Playlist 2: The Best Songs Ever

So, between my new job (which I'm loving so far after my first full week!) and details surrounding my band's debut album release, life has been incredibly insane. I want you to know that I have not abandoned this blog! I simply have a lot going on. As I settle in to a new routine, I'm sure I will be able to write more often.

Here is my second playlist for you. These are The Best Songs Ever. Period. No "arguably"s or "in my opinion"s or anything of that BS. These are not in ranked order; they are just the best songs ever in the order that I thought of them. And I'd like to make the distinction that these are the best versions of the best songs ever as well... I mean seriously, you can't compare Bob Dylan with Peter, Paul, and Mary (cough cough), right? And, I didn't want to use the same artist more than once. Also a note: These are all in the pop/rock/R&B/folk realm. If I took jazz into consideration, this list would be 50 songs long!

-"Midnight Train to Georgia," by Gladys Knight and the Pips
-"Don't Let Me Down," by The Beatles
-"The Weight," by The Band with The Staple Singers (The Last Waltz version)
-"Tupelo Honey," by Van ("The Man") Morrison
-"Diamonds and Rust," by Joan Baez
-"I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)," by Aretha Franklin
-"A Change is Gonna Come," by Sam Cooke
-"Try a Little Tenderness," by Otis Redding
-"Cactus Tree," by Joni Mitchell (The live Miles of Aisles version from 1974)
-"Good Vibrations" by The Beach Boys
-"Jolene," by Dolly Parton
-"Let's Get it On," by Marvin Gaye
-"Helpless," by Neil Young (The Last Waltz version with The Band and Joni Mitchell singing backups)
-"My Little Town," by Simon and Garfunkel (I could only find a live version of this online, but I mean the studio version!)
-"Tutti Frutti," by Little Richard
-"Amie," by Pure Prairie League
-"Superstition," by Stevie Wonder
-"Whipping Post," by The Allman Brothers (The live 23-minute version from Live at the Fillmore East version... the recording I linked to says it is 1/3 of the song!)
-"The Rainbow Connection," by Kermit the Frog

You're welcome. There are many more amazing, awesome songs, obviously. But, this is MY Best Songs Ever list, so I get to decide what goes on it.

I think my dad would be proud of how much of the music-appreciation he imparted on me (Hi Dad!) stuck. I'm more than a little happy about it too. He and I both do this thing when we're excited about a song (or even a small part of a song): We make the people around us listen to it, even though we know they'll never quite love it as much as we do or the same way we do. But, we just want so badly for that person to feel what we feel when that song is playing, so, we try anyways. Many of the songs above came into my life because of my dad (and many of them move me to tears simply because they're so good), and I'd just like to give him a shout-out. Plus, he plays a MEAN air guitar.

Also, I'd like to officially announce my band's CD Release Party at The Southern in Charlottesville, VA on Saturday, March 5! Tickets are $10 and include a copy of the album. If you're in the area, it would be lovely to see you there! Here's a link to the venue's website: http://www.thesoutherncville.com/. If you scroll down to March 5th, you'll see the listing for our show, and you can buy tickets right off the site. Exciting! Maybe someday someone else will put one of our songs on their Best Songs Ever list...

Away on Business

Sorry it's been so long, folks.

Well, I had my first day of my new job today! And it went really, really well, so I'm pretty freakin' excited. The people in my new office are all really nice, which is so important. And, this job is going to be perfect for me, I can already tell. I can wear JEANS to work if I want to (Hallelujah, Amen)! So far, I've been dressing slightly nicer than most of my coworkers, but I'm sure it won't last too long!

Tomorrow I hit the road for another office in the company I work for. I'm going to be doing training there for three days, and I'm getting put up in a hotel. Fancy pants! And I will learn to file an expense report afterwards and get reimbursed for the mileage I put on my car and stuff.

I also got a work laptop and will get a Blackberry very soon. I seriously feel spoilt. Yes, spoilt.

I was also thinking today about all those people out there who are looking for jobs. I just want to say that it is all going to be ok. Just hang in there, try to exercise when you can, and read an article or two on how to ace an interview. It's all helpful. I keep hearing things about the job market getting better also, so that's a positive.

