Feet all stomped up

Saw Skeletonwitch with the South and the Brothers H this evening. My, I do love a show with a good moshpit. It has been a long time.

You don't know the power of Styrofoam!

I watched "Bolt" tonight.

"Rhino is awesome! He's beyond awesome!! He's Be-Awesome!!!" - Rhino

It was in fact Be-Awesome!
There. I have spoilered my favorite line from the movie. And now, I want to watch it again. Right now.

Still here

Since moving to the City, I have become prone to making all kinds of strange and random generalizations about living here. And observations about what I am learning from my time here. JY has on occasion suggested that I unfairly attribute things to this place. His experience here is wildly different from mine.

Perhaps it's not NYC, it's me. Entirely likely.

Some days I find this City heartbreaking and utterly disappointing, at other times unspeakably beautiful and captivating.

The balance between so many attractive and repellent forces continues to hold me in orbit here.

I thought I would leave after 6 months. But I am still here.

Cuz a little spam is good for the soul

The kid who made this poster possible can be found here.

Just sayin'.

Train + Postal Service + heat =

On the train ride home I had this warm fuzzy feeling wash over me. I wanted to compliment people on their shoes, help them straighten their coat collars, help them retie their ponytails.

I have this happen on occasion now and find it a little bit disconcerting. Maybe it was because, while it's cold outside, it was warm on the F train this evening.

Someone must have been mischannelling something through me. Otherwise I cannot account for it.

But in the spirit of this disembodied feeling let me offer up a little CNSY.

More than skin deep

BBFK and Miss N came out for a visit this weekend. And a fine old time was had. I must tell you, those girls know how to party. Good company and good times, for sure.

I wanted to give a particular hat tip to the Bodies Exhibit. Which was pretty damn amazing. The human body is stunning. You and I, we are works of art. We and everyone we know. I was floored by their ability to capture and reveal this. And at the end of the exhibit, I got to hold a brain. Braaaaaiiiiinnnssss!!!!

I want to be sedated.

How else to soothe the savage beast?

That or punch someone.

Sigh.

I am no promoter

I sent an email out to a bunch of people inviting them to come out on a Wednesday without telling them the occasion. (Which is the day before my birthday.)

Naturally, I am getting any number of excuses and not much of a groundswell for it.

Which just goes to show what a lousy promoter/marketer I am.

Which is, in fact, fine by me.

As I sit here and think about this, I am reminded of one of RD's classes in which he said something to the effect that more and more marketing needs to be done by nontraditional means. The important thing is reaching the audience, not the medium used to do it. He came up with the example of reaching out to horror movie fans at the right kind of rock show. What if you could persuade Marilyn Manson to mention your movie during his set ... "Hey you assholes. You need to check out Hellraiser 24 when it comes out next week."

I suppose this generally only works with adolescents, who tend to think that name calling, a bad attitude and a derisive tone of voice = cool. And I am not sure that this is the kind of thing that Marilyn Manson would ever say. But today I keep revisiting the "Hey you assholes" marketing strategy and day dreaming about what the response rate would have been to an email that read:

"Hey you assholes, it's my F**kin' birthday. I am one step closer to Corpsville so come out and have a G*dd*mn drink with me."

I think my entire circle of acquaintance has gotten to the age where that sh*t just does not fly. But I am still quite taken with the very thought of it.

Latest note to self

My choices are my own.
They lead to certain consequences.
If I make different choices, the results will be different.

it meant a lot to me, it really did

It is strange how hard it can be to take a compliment. It is a skill to figure out how to accept one gracefully. To accept a compliment is different from merely thanking someone for giving it. Sometimes this is due to embarrassment. Sometimes this is due to skepticism or confusion or self-loathing. Sometimes it is a desire to not appear stuck up or too prideful.

The thing to do is not be a doofus, hear them out and find a genuine way to positively acknowledge what they say.

To not accept it gracefully is ungracious to the giver. A challenge to their judgment, their powers of observation, their discernment.

But sometimes the compliment itself is so odd or misplaced or generic that one does not know how to react. Often a compliment will seem very generic, even if it is sincerely meant and expressed. Or misplaced.

There is this quote that I heard first on "My So-Called Life" that went something like:

"What you are is God's gift to you, what you do with it is your gift to God."

It occurs to me that this idea comes into play with the compliments that people give you. When they compliment you on things that are "God's gift to you," they are complimenting you on something you had nothing to do with. Best to pass those along to your parents and grandparents. Chalk it up to luck, genetics, Providence.

But compliments pertaining to "your gift to God" are a product of your actions and choices. Often they are very specific to you.

At a show recently someone told me that she thought that my diction and my phrasing were very good. At the same show, someone told me that he liked that it was not just singing, that I was very Broadway in my interpretation. In the time that I have sung in front of people, these were among rare instances in which someone complimented me on my musicianship or my performing and not my pipes.

JY at one point called me a "stalwart lass" and JJsn once called me a "Game-y Broad." Which is basically code for "stubborn foolish (probably drunken) moron." I am not sure that either statement was meant as a compliment. But they were observations that jibed with how I try to roll in this life. Observations that made me feel like someone was actually paying attention and perhaps, liked something about me that I like about myself.

These were not all compliments graciously received but I will say, when someone compliments you on "your gift to God," ...

"There's nothing like it, there's nothing like it in the world." -
Richard Maltby, Jr.

want vs. have / want vs. sell

It's easy to get more than a little paranoid about your privacy on the internet. It's altogether likely that everyone is watching you there. Some are watching everything in general and saving it all, in case there are interesting trends to be observed, or they ever need to find you or someone like you in particular. Others are just stalking you or your cohort, the people who think, feel, behave and spend as you do.

I mistakenly keep thinking in light of this, some people at businesses would be able to find me, read my mind and offer to sell me exactly what I want.

For example this week I want to buy: 10 Temporary tatoos of the Looney Tunes character Speedy Gonzalez and a very tart lemon tart or cake or pan of lemon bars. Alas, the internet today sees fit to try to sell me a blackberry, Levis, iPhone insurance, Tennis lessons, or a local piano tuner.

CK pointed out to me a long time ago that companies are not interested in selling you what you want, they are interested in making you want to buy what they have, by whatever means they can. Still, I live in the hope that the internet algorithms are eventually going to get so good that someone will anticipate my every desire and suss out the specific price point and make the exchange happen such that they make money and my material happiness increases substantially and significantly.

A girl can dream, can't she?

Meanwhile, I while away my hard earned cash on hot dogs and well drinks.

Positively Dumb

For many people the drive to correct and edit is more powerful than the drive to make a decision or share information. Often the decisions are absolutely necessary but scary to make. If your ego and reputation can handle it, sometimes playing dumb will yield you more effective results than asking questions.

Gear shift

While things were slow, I was the one kind of crazy at work. And now that things are picking up, I am trying to remember how I did things when I was the other kind of crazy.

mercy or fairness

The problem with enforcing excessive fairness is that you have to refuse people things that aren't that big a deal, because they are a big deal to someone, on principle if nothing else.

And trickled down to me, I feel petty when required to enforce such fairness. Would that I was in a position of enough authority to afford to be generous.

Healthcare Slow Jam

KL pointed this one out to me.



"Bipartisanship means, bipartisanship means, everyone can par-tay-ee"