Probably-not-meant-to-be-funny song lyrics I cannot not laugh at

1. the Sean Kingston song that contains the line, "shorty fire burning on the dance floor." (And they say it so many times!) SAFETY!

2. "Her heart's been gone awhile, with the truck-driving man that took it." I never get tired of this Everlast song. Because it is liquid awesome.

3. It's in his kiss: "In his warm embrace? Oh no, that's just his arm." LOL.

4. "She's going to join the roster." They had to say this because it rhymes with "great imposter." It always cracks me up because I imagine some kind of clipboard, with the names of heartbroken women on it.

5. Whatever You Like: It's hard to figure out exactly what he's saying, but it's something like, "your brain's so good could'a swore you went to college." (Actually, I love the Anya Marina cover of this song, like, for real--but it belongs on another list, "Hip Hop songs that sound INSANE and psychotic and hateful of women when sung acoustically," along with the Ben Folds Five version of Bitches Ain't Shit and the Jenny Owens Young version of Hot In Herre.)

6. Honey. The whole song. This is kind of a different case because what I find about the song is how inadvertently patronizing and sort of borderline abusive it is. Like, "She came running in, all excited, slipped and almost hurt herself; and I laughed till I cried..." Hey narrator, are you supposed to come out of this looking like a good guy?

7. Fergie, Fergilicious: "My body stay vicious/I be up in the gym just working on my fitness."

8. Fancy. All of it. Are country songs fair game? The video is actually even better than the song by itself, because it takes the song SO LITERALLY.

9. the part of "Can't Hold Us Down" that goes, "you need to let him know that his game is whack/And Lil Kim and Christina Aguilera got your back." I tell James this all the time, but for some reason I get the feeling he isn't taking me seriously. (The video is good too. Christina's short-shorts scream empowerment! If only more gender inequality issues could be solved with a nice, wholesome dance-off in the hood.)

Honourable mention: Bell XI, in Rocky Took a Lover: "If there was a God, then why is my arse/The perfect height for kicking?" (Only honourary because I think this is actually meant to be kind of funny. However they are my new favourite band so I had to work them in somehow)

I know it seems like I'm making fun of oldies, but you have to understand, I mock only what I love. Someday I'm going to become a DJ on an AM oldies station, and people are going to call me and hum the song they can't figure out. I will be the Classic Rock Reference Librarian.

Dear boyfriend, the Internet:

I feel so crappy! I wish you were real so you could send me some flowers, Internet. Along with a big, cold bottle of water and some tylenol. I caught a cold on my flight back from Seattle last Sunday and I've been in the throes of it since. It was one of those lightning viral attacks, where you know attempting to fend it off is useless, because you go from being 100% healthy to wanting to lie down and die on the floor in the space of 24 hours. Hmm! a tickle in my throat! you think on Sunday night. Ghhhhhhhhhhgh, I can't feel my feet, you think on Monday morning. So I missed a couple days of work but now I'm back at my desk because this is a long weekend coming up, and I wasn't relishing the idea of four more days' accumulated email and invoices and book orders and water-logged reference books greeting me next week. Plus a person can only run so many chain heroics, you know? Especially with a sinus headache. That just makes n00bs all the more intolerable.

Around 3 this morning (long story!) I finished John Irving's new book, Last Night in Twisted River. From the time I was in about grade 11 to, oh I don't know, about two years ago, John Irving was My Favourite, capital M capital F. A couple of his books (A Prayer for Owen Meany and The Cider House Rules) changed my life the way books only can when you're young; there are lines from those books that I will probably remember for the rest of my life. But his last one (Until I Find You? maybe? Something like that) left me pretty cold after a couple of chapters, and I didn't finish it; and Twisted River is compelling in that way John Irving books tend to be compelling, but still kind of empty, in the end. It reminds me of every other John Irving book I've read, sort of compiled together and with the addition of backwoods logging. Isn't that disappointing, when books you once thought you could count on loving become ambiguous in their appeal? It makes the world seem shaky. I was saving this one for my trip but instead reading it became kind of a chore, and I finished a couple other quickies (The Adoration of Jenna Fox and Endymion Spring and Alanna, the First Adventure-- Jenna Fox, especially, was excellent) while carrying it around guiltily.

Also, from the reliving the past category: I've had the Sarah McLachlan song Ice Cream running through my head for the past couple of days, so I downloaded it yesterday along with a couple other songs from that album. My tape (!) of Fumbling Towards Ecstasy was probably the only thing that I listened to from approximately sixth to tenth grades. I'm surprised it's still listen-able, but it is. Well, I mean, the music is. The tape itself has disappeared into the void. (Actually, now that I think about it-- I can't believe I paid for it AGAIN! This more than makes up for all the MP3s I downloaded in my younger days. I'm half-kidding but if the CRIA is right about its ethics, then they owe me one album, those copyrighting jerks. Or they can just send me a cheque.)

