Broken Bluesy Whisper Sing to Me Tonight

Dear Ryan Adams,

These are my top ten favorites of your songs:
1. To Be Young
2. Firecracker
3. Trains
4. So Alive
5. Come Pick Me Up
6. Hotel Chelsea Nights
7. Oh My Sweet Carolina
8. Goodnight, Hollywood Boulevard
9. Rip Off
10. Wonderwall

I guess I should be happy you played five of those songs, but you didn't play any of the top four. More harmonica songs tomorrow, please!

I did, however, really dig "Sarcophagus."

Ryan, see ya tomorrow,
Laura

Oh, also, P.S. You have a spectacular t-shirt collection that are not only awesome in their subject matter but also in how well they fit you. Good job.

I really can't stand how frequently people clap during the State of the Union Address.

Anger (is the name of a graffiti writer).

Dear Roommate,

Spraying Glade Garden whatever all over the kitchen counters and my cutting board isn't actually a good idea. Not only is my food now going to taste disgusting, I am sure that stuff is carcinogenic if ingested. And while we're at it, food is supposed to be aromatic. In fact, it smells good. It makes the apartment feel warm and homey during these rains and not the weird stucco box that it is. Especially the delightful smell of heated tasty Asian sesame oil (an oil that is way too expensive, by the way)! And now not only is there no delicious smell, there isn't even no smell. There is, instead, nasty Country Gardens.

Boo,
Laura

P.S. I like my roommate. Just not this.

Wet Ground

Dear landlady,

What's the point of having a pager when you don't call anyone back very immediately at all? My apartment is leaking and I am for sure going to wake up from being electrocuted, since the water* is leaking into an outlet next to my bed and you aren't doing anything about it (Plus, now I am sitting in the dark 'cause I don't want to plug my lamp into a wet outlet). I mean, I put towels there, but if it rains again in the middle of the night that ain't gonna be enough.

Get your act together,
Laura

*Greg Ruben would be happy if it was freezing cold, 'cause then he could fulfill his dream of having an ice skating party in my apartment.

Lobby Bears

Dear Celestial Seasonings,

Your "Sleepytime Tea" is awesome, so is the sleepytime tea bear (pictured above in humongous stuffed animal form, as shown at the Celestial Seasonings factory in Colorado near Boulder). Your "Morning Thunder" is also pretty spectac for the opposite effect.

Kudos,
Laura

boomtown rats.

If you've forgotten, I got bitten by a rat this past October whilst at work. It was a sort of traumatic experience, but I got over it in about two days. Also whilst at work in December, there was another appearance of rats. This time in the form of costumes for the Nutcracker ballet. My boss thought that made this (and other pictures, some of which he took, which you can see at my flickr) oh so extra hilarious.

Pescatarians, be enthused.

Dear Denver Art Museum,

Thank you for giving me one of the best meals of my life. The mix of textures of the roasted sprouts and the crispy potato sandwiching the tender scallops--oh man! And then the sauce, yowza! A combination of capers and golden raisins, over cauliflower. Amazing.

You're awesome,
Laura


*This is an example of what I previously promised--"finally getting to my trip to Colorado."

Yippie Ay Yay

I do not usually like to simply be an internet curator. And while I think too many of my posts lately have been just sharing links, this one is too amazing to pass up. At this expertly compiled collection, you can get probably about a hundred different and awesome versions of the classic song, "Ghost Riders in the Sky." I especially recommend the Czech pop version and heartily urge you to ignore Debbie Harry's frightening robotic synth-y version.

William Holden, Birds, and Geico.

I just watched a movie from 1950, Union Station, with star William Holden (of The Bridge on the River Kwai fame and one of my favorites, Stalag 17, not to mention Sunset Boulevard), and the great Barry Fitzgerald (who played Det. Lt. Dan Muldoon in another one of my favorites, the Oscar-wining The Naked City). Which makes it odd that Netflix doesn't have it. Shame on then! Anyways, the movie is filmed almost entirely in Los Angeles' Union Station and it is super swell looking at all the things that are exactly the same today, which surprisingly is a lot.

Read this.

Also read this from Pigeon John (a past Auto Stapler guest and fantastic hip hop-er, please ignore his horrendous confusion of there and their):

I've been reading again. Reading Fitzgerald's "Six Tales Of The Jazz Age" and pretty much being floored by every other sentence. He died at 44. He lived in Paris with Zelda, his wife. He was an Army man. He had a great head of hair and was born in the Mid-West. I trust dudes like him. Dylan's from the Mid-West. Prince as well. Farmer boys and blue collar hearts. I don't trust or listen to the Coasts, East or West. They are very emotional and change there opinions like coats. They are fashion forward pigs, who would eat there young if it it paid right. Trust me. I live in L.A. and am surrounded by the new hippies (scensters). And.....I change my opinions like a motherfreaker.

"Bask in the Wonder of It All"

When one's textbook is written by the professor, it inevitably seems as if the only reason one is reading it is because the professor wants to increase sales. What a lovely surprise today, then, that one of my professors who is requiring we read his book exclaimed, "I always wanted to take the royalties I make from this class and throw a party. Maybe this quarter we'll have some wine and cheese." It was super cute.

