Sunday thoughts

Here are two thoughts for this Sunday night.

1 - I could listen to The Civil Wars forever. They make my brain stop running so fast. There is a soothing to their music that affects me unlike anything else. Perhaps it was because the first time I really listened to them was in a field surrounded by about 4,000 of my closest personal camping friends. Anytime I hear them, I am taken back to the calm and delight I felt that first time.

2 - Lucy Steele is kind of a see you next tuesday. Misunderstood, my balls. She is the worst.

whaaa happen?

So, I disappeared from the internet for a while. Whoops. Sorry about that.

A friend made a comment in passing that wasn't meant to be mean, but made me feel self-conscious about this blog. Which is dumb, because this is the internet, its my job as a human to fill it with garbage. But the sensation of doubt was hard to shake and has left me tentative to fill the non-existent (and yet still there) void of internet I have.

Anyway - I promise, I will finish writing about Alinea. For those who are interested.

And I will blog about taking on Easter which will be epic.

And eventually, I will blog about something that isn't food.

Until I do - go download the new Of Monsters and Men album. Its real, real good. I do not consider myself a "music" person. So I am excited to be the first of my friends to have listened to them. They were amazing in concert and I cannot wait to see them again.

March Awesomeness

March tends to be kind of a throwaway month as we all sit on the edges of our seats waiting for Chicago Summer but for some reason, this March is going to be amazing.  More details to come once all these totally amazing things have happened.

Tonight - This (to eat)

Next Thursday (through Monday) - This (to experience)

Then bright and early the next Saturday - This (to get ridiculous)

Then the next Friday, at 10 PM - This (to watch)

*edited to add* how could I forget?! - This (to watch as well)

And then to round out the month, on the 30th - This (to listen to)

This month is also going to have a lot of challenges and some tears as I try to work through a lot of stuff. But knowing that there is something awesome happening every. single. week should give me the motivation I need to get through all the crappy stuff.

Happy March!

There's a fire

Things that make my Life -

Watching a bunch of Uptown kids, who are normally way too cool for school, go crazy dancing to Adele's Rolling in the Deep and then demanding it get played on repeat.

When I leave this job, there is a lot that I will not miss, but there are piles upon piles of things I cannot imagine living without.  The weekly Thursday dance party is one of them.

Also, I am still not totally convinced that the lyrics aren't, "the stars in your love remind me of us..."

The case for "line dances"

I am going to a wedding this weekend for some good friends of mine (the bride actually, in a round-a-bout way could be blamed for me and the Boyfriend bothering each other with love all the time). I was told today that there is a No Line Dances rule in affect for the event and I have to say, I'm kind of disappointed.

After voicing my sadness to the Boyfriend, he said he was relieved, because (according to him) line dancing blows.

So then I took the debate to facebook. And my friends are very opinionated and very split on this particular topic.

So here is why I think line dances are acceptable at weddings.

First of all lets clarify a few things: when I say "line dancing" I mean: cupid shuffle, electric slide, that other one that is kind of like cupid shuffle but more complicated and if you're feeling really classy - the booty call. That's IT. No hokey-pokey, no macarena and NO chicken dance. Come on people, lets get serious.

If you have a group of people who come in a variety of ages, sizes, and coordination - a line dance can really get the party started. There are some people who need a little extra push to get on the dance floor.

Imagine that all the "first" dances are done and you've played some wedding standards (I'm looking at you Whitney "Saving All My Love For You" Houston, and people are a little tipsy and its time to get the party started.

If you put on some Luda or Chris Brown and then just demand that Grandma get up and dance. She will bashfully shake her head and clutch the table cloth for dear life.

If you put on a Boyz II Men or U2 slow jam, those singles hanging around playing 7th wheel at their table are just going to drink straight vodka until they vomit miserableness and scallops wrapped in bacon.

If you put on Journey or Eddie Money people will sing, but they're not drunk enough to jump up and down like college kids at a Sig Ep "anything but clothes" party.

So what do you play to get everyone on the dance floor??

Okay - the obvious answer is "Brick House."

That'll get you at about 70% but then WHAT? You'll lose them with the next one if you're not careful.

This is when Cupid Shuffle comes in handy. Because the instructions are IN. THE. SONG. No one has to work too hard or feel like a giant flaming turd pile. Plus there are no partner bits - you don't have to worry about being the ONLY one without someone to dance with. AND its got enough groove to get you feeling good, but not so much that you need a shot of jager to make it happen.

