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Pitseleh
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Name: Moneypenny
Country: United States
State: California
Metro: Sacramento
Birthday: 3/25/1985
Gender: Female
Interests: film, acting, video games, politics, listening to mass amounts of music, cooking, hot skinny rocker boys, Angelina Jolie
Expertise: surviving college, acronyms, scene it, film theatre music sushi random pop culture passing time ranting raving rocking rolling and being Green
Occupation: Student
Industry: Art
Message: message meEmail: email me
AIM:  AmericanNight85
Member Since:
5/22/2002
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| Hello folks! As my seven year Xanagaversary approaches, I've been thinking a lot about how I haven't been seriously blogging for a long time. A part of me outgrew it and I think for another part of me, what it meant to blog changed. Also, I have to blame a lot of it on Facebook. Microblogging requires a lot less work, right? But I think there is a still a place for more in depth xanga entries. A lot has been going on in my life as of late and I'd like to share it with whomever is still out there. So there's more to come on this great horizon. Just wait and see... A great adventure awaits!
Also, I just have to sneak in a plug for the new Fox show Glee. It's corny and predictable but also hilarious and shockingly earnest. Plus, Jane Lynch! Let me just say, I hate Journey with the fire of 1000 suns, and the Journey revival has just made me resent them more. But I was, dare I say, SHOCKED when the Glee cast started to sing Don't Stop Believin (which always makes me think of that odd roller-skating scene in Monster, and that has not helped with my feelings towards Journey) and I...liked it. More than that, I watched the show again and bought the song! Their interpretation actually makes me listen to the lyrics and appreciate them. They strike me as something Bruce might sing, but with more pep. In a Bruce song, small town girl would be a waitress and city boy would probably take off with her to Atlantic City in a classic car, to persue the American Dream. Unless this is Badlands, in which case they go on a murder spree. Nonetheless, if a show can make me appreciate something which I was vhemently opposed to, I say give it a chance. It's free on Hulu!
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| I have managed to watch the entire first season of Friday Night Lights in a week and a half. I think that's a sign of something just slightly unhealthy  I never though I'd love a show about small towns and football. Isn't that the story of where I come from? Isn't that what I worked so hard to get away from (only to miss it of course, oh the irony!). I couldn't care less about sports and I think the entire town of Dillon need a reality check or...at least another hobby. But I love that the football is a metaphor for the heart of the town, for the heart of America. The passion, the politics, the blood and the sweat and the playing dirty and the glory of pulling something off out of sheer will. When Riggs looks at Lila and tells her he can't stop thinking about her, my heart stops. Doesn't every girl want a guy to look at her that way, to want her with such palpable desire? Matt Saracen's fumbles and awkwardness and eventual blossoming into a man were predictable but I rooted for him the entire way.
I have to say, I am Landry. I'd love to be someone cooler, but if you took out the math geek and put in drama geek, that'd be me. Sarcasm and wit, awkward bravado and an all-too-sensitive core that he keeps tucked away. I love Landry. I don't get him and Tyra but my heart went out to them after the near miss rape that threw my stomache around and made my heart beat fast. The evolution of Tyra has been something totally unexpected, from a raw slutty gold digger to a wounded but complex fighter a girl who knows she wants more and has finally been inspired to get it, without the help of men. Her relationship with her mother truly touched me and her fierce devotion to her family made her something fully dimensional. It's often the songs or the characters that have to grow on us that we end up loving the most, and I have to say the same for Tyra.
But maybe most of all, I love Coach Taylor. I can't believe that the same gawky man from Early Edition is the tough but heartfelt Texan who brought a team to state. His relationship with the wonderful Connie Britton isn't the simple I love you or I hate you relationships you often see among adults or parents on tv. There's a real love but there's also real struggle. I truly wish I had parents who were that understanding or supportive, who loved each other with that much acceptance. I think it is fantastic that they challenge each other to be better people, better professionals, better parents. I'm actually excited to see them have a baby, which I was initially dreading. So here's to Dillon, a town I can root for a show I love. Who knew?
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| I am not a proposition or an concept or a symbol to rally for or against. I am a human being.
The passage of Proposition 8 (the anti-gay marriage amendment) and the hullabaloo surrounding it was not only frustrating and annoying, it was degrading. I have to ask those who voted "yes," is your life any better? Is your relationship any safer? Depriving human beings of equality validates your heterosexual lifestyle and the union you are legally allowed to enter into? Bully for you! Preventing committed homosexuals from having the equal rights will not stop a 50% divorce rate, or a world in which Britany Spears can be married for 55 hours. Don't tell me that marriage is sacred when these things go on. I find it particularly hypocritical that the LDS Church donated approximately $25 million dollars to the Yes on 8 campain. Not only does this proposition not affect Utah, but wasn't it Mormons themselves that had to flee their homes and create an entire state to escape persecution for their beliefes, a major tenent of which was the right to marry whomever and however many spouses they chose? Thus, Utah was born (you can keep it, thanks). Hypocrisy! It's a bitter taste in my mouth and I can't quite get rid of it.
