Aug 17 7 comments
ACK, Nostalgia, movie films

Stranded at the Drive-In, Branded a Fool

Bess and I recently went on a Groupon date (her buy-one-get-one was about to expire and I REAPED ALL THE BENEFITS) to the Tibbs Drive-In here in Indy.

Honestly, I haven’t been to the drive-in since 2002, and that was a VERY DIFFERENT SCENARIO. I was in Michigan and went with my boyfriend, Adam. I was 18, and I’m pretty sure we made out in the bed of his truck the whole time? Are you humming “Strawberry Wine” in your head? You should, because that’s how insufferable and nauseating we were.

I do remember this much: The feature was “Halloween Resurrection,” featuring a fine performance by rapper BUSTA RHYMES, whose (spoiler alert!) catchphrase was, I am kidding you not:

Yes, those were different times, indeed. But just because I didn’t have some lusty man-child trying to put his hand up my shirt didn’t mean that I couldn’t LOOK for love on a Monday night, in a nearly deserted drive-in theatre…

We each checked in on Foursquare.

“Ooh, the MAYOR is here, right now,” I cooed.

[Because you get points if the mayor is "in the house." Because the more points you get, the closer you are to...winning? Winning Foursquare? Do we know what the point of Foursquare is yet?]

Out of sheer boredom, Bess clicked on his profile. WHO IS THIS MYSTERY MAYOR AMONG US?

Bess: “He’s kinda cute. Oohh, he’s in med school.“

Talk about a meet-cute, right? Drive-ins mean the movie-film GREASE, and so this was kind of how I pictured the scenario:

(You guys don’t know the trouble I go to to do such fine ’shop work for you. Did you notice the red cross? CUZ HE’S A DOCTOR. And also because I couldn’t draw a stethoscope freehand.)

“OooOOOhh. Maybe I should feign an injury!” I decide brilliantly. “But it would have to be a sexy injury, ya know? What would be the SEXIEST injury I could get right now?”

Without skipping a beat, Bess: “You sprained your… VAGINA….doing…KEGELS. That’s probably the sexiest. Or the grossest. I can’t tell.”

So clearly, based on this conversation, we’re both a little more THIS:

(That’s supposed to be me as “Rizzo.” With a cigarette complete with billowing sm–OKAY, I GET IT, I DON’T UNDERSTAND PROPORTIONS.)

Anyway, none of this matters because I never found The Doctor. Instead, I ended up getting distracted by the various food offerings of the Snack Shack. Pretty typical.

Also, I obviously didn’t want to be seen by ANYONE, as I was wearing a muu-muu:

muumuu

(IT WAS HOT, OKAY? This was when it was sweltering hot day after day, and I didn’t feel like putting on pants, or anything that was going touch my body beyond the purpose of keeping the damn garment on my person.)

THE END!

danny-zuko

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Aug 16 3 comments
For the Record, lists

Open Letter to Myself: 28 for 28, Part 2

On the way back from the Paul McCartney show, my friend Melissa turned to me and asked, “You have a birthday coming up, don’t you?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Twenty-eight.” I shrugged, not knowing what more to add.

“Oh, twenty-eight is the BEST year!” she declared. She went on to say that all her friends would agree: if they could go back and relive a year of their past? It would be twenty-eight. I thought about this as I downed my birthday cocktails last night. Yes, I should make twenty-eight a year anyone would want to relive with fervor.

Part Deux of the Open Letter to Myself: (You can read Part One HERE. Oh and my rambling “1.5″ here.)

16. Continue the art of honing down your “Homecoming Expectations.” You know, when you hold a person or event to ridiculous expectations (like Homecoming) and you’re devastated when they don’t live up to them (like when your boyfriend won’t even dance the last dance with you and subsequently breaks up with you after a Matchbox20 concert).

17. You have the best mom and dad ever. They gave you a ridiculously happy childhood and a great foundation off of which to launch and make a mark on the world.  Make sure they know that you know that.

18. Heed this:

19. You can be trusted with a lot of things. Mature things. Adult things. A credit card is not one of those things.

20. Jesus Christ, Jenny. When you need help, JUST ASK FOR IT.

21. Never forget the weird dichotomic ability for He’s Just Not That Into You to simultaneously save and ruin your life. “Save,” because it’s genuinely a time-saver, and “Ruin,” because it makes crushes SO MUCH LESS FUN.

