Drama

AWESOME. I love R. Kelly news - I cannot wait for the new installments of Trapped in the Closet.

Religion 101

How Anglican priest is this guy? And by this guy, clearly I mean the Archbishop of Canterbury. Something I sort of thought ended with Thomas Becket. But apparently not. You learn new things every day.

He looks like my grandpa sort of. I love his eyebrows.

UPDATE:

Sorry! Take it back. He does not look like my grandpa. Now he just looks like a wise, somewhat quirky English gentleman - the kind who, if he were your grandpa, might play tricks on you in order to help you learn a valuable life less.

I like.

"Making a fool of yourself for love is ultimately about you, how much you have to give and the distances you will travel to keep your heart wide open when everything around you makes you feel like slamming it shut and soldering it closed."

Glimmers of my past, and really, my present, just in a different form. I'll check back in 10 years and see how I feel about it.

From an old NYTimes column

Why do I find this so sad?

Poor kitty. It's such a nice looking cat too.

Ring around the rosy

I just cleaned out my jewelry drawer. Of course there is a lot of talk about American acquisition of THINGS. The hip way of thinking about our society's downfall is that we are going to eventually going to be destroyed not by nuclear war or bad politics or ozone depletion or overdependence on foreign oil or... but rather by our own compulsions, obsessions, passions, and so on. When I clean out my drawers, I start to believe in that. (Honestly, I believe in that other times as well. However.)

Case in point: Did you know that I own no less than 17 rings? These are clearly not diamond rings or anything, but rather a bunch of random silver rings, collected over time and never worn. I have a few which I actually like, but since I hate my hands/fingers (they taper funny) I can't really wear them too often and so when I take them off once I forget they existed. During my hippie-pagan days in high school I collected a ton of rings with Celtic patterns and designs and I love those, too - I used to wear them all at once as though I drew witchy power from them. However none of them fit quite right, so they aggravate the funny tapering powers of my fingers more than they empower my fashion. My aunt handed a few rings down, some of which are pretty ridiculous numbers including one which actually is diamond - it has little diamond chips and two elephants and I would wear it every day except it's abnormally small. I have a class ring from high school, which I feel ashamed of. And the only ring I've worn at all in the past year (except the elephant one wishfully around my room) is a replica of a ring found on the original site of the Globe Theater, which my dad bought me when we were in London.

Ow. I just got the elephant ring stuck on my finger.

No, seriously.

Ok, it's off. I shouldn't play while blogging.

The funny part about all of this is that all this collecting is done for the sake of preservation. I save these things so I can use them later when all of a sudden I am wearing Celtic rings again, or when my kids will want them for costumes or for when they need to wear Celtic rings or when class rings become retro again (although I think they have actually always been retro). I hope I give birth to small children who can wear the elephant ring without fear of losing all blood in the tips of their fingers. And ironically my preservation instinct is the same thing that leads me to pile up so much useless, outdated, nostalgic crap that is one day going to suffocate me, tarnished silver and all.

Humans are weird.

ffjksdlfdjks

I am so tired of this. First of all, the book was terrible. Secondly, when authors "appropriate architecture" from a "historical speculation" book (which is some sort of hypothetical nonfiction), it's called research.

Last week pinkisthenewblog posted a link to a Dan Brown copyright trial article with the title, "Don't any authors tell the truth anymore?"

To which I responded, to myself... did they tell the truth before? That's why it's called fiction, people.

Also, the whole copyright trial hinges on the fact that both books explore the idea that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and had a kid. Didn't anyone see Dogma? Hello? I seem to remember Alan Rickman (sexy-voiced Metatron) putting forth the same theory and no one hung up that film's release.

Maybe this is a vast conspiracy on the part of the suing party to get Da Vinci Code pulled from bookstores. In which case, I should shut up and let them sue away.

Uh....

You have to be kidding me.

Mundane Observation on Fashion

I realize about 2 people find this interesting, but apparently owls are the new hip fashion accessory. That and elephants. In my bored browing at work I have found 432890489 (maybe a few less) earrings, necklaces, belts, etc. with elephants and owls on them. Not surprisingly I want them all.

Examples:
Tiny owls at Anthropologie
"Tricoastal Design" (wtf) owls
Tricoastal Design ellies (In my head I just called them "ellies" - I must be reading too much cuteoverload.com)
Necklace
Elephant belt at Anthropologie not surprisingly overpriced even though it's on sale.
Uncute necklace at Urban Outfitters - also not a surprise

Which of these should I buy?

Moving on to more despicable things, apparently Uggs have gone logo... because clearly all the 12 year olds carrying Dooney & Bourke bags (actually I think that sadly, 12 year olds have moved on to LV and Coach) don't have enough brands all over their bodies...

Just thought you should know. I promise real entries are forthcoming.

Lost and Found

I was going through my piles of miscellaneous papers from senior year of high school up until now (I periodically feel compelled to organize my records of my past as though that would help me figure out the future) and I found some entertaining stuff. One particularly enigmatic note had to have been from the past year and a half, since it is written on note paper that was a gift to me when I started my CA job in September 2004. I find it quite intriguing since they sort of seem meaningful and possibly even class-related, but I have no idea what they belong to. Oooh, lost records of the past...

-if novels instruct how to live, what does this mean?
-tweed coat - being what you want to be? college
-what they mean to us?
-screaming a word inside head
-literature takes you out of your head - writing
-language - don't let it be accidental
-lit can do that too (for Cal)
-what books have changed your life?
-density
-unhappy vs. happy - textured
-living a life - being aware you're living
-"you live twice" -RR
-indian cannot impersonate an indian
-peer pressure - friends know a certain kind of way - going into self (living twice)
-"this would make a really good scene"
-"redemptive"
-everybody has a part of themselves that is invisible
-version of RR that works for this essay - multiple selves
-would this be a good scene
voyeur
spectator

The last two words are circled, as though I came to some deep conclusion in the end. It must be notes for an essay or about an essay - especially with the "RR" credits, "Redemptive" in quotes, and the random phrase "indian cannot impersonate an indian." However, I never took notes on this paper (it's shaped like an "E" and you have to write around the legs of the "E" so it's basically impossible to write more than 8 words to a page) and as a result I am baffled. Any ideas? If so, please comment.

In fact, comment anyway.

Restart

I've said it before, but I have decided to turn this into a real-ish blog. I live my life on autopilot these days and often I find myself following the easier path just because it's, well, easier. But I think it's good to step out of the rut and take a look at what I'm doing and why. Therefore, this is a blog about my take on living. Seriously. It sounds overly comprehensive and pretentious, but all I mean is that this is a blog written by someone who acutely observes everyday life and asks questions about it and engages with it. Stay tuned.

That's me!!

An article about Trader Joe's stores in the NyTimes in which the founder says that they started the store "to appeal to people who are well-e­du­cated, well-traveled and un­der­paid."

i've decided that i'm going to make lists of my friends and what i admire most about each one of them. i feel like that will build a sort of comprehensive listing of what makes good character. when i applied to princeton back in the day, one of the essays was on what was good character. i think i wrote about atticus finch. that's cool, yes, but i think that building a definition of good character from real people could be more enlightening. as cher (or is it dion?) says in clueless, ooh, project!!