I'm not quite a notorious fanner/liker, but I'm pretty bad, I'll admit. But sometimes I can't help myself. Yes, there are some dumb ones and some with spelling and grammar so horrific that I can't bring myself to fan them (a frequent conflict for me: If I come across a fan page that describes my life perfectly, but misuses your/you're, do I still fan it? Often, I'm tempted to remake the page with the correct usage so all those who care about grammar as much as I do would join my forces, but that'd feel like plagarism. Surely I'm overthinking this). Anyways, usually I really like Fanpages. The pop culture references, if not clever, are still pretty fun and the ones about life's little idiosyncrasies are really cute; it's nice to know other people do the silly things that I do and notice the silly little things I notice. The ones about people's texting and Facebooking habits might be my favorites; I like knowing that when not using face-to-face communication, the person I'm talking to might be doing the same equally quirky things as I'm doing.
Anyways, I'm not sure if this should go on Tumblr or on here, but I'll post it here and maybe this time it'll import to Tumblr correctly:
If I could sum up my life in 10 Facebook Fan Pages:
And while we're on the topic of wishes, for good measure, one that doesn't describe my life, but is a perfect combination of pop culture, childhood nostalgia, meta-commentary on Facebook trends under the guise of a facebook trend itsself [Most fan pages seem to be one of these]:
Hello, readers! To all my STL readers, I miss you like whoa and you all should come to Pennsylvania and play Yeah Dude with me right now.
So thus far, epic RENT night aside, my summer’s consisted of looking up animal hybrids on Wikipedia (check out the puma/leopard mix, the dwarf pumapard), checking my FormSpring which you all should ask me questions on, playing Treasure Isle on Facebook extensively and listening to more 4 Non Blondes than anyone should in a lifetime (Seriously, the “What’s Up” video is on demand and I’ve listened to it more than is healthy…it’s probably a good thing that I wasn’t the age I am now in the 90s, cause I’d be trying to emulate them like whoa.)
Anyways…it’s hard to believe I used to value sitting at home alone and learning about phantom big cats and whatnot more than anything in the world, cause I really can’t take much more of it right about now. Sure one day I’ll be able to wow someone with my knowledge of ligers and beefalo (which have apparently stunted buffalo conservation efforts like whoa), but it’s really not productive at all, and loses the fun value quite quickly.
But, yeah, even when I did genuinely enjoy sitting around doing nothing all the time, the highlight of the summer months was still the few weeks I'd go away to Girl Scout camp. For a total couch potato/only child, it was great to be around a big group of really awesome people spending time outside and doing really fun things...like the time I was in the travelers group (probably the best week at camp I had) when we went to the Delaware Water Gap (and they talked about the Shawnee tribe until shawnee didn't sound like a word anymore) and to Camelback Beach (I'm not a big water slide person, but I sure love wave pools...it's like being at the beach without the jellyfish and with a shitton of chemicals) on the 4th of July and spent the entire day imitating our British counselor's accents, because we thought they were the coolest ever (and we all felt really bad when we made "Ringo" (a girl scout camp counselor never reveals her real name...unless she does or you force it out of her...I got in trouble for telling people a counselor's name once) lost her belly button ring because we begged her to take it out and show us how it worked). (I'm on a roll with the run-ons and parentheticals today)...and the next year with my "Theater of the Mountains" group we went to see 42nd Street in town and it was...well, obviously a small town theater production (but hey, I just went and saw RENT at the Media theater and it was surprisingly awesome), but pretty fun.
I just tried to write a paragraph about how great camp was and ended up writing about how great not being at camp was. I promise we had fun on the campgrounds, too...we canoed (I was never a big canoing fan; your shoes got too muddy...I could deal with being grimy and having dirty clothes, but wet shoes are the one thing I really can't put up with for some reason), and funyaked (it's a little yellow floaty thing that you sat in the middle of, fwiw) (you could step into the funyak without getting completely soaked and for some reason the kayaking motion is much more fun than the canoeing one and you don't have to deal with sharing a boat with a slow paddler (though this one time I had to deal with a clingy campmate who made it her goal to link our funyaks together)).
And if you were willing to hike up a humungo hill you'd get to ride horses, which was really fun even though everyone there knew way more about horses than I did and this one time I steered the horse too hard and the scary barn leader yelled at me...and then the horse tried to buck me off and she ran over and was like "Wow, you handle that horse so well!" and affirmed that statement after the thing decided to step on my foot as I was demounting it.
Speaking of crazy animal experiences, there was the summer when the bears ran rampant. Over the counselors' radios, we'd hear them talk about "Code B's" all over camp, but they wouldn't tell us what a Code B was...we quickly hypothesized that we were dealing with a Code B(ear), and everyone got really excited, though I was a bit skeptic. This next story starts with something totally out of character for me...I'd joined Roadrunners, and we woke up at ungodly hours to go for runs (yeah, I know...I was with the lagging group in the back in case you hadn't assumed that). I was walking back to my tent with someone else in my unit when I stopped dead in my tracks...there was nobody else around...except for a baby bear eating a big rubber band. I calmly tapped my friend on the shoulder and was like, "Hey, what's that?". "What's what?" "The bear!" and she looked up and freaked...quietly freaked, since being loud around a baby bear...I mean the baby prolly couldn't do much, but where there's a baby animal there's a crazy mother (I got attacked by a mother goose last year, so I know). So we stood there until it ran away and then went to our counselor who reported it and everyone in the camp found out and there was a hoopla and everyone thought I was really cool. It was a triumph of sorts, I suppose. And then one time was one either inside or just outside the mess hall and they had to chase it away and we all watched from a distance and by then they couldn't pretend there weren't bear around it was really exciting. Who needs danger perception, anyway?
And all the nights we'd stay up singing (This one time a counselor came to our tent to give us our nightly option of a "handshake, hug, or ET touch" [we always took all 3] and we ended up singing "Thank You" by Dido with her so now that song reminds me of camp) and playing truth or dare and the "nervous game" (and somehow I got the repuation of being the prudish one...in a group of 12 year olds, mind you) and gossiping about other campers (During the travelers unit we ended up splitting up into 2 cliques...which were like the city people and the surburban ones, which seems really awful now, but at the time it was fun...I mean, everyone was in one and it's not like we were outright excluding everyone and the cool, urban kids liked me just fine even though I was from suburbia (which was good because I was with most of them in Theater of the Mountains so it would've been bad if they had recognized me as that girl from the rival clique) so its okay...right? Okay, fine...but I'm sure you weren't a nice person when you were 12, either)
But my favorite part of camp was also my least favorite, because it was the last night of each session, when we would have a campfire/singalong/talent show. We'd do the same skits every year (except when I was in the acting one, when we decided we needed a good skit so we did a good one, though I forget what it was...we also did a modern version of Cinderella which I narrated and when we raised/took down the flag some of the girls did a step routine...I meanwhile stood by the flag lamely and gave all the orders). But anyways...usually the skits were the Magic Blanket skit (in which people would through things over a blanket and they'd come back double in size until a skeptic spit on it and then got hit with a bucket of water) and the "and then I heard a knock, a knock, a knock, and I thought it was Cecilia, Cecilia, Cecilia!" one and "If I were not a camper, I wonder what I'd be, If I were not a camper, *insert counselors name here* is what I'd be! *Insert something the counselor said here*"...or, conversely, "A birdwatcher's what I'd be! Hark, a lark, sitting in the park! *Crack an egg over head, pretend it's bird shit, hilarity ensues*"
So we'd sing some silly songs...they were the songs that I'd sing all through the school years to get funny looks from people, so it was pretty sweet to go to camp and burst out in a silly song and simply have those around me join in ("Baby shark, do do do do do do do"..."There's a hole in the bucket, dear Eliza, dear Eliza!"..."Oh I had a little chickie and it wouldn't lay an egg so I rubbed hot water up and down its legs! Oh, the little chickie hollered and the little chickie begged...and the little Chickie laid a hard-boiled egg!" and the "Just a boy and a girl in a little canoe..." song which ended with a girl paddling a canoe and the boy that she kicked out of the boat swimming all around...in the same misandric vein, the song that started with a girl sitting 'neath the lilacs and playing a guitar and then she meets a guy smoking a cigar and she dies and he becomes a douchebag and then he is killed by her tombstone and the moral of this song, according to the counselors, was "never tell lies", but we always sang "never trust guys!"
