Hey June, Don't Make It Bad

Happy June, lovely readers! Although I have no idea if anything cool happens in June due to the fact that I haven't changed the page of my zombie-themed calendar yet, I'm sure there's something. And, if not, whatever.

Mike Falzone and Coffee Girl

Anywho, lucky me is on a day off from work today, so that pretty much gives me permission to do nothing that can be defined as physical movement. Happy day! In reality, though, I'll probably end up trying to finish unpacking (a chore that seems to have taken me three blissful weeks to complete, mind you) my stuff from college along with cleaning my room while listening to Mike Falzone's podcast "Welcome to the Podcast!" (which you should totally go give a listen because he and his lady are hilarious and it is totally free and available on iTunes! **language warning for the kids**). Actually, none of that will probably happen, but it's nice to think about, ya know? But for now, I'm just going to take some time to write this lovely blog post. Boom!

With the summer heat starting to roar into Oklahoma, I've been hit with a lot of nostalgia. Past summers have typically been pretty nice to me (with exceptions here and there). Concerts of the Jonas Brothers variety (don't judge, just put yo' pom poms down for me), going to the local water park, staying up until who-knows-when and sleeping until never-gonna-happen after drinking energy drinks (Grape NOS and Black Mamba Venom Energy were once the only ways I could pretend to be awake) and having access to the Internet. Smells like summer, right? Oh, the good old days when I didn't have responsibilities or financial burdens. 

Sexxxy

The summer before my freshman year of high school, if I remember well, was actually a pretty decent summer. Despite my constant need to update my at-the-time blog (mentioned in detail here) and fiddle around on Paint Shop Pro, my life wasn't entirely consumed by one thing. That summer was the summer of movies for me. I was fresh out of middle school and still in contact with my close friends
from those torturous years, so we went to the cinema all the time (it probably wasn't actually all the time, but actually like 3 times pfft). Can we all just take a moment of silence for emo Peter Parker in Spider-Man 3? *touches up eyeliner* Okay, we're done with that.  At the time, though, he was the hottest thing in my mind. That summer I also ate a lot of Arby's. I don't even know.

STOP JUDGING ME! YOU DON'T KNOW MY LIFE!

But the big thing about that summer was the loss of my J-Card. Yup, that was the summer the Jonas Brothers entered my life and stayed a long three years. I can't even remember how exactly I found the Jonas Brothers. Was it that I had their catchy single "Year 3000" on my iPod?  I don't even know. I just know that I was hooked. Here, I'll paint you a picture! I found out they were coming to Tulsa, so I begged for tickets (which had a cost of $27.50 each, btw. That's never going to happen ever again). I wanted a physical copy of their out-of-print debut album so I found a copy on eBay for like $30. They had a new album coming out in August of that year, so you know I had to preorder that ish. Sadly, though, that was probably the cheapest year for my JB obsession.

Man, my life is so sad. 

I'll tell you what pisses me off about that whole JB ordeal, though. At the concert, they did meet-and-greets afterwards and each pass was like $20 (HAHAHAHAHAAH!). I made the biggest mistake of my whole life that night. I decided to not get a M&G pass and instead get a stupid t-shirt and hat! Disastrous, I know! But whatever! 

Life goes on. But, as you can see, I'm still not over it. Never. 

Excuse Me, My Brain Just Farted

I have hit a dilemma I can't bullshit my way out of. This unforeseen obstacle is a stress-induced writer's block. With less than 4 weeks left of the semester, I know I'm not the only one getting a little steamed from all the heat in the kitchen. I still have tests, papers, financial burdens, and the hive full of busy work still left on my plate before I can even begin thinking about summer vacation. But my stress ruins my life. It causes every single bit of me to go on standby (ie. sleep, weight loss, creativity, and my control to not eat everything in sight) for as long as I have this heaviness weighing down on my shoulders.

