Five years

OH HI.

So: as of today I have officially lived in New York City for five whole years and, for some reason, the occasion made want to revisit this long-forgotten little blog.  Also, I saw that Google automatically shows visitor stats now and apparently I am still getting DAILY page views here.  I mean, we're talking like, two or three readers daily but STILL.  I feel guilty now.  What if it's the same two or three people revisiting every day, desperately hoping I've gone to another Jens Lekman show or eaten too many cupcakes again, only to find that same old post from October??  Sorry, reader(s).  I also realized I need to finally pay Flickr so that photostream shows up again too.  Whoops.

Anyway, here's a glimpse of what's been going on in the last six months:

Wild!

I've also been working 1.5 jobs, writing movie articles for Sketch Tiger, making half-hearted attempts at open mic storytelling, buying grown-up clothes, and making a number of questionable choices under the influence of whiskey. 

I'll be honest: I'm in kind of a creative rut right now.  I want to write awesome things and perform awesome things and make some non-depressing collages and learn to play the drums, but I can't seem to get started in any direction.  Instead I'm listening to a lot of Jens and old Wilco and painting my nails and reading magazines and grumbling about teenagers.  I told this to my mom today and she said "don't let those bad people in your house," by which I think she meant "don't let negative energy in your head" although I'm also going to double check all my locks.  She's right, but mostly I just need any energy.

Hopefully I can get back on track with this blog.  In the meantime, send me a project.  Clearly I've been spending too much energy perfecting my sassy sunglasses face.

BALLLLLLLLLLLLLLIN!!!

OK: let's acknowledge the fact that I've been so lazy about this blog that I've let a good two months breeze by without a peep about my (not at all exciting) life - to the extent that I even forgot my blogiversary AGAIN.  I don't even have cupcakes laying around that I can pretend I baked in celebration (but daaaamn I wish I did.)  Well, OK, here's a photo of some cupcakes I baked four months ago because I was being a fatty and really wanted peanut butter cake with chocolate icing:

Yay fatty blog!  But what is there to say about six years anyway?  I mean, I was a pretty rad six-year-old (braid-ponytails-on-the-side and sparkly sweaters, whatwhat!), but in the grand scheme of life it's like, meh... six.  Maybe I'm just feeling cynical.  And still lazy.

(Oh, an aside about the word "lazy": I'm determined to reclaim it as a cool thing.  Remember when phones weren't smartphones and were just "cell phones?"  I know, those were crazy times, right?  And some people still have them!  Anyway: one of the best precursors to auto-correct was the T9 word function, where you would just furiously type away on the number pad and the phone would "know" which letters you meant to type.  My old phone was the best at this because every time I tried to type the word "lazy" it would default to "jazz" - resulting in sentences like "I'm too jazz to get off the couch" and "stop being such a jazz ass."  So much cooler, right?  So don't be lazy, be JAZZ.)

But let's get back to my life.  Yesterday was a crazy day: I had to work at 7am, there was a minor earthquake that got all of NYC's panties in a twist, AND - thanks to Kottke - I discovered this amazing website.   It's a collection of stories by Questlove, sorted by name, in which he recalls encounters with different celebrities, as requested by other readers.  What makes them so amazing is not just the way they are written (which is as if he typed directly from a dictation of himself), but the kind of crazy celebrity shenanigans he gets into.  And I'm not talking like, action movie buddy cop craziness, but over-the-top displays of money that must just seem totally normal once you hit a certain level on the star meter.  The story about Will Smith's leather-floored mansion tops everything, but rollerskating Prince (part of the Eddie Murphy story) is a close runner up.  I mean.... GOD. DAMN.

Questlove: please come to a Moth StorySlam.  It would be the best six minutes of everyone's life.

PS: As a bonus, I discovered this site linked to the Questlove one: The 90s Rap Name Generator!  Mine's "Big M Da' Slim Pimp" - but you probably already knew that.

Hey ladieeeees!

It's a little crazy how many new artists I've discovered solely by watching the music video channels at Crunch while plodding along on the treadmill.  Do they secretly have some kind of deal with fledgling record labels?  You'd think this would make me go to the gym more often but... no.

Here are two of my new faves: lady rappers!




Also: isn't weird how both of their videos open with shots of the street and trucks?  SO URBAN.

Widget and Sassoon: London adventure times!

I know, I know - I had that burst of energetic blogging and now I've stopped.  I'm gonna get back on the wagon though, I swear... soon.  For now I'm just popping in to say HOLY CRAP ANDREA AND I ARE IN LONDON.  We're in the midst of all sorts of shenanigans right now (canned cocktails, Jammie Dodgers, hot tunes, heart-print tights, pants-less dancing, etc.) so I'll have to post a full report when I get home and I'm all sad and broke.  Here's a sneak peak though:

My pocket's eatin' cheese cake!

Look out, Annie Leibovitz!

I would just like to make it known that not one, not two, but THREE dudes are currently using a photo that I snapped as their main Facebook profile picture.