I also baked some INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATING COOKIES!

It has been a rough few days.

Blerg.

Since I started keeping track at the beginning of August, I've swum just over 20km! Since I only travel 15 km to work every day, that means I could have swum to work. Although not home.

I had my first taste of Rock Band last night and I think I'm addicted. The drums are the most fun, I think, although singing is fun too--I'm pretty bad at it, but I'm loud. I don't really believe in singing things quietly. I'm pretty sure that after a few hours of Rock Band, I'm ready to be a real rock star. All this other stuff is not working out for me. However, my band is only going to sing covers.

I'm going to see Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist today. I have pretty low expectations for the movie but I liked the book, plus I like Michael Cera (although he needs to play a badass serial killer or something quick, before he ends up playing sweet, awkward guys well into his 40s). If the blue kool-aid slurpee machine at the theatre is still broken, there's going to be a riot--the last two or three times I've gone there, no slurpees! What's the point?

I have Apple Genius now and I can already see it is going to be an expensive proposition for me. Downloading things out of a dynamically generated sidebar is credit card suicide. I am not all that impressed with its playlist-making capabilities though--I mean, it's pretty easy to pick things I'll like from among my own songs, since, you know, I paid money to download them.

----------------
Now playing: Amanda Palmer - Leeds United (Lounge Version)
via FoxyTunes

[I love this song.

"Who needs love
when there's Law and Order?
Who needs love
when there's Southern Comfort?
who needs love when the sandwitches are wicked
and they know you at the Mac's store?"

GOOD QUESTION.]

sort of like a love song

On my to-do list today (along with a bunch of boring things) was "create new iPod playlist." The main motivation for this was that I thought of the best possible playlist name last week and haven't had time in front of my computer to make it. thus was born songs for boning.

Romantic, right? I thought it was the funniest thing ever, at the time, and I still do, a little. However, these are songs for boning, or about boning, for sure (well, except the corb lund one, which is nominally about horses, like every corb lund song):

all the way down - gemma hayes
soft revolution - the stills
rumors - josh ritter
just like heaven - the cure
out of this world - bush
i don't know - starsailor
maybe tonight - nicole atkins
samson - regina spektor
about a boy - patti smith
superstar - sonic youth
under the blacklight - rilo kiley
not tonight - matt sharp and maya rudolph
it's only love - heather nova
love will tear us apart - hawksley workman
limit to your love - feist
what's left of me - nick lachey
baby i - amy millan
adore adore - yoav
hotel song - regina spektor
how my heart behaves - feist
mind's eye - josh ritter
all the way down - glen hansard
especially a paint - corb lund
straight to hell - moby and heather nova
running back - emm gryner

yep, not one but two versions of all the way down. These days, that song is the one my brain is humming to itself all the time. I can't account for Nick Lachey, except he told me he wanted to be on at least ONE playlist. who am I to argue?

Among the BORING things on my to-do list was laundry, but I have to note that a few weeks ago i made the mistake of washing some white things with my red bedspread and, well, it didn't end well. The Internet told me to try Rit Color Remover, so I did, and it is magic, eye-irritant powder. Everything has been restored to its natural colour. I just thought you'd be happy to know that.

This morning on the way to work I was thinking of a cool idea for a poster. It would be an intricately hand-drawn map, populated completely with fictional places from music. (The New Pornographers' Myriad Harbour was playing when I thought of it, and aside from the fact that that song is sublime, it would also be a great name for an actual harbour.) Then I was thinking about that Elvis Costello song that goes, "So they came from Ugly, Texas, and from Nameless, Tennessee..." I can't tell you how many SimCities I've built that were named one of those two things.

Actually, I can't think of any others. This might not be as good an idea as I had first assumed. Desolation row, maybe, but is that a region of a town? Like cannery row?

Searching for this topic led me to The 7 worst fictional towns in America. I've often thought that the town where Miss Marple lives (in the Agatha Christie mysteries, which I used to read compulsively) has got to be one of the worst places in the WORLD to live, with a death rate of around 15% a year. Along with Sunnydale, California, of course.

This would also be a good time to mention the rocklopedia fakebandica, the ultimate reference work for fictional bands. I can't tell you how happy it makes me that every fake band I can think of is in there.

in which I learn interesting things on the Internet

Today, I learned on the Internet that infertile North American and European couples' pregnancies are being outsourced to India. This is like something that would happen on Futurama, only real.

