| Writer's Block: Goodness gracious |
[May. 22nd, 2010|12:17 pm] |
Have you even had a moment, an hour, or a day that renewed your faith in the fundamental goodness of humankind?
Submitted By francine2869
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no... |
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| Concert! |
[Aug. 18th, 2009|06:11 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  tired | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | AC/DC--Back In Black | ] |
I spent last night watching Tori Amos gyrating between her piano and synthesizer in skin-tight silver iridescent leggings for her final show of the USA tour. Therefore, everything else seems kind of insignificant.
Oh, but remember that Cherry Bleeds now only comes out once every other month so my story is available for the rest of August. I love pimping this one so please give it another read. |
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| Star Struck? Me? Never! |
[Jun. 8th, 2009|12:37 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | accomplished | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | The Rolling Stones--Street Fighting Man | ] |
I saw PJ Harvey in concert Saturday. Therefore nothing else in life matters!!! |
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| How Has It Been More Than Two Months Since I Last Updated??? |
[May. 21st, 2009|08:40 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | self-promotion | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | tired | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Tori Amos--Little Earthquakes | ] |
...And I'm not even doing a real update now (though I promise I will at some point.) Just popping by to tell you all to go to 3:AM Magazine and check out my review of National Book Award-winner Denis Johnson's latest novel.
It's a pretty cool magazine in general. It's got stories by Steve Almond and commentary by Lydia Lunch and an interview with Henry (FUCK-YEAH) Rollins. And I'm not sure whether it is based out of England or France. Hopefully, it will expand my "readership" out of this continent.
I was a little bit frustrated at how long it took for them to post it--I sent it about a month ago--but they actually did a really nice job with it, so I need to learn that patience is a virtue.
Oh, and feel free to ridicule my photograph at the bottom. I was in a pinch so I used one that a co-worker of my sister had taken at an art exhibition, after I had walked more than two miles and was not unconvinced that I had swine flu. Therefore, I look like I am demonically possessed and/or trippin' on acid. (I guess the guy was a good photographer.) |
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| Venus |
[May. 13th, 2008|07:48 pm] |
Hey folks, I promise to post an update 'proper' later this week because a lot has been going on.
For now I want to say, go to Venus and read my article!
Okay, like I said, I'll update more later and say more about this. Possibly even tonight! |
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| And That's That... |
[Dec. 22nd, 2007|11:43 pm] |
Well, folks, yesterday I handed in my last final. (I should have posted then, but I was so beat as to be not really functioning).
Thus, it seems that I, too, shall get to ride off into the sunset with all the cowboys : ), as I wrote to the professor I turned in that assignment to. Hey, it was a film class analyzing the Western as a genre.
Last Friday, the 14th, president had a mini reception for the '08J graduates at her house. We still get invited back for the one in May, especially given that at that point we hadn't even finished our finals yet, so it was simply the dumbed-down, tribute version, which was fine with me--I'm not really big on ceremonies. I decided to do what I assume any self-respecting senior would do and get drunk on half a bottle's worth of wine right before going. I got an email about a senior wine and cheese in my dorm and that clinched it for me. I ran into the other '08J when I was going out the door, so she was able to escort me to the president's house. I just tried to say as little as possible when the president congratulated me and asked what my plans were and stood near the front of the room so I didn't have to walk far when she called my name. Anyway, it's weird, people keep asking me how it feels to be graduated and stuff like that, but it hasn't really sunken in yet. Fortunately, the president of the college seemed to anticipate the difficulty I would have grappling with my emotions at this moment of my life and provided the perfect solution ( which was namely )
Graduating in December is pretty anti-climactic because most people aren't doing it, but that's probably a good thing. I vaguely remember thinking that the last day of high school was the best day of my life, and yet for some reason, it is too painful and overwhelming to look back on me.