For my professional writing class, I have to write a 2000 word short story as the final assignment. While my peers are eager to scribble down plots and characters that would honestly be more appropriate for full-length novels or sagas, I am sitting there with a brain that has a horrible case of flatulence. Nothing is going on upstairs. I have nothing going for this assignment. I've turned to probing my friends, family, and Internet strangers for some kind of idea for this damn assignment, but even that doesn't help. I have tried listening to music, watching movies, reliving episodes of Degrassi before it turned into really ripe shit, and going out and doing things but nothing will unfreeze my brain. WHERE IS THE OVERRIDE BUTTON WHEN I NEED IT?  This is really embarrassing for me.


This doesn't happen to me. I am the queen of bullshit.

I am preparing to have a career that is centered around my ability to make shit up, and it scares me that
my stress might just jeopardize my dream of being cool enough to win a Poe bust like John Green.

Maybe if I just continue to listen to the song previews on the iTunes top 200 list, the creative energy of people who are creative for a living will just start seeping out of my ears and into my computer so that I can get this assignment started.  I mean, if the Jonas Brothers were able to come up with that pile of shit they call a new single, why can't I concoct a plot for this stupid short story? Maybe if I had type 1 diabetes, an Italian wife from New Jersey, and an ego bigger than Texas I'd be able to work some literary magic here. POOOOOOOP! 

I cry, and my tears are literary masterpieces I can't write.

But seriously.

Oh, well. Maybe I just need to take up heroine or whiskey like all the great writers of history to make wonderful stories and slowly kill myself as a bonus result.

Just kidding. Kids, stay away from drugs and alcohol. Eat your veggies. Keep your hands out of your pants.

The Music of My Life

With the reformation and return of the almighty Fall Out Boy  this passed week, I can't help but get a little a nostalgic for middle school and high school jams. I've been thinking a lot of about all the bands  I've been into over the years, and I realize how shitty my taste in music has been and will probably to be as I grow older and lose my connects to the current music scene of the future. Sure, I'll admit that not everyone will like my taste in music, but who really cares?

Pretty sure I had this poster....

My first official concert was *NSYNC in St.Louis, Missouri, on the PopOdyssey Tour when I was like 6 years-old. I remember having seats in like the middle of freaking nowhere in the back and not being able to see a damn thing because I was short for my age (Screw that, I'm still short for my age). I totally still have a t-shirt (that totally fits!) that's got holes in the pits from the concert. But the first concert I actually remember and was old enough to enjoy was The All-American Rejects  (still my babies 7 years late, by the way) and Fall Out Boy in Norman, Oklahoma, in the 7th grade. That concert was legit, guys. Like, my hormone-filled mind thought that was like the most amazing night ever because I finally got to see my favorite band live after liking them for almost 2 years. Dream come freaking true!
Fun fact #1: My sister, her at-the-time boyfriend, and I left in the middle of FOB's set because we only knew like 3 songs. No shame. 

Fun fact #2: I've seen The All-American Rejects 3 times and met them finally in April 2012 at a show in Oklahoma City. 

Okay, here's where things get rocky. In middle school, I also had the hots for Jesse McCartney and his "Beautiful Soul" and his straight-from-the-beach look. To this day, I own 3 of his CD's and some kind of DVD that I've probably never watched in the 7 years I've owned it. I also had a thing for Avril Lavigne and some bands that one of my older sisters was into (I'll never admit that I liked her music, though. Sorry Lisa!)

Check out that Jewfro! 

Then right before freshman year of high school, I fell in love with 3 brothers from New Jersey (Shore). Y'all know who I'm talking about. The Jonas Brothers! They were key figures in my life for about 3 years. In that time, my dad spent way too much money on merchandise (they were like cheap Jews or something. L'Chaim!) and concert tickets for my sisters and me. I saw them 3 times in concert (it totally would have been 4 times if Hannah stupid Montana hadn't caused the show to sell out in like 1.5 milliseconds). I went through so much bullying from my peers because of this obsession. It probably would have lasted until senior year, too, if the boys hadn't broken up and Nick hadn't gone and ruined Broadway and Joe hadn't lost his virginity to everyone and Kevin hadn't gotten married and lost his virginity to an Italian. I'll wait for you, Nick. 

