Top 10 Tuesday

Top 10 Weird Things I Do

10) When I'm using a pen with a cap I have to line up the prong of the cap with the writing on the pen. If they're out of line It bugs me. Or if its a highlighter I line it up with the tip of the highlighter.
9) If I'm driving and listening to the radio and it's the 3rd of 4th time I've heard a song and I'm bored with it I make up different parts to it and do my own harmonies.
8) I get more excited about a movie if a favorite writer I love is working on it than one of my favorite actors
7) I have a Mary Poppins purse. The typical items I carry are; a pocket knife, lotion, gum, dental floss, band aids, neosporin, tea, pain killers, a toothbrush, toothpaste, dayquil, Clorox wipes, baby wipes, alcohol swabs, aloe, hand sanitizer, sewing kit, a handkerchief, Kleenex, a camera, an iPod, and all that on top of a wallet, planner, phone and make up.
6) In my iTunes whenever I get a new song or upload something I have to find the artwork to go with it and if I can't I put something else up, like a random picture. I just needs something visual.
5) I like doing laundry but I hate putting it away. It drives me nuts.
4) The noise that those cards of gum makes drives me crazy too. I buy gum in the little buckets to avoid the foil and plastic cards.
3) I don't like driving the same route home that I took to get somewhere. I'll purposefully take another route.
2) I typically practice the remnants of my ballet training when I'm waiting for the microwave
1) If my feet are cold its impossible for me to relax, be in a good mood or sleep.


Top 10 Things I LOVE about Christmas Time

10) the Christmas around the world stuff; Christmas crackers, luminarias etc
9) The Music; bell choirs, boy choirs, classical choirs. people randomly bursting into song and it being acceptable, The Hanukkah song back on the radio
8) The Special Treats; shortbread, eggnog, candy cane Joe-Joe's, peppermint hot chocolate...
7) the smell of pine, candle wax and wrapping paper. All mixed up
6) Disneyland
5) people thinking about each other and things that are bigger than them for more than a moment that comes out in random "Merry Christmas"s on the street
4) Christmas lights walks clutching hot coco
3) A Charlie Brown Christmas on a near constant loop
2) How hopeful everything feels
1) Having a whole season, not just a day, to celebrate Christ and how much I love the people in my life and reach out for new ones to bring in

I Paid for This?

I am totally an admitted wimp. I am a bleeding heart. I convulsively cried at Where the Heart Is and didn't sleep for 3 days after I saw The Ring.

Things affect me.

A lot.

Little things, big things, said things, unsaid things; my brain records them all, my heart picks up on all of it and they stay with me. It’s taken years of practice, deep breathing, theater training, and mobilizing the vast pool of logic that Heavenly Father has seen fit to give me to balance out my spongy brain and figure out how to keep myself from going in every direction at once. I don’t want to be that girl and exhaust and annoy everyone around me and I’d like to think I’ve been marginally successful.

However, because of this I don't like being scared because I get SCARED. It typically doesn't go away for days and days. I avoid scary things like the plague, especially scary movies.

I enjoy suspenseful movies (read: The Village) and being startled is a bit fun. Like when you can immediately laugh at yourself and shake off the adrenaline. That’s fine. I grew up with brothers, that’s just a fact of life.

But I don't like being scared..... and its Halloween.

All the good candy is coming out and Disney's Halloween Treat will be on every half hour somewhere till the end of the month (Huey dressed as a witch was always my favorite).

For a long time I was a very big Halloween grinch. My pumpkin got smashed and my cat died on the same Halloween once and it took me years to forgive the day but I finally did. My friend Jamie reintroduced me to the joy that is the 7 year old's Halloween when I was 20 or so - dressing up and candy.

I even got talked into going to Knott's Scary Farm once for a friend's bachelorette party (yeah – I know. I don’t get it either. She loved it though and it was about her that night…) and I actually had fun. But only after the first 20 minutes when I got over the "OHMY Creepy Batman" and realized that they all were all goofy teenagers in campy monster costumes running around with noise makers. It was funny.

