Am weak.

So weak. 2 days before Christmas, and I just spent £63 on Things I Shouldn't Have, breaking quite a few rules.
1. Don't shop clothes online, it never works out
2. December is the month for giving stuff to others, not yourself
3. November was a shit finance month, in December try and be prudent
4. Never buy the same item of clothing in different colours no matter how much you like it - you always feel silly

My only excuse is that it is preeeeetty. And there was a SALE. And it is dark, and cold, and this is a surfing brand and I can pretend that I am someday going to need it living in Australia or California. So much self-delusion. Here's to hoping that size 16 (or, in O'Neill terms, 5XL) will fit me. Didn't bother checking returns policy for Europe, too much hassle regardless...

ONEILL KATSUMI HOODED L/S TEE Black Out - Long Sleeve Tops - Fashion - Ladies - Surf Clothing - Wetsuits and Hardware at Shore.co.uk

To be fair

Obsession may be further strengthened by my ice dancing obsession - my favourite ever ice dancing couple Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat once danced to Time to Say Goodbye, also with Andrea and Sarah Brightman. I just listened to it on Spotify and cried.

God, I may have to find some youtube clips of them now! I hadn't even thought of this possibility! I heart Marina and Gwendal, aka the Russian princess and Sully (not that a name like Gwendal really needs a nickname, but he's like the ice dancing version of Dr Quinn's Sully, I swear (who in turn had the 'real' name Byron - dude!)) fiercely, despite them competing for France.
I need a new youtube obsession anyway, yesterday I finished watching 2,5 yrs Verbotene Liebe Chrolli backlog. Now I'm going to have to wait for new episodes to air. Unbearable.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BInmuBnSPcI
Spontanous post-watching thoughts: oh, so that's who can pull off a gold bodysuit? Also, the Japanese could rival the Canadian in cultural ownership of the 'eh'-ing

Andrea

I've been aware of Andrea Bocelli's existence at least since I was 6 years old. I have a very specific memory from pre-school class where we talk about the meaning of our names. As my second name is Andrea, I've always used him as an example, ie "it's a guy's name in Italy!" (when I was small I wanted it to be spelled Andreas, like the boys' name. I'm not going to even attempt to psychoanalyze this, I was 7).
Anyway, I didn't really realize he was blind until a few weeks ago when I saw him in an interview on this Swedish chat show. I've just assumed that the reason the guy has his eyes closed on his CD covers is because, dude, idk, he's in singing-ecstasy? (I sing, makes perfect sense to me)
Now when I hear him in Canto Della Terra it just totally fricking kills me. Feels like dying a little bit, but maybe of happiness? I may have to buy a CD or something, and suddenly I get what they were talking about on the show, the women who are obsessed with him. If someone can explain this sudden shift, please let me know.

the stuff dreams are made of

Today is what we in very bad Swenglish call a 'squeeze day'. Hence I am working from home, but my tech is really screwing me over. Work laptop is having another unexplainable internet refusal day, so I'm connecting via VPN on my own shitty PC City laptop which crashes whenever you move it a millimeter in any direction. Also, I am doing migration umlaut-cleansing, and conveniently enough this laptop is the British one - which doesn't have any åäö's. I've managed to get Swedish as an input language but it's only working on the internet, not any other apps... I also have to have it on a tiny side table which is at an incredibly achy angle to my back - I just moved it so I could rest my wrists on the table aaaand it crashed (hence blog break from mini-pc)

In other exciting and unrelated news, I've been on a big electronica binge for a few weeks now, playing Röyksopp and Detektivbyrån morning and night. But just now as I realized I was in a mood for some german emo and reached for Zimmer 483 I realized that OMG - I had a dream where I made out with Bill!! Last night! This could certainly explain the urge to hear his voice. It was quite surreal, they were staying in the same hotel as me and there was lots of sneaking in and out of very scary bunker-like toilets. The kiss itself was at a dinner table with lots of other people and very stiff and ehm, surreal. I was like, dude, there are other ppl here! I was still devastated when they left the hotel though, he was very love and leave 'em (so, clearly unrealistic because I insist that Bill seems like a lovely person).

