No shopping for me today, I hate crowds and Black Friday is basically my idea of hell, so I am ensconced in my house on this very gray November day. I have a bunch of things I'd like to do -- clean, write, make turkey soup -- but apparently I am screwing around on the Internet and having an impromptu Michael Pitt film festival, Murder by Numbers and now Last Days. I may go out to the gym and the drugstore later, but maybe not.

It's that time of year, and I love to send holiday cards, so if you'd like one, please give me your address! (Even if you think I have it -- I just moved and am still having trouble finding some things.)

Poll #1491161 Holiday Cards
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 17

Name:

Address:

Address:

Address:

I just set the out of office assistant message on my work email and so I'm officially off work till Tuesday! Very excited, I'm looking forward to relaxing. Usually I make a fancy side dish to take to my dad's -- his wife makes the big dinner -- but this year I'm bringing a nice bottle of wine as my contribution. I like to cook but I've been cooking a lot and am looking forward to a little break; I'd make a dessert but we have pies we get from the farmer's market in a 20+ year tradition, so dessert-making will have to wait till xmas. I've had a lot going on, and will continue to, so I'm just taking it easy this weekend. Tomorrow I'm going to see An Education, and I'm hoping to see at least one more movie this weekend, and Monday my sister and I have a yearly tradition of going Christmas shopping on the Monday after Thanksgiving.

In other news, I really liked the little video empires posted -- I'm excited for more music! Also, just glad to hear more from them. Certain other bands could take note, I'm just saying.

Dear Yuletide Writer --

I pretty much covered everything that's important to me in my sign-up, but just in case:

( The Wire )
( RPF - Hip-hop, Beyonce Knowles, Jay-Z )
( The Like )

Here's a post about some things I find romantic in stories -- although absolutely no need to write anything romantic if you're not feeling it, I'd be very happy with gen for any of these, especially The Wire.

Thanks so much!

I mostly hung around the house today, except for running out for a pumpkin latte. I walked for two miles, did not rake my lawn, cleaned the whole house, and filed a bunch of papers relating to money and the house. I also made a sausage ragout for dinner and am now sitting around drinking a pumpkin ale and working on the popoffacork matches. That should mix well with alcohol -- you might want to double check those assignments when you get them! I kid, I kid, I would never do something so important unless I was sober as a judge.

Today is new (to me) music Sunday chez jae -- I purchased three albums I've been wanting for a while: The Gaslight Anthem, Sink or Swim, b/c I've been loving The 59 Sound for forever and they were great in concert and I'm hoping to see them again in December; The Mountain Goats, The Life of the World to Come, b/c I have been wanting it for a while; and The Avett Brothers, I and Love and You, b/c I am a wretched hipster. Or really, b/c they've been playing a song i love on XPN and that I remembered that that is basically how I found two groups I love, The Hold Steady and The Gaslight Anthem, from getting obsessed with a song I heard on XPN. (Also, I do sometimes like bands without the word The in their names.)

Fall back means I'm up early and well-rested, which is a nice change. It's a very gray and somewhat chilly day here, and I am thinking about lazing about the house for most of the day, doing some cleaning, maybe starting a new book. I have to do the matchups for popoffacork sometime today, which will take me a while -- I think we have more people than we've had before but I haven't really done a good count.

Halloween was crazy in my little town yesterday. I was kind of bummed b/c it was my aunt's surprise birthday party yesterday, smack in the middle of the day, and my dad wanted me to go but I thought I'd miss trick-or-treaters at my house. Then when I tried to leave at around 5:30 (I was there since 2!) my other aunt was all, She's about to open presents, you can't leave! and I had to hang around for another hour. I love my family, but these things that start at 2 kill my whole day, as it takes me over an hour to drive there. But when I came home there was still tons of stuff going on -- tons and tons of kids & parents on the streets ,and all the old Victorian houses were all decorated as haunted houses, with lights and fake fog and scary music. It was really fun! Of course, half an hour later it started to rain really hard so I still have a ton of candy.

Since I was going to South Jersey anyway yesterday I stopped at the farmer's and got some really delicious-looking, really large winesaps, just picked, and a big butternut squash.

Last two days to sign up for popoffacork! Signups close on Friday night!

First thought of my three-day weekend: trixiesfic linked to new music by Greta Salpeter, which I really liked, and suggested it sounds like she could tour with The Young Veins. The only thing that would make that better is if it were a three-band tour w/empires, and I don't just say that because I would read the hell out of a Jon/Tom/Greta threesome. Well, maybe 50% that's the reason.

One more week to sign up for popoffacork!

Impromptu three-day weekend starts now. I'm so glad.

popoffacork sign-ups are now open! Sign ups will be open till Friday, October 30th, so if you'd like to participate this year, go here and go ahead and sign up!

I can't believe it's the middle of October already! And it feels like the middle of November here. Anyway, someone asked me about this, and as it is that time of year, thought I'd see if people wanted to do the popoffacork New Year's story swap again!


Poll #1472253
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 34

New year's story swap?

Anything else you want to say?

