Author: pookiebear

Storm clouds and bendy trees

Storm clouds and bendy trees.

The heat broke today for the first time in weeks and I’m hoping the blanket of humidity that has been suffocating my brain will rise and let me think more clearly.
We’ve been slugs around these parts, our bodies languid in the heat and our minds unfocused and restless. We can barely stand to touch each other at night because we stick together like glue, which makes sleeping highly uncomfortable in queen size bed with two overly tall people.
The heat break does boil down to taking back what is ours, what is mine – that semi-precious gift of time that I keep forking over to other not-so -important things. Summer is racing to an end already, I can feel it even if the calendar says differently. As my calendar fills and swells, it’s sometimes difficult to remember that there once was a time when summer was the signal of new adventures waiting to happen and it should always be about that feeling.

Everything Austen II: The Jane Austen Challenge #everythingausten

So, Jane Austen. Woman writes six books, dies at the age of 41 with something no one is quite sure what killed her and is discretely known during her lifetime for her writing. BUT! And here’s the big but, she’s NEVER gone out of print in the nearly 200 years since her death. She’s as beloved today as when she began publishing as “A Lady,” is if the “not being out of print for 200 years” doesn’t grab you by the cajones, than it should be the fact that there is a pop culture explosion of Jane Austen goodness has been going on for the last couple of years.

Entrance to the Jane Austen Centre
Bath, England

Her popularity is so huge that when I traveled to England in 2008, there were two things I had to do: Visit the For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming and James Bond exhibit at the IWM and lodge in as many Jane Austen locales as humanly possible. My friends Andy and Charlotte, whom I stayed with on this particular trip, graciously drove me to various points around south east England to get my fix. They even suffered through a talk at the Jane Austen Centrein Bath for my benefit. True friends will suffer for anything with you (and hide the bodies later). Andy and Charlotte also lived within minutes of Basildon Park, which was the location of Netherfield in the 2005 adaptation of Pride & Prejudice1, and I had to suffer through Andy’s mockery of holy that is Jane Austen and P+P as I toured the estate. But then again, Andy continually mocked just about everything I did on that trip because he loves to remind me that my country is mere toddler to his country and I’m easily and suitably impressed with any structure, monument, or bridge over 50 years old. In America, if it’s over 50 years old, it must be knocked down and the space made into a car park. Yes, apparently England is up to HERE in castles.3
You may remember that book-thing, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, which came out in the spring of 2009? The mash-up of the old and the new has spawned a whole new industry and it’s not even just the mash-ups, it’s also the paraliterature, retellings (Clueless, Bride & Prejudice and cannot forget, Pride and Prejudice: A Latter-Day Comedy (Yes, it IS a Mormon version!) – which I willingly did watch.), action figures, t-shirts, and the list goes on.
P+P and Zombies did not start the paraliterature trend, not by a long shot, but it DID push to public Ms. Austen’s popularity beyond that of Janeites and English Lit majors the world over. However you wish to explain Ms. Austen’s renaissance in the 21st century, it does go without saying that one could read/watch/listen to a plethora of retellings/mashups/adaptations/etc and not run of things to do for a very long time. When I stumbled across the Everything Austen II Challenge a few weeks ago, I knew this would be a perfect opportunity to organize my obsession a bit better. Goal: Pick any six Austen things (books/paraliterature/movies/audio/etc) and read/watch/listen to them between July 1, 2010 and January 1, 2011. Because there is so much, and I also read/watch/listen rather quickly, I’m fattening up my list to more then six items because I want to take pleasure in this for quite some time.
To Read:

To Watch:

  • Pride and Prejudice (1940), with Laurence Olivier as Mr. Darcy and Greer Garson as Lizzie. [With a tagline of, “The Gayest Comedy Hit of the Screen! Five Gorgeous Beauties on a Mad-Cap Manhunt!,” it will surely be hard to resist.]
  • Sex and the Austen Girl. [A webseries based off the work of Laurie Viera Rigler.]

To Listen:

  • Old Harry’s Game. [A BBC comedy radio show, Harry is actually Satan and the series, based in Hell, revolves around Harry\’s relationships/conflicts and tensions with his minions and the damned. J.A. is played as a foul mouth creature. Can’t wait to listen!]

