Why Not Blog Today?!

I haven't blogged in some time (who cares? Who even reads this shit?) but I've just had so much going on that I haven't had time to or felt like it.

According to Twitter, only twenty (CAN'T BE?!) days ago, I was in London (as I am now, but I have been back to Carlisle since) at KOKO in Camden, getting shit together to do merch for Amanda Palmer.
Here is a link to a picture she posted of me and fellow merch girl Kaitlin: http://twitpic.com/1hj53l
I happen to look like some kind of evil troll in half of the pictures I am in from that night.
Here is a nicer one from the next night at Bush Hall:
Anyway, Amanda's crew got trapped in the US due to the ASHCLOUD from the Iceland volcano (which she luckily escaped, which prompted me to do this drawing, which Amanda also tweeted: http://twitpic.com/1iwjip (you'll notice that I am opting to post links to Facebook and Amanda's twitpic. This is from laziness. If you can't see the above pictures of Kaitlin and myself, either Amanda's deleted them from twitpic or facebook's not letting you see) and she was short a merch girl. Also they needed someone who could drive. Which I can't.
Beth emailed me asking if I could do merch in Glasgow, Dublin and London, as I had already done it at a couple of shows last year. I said no to Dublin because I didn't have my passport on me (in London with my mother) but yes to Glasgow and London. So the next day I got on a train with Johnny (to whom I had given my guest list space as a sort of crap birthday present -my plan had been to use a ticket, but these both turned out unnecessary as we were both given AAA passes).
Highlight of the night #1: Amanda saying thank you to me, 'Audrey my friend from London who came here to do merch!' onstage. I punched my fists in the air and yelled 'yeah!' along with the crowd, still cheering at her thanks speech, which was aimed at the last minute support bands, her emergency tour manager Sven and myself, attracting much attention from the people at the bar to my right.
After the show we were being kicked out so a few of us piled into a shockingly slow elevator to find the dressing room, where everyone else had apparently congregated and Amanda was passing beer and tea cakes out (I guess she needed to get rid of them to make space?) before we all went downstairs to see if there was any space in the bar. There was not.
We went to the resturant and took over a booth in a corner.
Some stuff happened. Lots of yelling and stuff.
Amanda made a toast and somewhere in there I yelled 'I RULE', perhaps slightly louder than I'd meant to.
(note to self: just don't drink.)
Basically this is a post about my ego being fed with gratitude and how I respond loudly to things, I suppose.
ANYWAY, after a trek to their far-away parked tour van and some goodbyes, we walked back to the hotel and got sleep. Then we wandered around Glasgow, I contemplated buying 'Kneller's Happy Campers' (book upon which a movie I love is based) and we got on a train back to Carlisle, where I made arrangements (travel tickets, etc.) for London.
I stayed in my family's house for the first night. I got to their house and opened my laptop to find 9 emails from Amanda, her tour manager, Holly (who was thought to be doing merch but ended up not doing merch at the UK shows) and Kaitlin. Including excel spreadsheets and a PDF file. Christ on a bike.
Read all of them, made battle plan.
Arrived in Camden and called Kaitlin, who told me how to get into the venue (after a brief struggle. Eventually Bitter Ruin -support band, amazing, google them- showed up and I just went in with them) and told me to meet her upstairs in the production office.
We spent a lot of time running around and having little idea as to what we should do and running minor un-merch-related errands before finally getting our shit together and sorting out the mess of merch. It was a busy night indeed.
I stayed with Kaitlin and the woman she was staying with, whose name is Liz.
The next day we went to Bush Hall for the first of 3 shows there. The first two days, while eventful, I cannot be arsed with describing.
On Sunday, the final day, there were two shows.
One during the afternoon at Underworld in Camden, followed by the 3rd and final Bush Hall show.
We were meant to be preparing to leave Camden at 5pm.
Amanda and Jason realised onstage that it was 5pm.
We all packed into the tour van and went to Bush Hall slightly late.
Jason, Kaitlin and I were in the back of the van and my phone rang. My ringtone has been a Jason Webley song for over a year and I thought nothing of it when it rang. For 10 minutes. Then it hit me.
As we neared the venue, I saw a familiar head of curly red hair and freaked the fuck out.
'RACHAEL'S HERE. OH SHIT NO.', said I.
'What's wrong?', asked Jason, Captain of Greatness.
'A friend of mine who I haven't seen in ages is here and I won't have any time to see her!!!'
'Ask her to help us unload the van and then she can hang out inside!', he suggested (thus earning his title as Captain of Greatness).
So I did.
I ran over there and went 'Rach! I need your help!'
And I got to take her in early.
It was brilliant. The table was pretty much set up already so I just had to eat and we sat down and had a chat and it was wonderful to see her again.
Highlights of the last night: Amanda thanking Kaitlin and I onstage while we stood at the door to the hall towards the end of the show, Holly handing us glasses of champagne as it was the last night after the show while we were still working.

