Lorange Blog

Reason # 4 Halloween of course! I didn't do anything outstanding this year so I'll leave you with a clip from the Today Show filmed on Friday. If you're in hurry you can jump ahead and watch the last two minutes for the best stuff but it's all good. By the best stuff I mean drunk, groping Ewoks. Oh there's moonwalking too. vid link

Ok I totally screwed myself over with this countdown of why this October has been the best month ever. Seriously, I should know better than to start a countdown at ten considering how inconsistently I blog these days. Oh well, for the combined reasons # 7, 6 and 5 and well worth it I might add: I found the greatest object ever made by mankind A ceramic bird sitting on a frog sitting on a bunny sitting on a turtle!! Which compliments my collection: The ceramic 3 Green Monkeys Holding A Basket on Their Heads, my stolen Lawn Gnome "Gnomey", and my Curious George Flashlight. Otherwise known to B as my collection of mostly monkey related crap that I try to pass off as table centerpieces.

Reason # 8: Fall in Los Angeles. Make all the fun you want about LA's lack of seasons. That's ok, most of the residents seem to be happy enough about how it works out here.  The changes are mild, the days are nearly the same beautiful day after day.  No reason to stress about the weather, dude. For me I do miss the fog and rainy winters of the Bay Area sometimes but I feel like I traded up with our gusty winds and low 80 degree temperatures (give or take) until December. And yes we had some crazy winds this week. Right along the streets of my neighborhood are the pile remains of fallen palm tree fronds after our recent "wind storm". It's hard to tell that six piles lay beyond what you see here in this picture; around the corner on the street lined with those classic 50 foot tall Los Angeles palms their discarded, mangled fronds are piled 7 feet high. Just a lovely Autumn reminder that I'll be able to wear my thin scarf soon! I'll take thes...

Reason # 9 Jury Duty - or a much needed day off work. lorange I crave nothing more than have a day off from work. Weekends are helpful but I'm talking about a day where I can sit and write, listen to whatever tracks download onto the computer in hopes of grabbing that next inspirational wave. I need this time more than I would like to admit, fearful that this might come off as being a loner, antisocial, devaluing the relationships of my life. I see how that might come off. Have ever blown away the globular head off a dandelion, seeds drifting into a cool valley wind? If I'm not exposed to music or if the words stop coming it feels like I'm chasing down the seeds, seperating along with them. Along with love, friendship, and family*, these are seeds to my completeness. Sometimes a blank moment of time like jury duty does the trick perfectly. *which I'm blessed in spades **( robo.to badge might not be visible on rss (vid and text is not static and might ...

Reason # 3  October Birthdays Not only did I have a birthday making October my best month ever but my dear Becky is having hers today and so far October has been very good to her too  (this is called foreshadowing). There is a lot of things about her that makes me smile and the biggest is her ablity to make me laugh. Not an easy thing to do, let me tell you. It could be as simple as buying her new favorite giant hat. And /or wearing this giant thing all summer and then pulling out the perfect pose. Or pulling the less than perfect pose just to be as goofy. If I didn't know better I would say she was being just goofy when the dance moves pop out in the grocery store, walking down the street, or well anywhere, anytime.  That's just normal for her. She'll even climb through the cat tree to make me laugh. Yup,she is a keeper in my book. She is going to kill me for posting that last photo. Happy Birthday my love! [Yes this is countdown as to why Octobe...

Reason # 10 - the internet always win I heard rumblings about this a while ago but this morning I noticed that Mashable posted about this crowd sourced project that was much further along than I realized. I love you internet. The Star Wars Uncut official trailer Star Wars: Uncut Trailer from Casey Pugh on Vimeo . [Yes this is countdown as to why October is the best month ever for me. Your mileage might vary.]

You might be a few months older or you might be 10 years younger than me like B is. I am now 37 today and I get to look back once again to where I've been, where I've gone. (not on this exact date obviously) 17 years ago I drove to Canada, spent one night, saw a hockey game and drove back 31 years ago I went to Guatemala for the Summer 30 years ago i went on a cross country trip to New York 14 years ago I was once married 7 years when my marriage ended for good 5 years ago my divorce was final (paperwork) too many years with too many crushes, some that inspired me, some I do regret 2 years ago I met B!! 12 years ago my first child was born 7 years my second child was born 35 years I went to Disneyland for the 1st time and I remember most of it 23 years ago I lost my virginity 20 years ago my father died of cancer 18 years ago I went bungee jumping 12 years ago I moved to LA County from the Bay Area 4 years ago I moved to the City of LA 23 years ago I had Chinese food for the f...

