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Tuesday, July 14th, 2009
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10:27 am - Look ma, I made the front page!
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My newest freelance client is Jew-ish.com, the young, hip, online brand of the Jewish Transcript - er, I mean JTNews. I'm doing a monthly column about Jewish music, and my first column went live this week!
www.jew-ish.com
Direct link: http://jew-ish.com/index.php?/stories/item/2854
current music: Some Talking Heads album
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| Monday, June 29th, 2009
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12:25 pm - What do we want? BOAT! When do we want it? BOAT!
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Children of the greater Seattle area! Are you mighty? Do you believe in the power of tomato? Are you a Jason Webley fan? Are you a person who has never heard of Jason Webley but enjoy running around in parks screaming and throwing tomatoes at complete strangers?
My friend, Camp Tomato awaits.
Jason Webley is a local musician/magician/cult leader/king who hosts this illustrious event once a year. It's a day of food, music, and a glorious game of Tomato Raid, which is like capture the flag but with tomatoes.
Yes. You heard correctly.
Come join me in leading Team Boat to victory! I can't remember who won last year, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't us (don't quote me on that).
HERE ARE ALL OF THE DETAILS:
Sunday, July 5th, high noon
CAMP TOMATO 2009
SE Corner of Meridian Playground
(behind the Good Shepherd Center,
4649 Sunnyside Ave N in Wallingford)
Admission: $5 donation and/or as many tomatoes as you can muster
Please also bring some food or beverage item to share for the potluck!
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| Tuesday, June 16th, 2009
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11:18 am - He always kept to himself
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One of my coworkers has made a hobby of finding all the sites online that list personal information without your consent. He's also a dab hand at stalking people on social networking sites, which he actually uses sometimes to find out if someone has placed a bogus order with us. We'll call him the Wizard. This is a chat with one of the guys from the department that deals with our affiliates - the sales people who place orders. He gets to be called Aff.
Aff says:
I heard you found your info at http://tnid.org/ that site is insane.
Sarah says:
I know. One more place where your name and personal info is online
Sarah says:
At least this one makes it easy to delete
Sarah says:
The Wizard found it, of course
Aff says:
yeah, he's the stalking expert. it wont come as a surprise when cops come to take him in for a string of myspace related murders
Aff says:
"he seemed so normal. this is so unexpected. he always kept to himself."
Sarah says:
"Police report that the suspect had extensive files on the victim, including her name, address, phone number, the names of her immediate family, her favorite bands, and what Disney Princess she would be."
Aff says:
lol
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| Thursday, June 11th, 2009
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4:33 pm - Time heals all wounds, apparently
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When I was in high school, I had a frenemy. I don't think the word "frenemy" had been invented yet, but he was it. He dated two of my friends and so we hung out quite a lot, but I always disliked him. He and I butted heads many times, a few of which particularly stand out.
1. He once chased me all over Erin's house trying to tickle me. Many of you know that I hate being tickled; I do not use the word hate here lightly. Be certain that I was not coyly running away or giggling, saying, "Oh no, don't tickle me!" the way that teen girls have been known to do. I held a chair between us and eventually brandished a butter knife in my attempt to keep him from touching me. The next day at school, he told everyone that I had thrown a chair at him and stabbed him.
2. He threatened to kick me out of his car on a random Bellevue street in the middle of the night because I had flipped the armrest in the middle of the backseat of his car up. Apparently, he liked it to be down. A lot.
3. I called him a rapist. The friend he was dating at that time told us he forced her, although she was a bit melodramatic so it's hard to say. I still called him a rapist in public.
Does this sound like the kind of person who would, even ten years later, look back on me fondly? No, I wouldn't think so. Yet he sent me a Facebook friend request just today, with this note attached:
"Good morning to you, Ms. Sarah. Life is good, we're not in high school, and you're one of the few from those days I enjoyed being around! Hope all is well with you."
Can I get a "WTF"?
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| Sunday, May 3rd, 2009
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7:12 pm - Stop the world.
