Grace Notes @ Snarkattack

Thought it might be cool to keep a record of what I’ve been listening to this week. I won’t do the weekend because I think I’ll be fairly busy and probably won’t be listening to that much.

Mon 12th May, 2008

V/A Nanoloop 1.0 - oh my gosh I cannot stress just how addictive this album is. It’s no longer available so I was very lucky to get it. Various electronic music artists, some well-known, others not so, get together and make music using the synth on a Nintendo Game Boy! How rad is that?! So it’s got that chiptune sound that just makes it so fun. Reminds me of when my most recent ex actually liked me. Feck, that was long ago.

Thom Yorke, The Eraser - okay, so if you like Radiohead, chances are you’ll love this, and it doesn’t disappoint. Lush, soothing, and glitchy. Yum. I played it straight after the album above to ‘wind me down’ (the above being high-energy stuff, hehe).

Jan Jelinek, Tierbeobachtungen - haven’t given this much of a chance despite this being by one of my favourite electronic music artists. Glitchy, minimalistic electronica that hypnotises. It’s the sort of music that washes over you. Nice for listening to late at night (which is exactly what I’m doing now).

Portishead, Dummy - me and housie were testing (non seq. thank you SO MUCH Rob for fixing my laptop) a Foobar feature. Man, it’s been forever since I listened to this album. I was a young’un when it first came out…I think my first boyfriend bought me my copy.

Tue 13th May, 2008

Boys Noize, Oi Oi Oi - yeah, yeah, I know I keep crapping on about it but it’s really wicked. The best description I can think of is that the artist sounds similar to Daft Punk, whom I’m not overly keen on (and must be the only person on the planet who seems to feel that way too…gosh, you should hear them crap on about them at work)

Luomo, Paper Tigers - zomg, Vocal City was tha shiznit. The Present Lover wasn’t too bad either. But I can’t say I’m a big fan of this album…maybe I need to give it another chance, and maybe Luomo needs to stop riding the success of ‘Tessio’.

Portishead, Third - I need to listen to this album by the seminal trip-hop act more. Man, it only took them eleven years…sheesh.

Future of the Left, Curses - woo hoo, some members of mclusky! Cursory listen, so not much to say at this point.

Einsturzende Neubauten, Silence Is Sexy - my ex put me on to these guys, and I’m glad, I really like what I’ve heard of them. They have an industrial lilt.

Julie Doiron, various tracks - supposedly a ’sadcore’ artist. Beautiful, haunting folk, with generally pared down instrumentation. She sings in French and English.

Wed 14th May, 2008

The Rapture, Echoes - debut album produced by the DFA - it rocks, I reckon, though they do sound very ‘arty’ for rock, and sometimes wimpy - but I dig that kind of thing.

Peaches, The Teaches of Peaches - I first saw this when I was in the UK in 2002 and because of the cover, said “hmph, why are they flogging this girl band shit?!” - uh, I was an IDIOT. It’s not girl band shit at all. In fact hypersexual electro is where it’s AT. Woo.

Thu 15th May, 2008

Klaxons, Myths of the Near Future - initial impressions are not good…thought I would like this a lot more. Probably need to give it a chance.

The White Stripes, Elephant - the only White Stripes album I own. Can’t figure out if I prefer this or White Blood Cells

The Bravery, The Bravery - fantastic EP. Kind of electro-rock.

Pilot of the Future, 1 - chiptune-inspired music! A duo from Brisbane who have this whole album available for free download on Last.fm which is where I got it from and found out about them. Go 8-bit go.

The Rapture, Echoes - yep, again!

The Soft Pink Truth, Do You Want New Wave, Or Do You Want the Soft Pink Truth? - electro versions of punk songs! It’s really, really good, the songs are so damn catchy and very provocative, as one can imagine. This has seen a lot of play in my car and my various residences.

Internet radio tagged ‘gamba’ on Last.fm - I’m really missing my early music CD collection, need to collect some stuff from my parents’ place. This is the best I can do for now. So far they’ve played some absolutely rapturous Tobias Hume and John Dowland. Thought it would be good music to have playing while I read some poetry.

Had a doctor’s appointment today. It was…hard. And it was payday.

That meant…BOOKS.

