#a good and sustainable practice? no. but i am not a big artist anyway so its fine. probably | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

aerial-aspie · 3 years

Text

An Autistic Point of View 2

Hi there! It's Hazel and I'm first going to talk about what it's like to me to be autistic.

So for me I got diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome at the age of 14 and it has helped me understand a lot of my traits, which now I can articulate to you.

I'm obsessive and I mean very obsessive, once I find something I really really like it's all the occupies my brain day and night, everyday and sometimes to the point where I can't focus because all I want to think about is my obsession. A few examples of this was Vocaloid, BTS/K-pop and right now Genshin Impact.

During lessons, I struggled to stay 100% focused at all times because my brain always likes to drift off into dream land and I have to make a big mental effort to reign myself back into reality. This problem affect me when I used to take Chemistry (it was far too hard for my pea brain anyway) and the moment my brain switched off, BOOM! I'd missed a ton of information, even if it was only for 10 seconds.

However, now, after changing subjects and finding the right ones for me, I'm finding it much easier to control my need to daydream and can focus much better.

Next, I am forgetful. Imagine a sieve but only the unimportant information (normally to do with what I'm obsessing over) stays and everything else falls through, no matter how important it is to me. I hurt my knuckles over lockdown learning and needed to ice them frequently and it was very important, however, 2 seconds after remembering I needed to do that, you guessed it! I forgot about it.

Forgetfulness is hard, especially when at school because I need to drill my theory into my brain so hard because I will forget so easily. As well as at school, I have my phone and Alexa full of reminders to tell me to simple tasks such as to update this blog or to practice my piano or else I'd forget.

Lets throw in a weird one now. To be honest even I have no clue if this is an autistic trait but it's certainly something that affects me. When studying or reading I can't listen to any music with English lyrics. Why? Because I focus on the lyrics and draw myself into them and then struggle to concentrate when working because I can understand what's being sung. So my playlists involve game soundtracks, a few screamo bands (you can't understand what they're saying anyways) and Asian pop.

One thing that was said through my diagnosis is that it's possible I could have anxiety for life and as of writing this I'm currently trying to get therapy or medication for it.

Anxiety is isolating, it's painful with its physical side effects (which manifest in chest pains for me), it gives unneeded stress over problems which to others seem minor, it gives me panic attacks which range in severity, it gives a fear embarrassment, of messing up, of standing out, of being DIFFERENT.

Everything about myself I scrutinise, I'm trying to give up chocolate because it gives me so much extra stress that I believe it's unhealthy for myself. I must present myself in a way where I don't seem rude or impolite as I'm scared of how everyone will react. If I get into an argument or something I believe is an argument, I beat myself up about it and I feel like I hurt everyone around me.

I believe I'm a constant annoyance, when I'm around people I'm comfortable with I'm a chatterbox and you can't shut me up. But it makes me self conscious, am I talking too much? Is everyone just being friendly out of obligation? Are they all secretly annoyed at me? Are questions I ask myself daily and blame myself at some points for not being normal.

My brain sticks to the past and words echo my mind for sometimes years giving me fears that others would even know of. Such as the lessons about heart disease in biology always play in my mind to the point I want to give up chocolate because it's giving me so much stress as my brain is like OH MY GOD YOU ATE CHOCOLATE NOW YOU'RE GONNA DIE! And then I get stressed and get chest pains which only further add to it.

Now we got the heavy topic out the way lets move on! Autism has led me to have a fine motor coordination disability which has affect me my whole life, I can't handwrite well, I struggle opening tins, peeling vegetables, unlocking the door to get in my house, using scissors, folding things and the list goes on (and let me tell you it's long).

But you get the gist, I struggle with a lot of things and it can take me a much longer amount of time to work out things than someone normal.

I'm also extremely disorganised, actually that's a lie. I'm extremely organised but it doesn't look it. My room is a mess and I know that but I could tell you where everything is in seconds because it's what I call 'an organised mess'. I organise things but it's not neat, it's just where my brain decides is a good place to put things.

My school bag is so organised to point I don't like people touch it because I know where everything is and it has to be in the same pockets or else I'll get upset because it just has to be there and that is something no one can change.

However, even though I'm on that point of organisation, I still get stressed about if I have forgotten anything even though I never have.

Part of my autism is physical traits too, I am born with weak muscles in many places, the ones I know of so far are my wrists, knees, eyes and lower back. Because of this I can't handwrite long essays and have to have computer support to help me with this problem. With other areas, it's places I know I need to be careful when training at circus because I discovered my weak back after crucifix rolls on a cloudswing went wrong (it's a type of error that will always happen when learning this move) and I locked up my spine, from then on I've never done that move ever again.

Whilst being quite extroverted (only around people I'm comfortable with, if not I'm extremely shy) I'm actually very sensitive to things. I can't be touched suddenly or at my waist or I will flinch or flail and let me tell you, as I martial artist I do hit extremely hard in reflex. I also am sensitive to loud noises when I'm not expecting it, such as seeing war horse the stage show where the sounds of gun shots and explosions were played so loud that I had a panic attack in the theatre. However, at concerts, I'm fine as I'm expecting this loud noise and I know what is coming.

A weird thing I find about myself is that I'm very contrasting, I'm highly emotional but don't understand emotion. My first emotional response to any emotion is to cry and yes it is extremely embarrassing to cry in front of others (I believe crying in public should be normalised not shamed). Yet I can't understand emotion such as when people are sad, I don't realise it and happily talk to them and then feel like they hate me because they ignore me and then beat myself up for not realising they're sad when they tell me so. But it's not just sadness, being talked to in a firm voice, to me means they're angry when they're not, criticism means everything I've done is stupid and you get the point.

However, not only do I not understand emotion normally, I actually at times can't feel it, I get excited before a concert but when it starts I feel nothing, everything I feel just disappears and my mind is blank, so I actually have to force myself to be happy and then my brain realises I'm happy and I don't have to put in effort to sustain an emotion.

Now last but not least (remember how I said I was forgetful, it's already come into play here that I can't even remember if I've covered everything about my Asperger's) I can't do instructions, if I'm given a list of items I need to take, a long list of instructions to follow with no physical copy to reference by the time the last instruction has been said, I've already forgotten the first one and this has been fatal when I've ended up with really bad sunburn because I forgot to bring sun cream because the list I was given was too long to remember.

And that's it folks, my autism is a nutshell that's probably missing some stuff but it's as much as I can tell you from the top of my head and if I remember more stuff I'll make sure to post it.

Thanks for following!

#autism #autistic experiences #being autistic #autistic culture #autistic problems #actually autistic #autistic life

7 notes · View notes

livingdeadinsideyourhead · 3 years

Text

Free Music in a Capitalist Society - Iggy Pop's Keynote Speech Transcript

Hi, I'm Iggy Pop. I've held a steady job at BBC 6 Music now for almost a year, which is a long time in my game. I always hated radio and the jerks who pushed that shit music into my tender mind, with rare exceptions. When I was a boy, I used to sit for hours suffering through the entire US radio top 40 waiting for that one song by The Beatles and the other one by The Kinks. Had there been anything like John Peel available in my Midwestern town I would have been thrilled. So it's an honor to be here. I understand that. I appreciate it.

Some months ago when the idea of this talk came up I thought it might be okay to talk about free music in a Capitalist society. So that's what I'm gonna try to talk about. A society in which the Capitalist system dominates all the others, and seeks their destruction when they get in its way. Since then, the shit has really hit the fan on the subject, thanks to U2 and Apple. I worked half of my life for free. I didn't really think about that one way or the other, until the masters of the record industry kept complaining that I wasn't making them any money. To tell you the truth, when it comes to art, money is an unimportant detail. It just happens to be a huge one unimportant detail. But, a good LP is a being, it's not a product. It has a life-force, a personality, and a history, just like you and me. It can be your friend. Try explaining that to a weasel.

As I learned when I hit 30 +, and realized I was penniless, and almost unable to get my music released, music had become an industrial art and it was the people who excelled at the industry who got to make the art. I had to sell most of my future rights to keep making records to keep going. And now, thanks to digital advances, we have a very large industry, which is laughably maybe almost entirely pirate so nobody can collect shit. Well, it was to be expected. Everybody made a lot of money reselling all of recorded musical history in CD form back in the 90s, but now the cat is out of the bag and the new electronic devices which estrange people from their morals also make it easier to steal music than to pay for it. So there's gonna be a correction.

When I started The Stooges we were organized as a group of Utopian communists. All the money was held communally and we lived together while we shared the pursuit of a radical ideal. We shared all song writing, publishing and royalty credits equally – didn’t matter who wrote it - because we'd seen it on the back of a Doors album and thought it was cool, at least I did. Yeah. I thought songwriting was about the glory, I didn't know you'd get paid for it. We practiced a total immersion to try to forge a new approach which would be something of our own. Something of lasting value. Something that was going to be revealed and created and was not yet known.

We are now in the age of the schemer and the plan is always big, big, big, but it's the nature of the technology created in the service of the various schemes that the pond, while wide, is very shallow. Nobody cares about anything too deeply expect money. Running out of it, getting it. I never sincerely wanted to be rich. There is a, in the US, we have this guy “Do you sincerely wanna be rich? You can do it!” I didn’t sincerely want to be rich. I never sincerely felt like making anyone else that way. That made me a kind of a wild card in the 60's and 70's. I got into the game because it felt good to play and it felt like being free. I'm still hearing today about how my early works with The Stooges were flops. But they're still in print and they sell 45 years later, they sell. Okay, it took 20 or 25 years for the first royalties to roll in. So sue me.

Some of us who couldn't get anywhere for years kept beating our heads against the same wall to no avail. No one did that better than my friends The Ramones. They kept putting out album after album, frustrated that they weren't getting the hit. They even tried Phil Spector and his handgun. After the first couple of records, which made a big impact, they couldn't sustain the quality, but I noticed that every album had at least one great song and I thought, wow if these guys would just stop and give it a rest, society would for sure catch up to them. And that's what's happening now, but they're not around to enjoy it. I used to run into Johnny at a little rehearsal joint in New York and he'd be in a big room all alone with a Marshall stack just going "dum, dum, dum, dum, dum" all my himself. I asked him why and he said if he didn't practice doing that exactly the way he did it live he'd lose it. He was devoted and obsessive, so were Joey and Deedee. I like that. Johnny asked me one day - Iggy don't you hate Offspring and the way they're so popular with that crap they play. That should be us, they stole it from us. I told him look, some guys are born and raised to be the captain of the football team and some guys are just gonna be James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause and that's the way it is. Not everybody is meant to be big. Not everybody big is any good.

I only ever wanted the money because it was symbolic of love and the best thing I ever did was to make a lifetime commitment to continue playing music no matter what, which is what I resolved to do at the age of 18. If who you are is who you are that is really hard to steal, and it can lead you in all sorts of useful directions when the road ahead of you is blocked and it will get blocked. Now I'm older and I need all the dough I can get. So I too am concerned about losing those lovely royalties, now that they've finally arrived, in the maze of the Internet. But I'm also diversifying my income, because a stream will dry up. I'm not here to complain about that, I'm here to survive it.

When I was starting out as a full time musician I was walking down the street one bright afternoon in the seedier part of my Midwestern college town. I passed a dive bar and from it emerged a portly balding pallid middle aged musician in a white tux with a drink in one hand and a guitar in the other. He was blinking in the daylight. I had a strong intuition that this was a fate to be avoided. He seemed cut off from society and resigned to an oblivious obscurity. A bar fly. An accessory to booze. So how do you engage society as an artist and get them to pay you? Well, that's a matter of art. And endurance.

To start with, I cannot stress enough the importance of study. I was lucky to work in a discount record store in Ann Arbor Michigan as a stock boy where I was exposed to a little bit of every form of music imaginable on record at the time. I listened to it all whether I liked it or not. Be curious. And I played in my high school orchestra and I learned the joy of the warm organic instruments working together in the service of a classical piece. That sticks with you forever. If anyone out there can get a chance to put an instrument and some knowledge in some kids hand, you've done a great, great thing.

Comparative information is a key to freedom. I found other people who were smarter than me. To teach me. My first pro band was a blues band called The Prime Movers and the leader Michael Erlewine was a very bright hippy beatnik with a beautifully organized record collection in library form of The Blues. I'd never really heard the Blues. That part of our American heritage was kept off the major media. It was system up, people down. No Big Bill Broonzy on BBC for us. Boy I wish! No money in it. But everything I learned from Michael's beautiful library became the building blocks for anything good I've done since. Guys like this are priceless. If you find one, follow him, or her. Get the knowledge.

Once in secondary school in the 60's some class clowns dressed up the tallest guy in school in a trench coat, shades and a fedora and rushed him in to a school dance with great hubbub proclaiming "Del Shannon is here, Del Shannon is here." And until they got to the stage we all believed them, because nobody knew what Del Shannon looked like. He was just a voice on some great records. He had no social ID. By the early 60's that had really changed with the invasion of The Beatles and The Stones. This time TV was added to the mix and print media too. So you knew who they were, or so you thought anyway. I'm mentioning this because the best way to survive the death or change of an industry is to transcend its form. You're better off with an identity of your own or maybe a few of them. Something special.

It is my own personal view having lived through it that in America The Beatles replaced our assassinated president Kennedy, who represented our hopes for a certain kind of society. Didn’t get there. And The Stones replaced our assassinated folk music which our own leaders suppressed for cultural, racial, and financial reasons. It wasn't okay with everybody to be Kennedy or Muddy Waters, but those messages could be accepted if they came through white entertainers from the parent culture. That's why they’re still around.

Years later I had the impression that Apple, the corporation, had successfully co-opted the good feelings that the average American felt about the culture of the Beatles, by kind of stealing the name of their company so I bought a little stock. Good move. 1992. Woo! But look, everybody is subject to the rip off and has to change affiliations from time to time. Even Superman and Barbie were German before America tempted them to come over. Tough luck, Nietzche.

So who owns what anyway. Or as Bob Dylan said "The relationships of ownership." That’s gates of Eden. Nobody knows for long, especially these days. Apparently when BBC radio was founded, the record companies in England wouldn't allow the BBC to play their master recordings because they thought no one would buy them for their personal use if they could hear them free on the radio. So they were really confused about what they had. They didn’t get it. And how people feel about music. ‘Cause it’s a feel thing, and it resists logic. It’s not binary code. Later when CD's came in, the retail merchants in American all panicked because they were just too damn tiny and they thought that Americans want something that looks big, like a vinyl record. Well they had a point but their solution was a kind of Frankenstein called "The Long Box." It didn't fool anybody because half of it was empty. It had a little CD in the bottom. You’d open it up and it was empty. Now we have people in the Sahara using GPS to bury huge wads of Euros under sand dunes for safe keeping. But GPS was created for military spying from the high ground, not radical banking so any sophisticated system, along with the bounty it brings, is subject to primitive hijacking.

I wanna talk about a type of entrepreneur who functions as a kind of popular music patron of the arts. It’s good to know a patron. I call him El Padron because his relationship to the artist is essentially feudal, though benign. He or she (La Padrona) if you will, is someone, usually the product of successful, enlightened parents, who owns a record company, but has had benefit of a very good education, and can see a bigger picture than a petty business person. If they like an artists’ style and it suits them, they'll support you even if you’re not a big money spinner. I can tell you, some of these powerful guys get so bored that if you are fun in the office, you’ll go places. Their ancestors, the old time record crooks just made it their business to make great, great records, but also to rip off the artist 100%, copyright, publishing, royalty splits, agency fees, you name it. If anyone complained the line was "Pay you? We worship you!" God bless Bo Diddley.