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I'm not going to lie: I love me some Newsies. I don't remember if I saw it in a theater, but it's been a favorite at least since my dad brought home the VHS when we were kids. I've since met lots of people for whom it's a childhood favorite or at least a guilty pleasure. It came out on DVD in 2002 (not an unreasonable time frame for a film that came out prior to DVD and wasn't a huge blockbuster hit), and rather than being a cheaply thrown together movie-only release, it actually had a lot of features.
So it came as a bit of a surprise when I learned today that it was considered a flop, despised by critics and audiences, and one of the biggest box office losses of any Disney live-action film. Leonard Maltin called it "Howard the Newsboy," and apparently Christian Bale has said he's not a fan. Apparently I am part of what is considered a "cult following" that developed after the movie was released on video and shown on TV. I mean, I knew the movie wasn't exactly a box-office smash...but "cult"?
Well, if this is a cult following, at least I'm in good company. It's not as if Joss Whedon would like a bad movie, would he?
For your daily does of surrealism, click on the tag "Newsies" and check the date of the only other post in this journal with that tag.
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| Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
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2:55 pm - Of Mice and Mayhem
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After living in Ballard for a year and a half, I am finally planning a housewarming party. It's Saturday, May 23; if any of you in Seattle want details, let me know.
The theme for the party (since all good parties must have a theme) is "Saturday Evening Cartoons." 80s and 90s cartoons on the TV, cold cereal, Pop Tarts, and toaster waffles, and everyone either wearing pajamas or dressing as their favorite cartoon character. I've been vacillating on a theme for some time, but I'm pretty pleased with this one.
My current plan is to dress as either April O'Neil or Gadget from Rescue Rangers, although either would be dependent on my finding a suitable jumpsuit. On a side note: if you're ever planning on doing a Google image search for either of those characters, you better brace yourself for some weird shit, including but not limited to lots of naked and/or bondage-related fanart,
Rescue Rangers/Rats of NIMH/The Rescuers crossover fanfic, or a 231-page Rescue Rangers fanmade graphic novel where Gadget becomes a government assassin and marries Chip.
I really wish I'd made any of those up.
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| Thursday, April 16th, 2009
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4:48 pm - Appropriately enough, I am flying Virgin
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YOUR ITINERARY
14-May-2009 SEATTLE, WA (SEA) 01:20PM LOS ANGELES, CA (LAX) 03:55PM
20-May-2009 LOS ANGELES, CA (LAX) 12:05PM SEATTLE, WA (SEA) 02:50PM
In the immortal words of that chick in Almost Famous, "It's all happening!"
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1:05 pm - Nothing Worse
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Is it just me, or is the most recent page of Nothing Better sort of crap? It feels really disjointed, visually and in terms of dialogue. The line "didn't you miss THIS?!" seems a little odd combined with the tragic gesture to her breasts. Rather than the line being said in a sexy, joking way, it's as if Molly's desperately begging for validation.
Then Josey goes from lounging on the steps to hugging her and then back to sitting on the step in a few quick panels, with no sense of motion in the artwork. It feels like someone cut up the panels and mixed them around, leaving some out.
Then at the end he goes from normal and lucid to bubbles-around-the-head, flushed-cheeks, eyes-half-closed drunk between panels. Again, where are the missing panels?
Anyone can have an off day, bit he doesn't update that often and I know he's creating the book for print, so this really surprises me. I expect better from this comic.
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1:51 am - Blues in the night
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Any week where I get to go dancing twice is guaranteed good times.
I've been getting more into blues dancing lately and have made a bunch of new friends in the dance scene. There's a very popular Tuesday night dance at a Haitian restaurant called Waid's, but it's so popular that it's getting over-crowded. You can hardly turn around without bumping into anyone, and the floorcraft there is not really up to snuff. Seeing the problem, a few people got together to find a new venue to set up another weekly blues night, and found China Harbor, a Chinese restaurant on Lake Union with a nice lounge and dance space.
I've known about the place since I was a kid, but I've never gone because it's a bit intimidating: the building is a huge, several-stories-tall cube with no windows, covered in shiny black tile, sporting a huge neon "China Harbor" sign in bright, tacky colors. It's a damn monolith.