The prize find for today was a graphic work by John Coulthart - H. P. Lovecraft’s The Haunter of the Dark and other Grotesque Visions. It has an introduction by Alan Moore but even cooler, it has a listed soundtrack! As follows…

Coil, How To Destroy Angels
Brian Eno, On Land
Jon Hassell, Aka-Darbari-Java / Magic Realism
Thomas Köner, Teimo
Alan Lamb, Night Passage
Lustmord, Where the Black Stars Hang
Main, Hz
Paul Schütze, New Maps of Hell I & II
Tangerine Dream, Zeit

Other books were:
Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber (reinterpretations of fairytales)
Tom Stoppard, Arcadia (theatre/play)
Carol Ann Duffy, Rapture (contemporary poetry - started reading it straightaway)

Alas, the bookstore in question apparently misplaced my copy of Tom Stoppard’s Travesties that I’d ordered…

No more book-buying for the rest of the month for me.

I went through ALL my notes and tagged them so that it shows whenever I mention specific people. It turns out I mention Rob A LOT. Well, he is my best bud, but it might be scary to others who aren’t aware of that (incidentally, I know he doesn’t consider me his best friend - which is fine. He has a wonderful partner and they are probably the only couple I know who I pretend will never break up; I mean all couples do eventually, don’t they? Even death parts them…but not them. They will go down in the blaze of glory that is the double suicide caused by either a. over-consumption of homebrew or b. the Darvon cocktail. Look it up on Urban Dictionary. I’m still so pissed they removed its entry on Wikipedia and its deletion log wasn’t exactly super-easy to find. Oh christ, I’ve crossed a new level of nerddom)

Except one.

There was one note where I admitted I nearly sent a Valentine to someone I fancied. Now someone I had coffee with today was telling me about how one female friend he had used to blog about her now boyfriend before they started seeing one another, and how this bloke used to read her blog! Zomg.

So yeah, I didn’t tag that note. Hi B if you happen to read this through the dreaded Facebook. You will be tagged.

Hmm, I’ll mention that really cute bloke that both B and Rob know…but I won’t tag him. I think I’ve pestered him enough by actually telling him he looks hot on a photo on Facebook (aha! I know, I’ll do it retrospectively like I will with the boy I nearly sent a Valentine to when he’s no longer single. Aha…). Oh and thank feck my last ex isn’t on here either! Or Nerd of my Dreams…

Oh god, I’ve really plunged into the depths of the lame now, haven’t I? Come join, it’s soooo much fun. We’ll blame my persistent insomnia, hm?

Finally, the whole reading like hell thing is paying off. Now that I’m feeling much better (though the insomnia persists, will talk to my doctor about that) I’ve decided to give a project I tried a few years ago another shot.

I’m adapting a verse novel into a screenplay.
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So last week I had this brilliant idea that I was going to start writing a screenplay. It’ll be an adaptation of a verse novel - I have unsuccessfully tried to write a screenplay for it before.

I’m still waiting for the secondhand copy of Peter Ackroyd’s Chatterton that I purchased off eBay the other day. My mind is starting to feel a lot more active and work is winding down again so I’ll have lots of time to write.

I finally found that Bruno Pronsato album I was after, but it’s the Boys Noize one that’s totally got my attention at the moment - damn it rocks hard! I also bought The Tudors on DVD! Am so horribly excited, and am hoping to watch it with my former Elizabethan lit classmate over the weekend.

A meme! w00t!

You’re feeling: tired

To your left: table

On your mind: sleep/work

Last meal included: fish

You sometimes find it hard to be: happy

The weather: dunno, actually

Something you have a collection of: books

A smell that cheers you up: Puss’ fur

A smell that can ruin your mood: puke

How long since you last shaved: what, my legs/armpits? christ I don’t even remember

The current state of your hair: slightly tangled

The largest item on your desk/workspace (not computer): old computer disk box

Your skill with chopsticks: liveable

Which section you head for first in a bookstore: poetry

Something you’re craving: a good bonk

Your general thoughts on the presidential race: go Obama go? (as in that’s a cheer)

How many times have you been hospitalized this year: none, but it was close a few months ago!

Favourite place to go for a quiet moment: bedroom

You’ve always secretly thought you’d be a good: massager?

Something that freaks you out a little: crowds

Something you’ve eaten too much of lately: meat?

You have never: kissed a girl

You never want to: take acid

Where is your cell phone? in my handbag

Your significant other? nah, don’t have one of those

Your hair? mussed. wasn’t there already a question about this?

Your mother? improving

Your father? ace

Your favourite thing? words

Your dream last night? that I had a nose-ring

Your favorite drink? tea

Your dream/goal? stable mental health

The room you’re in? bedroom

Your ex? infuriating

Your fear? never getting better

Where do you want to be in 6 years? fitter, happier, more productive…

Where were you last night? at my parents’ place

What you’re not? tall

Muffins? what about them?

