Making the Switch

My dearest followers who I would ask kindly not to kill me for my extended absence,

So I am officially bored with the 30 Day Music Challenge. I am uninspired by the last few questions and have decided that I am not going to answer them. I'm sorry if you are terribly disappointed. [I think you can  handle it.] But because I was so successful at the 30 Day Music Challenge, I have decided to attempt the 30 Day Movie Challenge! I am fully aware of the silliness of that selection considering that my 30 Day Music Challenge started over a year ago and it was never completed. But I am not feeling imaginative enough to spark my own topic of conversation so I am relying on the creative juices of the Tumblr [my blog] and Facebook community to do it for me. 

If you haven't lost all faith in my blogging ability throughout the 30 Day Music Challenge, a) I appreciate it. b) follow my sarcastic rantings and self-righteous commentary for the next 30[ish] Movie Challenge posts, it should be an enlightening ride.

Day 01: Your favorite movie

Day 02: The last movie you watched
Day 03: Your favorite action/adventure movie
Day 04: Your favorite horror movie
Day 05: Your favorite drama movie
Day 06: Your favorite comedy movie
Day 07: A movie that makes you happy
Day 08: A movie that makes you sad
Day 09: A movie that you know practically the whole script of
Day 10: Your favorite director
Day 11: Your favorite movie from your childhood
Day 12: Your favorite animated movie
Day 13: A movie that you used to love but now hate
Day 14: Your favorite quote from any movie
Day 15: The first movie you saw in theaters
Day 16: The last movie you saw in theaters
Day 17: The best movie you saw during the last year
Day 18: A movie that disappointed you the most
Day 19: Your favorite actor
Day 20: Your favorite actress
Day 21: The most overrated movie
Day 22: The most underrated movie
Day 23: Your favorite character from any movie
Day 24: Favorite documentary
Day 25: A movie that no one would expect you to love
Day 26: A movie that is a guilty pleasure
Day 27: Favorite classic movie
Day 28: Movie with the best soundtrack
Day 29: A movie that changed your opinion about something
Day 30: Your least favorite movie

Here's to the lists of questions on Tumblr and Facebook that we all love to hate. Here's to answering every question, knowing full well that nobody will read them. And here's to giving second chances to bloggers who just can't seem to get into the habit of posting on a regular basis. [Hint, hint.]

Surprise Post about Nothing!

Greetings neglected followers!

I have not posted for months, largely because the rest of the 30 Day Song Challenge bores me. So tonight I am going to post a little about me, because that has been what I've been thinking about a lot lately. I'm sorry if you don't care. Nobody really reads this anyway, and I do care about me. So there.

This year, I have been continually amazed by how much I have changed. So much that every once in a while it scares me. I discovered about a week ago that I have dimples. Not profound, takes-up-my-entire-face, Mario Lopez dimples, but dimples nonetheless. It scared the shit out of me! I had to ask a good friend from home if I'd ever had dimples before. I then proceeded to creep on myself to find out exactly when said dimples had developed. What kind of person gets older and all the sudden has dimples?

Even more alarming, somewhere during my college experience, I became a relatively laid-back person. In high school, I would never have described myself as relaxed in any sense of the word. I freaked out about little things. I redid an entire poster at 2:00 am because I was worried about how the boxes were laid out. I didn't speak to people I'd known for years because I assumed they wouldn't know who I was. I was overly critical, overly cautious and high strung, and I suppose to some extent I still am.

But somehow, two years later, I have fallen into an entirely different wavelength. Suddenly, all the urgency is gone. All of the anal retentiveness and stress of high school has melted into this right-brained, relatively fluid, college lifestyle. I couldn't tell you when it happened. But suddenly I find organization difficult and imagination instinctual. Maybe the absence of calculus in my life formed a black hole for all linear thinking leaving only loop-de-loops and color splotches. Which is mildly terrifying! To go from having a direct plan to having nothing is very scary.

But it is also very freeing. I've learned how to organize my school life to allow for fun and relationships, something I missed the boat on in high school. I've learned how to take embarrassment and failure in stride. God knows there has been and will be plenty of it. Somewhere along the way I have found comedy in my oddities.

Everyone tells you that college is the place where teenagers learn to be adults, to find themselves and their futures, but no 18-year-old high school graduate takes that seriously. It has taken me until my 20th birthday to think about the phase of life that I am living in. And to imagine that in two years I will be expected to be a real person, with bills and a job and a car and insurance and terrible things like that, is really scary to my amorphous, half-developed brain.