The part of the dream I really wish comes true is the part where he had his old hair back. Bill, if you read this, please grow your hair back out, OK? I know you had the mohawk for like 10 years already but 8 out of those 10 years you were only famous in Germany. Now you're depriving your fans all over the world of this hair-faboulousness! Also, I think it would do wonders for your sales figures.
Love
librarian_girl

Warning!! Detailed discussions of themes that may be considered emo

So, last Friday one of the dreams I've had for oh about four months or so finally, FINALLY came true - Tokio Hotel live. My biggest hope for the concert was that Bill, who according to the CDs have a range with Mariah Carey-esque aspirations, would not suck too badly IRL. I've learned the hard way not to expect the same vocal prowess live as from recorded mediums (OK, I never saw Backstreet Boys live but they sang live on Söndagsöppet when I was about 11 or so and gosh was I horrified - I can still remember the disappointment like it was yesterday).
My second hope was that recent pictures of Bill were mainly PR-smokescreens for his fabulous new hairstyle which would look nothing like anything he's been sporting recently.

Was proved wrong Big Time on both accounts. Horrible, horrible oversized back-slick. I mean, I suppose I could accept it if he wanted to move away from the manga/porcupine/mohawk look I fell in love with as he's had it for quite some time. But this was NOT hot.
On the other hand, it turns out he can actually sing. Like, live. Very well. He hardly wrote down any songs, only one or two songs with incredibly high notes, both of which were not suited for standing still and singing, but required jumping around. Completely understandable. I was impressed.

Another cool thing about the concert was the fact that their set was like a tribute to the Star Trek movie First Contact, with a giant round Borg cube being the focal point. I actually read in one review that the 30m high steel construction should actually resemble the Death Star - but as Bill was dressed up as the Borg queen (...) I refute that statement. This has nothing to do with my aversion to Star Wars, obviously, but is rather the logical conclusion (live long and prosper). The projection in the background featured futuristic cityscapes which could have been borrowed straight from the SGA CGI library. Yes yes so their latest CD is on the futuristic theme but I didn't know that when I got hooked on Monsoon last October so it all pleased my little sci-fi heart to no end.

A fairly big disappointment for which I was prepared was the fact that the manager/band/tour planner was obviously not aware that as German is a very common second language-choice in school here, many Swedish fans prefer the songs in their original language. I base this not only on my own views but on the girl behind me who even though she was substantially younger than me (or shall I say, in the demographic group of 13-18yr olds that 99,5% of the audience belonged to) and may not even have had time to take any German in school exclaimed to her mother that she wouldn't know the lyrics in English. This meant that the high-pitched screaming was by far louder than the sing-along bits, which may be a curse for all bands who publish bilingually (with a target audience who squeals).
Anyway, this may have been a blessing to my dignity as I couldn't always sing along... But it was dark, and I don't know anyone in Gothenburg anyway and oh it would have been so much better in German! An additional minus with the English is the fact that Bill is not a competent English-speaker = practically non-existent between-song-chatter. I mean, this didn't bother me much but that's like the only direct communication line you'll ever have with the star as a fan, so it's a shame it was stilted.

Apparently to the reviewers the pyrotechnics were basic but they must be rather blasé I guess - I don't go to a lot of concerts so I thought it was pretty awesome. Two soundguys got to step into big seats of tech hoisted to the ceiling with wires - that was also awesome (made me briefly rethink career, was very Matrix-inspired).

To summarize, I'm thinking of removing myself from the FB group worshipping Bill's hair, but I'm actually a bigger fan of Bill as a person and as a singer than ever. So there. In indulging in one of my other big interests folk music I hang out with the age demographic 55+ so shouldn't this emo-activity put me somewhere in the middle, close to something normal?

Yeah, maybe not.

Addition to useless blurb (still can't sleep)

Oh yeah. And apparently Plushenko (see previous rant about Eurovision) has made a comeback after 4yrs away, and he swept the ice with the competition in the European championships this week. His floppy hair looks ridicilous in the piruettes, and I would just like to point out that if it was up to the general public I would not vote for him.

Sunday insomnia useless blurb

So. I'm not actually broke, but this January still sucks for a number of reasons. Most importantly, my zazzle-delivery which should take 8-15 days to deliver has yet to appear (it is now day 21 since order). However! Today when I was channel-surfing I came across a TV-movie with Chris Pine in it!! I'm taking this as a sign that the package delivery slip will be in the mail tomorrow.

Chris was overacting horribly, but I think he was just frustrated he didn't have more lines. And apparently those acne scars he has in ST:XI are real. I grieve with thee, Chris.
(I mean, not that he needs sympathy, he's still out-of-this-world (...) gorgeous and on men they're practically a quality deemed ruggedly handsome)

Let's talk strategy

Happy New Year! Despite being not-so-happy about being back at work already I have a good feeling about this year. For instance, I have a new dating strategy. I am going to wear this t-shirt to the gym:

Sorry. I only date Trekkies. by slave2moonlight
See more Trekkies T-Shirts

Failproof.