Luckily, it turns out to have a pretty nice, spacious dance floor, plus it's closer to home, starts a little later, and is only $5. I am wholly in favor.
Unfortunately not a lot of people are going yet, but hopefully people will start coming over gradually. Waid's is great, but this is a great alternative. I may start alternating weeks...we'll see.
Our conversation topics this evening included whether Eddie Izzard is hotter in or out of drag, the inherent sexiness of 10 Things I Hate About You, the inherent creepiness of the dude running Harbor Blues, floorcraft, and my friend McLean's upcoming completion of his phd, after which he will become DR. SLOUGHTER and obviously be a supervillain.
Obviously.
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| Wednesday, April 15th, 2009
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3:00 am - Notes to self
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Notes:
- The last bus to Ballard leaves Queen Anne and Mercer at 1:38, not 1:45
- The shoes that are good for dancing are not as good for walking
- There is a lot of broken glass in Interbay
- Yes, as previously surmised it does take about an hour to walk from Lower Queen Anne to Ballard
- Charge your ipod more often
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| Monday, April 13th, 2009
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2:22 pm - Plus I think Kristen Bell was there
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My dream last night involved time travel, high school math homework, two guys I met in Israel, references to the Young Ones, a photograph of Neil Gaiman, the inner-city, small children, a muppet, and jealousy.
I'm just not sure how it all went together.
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| Saturday, April 11th, 2009
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9:31 am - Aretha, Shamretha
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For the record, this photo was taken MONTHS before Aretha Franklin's appearance at the presidential inauguration. I think we all know who was copying who.
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| Friday, April 3rd, 2009
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12:20 pm - Comic Con is GO!
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My dear friend Rachel Dukes of Poseur Ink is coming to Seattle for the Emerald City Comic Con, which is this weekend. You should come and visit us and buy lots of cool stuff. We'll be at table E-14 in Artists Alley.
This will be the first year that the con has been at the Washington State Convention Center, so it'll be bigger and better than ever.
Well, bigger at least.
Other exciting attractions!
* Q&A/reading with Wil Wheaton: Former Starfleet ensign, blogger extraordinaire, and my first celebrity crush
* Jewel Staite, whom you all remember as KATARINA on the classic Nickelodeon show SPACE CASES! Oh, also Firefly.
* Some dudes from Battlestar Galactica, I guess. I dunno.
* Darth Maul!
* Miriam Libicki from Real Gone Girl Studios! In addition to drawing cool comics about her experience in the Israel Defense Forces, she makes cool clothing (see: my black shirt with stars and airplanes on it, and the patch on my green hoodie that says "desire peace and pursue it" in Hebrew)
* Penny Arcade, naturally. I am eagerly anticipating my annual dose of Jerry.
* Tons of other shit, I'm sure.
current music: Jason Webley - Eleven Saints
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| Saturday, March 28th, 2009
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9:20 am - Music To Which You Should Be Listening
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I've been toying with the idea of making this blog a little more directed. It has always been (for the last nine years I've had it, sweet clattering mackerels) a mixture of "this is what I did today," and "here's something amusing to read." I will probably still use it for the "so today work sucked but then I ate a sandwich it was pretty good" variety of posts, but I feel that an emphasis on more article-like entries will force me to focus on my writing more. That's always a good thing.
And so, gentle readers, I bring you the first installment of
Music To Which You Should Be Listening
or
I know better than you, so shut up and buy this
Band O' The Day: Act of Congress
Location: Birmingham, Alabama
In ten words or less: Pop-inspired nouveau bluegrass with a heavy dose of Nickel Creek
Let's get this out of the way right now: Act of Congress loves Nickel Creek. It's stamped all over nearly every one of their songs. In my preview of their show in Brick Weekly (linked below), I said, "Would someone please check on [Nickel Creek's] Chris Thile? I think Act of Congress’ mandolin player Adam Wright may have killed him and eaten his brain in order to gain his powers. Or something similar." They even look a bit alike, and there's a vocal similarity as well. It's...it's kind of creepy.
