asimplechord

I had some stuff to ramble about, but first:



A bajillion times more awesome than Milan Lucic's bank commercial.

+ I chose the next book club book. I picked Robin McKinley's Sunshine, because even though I've already read it, I feel like it's something that most people might like? IDK, we all have such different things we look for in books that none of us has really been pleased with any of the choices, so. Eh. At least I know I liked this one the first time through. Sent the email out, and immediately got a reply: but it's not available for Kindle. My reply: DOES THAT MEAN YOU MIGHT HAVE TO ACTUALLY BUY OR BORROW A PHYSICAL COPY? OH, THE HORROR!

~ A & I talked about playing hooky and going to the day game the Aeros play against the Rampage on 11Dec, but he just realized that he has meetings he can't miss that day. I sort of want to play hooky and go by myself anyway?

+ A+ to the waiter who served us at the Queen Vic, who brought me a glass of prosecco that was probably a good 8 oz, rather than the normal flute of sparkling wine. Also, he was pretty indulgent of a group of ladies who wanted a lot of wine and to occupy his table for longer than a normal dinner would take.

- Trying to decide about going to the Cobra Starship show in ATX tomorrow. I mean, I want to, because Cobra. But a) drive, b) so much shit to do on Saturday.

+ Possibly King Animal will be on repeat for a while. Or maybe just Non-State Actor. Thank you, Kim, Ben, Matt, and Chris.

It's been a while!

Since I last posted, I:

1. had a why_me_why_not visit

2. induced said visitor to watch Generation Kill

3. saw Cobra Starship and Travie (twice). There were some other bands involved. I actually enjoyed I Fight Dragons for the novelty of using a Nintendo and DDR as instruments. Not so much the random addition of Jay Sean and other individuals to the lineup. You know your attitude is bad when a singer sarcastically thanks the ladies at the barrier who are obviously present to see the next act rather than him.

4. went to Bonnaroo. It was amaaaaaaaazing. We had VIP passes this year, so we didn't have to wait in the 16 mile line (no, really, sixteen miles on I-24 from the east, and another sixteen mile line on the opposite side of the highway, coming from Nashville), and our campsite was RIDICULOUSLY close to the What Stage. In fact, for the headliners' sets, we and others put our camp chairs out in front of the tents and partied instead of going into the paddock with the other 75k attendees. I've seen Kings of Leon before, but they were on FIRE Friday night - I guess it was the equivalent of a hometown show for them. Stevie Wonder and JayZ put on a couple of amazing sets. Weezer, The National, Gaslight Anthem, Regina Spektor, Against Me!, pretty much everyone I saw was awesome. I even saw The Young Veins' set. It was smoother, less disjointed, than the SXSW set I saw, and Ryan was better at being the frontman. There were a LOT of dudebros in the crowd cheering for them, and one yelled a request for Behind The Sea, which Ryan said he would play if only he could remember it, which made me LOL for multiple reasons. JWalk's flipflops returned, as you might imagine, since it was ~100F at Bonnaroo every day; Ryan Ross even broke a sweat. Slightly. After the set, I went over to the beer tent to get a cold one, and on my way back to the Which Stage, I ran into Andy, and talked to him for a bit about the Rooney tour and such. RyRo was there, standing off to the side talking to a fan, and as I was bidding Andy good luck their minder dragged them away for an interview with SPIN. IDK who they know at SPIN, but SPIN is giving them serious face time. Which, you know, good for them, I guess. I wouldn't care about it one way or the other if it didn't seem like Ryan Ross was trying to publicly retcon Panic At The Disco into something that only he and Jon Walker contributed to, artistically. That would be an interesting trick since JWalk joined the band well after the first album was released. And hit platinum, no? You'd think I'd be past being disappointed when he lies in interviews, since he was never my favorite. But apparently I'm still sort of invested in the douches after all.

Anyway. It was wicked hot all four days, and we ended up not staying for Dave Matthews Band (I know, ppl think I'm crazy but I am not a fan) on the last day, but overall I had an awesome time. So did Aaron. And I didn't come home with pneumonia requiring three weeks' sick leave this time, which is a total bonus!

Best sets by bands I hadn't seen before: Lucero, The xx, Blitzen Trapper.