Worse still was watching the Yes on 8 Campaign wrap itself in the cloak of family. Whenever a conservative movement attempts to deprive other people of their rights or censor others, it invokes the rights of FAMILIES. What about the hundreds of gay families I saw in Pride this year? How can we not consider them? I heard over and over how marriage would be taught in schools. I can tell you that after 17 years of schooling, not once did I ever, EVER discuss marriage (let alone gay marriage) with a teacher. There were no units on family or marriage in elementary school. And when we finally got to high school, when sexual education was actually taught, we never spoke about homosexuality. This includes how the LGBT student body should protect itself from STDs. When the time came, I had to ask my vajayjay doctor about how I could contract STDs from another woman and how I could protect myself. Most lesbian and bisexual women aren't even aware that they can contract an STD from same sex contact, let alone that they should protect themselves. Yet another way that high school failed me. Truly, what is worse? A lot of young, ill-informed LGBT teenagers having unprotected sex and contracting life threatening diseases or spending 10 minutes discussing options for protection? What the Yes on 8 Campaign meant was that teachers would have to acknowledge that some parents are same sex and married. That is not the same as educating or indoctrinating about the institution of marriage.
I understand that some Californians felt that the court had gone too far and made a major decision despite "popular" will. And to that I say, you are not entirely wrong. I am not a fan of an activist court, but if it were not for such decisions we would not have Brown vs. Board of Education and some schools in the South I am sure would still be segregated. But despite your legal reservations, you should have been able to see that this case was bigger than legal haranging. One of the WORST arguments I have heard for Prop 8 was that marriage "has always been between a man and a woman and that's how it should stay." Just because something is the way it is doesn't mean it is the way it should be. Tradition is not a valid argument, your unwillingness to progress or do something that makes you feel uncomfortable or awkward is not a strong enough reason. IT IS WHAT IT IS fails! Epic fail!
I will not stop fighting, registering people to vote or volunteering. I know in my heart some day we will look back at this with shame, the same way we do when discussing illegal interracial unions and Jim Crow. Unfortunately, that day is not today. So it is up to myself and other passionate straight allies to help pave the roads that will lead to this future. So the next time you think of "gay marriage" as an abstract idea, STOP. Think of me. Think of someone you know and love who is gay. Think of what you're saying to them with your vote. You are saying, in effect, you are not an equal citizen, you do not deserve what I have. Accept less and be happy with what I am giving you. Think of a person, not an idea or a fear you hold in your heart. The fight is not over and while we have lost the battle I believe we have won the war (Barack Obama, fuck yeah!). For the first time in my memory, the President of the United States (Barak Obama! I can't get enough of saying it) thanked gay people for helping him get to the White House and for having the vision to vote for a better America. Prop 8 is not the end, we will continue to create a better America.
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| Just got back from the Drive-By Truckers show at Empire. I think this is the first time they've come to Sacramento... ever? They did open for the Black Crows two years ago but that was in Marysville and I'm not sure that counts (they were, by the way 100x better than those stoned out Crows and it's how I discovered them). I was so worried that Sacramento would not give them a warm welcome. Crowds here are notoriously unappreciative, mean and fickle. Sometimes it's great, but most of the time it's not. It being a Tuesday with a band not well known on this coast, I was extra concerned. But I am pleased to say it was a great crowd who showed much love for one of the most rockin', talented bands performing today. DBT brought The Rock! I had a great time with a crowd that was mildly drunk but did not get in my face or spill beer on me like the show at the 9:30 in DC back in May. We bonded and I could actually hear us singing along! At one point I believe Shonna was going to sing but backed off from fear. Poor, Shonna, we love you! A lot of older songs were pulled out and it was fantastic. I notice both times I've seen them there have been no songs off of A Blessing and a Curse. It was a mixed album but there were a lot of gems on there and I wish they'd play a few more from that one. ANYWAY... After waiting for about twenty minutes I MET PATTERSON HOOD! Ok, I met the keyboardist first and told him how I appreciated what he and John Neff were bringing to the band and I'd seen them with the Crows and at the 9:30, etc. He was super nice and possibly a little drunk (I totally saw him invite some skeezy girls into the bus). I waited and waited for Mike Cooley (I know, KNOW that he pointed back at me when the show ended. It was amazing!) and Patterson and after giving up and walking back into the building. He appeared! He was SO NICE but I was so overwhelmed and wasted all the good things I had to say on the nice new keyboardist. How do you tell someone that they put out the best Rock Show on Earth and that their music changed your life and the way you view the South and Southern Rock in general? Instead it came out like, "Thank you so much... Katie with an ie, thank you for asking... That was ridiculously good.... I wish I could say something but smart words are not coming into my brain right now." I literally said that. BUT HE HUGGED ME! And I guess that makes up for my stupidity. Sorry, had to get that out there. This entry is probably littered with grammatical errors but I will let it go tonight. As DBT would say, Let There Be Rock...
Patterson inches above me.
Singing 18 Wheels of Love
Patterson and Shonna. Clearly I can't post them all here but I thought I'd share some of the love courtesy of my iPhone
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| I am home. I am home from Washington, DC. I am home from humidity and museums and major papers and intense debate and presentations that will end my life and funny roommates and bad reality tv (I'm looking at you Tila Tequila!), and Safeway delivery, and honking horns and the Metro, and the ACLU. Mostly, I came home to do what I did today.
Today, I am an official college graduate! Holy bajoley! Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, Minor in Dramatic Art.
... SO! Now what do I do?
Pictures to come!
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