| Viva Las Vegas!!! |
[Sunday November 8th, 6:24pm] |
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So I finally have a chance to sit down and post my pics from Vegas!
I had a blast and I can't wait to go back. I had more fun than I did at Dragon*Con this year to be honest. Maybe because it was a new experience and I've been going to Dragon*Con off and on for the past 10 years.
Meh. My life isn't going to revolve around cons anymore, but more of traveling. Don't get me wrong, I love conventions and will never stop going, but instead of putting so much time and money into something I do every year, I will try to see a new city at LEAST once a year.
Speaking of traveling, I have HUGE news that is too big to share with my Vegas post. More about that later. It's insane!
Anyway...pictures from Las Vegas!!!! Please keep in mind that I never just post pictures. That's no fun! They all have a meaning behind them, so please read the captions to get the full effect of the adventure!
( LOTS and LOTS of pictures under the cut! )
Last picture in Vegas.
SOO MUCH FUN! I can't even express it! I can't wait to go back! I have a couple of little videos that I took of the Bellagio fountains, the KISS tribute on Fremont, and Brad and I being drunk and retarded. I'm having trouble posting them. If you want to see em, just ask and I can email them to you. Until next time!
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| www.Hopeline.com |
[Sunday November 1st, 12:58am] |
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http://postsecret.blogspot.com/2007/02/wwwhopelinecom.html
-----Email Message-----
Subject: thank you
Frank,
This past Friday night I found myself in a black hole of depression and I didn't know how I was going to make it through the night. Not knowing where to turn and feeling like I couldn't stop. I remembered seeing the Hopeline phone number in the front of your book. I talked with someone there for 2 and a half hours and I truly feel that they saved my life.
Thank you for the book, thank Hopeline for being there, and thank the people that send in their postcards so that others know they are not alone with their secrets.
-Casie (with permission)
Order Your Copy Today
-----Email Message-----
(posted with permission)
Good evening Frank,
I sent you a post card in 2006. I made it on a picture. I liked it a lot. And I guess, so did you, because you posted it that fallowing Sunday. I was excited and happy, until I noticed that YOU HAD CUT OFF HALF OF MY SECRET. Then my excitement and happiness turned into violation and anger... I was so pissed! I didn't know why you had done that! I felt like you had taken my secret, and changed it... and then shown the whole world. I realize now, that you had CUT OFF MY SECRET because it wasn't the 'correct size' of a post card. Which STILL pisses me off, because I have seen a lot of post cards that you have posted, that isn't the "shape" of a fucking post card. But you don't change their wording, or edit them... (or maybe you do.)
Frankly, Frank... I have never, and probably will never sent you another post card again. Because it doesn't feel safe. Because what if you're going to change and alter that one, too? Now I doubt the post cards I see.... if you altered and edited mine, how would I know that you didn't just do the same thing, to some other poor girl, pouring her heart out on a dark night?
Final Kicker: That post card i sent was god themed. It said "Maybe I'll start believeing in G-d..." (and THE PART YOU FUCKING CUT OFF WOULD OF SAID "...Now that I am slowly loosing everything, there seems no better time") I bought your new book... Maybe because I wanted another PS book, or maybe because I was still holding out that I might see my old secret, properly displayed in whole... alas, I was left disappointed that my secret was no where to be found. Anywhere.
So... why am I writing you, 3 years later about a post card you don't remember? I'm not sure. I've started and deleted this same email to you so many times, over the last 3 years. I feel stupid for being this upset over something so silly. That's why I've deleted the past emails...Part of me feels like you deserve to know that you have hurt the feelings of one of your (long time) viewers. I still like Post Secret, I still support you, and I still tell others about this project, but you did take some fire out of my passion. And you did hurt my feelings, and I don't feel safe sharing my secrets with you any more.
But this time Frank, I might just hit the send button...
-----Email Message-----
On this week's post secret there is a picture of a girl with nipple peircings. The strange thing is, that girl looks just like me.. I have straight red hair that color and I am pale and thin just the same. I could send you a picture of myself if you do not understand why I am so upset. Please take it off!!
My Twitter Updates
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| My Thoughts on Michael Jackson's "This Is It" |
[Thursday October 29th, 3:22pm] |
On June 25th, the day Michael Jackson died, I was in the first week of my West Coast tour. I was driving through Denver, CO when a cousin of mine in Brooklyn, NY called my cell phone to inform me of MJ’s death. I’d already received texts from various friends with different stories about his physical condition, but was waiting for confirmation from a more official source. My cousin is by no means a journalist, but the fact that this phone call was his first to me in YEARS was more than enough confirmation. Our brief conversation consisted mostly of me reciting the pat responses that this year’s relentless onslaught of celebrity deaths had forced me to unconsciously memorize: there will never be another like MJ, we should appreciate our heroes while they’re still here, we should cultivate a new generation of heroes, etc.
As true as my words were then, it took a while for their significance to fully sink in. MJ’s death sent instant shockwaves of grief through millions of people around the world; for me, the grieving process was more of a slow burn. My first sincere response to his death was to renew my own commitment to giving the best performance possible on every night of the tour. This commitment was in danger of waning after the dismal show I played in Lakewood, CO the previous night (note to booking agents: sandwiching me between two nu-metal bands will never be a good idea), but I took new inspiration from the fact that MJ died while readying what would be his final and most colossal run of shows. If he could die pushing the limits of his talent and ambition, then I could certainly live doing the same. That night, I played a great show in a Laramie, WY coffeehouse to an audience of 20 people. (Economies of scale are funny things.)