I hit my limit last week. I work hard against the pull of the work drain and deal with the email suckage each morning at my place of employment. Each night is another night of little sleep. damn you thoughts. damn you unrealistic expectations. damn. like glucose film on your teeth no amount of tongue swabbing wipes them clean. like a mosquito's lingering welt, an unstainable itch that remains even in my dreams each night. Expectations have been tackling me. I'm dealing with them one by one - it's just going take some time, that's all. I understand why that kid would want to take off in a balloon

Band: The Antlers Song:   Two -(I also recommend checking out the song Bear for your ipod) Why: I've lost time with this album. First disappearance: evening with a laptop, headphones and this album in the background. Second disappearance: my morning drive to work, this CD in the player. Tonight again, lost in thoughts of you asleep. this album does that for me. THE ANTLERS - Evolving from Peter Silberman's bedroom recordings to a fully realized band, for Brooklyn-based the Antlers, what started out as a solo lo-fi folk project, progressed quickly into a colossal-sounding chamber pop group. After self-recording a handful of albums in a kamikaze fashion, Silberman set forth to record his opus, Hospice, in July of 2007. Recorded over the course of almost two years, Hospice started out as another solo project before Silberman started incorporating other musicians, including drummer Michael Lerner and multi-instrumentalist Darby Cicci, who eventually ended up as permanent members...

The other day I saw a car that drove off the curb. 2 men were helping the older lady so I ate my sandwich and listened to NPR. Another day I thought maybe my friend had started pimping TOGO'S in his free time. today was a rough day at work today was a great day to eat a hamburger (comfort food for stressed filled days)

 I'm just getting into Sara Lov these days. This video makes it so easy. fountain fountain we are the same you with the water me with the pain turning it over again and again don’t you wish you could throw their pennies back at them?

A few months after I landed my current job I decided my first splurge was to be on season passes to Disneyland. Each year I toke my December born kids out to the parks as a combined birthday/Xmas present as I'm a firm believer in life experiences over material gifts.  Memories last forever, not so much whatever toy or gadget that is popular in the elementary/junior high set. Conveniently for me Disneyland now offers a monthly payment plan at 0% interest to SoCal residents so I had to jump on that.  Now we visit on random Sundays a few hour here, a few hours there never feeling the need to cram every ride in one day. While it is safe to say that I'm financially stable now, this wasn't true for most of this decade.  Those yearly trips were my way of evening out the playing field from the crazy and expensive gifts my Ex and her friends spoiled the kids with back then. I just couldn't complete with inflatable jumpers, computers, chinchillas and Nintendo DS ga...

From the band's tweet from today: @thenewfidelity : Download our new CD All Here Now for Free for a limited time only! http://www.newfidelity.com I made it out again last week for another night of fun at Rob Z's little semi-monthly shindig at El Cid. Maybe you should have gone too because it was a great line up of bands. And if you know Rob Z (and you probably know him way better than I do in fact), then you know how he cherry picks great talent for these events. The New Fidelity made the night their CD Release show, packing the place with locals and bringing along quite a few Long Beach folks with them. They offer such a great, consistent sets of 60s/70s Brit-Pop inspired songs that get people up and dancing each time I catch them. I like what they bring to shows that I even tried to book them for big corporate party in Vegas a few years ago before my West Coast office was sadly closed down (and I was laid off). I highly recommend The New Fidelity if you're look...

It's not like I've been all depressed and shit for two weeks straight, moping about eyeglasses and dental insurance. I'm generally happy everyday but come to think of it... work has been incredibly stressful lately, like I don't want to be there anymore stressful, and my car's transmission looked liked it was totally screwed, and the TV I've carted around, since 1996 died in the middle of Ghosthunters , and the money I've been saving for some wonderful things in the future are now tagged for the car+TV, and then I ate too many almonds one day. ugh my stomach, and then it seemed I ran out of words again. Okay, so yeah I had a lot of things bringing me down, crimping my style, setting the dial on to funk the last couple weeks.  The over-sharing has been helpful here as a way to release some thoughts without burdening B who's nothing but patient with my moodiness. There's also been a few nights of fun mixed in, namely I finally met Ms Sizzle ...

