Because I Got High

Posted on October 25, 2012 by Let Hip Hop Ring

What do Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton have in common with Wiz Khalifa, Lil Wayne, Curren$y, Three 6 Mafia, Snoop Dogg/Lion, and the old Kid Cudi? They’ve all had their run in with cannabis of course. Well we all know the president and the former presidents didn’t use marijuana to the extent of these hip hop stars, but all have admitted, or at least not denied the use of marijuana.

Marijuana, weed, dope, Mary Jane, pot, reefer, what ever you may call it, is everywhere: TV, movies, music and politics. Today marijuana is a hot topic in music and in politics, but for very different reasons. 

Without marijuana the majority of the work produced by the artists mentioned above would not have names or content, for example, Wiz Khalifa’s mixtapes ‘Kush and OJ’ and ‘Burn After Rolling’, Kid Cudi’s weed anthem, ‘Marijuana,’ and Juicy J’s ‘Stoner’s Night’. Some people even claim a dramatic negative change in Kid Cudi’s music ever since he stopped smoking marijuana.

There is no doubt that marijuana has a huge affect on hip hop, so huge that you would think smoking weed is perfectly legal, but it’s not. This is where politics come in.

The War on Drugs is huge and the debate on whether marijuana should be legal or illegal is prominent discussion in America. There are arguments on both sides that make perfect sense. The use of marijuana can cause mild side effects but marijuana is not a deadly drug.  Marijuana contains levels of some toxins even higher than tobacco and frequent use of marijuana can cause harm to vital organs, but marijuana can have medical value unlike tobacco. Marijuana can be a gateway drug, causing people to turn to more dangerous drugs. But the U.S. prisons are filled with marijuana offenders and millions of dollars would be saved if the possession and use of marijuana were legal. Also minorities are disproportionately affected by arrests for marijuana use and possession.  Marijuana can be slightly addictive but it is still heavily used although it is illegal and legalizing marijuana would better regulate the drug.

In the end whether or not marijuana becomes legal or not, rappers and hip hop artists will still use it recreationally and to enhance the creative process of making music.  I believe regulation of marijuana will have little effect on hip hop, what’s done now will just be more open than it already is. But does that make it right?

Whether they like it or not, millions of kids look up to rappers and hip hop artists. There are people who want to emulate the lives of their favorite artists, and more often than not, that includes smoking marijuana.  Fans see that these can artists use marijuana with little to no consequences, but in the world outside of hip hop there are consequences.  As stated before blacks and Hispanics are effected by marijuana related arrests more than any other race.

The Hip Hop community should want marijuana to be legal to get black and hispanic men and women out of prison and to keep young black and hispanic men and women from going to prison, not just for pleasure and to get high whenever and wherever we want. Too often the hip hop community glamorizes the use of marijuana and forgets the dark side that has lead so many men and women in prison. Hip Hop artists should not only rap about the great feeling they get when they get high but also about how marijuana is hurting the black community. 

 

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You suck if you don’t know…Beetlejuice

Posted on October 24, 2012 by ericrosenberg7

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWuHHMuxTQY

That’s a face only a mother can love. But then again, you probably only get that face if your mother loves crack so much that she still does it when she’s pregnant. I guess then it’s a face that only a mother can love because she’s high on crack. Regardless, this is Lester Green, or better known as Beetlejuice. Beet is part of Howard Stern’s “Wack Pack” or essentially a group of people who would have been circus freaks and kept in cages with miniature ponies before feminists and virgins decided everyone else can’t enjoy those types of things, but instead are featured on a satellite radio show with millions and millions of listeners. In terms of political correctness, The Wack Pack is the exact opposite of the term “intellectual disability.”

Side rant- Intellectual disability is so far from an accurate characterization of being retarded that it’s honestly more offensive. President Obama signed a law that replaced “mental retardation” with “intellectual disability” in all Federal statues. The fucking President had to take time away from killing terrorists and helping sick, poor, and- wait for it- actual retards to tell us we can’t say retard. Mentally challenged, developmentally challenged, special- when you hear these words in your head your just saying “Okay, I think he means retard.”  Retard is and always will be how we conceptualize these types of people. Using that word shouldn’t change how you treat them. Is it better to point and laugh at someone trying to scoop a whole jar of peanut butter in their mouth and scream “Look at that intellectually disabled person!” or should we take the time and speak with them and get to know them and let them know “Hey, you know what- you’re a pretty cool retard.”

Intellectual disability. Please. Retarded people aren’t intellectually disabled- people who sit in a room and think up names for retards are intellectually disabled.

Anyway. Beetlejuice. The best place to really appreciate his brilliance is on his Twitter page. Being 4 foot 3 inches and having a head the size of a peach are pretty good indicators that you can’t really do stuff normally. So Beet has a handler of sorts.  He drives him around, make sure he remembers how to breathe, feeds him, whatever he needs to not die basically. He also manages the Twitter feed because, believe or not, Beet cannot read or write or spell or remember his password. How it works is you tweet @beetlepimp asking a question for Lester’s handler to then go and ask Beet himself. Beetle responds and his answer is transcribed in words so vivid its like you have your very own 44 year old black dwarf.

The tweets are Internet gold. The misunderstandings, insults, sexual images are as plentiful as they are unbelievably hilarious. With nearly 43,000 followers you can feel comfort in knowing thousands of other people are laughing at a retard so it’s perfectly okay for you to also. Beet may take a few days off from the Twitter, but getting an alert to know when he’s back tweeting is the best way to get him to answer your question and never miss his nuggets of wisdom.

If you’ve liked what you’ve seen in these short clips and tweets, there are hours and hours of Beet footage online. Something about watching him try to reason through things is so mesmerizing. It’s like vicariously being on some mind-bending acid heroin meth crazy pills trip. I can’t think of anyone else I would want to be for a day. Sure Brad Pitt fucks Angelina Jolie and Derek Jeter plays in the World Series and also probably fucks Angelina Jolie, but I would want to be Beet. Thinking his thoughts. Feeling his feelings. Hanging out with other tards. Spend your day with Beet. Enjoy these videos-

watch?v=oqBuFRhIbgs

watch?v=4PrCXwgVjAg

watch?v=684XZr5HlOY *Personal favorite* This is a long  video of Beet trying to order chinese food. I’ve probably watched the whole thing in its entirety at least 4 or 5 times. Yes that means I suck for wasting an hour of my life on a video where no food is actually ordered and delivered. I don’t care, I could watch it everyday. Makes me think my life will never be complete until I have my very own Beet.

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Twitter + Beef = Tweef

Posted on October 24, 2012 by Let Hip Hop Ring

The age of social networking has provided millions of fans with the ability to connect with their favorite stars like never before.  If your favorite hip hop star is an avid tweeter, which most are, you are able to know what they’re doing, where they are, and who they’re with almost all of the time.  But another thing fans get to see is the “beefs” or rivalries that these celebrities have.  Hip hop is notorious for feuding artists, sometimes leading to death, in the case of Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur as a result of the East Coast vs. West Coast feud.  Today, beefs have gone viral. Artists use twitter to express their feelings and the world can now see.  There have been numerous twitter beefs, or tweefs, since Twitter became popular. 2012 has been a year full of tweefs so I have made a list of the tweefs I think made the biggest impact on the hip hop community.

