we rock together!

i was bored so i made a playlist that i would play if i got radio time. i'm not uploading the songs, but enjoy the list! (?!)

New Wizard Anthem - Harry and the Potters
Flesh Canoe - Animal Collective
Bluebird - Swan Lake
Gong - Sigur Ros
Frequency Transmission Systems - The New Sound of Numbers
I Was A Lover - TV On The Radio
Joy! Joy! Joy! - Sufjan Stevens
Australia - The Shins
Music Box - Regina Spektor
Ship The Majestic Suffix - Danielson
Right In The Head - M. Ward
Teardrop - Massive Attack
What it Means - Mates Of State
100,000 Fireflies - The Magnetic Fields
How Lester Lost His Wife (Pocket Remix) - of Montreal
Long Live the Future - Only Son
Face The Blood - Sondre Lerche
Hold On, Slow Down - Earlimart
Clementine - The Decemberists
Bottle Rocket - The Go! Team
You've Been Faithful To Us Clouds - Half-Handed Cloud
Rough Gem - Islands
Parallel Lines - Kings of Convenience
High Society - The Bees (U.S.)
This Is War - Ben Kweller
Its Almost A Trap - Architecture in Helsinki
Cold Wind - The Arcade Fire
Please Please Please - Final Fantasy
Pardon Me - The Blow
Golden Star - My Brightest Diamond
No More Mosquitoes - Four Tet
Measuring Cups (Fingerlings 3 Version) - Andrew Bird
Sky Phonomenon - Jens Lekman

it is 1.9 hours, 140.5 mb, and 33 songs.

i saw she was happy in her circumstances

i am listening to the new midlake and rather not enjoying having strep throat, although it is better than mono. i went to the ER from 8 pm to 230 am and it not my favorite thing ever. mmm benadryl ibuprofen tylenol sudafed claritin antibioticsz
however, this is [my favorite thing ever]. but i love stuff like that, so...
also, i want this poster but it is expensive. i am still flipping out over having missed sufjan on austin city limits.
jeph jacques is my hero!
and i must now rest because i have to make up my exams eventually.

ps: today i bought the unbearable lightness of being so i want to read that and i finished possible side effects which is the funniest thing evar. here is a part of one of the stories. he is immitating a cooking show in the kitchen.

"i used an entire stick of butter to grease the pan, mashing the stick back and forth until all that was left in my hand was a greasy wax paper wrapper. clumps and thick streaks of butter stuck to the bottom, sides, and rim of the pan.
"i believe in butter," i told my viewers. "no matter what they say, parkay just doesn't have the same taste or richness. sometimes, a simple butter sandwich in the afternoon is the zenith of my day."
my vocabulary was impressive for a nine-year-old. television had a lot to offer a smart, attentive child. people generally scoffed at children like me who spent all their time in front of the tube. but what these pepole failed to consider was that the answers on game shows had been fact-checked for accuracy.
i removed the dark bottle from the cabinet. "add vanilla to taste," i said, dumping all of it into the mixture, then tossing the bottle on the rug in front of the dishwasher.
sometimes, i would forget a step and this would make me mad. "cut," i said out loud, then turned on the oven. back in character, i returned to my show, smiling. "by now your preheated oven should be ready to accept the cake."
my recipes had involved no actual knowledge, but rather a collection of ingredients i'd seen julia use in various recipes. so there would just as likely be bacon in one of my cakes as vinear in a batch of my muffins."

just a taste of a great book. go buy it! now!

pps: comic.

all the girls are sitting on a pile of gold

i want andvari, með Blóðnasir, hafssól, and svo hjótt.
i am busy. leslie feist is adorable. i got her autograph a while ago on my shirt. that was pretty sweet. well, i have to go. sorry about the brevity of this post!
today's married to the sea webcomic

the picture was an old collage of something classical

i took a two hour nap from 2:30 until 4:30 today and it was awful. i will never be able to sleep tonight. i also read this amusing article on cnn, so perhaps it balances out. like i suspected, i am far from finished with a farewell to arms. i don't know waht to do about that.

anathallo is a great band, even though pitchfork hates them to death. buy floating world! it reminds me of the crane wife because it is based upon an eastern folk tale (but this time a japanese one about a dog). it would be amazing to see them live, but i doubt they'll ever come here. they only have about 7,000 listeners on last.fm. check these lyrics out.

In the dokkoise house
With face covered,
Leaving open the door.
That night in muddy water
The blossom unfolds as
A beautiful flower.
Hana no iro wa
Utsuri ni keri na
Translation of Japanese:
The color of the flower
has already faded away.
O hana.

they sing it in rounds and its a magical moment indeed. Here and here are two great pictures of them that should be viewed in full size. flickr is probably one of the greatest inventions of mankind. i just discovered today that the pictures are sorted in three different ways. i had never viewed "interesting" pictures before, and they are stunningly beautiful. great work, internet makers.

however, this find has (of course) caused me to look up sufjan stevens again (i've been through over 100 pages of his pictures, man) and see all the breath taking shots i had missed! and the cute/funny ones. so here they are. and i know that the average internet user doesn't have time to click through a long list of links without proper descriptions, but please, take the time out of your busy day to look at them.
(and these are just the ones i hadn't seen before. i skipped over a few magnificent ones because i knew them already. nevermind i put a few i'd already seen in because they were great.)

