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Circlesquare - Dancers from Bienvenido Cruz on Vimeo.

I spent this year's Hallmark holiday with my friend Banana at the movies. We sidestepped the ridiculous line to see He's Just Not That Into You to see Taken. It was sufficiently fun and badass (though lacking the wonderful scene with the nails in the commercials) and that was almost enough to ease the bitterness of movie tickets being $12 nowadays. Now I remember why I go to the movie theater like once a year. Perhaps almost 28 is long enough to finally experience this movie date thing that other people seem to do. Obviously I'm doing something wrong. Afterwards, we successfully sidestepped couples grabbing burgers at a diner, then drinking at semi-divey Gramercy area bar. Good night overall.

I meant to go upstate for the day, keeping with my new getting out of town more often mantra, but that didn't work out so well. Instead of cleaned out my fridge and danced around the house to reggae. Life is so exciting right now!

The royal we hearts Gary Oldman. Inspired by this

Fucking Christmas on the last fucking day in July!

And Bill's posting Nona Hendryx songs. Oh, lovely day it is!

Voom:Voom, Keep The Drums Out
Whodini, One Love
Manu Dibango, Soul Fiesta (Chateau Flight Rework)
Lords of the Underground, Funky Child
Royksopp, Remind Me

-- with my favorite commercials of the moment as a bonus. Both on the old side, but the 2nd will be starring in a Times Square billboard I had a hand in getting together.

I'm such a lady, but I'm dressing like a ho....aurgh! Shoot me. No more VMA clips. I'm a little amused by the resurrection of Timbersnake. It only makes me feel worse for my real 'Nsync fave, JC. Dude doesn't stand a chance in the pop world at the moment. He'd be better off doing some random ass XLR8R-approved techno/electro collabo and trying to recast himself as hipster avant garde.

Banksy v. Paris: video | flickr set | news article. Maybe it just makes an asshole but I think you almost deserve to get a doctored version with "That's Hot" on a megaloop if you actually purposely go out to buy a Paris CD. [via Abe]

Interview snippet:

10. What do you think of laptop DJs?

Its whatever, I dont think anyone likes seeing someone checking their Myspace profiles for new messages from hot girls during a set.

If youre gonna act like a performer, then do something magical.

Laptop DJs should be hidden in a black box because its distracting and very unflattering what they are trying to do.

Ouch.

I've been having more than a few moments lately (especially when I start to think about the upcoming new apartment hunt) when I think it might be fun to pick up and go somewhere new. And then I remember I can't drive and/or speak more than the basics of a foreign language and that I'm broke and then that nips itself in the bud. And then I had one of those "it can only happen here!" couple of days and I really forget about that.

Thursday night, I left work and went downstairs to the boy's lair. We're friends it seems..at the moment...I guess. I'm just the type of person prone to silly entanglements, but I'm trying to get better. (In an aside, I've decided to blame my guy friends for that. Besides them giving me mostly ineffectual advice, I must be the only girl in NY with a horde of attached guy friends who know nothing but...other attached guys. What are the fucking odds for fuck's sake?! Since I'm left to my own devices, all I've got is recycling and the internet. le sigh.) We palled around about dumbo, then went to the birthday party for this band guy I used to harass the hell out of. The boy intro'd me with a "you remember Candice..." and I got the unsure blink of recognition, but at least he didn't say "you're the bitch who used to get on my nerves!" I might have if the situation was reversed.

Everyone at the party besides me and a handful of people were giants. I'm about average height, so it's very strange to be somewhere that 95% of the crowd is 5'10"+. It makes me wish I had a spare pair of heels stashed in my bag to at least be in the same atmosphere as everyone else. One of the other shorties was this random who was very weird. She and the boy are friends of friends and they were chattering away. She looked at me once like "are you lost?" and then again after some time had passed like "hmm..you're not going away..." What did I do? Well...nothing. I was drinking and passing the time, I didn't really feel any way about her besides amusement. When he wandered away for some reason, she gave me the grilling (why do they do that?!) and I was pretty blase. She perked up when I said I lived in the Heights and she dropped that her boyfriend lived a block over from me on Lincoln. Well...bully for him. Soon after, she poofed and I'll admit I got a slight thrill dropping to the boy about her bf living in my hood. He kinda visibly deflated. I might have hid a snicker. Good times. But, some good advice: let's just avoid the hero at 3am, even if someone else is paying. It'll just make you feel bad the next day. Seriously.

Saturday night, I was representing for the office at a coworker's DJ gig. Also there was this guy we work with that I had a crush on until I realized a) we'll always be working together, so it's to my best interest not to be that into him b) he resembles a young Tom Cruise circa Risky Business and reminds me of how much I always hated that guy with his dead eyes and chicklet teeth. Poof! Crush gone. Biggest thrill of the night was hearing "Sweet Freedom" and then spazzing with the DJ partner about how much we love Michael McDonald and how a yacht rock mix would be the sweetest thing ever. Yacht Rock...bringing people together. Also, being at a party in Williamsburg with the '06 crowd of FOA hipsters made me feel like I was 40 years old. Deliverance now!

Alafairnadia and I took in a show at the shores of the Gowanus Sunday afternoon. I love shows in random ass places. We heard good music, got a new DJ hero, and even got to see Justin...though saying hi almost got me a broken foot. Ouch. Amusement was making a bathroom line friend by talking shit about how slow the people in front of us were and running down how we and others reacted in other lines. Kids gotta get their kicks where they can I guess.

I ripped the whole Steely Dan boxset (and what?!) to my Zen the other day. To say I'm on a kick would be an understatement. I want to go to the Atlantic City show. It's a SD/Michael McDonald double bill. All my Yacht Rock dreams come true! Man, I loved that show. I'm so sad it's gone.

I was stuck upstate half the weekend and had the chance to sit around watch videos mindlessly for a bit. Cassie really is a Ciara knockoff. That's like someone making a Conway version of a Chinatown Prada bag. Totally unnecessary. Deja Vu is the latest in highly stupid disjointed videos. Look at B shake her fake hair! Is she in Savannah? WTF is up with all the gloves? Zero dramatic tension in the video. Her wide-eyed look face shows what a crap actress she is. And the "hey everybody, look what I learned in African dance class" section is just even more bizarre. Someone stop putting Keyshia Cole and her non-singing ass on songs. She's like the famous version of the teenage girls on the bus who wouldn't know how to stay on key if they're life depending on it. Enough with the wet cat sounds. Hate!

DFA79 broke up...that's a shame. That was a kickass live show (minus the idiotic "banter").

I can't remember for the life of me where I got this link from but this is hilarious. Dude was a super dirty old man:

Something that's been driving me nuts for months now: does the Burger King look like Val Kilmer or what? Am I the only one who sees that?

You know what turns me on? Modern technology. On the bus ride home tonight, I was chilling watching the Navy Yard and Vanderbilt go by, listening to As The World Turns. Yes, listening to an mp3 of the previous day's episodes. They fucking podcast soap operas! Is that a riot or what? Complete with a voiceover describing wordless action and the "previously on.." and "next on..." scenes. And they update the new ones on the day of. It's awesome.

I've been watching an excessive amount of videos lately. And pretty much only reminding myself how much I hate Keyshia Cole. That heifer ruined a video starring Tyrese with her bleating! I f'love Tyrese. I'll watch him in just about anything..sooner or later. 2 Fast 2 Furious...needed more Tyrese...half-naked.

I've loved him a loooong time, since he was singing in Tommy commercials and had facial piercings. Remember when he was all edgy and playing the baddie in the "My Way" video? I do. As if someone would give up Tyrese for Usher! Not in this world. Why don't I meet more Tyresesque guys? Oh yeah, cause I spend too much time with corny hipsters or acid freaks. No self respecting sex symbol would slum it like that. Ah well. Sucks to be me I suppose.