Oh, girl scout camp...
If you're still with me after that last paragraph, then thanks for putting up with my ramblings...so after alternating between silly skits and silly songs we'd calm down and sing some more solemn songs, like "On My Honor" which was full of sappy, heartwarming Girl Scout-y values, "Red Balloon" and "Spider's Web", which was one of my favorites:
My other favorite was "Linger", which IIRC I got up and attempted to sing at my high school's last meeting for worship before graduation and prolly embarrassed myself like whoa...but anyways, there are lots of versions of it, I believe, but ours went:
I want to linger A little longer A little longer here with you it's such a perfect night, it doesn't seem quite right that it should be my last with you and come September we'll all remember and as the years go by I'll think of you and sigh this is goodnight and not goodbye
And everyone would get all sappy and sentimental and give big hugs and we'd link hands and sing Taps and there would be a phantom trumpet playing it from the activities lodge (I don't know who the player was, still) And then the next day would be come, and it would be over...until the next year.
The last year I went things sort of fell apart, at least with my group of friends...drama, people getting in trouble for cigarettes and stuff, a giant foodfight, and then I didn't go back because everyone decided not to go back, either...Sad, sad...but at least it was fun for the time being! And it's so aweosme to meet someone else who went to Girl Scout camp and to compare experiences and campfire songs. So...if you're reading this and went to camp...what songs did you sing?
P.S. Go here for lots of great camp songs! P.P.S. Sorry for the wonky fonts...I don't know what happened.
I'm sure there are intelligent things I could be doing-like studying, and if I'm going to instead waste time on this blog I could be writing about something intelligent, but I just feel like doing something fun (okay, I ended up analyzing everything below, albeit not very well). I was going to write about Girl Scout Camp back in the day and how much I miss it, but (a) that has potential to be sappy sappy, and (b) Carrie Brownstein (of Sleater-Kinney) just beat me to it in writing a blog post about her favorite summer camp songs and I could take it as coincidence, or as a sign that I should or should not write my post, but for the time being I'm going to not be a copy cat. Not that Carrie and I have overlapping readership or anything...I'm sure that post will come soon enough.
Anyways, hmm...pure, unadulterated fun...I know! I present to you...
Sienna's Guiltiest Pleasures
Actually, I'm sure I'll forget some of the guilty ones. And I already established that I'm bad at Top 5/Top 10 Lists (Yeah, I'm still not a together person...but I guess Rob Fleming wasn't, either...) I'm not even sure I'm going to feel like writing explanations for each one...I guess it's not really necessary. I mean, if you like something, you like something. Actually, I'm not sure how guilty/embarrassed I feel about any of these. I kind of want to re-name this "Things Sienna Likes That Other People Judge Her For, Yet She Goes On Liking Them", but that doesn't flow nicely.
I mean, sure, when other people are discussing great American literature that they're fond of and then I really want to chime in with how I *love* Valley of the Dolls I usually hold back...there are some things that truly are in bad taste for me to like. But for a lot of these I don't know why they're considered bad/tacky/low-class/whatver. As long as something's not outright offensive, what's wrong with liking it? I think the fact that we consider some things to be in bad taste when there's no real reason for it is pretty pretentious. There are plenty of things that I like for irony's sake, but lately I've been feeling bad about that. The whole irony thing is often a bunch of privileged and/or "in-crowd" people deciding to deride something that someone else either genuinely likes or, in other cases, has to purchase/wear out of necessity. I should probably cut that out.
