let me introduce to you

mr. swingsley wakarusa. he belongs to my nephew, nels, and will be accompanying me to san francisco tomorrow. his tag says "swingsley" and my sister and i gave him the last name of wakarusa. it's pronounced WHACK-a-rusa though. at some point during the gomez texas tour, tom was talking about playing the wakarusa music festival and that's the way he pronounced it. it really cracked me up! i've never heard anyone say it that way before. i've only heard it pronounced like WALK-a-rusa. i'm going to take swingsley around to show him the sites.

actually, i'm going to take pictures of swingsley wherever i go so i can make a book for nels someday. i might make it as soon as i get home but he probably won't be interested in it for a while. hopefully i get lots of fun pictures of him! swingsley probably won't go to the shows though because he doesn't have tickets.

stuff i love 9

with just two more sleeps (that's how i'm measuring time now) until i leave for san francisco, it's no wonder i'm going to write about how much i love gomez. i'll keep it short because it's probably stuff you've all heard before but i'm too excited about this trip to think about anything else. well, i've been thinking of things other than gomez but it's all related to the trip. blind pilot, booze cruise, the plethora of fabulous friends i'll get to spend time with...etc. sorry for being boring another week in a row but i can't help it...I LOVE GOMEZ.

my experience at phara's

last saturday my friend casey had his birthday party at phara's. if you're too lame to click that link and investigate, phara's is a mediterranean restaurant/hookah bar/awesome place located on north loop here in austin. i had never been there before and didn't really know much about it so i didn't quite know what to expect. casey had actually reserved christopher's casbah for his celebration so we were in a separate building than the rest of the people there. i never went inside the main building so i have no idea what it looks like. christopher's is a cozy room with several tables. we only occupied about half of the space. phara's is byob which is great if you're trying to save money! casey had arranged for a massive food spread and, as far as i could tell, most of it was devoured.

the pictures featured above were actually taken a few days before the party, right before i found out that casey was celebrating his birthday there. i had spent the day taking pictures around town and had actually stumbled upon this place then. i wasn't familiar with it before that day. i wish i had pictures of the back area. i wouldn't call it a patio because it's not. it's just this massive space behind the buildings FULL of tables and chairs. it's really cool! phara's rents hookahs so people can enjoy those in the backyard. haha i don't know what else to call it! my favorite part of the night, aside from hanging out with lots of friends i hadn't seen in a while, was the belly dancers! they were so cool!! everyone was in awe of their skills. it was truly fascinating. i think i'll return to phara's soon and i recommend it to everyone. it was a fabulous place for a birthday gathering but i think it would be great on an occasion-less night as well.

top five 7/19-25

artists:

david garza (9)

brendan hines (9)

black joe lewis and the honeybears (8)

joseph arthur (4)

sufjan stevens (4)

songs:

grateful dead-estimated prophet (2)

led zeppelin-going to california (2)

black joe lewis and the honeybears-get yo shit (2)

brendan hines-hard to kill (2)

brendan hines-if i were you (2)

because i have little shame

and i've already posted this on my flickr, i will share with you a rather pathetic picture of myself:

that was just a few hours after i had my molar extracted. the super cool headstrap is used to keep ice on my face. i had to ice for 60 minutes at a time with only 15 minute breaks in between. it might look ridiculous but it was mighty helpful. despite how terrible i look in this picture, the whole experience really wasn't as bad as i thought it would be. i'm not totally out of the woods yet but i'm back to eating most solid foods and i can drink out of a straw again!

i had a slightly rough transition from bed-ridden bum to camera store slave yesterday. i wasn't in much, if any, pain most of the day but it was tough being awake and standing for so long. i know that sounds kind of absurd but i had already adjusted to sleeping on and off all day for 3 days. that was aided greatly by the painkillers i was prescribed. however, i managed to power on and only left work 45 minutes early. i anticipate that by the time i leave for san francisco on thursday, i'll be almost completely back to normal. well, minus the hole in my mouth.

he was wearing denim scrubs again today

my procedure went pretty well this morning. i was not anxious about the iv at all which i expected to be. i hate needles. i've had ivs before so i guess i was more calm about it this time. right before the sedation really started to kick in, i closed my eyes and everything was red. it reminded me of a line from flavors, by gomez, "there was a red light coughing up a room of blood." then when i woke up, i was panicking because i had to finish planning a gomez tour. haha what?

i've been on a strict ice regimen since i got home and i think it is helping a lot. i'm really not experiencing much discomfort at all. i hate to jinx it though!

and, i'm a little too out of it to continue writing. i believe if i were to make a "stuff i love" post, it would be similar to this one anyway.

tales from the dentist

as most of you know, a few weeks ago i had a terrible infection in one of my molars. i went to see a dentist who is part of a big dental practice in austin. the only doctor available to see me on the day i could squeeze in an appointment is in their georgetown office. ugh, that's a drive! the office park (if you can call it that) that he is located in felt like a parking lot full of double wide trailers. maybe it is? i don't know.