But, hey, I suppose that is what the next two years are for.  So, I will procrastinate reality for another night, and continue playing silly internet games until 4:00 am when I will consider going to bed.  But probably won't. Good night, readers. If you're reading this, you are either intensely bored or delirious from lack of sleep. I apologize for my night time ramblings, at least it is another post.

Day 25: A Song that Makes You Laugh

Greetings followers,

I hope your summer has been a ball and a half. As usual, my summer was conspicuously work-filled and blog-free. I had fully intended to keep blogging throughout the summer, perhaps finish the 30 Day Song Challenge, but that obviously did not happen. So, today I found myself strangely craving a good blogging session after a month of absence. And where better to start than on Day 25 with a song that makes me laugh? And that song is....

"Friends O' Mine" by the fabulously unfabulous Bowling for Soup. Although this song isn't particularly funny, I think the lyrics are clever and honest. The simplicity of the lyrics and rhymes make the song what it is: "We saw the world and the world seems smaller. We're getting wider, but not getting no taller."It is not a masterpiece, it's not even beautiful, but it's real and representative of their relationship. The quality of his voice is mediocre at best and the melody is simplistic and unpolished, but I think the overall effect is raw and perfect. The friendship described isn't polished and pretty, it's messy and unpretentious; if you ask me that is the best kind of friendship there is.

I've already grown bored of this post, but don't want to put off posting it another day. So here it goes. Here's to the simple things in life, to effortless, unpretentious friendships, and finally squeaking out another post. G'night, all.

Day 24: A Song that You Want to play at Your Funeral

Greetings followers and other random people who are reading [You're awesome.].

[Quick promotion: If you follow my blog, consider following Mr. Jeff Nelson's blog. He's awesome and is just getting started with blogging and needs more followers! [Don't we all?]]

But let's talk about me, that's what's important after all. [I hope the sarcasm in the precious statement was fully communicated and received.] But seriously, today's post is about a song that I want to play at my funeral [hopefully this will not be necessary for many many years.] But in the name of finishing this God-forsaken 30-day challenge, I will answer it.

Although the context of this song has little to do with me or my death, I would love Elton John's "Tiny Dancer" to play at my funeral. I cannot give you a discernible reason for choosing this song, but it has always been a favorite. There's something about the opening description of women and their "pirate smile(s)" that makes you fall in love.

I suppose that is why I chose it for this post. "Tiny Dancer" celebrates the life and the little things about the incredible women that Bernie Taupin [the song's lyricist] and Elton John [both English tourists] witness on the streets of California. To Taupin, these street dancers were free spirits, full of life and worthy of song. I hope that at the end, my life is celebrated as well, rather than my death mourned. [Journalist as an occupation doesn't really offer the same romantic imagery as a dancer [particularly a tiny one], but you get my drift.] While I will never be a dainty street dancer in California, I want to lead a life worthy of a song as beautiful as this one.

I apologize for the short and relatively somber post. I felt that my usual sarcastic tone was inappropriate for today's theme, but there are six days left and hopefully I will pull off another entertaining post before the challenge comes to a close. My stream of blogging wit seems to have run dry for the moment.

But here's to well-written lyrics, free-spirited street dancers, and living life to the fullest. Happy summer, followers.

Day 23: A Song that You Want to play at Your Wedding

A wildly enthusiastic greeting to my now 11 followers [including an extra Mark]!

It is mildly ridiculous how much a few extra followers mean. But when two extra followers mean that there are two extra people who give a hoot about what I write, that's pretty awesome. So thanks Mary Bess and Sally [and all my other loyal followers] for sticking with me through a few rough posts. Hopefully this one won't disappoint you.

Enough of all that. Hi. You're here to read about a song that I want to play at my wedding. [Maybe you're not. If you're not, this is a little awkward, but I think you have the wrong blog.] This post was a little tricky because I have no bloody idea what songs I would like to play at my wedding.

But I have finally come to the conclusion that "The Way You Look Tonight" by Maroon 5 will play at my wedding. [I would play the Fred Astaire version, but I love this cover dearly, so deal with it.] There's something about Adam Levine's voice that makes me want to melt into a puddle of quivering goo. [That is an entirely unromantic image, but I just can't help it.] After my first listen, I was pleasantly surprised that the band hadn't slapped the Maroon 5 sound over the classic Sinatra-Astaire early versions. They did an incredible job of contributing to the song while staying true to the original, spectacular vibes. I am continually surprised by Adam's and the rest of Maroon 5's versatility. [I really should go on a Maroon 5 music hunt.]

