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1/27/10

R.I.P. Grandma Bee

I've been on a mini blogging hiatus since my grandma passed away on Sunday*. I had reservations about even sharing that info on Facebook and my blog, but those are the easiest ways to reach all of my friends at once (and spare me the agony of sharing that news with each... and every... person that asks how I've been or what I've been up to).

This excerpt from some other grieving person's blog post helped me with the decision of whether or not to share this news via the internet:

The issue I hadn't prepared myself for was how to address "what was on my mind" with my Facebook friends after my father's death. I love Facebook, and pride myself on being "good" at it. I post often but not incessantly, I try to keep things funny and interesting, and seldom use it for rants and complaints (though I may be one of those annoying people who post too often about their kids.) Facebook is the perfect way for an introvert like me, who is intensely private about the most important things in my life, to stay in touch with the people I enjoy -- but it felt like a really inappropriate place to announce my father's death.

Like everybody, I have a collection of random Facebook friends: my sister-in-law's brother-in-law; the nice young woman who used to work at my favorite boutique; the friendly pilates-instructor-turned-diet-book-author that I met at a writers' conference; in short, fun people I like but don't know very well. At the same time, refusing to tell my network something so truly important felt strange and almost dishonest. I struggled to find the words, but I didn't know how to describe what had happened with the heart and depth it deserved in only 420 characters.

I realize that my preference for online discretion makes me hopelessly old-fashioned in a world where others offer live Twitter updates about a miscarriage or the accidental drowning of a child. I noted with awe the way my younger brother, who avoids Facebook most of the time, updated his status the day after Dad's death and was then showered with messages of concern. As the news continued to spread online and off, a smattering of condolences appeared on my Facebook wall. I truly appreciated the expressions of support, but they also increased the pressure I felt to formally announce the news.

I coped by trying to stay off FB as much as possible.

[via Silicon Valley Moms Blog]

So there it is, folks: my grandma died, and as a result I may be a little sparse around these parts this week.

*Also lost one of my uncles last Thursday

Jesus, when it rains it pours.

10/21/09

Mystery Book (long post... may be worthwhile if you enjoy reading and whatnot)

Last week I was the recipient of a very strange novel. It's titled "Revisions Of..." and the author is someone writing under the pseudonym "Goodloe Byron."

I read the back cover and the book seemed fairly interesting I suppose:

Nathan First is a childlike biographer, making barely enough from his writing to survive. His only source of contact with the outside world is his sister, whose recent marriage has left Nathan to his own devices. Moved by a paltry obituary that he reads in the paper, Nathan sets out to compose his masterpiece; a biography of an ordinary man. But this will be no ordinary book; as Nathan becomes increasingly ambitious, the project blossoms into a study of the dark matter of humanity and appears to contain the abandoned history of the world.

Actually, the book sounded like a leftover from the reading list of someone's socialism class. The guy who passed this book on to me was a local student I met while prepping for a night out. It was my first and only time meeting this dude, so he knew nothing about my reading habits and what I prefer to read, only that I enjoy reading and have an English degree. But he enthusiastically recommended this book.

"If you love to read, you'll love this book," he said. "Plus it's free!"

Indeed it was:

Reading the bottom half of the back cover, I was even more convinced this is someone's little socialist project. Not only is the book clearly priced at $0.00, it is also part of something called The Zero Dollar Tour, which "[d]istributes book to the public free of charge. The previous rounds have distributed twenty thousand copies of 'The Abstract: Tales of Wickedness and Sorrow.'"

Uh... ok. Never heard of the tour or that other novel, but I'm always down to read things with which I'm unfamiliar.

The first twelve pages of the book are dedicated to explaining what exactly The Zero Dollar Tour is. All the descriptions, divided neatly into 11 personal narratives, are in the third person and all provide background information about the author, Goodloe Byron, and his travelling book tour. Byron goes around the country to book fairs, coffee shops, parks--anywhere really--and tries to give away copies of his manuscript, sometimes to no avail. His request to leave a pile of his free books at one location was met with suspicion: "[W]hat's the catch? Is this pornography? Is it Satanic?"

Pretty much the same things I was thinking about the book as I read it.

Many of the narratives praise Byron's efforts to get his book to the masses for free.

"...[L]ike a traveling road show of yore," is how author Steven Cleaver describes Byron and his band of vagabond book distributors. "If nothing else, in the story of his own life, Goodloe Byron is creating a character to remember," Cleaver wrote.

Cleaver is attributed in his signoff as the author of two books, "Saving Eramus" and "Dear God, Whatever Your Name is Now." I Googled Cleaver and his novels to verify he was a real person. I found "Saving Eramus" on Amazon.com, described as a "bizarre, whimsical novel [that] will charm and delight some readers and perplex others." Again, I felt as if the same could be said for "Revisions Of..." It was certainly perplexing me.

I tossed the book in the back seat of my car and pretty much forgot about it until earlier this week. There was a website listed for the publisher of the book on the back cover, so I decided to check it out. Maybe the company behind this book could offer some insight into the author and his motives.