By the time I came along, there was a new brand of Padron. People like this are still around and some can help you. One was named Jack Holzman. Jack had a beautiful label called Elektra Records, they put out Judy Collins, Tim Buckley, the Doors and Love. He'd started working in his family record store, like Brian Epstein. He dressed mod and he treated us very gently. He was a civilized man. He obviously loved the arts, but what he really wanted to do was build his business - and he did. He had his own concerns, and style, and you had to serve them, and of course when he sold out, as all indies do, you were stranded culturally in the hands of a cold clumsy conglomerate. But he put us in the right studios with the right producers and he tried to get us seen in the right venues and it really helped. This is a good example of the industry.

Another good guy I met is Sir Richard Branson. I ended up serving my full term at Virgin Records having been removed from every other label. And he created a superior culture there. People were happier and nicer than the weasels at some other places. The first time he tried to sign me it didn't work out, because I had my sights set on A&M, a company I thought would help make me respectable. After all they had Sting! Richard was secretly starting his own company at the time in the US and he phoned me in my tiny flat with no furniture. He said he'd give me a longer term deal with more dough than the other guys and he was very, very polite and soft spoken. But I had just smoked a joint that day and I couldn't make a decision. So I went with the other guys who soon got sick of me. Virgin picked me up again later on the rebound. And on the cheap. Damn. My own fault.

Another kind of indie legend who is slightly more contemporary is Long Gone John of the label Sympathy for the Record Industry. Good name. John is famous with some artists for his disinterest in paying royalties. He has a very interesting music themed folk art collection – its visible online - which includes my leather jacket. I wish he'd give it back. There are lots of indie people with a gift for organization who just kind of collect freaks and throw them up at the wall to see who sticks. You gotta watch 'em.

When you go a step down creatively from the Padrons who are actually entrepreneurs you get to the executives. You don't wanna know these guys. They usually came over from legal or accounting. They have protégés usually called A&R men to do their dirty work. You can become a favorite with them if your fame or image might reflect limelight on their career. They tend to have no personalities to speak of, which is their strength. Strangely they're never really thinking about the good of their parent company as much as old number one. Avoid them. If you’re an artist, they’ll make you sick or suicidal. The only good thing the conglomerate can do for you – and they’ve done it recently for me - is make you really, really ubiquitous. They do that well. But, when the company is your banker, then you are basically gonna be the Beverly Hill Billies. So it's best not to take their money. Especially when you’re young. These are very tough people, and they can hurt you.

So who are the good guys?! They asked me when they read this thing at BBC 6 Music. Well there are lots of them. If fact, today there are more than ever and they are just about all indies, but first I want to mention Peter Gabriel and WOMAD for everything they've done for what seems like forever to help the greatest musicians in the world, the so called world musicians to gain a foothold and make a living in the modern screwed up cash and carry world. Traditional music was never a for profit enterprise, all the best forms were developed as a kind of you’re job in the community. It was pretty good, it was “Yeah, I’m a musician, I’m gonna skip like doing the dishes or taking the trash out.” It's not surprising that all the greatest singers and players come from parts of the world where everybody is broke and the old ways are getting paved over. So it's crucial for everyone that these treasures not be lost. There are other people of means and intelligence who help others in this way like Philip Glass through Tibet House, David Burn with Luaka Bop, Damon Albarn through Honest John Records. Shout out to Hypnotic Brass Ensemble. Almost all the best music is coming out on indies today like XL Matador, Burger, Anti, Epitaph, Mute, Rough Trade, 4 A D, Sub Pop, etc. etc.

But now YouTube is trying to put the squeeze on these people because it's just easier for a power nerd to negotiate with a couple big labels who own the kind of music that people listen to when they're really not that into music, which of course is most people. So they've got the numbers. But the indies kind of have the guns. I've noticed that indies are showing strength at some of the established streaming services like Spotify and Rhapsody – people are choosing that music. And it's also great that some people are starting their own outlets, like Pledge Music, Band Camp or Drip. As the commercial trade swings more into general show biz the indies will be the only place to go for new talent, outside the Mickey Mouse Club, so I think they were right to band together and sign the Fair Digital Deals Declaration.

There are just so many ways to screw an artist that it's unbelievable. In the old vinyl days they would deduct 10% "breakage fees" for records supposedly broken in shipping, whether that happened or not, and now they have unattributed digital revenue, whatever the **** that means. It means money for some guy’s triple bypass. I actually think that what Thom Yorke has done with Bit Torrent is very good. I was gonna say here: “Sure the guy is a pirate at Bit Torrent” but I was warned legally, so I’ll say: “Sure the guy a Bit Torrent is a pirate’s friend” But all pirates want to go legit, just like I wanted to be respectable. It’s normal. After a while people feel like you’re a crook, it’s too hard to do business. So it’s good in this case that Thom Yorke is encouraging a positive change. The music is good. It’s being offered at a low price direct to people who care.

I want to try to define what I am talking about when I say free. For me in the arts or in the media, there are two kinds of free. One kind of free is when the process is something that people just feel for you. You feel a sense of possibility. You feel a lack of constraint. This leads to powerful, energetic, sometimes kind of loony situations.

Vice Media is an interesting case of this because they started as a free handout, using public funds, and they had open, free-wheeling minds. Originally a free handout was called Voice and these kids were like “Just get rid of the old! I don’t wanna be Vice, yeah!” Okay. By taking an immersive approach with no particular preconceptions to their reporting, they've become a huge success, also through corporate advertising, at attracting big, big money investment hundreds of millions of dollars now pumped into Fox Media and a couple of others bigger than that in the US. And they get it because they attract lots of little boy eyeballs. So they brought us Dennis Rodman in North Korea. And it’s kind of a travesty, but it’s kind of spunky. It's interesting that capital investment, for all its posturing, never really leads, it always follows. They follow the action. So if it's money you're after, be the yourself in a consistent way and you might get it. You’ll at least end up getting what you are worth and feel better. Just follow your nose.

The second kind of freedom to me that is important in the media is the idea of giving freely. When you feel or sense that someone that someone is giving you something not out of profit, but out of self-respect, Christian charity, whatever it is. That has a very powerful energy. The Guardian, in my understanding, was founded by an endowment by a successful man with a social conscience who wanted to help create a voice for what I would call the little guy. So they have a kind of moral mission or imperative. This has given them the latitude to try to be interesting, thoughtful, helpful. And they bring Edward Snowden to the world stage. Something that is not pleasant for a lot of people to hear about, but we need to know.

These two approaches couldn't be more different. To justify their new mega bucks Vice will have to expand and expand in capital terms. Presumably they'll have to titillate a dumb, but energetic audience. Of course all capitalist expansions are subject to the big bang – balloon, bust, poof, and you’re gone. As for the Guardian I would imagine that the task involves gaining the trust and support of a more discerning, less definable reader, without spending the principal. There is usually an antipathy between cultural poles, but these two actually have a lot in common in terms of the energy and nuisance to power that they are willing to generate. I wish red and blue could come together somehow.

Sometimes I'd rather read than listen to music. One of my favourite odd books is Bootleg: The Secret History of the Other Recording Industry by Clinton Heylin. I bought the book in the 90's because a couple of my bootlegs were mentioned. I loved my bootlegs. They did a lot for me. I never really thought about the dough much. I liked the titles, like Suck on This, Stow Away DOA or Metalic KO. The packaging was always way more creative and edgy than most of my official stuff. So I just liked being seen and heard, like anybody else. These bootleggers were creative. Here are two quotes from the dust jacket by veteran industry stalwarts on the subject of bootlegs in 1994.

"Bootleg is the thoroughly researched and highly entertaining tale of those colorful brigands, hapless amateurs, and true believers who have done wonders for my record collection. Rock and roll doesn't get more underground than this." – that was David Fricke, the music editor of Rolling Stone "I think that bootlegs keep the flame of the music alive by keeping it out of not only the industry's conception of the artist, but also the artist's conception of the artist." – that was Lenny Kaye from the Patti Smith group, musician, critic and my friend.

Wow!! Sounds heroic and vital!

I wonder what these guys feel about all of this now, because things have changed, haven't they? We are now talking about Megaupload, Kim Dot Com, big money, political power, and varying definitions of theft that are legally way over my head. But I know a con man when I see one. I want to include a rant from an early bootlegger in this discussion because it's so passionate and I just think it's funny.

This is Lou Cohan "If anybody thinks that if I have purchased every single Rolling Stones album in existence, and I have bought all the Rolling Stones albums that have been released in England, France, Japan, Italy, and Brazil that if I have an extra $100 in my pocket instead of buying a Rolling Stones bootleg I am going to buy a John Denver album or a Sinead O'Conner album, they are retarded."

So the guy is trying to say don't try to force me. And don't steal my choice. And the people who don't want the free U2 download are trying to say, don't try to force me. And they've got a point. Part of the process when you buy something from an artist. It’s a kind of anointing, you are giving people love. It’s your choice to give or withhold. You are giving a lot of yourself, besides the money. But in this particular case, without the convention, maybe some people felt like they were robbed of that chance and they have a point. It’s not the only point. These are not bad guys. But now, everybody's a bootlegger, but not as cute, and there are people out there just stealing the stuff and saying don't try to force me to pay. And that act of thieving will become a habit and that’s bad for everything. So we are exchanging the corporate rip off for the public one. Aided by power nerds. Kind of computer Putins. They just wanna get rich and powerful. And now the biggest bands are charging insane ticket prices or giving away music before it can flop, in an effort to stay huge. And there's something in this huge thing that kind of sucks.

Which brings us to Punk. The most punk thing I ever saw in my life was Malcolm McLaren's cardboard box full of dirty old winkle pinkers. It was the first thing I saw walking in the door of Let It Rock in 1972 which was his shop at Worlds End on the Kings Road. It was a huge ugly cardboard bin full of mismatched unpolished dried out winkle pickers without laces at some crazy price like maybe five pounds each. Another 200 yards up the street was Granny Takes a Trip, where they sold proper Rockstar clothes like scarves, velvet jackets, and snake skin platform boy boots. Malcolm's obviously worthless box of shit was like a fire bomb against the status quo because it was saying that these violent shoes have the right idea and they are worth more than your fashion, which serves a false value. This is right out of the French enlightenment.

So is the thieving that big a deal? Ethically, yes, and it destroys people because it's a bad road you take. But I don't think that's the biggest problem for the music biz. I think people are just a little bit bored, and more than a little bit broke. No money. Especially simple working people who have been totally left out, screwed and abandoned. If I had to depend on what I actually get from sales I’d be tending bars between sets. I mean honestly it’s become a patronage system. There’s a lot of corps involved and I don’t fault any of them but it’s not as much fun as playing at the Music Machine in Camden Town in 1977. There is a general atmosphere of resentment, pressure, kind of strange perpetual war, dripping on all the time. And I think that prosecuting some college kid because she shared a file is a lot like sending somebody to Australia 200 years ago for poaching his lordship's rabbit. That's how it must seem to poor people who just want to watch a crappy movie for free after they’ve been working themselves to death all day at Tesco or whatever, you know.

If I wanna make music, at this point in my life I'd rather do what I want, and do it for free, which I do, or cheap, if I can afford to. I can. And fund through alternative means, like a film budget, or a fashion website, both of which I've done. Those seem to be turning out better for me than the official rock n roll company albums I struggle through. Sorry. If I wanna make money, well how about selling car insurance? At least I'm honest. It's an ad and that's all it is. Every free media platform I've ever known has been a front for advertising or propaganda or both. And it always colors the content. In other words, you hear crap on the commercial radio. The licensing of music by films, corps, and TV has become a flood, because these people know they're not a hell of a lot of fun so they throw in some music that is. I'm all for that, because that's the way the door opened for me. I got heard on tv before radio would take a chance. But then I was ok. Good. And others too. I notice there are a lot of people, younger and younger, getting their exposure that way. But it's a personal choice. I think it’s an aesthetic one, not an ethical one.

Now with the Internet people can choose to hear stuff and investigate it in their own way. If they want to see me jump around the Manchester Apollo with a horse tail instead of trying to be a proper Rockstar, they can look. Good. Personally I don't worry too much about how much I get paid for any given thing, because I never expected much in the first place and the whole industry has become bloated in its expectations. Look, Howling Wolf would work for a sandwich. This whole thing started in Honky Tonk bars. It's more important to do something important or just make people feel something and then just trust in God. If you're an entertainer your God is the public. They'll take care of you somehow. I want them to hear my music any old which way. Period. There is an unseen hand that turns the pages of existence in ways no one can predict. But while you’re waiting for God to show up and try to find a good entertainment lawyer.

It's good to remember that this is a dream job, whether you're performing or working in broadcasting, or writing or the biz. So dream. Dream. Be generous, don’t be stingy. Please. I can't help but note that it always seems to be the pursuit of the money that coincides with the great art, but not its arrival. It's just kind of a death agent. It kills everything that fails to reflect its own image, so your home turns into money, your friends turn into money, and your music turns into money. No fun, binary code – zero one, zero one - no risk, no nothing. What you gotta do you gotta do, life's a hurly-burly, so I would say try hard to diversify your skills and interests. Stay away from drugs and talent judges. Get organized. Big or little, that helps a lot.

I'd like you to do better than I did. Keep your dreams out of the stinky business, or you'll go crazy, and the money won't help you. Be careful to maintain a spiritual EXIT. Don't live by this game because it's not worth dying for. Hang onto your hopes. You know what they are. They’re private. Because that's who you really are and if you can hang around long enough you should get paid. I hope it makes you happy. It's the ending that counts, and the best things in life really are free.

#iggy pop #idk if anyone posted it here already #I'm just too lazy to look up so #here it is!

12 notes · View notes

amphtaminedreams · 3 years

Text

If We Can’t Have the Parties, At Least We Have the Coats: Lookbook no.13

Hi to anyone reading,

It’s been a weird winter, right?

A winter that I REALLY did not need to buy as many clothes for as I have. You WILL save loads of money during this lockdown, I told myself. You WILL. And yet here I am in December, in exactly the same financial position I was in March. You would think that making the switch to an environmentally friendly wardrobe would mean I own less but now I no longer have the guilt of supporting fast fashion to hold me back, I’ve accumulated more clothes than ever. Part of a sustainable wardrobe is also about reducing your consumption so now I’ve mostly made the move towards only supporting transparent companies/small businesses, I can move onto the buying less part. I haven’t thrown any clothes away but still, I am not the clothes rescuer I think I am-more just an overdraft abuser. To add to that, for those of us actually following the rules (half the people I went to secondary school with flaunting their apparently unaffected social lives on Instagram, I’m looking at you) there aren’t actually all that many opportunities to wear new outfits. Not to go too first world problems, but it is a little shit when getting dressed up and doing your makeup is one of the things that you do to help you feel a little better, especially when the seasonal (and situational in these times) depression kicks in.