Updated: 07/14/2010

1. In the holy war of the 2005 vs 1995 version of P+P, I’m firmly in the camp of 2005. Before someone starts squawking about the “integrity” of the 1995 version and how “true to the book” it is, let me remind one and sundry that there is not a single effing scene in the book describing Mr. Darcy’s exit from the lake. SECONDLY! Having re-read P+P after watching 2005 and 1995, 2005 is MUCH CLOSER to the book than 1995 version. Besides, K.K. is much “truer” to Lizzie’s spirit than Jennifer Ehle.
2. Grabbed P+P and Z when it was first published and tried desperately to read it. DESPERATELY is as close of word I can come up with because it is essentially JA’s writing worked around some awful “writing” that is to allude that if P+P had Zombies, this is how it would go. But the book is awful not because it’s a mashup but it’s awful because Seth Grahame-Smith delivered a great idea but an awful execution. What’s obvious is that he “attempted” to imitate JA’s voice but he fails madly at doing so so instead of having a blended work that is to be “80% JA and 20% SGS” comes out as “100% dreck.” Having started on the prequel, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls, which is far and away 1000 times better than the P+P and Zombies, this is the one I recommend for JA paraliterature/mashup over that other one.
3. Nod to Eddie Izzard for that one.

Naked Librarians: ALA 10 Unplugged. #ala10 (Part I.)

I made several of these shirts in several different colors for the #ala10 conference and wore them all weekend. The QR Code does indeed work.

Holy. Cats.
After much hemming & hawing, I made it to D.C. this past week for the American Library Association’s annual convention (or known in Twitterland as #ala10). Geeks, by the way, have NOTHING on the librarians ifyouknowwhatImean.
Now that the conference is over, there have been a trickle of posts coming out of the blogosphere about various libarians’ experiences with #ala10. A few worth mentioning are: I’ve been a passive fan girl of Andy Woodworth for some time now as he’s been super helpful in helping me with that murky area between the ending of my SLIS program and being thrust out to the world of librarianship with only a single arm floatie to prop me up. Andy wrote a breakdown of of the conference, specifically talking about social media advocacy. What I took away from this was, “STFU. You’ve got the tools, now USE THEM.”
P.C. Sweeney also wrote up his experiences for the PLA blog, which captured some of the spirit of the conference. While not a blog post, I DID ran into (almost literally) to one of the creators of Crave Libraries on the exhibit floor (and also scored a few cool buttons FTW!). Advocacy, awareness and grassroots-esque ideas while not heavy on the sessions list, were definitely huge topic of conversation at the dinners and social events.
A knockoff of my Moo cards that I printed at home since I forgot to order new batch before the conference. These were also a big hit at #ala10.

The second thing I want to tackle before I going my observations on the conference (and because I know how wordy I am, this will be a two part post, with the first discussing the positive and the second post why ALA (and by extension, most librarians) are still huddling in the 19th century) is the plethora forwarding and retweeting of a blog post by Bobbi Newman that she wrote last year called, Why I’m over people Twittering Conferences, Meetings.
A year ago I would have been nodding my head vigorously and shaking a fist while proclaiming, “Right on, sister!” but having attended three separate conferences within the last year, I can only respectfully disagree.
Here’s why:

  • If you’re Twittering, you’re not paying attention – multitasking is a myth The problem I have with this statement is that it’s flat generalization across learning and theory styles. Statistically, I do much better cognitively if I took notes and in lieu of having a pen/paper or my netbook with me, tweeted the information for later user. I also am a much better visual learner so I need something to connect the aural with the visceral. This also doesn’t take into account those who have smart phones (and thus there is an app for that productivity if you’re sans your netbook) or those with just text only options, so texting at leas to their Twitter accounts may be the only way to keep notes.