The website for Brown Paper Publishing, www.brownpaperpublishing.com, is amateurish at best, especially for a publishing house. In fact, the very first words on the main site are "Alright, so i have no idea how to edit the website." Most of the information to be found there is out-of-date anyways. Even some of the links are dead. Great.

If you Google "revisions of goodloe byron," not much comes up, except for a few paltry reviews and a Facebook group that has 12 members. By this point, I had pretty much given up on caring who Goodloe Byron really was and what exactly his book was about. I could barely make it past the first chapter it was so... difficult to follow and make sense of. I didn't even know in which context to read the book: is it a satire? A biography? An autobiography? It seemed to be all three and possibly more.

Anyways, that brings me to this post. I am angry and frustrated that Random Guy gave me this crap book to read. I want to ask him so many questions: Why did you recommend this crap book to me, stranger? Were you kidding? Do YOU understand this mess? So. Many. Questions.

I want the minutes and seconds of my life that it took to read as much of "Revisions Of.." that I did back! Just looking at the book, sitting there, being all elusive and nonsensical and ish, is pissing me off! At least it was free.

I have plans to leave the book in a bookstore, Dunkin Donuts, park or side-of-the-freeway near you, so maybe you (or some other hapless, bored soul) can make sense of it.

10/2/09

Swag & Diddy Bop

I already posted this on Twitter and Facebook, so for those of you experiencing overload of this magical moment in time--heh, my bad. But I met motherf*ckin' GHOSTFACE KILLAHHHH! He was in Georgetown yesterday promoting his latest album.

Details:
- He was cool as hell
- Smelled like leather & 'dro
- I got a signed CD and a free Red Bull for waiting in line

Sidenote: Peep the nails! FIERCE, I know

After that, perused the offerings of the infamous fake bag sellers up and down Wisconsin Ave. (hey, a broke girl can dream.) Saw fake Coach bags that said "Cooch" instead of "Coach." LOL.

All in all, it was a fun and productive afternoon

9/20/09

Declare War on a B*tch Day/Week/Month/Year

I am so tired of people and their BS. This was my Facebook status from earlier last week:

"I have been WAY too nice to people, but tomorrow is a new day! I will be destroying everybody! So if you're in [DC!], stay outta my way." - Kid Fury

That was totally inspired by Kid Fury's Twitter (for my non-Twittering folks, you read from the bottom up):

Last week a couple fools were really pushing to get on my reserve nerve (c) Mo, but NAH-UH, Lisa Bee ain't having that. I'm a nice person generally, but I am NOT afraid to stand up and defend mines. Try to play a sista and see if you don't get shanked (EDIT: figuratively! Peace & Love, y'all

)... or carried the hell out of. PLEASE.

Anyways, big ups to Kid Fury for making "Declare War on a B*tch Day" at least somewhat official. Homeboy is so quotable *love*

Drop kick a fool for your RESPECT!

8/30/09

My Kennedy Story

In the wake of Sen. Ted Kennedy's death, I've decided to share an all too brief encounter I had with a member of the prominent family.

Fall of my sophomore year, A Tribe Called Quest reunited for the Rock the Bells Tour. I LOVED ATCQ at this point in my life (still do, for real for real), so I desperately wanted to be at that concert. Unfortunately the closest the tour was coming to my school was this little town about an hour/hour and a half from campus. NO RIDE to get out there and of course, the bus and train did not stop there from Providence. I bought my ticket anyways and put a notice up on my school's online campus bulletin board looking for a ride.

In class a few hours later, I heard that some guy named Wendell* was going to the concert and driving himself and some friends there from my school. Sweet. "Wendell" of course turns out to be Wendell, RFK's grandson and JFK's nephew (I think that's right... eh, it's big family). We didn't run in the same circle of friends at school so I knew very little about Wendell other than his douche-tastic Facebook picture at the time, which was him, shirtless, with "THUG LIFE" written across his stomach Tupac-style. Not the best first impression.

Imagine this... on a pasty, rich white dude. Yeah.

Anyways, I figured I wasn't in this to make a new friend or even like the guy on a basic level; I just needed a ride to that concert.

Game day comes around and about 5 of us pile into Wendell's weathered BMW headed for the Tribe concert. From the time we left Providence to the time we partied with people Wendell knew in the town where the concert was playing to the time we actually MADE it to the concert doors is mostly a blur, but I do remember the concert itself being pretty awesome. It's after the concert that things started going downhill.

So Wendell and maybe 3 people in the car decide they want to meet up with some more people they knew in the town the concert was being held. It was about 1 am at this point and me and this hippie girl we rode up there with were wondering when the eff we were all gonna leave, as some of us had class and ish in the morning.

Wendell and his 3 friends decide they are too wasted to get back to Providence that night and say they're all gonna crash at their other friend's place.

"SO HOW THE F*CK ARE WE SUPPOSED TO GET BACK TO SCHOOL?!" me and this other chick wonder out loud. Wendell basically says that's our problem and goes off to rejoin the party.

