Saturday, May 03, 2008
God, I love today. It’s the first day in weeks that I’ve given up to complete and utter laziness. The last two weeks have been pretty crazy - my mom was in the hospital and ended up having some surgery, and I went to Buffalo to help her out during her recovery. We’re very fortunate and happy that she is totally fine and is back to her normal self. (She hates when I write about her on my blog so that’s all I’m going to say about that...)
Thursday night was Hanson night. We took the Walk again, which is the event they hold prior to each show. Hanson walks a barefoot mile with fans and megaphones to raise awareness and money for children and families in Africa. I was going to support their cause by buying TOM’s shoes (for every pair you buy, another pair is donated to a child in Africa - VERY cool, I think), but we found out recently that some of the money from the sale of TOMs shoes through Hanson supports a research hospital in Soweto which circumcises children as part of AIDS prevention. I don’t believe circumcision prevents AIDS in any way, shape or form, and I definitely don’t believe in circumcising a non-consenting child. Sorry, Hanson!
Taylor pointed out in his speech on this walk that this generation of kids (we were definitely part of the “old fogie” contingency and in the very small minority of fans who weren’t chaperoning children) is unlike any other - their greatest worries are what kind of iPod to buy and what college to attend (rather than whether they’ll be able to attend college at all). This is one of my favorite subjects to whine about, so when he started on about it, my ears pricked right up. Instead of a good old-fashioned bitch and moan fest with some nice, IN MY DAYs thrown in, Taylor had to go and be all kinds of inspirational, telling these teens and twenty-somethings that they have the unique opportunity to create change in this world, and prove everyone wrong. And he’s right, which makes me mad and jealous. Which I am allowed to be because I am old.
And so here’s Hanson being all motivational:
I usually spend the first few days of a concert in a slight state of mania. I’ve been listening to the a cappella song “Change in My Life” and acousting Mmmmbop on a nonstop loop, but all in all, I’d only classify the Hanson obsession as a low-level one, the highest being Shaun Cassidy, Donny Osmond, Howard Jones, The Police, and of course, Clay Aiken.
The Clay Aiken obsession makes me sort of sad, though. I can’t believe what he’s become. I see pictures like this:
photo: Dlisted
and I barely recognize the person in them. I didn’t want to see him in Spamalot on Broadway (me! didn’t want to see a Broadway show!) and I have no interest in buying his new CD. It sounds almost exactly like the last CD he put out, but worse. He hocked the thing on QVC, for god’s sake. And I don’t even want him to come out of the closet, because I don’t want him to ruin gayness for me. I love gay men almost as much as I love breathing air, and I don’t want him tainting that in any way. He should just stay in the closet with his large collection of oversized Carolina hoodies and ill-fitting suits. Whatever happened to American Idol Clay, I don’t know, but I know he’s not coming back, and that’s what bums me out.
In other news, Robbie Williams is porking out in America:
photo: Metro.co.uk
which is a wonderful thing. I love him. I’ll never understand how he can be a huge sensation in Europe and barely known here, but whatevs. Hopefully he’ll take his current fascination with extraterrestrials on the road and end up somewhere near DC and we’ll find ourselves with Robbie Williams as a houseguest. Nothing would please me more.
I’m so sorry I haven’t been so good at keeping in touch with people lately. Just think, though. Summer vacation is around the corner which means lots of blog stalking and maniacal emailing is heading your way in the very near future! You’re trembling with excitement, aren’t you?!