My favorite music hunting ground [I prefer to hunt in relatively legal territory.] is the local library. I recently returned from the library with a stack of 47 CDs. Excessive? Maybe, but I was curious, and hadn't looked through their selection in a while. I've picked up CDs in the library that I would never think of when browsing YouTube or iTunes, especially classics. [I'm listening to Billie Holiday right now.]

There are the obvious downsides of getting music from the library. For example, most of their music is at least five years old and geared towards 45 year old housewives with a poor taste in music. [I swear to you, there must be 25 Barry Manilow CDs.] But it's forced me to step outside of my musical comfort zone, which was once tragically limited to mediocre alternative rock bands [I still enjoy a select few of them, but my horizons have broadened significantly.] But if you look past the seemingly endless rows of 80s crooners, there are CDs to be listened to [and they are free].

It's late, I'm tired, and this post has taken me far too long. So, here's to teasing poor Barry Manilow [once again. I should really find a new punching bag.], new music, and your local library. Good night.

Day 22: A Song that You Listen to when You're Sad

Hey, all!

Today is Day 22 of the 30 Day Song Challenge which means that today's song is a song I listen to when I'm sad. But before the song of the day is released, I'd like to clarify. There is a very big difference between a song that I listen to when I'm sad and a sad song. When I am sad, I prefer not to listen to sad music because I am one of those people who prefers not to be sad. [Also, I do not sit on the couch and watch sad movies eating ice cream. However, if that is what makes you feel better, by all means, have at it.]

But I listen to "Blossom" by Ryan Adams when I'm sad, actually the entire Cold Roses album is decent listening-to-while-sad music. Today, I spent about an hour and a half sitting underneath a tree listening to it. I wasn't particularly sad, but I was feeling reflective. [Perfect Day: 75 degrees with a few clouds and a relatively stiff breeze, sitting under a tree in the grass, listening to good music/reading a book/chatting with a friend. Sigh.]

Anyway, Cold Roses was one of the 50+ albums that I downloaded from the library last summer that I didn't really get to listen to fully. I rediscovered it this year when my iPod was on shuffle and I couldn't figure out what lovely song was playing. [Love finding old music. Its like finding a few bucks in your coat pocket from last winter.] Reason you should love this album too: harmonica. [Also, its good and the album cover is pretty. [Fun fact: I have a number of songs on my iPod that I hate, but can't bear to delete because I love the album art so much. #DesignStudentWoes [Third insert: I'd love you forever if you followed me on Twitter: @rachelweeks5]]]

Now that I've thoroughly rambled, I'm sure you're bored. [I'm a smidge bored as well.] Only 8 days left in the 30 Day Song Challenge. Think you can hold out until the end? Here's to harmonicas, good weather, and to putting off your final paper a few hours more. Night.

Day 21: A Song that You Listen to when You're Happy

Oh, hey there.

It’s been a while. And things aren't looking like I'm going to finish the 30 Day Song Challenge before school lets out. I have failed this challenge in so many ways it has become the teensiest bit embarrassing. However, I am resilient. Regardless of my tardiness in this assignment, today's theme is a song that I listen to when I'm happy. My recent obsession/happy song is...

"Talk on Indolence" by The Avett Brothers [the live version, of course]. I'm not sure if it is physically possible to listen to this song without jumping or bobbing or stomping or generally jiving. [Of course, I haven't really tried to resist.] I'm 124% certain I have pissed my roommate off with my frequent and violent dancing to this song. [But I will never apologize!] I just cannot resist the enthusiasm of The Avett Brothers. Whether they are hopping up and down the stage with a banjo or swinging a cello around their head, these boys know how to jam. [The video on YouTube is great: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl4wLgw-6Zk].

[Warning: Self-important rant is a-comin'.] I will never scorn a musician who loves to play, even if what they play is torturously bad. [Side note: Avett Brothers are not torturously bad, I just feel like pushing my opinions on people.] If Mary Sue Berry wants to squawk around on a clarinet a bit, who am I to tell her she isn’t good enough? Little Miss Berry doesn’t necessarily deserve a record deal [Of course, if Mary Sue is blonde with big boobs, she might get one anyway.] Music is made to affect people. So if a few unpracticed chords on a piano are what make Franklin happy, I can dig it.

Well, this post ran out of gas pretty fast, surprising considering the kick-ass-ity of the song/band. I apologize for the lame-sauce writing. I tried. Hopefully Day 22 will be slightly more entertaining.

Until then, followers [All 8 of you.] Here's to musicians with passion and enthusiasm [including Mary Sue and Franklin]. Too bad they could do nothing to help today's painfully uninspired writing.