I've left so many details out of this.
But it was great.

Some pictures from the last night:
AFP: Let's lie down in the boxes, it will be an accurate representation of your week. (something to that effect but I can't remember what it was exactly)
Me: You can do that. I'm gonna sit here.

L-R: Alex, Me, Drew, Ben.

Georgia, Me, Amanda, Kaitlin, Drew, Jason.

This was the night most of the photos were taken and as it was the final and busiest night, the day I'd put the least effort into my outfit/hair/errr...face.
Hah.

Other stuff:
Started a project called Hungry Ghosts last month, here's the website: www.hungryghosts.info
Nothing up there aside from who the artists are and stuff.
Was very busy.
But soon there will be stuff.

Will turned 7 on Monday, so I came to visit for his birthday and have made him 2 cakes (cheesecake with a lovely raspberry syrup & a white chocolate mud cake).

Now I'm sitting in my mums room watching her play uno with will. :)

London (Will is the ultimate hero.)

I'm in London. I caught the bus down from Carlisle on Thursday to spend Mother's Day with my mum. The bus trip was meant to take 8 hours or something but it ended up taking closer to 9.
I don't mind long bus trips. I can handle them better than the 3 hour train trips. I can read or I can stare out the window...I don't know why that is, I guess trains just aren't as comfortable to me.
Also when we were at a rest stop place some guy stopped me and went 'I saw your drawings! You are a good drawer!' (yes, a drawer. It was still nice!) because I had been sketching a bit on the bus.
I finally got to Victoria station and met my mum and after a quick and unhealthy fast food dinner, we went home. Will was asleep but he woke up and gave me some tired hugs and was generally adorable. He's 7 in May but he still looks like a squishy little baby to me. Also apparently at school, a teacher was asking them to come up with animals starting with D and his answe was 'demon' and once he asked for a drink of water and the teacher said no and he said 'I'm not long for this world!' and asked how she would explain it to his mum when he died.
I'm pretty proud of him.
Yesterday I met up wit Lucy at Angel tube station and this girl I knew when I was 9 showed up. She was on her way to college, but it was still odd to be at that station waiting for Lucy and then to have someone I haven't actually seen in a couple of years (I think the last time I did was just after I moved back to England and I think that was about 3 years ago) just like...appear. So odd.
Lucy was going to an Emilie Autumn concert that I had missed out on getting a ticket for but I still wanted to hang out with her. So I spent most of the day in the line for it. It was still good, however. I got a free muffin and a cookie and a lollipop and a tiny little brownie. It was a nice queue.
THEN I went over to Shepherds Bush to hang out with Paloma. We were waiting for a couple of her friends to show up and I had a look at some of her art and she looked at my pathetic sketchbook that I've only been using for about a week so it pretty much has the same two things that I've been experimenting with over and over and we had tea and meringues and lemon tart. Her friends showed up and we all chatted a bit and had some lasagna and then I went back to my family's house, to sleep. I walked there in the dark, it was past 10pm and the area my family lives in makes doing such a thing feels uncomfortable and scary. But I survived!
Today, my mum isn't home, but when she is, we're going to watch 'Black Books'.
I'm going home on Thursday which is also my brother Erik's 15th birthday.

DNA, baby, that spells DNA.

My best friend Bekki and I sometimes make each other folders of funny/pretty pictures to send to each other and sometimes we make folders of our favourite songs and swap them. Bekki has really wonderful taste in music. I'm not going to bother listing everything she sent me, but here are my 3 favourites:

That Spells DNA- Jonathan Coulton
I only know who Jonathan Coulton is because of the song 'Still Alive' at the end of the game 'Portal' (first video game I ever completed fully. Because it fucking rocks). This song is great. 'DNA, baby, that spells DNA'....I think that line just makes it awesome alone.

Rabbit Fur Coat- Jenny Lewis with the Watson Twins
This is the prettiest damn song I have heard in the longest time. It's beautiful.

