Writer's Block and J.Cole

I've been feeling a bit (okay, a lot) of writer's block lately. Not because everything is terrible, but rather because lots of things are great! It FINALLY feels like summer here in AK- the leaves are on the trees, the grass is growing, and the snow pile in my yard has finally melted. The mosquitos are out, but at least they are still slow and stupid. I stepped on my glasses the other day (Boo) but that forced me to finally go to the eye doctor, so now I have new contacts AND glasses (Yay!) The new Arrested Development episodes are up, and last week was the first bluegrass festival of the season (where it was sunny and warm. Mostly.)  Long list short, things are good (minus the writer's block). I hope to be back soon with regular favorite thing writing.

Coolest kid at the party

One thing I'm not feeling blocked about is J.Cole. He's back with a hot new jam - Power Trip. LOVING IT, you guys.Slow jam + Rap. YES. And a twist ending!

Backyard Parties and Rihanna

According to the calendar, it's May 1st. According to the weather, it's more like March 1st. It snowed yesterday. SNOWED, you guys. Regardless, the museum switched to summer hours today, and there are RVs (being driven by people with no business driving RVs) on the road again, so it must be almost summer.

No matter what the forecast says.

A few weeks ago it warm (read: warmish) and sunny enough for the first backyard party of the year. Okay, so the lawn chairs were buried half way up their backs in the snow, but we take what we can get around here. (Not to mention, the snow kept the beer cold)

Sure you could use tablecloths (or even just tables...) and string up twinkle lights and serve things that start with the word "deconstructed". Or you could just throw some chairs on the grass (or snow) and tell everyone to bring a dish and their own beer. That's the joy of a backyard party.

This week's hot jam is Stay by Rihanna and Mikky Ekko. Let's be honest, Rihanna needs a Sassy Gay Friend to help her make some life decisions, but Girl knows how to sing a pop song. In fact, she just broke the record for the most #1 songs on the Billboard Pop Chart. Stay is haunting but somehow still catchy. It's been playing on the radio here like crazy and I'm not sick of it yet, (unlike some songs, I'm looking at you Bruno Mars,) so that certainly qualifies it for hot jam status.

PS Was anyone else surprised by Mikky Ekko? Did not expect him to look like that.

Jackson Hole and The Hold Steady

In case you haven't checked your calendar lately, it's January. And in case you're new here, I live in Anchorage. January in Anchorage looks like this.

And sometimes like this.

I'm feeling nostalgic for warmer, brighter days.Let's reminisce together, shall we? Some of my favorite warmer, brighter days were spent here:

Grand Teton National Park

I spent summer 2009 teaching environmental ed in Jackson, WY and it took about 35 seconds for the general Jackson Hole region (Jackson is the town, Jackson Hole is the whole area) to become my favorite place in the whole world. I could write pages of reasons I love Jackson Hole, fraught with flowery language and extended metaphors. But I still wouldn't do it justice.

A lot of times this was my job:

Sometimes, it was this:

Other times, I wasn't working, so I floated the Snake River

Or made rock art at the Gros Ventre slide

 I got in bison jams

And played kickball:

Long story short, I made no money, but spent everyday in the sun. Worth it. I've been a lot of beautiful places, especially here in Alaska, but nothing compares to staring up at the Tetons from String Lake or the alpenglow on Sleeping Indian.

This week's hot jam is Magazines by The Hold Steady. I love the honesty (and I'm not sure honesty is quite the right word) of The Hold Steady songs. I love that they don't try to glamorize anything. The songs all tell a story, and usually not a  very pretty one, but it's covered up with catching choruses. Genius.

Game Shows and Best Coast

I spent my formative years in Illinois. And Illinois in the summer is hot. And humid. I mean, seriously hot and humid, which means you do two things during the summer:
1) Go to the water park

No one does water parks like the Midwest. This is an actual picture of my local neighborhood pool.

2) Stay inside in the air conditioning.