I also learned from the Internet that Bret McKenzie, of Flight of the Conchords, was in The Lord of the Rings. He was basically an extra, but his character has been lovingly named by the fans: Figwit, which stands for "Frodo is great... who IS that?" because of the way his appearance distracts from the heroic moment when Frodo agrees to carry the ring into Mordor. Heh. I love LOTR, the Internet, Wikipedia, fandorks, and the whole world really.

James and I just finished watching the first season of Flight of the Conchords' HBO show yesterday (I gave it to him for Christmas) and I have to say that it is AWESOME. It's a deadpan, hilarious, hipster gem with funny animal sweatshirts and musical interludes. You should rent it, if you can, or better yet, you should BUY it. And you should buy one for me. Because James has one, but it's at his house, and we don't live together, so I can only watch it at his house, or if I borrow it, instead of all the time as would be ideal.

I also saw some other things that were not as good as Flight of the Conchords: season 9 of The X-Files, which I finished yesterday, was good but the finale was disappointing, too epic in some ways and not epic enough in others; Battlestar Galactica: Razor, which was OK, but sort of like a longer version of one of the crappier episodes in the second season; No Country for Old Men, which baffled me because I've seen it in/at the top of so many film critics' Top 10 of 2007 lists and I didn't really get what all the fuss was about; and I Am Legend, which was pretty good in the sense that it fulfilled all my post-apocalyptic New York needs.

we won, or we think we did...

The music of my unconscious right now is Stars' In Our Bedroom After the War:

All the living are dead
And the dead are all living
The war is over
And we are beginning...

I develop these crushes on songs that last hours, days, weeks.

I wrote my Prime Minister and Member of Parliament letters today. I also went to IKEA and purchased some awesome, nuclear-esque fabric. I love the promise of a little bundle of fabric with no set purpose. I love, also, in no particular order: the organic smoothness of new bamboo knitting needles, waking up in a warm bed in a cold room, the view of falling snow and Christmas lights out my window, and Bollywood music.

I put up my Christmas decoration, singular, this week:



It is approximately 200% more festive in my apartment than it was before.

I'm totally downloading a bunch of Christmas music. Yep. That just happened. Standard-response cynicism be damned!

Wait, am I even cynical? I wrote that and then hit "publish" and then I realized I might not even be. Sometimes I'm the downright opposite of cynical. Hmm.

Hot love on the hot love highway

James and I watched The Office Special (the Christmas episodes) tonight. I have now watched the whole British Office and I am ready to start on the American version--fortunately, since my ignorance about this show is alienating me from my peers. As such, I am humming "Freelove Freeway" until further notice. (This is the song David Brent plays on his guitar in one of the most excrutiatingly embarrassing episodes of The Office. It goes, "Free love on the freelove freeway, where the love is free and the freeway's long." And then it gets better.)

It's Canadian Finals Rodeo week (weeks?) here in Edmonton. This is such a weird time of year because there are people in cowboy hats EVERYWHERE, and as James pointed out, "not in an ironic way." I kind of like this, however. It reminds me that where I live is only one of several Albertas. I don't really like visiting the others, let alone living there, but I like being reminded of their existence. It's refreshing to remember that others construct reality differently from us. Also, I think if I pay $5 to the United Way, I get to wear jeans to work for the whole week.

Just around the corner from me is a beautiful old school building that was built back when Edmonton was a wee city in arms. It's one of those utterly charming, traditional red brick schools that looks like somewhere you would go to learn about The War, or get caned. People book weddings and/or wedding photos there all the time, and yesterday as I was walking home from lunch on the South side, a whole bridal party was standing outside the side door, smoking, even the bride in her white dress and a scarlet cape. I loved the juxtaposition of formal attire and informal standing-around-smoking and had to remind myself to keep moving so as not to appear weird.

Hands off the drummer, though

My boyfriend's band, Potemkin Village (my second-favourite band!) is on iTunes now. FAMOUS. If you act now, I think you can be the first customer to write a review. I can't write a review, though, because it would represent a conflict of interest. I have my blogalistic integrity, after all!

[OK, I went to the iTunes website to see if I could link to their songs, and I was bombarded with pictures of those new iPods. I have only had my sexy green iPod, Josephine, for a year, but I want a new one every time I see them. It's like Homer Simpson picturing Ned Flanders in his little ski outfit: STUPID SEXY FLANDERS! Only it's STUPID SEXY IPODS! And, no, you can't link to things in the iTunes store online, as far as I can tell, so NEVER MIND.]