i've been slowly chipping away at the unabridged journals of sylvia plath and had it with me the day of my appointment. the nurse commented on the size of the book, then asked what it was. so i said, "it's the sylvia plath journals." to which she replied, "who is sylvia plath?" woah, really? then the dentist came in wearing denim scrubs. i am not even kidding. denim scrubs! the bottoms looked like jeans but they didn't button or zip or anything. and the top looked like a denim v-neck shirt. i mean, i guess that's what it is. neither item was particularly loose fitting either. the whole ensemble was really topped off with his brown leather clogs. clothing aside, he was a very nice guy.

after the consultation was over and he told me my tooth had to be extracted, i went to talk to the insurance coordinator of the office to figure out what my insurance would cover and what it wouldn't. she saw the book and said, "that's a big book. is it for school?" i wanted to say, "no, some people read big books for fun!" but i just said, "no, it's not." she asked me what it was, so i told her. and can you guess what she said? "who is sylvia plath?" i thought it was some kind of joke since i had just had an almost identical conversation 15 minutes earlier.

fast forward 8 days when i call the office to inform them that i am almost out of pain pills. i hadn't been taking them with any regularity because my pain was mostly gone but i was nervous that i would run out and really need a couple more. no one returned my phone call. luckily, after i took the last pill a few days later, i didn't really experience any pain that ibuprofen couldn't kill.

and now, fast forward to today when i call the office to ask them to call in my prescriptions today. here is how that conversation went:

me: i have an appointment for an extraction tomorrow and i was hoping you guys could call in any prescriptions that i might need after the procedure because i'm not going to want to deal with going to the pharmacy tomorrow.

lady: have you been seen here before?

me: yes.

lady: and they didn't give you any prescriptions then?

me: yes, they gave me antibiotics and pain pills.

lady: okay, those are your prescriptions for after the procedure.

me: no they aren't. i was instructed to start taking the antibiotics immediately because i had an infection and the pain pills are gone. that was 3 weeks ago.

lady: ummm....well? hmmm. hold on.

i hold for 5 minutes

lady: okay, i've left a message for the girls about this. the doctor isn't in today but someone should call you back.

me: last time you guys told me that you "left a message for the girls" no one ever called me back. this has to be taken care of today. i refuse to deal with this tomorrow.

lady: i said i was going to give the message to the girls.

me: i understand that but i've heard that from your office before.

good god, these people are morons. one of "the girls" called me back 20 minutes later to tell me that the prescriptions had been called in. was that so complicated? also, i don't really understand why i had to take that initiative in the first place. shouldn't they call me and ask me where i want my prescriptions called into? do they really think that i want to go sit at the pharmacy tomorrow for 45 minutes after having a huge tooth ripped out of my face?

top five 7/12-18

artists:

guster (11)

phoenix (10)

andrew bird (10)

spoon (5)

cold war kids (4)

songs:

i didn't get to spend much time with my itunes this week so i didn't listen to any song more than once.

stuff i love 8

i have been watching so much roseanne lately, it is unreal. part of it is because it's the summer and there really isn't anything else on tv. another part is that it is on almost all the time, tv land might as well change their name to "roseanne land with small breaks for the cosby show". and the last part of my current roseanne addiction is that i've always loved this show and i love re-watching it. when i was a kid, it was the only show on televsion that i could really relate to. i don't know if we were ever as bad off as the conners but we definitely had some tough times and had to do without a lot of unnecessary material possessions. i would be lying if i said that roseanne helped all of that make sense to me because it didn't. i still wanted what all the other kids had and felt vastly inferior because i didn't have whatever the "cool" items were at the time.

so this week, i love roseanne for still providing a relevant social commentary. i'm not "conner poor" anymore but i still really appreciate one of the first shows to "go there". i suppose married with children did it first but that show was so disgusting and un-funny, it shouldn't count.

soco stroll

for the record, i actually hate when people refer to south congress as "soco" but i thought it sounded okay as the title to this blog post. whatever. anyway, this afternoon i decided to take a little field trip down to south congress to take some pictures. it was hotter than shit but i trucked along anyway because i knew i would be bored if i just went home and sat around all afternoon. here are a few of my favorite shots from today. i have LOTS and i'm slowly working on narrowing them down to upload to flickr.

top five 7/5-7/11

artists:

gomez (5)

phoenix (5)

spoon (5)

slow club (4)

grizzly bear (3)

songs:

gomez-ain't no sunshine (4)

slow club-thinking, drinking, sinking, feeling (3)

phoenix-lisztomania (2)

phoenix-armistice (2)

grizzly bear-lullabye (2)

more cupcake

i finally stopped by the hey cupcake! near my house to take some pictures. i think this one is my favorite.

