Soft Shock

The past couple of weeks have been...interesting. I'll start with the bad and go to the good. I want you to leave here happy.

Death needs to chill out for a while. I lost my dog and my Grandpa one week apart. Even when you know it's coming, death still has a shock to it. I'm lucky to work in an amazing place, with some of the best people you can imagine. I haven't really told everyone I work with what is going on, but the few people that know have gone out of their way to be supportive and just plain awesome. My boss even surprised me and ordered me these:















That's right - special edition Emily the Strange Jones soda. My dark little heart was bursting with design joy. My friends have also been amazingly supportive. I'm feeling overly fortunate this week. So much love.

Oh, and I got these:



















My office was abuzz with the deliveries I got yesterday. If ever in doubt, yes, send your girl flowers at work. Major points, fellas.

Just to illustrate how strange it's been, I was standing in the middle of a Tegan + Sara show when I got the news about my dog. Two girls were making out in front of me, two were making out behind me, Tegan + Sara were putting on an amazing show, and I was arranging the burial plans for my dog. That (luckily) does not happen every day.

Speaking of shows, I managed to hit quite a few last week. Starting with my favorites:

1: Joanna Newsom
Amazing, amazing show. Live, she is just beautiful and incredibly talented. If she is close, pay whatever they ask and see her!

2: The XX
I love The XX even more now. While they kept the show simple, they changed things up and added drama with some of the best lights I've seen. They were just genuinely good. While the first opener, Nosaj Thing, blew us all away (seriously, check the guy out), the second opener jj was by far the strangest act I've seen. So.much.drugs.

3: Tegan and Sara
A fun albeit interesting show. The girls are talented and authentic - switching instruments, talking to the crowd, putting on a good show. They thankfully played a lot of older songs and ended with my favorite, Living Room.

4: Temper Trap
Fun show, high energy. The lead singer moves like Michael Jackson. They ended by pouring water on a floor tom and going wild. The water went out into the crowd, up to the ceiling. Quite the sight.

5: David Bazan
I loved him and his band and their plain, stretched t-shirts. They want you to cry and drink, I think, and you still like them for it. I was happy to hear a couple of Pedro the Lion songs sneak their way into the set.

6: Passion Pit
Glow sticks. So many glowsticks. This was a fun show, but I felt like the venue was too big to really enjoy the spastic energy. One of my favorite parts was the three old (gray hair) women getting down beside us. They danced so much more than I did.

So, life has been interesting. That might be a boring way to put it, but that is about as accurate as it gets. And I'm ok with that right now. Today, the sun is shining after two rainy and cold days. I'm cleaning and organizing, finally hanging things on my walls, and enjoying a fun playlist from The Blisslist, who always has cheerful noises to offer (and whose playlist just inspired the name for this post). May life never fail to be interesting...