On days I wasn't floating around the lazy river at Splash Country, my sister and I were watching game shows. No, watching isn't really a strong enough word. We were practicing for our shot at the game show title. It started at 9:00am with Price is Right. Sue Bee Honey? $2.19, you idiot! During the showcase we would each total up the prizes in our heads then compare to see who was closest. We were good.  Then we moved on to reruns of $10,000 or $25,000 or $100,000 Pyramid (whichever happened to be on). This was were the practice really started. We'd mute the TV then one of us would sit with our back to the TV and the other would give clues. We'd try to beat the people on the show. We usually did.

An egg! Your knuckles! A joke! Skulls of idiots who make terrible guesses!

When we moved to California, we discover that Pat Sayjak was one of the investors for my parents' summer camp. That meant Alissa couldn't go on Wheel of Fortune. Which was really a shame, because she's super good. Like 1-letter-on-the-board good. On the upside, my parents now have an autographed photo of Pat and Vanna in there house. In college I went to a taping of the Price is Right. It was everything I hoped for an more. Bob Barker is hysterical off camera, Barker's Beauties' dresses are just as awesome in person, and the set is just as colorful as you'd expect. Unfortunately, I didn't get to "Come on down!" but that was probably good for CBS because I would have cleaned up. And I didn't really need a dining room set.

This week's hot jam is Boyfriend by Best Coast. If I had a nickel for every time I've said, "That guy should be my boyfriend" (seriously or otherwise) I would be swimming in money like Scrooge McDuck.

I've mostly recently said it in reference to NASA's new golden boy, Bobak Ferdowsi and the boy I see riding a fat tire bike around town and The Lonely Man and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Maybe if I sent them all the video, they would get the hint?

Or this comic from A Softer World?

Lower 48 Special and Miranda Lambert

So I just figured out that I've been writing for a year and I didn't even know it!

Life's been pretty crazy the past few weeks: baptisms, funerals, air travel, car travel, hotels, new jobs, life decisions, etc etc etc. But life's getting back to normal and I'm getting back to my regular schedule.

I had a bit of an extended spring break thanks to some full Alaska Airlines flights, which was nice because it meant spending more time in sunny, (unseasonably) warm weather with my family.

Including this guy- isn't he the cutest?

It also gave me some time to reflect on things I love about the lower 48.

So, the lower 48 special: (It's a little like .38 Special)

(Full disclosure- It's March. In Alaska. It's really cold and gross, so this is pretty much just an ode to summer.)

1) Thunderstorms - I wrote about these before, but I seriously love them. I got to see a couple while I was in TN/IL, and they were good ones - lots of lightning and thunder. There's just something about the drama and the danger, right?

2) Shorts- Everyone knows shorts are better than pants. I just wish I had more of a chance to wear them. Okay, I didn't actually wear shorts while I was on vacation,  mostly because I'm not really sure where my few pairs are. But in theory, I could have been rocking them like nobody's business. It's never really warm enough for shorts in Alaska, even in the summer. Sure, Alaskans might risk it a few days during the summer, but let's be honest, legs that don't see the sun most of the year, don't look very good in shorts.

This was actually last winter. I was going out to get the mail.

3) Warm Nights- I went out for ice cream one night when I was in Nashville. And we sat outside. And I didn’t need a coat. (I had whiskey and pecan ice cream, and it was amazing) Here in Alaska it’s not warm outside at night, even in the summer. In fact, I haven’t lived somewhere with warm nights in a really long time (California doesn’t have warm nights either). There is something so great about being outside after a long, hot day. It might not have been summer, but that didn’t stop me from getting Summer Nights stuck in my head.

4) Steak ‘n Shake- When my sister asked me what I wanted to do while I was in Nashville, my only answer was, “Go to Steak ‘n Shake”. You can’t get Steak n Shake just anywhere, and they have the best fries ever. (They are even better if you get them with cheese). It’s traditional diner food, but so much better. They make their burgers with ground steak rather than regular ground beef, and while they are delicious I prefer the Chili 4-Way, which isn’t actually on the menu. I guess technically it’s a Chili 3-Way with cheese or a Chili 5-Way without onions, either way it’s spaghetti topped with chili and cheese. It’s a delicious comfort food party in your mouth.