"THAT'S WHY YOUR DAD'S A DRUNK!" I screamed. I think it fell on deaf ears (most definitely drunk ears), but I thought it was a clever and appropriate comment at the time.

Me and the hippie chick looked at each other blankly for a few seconds before realizing we need to think quick to get out of this hicktown (OK, not really, more like a small city... but no buses or trains stopped there! That equals hicktown to me) and back to civilization.

There just happened to be some random guy from the concert who followed a group of us to Wendell's OTHER friend's house, the one where he stranded us, and who kept staring alluringly/creepily at the hippie chick I was with. We thought maybe he went to school with us or somewhere in the vicinity of the concert, but after chatting him up for a few minutes, turns out he was just some kid who lived in his grandma's basement. Chatting him up for a few more minutes, we found out he has a car (!), that his grandma's basement is in Providence (!!), and that he was trying to go home THAT NIGHT (!!!).

Then, and I kid you not folks, right after finding that out, the hippie chick I was with and this dude go to a nearby parking lot where "supposedly" his car is located (REMEMBER: We're stranded at this point, this guy could very well be a serial killer, yo... I know I wasn't going anywhere with him alone!). I asked the chick if she wanted me to come with her; I know I would want witnesses if a trial were to go down over this mess. She said "Nope, just chill here for a second" and her and the guy walked off into the moonlight.

Fifteen minutes of standing awkwardly outside the party later, Hippie Girl and Possible Serial Killer Guy drive up in his old white Nissan. To this day I don't know what that b*tch did to get both of us a ride back to Providence that night, but whatever it was, it worked and we're still alive.

Anyways, moral of the story is: Sorry your great-uncle or whatever died, but damn you Wendell Kennedy!

*Names have been changed to protect the douchey.

8/26/09

And this is why Myspace sucks (again)

I don't really check Myspace anymore (and would seriously considering deleting it if it weren't the sole link to some of my family), but on the off chance that I do check it I'm bombarded by friend requests from fools like this:

With that dead and confused look in his eyes, maybe he should be relating to a therapist (or a talent agent) instead.

Or random-ass misspelled messages from guido-looking guys from Iowa:

how are yOuH doin babay? you look sexY can I wanna know u betta shawty
;)

That would be a resounding NO, babe. ::immediately hits the delete button::

Ok ok. Sometimes I delete the supremely wack messages and requests, of which there are many. Some I keep around to chuckle about

There's even a blog devoted to this mess: MyFreaks.

Facebook (sheeit, even Twitter) for the win, y'all.

6/16/09

I told you guys Myspace sucks!

MySpace Slashes Jobs As Growth Slows Down

Not gonna lie, I signed up for Myspace just to see what the hype was about and to keep in touch with my fam. However, I rarely--if ever--checked it on the regular. Facebook is a lot more classy to me.

5/25/09

I AM A GROWN ASS WOMAN

I stumbled across this random public Facebook profile. Kids, stay in school.

4/22/09

Pa-pa-pa-poker face, pa-pa-poker face

The lyrics are so funny on this joint, especially Common's part:

She said she want whatever she like
But you gotta bring your friend
And we can have one hell of a night
Through the day
She blamed it on the a-a-a-a-a-alcohol
She had her hair did, it was bound to fall
Down down for a... damn, Cudi already said it
Her poker Facebook, I already read it
But man, her head was gooder than the music
Electro body, known to blow fuses
A stripper from the south
Lookin for a payday
Said, bitch you should do it for the love like Ray-J
But they say you be on that conscious tip
Get your head right and get up on this conscious dick [Note: LMAO]
I embody everything from the godly to the party
It's the way I was raised on the Southside safari
So...

The way they all ride the beat on this track is VICIOUSSS

3/1/09

Shhhh.../Interesting article of the day

In an increasingly digital world, it can be difficult to maintain some sort of privacy--ESPECIALLY online. How many of you guys have Facebook pages and don't know who half your "friends" are? Those drunken pics you took at last night's party could easily be forwarded to thousands of peeps you don't know. And some who you know all too well: Your boss, your current boyfriend or girlfriend (lol)... YO MAMA.

For those of you who want to share yourself with the world but don't want errybody all up in yo business, here's a little tutorial on how to make a friends list on Facebook.

1. Click the "Friends" tab at the top of the page

2. On the left-hand sidebar, click "Make a New List"

3. Name your list (I named mine "People I Don't Really Know Like That")

4. Add people's names to the list

5. From here, go to "Settings" at the top of the page

6. Click on "Privacy Settings"

7. Under "Privacy," click "Profile"

8. Click one of the drop down tabs. The last option should be "Customize..."

9. At the bottom of the pop-up window you should see a highlighted area that reads "Except These People." In the box underneath this, type in your newly created friends list

This is optional, but if you really want to make sure the people on your list are only viewing what you want them to see of your page, Facebook lets you see how specific people view your page.

Voila! You're now a member of the Anti-Stalking Brigade.

And now... one of the many articles and warnings (Thanks Mom!) that inspired this post: