I kept the name for nearly a decade, regardless of which domain it was hosted on, but in 2006 (in several more entries to come, you ‘ll see how 2006 proved to be a pretty pivotal year), I registered a new domain with a different idea: shesgotplans.net. I wanted to go beyond just writing chronicles of my life/snarky commentary, I wanted to have an all-in-one place place to showcase everything I was/will be into: Books, movies, music, food, opinion, pop culture, photography, librarianship and archives (and everything in between). I had gone from having my own domain for keeping my online journal, to LiveJournal and was feeling the pull of having my own site again where I could do the above. The name of the domain was culled from an episode of “Grey’s Anatomy,”3 when Meridith exclaims about Finn, her mens of the moment, “And Finn! He’s got plans!” I wanted shesgotplans.net to not only be entertaining, but also to keep track of anything new or fun or interesting that I was obsessing about at the moment. Food? I would want millions of pictures of food and recipes. Photography? Here’s what I learned and why I liked these tips. Writing? Here is a new short story/poem/ I wrote and you can have it for free. Music? Here is the latest CD I’ve been digging and why you should dig it or why it fucking sucks.
That was the general idea. My writing, when I started in 1998, went from dozens of posts of month to one or two (if that) and then to nothing for months at a time by 2006-07. I started and stopped writing. A lot. When I started my MLIS in the fall of 2008, I saw it as a perfect way to reboot my writing while I worked on this degree. I wrote a lot of posts about librarianship, archives and anything remotely related. And while in the last several months, since graduation, I’ve been writing more personal then professional, the number one reason why people come here is for the “So, You Want To Be A Librarian/Archivist?” series.
That depresses the fuck out of me as I feel I’m much more than a snappy piece about going to library school, at least I used to be. No one reads me anymore because I’m provocative or interesting and that bothers the hell out of me. I feel I have grown way too conservative and soft in my old age. Gone were the days of owning domains like pronstar.org and bitchasshoes.org4, writing about sex, drugs and rock and roll. I’ve become so hypervigilant about what I was posting on what network5, with what content that saying the word “fuck” made me cringe. Me. Cringe at saying the word fuck!? What in Nigel’s name has happened to me? Don’t answer that. With all that is being said, I don’t want this to become some boring ass librarian page of dick tugging and circle jerking.6 But that is what is happening. The top keywords that drive traffic here is “So, you want to be a librarian?” and “Jobs that require MLIS.” I’ve taken back ownership of “The Lisa Chronicles” for the journal title, content will be be more what I envisioned and lots more updates are planned.
It feels good to be back.
1. I blame the memory loss to conscious forgetting and loads of alcohol. I married my husband because he remembers more of my 20s than I do.
2. Digital archivists will bicker on this point, but for the sake of the piece, it makes sense. 3. Don’t judge. This is where she goes back to McDreamy. Again.
4. .Exhbit A: pronstar.org and Exhibit B: bitchasshoe.org.
5. Numerous (okay, 2) people have emailed/FB’d/etc me to warn me to watch I say on Twitter/blog as possibly be detrimental to me obtaining a job. I understand and get that, I’m not incredibly stupid.
6. There is enough of clique in the library world that it drives me INSANE that this behavior is so easily accepted and even, in some cases, applauded.