Since I spent nearly two weeks in Nashville, it seemed appropriate to pick a country song, so this week's hot jam is Kerosene by Miranda Lambert. I like Miranda because she's sassy, plays her own guitar, and writes (most) of her own songs. The video for this song is kind of dumb, so I suggest listening while you update or facebook status or tweet about how cool I am. Something like that.

Small Towns and 3Oh!3

Apologies for the delayed post, summer time is busy around here!

This week's favorite thing was inspired by my recent trip to Seldovia, AK for 4th of July. I love small towns and Seldovia definitely fits the bill. The year-round population is a little over 250 and it's only accessible by boat (although it's not an island, there just aren't any roads that go there.) I had a fabulous time. There are no stoplights, people mostly get around by 4-wheeler and everyone waves at everyone.

Did I mention it's also beautiful?

I think holidays in small towns are particularly amazing. Seldovia's 4th of July celebration included events such as a hula hoop contest (where I took 3rd place), fish toss, pie eating, rubber ducky races, canoe jousting, log rolling, tug of war, and a survival suit relay (which my team won!)

Canoe Jousting

This is a survival suit

Speaking of small town celebrations, my grandparents live in a small town in central IL and it features an amazing summer time festival called Old Settlers. There's carnival rides and games and pie and elephant ears and music and a parade and all sorts of other amazing things. When I was little we always went down to visit for Old Settlers and one of my favorite parts (besides the carnival) was the parade. My family would go claim a good spot along the parade route, watch the whole thing, then as soon as the last candy-tossing float went by, my sister and I would take off through the backyards and meet the beginning of the parade on the next block. Double parade viewing = double candy. Pure genius.

This week's hot jam is I'm Not Your Boyfriend Baby by 3Oh!3. 3Oh!3 manages to combine 3 genres of music into one song and still make it sound amazing. There's a little something for everyone. You like rap? Got it. Emo? That too. Techno? It's in there. Okay, maybe not something for everyone, but at least a lot of people.

This song is probably NSFW, unless your boss is down with some F-bombs.

Dancing and Anne and Pete Sibley

This week's favorite thing is dancing. I love dancing. I think if people danced more often the world would be a better place. (I also feel that way about eating popsicles.) Much like my tendency to sing whenever I hear music (see Singing and Justin Bieber) I almost always dance to the music too, or at least tap my toes/fingers, bob my head, etc. And not only is it super fun, but it's also great exercise! (And anyone who knows me knows how much I hate to exercise. So if I can do it without realizing, all the better!)

I love dancing in just about any style:

Partner dancing

The Robot

Barefoot dancing

The Twist/Michelle Tanner

Raptor impersonations

Summer in Alaska is full of bluegrass music. There is a bluegrass festival just about every weekend, and I make a point to attend as many as possible. This past weekend I was in Sutton, AK at Granite Creek Bluegrass Festival and Old Time Picker's Retreat, it was amazing as usual and Monday morning I was still feeling blugrass-y, so I got out Anne and Pete Sibley's CD Coming Home. The first song that played was Past the Point of Rescue. I had forgotten how much I love it, so it's this week's hot jam. I saw Anne and Pete when they came to perform at Teton Science Schools. They are possibly the nicest, coolest, most awesome singers and people I have ever seen/met. In 2009, they won Prairie Home Companion's Great Duet Sing Off and they definitely deserved it. They have amazing harmonies and mix up their songs with guitar and banjo.



Fun Fact: I regularly type "hot ham" instead of "hot jam". I'm always tempted to leave it.

Porch Sitting and Something Corporate

A teacher once told me that only boring people are ever bored. I can't even remember the last time I was bored, so I must be an incredibly exciting person, right?