In other news:
-I finally cleaned the upstairs bathroom. Who knew it was that color?
-Getting up at 8 after getting up between 11-12 for months was difficult. I felt sick this morning.
-It's so cold that my skin immediately dries out the second I walk outside. I'm like an alligator over here!
-Now that I know I will have a steady paycheck, I have consumed sushi multiple times...
-Chris has me watching Battlestar Galactica now that we've finished Stargate SG-1. DORKITUDE! Okay, whatever, it's actually an amazing show.

Dream Job

So, for some reason I haven't yet written a post to detail the craziness that occurred in my life last week. Maybe because it's just too good to be true. Maybe I felt that writing about it would make it turn out to not have happened at all.

I wrote a post before letting you all know that I had been offered an Office Assistant position with an insurance company. Well, that was after being told by the company that I really wanted to work for that they had decided to offer the Admin position there to someone else. I was pretty devastated, but was offered this other Office Assistant job the very next day. So, needing gainful employment, I accepted. Then, two days later, after having let the job I really wanted go, and after having embraced the idea that I would be working for this insurance company, I found that I had a message on my voicemail from the guy who was hiring at the company I wanted to work for in the first place (we had been in the recording studio all day, so my phone was on silent). I didn't get the message until about 6 PM on Friday, but I called him back anyways. And, THEY OFFERED ME THE JOB! I don't know what happened (likely, the person they offered the position to did not accept!), but I was floored! I cried as soon as I hung up the phone because I was so excited, relieved, and flattered.

The only bad thing was the part where I had to tell the insurance company that I had accepted another position. Awkward! But, pretty much everything about the job is better, so I certainly owed it to myself.

So, now I am an Administrative Assistant to the Director of Operations for a Biofuel Company. That's right. They make fuel out of waste vegetable oil from restaurants, etc. How awesome and green is that? And the people who work there seem incredibly cool, which is something I really care about. So, I dive-in on Monday.

And so, a new era begins... and I'm incredibly excited.

Reading List

I finally finished Chesapeake by James Michener (yes, it look me freakin' FOREVER to read. I haven't been making as much time for reading as I typically like), so I'm moving on to my GIANT reading list. I got several books for Christmas, my sister leant me a book, I have a few I've had on the shelf waiting on me, and I'm ready to read them! At the rate I've been going, it'll take me a year to read all the books on my list. When I was in college, I made a point of reading for pleasure everyday (and that's on top of all the reading I had for school), and went through a book a week. So, here's my reading list:

1. Shakespeare's Christmas, by Charlaine Harris (209 Pages)
This is the third book in a series by Charlaine Harris, who also wrote the books that the show True Blood is based on. These books are short, easy reads. They'd be good beach reads. My sister leant me this book, and I'm planning on tackling this one first, since it is pretty much the opposite of Chesapeake.

2. Things I Learned About My Dad in Therapy, edited by Heather Armstrong (230 Pages)
This is a book of essays by several writers, which was put together by Heather Armstrong (who writes http://www.dooce.com/, which I'm sure I've mentioned before!). The description for the book says that it is "A funny and poignant exploration of fatherhood-- warts, poop, and all." Haha.

3. Hawaii, by James Michener (937 Pages)
So, by the time I finish the first two books, I figure I'll be ready for another Michener book. Chris has read Hawaii already, and he says it's great. Considering the fact that Cheseapeake is probably on my top five list now, I'm pretty sure this book will be one I like as well.

4. Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen (335 Pages)
I believe I mentioned this book in a previous post. The reason I mentioned it is that it was originally written as a National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) book. It takes place during The Great Depression, and follows a man who walks out of his medical school exams to join the circus.

5. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Dubliners, by James Joyce (372 Pages)
I bought a Barnes and Noble Classics book with both of these in it awhile ago, but I have yet to read it. From everything I've heard, reading Joyce is a bit of a dauting task. But, I've never tried, so I'm a gonna.