One of your wish list items? MAC

Where you grew up? London/Melbourne

The last thing you did? read poetry

What are you wearing? pyjamas

Your TV? I don’t personally own one

Your pets? absolutely adorable

Your computer? fixed!

Your life? improving

Your mood? better

Missing someone? alas, yes

Your car? old, but fine

Something you’re not wearing? a bra

Favourite Store? probably Readings in Carlton, Melbourne

Your summer? hot!

Like someone? yep!

Your favourite color? black?

When is the last time you laughed? last time I spoke to my housemate

Last time you cried? when I had to tell my father something awful

I went online and decided to use Neil Gaiman’s Magnificent Oracular Journal. The question I chose to pose (as a joke, I might point out):

Will anyone ever love me?

(and yes, I’m lame, I meant it in the romantic way)

The first answer made no sense. It was:

I read all messages (including Erin’s) sent to me.

You’re allowed to shake it again if it makes no sense. Which it didn’t. So I shook the magic ball again.

What I got was very coherent, and so funny I burst out laughing at work:

Probably in the shops end of September.

Uh, I think he’s answering the question “When will The Graveyard Book be on sale?” but it’s a pisser to think that this might actually be true for me.

Yea, I get to post a positive post for a change!

(Oh christ, I’ve forgotten how to use the ‘unordered list’ html tag, zomg nerd embarrassment…)

- Rome is being repeated on pay TV - am trying to catch it whenever I’m at my parents’ place
- found a Killdozer album that my ex once lent to me (Uncompromising War on Art Under the Dictatorship of the Proletariat in particular, which I recall being hilarious)
- I ordered some xkcd tee shirts
- I also ordered some cool comics by a guy called Jamie McKelvie (whom Warren Ellis waxes lyrical over)
- read a funny poem by Shanna Compton
- I ordered two plays by Tom Stoppard and they’re waiting to be picked up already! They are Travesties and Arcadia
- tried kangaroo meat for the first time this week at a steakhouse
- got some Keep Calm and Carry On apparel
- am on a new antidepressant (paroxetine) which seems to be loads better than the previous one (in that I’m not throwing up nearly every morning, w00t!)
- got some lovely BPAL in the mail - after ordering a month ago! sheesh
- Neil Gaiman is in Melbourne-town!
- I have the love of not one, but two cats!
- I finally have an idea for a poem, but it requires me to do some research/reading on the poet Thomas Chatterton

Or ‘glitch’ for short is what the most recent xkcd cartoon calls ‘broken hard drive techno’. According to the xkcd forum.

I happen to love glitch. In fact, I recently started listening to it again.

Life is slowly starting to improve. I’m socialising, losing weight, and reading an awful lot. On my day off on Tuesday I finished reading Neil Gaiman’s Sandman volume 8, Jasper Fforde’s Lost In A Good Book, and read two plays by Tom Stoppard (Professional Foul and Every Good Boy Deserves Favour) - both of which were highly political. I got all inspired after watching Stoppard dir. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (based on his play of the same name).

The Sandman series is coming to an end for me, which is sad…only three more volumes to go.

I got tagged for a meme quite sometime ago (NaBloPoMo 2007) and for some reason the link didn’t show up till my housemate upgraded WordPress for me. Weird.

Name six guilty pleasures you wish you had the courage to indulge.

1. Not so much courage, but money - big fat art monographs.
2. DVDs?
3. Dying my hair; I assume once you start you wouldn’t be able to stop.
4. Reading fantasy novels - would get hopelessly lost in them.
5. Swearing like a sailor?
6. Being openly affectionate with humans (yeah, I’m really a cyborg…)

(honourable mention - suicide? But I think that that might be a good thing to not indulge in)

NB. This is a hard category because generally speaking the concept of me not having the courage to do something, particularly indulging in guilty pleasures, is foreign. That is not to say I don’t have fears - oh gosh, I have plenty of them.

Name six pleasures you once considered guilty but have now either abandoned or made peace with.

1. Wearing cosmetics - made peace with
2. Eating meat - made peace with
3. Wishing I were dead everyday - abandoned
4. Baths - made peace with
5. Enjoying sex - made peace with
6. Not wearing underwear to bed? - made peace with

(honourable mention to writing poetry - that’s a big one I’ve made peace with)

Name six guilty pleasures no one would suspect you of having.