So I don’t know what got into me when I got talked into going to going to the “haunted house” at Fairplex.

Well… I do know what I was thinking but that’s a blog for another day…
The meat of the matter is that I ended up there with a group of people from church.

We bought our tickets and got in line and proceeded to wait for over an hour to get into this ply wooded and spray painted attempt at a front of a spooky haunted house. The theme was it was an asylum that had been demented and all the patients had gotten loose.

Cue eye roll.

There were the standard strobe lights and looped 16 bars from The Exorcist theme ting-tanging through cheap speakers that were situated behind a dangling skeleton over the entrance.

It might have been ominous at a quick glass or pass, but an hour in line gives you ample time to realize how this was probably designed by a 15 year old while on a 15 min break with the Stage Crew. Now the group I was with was a bit odd. There were 8 of us. 3 guys, 5 girls. The ratios were a bit off for a truly hilarious experience. I mean, that’s why guys take girls to haunted houses right, so they’ll freak out and be all over them and they get to be heroes and feel invincible right? Anyway…

2 of the girls in this group are some of the best people on the planet. However, to say they were skittish would also be a gross understatement. These are the girls who won’t touch raw meat because if flips them out. Now imagine that kind of hyper girly flip out potential standing in line to a haunted house with “monsters” pacing up and down the line scaring people as they go. Yeah -

All of us were expecting a hilarious show, at our friend’s psychological expense. But that’s what Halloween is about right? Right –

I am unspeakably grateful that those two were there because it took attention off of the fact that I was quietly and internally flipping out myself. I like to think that externally I appear put together, but, at the time, there were nothing but pans rattling and air horns of panic and anxiety going off just behind my eyes. I don’t like being scared and here I was totally opening myself up for it. I stood in line next to my friend whose idea this whole excursion was while he just smiled and watched me talk too fast and stand with my arms crossed and keep quiet pretending to listening to people around me. But alas and once again, just a few centimeters underneath my skin I was practically shaking.

However, by the time we got to the front of the line the monsters were funny, the “BOOO!!! Ohhhh, snarl snarly” was funny. I had planked up my brain for that and I was good to go by the time we went in.

I was somehow nominated to lead our group through this maze. It was a maze and it sucked. I’m not good at mazes, never have been. There were machines that sent bursts of air at your feet that startled me and badly made up girls walking around in night gowns pretending to be crazy but I was well. There were dead ends that I led people straight into that had gauntly looking bloody type people in showers popping out at me and I was well.

It went totally dark and I wasn’t so well. That’s when I started groping for reassuring somebodys and I peaked around every corner like the flaming chicken that I am but somehow towards the end of the maze when I thought I had made it through like a pro we were in this room that was really narrow and through some turn I ended up at the back of group instead of the front. It was dark and I was anxious for it all to be over so I grabbed onto the person in front of me who happened to be my friend Brad that I have known since my pre mission days. The guy has seen me in almost every possible respect, except this one apparently.

I had a pretty good grip on his jacket and I was looking around for anyone who might be behind me and instead of a group member there was one of the monster people. Now, at Knott’s the rule is that the monsters stay in whatever room you see them in. Once you make it through a room you’re safe from that particular monster. That’s the haunted house norm so I thought “ok just a few more feet and he’ll back off…”

Oh no –

He followed me into the next room and I said “Brad, there’s a monster behind me” and Brad turned around and said over his shoulder “I KNOW!” and I tightened my grip on his jacket a little bit more. So the monster guy starts his creepy voice saying something to scare me.

Now, if he had stayed in character and the following would have happened I would have been perfectly fine. However he did not -

He cleared his throat, broke character, and in a perfectly normal voice said “Ooooh – you smell good.” Brad and I both started laughing but I can’t tell you how this totally unnerved me. If he wasn’t wearing such a sturdy jacket I could have possibly ripped it with how much tighter my grip got. If someone was that close and normally clad and made up that still would have unnerved me.

Then he got super close to me and started smelling and breathing on my neck. I had my hair pulled back so it was exposed and he was really enjoying himself as a dude, not the supposed monster he was supposed to be. They’re not allowed to touch people but that was enough for me.