22. When someone arrives at a party, yell, “Heeey!” like you were waiting for them this whole time! People love that. Also, fine-tune your ability to read a party so that you leave riiight after it reaches its peak. Don’t linger, like that one time you tried to hang out with Ra Ra Riot in Bloomington and they turned you down, or that other time you stuck around the Anthony Bourdain meet ‘n greet until the waitstaff was packing up and they were turning off the lights.

23. Don’t forget what Anthony told you in regards to your writing:

24. You can’t pull off a romper. It’s okay, though! You can pull off a lot of other things! Oh, and when in doubt, BELT IT.

25. I hope you never lose your sense of wonder. Oh shit, that’s from a song. But seriously. Never lose your eagerness to learn, even when it means you possess an oddly vast knowledge of documentaries about fundamentalist religious groups.

26. You are in your lane. Other people are in their lanes. Stop being mean to yourself for not being in someone else’s lane. No matter how good that person’s lane looks on Facebook.

27. You’re young; you’re gonna make mistakes!

28. All of this? All of the turmoil and absurdity and hilarity and joy? It’s going to make a great book some day.

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Aug 15 0 comments
ACK

Open Letter to Myself: 28 for 28, Part 1.5

15. On your 28th Birthday, you’ll have to work late on a powerpoint for some god-awful presentation, and the dude who’s giving the presentation won’t know it’s your birthday, and you HATE HIM for this, but you’ll feel too proud to be like, “Dude, I should be drinking right now instead of formatting text boxes?” but you start thinking about how you’re 28, almost, I mean at 8:40pm, officially, and maybe you don’t need to formally announce your birthday and expect all work to cease on account of your existence, but, yeah, you kind of expect that, a little, so instead of finishing the other half of the Open Letter to yourself on your blog, just yell “Birthday Pass!” real loud, stuff your face with that cookie cake Bess just brought home, and pop the J. Roget that’s been chillin’ in the back of the fridge since the Royal Wedding.

Also, this is my favorite song and the world needs to know this video:

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Aug 14 2 comments
For the Record, Uncategorized, lists

Open Letter to Myself: 28 for 28, Part 1.

Tomorrow is my 28th Birthday. Here is an open letter to myself. (First half.)

Dear Jenny,

1. Forget about being cool. The real you is awkward; embrace it. You know how there’s nothing more painful than watching someone try SO HARD to be cool? Yeah. Don’t do that.

2. Time and time again you’ll think about going vegan, and then you’ll remember how the priest at your grandma’s funeral charged you with the task of learning her famous meatball recipe. You’re never going to be vegan. That’s okay.

3. Figure out a way to get back to Europe. Europe was the best, wasn’t it?

4. The great thing about being an only child is that you get to choose your brothers and sisters. You have some of the best. Never forget this.

5. Stop apologizing so much. You’re fine. You’re fine.

6. One of life’s biggest disappointments is realizing that boys sometimes really are like the after-school specials, in that they’ll say anything to sleep with you, and you will. And they will subsequently forget about you, and it will hurt.

7. That said, remember the men who have shown you love, who have shown you what it means to be a decent man. Don’t confuse the boys with the men.

8. Fine-tuning your tolerance for alcohol has been one of the biggest gifts you have given yourself. You haven’t puked since March 2009. Keep it up.

9. Remember that one time you had that Abbey Road Side-B sing-along at the top of Matt Wilson’s stairwell? Those are life’s Peak Moments. Commit yourself to having more of them.

10. Make more photographs.

11. Know when to hold ‘em. Know when to fold ‘em. Know when to walk away. Know when to run.

12.  Quit freaking out about your body. Everyone’s too busy being insecure about his or her body to worry about your body.

13. Someone you greatly respect once told you, “You are your own force.” Make this your mantra for Year 28.

14. When in doubt, put on the red lipstick. It’s never steered you wrong.

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Aug 13 0 comments
music, shopping

Check It: Ezra Furman

Baby’s First Black-Out Drunk Purchase:

Sometime in April, I came home one afternoon to find this in my mailbox:

This is an autographed copy of Ezra Furman and the Harpoons latest, Mysterious Power. I was happy to receive it; however, I had no recollection of ever ordering it. I checked my bank statement and it turns out I purchased this after coming home from the bar at about 3am. A brilliant choice, nonetheless.

