This makes me super sad. Part of it is a selfish grief for fans who truly enjoy Patrick Stump's music, no matter the format, but the majority of it is for him.

I want to give him a big hug and tell him to ignore haters. But I'm not the one who has to deal with them, so it's easy for me to say that. I just don't understand why people go out of their way to be negative. Isn't there enough shit in life? Why generate more?

It's sort of ironic, b/c I was at a show earlier tonight (I actually bailed on the moshpit mid-way through the final set because I needed a drink, and I read the tumblr post while standing at the back of the House of Blues), and at one point the drummer for Frank Turner's band, the Sleeping Souls, was tuning a guitar and playing drums and singing back-up, and I was like, "Oooh, multi-talented!" and it made me think of Patrick doing his drum solos and singing, and I wanted to come home after the Dropkick Murphys' set and watch a bunch of YouTube videos of Frank Turner and PStump and Dropkick, and flail happily about music.

Well, I got one part of my wish: flailing, minus the happiness. :/

(FYI: FRANK TURNER. HOLY HELL, THAT VERSION OF LONG LIVE THE QUEEN. ♥__♥)

1. Last week when I stopped at Sbux for coffee (for the first time in ages, because taking the commuter bus changes my proximity to caffeinated temptation) the barista gave me a receipt with info to take a survey in return for a free drink. Took the survey. On Sunday, when I came to work (uninterrupted time with the workstation in the imaging facility; I spent a half-day doing image deconvolution, which actually was a productive use of time) I stopped in for a tall black-eye. The barista waiting on me saw the free drink note and asked why I didn't get a large or a fancier drink, since it was free. Because I won't drink a venti black-eye before it gets cold, and I don't generally like the fancier drinks unless I'm looking for dessert. But she didn't understand that. "But you could get a large." "Yes, but it'd be a waste." "But..." "No, really. Thanks for the tall." Is it that hard to understand that I don't NEED a large, just because it's available? I blame McDonald's and super-sizing.

2. There was not enough flailing on my part or LJ's part (possibly there was on tumblr, but I have to avoid it b/c it's rage-inducing) about Patrick Stump on Leno. The keyboardist with the hair (Studz? I can't remember his name.) was back! Matt had the mega-bass! Mike Day looked dapper! And Patrick in the blue tuxedo!!!! Sometimes bands (*cough* Cobra Starship *cough*) don't sound particularly good when they do a tv show - it's a difficult thing to balance sound so that it's good for the studio audience and the tv audience - but I thought they sounded decent. It is possible that I will make jmc_bks watch the last five minutes of the recording over and over when she visits later this week for birthday and turkey-day shenanigans. (She will be here in one-and-a-half days. :D)

3. In addition, it is quite likely that we will watch the London ATP finals. Roger and Rafa get their tennis on against each other today. :D :D Daveeed won yesterday, I understand, although I have not yet had a chance to watch the match.

4. If you care enough about a fic idea to write 80k words, why don't you care enough to make sure it's not sloppily punctuated, missing words, or that a historical figure's name is not mis-spelled (multiple times/ways)?

5. Book club. D: We discussed Room the other night. I suggested The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, but was vetoed because it's non-fiction. The group wants to read a romance or erotica. Which is fine, but I asked that it at least be well-written. So instead of the people who want to read a romance choosing a book, they asked me to.

Yeah. I've got nothing against the idea, but that's not really the genre of books I follow in any consistent way. Most of the romance or porn I read is on the internet.

Why don't the people who DO read regularly in that category suggest a book? IDK. But I've got a list of author suggestions, and the request that the books be contemporary (urban fantasy is okay) but not m/m romance. And with lots of sex. Just... SRSLY? If you've got a specific request you pick the damn book, and I'll pick something I want to read for my turn.

6. Work. This manuscript is going out in the next 48 hours. Other than final edits, I AM DONE WITH IT.

7. There were hangtimes with eckerlilas and her adorable boys. I missed shutyourface b/c I had to leave early, but hopefully we'll all get together again some time sooooon. We need to get on this fangirl commune thing, because only seeing each other when it's tour-time isn't cool.

I am sure there's other stuff I was going to say, but I should probably post this before it hits the two-week mark in my drafts folder. ♥

I have to write this out or I'll forget it. And half the time everyone involved remembers little bits that others didn't so if we put all the recaps together, we get a fuller picture.

( Panic/Patrick shenanigans, cut for pictures and lengthy babble )

1. Rough draft of my we_pimpin fic is pretty much done. It needs a day before I go back and edit, then ship it off to beta.

2. Lesa & Katie (you can see her photos here) both wrote up the PStump shenanigans, and I don't have much to add. Except that I'm really excited for his next tour. And I am still ridiculously amused by the height difference here (HE IS SO TINY!), but at the time it felt weird to be so gigantic in comparison, so I slumped a bit the next time.