So yes, I have been extra af recently and combatted this with the decision to start making an effort to outfit plan for the most basic of tasks. We’re talking a full face of makeup and accessories for going into town to get a coffee or to meet a friend for a walk. I mean, I still go to Tesco in my trackies but if I’m seeing somebody else, I am sure as hell going to treat it as a reason to wear something nice. See the winter outfits section of the lookbook as your inspiration to do the same because I can guarantee you the sense of normality forcing yourself to take makeup off at the end of the day brings will actually make you feel a lot better. Genuinely the mark of exceptional times. We’ve also got the few days relief period over Christmas in the UK where we’re allowed to mix with a maximum of 3 other households, and ignoring the fact that it doesn’t really make any sense given that the number of people you could end up mixing with depends on the size of the households and is realistically completely arbitrary (I have a lot of feelings about how fucking moronic half the decisions this government has been making are but then again, what’s new?), I’m sure those of you with big families are gonna be partying. I’m only spending Christmas with my immediate family but I thought I’d put some more festive outfits together anyway. I know, I know, it sounds like I’m just bullshitting an explanation as to why I put this lookbook together when in reality I’m trying to make myself feel better about the damage to my bank account buuuut it really is more a case of being inspired by my Depop finds and if you are trying to quit fast fashion, I can’t recommend the app enough (especially if you know what you’re looking for). As I did in the last lookbook, I will make sure to include the tags of all the people I bought these pieces from but I also thought it might be helpful to make a note of some of the descriptors I used to find them so you can get more of an idea how to find the things you’re looking for too, as well as prices. I did include the names of the shops I bought the few fast fashion items I styled from too, mostly earlier this year or at some point over the last couple of years, on the basis that they may be a useful search prompt if you’re looking for something similar or the exact item-the majority are no longer available (disclaimer: I haven’t bought anything from Boohoo in a longgg time) to buy but you might be able to find an account that’s selling a used version. Don’t be put off by that-I’ve had to wash a couple of pieces but for the most part, that hasn’t been necessary. Charity shops usually wash things before they put them out, so you have nothing to worry about there either-I expect that they’re particularly thorough at the moment considering the COVID crisis.

Enough rambling from me for now! Enjoy!

-(SOCIALLY DISTANCED) PARTY SZN LOOKS-

Powder Blue Wide Brim Felt Hat/Fedora: £16.99

Structured White Mesh Oh Polly Mini Dress w/Ruched Detail: £27

Black PVC Beret w/Red Flame Detail: £14

Red Fit and Flare Dress w/Satin Corset & Tulle Skirt: £12

Black PVC Vintage Platform Boots w/Red Flame Detail: £27

White Satin Corset w/Straps: £8

Pinstripe Cropped Blazer Co-ord Set: £12.50

Oh Mighty Strappy Contrast Corset: £27

Contrast Check Cigarette Trousers: £15

Pink Topshop Gingham Blazer Co-ord Set BNWT: £35

White Strappy Corset w/Suspender Detail: £10

White PVC Beret w/Black Flame Detail: £14

Reworked Strappy Patchwork Sports Cropped Tee: £10

Black Combat Cargo Trousers: £5

Strappy Tie-dye Pretty Little Thing Corset BNWT: £15

PVC/Vinyl Zip-up Mini Skirt w/Belt Detail: £9

White Satin Cowl Neck Mini Slip Dress: £8

Urban Outfitters ‘90s Style Celestial Print Mesh Babydoll Dress: £15

-(SOMETIMES PRACTICAL) COAT SZN LOOKS-

UNIF Colour Block Oversized Jumper/Sweater: £25

Topshop Dark Wash Denim Kick Flare Jeans w/Frayed Hem Detail: £16

Vintage ‘70s Style Brown Faux Suede Western Blazer/Jacket: £15

Black Velvet High Neck Bodysuit w/Keyhole Detail: £4

Topshop Paisley Print Chiffon Midi Dress: £15

Brandy Melville Cropped Motorcross Slogan Slogan Tee: £13.60

Ragged Priest Gingham Cargo/Combat Trousers w/Utility Style Buckle Detailing: £33

Black Kappa Logo Beanie: £12

White Platform FILA Disruptors in Good Condition: £55

Black Fur Bucket Hat: £8

Celestial Silver Moon Detail Chain Belt: £18

Black Satin Cowl Neck Detail Midi Slip Dress: £15

Floral Print Platform Boots: £10

Blue Denim ASOS High Rise Mom Jeans: £12

Brown Vintage ‘70s Style Afghan Coat w/Fur Trim: £25

Teal Wide Brim Felt Hat/Fedora: £10

Topshop Floral Print A-Line Jacquard Mini Skirt: £7

Lana Del Rey Screen Printed T-Shirt: £9.99

Vintage Corduroy Contrast Stripe Trousers w/Kick Flare: £28

Anyone that read to the end, thank you so much as always and I hope this shows just how many in-trend pieces you can find second hand! I know I'm SUPER far behind to the point where it’s closer to the F/W2021 shows now than it is since the S/S2021 collections were showcased but I decided I am going to do a full length fashion week review. I also have a few moodboards planned and my next is gonna be one focussing purely on plus sized fashion as the feedback that I got from my New Style Icons post was that I could have included more bigger girls; I am so, so, SO passionate about body positivity and fat acceptance, especially since I know my own relationship with my body would be so much better if this kind of movement was more prominent when I was younger, so I don’t for a minute want anyone to think it was my intention to be exclusionary in any way. It bears repeating that I genuinely appreciate feedback in any form (as long as it’s not too mean and presumptive, lol) and I hope the next post doesn’t disappoint! It hasn’t been a good year for cinema due to COVID having lead to theatre closures, however I still do want to do another film tier ranking in the new year as that is something I really enjoyed doing last time. Any more suggestions are welcome!

As always, my inbox is always open if you need someone to talk to or just wanna chat about a post:-) I am constantly on the look out for new blogs to follow and people to interact with so any communication is welcome. I’m not sure if I’ll get another post finished before we enter 2021, SO I wanna say that I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and that this shitshow of a year DOES come to an end at 11:59PM on the 31st because THOSE MEMES ABOUT IT TURNING DECEMBER THE 32ND ARE NOT FUNNY! Here’s to our second attempt at our first year of the roaring twenties (because this past year it feels like we skipped them and went straight to The Great Depression, the likely incoming recession denial is real) and to happier times and good health for everyone.

Lauren x

DISCLAIMER: Background in the first 2 images are mine, others are not. I found them on Pinterest so not sure of the artists but if you do know, drop me a message so I can credit them!

7 notes · View notes

sineala · 6 years

Note

hi uh, it's the stupid-question anon again. what i meant is, even if you manage to complete a story, it's stuck at around 5-6K words, and you somehow just can't write anything more than that measly word count, whether complete or not. but it seems you've never had that problem, so thank-you anyway for the response!

It’s still not a stupid question, and, yes, absolutely I have been in that situation. Before I did NaNoWriMo I definitely hadn’t written more than 5k of anything and literally none of it was finished. It took me a while to get to Hey You Can Finish Things and then Hey You Can Write Long Things and then Hey You Can Finish Long Things. These are all separate stages! I promise you I did not spring into being knowing how to finish a 100,000 word story. I learned how to do it and I firmly believe that you can too. I started off writing extremely mediocre unfinished Iceman/Gambit hurt/comfort songfic in which the song in question was in French and all accents were spelled phonetically! If you read it you would cry! And they wouldn’t be good tears!

First off, I wouldn’t call a 5-6k story measly. Some of my favorite stories are short stories. @kiyaar, for example, can routinely DESTROY ME in about two thousand words. Sometimes less. I have favorite stories in other fandoms that are literally just drabbles, traditional hundred-word drabbles. Some ideas just lend themselves to being told in 5000 words. That’s not a problem, in my view. That’s just the nature of the particular story that you’re trying to tell. And, hey, I would say that if you are actually FINISHING STORIES, of any length, that is amazing and that is a heck of a lot better than I was doing when I started. So go you!

But if what you’re saying is that you are dissatisfied with the length of the stories that you are writing and you would be happier with your writing if only you could write long stories, that is a different problem. I am no kind of writing professional, but this is what I would suggest:

Try NaNoWriMo, or a similar writing challenge with a length requirement. The goal is just to get the words out. It doesn’t matter how good they are. It doesn’t matter if your plot makes sense. Just start with something, anything, and keep writing. You are going to sit there and write 1,667 words per day for a month and by the end of the month you will have 50,000 words. They might not be your favorite words, and you might not be finished with the story by the end, but they will be 50,000 words of a story. As long as you keep putting words on the page, you will get there. Just keep going. Look, in my one NaNo novel I made half of the story take place in a dream of the characters’ past lives on an alien planet and this was probably a terrible narrative idea but while I was writing it it was amazing because if I couldn’t think of what to write in the actual plot I could just make all the characters fall asleep again and have another dream.

(Something like a Big Bang is also a possibility, in which you would be matched with an artist; I find them motivating because for me a great writing motivation is the fear of disappointing other people who were counting on me to finish the story. You may want to wait until you know you can write to that length before trying one. Or just throw yourself in the deep end of the pool! It’s all good.)

If you have the ideas but the problem arises in the act of Getting The Words Out, finding a group of people who do writing sprints may be helpful. (You can also do them yourself, but I find that having other people is the key for me.) Basically this is everyone setting a time and then writing for 15-20 minutes and then cheering each other on. On the 616 Steve/Tony server we actually have a bot to run sprints for us and keep statistics of your wpm and personal best and so on.

If the problem is that the ideas you are thinking of just can’t sustain a longer story, there are also answers to that one. There are probably books about plotting and various writing exercises and whatnot and if any of that seems like it’s helpful to you, then go for it, but off the top of my head, the way to Get More Words is twofold:

One: Just be more wordy. Expand sentences, expand thoughts, describe things more. Maybe this is where one of those writing-exercise books would help. I don’t know what your style is, but if you’re not verbose, play around a little. Use all the adjectives! What is your POV character thinking right now? How about now?

Two: Get another plot or two. Honestly the reason I end up with these monster stories is that I generally underestimate how long it is going to take to resolve my B-plot. But the more plots you add, the longer the story will be. Say you want to write a story where Steve and Tony have to learn to love each other again at the beginning of Avengers v4 and trust each other and deal with all their unresolved Civil War feelings. You could have them have a few conversations and that would be over in 5k, easy. But if they’re still trying to learn how to be friends again and the problem is also that Tony was damn near positive that the SHRA database was deleted because he has the amnesia to prove it, but now someone is abducting kids with minor superpowers whose only commonality is that they were probably on the list that he no longer remembers and he has to work together with Steve and Steve’s sneaky black-ops team and deal with all the feelings he has about that (possibly especially given that Steve is dating Sharon again who is on the black-ops team, and maybe that isn’t going so well)... well, that’s more than 5k, and also sign me up because I wanna read that. Goddammit, I might even want to write that.

I hope that helps some. Really, honestly, this is a thing you can learn to do. I promise it is learnable. It’s not magic. It’s practice. It’s a lot of practice and a lot of just sitting there and getting the words out.

#Anonymous #replies

57 notes · View notes

kurlykayaker · 5 years

Text

it all begins...

the 30 day challenge artist said, “one song a day, man. that’s it, i’ve got to write one song a day.” and so by chance or by the universe or in some manner, i’m attempting this challenge with poems? i don’t often broadcast/openly discuss my passion for poetry (maybe d/t a mixture of a hyper masculine culture and me being in an predominantly athletic-field). it all begins again, tomorrow. the apartment parking lot is fuuuuull. my routine 11pm-12am grocery shopping trip happened tonight rather than last night, a lame attempt at not accepting the reality of tomorrow? not enough time away from 37 other graduate students to cleanse my soul not enough time to return, refreshed. a week fuuuuull of studying, for an exam, practical, and my retake. back to my routine my late-night Kroger trip failed to bring bananas, avocados and the goood spinach home. devoured by the undergrads, “why did toilet paper go up so HIGH in price?”, i buy the good stuff anyway, knowing i will be frequenting the bathroom more often this week. leave the store, a freshly slick pavement even more reason to grab the sides of the small cart, prop my two feet on the bottom rung and soar midway to my silver car. a big smile erupts from my face, i’ve been studying alllllll day, my mind welcomes this break, “am i ready to go back?” the question isn’t really valid, homework waited on me. mental health conversations, come to mind. the professors words utter like the worst-kind of news, “patients with lower neurological levels (SCI) have a higher rate of suicide/ why is this?” physical capability. <<dead silence>> the lecture abruptly continues in a different direction, but i can feel the huge hole in the gap of the lecture. i want to stand up and shout, “WHAT THE FUCK?” i want to rock in my chair, and wave my hands, and say, “excuse me, let’s address this.” but so many things in our society, in academia, in relationships, are carved into different dimensions never crossing, never overflowing the other because entropy isn’t a thing? an illusion of control? a close classmate and i meet up this past week to practice essential spinal cord rehabilitation skills. her boyfriend’s grandfather passed, i’m thinking natural causes, she shares suicide. my mind goes back to that specific lecture, over 2 weeks ago, it still lingers on my heart like hurtful words spat at you, by a lover. “recollect Jordan,” i tell myself, “you will be there, you can help, you’ll bring empathy.” but it’s beyond that. it’s sooooo beyond that. it’s the fact that more could be said to 38 graduate students, who don’t know the meaning of that word. it’s a taboo word, that people shouldn’t do. it’s a word that i know some people in that classroom have thought / tried / .... we need to address the pink-polka dotted elephant IN THE ROOM more often. mental health is more than having sufficient psychiatric hospitals and suicidal “watch” programs, it’s even more than attending helpful therapy sessions, it’s creating a sustainable lifestyle (sustainable doesn’t always refer to footprint lol). we talk about energy expenditure in gait, in human movement. what’s the energy expenditure of your soul? were humans designed to take 7 finals, 8 finals in 1 week? why do graduate students need a spring break, anyway? ....because, it might save a life. it might brighten their personal life. their cortisol levels will be lower, building a foundation that’s sustainable. “may the words that come from my mouth and the meditations that come from my heart be acceptable in thy sight.” ---------- may the words that come from my mouth, the actions that i perform daily, and the meditations that come from my heart be representative of what i advocate for my patients, as a future healthcare provider. (sincerely). ------------------------ my soul is refreshed, but the fragments of my mind are still recollecting. the fatigued graduate student within is looking forward to next weekend already -- when hopefully, i’ll have passed my retake, i can sleep in some... and drink a bit. the fatigued grad student runs the small grocery cart back to the entrance. i used to be a bagger and a cashier, back in Indiana. it was the job i had, when i proclaimed my love to my first girlfriend. we were going to be together - match made in heaven until....we, weren’t.... lonely late-nights, bringing carts in - i imagine a lonely bachelor at the local Krogers’ corralling the last few carts in, annoyed by the late night shoppers, “don’t they have better places to be?” he/she is thinking, older, wiser Jordan replies, “sometimes, the best place to be - is right where you are, right now -where ever that happens to be.” my smile fades as i walk to my car, it all begins again, tomorrow.

0 notes

juangallojongaro · 5 years

Text

Best of 2018

Anna Birch – “Belle Isle” What starts as a slide-guitar-country-crooner transitions into a rockabilly bridge before settling back into sentiment. A heartbreakingly earnest and beautiful love song about moving to a new place and meeting a new person. I saw Birch open for Speedy Ortiz last summer, watched a young couple slow dance to the song, and started crying a little bit. After Birch sang the closing lyric, beginning with “we danced to that song/twice in a row,” she was exhorted by Speedy Ortiz lead singer Sadie Dupuis to play the song again. She didn’t; I wish she had.

Big Red Machine – “Melt” I was introduced to this song because it was the theme song to a podcast about the disastrous 1996 U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team (find that excellent pod here), and found the chanting rising “when you are who you are” sort of mesmerizing. The lyrics are obtuse (much like the entire project, a collab between Justin Vernon and one of the Dressners from the National where they dress like Mad Max Kanye [which, what the fuck]). It is a good time to hear Vernon scream “YOU KNOW IT’S A STRUGGLE, IT’S A KIND OF DEBACLE” like he’s Jim Ross calling a particularly exciting Attitude Era WWE match. A slobberknocker!

boygenius – “Me & My Dog” Politically, 2018 will go down as the Year of Woman as female candidates ran and won in historic numbers in the midterms. In a less historic achievement, it was the Year of the Woman in my best of list, where female fronted or involved projects carried 12 of 18 spots. 2018 was the year when the majority of the best rock records were made by women, and few put out better albums that the three headed monster supergroup, boygenius. “Me & My Dog” is the best track on their superlative self-titled LP. The first third starts with simple orchestration and Phoebe Bridgers’ voice followed by Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker swooning swelling harmonies until the song kicks into another gear in the middle before crescendoing higher and higher until the punchline and plaintive lyric “I wanna be emaciated.” The album version is great, but the live versions best capture the catharsis. boygenius is my favorite new band of the year.