1 2 3 (jim face!!) 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 (awesome) 21 22 (i know that scar) 23 24 25 (bridget decook lost a ton of weight and sufjan gained hehe) 26 27 28 29 30 (tough) 31 32 (that shoot was so hilarious) 33 34 35 (shara's adorable) 36 (HAT!) 37 38 (scarf) 39 40 41 42 (great stuff) 43 (i wish i'd been at bowery) 44 45 46 (playing happy birthday, apparently. i wish i could find a live track of that song.) 47 48 (!!) 49 (what i'd do for a santa...) 50 51 52 (hahah) 53 (phyllis face) 54 55 (these are why i want a lomo) 56 57

and that's why i want to be a good photographer. so i can *capture moments* like those i have linked to. i want to get some prints. here is a link to the fantastic lomo ones. WHY.
that took longer than you'd guess. what a huge distraction. it was worth it, though. cheers.

ps: today's qc (questionable content, a webcomic) is pretty funny!

og sáttur halla nú höfði hér

happy new year to everyone. i ended up having a fantastic night and today was my friend's birthday. she had a great cake. dang. i finished middlesex and started a farewell to arms. not so great to read in 2 days. i probably won't be able to finish it. i also haven't watched any of those movies i rented. this winter break has been eventful in some ways, but i wasted the majority of it. atleast i read.

now music talk. i am shocked that return to the sea was not on the pitchfork top 50. it is so fantastic. i got the anathallo album finally. i had been wanting it for months. i am also getting "fold your hands child, you walk like a peasant" and some unreleasted songs by b&s. plus, i am going to listen to the tragic treasury by the gothic archies now that i have read the end. [edit: scratch that. the link was broken.] i need the new man man album, man! takk is such a great album. i want a sigur ros dvd even though i've already seen the glosoli and hoppipolla music videos. perhaps brandon would let me borrow his! and then i could rip it with virgil's help. (hohoho i really need to tell my friends about this blog.) i fell asleep around 2pm today listening to knives don't have your back. pretty relaxing.
i can't decide what course to take this summer at this thing i'll be doing. i'm considering 20th century lit, political theory in america, and writing with power. lit would be fun because i could read interesting books and write creatively, although creative writing makes me cry. and then political theory would help me actually form my own opinions about current events and know what i'm talking about instead of repeating what i've heard from someone else. writing with power would be perfect for improving analytical essays and such, plus college app papers.

i'm going to post a poem concerning new years. i did not write it. buy the book! cinquefoil. its on amazon.

Resolutions

This new year I want
I want
I want

I want

the clock to strike twelve oh one
twelve times still lingering oh

and in that one minute to feel
a great chasm torn open in the earth
the sound not of cheering but of trumpets

the trembling of the firmament
the buckling of the firmament
the failing of the firmament

the dropping of diadems
the surrender of doges

split open into two arcs
swooping

wildly into the night, against the blue sky
the arms of the angels, their bird keening

all the continents crushed
beneath the roiling waters.

This new year I am tired
of anticipation
of wondering

of the fear that lingers
of the worst

I want

the worst to come,
to embrace the earthquakes,

to follow the floods,
to make ripe and ready the fields
for the fires.

New year--
the world is weary of waiting
the weight is no longer wondrous

tell us: is it triumph or terror told
in your

oh one
oh one
oh one

i had to crack the binding for the first time in order to copy that up. i managed to resist doing that reading the whole thing. the book is no longer in perfect condition. man. well, i might as well underline and star things in it if i already ruined it.
one more day.

EDIT: I MISSED A SIGUR ROS SHOW ON VALENTINES DAY LAST YEAR SDLKfJSDkKDSj i might as well cease to exist.

wrapped up in books

(i really wish i was friends with sufjan stevens. it would be the most fantastic thing of my life.)

it seems unreal that i will be back in school in two short days. where did my time go?
i have pretty much been reading middlesex ever since i began it a few nights ago. it is fantastic and an automatic favorite. today i woke up, read, went out for lunch with lauren and kate (and exchanged belated christmas gifts. i got some earrings with cardinals on them. very lovely.), came home and read until right now, dinner time. then it will be either time to go to a new years eve party or stay home. if i had to bet, i'm going to guess that i will end up going.
i'll spare my mind the stress of writing what i'm worrying about these days.
anyway. i've heard that dreamgirls was good and that it was lousy. who should i believe?

i still want a lomography camera, although i have recently purchaed a panoramic fisheye lens for my manual 35mm pentax camera. photography is an expensive hobby, but so is everything these days. especially classes with monthly fees. those add up quickly.