It's more likely that I'm never bored because I like really boring things. I can sit for a million hours doing nothing and not get bored. One of the dull things I really love is porch sitting. It's exactly what it sounds like, hanging out on a porch, preferably sitting in a rocking chair or porch swing. I know, I'm 90 years old.

Porch sitting often combines some of my favorite things: people watching, reading, drinking lemonade, watching thunderstorms, etc. When I was living in Wyoming, all of the buildings had fabulous giant porches, great for eating breakfast on a Saturday morning or relaxing after work. I could have sat out there all day.

According to people who know about this sort of thing, rocking is a sign of schizophrenia. Is loving rocking chairs a precursor to rocking without a chair, and thus a precursor to schizophrenia?

Speaking of rocking, this week's hot jam is If You C Jordan by Something Corporate. The late 90's to early-mid 00's produced a lot of what I like to call "punk for the masses." Boy bands were on their way out and rock was on its way in. Power pop and pop punk bridged that gap and made punk music accessible for even the most devout boy band lovers. Don't pretend like you didn't rock out to Good Charlotte (or any number of other similar bands) a time or two. Pop punk is fast, catchy, and unlike more traditional punk songs, most of the time you can understand the words and sing along, which is why it was such a hit. The lyrics spoke to a whole generation of teenagers, with songs about stickin' it to the man, fighting with friends and parents, unrequited love, and even tougher issues like death. Pop punk provided a little something for everyone. At least for awhile.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I still listen to a lot of the same music I did in high school. Okay, I listened to some pretty bad music then, but I listened to some pretty good stuff too, which is probably why I still bust out the old scratched CDs occasionally. One of the CDs that never disappoints me is Something Corporate's Leaving Through the Window. I love every song on the album, but If You C Jordan is one of my favorites. It's everything you ever wanted to say to that jerk who went to your high school. Best part: Jordan was the name of the actual jerk that went to Andrew McMahon's high school. (Click here if you want to read about it)

Andrew McMahon is an amazing piano player. I've seen him perform a few times and it's always awesome. Even standing on the piano keys (literally) and jumping up and down he can still make it sound like the song. If that's not hot jam worthy I don't know what is.

Four Seasons and George Jones

I'm once again at a place in my life where I can decide to go pretty much wherever I want. (Assuming that someone will actually hire me, but that is one of my least favorite topics, so it certainly doesn't belong here.) In my search for a job, location is of the utmost importance to me. I've come up with a pretty good list of requirements, one of the which is having four seasons. (Other things on the list include: fireflies, thunderstorms, and relatively close proximity to a major airport.)

It's been a few years since I've lived somewhere with textbook seasons. You know, cold in the winter, hot in the summer, red/orange/yellow leaves in the fall, and rain and tulips in the spring. I like the balance of the seasons; as a reward for a surviving a cold and snowy winter, you get a hot and sunny summer. It all evens out. Here in Anchorage we have two seasons winter and not winter; dark and light, which has a balance of its own, I guess, but it's just not quite the same. For example, it's May 4th; it's raining, which is spring-y, but it's also 35 degrees, which is not.

This week's hot jam is He Stopped Loving Her Today by George Jones. Generally, I wouldn't consider a song this melancholy to be a hot jam, but I do love it. Released in 1980, it was George's first #1 song in six years, and it's often considered the greatest country music song of all time, although I'm not so sure about that. How do you judge such a thing? But it does have its own website (http://www.hestoppedlovinghertoday.com/) so that must count for something. Also I love any song that has talking in the middle.



Fun fact about George Jones: His alcoholism is/was well known, and apparently one time his wife got mad at him for being drunk all the time so she hid the car keys and left. The liquor store/bar was 8 miles away and she knew he wouldn't walk that far. Fueled by alcohol withdrawals and a stubborn streak, George rode the lawn mower all the way there.