In other news, I have been so busy, mostly with good things happily, for what seems like forever that I'm exhausted. Tonight I'm going to hang out in my sweatpants and eat some sushi and catch up on my TV. Project Runway and Top Chef are waiting for me. More to come.

popoffacork writers have been revealed!

I knew, of course, that templemarker wrote my wonderful Jon/Tom story, [half-spent], but now the rest of the world can know too.

I wrote a Jon/Tom story myself, [never be done] for frausorge.

Thanks so much to everyone who participated, writers and readers!

I am not in school and have no kids in school but September after Labor Day always makes me feel like it's a new year starting. I'm getting back on my schedule -- I put in a huge push to get moved and now I feel like I've been lazy so I need to get back on track. I started back at pilates class at the gym tonight, and am going to class tomorrow as well. I baked some banana bread, and this week I have to do something about my yard, which is approaching neighbor-scandalizing state, and hang curtains (I got them up in the living room and have been resting on my laurels).

I am so glad the popoffacork stories are up, and not just b/c I don't have to post all those stories again! I am looking forward to reading them -- I was up way too late last night, and tonight I took a nap between work and the gym, but I am going to read them all. I have, of course, read the story written for me, [half-spent] (and I admit to cheating a little and exercising the organizer's prerogative and reading it when it was first submitted), which is an awesome Jon/Tom story with so many of my favorite things, including a kind of dirty domesticity between them that I just love with this pairing. They're my favorites -- I don't know how the writer guessed, she must be psychic.

The popoffacork summer swap stories are live! 34 stories for your enjoyment! Go and read!

Calling all pinch hitters! popoffacork needs someone who can write Fallout Boy and someone who can write Panic. If you'd like to write a story (I need it by Sunday), please email me at jaesepha at gmail and I'll send you the details of the request and you can let me know if you can do it. Thanks so much!

Buying and moving into a house is awesome! And stressful! And expensive! And awesome! I am finally -- and precariously -- back online, and comcast has only been out to my house three times and is coming again tomorrow. I am 80% unpacked, and the rest is pictures for the walls, and books & stuff that goes on my bookshelves -- I jettisoned a bunch of my old crappy bookshelves. I moved in 95 degree heat, and my family are American (and in the case of my brother-in-law, Ghanaian) heroes, and I am very very thankful to be part of a family in which women are considered full equals in everything except the carrying of heavy things. My big moving day fear was that my couch would be a big problem -- it took us an hour to move it into my narrow-halled apartment, and at one point it was jammed in the hallway, suspended in the air without touching the floor while we all stared at it in despair. But my brother & brother-in-law got it out of the apartment in like ten minutes. The whole move took less than 3 hours, including loading the truck, driving 45 minutes, and unloading. Today I bought a gorgeous dining room table and chairs marked down $200 at the Crate and Barrel outlet, also a floor lamp and curtains. My yard is next on the list -- I don't think the previous owners did a single thing to it since I signed the contract at the very end of May, but it's been too hot to deal with this week. The thing about moving into a house is that you instantly get like a million new projects, and need tons of new furniture. I keep having adrenaline surges where I accomplish huge feats, and then crashing (today I almost melted down in Ikea over nothing). I almost teared up looking at my gorgeous orange kitchen once it was all unpacked. The whole thing is pretty exciting.

I have been offline for several days so tell me if I missed anything!

Some top fives:

( Top 5 actual photographs of Tomrad )

( Top 5 moments with Omar Little (spoilers!) )

I spent all day yesterday painting painting, and now I have to spend today packing packing (I took a break to go to a movie), with more to do tomorrow. Feel free to distract me:

Ask me my fannish Top Fives. Any top fives. Doesn't matter what, really! And I will answer them all in a new post.

[Morning After]
Panic!, The Young Veins. Four mornings, four drabbles, four views of a break-up. 4 x 100 words.

( Morning After )

I had an 8-hour bus trip today to DC and back for our homeless advocacy group's congressional reception, and when I came home I was rewarded with new music!

About a week or so ago I was driving somewhere and I actually said out loud to myself in the car, "Look, Ryan and Jon's band's name is going to be horrible, you just need to accept that and move on." But it's not -- it's totally livable! I mean, it's not super-fantastic, but I have absolutely no desire to shoot myself in the head upon hearing it! (My standards are low, I admit.) I was also worried about the song; it reminded me of how before empires came out with their stuff I was all worried that it would be bad and thinking, "please, just let it be mediocre, I can totally live with mediocre." And of course it was much better! That was a little different b/c I had no clue what Tom would come up with, while Ryan & Jon have had many opportunities to give me clues.

( the verdict )
And what I really like are the extra-subtle titles of these singles. New Perspective! Change! I look forward to both bands' second singles, which totally coincidentally will both be named, "Here's the New Song by My New Band that's Totally Different From Anything We Did Before! Really!" I'm actually looking forward to the second songs from each group -- I feel like both first songs are a little weighted down with the fact that they're not the old panic anymore, whether it's our own interpretation of the songs or their own commentary (and I think it's a little of both, really). So I'd really like to hear what each of them create without that baggage.

One last thing ( about Ryan Ross )