It's going around
This weekend was a pretty good one, other than the fact that it's now the middle of June and it's still averaging around 60 degrees and cloudy/raining every day.
Shabbos was pretty standard. We had dinner by ourselves (I made a weird soup: no-chicken broth with charred onion, diced tomato and zucchini, shredded carrots, shredded ginger, star anise, a cinnamon stick, allspice, turkey meatballs, rice noodles, cilantro and scallion, and sambal oelek, our go-to soup spicer-upper.) before walking over to visit our friends, where the last game of the Stanley Cup finals was ignored by me and passivelty watched by the Mister. Then I fell asleep on their couch for 15 minutes. After I woke up we walked home. The next day we went to shul, came home, had lunch (Thai chicken salad with peanut lime sauce, spicy wontons, brown rice with more scallions and diced green pepper), and then went to an interesting lecture on woman, Judaism, and ritual. After the lecture we played a game of Rummikub with the in-laws before setting out to chit the chat with some friends down the hill from us.
Yesterday we were in the city to represent Stamford at the Orthodox Union's emerging communities fair. It was an interesting time. I saw several people there that I hadn't seen since at least 1999. (It's fun reintroducing yourself to people that you haven't seen in that long, even if you have been keeping up with each other on Facebook.) There were other people there that we knew through friends or that we just met, but also happened to be friends of friends, like the guy from Houston who lives literally right next door to our friend Rhoda. He invited us over for BBQ whenever we're in town.
After our shift was finished we went uptown, got some sushi, walked around the street fair set up in the north-bound lanes of Broadway, get wonderful gelato at Grom (I got pistacchio and Turinese chocolate with hazelnuts), met up with the Mister's sister's family, hung out a little while longer, and went home. Thankfully, the day was sunny and I feel like I got a little Vitamin D or whichever it is that I'm probably extremely deprived of.
Today it's back to the office grind. Still need to find a job. Still completely miserable where I am. Still suffering insomnia effects from waking up at least a half dozen times every night thanks to lots of snoring going on next to me. I really need things to change.
And now a meme. Like the book meme going around, but with albums. I first got it from Bob on Facebook but then saw it on LJ and I wasn't exactly doing much else at the moment.
1. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (my grown-up album, I insisted it be played on car rides with my dad all through first and second grades.)
2. They Might Be Giants - Lincoln (First heard in 1988, I instantly fell in love with “Purple Toupee” and “Youth Culture Killed My Dog,” which started a lifelong love of alt. nerd rock)
3. The Rocky Horror Picture Show soundtrack with audience partici-say it!-pation (I must have listened to it a hundred times freshman year of high school. Let to acceptance of counter-culture lifestyles.)
4. Moxy Früvous - Bargainville (Elisheva Weiss gets credit for introducing me to one of my favorite bands - a folk/acoustic/sometimes a capella/ rock/disco/ comedy group from Canada.)
5. Radiohead - OK Computer (One of the greatest rock albums of all time.)
6. Church of Betty - Fruit on the Vine (First exposure to Indian-inspired music, after which I developed a fondness for real Indian music.)
7. Piñataland - Piñataland (Led to enjoyment of Tejano music and then stuff like Ozomatli and Buena Vista Social Club… Basically took away my habit of skipping over Spanish stations.)
8. The bedridden - Big Scary Cow / It’s all Fun and Games until Someone Loses an Eye (The only band I ever wanted to join, I just love them. They’re crazy and quirky and witty and make for good penpals.)
9. Cats (yes, the musical) - Andrew Lloyd Webber (The first musical I ever heard. And now I’ve heard many and generally love musical theater. I just have to remember my roots, you know?)
10. Queen - Classic Queen (I remember the day Freddie Mercury died. My dad mentioned he was the guy who sang “Bohemian Rhapsody.” I immediately had to hear the rest of the album.)
11. Klezmer Conservatory Band - Yiddishe Renaissance / Squirrel Nut Zippers - Perennial Favorites (These came to me at the same point in my life. Both bands were bringing old-time styles to modern audiences. I sometimes think if I was an instrument I’d be an accordion.)
12. Cornelius - Fantasma (The first electronica I ever liked, Fantasma is funny and complex and gave me an appreciation for DJs doing their thing well.)
13. The Bogmen - Life Begins at 40,000,000 (One of my favorite albums. The lyrics are uniformly great and thought-provoking, but the vocals, like with the bedridden, are raw and cheeky. It makes me want to jump around - not in a House of Pain kind of way.)
14. Beethoven - Immortal Beloved Soundtrack (Because Beethoven was awesome and wrote really beautiful, emotionally compelling music even though he suffered a lifetime of lead poisoning, which eventually led to his death as a generally despised guy. After that I started listening to more Classical, another genre with a station I often just passed by.)
