barbed_whispers

( tl;dr blah blah about why i don't hang out on lj much anymore. )

unrelatedly, there is no way i am going to complete my book goal for the year. 100 books was way too ambitious (although, to be fair, work was so slow that i hardly had any reading time this summer) and i feel like crap knowing i won't get there. i really dislike not meeting my goals, urgh. i read a decent amount of stuff that was both time-consuming and outside my comfort zone (several non-fiction books, for starters), and i should be able to hit at least 75, but still. unhappy. need to decide if i want to set a smaller goal next year or work harder.

i blew my shows goal (15) out of the water though. 22 so far, not including all the random sets i've caught at the community market. and i'm going to at least 4 more this year. (TAI, say anything, olp, the olp/patd/say anything/every other band ever show, and then maybe the mountain goats, maybe joshua radin, almost definitely damion suomi next week, and i might check out the anti*pop festival even though there aren't really any bands listed that i care that much about. and i'm still considering the cobras show haha. AND there's still a lot of unclaimed dates on the calendar. so at least i can feel good about this one.)

you guyssssssssssssss. dragon*con was awesome and i am once again sad to be back in the real world.

( ya lit, steampunk, and that time i fell in love. also knows as WELCOME TO TL;DR CITY! )

on the plus side: ONE MONTH TIL THE WHOMPING WILLOWS AND JFF AND FRED LIVES, ZOMG!

ON BOOKS:
read cape storm, the latest weather warden book by rachelcaine. YOU GUYS! so good. SO GOOD. so many declarations of love & kisses! a VENNACORN!! kevin being an awesome dickface! etc! i am going to be crazy sad when this 'verse finishes. i'm glad that she doesn't want to torture jo anymore (and really, what's left to do to her at this point?) but i will miss lewis like crazy.

also recently finished the second scott lynch book (red seas under red skies) and HOO-BOY, i love him. the first half was not that exciting, but once they became pirates the book turned awesome. both excited and nervous about the next one- i'm kind of afraid of how it will end D:

and i read a little more than a third of kushiel's dart before getting permission to give up. there were way too many characters, and i really don't care about the politics of a ridiculous and made-up world. i feel like i fail at being a fantasy fan now. (i may give it another try, cos the library finally let me renew it. hm.)

ON MUSIC:
the new olp album has mostly grown on me, but it is by no means their best work. some of the songs are just completely terrible, and a lot of them sound the same. raine's a decent producer, but he should probably not be producing his own albums. ("paper moon" is still amazing though.)

i went to see the cab, a rocket to the moon, eye alaska, and...two other bands? rocket are totally adorable and really good. i was digging eye alaska a lot, and their bassist is super-cute. i am still not a big fan of the cab. i want to awesome, super-friendly, and ridiculously adorable drummer from summer set (or whatever they are called) to find a band worthy of her awesomeness. all in all: MUCH FUN WAS HAD. also, much liquor was had. these things may be related.

the fall concert schedule is starting to get interesting. i need to un-poorify myself so i can see some fuckin' shows.

ON TV:
we mainlined being human today. it was pretty awesome! i love how watching things with vampires always leads to "but i thought vampires [x y z]" and then a largely ridiculous debate on different vamp mythologies and their pros and cons which then leads to shunning people who have never seen buffy. weeeeeeee, friends!

ON THE INTERNET:
momebie started this awesome project called Scattering Stars which you can learn more about here. it basically involves drawing on photos and making people smile though, so you have no excuses for not participating.

collabing with some friends (theemdash! marilla82! momebie! you!) to make an awesome wizard rock directory / calendar / general site thing. tomorrow is layout til i die day! woo! relearning html (and teaching myself php / div layers) is hard but fun. i'll never be a great designer or anything, but i like the actual work of coding stuff so i think this is gonna be a good project. i'm really glad i have friends who nudge me until i dive headfirst into this kind of thing :p

this post is 90% to point out that getaway_machine has missed her chance to nudge me.

and 10% to say weeenewtimeconsumingprojects!

from giventofly37:

1. Reply to this post and I'll assign you a letter.
2. List (and upload, if you feel like it) 5 songs that start with that letter.
3. Post them to your journal with these instructions.