1. Self-mutilation
2. Self-starvation (just so we’re clear, I don’t approve of others starving themselves)…maybe. Again those close to me probably suspect this.
3. Eating day-old chips
4. Bursting cod liver oil capsules in my mouth (yep, sick freak…)
5. Teasing my cat? But perhaps those who know me closely/live with me might know this!
6. I had one I was too chicken to mention but if I were asked personally I might own up to it. I’ll give you a tame one: driving alone at 3-5 in the morning (pure bliss).

(honourable mention to hardcore snogging boys thus resulting in the smearing of lipgloss you’re wearing all over their faces. So fecking hot)

Courtesy of being tagged by this blog

I love Randall Munroe. A major science nerd who actually knows what iambic pentameter is.

To keep sane at work I went through the entire archive of xkcd and was just one of the many ones that made me chuckle.

NB. Don’t forget to put your mouse over the image for more text. I *think* it works this time.

I didn’t take my anti-depressants yesterday (on Thurs night, went to the pub, drank too much, crashed at my place, left my meds at my folks’ place). Over 24 hours later, the glitching has begun. I feel like a character out of William Gibson’s Neuromancer, hehe.

I had to go home from work early today because my meds’ side effects were so bad (nausea all afternoon/evening). How the hell am I supposed to drown myself in work if I have to go home sick for dumbarse reasons?!

Am VERY pissed off.

The nausea and vomiting make me feel very miserable, I’m sorry to complain but there it is. I actually told my mother that I preferred Efexor to Lovan/Prozac - and when I was on Efexor, the electric shocks and nightmares were pretty bad (kept me reed thin too, but I rather liked that!).

In other news, I finished all the trade paperback comics I bought - that’s 2 volumes of Promethea and one of Sandman. Major bummer, will have to wait till next payday to buy more Sandman. The end is near…sob sob (only vols 7-10 to go).

I felt slightly reassured that one of the characters in Promethea, Stacia gets put on anti-psychotics and gains weight.

***SPOILER ALERT (But at the end of the world she gets all hot again, and has affairs with not one woman but two. And one’s a superhero)

Hmm, what are the chances of the same happening to me? *flutters eyelashes*

“The only cure for grief is action.”

http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/2256.html

Is it true? (I should stop sleeping so much…)

(also, I forgot to state in my last materialistic post that I also purchased a copy of Charles Vess’ The Horns of Elfland…SIGNED! and it’s older than me. Christ, that’s old)

I wrote a fragment of poetry today. I have had an electronic music track stuck in my head most of this week (Jan Jelinek’s ‘music to interrogate by’ from the album La nouvelle pauvrete) and it inspired some poetic tendencies which was good. The concept of the poem was sex as interrogation (it’s a good bonking track).
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Thanks Rob for picking up my packages at the post office *grins*.

Today I came home (to my parents’ place where I am still currently staying) after a very nice and cheap Japanese dinner to discover that I had more packages waiting for me! Woo hoo!

I got…

Volumes 4 & 5 of Alan Moore’s Promethea comic (I don’t like it as much as Sandman but it’s very addictive)
Volume 6 of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman comic (M - I’m very jealous if you really did get all of the volumes for as much as you said. You lucky, seedy bastard)
a new lipgloss (MAC Fafi Squeeze It l/g!)
some Silk Road Trading Company soap (L - these smell wonderful! You must try them!)
some MAC Heatherette items

So glad for the comic books, just finished Neil Gaiman’s Marvel 1602 (imagine Marvel superheroes transplanted to Elizabethan England) and was panicking somewhat.

And christ you should see the list of hard-to-get CDs I have on the way…Life will never be the same now that I’ve joined Discogs. Next payday I’ve decided I’ll be getting Simon Schama’s History of Britain on DVD, am dying to watch it again.
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Life stinks (but my cat loves me). My parents lost my favourite Monet painting postcard which I bought in the Musee d’Orsay in Paris. Doctor Who season 4 is soon going to air en Angleterre. I admire anorexics. Rob thinks I’m hotter than my ex (believe me when I say that’s just not possible). Neil Gaiman is coming to Australia and doing lots of book signings in Melbourne (think I might chase him up to get my copy of Stardust and Sandman 2 signed).

This person’s LiveJournal is very, very good. S/he posts poems, and bloody fine ones too. This is just one of the ones that I read that made me go ‘wow’, which I’ve not done in a long time. Something to do with the meds, I think.

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I wish I could just embed this into my blog (I forgot how…). It’s so fecking good.

