me to write halfway-decently. If I didn’t let everything in, and experience all the ugly, would I be able to see the beauty in the oft-overlooked slices of life that I find so delicious? Would I get as excited about shooting the broken windows of an abandoned state hospital?

I have it in my head that I wouldn’t. I’m convinced that I would become boring and uncreative.

That’s probably my problem.

While I’m waiting, a little blurb:

If you know what’s good for you, you’ll be watching the Mad Men season premiere tonight. And if your experience with Season Three is similar to mine, you will have NO RECOLLECTION WHAT HAPPENED BECAUSE YOU WERE DRUNK FOR EVERY EPISODE. (This is what happens when your primetime show airs during football/mimosa-and-jalepeno-poppers season.)

Here are:

My Top Three Favorite Mad Men Scenes, I Mean Maybe, This is Just Off the Top of My Memory, There are Probably Better Ones

THREE: ONE, TWO, CHA-CHA-CHA

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zN_MpktVbeQ

See also: Every scene Joan Holloway is in.

TWO: THE PITCH

www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2bLNkCqpuY

A) Okay, who WROTE this, because they should be given BJs on the reg. Straight up.

B) I watched Mad Men Seasons 1 and 2 in a whirlwind, streaming back-to-back episodes for days on end, and I worked at an ad agency at the time. I was telling my dad this story about how our creatives gave a pitch to a potential client, and how it was so good that they canceled all their other interviews. As soon as the words came out of my mouth, I realized I was TOTALLY CONFUSING MY REAL AGENCY LIFE with MAD MEN. Proud moment for my father, to be sure: “Oh shit. Nevermind. That didn’t actually happen. I was confusing it with a cable tv show.” whatevs, I heart you Don Draper.

ONE: THE THREATENING FINGERBANG

www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOPXMzkq8EU

THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE.

Dylan. April 17, 2010.

“Oh, he’s on his lunch break. Can you maybe wait ten minutes?” she says.

“You know what, I’ll just come back another time. This was just a spur of the moment thing…”

As I’m getting into my car I hear a voice call out to me in the parking lot -

“You want a reading?”

Mark was coming back from his lunch break. Of course I want a reading. He knew that. Because Mark is a psychic.

This was my second time seeing him, and I DON’T KNOW WHY. Sometimes it’s pay day, and you just want to give someone $20 to tell you about your life for 15 minutes. Must be part of that whole daunting-mid-twenties thing: “I have no idea what I’m doing. Just tell me some things, and I’ll cherry pick the parts I want to believe.”

We sit at the table and he starts with a Tarot card reading. I select a card; he flips it over.

“Are you in a relationship?”

[Really? We gotta start with this, Mark?]

“I am not.”

“Well, you pulled the Knight in Shining Armor card. So someone’s going to be coming into your life, if he hasn’t already.”

This. This is why I happily give you my twenty dollars. (Although I’m REALLY REALLY hoping my Knight isn’t Steer-In guy.)

In the thirty minutes total that I’ve spent with Mark, he’s told me things that I already knew/things that could apply to any twenty-something female:

• I’m going to be making a lot of changes in the near future
• I’m very emotional
• I let people in too easily and they walk all over me and then I make excuses for them (duh)
• I’ll find success in something that will “put me in the spotlight,” but not until I gain more experience

And then he’ll hit me with something REALLY SPECIFIC, like

• I’m going to be working in healthcare marketing (?)
• I’m going to have four kids (!)
• I need to be careful for the next two months, because I’m GOING TO BE EXTREMELY FERTILE (!!!)

And then how about this doozy:

Mark: You’ve been crafting an ideal mate since you were little. Your (insert planet here) has been in (insert astrological sign here), so I bet your love life has been TERRIBLE the past couple years, right? And you’ve determined what you DON’T want?

Jenn: Check.

Mark: And now you’re meeting guys that you put on a pedestal, so you construct these fanciful, non-realistic expectations that never work out.

Jenn: Check.

Mark: So now that your (insert planet here) is moving back into (insert astrological sign here) you’re going to be finding ways to pull back closer to center.

Jenn: Uh-huh. So that’s what, the next couple months or so?

Mark: That’s the next two and a half years.

Should’ve asked for that $20 back so I could buy some wine and chocolates, because: AAAAAACCCCCKKKKK.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRjb8sMjYu8

FACT: I had the sheet music to the Linda Ronstadt/James Ingram version of this and played the guitar solo ON MY CLARINET. (COOL POINTS — RACKIN’ UP, AMIRITE, GUYS?)

