lockhart steele has part 1 of his LES year-in-review thang. i am quoted...and edited! the horror! in addition to making many funnies, lock reveals the joyous news that swim has closed. ever since my run-in with the nasty little lame-o owner who thought his stupid bar was cool enough to have a line outside when the place was half empty, i have been praying for its demise. huzzah! part 2 will be up tomorrow.

mai tais are evil. my birthday is finally over. the karaoke party could not have been better. that was a genius idea of mine. i sang what i'm sure all present will agree to have been superior versions of "i think we're alone now" and "tell it to my heart," as well as (i'm told) an appropriately sloppy version of "i love rock 'n' roll." other highlights: some out-of-control old chinese dyke felt up tamar; i gave several lap dances and broke my phone; the sheer deliciousness of the aforementioned mai tais. and of course the "surprise" appearance of cormi and john and mugsy, who made the trek from delaware. cormi has hee-larious pics of the exact moment of surprise as well as some of my spectacular performance over at the pulpy. for those of you who did not get a chance to sing, we will be rocking the 'roke AGAIN at the home office on 12/31, probably late late late-night. let me know if your invite got lost in the email.

and then yesterday, the day i turned glorious 28, i ate breakfast burritos with holly and nate and tamar. guacamole=good. then i went shopping for records and kiehl's products and new cell-phone antennas, then had dinner with eileen at la caverna, the weird new italian place done up like a cave. it's weird, to be sure, but that lobster ravioli was damn good. and i'm still thinking about the garlic bread. later eileen and i made out in front of my apartment (okay, that's a lie), and it was a perfect end to the birthdaze.

christmas? it was good. it was a very lord of the rings christmas, oddly. i watched the second one on dvd on christmas eve, the extended cut even, and liked it. on christmas night we played the lord of the rings version of monopoly. weird. and then the boys dragged me to see "return of the king" on boxing day, and i kind of loved it. loved it! it was captivating for all three and a half hours. thoughts: are hobbits gay? is gandalf perhaps a member of NAMBLA? also, did anyone else identify with that poor scrappy blonde chick, the one who (kind of) professed her love for aragorn, then had to hear him say, "i can't give you what you want," only to have him turn around and get with weepy, boring liv tyler, who doesn't even speak, let alone lop the heads off of flying dragons? sheesh.

having a christmas birthday, at least this year, meant a ton of good-ass loot, including a new stereo to replace my ailing one; a 70-year-old sewing machine so i can get even craftier; not one but two toaster ovens, one of which was returned in favor of a candy-colored orange bag (mmm, bags); a lamp with not one but five goosenecks; bright pink rubber rain boots; a fancy coppery evening bag; a cool gig poster.... i just love all my new stuff. i can't help it. precious!

pitchfork's top 50 albums of 2003. they picked the rapture for their #1 (pass that barf bag). they also used the phrase "emo's shiny weblog" in their review of the wrens cd. emo's shiny weblog.

to bookmark and check out later: rock crit highlights of 03, via catchdubs.

okay. in trying to convince me to give up my opposition to going to see "lord of the rings: the third interminable one" on boxing day, because it is such a "significant cultural phenomenon," my dad said the following: "it has to do with the decline of the old order of the world and its replacement with a new order.... it has to do with the whole development of human history. well, it's very, very complicated." uh-huh. god help me.

i have the best friends in the universe. they threw me a surprise party! i've always wanted a surprise party! the ruse was that jami and i were supposed to be going to this "record label loft party on the LES," which is suspect on so many levels but it never occurred to me to question it too closely, although i should have known when jami refused to name the record label. so we had a couple of drinks at welcome to the johnsons, then we were going to meet our other friends at motor city before heading to the party. so we walk in and i experience the following emotions rat-a-tat-tat:

1. fear (what is all that yelling?)
2. confusion (why is leigh ann here smiling at me?)
3. surprise (ohhhhhhhhhh)
4. complete, unadulterated joy: reader, i CRIED. oh my god. so good.

thank god i was wearing my new cute skirt! it was easily the best birthday party i've ever had. so thanks to holly for masterminding the party, and jami and tamar for acting as accomplices, and matt for spinning the songs i love, and ange for making the kickass cake, and all the people who showed up and drank with me and bought me drinks and presents and let me spray them with silly string. birthday celebration #2 will take place saturday night at chinatown dive bar/karaoke joint winnie's, with the drunk chinese men, the eyepatch guy, the midget, and my friends all taking turns on the mic. prepare a song for me. and there might just be something on the actual day, too. i have become one of those people. i blame holly.

the rest of the weekend was pretty great too: coffee and ice skating and weird spicy corn on the cob and more coffee and a ride in a busted old pick-up truck and tv on the radio and esg and dancing and a cool new club in red hook, and it was all pretty great....and then exhaustion.

