spiders under my skin when you're not around.

some quick updates for you all:

• went to the so it goes ep release (white light riot played), and it took me a few days to recover. overhung. below is how much i dressed up for that show. i never wear dresses.
• officially booked my ticket to la for memorial day weekend and jp's birthday!!! i will be gone from the 22nd to the 27th. i. cannot. wait! it will be epic times, really. and add on top of seeing jp, i get to see and hang out with miss jessica. hoorah! it will be grand! hopefully i will be able to see a bit of the recording process as well. i think it would be really interesting to watch and learn about, especially since i may work in music one day. i also just can't wait to hug on justin. i am lame. ha.
  

• got my hair done. back to a bright white blonde. will post pictures soon. love it.
  

• lightened my eyebrows myself (eep!) to match my hair better. it sounds weird, but they turned out SO good. i am so much more confident now. if you ever need tips on doing it, i am here for you!

• went to trivia night with miss kari gray last thursday. she told an amazing story concerning an insect that is STILL haunting me. good times with her, per usual.
  

• plan to go shopping for mother's day presents and justin's birthday presents tomorrow. i am actually kind of excited to go shopping for once in my life.

• also hope to see baby whitney and miss dagger tomorrow!
  

• bought and finished the last olympian (final book in the percy jackson and the olympians series). couldn't put it down for two days. please read this series. so delicious! also excited for how it ended.

• plan to see the star trek movie this weekend. i am a gigantic trekker, and i am a little afraid as to if i will approve. i have heard overall good things though. justin went to the la premiere of the movie (he isn't a star trek fan) and even he loved it. so it cannot be all bad. i am just concerned that there will be a new wave of bandwagon star trek fans. ugh.

• once my sister gets back from her roadtrip to virginia, we will probably be making some incredibly stupid webisodes. they will probably be nonsense, and you will probably not laugh as much as we will, but i will probably post them anyway.

• excited for photoshoot with mike minehart next saturday!!! we will be doing a music theme, i believe. i need to find some awesome headphones pronto pup!
  

stuck a pin in your backbone.

baby:

so last saturday night, heather called me and said she thought the baby was coming. the next morning around 4am i get a call to come join her and her mom at the hospital. hoorah!!! driving there, i realized that this would be one of the most monumental events in my life that would be happening to someone else. crazy. eventually ryan, his parents, dan, amy, jojo, tiffany, and lydia showed up as well. the best part (besides heather's beautiful baby boy being born into the world)? heather so graciously allowed me to be in the room during the whole thing AND i got to cut the umbilical cord. what!?! AMAZING!!! such a miracle. i am so grateful to her for everything.

baby whitney is doing wonderful. heather looks like a million bucks. she makes it all seem very easy. motherhood really, really suits her. she sounds so confident and sure of her life. i think i can one day look forward to children, now that i know it is not so scary.

pinestock:

on saturday afternoon, my co-worker (crystal) and i drove up to collegeville, minnesota to st. john's university for their annual "pinestock" festival. justin's band motion city soundtrack was headlining, and as i had not seen one of their shows in almost a year, i was quite excited to go.

once we arrived we ran into jim, farewell continental's bassist, and his friend. so much fun. we laughed and watched the band unicycle loves you play until the guys arrived backstage. then justin came to say "hi," gave us wristbands to be backstage as well, and went to go prep for the show. as i was back there waiting, i ended up running into this world fair's former drummer, JT, who i had not seen in FOREVER. it was really good seeing someone who is a part of some of my best memories.

mcs eventually went on, and crystal and i watched from up front for the first few songs. jackie, justin's little sis, arrived with tam--and we all headed onstage for the rest of the show. i love being able to see the show from the other side of things. the energy that comes from the crowd is unreal. i loved seeing all of the people so excited to see the guys play and seeing them sing all of the words. made me very proud that mcs has influenced people so much with what they do. they encored, and then we all waited around talking to each other and matt for a bit, while justin signed autographs and took pictures with fans (weird). i also approached jesse and awkwardly told him how awesome i think jessica (his fiancee) is, and how excited i am to meet her one day.

justin finished up, and we scored some free tees. we walked through the woods to my car--back to minneapolis. of course we stopped for delicious foods on the way home.

free time:

since justin is now gone until july/august, i spent my entire weekend hanging out with him--sucking up the little time we had left. what a good weekend. watched about 6 movies. ate stuff. went shopping for his trip. etc, etc, etc... i do admit i was pretty sad to say goodbye to him on monday, but i am maybe visiting him in may, and i know the guys will do exciting and spectacular things out in LA with their new record.

justin, matt, and jesse. keeping busy whilst on the road.

i think since heather is obviously going to be pretty busy with her darling boy, and since jp is gone all summer, i may write a lot in the next few months. i foresee my summer being very calm. i guess i am alright with that. i have had some crazy ones, now it may be time for some less-than-crazy ones. i have a mentally adopted son now to visit and help with, i have an ideal guy, and i have a very good job. i have no reason to go out and get totally nuts at this point.

i do hope, however, to hang more with kari. have hangs with tommy at some point (maybe with josh and jaci). and expand my circle of friends just a bit. ya know?

anyway:

that's all for now.

it is a rainy day today, and i am excited to do close to nothing tonight. i love sleeping in sloppy weather. this whole week actually looks promising.

oh, and i am really into the archers of loaf right now.

languid lessons.

this week i am on vacation from work. after working hard and steadily for the entire summer, i need time to recoup. big time. days off, however, leave me bored and not knowing what to do with myself. i have basically been sleeping too much, reading a lot, whining about not enough exciting things going on, cleaning, and stuck on the computer. lammmmee.

justin and i had list spots for the jack's mannequin show at the grandstand yesterday via him pulling some strings with his manager and me knowing jack's manager. we both initially thought that the show was today, though, and i do not think he ever realized the correction. that better be the case, anyhow. oh well.

instead, heather and i went to major's (bleh) for fatty fatty foods (yum), went to blockbuster where we rented the first episode of a new vampire series on HBO (meh) and Superbad, which i have never seen (loved). i also pranced around in blockbuster in happiness for the 3 movies for $20 deal. i bought the other boleyn girl (not awful), sweeney todd, and definetly, maybe (my life). yay deals!

today i plan to run up to barnes and noble to pick up some editing books, the chicago manual of style, and whatever else i run into. later, mo is playing at the ugly mug downtown. thank god! something to do! i love love love his music, so i am extremely pumped for that tonight.

in the meantime, i am loving me some thunder and lightening. mmm. what else could a girl need?

these past few weeks have taken up territory in a strange land. i have found myself avoiding certain situations, people, and thoughts. i believe, within the next few weeks, things will become much more clear. for now, i am laying low and biding my time.

triple threat photoshoot by mike minehart

weekend blabber.

last night heather and i met up with lydia @ the uptown bar. we had some drinks and waited for her friend's band to go on, but decided to go grab some sushi before. so we went to sushi tango, stole a pen, and ended up drawing 'stamps' on our hand in eyeliner to get back into the bar without paying cover. lydia is a mastermind. simply put. and we got in after taking her lead. killer. but then i started to feel super ill, and so i had to leave early. apparently lyds got sick later too. so maybe it was just not meant to last the entire night. good times, regardless. at least we were productive, and gave george a power animal (a black stallion).

today i was supposed to go to the show with 50 people, and really wanted to, but felt too sick. i hope they are not angry with me.

my hair is getting longer. i am an idiot for chopping it off early this year. it was a cute cut, but i just miss the length a lot. now it is at a point where i look in the mirror and think "meh. it is longish." so that is positive.

nothing too exciting or witty to comment on. i apologize.

in further news: some people are so self absorbed it disturbs me, and also, i should probably not ever have a phone nearby me when i have been drinking. good lord.

take note: perhaps "fuck off" is too kind.

i have come to the conclusion, with the help of a talk with heather dagger, that i am over working for the hearts of people who do not appreciate the effort. done. i spend too much time agonizing and worrying about whether or not someone is receiving my affections and returning them. again and again the mantra of the backbone gang comes to mind:

if you like someone, you like someone.

there is no justification for spending so much time and care over people who refuse to return the same. of course new people and situations arise where one must put forth initial effort. but for those who have been treated to these courtesies for years, no more.

you don't love me; you can't love what i dont show.

so i stayed up all night writing a ten-page paper which was due this morning. luckily, i did get it finished. don't i always. brian and i would call each other periodically to update the status of our progress and coach each other through writing. we have done this since freshman year. we are pretty much rockstars at procrastination. i have been talking to him almost every day, and i am grateful to have such a good guy friend to share anxieties with. no matter the time in between talking, we always reconnect as if we never stopped talking. i am going to write a book full of little motivational phrases for him, like, "it's okay, in the morning you will feel like all of this hell was worth it."

i forgot to mention that on thursday of last week mr. pierre and i had some hang time. i admit i was a bit tipsy and attempted to push him over in his chair, but after twenty minutes of snarkiness on my part we were back on track. we ended up going to uptown to see the movie "in brouge" (i believe that's how it's spelt?). i really recommend it. It is about two hit men who talk about life and their concerns while hiding out in belgium. you end up loving both of the hit men in the end. it had its emotional part, its emotional parts, and very gruesome parts. there is a "splat" scene, which could be the most grotesque part in a film i have ever seen. side note: justin (in quintessential justin form) bought some little cheeses to eat during the movie. popcorn? who does popcorn anymore... obviously not him. it was interesting to see him after so long, and no one got hurt. so overall i suppose it wasn't bad. haha.

easter went well. i adore my family. adore. i have been blessed with an accepting and witty group of extended relatives. i have never once dreaded a family get-together. both sides of my family get along so well and have always offered so much love and support to me. my mother--er--the easter bunny gave me and my sister easter basket, per usual. chocolate never hurt anyone.

for my family birthday dinner, my family and i went to tanner's. delicious. i saw tasha, whom i hadn't seen since she moved to D.C., but apparently she is back in minnesota now. love that girl.

well the rest of the week is going to be exciting. i am absolutely stoked. tonight is the weaver at the loom & this world fair show at the varsity. ck told me a surprise that is happening there tonight, and it is AMAZING. everyone needs to go so that they can benefit from this surprise. it alone makes me excited to go tonight. saturday is the white light riot show at the fineline, and sunday is the honorary title show at the fineline as well. apparently i will be living at the fineline this weekend. so come on over, hang out, and if you cannot find me, i may be sleeping underneath the bar. so many shows. just what i need. and so many great people to hang out with in the meantime. tonight i get to see all of the 50records people that i have missed so much since my return from sxsw. i also get to hang with my girls heath and lyds. and sara k. will be at the show as well (who i will insist that twf use for a promo shoot). saturday will include a lot of the same people, and sunday will include the girls and someone who i have not seen in about six months. i cannot cannot cannot wait to catch up.

i will leave you with this closing thought (as i attempt to not hot-poker my eyes out):

i do not know how to perfectly walk a tightrope, but you don't see me joining the circus. therefore, do not be surprised if i am completely disgusted with you as you flail around above me.

confused? i hope so.