I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Ezra Furman twice live here in Indianapolis, and I have no idea why he isn’t famous yet — his music is so sincere and awkward and fun. A lot of indie music nowadays is so calculated and precise but I love a band that’s off-kilter and perfectly unperfect. Music blogs draw a lot of comparison between Ezra and Bob Dylan/the Violent Femmes/David Byrne, but what I really hear is a beautiful, rambling poet who was clearly influenced by music I’ve always loved.

This is one of my favorites from this newest album:

“Something about her reminds me of the United States, sprawling across the west in all their glory.” I just love the way he looks at the world. Okay, yes, I kind of have a crush on him too, after reading his blog.

I’ll profess my love on a Saturday because no one reads blogs on Saturdays.

Anyway, Ezra Furman is now working on a solo record, which you can support at Kickstarter. According to his video, his new work is the result of breaking through artistic boredom by getting into intentional fistfights at bars. Totally.

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Aug 12 1 comments
writing

On Storytelling.

I used to get flustered when people asked me what kind of writing I did. Because I operate from a standpoint of near-constant self-deprecation (ack!), it’s taken me a while to consider what I do with any level of seriousness.  I learned from Matt to just say, “I work mostly in creative non-fiction,” which usually is enough to shut someone up.

However, I’ve considered just going balls-out art student and spouting something like, “For the most part, my work is concerned with narrative, its varying forms and renderings”:

The truth is, I just like to tell stories. And maybe make people laugh.

While I’m trying to figure out how to do that, I play this clip on a weekly basis:

Relatedly, This American Life offers a 6-month paid internship in New York City. Applications are due October 1.

I think I’m gonna go for it.

…And I’m posting it here so you guys don’t let me chicken out.

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Aug 11 3 comments
ACK

I Can Haz Sum Slack?

Today was just…ugh.

The 40-hour 9-to-5, for me, is just kind of one big farce. For eight hours a day, I have to essentially pretend to be someone else. Smile. Be cheery. Do the work. Punch the clock. I do this, day in and day out, with the knowledge that eventually I’ll break out of it. I’ll bust through this rut and find something meaningful to do with my life; I know this. In the meantime, I feel like I’m merely an actress playing the role of “Adult,” and that some time or another, They’re gonna figure me out. It’s a performance you don’t realize is completely exhausting until you’ve hit your breaking point and you can’t convince yourself to uphold the facade anymore.

Eventually, I’d like to write full-time, and I’m taking baby steps towards this goal. But sometimes, mere baby steps aren’t enough, and when someone asks me something harmless, like, “We’re out of file folders?” it somehow becomes the epitome of everything I hate about my life.  I begin to beat myself up over all the things I haven’t accomplished, about the insecurities and self-doubt I’ve let immobilize me over the years. I’m bored and unstimulated and it is from CHOICES I HAVE MADE. Instead of using it as fuel to motivate me, I am dreadfully, dreadfully mean to my Self.  This gets me nowhere; I know this. I’m working on cutting myself some slack.

If there’s any solace to be found in this ridiculous 20-something struggle, it’s that I’m not alone:

Next best thing:

THIS IS MY DINNER AND EVERYONE CAN SUCK IT.

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Aug 10 2 comments
smells like quarter-life-crisis, television

Punky Power Existentialism

Every time someone announces her engagement or pregnancy, I have a two-second existential crisis.

Second One: DEAR GOD, WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?

Second Two: What is wrong with ME?

Yep, I congratulate you, and then I immediately make it about me. Don’t worry, though — you ought to know that 1) I have a phenomenal therapist, and 2) this is an equal-opportunity neurosis, which also applies to people I don’t know personally. Like Punky Brewster.

I had just read an article over at Hello Giggles about Soleil Moon Frye’s new parenting book. You’ll notice that this was posted at 3:39 am. A time of night not commonly associated with clear, uplifting thoughts. Somehow I let Punky Brewster bum me out and make me feel old.

But that’s the OPPOSITE of what she was. Ladies of the 80s, you know what I’m talking about. Punky Brewster was the ISH.

(Fact: The guy who wrote the Punky Brewster theme song also wrote the themes to Cheers AND Mr. Belvedere! Where were we before Wikipedia? I don’t even want to THINK of a world where I went around unaware of TV show theme composer catalogs! I digress!)

We were all obsessed with orphans in the 80s/90s - Punky Brewster, Annie, Boxcar Children. I even had Punky Brewster sneakers (bright converse high tops, one pink, one purple). And all of us were traumatized by that “Hide and Seek” episode where Cherie hides in an old refrigerator and Punky has to bring her back to life with the CPR skills that she thankfully learned, like, THAT DAY.

OH NOES!

OH NOES!

(I even referenced this the other day, then Bogey became fascinated with trying to climb into the fridge: “Bogey!” I cried. “Don’t do that! What if I shut you in there and you’d be like Cherie when she almost died?!” / Bess: “..the fuck you talking about?”)

But, aside from all this, when it’s 3:39 in the morning, and this person who symbolizes the simplicity of your youth shows up in your Google Reader, and she has like, seven kids already and seems to be doing something really meaningful with her life, and you’ve spent your night eating a Lean Cuisine and blogging about Harry Belafonte, and where is your book deal, already, is it because you write in constant run-on stream-of-consciousness? — that’s just a lot for a girl to handle.

Then I realized that I’ve been lacking a key ingredient that Soleil Moon Frye has been rocking this whole time: Punky Power.

“It’s believing in myself, it’s never giving up, it’s faith that things are going to turn out okay. But most of all it’s knowing I can do anything I want, if I really try.”

Also, PUNKY DON’T NEED NO MAN:

I CAN CARRY MY OWN BOOKS.

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Aug 09 2 comments
lists, music

10 Things You Didn’t Know about Harry Belafonte

About a year ago, I went to my first major league baseball game with my friends Katie and Nick. Katie had to work the event, so we had to get there super early. Nick and I, naturally, headed across the street from the ballpark and started drinking. It was Cardinals v. Reds, but I can barely remember that, because I was drunkity drunk drunk by the time the game started. BASEBALL!

Here’s what I do remember: it was the Civil Rights Game, and HARRY BELAFONTE WAS THERE to win an award. They drove him around the diamond in a little golf cart and he waved, and from the upper deck, I “Woo”ed like I’ve never wooed before. Then I accosted everyone in a ten-row radius by slurring, “WH..WHY AREN’T YOU CLAAPPING? It’s…that’s HARRY BELLLLAFONTAAAY, PEOPLE. Yooo…you people don’t know ANYTHING.” And then Nick told me to sit down because I was spilling my beer all over him.

This is all to say, I LOVE HARRY BELAFONTE. And you should too.

Stud.

Stud.

Ten Things You Didn’t Know about Harry Belafonte:

1. He served in the U.S. Navy during WWII.

2. In the late 1940s, he took classes in acting at The New School in New York alongside MARLON BRANDO. SIDNEY POITIER. AND BEA ARTHUR. What a lunch table that must’ve been.

3. His breakthrough album Calypso (1956) became the first LP to sell over 1 million copies.

4. His album Midnight Special (1962) featured the first–ever record appearance by a then young harmonica player named Bob Dylan:

5. Belafonte was the first African–American to win an Emmy, with his first solo TV special Tonight with Belafonte (1959).

harry-belafonte-emmy

6. Belafonte supported the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and was one of Martin Luther King Jr.’s confidants. He provided for King’s family, since King made only $8,000 a year as a preacher.

7. In 1968, Belafonte appeared on a Petula Clark primetime television special on NBC.

In the middle of a song, Clark smiled and briefly touched Belafonte’s arm. This made the show’s sponsor, Plymouth Motors, nervous. Plymouth wanted to cut the segment, but Clark, who had ownership of the special, told NBC that the performance would be shown intact or she would not allow the special to be aired at all. Newspapers reported the controversy and, when the special aired, it grabbed high ratings.

(You can watch the video here. “Scandal” at 2:13.)

8. BELAFONTE BEAT PROSTATE CANCER.

9. Harry Belafonte IS RESPONSIBLE FOR RAP IN CUBA.

According to Geoffrey Baker’s article “Hip hop, Revolucion! Nationalizing Rap in Cuba,” in 1999, Belafonte met with representatives of the rap community immediately before meeting with Fidel Castro. This meeting resulted in Castro’s personal approval of (and hence the government’s involvement in), the incorporation of rap into his country’s culture.

10. During the Martin Luther King, Jr. Day speech at the Duke University in 2006, Belafonte said that if he could choose his epitaph, it would be, “Harry Belafonte, Patriot.”

How about, “Harry Belafonte, LOVE OF MY LIFE,” AM I RIGHT?

(Source: Wikipedia, all of it.)

—————————--

BONUS VID:

Harry Belafonte singing “Turn the World Around” on The Muppet Show.

(fact: this was said to have been one of Jim Hensons’s favorite performances. Belafonte was asked to perform this number at Henson’s memorial. WARNING: Do NOT youtube Jim Henson’s memorial because I believe it to be the saddest thing on the internet.)

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Aug 08 0 comments
Utterly and Completely Random

Humphrey Bogart

One of my roommates has ringworm.

This isn’t my dog. This is Bess’s dog, Humphrey Bogart.

Bogie.

Yes, “Bogie” is what we yell when he chews things he shouldn’t. And barks at things he shouldn’t. And jumps on things he shouldn’t. Etc, etc. This happens often.

I suppose you could call him my fur nephew. I technically have no responsibilities to this dog, but if Bess is gone for an evening I’ll take him on walks and try to train him. I suppose we can throw that in quotes - “train.” So far, I keep trying Cesar Milan Dog Whisperer shit, where you form your hand into a kind of claw (supposedly mimicking a mother dog’s mouth/teeth) and poke/correct him with a “shh!” sound. This does not work.

Me: “SHHT!” (poke)

Bogie: ”HAAAAND! I LOVE HAAAANDS!”  *gumgumgum*

I am not a pack leader.

He’s also part German Shepherd, so he’s becoming a little bit of an ankle biter as he tries to “herd” us from room to room. That’s the worst.

I want to take him to the dog park to meet dudes, but I can’t, ON ACCOUNT OF THE RINGWORM. He also can’t start obedience training until that gets cleared up. So until that happens, Bess and I are trying to “parent” him consistently, and making sure we discipline him similarly, which is like raising a child, which is not clearing up those lesbian rumors.

He’s such a little shit, but sometimes I can tell that he’s going to be the sweetest dog. The other day, I was washing my face, and he wandered into the bathroom, oddly serene. I sat on the floor and he just sat there, stoic, as I patted him on the head, and - it was weird - he looked at me directly in the eyes and I…I saw the dog he was going to be. He’ll be a scrappy little companion, with the best of doggy spirits.

I scratched him behind the ears.

“Good boy,” I said quietly.

And then he burped in my face.

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Aug 07 4 comments
ACK, television

Weekend Reflections.

I’ve been kind of boring the past couple weekends.

I’m trying to save up for a couple weekend vacations this month (Nashville! New York!), and the only way I know how to save money is to sequester myself in my house and watch television programs on demand until I fall asleep. If I don’t literally lock myself in, I spend oh, so much money at bars and the fast food drive-thrus that follow. Now that I’m not testing my liver to its limits, my face has de-puffed, and my stomach has deflated from its frat-boy proportions. (#fellas.) Except now I’m not in public for anyone to see it and appreciate it.

Anyway, this weekend, I watched 6 hours worth of HBO’s “Game of Thrones.” HAVE YOU GUYS WATCHED THIS SERIES YET? OH MY GAH. After hour 1, I declared (to no one in particular) that it was “The Tudors” meets “Lord of the Rings,” but apparently SO DID THE ENTIRE INTERNET, so I guess you still have a job at describing things, Roger Ebert.

The truth is, I couldn’t watch more than a couple seasons of “The Tudors” because it was historically inaccurate; THAT’S how big of a dork I am. But I do love all the scandals and the sex and the costumes. So when you combine the medieval storylines with a history that I cannot wikipedia for accuracy because it’s fictional? BRILLIANT.

I wish I could tell you that my favorite characters in “Game of Thrones” are the feminist icons or maybe the swash-buckling noble lords, but I really just like the barbarian horse lord dude.

He doesn’t say much but he has his own weird horselord language, and, GAH! ACK!

You guys? Bess was out of town last night, so I got in bed with a bottle of wine (and some frozen cookie dough, that I stole from Bess) and churned out half of season one. It was one of the best dates I’ve ever been on. I’m pretty sure “Game of Thrones” is my equivalent of a harlequin novel.

AAACK! Forever alone.

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Aug 06 1 comments
Nostalgia, music

Hot Licks on the Licorice Stick

What I really wanted to do was play the French Horn.

I don’t know how a child of six or seven manages to fixate on the idea of playing a particular musical instrument. I don’t know if I saw it on Sesame Street, or if a character from Punky Brewster played the French horn. Either way, I was obsessed with it. It’s weird, but considering the kind of adult I grew into (see last night’s post about purchasing a ukulele), no one should be surprised.

My parents took me to the Grand Rapids Symphony a lot when I was little. One evening they had an “instrument petting zoo” in the lobby, where you could walk up to the musicians and test drive their instruments. (O HAI, GERMS!) I remember walking up to the lady with the French horn. “This is my destiny, lady, I got this,” my little self thought. She explained how to buzz your lips into the mouthpiece. I took a deep breath, put my mouth to the brass, and…Pffffft. Nothing. “Fuck your horn, lady!” I snarled. Just kidding. I was seven.

I then approached the guy with the clarinet. I played a note. The note was “E.” “Rad,” I thought (because it was 1991 and that was something we said back then). A few days later, my mother asked nonchalantly, “Do you want to play the clarinet?” And I was like, “Okay?” because, why not, I had nothing else to do.

In third grade, I started taking lessons from an old gentleman named Mr. Emerson. When I say old, I mean Mr. Emerson was the band director of my dad’s high school, WHEN MY DAD WAS IN HIGH SCHOOL. But he was kind and patient as I honked my way through Hot Cross Buns. Mr. Emerson would look at the scales I scribbled out, remarking, “Your notes! They’re so fat and happy.” When I got visibly bored playing classics, he brought out a book of Elvis tunes and let me play from that. Despite all this, I decided to quit after the first year — to which my mother said, “How about you give it just more year. After that, if you don’t like it, you can quit.”

I didn’t quit for another 8 years. (MOMS, how do they work?!)

And I was good, for a while. But somewhere, atop my throne as first chair in my high school’s highest band, playing music stopped being fun. It got ridiculously competitive, and I just wanted to play some Benny Goodman and call it a night, man. I packed my clarinet up in the summer of 2000, only breaking it out on a handful of occasions. . . .until now.

[An aside: I was inspired by the weirdest source. A few years ago I was watching "Cathouse" on HBO - you know, the one about the Moonlight Bunny Ranch? One of the girls plays the French horn. Like, in between banging dudes for money, she sequesters herself in a corner and busts out an etude or two. She said it was relaxing and kept her mind sharp, or something. "I should be more like this prostitute," I thought.]

So on my way home from work last Wednesday, I stopped by a music shop on the eastside and bought the thinnest clarinet reed possible. I smiled as I put the clarinet together; I imagine this is what it feels like to lock together the pieces of an old, familiar gun.

I took a breath, blew into the mouthpiece, and awaited the rich, sultry tones of my yesteryears.

Instead, I heard a goose, dying a violent death.

Yep. I sucked. So back to Hot Cross Buns.

THIS CHICK KNOWS WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT:

I like how she runs this video like it’s a lounge act. “Aaaand that’s my interpretation of Hot Cross Buns, everybody. Remember to tip your waitresses.” Julia, if you’re reading this, please do a mic drop in your next video.

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Aug 05 0 comments
music

In Which McCartney Wins All the Concerts.

This is the setlist for last night’s Paul McCartney concert at Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati. As a special treat, I highlighted the songs that made me cry! Just call me Sentimental McSap! Shocker.

Highlight = Tearduct Fail.

Best. Show. Ever.

And I’m not saying that in the way my generation so often does - when something’s good, maybe even great - and you say, “Best. ____. ever!”

No.

I’m saying this was the best concert I’ve ever been to, and I’m not sure any performer I see after this will top it. That’s a weird thing to grapple, when you’re in it, slowly becoming conscious of the fact that your live show experience is right now peaking, here at this Ohio ballpark, in the Summer of 2011.