Documenting the American South

[This was first published at AMPed.]
To say those from the South are proud of their heritage is putting it mildly. Every year dozens if not hundreds of groups, towns and culture centers celebrate some aspect of Southern life from Civil War reenactments to living history villages to a wide array of festivals honoring everything from fruit and food to music and specialty local events. 1
To help commemorate the South’s (and also America’s) illustrious background and to give a voice to the Southern perspective, the University of North Carolina has put together a digital initiative of primary and secondary sources on the Internet. Since 2004, Documenting the American South has been the premier location for education and research materials on Southern life not just on the Internet, but also in the world. The fourteen thematic collections offer wide range of digital materials that includes books, diaries, posters, artifacts, letters, oral history interviews, and songs. This vibrant digital collection consists of numerous large print, photograph and rare materials collections made possible by Southern Historical Collection, the North Carolina Collection, UNC’s Rare Book Collection and the Davis Library.
What makes Documenting the American South such a rich resource is not just because of the various large collections that have been consolidated into a single landing point for research and discovery rather it is also because the scope, design and ease of use of the site that makes it such a valuable resource. In addition, the site is consistantly updated with new information and materials, making it not only a valuable resource for things past, but also for things present and future.
Documenting the American South has a number of discovery and mapping tools to help viewers explore the collection. This includes a Highlights section, a monthly update that explores content in the collection, which is also available via RSS. In addition is the Collections section, a listing of the digital collections by theme, also available for researchers and educators to use for finding materials that range from first person narratives, slave narratives to Southern literature and more. Specific content can also be found by using the Subjects, Geographical, Authors and Titles tabs in the top navigation bar. And if you still can’t find what you’re looking for, there is also a search option to search the entire collection by keyword to find exactly what you need.
UNC has also put together Classroom Resources, which includes kits, lesson plans and additional materials to help bring Southern life vividly into the classroom.
This is a wonderful treasure trove of materials, that is not only rich for discovery but also a valuable archive of not just Southern life, but American life as well.
 
1. In addition, Southern Festivals is a fantastic resource for festivals happening in the South. This site is organized by state, so if you’re traveling south this year and looking for things to do, this would definitely be one site you want to bookmark.

The Power of the Retweet

[This was first published at AMPed.]
I’ve discussed Twitter in a variety of capacities on AMPed but mainly within the context of using mashable technologies that include Twitter, but I have not discussed a feature of Twitter that sometimes is overlooked – retweeting.
What exactly is retweeting? Retweeting is taking a tweet that was originally sent by one person that you follow and you in turn forward it on to your own followers, usually with an added comment so that the new tweet would look something like this:

Awww RT@stephenfry Plus *eyelidflutter* Steve Jobs said “Hi, Stephen” *swoon*.

In this case I’m commenting on a tweet originally sent by @stephenfry, whom I follow and in turn, I forwarded that tweet to my followers along with my comment. Because of the format of the tweet, it is generally understood that everything before the “RT” is by me and everything after the “RT” is by the originating author. And this is accepted as the norm in Twitter communication for since time immortal (or 2006).
It is exactly like email forwarding, with the exception that you cannot selective choose who your retweet goes out to, it has to go out to all of those that follow you or none at all.
When Twitter first came to being, it didn’t have an official re-tweet option, at least not on Twitter.com. A lot of the retweeting that went on was done by hand, meaning simple cut and paste with formatting to make it fit within 140 characters. As Twitter, and obviously by extension tweeting, became more popular, applications and websites like HootSuite, Seesmic and TweetDeck started building tools within their clients to make retweeting easier, thus no more cut and paste! One could simply select the option to retweet a tweet and the application would do the formatting for you.
But then, everything changed. In the fall of 2009, Twitter announced they were going to do something a little bit differently: change how people retweeted. This may not seem like earth shattering details but in the context of how people use Twitter and for people who use Twitter.com, it was a big deal.
Here is what they did:
For ages, applications were already incorporating ways for people to retweet content, allowing people to style how they disseminated the information as seen by my example above. Twitter.com, sometimes late to their own party, decided to shake things up by adding a retweet option natively into the website. What this option did is that if you were reading your Twitter timeline on Twitter.com and saw something you wanted to retweet, the retweet option would re-post the tweet for you but as it originated from the author, with no option to restyle it or adding commentary. So, if I retweeted my example from above to my followers, what they would see is the tweet as it was originally sent by Stephen Fry with “retweeted by” appended on. The interesting thing about this new option is that for those who ALREADY follow Stephen Fry on Twitter, they would not see my retweet since it already appeared originally in their timeline.
Applications and websites have started incorporating this option into their software, giving users a choice to do it natively or to add commentary.
Evan Williams, one of the co-founders of Twitter, explains the rationale behind the the new format and the ideology of how retweeting emerged organically.
So now that we’ve covered what retweeting is, how it’s used and how to use it, what exactly makes it powerful? There are a number of reasons (in no particular order):

  1. It introduces new users to your followers that they may not already know. For example, there are a number of Twitter users who have become massively popular due to the viralness of retweeting, such as @ArchivesOpen and @UkNatArchives. The viralness of a Twitter account is not limited to an account that is for pure entertainment, as news & culture magazins, think tanks, research groups and individuals that I do not follow have appeared in my timeline, retweeted by people who think that information is interesting or useful.
  2. It draws attention to a particular action, ideology or commentary that you believe in and want to share with your followers.
  3. It illustrates something you agree or disagree with, but sharing the orignal tweet with your own commentary, thus drawing attention to something that may not have been noticed before.
  4. Retweeting gives credit to sources, which again goes back to expanding your social network, either professionally or personally.
  5. It creates conversations with your followers by them retweeting or responding directly to you about your retweet or by retweeting a tweet that originated from yourself.

This list is just the tip of the iceberg and there could be a series on the power of retweeting, but for now we’ll just cover the basics to lay the foundation on becoming a better tweeter. By understanding why people use retweeting, how to use it, what it does and why it can be so powerful gives you a better foundation to be a better tweeter and at the end of the day, isn’t that what everyone wants?

Hire me or the pug gets it.

Hire me or else the pug gets it.
The closer my friend Jessica got to graduation from our alma mater, the more worried she got about not finding a job. Understandably, Jessica had been pimping herself out for six moths prior to graduation and had not so much as a phone interview yet. Jessica was my litmus stick in the world of job hunting – if SHE couldn’t get a job (and Jessica is super awesome beyond words), then my chances of obtaining employment nirvana upon my graduation were damned near close to nil.
Literally two weeks before our exams at the end of December, Jessica bagged not only an interview but also a job offer! The day after our last class together, Jessica packed up her crap and moved to Chicago. While I knew she was stressed about the barely-making it to her deadline, she would often tell me that she wasn’t AS worried because things would work out – they had to. You couldn’t, she kept telling me, stress about probabilities because things could and CAN change in an instant, as certainly shown by her obtaining a position seemingly minutes before graduation.
My own graduation was looming six months after Jessica’s and based upon Jessica’s experiences, I swore to myself that I would start immediately on the job hunt once we came back from holiday break in January. I would apply weekly! Keep a spreadsheet! Be diligent in my cover letters and resume tactics!
For the most part, I did all of the above starting with having a few friends who have worked as professional editors help me prefect my resume near the end of the fall term. In addition to the professional editors, I also had my resume looked at by professionals in the librarian and archives fields. I even started the damn spreadsheet and kept track of my job hunt diligently. I networked like crazy and while I didn’t apply weekly for jobs starting in January as I had planned, the closer I got to graduation, the more frequently I applied. Spending hours shifting through mailing lists, job sites, and emails from friends looking for a job, any job, that would fit me. But as I started automating the process of applying for jobs, I began to notice several trends:

  • Job descriptions were more often than not vague and/or really generic. “We want a creative or innovative person!” (One of the most common starts to the job ads.)
  • Qualifications, at least when listed under “desired,” sometimes bordered on the outrageous or impossible. “10 years in social media experience.” Say what? Sure you could PROBABLY make the claim that community managers from days of yore could be counted in this, but in reality, not really.
  • Jobs looking for someone tech savvy would use least likely tech savvy way of contact. For example, position for a job required faxing my application and resume, which was fine except nowhere on the HR or institution’s website was a listing for email OR phone number for HR or even hell, the library system. So, if I had questions – how was I to contact them?

These are complaints echo what I’ve complained about on Twitter, but I couldn’t REALLY justify the bitching: In comparison to many of those in my graduating class at said alma mater: I was getting interviews and rejection notices. Many, if not most, were barely getting the latter. My frustration may have been with the system but I was still getting a response from the system, many of my peers were not. Here is how my stats break down: As of June 10, 2010:

  • Total number of jobs applied for: 28
  • Total number of rejections (email/snail): 12
  • Total number of interviews (phone/video/f2f): 7
  • Total number of rejections from interviews: 4
  • Total number of still open applications: 10
  • Total number of still open interviews: 3

