it's been one week, vol. 5

Happy longest day of the year! Last year it was sweltering, but this week has been beautiful and mild. I took a little coffee break in Madison Square park the other day on my way back down from midtown. Pretty perfect, I must say.

Aside from listening to Yeezus, and being inadvertently sucked into having an interest in the Stanley Cup Finals, this week brought us:

- There's now a super awesome mosaic of David Bowie outside of the Rag & Bone store on Elizabeth St. It's made up of the lyrics to Heroes and Fashion.

- CHVRCHES played The Mother We Share, which is my favorite song of theirs, live on Jimmy Fallon the other night. Maybe they've just been playing She's All That too much on tv lately, but she reminds me of a (doe-eyed elf version of) Rachel Leigh Cook.

- How did I not know about MØ before? I was catching up on some of my music blog reading, and I had skipped over all the coverage on them previously. For shame, because now I'm obsessed. Their first album will be out this fall! Check out their Yours Truly performance:

and, their new video for "Waste of Time" (which I enjoy, minus the snake...) :
- Pitchfork finally released the set times for the festival which is now less than a month away!! Of course, the things my friends and I want to see overlap and we'll have to make some annoying choices. The biggest being, do we want to have an R. Kelly dance party, or a crazy TNGHT dance party on Sunday night? Choices, gah! At least I'll be free to watch Foxygen...if I get there at the stupidly early time they're on.

- Finally, I'm a bit surprised by how sad I was about James Gandolfini's death. Not that it is unwarranted, but my connection to him was not even so deep -- I wasn't a big watcher of The Sopranos (though my dad was and would talk about it all the time), but it was very sudden and untimely.

hello again, hellogoodbye

Today on Design*Sponge there is a combination of two of my favorite things: music and home tours. They have a feature on the home of Forrest Kline of Hellogoodbye, and his wife Chelsea whose event company is called Hello Gem (I sense a trend). Aside from it being a beautifully decorated house, it prompted me to immediately open up Hellogoodbye in Spotify and realize that they had released an album last year which completely missed my radar. They were one of the first bands I had in my iTunes back in highschool (when iTunes was still a new thing!) and their EP was possibly the first that I owned exclusively in a digital format. They followed me to college where I have a really strong association to driving around Ithaca with my roommates listening to Here (In Your Arms).

The home tour includes seeing the permanent location of the gallery wall that is featured on last year's Would It Kill You?

I also really love their mix of bedding, and a painting they made themselves:

you're all right

Happy Valentine's Day! This holiday isn't particularly important, but I love it in a very not-taking-it-seriously way. I've always been a fan of going overboard and wearing a ridiculous amount of red and pink clothing and giving my friends silly cards or cookies (or senior year of high school when I made the craziest heart-shaped pink layer cake surrounded by chocolate-covered strawberries). To be fair though, many days in my life look like a Valentine's Day costume because I have red jeans (which I wore yesterday) and two red coats.

This year I launched a shop on Society6 of drawings/cards (one of which you can see above). And of course, I also made you this mix of things I've been listening to lately. because I love puns, and I love these songs/bands/artists.

like glue holding each of us together

I have been sucked into a wormhole of design blogs and heart-ing things on Tumblr and Pinterest. It's an endless loop gluing me to the internet. The problem with these kinds of blogs, as opposed to music blogs, is that when you see something you like it is generally much more difficult to acquire it. It fills my head with ideas about large-scale projects and DIYs and redecorating (and just generally lusting after architecturally amazing places that will never be mine). When I find something I like on a music blog, I can download it or re-stream it a million times until I've been satisfied.

The rest of my free time has been spent trolling Craigslist and realty agency websites, toying with the idea of moving. So far all I've learned is that I probably have a good thing going here, even if sometimes it seems like my apartment wants to fall apart at the seams and my buzzer ringing is going to give me a heartattack one day. If I do stay, I have a lot of plans for how to make this space less cluttered. It unfortunately involves buying some new things (shelves, etc) but that's still cheaper than the painstaking process of moving so I guess I'd come out on top.