(she gave me H.)

meiko - how lucky we are: this is possibly my favorite song on her album. it belongs on my Common Threads playlist (which is where all the best music lives) (except i don't actually have a Common Threads playlist. i need to fix this.)
my chemical romance - headfirst for halos: i am absolutely in love with the energy in this song.
fall out boy - hand of god: which is it- the boy who writes the songs or the boy who's in them?
our lady peace - happiness and the fish: i can't hear this song (or anything on this album) without being transported back to when i was 16 and spending a stupid amount of time on a bus in europe with a bunch of crazy people ♥
fred lives - hey brother: saddest wrock song ever, Y/Y? (trufax: i almost cried at the last show cos it caught me off-guard.)
the fratellis - henrietta: i can't help but dance when i hear this.
regina spektor - hotel song: this is totes my favorite regina song, and i couldn't bear to delete it from the H playlist.


from momebie

Comment to this post and I will (try to) give you 5 subjects/things I associate you with. Then post this in your LJ and elaborate on the subjects given.

Wee Giraffes: they are just so CUTE! ::smishes their little faces::

Music: i could talk about music all day every day and bore the pants off of every single person in the world, i swear. i think the thing i love most about music is that it is pure magic to me. i have screwed around with music my whole life, and i am reasonably intelligent, but i honest-to-god have no idea how these sounds come together to make something that can make me feel so much. (thing i love second most: indie rock boys. IT'S A SICKNESS.)

The Cave of Wonders: one time at a party, i somehow convinced my bff to wear an abu hat (it was a little fez that belonged to a doll someone gave her) and pretend to fly around the apartment on a magic kitchen rug and sing a whole new world. this is what i think of whenever we refer to my apartment as the cave of wonders. (i also think about how if you touch my lamp my house will melt.)

Wizard Rock: nvfje here's the thing- these kids are not playing music so they can be famous or rich or surrounded by groupies. these kids are busting their asses to make music and tour the country because it's what they love to do. it is like dumping the indie scene in a brita filter! also, i absolutely love that they write music about BOOKS. sometimes i get really fed up with regular music because i don't give a shit about love, so it's good that people are writing songs that i can relate to.

Moats: I HAVE A MOAT!! it lets me pretend that i live in a castle like a real knight. also, i thought i heard raptors upstream a couple of weeks ago. it was pretty terrifying.

so, let me know if you want a letter or five things. and if for some reason there are other things you want me to ramble on about, let me know :P

I don't remember if I posted about this, but we went to a wrock show a couple of weeks ago and had a kick-ass good time. We saw Fred Lives, The Whomping Willows, Justin Finch-Fletchly, Witherwings, and House of Black, and they were all fantasic. I got Whompy's January demo and Fred's "In Memory of Fred" ep (and some JFF buttons, weeeee). The Whomping Willows' demo isn't all strictly wrock- some of the songs are just about tour. One of them is even about a friend of mine, heeeeeeee. (Okay not really, but it WILL be!) And Fred Lives isn't always child-friendly, but he IS hilarious. Anyway, we all bought different cds so that we could share, so here is the music!

If you get a chance, you really need to go see some of these kids live. (Any wrock band, really.) Every band I've seen/met has just been so excited and talented and friendly, and they really are just kids who get in their cars and drive all over the place to make this music. (I say "kids" but most of them are, I would guess, around my age. I just mean they are not crazy old people.)

If you need help finding a wrock show, let me know and I will do some research for you. Stalking tour schedules is one of my hobbies, so I can probably find you something! (And there are srsly TONS of these bands, all around the country, so you do not have any excuses for not going.)

i am way way waaaaay too lazy to read lj and see if this is old news, but the whomping willows are playing orlando on 01/24 at taste. admission is $5. who's in?