The One About Music

One of the least favorite questions I like being asked is, "What kind of music do you like to listen to?" It's really difficult for me to quantify my taste in music. I like music that speaks to me in the moment. I like listening to music that either matches the way I feel, or that makes me feel something, and that can been anything from Ben Folds to Sara Bareilles to Drake to a concerto by Bach. Over the past few years I've come to realize that I gravitate towards singer-songwriter stuff, because, despite how hipster it sounds, I love finding something that the world hasn't discovered yet; something full of raw emotion and brimming over with heart, and more often than not that's the genre where you'll find it.

When I was younger, I loved poring over song lyrics inside of CD covers and finding words that spoke to me. The leaps and bounds of growth in the way we listen to our music over the years and the introduction of iTunes made it even easier for me to find new music, and I would spend hours searching playlists and genres  like a game of hide and seek that I was usually fortunate enough to win. I'm not sure what happened, or when it stopped, but I haven't done this for years. I guess I just grew up and got busy with all the distractions of adulthood - jobs, responsibilities, and everything in-between. Recently, though, I've stumbled across a plethora of incredibly lovely music in places that I wouldn't have expected to find it, and it's re-awakened that old desire in me to search and discover. So that's what I did.

I wanted to share some of my favorite discoveries with you, because they're just so fun I couldn't keep them to myself. So, grab a pair of headphones and a cup of coffee, sit back, and have a listen. I promise you won't regret it. (A lot of these won't play here on Blogger, but just click the link to take you to YouTube and you can watch them there!)

So You Think You Can Dance Hits
Heard these two on SYTYCD over the summer and had to download them. Love listening to Gold Rush by Clinton Sparks ft. 2 Chainz, Macklemore & D.A. during my workouts, and Tank's cover of Bonnie Raitt's I Can't Make you Love Me is, in my opinion, so much better than the original.





Till Kingdom Come by Coldplay
First heard this in the new (well, it was new at the time) Spiderman movie. Love the guitar, love the lyrics, it's really just a very beautiful song.



The Gabe Dixon Double Feature
Occasionally, my company brings in people from various industries to talk about their experiences and how they manage their personal brands. Gabe came in to perform for us, and I loved his style. Very talented guy. All Will Be Well and Running on Fumes are two of my favorite songs of his.





Songs from "Parenthood"
Not only is this show phenomenal, it also has some really great music. Two of my favorites are High Hope by Glen Hansard and A Case of You, a Joni Mitchell cover by James Blake; both incredibly heart-wrenching, but in the most delicious way.





Joshua Radin
Just a guy and his guitar. Josh has so many great songs, but My My Love and Think I'll Go Inside are two of my favorites. They make me miss being in love.





Restless Heart by Matt Hires
This one is a great "This guy may be super hot but he's bad news and I need to psych myself up to stay away because it will only end badly" song. Plus, it has such a fun beat!



When the Right One Comes Along by Striking Matches
This song was covered on the show Nashville recently, but I prefer the original version. Love the lyrics and the way the vocals blend so well with the simplicity of the accompaniment.



Sara Bareilles = Love
She is my favorite female singer-songwriter, hands down. I love this woman, and I love just about everything she does. These are my three favorite songs from her newest album, The Blessed Unrest. She can write the hell out of heartbreak, as evident in Manhattan, which I listened to on repeat for three days straight when I first heard it. 1000 Times tells the familiar story of a dysfunctional relationship that we've all been through, and Little Black Dress is one of the best post-breakup songs I've heard in a long time.






Songs from About Time
I saw this movie recently and was surprised at how many songs I heard that had me frantically searching for them in Google Play. I highly suggest checking out the movie as well - it has such a beautiful message, just like all three of these songs; The Luckiest by Ben Folds, How Long Will I Love You by Josh Boden, and Gold In Them Hills by Ron Sexsmith.

The Story of Paul

Anyone who knows me knows how much I hate bugs. I can't even kill them because they squish and there's guts and ew. Just ew. When I spot one in my apartment, it immediately turns into a big event that involves the following steps:

1. Freak out and dance around while cursing up a storm.

2. Haul out the vacuum and wish for the millionth time I had one with a longer hose. (That's what she said.) Or a boyfriend. (Also with a long hose.) (You knew that was coming.)

3. Crawl up onto whichever piece of furniture is closest to said bug while praying I don't fall and break a hip because let's face it I'm 30 now and that's a real possibility.