Top 4 Hip Hop Tweefs of 2012 

1.Chris Brown vs. Drake

            Earlier this year Drake and Chris Brown had a bottle throwing altercation allegedly over R&B singer Rihanna in a New York City club. After this incident, Chris (who is a notable twitter thug) took to twitter to express how he felt about the night.  This is a top Celebrity beef not because of the tweets Chris Brown directed to Drake, but because of the response from the twitter community. Drake is a rapper who occasionally sings and Chris Brown is a singer who occasionally raps.  Both rappers/singers are light skin African Americans.  The combination of the singing and “light skinnedness” don’t give Drake and Chris the most street cred.  Not to mention they threw bottles, not punches.  So in the days to follow twitter was full of jokes about light skin males being weak, gay, punks, etc.  Many people have been saying light skin is going out of style, and this event might have been the straw that broke the camel’s back.

2. Roscoe Dash vs. Meek Mill and Miguel and Kanye West and Wale

            Roscoe Dash is best known for his club anthems, but to my surprise he is apparently a pretty good songwriter.  Roscoe claims that he wrote for Wale and Kanye, but got no credit. So like any frustrated youth of today, he logged onto twitter and took shots at any and everyone who he thought did him wrong. Meek Mill fired back at Roscoe to defend his label mate Wale.  Miguel who is featured on the song Roscoe claimed to write was also brought into the argument because of an interview he where he stated Roscoe had no part in writing the song.  This beef makes the top four list because it involves one of the hottest hip hop artists of our time and some of the newest rising stars of hip hop.  It also shows how collaborations can go horribly wrong.

3. Chief Keef vs. Kanye West

            Chicago rapper Chief Keef blew up this year, due to his hit single “I Don’t Like.” His newfound popularity came largely from Kanye West’s remix of the song.  But Chief Keef told twitter that Kanye’s remix didn’t help him at all. This beef is important because of the response it got from the twitter community.  People could not believe an up and coming artist would diss THE Kanye West.  There were plenty of comments saying that Chief Keef could say goodbye to his career for pulling a move like this. And many people called him ungrateful for Kanye’s help

4. K. Michelle vs. Toya

            Love and Hip Hop: Atlanta star and native Memphian, K. Michelle and the former wife of Lil’ Wayne and current wife of producer, Memphitz, Toya Wright, used twitter to hash out the problems they have with one another due to K. Michelle’s public allegations against Toya’s husband.  K. Michelle claimed that Memphitz abused her and ruined her record deal when they were together.  This beef made the top four because Love and Hip Hop Atlanta was such a hit and controversy in the Hip Hop community.  There were even small rivalries between the people who believed K’s story about being abused by Toya’s husband and people who took Toya’s side.  This year we grew to love K. Michelle from watching Love and Hip Hop: Atlanta, but we had also fallen in love with Toya from her time on Tiny and Toya and Toya: A Family Affair.  This tweef was so controversial because no one could be truly right about whose side they choose because no one except Memphitz and K. Michelle know the whole truth in this situation.

While Twitter has given celebrities the platform to easily connect with fans, it has also allowed them to publically feud over trivial matters. Although this type of beef is no where near as bad as the killings that have occurred in the past because of beefs, it still brings out the worst in people while the world watches.

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Twitter Fiction: “Shrapnel”

Posted on October 24, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

This week I’m posting my first ever fiction story to appear on this blog. It also happens to be the first short story that I have ever written to fit the  140-character Twitter format, and was published via @pancakebooks (stupid name, I know) earlier this week.

My inspiration for this form comes from Jennifer Egan’s short story “Black Box,” originally published on Twitter and then in The New Yorker.

Voila. Hope you enjoy.

Glo-Buddha

Shrapnel

The day before my grandfather’s entire platoon was wiped out—all except for him—they spent the afternoon digging trenches in a Korean graveyard.

A man from a nearby village had begged them to stop. It was bad luck, he told them. No good would come of it. They would be cursed.

But the Chinese were on the other side of the hill. It was war. They did what they had to do, and my grandfather was the Lieutenant.

He told them to keep digging.

In all likelihood, they unearthed bodies as they dug. Yellowed bones, human hair. But my grandfather didn’t talk to us about those things.

He was a storyteller. He told us instead of another discovery: a jade Buddha, sea green and the size of his hand.

When the Korean man from the village saw it, he started crying.

Who knows how long the Buddha lived there, under the earth—centuries? My grandfather was the Lieutenant. He put it in his knapsack.

A souvenir.

That night the men used the grave stones for washboards. They ate from their mess kits, joked about home—how they’d never eat rice again.

A private in my grandfather’s unit, Eddie from Kentucky, stayed up one night to finish a book. Get some sleep, the guys told him.

It was a damn good book, though, and he’d wanted to finish it. Eddie read the last chapters by the beam of his military-issue flashlight.

The next morning, the Americans were overrun. Bullets strafed the air. Smoke rose in plumes, then clung to the ground in low, dark clouds.

A bullet slid through Eddie’s chest and pierced his lung. He died choking for breath, unable to speak.

But he finished it, my grandfather said. What was the book? I asked. The Call of the Wild, my grandfather said.

The rest of my grandfather’s unit died around him.

My grandfather was lucky. He heard the grenade as it dropped over the wall of the trench, as it danced down the concrete steps.

One, two—and he lunged sideways—three.

When I was young I ran my finger across the scars, over the jagged shrapnel that racked his body and crawled like spiders under his skin.

By the time he died—62 of cancer—he’d had 12 operations. At 58, the metal still wriggled inside his leg, searching out an artery.

After the war, my grandfather came home and went back to college. He met my grandmother, they married, and life happened.

They had three girls. One, two—and a gap of six years—three.

My grandmother still tells the stories my grandfather told her about the war, about his childhood.

I try to pay attention to how they warp and bend over time. How her memory matches up against mine, against my aunts’, against my mother’s.

Who’s to say who’s right?

Memory works like shrapnel. Long after a callus has grown over a wound, memory still cuts inside you. Drawing up new pain or lying dormant—for a time.

Often, my mind goes back to that jade Buddha. My grandmother says it was stolen from my grandfather on his way home from war.

And yet I can’t believe this.

Did I not see it as a child? That soft, green belly, that laughing mouth? Winking at me from some high shelf, or the back of a dark cabinet?

The last few days he was in the hospital, he hallucinated that he was back in Korea.

I was only six at the time, but still. Hadn’t I seen the Buddha, clenched in the grip of his sweating hand?

Begging for one last miracle, all the while still crouched in the trenches, the ping of the grenade hitting against the concrete steps.

One, two—yes, hadn’t I seen it then?—three.