Category: The Lisa Chronicles
Summer/Time
I’m currently ensconced in the wilds of Illinois, where Wednesday I’ll be heading off to my second interview with a local library system. I’m alternating between being nervous and depressed about this interview, not because I don’t want the job – I do, but rather because job hunting is exhausting and at times, incredibly depressing. But I think the depression is not so much about the looking for the job but rather how much my life will change once said job is obtained. It is not so much about what I’ll be doing as it will be where I’ll be doing it and how much coin will be slipped across my hand for my performance. Justin and I ran the figures on what I needed to stay solvent, independently, to fend off the U.S. student loan sharks1 and save a buck or two for retirement. 2 And then there is the probability if we want to have kids, buy a second home, or even a new car. It feels like everything I want takes money and I will never catch up.3
And if I’m not stressing about money, I stress a lot about time. I never seem to have it and when I do, I never seem to manage it properly. Which is odd since I managed it quite well juggling everything I did while in school. All the silly projects I had set up for the summer, I have not even touched. It feels when I have two seconds to myself, I’m prepping/heading off to go somewhere else or do something else. I always wonder how people can accomplish so much when they have the exact amount of time that I do. Time is not flexible
This is the first summer since I was a bonafied kid that I’ve had “off” – no work or school to contend with. But my time has been packed and while I can easily account for it all – job applications, job interviews, volunteer work, trips to professional conferences and such, it still doesn’t feel like I’ve accomplished anything this summer. Well, I haven’t accomplished I had set out to do: learning new programming languages, research projects, writing projects, knitting projects. Job applications are a two day process and when I have an interview or two a week lined up, even by phone, those interviews require prep work, which means more time set aside when I could have it allotted for something else. I’m not resentful I have to do these things, I’m more resentful that I’ve let so much spare time slip through my fingers.
This will also be the first fall in nearly a decade in which I will not be heading off to some institution of higher learning. Books will not be bought, notebooks will not be scribbled in and notes will not be taken. I will not be graded on my achievements, not in the usual way of a letter grade, but there is something sad about not having grades made instantly available at the end of the term. Now all is the piling of rejection notices and “We’ve not quite made a decision yet” emails. Summer, when I was a kid and had no real responsibilities to contend with, meant cookouts, overnight pajama parties with friends, long bike rides to hidden areas where I would pack a lunch and read for the day. Trips to the exotic lands of Canada or to a cabin up in the Thumb area4 with family. There were many, many days of going to the beach and getting brown like a raisin.
The seasons always have a certain smell to them, each one is completely distinctive from the others. Summer always smelled of fresh cut grass, meat roasting on the grill, and the smell of coconut from the tanning lotions. My skin and hair always smelled of the lake we lived by, and while I did not go swimming every day during the summer, I did so enough that the smell lingered for weeks. I always felt that my best moments, my adventures and my memories, are all romanticized from those days. Even in the summers when I was working or in class, there was still a sense of excitment about them even if they were not close duplicates to my childhood. Then it was more about the sense of getting time off to do some of these things, the freedom and de-stressing form work/school whereas this summer, it’s about the additional stress and in some cases, the derailing of freedom. We’ve made many plans this summer, only to have them curtailed by sudden changes in my schedule, whether that meant I was leaving for job interviews or by Justin’s schedule, with him being on call or there was a strike or two happening within his company.
We’ve tightened our belts, financially, since I have no income coming in. We’re not struggling, no, we’re fine but mini-breaks, cabin overnights or day long picnics all must be accounted for somehow. We’ve been trying to set something up before I get whisked away by a library system and I’m working fulltime, but until the strikes end, when we can call our time our own again, those plans will not be happening. Last summer we planned on driving up around the eastern coast of Michigan, going up as far north as Mackinac before heading diagonally home on I-75. We wanted to sleep in cabins, splash around in the beach, and go walking in the woods. Hunt through sleepy little towns, lounge about in hammocks, reading all day and eat fruit so fresh, our faces are bathed in their juices. We never went because we could never sort out my work/school schedule for the summer and then fall came, and everything went to hell.
In the wilds of Illinois, I would give anything right now for that weekend to happen. Just one more last summer hurrah before adulthood, and reality, sets in.
1. My car will finally be paid off soon, so student loan debt will be all that I have. Before you get all jealous, that debt is nearly $100K.
2. Solvent in that I should be supporting myself, in case Justin leaves me for an (even) older woman or young hussy, or dies by Pug strangulation or something. Since I’m seven years older than him, I should have money in the bank for retirement and since I do not, I have to be aggressive with the savings.