However, I've decided to forgive them their slight crutch, and you should give them a chance to change your mind too. These kids, to put it briefly, sound fantastic. The young quartet has taken the sacred combination of mandolin, fiddle, guitar, and bass, and blended in indie-pop creativity built on a solid singer/songwriter foundation. Particularly in the light of both Nickel Creek's untimely demise and Chris Thile's recent penchant for artsy-fartsy classical crossovers, Act of Congress is the best thing going for nouveau bluegrass that I've heard yet.
Their first album, Declaration, is currently only available on iTunes, but when they release a physical edition I will be on that in one and a half shakes of a lamb's tail. The songs they have for sampling on their MySpace show a variety of musical styles and fairly strong songwriting that I imagine will only grow as they go on. If you don't mind the similarities and can stand the occasional Jesus reference, you'd do right to give them a try.
Currently they're only touring around their area, but I can only imagine they're fantastic live. If I am very good and eat all my vegetables, perhaps they'll come northerly in the near future.
Official: http://www.actofcongressmusic.com/
MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/actofcongress
My other review: http://www.brickweekly.com/index.php/events/article/do_it/
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8:53 am - Twittering Idiocy
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Ok, you win. I signed up for Twitter.
I resisted for some time, but finally my friend Ronen talked me into it. I resisted because, really, do I need another way to waste time on the internet? Between LJ, MySpace, Facebook, Tumblr, HitRecord, and Rian's forum, I already spend way more time online than I'd like. And those are just the sites I check regularly. We're not counting the days where I get sucked into Cake Wrecks or Photoshop Disasters.
In light of that, I have set myself some very strict Twittering rules.
I will:
Use Twitter to follow people I don't have contact with any other way
Follow people who actually post something interesting or amusing
Try to make my own posts interesting or amusing, not "dude I just ate a sandwich"
Only post about sandwiches if they are really, really good
I will not:
Follow people I know as a matter of course
Automatically follow people who follow me
Follow people who post their Twittering to LJ
Feel bad for not following friends
Use the word "tweet"
You can follow me, if you want, @realsarahalyse (because some moldy whore already registered sarahalyse).
Really, it all comes down to the fact that Stephen Fry uses Twitter. If the greatest interpreter of the English language since Wilde himself uses Twitter, who am I to judge?
current music: Act of Congress - In the Middle
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| Friday, March 20th, 2009
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2:35 am - Into the great wide open
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I just got back from finally hanging out with the mysterious neighbors, Ryan and Gibson. I went out with the Muffins tonight for Erin's birthday, and had just come home, tired and slightly tipsy, when Gibson came and knocked on my door. They had a couple friends over, so we all hung out and talked and listening to music for a few hours before I had to trot off to bed. Topics of conversation included what a jerk Charles Bukowski is, the timeless nature of Tom Petty's music, and how awesome Mates of State are. They played me some of the music I've been hearing them record over there, and it's actually pretty good. They covered the song from the freaking Goofy Movie, for crissakes. My kinda people.
Ryan had this old, awesome mandolin that someone had given him that was way out of tune. I asked if I could borrow it and tune it up, and he said sure. I am very excited now that I have a pretty, fancy mandolin to play with for awhile, since I've only ever played on my (beloved, but admittedly cheap and pretty basic) mando. Plus, they gave me an open invite to come jam with them, so hopefully we'll do some collaborating in the future.
This was after my office closed early so we could all go bowling and eat yummy food, all compliments of HSN, and the announcement that the office will be closed tomorrow. All in all, a damn good day.
Edit: Their friend Robbie ( just knocked on my door... )
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| Saturday, March 14th, 2009
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1:03 am - Bloody big jobs
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That's two nights in a row I have been seriously inconvenienced and been in physical pain as a result. I may just stay in the house all day tomorrow, just to be safe.
I guess I'd have to leave at some point, though. For pie.
current music: Bomb The Music Industry - Even Winning Feels Bad
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| Tuesday, March 10th, 2009
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11:43 pm - I'd let you choose the blue
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Update time!
I did not go to Vancouver. Fuck.