Posted in Black Box, buddha, Jennifer Egan, korean war, New Yorker, Original Fiction, Short story, Twitter, twitter fiction | Comments Off on Twitter Fiction: “Shrapnel”

#climatesilence2012 in tweets

Posted on October 24, 2012 by summysays

Welcome blogging class! Just a quick update from last week–not one hour after posting, I had a minor infraction in which I was approached with a hot dog and completely forgot about my mission to abstain from eating meat. So I took a bite. Rest assured that I felt very bad once I realized, a full 15 minutes afterwards. Then Dave ate a sausage breakfast sandwich, so we declared it even and are starting afresh. Let us be a lesson as to how quickly we forget our commitments…

Other than that I’ve been enjoying alternatives to meat. For example, on Saturday I went to Korea House and was pleasantly surprised at how many delicious tofu, noodle and seafood options there are in korean food. I got the spicy tofu soup with some mussels and shrimp; it was incredible. Conversely, for the vegetarians out there, the absolute worst idea on campus is getting the vegetarian paella at Chef James, it’s just the worst.

#climatesilence

Now for more pressing matters. With the election less than 2 weeks away, people should be pretty set to align themselves in favor of Mittens or Pres Barry. A lot of debate airtime this week was focused on domestic issues this campaign (taxes, economy, the auto bailout, women, binders) and a lot less time vaguely addressing foreign policy issues (Iraq, China) in comparison. But have you noticed how much time the candidates spent discussing climate change in the last debate? The future of mankind? Here’s a sampling of reactions in the Twittersphere this week:

A tweet from my class blog, 350 dot org:

@350 2012′s Presidential debates make history: the first debates since we knew about the climate crisis to ignore it entirely. #climatesilence

One of my environmental heroes, Bill McKibben:

@billmckibben Almost certain they’re planning to take up climate change at the next debate. That’s what I heard. #climatesilence http://math.350.org

And the man who fostered every kid’s love for science with entertainment and curiosity:

Bill Nye @TheScienceGuy Big Debate tonight. Let’s push for a question about the environment or climate change. 

The decision by the candidates, moderators, and voters at large to ignore the immediacy of climate change is not good news. As Greenpeace points out, we’ve heard a bit about clean energy in the debate, but without the “controversy” of climate change:

Greenpeace USAGreenpeace USA‏@greenpeaceusa Talking about energy without talking about climate change. #climatesilence again #debates

The shocking silence of both candidates on this topic inspired a Twitter hashtag movement, #climatesilence. Prominent Tweeters like Al Gore, Bill McKibben, Bill Nye and I all tweeted about Climate Silence and garnered thousands of retweets from their friends. Bill Nye!

Indeed, their reluctance to discuss foreign policy (particularly any specifics) and international relations was the first red flag that we would not be hearing much about climate change this election cycle. It is, after all, “global” warming, fundamentally a foreign policy issue, then an environmental justice issue. And if candidates and voters only concern themselves with immediate issues, albeit in critical fields – healthcare, immigration, gay rights, jobs – we will never be able to work together and compromise with other countries to solve this issue. We are facing the biggest crisis of all time, and the sense of urgency we felt in 2008 for climate change has gone out. We can’t be bothered to plan for the future, to reduce the suffering of future generations, but instead will continue to focus on immediate domestic issues that are very important but ultimately cannot constitute 100% of our concerns.

“Climate change is a global threat that requires a global response. Yet neither candidate saw fit to address climate change’s implications for foreign policy,” said Erich Pica, president of the environmental group Friends of the Earth Action. “By ignoring climate change, both President Obama and Governor Romney are telling the rest of the world that they do not take it seriously, and that America cannot be expected to act with the intensity and urgency needed to avert catastrophe.”

HuffingtonPost: Climate Change Not Mentioned In Presidential Debates For First Time In A Generation

From the idealistic and lazy college student to the future leader of our country, none of us cannot afford to be silent. I exhort you, candidates, to seriously wrestle with this issue! You need to gather your team of Bill Nyes and Tyson de Grasses and decide how much of US resources can we appropriate to the end of climate change.  This issue will literally never go away until we are all dead and it becomes a moot point. Don’t let it get to that point.

Posted in climate silence, climatesilence, environment, environmental justice, presidential debate | Tagged | Comments Off on #climatesilence2012 in tweets

The rumble 2012

Posted on October 24, 2012 by astudentguidetoelection2012

In the aftermath of what seems like one of the most significant presidential debates in history on October 3rd, commentary after commentary on the most minute details of the candidates’ performances is enough to make anyone a little insane. Fortunately, young voters had at least had one thing to look forward to. One of the most popular liberal comedic talk show hosts (or can we call him news broadcaster?) was about to take on enthusiastic conservative Fox host Bill O’ Reilly in a mock-presidential debate. (Fitting for the timing of its live airing.) It was called “The Rumble 2012,” and boy did it cause a rumble. The debate was available online for viewers who paid $4.95, with half of the net profits to be donated to charities of the debaters choosing. But viewers apparently didn’t even need that incentive to watch the showdown. So many people across the world bought access to the live streaming debate that on the day of, just three days after the first presidential debate of the season, the website actually crashed. That’s right – so many people wanted to watch liberal funnyman Stewart and the conservative Fox News reporter O’ Reilly battle it out, that for some period of time the whole website fell into malfunction.

During the 2008 election, and even long before that, it was brought to public attention that Jon Stewart’s the Daily Show was used by many, particularly citizens of the younger variety, as a main source of political news. Stewart’s daily (4 times a week) rants and rages on the most ridiculous of political gaffes, at the same time expose the most interesting and provocative aspects of daily political discourse. Still, meanwhile, hitting on the big news and being funny to boot. Criticized for being a news reporting imposter, Stewart sticks to the argument that his show is first and foremost comedic. He once responded, “The show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls!” But nevertheless, many young Americans still say they get the majority of their news from Stewart’s show. Apparently, this year is no exception, with thousands of viewers not only tuning in, but purchasing access to Stewart and O’Reilly’s 90 minute debate.

In a sense, this comedic parody of a real debate was far from being a mock-anything. There was no fakeness to either Stewart or O’Reilly’s equivocations but rather as straight forward and honest as you can get. As fake politicians, the two debaters had no reason to shift to the center, or play the part of the moderate to appeal to the other side. Stewart runs an admittedly liberal comedy show, and, well, O’ Reilly works for Fox News. There was no pretending there. Not only was ideological moderation unnecessary, but the two debaters actually talked the entire time about the salience of issues and opinions, and didn’t have to play up their leadership skills or “family values.” (Stewart did however make a jab at his own short stature, and, possibly former candidate for office Michael Dukakis who stood on a raised platform at a 1988 debate to make up for his height.)

The seriousness of the debate between these two opposing figures was far from lacking in heat or comedy, and each “mock candidate” seemed to touch on and clarify more hard-hitting issues than either of the real candidates did with their often long-winded or elusive responses. Because of this, parsing out ideological preferences couldn’t have been easier during “The Rumble” either. Surprised? It’s kind of like hoping and wishing for your politicians to be straightforward and clear, when along come a Democratic comedian and a Republican broadcaster for arguably the most right-leaning channel on television to put everything in order. Without the pressure of losing a race or disappointing constituents, these two seeming mortal enemies used the democratic process for good instead of evil. Or, at least, for sanity’s sake.

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How the Nash Food Trucks are Servin’ Up in 3 Little Steps

Posted on October 23, 2012 by alexlouisealonso

Some may call me a tweetoholic.

Don’t jump to conclusions now… I’m not one of those wow-I-just-had-the-best-bagel-of-my-life-type of tweethearts. In fact I pride myself in thinking I am both entertaining and fun to follow (not to toot my own horn). For me, Twitter’s an outlet to be witty. To read funny tweets. To stay in the loop with friends, getting a little snapshot of their day, hearing a random thought that they have.

With that being said, there’s no denying that Twitter has evolved into an INCREDIBLE force beyond the personal day-to-day use. The little birdie often tweets major news before broadcast and has become a medium for celebrities to communicate with their fans. However what really gets me is how in 140 characters or less, small and large businesses alike are making major professional strides. Here in Nashville alone the phenomenon of food trucks around town is living proof of how vital Twitter has become as a means to help develop small business.

The key? It’s simple, cheap, and undeniably powerful. With the help of this little birdie, food trucks are servin’ up around town through 3 effortless steps – Branding. Networking. Building.

1. First Step: Branding

In a USA Today article by Steve Strauss, he states that Twitter is “a great megaphone for branding.” This is hands down unarguably true. Twitter is a platform for small businesses to create an image and hold a presence. With Twitter images attached to each handle, that is what followers associate directly to the tweets. So picture this. I’m a famished Vanderbilt student mid-day scrolling through my Twitter feed in class. Suddenly spotted: the Grilled Cheeserie icon. All at once grilled cheese sounds absolutely divine to the point I simply cannot go on without it. Click their page. See current location. Done. It’s as simple as that.

the best icon to spot on my Twitter feed #grilledcheeserie #omnomnom

2. Second Step: Networking

Twitter is in itself a foolproof way to network businesses. Simply follow the #hashtag trends of the topics and conversations that are of interest. It’s as easy as #Nashville #foodtrucks. Following trends will help Twitter suggest people for you to follow, suggest handles similar to your own, and suggest your handle to other Twitter users. Through this, food trucks can follow and be followed by local foodies, online Nashville blogs, and other food trucks – gaining exposure and networking for publicity and potential work collaboration. The circle of food trucks here in Music City is so diverse, which works wonders on the publicity scene. It’s the “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” of the online world. In fact, the food truck circle often tweets at each other, especially when grouped together for a particular event. I can assure you there’s tweet lovin’ all around with this group. Competition? Well Twitter can help with that too. Through following similar trucks, these mobile kitchens of deliciousness can monitor their competitors, keeping track of schedules, viewing menus, and comparing followers.

such a loving twonvo amongst food truck friends
(for reference: twitter conversation -> twitter convo -> twonvo)

3. Third & Final Step: Building

Who are the main Twitter followers of small businesses? Customers, of course. Followers of these local mobile delicacies? Hungry customers. Food trucks have something a tad bit bigger going for them than the typical small business: they command attention. Hunger in a sense is just like urgency. Just as the public demands pressing news-related tweets, hungry customers want food and want it now. From anywhere, these customers can find the exact location and menus of their go-to favorite food truck right at their fingertips. The cycle of customer-food truck relationships continue with customer tweets of compliments, recommendations, or critiques. New customers may tweet at the trucks Instagrammed images of their first meals while loyal customers oftentimes praise their favorites, request a special dish, and retweet the truck’s handle. In turn, the best publicity of all is the business’ ability to then retweet their customers. Giving their customers a little love is the ultimate thank you not to mention a great way to show potential followers the reviews of their food as well as exaggerate how large their fan base may be.

cue stomach growling

So head out this weekend and track one of these bad boys down. And with that I encourage all of you to follow these local handles because ya know what? We’re what make their wheels go round. And more importantly: they are all absolutely mouthwatering mobile bundles of goodness. Cheers to good bites!

a sampling of some local crowd pleasers

DISCLAIMER: Do not read if hungry.

Posted in biscuitluvtruck, coffeetrucknash, cupcaketweets, foodtrucks, grilled cheeserie, hossburgers, jonbalaya, mooversshakers, music city, nashville, thelatinwagon, yayosomg | Comments Off on How the Nash Food Trucks are Servin’ Up in 3 Little Steps

ABC’s newest show “Nashville:” The Top 5 Reasons Why it’s Bound to Be a Showstoppin’ Hit

Posted on October 22, 2012 by alexlouisealonso

A few weeks back I ventured to the TN State Fair to scratch it off one of my many Nash-inspired bucket lists. Somewhere between the neon lights of traveling rides and the sweet aroma of kettle corn lay the greatest attraction of them all: an advance screening of ABC’s new show, “Nashville.” Being among the first to see this highly anticipated show in the city of its birth, I was anything but calm about this experience. And boy oh boy was I blown away. From the ambience of the hidden Nashville music scene to the star-studded cast, this show is bound to be a success for ABC. I can babble on and on and on and on but, in short, here are my Top 5 of why I think this country music show is hitting all the right notes.

5. Hits on a Recipe for Success

On the most basic level, ABC’s network caters to a wide variety of audiences. From “Good Morning America” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live” to “Modern Family” and “Dancing with the Stars,” ABC’s got a little something for everyone. Nashville could be the show commanding more traffic for the network – more dramatic and mature than other rival-network and musically infused shows, like FOX’s “Glee.” The soap-opera-meets-musical-show played during primetime will work wonders for the network. A pinch of humor, a splash of drama, and a whole lotta country is the recipe for success for ABC.

4. Hits Up All the Secret Spots

As a recent Nashvillian, taking the big plunge from the North down to the South, Nashville has always been this unknown territory. For much of America, Music City is a mix of big hair, velvet jumpsuits, bedazzled cowboy boots, and the Opry (ahem, hello Dolly). The pilot alone already spotlights the nooks and crannies of what make Nashville the magical musical haven that it’s become. The show will hook the rest of America into discovering the mystery of this place – unlocking all the hidden treasures of this infamous town.

3. Hits a Sensitive Chord in the Industry

“Nashville” puts the struggles within this industry out there for discussion. In the show, country legend, Rayna Jaymes, is pushed aside to make room for the younger, sexier, crossover artist, Juliette Barnes. I’m sorry but doesn’t this sound a bit too familiar? Move aside Reba McEntire, small-town sweetheart from Pennsylvania, Taylor Swift, is here to steal your throne.

2. Hits All the Right Notes (quite literally)

“Nashville” music producer, T Bone Burnett, is to thank for the sweet country sounds intertwined within each episode. With an array of hits and 12 Grammy’s under his belt, Burnett works to incorporate both the commercial mainstream country into the show (welcome, Juliette Barnes!) as well as “all the edges” – what he describes as the low-key everyday Nashville moments (my absolute favorite so far). We all know about the glamorous twang of historical country music but what this show will provide is a peek into the rough, the raw, the legend-making songwriter moments of Music City.

