Messages

16

Live Shows / 8/2 Spiedie Fest (review)

« on: August 03, 2008, 01:22:50 pm »

Hey all, so Vanessa's performance went really well last night. The only bad thing about it was that it was wayyyy too short. The singer performing before her was Ace Young, a guy from American Idol (I had no idea who he was until someone told me). He was good, but sang for an hour. Vanessa's piano was set up, but had to be tuned which took about 45 minutes!

Since things were running an hour and a half behind schedule her set list had to be cut short, and it was pretty short to begin with. The set was:

Nolita Fairytale
PYHOM
Ordinary Day
White Houses
Heroes & Thieves
Who's To Say
Pretty Baby
ATM
Home

I snatched the set list which also had More Than This on it, but that had to be cut. Anyway, I'm pleased to say that her vocals were great, and the only times she faulted were during White Houses on the first note, which always happens, and on Pretty Baby when she forgot the words.

Pretty Baby was actually one of my favorite songs she performed, and I'm not a huge fan of it. She performed with a guitarist, and instead of playing the piano she had him play the guitar while she sang. She told the audience that she prefers that version as opposed to the one on her album. She also had a cheat sheet on her piano since she hadn't sung it in so long, but she still forgot the words. Most of the people in the audience were singing along and filled in for her, haha.

She told the story of how she came up with the idea behind Heroes & Thieves. She said she was walking Viktor in Central Park and got caught in a horrible thunderstorm. She tried to open her umbrella but it turned inside out right away, and then she had to take off her shoes. She said it was a disaster, but sometimes disasters are good things, and that's what got her thinking about disasters and heroes & thieves.

She also looked great - a typical white lacey/boho top and skinny jeans with boots. I do have pictures but don't have anything to resize them with (they're huge) so if anyone can resize them for me, let me know and I'll email them to you. I also took some video clips but have no idea how to host them, so if someone could help me with that I'd be greatful!

There was a decent sized audience considering the weather (thunderstorms on and off all day) and it was all around a great performance, despite the fact it was way too short! No meet and greet afterwards, but because it was so late she wouldn't have been able to anyway (she finished just as the festival was closing). She got a great reaction from the crowd!

17

Entertainment - Movies / TV / Books / Kathy Griffin: Life on the D-List

« on: August 01, 2008, 06:25:06 pm »

When I was in San Jose last week for V's show in the park I saw this man on a Segway who totally looked like Woz. I remembered seeing an episode with him on one and well it was San Jose so I just knew it was him. I went over to him and asked if he was Woz. He extended his hand and said he was. I told him how I watch him on the show. He was saying how Kathy is cheap and he donated the computers. He mentioned the bear/cub episode. He said that the bf/gf thing is made up and pointed to his wife (who was also on a Segway) He was nice and was looking forward to the show. He said he and his wife try and make it to them.

I still love this show but sometimes she's a little too much.

How weird that they made up their relationship? I know she'll do a lot for publicity, but that seems a little much to me. Did he mention why they made up the relationship?

18

Live Shows / 8/02/08 - Binghamton, NY Spiedie Fest

« on: July 29, 2008, 05:10:16 am »

is anyone planning to go? I will be more than likely be there...so if you're going to go and want to meet up, let me know :-)

19

Live Shows / Re: 07/24/08: Music In The Park - San Jose, CA (review)

« on: July 29, 2008, 05:02:11 am »

If any of you watch My Life On The D-List or just know who the co-founder of Apple Computers is.  I met Woz!! Steve Wozniak.

I'm so jealous! What was he like? haha I think I'm more jealous about you meeting him than seeing Vanessa :-P

20

Live Shows / 8/02/08 - Binghamton, NY Spiedie Fest

« on: May 30, 2008, 03:33:50 pm »

I'll mostly likely be going to this one, seeing as I'm only an hour away :-P I can't believe she's actually doing Spedie Fest!

21

Completely Off-Topic / Happy Birthday Joey (LimeTwister)

« on: January 01, 2008, 12:40:37 pm »

Happy Birthday :-)

22

Completely Off-Topic / Happy Birthday Z!

« on: November 20, 2007, 11:08:25 am »

:happybirthday:

Hope it's a good one!