Edit: okay, I figured it out. Here we go! (but I can’t get the text when you put your mouse over the cartoon to show up. It’s “I didn’t even know I *had* the Monty Python ‘Lumberjack’ song.”)

It was my birthday yesterday so I’m posting a wishlist, very much in the vein of cicconeyouth.

BOOKS

Marion Bradley Zimmer, The Mists of Avalon
Antonia Fraser, Marie Antoinette
Christopher Hibbert, Elizabeth I (zomg if someone can actually find this and get it for me I’ll be your sex slave forever…or will promise never to be, you take your pick)
Phillippa Gregory, The Other Boleyn Girl
anything from the comic book series Sandman from volume 5 onwards

DVDs

History of Britain, Simon Schama
The Tudors
Rome season 2

CDs

Goldfrapp’s new offering Seventh Tree
Portishead’s new offering Third
Bruno Pronsato, Why Can’t We Be Like Us (super-want, really hard to get at present here)

miscellaneous

a new Little Twin Stars wallet
some MAC Heatherette makeup items
Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab fragrances in Muse and Victoria

I’ve been notably (or not so perhaps?) from here because of struggles with the neurochemical imbalances…things got pretty nasty for a while, thought I’d have to go away to the fabled ‘place of convalescence’ for a while but instead have ended up at my parents’ place being looked after.

At any rate, the world seems less frightening, even if I am sunburnt after my trip to Anglesea over the weekend (which was thoroughly enjoyable, I don’t remember the last time I actually enjoyed other humans’ company so much!).

I’m off Neulactil as of last night. I haven’t slept, probably as a result of not being on it.

I was on a reduced dose for the last 2 weeks. I’m not noticing any reduction in my weight like I did the last time I (unsuccessfully) tried to reduce my dose *pouts*.

However, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I wrote five poems this week either. Perhaps Neulactil really was responsible for dulling my mind. I do feel a lot sharper and more alert of late, and not needing as much sleep which has been great.

Well, I have till October (for the brother’s wedding) to get into shape. I hope I can do it…

About bloody time too. I think it must be the Sylvia Plath poetry I’m reading. That and this excellent book by Steve Kowit on writing poetry - fantastic book with all these exercises for writing. I also read a few poems on a LiveJournal community I’m a member of (remember, the one that slammed my ‘KGB Dental Plan’ poem?).

So in total this week so far, I’ve written four poems. I edited two of them today, one that I wrote a few days ago, and one I just wrote this evening. They seem pretty abstract to what I usually write, I feel. Except one, which is a narrative poem, after an exercise in the Kowit book (this is the book I’m referring to. I had to order it in from the States).

In addition to reading Plath (still!) I’m also reading volume 4 of the Sandman comic by Neil Gaiman. I’m really enjoying it, positively swallowed down volume 3 yesterday. I’m also loving his blog. His new book The Graveyard Book is apparently finished and he’s down to editing it and typing it out. I don’t know what it is I find so exciting about his blog, it’s just a very refreshing read.

Oh shit, in all my writing fury I forgot about my cup of tea. Better go and rescue it.

No alarms and no surprises…

…I didn’t get any Valentines today. Hardly surprising, I wasn’t expecting any but I confess it might be nice to get one. I thought about sending one but I didn’t have the guts (besides the fellow in question is apparently getting back with his ex-girlfriend so my effort would be wasted).

I was completely useless today, watched a hideous (why is it not ‘an hideous’?) amount of daytime television (Oprah, The Bold and the Beautiful, and other assorted cooking shows), spent the whole day in my pyjamas and am now testing fragrances. I did also read some more of my book by Jasper Fforde from the ‘Thursday Next’ series called The Well of Lost Plots. I wasn’t enjoying it initially but am now, it’s got really good and engaging and all the things you want from a novel. It’s about a literary detective who’s hiding out…in a book. Yeah, in a book.

Now if I can just back into my Sylvia Plath poetry…it’s really mentally demanding to read I find. I don’t think (and this is probably showing just how much of an intellectual loser I am - after all she did posthumously win the Nobel Prize for Literature for her collected poetry) I like her mythos, her personal mythology. It could be that I don’t understand it properly (and I confess I don’t a lot of the time) but also, I find myself not caring that I don’t. I much prefer her husband Ted Hughes’ poetry (okay, so I’m a bit biased, he’s one of my favourite poets) even though I think she’s probably more talented.

Or perhaps I’m just forcing myself to read that which I do not find personally engaging and it’s okay to not like something, isn’t it? Yeah, I’m asking you, the reader a question!