we are only made of air and dust

sinonymity nudged me about making a holiday wish list (and if you guys have made one, please let me know in the comments - I'd like to see if there is something I could do for you) and it was hard, probably harder than the anonymous comment meme (which I think I may not do after all. Oops.) Mostly because it's the circumstances I'm in and the chill in the weather and how I just seem to be in a half awake state these days. I'm so tired.

if wishes were horses - I'd be galloping away

1. Someone to go to Japan with me. I like South Korea a lot. In fact, I'm looking out for a way to stay for another year, but with another school (PUBLIC) and another boss (A MILLION TIMES THIS), but right now it is very much WORK to me. I want to play and get away. I'm done with being an independent lone wolf, I need to be up with people. In Japan. I'm thinking of doing a mini break in February. This wish may be adapted to become Seoul if funds become tight, but yeah...a traveling companion.

2. My co teacher really likes gummy bears. The gummy candy they have in Korea is fine, but it's not gummy bears or Swedish fish, and since she's been a life saver in some tough jams, I'd like to get some gummy bears for her (and swedish fish!). amezri is sending me gummy bears and also American Junk Food (TM)

3. An email or a letter (pending my new mail address, obviously). Tell me about your life. I've been a shitty correspondent and lost touch with some people - I get it, we're all busy, but I'd really like to reconnect/or connect with you again. Why are you my friend? Or if you don't feel like that, tell me a story. I love stories.

4. A jetpens.com gift certificate or a pro flickr account upgrade

5. Mix cds. I used to love making these. It was one of my many semi-useful skills and I made them for everyone regardless of whether I had a crush on them or not. I even used to make mix tapes (this was in the dinosaur era and there are some embarrassing ones I made for a boy I was in love with internet flirting with when I was all of seventeen years old) and usually I made them because I wanted to share some music I really loved with the people I loved/liked/wanted to impress my musical inclinations on/just thought their day needed something.

I think I was pretty good at making a mix cd but there's always the worry that some people just aren't going to get it - musical taste being subjective and all, but I like to think I had more hits than misses. Then I got this amazing email from mistakency, who graciously let me quote her -

But this CD - it's just! Four years later and the transitions are perfect! I cannot believe no one else gets to enjoy them! That's a crime.

This afternoon I was listening to the untitled one that begins with Esthero raging about Ashanti, and I want to tell you that I played it during a high school trip once and everyone went silent and listened when "Calculation Theme" came on. AND THEN THAT ENTIRE ROOM FULL OF PEOPLE I LOVED WENT HOME AND DOWNLOADED THEMSELVES SOME METRIC. aaaaah favorite moment for life, and you were responsible.

And then I remember the time I was in Scotland on a tour bus and I brought along some mix cds and I sidled up to the (unnervingly attractive) guide/driver and asked him if he could play the cd and he smiled at me and said yes, and we listened to a lot of Scottish indie and good old fashioned anthem rock and yes, I snuck in Travis - because SCOTLAND. I may not remember all the songs that were on the cd - I have a bad habit of not writing down lists for many of my mix cds when they're for me, but I remember the feeling of being on that bus, my head against the window watching the highlands blur and being so happy that I was there, in that moment and place.

Music to me is as necessary and food and air and someone I love saying my name. It's essential.

fandom colliding: Na In (or is it Nine?) of Dear Cloud dueting with Rachael Yamagata for her song Be Be Your Love

Dear Cloud is the r0xors. For all my pop sensibilities, I am a rock and roll girl at heart, and there's nothing I love more than watching musicians and their instruments.

( I floated away on a cloud but you were there waiting with a salt shaker )

oh wait, this is actually good. YEAH I SAID IT.

Epik High, why you so FREAKING AWESOME?



I've watched half of episode 4 of You're Beautiful, and guys, I don't think I have the patience to go on watching for another 16 episodes (or watch, like a zombie outbreak, this becomes the new Boys Over Flowers in popularity and becomes the new fandom juggernaut, and it gets extended to 20+ eps.)

