Yay, holiday season! I’m on a three week break from school, and Christmas is soon approaching. I’ve made cute little mugs of candy as gifts for my friends. They’re easy to make. You just need to arrange the following:

• A Christmas Mug
• Peppermint Patties (in the bottom)
• Giant Christmas Kit Kat Bar
• Skittles or M&M Tins, containing their respective candies
• 2 Sweet Tart Candy Canes

And you’ve got yourself an affordable and enjoyable gift for many people. I think this also sort of counts for one thing my list of 101 Things to do in 1001 Days; #28. Make Christmas presents. This counts, right? Sure….

It is my hope that everyone enjoys this holiday season. (And really… who can’t have a nice time with all the pretty snow, music, lights, and happy friends and family about them? If you can’t, you are a grinch. And I’ll call you out on it!)

A note to Santa: I would like my own Santa Hat this season so I don’t have to Photoshop one onto my head each year. (P.S. I’ve been a very good girl.)

Happy Chrismahanukwanzakah!

~Ellen

So my first week home from college and I drive over 350 miles around the state. I knew I was going to be in the car for a long time, and I knew I didn’t want to listen to my brother’s music the whole time which is made up of a lot of Weezer and Phish. (We share the car.) So, thinking in advance, I cooked up a mix CD to put in the car. The mix is as follows:

I have to say, it’s been a very good driving mix and I’ve gone through it about ten times by now. Not sick of it yet. I’m thinking of making a second one as well… my brother can spare some more space in that 6-CD changer for another CD of mine. Hehe.

Nor is it strep. Symptoms said strep. My mom said strep. The clinician even said strep, though the rapid test came back negative. They sent in labs and days later, once I was better, they called and said, “Nope! Not strep!” Thanks, I had no idea. Hah.

Anyway, so that was the last half of my week. Spent skipping non-essential classes to sleep 10-13 hours a day and drink five or six refills of my aluminum water bottle. My reward, not having to do homework, and making a full recovery by the time I had to go see my parents and go to a play.

Oh! Something interesting now, you say? Yes, I saw a play. My family and some guests went to see The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. It is a Broadway musical, though somewhat lesser known. My critique is it was very good and enjoyable. Quite funny and cute, with good music and an interesting twist of some audience participation! If you have seen this musical, or know of it, then I will tell you, my favorite character was Leaf Coneybear because he has cats. Don’t worry. That’s not a spoiler if you have not seen the musical. Just an inside joke. Hehe.

Well, back to my continuing hectic work week. All my final project deadlines are coming up very soon, so I’ve got a lot to finish. Good luck to me!

In some rare occasions, a song strikes my ear in an amazing way, and makes me listen to it’s every instrument, chord, and lyric with such rapture that my imagination explodes and creates an instant animated music video in my head. Recently, one of these visions even lent itself to become a poem.

In my scramble to write down the words that came to me, I opened a web page and started writing. I got it all typed down and I copied it to my clipboard but somehow between opening a new document to save it and closing the web page, I lost it.  And to my dismay, there is no clipboard history (there really should be) so it was completely gone.

Now, thanks to modern technology I was able to buy the song from iTunes via my iPod Touch and listen to it on repeat while writing what I remembered of the poem on paper this time. I also ended up skipping my boring science class to do this. Well worth it I think. Later, I went back and did my usual editing process with about three different revisions which brought it to where it is now.

Click the link to listen to the song that inspired this all while you read the poem.

Welcome Home, Son by Radical Face

Lovers and a Pretty Song

When you hear a pretty song,
it’s like getting an unexpected hug from behind
by an unexpected lover.
You look up and smile at their face
and you see yourself, brighter than before.
They smile back and you feel warmer,
as you forget your fears from yesterday.
“Welcome home,” they whisper.
And there’s a new smile on your face
as you examine your radical feelings inside.
And the choir remains singing,
as the invisible lover leaves your back,
leaving you with their breath on your neck
and their imaginary scent,
drifting from memory.

When you hear that pretty song,
it’s like getting an unexpected hug from behind
by an invisible lover.
You look up and smile at the cloudy sky
and see your day, brighter than before.
The sun smiles back and you feel warm
as you forget the fears from yesterday.
“Welcome home,” the wind seems to whisper.
And there’s a smile on your face
as you look at the radical new colors in your world.
And the choir remains to sing
as the invisible lover leaves your back,
leaving you with the breeze on your neck
and the effervescent scent of summer,
drifting away.

So in my morning art class, we spent the last half of the class just sitting in a circle and listening to remixes of the song Reckoner by Radiohead on this website.

What Radiohead did was provide all the studio tracks, bass, lead vocals, backing vocals, guitar, piano/strings and drums, and create their own mix and resubmit it. Then you could vote on which one you like best and the band members will also listen to them.

I find this to be a really neat idea. Just the idea of taking an original piece of music and changing it and warping the sound to make a new song while also keeping enough intact enough that you can recognize the original song it came from, that’s just really cool.

And interesting contrast with the idea of change. I just really liked how it make me think and I enjoyed the website and the music, so check it out! radioheadremix.com