Damien Jurado – “Percy Faith” Shouts to my dude Kit who made sure that I checked out this album, the first I’ve listened to from Mr. Jurado’s enormous discography. While I find the sheer size of that discography pretty intimidating, this song is approachable—a time traveling track about big band leaders, hostage situations, and being on your phone too much. Wry lyrics delivered with a straight face (see, “I am writing from Seattle/Where they now have put a trademark on the rain”) are the star of the show, but the soaring strings and noodling organ sustain multiple listens.

Father John Misty – “Date Night” It shambles, it Jaggers, it oozes confidence in both senses of the word. Ooze is correct, and I wouldn’t be shocked if FJM revealed the swirling synths were covered with cheap, greasy pomade. It’s the best song on great record that’s funny (“I’ll get you ice cream if you give me a card”) and propulsive enough to close a set. God’s Favorite Customer was a return to form after the solipsistic bloat of the second half of Pure Comedy. Here’s hoping he remains in poem zone going forward.

illuminati hotties – “(You’re Better) Than Ever” Too precious by half but catchy as hell, “(You’re Better) Than Ever” was the song that I listened to the most despite of my better judgment. It’s a straight forward rocker about an ex that’s doing better than you are. Problem is the song is delivered with a smile instead of a sneer, and the mean lyrics don’t match the sweet delivery. Still, the surf rock drums and harmonies are great. More importantly: illuminati hotties is the best new band name of the year.

Jeff Rosenstock – “Yr Throat” SEE BELOW

Lucy Dacus – “Night Shift” Without question, the SONG OF THE YEAR. One third of the boygenius titanic triumvirate, Dacus’s anthem starts in a diner with a two-timing ex and ends with a division of the city by time of day. Dacus knows that she isn’t necessarily being practical, but she’s emotionally unreasonable and raw. Quiet/loud that would leave Black Francis and Kim Deal taking notes, the last two minutes are sad and soaring, roaring and resigned.

Mitski – “Nobody” Mitski made the leap this year, basically the music business version of 2018 Brewers slugger Christian Yelich. Like Yelich, Mitski had flashed elite tools in prior years but never quite put it all together (somehow this is Mitski’s first official appearance on my list; honorable mention only in 2015). In 2018, things changed with the New York City songstress dropping Be the Cowboy, the audio equivalent of Yelich’s monstrous .326/.402/.598 (w/ 36 dingers and 22 bags!) 2018 line. Mitski took home album the year from a number of publications and Yelich was the National League MVP. “Nobody” is the basically Yelich’s mega-game from August 29 where he went 6 for 6 and hit for the cycle, helping the Brewers pull out a one run win over the Reds. A slinking disco home run, the song showed Mitski feels both seamless and like five different songs at once. Excellent delivery, danceable and delectable. I’m seeing her in April, right around Opening Day. If you’re looking for me, I’ll be the one leading the MVP chants.

Pusha T – “If You Know You Know” The best of Kanye’s bizarre 2018 productions (the less said about Mr. West at this point, the better), Push’s irresistible ode to (what else, literally what else?) having once dealt cocaine was so good it convinced me for about three weeks that Kanye was back. Also, apparently Pusha T beefed with Drake this year; I’m okay with that.

Robyn – “Ever Again” SEE BELOW

Shannon Shaw – “Freddies ‘n’ Teddies” A brassy wall of sound missive from Shaw, a big voiced Californian who, I just discovered, fronts an outfit called “Shannon and the Clams,” who also released an album in 2018. I’m concerned I should have picked a song by “Shannon and the Clams.” Alas, we’re not starting the new year with regret. “Freddies ‘n’ Teddies” is an excellent throwback jam. It’s a pearl.

Speedy Ortiz – “Lucky 88” Had a weird experience at the Speedy Ortiz show last summer—they went on at like 10:30 PM and played, like, my six favorite Speedy Ortiz songs in a row. At that point, I’d rode my bike to the show and realized a couple things: 1) it was a work night, and 2) I really didn’t want to hear any more of the songs. So, I left! Never done that before. Anyway, goes without saying that “Lucky 88” was one those songs. It’s very good of Speedy Ortiz to keep making Rilo Kiley records because I like Rilo Kiley! Tackling subject of gross dudes with interesting percussion and evocative and tongue-twisty lyrics lyrics (See, “Try and work in this town/without a silver spoon and foot in your mouth” and “One more time with reeling” and “I was born in the cold-clotted heart of the storm”) it’s a stand out track on a good record.

St. Vincent – “Fast Slow Disco” Technically a remix of the “Slow Disco” off of 2017 Album of the Year, MASSEDUCTION, the new version improves on the original in every way. On Twitter, Annie Clark wrote that she “always felt this song could wear many different outfits and live many different lives. here she is in disco pants, sweating on a new york dance floor.” Sweat and live it does, transformed from the original prayer to a fucking Pet Shop Boys song. It’s a banger, and continued proof that Clark is one of the best pop artists working.

Swearin’ – “Grow into a Ghost” There’s some Fleetwood Mac-y shenanigans going on with this band—basically, the two lead singers were dating and then broke up but then made this record. I don’t know; it’s not my business. This song is my business. With Allison Crutchfield leading the way with an excellent read on the lyrics, this pop punk potato chip isn’t particularly substance, but it is really good, crunchy, and with the right amount of salt.

Tranyanne and Danny – “O’Keeffe” There’s a swaying simplicity, putting you in mind of the Ben Folds Five at their most daydreamy with a dash of Broadway panache. Ostensibly about titular painter, it’s a duet that’s good for a slow dance with a dip or two.

U.S. Girls – “Incidental Boogie” You like art rock? U.S. Girls love art rock! It’s a feminist statement piece about (I think, I’m ready to be really wrong here) about domestic violence, BDSM, and empowerment that puts you in mind of The Knife’s masterpiece Silent Shout and maybe The Phantom Thread. It’s all over the place and I’m too thick to figure it out.

Young Gun Silver Fox – “Lenny” This 70’s cheese rock throwback is delicious trash. Essentially, it’s “One for My Baby (And One More for the Road)” if, 1981, someone commissioned Daryl Hall and Michael McDonald to write a yacht rock musical based on Frank Sinatra songs. I’m not saying this song is frozen pizza rolls—I’m saying it’s gourmet frozen pizza rolls that are filled with the finest heirloom tomato sauce, cured salumis, and aged cheeses. It’s stupid and it’s bad for you and I will eat a million of them.

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR: Honey by Robyn and POST- by Jeff Rosenstock.

These are two very different albums. The lyrics are in English and no one, like, throat sings, but Rosenstock’s raw, claustrophobic punk and Robyn’s luscious electropop seem antithetical. Taken together, the two help me best explain what was like for me to be alive in 2018.

Dropped on New Year’s Day, POST- begins screaming, “Dumbfounded, downtrodden and dejected/Crestfallen, grief-stricken and exhausted/Trapped in my room while the house was burnin'/To the motherfuckin' ground.” Rosenstock captures just how fucking stressful it is to be living through the Trump Administration. The grift, the humanitarian horror, the callous and smirking racism, the grinding and clobbering indecency. He captures the paralysis and that feeling that it won’t get better, he won’t go way; “it’s not like any other job I know/If you’re a piece of shit they don’t let you go.”

There were so many times this year when I was struggling with something personal—anxiety, the stresses of my job, feeling mean or irritable and it would feel worse because President Diaper-Butt said something repugnant. The political stress and the personal stress fed each other.

On “Powerlessness”, Rosenstock sings “[s]o where can you go when the troubles inside you/Make your limbs feel like they're covered in lead?/How can you solve all the problems around you/When you can't even solve the ones in your head?” I struggled with this all year and basically defaulted to paralysis. Rostenstock put words to that ennui.

Rosenstock sang about feeling bad—Robyn sang about getting better. Her record starts in a similar place of psychic pain. It’s more mundane, a break up, but Robyn blows the heartbreak out into pop hits. On “Missing U,” she’s just as vulnerable and paralyzed as Rosenstock, “[c]an't make sense of all of the pieces/Of my own delusions/Can't take all these memories/Don't know how to use them.”

Over the course of the record, Robyn gets better. In interviews, she explained that she took the time to go through a couple years of psychotherapy (this is privilege; we all can’t take years off from work to sort out our shit—I can’t, Rosenstock certainly can’t) and emerges better—fully realized and in charge of herself. The two centerpieces of the second half of the album, the titular “Honey” and the finale, “Ever Again” are physical and optimistic. She put the work in and got better.

I tried to get better in 2019, as well. It was a mixed bag—lost a bunch of weight, gained it back. Bought a house and was driven half-crazy by the process. Got a promotion, lost some hard cases. But I really improved my mental health. I worked hard on being mindful and trying to feel better. I didn’t get all the way (unlike Roybn, I don’t feel like “I’m never gonna be brokenhearted ever again”), but I feel better than I did a year ago.

There’s going to be at least more years of the political degradation. I can’t control that. But both albums end on hopeful notes, expecting that things will get better. I don’t know if they will. But the emotion and message of these albums, make them the best of 2018.

#bestof2018

0 notes

perhapsthevision · 7 years

Text

ok I don’t think there are any security questions in here so why not

Tagged by my sister @prodigaldaughteralice. Also, tumblr is bizarrely laggy so now I'm typing long posts in a text editor like it's 2005...

1. Coke or Pepsi: I don't actually dislike cola any more, but I also don't drink it enough to have an opinion or be able to tell the difference. Anyway, I'm white so I can hand anything to a cop and be okay :p

2. Disney or Dreamworks: I can't tell if Dreamworks actually hasn't made anything good lately, or if knocking Dreamworks has just become a meme. But their old stuff was good. Disney always makes a few really good things, and then a lot of dreck. But I kind of resent them from keeping anything from passing into the public domain, as long as their lawyers have money.

3. Coffee or Tea: I probably drink more coffee per day, but tea is the one I have opinions about. I drink coffee with a lot of milk and am just looking for something that doesn't taste nasty; tea we keep a lot of varieties of and pick based on how we're feeling.

4. Books or Movies: In the abstract I tend to prefer books, but I enjoy both.

5. Windows or Mac: I typically prefer Apple stuff and my primary computer will probably always be a Mac. But it is one of my someday goals to build a PC to act as a media/game center.

6. DC or Marvel: I'm not that invested but I think there's more Marvel stuff I like.

7. X-box or Playstation: I've always had Playstation consoles but I have nothing in particular against the XBox line that I know of.

8. Dragon Age or Mass Effect: I stopped playing DA:I when I learned Cassandra was straight and I've never had access to the ME line of games. But I'd still give this to ME since my partner loves them and he's showed me hilarious stuff from them.

9. Night Owl or Early Riser: I really enjoy being up late, sleeping, and being up early, so I think my chronotype is officially "gets all her sleep in a time machine". But when I was really little I was a super early riser and I wouldn't be surprised if my body eventually shifts back toward that.

10. Cards or Chess: There's a running joke about me hating chess but I'm not that into card games either.

11. Chocolate or Vanilla: Chocolate for most purposes but my test of an ice cream brand is whether or not they can make a really good cream or vanilla.

12. Vans or Converse: I haven't really found either to be supportive enough for me to wear.

13. Lavallan, Trevelyan, Cadash, or Adaar: Apparently this is a DA thing?

14. Fluff or Angst: I don't really like either if it's just that and no plot. But I guess I'd go with fluff because lately I don't like even very good media that are just All About Pain.

15. Beach or Forest: Forest, but the beach can be beautiful too.

16. Dogs or Cats: I prefer cats but dogs are pretty great. If I had a giant house with a big yard I'd give my cat his own personal army of large dogs to ride into battle.

17. Clear Skies or Rain: I've lived somewhere really rainy for eight years and I loved it, especially since I'm light sensitive and sunburn super easily, but lately I've been really into clear skies for weird psychological reasons. (OK, not that weird: someone I care about a lot passed away and then we kept having storms and rain.)

18. Cooking or Eating Out: I make the majority of the food we eat, and lately I've been trying to spend more of our food budget on good food to cook and less on going out to eat, but there's a great food scene here so I really do enjoy going to restaurants and food carts.

19. Spicy Food or Mild: I like it when the person at the spice store is like "it scares me that you're buying this"

20. Halloween/Samhain or Solstice/Yule/Christmas: Christmas is my favorite holiday. My family tends to come together and most of us have time off from work to spend together, and then we get to both give and receive presents, and the cookies are good. Kids don't come by where I live and I was never into Halloween parties, so Halloween kind of fell off after I got too old to trick or treat myself.

21. Little too cold or little too hot: Little too cold -- but lots too hot.

22. Superpower: There are others that would do more good in the world but for myself, flight or time travel.

23. Animation or Live Action: There are a lot more live action things than animated things, so it seems unfair to compare them.

24. Paragon or Renegade: Like I said I haven't played ME so I never had to pick. In general, I usually want to play evil as amoral/practical, and way too many games instead present save puppies vs kick puppies, which pisses me off. Also, when it seems like you're picking good for less reward vs evil for more, but you KNOW that good gives you a better reward down the line, it really saps the meaningfullness of the choice.

25. Bath or Showers: On a daily basis showers are way more practical. I do like a nice bath now and then especially if my muscles are achy, but our tub isn't really deep enough to get comfortable. Also I get bored in the bath and have to listen to music or something.

26. Team Cap or Team Ironman: No, you move! Which is weird because I otherwise find Iron Man a way more interesting character.

27. Fantasy or Sci-Fi: Lately I've been picking up more sci fi but I don't have a hard preference.

28. Fav Quotes: I could make a post at least this long with random quotes I like.

29. Youtube or Netflix: They fill pretty different roles though I know YouTube is trying to get into the business of movies/tv and original content.

30. Harry Potter or Percy Jackson: Harry Potter was a generational thing, Percy Jackson came out after I was too old for it.

31. When I Feel Accomplished: When something works out, particularly if I get praise for something I've been trying very hard to do. Lately I got praise for my coding style and was told that I'm personable and easy to work with, and both of those made me really happy because I've been putting particular effort into them.

32. Star Wars or Star Trek: There's a special place in my heart for the original SW trilogy but there's much more of the Star Trek verse that I'm into.

33. Paperback Books or Hardback: I usually buy paperbacks because they're cheaper and easier to carry around, but really beautiful hardbacks are cool as art objects, and more durable.

34. A world without literature or music: Would probably mean some fundamental change in the psychology of humans. Even dictatorships tend to have state-produced art to use to control the people. I don't think it's sustainable to have humans and not have some of them trying to make art.

35. Who was the last person to make me laugh: My cat being cute. Are you gonna tell him he's not a person?

36. Sour or Sweet Candy: Sweet, I've never gotten the point of sour candies.

37. Believe in aliens?: There is probably some form of life somewhere but I have no reason to believe it's interacted with or been exposed to us.

38. Dawn or Dusk: Probably dawn, but I see a lot more of dusk.

39. Piercings or Tattoos: I see more people with a lot of tattoos that I think look good, than people with a lot of piercings that I think look good, but that is my personal aesthetics and obviously nobody made that choice to appeal to me. I have pierced ears and want to get a (particular) tattoo on either my wrist or ankle someday but it keeps getting pushed down the priority list.

40. Girls? Hot?: Is this a choice or a song reference or ...?

41. Snow or Fog: I have a thing about snow because snow shut my city down repeatedly over the winter to a downright embarrassing extent and it probably accelerated the wear on my car. In a city with decent infrastructure I'd dig snow. Fog is pretty until you have to drive in it.

42. Sleep facing the wall or room: I share a bed so I always sleep facing the outside of the bed, I don't care which side I'm on.

43. TRC of AFTG: All Google tells me is this is some series I've never heard of

44. Horror or Drama: In terms of movie classifications, drama. But again it's much broader.

45. Orcarina of Time or Majora’s Mask: I haven't played either, the only Nintendo products I ever had were DSes

46. Living in nature or city: I think about this a lot, nature appeals to me but I can't actually handle living in a remote area.

47. Any addictions: TBH this is a weird question to put on a lighthearted quiz, like it's written only expecting caffeine and "lol this fandom pairing" answers but it's actually very personal information?

48. Languages: English natively. Still pretty good at Japanese though I'm a bit shy about actually using it any more. I can passively understand some Mandarin but I don't tend to speak it myself because I probably couldn't keep up with a conversation. (Though I feel like a donk because people speak Mandarin around me a lot and I feel like they should know I understand like 60% of their conversation?) French and Latin didn't really stick at all. I can discuss who's making the coffee/tea in Korean and I'm trying to learn more, it's a goal of mine to get in a real class when I'm out of grad school.

49. What music do I listen to: I draw from a bunch of different genres, the core ones are probably indie rock, k-pop, and electronic. Then I tend to be picky about which artists I actually like. Since I got a streaming account I've been enjoying trying out a lot of new stuff.

50. Fav mythical creature: uh do mindflayers count?

51. Safe zone: My apartment I guess? That's where I can change into sweatpants and not feel self-conscious so let's go with that.

52. First fandom: I think it was Utena. That was definitely the first one I was really into and old enough for the internet for.

53. Cartoons or Adult Shows: No matter how you define cartoons there's way more "adult shows" than that, unless maybe you mean "adult" shows, in which case this question gets even odder.

54. Current music: Dishwasher Noises by My Old Tiny Dishwasher. It's an ambient classic AND gets most of the dishes mostly clean.

55. Favorite starter?: I'd better go with the one in my car so it doesn't get offended and act up. (Litten though.)

56. What would your witch’s familiar be? Maybe my cat, or maybe a floating land octopus. Or a hawk. But that might eat other people's familiars.

#perhapsthevision personal

1 note · View note

anigraham · 7 years

Photo

This. Fucking. Book. (Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.)

First off, some background: I'm not a big "reader." I contribute that to being discouraged from reading at a very young age. As a result I ended up navigating toward non-fiction if I was to read something, but I have read a few handful of fiction pieces. I picked up 1984 last year because even though I am familiar with concepts like Big Brother and Newspeak because of how the concepts are often used, I didn't always quite understand why people today reference that book so much. I read it. I loved it. Not only that, but I am thankful I didn't read it until I was an adult because I know if I had read it in even as late as high school, I probably would have disliked it and not fully appreciate what it was trying to show.

So now? A friend showed me a comic that compared 1984 to Brave New World and saying that society is headed more in the direction of Brave New World. The comic was pretty annoying in my opinion with its depiction of 1984. I felt like that the artist/writer of the comic either just. . .didn't read 1984 (cliff notes maybe?) or just didn't really understand it. It completely misses so much of what makes 1984 great...but that's only half the comic. I hadn't read or even heard of Brave New World. Another dystopian classic? Sign me up sure! I decided to give it a try.

My initial feels. . .the very beginning of the book I had high hopes. The book was making me angry. Appalled. But there is a difference between hating a piece of work and hating the message the work is portraying. The "perfect" society where people are content with their place and role in life, where there is no pain or suffering, and everyone is in a sense. . .happy. . .was making me uncomfortable and even angry by how this society was achieving such things. I liked that. I'm an outsider in the sense that I don't live in such a society. It was alien to me and I would be alien to them. Brave New World had my interest right off the bat. I had so many questions I wanted to muse over and explore. But then. . .

It got boring as fuck and it took a while for me to really figure out why. I had been presented with a somewhat advanced world with an abundance amount of joy and everyone in their society working as happy little ants or bees. Somehow they did nothing with that. It finally hit me one night when I realized how much I fucking hated the not-actually-the-main-character, Bernard. Alfred Hitchcock once said that "Drama is life with the dull bits cut out". Well, this book has kept all the dull bits in it and on teases you with interesting pieces. There is literally no drive in the book. There is literally no point in the book. There was no main character for me to be following and there was no overarching conflict that needed to be addressed resolved. At least not until way later in the book. I was reading words with absolutely no substance.

Now. I get it. I know what some people would probably say in defense of this book. It's a "slice of life" peek into this "utopia" that HAS no conflict so I shouldn't expect there to BE conflict. But there is so much wrong with that! Some great slice of life movies that I can think of (Terminal and Forrest Gump to name two) HAVE drive. HAVE conflict. Worst of all. . .Brave New World HAS conflict as well but only TEASES you with it. The drama or "action" always happens behind the scenes and you are only getting to read the dull bits around it or the outcome long after the fact. It doesn't tell you THOSE stories for some fucking reason and the rest of the time it gives you such fucking shitty characters that I am seriously left wondering WHY. WHY. Bernard. Oh my fucking hell, Bernard.

All the fucking characters are two-dimensional, over the top, exaggerated, and unrealistic husks that occasionally talk to each other. Bernard is one of the worst and he's the one the story follows for the most part in the beginning. He's an absolutely horrible man who just. . .doesn't fit in to this Brave New World society. As a reader who also doesn't fit into that society either, I should be able to relate or care about him. But I can't. He's a terrible, angry, and hateful man who does absolutely nothing about his problems. He's just like those people in OUR world who do nothing but complain about how terrible life is but for some reason will make zero effort to do something about it. Bernard hates his world. He even imagines a better one. Does he do ANYTHING to make a change? NO. Because THAT would be too interesting to read and follow. Maybe I am supposed to be like "WTF is wrong with you, your world is perfect Bernard!" Instead I am like "Your world is shit. YOU are shit. THIS BOOK IS SHIT why am I still reading this?!" I mean at least Winston Smith in 1984 DID something to change his life even though he had absolutely LITTLE idea of where to go or what to do.

God. (Or should I cry Ford?) I kept reading anyway. I HAD to know if there was a goddamn point to this book or if it would go anywhere.

So. Turns out that Bernard is not the only one who doesn't "fit in." His friend Helmholtz Watson. They are two different people, but their big connection is they don't "fit in." Helmholtz seems to be the type of artistic person who desires to express his artistic vision. He writes poetry. He even mentions testing his poetry out to a class of people and the response he got. Do we get to read about this? Do we get to follow his story? Do we get to fully experience his internal conflict with his depression in a society where depression isn't supposed to exist? NO. Of course not! That would be actually an interesting thing to read. Honestly, you could probably cut Helmholtz from the entirety of the book because as far as I am concerned, he's just another tease of an actually interesting character with an interesting story who, for the most part, is kept away from us.

Bernard has a love interest named Lenina. (The names in this book I swear to Ford.) If you hate the depiction of women in fiction for being soulless stereotypes then you will hate Lenina. Now, I am normally not bothered by the depiction of women as I often see interesting female characters everywhere. I mean sometimes I feel like people's complaints are "This woman has some flaws" and to me flaws are realistic. They are relate-able. But I simply cannot think of anything good about Lenina. I guess maybe that she can make a decision. She's a decision maker. She wants to go New Mexico. She wants to play frisbee golf or whatever it is in this book. She wants to go dancing. That's. . .that's about it. And the way Bernard views her is incredibly aggravating. If you haven't read the book I need to mention that promiscuity is heavily encouraged and practiced and taught from an uncomfortably young age. Bernard doesn't have an easy time getting women and is kind of focused on this ONE woman (the horror!). Lenina has no problem getting men, but kind of favors Henry (the horror!) Since Lenina does sleep with multiple men, Bernard tends to mumble about how she's nothing but a piece of meat all the time. (What. The. Fuck.) All the while Lenina feels like she has to force herself to sleep with other men because "Everyone belongs to everyone."

Can we just take a moment to just focus on how Bernard and Lenina are setup in a way where something interesting COULD be told between the two, but instead we don't get that? It makes no Ford sense to me why Bernard would go on and on about how Lenina treats herself as a "piece of meat" when the society encourages and teaches promiscuity and he KNOWS this. She's doing what literally everyone is doing. BUT NOT ONLY THAT, Lenina shows signs that she would kind of like a more monogamous relationship. Granted, it is with Henry, BUT FORD damn you could tell a story about Bernard expressing his desires to Lenina and the two coming to terms with that MAYBE just MAYBE promiscuity ISN'T FOR THEM. BUT THAT WOULD BE INTERESTING WOULDN'T IT. THAT WOULD INVOLVE CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT AND WE CAN'T HAVE THAT IN THIS FUCKING BOOK. (Oh but spoiler: Bernard is actually okay with promiscuity when he suddenly becomes popular with the women near the end of the book so apparently it turns out it isn't that he wants a more monogamous relationship, he just wants all women to be that "piece of meat" for him. GOD I HATE THIS CHARACTER.)

Now I have to mention Thomas briefly because he is behind one of the "big twists" to the book. See, in Brave New World, there are no mothers or fathers. People aren’t born. They are created in test tubes and grown. (At a very scary rate that makes me wonder how the flying fuck is the earth capable of sustaining such a high population. But we can’t address that because it’s INTERESTING.) It just so happens that Thomas, The Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, fathered a baby once upon a time with Linda. Linda and Thomas took a trip to New Mexico to visit a "Savage Reservation." Basically people untouched by "civilization" and well, Linda gets lost, thought for dead, and left behind. Linda ends up stuck on the reservation and with no access to abortion services and gives birth to John. John is basically the main character of this horrible book and everything interesting about him (like everyone else) is kept behind the scenes.

What aggravates me so fucking much about Thomas, Linda, and John is THEIR STORY is what should have been written. It's what Brave New World should have been. Thomas and Linda are from this fucked up society and they visit the other extreme of things. When Linda and John enter the story we get bits and pieces of their life and adjustment to the reservation. Linda doesn't fit in. John doesn't fit in because he doesn't look like all the other "savages" and because of who his mother is. You get the vague impression that Linda is miserable and John really struggles to fit in. You get interesting tidbits like how John never calls Linda "mom" and instead always uses her name. He was taught to read. There are little bits of how they follow a religion which now views Jesus and other gods in a completely different way from our world. How did it get that way? There are so many questions that I could entertain myself with if only YOU HAD TOLD THIS STORY INSTEAD. WHY. WHY DIDN'T YOU?!

Just fucking imagine! Learning about this sterile and "perfect" world. Following Thomas and Linda to New Mexico. The fear and struggle with Linda being left behind and adjusting to life on a reservation. The incredibly difficult experience she has to go through with a NATURAL BIRTH something that just DOES NOT HAPPEN in her society. Then getting to follow John as he grows up as an outcast. He mentioned hearing the amazing and wonderful stories of Linda's old civilized life. The struggle and desperation John has trying to fit in with life on the reservation. Getting to see and experience this instead of reading his telling of it to Bernard. Then you could describe the day Bernard and Lenina show up. John and Linda going back to the civilized world. John faced with the sudden reality that the civilized world ain't what it cracked up to be. That harsh contrast we would get! Getting to really understand and experience John's struggles! THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN A GREAT STORY. WHY DIDN'T WE GET THIS STORY?!

BUT NO. Instead we get a story where we see some hateful little man obsess over a woman, take her on a date to New Mexico, pick up Linda and the-actual-main-character John, and return to civilization. Instead we get see Bernard show how he is a hypocrite as he peacocks around and sleeps with all the women now that he is super popular. All the while for some unknown reason Lenina becomes infatuated with John and tries to sleep with him. John can't handle how forward Lenina is because he grew up in a world where monogamy is a thing. So even though John loves Lenina (because why the fuck not?) sex is bad unless married. HE EVEN ATTACKS HER BECAUSE WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE A SLUT LIKE MY MOTHER LINDA, LENINA?!?!? Lenina is frightened, then angry, then confused because why won't John sleep with her???

OH MY FORD I just realized this book is a FUCKING SOAP-OPERA ON PAPER.

IT'S A FUCKING SOAP-OPERA HOLY SHIT.

YOU WANNA KNOW HOW IT ENDS?! Let me tell you how it ends!!! JOHN HATES CIVILIZATION SO HE RUNS AWAY and cuts off his nose to spite his face in the form of buying civilized food and deciding to never eat it. I'm not even kidding! He's going to live off the land outside of civilization. Civilization sees this as a weird thing and documents it. Makes a movie (essentially) out of it. This draws people to see him in person especially since the movie documents him taking part in self-flagellation. They want to see him whip himself. They begin chanting it. Then suddenly Lenina shows up because she wants John still even after he had attacked her and scared her before. HE ATTACKS HER AGAIN. Whipping her! Beating her! THE CROWD IS IN AWE. THEY NEVER SEEN THIS. THEY START BEATING EACH OTHER IN RHYTHMIC DANCING.

I'M NOT KIDDING. They are all caught up in beating each other because they never felt or seen pain like this despite the fact that we are still animals with a sense of self-preservation and survival BUT WHAT THE FUCK EVER. I am supposed to believe that all their brainwashing and conditioning to desire for unamity and sameness would lead them to dance and beat each other. You don't even know if Lenina lives! John then kills himself the next day because FUCK THIS BOOK AND FUCK THIS STORY.

There is one last thing I haven't bitched about. Soma. Everyone is brainwashed and conditioned to behave a certain way and to accept their place in the world. They are also drugged with this magical thing called Soma. By the end of the book I felt like Soma was just some weak plot device to explain everything away that the author didn't want to worry about. Truly. Because Soma is never really explained. Sometimes it seems like it just numbs your feelings. If you're upset, just had a dude attack you after you stripped naked for him, if you are depressed. . .you just take Soma and all is right with the world. Sometimes they say Soma makes you pass out in a dream like state and if you take too much then you're be asleep for longer than intended. Other times it functions exactly like an anti-depressant. I can never tell. Sometimes it makes you sleep other times it doesn't. The people beating each other in dance were supposedly high off of Soma. There's no. Fucking. Consistency to it's use and the effect it has on people. It's even compared to alcohol at times. . .you just won't have the hangover the next day.

It's just. Ford. I hate this book.

I get that there is an overall message. How we need pain, freedom, and the value we have as individuals. How difficult and restrictive it would be to achieve a world without pain. The terrible shit we would have to do to try and accomplish a world where everyone had a place and everyone was happy with their place. BUT DEAR FUCKING FORD there are SO MANY BETTER WAYS to make that point. There are so many better stories to tell to illustrate this. I hate this book.

#shut up ani #long post #ramble #rant #fucking hate this fucking book #CRUISE CONTROL FOR COOL #CRUISE CONTROL FOR RAGE #f word abuse #JUST READ THE GIVER INSTEAD

4 notes · View notes

crypticchanglings · 4 years

Text

from london [03.10.19]

i'm currently obsessed with these youtubers:

j lou - hong konger who posts videos in cantonese/english

it's fantastic since i'm currently learning cantonese/improving my mandarin and she's so hilarious

https://www.youtube.com/channel/uc530gkg2oj26figqzayqqow

slice n rice - hilarious (and musically talented!) interracial couple with content different from most vloggers i've seen

https://www.youtube.com/channel/ucormlwayqudm-ieq49audna

---

i've also been obsessing over some poc artists lately:

jess x snow - been following their account since high school and the quality of animation/murals/music/poetry/everything is so so good

https://www.instagram.com/jessxsnow/

hannah che - i really want to be more plant-based for carbon neutrality and sustainability, and she's super inspirational. she posts a ton of chinese recipes made vegan including adorable vegan mooncakes for 中秋節!!

https://www.instagram.com/hannah__chia/

---

also, it's so hard to consistently write travel logs, so i have immense respect for friends who do keep up regular updates. london is fun (classes start tomorrow wish me luck rippp) and there's so many cool clubs/pubs/bars everywhere. the people here are so friendly and i'm unfortunately a ridiculous lightweight (i'm usually done after half a glass of wine lol) and have to sleep more hours than i've been giving myself. there's also an obsession with halloumi, which i discovered in the heathrow airport on my first day in the city.

i've been sort of keeping up a travel log on instagram, but even that's starting to feel disingenuous and like i need to be constantly posting content. i want to find some happy medium that's not too difficult to keep up to date and that doesn't make me feel like i'm trying too hard to please someone. i'm also thinking of making an ig that's more of an artistic portfolio/journal of some sort anyway.

---

i visited cork the week before school started and it made me realize just how much of eastern us/nyc culture comes from early irish immigrants. from food staples (corn and peas and potatoes) to pub culture to irish monuments and cathedrals i didn't really notice before to surnames (williams, allen, brown, campbell, etc.) - basically most of the things i used to just associate with being "american". it was mind blowing to see plants i thought only grew inside flower pots out in the wild, rock formations that aren't faked and inside malls, pubs that have genuinely been around for hundreds of years. talk about cultural appropriation.

i love seeing the different species of birds - the ravens in western cork, the javan mynah in singapore, the nyc pigeon. they all act about the same way you'd expect birds to act, but come from such different backgrounds.

i also met a model turned dominatrix and a recreational dominatrix at a fantastic pub while drowning in half a pint of beer (literally rip). they had somehow not known this about each other, only previously being work friends, so i'm glad i've now united them on a different front. we talked for a long while about open relationships and what makes people click.

---

i started pole dancing, and it's really fun! hopefully by the time i return to mit i'll be good enough to practice some routines on the pika pole. it's a shame that boston doesn't have a vibrant pole culture - every london uni has a pole fitness club, there's tons of pole meetups around the city, and so many pole performances and competitions year round. plus there's something addicting about sore arms.

while london isn't super expensive, there's a lot of things that i took for granted at mit that aren't at imperial. laundry is a whopping £3-4, the gym costs £30 for membership, most clubs aren't free (£5-10 for membership), the doors in my hall lock automatically (??), the mail delivery service is a bit of a pain since they're manually recorded, timetables for classes aren't automatically available online nor are classes rated in any way, there are no frats or house parties so students go clubbing instead (and clubs cost £8-15 for big parties), and since parties aren't subsidized, drinks cost £££ too.

it's kind of hilarious that i'm specifically studying engineering in a place so ripe with poetry, theater, art, film, exhibitions, sculpture, etc. imperial has free lunchtime concerts and art galleries throughout the school, but humanities classes cost £200 a piece.

also, the assassins guild, caving club, hiking club, and hackerspaces remind me of mit. the other mit exchange student told me they seemed less in-your-face than at mit. i suppose ec/tetazoo is fairly in-your-face about caving/climbing and ec/putz with building stuff so that's a reasonable comparison to make.

i've always had a contrarian bent against things i saw were mainstream. unfortunately, mainstream was always defined by the people closest to me, so that meant wanting to not be in cs at mit and instead to be part of a smaller major. somehow, the distance has taken away this discomfort and i feel better about my interests. also, i've been able to discover an interest for exploring/climbing outside of the mob mentality, which is refreshing.

---

i got my first internship offer for the summer (!!), so summer interviews don't feel as stressful. i am still lowkey stressed about iap, since i don't have anything lined up yet rip so winter interviewing must still go on. i feel myself getting a lot better at technical and non-technical interviews, though, so hmu if you have any questions about tech interviewing.

---

travel plans

amsterdam: 10/4-6

oxford: 10/12

wales (with the caving club!): 10/25-27

edinburgh: 10/15-17

istanbul: 10/22-24

iceland: 10/5-8

athens: 10/8-10

marrakesh: 10/13-16

i so so recommend rome2rio, skyscanner, hostelsworld/booking.com, and student universe for finding dirt cheap flights. all of these flights were about $100 or less (mostly less) although being geographically near so many vastly different cultures is convenient.

i also now understand douglas adams' obsession with towels - one of the most useful things ever (and prevents you from having to wipe your naked body with old clothes or a bed sheet after being too cheap/forgetting to rent a towel).

---

i've been writing for hackaday since the summer and while most of my writing has been fulfilling assignments, it's humbling to read the readers' comments. i think i've always taken the maker community for granted and i haven't realized the work that people put in to ensure that open source has the integrity that it has today.

there's constantly talk about whether something feels like an advertisement. i've always been in support of ads on social media and sponsorship since it helps all parties, but i have felt like intentions are faked when there are too many sponsors at a hackathon - or when it feels like sweet talking the sponsors are more important than making a great experience for users.

i'm not sure if anyone's taking the class by the poetic justice group at the media lab, but i worked with them on the green book project this summer and it completely changed the way i look at race inside and outside of america. i also know there's some complicated feelings about malcolm gladwell, but i appreciate the nuance he uses when discussing the sandra bland case in his latest book - i think it puts to perspective the systemic reasons for police brutality, rather than focusing on individual reasons (which is the reason why juries decide the way they do and why attorneys are able to win cases in favor of police officers in the court. see radiolab mr. graham and the reasonable man for more info.)

i'm really grateful for garnette - my writing professor last term - for introducing me to gladwell's masterclass. he really understands how to craft writing to be accessible to people and has a really great approach towards being a writer - having a regular low-stress/low-hours job to pay the bills and writing on the side (until you can make a living as a writer or just perpetually writing on the side). ted chiang (author of the book inspiring arrival) did the same thing - studied computer science in college, became a technical writer to free up time and finances to write, eventually freelanced and is now quite good at his craft, so he's also a minor idol career-wise.

---

that's all for now. just wanted to do a quick update, hope you're all doing well! remember that work isn't the most important thing in the world - drink water, eat vegetables (they feel really good), don't eat too much sugar, take a break, and get sleep!

0 notes

channelnewswire-blog · 5 years

Text

The double lives of New Zealand's celebrity impersonators

How is Austin Powers still relevant in 2019? And why employ the Queen for your birthday party? Alex Casey talks with the lobbyists of New Zealand's celeb impersonator scene.It ain't simple being shagadelic.Orewa local

Gary Brown, the only lawfully authorised Austin Powers impersonator in the world, understands that cold tough truth much better than anybody."The task can be exhausting. When I'm in that clothing, I am the character. I've got no option.

I've got to maintain the mannerisms, the walk, the insane one-liners-- it's what the people expect." By the end of a gig as Austin, Brown's velour match will often

be soaked with his own sweat. Some might presume that celeb impersonators are a dying type.

In a time where Prince can carry out as a hologram and any old Snapchat filter can transform you into a Kardashian catfish, they appear like a relic from bygone days when celeb seemed like something glamorous and illusory. However across the world, and here in New Zealand, there are many industrious individuals who still have a lot of skin-- and sweat-- in the impersonation game.Gary Brown has actually been carrying out as an impersonator considering that 1988, when he initially toured America as Crocodile Dundee. He's now been sharing his life with Austin Powers for more than 18 years, and describes it as" quite the enterprise"at about 40-60 paid gigs a year. Donning the cravat in 1999 for a swinging '60s home celebration, he noticed more than a passing similarity. Not long after, he was gotten in touch with by a buddy requiring entertainment for a large occasion in Australia. He informed them he might sing, he might dance and he could do Austin Powers."They wanted Austin and that was that. I got the jagged dentures done, the fit and the wig made and

discovered the right glasses." Gary Brown as Austin Powers. Image: Adrian Malloch When Brown arrived in Australia, accompanied by

former TrueBliss member Keri Harper in the function of Felicity Shagwell,

he realised the"large event"for his first paid Austin Powers gig was the Sydney Olympics."It was so fantastic, things got so crazy that we had to get guard to stop individuals getting images with us."Just like Brown, Auckland actor Judy

Rankin initially fell into impersonating through her noteworthy look. After playing Queen Elizabeth II in a regional theatre production in

the 1990s, word of mouth began to spread out of her regal resemblance."People began stating' you look rather a lot like her 'and the tasks just streamed in from there,"she states. Her very first gig was for a business association, sitting outside an estate surrounded by cucumber sandwiches and tea. Entry to the imitation game can likewise be born from a deep idolisation of a star. Pauline Berry, an ex-Marilyn Monroe impersonator, can affirm to that."I just really enjoyed her, and no one else was doing her at the time."Working as a backup vocalist, Berry saw an opportunity to do justice to Marilyn's skill."I wanted to do her as classy as she actually was, not because garish sort of way. People think that she wasn't a good singer, but she was the real deal." Her first look as Marilyn was being driven in a classic car in the Auckland Christmas Parade. The crowd, she remembers, went nuts for it. "I could see that it made individuals really happy, they purchased into this nostalgic minute where Marilyn was still alive. It was just so great."

The idea of who Marilyn Monroe is changes depending upon the individual, according to Berry. "I think she is an example for a great deal of people, but likewise a forecast of their failings or their successes. They see her one way, where another person may see her totally differently." Pauline Berry as Marilyn Monroe. Image: Supplied Another fan who was driven to embody his hero is Brendon Chase, New Zealand and Australia's premiere Elvis impersonator. He recently transferred to

the Gold Coast to widen his Elvis audience base, and is wishing to reserve a 3rd trip to Graceland quickly."I have actually constantly liked Elvis ever because I was a kid. When I went down to Rotorua in 1996 to support a buddy in the first ever New Zealand Elvis contest, I believed 'I'm sure I can do this'." He returned the next year, and won the entire competitors."I simply want to keep his memory alive, that's my vision,"says Chase, one of an international network of self-declared ETAs-- Elvis Homage Artists."It's likewise a way of keeping my passion alive in a different method from just purchasing posters and images of him. When you're onstage, you can see individuals return in time

to a various, better, point in their life. Music can bring back those memories pretty quickly. "It's his complete time task, he prefers to call it a"well-paid pastime". The change needs a lot more than a cheap outfit and wig, but nailing the aesthetic is a good place to start."Marilyn is extremely' impersonatable 'because she has such an unique look,"states Berry." If you get all the elements and toss them together, you'll have some sort of simulation."In

her Marilyn days, she maintained the iconic platinum blonde at the salon every 3 weeks."I was never as thin as her though, she was tiny."In a comparable vein, Chase currently owns seven bespoke Elvis suits-- with another in the mail.He has them personalized by Lansky Bros in Memphis, Tennessee. It's the same store that dressed Elvis throughout his profession, and purchased his patterns after he passed away." All my clothes are from there. That's how seriously I take this task, due to the fact that they are

n't inexpensive. If I was a carpenter, I would need a saw. It just so happens that I'm a vocalist and I need a match." Brendon Chase as Elvis. Picture: Supplied As soon as you have the iconography in place, you require to lock down the attributes."I work hard on the Queen's voice,"says Judy Rankin."I have never ever been able to smile like her, so I try and avoid that at all costs. Luckily, she

doesn't smile really much in public anyway."

When preparing for Marilyn, Berry explains an extreme mental game. "I consider being her all day, I watch her old films andfocus in on the method that she talks. It's a mindset that's really tough to sustain. "Having been Elvis for 26 years, Chase does not need to prepare as much nowadays. In reality, he boasts that he can"fall out of bed in character"and often forgets what his genuine voice sounds like. But that didn't come without a lot of practice and study."

It's like attempting to improve at a sport. There are four main points: the look, the presence, the outfits and the voice. Lots of individuals have actually got two or three of them, but not many have got all 4 ... I'm taking a look at three and a half, I believe. "Playing an imaginary character, Gary Brown confesses to having slightly more liberty when it comes to his Austin Powers act. But that didn't come without a few legal obstacles. When he initially released his website, he got a letter from a solicitor on behalf of Warner Brothers in California listing a variety of copyright infringements. He got their piracy supervisor on the phone and persuaded him, then the marketing division in New york city, that he was the real deal. They waived the violations, and gave him authorisation to keep the character alive. Does that mean it's possible that Mike Myers from Hollywood understands about Gary Brown from Orewa? He can't make certain on that one, but he was definitely made mindful of what is outside the Austin character oeuvre according to the character's developer. Promoting firearms is a big no-no. Taking a polarising character like Austin into

the real life isn't without its threats. Brown performs everywhere from birthdays to business events, the Sevens rugby and free public gatherings, and states that nearly everyone he satisfies reacts favorably."People either love Austin or they dislike him, but [the haters]

typically have a change of heart."There was only one circumstances, during the V8 Motorsport in Mansfield, where things turned ugly. "Some person didn't like Austin, so he threw me into the pool. I dislocated my shoulder and I could not perform for the remainder of the day. " Gary Brown as Austin Powers. Image: Adrian Malloch Berry dealt with a couple of unpleasant scenarios when she was working as Marilyn Monroe." I truly loved the singing however I wasn't so much into strolling about with the doopy-doop voice, resting on laps and rubbing men's bald heads."She rapidly discovered that sort of interaction is what some individuals were spending for."I had one female who was extremely dissatisfied that I didn't swoon all over her hubby and sit in his lap. That's just not my

thing. I did find it quite difficult attempting to determine if customers were anticipating Marilyn the singer or Marilyn the slut."In spite of a handful of disappointments, the impersonation market appears to have no shortage of fish stories. Rankin typically just looks like the Queen these days for 100th birthday celebrations, of which there are increasingly more. "If it still makes people smile, then I'll keep doing it. Because I'm certainly not in it for the cash. "It was at one guy's 70th birthday where Chase had an especially excellent day in the workplace. Upon Elvis 'arrival to the celebration, the elderly male immediately stood out of his wheelchair and began trying to dance." His kids all began bawling their eyes out around him. They told me he had not been able to stand up by himself for 20 years. That was pretty surreal."The fond memories icons of Marilyn and Elvis might survive on forever, however their impersonators aren't rather so indefatigable. After taking a trip to Hollywood to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Marilyn's death

, Berry chose to leave the act behind."I initially associated to her sensation alone worldwide, but eventually I stopped seeming like that. I understood that I had actually outgrown her." Judy is less poetic about the Queen circuit.

"If the work dried up, I would not be brokenhearted. It's simply a bit of enjoyable while it exists." Brendon Chase as Elvis. Image: Supplied Working towards winning an Elvis world title, Chase isn't letting go of his blue suede shoes any time soon. The fans won't either."Audiences still like him and they like the music. There are exceptionally fanatic people

out there, I still get screams and screams." One of his good buddies-- another ETA-- didn't secure the world champs until he was 55 years old."I have actually got a little time left in me, which is quite great. I'm fortunate that I keep healthy and the music keeps me young. As long as I do not end up being the fat Elvis, I'll be alright."

When it comes to Brown, he's still" riding the circulation"

of Austin Powers-- 15 years after the last movie was released. He's got gigs booked all the method through up until 2020, but is likewise intending to introduce his real estate career. To manage the two demanding tasks, he's connected to fellow entertainer-cum-realtor Shane Cortese for guidance." It will be a fascinating shift-- I desire to keep doing my programs since that's what I enjoy doing one of the most. "Without missing out on a beat, he uses a service. "Maybe I might simply become the grooviest person in property. "

0 notes

tryandmakeitdaily · 5 years

Text

1/24/19

Super fruitful past couple of days. The coming move has sharpened my focus to a point. I really did need that trip to see my grandpa. I learned so much from that whole experience - mostly that I’m happy I’m not 16 again and bickering with my dad in small, minute, meaningless ways. He has a way of getting under my skin I think mostly because I notice so much of what I don’t like in him as a part of me as well.

