August 2014

Hip Hop Sunday: Jurassic 5 - The Way We Do

- by admin


Slept in and woke up listening to the rain outside.

Thought about breakfast and benedicts and coffee.

Braved the rain under a shared umbrella to the local greasy spoon, The Nook.

Laughed. Smiled. Was thankful.

Going to a wedding this afternoon which means yr girl is getting dressed to the 9's.

Expect photographic evidence here and here.

Hope your Sunday is filled with as much love as mine.

xox

yr girl Shaner


 

I lead the best life

- by admin

10646710_10154549024605323_1919490947789051443_nI don't say that enough because we're trained not to say it.

We live in a big, cynical world and it's cool to emphasize the struggle and be a starving, fucked-up artist or whatever

but sometimes, when life is just right

you have to #humblebrag.

Which is what this post is.

I have amazing friends. It's funny how you only realize who the good, solid people are when you go through yr toughest times, but when they do holy hell does it feel good to know you have them in yr corner.

I have an amazing bf who is funny and charming and makes me feel like the only girl in the world. I love him endlessly.

I have a blossoming career that challenges and inspires me constantly.

I have all of you, who show up here and read day after day & year after year to read this nonsense and comment and send me nice messages once & a while. Because you're beautiful people.

Thank you, all of you, for making my life so rich.

xox

yr girl Shaner


 

Today is Elvis Costello's birthday

- by admin

he's 60 which means that he was the age of the guy that I'm dating when I was born. Wrap yr head around that.

I didn't grow up listening to Costello as my parents (bless their hearts) had questionable taste in music besides blasting Elton John during Sunday morning house cleanings.

The first time I really heard Costello was sitting in a coffee shop downtown drinking a London Fog with a boy I was dating who was into photography and had just finished taking my picture in the December snow in a dress that was far too short for the wind chill that night.

We were talking about who knows what when Little Palaces came on and he started to sing along and I said

I don't know this song

and he said

that's unbelievable! I'm taking you home and we're going to listen to all of his greatest hits and then some because it is a travesty if you don't know Costello.

He took my hand and we ran through the snowbanks and suddenly my legs didn't feel so cold

and he made me hot chocolate and sang Alison

which isn't spelled right but whatever

I'll take it.

Happy birthday, Mr. Costello.


 

Hip Hop Sunday: The Lytics - Ring My Alarm

- by admin

Finally around on a Sunday to take care of this 'ol blog tradition.

Today's feature are the Winnipeg-based, super talented, The Lytics

who yr girl had the pleasure of seeing last Saturday night at Rainbow Trout

who put on a stellar performance

despite some ongoing technical difficulties

and were super nice about it

of course

and wished everyone a great weekend when their set was done

just like I'm wishing to you:

hope you had a great weekend!

xox

yr girl Shaner


 

Pstew wins the #IceBucketChallenge

- by admin

Like a boss.


 

I know this isn't a very good song

- by admin

by a band that isn't all that great, really.

But sometimes I get it in my head and can't get it out no matter how hard I shake it or listen to Royal Canoe.

The first time I really listened to it

I mean really listened

was while walking down the street in Hamilton when I lived there.

It was spring but still cold and I was walking around puddles and I was sad because I missed Winnipeg and everyone in it, even though I would have never admitted it at the time -to myself or to anyone.

I walked around and was thinking about my boyfriend and my life and how lonely I was even though I'd left on what was supposed to be this grand, life-changing adventure

it didn't really change me at all

at least, not until after it was over, anyway.

This song was on a playlist that my then-boyfriend had put together for me and as I walked through the weird, kinda-scary tunnel under the train track hill to pick up my sushi and sashimi Saturday night dinner for one I realized

you hold me down.

Which is never a good feeling

because things got complicated after that.


 

Home from Rainbow Trout

- by admin


which is easily the best festival that Manitoba has to offer

both in terms of the amazing (seriously, amazing) music and the overall vibe that lasted the whole weekend.

