First Snow and All American Rejects

According to the National Weather Service it's supposed to snow tomorrow morning. While I'm not looking forward AT ALL to driving to work, I'm still pretty excited about the snow.

Side Note- Anchorage sees approximately 6-8 months of snow every year. It starts snowing usually around Halloween and doesn't melt until May, sometimes June. So one would think that people, on average, would have a handle on winter driving. But for some reason, every year people forget how it works. It's like that pregnancy amnesia business. Anchorage residents seem to have winter amnesia (probably to keep us here year after year.) Winter amnesia causes people to turn into idiots the instant snow hits the ground. I'm sure I'll see at least one car in the ditch tomorrow morning. Hence my lack of excitement for my morning commute across town.

First snows always see so magical. Everything is so clean and white. (Unlike snow in February when everything is gross and grey.) Snow forces you to slow down. You can't be in a hurry when you can only drive 30 mph. You have to work a little harder and plan a little more, but I think it's worth it to see a fresh blanket of snow. It's like living in a Thomas Kinkade painting.

This past weekend I was in Talkeetna, AK celebrating two of my friends' birthdays.

Happy Birthday Jim and Michaela!

We woke up Sunday morning to Talkeetna's first snow. It was beautiful. Especially since we stayed in an adorable, cuddly warm cabin and got to eat bomb.com biscuits and gravy at The Roadhouse.

This week's hot jam is The Last Song by All American Rejects. Earlier this week I heard an AAR song on the radio. I hadn't heard one in awhile and it reminded me that I kind of totally love them. Sure, they don't have spectacularly deep lyrics or intricate chord progressions. But they are poppy and fun and sometimes that's what you want. In high school I was an AAR super fan. I saw them 6 or 8 times, and even met the band twice.

I nearly died.

The emo lyrics of The Last Song are covered up by a fun pop punk arrangement and a totally unrelated video and it's just as great as I remember it.

High Heels and The Turtles

As a sorority alumnae (TriDelta, represent) I've worn my fair share of high heels. Chapter meetings, brunches, formals, etc., all require fancy footwear, and assuming I don't have to stand for a million hours, I love wearing them. But I live in Alaska now and you are far more likely to see me in these.

While XtraTufs are far more comfortable, they aren't nearly as cute as these...

Things I like about high heels:

1. They automatically make your legs look fabulous.
2. They make you taller. At 5"4' sometimes I like to feel a little taller.
3. Heels + pencil skirt = sexy without trying
4. They are a little bit dangerous: step wrong and you've got a sprained ankle, wear them with the wrong skirt and you look like a hooker.
5. Nobody messes with a girl in heels

There is one reason I love Elenore by The Turtles: the line, "You're my pride and joy, et cetera." What other band successfully uses et cetera in a song lyric? You'd be hard pressed to find one. I had never seen The Turtles before I went looking for a video. I love that they look like used car salesman and that they have a very enthusiastic tambourine player. The Turtles are probably most famous for their song Happy Together but I like Elenore much better.

I love that The Turtles don't take themselves too seriously. They definitely could have; Happy Together knocked The Beatles' Penny Lane out of the #1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, but they really just seem to be having a good time. (But I guess if one of your lead singers looks like this and occasionally calls himself "The Phlorescent Leech" you probably wouldn't take yourselves too seriously)

UFC and Nicki Minaj

Apologies for the late posting this week, life got busy.

I have a now-not-so-secret passion for UFC fights. They are always violent (obviously) and sometimes gory and I love them. Modern day (well paid) gladiators in an octagon: it's a train wreck and I can't stop staring. Which brings me to Wednesday's adventure.

Last week my friend Brinna mentioned that she served (as a waitress, of course) some of the fighters from Alaska's answer to the UFC, the AFC, and they suggested she attend the fight on Wednesday. My friend Michaela and I jumped at the chance to go, we'd been talking about it for awhile but never went. So Wednesday evening (after a long day of teaching for all of us)  headed over to the Sullivan Arena for AFC 85(?).

We knew we were in for a good time when, after purchasing our $20 general admission tickets, the usher told us that we could sit in the $60 seats, but if someone came, she'd have to move us. We were three rows from the floor. No one ever came for our seats.

There were 12 fights. Some good, some bad. A couple lasted less that a minute.There was even one lady fight, which was poorly matched and way less exciting than one would think. But the real prize was the people watching. Lots of men in TapouT t-shirts, girls in short skirts, pregnant women, and a surprising number of children.

Brinna is trying to get us free floor seats for next month's fights. Ballin' Alaska style

This week's hot jam is Super Bass by Nicki Minaj. In general, I'm not a Nicki Minaj fan. I cannot take her Lil Kim meets Lady Gaga persona seriously, but I love this song. It plays on the radio here ALL the time and I'm not sick of it yet, so it must be a hot jam. I'm sure being a female rapper is difficult, it is a men's game, but Nicki Minaj does it well. She was the first women to be included in MTV's annual Hottest MC list, joining people like Jay-Z, Eminem and Lil Wayne (of course, that list has only been around since 2007, but still pretty impressive)

Getting a job and The Cyrkle

Folks, I've been waiting a REALLY long time to write about this and it's finally time. I've gotten a job. It's not my dream job but it'll do for now. (With 14 million people out of work in the US I'm thankful for anything.)

Things that are great about my new job:
1. Regular pay checks- being a sub means never knowing how much you are going to work. I'm incredibly excited to have a regular schedule and therefore a regular paycheck
2. Benefits- In 90 days I'll be able to get sick again. (Actually, I could probably get sick now, because my wonderful and generous parents have been paying for my health insurance, but still)
3. Retirement- I want to retire now, but it turns out you have to save money and work for awhile before you can do that.
4. No parents, paperwork, or politics- As a teacher I loved teaching but hated dealing with parents, paperwork, and school politics. While I'll still be working in a school I won't have to deal with that business anymore
5. Paid holidays- 'nuff said.
6. And last. NO MORE SUBBING

When I started this blog, (side note- I hate the word blog) it was to keep me sane while I was subbing. Even though I won't be subbing anymore I'll still be writing. Because I like it and because it's always good to look on the bright side.

Let me preface this week's hot jam by saying I was a totally weird kid. (See Example 1.)

Example 1

When I was maybe 7 or 8 years old (about the time example 1 was taken) if you asked me what my favorite song was, I would have said Red Rubber Ball. While it sounds like something performed by Raffi, it was actually written by Paul Simon for the 1960's pop-rock band, The Cyrkle. My parents always listened to the oldies station when I was growing up, so that's what I listened to too. (In fact, I still listen to the oldies stations.) And I really loved nothing more than when this mid-1960's hit played. It was written by Paul Simon and made it to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100. Not that any of that mattered, even as a kid I thought it was cool/weird that they compared the sun to a red rubber ball and said there were more starfish in the sea rather than just fish.



Fun Fact: The unusual spelling of their name was suggested by John Lennon
Fun Fact #2: Tom Dawes and Dan Dannemann (seriously?), The Cyrkle's lead singers, went on to head their own advertising agency. Tom Dawes was the writer behind the famous Alka Selzter jingle, "Plop Plop Fizz Fizz"

More of a ska fan? Streetlight Manifesto did a fun cover of Red Rubber Ball on their album 99 Songs of Revolution