one reason why I'm sad to be missing the Brandi Carlile show in Athens...

Brandi Carlile is an amazing live performer with an electric voice. Even if you are inclined to dis people whose work has appeared on Grey's Anatomy, I encourage you to give her a chance anyway. Listen to her voice and guitar work! I just love her.

This video was posted a few years ago and still brings a tear to my eye. Can you imagine the joy and excitement that girl must have felt?!

I'm applying for the best job ever!

It's my birthday, by the way.

I finally finished my video application for the Best Job in the World. Video applications are due 2/22, so of course I finished mine 2/21. You'd be amazed--simply amazed!--at the amount of crap I got done today, crap I've had to do for weeks. Funny what a month-long trip away from home will inspire a girl to do. I mailed a ton of letters, sent off boring paperwork, took care of my taxes (read: mailed all forms to an accountant), did Addieville duties, picked up some Argentine pesos, tidied the house, and more, more, more!

Plus I went out for an hour this evening to celebrate Baby Neighb's birthday. And I watched a movie and did this video! Life is good. Hope I'm not too sleepy when I wake up all too early tomorrow.

Watch the video, but don't write evil comments or give me less than 5 stars. 'Cause then, you know, I'd be sad--and a girl shouldn't be sad on her birthday.

could she be any cooler?

I've told you before about some hilarious kids in Georgia I have the great fortune of knowing. I could have sworn I've mentioned Rio before, but perhaps not. She is the wonderchild of my NYU friends Eliza and Eric Obenauf (of $2 Radio fame).

Check out how awesome she is!

(photos courtesy of Eric & Eliza Obenauf)

podcast recommendation of the day

Are there any English majors out there? Anyone who wanted to take more English classes but decided to pursue some other interests instead? You might want to keep reading to find out what podcast I'm going to recommend and why. I promise it's good--you should stay tuned.

As someone with an undergraduate degree in English and American literature, I can recall many, many hours of discussion-based literature classes during which pompous classmates dismissed others' theories and claimed their interpretations were the "right" ones. Luckily, far more prevalent are the memories of having one "aha!" moment after another during class discussions, grateful for others' insights that led me to understanding the story, poem, or essay more deeply. Despite my initial discomfort with revealing to others what I saw in the patterns and prose of fiction, I eventually opened up with the knowledge that almost any self-proclaimed theory about literature can be argued as long as you have some evidence and well-picked quotes to support it. Work may be created by the author with one particular goal in mind, but his readers will walk away from the piece with a variety of insights the author may not have intended--and each reader may have a completely unique interpretation.

Other than a few informal meetings of our local fledgling book club, I haven't much talked about literature in a critical sense since I graduated from NYU in 2002. I read voraciously and definitely reflect on my reading, but I don't go out of my way to push myself to understand a novel more deeply or try to see someone else's point of view. I read and reflect alone, then put the book back on the shelf. I hadn't realized I missed the push and pull of roundtable literature discussions, hadn't known that I'd missed the part of myself that could pull all-nighters writing twenty-page papers about my particular take on a poem.

Until now. On a whim, I downloaded a few episodes of The New Yorker's Fiction Podcast. I bundled up for a walk a couple weeks bag and pressed play on my iPod and was whisked into a wonderful, beautiful story. I can't remember what episode I listened to that day, but I can remember smiling as I walked down the streets of Athens. I remember thinking to myself, "Wow! I feel as if I'm in one of my English classes with a really good teacher and no obnoxious, holier-than-thou classmates!" You see, the show not only features the stories themselves--it comes complete with a brief discussion before and after the story is read. One famous author picks any story he wants that has been published in The New Yorker. The guest author reads this story he admires and then discusses the ins and outs of the work with the magazine's fiction editor, Deborah Treisman, who has a really pleasant voice (unlike the voices I've stumbled across on several less-established podcasts). I did a quick Google search for her so I could link to her name and came across a really great article from The New York Times--click on her name and read it, if you'd like. Sounds like a cool woman in the NYT article.

And she sounds like a cool woman in her recorded life on this podcast. She isn't abrasive, judgmental, or dismissive when it comes to guest authors' interpretations of the work they choose to read. She retains the wide-eyed wonder (overused phrase--sorry--but it seems to ring true here) of a girl who's still in love with reading, who's still amazed at all the tricks of language and tone. Deborah and the guest author talk about whatever has moved them in the story, about the author's language and motivation, about his/her diction and use of imagery. I've listened to about ten of the episodes so far, and no one has annoyed me. The stories are always great, and the intimate conversation that follows really does shine light on the story.