It never does.

I get anxious to start the next chapter, to push the re-do button until I stumble upon a Life that makes sense to me.  Luckily, I’m not alone in this one. My beautiful BFF Katie and I have spent endless hours on the Cockpit Couch, imagining a total overhaul of our lives. We don’t know where it will take us — or if we’ll take on the adventure together or apart. We just know things need to change. And when we get tired of talking about it?

We watch The Hills.

…like for 6 hours, on a Sunday. Both of us were fair-weather Hills fans, only tuning in for a couple episodes here and there. But a few Sundays ago, we needed complete, mindless escapism. Enter MTV. We got so into it that we planned our entire Tuesday night around the series finale, complete with a bottle of wine (PER PERSON). We laughed about it, mocked ourselves…until three glasses in, and Kristin says something like “I need a change, y’know?” and we slurred, “Oh my gaaaaah, this is SO US. SO. US.”

Hence, this G-Chat conversation:

Jenn: We need a theme song.

Katie: Something like…’feel the rain on your skin.’

Jenn: Oh yeah. DUH.  We already have one.

Katie: Hahaha.

Jenn: Shit…and then when we’re feeling super emotional, we have to find that unplugged version.

Katie: Oh man, the unplugged version! Omg I’m listening to it right now…why does it somehow make me feel better? This is sick.

Jenn: I don’t know. This is totally one of those things where we like it ironically until we start to like it unironically.

Katie: Okay, I’ve hit a wall. That must mean lunch time.

Jenn: GO GIT IT! Your lunch is still uneaten.

Katie: Wow.

I’m going to tell you the top five reasons I am now obsessed with this song and its corresponding video.

Because if anything, this blog is TOPICAL.

Jenn’s Top Five: “You Don’t Know My Name” Edition

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhOvpXETKYI

1) 0:00 Let’s get one thing straight: THIS VIDEO IS STUPID. But the song is a soul-stirring gem. (Co-written by Kanye West, John Legend on BG vocals, FTW.)

2) 0:33 Face it, you’d have that reaction too if you watched Mos Def slo-mo walk into your diner.

3) 1:05 I love songs that replace feelings with interjections. Like, “It feels like oooooh, but you don’t know my name.” (see also, “My love is like whoa.”)

4) 3:00 BASEMENT OF PIANOS. And it only takes one.

5) 3:37 MOTHERFUCKING SPOKEN WORD INTERLUDE. “You always order the special, wit da hot chocolate.”

Please note: My infatuation with this romantic diner situation is COMPLETELY UNRELATED to Young Gun at the Steer-In and the possibility of me dating a black dude.

“I texted Glasses. He’s meeting us,” Matt had declared on the cab ride up.

See, we’re always meeting “characters” in the various hipster hotspots around Indianapolis. We’ll have these  brief, random run-ins with these personalities and immediately give them monikers for future reference:   “Knee-Knocker.” “The Kid.” “Poop Guy.” “Eyepatch.”

In Spring of ‘09, “Glasses” was a new character, one Matt and Katie had met a weekend earlier at the same bar. Naturally, he was sporting a pair of plastic frames at the time - hence the name (hey, I’m not saying the nickname has to be ORIGINAL, just MEMORABLE.) The two of them went on and on about how cool he was, so every time the door opened, someone would inevitably whisper, “Glasses?…Nope.”

Finally, Glasses - or Jordan, as we now know him - walked into the Alley Cat and INTO. OUR. HEARTS.

They were right: He was a cool dude, who seamlessly became one of The Gang. Throughout that summer, we found ourselves saying, “Let’s see what Jordan’s up to!” By Autumn, he spent most Saturday nights on our couch and spent most Sunday days drinking with us on Mass Ave. By Winter, we were Secret Santa-ing and taking weekend trips to ring in the New Year. By Spring, he was coaching me on my boy problems and introducing us to his new love.

I thought about all of this last week, as I watched Matt meticulously insert 27 neon candles into a cake we had just made.

“Just over a year ago, he was Glasses,” I said. “And now we’re baking his birthday cake.”

I’m so happy that we get to.

Happy Birthday, Jordan.

Matt, walking with our cake through Lockerbie on our way to The Ball and Biscuit.

Dapper Birthday Boy and the Ever-Lovely Sarah D.

Indianapolis' Coolest Came Out to Play

Cake Blur, because I can't hold my camera still and sing at the same time, silly.

Happy Birthday. Love, Chief.