Baseball and The Jock Jams Megamix (Yes, seriously)

As I write this I'm grumbling at my computer. Mostly things like, "Really!?" and "Come on, guys!" and probably a few "You've got to be kidding me!"'s. Ah yes, baseball season is upon us. Baseball is one of my favorite things, and I am cursed with a love of the Cleveland Indians, hence the grumbling. I can hear you fellow baseball fans snickering, muttering about me being a poor sap. Yes, I know. They lose. A lot. (They've won 2 World Series', 1920 and 1948; and they have the longest World Series drought in the American League. It's the second longest drought in all of baseball. Topped only by my distant second favorite team, the Chicago Cubs' 102 year drought.) In fact, the Indians are losing right now. 8 to 3 to the White Sox. THE WHITE SOX of all teams! Horrible. Not to mention they lost on Friday 15 to 10 AND IT WAS THE HOME OPENER. But I love them still. (Edit: They finally won on Monday! Woohoo!)

It's really all my dad's fault that I love both baseball and the Indians. He's a big fan and it rubbed off on me and my sister. We lived in Cleveland until I was 8ish and I went to a few games as a kid. My sister even got to be a ball girl at one of the games. (Did you win an essay contest, Alissa?)

Alissa on the field. Check out that sweet jacket under her jersey

Alissa's friend Sarah and me before the game

I've been to a few since and I always love it. One time we got to use my parent's boss' season ticket seats at an Angels-Indians game. They were very good  seats. Like 10 rows behind home plate seats. Did you know they come and take your order down there? Very nice. It's not just major league baseball I like though, I love it all, little league, minor league. I think it's all great. Remember that scene in The Sandlot where the kids play the little leaguers? That's what baseball is about.



I know a lot of people aren't baseball fans because they think it's "boring". Nobody gets tackled, it's not particularly fast paced, there's rarely a fight (although bench-clearing brawls do break out every once in awhile). But I think the more you watch the more you like it. When you know the players and see the subtleties of the game it gets very exciting. Which is why I'm sitting on my couch in my PJs on a Saturday morning "watching" the game on MLB Gameday.  I know what these players can do and I hope to see them do it.  I think there is nothing more exciting a well timed double play, or a diving catch in the outfield, or seeing a guy whack a baseball  500 feet for a home run. Or what about the be-all and end-all of baseball? Stealing home. You can't tell me that's not exciting.




Keeping with the sports theme this week, the hot jam is none other than the Jock Jams Megamix. Chances are if you are a 20-something like I am, you owned Jock Jams vol. 3 or knew someone that did. There's no real reason to own it, you're probably not going to be cruising in your car blasting the megamix. More likely you were making up dance routines in your basement. Don't deny it, you know you did. A popular soundtrack to many a sleep over, Jock Jam Megamix is a hot jam because, well, it just is, so dust off those cheerleader moves and turn.it.up.

Jorts and Dog Police

My love for jorts (jean shorts, if you prefer) is well known. Note in the header photo my sister and I are BOTH wearing jorts . I even tucked my sweet polka dot shirt in, as if to show off even more of my jorts. But clearly my love didn't stop when I turned 8. 

Exhibit A

Exhibit B

Exhibit C

And this doesn't include the countless photos of me as a child wearing jorts. I don't think it's the jorts themselves that I love so much, it's what the represent. Jorts mean summer and music festivals and drinking beer and relaxation. They say, "Hey, I got hot one day so I cut off the legs of my pants. No big deal."

The hot jam of a the week is Dog Police by Dog Police (from the album Dog Police.)  Chances are you've never heard of Dog Police. The video won MTV's 1985 Basement Tapes Competition, but that's their only claim to fame as far as I know.

I was unaware my life was incomplete and then my dear friend Jonathan showed me this (award winning) video. After I watched it I realized that a piece of me had been missing, and that piece could only be filled by this song and video. Be warned: it WILL get stuck in your head and when you finally get it out, it will pop back in randomly. But that's the beauty, every time you randomly start humming a few bars of the chorus you'll laugh. So you're welcome.