So then, everyone is up (and by everyone, I mean the wedding guests that don't suck) and you can do what you like. Play some Jay-Z, and then followed by a little Mraz if you're feeling frisky. Later, when everyone is starting to fade - you play the electric slide. To get everyone back up because they all know it.

FACT. In 8th grade, in preparation for life (and the 8th grade formal) we spent an entire period learning the chicken dance, the electric slide and something else (it may have had something to do with "Achey-Breaky Heart", which there is no excuse for, but we lived in the country...and that's my excuse). Allow that to sink in...the administration (at my National Blue Ribbon middle school) thought that it was worthwhile to take time away from learning Math and Science and...tech ed? to learn exactly how to do the electric slide. It is a valuable tool for a productive life.

And I get it, people don't like line dances because they're dumb. Which is valid. But my Aunt L. who is super buttoned up for the most point, will at weddings, get real liquored up and ONLY dance to the electric slide (well, and Brick House - but duh). And it is. AWESOME. She will probably never dance to Single Ladies (and nor should she, being married and all) but its okay because the electric slide is worth the decade or so wait.

So of course they're dumb, we can agree on that, but everyone can get down - and shouldn't that overrule having an undumb wedding? Having fun?

And this is an excellent segue into my disdain for weddings that are "too cool for school," but we'll save that for another day.

Scrambling...

So for the first time in my whole life, I have a job where when I am at work, I do work pretty much all day. I will take the occasional cnn/facebook/gofugyourself break but for the most part I am busy all day.

While this does have its merits (like feeling productive) it also has its downfalls (like being tired and stressed out).

Also it means that blogging is going to be hard on the days that I am here (at this very moment, this job is only part time). So I am blogging right now mid-email, so I don't forget.

My apartment is not even close to being done. We needed 2 coats of primer in the nook and we didn't notice until like 10 PM last night that our bedroom ceiling is like 13 feet high. Sweet, except for painting. But we are optomistic, particulary because this is a great excuse to eat crappy delivery food and not feel bad about it. So tonight we are going to roll our faces off (not in the cool way, in the painting way).

In other Friday morning news, I suggested we use "Daydreaming" by Lupe Fiasco in our Spring childrens show and my co-worker laughed. Then he made me go look up the lyrics. Damn you, Lupe, you are a filthy fast-talking bastard. Its still a real good song, despite the line about making cocaine cool. Cocaine is not cool, kids. Unless you have a trust fund. Even then its really kind of a cliche.

More blogging later? Maybe... Except probably not, so I'm going to leave you with this:



nataliedee.com

"I let you go (oh oh)"

I've had a phenomonally sucky week. Not that anything too terrible happened, but when all the not so terrible things are piled on top of one another it kind of makes me want to crawl into a hole and cancel my Grown Up Club membership.

And there were a few redeemable things that happened but none of them were so earth shattering that they made up for everything else.

Except for one.

I heard my two most favorite songs from 5th grade. "Don't Turn Around" and "The Sign" by Ace of Base. That's right BOTH of those songs worked their ways into my week coincidentally (once was when I was in my boss's car trying not to cry about the cluster fuck of my life, the other was when I was in the bank today taking out more of my rapidly dwindling checking account).

It was awesome. I still know every single word to both. Which is pretty impressive considering all the brain cells I've destroyed since I was ten.

When The Sign first came out I bought the single. On cassette (yeah, thats right. Cassette). We listened to it every morning on the bus to school. We had, I realize now, the coolest bus driver ever. Seriously, the fact that she was willing to listen to the same effin' song about 40,000 times in 5 months is pretty incredible. She was probably drunk the whole time.

Then I got the full album on CD and I'm pretty sure my best friend/worst enemy/next door neighbor stole it. Dumb bitch.

Ace of Base is the first band I remember liking that wasn't influenced by my parents. They were the first thing that mainstream media got me all worked up about. They were my first act of defiance and rebellion against the parentals (my Mom hated them...with good reason, their music is kind of terrible). They were one of the first little threads of grown-up real person-ness that I had.

Anyway, I'm not really sure what happened to Ace of Base, I guess they went back to Sweden or wherever and faded into oblivion. I'm sure one or two of them has been on some sort of VH-1 reality show. But no matter how terrible and nonsensical (have you listened to the lyrics?) their music is I will still love it. And it'll still make my day.