Right now I have three open interviews, which means that I have not heard back from two of them (those were done in the last week or so) and the third is attempting to schedule something to fly me out to do a campus interview, as I apparently rocked the video interview but there seems to be scheduling conflict. Of the two outstanding, I’m pretty sure I won’t be extended a second interview for one of them. I realized in the shower the day after WHY I wasn’t getting beyond the first interview with least three of them, and possibly one that is still open: I am prepping for a job description that does NOT match what they are looking for.
For example if a university says they want someone with knowledge of HTML, fine. But there is a difference between having working knowledge and being a full blown web developer. Stating that you want someone with preferred qualifications in a specific ILS does not translate into asking me about information architecture, usability or what my work flow is for web development. And when I ask you, for example, about the ILS qualification, being told that your institution is replacing it with another brand also makes the qualification seem slightly above silly, even more so when the ILS’ are wildly different.
This has been a costly mistake to me: the bugger all is that I CAN speak intelligently about information architecture, usability, and work flow design. I DO have examples of how to mock up a website and examples of my work. I AM knowledgeable on social media and networking. But I’m prepping for their job description, not my resume. This has been the largest, and hopefully only, mistake that I’ve done. I’m hoping that my understanding of this now will pay off in the near future. In conjunction with applying for jobs, I’ve started putting together a talking points list of questions I bombed, unintentionally, in past interviews.
The point of this is that when asked to discuss on X, I have keywords to help jump me off on the topic and keep my thoughts straight. This is inspired by the institution that wants to fly me out who sent me a list of questions they were going to ask me 24 hours before my video interview. What was so great about this is after I put my thoughts and notes down, I didn’t need to check the list since it was all fresh in my brain. Since it was all fresh in my mind, I was able to rock the interview. The irony of this is that the questions this institution asked me is almost identical to the ones asked of me by the places that I bombed. Heh. Like I said, expensive mistake. I’ve also been plotting with a few experienced librarians about my assault on #ALA10, which includes interesting ways to get my resume noticed. And if after all of this, and the continued job search AND the assault on #ALA10 doesn’t pan out – then what? I’ve got two other life plans worked out – but that’s another entry for another time.
P.S. Please do not comment about the “Dos” and “Don’ts” of resume/cv, what HR’s are looking for and what have you. Not only have I heard them all BUT a lot of the “advice” I’ve been given contradicts itself. For example, was told by one HR person my resume was “far too detailed.” When I related this to a hiring manager at another institution, who was in fact interviewing me at the time, they said that having details makes it far EASIER to scan for keywords. Making my resume too general doesn’t allow me to stand out of the crowd. Secondly, I’ve had my resume/cv looked at by a number of qualified people in my profession (all of whom are on or have been on search committees) who helped me with some adjustments but they all pretty much said my resume was rock solid. Clearly, it is NOT my resume that needs help. I’m just ranting/ruminating on the process thus far and am NOT seeking advice. Thanks and etc.

May the 4th Be With You: Lisa and Justin got married.

Lisa & Justin, 1998
Originally, I was going to write up some pithy (well, not really) blog post about how we got here and the decade long separation between the last time we dated and now and why we are getting married. The entry was going to post at the time we were due at to the courthouse, but yeah, didn’t happen. So, instead I’ll go with this: to the left is montage of images that were taken in 1998 with a Logitech B&W webcam from when we were living together in the Bay Are. The images are small enough that blowing them up pixelates them beyond recognition, so it was just easier to create the montage. My favorite image is the one on the lower right, that look he’s giving me — that he’s still giving me 12 years later. Then he would have waxed poetic about how much he loves me, now he’ll wax on that the look is from gas.

Lisa & Justin, 2010

I remember when these pictures were taken, that the whole idea of publishing your life online was still a damned novelty and yet “The Lisa Chronicles” was launched that same summer the pictures were taken. A year after those pictures were taken, we would have broken up and it would be nearly a decade until before we would speak again. We are older & fatter now and I’m definitely more wiser – though according to many who know us claim we have not aged. We claim the sacrifice of virgins, but as this is Detroit, that is getting harder and harder to maintain. We got married for a plethora of reasons: love, legal status so that I can pull the plug if he is on life support, health insurance. People keep asking me if things have changed now that we’re legally hitched and the answer is: Not really, we’re still Lisa and Justin.
So on May 4th, next year and every year after, wherever you are: Raise a glass in salute to love lost and love regained, to the impossible and improbable and to Lisa and Justin getting married.

