IF YOUR LIFE WAS A MOVIE, WHAT WOULD THE SOUNDTRACK BE?
So, here’s how it works:
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that’s playing (feel free to annotate, since snarky commentary is half the fun)
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don’t lie and try to pretend that you’re cool…

Opening credits: “The Herald’s Creed,” Heather Alexander — Yeah, I’m a fangirl. And a Herald. No, really. I fulfilled all the requirements. Why else would I have a Hawkbrother feather on my arm, which goes with the shield of Valdemar on my beloved’s arm?

Waking up: “Wherever You Will Go,” The Calling — I’ve never figured out if this was a love song to a lover, a promise to a child, or an oath from beyond the grave. Or maybe all of them. Anyway, it nicely represents my tendency toward tenacity.

First day of school: “Islands in the Stream,” Kenny Rogers & Dolly Parton — Yeah, I got nothing here. Okay, here’s a theory: I always felt isolated as a child. Might be why I spent the first 3 decades or so of my life trying so hard to belong. And mostly failing. *shrug*

Falling in love: “Wake Me Up When September Ends,” Green Day — I met my first love in the month of September. Other than that, I can’t think of how this song relates…aside from the lines, “The innocent can never last” and “Twenty years has gone so fast.” And I love the way the song starts out so softly, with very little accompaniment, and then the music just crashes in strongly and beautifully about halfway through.

Love scene: “Scotty Doesn’t Know (Euro Mix),” MC Jeffsky featuring Igor — This probably says something about my really awful behavior toward most of my boyfriends (okay, and husbands) when I was younger. Yeah, I was a bad, bad girl. Never in Europe, though.

Breaking up: “Pushing Me Away,” Linkin Park — “I’ve tried, like you, to do everything you wanted to / This is the last time I’ll take the blame, for the sake of being with you” … and … “The sacrifice of hiding in a lie, the sacrifice is never knowing / Why I never walked away, why I played myself this way” Yeah.

Life is good: “the middle,” Jimmy Eat World — This song used to make me cringe. Now it makes me dance. So, is all good.

Mental Breakdown: “Release Me,” Wilson Phillips — “I’m not going back to you anymore / Finally my weakened heart is healing though very slow.” Not entirely appropriate, but then again there were a few obsessive bits in my life. Bad times, that.

Driving: “All You Zombies,” The Hooters — Such a lovely song, and strangely enough, it does make a good driving song. Strong beat, aggressive theme, making a promise to those “people in high places” who want to slow you down. Nice metaphor.

Flashback: “Like A Prayer,” Madonna — It’s about God…and passion…and love…and power… Very pagan, really. *grin*

Getting back together: “We Belong,” Pat Benatar – Wow, this one FITS. I’ve always primarily thought of this song as being mine and Brenda’s, although it has fit other relationships in my life, too. But I’ve known Bren for (omg!) 25 years now, we have so much history, we’ve been through so much together.

Wedding: “The Other Side of Life,” The Moody Blues — Strangely fitting. It was my late husband’s favorite band, one of his favorite songs, and I suppose you could say he now is on the other side of life. “So take your share of the gifts that are there / They all belong to you / And come what may, at the break of each day / We all begin anew once more, we all begin anew.”

Birth of Child: “Xena Warrior Princess Theme Song,” Xena Soundtrack — I shit you not. Don’t know if this is a reflection on my eldest child, or the fact that I went through twenty-two hours of labor to bring her into the world. If that doesn’t qualify as warrior-related, I don’t know what does.

Final Battle: “Take On Me,” a-ha — If you’ve seen the video, you know it fits. Kinda.

Death Scene: “Dream On,” Aerosmith — Just. Entirely. Awesome.

Funeral song: “Draw the Circle,” Meg Davis — Another fangirl song. Very pagan, and nicely fitting. “Draw the circle ‘tween two worlds, Celestial fire to cleanse the girl / One to watch, and one to pray, and two to bear her soul away / The moon is every woman’s friend, to her your goodness condescend / And let this night, in visions see, the emblems of our destiny.”

End Credits: “Invincible (Theme from Legend of Billie Jean),” Pat Benatar — I’ve loved (and taken to heart) this song from the first time I heard it, when I was maybe 16. Of course, since I started reading military sci-fi, I can’t hear this song without thinking of killing Posleen. *grin* But yeah, this is one of the songs that most speaks to me.

If you’re looking for something fun to do the night before Valentine’s Day, I heartily recommend you go see the band Members Only at the Ash Street Saloon. Where else can you find a neurosurgeon and three other fine doctors rocking out to hits of the eighties? (One of the band members is leaving for a medical fellowship, so this will be their very last show.)

Go check out Dr Horrible’s Sing-A-Long Blog. Get updates at the official fan site. (Free viewing only until the 21st.)

Nathan Fillion is hot. So is Neil Patrick Harris. Turns out Neil can sing, too. (Anything Joss Whedon does is an exception to my rule that musicals suck.)

If Joss puts James Marsters in this, I am so doomed.

Damn. It makes me want to get a t-shirt.

Try not to pull abdominal muscles laughing, like I did.

That is all.

Anyhoo, yesterday some apparently-famous rappers (who I’d never heard of) came in to the restaurant while I was working. They seemed like any other rowdy, arrogant customers — other than having one guy following the rest around with a videocam, or the manager who apparently recognized a couple of them and asked for their autographs for his teenage sons. It was Young Buck and most of G-Unit (minus 50 Cent). All I can say is that I was underwhelmed by their public behavior. Lyse was astonished by my blase attitude toward it, but hey — this is Portland! I’ve seen Art Alexakis shopping at Lloyd Center, for crying out loud. (He’s damned good-looking for a man his age, and with his history, I must say.)

I’m just really glad it’s the weekend…I’m pretty wiped out. Other than taking my Number One Internet Fanboy and his lovely lady out to dinner tomorrow night, I’m going to do as little as possible.

I’m going to go listen to all 3 of the My Chemical Romance albums now, to try to cleanse my poor little brain.

I organized a new playlist on my iTunes, for musical inspiration during NaNoWriMo. Since my crappy novel (which has no actual title, just a working title of “Inconnu” — and mega points if anyone gets the literary reference, which nobody will because it’s too obscure, unless I made them read the books in question) is vaguely set in a somewhat medieval setting, I obviously didn’t want a bunch of metal or alt-rock music while I’m writing. (I couldn’t resist putting Tesla’s “Love Song” on the playlist, though.) Most of the stuff I have on there is very Celtic…Loreena McKennitt, Enya, generic Irish music. There’s also a bit of foreign-language contemporary stuff — basically Josh Groban, plus a handful of fairly mellow songs with lyrics in French (don’t ask).

Any other rather mellow music with English lyrics which doesn’t evoke strong emotions in me also made the cut — a few songs by VAST, some Sarah McLachlan, and a smattering of other stuff. The oddest one is Robert’s fault — I went ahead & added Save Me by Remy Zero. Currently there’s 4.6 hours’ worth of music that I think will work for “background music to write to”…and I can always take anything out that intrudes too much. I’ll be going through any CDs I can find around the house to hunt for more musical possibilities, and possibly try to download some more Celtic traditional stuff. Just no bagpipes — I’d like to retain as much sanity as possible, thanks.

And now for a complete change of topic — Battlestar! I’ve been watching each new episode like it was manna from heaven, and often watching them again since Comcast was kind enough to put them OnDemand. Before I saw tonight’s (Friday’s) episode, I had remarked to Karel that I hoped…(click on the TMI for spoilers)

I hoped they’d kill off Colonel Tigh’s wife, because she’s a traitorous, manipulative bitch who’s no good for him (or anyone else but herself, really). And that I hoped they’d kill off Casey, the child that Starbuck has been brainwashed to believe is half-Cylon and born of her ova. I got 1 1/2 of my wishes!!!

They killed Tigh’s wife (actually he did, since she betrayed him & all the rest of humanity). Yay, no more Ellen ruining things! Not that I expect he’s capable of a non-dysfunctional romantic relationship, but oh well. He can bury himself in his work, hopefully without giving into his drinking problem.

They didn’t kill off Casey. Too obvious, I suppose. But it was revealed at the end of the episode that Casey was NOT half-Cylon and NOT born of Starbuck’s ova, but had been taken from her real (human) mother on New Caprica to be used in manipulating and brain-washing Starbuck by the Cylon who was obsessed with her. Now that the truth is out, and Starbuck has been reunited with her husband after 4 months in isolation from all other humans, I imagine there will be some interesting emotional repercussions. Can’t wait to see what happens next!!!!

And now, for something completely different — more kitty pics!

Also in my photo gallery, this is the wallet that Lyse bought Angst — showing the creative addition that Angst made to the wallet with the label maker that they use at her work to make name tags for the employees. And, of course, because she has a sick sense of humor, this pic shows what she put on the reverse of the wallet. Oi.

And finally, a nifty little toy I found over at Molly’s blog…

Thank heavens that Molly tossed some Flexaril my way. *sigh* I’ve gotten enough exercise to last months, and I’m not done yet.

Saturday night Beanpole took me to the NIN concert! Yay for Trent Reznor! Yay for stunning stage shows! Yay for my new NIN t-shirt!

Not so yay for a few other things. The opening bands (both of them) sucked. One was a new-ish band called Autolux; their music was actually pretty darned good, but they have absolutely no stage presence and they were stupid enough to advertize their inexperience by announcing they’d never played for a crowd so large before. I liked that their female band member was the drummer (and good at it, too!), but she really needs to sit up straight & quit staring down so much – or they should put her & the drumset up on a high platform, so it appears that she’s actually looking down at the audience instead of her hands. The second opening act was Queens of the Stone Age, and while their stage presence & showmanship was fairly impressive, their music was gawd-awful. So Beanpole & I spent most of their set out in the beer garden, smoking.

NIN was terrific. Trent sounds every bit as good in person as on his CDs, but the delightful surprise was watching him – he moves oh-so deliciously! I can’t really explain it…it was sexy without being sexual, aggressive without being threatening, and hugely self-confident without being cocky or arrogant. Everyone in the band was energetic & physically-expressive; the show rode that fine line between engaging the audience and provoking the audience. Visually, it was very hyper-active; lots of effects (smoke/fog machine, strobe lights, a projection curtain), and a variety of light displays, with flagrant use of the colors red, purple, blue, and yellow (lots of purple, yay!).

It was also really, really loud. I felt half-deafened for the rest of the night, but since I very rarely go to concerts, I’m not too worried about permanent hearing difficulties. I do wonder how the band can do dozens of performances like that in a year and still have any hearing left!

When I got home, I found out that (just like the last time we moved) my white noise machine, without which I can barely maange to sleep at all, hadn’t made it over to the new place. Last time, I didn’t go retrieve it, and wound up startling awake at every little sound from the other people in the room, getting very little sleep, and being quite unhappy about the whole situation. This time, I drove back to the old place to get it! I think that, in the last few years, I’ve come to put a higher (and more appropriate) priority on my comfort & contentedness. Maybe I’ve finally learned the lesson on not making myself miserable just to avoid inconveniencing or upsetting someone else …not in the way of being so selfish as to not consider others’ wants & needs, but rather taking responsibility for my own happiness while expecting others to do the same for their own happiness, instead of arranging my life to suit their wishes. I can only hope the lesson has stuck this time.