4. Suck the bug up with the vacuum while cackling maniacally.

5. Immediately jump down and holster the hose so that the bug can't crawl back out in some kind of superhero-like feat of strength that's powered by thoughts of revenge.

6. Grab a huge black plastic garbage bag instead of the more appropriate small grocery bag because what if it touches me while I'm trying to empty it because the bag is too small?

7. Empty the canister into the inappropriately large black plastic garbage bag.

8. Tie it closed and run - literally, run - to throw it out the front door.

I wish I was kidding.

Late last week, while I was getting ready for work, I spotted a small brown house spider on the ceiling in my bathroom. He was just hanging out in the corner, minding his own business, and since I was already late for work, I couldn't commence with the above bug evacuation plan. So, I decided to let him live, at least until I got home. I figured he couldn't go far. I told him he'd better stay the hell out of my bedroom, and I left for work.

Well, apparently my laziness has finally overtaken my hatred of bugs, because as the week progressed, I spotted him quite a few times - in the bathroom, over the kitchen table, in the living room, but never in my bedroom - and I never got the urge to kill him. I really appreciated his willingness to abide by my "no bedroom" rule, and I also just didn't feel like climbing up on any furniture, so I figured he deserved some brownie points for that. He started to become part of my day. He spent most of his time in my living room - apparently he has the same taste in television as I do - so it was kind of like we were hanging out. I named him Paul. I said hello to him in the morning. I said goodnight to him when I went to bed. And he never set foot in my room, as per our agreement.

I guess you could say things were going well.

Until yesterday.

When I got home from work and changed into sweatpants and took off my bra (literally my favorite moment of the day) I realized I hadn't seen Paul all day. I glanced around the kitchen and the living room, but he was nowhere to be found. I warily crept back into my bedroom and searched the corners and the ceiling, but he wasn't in there, either. I immediately felt kind of bad for not trusting him. After checking the corners of the bathroom and the second bedroom, I concluded that he had probably ducked underground to hang out with his spider girlfriend or lay some eggs or whatever spiders do when they're underground, and I went about my business. I've been doing my best to drink a lot of water, so not long after my apartment-wide search, I had to go to the bathroom. 

And that's when a routine trip to the restroom became the stuff of nightmares. 

When I went to grab some toilet paper, I finally found Paul. He was hiding on the wall just behind the toilet paper. When it spun, it must have scared him, because he started skittering up the wall. I don't do skittering. I may or may not have jumped off the toilet, and screamed, and run out of the bathroom. 

And I may or may not have yelled, "Damnit, Paul. Damnit. Now you have to die."

Here's the thing, though. I was so pissed off that he'd hide behind the toilet paper like that, just to fuck with me, that I didn't even get the vacuum. I decided that, to teach him a lesson, he would die at the hand of said toilet paper. And so he did. It was quick, and painless, and I flushed him just to make sure he didn't come back to life and try to exact his revenge. 

And so, I dedicate this post to Paul. Our friendship, however precarious and brief it may have been, has taught me that no matter how tolerant and accepting I try to be, I am just not cut out to be friends with a spider.

RIP Paul

Married Men and Poor Life Choices

We've all done stupid things in our lives. Every single one of us. Like the time that I wore white shorts on a date when I had my period. For the record, that was one of the poorest life choices I've ever made, which ended with a frantic call to my dad from the bathroom of the restaurant and a jacket tied around my waist until he showed up with a spare pair of shorts to save the day. Believe it or not, my date didn't even realize what had happened until I told him about it months later.

The point of it is, we all make poor life choices, though they may not all end in disaster. However, there is one poor life choice that will almost always end that way, and that's choosing to get involved with a married man.

I am not here to tell you some deep, intimate story about any specific experience I've had, or any of the specific experiences that I've watched many of my friends go through - and above all that, all perpetrators shall remain nameless and faceless throughout this blog post. But I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and I decided, since I've never been one to filter myself, to write about it.

The one disclaimer I will make is this: I make no judgments. These are simply things that I have come to realize as truths as I've watched various scandalous relationships unfold throughout the years. We all make stupid choices. All of us. And no one has the right to judge anyone else for theirs. That being said, here we go.

Top 5 Reasons Not To Get Involved With a Married Man

1. He's Married
Shocker, right? But think about it. What if you were his wife? This is the first thing that always crosses my mind when I find out the man I've been talking to/dating is married (yes, this, unfortunately, has happened to me more than once.) I'll be the first to admit that there can be something attractive about a married man - the whole, "someone else wants him so he has clearly proven that he is dating/marriage material and he knows how to treat a woman" thing - but that's really the point. Someone else already chose to spend their lives being faithful to him; someone else is already waiting for him at home. There may have been once or twice in my life where I have entertained dabbling in this type of dating stupidity, but that's always the thought that I can't get out of my head that brings me back around to sanity. Which brings me to reason number two....