Honeymoon: Paris to Bruxelles

As I write this, we’re currently on Thalys train 9443, from Paris to Bruxelles, on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. This may be one of the few times I’ll get to properly update since none of the hotels we are staying in Bruxelles or Amsterdam have free Wifi. The lack of free Wifi floating around Paris was poor — apparently for many of the free Wifi sites in Paris, you have to pre-register and then login once you get to the location.
For my iPhone, we paid for international data roaming (up to 50Mb) on this trip but you so much as spit while in a another country, you’ve used up a mb so everything has been shut off – data and 3G. I’ve only used data in Paris to Foursquare my way across the city when I could. This is going to be a very quick update on what has been going on for the last week since I only have about an hour before we get to Bruxelles.
Foursquaring, tweeting and other general updating will be done at the barest of minimums for the next 1.5 weeks. Also, all images from our camera are in raw format and I don’t have proper graphic software on my netbook so those will be done when we get back (more or less). If you haven’t been following me on Twitter, here is what you’ve missed:

  • Our flight was delayed due to unknown reasons from Montreal to Paris, which wasn’t so much the issue. The issue was that Delta never bothered to contact me via text or email about the plane delays and I only found out by happenstance when we purchased Wifi in Montreal to find out what the fuck was going on since NO ONE in Montreal, it seems, knew what the hell was going on. None of the desks manned in our concourse for Delta/AirFrance actually HAD people manning the desks. Our flight changed three times, which also included our seating. Now, part of the reason why we booked our trip (in fact the main reason) was that we were able to request and have confirmation for bulkhead and exit row seats on all three legs of our journey (Detroit->Montreal->Paris, Amsterdam->Detroit). I get that due to Ash Cloud shenanigans, flights are going to be screwy, but to change our flight, disregard our requests, not notify us, and then not have anyone available to talk to at the airport? Yeah, fuck you Delta/Air France. What burns, even more, is that when flights were settled and we were ready to board, our tickets that were printed at DTW suddenly were not working at YUL. Air France said it was due to the change over in flight information, we were in the registry and our tickets were reprinted.
  • Due to the above all, Delta/Air France LOST OUR LUGGAGE!
  • It arrived 2 days later, but beating one’s underwear and shirts in the sink and then spending the day wearing damp, vaguely dirty clothes for another run is bleh. Yes, first world problem, but dammit, it’s my fucking honeymoon!
  • We met up with Jon and Alice (from #userfriendly/Twitter/etc) for the weekend and quite enjoyed the drinking, laughing, stumbling, and shopping that took place all over Paris. Since all of us were pretty much in agreement that it would be impossible to do EVERYTHING in such a short amount of time (and to be honest, you would need weeks to do everything in Paris), we just hung out and ate ourselves silly from one end of the city to the other. We also became the masters of the Paris metro.
  • Justin and I actually did spend the entire day at the Louvre, which was not as bad as I would have thought it would have been. Seeing the Mona Lisa was fairly uninspiring (too many fucking people flashing their fucking cameras on the fucking masterpiece that was covered in fucking glass). We did not see the ENTIRE Louvre but we saw a good portion — I also got to knock three Caravaggio paintings of my list, so that was exciting (my lifetime goal is to see everyone of his paintings and I’ve knocked a considerable amount of them off the list since I went to Rome and now Paris). But as for the rest of the Louvre, you get oversaturated with the religious artifacts, the 975 different representations of Christo on a cross and sheer amount of boobage everywhere. Even Justin pointed out that after awhile, you get sick of looking at breasts.
  • Alice turned us into the Le marche aux puces de Saint-Ouen (flea markets of St. Ouen) which was fan-fucking-tastic idea! This was such a brilliant idea and it was a shame we left it for the morning before we left because we could have spent the entire day there and still not have seen everything. I picked up a few trinkets for myself and for gifts while Alice picked up oodles and oodles of beads. We roamed through a good portion of the market and saw everything from used books, post cards to antique furniture and clothes to stall upon stall of Converse, hookahs and the every popular pashmina.
  • My netbook cracked sometime between when we left our hotel in Paris and when we got on the train to Bruxelles and will have to be junked when we get back (which is also why updating is going to be very, very sporadic).
  • In other good news (other than hanging out with Jon+Alice for the weekend), I had a job interview before I left for the trip (literally, the day before) and I have another job interview lined up when I get back from my trip, the first week of June. I’m getting the job interviews — I just need someone to FUCKING GIVE ME A JOB!

