please send me to charm school

... or wherever they teach you to pose like a girl (i.e., 50s pinup, in this genre, i spose). i know i'm not doing bad for a "middle-aged broad," but it's embarrassing to play/have played in bands w/women who are quite glamorous & yet come off (me, that is) this consistently dorky in photos (yet, i post them)... and why in heck was i smoking? i really do look "wrong" smoking, as some people've told me... argh.
- intellectually i know there's nothing wrong w/just being a human in photos, wrinkles, squints, fat rolls, dippiness, ugliness, imperfections, HUMANITY & all... but man, it can be tough, esp in this social media age, plus being a performer & kinda reliant on projecting a physical image... what's the effect of the former, i wonder, on kids? it seems to me more youngsters than not are a bit too pose-perfect & always ready for their closeup, having grown up w/noses in media devices... google "duck face" -- not just teenaged girls do it -- adults aside (on which duck face or its cousin contrivances can look rather pathetic, doncha think?), i recently saw a slew of photos of a little boy now about 8 yrs old, brother of a former student, mugging it up in that goofy-yet-glamorous way kids who've grown up photographing themselves to post to social media sites all seem to have... it's kinda weird, isn't it? do you recall when kids -- or any of us, except maybe actors & models -- had no preconceived idea or anxiety, really, about how they looked in photos? (i had a free-floating, amorphous anxiety, but it was that i was ugly -- it never occurred to me that a particular pose or angle would fix that ugliness...) hmm... that last pt makes me wonder: is the constant visual diary most kids keep of themselves these days boosting their confidence or making them feel more self-conscious? (recently i saw a woman had posted her daughter's pic, to this response from daughter: "OMG!!! MOM!!!! you know that's my bad side!! i hate this picture!!!") are we getting more narcissistic? realistic? calculating? neurotic? a little of all? i mean, w/in a culture's (mostly unspoken) dictates, each of us has a gendered & performative role... maybe these kids who've grown up self-photoing for instant upload are better able to fit into this game called american society...
guess all this musing just makes me sound old... oh well.
karling is supposed to come up & stay (we might make a comic book, i hope, but probably just will watch "spider baby," which she, a monster movie fan, somehow's never seen). maybe i can get pointers from karling, who is extraordinarily glamorous, as well as kind & very talented... at the hike i took a few wks ago, one of the gals, stephanie, is a photographer, & before we got our photo taken, she told me to do something w/one foot, then pull out & tuck my chin. that is a start, i spose...
i like our young rhythm section right now. they are not just cuties, but good musicians. overall, i am  happy musically, & i know our folks gave me good genes, so can't complain too, too much. :)

rockabilly or shlockabilly? crazy man, crazy; culture, sex, & gender in the "scene;" riffing & a rolling, rocking & a ranting on book fair day....

