Chapter 200: Bionic

Mondays have long been the worst day of the week for me. Millions of other administrative type workers in this world surely know what I am talking about. It sometimes begins to feel like you are living your life for the weekend, only to go through all the exact same motions and repeat, repeat, repeat. It all begins with Monday morning. I mean, I don’t genuinely feel that way most of the time but every now and then that feeling does creep in. It is the simple feeling that everything in life has just become completely mundane and routine and blasé. I hate that feeling. Fortunately, since my schedule has changed, Monday doesn’t feel bad at all. I woke up at 6am this morning and washed my face, brushed my teeth, made myself a cup of coffee and smoked a cigarette. I ate a bowl of Fruity Pebbles for breakfast and was ready to start my workout by 6:45am. I decided to do slightly less working out this morning than I did last week in attempts to avoid the type of soreness I experienced last week. Instead of doing three sections of the “Dancing With The Stars” workout, I only did two. It was still pretty rigorous, though, and really got my blood flowing this morning. I really like this workout. It is fun, like Zumba, but also really feels like you’re getting a good workout. It’s working out really well for me so far. I like it a lot and have learned to deal with the soreness a bit better, because it was there again today to a lesser degree. I assume that as I keep doing it that will slowly start to get less and less. In the meantime, though, I will simply tolerate it.

I decided last night that I was going to try the natural, shimmering nude eye look that I found on YouTube, inspired by Celine Dion, and I did full foundation and such, and wore blush. The whole look came together really well, I think, and a few people had to ask whether or not I was wearing makeup. Normally, I would take that as a bad sign but for the look I was going for today it was a very good thing. It was a very fresh, natural look and I really enjoyed it. It was a little less than I am used to because I am used to having colors that really stand out on my eyes but it did look really good. My Mom said that I should do that look for the wedding. I don’t know about all that but it was a very good, natural look for today. Tomorrow? Black. I feel the need to do something a little more dark and drastic to make up for today. Of course, I probably won’t do much of anything makeup-wise tomorrow because I probably won’t wind up leaving the house. It is my day off and I don’t have any plans, aside from doing laundry and doing some finishing touch cleaning on my room and maybe doing some further work on my bathroom. I definitely plan on making tomorrow a more productive day than last Tuesday was. I definitely plan on doing a good deal of piano practice tomorrow, as well. I have been really good about practicing piano this past week and feel like I am pretty much there, as far as the pieces I’ve been working on. I am really excited for my lesson on Wednesday and starting on a new piece. I feel like I am ready to take on something a little more serious. Although, last night I pulled up a few pieces of sheet music online and got a little lost on them because they were full of flags. I haven’t actually learned about flags yet, so I wasn’t sure what they meant. I know, I already said that I didn’t want to step outside of my lessons but I had this hankering last night to learn to play “A New Day Has Come” by Celine Dion. Sadly, like I said, it was full of flags and I didn’t quite understand how those worked. I took that as a sign that it is a better idea not to step outside of my lesson plan at this point. Everything will come together in time – I just have to be patient.

So, work was pretty laid back today. It wasn’t too busy but it wasn’t too slow, either. We moved our desks around so now I am sitting only one desk away from my sister, which is pretty interesting. I don’t really foresee that being a problem, although now she can hear all of my conversations when she is at her desk. So, that could suck. Overall, though, I don’t think it’s a bad thing. The first half of today passed pretty quickly. I wrote my two new songs for the day, one of which was really good and the other was not as good. The good one was called “Volume,” and is basically a really fun, sexual, dance type song about liking a boy who gets loud. I try to avoid talking too much about things that I’m into, as far as that goes, but I definitely enjoy a boy who makes some noise. So, why not write a whole song about it? The not as good song was called “Wherever The Wind Blows,” and it was basically a song about trying to put your faith in the fact that the Universe has a plan for us all and just following where it takes us. The reason this song doesn’t really work for me is because it was trying too hard to be like one of the songs I wrote on Friday. This song I wrote on Friday is my favorite of the songs I have written lately, so I was trying to recreate the general vibe of that song with different lyrical content and it really didn’t work. The song from Friday was called “Nothing But A Rumor,” and is very different from anything I have written before. In terms of melody, it reminds me a bit of something that She & Him would do, but not as old school sounding. The vibe of the song was very inspired by Leighton Meester’s cover of “Bette Davis Eyes,” which had a very retro sound, while still sounding very modern and electronic. She sang that song very much in the style of those 40s lounge singers you see in old movies and such, and I kind of wrote this song with that sort of vocal style in mind. The music in my head, though, is very modern sounding with hints of synth and such mixed in. As far as the lyrics for the song, it is pretty simple. It is basically a song about people talking shit and trying to make sure that the person you love remains unaffected by that talk. It is definitely based on personal experience, although an experience from a very long time ago. I don’t know how to describe it any better than this but like I said, it is my favorite of the songs I have written since I have started the two songs a day plan.

