User:Aurora Hawthorne
I have a LiveJournal. My username is gifted_freak (which I believe suits me very well, thanks). Just click [this little linkie] to read it. And my bio for more. Also past entries, because those are very important as well.
Also important: I will be gone from 6/27/04 to 7/10/04. I will be at camp.
Camp, and Shopping (underlined, bold, and italicized!)
Well, I'm off to music camp tomorrow. To prepare, I was forced to go on a major shopping trip today. I. Hate. Shopping. I must say, I've bought more in the last week than I probably have in years. Maybe in my entire life. I know a lot of people that have hundreds of dollars they can spend on a whim. On clothes. And lots of accessories that they buy special for one outfit, then they never wear that outfit. And they spent one hundred dollars on it all. Sometimes more.
Oh, right. That's going past general interest and just plain old rambling. Camp, right. I have to wear skirts at dinner. I have a dorm that I'm going to be sharing with three other people, and one person will share a room with me. A dorm. With a washing machine. And a dryer. This is a big step up from the four-person tents that I'm used to. I'm used to living out of a suitcase and wearing dirty clothes because I've stopped caring. Well, generally after a week I end up with horse crap on every article of clothing I have ever possessed. Washing machines. And no horses. No falling off the horses. No watching your friend get a concussion from falling off the horses. Wow. Of course, no one to steal hospital gowns and blankets for you, which means no swooping around in said hospital gowns. What can I say? I make my own fun. Plus, it was in style the last week I was at camp last year, and that shows just how completely crap the camp was. It was considered fun to wear hospital gowns and swoop around like some kind of deranged bird. And then, if you were me, you would slip in some horse crap and make the clothes you had on underneath that hospital gown even more disgusting than before. But no more! Real showers, and a real bathroom, and incentive to look not like you slipped in horse crap. Although that shouldn't pose too big of a problem. I wonder if they have coffee? Wow.
So, as of tomorrow, I will not be updating this page. And I will mysteriously vanish for two weeks. I'm just going to have to write in a journal while I'm gone. Ooh. I better finish writing the chapter of the fanfic I'm doing now, or I'll never get back the inspiration. Well, still. Real showers. No horses. Yay!
I figured that I should probably write about this sooner or later, so here it is. I'm going to tell you all about my personal history with the Johns. Well, with Their music.
I first heard TMBG either on Tiny Toons or the Power Rangers Movie soundtrack, but I can't remember which came first. But now that I'm thinking about it, for all I know I've been listening to TMBG my entire life. After all, several of my cousins (both sides of the family, by the way) have been listening to Their stuff since I was tiny.
The first time I actually remember listening to TMBG was on Tiny Toons. I specifically remember wondering why they didn't play that cartoon with the song about that city (because I was more farmiliar with what was going on than with the music, even though I can't remember what the cartoon was about now) again. That was, obviously, Istanbul (Not Constantinople). I assume I saw the Particle Man one, too, but can only vaguely remember it, and it might be my brain playing tricks on me again.
I heard the melodies to Birdhouse In Your Soul and Ana Ng on a midi site that took midis used by authors for Sailor Moon fanfics (although we do not speak of that). Someone apparently liked TMBG. I remember liking the songs, but wondering what was wrong with the tempos. Trust me, They sound much better when They aren't in internet midi form.
My geography teacher in seventh grade would insist on singing Istanbul (Not Constantinople) the entire year long. And he didn't even know who They were; he'd heard earlier versions. It got worse after he visited Turkey over spring break. Much worse. And the next year, he hummed it in History class just to get my goat, because I still couldn't place where I knew it from. Ooh! Sudden realisation (Brit-like, too)! He heard it on Tiny Toons; he told us, and I still couldn't remember it! He also happened to like "Kokomo" by The Beach Boys muchly, and now so do I (and half of my class, too).
When I was in eighth grade, my cousin showed me the videos for Istanbul (Not Constantinople) and Birdhouse In Your Soul. A major brain snap occured; I'd heard them both before and I suddenly realised where (and my cousin was inpressed with how I unknowingly started to hum to Birdhouse, and sing to Istanbul). Thusly they were the first songs I heard of TMBG's knowing that they were by TMBG.
I wish I could say this is where the story ends, but I went off to camp that summer for three weeks. Camp does a funny thing to a person. So does falling off a horse twice (and camp mattresses are so not meant for people who have just landed very hard on their backs, and cannot sit or lie down for more than five seconds in one position without wanting to scream with the pain). And so there is more.
In October of 2003, I heard Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is A Mass Of Incandescent Gas) and Birdhouse (again) on Netscape radio. I hadn't heard the former before, but I recognised Birdhouse, and had another brain snap.
I searched for Them on LaunchYahoo! and came to Their artist page. All of a sudden, I knew just how much stuff They had out there. Their artist page had links to Dial-A-Song and tmbg.com, and I downloaded the clock radio, and listened to a lot of TMBG's albums (most notably John Henry, which I still consider my favorite).
Since December, I have become a full-time TMBG fan and listener. For some reason, having Their music playing while I'm reading helps me read between the lines and pick up stuff I missed before (if I've read it before). I also listen to Them without any distractions, just to listen. I can't write with Them on, though, becaus of all the genre-hopping. I don't know why, but I need music that matches the tones of the story. Dido and Coldplay help with that, which should tell you that my stories aren't happy-go-lucky in the least (and I refuse to tie up some of the loose ends).