Have you never ventured into literary criticism but wanted to know what intellectual bibliophiles had to say about so-called "good" fiction? Did you take one (or twenty) literature classes in college and then go cold turkey, not having another literary discussion after age 22? Are you an avid reader who thinks she immediately knows all there is to know about a piece of writing? Are you curious to know why I love this show so much? If you answered yes to any of those questions, I have an answer: this is the podcast for you.

Let me know what you think of it.

my neighborhood

some favorite photos (summer 2006)

taken in Toronto

taken in Toronto

Just one of many gorgeous spots on the Islands in Toronto

My grandfather's name was Herbert Geddis, and he was a fireman. I was
delighted to find a fire station on Herbert Av. in Toronto!

The Tilt-a-Whirl at Erieview (or "Pera's") Park in Geneva-on-the-Lake, Ohio. A few
months after this was taken, the longtime amusement park was dismantled and is now no longer.

Here are some photos from summer 2006 that I shot. I have recently tried to get back into photography a bit, and I'm succeeding! I want some fancy lenses and such that will fit my digital SLR. When I bought my digital SLR a year ago, I was under the impression that my rather large collection of lenses and accessories (given to me by my grandfather) would fit the body of the new digital. Wrong impression. It seems there's no adapter to get these lenses to fit on any camera made in the last ten years, so I'm pretty disappointed.

The need for this statement won't ever arise, I'm sure, but here it is anyway: Please do not repost, reprint, or share the photographs on this site without express written permission from Janet Geddis. Thank you.

baby neighb

I just got in after a day o' fun with my dear friend A., a girl who just so happens to live two doors away! How convenient to find your neighbor funny, smart, and quite companionable!

Before I got a chance to hang out with A., we exchanged many messages posted to each other's doors. With each note we upped the ante a bit, always saying in one way or another that we should hang out soon. At last we got a chance to have a date, and ever since then we've been going strong. I'm very grateful to have her around!

Though more artistically talented than I, we share a knack for creating little homemade gifts and greetings. Imagine the happy snippets of delight I experience when I find a felt flower accompanied by a little note that says, "Happy spring!" or a little greeting card on my windshield when I walk out to my car to drive around and do errands.

Here are but two photos of greetings A. (or "Baby Neighb," as I and only I am allowed to call her--my rule) has left for me to discover.

For Halloween this year, she made little cupcakes; for Thanksgiving, a hand turkey with google eyes. It's my (well-researched) belief that engaging in little creative activities now and then keeps up your spirits, lets you relax, and causes you to feel more at ease with your life. Listen to me, guys: I have a Master's degree in this.

watch!

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

Dancer vs. Politician

I love this band. The members are charming and extraordinarily attractive (I dare you not to have a crush on lead singer/composer/founder Sanni Baumgartner), and the music really resonates with me despite my not knowing a lick of German. (A number of the songs on the new album, A City Half-Lost, are in German; the rest are in good ol' English.)

I've seen this video a number of times, but I can't get enough of it. It's lush and beautiful--the setting is so very Georgia summer, if you will. The music is pretty yet unpolished in the video, which is a part of a series I'd like to know more about.

Take a look:

Dancer Vs Politician: Justin Fairborn
by eikonproductions

that time R.E.M. played a private show for me and I didn't show up

I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS! My dear Brandi posted a couple of Blogotheque videos on her awesome blog, and in my monthly review of her writing, I stumbled across this one of R.E.M. playing in Athens.

Playing behind my house.
Literally behind my house. Maybe fifty feet from my porch. WHY DID I NOT KNOW THIS WAS HAPPENING? True the shows aren't publicized. True Michael Stipe doesn't know we're friends (even though we are, of course). Oh I'm sad. But also excited. I mean, R.E.M. played a show next to my house.

See it here. Now if Sweet and Sarah Beth could cry with me for a minute, I'd feel better.

Athens Banner Herald's readers' choice awards 2008

The awards are now posted on the newspaper's website. For the most part, the winners are predictable and boring. No big surprises there.

I was really sad to see this:

Bookstore
1st place - Barnes & Noble
2nd place - Borders

People! This is terrible! In the town we all love so much and believe is cool, independent, and creative, our favorite bookstores are national chains? (Not that there's much of a choice--that is, until I am able to open my store.)

The end.

VOTING!

With the HUGE issues looming out there (money, health--you know), some very important concerns are getting lost in the shuffle. Click on the following link to see how the presidential candidates plan on supporting the arts and art education--if they're supportive at all.

http://www.artsactionfund.org/artsvote/default.asp

Deadline to register to vote is OCTOBER 6! That's tomorrow! Hurry it up, kids!

$2 Radio & Vroman's Bookstore

When I went to the Book Expo America this past May, I was thrilled to see some old friends (Eliza, Eric, Alissa!) and really happy to meet a new one (Patrick Brown of Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, CA). Imagine my surprise and delight to have stumbled upon this blog entry, written by Patrick for the Vroman's site, starring Eliza & Eric of $2 Radio!

