you are everything

I love them all. All pics taken after the final Phantom Planet show on Friday night. I'm so incredibly glad I was able to go to this show.

(click for larger versions)

Me and Darren

Me and Jeff

Me and Sam

Alex and I

Me and Ryan

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Permanent accounts just went on sale again, and people who already have permanent accounts - like me - just got their number of userpics upped. Mine went from 145 to 195! [My storage space for photos and voice posts and stuff went from 10GB to 15GB too, but I wasn't anywhere near 10GB anyway.]

So can someone point me to some posts with Panic icons from the Live in Chicago DVD? I want some.

Also, if you haven't heard about the latest reason that Spencer Smith is completely awesome, go read this.

Having a great time in Seattle with darksylvia. Had Meet & Greet with Panic last night and it was great! My photo is a little blurry though. Loads of other good photos and video clips - some full songs - from all three shows. I may not get them uploaded until after I get back home Saturday night though. We'll see. Maybe I can get the photos uploaded before then, and at least get a start on the videos.

Met some nice people at the Sacramento and Everett (Seattle) shows too. ::waves::

More later. If you have darksylvia friended, she has awesome recaps for all 3 RockBand shows and the Razia's Shadow listening party up in her journal. She's rad. ;-)

Sorry about my message being split into 2 posts last night. I can never remember what the character limit is. Actually I still don't know. I suppose I could go count the characters in the first post or search the FAQ, but meh... don't wanna.

Mom did much better today, and did go to the doctor this morning. Her blood count was normal, so that's good. Her doctor is still a complete freakin' idiot, and didn't even think it was blood she was throwing up but it couldn't have been anything else and his idea of what it was made no sense at all and regardless, he doesn't plan to do anything about it. But at least her blood count was normal, and the episode seems to be over with, and that's what I'm focusing on. That, and the fact that I still desperately want her and my Dad to switch to a different primary care physician.

Enough about that, though. Thanks to Leah and Bex and Liz and Lidia for the positive thoughts. ::hugs you all::

On a more upbeat note, did I tell you all that Leah and I are going to the Panic show in San Jose now too? So we'll see Panic and The Cab and those other two bands on Oct. 11, 12 and 14. Whew. It's gonna be AWESOME!!!!

Saw this over on bandslashmania and thought I'd spam you all with it as well.

From NPR: Take The Poll: Best CDs of the Year (So Far)

We have hit the halfway point in 2008. What are you loving so far? Below is a list of 50 albums to get you thinking. Choose five of these, or submit a write-in for whatever isn't on this list, but in the end choose only five total CDs. If we get a groundswell for something not on the list, we'll will add it.
You can also put the poll on your site blog or facebook page by clicking the share button at the bottom of the list.

To write in your choice, put a comment on the blog. Voting ends July 2.

( To the Poll... )

Surely there are more than 247 people (that's the count right now as I'm posting this) that think Pretty. Odd. is in the top 5, right?

x-posting to patd, because... why not?

Hi all!

Thanks so much to everyone who left me birthday wishes or sent me v-gifts or e-cards or even just thought about me on or around my birthday Sunday (that pretty much covers everyone, right? LOL). I had a very nice day with my brother, sis-in-law, niece and 3 nephews complete with Baskin Robbins ice cream cake - my favorite! The three older kids sang Happy Birthday to me, which was *hilarious!* All 3 really know how to ham it up! LOL

I've been here in Virginia for about 4 1/2 weeks now and I fly home on Saturday. I really want to stay though!

It's been an eventful month - both good and bad - and I hope you all will forgive me for being scarce. I've spent a *lot* of time helping with my new nephew, who is now about 10 weeks old. He's the fourth child for my brother and his wife, and the other 3 are really a handful, so I've had fun playing with the adorable baby who coos and smiles at me while the parents wrangle the other kids. Actually, all 4 kids are pretty wonderful and I'm going to miss them terribly when I leave.

Events (other than the Panic At The Disco concert in DC on April 30th, which I never really did a proper post about and probably never will now, but it was fantastic!!!) of the past few weeks:

A few days after the Panic concert, I slipped on the stairs and badly bruised my ankle (I thought that was the worse injury at the time) and bruised/possibly fractured my tailbone. My ankle is fine now. My tailbone? Not so much. I haven't been to the doctor or anything - not sure they're much they can do anyway other than confirm whether or not it's fractured - but it hurts a *lot.* I'm fine if I'm just standing or lying down or (in most chairs) sitting, but going from standing to sitting or vice versa is excruciating. It hasn't slowed me down too much though.

We took all of the kids to see Speed Racer in IMAX. Not a movie I would normally care about, but watching it with the kiddos made it *so* much fun! They were literally dancing to the music that played over the end credits. It was so cute. :-D

My uncle - the one who had the brain aneurysm a few months ago - passed away about a week ago. I wanted to go to the funeral so badly - he really meant a lot to me - but there was just no way. My parents drove up to Idaho for it, but I stayed here in Virginia. My aunt was very understanding, of course, but I wish I could have found a way to be there that didn't cost close to $1000. If I'd been home in California at the time, I could have driven up with Mom & Dad, but... ::shrug:: That's the way it goes sometimes, I guess. My uncle did pass very peacefully at home in his own bed during his sleep, and we can't ask for much more than that, can we? It is a comfort to all of us to know that he's no longer trapped in a body that no longer allowed him to do the things he loved to do, or even the simple everyday things we all take for granted.

My internet time has be limited due to all of the above things, combined with only having an internet connection in one room of the house - a room you can't keep the kids out of no matter how hard you try. Heh. I'm not used to having to censure everything I read and view online. I've had to avoid porn and even most of the fanfic I usually read! It's been awful! Although darksylvia still hasn't posted any new bandslash, so I didn't miss anything there. Better get crackin' though, L. I'll be home in less than a week and I need new fic from you!!