I bolted and he took off after me. I pushed past the people in our group trying to put some distance between us but, the oh so loving people that I was with saw a show and just got out of his and my way. My other friend (the ones who’s this idea was in the first place) saw me and him bolt by and noted that he also had a chainsaw and told him to “fire it up!” So when there was a bit of an opening and he had me on the run the monster guy roared the chainsaw to life and that’s when my last shred of logic and dignity just fell out of my ears.

I grabbed for the first person I saw and who was it? Only one of our loveably skittish sisters. She barely turned around and saw a totally unglued Lizzie with a chainsaw wielding fiend behind her, and bless her, she caught me and just as terror filled, did what she could which was sink down and sit in the chair that was there and I ended up crouched on the floor right next to her with my head covered.

I stayed there for a second or two and peeked up when the chainsaw finally died and the monster was silently crouched right in front of me about 6 inches from my face just waiting for me to come to and properly made fun of me when I recovered 30 seconds later.

We got out of the maze and made our way back to the car all reliving my meltdown and reporting what we were thinking and what was funny and everyone was marveling that “of all of us here – Liz would be the one to cave…”

Glad I could take one for the team people. That’s what I’m here for.

It was absolutely ridiculous and a total blast. I can’t deny how fun it was. I never once thought I was in any kind of proper danger. It was just an adrenaline rush and a chance to release a little I think. I almost kept it together but I think I just can’t handle mud faced, chainsaw wielding, clown suited, actors enjoying my DKNY perfume at close range.

Call me crazy.

The Space Between

I love music.

I always have.

It's been my best friend/boyfriend/life coach for many a year. It's is one of those things that helps me feel a little bit less lonely when the feeling creeps up.

I'm a huge fan of live music and especially of live music by the singer/songwriter types. I'm a puddle for an honest piano and literate lyric. Consequently, one of my favorite places in the entirety of LA is a little place on Cahuenga called The Hotel Cafe. It's a music club that’s a singer/songwriter zone only; little, intimate, quality and 1000% awesome.

I love it. I'd work there if I could, for free even. That way I could be there chronically, frequently, and often. This last Friday one of my favorites was playing. Greg Laswell - he was releasing his new album (Three Flights from Alto Nido - go get it right now right now. You'll thank me and bless my future children. Buy them trusts even. It's that good.) and he was having the release show & party there. Needless to say, Patrick (my partner in musical crime) and I were some of the first people in the door.

Greg is awesome. He’s been on my iMeem list for the last year and a half but I hadn't seen him live until the Hotel Cafe Tour show in April. I was a bit nervous to see him because sounding good on an album is one thing, and I really liked his album work, but I bank my love and devotion on live performances. He totally delivered. He's money, absolutle money. He's a rare bird and on the favorite list for this reason; he's a brilliant song writer that is an honest performer. It's a transfiguring experience to see him perform. You just get sucked into the song, launch, and hover above yourself and your life for a few brilliant minutes. It's indescribable.

I know I'm getting caught up in Lizisms, sorry....

Def:
Honest Performance -

I think there are a lot of amazing songs out there that aren't necessarily honestly performed. Ex: Jewel. She’s an amazing writer, but there is a dissonance between the sobriety of her writing and gravity of her meaning and the uppityness of her music. read: me-no-likey.

Contrastingly, I think a perfect example of someone who is completely honest in writing and performance is Tori Amos. There is total union between her music and her poetry in my opinion. There are myriads of others too but shes the first one that comes to mind

I mean, there are bad songs that are honestly performed. Like, I totally believe that the Pussycat Dolls really did want to drive nice cars and have boobies when they grew up, I could just give a damn. Usher really DOES want to make love in that club, but like I said....

Back to Greg-
He is beloved because I think about his stuff. I see his images and relate them to things outside of my iPod. They harrow ideas and memories out of me that typically I don't take out. And sometimes I swear he has peeked into my brain because so many of his images and ideas are intimately familiar to me. Especially June bugs.

**btw: This blog isn't an attempt to get on Greg's street team, I just can't explain the "Space Between" epiphany I had at that show without this slight background**

Patrick, myself, and a few other friends who share our neurosis about meaning have debated over his songs in the past and our current email discussion was regarding one off of his EP, "Salvation, Dear". We all had different ideas where he was coming from and why and were all kind of locked in the folded arm "I'm right" stance.

Q:How awesome is this music if it gets 4 totally different people recreationally discussing meaning?! That don't have the English major reflex like me?
A: very.

Back to the show -

When we were walking in from the valet Greg was coming around the corner and simultaneously Patrick and I thought, "There he is, lets ask him about it!"

Not "ohhmigoshhohhmigoshhohhmigoshh - It's Greg Laswell, maybe he'll sign a CD. " No, we wanted to talk about lyrics. We're geeks. We know. We own it. We love it. That's what family is about.

He was trying to get situated for the show and stuff, but he was insanely cool and stopped and listened to this 6' 4" red head and chubby brunette burble on about speakers and POV and motivation. He was really excited to talk about it too - more cool points. Actually Patrick ran the approach and I joined when it looked like a discussion and not just an over the shoulder hallway conversation. I was trying to be respectful. First rule of LA culture: don't harass or approach the talent. Anyway, I don't think he was anticipating the fire hydrant of questions Patrick and I had.

And honestly, it's an intensely personal song about not being ready for a relationship and our questions were along the lines of "Why weren't you ready? What were your reasons for turning away happiness?" and he gave a polite non-revelatory answer like "I wasn't ready for something and she was so I had to let her go" and that was about it. Then he went on to let us know that his guitar player was about to go on and thanked us for coming out etc.

So as we were walking away Patrick said "Well that explains everything" and I said "What are you talking about? He didn't explain a single thing."

And in all honesty, if two complete and utter strangers had came up to me and asked me to spill my guts about an amazingly painful time in my life I'd start talking about the weather and conditions of the roads as well.

What was fascinating to me (more than the song in question obviously) and what I was in my head about the rest of the night, was the difference in idealistic space crashing together in the physical space between me and Greg. It was like this 18" wide weather system of realities. This was my first time meeting the guy and shaking hands and discussing his work and all that. As a fan I had this really solidified idea of him that I had gleaned and pieced together from his music. What his life has been about, what he must think, his candor about his experiences etc. But seeing him there (he’s much shorter than I imagined) and hearing him speak to things and getting that other 90% of human communication of body language, was someone completely different.

He went from Greg Laswell the idea or voice out of a box, to Greg Laswell, the whiskey drinking guy that forgot to wash his shirt that morning (because he did). There was this precious space between my understanding of the guy and what he wanted me to understand him as that crashed and meet in the foot and a half between us.

The relationship between artist, art and viewer has been debated since the beginning of time, I know. I'm painfully unoriginal, but it’s such an experience, such a mental deflowering, but not in a bad way.

I wasn't let down at all or disgusted by his not knowing me as well as I felt I knew him or being as open as I hoped. That he didn't connect with me like I had connected with him. I mean, I wanted to know why he wrote that song and what he was thinking, but after 30 seconds i knew he wasn't going to really tell me. He was a genuinely pleasant and awesome guy, patient too. Patrick and I have to be quite an experience and getting blindsided by one of us, much less both.... well - it takes a champ.

I'm sure artists deal with that disadvantage of perceived intimacy all the time. It’s got to try your sense of reality after awhile. I don't envy them a jot but I am grateful for ones like Greg.

The show was phenomenal, swelteringly hot, but worth every lost electrolyte.

Seeing Elijah Wood at the valet, Evangeline Lily at the bar and actually briefly meeting Dominic Monaghan was icing on the night.

Man I love LA, and despite it not being very comfortable, I love the Space Between. It keeps me alive you know; feeling, thinking, and wondering. That's art. That's what it’s all about and it’s a realigning experience I hope to have over and over again.

So - see you at The Hotel Cafe next week?