15. O Brother, Where Art Though? - Various (I can listen to and enjoy non-classical, Christian-inspired music. Go fig.)
Shabbos was pretty standard. We had dinner by ourselves (I made a weird soup: no-chicken broth with charred onion, diced tomato and zucchini, shredded carrots, shredded ginger, star anise, a cinnamon stick, allspice, turkey meatballs, rice noodles, cilantro and scallion, and sambal oelek, our go-to soup spicer-upper.) before walking over to visit our friends, where the last game of the Stanley Cup finals was ignored by me and passivelty watched by the Mister. Then I fell asleep on their couch for 15 minutes. After I woke up we walked home. The next day we went to shul, came home, had lunch (Thai chicken salad with peanut lime sauce, spicy wontons, brown rice with more scallions and diced green pepper), and then went to an interesting lecture on woman, Judaism, and ritual. After the lecture we played a game of Rummikub with the in-laws before setting out to chit the chat with some friends down the hill from us.
Yesterday we were in the city to represent Stamford at the Orthodox Union's emerging communities fair. It was an interesting time. I saw several people there that I hadn't seen since at least 1999. (It's fun reintroducing yourself to people that you haven't seen in that long, even if you have been keeping up with each other on Facebook.) There were other people there that we knew through friends or that we just met, but also happened to be friends of friends, like the guy from Houston who lives literally right next door to our friend Rhoda. He invited us over for BBQ whenever we're in town.
After our shift was finished we went uptown, got some sushi, walked around the street fair set up in the north-bound lanes of Broadway, get wonderful gelato at Grom (I got pistacchio and Turinese chocolate with hazelnuts), met up with the Mister's sister's family, hung out a little while longer, and went home. Thankfully, the day was sunny and I feel like I got a little Vitamin D or whichever it is that I'm probably extremely deprived of.
Today it's back to the office grind. Still need to find a job. Still completely miserable where I am. Still suffering insomnia effects from waking up at least a half dozen times every night thanks to lots of snoring going on next to me. I really need things to change.
And now a meme. Like the book meme going around, but with albums. I first got it from Bob on Facebook but then saw it on LJ and I wasn't exactly doing much else at the moment.
1. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (my grown-up album, I insisted it be played on car rides with my dad all through first and second grades.)
2. They Might Be Giants - Lincoln (First heard in 1988, I instantly fell in love with “Purple Toupee” and “Youth Culture Killed My Dog,” which started a lifelong love of alt. nerd rock)
3. The Rocky Horror Picture Show soundtrack with audience partici-say it!-pation (I must have listened to it a hundred times freshman year of high school. Let to acceptance of counter-culture lifestyles.)
4. Moxy Früvous - Bargainville (Elisheva Weiss gets credit for introducing me to one of my favorite bands - a folk/acoustic/sometimes a capella/ rock/disco/ comedy group from Canada.)
5. Radiohead - OK Computer (One of the greatest rock albums of all time.)
6. Church of Betty - Fruit on the Vine (First exposure to Indian-inspired music, after which I developed a fondness for real Indian music.)
7. Piñataland - Piñataland (Led to enjoyment of Tejano music and then stuff like Ozomatli and Buena Vista Social Club… Basically took away my habit of skipping over Spanish stations.)
8. The bedridden - Big Scary Cow / It’s all Fun and Games until Someone Loses an Eye (The only band I ever wanted to join, I just love them. They’re crazy and quirky and witty and make for good penpals.)
9. Cats (yes, the musical) - Andrew Lloyd Webber (The first musical I ever heard. And now I’ve heard many and generally love musical theater. I just have to remember my roots, you know?)
10. Queen - Classic Queen (I remember the day Freddie Mercury died. My dad mentioned he was the guy who sang “Bohemian Rhapsody.” I immediately had to hear the rest of the album.)
11. Klezmer Conservatory Band - Yiddishe Renaissance / Squirrel Nut Zippers - Perennial Favorites (These came to me at the same point in my life. Both bands were bringing old-time styles to modern audiences. I sometimes think if I was an instrument I’d be an accordion.)
12. Cornelius - Fantasma (The first electronica I ever liked, Fantasma is funny and complex and gave me an appreciation for DJs doing their thing well.)
13. The Bogmen - Life Begins at 40,000,000 (One of my favorite albums. The lyrics are uniformly great and thought-provoking, but the vocals, like with the bedridden, are raw and cheeky. It makes me want to jump around - not in a House of Pain kind of way.)
14. Beethoven - Immortal Beloved Soundtrack (Because Beethoven was awesome and wrote really beautiful, emotionally compelling music even though he suffered a lifetime of lead poisoning, which eventually led to his death as a generally despised guy. After that I started listening to more Classical, another genre with a station I often just passed by.)
15. O Brother, Where Art Though? - Various (I can listen to and enjoy non-classical, Christian-inspired music. Go fig.)