I guess with college, in a lot of ways, I don't really know what to say goodbye to, because I never really considered it home. I mean, when you think about it, you spend a good five months of the college year at home, anyway. Furthermore, in my own case, I spent the first two years of college threatening to drop out, and at one point, made up my mind that I was transferring. Instead, I graduated early. In a lot of ways, I find myself wondering how I am going to look back at this experience. At times, as my blog has probably reflected, I have felt intense bitterness and downright bitterness towards my peers and my school. On the other hand, at the beginning of this year, I suffered a breakdown, at which point it struck me that it was probably easier for me to show contempt for those in my immediate environment, thus allowing me a way to ignore the ways in which certain events in my past have irrevocably damaged me in ways that I cannot go back and change. I think I will always suffer untold amounts of anguish over that which remains truly unacknowledgeable for me.
What is striking to me is the extent to which my experience with college contrasts with my experience as an adolescent in high school/junior high school. The latter was always bold, bright, and mostly painful, yet within that pain, there was always this deranged sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. Getting through the day was so difficult back then as to be considered an achievement. Yet what amazes me to this day is how consistent my feelings are about that period of my life. In the last year, I have discovered to my horror and to my relief that preciously little has changedin terms of them.
College was different though. It was easy, painfully so. Yet for all that ease, I was deprived of that sensation I had in high school, that thrill of teetering vertiginously close to the edge, yet always, always, pulling myself back at the last minute. Sometimes, I feel like I didn't really have the college experience I was supposed to have. People talk about how college "changed their lives" and how they "made the friends who will be the closest friends of their life" and the rest of what it says in the brochures and I don't know if I really had that. It's hard for me to know to whether the few attempts at bonds I made, primarily in the last three semesters will last as they are, grow into something more fruitful, or just wither away. In a lot of ways, I think I could have picked a better school. A school that wasn't, as both ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=88.8) manosrebirth and downer13 described as "out in the middle of nowhere" and that had a more expanded, diverse body. But the fact that I didn't do that is less my school's fault and more the fault of the extent to which as a seventeen year-old I was incapable of knowing what I wanted or even wanting anything. And that's hardly my school's fault. The fact that I didn't make close friends or even friends at all immediately has as much to do with the fact that I hid in the school's library and computer lab writing fictional manuscripts so bad that sult can't even bear to read them as it does with certain elements of the student body that I wasn't a fan of.
I guess I'm being diplomatic because I've received a lot of really kind messages via FaceBook and running into people around campus wishing me the best, which is touching given how little I actively interacted with others. What I really mean is that in comparison to high school, it amazes me how unstable my perception of my college experience is, and the extent to which it will likely vary according to where I am a year from now, two years from now, and even ten years from now, and whether that is a good place for me. Maybe simply breaking away from certain things will prove significant enough. It's possible that a different experience, one filled with friends, boyfriends, and highly-touted revelry would have ultimately turned me into a borderline-type who used those around me as an audience for self-destruction. I guess, for now, I am kind of floating in-between. On the one hand, I have certainly done my share of trashing the college lifestyle and questioning the value of a college degree, but I can also admit that I didn't take advantage of the opportunities I could have. That I questioned their merit, well... I'm just going in circles now.
I guess that as someone who has always considered being a student an integral part of my identity (something that leaving home may have loosened but never completely shook off) it's weird to realize that I'm finally free and do have my whole life ahead of me.
Anyway, have a Merry Christmas, All. Here's to hoping your holiday season kicks some serious patoot! |
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| Summer Reading List 2007 |
[Sep. 1st, 2007|12:33 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | books | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  contemplative | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | White Zombie--More Human Than Human | ] |
1. She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb--pretty good. I think I touched on this at the beginning of the summer: it was good, but I did get the feeling that parts of it were just a lot of typically female traumas being strung together and interpreted by a male author.
2. My Sister's Bones by Cathi Hanauer--pretty good.
3. The IHOP Papers by Ali Liebegott--okay. I'm a sucker for books about menial jobs (mainly because I've had so many) and I heard her read at the Sister Spit tour at school and it sounded promising. But instead, the book more becomes about her chasing after her philosophy teacher from community college and kind of being in this love "square" with three of her students, the narrator included.
4. Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture by Ariel Levy--pretty good. ( Read more... )
5. Symptomatic by Danzy Senna--good. Flawed and perhaps underdeveloped, but I was surprised given that this one supposedly showed signs of "Sophomore slump" after the perhaps more "important" Caucasia which I thought was good but wasn't blown away by.
6. Napalm & Silly Putty by George Carlin--okay, but he recycled some material not only from his stand-up routines (which would be acceptable) but from his other books!!! Did he think I wouldn't notice? Tsk-tsk.
7. In The Cut by Susanna Moore--eh, not good.
8. Wasted: The Plight of America's Unwanted Children by Patrick T. Murphy--very good.
9. When the Messenger is Hot by Elizabeth Crane--disappointingly not good. I had been meaning to read this for a long time and when reviews of this book called it something along the lines of one-dimensional, I rolled my eyes thinking that in today's literary world, a short story is called simplistic if it actually follows a plot and doesn't spent ten pages describing jacaranda blossoms floating in a pool. But then I read it and for the most part it was pretty one-dimensional, with a lot of the stories being more concepts outlined rather than fleshed out.
10. Whores for Gloria by William T. Vollmann--quite good.
11. Choke by Chuck Palahniuk--quite possibly THE BEST, dude. I tried to read this a couple of times, dude, but somehow ended up putting it down for no reason, dude. Which was totally my loss, dude. And dude, this would make such an awesome movie, dude. And dude, I totally claim the role of "Beth" a.k.a Cherry Daiquiri, the stripper girl Denny draws, dude, my main qualifier being that, dude, I have a mole on my thigh. It's not cancerous yet, dude, but give me a couple of years, dude. And dude, has anyone counted the number of times the word "dude" appears in the book, dude?
12. Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disasters, and Survival by Anderson Cooper--pretty good. This is the book by that gay guy who comes on after Larry King. It was good, although at times all of his assignments sort of blurred together (although that might have been kind of his point) and I found the personal stories about his childhood to be much more interesting and so poignantly sad, I wish he'd focused more on them. Incidentally, I half-heartedly made it my New Years' Resolution to figure out whether or not he was gay, and then never watched the show again. Well, after reading this book, there's no doubt in my mind. My favorite piece of evidence is when he's in Bosnia and he gets mad at his Serbian driver--who he describes as good-looking--for having sex in their car and leaving a used condom on Anderson's seat. But it seems more likely that Anderson was mad that the guy was having sex with women instead of him. Nerdy newsboys need lovin' too :-P
So all-in-all, some good reads, some not good reads. Not as stand-out as some past years, but better than last year. As for movies, I watched ten or so, most of which I had an okay sort of response to. The one movie I can recommend with an unequivocal two thumbs up is Black Snake Moan with Christina Ricci (who really ought to consider staying a blonde), Samuel (there a muthafuckin' snakes on the muthafuckin'...) L. Jackson, and yes, Justin Timberlake. While I personally don't think the guy can act, I'm starting to agree with adaptivelythat in conjunction and Dick in a Box, he seems to be becoming ironic about himself in the case of the latter and throwing his celebrity status behind some worthwhile projects in the case of the former. I mean, at least he didn't star in some stupid "romantic comedy" with Jessica Simpson. The other movie I watched that caught my attention was Thirteen starring Nikki Reed and Evan Rachel Wood, which I simultaneously hated (because I can't stand movies about teens who are obsessed with fitting in with their peers--by the time I was 13, I hated all of my peers) and liked because it was so engrossing to watch.
Broadly speaking, it was a generally good summer. It probably would have been a better one if I hadn't been suffering from panic attacks so severe that I developed a tremor in my left hand, but I'd a million times rather suffer from panic attacks than from the crippling depression I would have were I to stay on the Vineyard locked inside by my mother. I've been making strangely optimistic statements like this all summer. I remember saying earlier, perhaps not here, that this school year had been pretty good in comparison to the last two. These statements are highly uncharacteristic and frighten me, like I'm going to turn into one of those people who believes the world is a good place and writes stories about people who solve their problems by having "positive experiences" in group therapy. Hey, if I start talking about wanting to reproduce, come give me a hysterectomy with a piece of broken glass. Print out this enry and leave it by me so that if I start screaming about you depriving me of potential womb fruit, I can be reminded of my saner wishes. You can even reimburse yourself with paper from my printer if it means that much to you. |
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| Party On Music_Rocks' Blog! |
[Aug. 11th, 2007|01:32 am] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  celebratory | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Nine Inch Nails--Head Like a Hole | ] |
A blog is like a flower...