Nostalgia was punching me in the face with every intro. I thought about how “Hey Jude” was the first song I knew by heart. How I blasted Sgt. Pepper in my Fisher Price boombox at 1st grade recess.  How “Blackbird” was playing on the radio the morning I left for college. How I can’t recall half of what I learned at that college, but I can rattle off hours of minutiae from a “History of the Beatles” course.

So I’m sitting there, nursing my sentimentalism, coming around to realize that, oh yeah, Paul McCartney’s right there. That guy SOUNDTRACKED THAT MEMORY FOR ME. And sure, I’m somewhere behind home plate and he’s so tiny! but yet not! Macca didn’t come to shortchange nobody.

Highlights:

  • That triple acoustic threat of I’ve Just Seen a Face / I Will / Blackbird (Face is one of my fave Paul songs). I died.
  • Only a handful of numbers deep into a 30+ song set, and I thought, “One hundred seventy four dollars and ninety cents, Jenny. Best money you’ve ever spent.”
  • Something may have provided the final push to finally buy that ukulele I’ve had my eye on.
  • Live and Let Die FIREWORKS? WHAAAAT??

  • Standing in line to get a beer and turning to Melissa, and saying, “A Day in the Life is playing and I’m getting a beer. Surreal.” “As long as we don’t miss Golden Slumbers,” she said. And I kept quiet, thinking, “There’s no way he’s playing Golden Slumbers.”  I had skimmed the setlists of his earlier shows, somehow missing that he closed with it every night. That made the surprise that much better. Boom, McCartney’d.

Anyway, it seems so silly to say you feel rejuvenated in the afterglow of such a spectacle. But I do. I feel changed, in the slightest but best of ways.

Also, “Singing the Na-Na-Na part of Hey Jude with Paul McCartney and 40,000 People” was an item for my Bucket List that I didn’t know I needed, until it happened.

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Aug 04 0 comments
television

Dr. Shoshana Schoenbaum.

Did you guys ever watch United States of Tara, on Showtime? You probably didn’t. No one watched it — which sucked when I went on a TORRENTING WHIRLWIND, watching Seasons 1 & 2 in one weekend and no one cared. NO ONE CARED.

And now the show is cancelled. Enjoy another season of Jersey Shore, America.

United States of Tara was a dramedy (does anyone use that term anymore?) by Diablo Cody that followed Tara (Toni Collette), a woman with dissociative identity disorder. There are a total seven personalities, or “alters,” and one of them is a Jewish therapist with a New York accent from the 1970s. Her name is Shoshana Schoenbaum.

And THAT is the character I unknowingly channeled with I got dressed this morning:

shoshanatwins

Outta sight!

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Aug 03 0 comments
music

In Which I Try to Sum up a Lifetime of Fandom in a Paragraph.

I have to see Paul McCartney before I die. Well, before he dies.  I just have to.

- Me, February 9th, 2006.

Guess who I’m seeing tomorrow?!?!

Paul McCartney

Me, tomorrow night:

beatlemania-001

I’ll probably cry. Just a warning, Great American Ballpark. It’s just that - there’s no one bigger for me, concert-wise.

I have an hour in which to make my NaBloPoMo deadline, but I’m not sure I can sum up what the Beatles have meant to me over my lifetime. With regards to McCartney, I just think there are certain people on this earth with the inherent gift to give us the melodies that our souls want to hear. I think about this often, ever since I saw this thing with Bobby McFerrin on the pentatonic scale:

I don’t know enough about this shit to draw a direct comparison, but I do believe that the best pop artists pluck chords and transitions straight out of nature. I think the best “guilty pleasure” songs get to us that way - whether we know it or not, our ears want to hear a certain sequence or theme, and we are futile to resist it. (Ugh. TYK Rule #1: Don’t let me write about music.)

Before I go to bed, a few trinkets:

This was always one of my favorite performances because they seem so legitimately happy. The Beatles kind of sucked live, mainly due to incapable stadium PA systems and the fact that they couldn’t hear themselves over all screaming. My mom saw the Beatles in 1964 in Detroit, but she’ll be the first to tell you that she couldn’t hear a damn thing, and she was 14, and she cried. But even after all the in-studio masterpieces, you always got the sense from Paul that he lived for the live performance, that he wanted to tour until his dying day. I feel lucky for that.

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