nothing is ever as good as it was

what you know you have or what you think you want, it's never perfect.

jenny lewis with the watson twins - melt your heart

now i don't hardly know her

prada the cat is officially in heat. her first time. my first time too, seeing a cat in proper sex-me mode. she keeps rubbing her little cat face against the floor whilst sticking her little cat bum in the air and chirping. so for prada, joan jett's cover of crimson and clover: "i want to do everything, what a beautiful feeling." ba-da-da-da-da-da.


joan jett and the blackhearts - crimson and clover

i don't care where you go as long as it's with me

i hate the feeling of losing something. however, since i usually live in complete squalor, this feeling is not uncommon to me. my things are constantly swallowed up by the mess that is my room, surfacing on occasion like regurgitated pearls. i have almost no control over their reappearance — they show up when they feel like it, perhaps when the tide of my shit (metaphorical, not literal) has receded from the floor of my room, perhaps not. yet from the time that i realize i can't find something to the time that it reappears, i'm obsessed with the thought that it is gone, possibly forever.

makes my brain hurt. seriously.

last month i realized that both of my born ruffians albums are missing. i thought only one had disappeared but no, they're both gone. did i loan them to someone? did someone with a penchant for born ruffians but a shortage of loose cash steal them from me? i have no idea and really, it matters not, because the simple fact is they're not here and i miss them. fare thee well, born ruffians albums. good luck and godspeed. i play for you an appropriate song.

born ruffians - little garcon

don't be afraid, love is simple

i kinda like valentine's day. i mean i don't despise it, and i like valentines themselves—they're really quite cool, combining as they often do bad puns with a certain style of artwork. last year i spent ages trying to find proper old timey valentines to give out but eventually i gave up and printed off a bunch of the red beret-ed rabbit and then cut them all out, which gave me scissor claw from holding the scissors for so long.

now one crappy thing about valentine's day is getting scissor claw from cutting out valentines for people and not getting a single one back. not even from your mother. like what the fuck.

and then of course the biggest crappy thing about valentine's day is having to see couples doing special coupley things and holding hands and going out for dinner and shit, because they think they have to, or whatever, or maybe they really do actually love each other and if you think i dislike couples being all coupley affectionate because i am secretly envious of their love well you'd be dead wrong. this is not a secret at all.

anyways, i give out valentines because i think it's nice and they're nice and there's always the hope that one year someone will remember to give me one.

so here's two songs for you and me and st. valentine on st. valentine's day. because love's simple, isn't it, just like the akron/family says.

akron/family - don't be afraid, you're already dead
the futureheads - hounds of love

smothered in hugs

today i ran into my friend claire on the street, but since she was headed in the opposite direction we basically just said our hellos and goodbyes and i gave her a hug, with like an extra squeeze at the end. which apparently i do a lot, as claire then noted, and marla (who was with me) followed by describing as "creepy." granted, i think she was speaking of hugs in general, but the fact is that i do enjoy a good hug with a friend and don't always let people go easily. it's like, you think you're getting away? oh no, there'll be at least five more seconds of hugging, and then i'm probably going to nestle my head into your neck too (varies depending on height of course; if my head comes up to your elbow you may get a few pats on the back instead). in any case, i like hugs and once put serious thought into considering whether i'd rather get a hug or a kiss at the end of a first date.*

so, yes, what others find creepy and smarmy (perhaps justifiably) i find comforting and welcome. what is particularly ironic and annoying to me is that all of my dearest friends take marla's stance on hugs. and, of course, these are really the only people in the world that i want to hug and be hugged by, save perhaps britney spears in her downward spiral... that girl just needed a friend. anyways, so unless my mom comes to visit i am rarely hugged for months on end, leaving me so starved for this affection that i love that i end up drunkenly hugging people at parties, like a sozzled cat.

but the thing is, sometimes just beeeeeeee-ing yourself, like the genie says to Aladdin in the 1992 animated film of the same name, means coming off as slightly creepy or cheesy or corny or foolish to some people, and there's really nothing you can do about that. so to all those i love, i shall NOT apologize for hugging you! i love you. ergo, hugs. hugs for you.**

also, this is kind of a perfect opportunity to post a song by a band called smothered in hugs (like the guided by voices song) that i like called "young flare." so i will.

smothered in hugs - young flare

* barring considerations such as attraction, compatibility, and how the date itself went, my conclusions were basically as follows: hugs — comforting, yes, but perhaps a tad dispassionate. kisses — potential for passion certainly, but also for awkwardness and herpes.

