Making: Working on the layouts for the two Friendship Star quilts. Also making a mini quilt out of leftover squares. But doesn’t look like there’ll be much time this weekend for it so we’ll see if I get anything done.
Reading: Just about finished with “A Complicated Kindness” by Miriam Toews, the book that swept Canada. (Pretty sure I bought this in London last January – when Alison posted about it this summer, it bumped itself higher on my TBR list…). I’m less than one El ride from finishing. Uh oh! Better figure out what I’m going to read next!
Watching: Wow, I loved both Bones and Life this week although I haven’t posted to the TV blog about either one yet. And I’m definitely seeing at least one movie this weekend although I’m not sure which one yet. Next week I’ve got tickets to two oldies (Peter Watkins-directed “Punishment Park” and Nicolas Roeg-directed “Walkabout”) that are showing as part of the Chicago Arts & Humanities festival.
Listening: I’m listening to Stars because I’m going to see them tomorrow night, along with some other random singles, and the soundtrack to Control which I went to see for a second time the other night.
Category Archives: Currently
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
…currently I am supposed to be working on my French homework. Bygones…
Making: Got back into the swing o’ the Friendship Stars this week (click on ‘blog’ above to check ’em out should you so desire). Hopefully this weekend I will at least be done with all the individual blocks I need so I can start trying out layouts.
Reading: A somewhat philosophical story about a girlhood friendship gone wrong, “The Myth of You and Me” by Leah Stewart. I’m really into it.
Watching: I’ve barely watched TV so far this week, can you believe it? Worked three nights in a row, then a concert, and tonight French. Oh sweet monkey sundae, am I going to be busy with the TIVO on my comp day tomorrow…
Listening: To three somewhat melancholy boys, although not as melancholy as some. Joshua James “The Sun Is Always B…” [my iPod is only telling me that much of the album name, too funny]: I’m really diggin the first few songs; the new Graham Colton “Flying Upside Down”: I enjoy a lot of it, but it gets a bit twangy; and the new Joe Purdy “Take My Blanket and Go”. Is Joe Purdy the new Ryan Adams or what? Dude puts out a new album every other week it seems. They’re all really lovely. Each one has a major tearjerker. Remember that song “Wash Away” that was on Lost a long time ago that I used to talk about constantly? (If you get mixes from me, you have it.) This album’s “one of those” is “Sinkin’ Low.” Soooo pretty. SO! Oh and also really diggin’ some songs from Mr. Hudson & the Library “A Tale of Two Cities”, particularly their “On the Street Where You Live” cover. Brilliant!! Thanks, MG!
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Still nothing. I should probably just delete this stupid category!!
Reading: Not what I expected to pick up next but have gotten sucked into “The Rain Before It Falls” by Jonathan Coe. Big fan of Coe, his writing just invites you in… Right now in the “epistolary” section where Rosamond has dictated onto tape her memories of her cousin Beatrix and herself, focused by photographs from the past…
Watching: Just caught up on Gossip Girl which I hadn’t been watching (thank you iTunes). Frivolous but fun. LonelyBoy Dan Humphrey is my new crush! (He was born the year I graduated high school! Wince!) Planning to see Michael Clayton this afternoon…before rushing home for FNL of course.
Listening: To lots of Joy Division and New Order and The Replacements and old, old U2 and the Cocteau Twins and The Smiths, among others, as recent viewing of Control has sent me back in the day. Or, as one of my friends likes to call it, I’ve been “College-ing It Out”.
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Still nothing.
Reading: Realized I have two Jake Arnott books on the to-be-read shelf but couldn’t remember enough about the book that came before them…so back I went for a reread of #1: “The Long Firm” by Jake Arnott, ’60s mob scene in swingin’ London. Given the boarding pass stuck inside, looks like I bought and read this one back in 2004. (Yup, looks like it.) Still really enjoying it the second time around.
Watching: Lots of TV. Plus have already been to…four movies at the Chicago Film Festival (1, 2, 3 and #4 not reviewed yet) and have tickets to two more (a documentary about jump rope competitions (!!) today and the Joy Division biopic on Tuesday)…
Listening: The new Band of Horses. Over and over. Not anything else really.
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Fucking nothing. That’s right, NOTHING.
Reading: So my dad and I had this conversation about how we both just lovelovelove Slightly Foxed but we were both falling behind in reading it because every time you read it, you spend half the time you’re reading it running around looking for books in your “library” you’ve forgotten about and figuring out if you have that book by that author or some other book and going and buying more books because now it’s reminded you of a book…. Yeah and our ultimate conclusion to this long conversation was that sometimes you just have to read them to enjoy reading what they’re saying about things and NOT let yourself get into a frenzy of adding more and more things to your to-be-read pile. So last week I read the last four issues. And then I was at loose ends. OH NO. What to do. Then the Miracle Man came to visit from Hong Kong yesterday and we wandered by a bookstore and Holy Shit, Haven Kimmel has a new book out! Why didn’t anyone tell me??? So yeah. Now I’m reading “The Used World” by Haven Kimmel.
