Knoxville Living

My friend Vicki turned me on to the Travel section of Bust magazine (www.bust.com), which offers a wide selection of shopping, eating, and general living suggestions from its readers. Just go to www.bust.com, click on the Travel section, then type in your city. I'm putting this out there for all the friends of mine who will soon be heading out to new and exciting places. It's good to know what's fun and worthy when moving to a new place.

That having been said, does anyone have some helpful information for me regarding Knoxville Tennessee? I'd be grateful.

Here's what I'm looking forward to the most - something called the Great Rubber Duck Race, which occurs annually in August. For $5, you can purchase a rubber duck that will race other ducks down the Tennessee River. Seriously, that's my kind of town:

The Terror of the Wedding Dress

I blame television and films mostly for the fact that I thought shopping for a wedding dress would be about champagne and glamour and my mother's eyes welling up at every turn of a swishy gown. But alas, there was no champagne nor glamour, though my mom did tear up a little and I ended up bawling in the car. Mind you, I did not bawl because of the beauty of the whole experience. I bawled because it is all so very stressful.

Imagine: a room full of a zillion white dresses. Now: choose one. Mind you: it must be perfect. This is your wedding day, after all and you only get one of these (God willing).

Bridal shops are dirty and low and stinky. This is my opinion and I am using those words both in the literal and metaphoric sense. Sales staff are either unavailable or pushy; the dressing rooms are either too small or embarrassingly cavernous; and the other brides shopping are spiteful rather than generous. It is a strange, strange thing.

All that having been said, I did find a dress. This was after three or four harrowing store experiences and one meltdown during which I really should not have been driving for the safety of all others on the road. My mom and I were driving down 44th Street and we passed by yet another bridal shop, one that was not on our schedule/radar. Let's do it, I said through tears. Maybe they have the most magical and perfect dress.

One frightening u-turn later, lo and behold, we find that they did. The store was full of beautiful dresses and sales people who gave us just the right amount of attention. I found my dress after one day of shopping for it, but I waited to purchase it to be sure. One day, despite how painful, did not seem long enough. But it was. I went back and it was still the most magical dress in all the stores.

And so above is a picture of the beading alone. If I included the whole dress, my fiance would destroy me, so the beading is here for your viewing interest.

Lastly, a word of advice about local Grand Rapids shops:

1. Avoid Kim Kriner's whose sales people are not only disinterested and annoyed, one of them is also remiss in her use of deodorant.

2. Despite what the commercials tell you, you will not love David's Bridal. There is a reason their dresses are so cheap. There is no construction to them whatsoever. When we walked in, we were interrupted by an aggressive woman who asked if we had an appointment. (An appointment? At David's Bridal?) She proceeded to generously give us an appointment and we were forced to walk around with a sales person who told us they wanted to create the whole look. Um. No. It's my wedding. I get to do that.

3. Bridal Gallery on 44th is very, very good. As is Bridal Espinosa on Plainfield.

4. Don't listen to anyone who says it's going to be magical. It probably isn't. It's overwhelming and stressful and full of desperate searching through a mountain of white. Breathe. Drink beforehand. Breathe.

The Perfect Mixed CD

Giving any sort of present is problematic. It suggests we know someone is some way. And not just that we know them, but that we might be able to predict what they would like that they do not currently have. Who hasn't received that cardigan from a well-meaning mother that is a color we would never put near our skin and of a cut that is meant for a woman who is well beyond even her soccer mom years? (Insert clever analogy for male readers).

Some mixed cds are the equivalent of that: compilations of music I would never put near my skin and definitely not cut for me. So when I make them for friends, I try to do the opposite of that. I want to give them something they don't have, but something that will complement who they are and will fit into their cd collection.

What's important as far as I am concerned is not the content. Gone are the days of trying to express my emotions to someone via the mixed tape. I'm a writer and a fairly direct person. If I want to tell someone how I feel, I'll use my own words. What is important is transitions, pacing, arc, and a powerfully snobby aesthetic. Access to a very large collection of music is also helpful.