3.. You know, The Jones
4. Michigan is shaped like a mitten, so the “Thumb” is the thumb shaped area that is directly north of Detroit.
To: Read: One Day
You’re going to read this book and know at least one thing: That the end won’t end happily or tied up in a big pink bow and that tissues will be needed. This is David Nicholls we are talking about here, where his endings are never simple nor do they tie together at the end to make the reader happy. No, the book is about the author and the challenge to the reader to believe – whether or not a story of a friendship between man/woman over 20 years can make it without sounding like a rip off of “When Harry Met Sally” or some other derivative, trite plot line. The story is gorgeous and IT IS believable. You can feel Emma’s frustration in her letter writing, the pooling of the grease on her nose and Dexter’s legendary trim backside and feel the heat of his hand on your ass. Nicholls knows how to capture that fine line of realism without being overtly descriptive and to not use the description as mere filler for the novel. The plot, the snapshot one day every year into the lives of these two people, is also incredibly clever. Watching Dex and Em (Em and Dex, together forever), grow up, fall in love and struggle with that idea of love over the course of 20 years is painful, hilarious and heartbreaking all at the same time.
Nicholls has a way with prose that you cannot put the damned book done – it’s like they injected heroine or crack into the binding of the book. I was so desperate to finish the book that I stayed in a black car in 95F heat while my aged mother was shopping because being 2 hours away from the book was painful. The night before, I was up to 4am because I couldn’t imagine falling asleep while there was more Dex + Em to get through. I finished the book in less than two days, reading at diners, coffee shops, parking lots, and until my eyes were bleeding from lack of sleep.
The reviewers who said this was chick-lit are wrong, it’s not even lad-lit. There is no happy ending and no moral or tale or lesson to take from it. The guy does not, for the sake of argument, get the girl. It’s, simply the snapshot of the lives of two very ordinary people and their extraordinary relationship. And it is also one of the better written books in the last few years. THIS, that feeling of having to finish the book before anything else was to take place is the feeling that all writers should aspire their readers to want to feel whilst reading their book. Writing in the last few decades has become almost unbearable dreck with a few jewels thrown in – particular in American writing. If you’re not writing some fake existentialistic-esque material with a vaguely catchy title, then you won’t be read. And that’s a shame because Nicholls, being a Brit, will be mostly ignored by the American audience who will attempt to liken him to Nick Hornby which is like comparing Jane Austen to a Bronte: There are similarities, yes, but they are vastly different. And if you don’t love it, then you are simply Un-American.
Biblyotheke: A Meme. (Look into a thought process.)
Does not include the TBR piles from the library or on our bedside tables…”
This is how it works:
My wonderful friend Alice and I were bemoaning to each other a few months back that we were behind on a number of projects, blogging on our websites and in short, world domination. We decided to support each other since we were in the same boat on a numerous things and so she wrote up this post to kind of nag us to well, stop bemoaning! One of my things is/was to clear out Google Reader and keep the more quality stuff while in turn, Alice would update her blog more on her antics with her crafts, charming daughter ‘Melia and whatever floats her boat that day. Total win-win situation.
This morning I’m poking Google Reader with a big stick and see that Alice has indeed been writing and not only that, but name checking me in the process. Except that because my gReader account is getting beyond scary, I haven’t been checking it as much as of late because well, it’s getting beyond scary even when marking many of the accounts “Mark as Read – Anything Over 7 Days.”1 Plus, I’ve also been talking to Alice nearly everyday so if she was name checking me, surely she would have told me, yes?
Well, no. 🙂 But the post, a meme, which looks kind of short and fun to do, instead of spending the 15 or 30 minutes of whatever writing, editing and posting the damn thing, I, being me, turn this into a big production!
In order to get the post out, I have to:
- Take pictures of our TBR books!
- Compare from photos taken a year ago.
- Notice that many of the books haven’t really moved position in that time.
- Wonder
- Upload the photos to Flickr and to the blog!
- Oh, wait – there is a work around for posting to Flickr and Twitter at the same time? I must debug that! 2
The meme (unanswered):
1. What was the last book you read?
2. Recommend a book.
3. Recommend a children’s book.
4. My guilty pleasure is:
5. This one was rubbish:
6. If you wrote a book, what would it be? (Adapt as desired if you are writing or have written a book.)
1. This is a definite note to self that I must clear out my gReader of stuff that is less than mildly interesting, educational or amusing.
