Don't even have a title for this one
Yeah....this is one of those posts where I just type words and see where they lead me. Basically, I'm sitting here at the computer with a predicament...I'm listening to some awesome music on youtube, but I don't actually have anything to do other than that. Facebook has gotten boring a long time ago. Nothing's happening on twitter. And God forbid I start to apply for scholarships. I have no idea where to find some that I might actually win.
Oh, and I'm completely lost as to formatting my NaNo novel. I finished editing on the hard copy, and then transfering the changes onto the saved copy, but...I'm having a helluva time with headers and footers. (Oh, when I say 'editing', I mean 'proofreading'. I decided long ago that I wrote this book for my own benefit, so I can get the characters out of my mind, and therefore I'm not expecting it to be a masterpiece of literature. It was just practice in writing style, and I'm happy with the way it came out.) I know I had the same trouble last year, but I had imagined that, since I have last year's novel to look at for reference, I wouldn't be having quite so much difficulty. But still...Microsoft Word isn't being very nice to me lately, and it's frustrating. Once I figure out these headers and footers, all I have to do is take a good picture for the front cover and find a good quote to put on the back cover. And then I can order my free proof copy! But...not until I can conquer the word processor. Hmph.
Ahhh, this music! My good friend Whovian42 just told me she's been listening to a ton of ska lately, and I have too...I think it's great music for this time in life--well, great music all the time, but now specifically--just because, with graduating and moving on and losing people that we've known and grown with for so long, it's too easy to get bogged down and weepy and shit. But ska...there's something different about it. It lets you be happy while being sad. As Suburban Legends so elequently states in "Do it for the Kids, "crackin' smiles, even when we're sad; that's just the way it goes in a ska band!"
Sometimes it seems like FIF and SM and SL are the only things keeping me up. And, you know, that's alright. Because it's feel good music. It says, "sure, everyone has some sucky times. But we can make it better."
Well, I can certainly see where this post is going. Hah.
And, listening to all this music, of course I'm doing some research as well. I can't just continue hitting the "Related Videos" button without investigating the song that I just heard! Anyway, my point is, I've come to realize that lots of these bands have really huge histories. Huge, and crazy. ("Huge histories"? Does that make sense? I can't write very well when I'm listening to lyrics at the same time. I apologize if I begin to sound like English is my second language. Or third.) I never knew that Suburban Legends used to tour with Streetlight Manifesto, and that their van was broken-into and stolen as well. And that their trombonist was killed in a hit-and-run motorcycle accident in 2005...on my birthday. And now I know how the slow version of "Bright Spring Morning" came about. Now that song has a whole different meaning to it, and I love it even more for that. Back onto the subject, though, there are some extensive timelines over on good ol' Wikipedia, with most of the bigger bands going all the way back into the nineties, which, I gather, is kind of long for a band. Is it? I think it is.
But the heartbreaking thing about all this is that so many of these bands that I've come to love have broken up, are gone, faded away, dead or dying. NO, I don't believe that ska is dead! But many of its greatest groups are. Don't get me started with Five Iron Frenzy. I just discovered them a month ago, maybe two, but they've changed my entire outlook on life. I am not exaggerating. But they're gone, now...I get the feeling that I was born too late. Not decades, no, but only a few years. If I was this age back in 2003, maybe, I could have seen Five Iron Frenzy or Suburban Legends in their primes. Not now, when there are only DVD releases and "Best Of" albums being sold. How could I have missed all this! Hell, a few years earlier, I could have seen Streetlight play music from their new album, Everything Goes Numb, before their fans became disillusioned and got used to the fact that new CDs were only made every five years or so.
Speaking of SM, I'm still waiting for my copy of 99SOR (The first part of 99 Songs of Revolution, for you dweebs not familiar with the shorthand). It came out March 16, and I ordered with seven day shipping....it is now March 28. RISC has apologized for the delay--it's not just me, but lots of people who ordered--saying that they weren't expecting such a wave of orders and weren't ready for it. Yeah, right. I find it fitting that a band known for procrastination and delays would screw up shipping as well. But I'm not impatient with it, because, as a sort of consolation gift, they're including a band sticker and a coupon to the store. Neato. A little more waiting isn't going to kill me.
WHOA. JUST LISTENED TO SUPERFLY. Blew my mind. I think I'm into the O.C. Supertones now.
Ok, ok, I was just going to do a whole sentimental segment on Five Iron Frenzy, but this entry is shamefully long already. I wasn't expecting to have to put a cut in anything today, but here I am, still typing. To summarize, everyone should give ska music a try. These musicians are people who get up on a stage and give their audience a good time, simply put. They don't dress up, don't worry about an image, dance like absolute morons and have a good time themselves. And when hearing some of this music, it's nearly impossible not to give in and skank to the beat, to just throw away all worries and smile. (Quick anecdote: I love how everybody in my group started skanking like crazy at the senior glowout. It was so amazing because I don't think many people knew exactly what they were doing. It was just a fun thing to be doing at the time.) Ahhhh, ska. I'm all pumped up now. I'll tell you one time that ska is not good for listening to. Right before bed.