Went climbing yesterday - pretty sure thats the thing. I’m not good at it, but most people are encouraging and excited about a new person going. Its pretty expensive, but not any more so than anything else worthwhile. Soccer was to demanding and I wasn’t very good and the team mentality made it difficult to really feel like I was contributing. People just come up and talk to you while climbing - there is always something to relate over. Especially when you’re bad at it. So many tips and little tricks they teach you. It feels good to learn in this way. I’m supremely thankful for my friend Brian. Hes the most active, social, thoughtful person I’ve ever met. Very grateful.

Yesterday Siena was freaking out after doing a couple takes of vocals, fearing she would never be able to do it in a way thats pleased her ever again. I told her to slow down, something I tell myself often when I’m freaking out. Begin to spell out all of the things I’m doing, saying them aloud. Something like ok now raise your right hand and grip the doorhandle by surrounding your fingers around it and squeezing. You can always slow down. I think I realized this when learning how to play piano, because my natural reaction was to do it faster, was to get it over with and learn it faster. But thats not how our brains work. You have to slow down and really breathe and take it all in. With patience you can achieve what you need to.

Anyway, I’m excited for her, I’ve invested a lot into her project and I know she can do it. Its only a matter of time. It does make me reflect on what it is I want for the next couple years. I imagine being in LA will bring far more insight but it feels like the move is practically meant to happen at this point. Finding it spiritually significant is so empowering. Finding spirituality in anything is so invigorating. I see church, I see all of these places where the community is so incredibly powerful and here in Detroit, it doesn’t feel right. For a second it was at Assemble and that taste alone allowed me to see what it was I was missing in my life. I guess in all reality I’m not too concerned with finding it - I know I will in LA. Its only a matter of time, just like anything else. I’m scared of not being a hustler enough but now that I have so many tools and so many things I know will make or sustain my wellbeing I can definitely manage it.

The transition will put some strain or at least some pressure on Garret as my manager but I think this is a good fit too - as much as I really enjoy and am grateful for what Garret has done for me (probably far more than I am able to list) I think its not quite the right culture fit. Its real close though. And maybe in time it will be right. But I do fear that the distance will make it increasingly difficult. He seems to want to be entrenching himself in too many scenes at the same time. Which might be how management works. I’m not really sure - I guess thats another good point, I’m not really entirely sure what a manager exactly does. Since I do’nt have a huge repetoire I do’nt have a huge need for a artist manger. But I do like sending the errant email to him or forwarding him to other people as things grow.

My music lately has been very pinpointed. Especially making those few ESPN tracks. There are some things I can really nail and other things which definitely kick my ass. I enjoy both, I think, although its definitely more satisfying being able to kill something. I’m taking more to guitar and bass, I think its natural because of my past in bands that I would gravitate back towards them. After buying Kontakt I’m using more and more natural instruments, making commercial stuff is easier. Getting weird isn’t super important - although my OP1 handles that quite a bit.

Its really difficult to continue writing when I don’t really have much else to write about. I find it refreshing to have a more empty mind, spilling out all of these things is I think really good for my psyche.

No real news on the girl or relationship front. Ashlynn and I related yesteday over the phone about what kind of guy shes looking for which I think is a big step in our ex relationship. I’m nervous about her finding someone she loves, because I know that will hurt, but she deserves someone who loves her. She really is an amazing person. I love her, in fact. I’ve thought about it a lot. I’ve never told her, I think about telling her, I fantasize about it, but I think it would be selfish to say as I leave. It would just make leaving harder. All these movies tell you to always say it if you feel it, but I just imagine it will make everything more difficult, especially for her. I just want her to be happy in all of this.

I will miss all of these people moving forward. I know they will always be around. I see my parents and their lack of friends, and I guess it concerns me. They seem so cloistered. And really I imagine that unless I find a significant other, cultivating friends will be super important. Its weird, I’m finally at a place in my life where I feel like I want a relationship, I think I could really do it correctly at this point. Having had a semi-successful one under my belt. My propensity to cheat or flirt around is the biggest problem within all of that. I haven’t truly figured out where that comes from. Its an impulse, one I am unable to ignore. I guess it kind of represents my constant need for validation. And being attractive is somerhing I find really important for some reason. Being desired is intoxicating. But its not all that important as it relates to my goals. Now that i’m not as concerned with becoming a face as an artist, I’m not too concerned with me becoming older or uglier. I mean, I don’t want to actively become those things, but after seeing my grandpa, they are inevitable and happiness and joy is on the other side, letting go of all of those things is really the key here.

Strangely, I think the reason I desire a relationship is just for more validation. Validation that I have the ability to actually do it. Which I don’t think is a good reason to be in a relationship. I’m not sure what a good reason is - I think my relationship to ashlynn was a big part of me trying to learn and grow and finding someone I can do that with. And now, I’m not sure. I mean I guess the elephant in the room that I’m not addressing is that I’m lonely. When it comes down to it, thats why I’m reaching out to all of these people as the day winds down. I don’t really have an activity that I do before I go to bed (maybe I should start reading?) but also I am lonely at the the end of the night. And addressing both of those problems shouldn’t be too difficult. I wonder if loneliness will persist despite the distraction of all of these things. Its definitely a big reason why I want to go on Omegle and talk to randoms and see if I still have “it.”

What is “it?” and why do I want it? What does it represent? Power? The ability to overcome needing another person by proving to myself I can always find or attract more? I’m not sure, but the desire to still prove to myself I still have the “thing” is definitely a curious one. I’m really not sure where it comes from or what I want to get from all of it. Is it an ego thing? It must be right? But its also a way to prevent feeling truly alone or feeling like I have to give my all to someone else.

0 notes

markwatkinsconsumerguide · 5 years

Photo

Consumer Guide / No.75 / with singer-songwriter, Bronwen Exter.

MW : Introduce me to the band…

BE : I'll list them in order of how long we've been playing music together:

Jennifer Middaugh - Vocal harmonies. Before a song is even done I know I can't sing it without her. Sometimes I write harmony lines explicitly, and sometimes she comes up with them. Jen is a BFF, I always let her order the sushi because she knows how to do so in a completely decadent way. She can sing circles around me. We met around 2000 at the Cosmic Joke Collective in NYC hosted by our Parisian friend, Mary Noelle Dana, or maybe at the off Broadway show De La Guarda. Our first collaboration was ‘Willow Weep For Me’. We ducked off at a loft party on the Lower East Side to put it together as a surprise that turned out to be an unforgettable collaboration, still going strong.

Michael Stark - Piano and Organ. In 2009, Jen and Mike and I spent a whole July night until daybreak making a recording of my song, ‘Junkyard’. Around dawn, by the time we were using beer bottle percussion and heavy chains for ambiance on the track, all the files were lost. It was so tragically funny we've been playing together ever since. Mike has all the charts to all my songs on the same old ragged pieces of paper. I make up chords and he names them and interprets them for everyone else. He knows my music inside and out, in some cases better than I do.

Matthew Saccuccimorano - Drums. Matt produced my second record, ‘Junkyard’, when we were a trio with a different drummer, (beloved Dana Billings). Matt is grouchy and loveable. He has the coolest family and smartest, most talented kids in the world. When Dana got too busy with another band he is in, I was really excited for the silver lining of bringing Matt into the band. He loves to rehearse, and he brings a production sensibility to rehearsals. In return, I sometimes bring him cookies. We both love loud drums, though we have completely different definitions of what loud drums are.

John Young - Electric and Upright Bass. Jen and I have also known John for almost 20 years. He plays in the cult NYC band Spottiswoode and His Enemies, one of our all time favorite acts and influences. John loves coffee, and John is great at talking. He definitely comes across as extremely smart, and I suspect he actually is.

Jason Shegogue - Guitar and Lap Steel. As Matt says, every single thing Jason plays sounds like a record. Jason collects old gear and never makes fun of my guitar playing. He is awfully nurturing, for being so good.

Venissa Santi - Vocal harmonies. Venissa learned two full sets of Jen's parts last spring because of a late conflict Jen had with our local release show, which speaks to her chops. Like Jen, she sings jazz in her own band. Once that show was done, once she had written her own parts to some new songs, once we heard the way we could all do three part harmonies, once we realized how fun she is in a band, once we realized splitting a couple hundred bucks seven ways is just about like splitting it six and nobody really cares anyway, she had to stay.

MW : Tell me about your new album…

BE : We recorded ‘Snakeskin, There’ at Old Soul Studios in Catskill, NY, where I made my first record ‘Elevator Ride’ in 2005. Kenny Siegal produced and recorded. It is available digitally on all the usual places, and physically through CD Baby or directly from me, in person.

The title comes from a lyric in track 3: ‘The Creature That You Knew’. The song is about a snake or, rather, the fact that I kept finding a snakeskin at my doorstep and it kind of freaked me out, but then I took inspiration thinking about metamorphosis and personal growth, how much better I liked myself living in a little house in the middle of nowhere than I had when I lived in NYC. At the same time, the bridge of the song is nostalgic for Paris musically and lyrically, and all the trappings of a more cosmopolitan life, so there's something unresolved in it.

The lyrics on this record come roughly half from dreams and half from stark life in Upstate NY, married and a new mom. There was a rawness to the time I wrote it, a lot of raw love. It's not an album of lullabies - I've also been called dreamy in the past, and I like to think that the dreaminess of these songs is more like when you wake up, can't shake it, and go, what the F was that?!

There are a couple singles, too - ‘Shapeshifter’ and ‘The Chase’, which is a three minute rock song. I wrote ‘The Chase’ with my wife Rachel on a picnic blanket. It's about the lure of the bad ex we all have.

MW : From your website, you seem to like PIE CHARTS?! What were your best subjects at school, and how did you actually get on with mathematics?!!

BE : I am terrible at math. I love history, and I love literature. The pie charts were a joke, but there’s way too little opportunity to not take yourself seriously promoting music, so I went with it.

I was fascinated with the idea of how transparent my songwriting could get if I challenged myself to be more clear and specific, thematically. Along the same lines as trying not to write songs in A minor, when I made the pie charts I was trying to check myself for cliches. The charts represent the songwriting before the current release (when I realized I made mention of bones too often). The batch of songs before that were too frequently set on a road in America. Making pie charts has nothing to do with being good at math - I enjoy basic math from time to time, for sure, but that's it.

My best subject in school was politics. I am endlessly fascinated with how power works, the intersection between legal and social change, theory and practice. I will never get over reading history - how human and flawed, multilayered, sordid and utterly engaging it is ; and literature is in its own category. The writers and poets I love are everything to me.

MW : Do you have any superstitions?

BE : I try not to have, so no, not that I can think of. Knock on wood! I think I am superstitious about having superstitions. I worry that if I think that way, bad things will happen as a result. I try to operate with a balance of reason and faith. The world is scary enough without being superstitious.

MW : What’s the best slice of luck you’ve had so far?

BE: Two sons, hands down.

MW : What’s downtown Ithaca, NY usually like in Winter?

BE : Winter lasts about six months and downtown gets deserted. There is already a foot of snow outside and it’s only mid-November, so it looks like winter came a month early this year and in my soul it has already lost its charm.

I wrote ‘In My Room’, track #4 on the new record, looking out at my blooming crab-apple tree getting covered in a massive snowstorm in April. For six months, downtown Ithaca and its people try to make the best of it. The rest of the year we've got it made, humidity notwithstanding.

This city rests on the land of the Cayuga, and any season reveals this land's utter beauty and majesty - glacial hills and lakes and gorges. A cold six months requires resilience and builds character, but it is often spectacularly beautiful. A story about last winter: my band played a winter residency at our favorite club downtown, Casita del Polaris, and each installment featured a calamity: my lost voice, the mayor telling everyone to stay off the roads, our bass player breaking his leg, etc. I dragged myself to each show, because we had rehearsed our faces off to learn my whole catalog - three two-hour, all original different sets of music, none of which with songs from the new record. It felt crazy to go out in the cold, and I think the shows were on Thursdays, too.

Here’s the fundamental thing I learned last year about downtown Ithaca in winter : when you show up for art, throw energy into it with abandon for no good reason other than trying to make music for the sake of the sound, people show up to bear witness. I loved that residency.

MW : How is it for arts & culture?

BE : Ithaca has lovely, thriving, collaborative, multiple arts scenes - independent, national, underground, highbrow, it’s a good little town for being so isolated. Ithaca is a college town, so if you are willing to brave that scene you can absorb the arts and culture it brings. When I was growing up I was always up on those hills - I got to meet Vladimir Ashkenazi, and Mstislav Rostropovich - I played violin and sang in the Children's choir.

When I moved back to town ten years ago, I was blown away by all the bands and songwriters. It's a small enough city that I now consider many of the people I admired good friends and collaborators ; and there is a whole other layer of independent, younger artists through the “Ithaca Underground” that will always be cooler than me - for that I am thankful.

Ithaca is great in how these layers tend to cross pollinate, too. I can think of lots of examples.

MW : What was the last book, cd, film you bought/saw?

BE : With two small kids we really don’t get out much, but the last movie I saw in the theater was ‘Black Panther’ and damn that was good. I read all the time, currently ‘Team of Rivals’ about Abraham Lincoln.

At home we are collecting records - other than supporting musician friends and collaborators, the last record I loved completely was ‘Capacity’ by Big Thief.

MW : How will you / do you (usually) celebrate Christmas?

BE : With family, as you might expect, but my favorite holidays are Thanksgiving and the Winter Solstice. I love remembering all the descant lines to all my favorite Christmas carols, so if there is an opportunity to attend a midnight mass and sing those, I do. I appreciate this time of year as alternately decadent and reflective.

MW : Plans for 2019?

BE: Keep writing songs and other things - poems, essays, whatever. I am in a steady, long-game phase--raising small children, trying to do so with love and integrity. I keep the things that sustain me going, including creativity, but I am also going underground a bit after the release of this record. I am listening for what songs want to be written next, eager to hear them.

http://www.bronwenexter.com/

0 notes

deverodesign · 7 years

Link

Reading Time: 9 minutes

Feeling like an impostor is something a lot of people have experience with. Even some of those individuals we see as successful admit they know this feeling. So, the good news is that if you feel like an impostor, you are not alone. In this article, we will explore this subject more in-depth. We will discuss everything, from what it means to feel like an impostor to how to deal with it. Without further ado, let’s begin.

Table of Contents:

What it feels like to feel like an impostor

The good news about the bad news

How to turn feeling like an impostor into an advantage

The truth

The ambiguity of being “good enough”

Tips on dealing with impostor syndrome

What it feels like to feel like an impostor

The best place to begin this discussion is what does it mean to feel like an impostor. Sure, if you feel like one, you already know what does it mean. In the end, you have to face this feeling sometimes, maybe on a daily basis. However, I think that outline some basic description is useful. So, what does it mean to feel like an impostor? The answer is simple. When you feel this, you feel inadequate. You feel like you don’t have what it takes to either be where you are, or get where you want to be. It is safe to say that you have doubts about your worth.

Well, it is normal to feel this. However, there is one thing that makes the difference between feeling these doubts and feeling like an impostor. These doubts persist even if you find information that indicates that the opposite is true. In other words, it is normal to feel self-doubt when you start something you never tried. This is not a reason to think you are experiencing what psychologist call impostor syndrome.

On the other hand, let’s say that you are doing some work where you have a decent experience and knowledge. In addition, let’s assume you are really good at it. Meaning, other people think your work is really good. Yet, you feel chronic self-doubt. You are regularly thinking you are an impostor or a fraud. No matter how great work you produce, and how many people praise it, you still feel like an impostor. Then, yes, we are talking about feeling like an impostor in its rawness.