Oh look, it's Jessica Dobson (aka Deep Sea Diver) playing with the Yeah Yeah Yeahs last night on Conan O'Brien. video clip no longer on hulu Wish I could go to the sold out show at the Greek tonight, especially since I live only a few blocks away. oh well.

It's probably not normal to leave the dentist crying at this point in my life. Before I get into why I found myself sitting in my car all teary eyed, you have to understand a couple things: 1) While I'm known for giving good advice, I'm not very good at following any advice. 2) I have regrets for not adapting to changes in my life - that I do not do curve balls well. 3) I have this frustrated/sad look about me at times. I'll deny it but it is the look of utter disappointment / frustration in the current situation/myself and usually related to money issues. 4) Also this post is very long. When The Ex moved out and filed for separation she also took me off her insurance coverage which coincided with the company I worked for being sold and moved.  It was really a crappy time in my life with a commute increasing from 5 minutes to 50 minutes, my worth needed to proved to new owners, and oh yeah while that whole divorce process was happening. Years went by and I ...

Damn I forgot to post this earlier. Last Friday a couple of weeks ago I won tickets to one of may favorite bands Los Campesinos through the generosity of LA metblogs. I had entered the ticket giveaway which asked for a link to my favorite picture of Wales where the band hailed from and the location of the image. A quick google image search led to many boring, non-specific to any part of Wales pictures so I went with the one subject I knew of in Wales in my comment: The only thing I can think of Wales related is Carol Smillie, the original host of Changing Rooms on BBC America (aka Trading Spaces in the US). She was way cute. I assume that this is not going to win me any Los Campesinos! tickets. Later that day the one and only Lucinda sent over a silly email informing me that I merely won because there were only two entries (including mine) and two prizes so that's an automatic win for me!   So I took Corey of course and spent the whole time outside during the opening ...

I now own my first new pair of glasses in 7 years.  Nothing fancy, just some thick frames branded by Converse (a bargain at $60 @ costco btw) that are just a bit trendy in a year 2003 sort of way. The old pair were whispery metal frames, sleek like thread that spoke to my imagined greater intelligence if not a little snobbishness, these new ones are obnoxious in comparison . Despite the 7 year lapse between examinations my prescription is still so minor these glasses are merely helpful but not necessary for driving an automobile or listening to poetry or making flan for dessert or even writing a blog post. No, because my eyes wear down quickly in this visual affair with all things web I wear them all day and more importantly they make my pumpkin head look, well better. Yes, on some level I do care about how people view me. So I started the past work week with the new glasses on, walking straight into the department I share with five other people as if nothing was differen...

So Corey asked what is the current buzzband and based on other blogs and reviews The xx is definitely on the short list this week. I've been listening to new album by The xx on my commute for a few days now and while sparse, the songs do make up a solid good first album. This would be a CD for long drawn out trips or relationships; I found myself day dreaming to this as a soundtrack, wanting to grow from this album into a stronger second disc that would better complete me. 3.75 out of 5 loranges. 4 on a good day.** The xx - Crystalised The xx - Basic Space ** I don't do proper reviews - this lorange numbering system is somewhat meaningless. Though if I like you/your band I will blog about you all the time.

People were chatting last week on the local music blogs about a cool documentary on the bands, clubs and people of the Silver Lake / Echo Park area called East of Sunset . Before moving to Southern California in the late 90s, I like many only knew of the glory days of the Sunset Strip; East of Sunset hopes to change that perception that still exists even within our own city limits. Here's the trailer: Very cool stuff and great for the bands included in this movie but this area has been a hotbed of activity for a long time so I wanted to highlight a couple documentaries of the lesser known slices of the same music scene: Live at the Smell Documentary ( LA Weekly article ) For over 10 year this downtown club has been serving the underground and the up and coming of LA music. "Live At The Smell" Trailer from Adam Cornelius on Vimeo And of course something close to my heart, the Kiss or Kill club of great people and bands that ran from 2002-2007 at Mr T...