After work, my Mom told me that she had some chicken in the refrigerator marinating and asked if I would use it and make dinner with it. Despite feeling really tired after work, I told her I would. When I got home, I sat down on the couch and watched today’s episode of “The View,” which was pretty boring. It was a “Behind The Scenes” episode, where they showed behind the scenes footage of putting together last Friday’s episode. It was interesting enough but I didn’t like not having a day of Hot Topics like they normally do on Mondays. While I was sitting there, I checked Facebook from my phone and found that my best friend, Don, had posted that the new Christina Aguilera record, “Bionic,” had leaked. There have been three main records that I am looking forward to this summer – Scissor Sisters’ “Night Work,” Kylie Minogue’s “Aphrodite” and Christina Aguilera’s “Bionic.” Despite everybody on the Internet seeming to have a different opinion, I am not disappointed with this record in the slightest. It is not my favorite Christina Aguilera record, by any means, but I do think it is a very strong pop record. I think the main issue is that the album has too many tracks and there are a few that really didn’t necessarily need to be there. Still, aside from one or two random songs that just seem kind of pointless, I think it is a pretty great pop/dance record. I first have to say that I love the fact that Christina has decided to do the electronic/dance style for this new record, because it works beautifully for her. Aside from a couple too many songs, the only other issue I have with the album is a few tracks that kind of feel like they’re trying too hard to be “different.” The best example of this would be the title track, “Bionic.” Someone on Oh No They Didn’t said it best when they said that this song was Christina “doing her best impression of M.I.A.” It really does kind of have that vibe. Still, underneath that it is still a pretty good song and a good intro to the album. This is followed by the album’s two singles, “Not Myself Tonight,” and “Woohoo.” “Woohoo” is a very sexual and very clever song, featuring one of my favorite new artists, Nicki Minaj. It is a really fun song and I think is much better than all the shit being talked about it on the internet. After that, the album continues with it’s experimental electronic/dance sound, including one of my favorite songs on the album, “Elastic Love.” This song has a very modern 80s vibe, if that makes any sense, and is extremely catchy and has a very fun lyric comparing a lover to a rubber band. Another favorite track of mine is “Glam,” which the producer, Claude Kelley, apparently tried to refer to as a “Modern Day Vogue.” It is a good song but not THAT good. In fact, my first thought upon hearing it was that it reminded me a lot of RuPaul’s music. I would call it more a modern day “Super Model,” than anything else. It is a really fun, over the top dance song and I love it. The strongest songs on the album are probably the ballads, particularly “Lift Me Up.” Christina performed this song on the “Hope For Haiti Now” benefit concert and I fell in love with it then. The studio version is just as good. As the title kind of suggests, it is a gorgeous, uplifting ballad written by Linda Perry, who is one of my favorite songwriters out there. Another great ballad on the record is called, “I Am,” which is a very simple, very vulnerable song about opening yourself up. I really fell in love with this song while listening to it, as well, and it may be my second favorite on the album. My very favorite song on this record, though, is the last track, “Vanity.” It’s over the top to the extreme, right from the opening line of “I’m not cocky I just love myself, bitch!” Some other favorite lines from this song are "Everyday I see myself I love me even more, Ain't nobody got nothing on me I'm number one for sure," and “Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who's the sexiest of them all? Nevermind, I am!" This is clearly just a fun, over the top, outrageous song about loving yourself. The only songs on this album that I don’t really love are “Sex For Breakfast,” and “Prima Donna.” These are the two songs that I feel are kind of out of place and are just there as filler. I can say, though, that I understand their purpose because each one gets slightly slower than the one before it and create a smooth transition into the ballads on the album. As individual songs, though, they just aren’t that great. “Prima Donna” is considerably better than “Sex For Breakfast,” but I’m not a huge fan of either one. I definitely recommend this record to everyone who enjoys good, solid pop/dance music. It is really a lot of fun and well worth the cost of an album on iTunes once it comes out, or worth the time to seek out a download if you want to hear it before the actual release on June 8th.

So, it is now 1:22am and I am starting to feel pretty tired. I don’t want to spend another of my days off sleeping until 1pm or later, so I should probably get to bed pretty quick. I am looking forward to spending tomorrow relaxing and being productive in small ways. Also, I’ll probably spend tomorrow listening to Christina Aguilera over and over while I clean and such. Should make for a fun day. In the meantime, it is time for bed. Goodnight.