You have to water it or something.
Anyway, that's just me distracting myself from my main point which is that today is Music_Rocks' birthday!
<--- DO WE HAVE TO TAKE IT HOME???
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MUSIC_ROCKS, I HOPE YOU'VE ENJOYED YOUR FIRST YEAR ON LIVEJOURNAL! |
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| Just Dropped By... |
[Aug. 9th, 2007|05:39 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | busy | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Three Doors Down--Kryptonite | ] |
Just figured I'd pop in and let you guys know that the screenplay is pretty much finished. It could probably use some more edits and rewrites and whatnots, but the basic structure that I'm after is there. It's got some material that I've been kicking around in my head since 2001 and that I tried to write as a manuscript then but couldn't finish. I think a script is a better format for it.
However, I'm stressing about the soundtrack. Truth be told, I've written four full-length manuscripts and a screenplay in the past seven years, and I've never really completed a soundtrack to my satisfaction. There's just too much music, and so much music I've never heard, to really consider everything to its ideal. So anyway, as sort of a sneak preview and as a solicitation of advice, I'm posting the soundtrack here for your listening pleasure.
Note: The videos linked to are not necessarily official ones put out by the band. I just tried to find the best audio recording quality possible.
1. Jet--Are You Gonna Be My Girl?
2. Lifehouse--You and Me
3. Garbage--Silence is Golden
4. Tori Amos--Winter
5. Nine Inch Nails--Sanctified
6. Hole--Old Age
7. Nirvana--School
8. Tool--Intolerance
9. PJ Harvey--Goodnight
10. The Bangles--Manic Monday
11. Creedence Clearwater Revival--Bad Moon Rising
12. B.B. King--The Thrill Is Gone
13. Tool--Hooker With a Penis
Please pardon the weird video (although it did inspire my new icon). It's the best audio I could find. My hope is that by featuring two songs by Tool, I can talk the lead singer into changing the title of this song to something more P.C. like "Hustling with Phallic Imprints" that will put the MPAA at ease.
14. Silverchair--Tomorrow
So let me know what you think. As you can probably tell, it's a pretty eclectic mix that was also influenced by my summer Tool kick which may or may not subside now that the screenplay has been completed.
In other news, I know I'm about three weeks late on this, but as you all know, the new Harry Potter book was released in July. In the event that any of you were so eager to get my opinion on the subject, perhaps so much so that you started the book, then thought, 'Gee, I wonder what Beth's thoughts on Harry Potter are' and truly could not continue reading the book until you knew my opinion of them, let me say this: I read the first two HP books. Music_Rocks whose opinion, come to think of it, you probably all respect much more than mine, read them all and owns most of them in hardback. Anyway, I read the first two and I enjoyed them. I thought they were good. I watched the movies and liked them as well. Neither version defined my existence. I do not schedule my life around the release of J.K. Rowling's books. If I have time and am so inclined, I may read the other five. I may not. My point being that I did not eschew the books as mere fad material, but did not become completely sucked into the fad. If you love the books, as long as you are sensible about it, I commend you; if you don't, I'm sure you have your reasons. I suppose another way of looking at it is that if J.K. Rowling can get bookstores to keep their doors open until midnight with customers practically drooling in wait, then I commend her for being able to inspire literary love in so many people, especially since she is not Danielle Steel or Jackie Collins.
On the other hand, if any of you are interested in becoming the paramour of Henry Rollins, DO NOT FUCKING TOUCH THE BOOKS or you will be forcibly ejected from his car.