Sunday, neighbor friend Lirio and I trotted over to the Court St. Theater to catch a sneak preview of Something New. Surprisingly enough (or perhaps not), I'm really big into the black boho romcom genre. Fave movie of those: Hav Plenty and I would've loved it even better if they would've kept the original "you snooze, you lose" ending. I always kinda wish for those. Not because I'm a hardened cynic or whatever, but because it's always nice to have a dose of reality at the end. Sometimes you just fuck up and can't fix it and that's just how it is! Oops, sorry. I'm letting my emo slip out.

I'm gonna start off with what I didn't like:

-- the hair thing. It was really annoying that when she had her long weave that unless she was being "fancy," she never put the fucking thing up. No ponytails, no scrunchies, never back or up, just her hair flopping about her shoulders all the time. Yeah right. And then when she went natural, the same thing: always hanging loose and curly. As if a woman as prissy as she was supposed to be never switched up her hairstyle. And when he asked her about taking out her weave saying that he wanted to see her "really naked," I really had to gag. In real life, a) he would probably never notice and b) I can't see her saying more than "fuck off. Issue deaded" instead of actually going to the hairdresser to get the tracks out.

-- they never showed his place. If you're dating (or whatever-ing) someone and spending as much time with them as the movie implied, unless they have something to hide, you'll have been at their place before. All they needed was one scene there, even just a visual would've been good. As it was, it seemed like dude fell from the sky to garden and roll around in his pickup truck. It would've made a nice contrast to know what kind of life he was living. Really nothing about Brian was sketched out besides him being a generally cool guy (except when he said something naive) who worked in the community garden and was all crunchy and stuff. Even giving him a dad (Cliff Clavin!) in the end was just an afterthought. It would've been nice to even have a throwaway scene with Kenya meeting his friends.

And that's pretty much it. Everything else I enjoyed: the full out debates between the friends (oh so familiar!); him getting some shit as well as ignored or people being kinda indifferent ("The white guy's alright!) as well as not being completely naive either; the Ideal Black Man (Blair Underwood looking not so hot. Dude looked mad skinny and had a perv's moustache, even if his character was cool) not being a bad guy, just not the guy for her; the workplace stuff -- I always get annoyed when people aren'ty really doing anything at their fictional jobs. She was working hard and that guy who didn't respect her pissed me off, so I liked the aspect that her boss was on her side and she made partner; and mainly the interactions between the two of them. I've had a million of those conversations and it was nice to see them not glossed over.

I was amused by all the older black women grumbling about how fine the guy who played Brian was. Dude was cute -- and I don't even like blonds. I just liked that they let both of the characters be bumblers. They were mutually fucking up all the time and that's realistic. It made even sweeter that they worked out in the end. (Yeah...that's not a spoiler. If you thought they weren't going to end up together in the end, you must've never seen a romantic movie before!) I wanna see it again!

All year, I've been telling myself that I would get my shit together and submit a proposal for the Pop Conference. Everyone made it sound so fun last year! And I had a topic I thought was pretty meaty (Trapped In The Closet and the mainstream success of the chitlin circuit) and have been definitely not shy about music punditry over the internets -- as poor Anthony's email box can confirm. But in typical form, the deadline's fast approaching and of course, I haven't written anything yet to send off. Oops. I think I'll go anyway though. I've never been to Seattle and I will ask probing questions and/or jeer for kicks. The meantime, I'll try not to let dumb things elevate my pressure and try to hold back the "eat a dick" in correspondence. After all, my (forthcoming) list o' 2006 resolutions includes see at least one creatively satisfying idea through and stop selling myself short. As harsh as I'll ever be on anyone, I've always been my worst critic.