Chick Habit- April March
I already knew this song (who doesn't know this song? Seriously?) but I didn't have it and now I'm glad I do.

As I said, I also sent her a few songs. I sent her 12 of my favourite songs. Here are my 3 favourite songs. Because...why not?

Elephant Gun- Beirut
This is one of those things where I forget I had a song and then someone mentioned it to me the other day and I've barely been able to stop listening to it since. It's a beautiful song and I love the video so much.

Through The Roof 'n' Underground- Gogol Bordello
This song is BRILLIANT. I first heard it watching 'Wristcutters: A Love Story'. It's only played like...a billion fucking times over the course of the film.
(also 'Wristcutters' is a beautiful film. Please see it. At least look up the trailer.)

I also uploaded a bunch of pictures I've done recently earlier. So I'll probably post them tomorrow. One of them is my header at the moment though, so there you go.
Also if we're friends on Facebook, you can go see them now anyway.
And if we're not friends on facebook...Why not? My feelings are so hurt.

x

Cold.

Went to Derry in Northern Ireland on Thursday, came back yesterday.
Got to go on a ferry. Twice, even.
It was pretty good.
Then there was a long bus ride which was rescued by Johnny playing some songs I didn't know from his mp3 player to me and mouthing the words along and being silly.
The trip itself was pretty good. Got a piggyback across some water because the other way across was stepping stones and I was scared that if I tried to cross them, I'd fall in...and so would my bag, containing my phone, iPod, moleskine, camera...General things that you don't want to give a bath to. Amusingly, the first attempt at the aforementioned piggyback ended in me falling off, which seemed like a bad omen but it worked out fine.
Managed to get two cups of tea, a pastry and a bowl of chips for about a fiver. Something I've never accomplished in England...
I took some photos but I don't have a digital camera and still use film blah blah blah...I need to get with the times, etc....so once that roll is full, I'll get it developed and upload some pictures.

Had an appointment early this morning and nearly froze to death. Got to sit across from a woman and mumble and get confused and things like that.
Then found out that the details associated with my library card were WRONG. Got them fixed.
It's been an exciting day. Not.
But I did get a fair bit done and it's only midday in 10 minutes so I'm not displeased with how it's going.

Must I dream and always see your face?

When I was younger, my mum REALLY liked Jeff Buckley. She'd play his album all the time in the house. Occasionally I'll decide to listen to him and I'll usually listen to the whole album 'Grace' a few times and then not be able to anymore. My mum used to take me and my brothers to pubs and things and I remember one of them having a jukebox and sometimes I got to put money in it and pick a song. I remember my mum asking me to get it to play either 'Lilac Wine' or 'Grace'.
I knew the song 'Hallelujah' but I didn't know that it was such a sad song until one of the times when I decided to listen to the album when I was 14. It's one of my favourite songs. Jeff Buckley's version is my favourite.
Another version was playing in a bookshop the other day (not sure what one, as there are so many and I wasn't paying attention) and since then, I've been wanting to listen to the album like crazy.

I found a song on my external drive that my mum used to play in the car when I was younger that I can remember going on an epic search through the internet for last year. Never, ever knew what the song was about, but when I listened to it, I remembered nearly all the words...Anyway, I found it on my external drive earlier...I've been having a weird night of songs-my-mum-played-when-I-was-a-fair-bit-smaller...
When I listen to Jeff Buckley, I can smell a house we lived in when I was younger. It's not a nice smell. And it reminds me of watching 'Anastasia' on a videotape that someone got for us before it was released. And peanut butter on toast. And one night, my mum wanted to go to the beach with her friends and we ended up there all night, sleeping on the beach, even though I wanted to go home and kept asking mum when we were going to and we got McDonalds for breakfast on the way home.

Around the same time, my mum liked to play The Cure and my brother Erik loved the song 'The Lovecats' and I remember my mum and tiny Erik dancing to it, so when I hear that song, I think of that and I feel happy.

I can't remember the point of this blog anymore, now!
Today was pretty boring. Had to get out of the house. Went and saw 'Valentine's Day' as it was the one movie starting within an hour of my getting there that didn't have the words 'post-apocalyptic America' in the summary thing.
I'm tired of post-apocalyptic America.

In other news, my moleskine is beginning to fall apart. Usually I'd just say notebook, but this time I mean fucking-expensive-notebook-which-everyone-said-would-be-sturdy-and-not-fall-apart.
Kind of irked by this.