also, i have the best boss in the universe. she bought me the dischord box set for christmas/birthday! wrapped in red and white stoli paper, with a johnny appleseed restaurant postcard for a card. she rules.

other business: a couple of weeks ago i told stu i didn't own any elvis costello, and he said, "that's just sad." now, thanks to joel from chicago and the magic of the amazon wishlist, i am reasonably familiar with the works of elvis costello. thanks joel!

i need to go try on my new skirts now. christmas shopping rules!

tricia has finally launched a blog to document her life in hong kong: asia land diaries. today she discusses fake calvin klein undies and does a survey of other expat blogs out of asia. with pics, now. get thee there.

what is a love lump, you ask? fear. it is fear.

whoa. jack white sure did go to town on that poor little von bondies kid, didn't he? or is it the von blondies, as the post seems to think?

i am getting a ridiculous number of people arriving here looking for pictures of miss modernage and karoake. gotta give the people what they want.

ew: the dude from red house painters is kind of gross.

what saddam was reading in the hut near his hole, and other crazy details. [via fimoculous]

test your music nerditude. i am a super music nerd, but you probably already knew that.

i don't know what else i can say about santacon except that i think it may have changed my life. santacon is the best ever and next year i would like some of my friends to join me, although i had a blast making new friends. word em up to tami especially for adopting me into her group and allowing me to continue santa debauching deep into the night. lord knows i wouldn't have made it to spirit without her, which means i wouldn't have been tearing up the dancefloor with santana's guitar to a dance remix of "seven nation army." yes yes, y'all. santacon was definitely the best thing i have ever done in new york. possibly in my life. it was that good. i wished i never had to rejoin non-santa society. santa will post the rest of the pics on ofoto tomorrow so you can see how cute she looked in her outfit (referring to oneself in the third person santa never gets old). some of these pics here are by my activity partner ray, by the way.

happy birthday to my girl leigh ann, turning big three-oh today! leigh ann joins the ranks of "cool people in their 30s," a vast, well-trained army indeed. i don't even know why people have ever made a big deal about turning 30. it seems hopelessly old-fashioned now. anyway, perennial party girl leigh ann says she is looking forward to toning it down, but i'll pretty much believe that when i see it.

it is inconceivable to me that only one person wants to do santacon with me! i am going to look so cute in my santa outfit, you are hardly going to be able to stand it.

krucoff provides a funny account of his lunch at a certain corporate cafeteria. love the picture of him reading.

you've seen this already, probably. and yet: you know yer indie. let's sub-categorize. i am "generally indie." how boring.

this is very possibly the worst blog ever. of course, it is hilarious.

i'm not sure i should be posting this, as it reflects poorly upon the state where i grew up, but: njguido.com. new jersey guidos "taking back the term" and celebrating their inherent lameness. enjoy.

saw two bands at mercury lounge last night. i was most interested in we ragazzi because i'd heard good things and they have that cool name and they're on self-starter. and yay: they were really good. my legs were set a-bobbin' many times. the vocals were kind of horribly affected, but it only bothered me for a short while. because they rocked. they rocked quite hard indeed, especially for a band containing a female keyboard player wearing a scarf. you know what i mean, right?

the unicorns were good too. a little...gay. or canadian. sometimes it's difficult to tell the difference. but these guys were wearing matching pink outfits. and brought a pink dollhouse on stage (um). the best gay thing though was when the mop-toppped guy appeared to be bleeding out of his mouth a little bit, and the bassist came over and KISSED him tenderly on the lips. i squealed. it was pretty hilarious and okay, i love them. except for their one thousand comments about the audience not dancing...when will bands learn that these comments are not dignified? plus, tons of people were dancing! stupid canadians. but they did play some weird catchy pop, good stuff, and they did pronounce "condoms" the funny english way (accent on both syllables) many times and make me laugh a lot. so.

in sum:
we ragazzi=cool name=cool
unicorns=gay name=gay

george clinton likes the crack.

hey, i know what i'd like to do today. why don't i call up this psycho cannibal and we can eat my penis together?

best commercial ever: "red stripe! it's beer. hooray beer!" seriously everyone needs to watch the "dance" one. so hilarious. "inner you" is pretty good too.

hmmm, what the hell did i do on my four-day weekend? well, i made a lot of freakin' magnets. thursday jami and i got a nice late-afternoon drink at bull's head tavern on 14th, where the friendly bartender was playing radiohead and frank black. i then cried my way through 21 grams and went home to make magnets.

friday i trekked to jami's in the snow, where we made magnets and drank late-afternoon vodka drinks. it was determined that i should sell the magnets on bedford. how much would you pay for a set of like four cool magnets?