-> ...real rockabilly really is more shlockabilly, i think. it's pure & wild & played with katie-bar-the-door grit, hellbent, heaven-sent, whatever you wanna call it, not neat & tidy & studio-clean. it's the music of the disenfranchised, the outsider, the squirrel, the soul that's gotta go go go now now now. it's the music of the dirty, greasy, laboring white man, mean mister phil alvin said one time, like the pictured joe coleman rendering of "the haz" (who also, like the killer, chuck berry, like all real R&R maniac males, was probably mean, esp toward females... why are so many of the great ones mean, w/misogynist leanings, seemingly straight from or needing to be in the bat factory?)(insert here essay about creativity & madness...)
-> do the great women R&R artists hate men? are they also nuttier than a payday? candye kane was pretty great the other night (she even got me up there to sing harmony on "crying time" w/her, & smiled as i hope i didn't deafen her w/my loud warbling). she's nice to everyone, & generous-spirited. but other than candye & wanda jackson, i've met only a few female musicians, & don't know the reputations of the big ones, really, like i do the males, since in the history of vernacular & american music (the stuff i like) male's've have the lion's share of the spotlight (except the blues women, & maybe it was craziness in part that gave them the spirit to forge ahead at a time when they were total outsiders...). i'm drawn to the crazies, but again, how come they're mostly guys? and from whence comes the pointedly girl-aimed hatred that seems to fuel the guy-crazy? is it all mama? are they just a**holes?
-> i think great women can't get away w/the spoiled, whacked-out, mean-spirited stuff. they'd be rejected, spurned, villified. remember what used to happen to women who spoke up too much: staked & set afire!!!! friend karen the other day was talking a fascinating line: "we're the mysterious creatures, the source of power, the ones that bleed every month & live, the givers of life, & men can't do any of that, so they have to misbehave, threaten, intimidate, push to control so they don't feel lost, bewildered & inferior... without us, they would not be, & they know it, so they have to try to knock us down. they're scared."... anyways, that was her opinion, & i definitely have mine on culture, sex, & gender, so that's enough for now...
-> rockabillies tend to be cool. i'm (and maybe you're'm) more like that line from american me: "i'm so cool, they call me culo." rockabilly guys generally look pretty good, w/the sideburns, slicked hair, & greaser or western duds: it's a flattering, masculinized look. rockabilly chicks tend to be drop-dead, vampy, make-you-stupid-when you-look gorgeous; they're pomaded, pancaked, push-up-bra'd, & corseted glamourous & retro-seductive. even the dorky ones are just sexy; it's the code, which demands exaggeration & stratification of the male/female gender roles so everyone knows who's who. comfort in the traditional. really very reactionary, when i think about it (so let's not). :)
-> the true billies do look great, but they more importantly know, revere, & carry forward all the wonderful old music... not like the ones who think the stray cats or social distortion (??) are the heart of the genre. i think folks like the latter are just in it for the fashion, which, red-state associations aside, again is pretty cool compared to many other pop culture looks... & w/luck they learn to love the old music, too, or quickly get bored & go away. anyways, that's enough on that topic...
-> i was chided the other day for often writing about my makeup. but dang it, every time i do, it's cause some MALE has said something about the facepaint. so i write! it's my face, for pete's sake!! it's my blog!! mine mine mine mine mine!!!!
-> today i looked at over 1,000 books for our school at the district book exhibit & earmarked at least 400. cross your fingers we get some!!!! there were so many really great titles. what a sincere wonder children's authors are, & the good good people that bring kids & teens books & encourage them to enjoy, escape, learn, & grow thru reading. :) tonight's aerobics & the drunks. tomorrow's flics (i won their contest!! i am queen of the nerds!!). sat is smellay, breakfast w/art fein & music all day w/manuel. sun is band practice. mon is big b's bd -- heinz 57! tues mom & day come home from italia.
-> whatta treat all this is!! i say this for myself as well as you: be grateful for this day, & be glad in it. get hot or go home. stay sick, turn blue. hail hail rock & roll. [let] the big beat keep you rockin' in your seat. etc etc etc. :) :) :)
-> my ballast has come home, so we shall now venture to cost-co to indulge in corporate consumerism- consumption worship. and get dog food. :)

waaahoooo!!! nearly done!!! : birthing a behemoth

finally!!!!! i just completed a fairly large section of my thesis, the story appendix that accompanies the curriculum/study guide i'm writing... this sucker is a behemoth!!
tentative page counts:
main thesis - 67 pages
curriculum/study guide - 35 pages
education standards - 1 page
at a glance lesson planner - 4 pages
appendix one (leveled stories) - 81 pages
appendices 2-10 - 35 pages
and it's still not finished!!!! so far i have 223 pages!!! i've been a "high maintenance" student, maybe, worried about everything & wanting to do the best i can (which means i ask lots of Qs), but still the profs've been supportive, especially my lovely advisor dr. jo sanzgiri, who is kind, patient, organized, & enthusiastic, too!... this is an important project i've undertaken -- this is definitely no phone-it-in kinda work for me!! read the overview & please give feedback, if you wish... http://www.freewebs.com/learningwithsoul/index.htm