Because yes, it's cute (sometimes cotton candy sickeningly so), and it's shiny, and Smirky Guyliner is starting to show more emotions instead of just constipated looking irritation, and Stylist Noona is still my favorite female character, and blondie Jeremy (WTF?) is a lovable dimwit, but as a whole, this drama isn't gelling for me in terms of total enjoyment factor. There are parts of it that are very good, and the crack is all right, I suppose (but I'm more used to and fond of jdrama crack and I was brought up on wuxia so you know my crack standards are HIGH)and while I can see the plot points that the Hong Sisters are juggling, I'm not sure I'm invested in anyway (snarky or otherwise) to see the emotional payoff.

And also, this guy:




He's NEVER GOING TO GET THE GIRL.

Check out the requirements: He's kind, he listens, he bandages her wounds. He covers for her. He wears white. He drinks tea.

HE IS SO SCREWED OVER.

And sometimes, as irreverent and snarky and totally aware of the 'great escapism' of dramas and how they have little to no connect to real life, WHATSOEVER drama watcher I am, sometimes (all the time) I'd like the second, decent, no secret pain, just genuinely kind character to actually have a relationship with the girl he loves and she loves him back. In that way.

BECAUSE NICE BOYS ARE AWESOME. SERIOUS. WORD TO YOUR MOM.

down here in the coal mine.

So I've flipped the AZN popculture switch over to South Korea lately (no, not dramas. Films, music, photography, food? Oh yes.) because that's just how it usually happens with me, and I can still remember the very first Korean mv I was exposed to (this phrase is really apt, I feel) as linked to me by a friend who got it off of one of the blogs at the time. Slashdot, I think? This was quite a few years ago. And oh, it was the pinnacle of everything mainstream Korea has been associated with since - gorgeous visuals, a sad (nay, tragic) love story, and buckets full of RIDICULOUSLY MELODRAMATIC BATHOS. The sheer wtfery that was going on in that video (Oh he's a photographer! Oh they fall in love! OH NOES, THERE'S DEVELOPER ON A SHELF! AIIEEEEE, BLINDNESS BURNS.)

( Saff's shortlist of soapiest, emotionally manipulative videos: Oh Korea, you are the saddest clown in the circus. )

.....super junior's sorry sorry sounds a lot like a rhianna song, specifically, "Disturbia."

HOW DO I KNOW THESE THINGS.

ALSO, HOW COME I CAN'T STOP LISTENING TO IT.

catdecember, if you're still debating on whether or not to see Miyavi @ the AVALON on the 16th, do not hesitate - the answer is an resounding YES. He puts on a show, an extravaganza - there is a tapdancer (WHO SOLOS), a taiko drummer, a DJ who does remixes right then and there, an incredible beat boxer, and Miyavi himself, who could easily be a one man show, but is charismatic enough to share the spotlight with a tight line up of amazing talent. (and if I didn't hate driving in LA traffic so much, I'd totally be there to see them again)

I mean, there was a TAP DANCE SOLO.


I've been back for little under two hours, and I'm still smiling (and still partially deaf). I have so much to share - the people watching, the sheer range of ages (Miyavi is all things to all people) from the expected tweens/college kids to middle aged couples (one woman wearing a Barack Obama "Hope" tshirt was telling her professor -looking husband to smuggle in her camera in his jacket), an entire Japanese family with a pregnant woman (the obaa-san was waving her arms along with her daughters to Miyavi. When you see a 70ish woman throwing up her arms and attempting the rock sign, you know you have entered another plane of AWESOME.), a really cute pair of gay boys who were very shy in their affection with one another (possibly first date?), more corsets and garters you could shake a bedazzled stick at, miles and miles of stripes and piercings and tattoos, and you should have seen the women, the hot Goth moms who brought their babies, and you guys, it was rock and roll.

I'm so happy right now.

Miyavi's DJ wunderkind - Teddy Loid, is incidentally also the cutest thing I have ever seen...this week. He's got MAD SKILLZ. I wanted to take him home in my purse.

gakked from tinyangl

1. Put your itunes, window media player, etc on shuffle
2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer
3. You must write that song name down no matter how silly it sounds
4. Put any comments in brackets after the song name

( LIKE A CRYSTAL BALL INTO MY SOUL, I SWEAR. )

you guys.....you guys.

I just fell in love with Tom's voice all over again. I don't know what's up with me lately, and I'm sure the recent hormonal outpourings aren't helping any, but there are tears.

Stream tracks from King of Cards

,

Why has no one told me about the comedy found in Led Zeppelin lyrics?

I MEAN, REALLY.

Also, Fleetwood Mac? Quite groovy.