periscope

part two:

i am officially done first year of university. it's a feat i'm pretty proud of. but it's also something almost everyone else accomplishes. i can't wait until i do something not just anyone can do. i am home for the summer, and i'm already bored. my mom has begun diagnosing every single problem that i have starting from the moment she walked into the door. so if you're curious, she thinks that i have an allergy to gluten. and i'm pretty sure she's right, but i don't want to admit it. with a serious allergy like that, i can't eat any of the food i usually eat and love, and ... no beer! that will be okay though. byebyecheapdrinks though. so yeah. i'm home, i'm bored, i'm lonely, and i'm sad, the classic first summer of a university student. three and a half more months to go...

today i had the best car ride with my dad ever. i had made mixes for the way home, and he had one of his old tapes with him. we made up a system to switch after every song. A little bit of Klaxons, a little bit of the Talking Heads. Some of Broken Social Scene, some of the B-52's. From Beck to The Police and Deerhoof to some crazy band from Buffalo that once asked if my mom could play saxophone with them. I realized on this drive home where I've gotten my love for music from. My dad has an amazing collection and knows so much, while my mom's got hidden talents like saxophone. I also realized how proud I am of myself for being musical like this. I'm excited for my life to come, even if it will suffer a few bumps and bruises.

with that being said ... i have a question i want answered, truthfully...
in order to be a great writer, do you have to suffer for or from something first?

inside+out

the two things that have been giving me a lot of anxiety over are done with.
1- we signed the lease for the duplex & deposited the money. it's now ours, we fought for it, eliminated the competition, and got the place that we cannot wait to live in. it was a damn race. i'm beyond excited. we have a lot of plans. i can't get over the fact of how lucky we got.
2- eyeopener elections are overwith. the pub night was fun, and i met a ton of really great people. i had one of my "happy to be a journalist" moments. and then i lost. so.... meh. obviously i need some time to myself to be a sore loser but all in all, laura's going to do a fantastic job and i'm really happy for her. now i just need to find a job for next year. will probably end up in something grossly retail. lovely. does anybody have any connections to music or photography stores?

the stuff might be overwith, but for some reason the anxiety is still there and it actually physically hurts. meh. 16 more days until i move out of here. it's crazy to think that this year is over, it's gone quicker than any year has ever gone for me. i've gained so many things this year though, amazing friends, tons of drunken excitement, life lessons, blahblahblah. i'm really grateful for this year, and even though i'm sad for it to be over, i'm glad for this chapter to be over, to get on to bigger and better things. i'm also quite sick of residence. *sigh*.

journalism's giving me a lot of heck lately. every day my opinion on it changes. which could be good or bad. good in the sense that i've got to find the right things to motivate me, bad in the sense that it creates doubt. one huge thing for me though was picking up this semesters Ryerson Review of Journalism. it's gorgeous and really interesting, which surprised me because i remembered picking up last years and wanting to gag. it made me really excited to stream into magazine (if i get it). people keep telling me i'm going all "hardcore journalism on their asses" or "being really brave" for running for an eye position, but i don't really believe them. i don't feel like i'm doing enough. funny, i'm set on this, but i can't catch up on my readings in time for exams. i'm determined and i cannot let my peers and teachers get me down about it. i haven't dreamt about anything like this for this long.

i'm craving new music, so i just downloaded like 20 new cds on DC++. oh how i'll miss it next year. i crave new music about twice a week and it drives me nuts. have you ever had those days (or weeks for me) where you just dont feel like listening to anything because nothing feels like it will work right to what's going on with you at that moment? thank god today broke that dry spell. i'm now listening to a Feist mix cd, and it's beautiful. i'm still angry nobody would go with me to her show next month.

i'm going to leave you with three youtube videos. this week i discovered the amazing-ness of youtube, and i was hooked. the first two videos are 15 seconds long and have no sound. the third is the encore from the decemberists show i mentioned in the previous post and you must watch it, it is AMAZING.

here's the Shins from St. Pattys Day -- its part of "Australia"


here's the Decemberists from last weekend -- it's the beginning of "The Island"


here's some person's video of the Decemberists encore "The Mariner's Revenge." amazing. watch out for the whale!

it was the perfect crime

moshpits are like those epic war battles you see in movies. somehow you get stuck in the middle between those who just need to push and shove their way to what they want. and you end up not being able to breathe. i've been in plenty of them before but i haven't been that scared in a long time. no need for details.

on a positive note, i got all of this weeks work done and in on time, and i'm pretty proud about that because there were a few freak out moments, and days with about two hours of sleep. i'm going to take this week to recooperate and catch up on readings, and then comes the study blitz. i can't believe i've got 23 days left in T.O. until the summer.

vanessa, nahmi, and i are in buffalo until tomorrow afternoon. we came purely to see the decemberists, which was tonight. and it was amazing. colin meloy is my hero, and gorgeous at that (much shorter than i imagined however). if you ever get a chance, listen to "The Mariner's Revenge Song." It's about getting swallowed by a whale. And it was their encore tonight. Best part was, they had two people in a huuuge whale costume come out and "swallow" them. it was amazing. "It's got dark carpeting, I guess we have some time to kill..." this band is so incredibly unique. they combine prog rock with a twang and a twist. their songs are about outrageous crimes and instances. Meloy tried to have the audience close their eyes at one point and imagine what he was saying to a haunting drum beat. Somehow he came up with buying a monkey, contemplating it, and poking it in the stomach. .... i guess you had to be there.


big news: we got the duplex in greektown. it's a pretty rad place, and we're excited x 10. I've got the big bedroom in the basement with the walk in closet! siiick. it's about 20 mn away from school. i better get lots of visitors.


listen to "The Perfect Crime #2" by the Decemberists.

it's the same old drag and you know you don't need none of that.

going through days where it hurts to get to tomorrow even though the sun is shining high and bright but all you can do is sit inside and work. not seeing the end of it. can't handle it anymore. losing control. just dying to be in the sunshine that hasn't been seen in ages. and then a light is suddenly shown. even though i've learned not to really trust anybody, there's always that one person that comes along every once in a while and does something really nice. and yesterday/today i met one of those people in my atrocious visits to court to get a story. she's one of the police officers that holds the accused. i met her initially yestrday but today when i ran into the court room all frazzled, she passed me a note of everything that i missed. and that just made a huge impact on me since i've had such bad luck this week. after that, i got such a great story, and i feel like i've finally gotten something right. the sun is still out and it's impossible to stay in a bad mood. i've got to finish my last essay of the year and three articles basically by tomorrow. and i'm not even that worried. i'm seeing a huge concert tomorrow and the next day (friday coming home). i'm gaining confidence, slowly but surely. i'm accepting things and working with them. girls & i are checking out a fantastic sounding duplex tonight, and we have great hopes for it. eyeopener elections are next week. i have reasonable goals for the summer. soon i'll have a feeling of settlement.


listen to "Energy" and "Same Old Drag" by The Apples in Stereo. now. and you'll instantly be in a great mood.