Hello, hello. I enjoy disappearing for a month and then resurfacing with absolutely nothing new to regale you with. I'll do my best.
Can I let everyone know just how much I hate Christmas shopping? I just have no idea what to get anyone. My parents learned long ago that I'm difficult to buy presents for, so they just give me money to buy what I want. Everything just seems so ritualistic, like you HAVE to get something for someone or you're breaking the rules. I guess that letting everyone know how much you care about them on a daily basis just isn't enough. We have to show our love materially. I already know what I want to give my best friend Kelsey, but everyone else pretty much has everything I could possibly think of buying them. It's just going to take wandering around a number of stores, online and real world, to just figure something out. I really hate doing that. Just another zombie inside the horde.
Thanksgiving was rather good. I went back to Martinsburg, rendezvoused with the parents, and then travelled to Westminster, MD, to hook up with my father's side of the family. My grandparents live in what I call a "pimped out Lutheran retirement home." It's nice. My uncles and one of my cousins were there, all of them in the DC area, and my brother came down from New Jersey. These meetings are hilarious, because we eat around noon and then just fall asleep watching the football games for a few hours, occassionally waking up to have arguments about the sepcifics of events that happened fifty years ago. It's a wonderful thing to have this once a year. Any more often and I may go insane. I love it, though.
Has anyone heard "Let It Die," by Feist? This could be the best record I've heard this year, and I'm putting it up there with Wolf Parade and Sufjan Stevens. She's a singer/songwriter in the purest sense of it. Give it a listen.
My applications for American University and Syracuse are all complete and submitted, so now it's a matter of waiting until early Spring for responses. I really hope I get in. Two years ago I made a half-hearted attempt at getting into Pittsburgh and Georgetown, but I really didn't sit down to work on everything with as much attention as I should have. This time I actually put some thought into what I ws writing for my statements, wrote a draft or two in some cases, and actually polished up my writing sample. It was the same section from my Tolkien Honors project that I submitted two years ago, but I changed some of the language and added a new example to flesh it out. I really want to get on with my life now. My Roanoke chapter has been written, and all I'll do if I stay here is work at the coffeeshop and serve America's caffeine addiction. I'm thinking of "Rent," here, about opening up a coffeehouse in Santa Fe where we can overcharge the wealthy clientelle. We'll reap financial gains (gains-gains-gains). But that won't happen. That's all for Dave Johnson, the Mr. Burns of Mill Mountain Coffee and Tea who charges %200 on deserts purchased at Sam's Club and who pays his employees jack shit. I want the MA and the PhD. I want them bad.
Speaking of "Rent," I saw it Tuesday. I'd seen it when it came to Roanoke a couple of years ago and got hooked on it. The movie is quite different, with lots of dialogue that is usually sung. It comes out a little strange, but it works. After the opening number I was thinking, "God this is going to suck," but then they got into "One Song Glory" and "Light My Candle" and I decided to give it the benefit of the doubt. It's really quite good. If you haven't seen it performed live I'd say listen to the musical soundtrack first, before seeing the movie. The movie will give life to the music, but a lot of technicalities get changed.
Peace out, bitches! I'm off to disappear for another month.
the tragedy starts from the very first spark
losing your mind for the sake of your heart
the saddest part of a broken heart
isn't the ending so much as the start
Feist "Let It Die"
Can I let everyone know just how much I hate Christmas shopping? I just have no idea what to get anyone. My parents learned long ago that I'm difficult to buy presents for, so they just give me money to buy what I want. Everything just seems so ritualistic, like you HAVE to get something for someone or you're breaking the rules. I guess that letting everyone know how much you care about them on a daily basis just isn't enough. We have to show our love materially. I already know what I want to give my best friend Kelsey, but everyone else pretty much has everything I could possibly think of buying them. It's just going to take wandering around a number of stores, online and real world, to just figure something out. I really hate doing that. Just another zombie inside the horde.
Thanksgiving was rather good. I went back to Martinsburg, rendezvoused with the parents, and then travelled to Westminster, MD, to hook up with my father's side of the family. My grandparents live in what I call a "pimped out Lutheran retirement home." It's nice. My uncles and one of my cousins were there, all of them in the DC area, and my brother came down from New Jersey. These meetings are hilarious, because we eat around noon and then just fall asleep watching the football games for a few hours, occassionally waking up to have arguments about the sepcifics of events that happened fifty years ago. It's a wonderful thing to have this once a year. Any more often and I may go insane. I love it, though.
Has anyone heard "Let It Die," by Feist? This could be the best record I've heard this year, and I'm putting it up there with Wolf Parade and Sufjan Stevens. She's a singer/songwriter in the purest sense of it. Give it a listen.
My applications for American University and Syracuse are all complete and submitted, so now it's a matter of waiting until early Spring for responses. I really hope I get in. Two years ago I made a half-hearted attempt at getting into Pittsburgh and Georgetown, but I really didn't sit down to work on everything with as much attention as I should have. This time I actually put some thought into what I ws writing for my statements, wrote a draft or two in some cases, and actually polished up my writing sample. It was the same section from my Tolkien Honors project that I submitted two years ago, but I changed some of the language and added a new example to flesh it out. I really want to get on with my life now. My Roanoke chapter has been written, and all I'll do if I stay here is work at the coffeeshop and serve America's caffeine addiction. I'm thinking of "Rent," here, about opening up a coffeehouse in Santa Fe where we can overcharge the wealthy clientelle. We'll reap financial gains (gains-gains-gains). But that won't happen. That's all for Dave Johnson, the Mr. Burns of Mill Mountain Coffee and Tea who charges %200 on deserts purchased at Sam's Club and who pays his employees jack shit. I want the MA and the PhD. I want them bad.
Speaking of "Rent," I saw it Tuesday. I'd seen it when it came to Roanoke a couple of years ago and got hooked on it. The movie is quite different, with lots of dialogue that is usually sung. It comes out a little strange, but it works. After the opening number I was thinking, "God this is going to suck," but then they got into "One Song Glory" and "Light My Candle" and I decided to give it the benefit of the doubt. It's really quite good. If you haven't seen it performed live I'd say listen to the musical soundtrack first, before seeing the movie. The movie will give life to the music, but a lot of technicalities get changed.
Peace out, bitches! I'm off to disappear for another month.
the tragedy starts from the very first spark
losing your mind for the sake of your heart
the saddest part of a broken heart
isn't the ending so much as the start
Feist "Let It Die"
Happy New Year!