(I still want a Three Wolf Moon shirt)
So I guess I'll start with the aforementioned Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann...I think I've read this book, with its adorable pink cover with the pill cut-outs, like 5 times. Long story short: A young woman leaves her New England hometown to go to New York City and make a name for herself, gets caught up in showbiz and becomes a drug addict. I knew I was going to love it when I read the godawful poem (Poem? I think that's what Susann was going for) in the front of the book...I like it because it sounds an awful lot like any poetry I've ever tried to write. Then..."...New York was steaming-an angry concrete animal caught unawares in an unreasonable hot spell"...and you're off! This is the book that started my trashy novel phase in high school, from Jackie Collins to such gems as Wanton Slave (which floated around my school's hallways, for some reason) and I Shocked the Sheriff. The story just sucks you in...and you read, and you read, and you read, and in the end you don't feel like you've gained anything at all, except a chance to escape and to realize that your life isn't that bad. There was also a movie made of it, which is now a camp classic (Susann allegedly walked out of the screening in disgust), but the book's the best. Reading is always more intelligent than watching a movie, right? (Go here if you want to read some of it...or just ask to borrow my copy..I'm glad to spread the love)
Next, a few musical guilty pleasures for you...I think I posted some of these on Facebook a while back so bear with me if you're a true cyber-stalker who's seen these already.
Vixen: Edge of a Broken Heart
I really don't know why I like some 80s Hair Metal. I guess I'm just a sucker for a good guitar riff. And female rock musicians are my favorite thing ever, hence the Vixen love, ... I mean, yeah, they're all wearing tight clothing (though I guess male Hair metal musicians dressed exactly the same...equal opportunity works in weird ways) and whining about heartbreak in most of their songs, but if you get past that they're just as talented as any 80s metal band (not saying much?) And the big hair and flashy clothes are just too awesome to pass up.
This was my favorite song in the 4th or 5th grade. I remember my best friend and I had learned the lyrics to like every song on MTV or VH1 (they played music? whoa) and would sing them at our school's after school program, and this was one of them. I don't know how I feel about the fact that little 10 year old me was running around singing about battling domestic violence with domestic violence. Actually, I know exactly how I feel about that, so if anything, that's why this song is a guilty pleasure. (No guilt about liking the Dixie Chicks...In fact, after sitting through Robert Altman's Nashville I sort of have a soft spot for country music...Okay, maybe not a soft spot as much as an infatuation with an element of Americana to which I've never felt much of an affinity)
Wilson Phillips: The Dream is Still Alive
I love, love, loooooove Wilson Phillips. I grew up listening to Carnie and Wendy Wilson's Christmas album every December, which I'm sure has a lot to with it (I'm planning a really aweosme post for July 25, FWIW...My Christmas Songs post was going to be for December but I don't think I can wait that long). And music from the 90s makes me very happy, as a reminder of my childhood-they were like the cool big kids that I wanted to be when I grew up (Yeah, I still want to dress like them). Plus, if you're the child of hippies you're like automatically aweosme until proven otherwise in my book (I chose this song becasue it reflects that...whee, being nostalgic for/trying to live the life of your parent's generation!). And depsite the fact that, "Hold On" aside, they're mainly known for Carnie's size (I mean, really?) (Also, I can't believe how far behind I am on her reality show...unheard of!) and for having batshit families (Carnie and Wendy Wilson are the daughters of a Beach Boy, and Chynna Phillips the daughter of a Mama & a Papa and there was weird stuff with her dad and her half sister and blah blah), they're actually quite talented...I wish I had people I could harmonize like that with!