1. Hits it Outta the Park: The All-Star League Cast

The absolute key to why this show is bound to be a network fave lies in the hands of its star-studded cast. Connie Britton and Hayden Panettiere lead the pack as rival country sensations – Britton as the soon-to-be-has-been legend and Panettiere as the sassy and glamorous up-and-coming. Both actresses are widely famous, undeniably beautiful, and, coincidentally, former stars of mainstream football classics. Britton most known for her work on ABC’s “Friday Night Lights” and Panettiere stepping into commercial Hollywood at age 10 in Disney’s “Remember the Titans.” This dynamic duo alone will draw in extremely wide but very distinct fan bases that will avidly follow their work on the show. For female audiences, Eric Close emerges as Britton’s husband on the show; a man working to define himself musically beyond “Mr. Rayna James.” Beloved for his work on CBS’s “Without a Trace,” Close is a major player whose CBS following will flip on ABC to watch him crossover into this new realm of drama. Which brings me to my main point: Why will this star-studded cast alone be the key to bringing in viewers? Of course there have been other shows who have acquired equally if not more famous casts than this one. So… what makes this show so different? The music. Put critically acclaimed actors into the musical spotlight and you’ve pushed them far out of their comfort zones. Nothing makes the public happier than uncomfortable celebrities, right? Right. “Nashville” will be a way for all of America to witness the knees-shaking, sweaty palmed, nervous celebrity trying to tackle new territory. Connie Britton has spoken of her fear to show off her musical talent and the show’s biggest names have never been seen, or shall I say heard, in this way. The sheer element of curiosity alone will initially gain viewership to the show. Then, once seeing how the show’s hitting on all the right places, people will be coming back for more and more – making “Nashville” more than a one-hit wonder.

Posted in abc, connie britton, eric close, hayden panettiere, hit, juliette barnes, music city, nashville, rayna james | Comments Off on ABC’s newest show “Nashville:” The Top 5 Reasons Why it’s Bound to Be a Showstoppin’ Hit

I dream of tofu

Posted on October 19, 2012 by summysays

This week, I decided to go vegetarian! :) Well I’m technically starting off “pescatarian”, because I still want to eat sushi and shrimp. (What can I say, the spirit is willing but the body is weak.) Still, I think this could be a good springboard into bigger things.

This is not the first time I’ve put aside my meat-loving taste buds in the name of friendly competition and good will towards animals. Last semester, David and I decided to keep each other accountable by going meat-free together. The loser had to buy the winner a lunch buffet at Woodlands Vegetarian Indian Cuisine down the street. Their lunch buffet is pretty cheap, like $9, and soooo delicious! Fellow ‘dores, I highly recommend it. And after four weeks I won the bet! But without anyone to keep me in check, I refrained from eating meat for about another four weeks before caving in. I still remember that first bite… the most moist, seasoned and flavorful turkey I can remember.

Dave & I say no to meat

So now we’re going double-or-nothing. From last time’s experiment I must say that Vandy’s efforts to accommodate vegetarians ultimately fall short. We have one totally vegetarian cafeteria on meal plan here, Grins Cafe, attached to the Vanderbilt Hillel.  The food is pretty yummy, but the portions literally would feed a 10-year-old me. Plus the wait for food can be anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes or more. The Grins-eating demographic has typically been sorority girls; men in Grins are rare, prized sightings. With its revamped menu and delicious cheeseburger paninis, Grins has diversified and gained popularity on campus, particularly amongst long-line-and-small-portion lovers.

And they’re out of paninis

Besides Grins, what other delightful vegetarian options are available on meal plan? I dunno, there’s salad bars at Commons and Rand. The Pub has a vegetarian quesadilla. There’s Leaf (as Stefon would say, Vandy’s hottest new salad bar) and that’s about it.

In addition to loving our cuddly animal friends, did you know that eating no or less meat is a wonderful, practical thing that you can do to protect the environment?

It turns out that we produce enough food to feed everyone! Princeton bioethicist Peter Singer claims that if we fed the grain we feed to livestock to the 1.4 billion people living in abject poverty, each of them would get more than half a ton of grain, or about 3 pounds of grain/day, twice the grain they would need to survive. “The world is not running out of food. The problem is that we — the relatively affluent — have found a way to consume four or five times as much food as would be possible, if we were to eat the crops we grow directly.” Although we still have to solve logistical issues of food distribution, not to mention resolve the basic tenants of capitalism that make even distribution of food so difficult with greedy people, admitting that we eat way too much is the first step to change, right?

I did find a lame counter-argument as well, which claims that being vegetarian does more harm to the environment than eating meat. Fiona Macrae of the UK’s Daily Mail writes, “The Cranfield University study found that switching from British-bred beef and lamb to meat substitutes imported from abroad such as tofu and Quorn would increase the amount of land cultivated, raising the risk of forests being destroyed.” Of course, she ignores the possibility that one might supplement a vegetarian diet with more than tofu or “quorn”, and I seriously doubt that the amount of land it takes to make tofu surpasses the amount needed for cattle cultivation.

To “sum” — wise words from a 12-year-old vegetarian:

Yes, I am still very concerned about the mistreatment of animals, but I am also concerned with the loss of the rainforests, with the increasing threat of global warming, and with having clean water to drink and clean air to breathe. What can I, a 12-year-old American girl, do to make a difference? I will still choose to conserve water and electricity and to reuse and recycle whenever possible, but the single most environmentally important choice I can make is to eat a plant-based diet.

And honest words from a 21-year-old pescatarian wannabe: I love tofu, eggplant and black beans. Maybe it will work out this time!

One final interesting factoid: “Researchers at the University of Chicago concluded that switching from standard American diet to a vegan diet is more effective in the fight against global warming than switching from a standard American car to a hybrid.” [source] To me, going vegan is the holy grail of commitment. I’ll get there one day! One dry veggie wrap at a time. For now my goal is to stay meat-free at least until the end of the semester. Hopefully you all can keep me accountable to this! I might make an exception for Thanksgiving, though :( i’m a sucker for moist, seasoned and flavorful turkey

Posted in environmental justice, grins cafe, pescatarian, tofu lovers, vegetarian | Comments Off on I dream of tofu

With A-Rod, Yanks Torpedo Sinking Ship

Posted on October 18, 2012 by Blogging Golomb

On the field and off it, in the short-term and long, the Yankees’ handling of A-Rod has been nothing short of wrong.

It’s not clear where this goes from here.

The Yankees could end up taking a cue from heartbreak past. They could surge back from 3-0 to advance to perhaps the most unlikely World Series in franchise history, quieting questions and putting off answers until another day.

Much more likely, they will go loudly into the night. (UPDATE: In case you went into frustration-induced hibernation after Game 3, they already have.) The Alex Rodriguez trade rumors, of which I am extremely skeptical, will continue to swirl.

