my careless contagion

I got in the wayback machine and ended up in 1997 listening to Sixpence None the Richer's Kiss Me. It's a good jam, so I decided to stay a while and explore the concept of the song. It was made popular by the movie She's All That, which was a sort of teen romcom, of which there were about 8 million during the 90s (my favorite of which was probably Can't Hardly Wait, which I wrote about previously).  I know we all probably forgot about such things, but back in the 90s it was okay to kiss a girl. (I cross the street when I see a woman approaching now.) And you knew she was a girl, too. This means, well, let's not get into it. Things are more complicated now. Songs like this are what life is about. These are the moments we live for. The few sparkling moments we trudge through endless years of mundane and downright ugly to experience. Kissing the girl. Dancing with her in the moonlight. Just existing with her in a special moment. Breathing in her essence. I realize I ha...

If you're anything like me, you're lounging around your hallways and living spaces right now in an outfit just like this. It's hot out, but you're even hotter. Way to look, man! You're living, laughing, and loving stylishly, my friend. Come along for the ride. This may be the last retro post, so enjoy while you can.  My all-time favorite styles are art deco and art nouveau. I believe Alphonse Mucha was brilliant and will always be remembered as emblematic of the art nouveau style, though he didn't want to be associated with art nouveau. The above is art deco. I simply love it. The grace. The modernity. The boldness. The shininess. The sensuality. For something stationary and two-dimensional, it has motion and depth. It's absolutely enrapturing for an amateur art nerd like me.  It's nice to think of times when life was supposedly simpler. Not easier, mind you. But, most likely, they were simpler. Like the age during which I grew up. Even the 90s were see...

A Thousand Miles From Nowhere by Dwight Yoakam. Why am I posting this video? Why not? Stop asking so many questions. Do you work for the CIA? I'm posting stuff that doesn't have anything to do with anything. It's liberating. Probably won't post much about my life anymore. Instead, I intend to write about things of absolutely no import. Actually, by that definition, I should write about my life exclusively. Haha.  This song was released in 1993. Think back to what you were doing then. That's how long this guy's been rocking. Well, longer, actually. And it probably took him that long to get out of those leather pants. Oof.  I like this video because it's a split screen, which is not something you see very often. It's a lot for the mind to process, two screens at once, but it works. When our minds are overloaded, we are more susceptible to things slipping into our subconscious unnoticed. Our minds have gateways, and when we're bombarded, things slip thr...

Perhaps I've neglected this topic. I am getting quite old and with over 550 posts in the bag, I may have forgotten I've already written this. Pardon me. Nod and smile and pretend you're hearing it for the first time. That's me in the photo. I was still in high school, so 1996 or before is my only guess as to the date. I wore a hat emblazoned with South Dakota State University (where I later took online courses). I had that coat up until recently when I finally threw it out before moving back to Nebraska. (Almost eight months now since I moved back, whoa.) The board, covered in snow, was sold a long time ago. I figure this was taken in Colorado. I have no recollection where exactly. Still have the cheesy, crooked grin. Can't help it; that's what God gave me.  When I was in elementary school, on a school trip to Terry Peak in the Black Hills, I learned how to ski. I skied for many years. I became bored with the two-plank setup and decided to try one plank in high ...

It's that time again. It's time for my semi-annual rewatching of Can't Hardly Wait , the 1998 film featuring music of the same ungrammatical name (yes, I briefly wrote about it nearly two years ago in my "That girl" post). What is my fascination with this movie? Perhaps that's too complex to start with. It's a fun, campy movie (that, apparently, still means a lot to many people ). And the main character gets the girl in the end. It's safe to say a lot has changed in the last 22 years. The movie, though, is a time capsule. We've changed. Our world has changed. Things that were okay or even funny in 1998 are no longer okay and funny, as this dumb article points out (leave it to Buzzfeed to miss the point). You can't take things out of the context in which they were created and examine them under the harsh light of today. Things were different then. This movie was never intended to be scrutinized or taken seriously. It was mindless entertain...

*"Can't Hardly Wait" by The Replacements. I love this song. It's grammatically incorrect, but that doesn't seem to bother me. It was included on the soundtrack of the 1998 movie of the same name starring Jennifer Love Hewitt. If you've watched a fair number of movies set in high school, you're aware of certain tropes that exist. There's one that I call "That Girl." You know the girl, the one the (usually) shy guy wants to be with. She's amazing; she's out of his league. She's that girl, the one he's pined for forever. She's the one who can elevate his life in ways he can't even imagine. It could change the whole course of his life if he could just get that girl. Somehow, mustering up the courage or doing whatever is necessary to get that girl would change him from being a loser who nobody knows into somebody. My "That Girl" got away, and I let her get away. The year was 1996. It was one of the most...

*This song was on the radio a lot in 1996 and 1997. I guess it seeped into my subconscious. After I met the girl I would eventually leave Nebraska for and start a new life with in Ohio, I consciously adopted this song as my "theme song" for our relationship. Obviously, this song is not about loving a girl; it's about rejecting how or who you're being told to love. It's a breaking-free song. I was breaking free from my parents with my act of defiant love for someone who I knew they would hate. Anyone who knew me at the time was probably well aware that I generally did not love pop songs. This is a pop song, yet I adopted it. It became mine. All the years since then, when I hear this song, I immediately go back to that cross-country trip and what were the beginnings of my new life. I simply could not explain what I was doing or feeling to anyone. This song kind of bridged the gap. If I could stay within the parameters of this band, then I could easily descri...

*It's one of those questions that I've thought about for so many years. The last five years have led me to this moment when I'm finding out the answer. For all of my words, so many lines of them, that I've written. For all of my prayers, all of my thoughts. I still don't have the answer. All I see, as the song says, is oblivion. Just a different kind of oblivion.* I'm only pretty sure that I can't take anymore Before you take a swing I wonder what are we fighting for When I say out loud I want to get out of this I wonder  is  there anything I'm going to miss I wonder how it's going to be When you don't know me How's it going to be When you're sure I'm not there How's it going to be When there's no one there to talk to Between you and me Cause I don't care How's it going to be, How's it going to be Where we used to laugh There's a shouting match Sharp a...