and here are two more cupcakes, buddy and ian, in the studio. the video was shot by the extremely talented christopher wray-mccan. i love it so much and it makes me crazy anxious to hear the new buddy album!

free ticket to the geezer show

in case you don't know who those gentleman are that's john mellencamp, willie nelson, and bob dylan. and in case you didn't know, those 3 are doing a minor league ballpark tour this summer (as well as some other venues). they're stopping by the dell diamond in round rock on august 4. the tickets are $68 each! but a couple of months ago i won 2 tickets to the show. i immediately told my pal jason that the second ticket was his. we had previously discussed going to the show until we found out how much the tickets were. well, jason had a total space cadet moment and booked a trip to seattle during the first week of august. boo hoo. so now i have an extra ticket. i'm not interested in selling it but i want to make sure it goes to the right person. if you're interested in attending this show with me, please let me know by leaving a comment here! and, just for funsies, tell me why you want to go. your reasoning doesn't necessarily need to be directly related to any of these musicians. i might pick the person who makes me laugh the hardest. or i might just pick my favorite person. or, hell, at the last minute i might sell both tickets and stay home in my air conditioned house that night. who knows.

stuff i love 7

today, i am sharing my love for guster with y'all. not only do i looooove their music but i love THEM. i've been lucky enough to meet the gusters a few times and it's always been a blast. they are genuinely nice and hilarious. i would love to be a fly on the wall of their tour bus for a couple of hours. i know that it's not all fun all the time but i'd like to witness some of the ridiculousness. fortunately, they've embraced technology and have shared this video with their fans. it gives us a small idea of what life is like on the gus-bus.

this is an excerpt from the road journal, penned by brian (thundergod!):

What happened next is hard to explain, but you can only watch Rothbury wookies dance naked for so long before you finally listen to Paula Abdul on another level. D.F. Yonkman is the man behind the iPhone.

Untitled from Guster on Vimeo.

i am so annoyed!

i wrote about this yesterday but decided to delete it. well, now i'm more annoyed than ever so i'm back.

dear lainey melnick,

STOP WITH THE FUCKING EMAILS. i don't even know how you got my email address because i damn sure never signed up for your list in the first place. i've gotten at least 8 "subscription verification" emails from you, along with 3 emails that are completely blank. i am really sick of this crap. and, of course, your stupid emails don't include a way for me to contact the sender to be removed from your stupid fucking list. all it says is, "if you do not wish to subscribe, do nothing!" or some shit. well, i've done nothing and my inbox is being attacked with your crap. it would be one thing if i had ever signed up to receive your stupid ass updates, but i haven't. for the love of god, provide me with a way to get my email off your list!!!!!!!!

watermelon baby

after dinner tonight nels became enthralled with this watermelon. i took many pictures but these are my absolute favorites.

top five 6/28-7/4

artists:

badly drawn boy (14)

the postal service (11)

jenny lewis with the watson twins (11)

stars of track and field (9)

bon iver (8)

songs:

gomez-ain't no sunshine (3)

jenny lewis with the watson twins-born secular (2)

elton john-tiny dancer (2)

peter gabriel-solsbury hill (2)

m. ward-never had nobody like you (2)

happy 4th, y'all

i hope you guys had a lovely 4th of july. i think most of us use today as an excuse to eat and drink a lot (just like any other holiday here in america). so, i hope you ate and/or drank a lot today and enjoyed yourselves while doing so. i spent the evening covered in sweat, hanging out with family and good friends. it was really lovely, minus the sweat part.

a summer mix

today i made this mix of stuff i'm really into right now. mostly upbeat stuff because i need happy music to help me forget about the weather.

matt & kim-daylight

phoenix-lisztomania

spoon-got nuffin'

grizzly bear-two weeks

conor oberst and the mystic valley band-big black nothing

gomez-engine

yeah yeah yeahs-heads will roll

m. ward-never had nobody like you

animal collective-summertime clothes

holly conlan-ok

wilco-sonny feeling

operation aloha-failure

andrew bird-oh no

these are some random images

these are just some pictures from this week. none of them having anything to do with each other but i just felt like sharing them.

this is one of my favorite beverages these days. they also just started making a raspberry lemonade that is to die for!

this might look like kool aid or something but it's actually hummingbird juice! i just thought it looked pretty.

my new antibiotics for my infected tooth. i've always liked pink and gray together so i was excited when i saw these pills. i'm so weird.

my free tito's belt buckle! isn't it cool?

today feels like a friday but it's only thursday. i thought about going out tonight but i have the next 4 days off work and i figured one night at home would be nice. plus, i'm a little whacked out on these pain pills so i probably shouldn't go anywhere. so i'm in bed watching gilmore girls. this is what i like to do.

an epic performance!

in case you haven't already seen this, you need to watch it ASAP. it might be 8:24 long but it's worth every second.