I Will Return (Probably)

Here is the problem with trying to return to my blog. I have no idea what to write about. So apparently, I am going to write about not knowing what to write about.

I quit blogging for Twitter. And then I quit Twitter because it sucks. I have Facebook, but it's really just to post pics of my kid so distant family can see her, and to brag about my travels. I'm too old for Snapchat and mostly dgaf about Instagram. I miss having a place to just write, whether it's in-depth feelings about something or just quick hits of random thoughts. So it seems like going back to blogging might be a good solution for me.

But when it comes down to it, I don't know what to write anymore. I have so many opinions and a lot to say, but when I sit down to write, I can't find the topics. I mean, an obvious one for me is politics, since it occupies such a yuuuuge part of my brain, but at some point I need a mental break from the dumpster fire that our Cheeto Overlord hath wrought upon us. I don't feel like writing about his traitorous ass, honestly. Another topic is just life in general, because I have a lot to say about what's up with me. My life is good and my life is fun. That's what I should be able to talk about here. But I don't know who might someday re-find my blog and read something mean-ish that I've said about them. I don't want to hurt the people I care about. (If I don't care about you? Well, you are probably mostly fucked if I get back into this blogging thing.) Travel? Yeah, I guess I could talk about that. It's something I am passionate about and even on our shortest trips there are a million stories I could share. If you knew how many travel blogs I have started and then never posted a single entry...yeah, I just don't think I am cut out for writing all the details of my trips with hotel reviews and recommendations and all that. That's not for me.

Really, when it comes down to it, the truth is that no one reads this. No one. Not even me, mostly. So I can say whatever I want, I suppose. I would love a place where I can let loose the way I used to, where I can talk about how crazy I can be and rant and rave about stupid tv shows and recap drunken soirees and be silly.

I don't know. I think I am just going to set a goal to write something, anything, even something as meaningless and time-wastey as what I have just written, just to get that writing muscle going inside me again.

Here's to another attempt at blogging *prost*
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Some brainstormed topics for when I am stuck:

• Nerves about Seattle
• New bosses at work
• Drama between S & Y at work
• Beer escapades upstate
• Parents aging
• My shoe obsession
• Traveling with SIL
• TJK and Sweggy
• JV's dad's funeral
• Music I'm listening to

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So for real, I always love listing what songs I am into right this minute because it's fun to look back on it and determine which songs I loved so much that I played them so much that I got so sick of them that I wanted to die, and which songs I loved for a minute and then discarded, and which songs I loved and loved and loved and continued to love and will always love. Here is today's list...some new, some old, some really old:

• hell is where i dreamt of u and woke up alone (blackbear)
• Where's My Love? (SYML)
• My Crass Patch (Dads)
• Do You Know What I Love the Most? (Saves the Day)
• Silver Lining (Panic! at the Disco)
• Say Amen (Panic! at the Disco
• Over and Over and Over (Jack White)
• Take a Picture (Filter)
• Erotic City (Prince)
• Conspiracy (RSRC)
• Jumpsuit (21 Pilots)
• Nico & the Niners (21 Pilots)

Dear Diary (and Current Playlist)

(I think its more of a diary than a blog if the only person who reads it is the author, yeah?)

In exactly 10 days, almost to the minute, we leave for New Orleans! It is one of my favorite places on the planet and it's funny: we were last there in 2007, about 18 months after Katrina. We didn't go back for 10 years. Then, we went in June 2017 and are going again in March 2018! Last year, it was just the hubby and I. I had a business trip, and he joined me, and it was glorious. This time, it'll be a group of 7 of us (the way we used to travel to NO) and it shall be glorious as well.

