backpack pants

what?

i was looking for a title. i looked straight in front of me and i saw a backpack then i looked to my right and saw the pants i just took off. backpack pants.

OH MY GOD! SHE ISN’T WEARING ANY PANTS!

***

in my pantless state i am re-evaluating. i suppose i’m always doing that. like all the time. perhaps that’s why he calls me tense. why he tells me i need to relax and have some fun.

the thing is-i do have fun! i really do! i totally love my life most time. it’s relatively drama free. i have amazing friends, a rad family. he calls me defensive. tells me i’m justifying it to myself. i tell him he has concrete proof of how fun i am. whatever. apparently i’m tense.

anyways, talking to this boy, this child man who i used to fuck in another life last night always reminds me of the fact that in a lot ways-and this is going to sound fucked up-my relationship with him, while completely nonsense was easily the most honest relationship i’ve ever had.

i’ve been in love twice. once i spoke too soon and once i never spoke at all. both of those boys were huge lies. they themselves were not lies (although one of them was/is a liar) but my relationships with them were lies. a friend is not just a friend if you want to be with them forever. the heartbreak is something entirely different when they move away. only one of the two loved me back-and i’m not sure that he wasn’t lying. maybe he was. i prefer to believe that if he ever said one truthful thing to me it was “i love you”. it’s easy to lie in the dark though…

i guess i want to be in love. realising the most honest relationship i’ve had was with some jerk who just wants to stick his dick in mouth is pretty…random? sad? but it isn’t sad; i don’t feel sad about it because it is what it is.

WHAT AM I TALKING ABOUT?!

***

kurt vonnegut is dead.

that’s pretty shitty. if there was ever a public i thought would find the ability to live forever it would be him.

so it goes.

***

i never go to bed early enough. i wonder what kind of person i’d be if i listened to my body and slept when it told me too.

***

boys with instruments are the best!

so are boys who like dancing!

dancing is pretty much the best! let’s go dancing! NOW! at 12:55am on sunday! SERIOUSLY!

***

good night.

POST-SCRIPT (AN HOMAGE TO CAPS LOCK)

HERE’S THE EXCITEMENT FRIENDS!

AND TWO POSTS IN ONE DAY!

AND VACATIONS!

ok, i’m sick of caps! but seriously, i get a vacation. two shows between now and september and i still get a vacation! YES!

details:

july5, 6, 7, and part of 8: toronto ontario.

drinking. dancing. painting? fun!

july 8, 9, 10, 11, 12: chicago, illinois!

me and my mom! walking. art. CHICAGO!

july 12, 13, 14, 15: new york, new york!

me and mom! walking. art. NEW YORK!

colour me pumped! xo

enter stage left.

first, i always enter the wrong password when i sign in to wordpress. i think it’s because my sign in name and email address are the same so i always enter that password.

ANYWAYS.

enter stage left.

reunions are always a strange thing. REAL reunions especially. the kind where you haven’t seen the person for YEARS. the contrast between how much they have changed and how much they haven’t changed at all slaps in you in the face a lot harder than it does when you see someone sporadically but more consistently.

what?

after cancelling coffee on monday due to excessive hangoveritis i met an old friend from high school for coffee on tuesday. she’d spent the last 4-ish years travelling and teaching in asia. truthfully, i wasn’t stoked about it because by the time she left (shortly after university was done) we weren’t getting along well and didn’t think too well of each other. there were a lot of factors that contributed to that…mostly silly stuff that we’re both long over.

it was nice, y’know. to just catch up and get to know someone i used to know really well all over again.

we’re gonna hang out this weekend, go see illfit outfit, and just chill.

i’m over high school and i’m over all the nonsense post high school. i’m always up for hanging out with new people who like going to rock shows.

SCHMACTING

well friends,
it’s official…i’m officially going to be getting back on stage to act my little heart out. it’s been 3 years since i’ve really done anything actor-y and truth be told i’m nervous as fuck.

i know it’s gonna be fun! candace and amanda and lauren are amazing but i’m really scared. what if it isn’t fun? acting has been shit for me which is why i quit AND what if i can’t not direct? i mean, i’ve been directing ONLY for the last few years and i feel like it’s so a part of me that it’s going to be a challenge not to do it.

hey amanda, if you’re reading this don’t worry, i’m stoked and it’s gonna be awesome and i’m gonna work my ass off for you. it’ll be awesome. i’m just…nervous.

NERVOUS!

…and out come the wolves

to eat tim armstrong’s face right off.

friends, i’m sad.

remember 1995?

remember when this album came out and all these little 14 year old kids went totally fucking ape shit for it and started listening to punk rock exclusively because it. remember all those kids who’d never heard of DOA and the dead kennedys and got into them because of THIS album. i do-cuz i’m one of them. this album changed my life in a lot of ways. i know i’ve been saying that a lot but from the ages of 12-16 music was constantly changing my life.

1995 was a long time ago and until i’d managed to retain my respect of tim armstrong. despite post-wolves shitty albums, mediocre side projects and weird production gigs with pink i was able to say without feeling like a total asshole, “tim armstrong is pretty rad despite all evidence to the contrary”…

WELL, i can no longer say that with any kind of confidence. even typing it made me sort choke back a gag.

last night i heard tim armstrong’s new single called “Into Action” and it really is the worst song i’ve heard in a long time. not that i like it but i’m pretty sure the new linkin park single is better. i’m convinced that all timmy did was push the ska button on his little sister’s keyboard and go to town. oh, and i’m pretty sure she sings back up vocals too. this, friends, is lifestyle maintenance 101. this, friends, is worse for me then when anti-flag signed to a major. selling out i can deal with; producing vile seething shit i cannot.

whatever. this is a sad day for me. officially it’s the end of an era. oh how the mighty have fallen.

inflammable material has gone up in smoke.

OH SHIT! ok, that last part is pure cheese but c’mon the picture forced my hand!

xo xo michelle.

ass-less chaps

i’m pretty sure these jeans i’m wearing make me look like i have absolutely no ass.

i’m also pretty sure i need swear off boys for a while and accept my in-voluntary crippling celibacy as a good thing. (Ha!) this probably isn’t going to happen but i wish it could. i’m just bad at having crushes these days. ugh, i don’t even want to talk about it.

also, i wonder if there is a function on this blog where i can restrict who reads it. hmmm…maybe i’ll have to save that revelation for myspace and preferred list blogging.

weird.

also weird: assless chaps. that’s weird shit. i wonder if they look sexy on anyone?

ALL OF TORONTO NEEDS TO HEAR THIS

(nicky, this one is canadian)

the other evening i was standing in the oddest place to watch a hardcore band ever and a friend said to me, “i was listening to doug’s EP walking down the street in toronto and as i walked past people i kept thinking: ALL OF TORONTO NEEDS TO HEAR THIS! but i didn’t tell them about it because i wanted to keep it all for myself.”

that’s  a little how i feel local singer-songwriter doug hoyer’s Tattoo EP too. it’s so personal and precious that i’m scared to share it with people, scared to let it out too far beyond the tiny scope of the edmonton music scene but it should be heard. i needs to be heard.

this album is about girls. about getting girls and losing girls and falling in love with girls and AS a girl i wanted to be those girls. i wanted to be the girl who broke doug hoyer’s heart. NOT ACTUALLY but it would nice to have a song written about me. and truthfully, when it was just me and my headphones i let myself believe that i was.

that’s the thing about these songs: they’d be easy to dismiss as silly songs about girls written by a silly 21 year old boy-they’d be easy to dismiss if that’s all they were. but that isn’t all they are. they are elegantly composed and arranged songs that let you know there’s more to doug then just bitchy ex-girlfriends.

admittedly, part of me what destined to like this EP. doug has been an aquaintence and sometimes friend of mine for a few years now and i’ve always really liked it. BUT, it’s better than a simple, “this dude i know wrote a cute little EP”. it’s worth the time to listen to these lovely 4 songs.

“tattoo” is a particular favourite of mine, not because it’s an ode to getting tattooed but because it’s an ode to choice and to loving your skin and SHARING your skin. just go to his mycrack page and give it a listen.

i’m done babbling. i’m not a good reviewer. just go to doug’s myspace page and listen and tell him if you like his songs. i did!

xo michelle

p.s. also worth a listen are the great lake swimmers’ new album ongiara (also canadian) and lucinda williams’ west. both delicious folk/country gems.

check it. make google your bitch!

m.

an anniversary.

the needle drops. a gun shot sounds. the world is changed.

however cheesy it may sound 13 years ago my life was changed by the death of a stranger who just happened to be a celebrity.

kurt cobain.

1967-1994.  

“a wolf in no one’s clothing is the perfect disguise”

the needle drops. you’ve heard these 6 songs 100 times before but it doesn’t matter because in those 15 seconds of crackle you’re as excited for the opening bars as you were the first time you heard it.

you knew these songs before you heard them because they were written for you, about you and if only you had the words and the guitar you would have written them yourself. but you don’t so this will always suffice. this will always better than you could ever hope for.

listening to those 6 songs (and the 100s that came before) you somehow feel like you know him: like you grew up in the same kind of town and you had your heart broken in the same kind of way and the first time you fell in love changed your life in the exact same way kind of way and as you aged you asked the same questions about god and the devil and war and politics and love and death and all the things in between.

and like him you’ve grown up your voice has gotten stronger and clearer and more capable then it ever was before. each word braver than the one before. and you can hear it in his voice because you feel it inside yourself: you care less and less about what people will say when they hear it.

you’ve grow up together because for the past…4? 5? years you’ve had no choice. and you, like him, will never forget that some people are made up of water and fear*

***

so, obviously i’m a huge nerd when i’m in love with an album. cassadaga sits at the post office waiting for me to pick it up. the pre-order comes with a special 7″ and i’m exicted for them both.

listen to four winds though, please, because this isn’t the weeping yelping bright eyes we’ve all come to love (or loathe). it’s a mature, confident, brilliant album with something to say. i promise.

here’s a link: cassadaga, free to listen **

cheerios,

m.

*from “Cartoon Blues” written by Conor Oberst from Four Winds [EP] released by Saddle Creek Records, 2007.

** according to Pitchfork it’s worth buying though, for the artwork alone. they’re fucking lovin’ bright eyes right now… seriously, BUY RECORDS FRIENDS!

it depends on the circumstances

on the other end it’s always silence

and

it’s always you.

i know because i do it too.

silent.

on the other end

tomorrow will be the same

the waiting game will continue and

i

will

sit. here.

and wait.

where it goes from here depends on none of the usual

suspects.

i just don’t know what to say anymore

or do

so i sit.

and…

wait.

tomorrow is always another day and it always will be.

depending on the circumstances.