Grateful Dead: Casey Jones Indigo Girls: Uncle John's Band
Okay, so I actually really like the Indigo Girls, and I really like the Grateful Dead. And I really really like the Indigo Girls covering the Grateful Dead. But I don't like fitting stereotypes, and I feel like the fact that I really like the aforementioned groups show how I fit various labels to a tee, and that makes me uncomfortable. So sometimes I pretend to like things ironically so I'm not some type of sterotype, but self-derision isn't any better than deriding someone else's taste (and if I ever get that Jeep Wrangler I was eying this morning...I wouldn't know how to pass such a big purchase off as ironic; I'd just have to go with it. Same with a hippie van or some little eco-friendly car...which I guess Jeeps aren't.). Really, going out of your way to reject stereotypes is as bad a going out of your way to propogate them or push them on others; you're still affirming the existence of the stereotype.
The best part of the Indigo Girls covering "Uncle John's Band" is the "Sister, well i declare..." line and "Ain't no time to hate, sister, barely time to wait" thing they added. I was like "They would..."
The best part of "Casey Jones" is...the whole thing! After "Touch of Grey", I think this was the first Dead song I heard and after bursting out in laughter on, the "high on cocaine" line I had another "They Would" moment...So why can't I have "I would" moments in my own life?
Speaking of stereotypes, let's move on to movies. Something I am actually reluctant to say that I like, something I've never liked ironically; I've tried to dislike it but I seriously can't look away, it's like a car crash (which I think ties into the movie somehow): Basic Instinct. I mean, gay rights groups picketed the movie with signs spoling the ending : [highlight for spoiler] She's the killer [highlight for spoiler] because of its portrayal of queer women as hypersexual psychos/killers/psycho-killers. And that hasn't really changed in time (Ohai, Jenny Schecter, and...whoever the fuck actually killed her). Judging by the length of the "Psycho Lesbian" and "Depraved Bisexual" pages on TV Tropes (I advise waiting until after exams are over before you explore TV Tropes...it can take up your entire day/week/life), it's quite a problem. Yet I don't think therein lies my specific problem with this movie; I think my problem with it is just with the over-the-top sex and violence (often conflated) in general. Let's compare it with Mulholland Drive, one of my favorite movies and far, far, from a guilty pleasure: because I feel no guilt about liking it, and instead of bringing me pleasure it actually makes me really sad. But anyways...Mulholland Drive has lots of sex and violence, and I've seen it like 10 times and still don't really understand the plot, but from what I gather [highlight for spoiler] The female protagonist's girlfriend leaves her for a man. so the protagonist goes crazy, hires a hitman to kill the GF and then kills herself [highlight for spoiler] (I'm sure that spoiler's tempting you sorely...and even if you're planning on watching the film but have yet to see it I might acutally advise reading a few spoilers first or you'll have no clue what's going on). On paper its plot doesn't the sound much better than Basic Instinct's. But the sex and violence is much more tasteful (there's the concept of "taste" again...anyone want to delve deeper into that for me?) in Mulholland Drive, and the film's widely known as a masterpiece; the narrative and cinematography are works of art; David Lynch doesn't make exploitation films (can't really quantify what he makes, though). I think the reason I feel guilty about liking Basic Instinct is that it doesn't have artistic mertit to fall back on so it relies solely on gratuitous sex and hacking away at people with ice picks. Plus, usually I think it's a good thing when characters in movies and such just happen to be LGBT without it having to do with the overarching themes of the work, but in this case there's no real reason for Catherine Tramell to be bisexual other than to tantalize and in the context of a movie about a murderer it's kind of an awful idea. The relationship between the women in Mulholland Drive contributes to the plot and even though Diane's actions are questionable, I always want to give her a hug. But, yeah, my issue with Basic Instinct is still mainly that it's a bad movie (but it's so enthralling, still!) (and apparently better than the sequel)
(I bet this is gonna be the day that my entire family reads my blog...just as I'm leaving to go home for the summer...SWEET timing)
I really didn't want to deconstruct all my favorite things, but I'm doing just that...Hm...what's something I like, and my guilt about it comes from an obvious place...*clap*clap* Xanadu!