3. I want to read or write something to go with this photo. Yes? I don't even care what fandom, or if it's original fic. Just. The hands, and the pose.

4. I sort of want to take a bite out of Sam Stosur's biceps. They just look so firm and delicious.

And with that random comment, I believe I shall go watch the Ivanovic/Williams match, and then get ready to go up to the CWMP for Seether and A7X.


I hope everybody in the States is having a good Labor Day!

+ Chicago was awesome! Lolla was great, except for the deluge(s) on Sunday. If you check out the Lolla YouTube channel, the video of the Cage The Elephant set? You can't tell, not really, how it was POURING. But it was. We literally could not see Sears Tower through the rain, it came down so hard. And it was still a good time. We were the filthiest. And that was before wading into the poorly drained mud pit that is the north end of Grant Park for the Foo Fighters' set.

Possibly unpopular opinion: I was not that impressed with the Black Cards. Bebe's hot, and the songs are okay, but they didn't hold my attention for the length of the set. (I sort of feel the same about Crystal Castles and DeadMau5: house/dance music is fine, but DNW 30-60 minutes of it unleavened with other beats, especially if it's broad daylight, not a dark, smoky club.) And Pete... just seemed like a frat boy on a rampage. I mean, do your DJing, pimp Patrick, stage dive as much as you want. But throwing what seemed like an endless supply of toilet paper to the crowd to get them to TP everything? Meh.

Patrick Stump, on the other hand? Unf. Gimme all the 90's R&B/hiphop covers in the world, and I'll listen.

Other sets I enjoyed: Friendly Fires (wow, the lead singer looks crazily double-joined at the hip!), Smith Westerns (I thought this set was better than the one at Bonnaroo), My Morning Jacket (ditto), Muse (not quite as good as the ACL set last year), Damien Marley & Nas, Ellie Goulding, Lykke Li, Explosions In The Sky.

+ Work. Eh. Good stuff, bad stuff. Spent a lot of time doing imaging lately. I ranted in an email-chain entry about Student. IDK. At this point, I wonder if he's even going to meet the deadlines to defend his master's thesis before the end of the fall term. Also, the med students are back, which makes me >:/ with their need to take the elevator one fucking floor, to walk in packs the full width of the hallway at an extremely slow pace, and to generally get in my way.

+ I got my we_pimpin assignment! I'm sort of excited about it! And I am rewatching GK for some inspiration. :D :D :D

+ Took the laptop to the Apple Store. Explained that I thought the fan needed to be replaced. The guy reset the battery, and the fan didn't come on for the 10 or so minutes that he fiddled with things. I told him that I'd reset the SMC myself, and that I thought the fans still needed to be cleaned and or replaced. He said the battery reset should fix it. But I've had it booted for approximately 10 minutes with nothing but the text editor and firefox open, and the fan's going like mad. So we'll see. Everything's backed up, at least.

+ Attending a lingerie shower/bachelorette party tonight. I... don't really want to go? I'm not that close to the bride - the groom is better friends with A than I am with the bride - and I am tired of the continuous round of engagement party, bachelorette party, wedding gift shopping for people who have been working and living together long enough not to actually need a shower in order to furnish a new home. Plus, I have work to do tomorrow, and getting sloppy drunk is not on my agenda for the evening. Ugh, when did I start being a grown-up? But anyway, skimpy "goth" schoolgirl outfit assembled for the bride, since the groom has a fetish. (NGL, it sort of skeeves me to know that about him.)

+ Now to backread what I've missed over the last ten days or so. &youguys;


I tried to post at DW, and apparently since I changed my username here since I set up the crossposting info at DW, it's having issues? IDK. Whatever. Comment here, there, or not at all.

That high-pitched shriek you heard a couple of hours ago? That was me, realizing that Patrick Stump is going to be in Texas on his tour, 26-28 August. SMALL VENUE AWESOMENESS. :D :D :D

In other news:

1. Sasha is back in my possession. I love my car. I live in the 'burbs, and I drive an unfortunate amount, and I MISSED MY iPod DOCK AND MY DECENT GAS MILEAGE AND MY EZPASS. Now I have them back, and Sasha is pretty and shiny again. My commute time is halved. I am marginally less cranky at the end of my work day now. Marginally.

2. Finished Tropic of Chaos. It's an interesting read, examining what Parenti calls the "catastrophic convergence" of climate change and political/economic policy of the Global North as applied to the Global South. [For GK fans, you'll be amused to hear that when citing The Age of Consequences: The Foreign Policy National Security Implications of Global Climate Change, a product of CNAS & CSIS, Parenti says that it was produced by "the most scientifically literate of the lot" of DC think-tanks.]

3. Is anyone else planning on going to the Empires show in Austin on the 18th?