i wish i hadn't missed the architecture in helsinki, broken social scene, joanna newsom, belle & sebastian, new pornographers, band of horses, metric, jenny lewis, and of montreal concerts in the past year. whenever i listen to their music i mourn the loss of not viewing them live. lauren agrees that ys is a great album even though she dislikes joanna's voice (especially in milk-eyed mender). i used to hate it as well but it has grown on me. speaking of voices, stuart murdoch has an adorable talking voice. it goes with his singing voice. this is related to joanna newsom because her talking voice is nothing like her singing voice, which is why i orignially disliked her. live albums are the best. especially andrew bird ones because he varies what he does with all his songs. and belle & sebastian have a lot of songs so that works well.
i need to dl the entire dear catastrophe waitress album. i can't believe i still don't have it. just "3..6..9 seconds of light", "dog on wheels", "if you're feeling sinister," "peel christmas party", "push barman to open old wounds discs 1 & 2", "revolution in the head", "sing jonathan david", "storytelling", "the boy with the arab strap", "the life pursuit", and "tigermilk." that's not including this live album and the npr thing i also have. the hidden cameras opened for them on this 1.5 hour concert. i need awoo. i have all their other albums as well, i believe.

well, back to reading and eating and listening to fantabulous tunes.
ps i need to buy a new desk and i can't find a suitable one. furniture shopping is harder than it would seem.
pps writing on blogger is quite odd because i'm not completely sure what part of my life i should be talking. the fact that almost no one reads it (none of my friends have the link, which is unusual in itself) makes the situation all the more complex. so i scroll through the things i'm thinking of in my head and choose a few of them to ramble about, then put in some pictures and publish the entry. that's that.
ppps why no ampersand in the tags? what is wrong with this world!

neat little domestic life

so i figured the template deal out. fantastic! all the links were originally red, but i changed them to teal-ish.

MY IDIOTIC 06 ALBUMS LIST:

• the blow - paper television
• sufjan stevens - the avalanche: even though these are outtakes, i love every single track.
• m. ward - post war: great stuff in here. he is so talented.
  
• joanna newsom - ys: it's magical and huge and the lyrics are some of the best i've heard in ages.
  
• danielson - ships
• grizzly bear - yellow house
• the decemberists - the crane wife: the second track is great as is the last as is the whole concept for this album. all around great. i can't stop listening to it!
  
• camera obscura - lets get out of this country: i love camera obscura. they're cute and have great melodies to hum.
  
• swan lake - beast moans
• tv on the radio - return to cookie mountain
• islands - return to the sea: every song on this is great. AWESOME BAND.
  
• belle & sebastian - the life pursuit
• neko case - fox confessor brings the flood
• regina spektor - begin to hope: in my opinion, this isn't her best album. i much prefer everything else she's done, including unreleased demos, but maybe that's because i like her narrative songs without too much instrumentation. she's great when she's just having fun with her voice. but these songs are catchy. apres moi is good.
  
• tilly and the wall - bottoms of barrels: so fun and dance-y. i have bad education as a ring tone.
• final fantasy - he poos clouds
• cat power - the greatest
• sufjan stevens - songs for christmas: i can't not have something he made on this list, even though its just eps and only a few original songs.
  
• jenny lewis with the watson twins - rabit fur coat
• band of horses - everything all the time
• ben kweller - s/t
• anathallo - floating world: i got this album after 06 but i still had to edit the entry and put it up here. it is fantastic. dokkoise house (with face covered) is my favorite track. they are like a cross between sigur ros, sufjan stevens, danielson famile, and maybe joanna newsom because of the lyrics. i don't know. great great great. i don't care that pitchfork gave it a 2.7, claiming every song was like chicago. well you know what? i don't even like chicago all that much so there.
  
• mates of state - bring it back
  

in no particular order, but bolded are my favorites. speaking of music, i might die if i don't get to see of montreal this march. the were originially playing on a saturday night, but that has become a wednesday. atleast it's not during exams! it's an 18+ show as well. i can't imagine why!

i rented election, raising arizona, annie hall, and one flew over the cuckoo's nest after i returned the bbc office second series. that, along with middlesex (over 500 pages) should keep me busy and antisocial for the next three days until real life starts again.

(speaking of real life, i still have to write a bookreport, draw coverart for said book, complete a geometry project, organize my civs binder, complete a biology project on current events, and study vocabulary)

i haven't decided what to do about the new years situation, either. the joys of angstyteendrama!

EDIT: i added some albums to the list and put stupid short comments on the bolded ones.

1/2 vampire

i can't figure out how to get a slightly attractive layout onto this thing and i am probably going to give up in the next 10 - 30 minutes if there's no revelation.

the highlight of my day was when those guys sent me a letter in the mail. they gave me a piece of paul's belt, but i think the mail people must have thought it was dangerous or something. it is nowhere to be found and the envelope came with a hole in the corner. perhaps a hobo or college student stole it from my mailbox!