Don't do drugs!!

One of the few subjects I would love to study out of sheer fascination (but don't because there's no future career prospects in it) is music theory. I had one of the most profound experiences in my life in the Milv sometime early Spring 2006 when I saw a documentary (on the BBC, of course, all hail the mighty Beeb!) about the Beatles and why exactly they were so bloody famous.

It's not all to do with how cool they were, or the timing, or the lyrics (though I know some get off more on the lyrics than the music so they are definitely a big part of it), but mainly because (and this is somewhat hazy, but I remember the gist of it): there are only a certain number of combination of notes that are pleasurable to the human brain. These belong, by tradition, in certain types of music, and go in and out of use with time and culture.

The Beatles somehow used (came up with? discovered? depends on how you look at it) ones that have not been around for awhile and so their music was fresh (to a 1960s ear anyway). I can't recall much more details than this other than that ABBA was mentioned in these circumstances as well - their melodies were also re-inventing music and thus highly 'catchy' for people all around the world, regardless of what language you speak (music is universal and boundary-less, yadda yadda and TRUE).

Anyway. This theory is prooved further by the Eurovision Song Contest. Yes, 2008 they won because of the goddamn skater (I used to like him but I now boycot him, so good for him he doesn't compete anymore!) but this year it was that chorus, that bloody violin chorus. Most people joke heavily about folk elements in the Eurovision but this combination of notes was so heady, so powerful, that all over Europe people chose to vote for Norway despite them being rich bastards with their oil and fantastic social security and chirpy language. Can't blame it on the number of neighbouring countries either as has been the case the last few years.

The guy who won wasn't even a particularly likeable chap, and everyone moaned post-win about his Polish parents making him practice 5h a day supporting the highly un-likeable theory that everyone can become a pro with the amount of practice fery few of us could ever bother with.
Nope. It was that chorus that won. Pure music crack.

Anyway. For the last few weeks Humanoid has been my crack. The lesson to learn is of course that everything that can be compared to drugs will probably have repercussions. I got about two weeks of constant music-induced euphoria before things went to hell. I started out being careful, only listening on like volume 5 out of 40 in quiet areas. Soon, however, I had to raise the volume and play it on my CD-player to get the same kind of high. Now my tinnitus is back with a vengeance, bugging me all day, at work, at home, when I am about to sleep. So, crap.

Note: this was originally going to be a happy, fluffy post about the mathematic/musical geniuses who write music crack. I got interrupted mid-post and now that I'm finishing it a week later it's gone down-hill. Just, in case anyone got confused with the change of tone.

So people: MIND YOUR EARS, AND DON'T DO DRUGS.

Perv or emo?

For an unknown reason (but I suspect boredom) I just looked up Tokio Hotel on mtv just to check if I actually have heard any of their songs. They're all over the celeb news sources I sometimes divulge in and I have had no idea who they are, just that they were possibly German. It's been bugging me for sometime and making me feel very old.

So I checked wikipedia to see what their biggest hits are so I could just play a few videos and now I've got Monsoon on repeat and it's driving me insane because it's invoking a huge emotional response. Huge!! HUGE.

I hardly ever listen to radio or MTV, where would I have heard the song under emotional circumstances? It must be in a movie or the soundtrack to one of my favourite tv-shows or was once featured in some emotional moment on one of my favourite tv-shows. Alternatively it's a rip-off of some other song by a band whose CD I own. I can't find any sources to confirm any of this though and it's driving me insane.

(I refuse to believe that the response is purely because of the song itself - no matter how well written, for an emotional response this big it would only mean that I was meant to be born in the 90s and that I'm actually an emo. I mean, there are no emo's over 20 right? At least not that didn't become emo's when they were still teens.)

Anyway. On the course of figuring this out I am now googling pics trying to determine if Bill and Tom really are identical twins, and twins are always fascinating and I've never really done any research into the whole emo phenomenon but now I'm fascinated, and possibly a perv, and how can a 19-year old (German!!) with hair like, like, I don't even know, a porcupine possibly be appealing? It's insane! I'm not even into manga!!! I'm not!!

The only reason I can come up with to explain this insanity is that it's Day 4 0f staying at home with the season's first proper cold, and that I don't even have daytime TV to distract me as the TV is not working. Four days with just me and my brain and the occasional movie and lots and lots of snot. And free time. That never ends. EVER.

I can honestly say that I've never before longed to go back to work quite this much. Monday and Health (physical as well as mental), please arrive soon.