TV watching has been non-existent. My brother doesn't have cable. Or satellite. Or even rabbit ears for his fancy widescreen TV home theater system. Can you imagine? I did see the movie Transformers though. With my 3 year old nephew shouting "Bumblebee" every few minutes. LOL But alas, I have seen no new episodes of Supernatural, nor have I seen Galeface's episode of Desperate Housewives. Though I heard his scene is really short? Hmmm.

It should come as no big surprise that I haven't kept up with my f-list at all. Happiest of birthdays to anyone whose birthday I missed. Hugs to anyone who needs them. High-fives (or my lame attempts at them - just ask Jon Walker haha) to anyone who has had happy, exciting moments.

It should also come as no surprise that... I think I had more I wanted to say, but I can't remember what... fairly typical of me really. If nothing else, I am predictable. ::lame grin::

ETA: LJ's spell-check:
bandslash     band slash, band-slash, bands lash, bands-lash, bounteously

YES! The bandslash should be bounteous!!! Please share links to your fave PATD bandslash stories from the past month or so! Any pairing. Porn preferred. ;-D

I just got off the phone with Artist Arena, and they actually came through!! They just confirmed that I am "100% guaranteed" on the Meet & Greet list for the DC show, to make up for their fuck up in San Francisco. And darksylvia is on the M&G list for the Seattle show! YAY!!! Maybe Artist Arena is getting their act together, finally. I did point out to them that they misspelled words in their emails too. If you want people to give you money, you have to look professional and trustworthy, know what I mean?

Other good news about the DC show - BLACK GOLD WILL BE PLAYING AT IT!!!!!!!!!!! ERIC RONICK!!!!!!!! And hopefully Brendon will come out and sing the one part of Plans & Reveries with them! I can't wait! Next Wednesday!!!

Then on Friday, I head for NYC. See Randy in Antony & Cleopatra with Lois. Hopefully find time to go to Angels & Kings with celiarosalind (a mug shot of me in the same spot where Bdon was being silly/drunk! ::fingers crossed::). And do a little bit of sightseeing on Saturday before coming back to DC.

After all that... the big letdown. Nothing exciting planned after that. And a mega-huge credit card bill to pay off. But *so* worth it.

Having a lot of fun with my niece and nephews here. They are so much fun and so affectionate and so *smart.*

Ack - must go get dressed for dinner. We're going out to dinner for Dad's 74th birthday today.

P.S. - celiarosalind, I will email you after dinner tonight.

So, the post-concert (and post-missing the meet & greet) blues are easing up a bit, and I decided to post my pictures. I kinda stopped looking at all the pics other people are posting, but I still suspect these are pretty typical. I did go through and remove most of the blurry ones, but there are still a few that I thought were worth posting despite not being perfectly in focus. There are a few pics of Phantom Planet, The Hush Sound and Motion City Soundtrack as well, but it's mostly Panic At The Disco. And although I really made an effort to get pics of all the Panic guys, the majority of them are of Brendon. You just can't take your eyes off that boy. He's got some unexplainable magnetic thing going on. Seriously.

( Phantom Planet )

( The Hush Sound )

( Motion City Soundtrack )

( Panic At The Disco )

I looked through the few video clips I did that night again, and I won't be posting any of those. They're all short little clips - no full songs at all - and none are all that great. Maybe I'll do better at the DC show. Although it's not that my camera wasn't capable of it - it's that my arms weren't. Ugh.

I sort of have little stories to tell about the show last Thursday, but... I don't feel like typing them all out. So let me just say that Eric Ronick is awesome - and TALL. And Shane Valdés (or Valdez, take your pick) is so much hotter in person. No picture I've seen of him does him justice. And he's super nice. And no - I did not ask him about being roomies with Brendon or whether or not that shower pic really is of him and Brendon or anything. Which may have been part of the reason he was so nice and so willing to talk about everything from "The Making of Pretty. Odd." DVD (which he edited in only 3 days) to the fact that he's doing the whole tour with the band (lucky bastard).

Hopefully I'll get another chance to talk to Shane and actually get Eric's autograph on my Black Gold CD and get another chance at a meet & greet with Panic - the latter being something I'm currently fighting with Artist Arena about.

Oh! You can find my scans of the tour booklet here.

So, I'm off to the Washington DC area on Saturday, and will be out there until May 24th. For those who might be wondering, my brother and his family live near DC and I made plans some time ago to go visit them this summer. They just had a new baby about a month ago, and I can't wait to see the little guy. It just worked out well that Panic is doing their DC show while I'm out there. I'm also meeting llvoncan in NYC to see the closing night show of "Antony & Cleopatra" with Randy Harrison. And we're staying really close to the Angels & Kings bar, so I'm hoping to stop by there for a drink and a photo or something (celiarosalind - want to come with me?)... but I'll only be in NYC for about 30 hours, so we'll see. If any of my other east coast friends want to try and meet up while I'm out there, let me know.

Guess that's it for now.

I won the meet & greet with Panic At The Disco for the April 10th San Francisco show!! I get to meet them!!!! On the first show of the tour!!! Best part? darksylvia got picked for it too! We get to go in together and stop each other from saying stupid things and generally making fools of ourselves. ::whew:: Okay... I think I have to go tell as many people about this as is humanly possible!!! Watch out for rabid cross-posting to Panic communities!!

I've talked to a number of people recently who have expressed an interest in a community for fans of Panic at the Disco (and other FBR/DecayDance bands) who know how to spell and write in complete sentences and just generally act a bit more mature than... um... some other Panic fans. Well, that community is here!

twentyoneoclock

Be sure and read the community information here, and please feel free to pass this information on to any friends that you think might be interested!