2. Originally, any camera photos were being uploaded to Twitpic. The problem I have with this is that I wanted a central location for my photos and while Flickr has a great iPhone app, said app does not have capability to upload photos to your Flickr account and then repost, from the app, to your Twitter account. Poking around, however, discovered that Flickr allows you to email photos to Flickr+Twitter simultaneously, so I can ditch the Flickr app, dump the Twitpic account and just post photos to Flickr as $deity intended.
To: Read: Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargave Manor #everythingausten
One of my, um, “hobbies” is that I’ll occasionally google authors/books/characters/worlds whatever and see if there is fan fiction for a particular pairing, no matter how bizarre or unlikely that pairing may be. Then I get obsessed for hours reading the wretched details of say Lizzy Bennett (from Pride and Prejudice) is having sex with Captain Jack Harkness from (Doctor Who/Torchwood), moments after she’s already, supposedly, banged Darcy.1 Paraliterature, which is to say materials derived from their original works but reworked/reedited/completed with additional new elements, is a twin sister to fan fiction, but in a much more structured and in some cases, academic way. Where as one can write about Draco Malfoy having sex with Hermione’s nose2 and publish it on their blog or fan fiction website, paraliterature usually requires vetting in the form of research, editors and physical publication. Another way to look at it is that paraliterature is usually in a physical book format, typically novel length while fan fiction tends to languish on the internets. And another confusing aspect of this? Paraliterature is fan fiction, but not all fan fiction is paraliterature. Right now, this is how I understand it and my definition is pretty fluid. For the rest of this piece, I’ll use “paraliterature” in the context of the above definition.
With all that being said, I love Jane Austen paraliterature. I love the idea of her stories being continued, of her unfinished books being completed and of the reinterpretations of her novels. Jane Austen paraliterature has been around for nearly 100 years, according to The Republic of Pemberley, with the publication of Old Friends, New Fancies in 1913, but it’s been in the last 30 or so years that it has really skyrocketed to a whole new level. 3 I knew, then, that finding materials to read for the “Everything Austen” challenge would not be terribly difficult. I discovered Stephanie Barron and her “Jane Austen Mystery” series when I was working at $corporate_bookstore a few years ago. The books were never HUGELY popular4, but they did occasionally sell and the concept, I thought, was clever: Friends of Barron “discover” via happenstance letters/materials, secreted away in the family’s cellar in the Colonies (America), apparently having been written by Austen herself. And lo’ and behold! Austen is a sleuth! The family demurs to Barron, gentle reader, as the editor and keeper of the volumes instead of donating the material to Oxbridge or anyone of note. Each JA Mystery, then, is a portion of Austen’s “diaries” that Barron has “edited” and published for public consumption. Like I said, clever idea. While the series has spawned 10 books, with the 10th one (Jane and the Madness of Lord Byron) coming out in September, I realise the first few books would be a little rough and that it would take a few books for Barron to get her writing chops in order. But there are some picayune points that kind of drove me nuts that I wanted to address:
- Barron claims that she wrote Scargave Manor before any of the J.A. books were made into films – for someone who has an incredibly impressive resume and worked as a CIA intelligence analyst, apparently she forwent her research skills – JA material has been on the silver screen since 1938. There has not been a decade since when something of Austen’s was not made in some capacity, so while yes, Barron’s publication of her first book was timed well with the release of BBC adaption of Pride and Prejudice, she was not the first person to write paraliterature nor did she start the fires for Austenmania.
- Verbal anachronisms: Barron has the fictional Austen saying “fiddlesticks” a lot, which is more reminiscent of Scarlett O’Hara than of Austen (or of any Austen characters). Fiddlesticks, as an exclamation (according to the OED), made an appearance once in 1600 and was not seen again until the 1840s, decades after Austen dies. In addition to “fiddlesticks,” Austen is doing a lot of “espying,” which also according to the OED, has been long obsolete before Austen’s time, this is not something she would have said. There were also a few others, but these stuck out in particular.
- Repetitiveness of phases: In the book, Austen (or a minor character) cannot possibly have X issue because it cannot “be born.” Fictional Austen is also running around doing a lot of “espying” (see above) on people (typically as “espied,” so always in the past tense).
- The servant’s speech, regardless of where the servant is from, is ALWAYS Cockney. I hope Barron learns later that not all servants come from East London.