He said he's from New York, but he has some peculiar accent. He teaches at the London School of Economics in the fall so perhaps he could've picked up some of the English intonations, but it's not really English either. I don't know. The accent just adds to his general swellness.

Oh, also, he talked about how he was interviewed by VH1 as an expert in why Orange County has a lot of punks. Ha!

Now look at some fun pictures I found of him on the department website! I love how they have him throughout many decades; apparently he sings, too. In addition to just being an all around superb 67-year old bear-like professor. All of this is based on the impressions created during one class, however, so of course opinions could change drastically.

On a side note, I have been watching a lot of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations and he drinks a lot of Soju, which is a word that is quite similar to this professor's name, Soja. The title of this post is a lovely sentence Soja said this afternoon.

In the post office, it is always interesting.*

Dear Frank Gehry,

While I own a watch designed by you that I quite adore, Walt Disney Concert Hall is truly inferior. First, I don't care if you are oh so innovative designing things by bending paper. Yes, I have watched the boring documentary Sketches of Frank Gehry (that movie calls for its own letter--"Dear Sydney Pollack, I expected much more from you). Second, in no way is WDCH 'unique,' considering the Bilbao Guggenheim and a bunch of your other buildings look exactly the same.

Third, I don't know if you made these decisions but since you seem to be quite the controlling man I am sure you had a large role and I must say I am quite disappointed. At a place such as this, of such preeminent stature and lofty prices, I expect leg room. And I am not talking about tons of space but even just enough to perhaps unlock my knees at some point in the evening would be nice. Plus, the arm rests are supremely uncomfortable, definitely not ergonomic, most surely unhealthy. Fourth, in the upper terrace, in which I have sat twice (although not today), this closeness of the rows combined with the overall steep grade of the seats leads to some pretty harrowing trips to one's seat. One could easily fall to his death from such a high and unprotected perch with such little space to maneuver (I really want to spell this maneuvre, as in the band Orchestral Maneuvres in the Dark aka OMD which had that one spectacular song, "If You Leave). And it's not like these horrible seats are even cheap!

Fifth, the organ looks lame; I am not even going to give reasons for that.

I do, however, love the ceiling. The ceiling is awesome; kudos on that.

Sorry, man, but you just needed to hear this.
Laura

*According to some recording via the EGPD.

Now since I am not a dedicated tagger at Flickr, and since I didn't want to spend a gazillion hours going through over a thousand pictures to find a very relevant one, the following picture of Sondre is relevant in that 1) Sondre performed at the WDCH tonight which is what put me in the situation which prompted this post and 2) Rami Raff, who is newly linked to the right, commented to me about how much I love Sondre, so I might as well reinforce that image of myself, because it is true. This picture is from Sondre's recent show at the Troubadour (although as it was in November, it wasn't that recent).

Ice cream man, on my street

Last year I was in the elevator (I believe with Susan Harris, in fact) and there was this kid (kid being college student of comparable age to me), but he looked more like he was thirty years old. I had seen him several times before in the elevator and whatever. He always wore solid colors--lots of army green, navy, black, white, beiges; even his shoes would fit in these parameters. But the particular time being discussed here was different. He was licking an ice cream cone from the dining halls like he was four years old--an activity not uncommon for the elevator of a college residence hall, but this coupled with the fact that he looked about thirty five was just too much. The juxtaposition was hilarious. He was just resting, leaning back in a corner of the (overly massive) elevator with his ice cream mindin' his business.

Ok, so then I guess he lives in my apartment building this year although I hadn't seen him once last quarter because I have seen him three times in two days! Still in the same color scheme, of course. My building has this 'study lounge' sort of thing which I never really go to, but today I decided to do some reading there because its couch is (unfortunately) more comfortable than mine. And this kid is there, on his laptop with headphones, laughing for about a half hour. But his laugh can't really be described as a normal human laugh; it's more of whispered cackle, if that makes any sense at all. Like a hyena who lost his voice. WEIRD.

* The title of this post comes from a song aptly entitled "Ice Cream Man" by Jonathan Richman that is super fantastic and highly recommended.

I paid my Verizon bill today.

Oy! I hate paying bills. In other 'communications' news:

On Saturday, I received an Instant Yiddish book from my grandmother which may or may not just sit on a shelf. My grandmother is pretty spectacular and an amazing cook, but she's not amazing at everything. Let's just say my grandmother doesn't have the firmest grasp on the English language. Which is totally fine by me, as it leads to fantastic sentences such as the following:

"He called the internet and they told him."

Excuse me, KCRW

Why were you playing Black Box's "Everybody Everybody" today (at approximately 7pm) ? Yes, that "Everybody Everybody."

On a side note, I am watching Soul Train and it is awesome, as expected. Thank you Don Cornelius.

Mr. White

greg:

: looking at my tom labonge wall calendar
: you heard me
: my counclman sent me a wall calendar
: what did yours send you
: besides more traffic and generally being a total tool for the mayor