I just love you, that is all, so I hope you come to my funeral.

I have downloaded two gorgeous but horrifyingly addictive things: Kayla Oberlin's EP and Zoe Boekbinder's album 'Artichoke Perfume'. I've been listening to the latter since I got home.

Today I went into town with plans to get a new pair of pyjamas and some ingredients for cookies. Instead, I came home with three new books ('The Fellowship of the Ring' -JRR Tolkien, obviously, and 'The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul' by Douglas Adams. And I felt like such a geek, carrying those two books to the checkout. And not even a good geek. A terrible geek...and I also got a copy of Fantastic Mr. Fox for about 79p), a copy of the newer Mighty Boosh live DVD (which is good but I don't think you should watch it in one go as it gets boring.)...we wandered around a bit and had some coffee and I had some of the surprisingly good bruschetta they sell at Costa (it's almost a guilty pleasure...but not really.) and got a roll of film developed (some really great pictures. And some blurry and discoloured ones, which I love equally. And for some reason, one day I thought a fruity drink was important enough to document...some of the pictures are random.)...and we got the most ridiculous photobooth picture taken to add to what is slowly becoming a collection that I keep in my wallet with my fancy pass that I got from helping at an Amanda Palmer concert last year, a tiny little picture of me that Johnny did on a little piece of cardboard the first time I came up here and...Hannah Montana stickers. Indeedy.

I've been reading break up blogs. Partly to counteract the sappiness I've been seeing as a side effect of people celebrating Valentines Day (lots of them claiming to hate it but clearly secretly loving the shit out of it...As long as they're with someone and get something). Most of them are by guys. Which is simultaneously surprising and completely and utterly unsurprising.
Always hearing about how guys 'don't care' but at the same time, I've watched more guy friends fall apart over their break ups than female friends. And I don't have that many guy friends.

Not much else to type.
Haven't been doing a lot. Was trying to put together something on the list of things I should do above my desk but haven't had much luck.
#4 on my list is 'Illustrate a song.', so I wrote out a plan of what I could do for 'Centre of the World' by Bright Eyes and stuck out a copy of the lyrics behind my desk...but I'm having no luck at all.

Laaaaame.

They can't take- they can't take you from me.

Got a photo done in a photobooth. This is my current facebook profile image. I had it done in the train station and there were some men doing some maintainence work or something just outside it so I got scared that I couldn't go in and because I'm the most nervous and jumpy person you're likely to come across at times, that was bad. But Johnny went into it and said it was fine, so I did the 3 photos thing and found that the first two were shite and after adjusting the seat, I came up with this one. Not amazing but believe me, a vast improvement on the other two.
I've been drawing mice and watching QI all evening.
And doing 30 second drawings. Drawing quickly but still getting my point across is one of my strong points...however...poses I've never had reason to draw in a mere 30 seconds? Very difficult. Very. Still, I think I did okay.
Um...I drew a really great mouse?
I finally got an inexpensive coat that isn't completely ugly. I got 3 books as well. 2 of them are favourites of mine... 'Lolita' by Vladimir Nabokov -except who doesn't love that book? Everyone I've met has either loved it or been fucking creeped out by the whole thing.-, 'Before I Die' by Jenny Downham -I have never cried so much over a book in my entire life.- and I also got 'The God of Small Things' by Arundhati Roy, which I have never read. The charity shop from which I bought that and 'Before I Die' were doing a 2 for 1 thing on the books so I just grabbed the first book I saw that I hadn't read already but had heard of. Not sure how interested I really am in 'The God of Small Things'. I've heard good things but...I don't know. It just doesn't interest me terribly.
I've also been listening to Astronautalis. The only rapper I've ever liked. I saw him open for Tegan & Sara when Johnny and Lucy and I went to see them for my birthday (well, Johnny and I went to see them for my birthday but we also met up with Lucy because Lucy fucking rules). The title of my blog comes from one of his songs. I can't remember what song though because I've listened to it once. I just liked the line...

I've been messing around with inks and pastels and when I feel proud enough of something (I've done a few okay things but...still just messing around.) I might put it here.
If we're friends on facebook, you can probably go see stuff I've done recently anyway.


Note: If I sound like I am under the impression that someone is actually going to read this, it's just because I figure that if I'm going to put something out on the internet, I may as well not seem like I'm talking to myself. I understand that the void is just eating my words, as it has eaten many of my possessions in recent times.