6. Caribbean, by James Michener (667 Pages)
I got this and Hawaii for Christmas, which is really exciting. Chris will probably read this before I do, and he tends to read more than I do of late, so it will be waiting for me when I get through the other five books on the list!

So, that's 2,750 pages. If I want to finish these books by six months from now, I have to read an average of 15.2 pages a day, which should be pretty easy to do.

Here's the STACK of books I'm planning on reading:


I LOVE BOOKS



Here is the stack next to an average-sized rabbit for scale.

Yeah, baby!

So, I guess I better get started! Anyone have any suggestions for good books to add to my list?

Officially EMPLOYED!

Gigantic, enormous, crazy sigh of relief. For serious. I am now officially an Office Assistant for a new company. I start Monday, so my Months-of-Unemployment Period is finally coming to a close. I had good days, bad days, fun times, and miserable times. And I learned a lot about myself and my capabilities. Also, I learned that I can live incredibly cheaply if necessary. I learned that I have a really great support system, and I learned that the job market really does SUCK big-time. "They" aren't lying when "they" say that.

I don't like to get on a soapbox very often, but I'm going to do so now for a minute. Being unemployed was at once exhilirating and terrifying. The times when things seemed hopeless and scary were very hard to deal with. People like me, who have a tendency towards clinical depression and extreme anxiety, may not always be very good at coping with that kind of stress. But it is important to seek help when help is needed, and it is even more important to stay active. Chris has helped me stay motivated to exercise regularly lately, and it has really helped me. I experienced a good bit of rejection in the past couple months, and I could have easily not gotten out of bed in the morning. That's what depression does to you; it makes it so you can't find a reason to get up and do anything about anything. But, I got through it all without having one day where I didn't get up or went back to bed to sleep the afternoon away. So, go me! I also had the help of my family and friends, along with that of a wonderful counselor, who all did their parts to keep me from going totally insane, so I just want to say thank you to all of them.

So, on Monday I gotta get my butt outta bed early in the morning, and drag myself to my new work. The first day is going to be scary! And getting back on a "normal" schedule will be difficult as well. And, Chris and I seem to have only just recently adjusted to both being home most of the day, so now we'll have to adjust back the other way!

In other news, my band is entering the home stretch of the recording process, and I will keep The Interweb abreast (yes, I said "abreast") of the details surrounding our album release. It's exciting stuff! It's so very glamorous! Photoshoots, days in the studio, CD replication, artwork... it's pretty cool. But, these things cost money, so it's a good thing we saved our pennies for so long!

sigh. Wine now.

Things That Annoy the Crap Out of Me

Yesterday was a very stressful day for a variety of reasons, so I really feel like bitching big-time. So, here are some things that have annoyed the crap out of me lately (lucky you):

1. Public restroom stalls without hanging hooks piss me off! Where the heck am I supposed to put my purse? I'm certainly not going to put it on the pee-floor. No way, no how. And in winter-time? Fuggedaboutit!!! Where am I supposed to put my jacket? And what about when I have a purse AND a coat (oh yeah, that's FIVE OR SIX MONTHS OF THE WHOLE FREAKIN' YEAR!)? Seriously, hooks: Get them.

2. Ok, snow is pretty and all (at least, for the first five minutes after it has fallen. Then it gets brown and gross and slushy and icky), but it's cold and it makes my life more difficult (and who needs help making their life more difficult? NO ONE.). I HATE SNOW. I hate clearing off my car, I hate shoveling, I hate the bottoms of my pants getting wet, and I hate feeling stuck in my house. I'm ready for June and July and the beach and shorts and sandals.

3. I can't stand when someone tells you they are going to do something, and then doesn't (and doesn't even let you know that they're not planning to). To me, this means that this flaky person doesn't think I'm worth their time, and that makes me mad.

4. Health insurance companies can just kiss my butt.

5. I can't stand screaming children. Get your kid away from me, or get me some duct tape.

6. I really, really hate when I hear a song on the radio with lyrics my rabbit could have spelled out in his litterbox with his own poop-pellets. Come on, people. Where are our standards? If I can write something better than what is on the radio, that, to me, means that I should be the one on the radio. Am I right?

7. I hate when people don't listen to me when I'm trying to communicate with them. Makes me feel very small.

8. I can't stand people who drive *just* under the speed limit. Unless I'm the one doing it, of course.

9. I really can't stand when people ask our band to play songs we don't know. Sorry, we don't know EVERY FRICKIN' SONG EVER FRICKIN' WRITTEN, mmmk? And, in the same vain, I hate when people assume that, just because I majored in English, I must know what every single word in the English language means, and I also must have read every book ever written or translated into English. Bah! NOPE.

10. And man, I hate when people BITCH all the time...

Say Cheese!

Whelp folks, it finally happened; I am now the proud, proud owner of a digital SLR camera! And I couldn't be happier with it (Thanks Mom and Merri!). I am so very spoilt. It's the Canon Rebel XS. At first I started playing with the auto mode (which means the camera does all the work for you), but I spent a good hour playing with the different manual settings yesterday post-yoga. SO, that means much better pictures for your viewing pleasure, and probably means that I will make this blog a little more photo-heavy than it has been. So yes, you get to be my little guinea pigs (though I prefer rabbits) when it comes to photography. How lucky are you?

So, here are the best pics (in my humble opinion) from my first manual-setting photo-taking session. I was just in my house, so there's nothing particularly interesting. As I mentioned before, becomming a better photographer is one of my "resolutions" this year. Oh, and I made the photos "extra large" so you can see how crisply this camera captures things. My old camera (now bequeathed to Chris) made things look like they had no depth.



Internet, meet Coltrane-Without-Red-Eye. Coltrane-Without-Red-Eye, Internet.



I really liked this picture of our Christmas tree out-of-focus, but when Chris saw it, he was like "oh." So maybe it is dumb, but I STILL LIKE IT!



I was trying to play with making the foreground clear and the background slightly blurry. Thank you, vacuum cleaner handle.

It doesn't matter if you're black or white... or black and white.



I see London, I see France...




Self-portrait? Got cold after yoga, put on my new flannel (of which Chris has a matching one), standing at the entrance of the half-bath. You know, I kind of hated the mirror until I saw it in black and white. It looks kinda cool.



In other news, our fridge was broken when we got back from doing Christmas with my family on Sunday night. It is now fixed (yay!).



I wanted to get a picture of my new camera with my new camera... so here's the best I could do.



And a crazy-wacko one for good measure...

How freakin' cool is my new camera? I shall have to name her.

Be prepared for lots of photos of boring crap around my house. :)

You Say You Want a Resolution

Chris thinks resolutions are stupid, and I tend to agree. Mainly because people make all these unattainable promises to themselves, and, as a result, set themselves up for unavoidable failure. However, I have to admit, the New Year offers the perfect opportunity to make changes: It's right after the holidays (when everyone eats, drinks, and sits too much), the days are slowly getting longer, you get to start counting from 1 (yesterday was 1/1/11!), and you clearly see the past year for what is was and the coming year for what you hope it will be. So, here are my "resolutions," or the changes that I'm hoping to make this year:

1 (/1/11!): Somebody Get that Girl a JOB!
Yes, I desperately seek employment. Still. Hopefully the New Year will bring wonderful things like job offers and paychecks. And full benefits?

2: Exercise, exercise, exercise!
There's really no reason not to. Exercise is the number one way to keep clinical depression at bay without meds, and that's what I need to do for myself everyday. Plus, those skinny jeans won't fit otherwise...

3: Become a Better Photographer
I have some news regarding this, which will be the subject of my next post!

4: Silver and Gold, Silver and Gold...
I shall make many nice pieces of jewely. I'd love to have a few wearable things made for next Christmas!

5: In Her Own Write
Okay, I want to finish my NaNoWriMo book, write blog posts more regularly, and continue to do the freelance writing that I've been doing lately.

I think all those things are at least semi-reasonable and attainable (at least I hope so). I'm also hoping to win more Settlers of Catan and Cow Game games than I lose. What are your resolutions?