 | Stroke 9 - Little Black Backpack |  |
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 | Found at bee mp3 search engine |  |
Monday, March 30, 2009
Little Black Backpack
I really love '90s one hit wonders. Especially because I was the kind of person to buy the whole album, learn all the words, become embarrassed about it and resell the cd so that nobody would have to know about it. I heard this song on the radio today and still remembered all the words. So I'm thinking maybe a cover is in the works, anybody in?
Sunday, March 29, 2009
The Cool Kids
Why do young people get to decide what's cool? They usually have such limited perspective, no sense of history and little concept of what's practical.
I've been pondering this idea of coolness since the beginning of my alt weekly internship. When you leave college or enter some kind of world in which everyone around you is no longer building an identity made out of bits of cool, it's hard work to keep up. The people I work, it's their job to keep up, to find out what's cool and then tell everyone about it, but isn't that so totally, inherently uncool? I think it may be. But then again, cool isn't cool either. It's all a big convoluted mess that I don't usually try to work out anymore, unless Sophie brings it up.
Or unless a younger sibling calls me out on it. Kim and I like to discuss how our siblings, still in their junior year of college, are way into being too cool for school. And they like to drop hints occasionally that they are disappointed with our fading coolness. Which is okay. Because I am actually not leading of the life of some hip person and there is no reason for me to pretend like I am. I wear a lab coat to work. I like to sit at home and watch Gossip Girl. In my spare time I wash dishes and clean my fishbowl to avoid studying for the GRE. I would have no place to wear top-siders (the footwear preference of our siblings) because I don't go boating and I like to wear socks. Not exactly the marks of the inexorably cool.
But in any case, both of our siblings were rather appalled that we didn't listen to Dan Deacon. Because that's how cool he is. So I had to check him out. I'm still undecided. Here is a video of his for you to judge for yourself.
I've been pondering this idea of coolness since the beginning of my alt weekly internship. When you leave college or enter some kind of world in which everyone around you is no longer building an identity made out of bits of cool, it's hard work to keep up. The people I work, it's their job to keep up, to find out what's cool and then tell everyone about it, but isn't that so totally, inherently uncool? I think it may be. But then again, cool isn't cool either. It's all a big convoluted mess that I don't usually try to work out anymore, unless Sophie brings it up.
Or unless a younger sibling calls me out on it. Kim and I like to discuss how our siblings, still in their junior year of college, are way into being too cool for school. And they like to drop hints occasionally that they are disappointed with our fading coolness. Which is okay. Because I am actually not leading of the life of some hip person and there is no reason for me to pretend like I am. I wear a lab coat to work. I like to sit at home and watch Gossip Girl. In my spare time I wash dishes and clean my fishbowl to avoid studying for the GRE. I would have no place to wear top-siders (the footwear preference of our siblings) because I don't go boating and I like to wear socks. Not exactly the marks of the inexorably cool.
But in any case, both of our siblings were rather appalled that we didn't listen to Dan Deacon. Because that's how cool he is. So I had to check him out. I'm still undecided. Here is a video of his for you to judge for yourself.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Monday, March 23, 2009
Sheep
I will mention that this video is slightly sad for sheep lovers, but also cool for people who like to watch colored lights. And it's also pretty lame that it's a commercial, but what can I say: I like it.
Friday, March 20, 2009
At the Desk of the Writer
Here's something that I started last week, just so you can see what's been coming out of my head these days:
Gordon had found recently, that when he went back in his mind to find the threads of stories he'd been saving, they weren't there. Instead there was a wall. He'd walk back and forth trying to find a hole to crawl through, hoping somebody would show up and tell him what was going on. But nothing happened. Well, there are some flowers, he thought to himself, thinking that maybe he could make do with the few story materials that lay outside the wall. But all he could come up with was one lousy sentence: "The bubblegum stuck stubbornly to the red rubber ball." Gordon kicked the wall a few times. Things tend to look different when you approach then in a new way so he left to pick up some beer with Louie and Fizz at the Plaid Pantry.
Meanwhile, things inside the wall were changing. The story about the girl who lost her arm was mixing up with a story about a robotic panda who escaped from the zoo. And the list of questions that Gordon had been forming about travel (what is a travel experience? what is the ultimate point?) were rearranging themselves with his statement of anti-purpose (I live to eat the bi-products of animals that live to eat mine...). "Listen," Yalpa Lester, Gordon's most popular, most used character was saying. "I've decided, after staring at all of these lines of obvious latent homosexual poetry, that I'd like to take up with a man." The two dimensional ladies from the epic post-college trip to Mexico story waved their paper-thin arms in jealousy for a while, but eventually fell into a heap on the floor. Yalpa eyed the underdeveloped young pirate, of a series of short stories that Gordon had never completed. "So tell me," Yalpa cooed and grabbed a drink from the pirate's treasure chest. "What do you see in your future?"
On the other side of the wall Gordon was pouring Sessions down his throat. There was something about the stubby bottle mixed with the light bubbliness of that beer that felt very satisfying. Louie was batting at the kooshball that lived on the 4th finger of his left hand. It was getting really annoying.
Gordon had found recently, that when he went back in his mind to find the threads of stories he'd been saving, they weren't there. Instead there was a wall. He'd walk back and forth trying to find a hole to crawl through, hoping somebody would show up and tell him what was going on. But nothing happened. Well, there are some flowers, he thought to himself, thinking that maybe he could make do with the few story materials that lay outside the wall. But all he could come up with was one lousy sentence: "The bubblegum stuck stubbornly to the red rubber ball." Gordon kicked the wall a few times. Things tend to look different when you approach then in a new way so he left to pick up some beer with Louie and Fizz at the Plaid Pantry.
Meanwhile, things inside the wall were changing. The story about the girl who lost her arm was mixing up with a story about a robotic panda who escaped from the zoo. And the list of questions that Gordon had been forming about travel (what is a travel experience? what is the ultimate point?) were rearranging themselves with his statement of anti-purpose (I live to eat the bi-products of animals that live to eat mine...). "Listen," Yalpa Lester, Gordon's most popular, most used character was saying. "I've decided, after staring at all of these lines of obvious latent homosexual poetry, that I'd like to take up with a man." The two dimensional ladies from the epic post-college trip to Mexico story waved their paper-thin arms in jealousy for a while, but eventually fell into a heap on the floor. Yalpa eyed the underdeveloped young pirate, of a series of short stories that Gordon had never completed. "So tell me," Yalpa cooed and grabbed a drink from the pirate's treasure chest. "What do you see in your future?"
On the other side of the wall Gordon was pouring Sessions down his throat. There was something about the stubby bottle mixed with the light bubbliness of that beer that felt very satisfying. Louie was batting at the kooshball that lived on the 4th finger of his left hand. It was getting really annoying.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
this blog needs a post
Well friends, to be honest, I'm a little computered out. It crossed my mind that every single aspect of my life is now computerized and sometimes at the end of the day I'm just DYING to read a friggin piece of paper. So for this reason, I am absolutely certain that print will never die. It may not be the primary way for people to receive their news, for example, but pleasurable reading will never be done on the same screen where I do banking, stupid adult education web-writing, mindless internet research for my semi-hip-but-not-hip-enough internship, calendar planning and since yesterday, reading of fiction submissions. Paper is real and textured and easy on the eyes. If I could write out this blog with funny pictures and mail it to each person who I want to read it, I would do that. But I can't. I don't even really have time in which to do things to write on this blog! Sad! But not to worry. Werewolf Bar Mitzvah planning will continue and good times are on the way.
Friday, March 6, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
this desk is also a TV room
If you haven't watched How's Your News before, it's quite fresh, endearing and good for many laughs. I wish Susan Harrington hung out with me all the time. This is the first episode and there are more at the MTV website.
At the Desk of the Intern
Today as I waded through the piles of digital responses to the sex survey that is an annual staple of the alternative weekly where I currently intern, it occurred to me that I know far too much about the sex lives of our readership than one person should have to carry around alone. I, of course, share this burden with other interns and select members of the staff, but I personally was the one responsible for reading through the infinite answers for the fill-in-the-blank portion of the survey. I would like to share some of the most memorable answers.
To preface: if you're not in Portland you might not know that our gay mayor is currently being investigated for his affair, about which he denied having, with a a hot, underage intern (whether they actually had "sex" while he was underage is controversial). They apparently got it on in the second floor bathroom of city hall. This is the backdrop for this year's survey, which highly features questions on ethics and public sex.
So to return to the survey: turns out quite a large number of people believe that the sexiest thing they did in 2008 was get married. Gross. The third most popular sexual fantasy, following threesomes and anal sex, was either being impregnated or doing the impregnation. Double gross. Most people think they are lame because they don't have public sex often enough and those who do, like to do it in very public places. I am now afraid of most parks in town and the bathrooms at the art museum. Triple gross. On another note, most people think that it's acceptable to sleep with people 20 years within your age range, which I thought was rather generous and possibly quadruple gross. Last, but not least, the sexual fantasy of joining the mile high club so cliche. It's a fantasy, you can choose to do anything! Use your imagination!
To preface: if you're not in Portland you might not know that our gay mayor is currently being investigated for his affair, about which he denied having, with a a hot, underage intern (whether they actually had "sex" while he was underage is controversial). They apparently got it on in the second floor bathroom of city hall. This is the backdrop for this year's survey, which highly features questions on ethics and public sex.
So to return to the survey: turns out quite a large number of people believe that the sexiest thing they did in 2008 was get married. Gross. The third most popular sexual fantasy, following threesomes and anal sex, was either being impregnated or doing the impregnation. Double gross. Most people think they are lame because they don't have public sex often enough and those who do, like to do it in very public places. I am now afraid of most parks in town and the bathrooms at the art museum. Triple gross. On another note, most people think that it's acceptable to sleep with people 20 years within your age range, which I thought was rather generous and possibly quadruple gross. Last, but not least, the sexual fantasy of joining the mile high club so cliche. It's a fantasy, you can choose to do anything! Use your imagination!
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