"and all night you drove me wild with your equations..."

Over Thanksgiving weekend, a friend recommended the Josh Ritter song "The Temptation of Adam," and I've been listening to it since, in my usual obsessive way. It's a love song for the end of the world, and thus, right up my alley.

I never had to learn to love her like I learned to love the Bomb
She just came along and started to ignore me
But as we waited for the Big One I started singing her my songs
And I think she started feeling something for me...
[...]

Oh Marie there's something tells me things just won't work out above
That our love would live a half-life on the surface
So at night while you are sleeping I hold you closer just because
As our time grows short I get a little nervous

I think about the Big One, W.W.I.I.I.
Would we ever really care the world had ended
You could hold me here forever like you're holding me tonight
I look at that great big red button and I'm tempted

You can stream the song on his site. Josh Ritter is on tour right now, and I'm going to see him when he comes here in February. Call me a romantic, but that nuclear war imagery just gets to me.

The Soundcheck Guy Song (as sung to the tune of "Spider-Man")

Soundcheck guy, soundcheck guy
Wearing a dorky hipster hat
Can he sing? No he can't
Cause he's just a
Soundcheck guy
Look out, here comes the soundcheck guy

Inspired by the New Pornographers concert last night.

I hope my fists can fight for two

[Via style files]: "Fractured Fairy Tales" wall display.


This is actually one unit, the individual boxes are attached to each other and to the wall. I just love this, and it seems like it would actually be pretty easy to build, with some basic carpentry skills. (Note to self: develop basic carpentry skills.) The guy who writes this blog, Thomas Wold, is a designer for ReadyMade, and I love love love his projects.

I know it's just a weird form of inverted lethargy, but I feel like taking on some apartnment-y projects: I've been considering making curtains, painting a wall or two, or making a new quilt. This is basically because I am bored, but whatever.

I had a swim, but no shower because there is no hot water in my building today. Denied! As a result, I feel very salty, like in a Kris Kristofferson song [Or, apparently, a Willie Nelson song. My illusions are shattered.]

OMG, internets, the song of the week on iTunes this week is the worst EVER. It's not often that I can listen to 15 seconds of a song and then decide to delete it from my computer FOREVER, but this is one of those times.

I wish I had something to tell you. I wish I had a cool wall installation made of boxes and cabinets. I wish I was a character in Lord of the Rings. (Preferably the movie, not the book, since J. R. R. Tolkien was kind of a mysogynist and would probably make me a giant spider.) I wish for lots of things.

One may think we're doing fine
but if I had to lay it on the line
we're losing ground with every passing day
we're not OK.
-The Perishers

Favourite thing of the day

Jenny Owen Youngs' indie acoustic cover of Nelly's "Hot in Herre." The video is an igloo party. It's a dumb AOL video, so if it doesn't embed properly, just go there. The polar bear costumes are hottt, or whatever. And this video really speaks to me as a Canadian.

The EP is also on iTunes. She sounds kind of like the Be Good Tanyas, but with more swearing, which is awesome.

ready for a big trip?

I leave for Washington tomorrow. I am making a new mix for my iPod, which is called "Washington" because I had an uncharacteristic bout of non-creativity. The emphasis is on Washington bands, because I'm just nerdy like that: Pedro the Lion, the Postal Service, Death Cab for Cutie, Band of Horses, Sleater-Kinney.

I am also buying some new books to read on the plane. I have been trying to buy fewer books recently, and get things from the library instead, but when I travel I need something new. Something YA (for the plane): Sarah Ryan's The Empress of the World, which is supposed to be a sensitive treatment of teenage lesbian experimentation; and something serious, Jose Saramago's Blindness, which I am morally bound to read because my book club is tackling it for October. When traveling, I think you need a less-serious book and a more-serious book. That way, if you're not in the mood for one, you have the other. This represents, actually, a pretty reduced version of traveling-book philosophies I've held in the past, which may have required bringing three or more books on any one trip.

With new books, and new playlists, I can go anywhere.

All of this is assuming I can get my pending passport in time. If I do, then I'm going to the Seattle Aquarium, baby.

if i had to lay it on the line

----------------
Currently listening to: The Perishers - Pills (Featuring Sarah McLachlan)
via FoxyTunes

Um, yeah, and this is listen 26 according to iTunes--not including the iPod listens, or the times I've rewound to the beginning before the song ended. Let's just call it listen 50, shall we?

