I Heart Brian Fellow

Want This Dress Please

J. Crew, I wish I could quit you.

{J. Crew, via Feather}

The Rory Gilmore Book Club

It took me a long time to suspend my cynicism and sit down and watch The Gilmore Girls. Once I finally did, I loved it. Yes, it often made me cringe at the cheesiness or roll my eyes at the sheer unbelievability (is that a word) of some of the plots, but the script was, for the most part, sharp and funny and smart.

One of the things that stands out is Rory's obsession with books. Again, it's highly unlikely that she would have been able to read as much as she did, but we were also expected to believe that she could eat a burger and fries every day, never exercise, and still weigh 98 pounds. However, if you're willing to move past that, Rory's love of books is one of the things that made the show so unique. Do you ever see Serena van der Woodsen curl up with a good book on Gossip Girl? How about Brenda and Dylan discussing the finer points of Kerouac on Beverly Hills, 90210 (ok, that's a dated reference, but you get where I'm going with this)?

According to this list, Rory read over 175 books over the seven seasons of the show, spanning from The Divine Secrets of the YaYa Sisterhood to Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter to Speak, Memory. There are also Rory Gilmore book clubs on sites like Goodreads and Shelfari. It sort of makes me want to start my own...or at least conquer all of the books on the list myself.

Let Me Eat Licorice

Neutral Milk Hotel's "In the Aeroplane Over the Sea" is a beautiful, much loved song with that holds many memories for me. In my office CD swap, the song turned up on at least 3 different mixes, so it's clearly a powerful song for many...apparently, even those who aren't quite sure of the words.

This cover is certainly one of the best things I've seen in a long time.

Sandcastles in the Sand

I organized a CD swap in my office and our official exchange day is tomorrow. I sent out an email inviting people to participate, and 26 people ended up signing up. I assigned everyone to random groups of 5-6 people, and everyone had two weeks to make a mix for each person in their group. Though not mandatory, themed mixes were encouraged. An extra copy for the genius organizer was also encouraged--I've already gotten a few CDs so I'm really excited for tomorrow. It's gonna be like Christmas.

Because it's still too cold, I decided to make a summer-themed mix, with songs that remind me of summer. Here's the playlist:

# dance dance dance--Lykke Li
# Fireworks--Animal Collective
# Postcards from Italy--Beirut
# What is the Light--The Flaming Lips
# Dry the Rain--Beta Band
# Strange Lights--Deer Hunter
# Summer Afternoon--The Kinks
# One Kiss Don't Make a Summer--Lucky Soul
# I Sing I Swim-- Seabear
# The Sun Goes Down and the World Goes Dancing--Magnetic Fields
# Electric Feel--MGMT
# Kim and Jessie--M83
# I Wish I Was the Moon Tonight--Neko Case
# Shady Lane--Pavement
# Bag of Hammers--Thao Nguyen and the Getdown
# Walcott--Vampire Weekend
# Modern Nature--Sondre Lerche
# This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody)--Talking Heads

The swap got a lot of buzz and everyone seems to be having a lot of fun with it. I'm already planning another iteration for summer and have begun contemplating what my next theme will be. Ideas?

The Perfect Summer Sandal

Though it will be a good couple of months before I'm willing to bare my toes to the elements, I'm already starting to contemplate summer footwear. Flip flops are my go-to choice for comfy summer shoes, but they're not really office appropriate. I will be prowling shoe stores in the coming months, searching for a flat, neutral sandal that is dressy enough for work, but not too fancy for breezy summer attire.

Here are a few pairs topping my wish list:



{Frye; via unruly-things}



{Piperlime}




{Piperlime}



{Piperlime}

The Feast of St. Joseph

Rhode Island has one of the largest concentrations of Italian Americans in the country, so it's not surprising that while I was growing up, wearing red and eating zeppole on March 19 was just as prevalent as wearing green and eating corned beef and cabbage (gross) on St. Patrick's Day (March 17).

St. Joseph's Day always makes me a little homesick. Now that I live in Boston (just about an hour north of my home state), I find that most people have no idea what I'm talking about when I wish them a Happy St. Joseph's Day. Yes, the Irish population in Boston far outnumbers the Italians, but it seems like some kind of ethnic snub when the entire city is awash in green for St. Patrick and nary a zeppola in sight for St. Joseph. Come on people, he was Jesus' DAD (sort of). Show a little love. Wear some red, eat some Italian food, and go find me a zeppola.

Wild Things

I am not a wild person by nature, and I certainly wasn't a wild child. But I did love Maurice Sendak's classic story of imagination and the land of make believe. In first grade, we read the book and made monster masks out of brown paper bags. Mine had orange yarn hair and a mean, sharp-toothed grin. We wore our masks and danced around the room, pretending to be our monsters.

Spike Jonze's film adaptation is scheduled to premiere this fall and I have high hopes for it, based on the awesome poster and several of my Hollywood favorites (Catherine Keener, Paul Dano, and Lauren Ambrose) doing voices. Also, I will always love Jonze for his stellar Buddy Holly video . Another also, Dave Eggers is co-writing the screenplay. All kinds of awesome.



{image courtesy of Videogum}

Cloud Wall

The walls of my apartment are a drab vanilla color and though I have a few prints and paintings hung, I just don't have the creative energy to do much with the blank spaces. I love this idea though--a collage of cloud images on the wall: so pretty and creative!

{from Design Sponge, via Cup of Jo}

The Fuckit List

Michael Ian Black is my hero. Modern culture has tried to brainwash us into thinking we need a "Bucket List": 1,000 Places to See Before You Die; The 100,000 Books You Need to Read Before You Die; The 1 Million YouTube Clips You Absolutely Must See NOW.

Everyone's favorite deadpan comedian finally stood up and wondered, "What about the stuff we DON'T want to do before we die?". And that's where the Fuckit list was born.

On mine: Going to the Super Bowl, reading the Harry Potter series, sailing around the world, and going skiing. What's on yours?

Cheesus

The good people at Everything is Terrible put together this inspiring montage of your favorite savior sightings. Gives new meaning to finding God in all things...

Gig me

I've been craving a concert poster to hang in my apartment for months now, but every time I browse the web, I can't seem to find one that I love enough that's not sold out or too expensive.

Here are a few I'm dreaming of:



The Arcade Fire



The Decemberists



Frightened Rabbit (sidenote: We Were Promised Jetpacks is my new favorite band name)



Jens Lekman

*All images from GigPosters.