Then came my obsession with Michael Jackson in 2009. While my family will report that I wasn't into him until he was a stiff, cold one, I can speak the truth and say that I actually got into him really late in December 2008 (I'm just calling it 2009 because why not? This is my blog). This craze has passed significantly. And that's all. He's still got a place in my iTunes library, though.

Hanson circa 2010: MMM-Sexy

Around the same time in 2009, My Chemical Romance and a bunch of "emo" bands blew up my headphones. It was a dark year. They're still pretty good. Then I got into Josh Groban and Hanson in 2010 and 2011. I also returned to the brief 6 months or so that I liked Switchfoot (They "dared me to move", if you know what I mean) but this time I went at it at 88 mph and I saw some serious shit happen.

So, basically, you can love or hate my music selection. I don't care. Just don't ask me to make you a playlist or mix-CD because you'll probably find something out of the small sample of my music history I've just presented here. I still like bits and pieces of all this stuff. After all, I grew up on this music, and I have a lot of great memories because of music. So don't hate.

What embarrassing music phases did you go through?

Did I Do That?

Have you ever been talking to someone you've known for a while and then, totally out of the blue, they ask you if you remember a really embarrassing moment that happened a long time ago? That happens to me all the time. I remember pretty much everything that can be considered worth remembering or even worth forgetting, but every once in a while, someone brings up something and I have no idea what they are talking about.

Me: ... and then my toe turned blue and I nearly pissed myself. My life is so cray-cray unbelievable sometimes!
Them: Speaking of your life! Do you remember that time when you snort-farted on that one Thursday in that one class that one year when you were wearing that blue shirt?

Lindsey, it's the crack talking!

Me: I have no idea what you're talking about.
Them: You're shitting me! You've got to remember it! It was a classic Angela moment!
Me: No, I really don't.
Me: Am I being Punk'd?
Me: Do I get to meet Ashton?
Them: What?
Me: What?

So, after that, I'm just obsessed with trying to remember this one moment of my life that, of all the mortifying things that have happened to me, I seem to have repressed from my memory. And that string of thoughts morphs into me thinking about how many other memories I don't remember that someone else remembers and will probably tell stories about without me being aware at all. How many blackmail-worthy memories about me are out there that I don't know about? Probably a million. And when I'm totally famous and have millions of dollars, you just know that ALL of the embarrassing stories are going to come out from under the bed of my life.

I'm not ashamed of my past or the moments that I'd probably love to have never happened. I'm just going to be very pissed if I find out old classmates or best friends are making money off my humiliation. I want to cash-in on that sucker. It's my life, after all! I deserve to be monetizing myself! Who needs prostitution when you can get paid for being totally awkward and clumsy? Don't sell your body, sell your pain!

He looks sad and homeless. What's with
the Eddie Munster hair? It's totally because
of the diabetes. 

And let's face it, I'll probably need the extra cash to pay for my diabetes (pronounced die-uh-beat-us) medication (because y'all know I'm going to totally have high glucose levels for the rest of my life from all the Sour Patch Kids I eat every week) that I'll buy out of pocket because I'll be too lazy to fill out forms for health insurance.

Wait. Where was I going with this? 

Anyway, the lesson here is that you should never leave your house because then there are absolutely no chances of doing anything in the least bit embarrassing where people will actually see you and then proceed to form memories about that embarrassing moment involving you. Also, if you never leave your house, your chances of dying probably go down so that's a bonus! Also, don't sell your body to pay for insulin. It's not worth it. Look how Nick Jonas turned out.

New life goal: Don't become Nick Jonas. Or smoke crack.