5. spent many hours parked in front of a microscope. Indirect immunofluorescence is one of my least favorite things to do. Mostly because a lot of what I'm looking at seems so subjective. First, count cells with multiple nuclei. Then count how many cells have 1, 2, or >2 centrosomes. Then count how many focal adhesions there are per cell. And, okay, while you're at it, go back and determine cell area for each specific cell you counted FAs, so you can express that as FA per unit area. D:

6. started seriously plotting a Generation Kill/American Idiot crossover. It sort of presumes that Brad doesn't go to the UK after the initial invasion of Iraq - maybe the deal with the RM fell through for some stupid paperwork-related reason? Alternatively, I suppose I could shift Tunny joining the military to 2006, when Brad would be back at Pendleton after his stint in Devon, before 1st Marines shipped back to Iraq. I sort of prefer the idea of having it set in spring of 2004 for historical reasons, though. Suggestions?


I am past all hope of catching up on LJ after being AWOL for so long, so if anyone has a post (fic! pics! life news!) that I should see, link me please! ♥

1. How is Alex Suarez simultaneously such a nerd and a hotass?

via suareasy

2. JFC, Stark Sands in American Idiot. I might need to visit NYC for this. I'm definitely watching the Grammy's for it.

3. Sometimes people suck. Srsly:

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club's personal storage locker was broken into and Michael Been's (Robert's dad and our sound man) had his vintage equipment stolen. Items were 1954 Fender Esquire (Yellow with Black Pick Guard), 1968 Ampeg Scrolltop Fretless Bass, 1964 Black Fender Precision Bass and a 1968 Gretsch Country Gentleman Single Cutaway. Please repost this and help spread the word - these items were extremely personal and the band, Michael, crew and management are devastated over this brazen act. Thank you.

4. My sister gave me her copy of Twilight. I keep meaning to read it for its bad-fic qualities and for mocking purposes, but somehow never get to it. Instead, I'm re-reading the Sookie Stackhouse mysteries (Well, I originally only read the first three. But I found cheap used copies of the next few, so I'm reading them, too). I can't quite bring myself to watch True Blood, but I'm enjoying imagining Alexander Skarsgard as Eric. Mostly, as I read, I'm annoyed at how Harris brutalizes or assaults her narrator over and over and over again, physically, emotionally, and sexually. Is the TV show as consistently violent as the books? I watched a grand total of five minutes before turning it off, sometime back in the first season.

5. I have three episodes of House, plus last week's SPN to watch yet. *sigh* So far behind. But I *did* watch this week's White Collar. Pretty Neil is pretty.

+ Ginger werewolves? Oh god, do I need another plot bunny, given my lack of attention to the last eleventy-billion? (I'm sure why_me_why_not and I could work into the werewolf universe we already started, if only we weren't so unmotivated at present.)

+ Somehow, the coffee that was labeled as Ethiopian fair trade at the grocery store turned out to be something flavored. I poured a bunch of it into the hopper of our coffee machine last night and set it to grind & brew a pot for this morning, and what came out was some weird-ass crap that was NOT what I wanted a sip of while sitting at a red light during my commute. >:/

+ I am still finding things the Idiot did and cursing him. Srsly, he left this lab months ago; there shouldn't be anything left of his fuck-ups. But no. A few weeks ago, I needed to thaw some new MCF7 cells. According to the inventory of our LN2 dewar, they should be on hook 4, box 3. Nope, nothing that was supposed to be on that hook was there; it looked like the contents of hook 3. So I took out the hook in slot 3, and its contents... appeared to be the contents of hook 6, according to the inventory. Hook 6 contained the contents of what should have been hook 4.

Then TODAY. Today I needed something from hook 5, and it turned out that the hook in the #5 slot actually contained all the cell lines listed for hook 2.

*headdesk*

There's really no way to fuck that up unless you have ALL of the hooks out at once. Which should NEVER happen. Unless you're a dumbass, and you forget to clasp the boxes in their racks, and when you tip the hook sideways to get it into the dewar, you spill the contents into the bottom of the 60-liter container of liquid nitrogen. Because THEN you have to take every last thing out, dump out the nitrogen (into a styrofoam cooler or some such), flip over the dewar to get the samples out, then refill the dewar and hope you noted which hook was which. Which, actually, we used to have them color-coded, but the colored paint has worn off since the last time I inventoried. I don't want to know. I really don't. I just hope everything is back where it should be now.