In case the title doesn't make it obvious (or perhaps the album on the sidebar), I've surrendered to Mariah for the moment. I haven't really hated her like I did in elementary school when I cursed "the annoying bitch hitting the stupid notes only dolphins can hear" in forever -- I even bought the #1s collection thingy in Discorama some years back for $6.99 I believe. The songs I've heard so far -- the singles really -- have caught my ear (well except for the latest one), but watching her videos really bother the fuck out of me. The desperation is usually wafting off the screen. She's always preening like a horse (show my left side! left side!) and usually wearing something real questionable. In the last video, was that her soccer outfit from when she was in junior high? Just no. Or maybe I just secretly still hate her and a few catchy JD productions isn't making me feel otherwise. That's what I suspect.

Kanye on the NBC Concert for Hurricane Katrina Relief:

"I hate the way they portray us in the media.

"If you see a black family it says they are looting if you see a white family it says they are looking for food.

"And you know that it’s been 5 days because most of the people are black and even for me to complain … I would be a hypocrite because I would turn away from the TV because it’s too hard to watch. I’ve even been shopping before giving a donation and so right now I’m calling my business manager what is the biggest amount I can give.

"And just to imagine if I was down there, those are my people down there. So anybody out there who wants to help with the set up, the way that America is set up to help … The poor, the black people, the less well off as slow as possible. I mean, Red Cross is doing everything they can.

"We already realize a lot of the people that could help are at war now fighting another way and they’ve given them permission to go down and shoot us."

George Bush doesn’t care about black people."

Someone should make a gif of Mike Myers's panicked expression. "You're ruining my career just by having me associated with you right now! I'm Canadian, I'm neutral!"

It's no secret that I'm not the biggest Kanye fan, but lately, I've got a lot of new found respect for the guy. The average celebrity as rich as he is tends to loathe coming out with a position about anything because their eyes are so firmly entrenched on making the most money possibilty. They are blank slates in order not to alienate anyone. Even their participation in most benefit shows is with the knowledge that they have the potential to increase sales heavily. So, when a best-selling artist recently on the cover of Time comes into the homes of America and actually speaks his mind, you know he's got balls of steel. Kanye West may have potentially risked career suicide, but he's a better man than Mike Myers who was gaping like a fool.

Even the criticism he's facing is typical: "he was overly emotional and inarticulate" "how dare he come to an event with an agenda? he's hurting relief efforts!" "why do they always have to make it into a black and white thing?" "it's not even George Bush's fault...it's the other government bureaucrats' fault!" "there's more white people than black people affected, you know." "how can he not care about black people? look at his cabinet lately?"

Talk about not seeing the forest for the trees. New Orleans as we knew it doesn't exist anymore. Some of the poorest areas and those inhabitants in the city were the most devestated. The Red Cross is not being allowed to enter. Dead bodies are floating in the streets. People were holed up for days in the fucking Superdome, sick, dying, and hungry. It took days for the federal goverment to show any kind of significant response. If your first instinct on someone famous showing the anger and fruatration that millions around the world are feeling is to play the blame game and undercut his words with charges of him being calculated and illiterate, then not only do you need to check yourself and wonder when you stopped being a human being, but fucking pray that you never have to experience what the people in New Orleans and the Gulf states are feeling right now. Because you are a heartless idiot who probably thinks of all of this as an inconvenience putting a pallor over your Labor Day celebrations and fucking shame on you. George Bush doesn't care about black people or poor people or anyone who didn't vote for him or anyone that's not on his side. Neither do many politicians who went down to New Orleans for photo ops and lip service. Good for Kanye and Ray Nagin and the Congressional Black Caucus and so many others for not being afraid to call it that. If a natural disaster had affected Houston or Atlanta or Washington DC or New York, there would have been aid before the papers went to press. Ladies and gentlemen, that's our government and they are a disgrace. For an entity supposedly the representatives of the people, our government has been moving in slow motion to help and revealing that they think of themselves as bound only to parts of the population. Even if we didn't vote them in, they still represent us and it's a travesty.