Molly Cameron: making boys look pretty since 2010.

Meet my new best friends

If you haven't seen this video yet, you should definitely watch it right now.  And then watch it every day that you wake up and it's still below freezing and remind yourself that someday - someday soon - it will be springtime and you'll be able to dance around in the outdoors wearing a sweet windbreaker.




ETA: that main dancer, Anne Marsen is credited as an "improvisational dancer."  Wait, that's a thing?  That kind of crazy random dancing I do at parties and in my kitchen has a real title?  I've got to update my resume.

Agreed

MADE

Have I mentioned that I'm being slowly crafted in a hip hop star?  It's true.  The sassy Bev Brown has me wrapped around her finger so hard that I decided to get in on her current performance workshop.  On paper, it's an eight-week workshop that ends with a performance at Alvin Ailey right after Thanksgiving.  In reality, it's hip hop boot camp - well, for me, at least.  I go to Bev's regular class about once a week, but now I'm going to the workshop class every Saturday plus one to two more during the week, depending on what I can afford.  We're doing at least seven numbers (although not the full songs) and while the choreography is similar if not exactly the same as what we do in class, we're expected to pick it up much faster.

This song in particular is the bane of my existence (this is best version I can find... ignore the skanky pics... unless you don't want to, perv):


Don't get me wrong, I love the song itself - especially all the random guest stars involved - (Bon Iver??) but the Nicki Minaj part that we're busting moves to (starting around 3:30) is killing me.  The moves are so fast that I look like a big flailing mess and I'm psyching myself out about it.  I've got 16 days to master this shit.  Oh, and to find some "sexy shorts" to wear in the show.  Errrgghhh.  I swear, I am living this episode of "Made."

Send good vibes, people.  And if you're in New York City over Thanksgiving, send yourself.  Really, how many chances do you have to see me get all ghetto while I'm sober AND have good choreo on my side?

The Weekly Widget and Sassoon: hip-unemployed-ster

See what I did there?  I stuck "unemployed" in the middle of the word "hipster"!  Get it?  "Hip-unemployed-ster"??  It's the caption for this hot photo:

I was originally posting it as an example of what my life has become now that I am officially, for real real, no joke, DONE with CAP21.  I declared on October 28 that I wasn't coming back and I have upheld the promise.  Now I'm spending lots of time hanging out in a big sweater that keeps my neck warm and drinking cheap beer.  But then I uploaded that photo and scoffed at myself.  Really, Molly?  A striped seventies mom sweater?  Bangs all up in your eyes?  Visible (albeit backwards) Jukebox the Ghost poster in the background?  PBR??  You hipster fuck.  (However: can we acknowledge how awesome that nail polish is?  It matches the can!!)

So... yeah.  Oops.  I'm keeping it there so you can scoff at what my life has become right along with me.  Let's consider it a caption contest.  If you can think of something better than "hip-unemployed-ster," you win a prize.  Probably something lazily homemade.

Maybe I'm just bitter because I never had a proper going-away party...

me: drunk

  at

  work

 andrea: You devil

 How are you getting drunk at work?

me: we just signed the lease for moving onto the 5th floor and had cake and champys

  and i pretended it was my going away party

 andrea: HAHAHAHAHAHA

  yes.

 me: so of course it was GREAT

PS: I still have all the office keys, CAP21.  If I return them can I get my soul back?

The Weekly Widget and Sassoon: Facebook school

I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook.  The pros include inviting many people at once to events when I don't want to use a phone, updating my status with pretentious song lyrics, and - of course - stalking people from high school.  The cons, however, are just as numerous: getting tagged in awful photos, people babbling about virtual farm animals, and... ok, people updating their statuses with pretentious song lyrics.  But BAD ones!  Blergh.  I feel like an old person in a rocking chair when I tell people how I long for the days when Facebook was just for college students to track down that dude from Geology class and post hilarious photos from the dorm.

For now I'm still neutral about Facebook, but it seems to be a trend among some of my friends to quit altogether and delete their accounts.  Is this the new cool thing to do?  Subvert the standard?  Drea seems to think so.

me: ummmm did jamien have a baby??

 andrea: i know she was preggers

  maybe she popped

  why?

  is facebook telling you tales?

 me: yup

  i'm inviting people to something so can't click on her profile yet, but i noticed her photo was a baby

  i had no idea she was knocked up

 man, i HATE that

  you are not your baby!

  don't make your photo of your kid!

 andrea: I KNOW

  people are so stupid

 me: although i also just noticed that my friend joel changed his photo to lindsay lohan's mugshot

  he wins

 andrea: i win

me: no, you can't win if you forfeit the game

  LADY

 andrea: no, that's the secret

  that's how you win at facebook

 me: whatevs

 be all too-cool-for-school

andrea: I've always been too cool for school

  duh

  duh

  duh

Well DUH right back at you because if it weren't for Facebook, we wouldn't have Lamebook.  Also, I wouldn't have found this old gem:

Thanks, Mr. Zuckerberg, for keeping my drunk-in-public moments precious.