amplified to rock
My Sox fan household is cheering: The Sox just kicked the Cubs' asses in extra innings. Haha, Matty! Cubs Magic Number: 911!!
Sorry to break the bad news to you, but Sunny Day Real Estate broke up.
Why do people come to my site for answers to questions like "does Ludacris have a big dick?" Am I supposed to know these things? My favorite search of recent memory is probably "boys wearing pretty pink slippers." That's an interesting fetish. And I can just imagine the person sitting behind their keyboard, frantically typing in their search request for "fucking nookie Russell Crowe." I still don't understand why people get all hot and bothered over him.
From the Musty Archives: The Gift of the Ex-Boyfriend. That story is true, by the way. Scandalous!
Bowling alley tests: Well, I've compiled the bowling alley suggestions that people have sent in, and Tim and I are going to go check a couple of them out this weekend, probably early Saturday evening or Sunday afternoon. If you'd like to bowl a game or two with us,
send me an email with your phone number and I'll call you and let you know when we're going. (Tim doesn't have a computer so I won't have email access over there. I promise not to prank-call you at 4 AM.)
Radiohead fans take note: there's a ticket presale at MTV2.com. The presale starts Thursday, June 14 at 10 AM, and ends on Friday, June 15 at 10 PM (or when the show sells out). If buying Radiohead tickets from MTV bothers you, fine. Get up early on June 16 and line up outside your local Ticketbastard outlet and see what kind of seats you end up getting.
This is a work of absolute genius. The description of the "sensitive indie poseur" is spot-on.
From the Musty Archives: The Levels of Romantic Setbacks.
A day early? No way! I turned in my midterm this afternoon. I know, that's not really impressive. But what is impressive is that I turned it in a day early. That's pretty much unprecedented. I have no idea why I decided to get the midterm done early, but it feels good to not have to worry about it any more. It ended up being nine pages. Yeesh.
I cleaned the office today. It was getting a little bit sloppy, so I filed all the papers, threw away the garbage, and straightened everything out. Work has not been busy, which is fine with me--it gives me time to do schoolwork and take care of other things I need to work on.
A few people have recommended bowling alleys for my party. I think that I'll just go and test them out over the next couple of weeks and then make an announcement about the party. Keep the evening of July 7th open if you'd like to attend.
On the way in to work this morning, I heard "He Wasn't Man Enough for Me" by Toni Braxton. That has got to be one of my favorite dis songs in recent memory. Take a look at the lyrics: She not only disses the guy who wasn't man enough for her, she also disses his new girlfriend. And she's so classy about it! Next time I get some stink from the new girlfriend of an ex, I'm going to bust out the Toni Braxton.
Stop playing me
He wasn’t man enough for me
If you don’t know now here’s chance
I’ve already had your man
Do you wonder just where he’s been, yeah?
Not be worried about him
Now it’s time you know the truth
I think he’s just the man for you
What an insult. "He wasn't man enough for ME, but he's just the man for YOU."
From the Musty Archives: Nanette's Top Three Non-Sexual Fantasies of the Day, from June 2000. Check out #3--I love it when my fantasies come true. That boss was such a dingleberry.
One year of Amplified: Okay, so I didn't really start posting regularly until June 12 or 13, but the first-ever post to Amplified to Rock was one year ago today. It regarded a shiny silver NSync suit. The second-ever post regarded the Great Scandal known as Journeygate. Anyone who has spent more than fifteen minutes in my physical presence has probably already heard that story, and if I repeat it here that will give me one less story to tell.
I'm still going to do some sort of Amplified to Rock birthday extravaganza, but it's going to be a belated birthday extravaganza. I could go into detailed bitching about all the schoolwork and other stuff I have to do, but that would be very uninteresting. I'm trying to avoid all things uninteresting these days.
Mike "Sissypants" Quinn wants me to organize a large-scale bowling tournament to celebrate the anniversary of this here webpage. And I would like to do so. Perhaps it could be a combination Amplified-anniversary/Nanette-birthday thing. What I need is a bowling alley that fits the following criteria:
-has open bowling on Friday or Saturday nights
-is located somewhere in Chicago (preferably somewhere that is easy to reach via public transportation)
-has the right sort of atmosphere for a kickassedly fun bowling party
If you know of such a place, let me know. Once I've found a bowling alley, I'll start planning things like dates and times. I know Quinn will make arrangements to get the rest of his teeth pulled just to avoid my party, and I want to give him plenty of time to make the appointment with his oral surgeon.
As for Quinn's suggestion that the winner of the bowling tournament should be drenched with $3.99 champagne, I will say this: cheap champagne is only good for one thing, and that's getting a girl in trouble. And that, my friends, is today's Amplified to Rock Musty Archive Post of the Day.
If you'll excuse me, I have a midterm to work on. Bleh.