Independent publishing houses are able to publish works that you might not ordinarily come across while browsing through Barnes & Noble's bestseller displays; independent bookstores are inspirational and inspired places where you can find all sorts of reading material to feed your brain.

I am so excited to be a part of all this in my own small way--perhaps this time next year I'll be ready to say that I've assumed an even bigger role!

save bitch!

Program Me In

You have to see this new Je Suis France video. My friend Jeremy Wheatley has been hiding away writing songs for a long time, but only recently has he started playing the gee-tar and singing for his adoring fans.

He's in an awesome band called Je Suis France, and he's the star of the new video. I LOVE this video. The song is really cool, too.

THE END.

another MTM Show celebrity spoken to!

(A note before you begin: I tried and tried to fix the font size in here but can't seem to get the swing of it. Sorry!)

I went to see Cloris Leachman at the UGA Fine Arts Building. She was giving a lecture (more of a question & answer session, really) as a follow-up to her one-woman career retrospective show (that I didn't get to see...). If you have ever met me or seen my walls, you know that I am a ridiculously huge fan of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. I first saw Cloris on MTM--she plays the ever-on-the-go, perfectionistic neighbor/landlady who's friends with Mary and always at odds with Rhoda (Valerie Harper, an actress I *almost* saw years ago but who was unable to perform in the play I attended--boo!). She is brilliant. Most recently I've seen her as the loving, half-drunk, serious-when-she's-gotta-be mother of Tea Leoni in Spanglish--but she's done lots of work before Mary, lots of work in between Mary and Spanglish, and is still really active.

Jim & I went to see her today. The theatre wasn't the fancy one I remembered--we must have been in a different studio or something. Harsh overhead fluorescent lights, a smattering of fans and actors-in-training, and a microphone that didn't work. With the heat (or AC?) blasting continuously the entire time, I missed out on about 1/2 of what was said. Despite the frustration that accompanied that, I was thrilled to see her in person. She looks amazing at almost 82 years old--in good shape, able to walk swiftly up and down stairs, and really quick witted and extremely silly.

I wish I'd taken a photo of when she started scooching her chair closer and closer and closer to the host, prompting lots of laughter from the crows. I did get a few good shots, though. Here's one of her in a girlish pose, feet hung over the side of the chair.

When Jim & I went to leave, I had a feeling she was going to call us out. She did. We started walking quietly toward the exit and she said, "Excuse me," to the crowd. Looking towards us, she asked, "Where are you going?!' I told her I was going to work; she asked me what I did. Then she looked at Jim and pointed. "What about you?"

"Oh, I have to go to the doctor," he explained. She, like any woman over 60 (or perhaps any woman of any age?) was charmed by Jim and expressed genuine concern for his back problem. After their quick talk, she snapped back into stage-Cloris and said, "All right. You can go."

I love her.

The end.

a once* in a lifetime Oscar moment

*pun intended

Last week, I watched parts of the Oscars while playing Mexican train dominoes with my sister and Jim. (That domino game is my newest obsession--my sister bought it for me for my birthday, knowing full well it'd become an addictive habit.) We watched a few boring acceptance speeches, all of which were cut off by music even more quickly than in years past. We watched and listened to the Best Song nominees sing their songs, but Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova's live version of "Falling Slowly," from the indie film Once, blew the others out of the water with its raw emotion and genuine luster. I loved it and, as usual, found my eyes getting watery. Some songs just do that to you.

A few minutes after their performance, all the Best Original Song nominees were named. And guess who won? That's right, these little indie-filmmaking, adorable people. Glen made the acceptance speech, but when it came time for Marketa to have a moment to thank everyone, the mic had already been turned off and she was further drowned out by the music.

Imagine our collective delight when, after the subsequent commercial break, Jon Stewart made way for Marketa Irglova to walk onto the stage again. She had a few moments to make the comments she'd wanted to make in the first place--never have I ever seen a moment like that on a huge awards show, a moment when they gave someone a chance to talk further after having been cut off. (Granted, there are two times in recent memory when those talking just kept barreling over the music--Kanye West mentioned that it'd be in good taste for the Powers that Be to cut the music as he was speaking about his late mother at the Grammys.) But to invite her back to speak after she raised no onstage protest? What a lovely moment.

This video below shows the moment they got the award as well as both winners' acceptance speeches. It's worth watching, I promise.

Mitch Hedberg & his widow

For those of you who don't already know it, let me say it to you now: I adore (adored?) Mitch Hedberg. He died in March 2005 and I sincerely wept upon hearing the news--for several months there, I wasn't able to listen to his comedy CDs at all. It was just too unbearable.

