Randomly decided to listen to Gavin DeGraw's Chariot. It's been almost exactly 6 years since all of us girls from Shadowfax went to the House of Blues in Anaheim to see Maroon 5/Gavin DeGraw/Big City Rock. It was such a fun show. Still one of my all time faves out for nostalgic reasons.

Thus, this album reminds me of the easier and more carefree days of undergrad...especially the Shadowfax days. Those were some goods times.

Too bad my image of Gavin DeGraw was later tainted by the overall icky gross vibe I got from him when I saw him again in DC.

Thanksgiving came and went. It was a lot of fun. Spent Thanksgiving with Chris's family in Arcadia. Spent the rest of the weekend hanging around in Irvine. Irvine's a lot more fun when you're not studying for law school finals and can go wander around Orange County, but it was still a good weekend.

Now it's officially December, which means it's time to get even more serious about finals. Guh.

For anyone arguing in favor of James being a cute and adorable brother:

(11:17:04 AM) Alea: do you want to be my friend :D
(11:17:13 AM) coolstupiddude: hell to the no

Amazon put up its Best of 2009 list earlier this week.

Can someone explain to me why Metric (or Passion Pit) is higher than Grizzly Bear? I liked both of the albums, but they don't have anything to the awesomeness that was Veckatimest. Also, can someone explain why Lonely Island is in the top 50 and M.Ward's album isn't? That stupid boat song was the bane of my existence for like half of the year.

I'm limiting myself to grumbling about that.

Yay Sondre being #56 and #16 for song.

I'm done with App Ad (well except for the class we have on Monday). Hurrah for one less class to worry about! Oral argument yesterday went well, I think. I know I could have been a lot better maybe if I actually practiced in front of other people, but I got primarily good comments, so yay! Whatever, it's done.

And I must thank Jeanne, who saved my life...or shoes. For whatever reason, the two pairs of black flats that I rotate between have disappeared except for half of one pair. At 11 on Tuesday night, it seemed like a good idea to just wear my blue shoes and hope no one noticed. When I actually was dressed for the OA, I saw that I made a huge mistake. Fortunately, I actually now have a friend who wears the same shoe size as I do so I was able to borrow one of her shoes. Go that.

In my mind, the week is over because my OA is done. However, I've still got a preemption check/thesis due for journal that I've been working on cranking out.

I've also got four outlines/finals to contend with in my other classes. :(

On a completely unrelated note, I got the new Cave Singers album this weekend when Umma sent us to Rasputin so we wouldn't whine about her trip to Marshalls. I actually like their other album, Invitation Songs, more. However, Mia claims that this band sounds like gargling mermaids. Please confirm/deny this.

Halloween came and went very quickly. Now it's November, which means I need to start getting serious about outlining...once I survive my OA on Wednesday at least. This is, of course, assuming I don't get more sick than I seem to be now before Wednesday.

This semester has gone by way too fast.

I could write about a lot of things right now, but I'm going to write about Juliet Naked, the newest Nick Hornby book. I got it a week or so ago, but didn't get around to reading it until I had a long train ride to SF for the Treasure Island Music Festival (which was amazing, by the way). Since then, I've had a difficult time putting it down (or alloting as much time to it as a law student can allot to a non-law book).

Anyway, as you might have noticed, I fell way off track with that 50 books in a year thing. I mean, I got through a couple of other ones since the last one I posted about, but the momentum from earlier in the year has been missing. Part of this is because I now watch TV while I work out and that was my primary reading time. It was a good run, however, and I think it did get me to branch out to read a lot of books that I might not have read otherwise.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the book. I think it might float somewhere between A Long Way Down and About a Boy, if I had to rank it.

My problem is that the book just kind of stopped and left us with an ambiguous ending. I don't know anyone who's read it either, so it's going to drive me nuts until I find someone who's read it.

That's it. I'd go to bed now, but I have to wait for laundry to finish...And i told myself I'd start my IP outline today.

It's storming like crazy right now. This is good because we need the water. On the other hand, when I decided to try to take BART in, I took two steps before the umbrella broke by the wind and it took another minute before I was completely soaked. Like through all of the 4 shirts I was wearing today. Re-parked and made it to the station when I found out that I forgot the space number and could not pay for parking. I was frustrated by that time, so I decided to drive in until I ran into super traffic because of all the accidents and decided that if I was going to air conditioned classes all day in wet clothes, I'd probably catch something. I was also about to miss my first class. So I just went home and am now warm and will be studying for my midterm all day.

Also, interesting coincidence. I finally got around to emailing my KALSA 1L buddy. We totally went to UCI together and worked at TOP together. What a coincidence huh?

Bruce is going to town on one of my old flip flops. By that, I mean that he's been chewing on it of course. The strap's almost broken through so it's pretty much unwearable now, which is unfortunate because it's what I wear when I go outside in the backyard to play with him and no other shoes are around. I took it away from him. now he's sulking.