Lastly, I hope you all are enjoying my new icon! |
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| What's The Story, Morning Glory? |
[Jun. 5th, 2007|07:12 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| | relaxed | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Liz Phair--Johnny Sunshine | ] |
Hmm... it's been a while since I've updated. I was down in Washington for the National Spelling Bee. Music_Rocks didn't win, but she is mentioned in this article on CNN and some reporter for a radio station wanted to interview her, but for some inexplicable reason, she declined. (I was ready to accept on her behalf.)
Washington was... eh... lots of landmarks. I kept having these panic attacks, either that or my blood-pressure/circulatory system is crapping out on me. And then I'd get all worried that I'd either pass out in a strange city or else that my stress was affecting Music_Rocks' concentration. She informed me that I am "depressing" to share a hotel room with. It's good to be back. The thing is, you can't get close enough to any of the landmarks so you might as well just watch them on TV. We did see a motorcade likely bearing President Bush drive by, or at least some policey dudes with guns went off on a total power-trip and wouldn't let us cross the street and wouldn't say why until this procession of dark cars went by. Then, I got to see sharp-shooters on the roof of the White House and something about the presence of men in dark clothing with guns cheered me up a bit. (I think Freud would have something to say about that, but fuck him!)
Now, I'm back at school where I am working in the computer labs for the summer. I just got back yesterday. I couldn't take another summer of my mother refusing to let me out of the house after seven o'clock at night because she was afraid I'd be raped by squirrels. This is my last summer that will actually be a summer vacation. I'm living on-campus for $95 a week. No meal-plan. Speaking of which: can anyone give me ideas of food I can buy that's cheap, convenient, and has a modicum of nutritional value??? I have a feeling these principles are all at odds with one another. I'm not used to food-shopping for myself. We do have a refrigerator and a kitchen. Otherwise, I swear I'm going to just live out of vending machines (which will likely include hefty consumption of soda which sult has found medical proof is very bad for me.) But what I want to know, sult if you're reading this is what qualifies as soda? Is this beverage okay? I mean, it's not really soda, is it? My goal is to try to break even in terms of expenses, but I'm scared that won't happen.
Last night, I had to sleep on a bed with no sheets or pillows because my stuff was in storage and I arrived too late to get the keys to the storage area and the campus security person had no idea what I was talking about. So that was an experience. Finally at around 2-3 o'clock at night, I sneaked down to the living room and discovered a quilt on one of the couches and took that up to my room. That made things a bit better. Today I picked up my box of stuff and some guy doing maintenance work offered to carry it to my dorm for me which was awesome because I packed it too heavy. I knew there was a reason I put on makeup this morning. The importance of sweaty eyeliner (^_^).
Well, working for the labs should be interesting. So far I don't have to do anything except sit on my ass for five hours and keep this place open. Other than that, I have free time, which is weird in a place I usually associate with school and stress. I need to get off my ass and read some books. Something I haven't done nearly enough of on my own. I did read She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb. As some of you may recall, my favorite book of all time (and my longest read of so far) is I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb. It was okay... As an author, he seems to have a preoccupation with getting in touch with his feminine side and I know he got a lot of acclaim for his ability to impersonate a female voice, but I can't help but feel that he just kind of strung together a bunch of incidents--divorced parents, rape, obesity, abortion, bad marriage, deaths of loved ones--that are distinctly female and expected readers to be all "You Go Girl!" Kind of like what I felt about White Oleander--that it was about this girl in a series of foster homes and just takes her through a series of every inconceivable abuse that could happen to a person in a foster home. I think I read an amazon.com review of it that said just that.
Lastly, it seems that while I was away, I won a prize from the English department for a short story I wrote and submitted to the annual English department prize competitions. I'd put a link but the website doesn't say any more than that. I actually didn't find out until somebody sent me a message on FaceBook congratulating me for winning and I was like, the hell? Then, my mom checked the mail and they're giving me a $200 gift certificate to the local bookstore. **Shakes head** I never even buy books, let alone $200 worth.
Well, I hope all is going OK with you, my dear readers. Drop me a line. |
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