+ Happy place for the morning( : )

+ Happy place for the afternoon( : )

Day 01 → My favorite song
Day 02 → My favorite movie
Day 03 → My favorite television program
Day 04 → My favorite book
Day 05 → My favorite quote
Day 06 → Whatever strikes my fancy
Day 07 → A photo that makes me happy
Day 08 → A photo that makes me sad
Day 09 → A photo that I took
Day 10 → A photo of me, taken at least 10 years ago
Day 11 → A photo of me, taken recently
Day 12 → Whatever strikes my fancy
Day 13 → A fictional book
Day 14 → A non-fictional book
Day 15 → A fanfic
Day 16 → A song that makes me cry (or almost)
Day 17 → A piece of art

Day 18 → Whatever tickles my fancy

I was going to blog about Gabe Saporta telling tonight's audience not to let anyone tell you what you can't do, and then proceeding to sing the radio/parent-approved versions of their songs, censoring himself for the radio-sponsored, Justin Bieber-adoring children in the audience.

But I am tired and mostly happy that I got to see Suarez slap Ryland's ass and the glittery Tyson & Nick show. (Srsly, interpretative dance. IDEK what drugs he's on, but they must be good.)

So here, ( have a photo while I sleep on it: )
More on the subject tomorrow. ♥

The other night at the 30STM show, the band sold hard copies of This Is War (complete with promises to hang out after the show and sign every one of them) before the official release date. Leto talked about their plan to have 2000 different fan photos grace the cover.

I sort of wish I'd stayed & gotten one with Gabe Saporta on it.

I love that he's as much of a fan/participant as we are.



In other news, I am freezing, and I think maybe the leftover Chinese I ate was not a good idea. Wanna take a long, hot bath and see if I feel up to going to Scout Bar for Bowling For Soup.

~ The Revolting Cocks are touring with Blownload? There's a joke there, I'm sure of it.

~ JWalk just made me ♥_♥ at him for the first time in a long while.

~ Gabe has his own clothing line too? IDEK what to say. Except that I hope it doesn't include purple hoodies and other day-glo attire.

~ I know this isn't news: Ticketmaster is such a rip-off. Fuck you, no, I'm not paying $10 in fees on a $15 ticket. I'll pick it up from the box office when I'm in the vicinity for some other show reason.

~ \o/ Angels! (Even if I missed House b/c of scheduling conflicts with your epic game.)

~ I would like work-related people to stop following me on Twitter. It makes it awkward when I bitch about work problems.



Sandy is perched on the back of the sofa right behind me, and she's grooming. The wet sound of her tongue against her fur makes me shudder. WHY CAN'T SHE GO DO THAT ELSEWHERE? Like, seriously, ANYWHERE ELSE IN THE HOUSE!

J is in so much trouble. SO MUCH.

She complained last week that whenever she listened to The Scene Is Dead, she imagined all the Cobras dancing around, dressed in old-fashioned sailor suits. You know the ones - white with navy trim, bell-bottom pants and all?

Now EVERY TIME that song comes up on shuffle, I picture this.

THIS IS NOT RIGHT.

(It just came up on my iPod, which is why I'm bitching about it now.)

( Wot? That is my favorite line from an album FILLED with ridiculous one-liners. )

In conclusion: if Cobra Starship come through TX when I am out of town/state again I am going to look like this: >>>:?

I was going to post about Twinkie, Deconstructed tonight, but I haven't quite gotten over my annoyance with it. So, tomorrow maybe?

Right now I'm going to go watch Conan O'Brian, solely to see the Cobras perform (which will hopefully sound better than their last late-night TV gig). ETA: It sounded a thousand times better than their last late-show performance. Plus, Gabe's antics always amuse me.

1. Does anyone have some Spitalfields to share, trusty f-list? I'll support them (even though the band is broken up) if I like what I hear, I'm just not willing to shell out without a preview.

2. Ugh, exercise. Last night I went running for the first time since... well, since we went to Bonnaroo, before I was sick. I won't tell you how long it took me to run 5K. It was ugly, though. And now I'm coughing again. >:/

And now it's unpopular fandom opinion time:

3. People are so fucking lazy. I was actually tempted to ask if the original poster didn't have access to Google. I mean, seriously, how hard is it to google "Midtown lyrics", and read the lyrics yourself? Or check bandom_primers (or a variety of other places) for Gabe Saporta? But then I thought maybe I was being too bitchy and mean. But seriously? SRSLY? Google the fucking lyrics if you can't be arsed to actually LISTEN to the albums before you ask stupid questions.

4. Alex Greenwald = not really attractive with long hair

5. Um, button your shirt, Ryan Ross. And comb your hair. Bedhead is not a look you need to wear every day.

6. 17 days 'til Chicago. :)

ETA:

LOL at The Young Veins. And their blatant rip-off of The Who and The Kinks. Oh, boys.