Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Pre-Vacation Provocations

These may or may not actually be provocative, but, you know, wordplay is fun. And now I will use this opportunity to post some Jason Mraz:



Anecdote: I once sang "The Remedy" at karaoke while quite drunk. It was difficult. There are a lot of words and they go fast. Of course, I remember this, and I do not remember singing "What a Girl Wants" with Julia later that same night, just the part where I was kneeling over the toilet in the Shari's* bathroom and realizing that this was probably the lowest point of my life. Don't drink a white russian and five long islands in a night; I don't care how weak they are, kids. Be smart. Drink responsibly. Choose songs with easy words for karaoke. All important lessons.

I'm going to the homestead to visit the fam for an extra-long weekend. I think I'm going to bring my laptop because god do I love the internet, so I should be blogging from in front of the digital cable. In the meantime, here's a couple links:

-Ms. Mix & Bitch, my new favorite advice columnist/DJ for your personal life, talked a while back about her love of her anti-depressants, and since I'm on the "thank The Sexy Gay Jesus for SSRIs, am I right?" train these days, I appreciated her general appreciation of finding the right meds to live your life without feeling like every tiny daily setback will cause the whole thing to shatter. Also, she's hilarious and gives awesome advice and playlists. Solidarity of the Depressed! We can get together and talk about how no one understands what we've been through and ill-advisedly drink lots of alcohol that can counteract our meds. It'll be fun. An Ode to Psychopharmacology. (Mix Tape Therapy)

-John Bacino, a friend of the dear Pretentious Ex-Boyfriend, has been creating awesome abstract digital art and putting it on the interwebs. (Thanks, Facebook!) Check them all out, but I found a recent one I'm particularly fond of: all the terrible acts i'm on the verge of committing. (johncbacino.) See the Creative Commons page of copyright magic.

-Lisa Kansas over at PunkAssBlog engages in a fascinating analysis of gender in relation to specific crimes. She gets to the root of some of the issues surrounding attempts to get men involved in/to the forefront of the elimination of a rape culture. Ch-ch-check it out. Rape and Neonaticide. (PunkAssBlog.com)

-Mirroring my long-held views about boys and guitars, the Token Sinner discusses how douchebags think that just because they can pluck out something that sounds vaguely like "Come As You Are,"** that means they are hot sexy musician men and you should probably just leave your underwear at the door, honey. Growing up with a music-obsessed brother (who never fucking stopped playing) and having dealt with someone who I'll just refer to as my Arch Nemesis, for whom the concept of Semi-Circle Action*** was invented, I was very reluctant to go anywhere near the guitar for many years. Eventually I gave into my musical desires because it's not like I was going to haul my ass over to the music building to play the piano all the time, and goddamn it I need something to sing to. So now I've been annoying my roommates and friends with the guitar myself. HOWEVER: I like to think my level of pretension is very low, and I assume that people don't really WANT to hear me play unless they specifically ask. Guitars: The Most Pretentious Musical Instrument Ever? (Sinnercyst, via The Hand Mirror)


*It's like Perkins, but in the Northwest. I maintain that the color scheme of Shari's is more pleasing than Perkins', but I may be biased due to having spent innumerable amounts of time and paper route money there in junior high.

**Is this a dated reference? Can 24 year-olds make dated references? It can be hard to say when one has older siblings; I seem to have a much better memory of late '80s/early '90s pop culture than a lot of people my same age.

***Semi-Circle Action occurred when my Arch Nemesis would start playing an instrument/singing and crowds of (mostly) girls would gather around to fawn over him. Actual level of skill or talent is irrelevant: a showoff is a showoff is a douchebag. Get over yourself. Everyone else: Don't feed the narcissist!

3 comments:

  1. OMG that night. I was just telling Kim about how we'll probably end up drunk at Shari's on Saturday, but hopefully not drunk and puking at Shari's.

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  2. I would say "Banana Pancakes" is the new "Come as you are". We have a lot of douchey guitar playing guys in Provo and that's a classic. Pretty much anything Jack Johnson.

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  3. Thanks for the props - you're a trip yourself - but you knew that already, hmmm?

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