P.S. I came across the wiki while searching for lyrics to People Are Wrong! The rest, I'm glad to say, is history.
This a picture that Flux put up here. Dude, you're awesome. And I'm on a sugar-free high (in other words, I'm completely hyper, but I haven't had sugar, or anything else for that matter, since about forever), and I don't know why. I'm just having a good day. For once. Ever.
Flux knows me too well. If you just flip it and add some sand (and painful burrs), the above picture looks exactly like a house my family vacations in sometimes. It happens to be in North Carolina, not Nevada, but still. Wow. I'm wondering if this place has all the good cable channels, because the channels down in NC suck something awful. And since the last time I went outside that place was two days before we left (being out in the sun too long makes me nauseous, and has ever since I was in Cape May when I was little), I spent a lot of time with the TV and the Nintendo game someone left there. That's fine with me; one time I was in the ocean and I thought there was an empty snail shell between my toes. I picked it up and it was... a hermit crab. A very angry hermit crab that promptly pinched me. It hurt, I screamed, and a wave knocked me over. I got salt water up my nose and sand in my mouth. Thus said, the beach (only a few blocks away from the beach house) is not exactly my favorite place in the world, although I went out almost every night to look for ghost crabs. Huh. That was really off the subject of anything, but I'm too tired to fix it. I didn't get enough sleep last night.
Flux here. What you said about Aurora Hawthorne being "all over the place" was great, because it's so true. Everywhere you look, you see only your eyes. When you listen, it's really just your ears you hear. Reach out and feel your fingertips, no matter what you grasp. Each of us is a prisoner of perception, although "prisoner" makes it sound bad. Maybe "permanent resident" is better (reminds me of the TMBG songs, "My Man" and "The Spine Surfs Alone").
What did you mean when you said we should check with you about assumptions? What rumors? Did I miss a memo? A meeting? Your live journal and the wiki are the only contact we have with you! Speaking of people making assumptions, the note you entered in the summary field, "Blame Flux. He wanted it," sounds REALLY, REALLY BAD, and I would hate for people to get the wrong idea (What she meant, people, was that I had posted a comment suggesting she update her live journal). Maybe when you're older you'll read this and laugh, but in the meantime, people should know that Flux is blameless and just wants to write and read thoughts about TMBG.
Blame, According to the Gospel of TMBG (This is humor, folks)
Hebrews 7:26 Such a high priest meets our need--one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens (Yup, that's me alright).
Revelation 14:4-5 These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for they kept themselves pure...no lie was found in their mouths; they are blameless (Wait--no women?!).
I Blame You/Lyrics: Now they say the same words of what used to be, what used to be--I blame you.
Out Of Jail/Lyrics: I wish I'd gotten to know her before I fell in love. I could say she's to blame, say she's the man in this cautionary tale, but I swore I'd be true, and I'll swear and I'll swear, 'til Kitten's out of jail.
My Evil Twin/Lyrics: I'd hate to see you leave, 'cause I have grown so grateful for the blame you save me from.
The Biggest One/Lyrics: I've got no one to blame but my fat self--I'm the biggest one.
Untitled/Lyrics: Look in the paper! Don't blame me if the guy's a nut.
--Flux
In the eighth paragraph, I assume you mean Oct. 2003? Oct. '04 isn't here yet. --My Evil Twin's Twin
Aurora says: Yes I do. *cough* Thank you, and now I have to go back to my lj, press the comments button, click on the blue pencil, and fix it. Crud.
I read your post at Why We Love TMBG. You're never friendless when you know the World's Address. --Flux.
- 28-februaro-2004
- Bonvenon (welcome). I couldn't pass up the opportunity to respond to your Esperanto comment. Please check out http://www.lernu.net/ to learn through the web, or http://www.nesto.subito.cc/ to learn through email with a tutor. --SR
Aurora, I love your post at The End Of The Tour/Interpretations. About TMBG fading with the album, "John Henry," I have good news: I'm 37 years old and though I bought "Flood" on a whim in 1990, I feel like I didn't "get" TMBG until 2004, just recently. Everything's different now. I believe that everything up to and including "Mink Car" is just like a gigantic Easter egg waiting to hatch. The Johns have even said somewhere recently that they are working on their "psychedelic masterpiece," right now, as you read this. --Flux
You're 14! life doesn't suck. Wait until taxes for it to suck - Fossilise Apostle
This is a fun page. Just for fun, I'm going to disagree with Fossilise Apostle and say that yes, indeed, Aurora's life doth sucketh. Insomnia induced by the existence of the word, "simple," is a terrible thing to plague a fourteen-year girl. Honestly, I thought you were a housewife in your 40's and I felt sorry for you, but now I see that you have an additional 26 years to struggle through before you even achieve that level of pitifulness, so yes, you're in a bit of a jam. I mean that in a nice way. Or nice it in a mean way, depending, so long as everyone's having fun. I have good news. When you're my age, 37, you will no longer wonder why the word, "simple," exists. You will wonder how it's possible for someone to wonder why the word "wonder" exists. I'm not kidding. And now, if you'll excuse me, I will forfeit the floor to someone more forgetful than myself who can hopefully tell me what I'll be thinking when I'm even older, maybe about my taxes, because time is marching on, and I must rest awhile. Kids these days. Oy. --Flux
Your so emo. I kind of wish you were a housewife in your 40s. --Michael Edward Willenzik III.
Comprehensible, possibly. --Octofish