23

Other Musicians / Third Eye Blind

« on: October 09, 2007, 05:48:41 pm »

Third Eye Blind will be playing at my school, Elmira College, November 14th! I am SO excited that they are coming, I can't even explain it. Anyway the show is in Elmira, NY and tickets will be going on sale to the public next Monday. They will be $20 each. If anyone is interested the just search Elmira College, or get a hold of me and I can tell you where to call for them.

24

Other Musicians / James Morrison

« on: September 07, 2007, 03:10:42 pm »

I don't think he's what you would call famous over here, but I have heard him played on some commercials and a few of his songs have been played in the background of the show "The Hills."

25

Completely Off-Topic / Vegan or Vegetarian?

« on: July 31, 2007, 07:20:29 am »

For the gardening thing - you're talking to a country girl, I've been gardening since I can remember :-P On of my jobs when I was a kid was to pick the tomatoes and shell the peas.  This year my roomate and I are in an apartment and are going to try growing our own herbs.

Sometimes I forget how rural upstate NY is.  I think NY and I think NYC and Buffalo.

A windowsill or deck herb garden should be easy enough to do in an apartment.  I bring my Rosemary inside every fall and put it back out during the summer and it does great.  Everything else I just freeze and dry.

I keep saying that my next house is going to have a grow room in it.  Just a big room that faces south and is full of windows.  I have two small tea plants and 2 small coffee plants and I desperatly want to try growing cirtus someday.

I think it's hilarious that you compare Buffalo to NYC....they are nothing alike :-P But yeah, except for NYC really, the rest of NY is farm country. It's the second largest dairy state in the country.

I definitely miss gardening while at school - that's one thing about the country that I really love. This summer my parents didn't have time to do our big garden, and when I went home last weekend it looked so empty and sad. Food you grow yourself just tastes better.

26

Completely Off-Topic / Vegan or Vegetarian?

« on: July 31, 2007, 06:42:25 am »

A small factor in my reasoning for becoming a vegetarian has to do with health, but it mostly has to do with how I feel about factory farming and the serious impact it has on the environment, not to mention the inhumane treatment towards animals. After reading a few (completely non-biased I might add) books on factory farming, I really just can't look at a slice of ham and not think about the awful treatment that pig went through just so I can eat it, when I can easily make a meal without it. And then I think about the impact that the factory it came from has had on the environment, and I really just lose any craving for meat whatsoever :-P I think the only thing I miss is the convenience of it - like when I'm at restaurants or something.

Well, there are plenty of non-factory farmed meat options.  You can get lots of free range meats at places like Whole Foots and Wild Oats.  Now, I realize even Free Range doesn't mean what it used to, but it's a huge step up from the factory farms.

I also know exactly what you're talking about with soy - I'm not saying that I add it in to every single thing that I eat. But many people, when they find out someone is vegetarian, immediately try and make vegetarians look dumb by saying "and where do you get your protein? where do you get your nutrients?" without realizing that those proteins and nutrients can be attained through soy products.

Right.  but beause that is such a default answer for vegetarians, they over rely on Soy.  Which is bad times for you in the long run.

Eat lots of nuts, whole grains, brown rice, whole wheat pasta, dark green leafy veggies (buy fresh and try steaming instead of boiling whenver possible, cause most of the good stuff is water soluble and leaks out when you cook it).

But yeah, you don't need meat.  I tried doing the vegetarian thing for about 4 months last summer, just to see what it was like.  I knew it would be short term, but I wanted to experience it and see what it was like.

It def wasn't for me, but I learned a LOT in the process.

Most of the food I eat I prepare myself. I buy a lot of fresh produce and mix it with other foods. For example, I have boxed dry mixes for veggie burgers and mock taco-fillings, but I only eat a small-regular portion of them and have fruits, veggies, and beans for the bulk of my meals.

Good girl ^_^

Plus, learning to cook is always a valuable skill.

If you ever get into gardening or want to try it (after college, obv) let me know.  I actually grow about half of what I eat during the summer and I can a ton of stuff for winter too.

I also buy about 75% of my groceries from the organic section. Being a poor college student it gets kind of difficult, but I do as much as I can afford.

Yeah.  That's understandable.  Even *I* don't buy organic in some things because of the cost.  Like, organic milk is clearly better, but it's more than twice the price for the same amount and I have a hard time justifying the cost difference especially when the conventional is local.

And in some cases the organic version is actually worse... like, all of the organic apple juices I find are made from concentrate and rehydrated with organic cane sugar.  I buy fresh press conventional instead, because less processing is more important to me than organic.