The good news about the bad news

Now, there is some good news about feeling like an impostor. As I mentioned in the intro, if you feel this way, you are not alone. Even some of the most successful people in the world have some experience with feeling this way. What’s more, some of them still sometimes have to deal with feeling like an impostor, no matter how successful they already are. This is especially true about people working in creative fields, such as writers, artists, poets, entrepreneurs and, yes, designers.

If you take a look at some interviews with people in creative fields, and other fields as well, you will often see or hear these people mentioning this feeling of being an impostor. You would be probably shocked if you knew how many famous people felt this way. For me, feeling self-doubt and inadequacy is something I’m feeling on a daily basis. When I finish new design, my first thought is that it is horrible. I’m convinced about it even if people tell me the opposite is true.

I made it almost a regular practice to delete my work if I have any doubts about it. As a result, I have only few pieces to show on my portfolio. And, even these pieces exist rather out of necessity to show something than because I feel good about them. This is the truth. When I review my work, I think that 99% of it is terrible. This goes beyond design. When I finish article for blog, I feel that it would be better to delete it and start again from scratch.

This applies to all articles, not just some of them. And, you can be sure that I will feel a ton of doubts about this article as well. In a fact, I already feel them, while I am writing these lines. So, let me repeat it. If you feel bad about yourself and your work, you are not alone. I hope that telling you all this will help you feel at least a little bit better about yourself.

How to turn feeling like an impostor into an advantage

So, that was the good news about the bad news. And, I think there is another thing that is good about feeling like an impostor. I believe that feeling like an impostor can actually be an advantage. Instead of seeing it as your weakness or flaw, you can turn it into a strength. I know what you probably think right now. What the hell are you talking about? You must be joking! How can I turn feeling like an impostor into my advantage? No, I am serious. Let me explain what I mean.

As we all know, hard work is the only sure way to get somewhere. It doesn’t really matter what do you want to achieve in life. You have to work for it. And, if your goals are at least a bit ambitious, you have to work hard. Otherwise, your chances to achieve your goals are almost zero. Also, when you achieve your goals, you have to sustain the momentum. In other words, you can’t rest on your laurels. We all heard about people who achieved big things and then disappeared.

Do you see where am I going with this? When you feel like an impostor, you feel self-doubt and inadequacy. You think that you, and your work, is not good enough. This feeling can be either debilitating, and making you weaker, or it can be empowering and making you stronger. How? Use this as a fuel to keep you moving forward. Stop thinking about yourself as just “not being good enough” or just “not having the skills”.

What you should do is add “yet”. So, instead of thinking “I am not good enough”, think “I am not good enough, yet”. Or, instead of “I don’t have the skills”, think “I don’t have the skills, yet”. Here is the key. Always think about your insecurities as something temporary. Then, look for ways to work on them.

The truth

The best thing about this approach to feeling like an impostor is that it is true. You are not faking or pretending anything. Also, you are not subscribing to any new age crap that is almost everywhere these days. Imagine you decide to change your point of view, and see something you are not “good” at only as temporary state. Then, all you are saying is that you might be not be good enough, but you can get better. Is that a lie? Are you pretending or faking something? No.

When you say I am not good enough at “x” and I can get better, you are speaking the truth. Well, let’s ignore the possibility that you might be actually pretty good at “x” for now. Because, well, if you do feel like an impostor, you are not the best person to judge your abilities. So, let’s put this meaning of being “good enough” aside. Anyway, this is what is beautiful on this approach. It is not just a bunch of lies, like a lot of self-help literature. It is also not about faking anything.

Do you still have doubts about validity of this statement? Okay. Under normal conditions, every human being has the ability to learn new things. Thanks to the research in neurobiology we now know that brain can change and create new connections through our life. This is something called neuroplasticity and neurogenesis. Regardless of your age, your brain can grow and reshape. So, unless you have some brain-related health condition, there is a chance you can learn it.

The ambiguity of being “good enough”

What does it even mean being “good enough”? I am serious. Think about it just for a moment. Have you ever seen any scale, based on valid science, you could use to “measure” how “good” you are? I haven’t. And, chances are that neither you. This means that any time you say you are not “good enough”, you are speaking subjectively. Meaning, you are judging yourself by your own description of what is “good enough”. This is not a general description of what is “good enough”.

It is your description. And, as such, it is relative. Other people will have different opinion. Now, let me ask you one question. Would you use something so ambiguous and relative as this to make any serious judgment? Imagine you want to drive somewhere. However, you don’t know how much gas do you have in your car. Would you rather follow your subjective, and relative, guess or would you rather check the fuel indicator?

Chances are quite high that you would not rely on your guess. Instead, you would check the fuel indicator. Fuel indicator is objective and unbiased, your own evaluation is not, especially if you have an inclination to feeling like an impostor. In that case, your own evaluation is among the things you should rely on the least. Since it is your opinion, you are inclined to give it more weight and priority. As Richard Feynman said: “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool.”

Tips on dealing with impostor syndrome

This brings me to tips you can use to help yourself in situations when you feel like an impostor. First, realize that this is quite common and you are not alone. We all sometimes feel inadequate. We all sometimes think about ourselves as frauds. The problem is that we are afraid to talk about it. However, just because nobody talks about something doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. Second, understand that you are often not the best person to evaluate your skills or work.

It is a well-known truth that we are our worst critics. If you want unbiased and objective evaluation of your skill, ask someone else. Do you want to evaluate your skills? Find someone who is already an expert at what you do. Third, if you are really not good at something, remember that this is only temporary state. If you put in the hard work, time and effort, you can change it. There are people who were born with predispositions, or “talent”, for something.

Full disclosure: I don’t believe in talent, I believe in hard work. However, even people with these predispositions had to work for it. Talent can help you get there faster. However, like with creativity, talent alone is not enough. Hard work is still necessary. So, don’t let that feeling that you are not “good enough” stop you. Take it is an indicator that there is some area you can improve yourself and your skills.

When you feel you are not good at something, find ways to get better at it. Read, watch videos, talk with experts and practice. Let your self-doubt of feeling of inadequacy fuel your hunger for learning. My fourth tip is one I have to remind myself about every day. Stop comparing yourself to others. The source of our self-doubt, and feeling like an impostor, is often this constant comparison with others. There is at least one problem with this.

We don’t usually compare ourselves to people on our level. Instead, we compare ourselves to people who are above us. Often with people we hold as our role models. There are two things you can do about this. First, just stop doing it. Stop comparing yourself with others. If you want to compare yourself with someone, compare yourself with your “yesterday” self. Review your past work and compare your current work with that.

Second, remind yourself that even your roles had to put in the work and effort. These people were not born with their knowledge and skills. They had to invest their time and learn it. Then, they had to take some more time to practice it. Even the brightest minds in history had to go through this process of learning and doing. Keep this in mind the next time you will want to compare yourself with people like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos or Mark Zuckerberg. They too had to start somewhere.

My last tip, is this. Believe in yourself. Believe that no matter what it is, you can get better at it. Whatever it is, there is always at least some tiny chance that you can learn to do it. Remember that the only limits are the ones you create for yourself. In a short, you are already a badass.

Closing thoughts on feeling like an impostor

Feeling like an impostor is nothing uncommon. It is more common that we may think it is. However, it is not fancy. It is almost like sex or money. A lot of people are not willing to talk about it. As a result, we think we are the only ones feeling that way. Well, we are not. This is what would want you to remember from this article. Feeling like an impostor is common. This will be a paradox, but you can use your self-doubt in a good way. You can either use it to as a fuel for moving forward or as a wall to stop you. It is only about your attitude. This choice is yours.

Aside from that, I hope you enjoyed reading this article. I also hope that this article helped you see self-doubt or inadequacy in a different light. If you liked this article, please share it, recommend it and comment on it. Knowing that this article help someone means a lot to me. This is the main reason why I write. Also, if you think I forgot to mention something, let me know. The best place to to reach me is Twitter. You can find me here every day. With that, until next time, have a great day!

Thank you very much for your time.

Want more?

If you liked this article, please subscribe or follow me on Twitter.

The post What to Do If You Feel Like an Impostor appeared first on Alex Devero Blog.

#Health SelfDevelopment #entrepreneurship #experience #experimenting #freelancing #learning #problems

0 notes

csown · 7 years

Link

1/ When you act before you have enough certainty to have confidence in the outcomes, you enter the fog of action (generalized from the idea of "fog of war") 2/ This fog is not fun. As Sonya Mann cleverly put it in her recent ribbonfarm post, "I’d rather be uncertain than wrong, but I’d rather be right than uncertain." 3/ Navigating fogs of action is about being right or wrong about things in the external world. It's about going ready-fire-aim and still hitting the target more often than others expect. 4/ The fog of intention has to do with being right or wrong about things in the internal world of reasons, justifications, motivations, desires and intentions. 5/ Uncertainty and ambiguity around questions like Why am I doing this? and What am I doing? These actually cause analysis-paralysis more often than the fog of action. 6/ It is easy to see why, even if you can't answer questions like What is the future of AI? and Should I go to college? you should dive into trial-and-error anyway. 7/ It is harder to see why you should dive into action when you aren't sure why you are doing something, or even what exactly you're doing. When the meaning of your actions is foggy. 8/ Are you writing blog posts to feed your vanity, or to market your services, or are you offering services in order to support your writing intentions? Or just practicing your typing? 9/ What do your actions mean? Are you analyzing the tech industry for investment insight, virtue-signaling to your tribe, or soothing internal insecurities about your tech credibility? 10/ Are you getting into 3d printing because you're good at it and see a market, or because people you think are cool are doing it and it's an excuse to hang out with them? 11/ Conundrums like this constitute the fog of intention. Most of the fog does dissipate as you keep acting, through trial and error, and actually hitting targets, intended or unintended. 12/ You discover your own agency -- your ability to influence the world and predict the pattern of that influence -- through trial-and-error. This is a pre-condition for harboring meaningful intentions. 13/ Repetition, habit-formation, and the raw fact of things turning out to be sustainable are fog-of-intention killers. Ready-fire-aim actually hitting the mark wonderfully clarifies the mind. 14/ After the 100th blog post or 3D print design, you've generally figured out what you're doing and why. If it works that is, sustainably and repeatedly hitting targets. 15/ Of course, this is only true if it creates rewards, both expected and unexpected, for you and others. A target is acknowledged value, expected or not. 16/ They say talent hits targets others can't hit, but genius hits targets others can't see. Trial-and-error clearing of the fog-of-intention can make you look like a genius in that sense. 17/ Talent gaps relate to the external world. I can see an archery target 100 feet away and admire somebody who hits it because I know what it is I cannot do before I see it being done. 18/ But effective-genius is about clearing the fog of intention: hitting targets that make people see things as worth doing. Putting the 'objective' in 'objective function.' 19/ One of my favorite artists, Amy Lin, routinely produces works that make me see in that way. She hits targets I can't even see except through her artworks, after the fact. 20/ In decision-making we often use the metaphors of chess (perfect information) and poker (imperfect information) to compare decision-makers. 21/ The fog of intention breaks that metaphor because the game board /rules are inside people's heads. Even if you see exactly what they see, you won't see the game they see. 22/ Another way of thinking about this is that they're making meaning out of what they see differently from you. The world is more legible to them; they can read/write more into it. 23/ To me, a pattern of dots in the environment is just noise. To Amy Lin, it's apparently an inspirational message in a secret language that unlocks a portal into a universe of creative possibilities I don't see. 24/ Finding your genius through the process of clearing an intention fog can take years. I don't think everybody can do it, but I don't think you need to be a certifiable genius either. 25/ A big part of it seems to be a key early challenge: learning the difference between doing the right thing for the wrong reason vs doing the wrong thing for the right reason. 26/ The external world rewards being right (and doing right), whatever your reasons. In the most extreme "external" rewards market, the stock market, reasons don't matter, only returns. 27/ Free-market ideologues often generalize and fetishize this idea. Milton Friedman for instance, argued that we should "make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing." 28/ Here "wrong people" is shorthand for "people motivated by the wrong reasons" according to some ideology. Or better still, "people motivated by any reason, selfish or selfless." 29/ This kind of behaviorist incentive design is all about talent in the sense of hitting-things-others-can't-hit. The invisible hand deals better with visible targets than revealed ones. 30/ You can support incentives for others in this sense only when you can see what it is that you cannot yourself do, and have a "right vs wrong" opinion about whether it should be done. 31/ This "right things for the wrong reasons" world is one of known targets and pre-estimated "expected value" thinking. Where consequences are predictable, reasons don't matter. 32/ There is no way to apply this kind of logic to kinds of value where the "right thing" is part of a game calculus buried in the intention fog of particular individuals. 33/ There is a deeper problem as well: reasons last a LOT longer than actions. Your reasons for doing things are likely to persist far longer than individual actions motivated by them. 34/ If you want to make money, you'll try many things over many years to try and make money. If you want to solve AIDS you'll try many strategies for that over many years. 35/ So if I see your talent and support you hitting a target I want hit for the "wrong reasons" I am still reinforcing your ability to hit other things I don't want hit for those reasons. 36/ By contrast, the only way I can support your genius is if you repeatedly surprise me by hitting targets I couldn't see before, and I decide I want more such surprises. 37/ Put another way, investing in developing "hits what others can't see" genius is a better way to foster serendipity in the world than investing in "hits what others can't hit" talent. 38/ To snowclone Friedman's line for this regime of action, the idea is to "make it politically profitable for the inscrutable people to do the unexpected thing" 39/ Here "inscrutable people" is not people who do the right or wrong thing by an external ideology, but do things for reasons only they can see as worth acting on at all at the time. 40/ How do you spot inscrutable people who are seeing things others aren't, and doing "the wrong thing" by any known calculus of motivations, but for the "right" reasons you can't see yet? 41/ You can score intentions along two dimensions: fogginess (it's not clear what exactly you want or why) and intensity (how badly you want it at gut level). 42/ Foggy intentions, intensely held, are necessary, but not sufficient, for developing an ability to routinely hit what others can't see. Clear intentions usually map to acknowledged targets. 43/ People who do this are often long-period obsessives, like Javert in Les Misérables. Their intentions are foggy but intensely held, and persist across multiple external incentive environments. 44/ We call such people "misguided" when their intentions are not foggy to others, and adequately account for all outcomes, leaving no room for surprises. This is the basis for a lot of psychology. 45/ It may be clear to a good psychologist that your actions/outcomes can be explained by unacknowledged resentments you are nursing, with no residual "genius" left to explain. 46/ If your intentions are foggy to you and partially or entirely inscrutable to others then you just might be doing the wrong thing for the right reason, and have a future as a revealed targeting genius. 47/ To develop your talent, you have to deal in promises and deliveries. You have to call your shots before you act and build trust that you'll hit known targets more often than others. You are customer-driven. 48/ To develop your targeting genius, you have to deal in surprises and addictions. You have to keep surprising people by acting through the fog of intention. You are product-driven. 49/ By repeatedly showing, through your actions, what is worth hitting, you create new meaning in the world. This is much more valuable than mere predictable utility. 50/ People will put a price on predictable utility, and itch to get into contracts with you. You will have a "market value" and people will have an "expected value" for their dealings with you. 51/ But meaning-making? That's in the economy of pricelessness. People will want relationships and life-long covenants with you, not mere transactions and contracts. 52/ They'll want to join your tribe, if you're inclined to lead one, and be a part of any bigger story you care to author. Not just opt-in to your customer list. 53/ Hitting targets others can't see is priceless. For hitting targets others can't hit, there is always Mastercard :)

0 notes