** unless you like, really, really hate them and they make you hideously uncomfortable. in which case, i will respect your wishes and NOT hug you. just so you know.

then suddenly you're puking out the door with your pants around your knees

i was thinking about my theme song today. i've had this song (jason collett's "almost summer") as my theme song since i first heard it in 2006, and the truth is it's no less true to my life today than it was three years ago. or ten years ago, if it would have been possible to have heard a song from the future when i was seventeen. another truth is that, really, it should have stayed the theme song for a seventeen-year-old girl, but for some reason even though i've aged, and moved, and gone to school and worked at jobs where i don't have to wear a name tag, i'm still kinda seventeen, relationship-wise.

so you know, like occasionally i'll wonder if it's finally become time to move on from this song, if it's stopped applying to my life, if i even like listening to it anymore... and then i'll remember that incident during the summer of 08 (say) when i got way too drunk, told someone i liked them, and then promptly walked into a telephone poll.

so the song stays. or, like the dude, abides.

jason collett - almost summer

photo: marla warner

garance doré

i have to admit that my style is pretty generic. as much as i love clothes and spend a lot of time thinking about how i should dress, the truth is that i usually play it pretty safe, clothing-wise. however, in my fantasy life (or maybe i should say in one of my fantasy lives, for i have many), i'd have the great skin and style of the people featured on une fille comme moi, which is a really lovely blog from french illustrator garance doré. she posts a mix of fashion illustration and street style photos, and i think if you like clothes, or you like pictures, or if you like clothes and pictures, you should check it out. it used to just be in french, but now the posts are also translated into english. which is helpful, seeing as i took french in school for about twelve years and yet can barely speak a word of it now.

i've included some of my favourite photos below. as i'm always impressed by/secretly, corrosively jealous of people who can pull off a look that is, in essence, pretty simple without also looking boring, i would happily knock over any of these people and steal their style and their no doubt delightful parisian lives. i like croissants.






all photos property of garance doré, from www.garancedore.fr

harmonica

i have a certain fondness for the old mouth harp, for a number of reasons. here are two of them.

bob dylan - most of the time (alternate version)
(you can listen to more of tell tale signs here.)

"this is another new one."


neil young - heart of gold

faster than the speed of night

so tonight i waited in the cold at a bus stop where bus after bus would pull up, let off all of its passengers, change its sign to read "out of service," and drive away. after about half an hour (6 buses) of this bizarre bus behaviour i gave up and decided to go home rather than figure out another way to get to the bar where i was already supposed to be, ages ago, so i condensed all of the relevant information into a text message for my friend — "transit fucked, going home" — and hit send. but the explanatory nugget would not be sent. MESSAGE FAILED, MESSAGE FAILED, the phone beeped. i tried again. MESSAGE FAIL. again. MESSAGE FAIL. then i tried calling, but (perhaps unsurprisingly) CALL FAIL, CALL FAIL said the phone. so i went home to call her, and now i'm in our "living room"* eating a bag of chips and listening to songs on repeat while my roommate's cat kneads the tender inside of my arm until it turns red. it's friday night. i have no plans to go back out. could this be LIFE FAIL? it is a big bag of chips.

*current contents of "living room":
me
cat
giant television, sitting on floor
mattress and box-spring, also on floor
assorted chairs
fan
dead plant
one winter boot
empty bag of chips
jenga

fortunately, it is for moments such as this that "faster than the speed of night" exists. the video is pretty amazing too, even though it cuts out the epic last third of the song.



i'd say the dancing guitar man is worth it though.