Our ride caved and we exhausted all other options before resigning to a weekend stateside. Instead, I went to see Teens In Heat and Black Houses at El Corazon and, since ElC shows are so ding dang early, had time to walk to the Funhouse and catch Steel Tigers of Death. If I'm going to miss an awesome show in Vancouver, I am damned well going to attend as many other shows as humanly possible!
So, turns out that putting a band together is hard. Who knew? Oh yeah: everyone. The other guitarist we met with didn't really pan out, but I have Sparky and my brother and this accordioniste chick who e-mailed me, so times are good. If I didn't already have this planned, I would totally try and join these guys. I saw them at the Ballard farmer's market last Sunday and was duly impressed. They seem to have a similar idea as I concerning what songs are hilarious and awesome to cover on weird acoustic instruments.
I have been running myself ragged lately. I keep desperately wanting a few evenings to just chill at home and do housework, but then something awesome comes up, and what can I do? Last night Ryan and I went to Mai Li & Nicol's play, and afterward Mai Li talked us into joining her for a Purim party hosted by JConnect, RavButz, and Jew-ish.com. Had a surprisingly good time, considering that JConnect events tend to be full of people I'd rather not run into.
The Seattle Jewish community, she is small.
Tonight I finally dragged my ass to one of Joel & Zan's shows. They're a couple of regulars from Splatters that Diana and I befriended, and I kept promising to go see their band and then wussing out or forgetting. I honestly felt bad for it, since Joel is a dear. Their band, The Cold Cold Ground, was playing a free show tonight at the Comet, so how could I say no? Of the three people who said they'd meet me there, precisely 0 actually showed up, but fuck 'em. I met one of Joel's friends named Paul, who seems a decent chap, and we chatted a good bit.
The opening band was...well. They'd benefit greatly from having a real drummer and bassist, I will say that. It was hard to appreciate anything the two guitarists were doing (yes, it was just two guitarists) whilst being so distracted by the dry, heartless, prerecorded drums. Zack Somebody and the Somethings, I can't quite recall the name.
Now the Cold Cold Ground, they really impressed me. I had heard a bit of their stuff back when I first met them and they were called The Curiosities, and sort of shrugged it off. This, however...this was good. They have serious potential, and for once that isn't a nice way of saying that they suck. According to Paul they were not in top form, so I look forward very much to seeing them again. Joel, whom I had previously categorized as a very nice, quiet sort of fellow, turns out to be a bit of a wildcat on stage. I approve.
Dear everyone who keeps shelling out for Murder City Devils "reunion shows,"
Stop encouraging them and go see the Cold Cold Ground instead.
DO IT.
love,
Sarah
current music: Mates of State - I Have Space | Powered by Last.fm
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12:34 am - Does the Bishop of Canterbury know you talk like this?
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OH MAN. OHHHHH MAN.
The History Boys.
Is finally.
Playing.
In Seattle.
Yeaaaaah. I'm a little excited.
The History Boys, in case you've been living under a rock, is a Tony award-winning play by Alan Bennett that was made into a movie a few years ago, which quickly became one of my all-time favorites of ever. I have seen it...let's not talk about how many times I have seen it.
I have dreamed of seeing the play live ever since I discovered the film, and now, finally, that dream can become a reality. Seeing the original cast in the first West End run is in my top ten list of "Things To Do If You Had a Time Machine."*
I'd love to get a group together to all go see it, so check out all the details on the Facebook invite: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=55213174500
*This is, of course, assuming the try-not-to-drastically-change-history-and/or-erase-your-own-existence rule. No throttling Hitler in his cradle or telling the Titanic designers, "Hey guys, about those lifeboats..."
The list also includes seeing Harry Chapin live, going to pretty much any show at CBGBs, and attending the Bordertown party in LA in the late 90s.
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| Sunday, March 8th, 2009
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7:18 pm - Where the trees bear flowers of gold
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Between "Midlothian," "Brandermill," and "Shockoe Bottom," I am beginning to think that all cities and neighborhoods in Virginia were named by Tolkien geeks.
Seriously.
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