I'm less than a week away, though, from (hopefully!) buying a new bike. I really hope something catches my eye at the Jumble this weekend - so many of the images that have burned themselves into my brain this past week have been of bikes and cute things related to them:

[images via: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

so american

It's barely even spring, and lately all I can think about is summer. The free shows are being announced, I've got my ticket to Newport Folk Fest, and I've shoved all my boots and heavy coats into the back of the closet. Come on, sunshine and warm weather! Summer in America is bookended by two patriotic holidays, with the big one tucked in the middle. Everything gets all red, white, and blue and barbecued. Coachella makes the rest of the country jealous not only for having a stellar lineup, but also because it was basically a summer preview (90 degrees?! seriously??) Everywhere I turn, I see hints of summertime americana...

clockwise from top left: Kate Bosworth at Coachella, pants from Anthropologie, Sea of Shoes, Royal Tenenbaums

plus, now, a clip from the next Portugal. The Man album being released this summer, with an oh-so-appropriate tune:

This week has kind of flown by. I'm hatching lots of new plans, including reviving my Etsy shop, and dropping off my compostable refuse at the Greenmarket this weekend. In addition, here are a few other tidbits:

Things I did:

* After reading a tweet by @ohjoystudio, I knew immediately that I had to go make myself some Cuban potato balls. They're pretty tasty, though I think I undersalted the potatoes. I'm seriously considering making some for Passover, substituting matzo meal for the breadcrumbs. I think it will be a really good alternative to what I normally end up eating.

* Spent way too much time on tumblr (seriously, I took a long break from looking at tumblr because it was so overwhelming, but I've been sucked back in). Happened across this band, The Dogs, described as being a cross between Belle and Sebastian and Pains of Being Pure at Heart, though after listening to their bandcamp page, I'd go with more of the latter. They're Chicago-based, and one of them is related to teen fashion blogging sensation Tavi. If you like the brand of indie pop that Pains do so well, you'll probably like these guys, too.

(something about their name, and maybe a little of their sound, but more that they're from Chicago, reminds me of highschool when I loved The Dog and Everything).

Things I want:

* Are there no Girl Scouts in NYC? Seriously, though, I have never encountered a single Girl Scout and somehow cookies magically appear every so often. But not this year. :'( I think I may have to take matters into my own hands by trying out this recipe for Samoas (or as we Chicagoans know them, Caramel Delights). (tipped via Cup of Jo)

via Band of Outsiders - I want to be at this sunny tea party! Someone pull me up a 3rd chair!

don't try to hide it fight it

(image via 20x200)

My little musical heart has been overwhelmed in the last few days. Two great album releases today (The Dodos and Noah & the Whale), full streaming of the new Strokes album, and a really beautiful song from The National.


No Color is only $2.99 today on Amazon! A serious serious steal. It has ass-kicking drums, vocals from Neko Case, and is overall a really solid album. If I could put stars next to the songs that I'm seriously in love with, you'd pretty much have to listen to the whole thing.


Last Night On Earth is more cheerful than The First Days of Spring was (thank goodness), but it still offers the same type of lyrical narrative that can be universally understood. I'm really looking forward to their show next week.  So far I'm really attached to "L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N.", "Just Me Before We Met" and "The Line."


The newest song from The National is for a new Paul Giamatti movie, Win Win.

(via PMA)

tee hee hee

image via The Pursuit Aesthetic

i'm not a box - there are more than 4 sides to me

My desktop rotates images every 30 minutes.  Here is what I will aptly call, the blue section:

May 25, 2010 newsflash: a hopeless endeavor? no.  sometimes, like today, the rhino succeeds.


 image credit:
*can't remember which blog i pulled this off of
SKYplay
20x200
threadless