In fact, the storm has already begun. As I write this, the Yankees are already down 6-0 in an elimination game. By the time you somehow waded through a sea of A-Rod columns to find this one, the 2012 Yankees – and Rodriguez’s career in pinstripes – could be over.

But regardless of how these Yankees are remembered (and right now, the odds on “fondly” aren’t looking too hot.), one thing must be said:

The Yankees’ handling of Alex Rodriguez during the postseason – and this is putting it kindly – has been straight up wrong.

On the field and off it, in the short-term and the long, the Yankees have diminished their chances of winning.

By treating one of history’s greatest sluggers as a mere nuisance unworthy of the stripes which he has so dutifully earned, they’ve hurt their chances against the Detroit Tigers of 2012, the Tampa Bay Rays of 2013, and all of baseball’s elite moving forward.

I get it. I’ve watched the games too. A-Rod looks finished, roasted. His bat speed is laughable, his confidence non-existent, his once majestic swing reduced to a pathetic flail.

The man who was supposed to end up blasting more homeruns than anyone else now looks incapable of ever hitting a single one again.

Still, looks can be deceiving: There’s no doubt A-Rod’s skill set has diminished, his 18 homeruns in 2012 being just one indicator of batting prowess passed. But it’s worth remembering that he hit .315 in July – albeit without much power – before fracturing his wrist and then returning for the stretch run, stripped of his once-legendary ability to hit a baseball.

Is Alex still hurt? Is this set of 25 or so at-bats merely an embarrassingly bad small sample?

I don’t know.

And guess what? Neither do the Yankees.

Which makes it all the more perplexing why they’ve treated this situation like one settled, seemingly already having launched a smear campaign of their $114 million third basemen (‘Confirmed by team sources,’ by the way. Are they even trying to disguise this stuff anymore?), just minutes after they announced their decision to bench him for the third time in five crucial contests.

“I’ve played this game for a long time,” Rodriguez told reporters before Wednesday’s rainout. “Bottom line is: anytime I’m in any lineup, I think that lineup is better. It has a better chance to win.”

Bottom line: A-Rod’s right. Especially when his absence requires the presence of the even more punchless Eric Chavez, who is 0-15 during these playoffs.

When you have one of the game’s greatest, you give him a chance to figure it out.

In baseball, 23 at-bats is not much of a chance.

(Just ask Robinson Cano, who recently vanquished a dubious streak of his own: hitless in 29 postseason ABs.)

But even worse than giving up on one of the game’s greatest, and likely doing it too hastily – the Yankees have banished A-Rod when they needed him most.

“I feel I can bring that type of impact and I’m also at any point ready to break through,” A-Rod said, flanked by reporters. “I thought my at-bats in some of those game got a little bit better. The last two, I hit two rockets. Anytime I’m in the box the game can change, and everyone knows that.”

Teetering on the verge of capsizing, without their captain to steady the ship, the Yankees should have listened to Alex, and given him a chance to right all that has gone wrong.

They needed him to find his stroke. They needed it yesterday – when, instead of playing baseball, he was answering questions from reporters and providing half-shaken, half-confident responses like the ones above.

Yet, even if the Yankees are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that their third baseman is fried – and it remains to be seen how they could be – and that any A-Rod plate appearance is destined to end in a trip back to the dugout, and that the best course of action is to trade him, and trade him tomorrow – then it boggles the mind why it made sense to torpedo a sinking ship, plummeting Rodriguez’s trade value to depths previously unseen.

Hey Cashman, it’s Jeff Loria. We’re interested in Alex.

But we know you want no part of him. You’ve made that exceedingly clear. You want him gone, ASAP.

So here’s what we’ll do: We’ll give you Mark Buerhle. And you’ll give us Alex Rodriguez.

And you’ll pay ninety-five of the hundred-and-fourteen million dollars remaining on Alex’ contract.

And, if Brian Cashman is serious about trading Rodriguez, as most seem to believe, he will have no choice but to say yes.

Because when you’ve made your disdain for a player this clear, that’s about the best offer you’re going to get.

Because when you’ve backed yourself into a corner like the Yankees have, the best offer you get might just be the one you can’t refuse.

Jesse Golomb is (unfortunately) a Yankee fan.

He’s also the Editor-in-Chief of TheFanManifesto. Follow him on twitter, or drop him a line via email. 

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There are too many people on Earth

Posted on October 17, 2012 by ericrosenberg7

Listen, I’m not into genocide or ethnic cleansing or anything Hitlery like that, but I think we can all agree that there are just too many people. There’s too much traffic. There’s always a wait at the Cheesecake Factory. Asians. There are almost 7 billion human beings on this Earth. I don’t know how we could actually fix the problem without feeding African babies obese Americans or putting everyone who can’t name the Vice President into a Hunger Games fight to the death, but something has to be done. Fast. Here are three people I think we can all agree just have to go. They don’t need to breathe our air or drink our water anymore, their need for attention has already stolen precious moments of our life. Spend a minute or two more so you understand what we’re dealing with, then go over to your nearest Long John Silver and sterilize everyone inside. Not sure why but I’m sure the people there are just as dumb as these.

Me being a Jew using a video of a German to make a point about lowering global population may not be the best idea, but regardless of the revenge factor, this guy has relinquished his right to existence. Did he make us laugh? Sure. Is he going to be an Internet sensation for a few hours? Probably. But this guy has just as much capability of reproducing as you and I. He will eat pounds and pounds and pounds of schnitzel in his lifetime, literally taking food out of the mouths of not morons. I spent the last 50 seconds of the video after the jump hoping he would fall right through the ice and I know you did too.  Don’t feel bad for hoping he would freeze to death- It’s a completely natural reaction. The second we saw his stupid bathing suit our animal instincts told us he had to go for the preservation of our gene pool. Unfortunately for us, our gene pool isn’t frozen over like this one and this guy is going to dive right in.

We don’t  usually want to get political here but I think we can muster up a bipartisan effort to get rid of this lady. She is an actual obstacle to the advancement of mankind. Just study it out. She is spending her Thursday afternoon not working, or taking care of kids, or doing anything of worth. The thing didn’t even start for another 3 and half hours, she was probably camping out for another 3 hours to be that close to something she could have watched on TV, and there’s no way she was even allowed into the debate because she would run onto the stage and try to kidnap Paul Ryan and bring him back to her house/ meth lab/ cat sanctuary. Just using words she doesn’t know and then trying to make Chris Matthews who gets paid to know what a communist is feel stupid. The worst, and I mean the absolute worst part of this video, is she probably went home and watched it a million times, loving it more each time she watched it. She probably really actually seriously believes she convinced people that Obama is a communist through her insightful argument. Okay that’s not the worst part. Those sunglasses are.

This is Justin Jedlica. 32 year old guy who had 90 cosmetic surgeries costing over $100,000 so he could become “a real life Ken doll.” Not only is he so unbelievably stupid but he has fucking money. If someone is batshit crazy enough to want to be a real life Ken doll taking all their money away and giving it to people who need surgeries for battle wounds or breast augmentations should be the first thing we do. It shouldn’t even get to the point of having thirteen surgeries on your ass. The plastic surgeon should have called the police the second he walked into the door and sent him to jail. It should be illegal to be this person. He would probably be played with like a doll more in jail than anywhere else anyway.He has fake biceps because, as he says, “working out isn’t glamorous or fabulous.” Well you continuing to walk around and do stuff isn’t working out for us.

As great as it would be, I’m sorry to say we can’t just kill dumb people. We just need to hope and pray the ice breaks or one of Ken’s fake testicles explodes.

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The Case for Lilac Prose

Posted on October 17, 2012 by writedrunkandeditsober

Dear literature lovers, have you grown sick of simple sentences?

Lilacs at the 2007 Lilac Celebration at the RBCDeadened to the doldrums of dry, dusty prose?

Benumbed by the banal?

You’re not alone.

I, and at least one other guy, agree with you.

And after all, don’t we have a right to be upset?

These days American literature has taken on the drab and isolating austerity of an Edward Hopper painting. Once bold and fresh, the pared-back writing style of literary greats like Hemingway and Carver has grown limp and weary—flaccid as a neglected houseplant in the fits of winter.

This Wednesday, The New York Times published another installment of Draft, a series of essays that hone in on the “art and craft of writing.” In this week’s selection, “A Short Defense of Literary Excess,” the 24-year old British author Ben Masters (who’s pretty cute for the literary type, in case you wanted to know) wrote about his love for writers who revel in the musicality of a poetic sentence and the long hours of tinkering that can occur in the process of perfecting the rhythm and diction of phrasing.

In the article, Masters describes a few of the great baroque stylists: Vladimir Nabokov, Saul Bellow, Virginia Woolf, David Foster Wallace, and others. For Masters, these authors open the doors to the house of literature, allowing it to breathe and expand.

Writes Masters, “Excess serves very different functions for each of [the authors], whether as an expression of wonder, adaptability, individuality, free will; or as a means of self-fashioning; even as a survival tactic. But whatever it embodies or performs, the sentence in their hands is expansive rather than constrictive.”

So what do you think of this Masters?

Is he pretentious?

Does he waggle his roseate pinky finger as he sips from his china tea cup? Who knows. But I don’t think so. I think I agree with him.

American prose has become unplayful and stiff, like a collared shirt flattened and then doused with too much starch. After all, when was the last time we frontier-forgers won a Nobel? Not since 1993, with Toni Morrison’s gorgeous, sometimes surrealist prose.

Just as this article came out, I was in the middle of reading The Street of Crocodiles, a book by a Polish author, Bruno Schulz, who was Poland’s preeminent writer in the years between World War I and World War II. Schulz, a Jew, was shot in the head by a Nazi in World War II, and we only have his slim oeuvre of fantastical stories and eery drawings to let us know how much we’ve missed by that loss.

Cover of "The Street of Crocodiles (Class...

Take these two sentences, the very first from The Street of Crocodiles.

“In July my father went to take the waters and left me, with my mother and elder brother, a prey to the blinding white heat of the summer days. Dizzy with light, we dipped into that enormous book of holidays, its pages blazing with sunshine and scented with the sweet melting pulp of golden pears.”

When was the last time you read something so gorgeous, so wonderfully unexpected and vivid?

Schulz’s book, The Street of Crocodiles, is a collection of short stories that act as a kind of fantastical memoir of his own childhood and the growing mania of his father. Just as his father becomes obsessed with the cockroaches that steal around the house, the exotic birds he raises in the attic, and the inanimate objects he infuses with lungs and breath and evil intentions, Schulz’s narrator uses madness’s close cousin—the fantastic—to describe this childhood from the perspective of a man looking back on his youth through the lens of that same vivid, childish imagination.

Just read how he describes the boredom of being cooped up in winter: “The days hardened with cold and boredom like last year’s loaves of bread. One began to cut them with blunt knives without appetite, with a lazy indifference.”

Translate that into popularized prose and you might get something like: “The winter was cold and he was bored. He looked for something to do. He went into town and walked around the stores.”

Yikes, no!

John Wood, a writer and literary critic, writes in his book How Fiction Works why language is such a tricky thing. The medium too easily lends itself to the common. For Wood, the trouble with writing arises “because language is the ordinary medium of daily communication—unlike music or paint.”

How, then, to create art?

For some, the answer may be found in creating poetry from prose, thereby elevating the way we communicate to a higher plane.

But really, that’s not an answer, because just think of all the writers who have attempted excess in prose and instead been sucked down inside the quagmires of their own pretensions.

The best authors are those who can alternate between the high intricacy of the ornate and the dry marrow of the simplistic to create dynamic, destabilizing prose that truly captures the way humans think, act, and dream their worlds.

What do you call a mix of purple prose and bland, Puritanical austerity?

I, for one, call it Lilac Prose, and I think you should, too.

Posted in american prose, Authors, Ben Masters, Bruno Schulz, Literature, maximalism, New York Times, prose, Saul Bellow, Street of Crocodiles, Vladimir Nabokov, writing | Comments Off on The Case for Lilac Prose

PEOPLE: Bad Days Are (kind of) Like Birthdays

Posted on October 16, 2012 by Emma Grager

You probably think I’m crazy for saying that. But stick with me.
Today was a shambly day for a dear friend of mine. Plain and simple, she had a bad day (cue the extremely over-played Daniel Powter one-hit wonder).
Today is also the 19th birthday of another fabulous girlI’m proud to call friend.  
How could two such opposite events both occupy October 16th?
The answer is simple: Maybe they aren’t so opposite after all.
Bad days. Every now and then there comes a day that you don’t really want to talk about, but deep down inside you kind of do want to talk about it because then at least you’re not the only one who knows how crappy everything is.
You’ve pretty much got two choices here:
1.     You can go around whining and complaining to everyone who will hear your tragic tale, so at least you aren’t alone in the depths of despair (since you’ve dragged everyone else down there with you).

OR…
2.     You can keep it quiet and not let a soul know that anything is wrong, suffering silently, but at least you’re not burdening everyone else with your problems.
As you can see, keeping your bad day a secret or making it the most obnoxious part of everyone’s Facebook feed has essentially the same result. It’s a very fitting lose-lose situation, compounding the frustration. As if having a terrible day wasn’t bad enough!
One last precaution on the silent treatment. Because what happens the next day? If you don’t tell anyone, and then, inevitably your woe-is-me story surfaces, chances are that your friends are going to pity you and say something along the lines of “What? Really? Why didn’t you tell me you had a rough day? You know I’m here for you, right?” Now you’re really stuck.
The flip side of bad days is that they are a reminder that every other day must be a good day simply by comparison! So while today might be Challenger Deeplow, other days must be at least sea level; maybe a few are even Mount Everest high.
Birthdays. Say it’s yours. You don’t really want to talk about it and announce your perceived self-importance to the rest of the universe, but deep down inside you kind of do want to talk about it because then at least you can insure that somebody besides you will acknowledge your special day.
Again, you’ve pretty much got two choices here:
1.     You can go around reminding everyone you know that your birthday is in 47 days so they should probably start planning something now. And you don’t want a surprise party or anything, but you never had one as a kid and it sure would be nice. But they don’t need to feel like they have to buy you anything because it’s not that big of a deal, just the day that your grand entrance into planet Earth forever shattered the course of human history. The positive side? At least you won’t have to bake your own cake.  (Other ideas for your Betty Crocker-type friends: something like this oneI had when I turned 5).
OR…
2.     You can keep it quiet and not let anyone know that your birthday is tomorrow, because you’re mature and you don’t need to make a big show of it. You guess it’s ok if you’re not showered with presents and desserts…At least you’re not making everybody feel obligated to celebrate you against their will.
As you can see, keeping your birthday a secret or making it the most obnoxious part of everyone’s Facebook feed has essentially the same result. It’s a very merry unbirthday type of lose-lose situation, compounding the frustration. And we’re supposed to be celebrating today!
And one last precaution on the silent treatment. Because what happens the next day? If you don’t tell anyone it’s your birthday, and then, inevitably your desk is littered with “Happy Birthday” cards from your relatives back home who remembered, chances are that your friends are going to pity you and say something along the lines of “What? Really? Why didn’t you tell me it was your birthday? I would have gotten you a gift or something!” Again, you’re stuck.
On the flip side, while birthdays might be starting to make you feel a little old,  they’re a reminder of just how great it is to be alive! Some people can only dream about the chance to celebrate another birthday, but here we are, complaining about how age 50 is the death of us.
So do yourself a favor and solve both of these moral dilemmas.
If you’re having a bad day, take a little “me-time” and just relax. Do something mindless, something you love – draw, cook, program websites – whatever it takes.  Chances are that your day isn’t really as terrible as you think it is. Sit down with a trustworthy friend and review the day’s events. I bet you’ll find that either you’ve exaggerated the situation just a little bit, or (even if your day is truly disastrous) your friend has some comforting advice.
If it’s your birthday, plan your own kind of celebration. The point of a milestone of life isn’t that somebody else remembers it, but that you get to remember it. You’ve lived a whole year from the last time you had a cake with your name on it! Think about all that happened in that year and get excited about what’s to come. Call your mom and thank her profusely for pushing you (literally and figuratively) into the beautiful world you now live in.
…And if you’re really desperate to have other people remember your birthday too, there’s nothing Yahoo answers can’t help you with. It’s a casual approach…kind of.

Posted in holidays, PEOPLE, social norms | Comments Off on PEOPLE: Bad Days Are (kind of) Like Birthdays

PEOPLE: Bad Days Are (kind of) Like Birthdays

Posted on October 16, 2012 by Emma Grager

You probably think I’m crazy for saying that. But stick with me.
Today was a shambly day for a dear friend of mine. Plain and simple, she had a bad day (cue the extremely over-played Daniel Powter one-hit wonder).
Today is also the 19th birthday of another fabulous girlI’m proud to call friend.  
How could two such opposite events both occupy October 16th?
The answer is simple: Maybe they aren’t so opposite after all.
Bad days. Every now and then there comes a day that you don’t really want to talk about, but deep down inside you kind of do want to talk about it because then at least you’re not the only one who knows how crappy everything is.
You’ve pretty much got two choices here:
1.     You can go around whining and complaining to everyone who will hear your tragic tale, so at least you aren’t alone in the depths of despair (since you’ve dragged everyone else down there with you).

OR…
2.     You can keep it quiet and not let a soul know that anything is wrong, suffering silently, but at least you’re not burdening everyone else with your problems.
As you can see, keeping your bad day a secret or making it the most obnoxious part of everyone’s Facebook feed has essentially the same result. It’s a very fitting lose-lose situation, compounding the frustration. As if having a terrible day wasn’t bad enough!
One last precaution on the silent treatment. Because what happens the next day? If you don’t tell anyone, and then, inevitably your woe-is-me story surfaces, chances are that your friends are going to pity you and say something along the lines of “What? Really? Why didn’t you tell me you had a rough day? You know I’m here for you, right?” Now you’re really stuck.
The flip side of bad days is that they are a reminder that every other day must be a good day simply by comparison! So while today might be Challenger Deeplow, other days must be at least sea level; maybe a few are even Mount Everest high.
Birthdays. Say it’s yours. You don’t really want to talk about it and announce your perceived self-importance to the rest of the universe, but deep down inside you kind of do want to talk about it because then at least you can insure that somebody besides you will acknowledge your special day.
Again, you’ve pretty much got two choices here:
1.     You can go around reminding everyone you know that your birthday is in 47 days so they should probably start planning something now. And you don’t want a surprise party or anything, but you never had one as a kid and it sure would be nice. But they don’t need to feel like they have to buy you anything because it’s not that big of a deal, just the day that your grand entrance into planet Earth forever shattered the course of human history. The positive side? At least you won’t have to bake your own cake.  (Other ideas for your Betty Crocker-type friends: something like this oneI had when I turned 5).
OR…
2.     You can keep it quiet and not let anyone know that your birthday is tomorrow, because you’re mature and you don’t need to make a big show of it. You guess it’s ok if you’re not showered with presents and desserts…At least you’re not making everybody feel obligated to celebrate you against their will.
As you can see, keeping your birthday a secret or making it the most obnoxious part of everyone’s Facebook feed has essentially the same result. It’s a very merry unbirthday type of lose-lose situation, compounding the frustration. And we’re supposed to be celebrating today!
And one last precaution on the silent treatment. Because what happens the next day? If you don’t tell anyone it’s your birthday, and then, inevitably your desk is littered with “Happy Birthday” cards from your relatives back home who remembered, chances are that your friends are going to pity you and say something along the lines of “What? Really? Why didn’t you tell me it was your birthday? I would have gotten you a gift or something!” Again, you’re stuck.
On the flip side, while birthdays might be starting to make you feel a little old,  they’re a reminder of just how great it is to be alive! Some people can only dream about the chance to celebrate another birthday, but here we are, complaining about how age 50 is the death of us.
So do yourself a favor and solve both of these moral dilemmas.
If you’re having a bad day, take a little “me-time” and just relax. Do something mindless, something you love – draw, cook, program websites – whatever it takes.  Chances are that your day isn’t really as terrible as you think it is. Sit down with a trustworthy friend and review the day’s events. I bet you’ll find that either you’ve exaggerated the situation just a little bit, or (even if your day is truly disastrous) your friend has some comforting advice.
If it’s your birthday, plan your own kind of celebration. The point of a milestone of life isn’t that somebody else remembers it, but that you get to remember it. You’ve lived a whole year from the last time you had a cake with your name on it! Think about all that happened in that year and get excited about what’s to come. Call your mom and thank her profusely for pushing you (literally and figuratively) into the beautiful world you now live in.
…And if you’re really desperate to have other people remember your birthday too, there’s nothing Yahoo answers can’t help you with. It’s a casual approach…kind of.

Posted in holidays, PEOPLE, social norms | Comments Off on PEOPLE: Bad Days Are (kind of) Like Birthdays