 
So, that’s a nutshell of what we’ve been doing (other than eating and drinking bad beer and hanging out at expat bars around Paris).
à bientôt!’

The Throbbing’s Wedding Mix

The Throbbing’s Wedding Mix [77Mb mp3]
I’m still working on the post from our wedding shenanigans, but wanted to put together a mix of songs that we would have played if we had a reception and the reason why I choose these songs. I did not change my name (too much paperwork, also rallying against TheMAN) but “The Throbbings” is a nod to Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies, in which there was a set of characters, Lord and Lady Throbbing. Throbbing has become our personal nom de plum and if we have sign up for anything together, it’s usually under the last name of Throbbing.
I used Audacity to mix the songs together and tried to blend the intros and outros as close as possible, but it’s not absolutely perfect. The track listing is as follows:
Home – Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros

Every couple has an “official” song, usually some Michael Buble remix or regurgitated Emo bullshit. We have Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros, a band we both gravitated to after hearing them on All Songs Considered. Lyrics can be found here and YouTube is here.

Idiot Wind – Bob Dylan

Granted, this is not a typical love song by a long shot but Idiot Wind is off of Justin’s favorite Dylan album, Blood on the Tracks. This album was one we listened to on repeat on one of our second first dates back in 2008 and it is also one of our favorite tracks.

Somethin’ Hot – Afghan Whigs

I do not think I could put together a wedding mix and not throw in some Greg Dulli. The album, 1965 came out when Justin and I were together the first time around (’98-’99) and I played it CONSTANTLY. This track, in particular, always gets me feeling a tad bit frisky. YouTube video is here.

No One Else But You – Louis Armstrong

We both have a love for early Jazz/New Orleans Jazz/Swing/Big Band – pretty much anything pre-Bop. This song is from a compilation of Armstrong tunes that were recorded between 1925-29, entitled Hot Fives & Sevens.

Single Ladies – Pomplamoose

I fell in love with this band once their viral video for Beyonce’s Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It) was making the rounds last fall. I started giggling when, during our wedding dinner, our friends Lauren and Eric kept commenting that Justin liked it so much, he put a ring on it – thus this song (and specifically this version) was included.

Cherry Bomb – The Runaways

I went out, begrudgingly, with Lindsay to see The Runaways this past week expecting that as history has shown, most bio-pics about bands tend to suck (more specifically, I was thinking this was going to suck because it has the Twilight goddess in it). But lo! It was actually pretty good and I had forgotten how much I loved early girl-punk (Lindsay hooked me up to keep on reminding me). Thus! This song got included because nothing says “true wuv” like overtly sexual suggestive songs. A video of the original Runaways singing it is found on YouTube (of course).

Ball and Chain – Social Distortion

Right, like how can I NOT include this song? Lyrics and YouTube video.

I Walk The Line – Johnny Cash

We’re both fans of the Man In Black, but, I was seriously contemplating including the Joaquin Phoenix version of this song on the mix instead of the Cash one because the first version of Cash I have is a terribly mixed live one. I found a studio quality version of Cash singing the song and removed Mr. Phoenix from the lineup. This is also one of our favorite songs. Here is 23 year old Cash singing this song on the Tex Ritter show in 1955.

Lover’s Day – TV On The Radio

Justin’s love of music that cannot be easily classified made me think that he would love TV on the Radio – and I was right. Well, he more or less would give them a strong “like” over love. Regardless, this is one of the first songs that we declared as ours and the one that reminds me the most of him. Since this was not a single, and there appears to be no video, only the lyrics are available.

Intergalactic – Beastie Boys

“Intergalactic,” the single off of Hello Nasty by the Beastie Boys, was released in the summer of 1998, right when Justin and I started dating the first time. According to him, I listened to Beastie Boys, Lords of Acid, Sarah Mclachlan and Afghan Whigs nonstop during that period. Since I was not, for the sake of the story, sober for most of that period, I’ll take his word. In 2009, Justin bequeathed me an art poster based off of “Intergalactic.” I knew based on the first few lines of the song, and the history behind it in regards to us, had to go into the mix. Video is available here.