It's a weird balance.  But if you're intersted, there is a great newsleter I get (http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/index.cfm) that does a really good job of helping you figure out what is in what foods and boxed food items.  It kinda tells you which brands are full of GMO's and who likes to hide unhealthy things and play games with labels.  It's also really good about keeping you informed on what is going on in government regarding food safety issues.

It's not nutty left-wing liberal, either.  It's pretty balanced.

edit: I didn't want this to sound preachy, but I had a friend who was a vegan in college and he ended up in the hospital for malnutrition because his heart was int he rigtht place but he didn't educate himself first.  He just jumped into a bad idea.

I'm definitely going to check out that newsletter. I did research before making the decision to be vegetarian, but like you said a lot of food that claims to be healthy really isn't - you really have to research each company you buy from - I find myself reading the nutrition labels even more carefully than I did before I was vegetarian. It's very easy to eat a lot of "empty calories" which I don't want to do.

I get what you're saying about non-factory farmed meat, but where I live in upstate NY, there aren't any specialty-food stores close enough that I could buy from. The closest we have is Wegmans, which is a chain grocery store but has a decent organic section. I never ate that much meat to begin with, so I don't really miss it at all.

And I eat plenty of nuts and whole wheats - I actually have a small container of unsalted almonds that I bring with me everywhere for when I get a little hungry. Everyone laughs at me but it's a good way to get good nutrients and it keeps me from eating potatoe chips all the time. And I'm obsessed with whole-wheat pasta. One of my friends introduced me to it last year and I've never gone back to regular pasta. Even my mother, a full blooded Italian swears by it :-P.

For the gardening thing - you're talking to a country girl, I've been gardening since I can remember :-P On of my jobs when I was a kid was to pick the tomatoes and shell the peas.  This year my roomate and I are in an apartment and are going to try growing our own herbs.

I understand what you're saying about your friend. I definitely do not want to become vegan without doing a lot of research first. I figured I would do the vegetarian thing for a year, and then if I wanted to try a vegan diet. You can be a vegan and be completely healthy, but you have to know exactly what you're doing and know exactly what foods to eat every day. I would never do it without becoming well educated on it.

27

Completely Off-Topic / Vegan or Vegetarian?

« on: July 31, 2007, 03:54:28 am »

Have you ever tried whey protein as a supplement?  It has a very high BV value in Protein that you can add to the top of everything else you are eating.  It is made from milk and might be something you'd be interested in.  It is easily digested so you either want to eat it with something that will slow it's introduction to your bloodstream or not to take too much of it at one time....not because it is dangerous but because your body can only process so much protein for it's use at any one time.  Some people compare it to the protein content or BV value of a steak.  A steak takes longer to digest though.

One thing I'm not sure of is the vitamin B12 in vegetarian diets.  From what I read and talked to about with other people is it can only be gotten from animal products even if you take it as a supplement, but like I said, I'm not so sure about that.  It might just be the amount of B12.  Anyone who knows about this please inform.

A lot of vegetarian products are infused with B12, like the Koshi cereal I have every morning. But I understand what you're saying, I had the same concern when I started to read about becoming vegetarian. Most experts just suggest eating B12 infused foods, and if you're still not getting enough, then taking a B12 supplement during the winter.

Also, since I juuuust started, I'm not really strict. For example, if I'm eating pasta with friends and they have a meatball in a pan of sauce, I'll still eat the sauce and just skip the meatball - a lot of vegetarians won't do that, they'll just go without the sauce altogether.  So, I'm still getting some meat proteins, which I think is fine - if your body goes too long without something eventually it will forget how to process it. A lot of strict vegetarians get sick if they somehow accidently eat a meat product after so many years of going without because their body has forgotten how to process and break down meat proteins. One of my friends got really violently ill when he ordered something off the grill at our dining hall, just because what he orderd was cooked on the same grill that a hamburger was being cooked on.

28

Completely Off-Topic / Vegan or Vegetarian?

« on: July 30, 2007, 04:32:49 pm »

I don't know about Jessica's family, but since I've become vegetarian (about a month and a half now) my diet has only gotten better. Taking away meet has made me re-evaluate what I put on my plate everyday. To make up for the protein I don't get from meet I make sure I have plenty of soy-protein (a cup of Silk every morning in my cereal usually does it). I also shop in the organic section of my grocery store now as well - it may be more expensive but it's totally worth it. Whole foods + lots of nutrition for your body = a happy body. I still eat sweets and cheeses, but I do try to stay away from eggs. Ideally I'd like to be vegan, but that's pretty much impossible on a college campus. Just lots of veggies and fruits and soy alternatives for me.