2. The Whole "Trust" Thing
Even if you did decide to say "screw it" and get involved anyway, really, how the hell could you ever trust him? How could you ever be certain that he's not going to do to you what he did to his wife? That he's not texting/sexting/dating three other women in addition to you and his wife? I mean, really, does that nagging doubt ever go away? On the flip side, during my recent foray into online dating, I was absolutely disgusted and appalled at just how many married men were out there looking for a good time - so much so that it actually put a lot of doubt into my mind about whether or not I would even want to get married in the future, because so few people seem to take it as seriously as I do. Hey - if marriage isn't for you, that's okay. Then don't get married. The correct answer is not "Oh hey, I do love this chick and/or I'm scared to be alone so just so she doesn't leave me, I'll get married and then do what I need to do on the side. She'll never know, and everyone wins." No, asshole. Everyone does not win. That woman at home who is faithful to you and does your laundry and puts up with your snoring and your always leaving the toilet seat up and your smelly feet? She doesn't win. Neither does the girl on the side, whose heart you are most likely breaking. You know who does win though? You. And that may be nice for you, but it really just makes you an asshole.

3. He's Not Going to Leave His Wife 
Of all the times I've watched friends get involved with married men, the guy has only actually left his wife twice. And ironically, both of them are still in very happy, healthy, functional relationships with those men. Of course there is the odd exception where the man is unhappily married for any multitude of reasons and you really are the love of his life, but this is the exception, not the rule. Unless divorce papers have been filed or are at least in the process of being filed, it's probably best that you wait... and even then, it's risky. There's a reason that there are so many sad love songs out there devoted to being the other woman. Hint: Just in case you didn't pick up what I was laying down, it's because you will always be the other woman. The plus side is, you will always have lots of sad songs to sing while you're crying into your ice cream. 

4. Yes, You Are Doing Something Wrong
I get it. You're single. You're not cheating. You're not the one lying to your significant other. But deep down, you still know that what you're engaging in is wrong. Even if you don't want to admit it, you still know it. And, in my very humble opinion, karma's a bitch.

And last but certainly not least,

5. You Know What Else is a Bitch? Unrequited Love
He always knows exactly what to say to make you swoon, doesn't he? He always tells you how beautiful and amazing you are, he knows how to make you laugh, he's always there when you need a shoulder to cry on (as long as his wife is at work), and all of the sneaking around he does just to steal a few moments with you makes you feel like the most gorgeous, most badass, most desirable woman in the world. Except for the fact that you're not. You see, he chose to dedicate his life and his heart to his wife, not to you. To share his house with her, to celebrate birthdays and holidays and rainy and sunny days with her. Not with you. Remember the episode of Scandal where the politician died in bed with his mistress? And Olivia Pope pointed out how awful it must have been to have shared so much of your life with someone and be left with nothing after his death? Yeah. That's what it's like. You have no claim over him. He's not yours. And even if he says he loves you, and he just might, it doesn't change the fact that he loves her, too. If he didn't, he wouldn't still be married. And if he tells you he's going to leave his wife, that he's just waiting for the right time - scroll back up and see #3, buy yourself a pint of Ben and Jerry's, cry until you're over it, and move on.

There are so many additional reasons I could throw in here, but these are really the ones that always cross my mind when I hear stories about women getting involved with married men. And perhaps even more disturbing is the fact that not only does the internet make it so easy to cheat these days, it also leads to an incredibly large gray area of moral ambiguity. Is sexting a woman you've never actually met or physically touched still considered cheating? It's just exchanging some pictures, or maybe some video, right? You've never actually touched her, so it's not wrong, per se. Right? Well, I think it is - but I seem to be in the minority. My rule of thumb is this: if I was dating someone, and I found out they were doing what I'm doing, would I be pissed or hurt? If the answer is yes, then it's probably not a good idea. But that's just me.

And so ladies, let's do ourselves a favor and avoid all of this bullshit. Dating is hard enough these days. There's no point in starting something that can only end, and badly, so let's just spare ourselves the heartache - and the calories - and stay the hell away from the married ones. Hashtag nothing but trouble, hashtag Ginger Jameson out.