Ten years ago, we spent most of our time on Bourbon and Decatur Streets in the French Quarter. Cheap booze and debauchery were all the rage and we lived every second to its fullest. The 2017 version of us had us spend a little time in the Quarter, hitting our favorite classic spots (like Lafitte's for voodoo daiquiris and Tropical Isle for Hand Grenades). The rest of the time, we head out to the neighborhoods to see what else the city had to offer (still focused on the booze, of course). It felt like a classier way to get drunk and be crazy: a whirlwind of craft breweries, fancy cocktail bars, tiki lounges, and wine laboratories. To me, this was perfection. My husband and me, flitting around the city, trying every drink and every yummy morsel we were offered. Chilling. Relaxing. Chatting with locals and tourists alike. Literally slowing down, sitting and having a drink, enjoying the hum of the city.

I am curious to see how this trip will go down. This may come off snobby but it's a fact: we have more money than some of our friends, and/or we are more willing to spend money than some of our friends. So we will sit in a fancy cocktail joint and drink scotch for hours; some of them can't or won't. We can work with that. We can be flexible. But at the same time, I don't want to drink piss beer on Bourbon all week, or shy away from the awesome things we experienced the last time around because some folks can't hang. So it is going to be interesting to see how compromise works with 7 bull-headed friends. I'm hoping for the best.
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On another weird note, we hung out with Patsy and Diddy (and Diddy's cousin) this weekend and it came up in discussion that I am meaner than Patsy. She is louder than I am...but she is all bark with no bite and I am the bite that follows the bark. I don't know how I feel about this. I mean, I don't mind that people know that my bark is not hollow and it will be followed by a generous and painful bite. But I guess I thought I was nicer than Patsy. Maybe our definitions of "nice" are different. I am definitely more thoughtful and conscientious of other people's feelings...but I guess I am the type where if you do cross me, there is hell to pay and perhaps with her, there is something slightly less than hell? I don't know, it just struck me as strange.
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And I am going to add in my current playlist, because I am so digging a few songs right now and I want to remember them when I move to something else:

1. Where's My Love (SYML) <---- OBSESSED with this song, so obsessed.
2. Dear Love of Mine (Daniel Spaleniak)
3. Do You Still Love Me? (Ryan Adams)
4. Don't Hurt Yourself (Beyonce with Jack White)
5. hell is where i dreamt of you and woke up alone (blackbear)
6. Yellow Flicker Beat (Lorde)
7. Quiet Lies (Matthew Mayfield)
8. I Am Mine (Pearl Jam)
9. Your Ghost (Kristin Hersch)
10. Cranes in the Sky (Solange)

Today's Playlist

Here's what I am playing on repeat today:

1. Don't Hurt Yourself - Beyonce f/ Jack White
2. Jolene - White Stripes
3. Stop Crying - Bobby Bare, Jr.
4. Right Turn - Alice in Chains f/ Chris Cornell
5. Nutshell - Aaron Lewis 
6. Midlife Crisis - Faith No More
7. Whenever We Wanted - John Mellencamp
8. Emily - From First to Last
9. Criminal - Fiona Apple
10. I Want You So Hard - Pearl Jam
11. A Deep Slow Panic - AFI

Mostly all old-school there, and several cover songs. The only new ones are Beyonce and Pearl Jam. I'm always obsessed with Pearl Jam, and I've always liked and admired Beyonce but with her Lemonade release, I'm really enjoying her.

This is a really strange mix of music, now that I look at it. A little sad and wistful, despite me not feeling that way at all. 

The Soundtrack of My Life

Music has always been a driving force in my life. Even now, if I hear a certain song it will bring me right back to that moment in time in my mind, no matter how long ago that moment might be, I feel like I have a running soundtrack to my life....and here it is:

The Beatles - Octopus' Garden:
The Beatles - Her Majesty
John Cougar - Pink Houses:
The Manhattans - Shining Star:
Van Halen - Jump:
Don Henley - Boys of Summer:
Grease 2 Soundtrack - Back to School:
Guns n' Roses - Patience:
John Cougar Mellencamp - Wild Nights
John Cougar Mellencamp - Last Chance
Pearl Jam - Even Flow:
Pearl Jam - Black:
Hole - Violet:
Van Halen - Why Can't This Be Love?
Husker Du - Could You Be The One?:
Soup Dragons - I'm Free:
Goo Goo Dolls - Two Days in February:
Fugazi - Margin Walker:
Four Seasons - Can't Take My Eyes Off You:
Destiny's Child - Lose My Breath:
White Stripes - Fell in Love With a Girl:
Hole - Beautiful Son:
John Mellencamp - Lonely Ol' Night
White Stripes - Seven Nation Army:
My Chemical Romance - Famous Last Words:
Lana Del Rey - basically all of Born To Die:
The Beatles - Her Majesty (again, for a different reason):
Miley Cyrus - Wrecking Ball:
Pearl Jam - Sirens:

I was going to write a little about each song and why it struck a chord with me at particular times in my life...but I decided not to do that. I truly don't need to write it out, because when I just look at the title of a song, it brings me to the pink houses we rented every summer down the shore, or dancing with friends at the Johnny Cougar concert, or my husband yelling at me to turn down the White Stripes and me turning it up even louder. A whole story on each isn't needed because when I hear the song, I see the whole picture in my mind. Music is such a wonderful thing!

(And, if you really need to see how wordy I can get with these memories, read this about the song Even Flow and how it changed the course of my life.)

Today's Playlist

Here's what I'm listening to today (there's some new-to-me stuff I'm digging, which is a change from me having the same 40 songs on repeat all day, errry day):

1. Hello - Adele (sorry, this one has me. My cousin and I have an inside joke going with it, and it just made me love it more.)
2. Fall to Pieces - Velvet Revolver (RIP Scott Weiland)
3. The Knock - Hop Along
4. Waitress - Hop Along
5. Sprained Ankle - Julien Baker
6. Too Late To Die Young - Beach Slang
7. Come Undone - Duran Duran (bringin' it back)
8. Drown - Bring Me The Horizon (still love this song; I just can't quit it)
9. Fall in Love - Phantogram
10. Love, Reign O'er Me - Pearl Jam
11. Hard to Imagine - Pearl Jam
12. Paralyzed - Failure Anthem (kinda cheesy generic fake-metal ballad, but I like it)

Today's Playlist

Playing in my office today:

1. Ex's and Oh's - Ellie King
2. Drown - Bring Me The Horizon
3. Fall In Love - Phantogram
4. Something From Nothing - Foo Fighters
5. Corduroy - Pearl Jam
6. Stardog Champion - Mother Love Bone
7. Tennessee - Arrested Development
8. Bag - White Lung
9. Northern Lights - 30 Seconds to Mars
10. Pretty Noose - Soundgarden

Today's Playlist

1. Mene, Brand New
2. Drown, Bring Me The Horizon
3. Everlong, The Color Morale
4. Love is Blindness, Jack White
5. Hard To Imagine, Pearl Jam
6. I Bought My Eyes, Ty Segal Band
7. Something From Nothing, Foo Fighters
8. A Deep Slow Panic, AFI
9. Chandelier (Piano Version), Sia
10. Left of Center, Suzanne Vega

Note: When the song Chandelier came out, all I could do was sing in my worst voice "the chan-DA- LIIIEEEEERRRRR!!!" I thought it was really pretty annoying, even if the singer's voice was good. Then I heard the piano version and while I still sing that part in my worst voice (because it's truly the only voice  I've got), I started to love it. I looked up the lyrics and really fell in love because it seemed to actually suit me pretty well:

Party girls don't get hurt

Can't feel anything, when will I learn

I push it down, push it down

I'm the one "for a good time call"

Phone's blowin' up, ringing my doorbell

I feel the love, feel the love...

I'm gonna live like tomorrow doesn't exist...

I'm gonna fly like a bird through the night

Feel my tears as they dry

I'm gonna swing from the chandelier

LOVE THIS.