later we went to this punk-rock hellhole that smelled like lots of unshowered people. (see jami's for pics.) we did a lot of waiting around and stayed until we ran out of beer, which was for exactly one interminable lyricless laptop-produced song. then we had fucking fantastic sandwiches and donuts at moto and hit up some loft party where i danced for a few glorious minutes until the music started sucking again.

saturday night i stayed in because no one would go see tv on the radio with me, and when i go see shows by myself i start retardedly text-messaging people. next time i guess. instead i, yes you guessed it, made more magnets. but the absolute highlight of the weekend had to be my dream wherein i was receiving love from kiefer sutherland. we were about to go parasailing, but, alas, i woke up before that could happen. i'd like to go back to bed now, in fact.

great snowy pics from power photoblogging couple mike c. and rion.

actually, lock, i think that is the most interesting spam possible.

people i want to win grammys:
-outkast for record of the year
-white stripes for album of the year
-fountains of wayne for best new artist (not that they're new)
-fountains of wayne for pop performance by a duo or group with vocals ("stacy's mom"!)
-white stripes for best rock song ("seven nation army")
-yeah yeah yeahs for best alternative album
-and the white stripes for like two other awards. come on, they rock. they deserve it.

my boss just informed me i'm off the next two days. i'd totally forgotten! woooh! (now i just have to figure out what to do....) here are some hot lixx for your hump-day pleasure. links. i meant links:

british sea power dude falls out of tree while trying to get branches for their stage decorations; breaks wrist. [via the modern age]

uh, travis morrison's solo album is going to be called "travistan." uh. i am fearing a...travesty (sorry). discuss.

norm macdonald asks nicole richie several times if she is black. hilarious. i was wondering the same thing last night. the girl is about as black as michael jackson. [via gothamist] also: paris hilton swears she "hates the taste of alcohol." come on honey, we've all seen "celebrities uncensored."

can you believe how interesting i am? is there another word for hilarious? how about hysterical? i don't use that one very often. this is not quite hysterical though. more like dryly humorous. just pretty damn fuckin' funny. all right? good. [via jami]

a lot of people seem to care that gwyneth paltrow is pregnant. why is that?

it's the end of the world. and it's hilarious.

and now a couple of excerpts from my roommate kurt's email missives from armenia, where he is busy clearing landmines and drinking mulberry vodka:

The Armenians, as you might have gathered, are extremely polite. But it is starting to get on my nerves. My colleagues rarely let me pay for anything despite the fact that I make heaps more than they do. I am constantly being given food and drinks which I usually accept in order to reciprocate their unflinching generosity. When I am in the fields or forests, it has become common for my colleagues to forage for berries and wild fruits for me to eat. This was nice at first, but nothing I have been offered has really won me over and I have become a master at secretly spitting the entire berry out, instead of just the seed. Today, I was presented with three large sprigs of this foul berry that has the consistency and odor of rotting fruit. I can only put up with so many offers of weird, oozing berries before I lose my cool!

and

Instead of riding home with my program manager in a relatively comfortable landrover, I took the bus home with all of the deminers. It was exactly the kind of bus that one would envision being used in a wartorn, desperately poor, ex-commie republic. According to the World Cup Soccer stickers that were affixed to the front of the bus, this vehicle dated back to (at least) the late 1970s. Furthermore, every seat was broken. And by broken, I mean visible springs a-popping! To deal with the over-crowding and lack of seats, small wooden stools were placed down the aisle. Everyone was smoking; and either the windows didn't open, or the Armenians are immune to suffocation. I imagine it was both. We even picked up a hitchhiker and his crate of apples to drop off at the market. I briefly thought that I should seek out the emergency exit but figured it was hardly worth it. I assured myself that as the guest of the exceedingly polite and generous Armenians, in case the bus burst into flames, I'd probably be ushered out first anyways.

yep that's right, the lack of cultural options in freehold had me taking experimental self portraits late at night in an alien hat. i also watched all the alternate endings of "28 days later" plus several episodes of "the office" with steve in his basement lair, shopped till i dropped at target (pink wool coat by isaac mizrahi! extralong-sleeved t-shirts!) and the mall, perused an old yearbook for more effective googling, saw bad santa (pretty funny), slept about 12 hours a day, ate about five meals per day, purchased five magazines, played with the dog, etc. it was an uneventful thanksgiving but that's fine. i am thankful i have no real crazies in my family.

and then yesterday i came home and stayed up late cutting up said magazines and making 12 of these magnets. so very fun. do not be surprised if you get some for christmas. i find myself getting really excited about crafty things like this tea towel kit when clicking the links on not martha. don't worry, i'm not gonna start knitting.

barf.

adam kempa has come out of hiding/coma to drop a christmas mix. nick catchdubs better catch up.

free williamsburg's best of 2003 (what up with the weird slam on the YYYs?). the catbirdseat and largehearted boy have posted theirs too.

years and years of the harpers index, on the magazine's newly redesigned site.