Because they're my new favourite band

On the weekends
We try to get our share
Of excitement and of fresh air
Trying to forget
Who we're gonna be
When the alarm rings
On monday morning
-the perishers

5% obsessive, 95% AWESOME

Currently listening to: The Perishers featuring Sarah McLachlan - Pills
via FoxyTunes

Oh my God, I love this song. I'm on my fifth consecutive listen now.

One may think
we’re alright
But we need pills
to sleep at night
We need lies
to make it through the day
We’re not ok

Call it old-fashioned, but I love a good duet. The Rufus Wainwright song "One Man Guy" is one of my favourites. My favourite Snow Patrol song, the one I can listen to over and over and over, is "Set the Fire to the Third Bar." (The common denominator is Martha Wainwright, but I don't like her solo material much--too slow and thoughtful.) I love Stars, and some of their best stuff is duetty. And I get to see them in November! And I'm getting off topic! (To the extent that "off-topic" is even a valid observation around here...)

That iTunes music recommending thingy is pretty good, actually. I've found lots of stuff I like that way. But I wish I could type the words "NO MORE FREAKIN JOHN MAYER" into my computer and have my wishes recognized. iTunes doesn't even care that that guy is my arch-nemesis. Actually, now that I think about it, it's almost as if Steven Jobs, personally, is mocking me. "Oh, yeah, Jocelyn? You like The Perishers? You like Beck? You like that new Josh Ritter album? How do you feel about.... JOHN MAYER?" Ha! More like John Maybe-not-er!

I think my interview went OK. All I know is, I would give myself that goddamn job. Anyway, it's disappeared from my mind like a heavy object dropped into a still pond. I get to go back to my life, now. I'm making pizza, bitches.

Three things I kind of love right now-- a movie, a song, and a book.

i. The Addams Family Values. I kind of love the Addams Family movies, although I am also very puzzled by them. Who is the designated audience for these movies, besides me? They don't seem to be aimed at adults, exactly, nor at children. My favourite moment is probably Anjelica Huston reading aloud to their baby (who has a little Hitler moustache) from The Cat in the Hat, and she just looks so troubled by the book's inanity and cheerfulness. And Christina Ricci is incredible. Plus all these unexpected actors--David Krumholtz! Joan Cusack! Nathan Lane! Valerie from The Princess Bride! The dad from Drop Dead Gorgeous! And Harmony, from Buffy! (Watch enough episodes of Buffy, and you'll get to be as good at this game as I am, because that show had 1,000,000 actors. All those demons and high school students.)

ii. The iTunes free song of the week, Flight of the Conchords' The Most Beautiful Girl in the Room. I have been developing this theory recently that the best love songs have an edge of cruelty, and this (in fact) is what makes them sweet, credible. James insists there are no good romantic songs, but I think Leonard Cohen's Chelsea Hotel #2 comes pretty close: "I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel/that's all, I don't even think of you that often..." Anyway, this Flight of the Conchords song has that same edge, although obviously it's played a lot more for laughs. "And when you're on the street/Depending on the street/I bet you are definitely in the top three/Good-looking girls on the street..."

iii. Neil Gaiman's Stardust. It's being made into a movie, which was the first I'd ever heard of it. But I'm'a read the book first, because that's just how I roll. Neil Gaiman is masterful at mixing fairy tales with the postmodern and cynical. His books are so funny, but so reverent, they never lose their sincerity. So many of the best satires have too much cruelty to be enjoyable, they're too mean-spirited; but his books are something different, some kind of hybrid genre.

I'm exhausted. I wonder what would happen if I just went to sleep right now.

I Heart Heart.

Nancy Wilson, from Heart, interviewed over at The Believer. She even talks about the moment in (her husband) Cameron Crowe's Almost Famous when the whole band starts singing Tiny Dancer, a moment that I have tried (unsuccessfully) to replicate in my own life, many times. (She helped write the "fake rock music" that Stillwater plays in Almost Famous.) About Heart's time based in Canada:

BLVR: I read that Heart was in Canada for a while. There’s some really great music coming out of that country right now—the Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade, Sunset Rubdown, Neko Case, and Destroyer, to name some of my favorites. But those musicians are all born-and-bred Canadians. For you guys, why the north country?
NW: Draft evasion. It was during the Vietnam War. Michael Fisher, who was the Svengali behind the band and Ann’s boyfriend, was evading. There was all kinds of drama surrounding that situation—like, when Ann came back over the border to get home for Christmas, she got the full-on third-degree interrogation and cavity search. She showed up really shaken that night, feeling like she’d been raped. The feds were all over it.

Actually, Neko Case isn't Canadian, but we'll take her. It's cool.