Anyway, I just got back from San Francisco. Late night. Went with Amanda and Dinah to see Rent play at the Curran. As in the worldwide tour with Adam Pascal and Anthony Rapp.



As cool as the thought of seeing Rent with THE Roger and Mark was, I also was kind of worried that they'd gotten too old for the roles. Not true. They were amazing. Much better live than in the movie too. The rest of the cast was phenomenal too. Rentheads are nuts, though. They went crazy over everything. Made for a fun experience.

I wanted to stay around the stage door to meet them. It was cold, super crowded, and we had to get back, we did not stay around. Sad.

They were amazing, though.

It was also really nice to see Amanda and Dinah again. I haven't seen Amanda in forever because she's been living the fun life in NY. I hadn't seen Dinah since we saw the Fleet Foxes last April. We were both home for the summer, so there was no excuse for that. It was fun hanging out.

I shall be listening to Rent on repeat for the next day or two, but next Sunday is TREASURE ISLAND, so I've got to start prepping for that :D

All right. Hoping to post here more often. I'm not feeling well so instead of lying around and doing nothing (rather than writing my brief), I'm going to post about the Sondre show. A short one as I have a brief to write and reading to do.

Saw Sondre Lerche on Sunday. Promoting his latest album, Heartbeat Radio. Amazing album. I missed him last year when he was at the Great American Music Hall because he was playing the second day of school and I didn't know anyone to go with. Did want to miss it this time around, so I got two tickets and said Chris would go as default. But because I didnt' want to drag Chris because he usually puts a damper on things like that, so I ended up getting Yaeri to go with me.

Anyway, drove into the city and picked her up from the Tower. Drove to the parking garage near the Great American Music Hall. I had no idea how the cheap tickets for the GAMH worked, so we wandered around for a while asking everyone until someone at the movie theater told us we validate it at the venue. Fair enough.

We got to the GAMH around 7:30 and it was kind of awkward. So they do this thing there where you can get dinner before the show for a more expensive ticket. The one other time that I went there was for the Noise Pop festival so we didn't really experience it. But it was kind of weird coming into the venue and seeing all of these tables with people eating. And the security guards were like super anal about it too because they were more expensive tickets. So if you even thought about getting near the tables they were on top of you.

The show starts and it's still like that. People are eating and us cheapos are lined up behind the tables. This left a super awkward floor space in the front. It was kind of awkward. Anyway, other than that, the opening act, JBM was really good. I really enjoyed his set and was kind of sad that I wasn't closer to the stage for it.



Also he was kind of cool because he was playing guitar and drums at once. That's a level of multitasking that I will never attain because I can barely play the drums on Rock Band. ...among other things.



Great set in general.

After he finished, we grumbled a little more about the whole table set up until Sondre went on stage. He started with Good Luck, which is a great song. I'm pretty sure that's what got me through OCI. Haha.



Once he finished the song, he said that there was too much empty floor space in front of him, so Yaeri and I rushed the stage and got pretty front and center spots. As in we were front and center. As in we were within spitting distance. It was nice.

Anyway, trying to keep this short because I have a brief to be writing, so let's do highlights.

x he's got an amazing voice

x he puts on an amazing show

x unplugged rendition of two way monologue





MVI_9751.AVI


x did mostly songs from heartbeat radio, but he did a lot of songs from two way monologues and faces down. he also did one song from phantom punch. nothing from duper sessions though.

x he did words and music

good show over all












after the show we stood in the line to meet him. never mind the fact that i'd met him twice before but i got kind of star struck this time around. ... it was a really good show.



i also got jbm's album because i really liked him.

on the way back to the car, some girl stopped me and asked me why i knew all the songs he performed. ...they were on all of his albums except for the one cover he did, so i don't see why i wouldn't have known them. it was a strange question and an awkward moment because i wasn't sure why she was watching me and not him. i just responded with an awkward laugh. wasn't sure how else i was supposed to respond to that.

anyway, it was a great show and I can't wait for the next time he rolls around this part of the country.

I haven't posted here in a long time. After we got back from Korea things got super hectic with school starting and OCI and everything. 2L in general has been a very hectic year and I'm waiting for some breathing room.

I did see the Dodos last Friday at amoeba. that was fun. And Sondre on Sunday!

I just wanted to hop on with the hope that i'd get back into this and also to comment about how Gossip Girl's portrayal of college students is just a tad off-base. College students do not generally turn down free sushi and alcohol, especially when the other option is to watch a documentary about a local garden. of course, if you haven't seen the episode, this doesn't make sense to you.

I got a new car this weekend because Gianni is stealing the CRV. 2008 Hyundai Accent. I'll post a picture maybe.