Oh, and I'm completely lost as to formatting my NaNo novel. I finished editing on the hard copy, and then transfering the changes onto the saved copy, but...I'm having a helluva time with headers and footers. (Oh, when I say 'editing', I mean 'proofreading'. I decided long ago that I wrote this book for my own benefit, so I can get the characters out of my mind, and therefore I'm not expecting it to be a masterpiece of literature. It was just practice in writing style, and I'm happy with the way it came out.) I know I had the same trouble last year, but I had imagined that, since I have last year's novel to look at for reference, I wouldn't be having quite so much difficulty. But still...Microsoft Word isn't being very nice to me lately, and it's frustrating. Once I figure out these headers and footers, all I have to do is take a good picture for the front cover and find a good quote to put on the back cover. And then I can order my free proof copy! But...not until I can conquer the word processor. Hmph.
Ahhh, this music! My good friend Whovian42 just told me she's been listening to a ton of ska lately, and I have too...I think it's great music for this time in life--well, great music all the time, but now specifically--just because, with graduating and moving on and losing people that we've known and grown with for so long, it's too easy to get bogged down and weepy and shit. But ska...there's something different about it. It lets you be happy while being sad. As Suburban Legends so elequently states in "Do it for the Kids, "crackin' smiles, even when we're sad; that's just the way it goes in a ska band!"
Sometimes it seems like FIF and SM and SL are the only things keeping me up. And, you know, that's alright. Because it's feel good music. It says, "sure, everyone has some sucky times. But we can make it better."
Well, I can certainly see where this post is going. Hah.
And, listening to all this music, of course I'm doing some research as well. I can't just continue hitting the "Related Videos" button without investigating the song that I just heard! Anyway, my point is, I've come to realize that lots of these bands have really huge histories. Huge, and crazy. ("Huge histories"? Does that make sense? I can't write very well when I'm listening to lyrics at the same time. I apologize if I begin to sound like English is my second language. Or third.) I never knew that Suburban Legends used to tour with Streetlight Manifesto, and that their van was broken-into and stolen as well. And that their trombonist was killed in a hit-and-run motorcycle accident in 2005...on my birthday. And now I know how the slow version of "Bright Spring Morning" came about. Now that song has a whole different meaning to it, and I love it even more for that. Back onto the subject, though, there are some extensive timelines over on good ol' Wikipedia, with most of the bigger bands going all the way back into the nineties, which, I gather, is kind of long for a band. Is it? I think it is.
But the heartbreaking thing about all this is that so many of these bands that I've come to love have broken up, are gone, faded away, dead or dying. NO, I don't believe that ska is dead! But many of its greatest groups are. Don't get me started with Five Iron Frenzy. I just discovered them a month ago, maybe two, but they've changed my entire outlook on life. I am not exaggerating. But they're gone, now...I get the feeling that I was born too late. Not decades, no, but only a few years. If I was this age back in 2003, maybe, I could have seen Five Iron Frenzy or Suburban Legends in their primes. Not now, when there are only DVD releases and "Best Of" albums being sold. How could I have missed all this! Hell, a few years earlier, I could have seen Streetlight play music from their new album, Everything Goes Numb, before their fans became disillusioned and got used to the fact that new CDs were only made every five years or so.
Speaking of SM, I'm still waiting for my copy of 99SOR (The first part of 99 Songs of Revolution, for you dweebs not familiar with the shorthand). It came out March 16, and I ordered with seven day shipping....it is now March 28. RISC has apologized for the delay--it's not just me, but lots of people who ordered--saying that they weren't expecting such a wave of orders and weren't ready for it. Yeah, right. I find it fitting that a band known for procrastination and delays would screw up shipping as well. But I'm not impatient with it, because, as a sort of consolation gift, they're including a band sticker and a coupon to the store. Neato. A little more waiting isn't going to kill me.
WHOA. JUST LISTENED TO SUPERFLY. Blew my mind. I think I'm into the O.C. Supertones now.
Ok, ok, I was just going to do a whole sentimental segment on Five Iron Frenzy, but this entry is shamefully long already. I wasn't expecting to have to put a cut in anything today, but here I am, still typing. To summarize, everyone should give ska music a try. These musicians are people who get up on a stage and give their audience a good time, simply put. They don't dress up, don't worry about an image, dance like absolute morons and have a good time themselves. And when hearing some of this music, it's nearly impossible not to give in and skank to the beat, to just throw away all worries and smile. (Quick anecdote: I love how everybody in my group started skanking like crazy at the senior glowout. It was so amazing because I don't think many people knew exactly what they were doing. It was just a fun thing to be doing at the time.) Ahhhh, ska. I'm all pumped up now. I'll tell you one time that ska is not good for listening to. Right before bed.