Vacation! After two aborted attempts at planning a vacation for this spring/summer, I've finally got it together. I'll be headed to Phoenix in July (the 18th-22nd, to be exact) to visit my friends Amanda and Hafthor. Even better, Tim's going to be going with me. While Amanda and I are running around terrorizing people, Tim and Hafthor can discuss their common interests, which include such things as computer science and Bjork. It will be wonderful. Everyone will be happy.
There's still a remote possibility that I might make it out to DC at some point this summer. Tim's friend Colleen wants to take a roadtrip in that direction, and (depending on timing/cash flow) I might go out there with her. If I don't get out there this summer, maybe I'll get out there next summer or over spring break or something. It's on the List of Places to Go.
The office smells like stinky feet. Ew.
I went down to the English department office to pick up my contemporary lit midterm, and it wasn't there. When I asked the secretary if she knew anything about it, she looked at me as if I had just said twelve very nasty swear words or something. I just want my midterm! I just want to get this stuff done! I should probably go check again, but I'm afraid that I'll get yet another stern look.
I heard that Mike Quinn dribbled applesauce on to his shirt last Friday. How sexy. I asked him if he would give me his wisdom teeth so I could get them gold-plated, but he said no. QUINN! GIVE ME THOSE TEETH!
My brother, the graduate: I should have known when I saw the nachos that it wouldn't be a very formal graduation. I knew it was at the UIC Pavilion--a venue better suited to a basketball game or a concert than a graduation--but I had assumed that there would be the usual formality of a graduation--"Pomp and Circumstance," serious and proud students sitting quietly in their caps and gowns, reflecting on their four (or more) years in higher education, admonitions to the audience to hold all applause until the names of all graduates have been read. But there was no such formality.
It was pretty much business as usual at the UIC Pavilion, right down to the concession stands. It seemed strange to see people eating nachos during a graduation ceremony. I've heard of worse--one friend who graduated from another local school said that vendors actually walked down the aisles during her graduation ceremony, selling everything from hot dogs to pop.
My brother's graduating class was much larger than my graduating class, and therefore the ceremony was even longer than my own. I will give his school credit--there was plenty of entertainment. Since Columbia is mainly a fine arts/performing arts/media school, they decided to showcase some of their best student work from the graduating class. Pre-ceremony, there was a video slideshow of sculpture, visual art, fashion and graphic design by students. During the ceremony, the dance department performed, a short film by an animation student was shown, a student poet read, and the jazz band (and a really excellent singer) performed. It kept the ceremony entertaining, which was for the best--the whole thing took over three hours.
Even the honorary degree recipients were interesting. The speakers at my college graduation were some guy who worked for Pepsi and the CNN-correspondent father of another student. The Pepsi guy was so boring that I don't remember his speech at all, and my only memory of the CNN correspondent was that, after hearing him speak, I understood where his daughter got her snobbish, uppity ways. At Mike's graduation, honorary degrees were given to a local congressman, a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, the only African American female investigative broadcast journalist in the U.S., and my favorite Ghostbuster. Of course Harold Ramis's speech was the best of the four. You can't go wrong with the guy who wrote Caddyshack and Ghostbusters.
It was also cool to see that the students were allowed to exercise their creativity. Along with the usual honor cords and tassels and medals, students added items to their caps and gowns that reflected their personalities. One young woman had one of those flower garden pinwheels attached to her cap, two others wore feather boas with their gowns. At first, the lack of seriousness was a little bothersome to me--I'm used to traditional ceremonies, where everyone marches in to "Pomp and Circumstance," sits quietly and calmly during the ceremony, cheers politely after all degrees have been conferred, and marches out to "Pomp and Circumstance." This ceremony was pretty chaotic--according to my brother, after the first 300 graduates were lined up, the organizers sort of gave up putting everyone else in order, so there was no alphabetical order whatsoever. The graduates marched in to a jazz song rather than the old traditional standard, and they didn't file in in perfect single-file lines. There was no formal recessional--people just left whenever. I thought that the lack of formality and the encouragement of creativity made the ceremony a little bit more fun, but I can't help but wonder if some of the graduates were a little bit let down by it. I don't know how I would have felt if my college graduation had been so chaotic and unstructured.
One question, though: is graduation etiquette breaking down so much that talking on cell phones during the ceremony is now acceptable? I'm not talking about audience members, though it was more than a little irritating when I would hear cell phones ring during the proceedings. I'm talking about the graduates. I must have seen at least twenty of them on the phone during the ceremony. Maybe some of them had reasons--friends or family members who couldn't make it to the ceremony, perhaps--but I was still a little bothered when I saw students walking across the stage with their cell phones held up to their ears.
So my brother now has a Bachelor of Arts (with honors!) in Television Production from Columbia College Chicago. Congratulations, Bun--I'm proud of you. You did well. (And if you'd like to congratulate him, you can send him an e-mail or an e-card to mike@spoonbender.org. Any job leads in the television industry in the Chicago area would also be appreciated.)