- Barron uses a variation “It’s a truth universally acknowledged” in some format, which drives me NUTS in paraliterature, particularly in materials that are spin-offs rather than rewrites or completions.
- The killer is announced in the first paragraph, in the last chapter which to me signals a classic rookie mistake. You never announce who the killer is in the last few paragraphs because you’re essentially telling the reader: “Hey, don’t read my stuff! Don’t use a few braincells to figure out WHODUNIT! Let me feed you the answer and save you the trouble!”
- Unnecessary minor characters with similar names. This is nothing but filler, right thar.
Barron suffers, at least with this book, from the delusion that more flowery the language is, the closer it must be to Austen’s time. I also hope in future tales she calms down a bit on this aspect of the story. Many (not just Barron), it seems, think that JA’s time is distant enough that Modern English was still in its infancy when in actuality, they are confusing Modern English with Contemporary English5. ME has been around since the time of Shakespeare (Elizabethan – Late 1400s) but CE has only been around since the Industrial Revolution (1850s)6. The distinction is not so much how English is used but growth of vocabulary, verbal usage, and structure. The older English gets, it seems, the more erudite it becomes.
Okay, I’ll stop pontificating. Overall: a decent read. Not fantastic, but not awful either. The story flowed, mostly, and despite my above criticisms, I did not feel bored or impatient with the book. I did, however, felt that the overlap between drawing JA out as a fictional character and Barron’s attempt to emulate Austen prose kept swapping the driver’s seat. I wasn’t quite sure what voice Barron was attempting to write in and that did get confusing. The plot seemed to dip in and out of consciousness, some of the characters seemed weakly drawn while others were extremely vibrant. Barron DOES have tremendous skill at writing and what parts she was lacking in with creativity she more than made up for in talent. Would recommend with a caveat that it is the first book in a series and might be a little rough. Am extremely hopeful that book two will be much more fleshed out.
1. Yes, this pairing does exist. If you google it, it will come.
2. This also exists. See, what I do for my readers?
3. For a wonderful list of JA paraliterature, The Republic of Pemberley has wonderful list, sorted by book as well as searchable, complete with reviews.
4. Clearly Jane Austen is not as fetching as a sleuth as Stephanie Plum or as a Cat.
5. Technically, CE is not an “official” term since the CE period referred to is known academically as Late Modern English, but most people’s eyes glaze over so I just define it as Modern English and Contemporary English.
6. For the sake of argument, I’m referring to what is known as the second industrial revolution but is more commonly known as THE industrial revolution.
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
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:
- Jane Bites Back by Michael Thomas. [Finished much more quickly than anticipated, so not a legit entry.] – Finished 6/18/2010
- Pride and Prejduice: The Graphic Novel by Jane Austen [Marvel produced, this came out shortly before Xmas 2009. I’m super excited about reading this.]
- Rude Awakenings of a Jane Austen Addict by Laurie Viera Rigler. [Read the first one, Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict, and thought it well written (For once. Most writers of JA paraliterature are too busy on sex0ring Mr. Darcy over actually writing a decent sentence) and funny.] – Finished 08/08/10
- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls by Steve Hockensmith. [Read the first few pages and it’s MUCH, MUCH better than that other one.]
- Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen. [It is the ONE complete novel I have not finished. I\’ve started it a dozen times but always get distracted and the book gets tossed aside.]
- Lady Susan/The Watsons/Sandition by Jane Austen. [I’m marking this as one entry instead of three since these are usually bundled together. My copy was destroyed in the Great Basement Flood of ’08, so this is an excuse to get another copy and finally READ them.]\r\n
- Lady Vernon and Her Daughter by Jane Rubino and Caitlen Rubino-Bradway. [A “completion” novel of Lady Susan.]
- Lost in Austen: Create Your Own Jane Austen Adventure by Emma Campbell Webster. [Have had this one sitting in the TBR pile for ages, so finally figure out what/whom I would end up with/as.]
- Jane Austen Mysteries
- Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor: Being the First Jane Austen Mystery – Finished 07/14/2010
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.
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.
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.