John and I rolled in around 6pm Friday and had enough light to set up our tent while dripping sweat, crack a few beers and hop in the river next to the campsite

where we goofed off and floated around and pulled ourselves together at dusk to head down to the stage

where we danced and kissed like fools to amazing music played by super talented people

a handful of which were dressed like the Village People

and met up with Alex and Adam

and had the time of our lives.

Saturday was filled with more river-sitting, beer-drinking, singing along, open mics

and even more amazing music which included a late-night performance by one of my favourite weirdo musicians, smoky tiger

(who played this masterpiece and it was glorious)

I couldn't have asked for a better weekend or a better way to wrap up the summer.

Thanks to Ben Jones, the volunteers, and all the musicians who made the weekend such an incredible experience.

Bravo.


 

Going to Rainbow Trout Music Festival tomorrow

- by admin

10483240_10202168965376762_8980454786686629118_o

which will be my first year going and I'm excited as hell.

We spent the evening running around getting stuff ready

in-between eating sandwiches on croissantsphoto (1)

laughing in back alleys

walking all over this damn town

holding hands.

Right now there's laundry in and I'm drinking a beer and watching John learn a song

but shhh don't tell him I'm watching because it might make him weird

because this is adorable and I don't want to ruin it in the moment

so I'll just capture it in a blog post instead

of course.


 

Goodbye, Mr. Williams

- by admin

Thank you for being a part of my life growing up.

Thank you for all the times my family could put aside their differences and watch Aladdin or Jumanji for the millionth time.

Thank you for your characters, who were so conflicted and real and human, and who helped me understand complex ideas like loss and despair long before I actually experienced them in real-life.

Thank for you being my childhood friend, even though you never knew it.

Thank you for giving hope to so many of us in the face of your own inner demons.

Thank you for making us smile even when you felt like you couldn't.

Thank you for bringing people together, even in your death, to laugh and cry and feel together.

Thank you for the memories, wonderful and bittersweet as they may be.

I'll never forget you.

xox

yr girl Shaner

Capture


 

Let's Talk About: Inappropriate Words

- by admin

When I was a little girl my parents got me a whole series of books called "Let's Talk About" which were designed to help small children deal with their emotions and attitudes that can prevent them from becoming responsible young people and eventually responsible adults.

They had titles like "Let's Talk About: Bullying," "Let's Talk About: Feeling Jealous" and other stuff like that. I think about those books a lot and reflect on how they provided an opportunity for me and my parents to have a dialogue that was at my level about complex issues.

While I don't want to talk about those books, I want to use this post as a way of having an open dialogue about something that embarrasses me a lot, and something that I'm hoping to change: my tendency to use words like "retard" and "gay" as derogatory terms in regular conversation.

Kind of like my own personal Let's Talk About.

It seems to me that the reason that we use words like "gay," "retard" and "homo" when we're young is because we hear them and recognize that they're insults, but we're too immature to grasp the larger context of what they mean in our society and how inappropriate it is to say them.

So I grew up using these words and they managed to make their way into my speech patterns as an adult largely because most of the people that I knew still used them.

It's easy to feel like calling someone a retard is okay when everyone you hang out with uses that word all the time.

As we get older we're supposed to learn these rules of social conduct, but many of us disregard them because we haven't grown up enough to realize that it's actually really offensive and hurtful to use that kind of language.

 

(For example, I used this image as a response in online conversations way more than I care to admit.)

Recently though I've had the opportunity to have some productive talks with different people about using those sorts of words and it's made me think about how frequently I fell back on using them, and the extent to which I defended my so-called "right" to say whatever I want (no matter how hurtful) and expressed annoyance at people being "butthurt" over it.

It's not nice to open your eyes and realize that you acted poorly when you could have made better choices, but that's how we learn and I want to take a moment to publicly apologize to anyone whose feelings I may have hurt with that sort of language: I'm sorry.

I could have acted better, and moving forward I intend to do so.

With that in mind, I'm looking for some help. It's not easy to change our speech patterns, and I would love some input for how to remove these words from my vocabulary. What tips or suggestions do you have?

Thanks in advance!

xox

yr girl Shaner


 

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