Clearly my grief is nothing compared to that of those who knew him. I ain't claiming that in the least. But it is strange when someone whose words you've laughed at uproariously and memorized for their wit and humor is suddenly gone from the world. His wife Lynn Shawcroft was one of those left behind to mourn him, and just tonight I stumbled across her blog. I don't necessarily recommend it unless you're really curious about her as a comedienne or wondering what her life (or life as Mitch's widow) is like. In my few minutes of browsing, I did come across a few particularly candid entries dealing with her loss and grief--in these particular entries the writing was really bare and unflowery. It made me scared for the time when I will begin to lose those who are close to me because she tossed neither herself nor her readers the smallest morsel of comfort. If I knew her, perhaps I'd commend her on the bravery it took to put those words to paper (or screen, as it were). What does it say that she then posted them to the internet? I'm not sure.

In any case, now I'm thinking about love and loss and Mitch and what it must be like to lose your partner when you and he make your living as comedians. You must perform and make others laugh if you are to succeed in the business--but how do you do that when you're mourning? I suppose it's the quintessential question all actors face. Truly, it's probably what most people face whenever they're going through a period of loss. I would guess that most people struggle to maintain a somewhat normal facade to cover up what's going on behind the scenes.

Ramble, ramble, ramble.

The end.

October 12, 2006 - Thursday

1:14 PM - Video: The Walmart Way Current mood: amused Some girls I know from NYU, ones who are doing pretty damn well for themselves on the acting, writing, and comedy front(s), seem to have played a major part in putting together this rather funny video. Check it out! 2 Comments - 4 Kudos

	K	ha, that was great! Posted by K on October 12, 2006 - Thursday at 2:26 PM [Remove] [Reply to this]

Suzanne

Hilariously realistic. Posted by Suzanne on October 12, 2006 - Thursday at 2:49 PM

8/8/06 - night of the blue donkey

August 8, 2006 - Tuesday

12:22 PM - night of the blue donkey Current mood: proud Last night, I went to Edwyna'sart show at the Flicker Bar, my newest home away from home. She has spent the better part of the last several ______ [insert accurate measurement to highlight how much of her recent life has been completely occupied by this project] creating this beautiful blue donkey paintings. Click on the link for a thorough description of what she's doing with the proceeds from this artwork. What's really amazing is...wow. Ha. I was about to say one thing as if there's just one amazing thing about her undertaking, when really there is an inexhaustible list. I showed up to Flicker at 7:04, just minutes after the official art opening had kicked off. Jim was tending bar and told me that I'd better hurry, that the paintings were going fast. I looked to the wall and realized that he (and the dream I'd had that day, a dream in which I'd showed up early and all the paintings had been sold before the show'd even begun) spoke the truth--several paintings already had neon orange post-it notes next to them, denoting the fact that they'd been claimed by loyal fans. My immediate favorite, one of a donkey peeking around the corner of a frame soaked in orange, was taken. Another one that immediately caught my eye was one in which the blues were gorgeously saturated and a donkey's face was at the forefront--also taken (by Jim, of all people). Alas. But my painting is really quite charming, and definitely one of my favorites of all the forty that were on display last night. You'll have to see it later, my friends, or else go to Flicker with me and buy me a beer so I can point out to you the adorable square painting where my blue ass stares out from a field under a cloud-spotted sky. Edwyna sold out in about an hour to a chorus of excited, smiley cheers and happiness. She was especially entertaining to watch in her blue dress as she rushed around--the disappointment of not getting to talk to the utterly busy woman was balanced by the fact that we were treated to watching her stuff wads of cash between her breasts as she got paid. Ha! Woohoooooo, Edwyna!! Go vote today, Athens. If one lady can work this hard for the Democratic party, we can step out of our homes and take a few minutes to punch a few dots at a voting booth in this insufferable heat. 1 Comment

(Steady) Eddy

One month of painting and another week to prepare them for display. That is what goes in the blank. This morning, I took the kid to school, drove out to a farm to take care of a friend's pet rats, then went by the school to VOTE.I like activity at the school on voting day so the kids sense something special happening. That is why I don't go the the Board of Elections. However, I am grateful we all have the opportunity to vote early there. I am so happy you like your painting. Thanks for not being too disappointed in not getting your first choice. Thanks for buying one. If they had not sold out, I certainly would not consider painting any more. So your purchase has given a few other people the opportunity to own a blue donkey as well.I couldn't look into people's faces and tell them that was IT. So there will be 25 more for $25. But THEN that is IT. I will need to get paid after that. AND I am always available for commissions, just to let you and everybody else know. Posted by (Steady) Eddy on August 8, 2006 - Tuesday at 1:10 PM