Starring Gene Kelly and Olivia Newton-John (and some guy who couldn't sing yet got cast in a musical and probably never made another movie). It's about this guy who paints replicas of album covers and hates his job...and then this muse visits him and he is inspired to open up a roller disco that combines elements from the dying days of disco with elements from the 1940s. And they sing about it. And there's this random Disney-esque animated sequence in the middle that makes no sense. And the special effects make me thing of We Have Lasers. I'm not making any of this up. Actually, the music is pretty awesome-Gene Kelly and ONJ are musical staples and there's tons of Electric Light Orchestra. That's the only real redeeming quality to this movie, yet I don't think that's why I really like it; I think it's just so rediculous that it's amazing.
Here's the trailer, which makes it seem like an updated Footlight Parade or some grand musical spectacle of that sort:
Expect a pt. 2 to this sometime, but for now I need to actually get stuff done today. Oh, reading week...where have you gone? What have I accomplished? LeSigh.
If anyone feels like commenting, leave some of your guilty pleasures! Analysis optional.
Before Facebook Fanpages (Or things you "like"...ugh, what is that?) usurped my profile information, I had "rescuing earthworms from the sidewalk" as one of my interests (Okay, I hadn't "liked" helping worms on the sidewalk yet, but I just did). In the Spring months, I've mentally added caterpillars to that list. I've just seen so many of them struggling to get back to the grass (I just helped an injured one, but probably just made things worse when he fell a few feet off the leaf back to the sidewalk...actually, maybe he wasn't even hurt, just staying still to avoid being eaten, and maybe i was the one that hurt him...I remember multiple times in my life where I've begged someone not to kill a bug that's been in the house, and then managed to decapitate it in the process of getting it in a cup and and slipping a sheet of paper underneath. At least my intentions were good?)
Anyways, I guess I feel an obligation to any cute, innocent little animal, insects included, to help them, especially since I've seen so many squished caterpillars, with their light green innards spilling out of their heads (Sorry for that image). I suppose I'm trying to use my privilege as a human to do good. I mean, why am I here as a person when another living being is a little spiky wormy thing that's going to get stepped on or biked over or eaten by a bird? Why are that wormy thing's siblings going to get the chance to be beautiful butterflies who live free and exiting (albeit short) lives? I'm guessing it isn't Karma, at least not in their current lives, since I don't really think caterpillars have the capacity to do bad (they might sting someone with those poison spiky thingers or eat too much of a tree so another caterpillar can't get to it, but those are mere survival techniques, not exerting power for the sake of exerting power). Maybe the caterpillars that never grow up to be butterflies (or...moths) are ones that did something bad in a previous life as a human or dolphin or something, but how do you explain how one gets to be a butterfly? It's not a bad life, but not an exceptionally good one, either. Maybe that's why there are so many insects in the world; because most people are not exceptionally good or evil, so they get to live secure, but not necessarily fulfilling next lives (I mean, you'd grow up without a family, make babies, and then die without getting to see them grow).
(I don't even know I believe in reincarnation; I don't know why I wrote all of that)
(This is what happens when I walk to and from class after losing my iPod...I think of weird, stream-of-conscious stuff)
(You're probably all like, "This entry would have been much easier to account for 10 days ago than it is today, under certain assumptions". [Though you probably don't really think/talk like that, even if I do] But I swear that isn't the case, and I have yet to reach for a cookie)
(Remember a few entries ago when I expressed concern for being driven totally up a wall? I think it's happening...)
Surely you've all seen it already, but...it's awesome and all. Remember when I was in high school and wouldn't touch pop music (or really...anything current) with a ten foot pole? That's because there was no Gaga...
Can I also say it makes me sad when pt. 1 of an awesome video has so many views and pt. 2 has way fewer? But conversely if this were a bad movie it'd make me happy to see the views plummet, and I'm sure that's the case with some videos. You win some, you lose some, I guess...
Yeah, there'll be a lot of this here, I'm sure. And by "this" I mean Youtube videos that I want to impose on you, not Stevie Nicks. Though I'll impose her on you a lot, too.