Watching: Fucking boatloads of fresh fall TV. Boatfuckingloads, I tell you.
Listening: New albums from bands I have loved awhile now: Athlete, The Thrills, Rogue Wave. The awesomely atmospheric Eddie Vedder soundtrack. New albums from James Blunt and Kanye (I like this one more and more the more I listen to, although I still agree with my initial thoughts that it’s not as joyful)… Of course, Ben Harper hasn’t left the rotation. New boys like Jeremy Fisher. New (to me) girls like Meiko, and Maria Taylor, and Sara Bareille…
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Same as last week, although I do have something on the blocking board I may get to sometime this week. Maybe…Quilting friendship star blocks. Knitting socks.
Reading: “Love Walked In” by Marisa de los Santos. I’m just about done though. I would be done if I hadn’t had to stand on the train this morning, and then things got all herky jerky and I fell into someone’s lap (no joke!) and was too embarrassed to pull out a book after that because what if it happened again and my book went flying and hit someone in the head or something….
Watching: Premieres! Yay! So far this week watched Heroes, Bones, Reaper (LOVED!), Chuck, 1/2 of Journeyman (hopefully I’ll finish that tonight), and the second episode of K-Ville. Still have House premiere and current episode of Damages on the DVR menu. More premieres to come tonight. Yay!
Listening: Nothing I haven’t mentioned here already…. my 1, 2, 3 albums so far this year The National, Okkervil River, Earlimart, new stuff from Kanye and Josh Ritter and James Blunt, and lots of French rap…. and Hard Fi “Once Upon a Time in the World” which I bought on a total whim the other night and really like! Rock/punk/FUN!
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Quilting friendship star blocks. Knitting socks.
Reading: Reading a multiple-movie-references book “Don’t Make a Scene” by Valerie Block. Looks like chick lit from the outside, but rises above it. Enjoying it!
Watching: Heroes season 1 on DVD (wow I like it so much better than I liked it when I tried to watch it in real-time last year. what’s up with that). And the only show that’s premiered so far (on my list anyway): K-Ville.
Listening: New stuff I bought yesterday and stuff I bought last week and stuff I bought in Belgium and Common who I’m going to see tomorrow night and The National who I’m going to see Saturday night…I’ve got a crazy mix of things going on right now.
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
Making: Focusing on Friendship Star blocks this week. With the hope of maybe possibly finishing those before I die…
Reading: I’m sorta lazily reading a magical mystery “Storm Front” by Jim Butcher while I am also devouring the trade paperbacks of the Runaways comics (just in time to read the new ones being written by Joss Whedon!)… I’ve read a lot of great books recently, I wanted a little breather while I am still running over them in my mind…
Watching: Summer season finales (The Closer, yay; Rescue Me, starting to bore me; Saving Grace, so much better than people realize; Damages, I don’t love it that much) and obsessing over Season 1 of Friday Night Lights (yeah NOW I’m obsessing. Before? That was nothing!) before the season 2 premiere on October 5. Now I actually have a happy reason to be home on Friday nights. Yay!
Listening: Lots of new stuff on my plate, but also really on a “The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter” kick today. He’s bringing all sorts of other folk to mind (first song Bob Dylan, “Right Moves” makes me think of Bob Seger [especially the chorus!], some songs Bruce Springsteen, some Leonard Cohen)… Rollicking, good humored, meandering… I’m enjoying it.
Protected: À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
À la Super Eggplant, currently, I am…
I mean to do a “currently” post every week. Every week. And then…I just don’t. Ah well.
Making: Working on two Friendship Star quilts, and just started a strippy pinwheel for a little five year old girl who refers to me as Aunt Carolyn although there’s no blood tie there.
Reading: Uh oh. I just finished my book on the way home. I am not reading ANYTHING right this second, can you believe it. But I’m figuring out what to take on vacation with me on Saturday. Right now “Seven Types of Ambiguity” by Elliot Perlman is at the top of the list. Ginger’s been recommending it to me and finally she just up and sent it to me for my last birthday. So I guess I’d better get to it. It’s nice and thick, I figured that way I only have to pack the ONE book!
Watching: The Closer is the only summer series I’ve been able to consistently watch (have just LOVED the last few eps!). The TIVO keeps filling up with the others (Rescue Me, Damages, Saving Grace), and I just keep not watching them, although I think I’m almost caught up with Psych. I’m also watching Miracles, some weird show that starred with Skeet Ulrich. It’s got a LOT of religious wishy washy psychobabble crap in it though so I don’t know if my crush will be enough to get me through all four discs. I really want to see Transformers (yes, I KNOW but I DO) and maybe the new Die Hard, but I can’t seem to get to the theater…
Listening: Hilarious live album from Matt Nathanson, new tunes from Common (mellower than I expected), Carla Bruni (it’s weird, poems by Wordsworth, Dickinson, etc. put to music), Okkervil River (LOVE it! v. fun!), and the old but only so far album by Rhymefest, who I really liked at Lollapalooza.