God Only Knows – Beach Boys

In the world of pop and rock music, one of the definitive albums that is still seen as the holy grail of influence is the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds. Any kind of music critic, if apparently worth his or her salt, will name check this album in their review at least ONCE, regardless of the song/album/band/genre they are reviewing. Most of my die-hard music friends also name check this album and agreed that yes, one should at least have Pet Sounds in their repertoire. For Christmas 2008, I indeed received Pet Sounds as a present from Justin. “God Only Knows,” in stereo not analog, is included in the mix. Again, with the stupid still photos with musical background only available on YouTube or terribly edited live version, there is only lyrics, which are available here.

Love Will Tear Us Apart – Joy Division

I was torn about including this song, since it has many different memories associated with it but I totally wanted to reclaim it for my own again. I’ve always said if I ever got married, I’d want this played at my reception -so fuck the memories, here it is. BUT! As a bonus, Justin is the man who used LWTUA to satire it as Pug Will Tear Us Apart for Valentine’s Day – so obviously in ode to Wednesday, the song had to be included. While I know an official video exists, apparently on YouTube it\’s all about crappy cover bands, still images with the music in the background that take precedence on “official” shit. This version was recorded for the Peel Sessions and was edited with other material, so it’s slightly different than the studio. But I can dig it.

Dear internets: please help me plan our honeymoon [Poll]

When Justin and I decided to get married, we were in agreement that we only wanted to have a city hall wedding so we could use our cash for a killer honeymoon. Despite the commentary from our families (more mine than his) and friends (again, more mine than his) requesting that we at least have a small reception, we are still sticking to our guns in regards that we are going to get the JOP treatment, not have a reception and just flutter off to the great unknown for a few weeks.
So, then, what’s the problem?
Well there are a few:

  1. Timing: Justin’s upper echelons management have decreed that no one can take vacation or personal time after June 18th due to some shenanigans that may be occurring. Since we also do not know where we will be living or if I’ll have a job after that time date, planning a later honeymoon is not feasible for us. Since I’ll be done with school AND my job as of May 7, we figured we might as well use that time to do this. So, we can only go after May 7 and be back no later than June 17th. Which leads into…
  2. Cost: We have a pretty healthy honeymoon budget, but, as we can only go in May/early June, this is also the beginning of the tourist season in most locations we’re interested in. Flight costs are also jacked up as evidence of my search this past weekend (using Kayak, Travelocity, Expedia and Priceline as well as airline website). Justin is 6’6″ and I’m nearly 6′ – we thought, “Hey! We’ll fly first class! It’s our honeymoon!” Yeah — that thought process was totally rejected after searching at aforementioned sites and discovering that we can get coach seats for about $1K USD each but to go first class? Cost skyrockets to (on average) $5K USD per person. In some cases, some airlines were charging taxes that were nearly half the cost of the coach ticket (Air Canada quoted me a price of $1K USD for coach ticket AND THEN another $500 USD for “taxes/fuel surcharge” on top of the price). Calling around to airlines to get better deals using our miles and cash combo also produced similar results (and in some cases, more expensive than web offerings on said airlines website). Even buying coach seats that are upgradeable to better class is also impossible as you still need to use miles AND pay another $2-3K on top of the initial seat cost. Buying miles an option but most airlines cap the number of miles and we’re short enough on the mileage that is not feasible. Thus our goal to get 2 first class tickets for under $4K USD combined? Not happening, apparently.
  3. Location: Justin and I have wanderlust — we want to go everywhere and see everything. So one would think that we would have a list of places, ranked in importance. In a way we do, but we decided when it came to our honeymoon, we’d go somewhere were neither of us have been before. Great in theory, but in practice one of us (okay, me) is rattling off what places I REALLY HAVE TO SEE AGAIN. Scotland for the beer, food and beauty. Rome for the culture, food and Caravaggio obsession. England to get my Anglophile on. Brussels? I have friends there. Amsterdam? They know how to treat tall people! But what about Moscow or Prague or Paris or Venice? New Zealand? Australia? We can’t freaking decide!

So internets, I implore you: Where can we go for our honeymoon that we can wander around overdosing ourselves in art, museums, food and drink. and seeing wondrous things. Where our coach tickets combined cost is not the same as the GDP of a small country and that we can find a decent hotel near the heart it all or near a metro/public transport option? Stipulation: Cannot be in North/South America.

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