Here is the double-disc playlist I recently created for a friend who is turning 33 (this very day! Happy birthday, A!), and yes, I did put Dolly Parton between Jay-Z and Roy Orbison. It works better than you might think:

1. Wasted Days and Wasted Nights (Freddy Fender)
2. Dedicated Follower of Fashion (The Kinks)
3. No Matter What (Badfinger)
4. The Passenger (Iggy Pop)
5. Beautiful Girls (Sean Kingston)
6. Lucifer (Jay-Z)
7. Jolene (Dolly Parton)
8. Working for the Man (Roy Orbison)
9. Stand (The Bees)
10. Amsterdam (Guster)
11. Publish My Love (Rogue Wave)
12. That Time (Regina Spektor)
13. I Feel It All (Feist)
14. Girl Least Likely To (Morrissey)
15. Holland, 1945 (Neutral Milk Hotel)
16. Is This Love? (Clap Your Hands Say Yeah)

1. Put a Penny in the Slot (Fionn Regan)
2. Song of Our So-Called Friend (Okkervil River)
3. On a Great Lake (Chris Brokaw)
4. I’m Lonely (and I Love It) (Future Bible Heroes)
5. When Your Mind’s Made Up (Glen Hansard & Markita Irglova)
6. Little Sister (Rufus Wainwright)
7. I Believe in a Thing Called Love (Edson)
8. I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever) (Stevie Wonder)
9. Michigan (Ambulance Ltd)
10. Four Seasons in One Day (Crowded House)
11. Vincent O’Brien (M. Ward)
12. Honey and the Moon (Joseph Arthur)
13. Dry the Rain (The Beta Band)
14. Sugar Free Jazz (Soul Coughing)
15. Days (Elvis Costello)
16. For Today I’m a Boy (Antony & the Johnsons)
17. Mix Tapes/Cell Mates (Rocky Votolato)

Things I Would Miss

Okay, so this title and list idea is completely and entirely lifted from Otterbutt. My equal apologies and thanks. With the advent of her taking leave of my fine state and fine city, she has posted those things she would most miss about Grand Rapids. Well, I will miss her terribly.

Here is my list if I were to be leaving, which, at some point, seems a likely eventuality:

1. My family
2. Logan's Alley on Michigan Street
3. US131, which is always navigable, even when it's down to one lane
4. Meijer
5. Recognizing 60% of the people I see and trying to remember how it is I know them
6. Looking out the window of my apartment
7. Rollerblading down Kent Trails
8. Vertigo, the greatest music shop ever, on Division
9. Going to Little Mexico Cafe with Texas friends who approve of the food
10. Proximity to a Nordstrom's Rack where I go for therapy on some very stressful weekdays
11. Proximity to the beach
12. Proximity to Chicago and Detroit
13. Pleasant Michigan summers
14. Lakes-a-plenty
15. The fact that it only gets better every single day
16. The fact that it is constantly in a growing state
17. The fact that I can drive down the street and frequently find a new bar or little shop that just opened
18. The fact that the Domino's on my street takes an absurd amount of pride in the quality of their pizza as though they were a gourmet pizza place
19. The fact that Grand Rapids will always be here for me
20. The fact that I will always have come from it

Peep Show for a Little Post-Easter Fun

The Washington Post has fun with Peep Dioramas. Go here and enjoy the fun:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/photo/gallery/070402/GAL-07Apr02-69859/index.html

Who knew Marilyn Monroe could be Peep-ified?

Wait Ache

I feel like a rubber band that's been pulled taut for months. Soon, the weather will improve. Soon, the sun will be out frequently. Soon, I won't have to worry about how much heat I am using in my apartment. It all feels like it should be happening now, that the thermometer's inching skyward is happening far too slowly. We are at 46 and always holding. I want the fifties, then the sixties, then the seventies before my rubber band self snaps.

This is what I hate about living in Michigan. When the sun and the warmth finally do return, I feel guilty with every moment that is not spent sucking it up with every availiable stripped, exposed, unclothed pore of my body. It makes working and writing very difficult. But I know - a part of me always knows - that the sun will go away again and it will be gone a long time. My body knows it and it inflicts me this overwhelming sense of obligation to get out. To go rollerblading, to go biking, to go running, to go walking, to move move move move. Be in the sun, it demands. And this would be a good thing if it wasn't coupled with a crippling knowledge of its temporariness. It makes the whole thing a little unliveable. It really is time for a new state.

Hey Jude Baby

I totally stole this from Cindy, but I have to say, I'm totally going to have babies this awesome, only likely not Asian: