Wormmageddon

After the rains come

   Living in Pennsylvania, it rains like no other, and sure, sometimes, we all want to go walking on the newly watered ground, and squish the wet grass between our toes, but here, you can’t. The worms have a mind of their own around here.

So the worms go lay on sidewalks, and climb up to the surface of the ground, I have no idea why they do that…

Maybe something like this:

Or maybe this:

Either way, they sneak up from the ground, find where I’m going to step, and lay there. And wait.

I hate them.

They get pale, bloated, and I don’t understand why they keep doing this crap. I don’t want to kill them, and I get really emotional when I step on them accidently, and I just don’t want to have to deal with it any more. I don’t know what to do about them. I can’t stay in, but I don’t want to go out either.

Usually I just end up sprinting out of my dorm to the other buildings while screaming:

And I usually feel better upon arriving after that.

Happy Spring Holiday!

Let’s collect some Spring Spheres!

   The holidays are always an interesting time for people who revel in being politically correct, in the world of holiday trees, season’s greetings and the festive nondenominational menorahs, I find myself laughing at the extremes people go to, to be inoffensive. But basically it makes you sound like a pretentious jerk, in my opinion.

The previous scenario has never actually occurred but I’m expecting it any year now…

So it is currently Easter season, and I have heard that a school in Seattle has taken it upon themselves to rename Easter Eggs. They are now  the more politically correct “Spring Spheres” (http://www.mynorthwest.com/?nid=11&sid=459668). I just wanna shake these people and say “You are not Starbuck’s! You cannot just arbitrarily rename things because it’s trendy!”

First off, spheres are circles, like ping-pong balls. Eggs are not spherical, and if you think that eggs ARE spherical, you should probably not be teaching at a school, EVEN in Seattle. Is alliteration so important that we are completely abandoning calling shapes by their proper name? If this were the case, we’d all be playing Four-Fractal, and how tough would that be?

About that tough.

Dear American Apparel

  I don’t know what copyright there is… but I don’t own these photos… so let’s start off with that. But has anyone noticed that American Apparel has incredibly slutty advertisements? Every time I check Texts from Last Night (http://textsfromlastnight.com/) I am confronted by graphic images of topless women trying to sell me watches, totes, and basically anything else that doesn’t necessarily require nudity advertise. First off, where do you find these women? And how do you say to them: “you’re going to be in an advertisement for totes. You need to be naked.”?

This just doesn’t seem necessary to me. you're advertising a bag. Not a shirt. Not a smock. Why make it look like one? Is it sex appeal? I don’t find this sexy. Kinda sad. I just wanna buy this poor girl a shirt so she doesn’t have to wear this tote around anymore. And this next ad:

Why would I want to buy these watches? I would only disrobe her further, and who wants that? Does the cleavage come with it? Just wondering, not for me, I mean.

Look, all I’m trying to say is that your ads make me feel uncomfortable, and get a little red in the face. Let’s put this into a different context, if this were facebook, and one of my friends had this on her profile picture, I would think she was desperate for attention and maybe a little high. I would take it upon myself to inform her, when she sobered up, that she has an embarrassing picture up. But since I don’t know these girls, does it suddenly make it ok? Cause I don’t think so. I just find it a smidgen ironic that a place that sells clothing advertises people wearing nothing… I would start re-thinking my marketing campaign, but that’s just me.

Now, let’s all just get back to the basics (which apparently means lunging around in our neutral colors, as it were).

Love,

Paige

It's Friday

Rebecca Black

   This horse has been beaten into a moist pulp, and you probably have your own opinion about it. Firstly, if you have not heard the song “Friday” by Rebecca Black, or seen the music video, please go here now: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD2LRROpph0 … did you? Good. Just gonna clear a few things up: I am not just going to hate on her. This 13-year-old “won” a contest to cut a song and music video for $2,000. That is fine. She sang (auto-tuned to the point that she sounds like she’s drowning) a song written by the company, not one of her own pieces, the lyrics are not hers. They are the company’s, so I’m going to make fun of those. Not her. Though I could. But honestly, coming from a 20 year old woman, it would just sound petty, and bitchy.

Moving on!