I am not sure what your reasons for becoming a vegetarian are, but if it's dietary health, I would suggest an alternative.

Try going all natural and simple instead of vegetarian.

By it's nature, it will force you to eat less meat.  I eat maybe 1.5 servings of meat a day, and when I say "servings" i mean official size servings (about the size of a deck of cards).

Vegetarian is a dangerous trap because you find yourself eatings tons and tons of processed soy foods that are "vegetarian" but are actually terrible for you.  They are full of GMO's and fatty oils used to bind the soy and vegetable slurries into a solid mass.  It's all kinds of bad times.

Try buying lots of unprepared foods and preparing them youselves.  It's really good for expanding your diet and trying new things.

edit: A lot of people do not realize this, because Soy has this aura of "healthy" but Soy is all kinds of bad for you in large quantities.  It has a hormone that mimics estrogen in many women and heavy soy consumption has been linked to endometriosis and infertility.  Soy and Corn are also the two produce crops most contaminated by GMO cross polination and it's almost impossible to get organic soy.

A small factor in my reasoning for becoming a vegetarian has to do with health, but it mostly has to do with how I feel about factory farming and the serious impact it has on the environment, not to mention the inhumane treatment towards animals. After reading a few (completely non-biased I might add) books on factory farming, I really just can't look at a slice of ham and not think about the awful treatment that pig went through just so I can eat it, when I can easily make a meal without it. And then I think about the impact that the factory it came from has had on the environment, and I really just lose any craving for meat whatsoever :-P I think the only thing I miss is the convenience of it - like when I'm at restaurants or something.

I also know exactly what you're talking about with soy - I'm not saying that I add it in to every single thing that I eat. But many people, when they find out someone is vegetarian, immediately try and make vegetarians look dumb by saying "and where do you get your protein? where do you get your nutrients?" without realizing that those proteins and nutrients can be attained through soy products.

Most of the food I eat I prepare myself. I buy a lot of fresh produce and mix it with other foods. For example, I have boxed dry mixes for veggie burgers and mock taco-fillings, but I only eat a small-regular portion of them and have fruits, veggies, and beans for the bulk of my meals.

I also buy about 75% of my groceries from the organic section. Being a poor college student it gets kind of difficult, but I do as much as I can afford.

[/soapbox]

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Completely Off-Topic / Vegan or Vegetarian?

« on: July 30, 2007, 12:48:40 pm »

Hey Jessica, can you tell us what a vegetarian diet in your family was like?  I'm very curious.  Did you guys have certain concerns or ideas on how you would receive the nutrition you needed?  And how did you get around those.  Not that you were really really worried, I'm just wondering what the make up of the diet was.  Even for people who eat meat the information could be useful and interesting.  There are probably variations from vegetarian to vegetarian, so the more perspective we can get the better.

I don't know about Jessica's family, but since I've become vegetarian (about a month and a half now) my diet has only gotten better. Taking away meet has made me re-evaluate what I put on my plate everyday. To make up for the protein I don't get from meet I make sure I have plenty of soy-protein (a cup of Silk every morning in my cereal usually does it). I also shop in the organic section of my grocery store now as well - it may be more expensive but it's totally worth it. Whole foods + lots of nutrition for your body = a happy body. I still eat sweets and cheeses, but I do try to stay away from eggs. Ideally I'd like to be vegan, but that's pretty much impossible on a college campus. Just lots of veggies and fruits and soy alternatives for me.

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Entertainment - Movies / TV / Books / Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

« on: July 24, 2007, 07:49:40 pm »

Did anyone else get really sentimental over Dobby's death.... I think I only cried more at Sirius' death in Order of the Phoenix. It was so well written imo.

I was at work when I read that part, so I didn't cry so much as get teary eyed, but if I had been alone then I probably would have. I did start to cry when it looked like Hagrid had died.

Overall this book is astounding - but the epilogue is pretty disappointing, in my opinion. I mean, it didn't answer much, did it? The lives of many characters were never tied up...to me it felt like JKR ran out of steam and just slapped on an ending.

I still can't quite believe it's over...