Personal merde: my brother Greg is a bit sick, my mother is still completely batshit crazy, and as each day passes, the realization that I need more money is becoming harder and harder to ignore. Lots of it, oodles and oodles of cash, maybe some euros and gold coins thrown in for good measure. Perhaps its time to bite the bullet and look for a second job. My little brother Elliot and my father Jean-Pierre are currently visiting the family back in France. I didn't have enough vacation days saved up to accompany them (plus, I can't afford to take two weeks off work right now and not have that paycheck coming in), and my stomach is currently in a state of mourning. No rabbit, no crusty French bread, no Orangina (yeah, they have at it at Trader Joe's, but it just isn't the same), no eclairs, no piss-poor reckless drivers, no smell-of-the-ocean, no-ugly-Eurotrash-in-Speedos, no French pizzas (made with swiss cheese instead of mozzarella, absolutely fantastic), no cheap + delectable French wines, no family get-togethers in my grandmother's crowded h ome (she puts pack rats to shame in the hoarding department), no Bastille Day... I know, I know, world's tiniest violin, pity-me-I-can't-go-to-Europe, its a bit insufferable to read, isn't it? *Sighs* I can't help it, though. I've traveled to a lot of places in my life: Turkey, Spain, Germany, France, Mexico, Japan, Monaco, England... and the only two places I've been to that have felt like home have been Arizona and the south of France. Whenever I'm in one place, I immediately start feeling homesick for the other place. I'm in hardcore Francophile mode right now: to cope, I've been listening to copious amounts of M83 and Serge Gainsbourg, and I've taken to counting things at work in French, cursing customers behind their backs in French, and pretty much embracing my inner snotty Parisian. Hell, I even sat down and watched Godard's Alphaville again. Still think its a pretty cool movie, even if parts of it confuse the hell out of me.
Pertaining to matters less serious: I've downloaded a veritable embarassment of riches the last two days. I've got tracks by the Geto Boys, Jay-Z, Comsat Angels, This Heat, XTC, Missy Elliot, Television Personalities, The Specials, The Clipse, Aaliyah, Slick Rick + Doug E. Fresh, Billy Idol, Talking Heads, Notorious B.I.G., Yin-Yang Twins, Slint's "Spiderland" album, Jack Off Jill, Curve, Massive Attack, the new TV On The Radio album (a-fucking-mazing), The Arcade Fire, Art Brut, and even Nelly Furtado's "Promiscious" (initially annoying as all hell, but like an earwig, it burrows a deeper tunnel towards my brain with each listen). Out of all the tracks I've downloaded, the two songs I've been listening to over and over again are Talking Heads "This Must Be The Place" and the Geto Boys "Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta". "Place" just might be the most romantic song I've heard in a long time.
And a-be-a-be-a-be
Pertaining to matters less serious: I've downloaded a veritable embarassment of riches the last two days. I've got tracks by the Geto Boys, Jay-Z, Comsat Angels, This Heat, XTC, Missy Elliot, Television Personalities, The Specials, The Clipse, Aaliyah, Slick Rick + Doug E. Fresh, Billy Idol, Talking Heads, Notorious B.I.G., Yin-Yang Twins, Slint's "Spiderland" album, Jack Off Jill, Curve, Massive Attack, the new TV On The Radio album (a-fucking-mazing), The Arcade Fire, Art Brut, and even Nelly Furtado's "Promiscious" (initially annoying as all hell, but like an earwig, it burrows a deeper tunnel towards my brain with each listen). Out of all the tracks I've downloaded, the two songs I've been listening to over and over again are Talking Heads "This Must Be The Place" and the Geto Boys "Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta". "Place" just might be the most romantic song I've heard in a long time.
And a-be-a-be-a-be