(Yeah, Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah-Ah-Ark) 
Oo-ooh-ooh, hoo yeah, yeah 
Yeah, yeah 
Yeah-ah-ah 
Yeah-ah-ah 
Yeah-ah-ah 
Yeah-ah-ah 
Yeah, yeah, yeah 
Great start. I always thought actual words were overrated. This intro reminds me of “Baby” by Justin Beiber except longer and more annoying. If I were watching this with the sound off and just subtitles, I am pretty sure that I would just see “vocalizations” for the first 40 seconds. Link to J-Beebs: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kffacxfA7G4 (let’s be honest, though, you KNOW what I’m talking about…)

Seven a.m., waking up in the morning 
Gotta be fresh, gotta go downstairs 
Gotta have my bowl, gotta have cereal 
Seein' everything, the time is goin' 
Tickin' on and on, everybody's rushin' 
Gotta get down to the bus stop 
Gotta catch my bus, I see my friends (My friends)

Short of saying the type of milk she uses and detailing the seven outfit changes she had to go through before heading out to the bus stop, this stanza describes the morning. Also, she says she sees her friends in their car. Miss Black, ya 13-year-old, what’re you doing having 16-year-old friends? And why do they look like they’re 12? And you were waiting at the bus stop. Are those kids going to drive you to school? I don’t think so. They’re going to high school, and you're in the 8^th grade. Does your mother know that you're not going to school? Do you think she would feel comfortable with you getting in the car with clearly unlicensed drivers, who have no regard for seatbelts or capacity laws? I mean, I know it’s Friday… but come on!

Kickin' in the front seat 
Sittin' in the back seat 
Gotta make my mind up 
Which seat can I take? 

I have no idea which seat you can take. I would suggest you take neither, take the bus, get an education so you can write better songs in the future.

It's Friday, Friday 
Gotta get down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend, weekend 
Friday, Friday 
Gettin' down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Fun, fun, fun, fun 
Lookin' forward to the weekend 
When I was 13, I looked forward to One Saturday Morning cartoons. What partying was I doing? …None. But that was 7 years ago, and times have changed… apparently the kids are “partyin, partyin (yeah)” these days which is fine, as long as you don’t repeat fun four times and call it a line in a song, and expect me to know what you mean.

7:45, we're drivin' on the highway 
Cruisin' so fast, I want time to fly 
Fun, fun, think about fun 
You know what it is 
I got this, you got this 
My friend is by my right, ay 
I got this, you got this 
Now you know it 
Now, its 7:45. Wasn’t it just 7am? I guess I got lost in all the fun, fun, fun, fun. This is assuming that it means 7:45 PM, not 7:45 AM when she should have been at the bus stop, and is instead on the highway. Again, this cryptic “fun” is mentioned. I would love to “think about it” if you would be more specific, no I don’t “know what it is.” Next: “my friend is by my right”--- only one.

Kickin' in the front seat 
Sittin' in the back seat 
Gotta make my mind up 
Which seat can I take? 
If you're cruising down the highway, I really hope that you have already chosen your seat, girl.

It's Friday, Friday 
Gotta get down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend, weekend 
Friday, Friday 
Gettin' down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Fun, fun, fun, fun 
Lookin' forward to the weekend 

Yesterday was Thursday, Thursday 
Today i-is Friday, Friday (Partyin') 
We-we-we so excited 
We so excited 
We gonna have a ball today 
Tomorrow is Saturday 
And Sunday comes after ... wards 
I don't want this weekend to end 
Dear whoever wrote this song: I thought it was odd that you took the beginning of the song and just describe a morning with an incoherent rhyme scheme. But now this. You're listing the days of the week, and disregarding that English requires verbs to create a complete sentences. We so excited? Are we? And why did you stop listing the days after Sunday? There are three unnamed days that you could turn into another verse of this ballad! And why don’t you want this weekend to end? Didn’t you just say you wanted “time to fly?” Consistency is not important here.

Love,

Paige

R-B, Rebecca Black 
So chillin' in the front seat (In the front seat) 
In the back seat (In the back seat) 
I'm drivin', cruisin' (Yeah, yeah) 
Fast lanes, switchin' lanes 
Wit' a car up on my side (Woo!) 
(C'mon) Passin' by is a school bus in front of me 
Makes tick tock, tick tock, wanna scream 
Check my time, it's Friday, it's a weekend 
We gonna have fun, c'mon, c'mon, y'all 
This part here is a rap breakdown, by some large black man in his car. It doesn’t remotely rhyme, unless you count “lanes” rhyming with “lanes,” and i feel bad that the school bus passing in front of him makes him wanna scream, it’s probably because Rebecca is not on that school bus, as she has decided to drive with her “friends” on the highway.

It's Friday, Friday 
Gotta get down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend, weekend 
Friday, Friday 
Gettin' down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Fun, fun, fun, fun 
Lookin' forward to the weekend 

It's Friday, Friday 
Gotta get down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend, weekend 
Friday, Friday 
Gettin' down on Friday 
Everybody's lookin' forward to the weekend 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Partyin', partyin' (Yeah) 
Fun, fun, fun, fun 
Lookin' forward to the weekend

Thankfully, that’s the end of the song.