My first palpable pangs of grief came during the last week of my tour, when I spent two days in Los Angeles, the city where MJ died. While hanging out with my friend Juli between shows, we watched his “Live in Bucharest – The Dangerous Tour” DVD, and I found myself holding back tears while singing along to “Heal the World.” Even then, my grief was tempered by trepidation. As I drove around the city and saw rows of stores selling tacky bootleg memorial T-shirts, I realized that the exploitation which marked MJ’s life had already marked his death; when store owners tried to charge me for taking pictures of their shirts, I knew this exploitation would intolerably intensify. (Mind you, this was BEFORE MJ’s father decided to resubmit his “Worst Celebrity Father Ever” application to Satan.)
Once I shook off my post-tour depression, I set time aside to listen to every solo MJ album from “Off the Wall” onward, to focus solely and specifically on his music and how it affected me. What I discovered was one of the most deceptively consistent discographies in pop music. Every MJ album boasts at least a handful of classics, and even the songs that aren’t are characterized by naked vulnerability, constant attention to detail, and/or a steadfast allegiance to the groove. There isn’t a song of his that isn’t executed well; there isn’t an emotion expressed in his lyrics that I can’t feel when he sings them; and there isn’t a single beat of his that I can’t dance to. There’s an undeniable slope in quality between “Thriller” and “Invincible,” but it’s not as steep as most people assume, and “Invincible” STILL surpasses most contemporary pop. I reiterate that I focused specifically on the music; his skill at dance and multimedia warrants their own respective paragraphs, but I’m trying to be concise.
MJ was the most famous man in the world, so famous that even when absent from the stage and the charts, he was ubiquitous enough to be taken for granted. Even as he directly appealed to us through his music and interviews, we magnified and dissected his pathologies and controversies enough to mask the human being who actually had to live with them. We focused on his arguably garish physical transformations, even after he told us that they were influenced by disease and his father’s mockery, and ignored the fact he still loved himself enough to continue identifying as Black. We focused on his admittedly unsettling fondness for children, even after he was tried and acquitted of molestation charges, and ignored the fact that he had his own childhood stolen from him. We focused on the so-called “freak show” and forgot why we started paying attention to him in the first place: his supernatural talent and perpetually open heart.
(A personal note: my deceased grandfather, too, had vitiligo. The slow, scattershot disappearance of his pigmentation made him a scary sight in the eyes of most children. As much as my grandfather loved children, if he had MJ’s money, I’m sure he’d have bleached his skin too if it meant he wouldn’t have to convince them to hug him.)
All of this was precisely why I wanted to see “This Is It,” the recently released film which was cobbled together from footage of MJ’s final rehearsals. Even though I know the film is clearly a way to recoup some of the money his estate lost from investing in the tour, I also knew that it would be my last chance to get a somewhat unfiltered view of his creative process, to finally see the artist and human being at work. I can honestly say that the film itself satisfied me in every way: considering the circumstances behind it, “This Is It” couldn’t have been done more tastefully and respectfully. The film makes no acknowledgment of his pathologies or controversies; any hagiography that occurs comes from the words of his own crew. The film remains focused on MJ’s art at all times.
On “This Is It,” I got to see just how involved MJ was in every part of the creative process, gently yet firmly directing his musicians, dancers, technicians and visual artists. I got to see how eager he truly was to share the spotlight with his collaborators. I got to hear him use phrases like “a little more booty” and “let it simmer” to describe his music. I got to hear him miss notes, omit lyrics and ignore cues. However, at no point in the film did MJ move or sound like a shell of his former self. MJ went out firing on all cylinders, and I left the theater convinced once again of his ability to exceed even his own standards. “This Is It” is a work of blatant commodification that, ironically, humanizes the commodity by spotlighting his artistry. Not only that, but there were more than enough moments of magic and levity to distract me from the knowledge that I was watching MJ during the very last moments of his life.
When I got home from the movie theater, though, I immediately retreated to my bedroom and released four months’ worth of dammed tears.
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| Sunday Secrets + Best Of |
[Sunday October 25th, 12:01am] |
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http://postsecret.blogspot.com/2009/10/sunday-secrets-best-of.html
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people
mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a postcard.
Because of the book tour and PostSecret Events, I was unable to complete the Blog. I have included 20 extra secrets below from April 13, 2008.
-----Email Message-----
i just stopped in to check today's new secrets and saw one of mine that i sent . . . it's nice to see that as we change, our secrets do too.
thanks for the reminder that we are not always who we once were (and for always keeping my secrets safe).
-----Email Message-----
Frank-
I am typing this to you at the library because I cannot afford a postcard and stamp. My family and I are living in a self-storage unit illegally. It's getting so cold at night. I want them to know I'm sorry, it's my fault, but I can't say it.
-----Email Message-----
When my mom kicked my dad out, she joked that he could live in our storage unit. Now he does.
-----Email Message-----
I told them.
-----Email Message-----
Dear Frank,
this past sunday I was with my boyfriend (we are both young christians) after 12:00 and being a postsecret reader I grabbed his laptop to go to the postsecret website. As i typed in the post secret address the computer filled in the url with a pornography website. In my attempt to read other people's secrets, I discovered one of his.
The world works in a funny way sometimes.
 See more secrets. Follow PostSecret on Twitter.
The new book is available from bookstores and online.
Thanks for making our secrets #1 on the New York Times Best Seller List.
Updated PostSecret Event Schedule for 2009
(Use the facebook links to RSVP and for more details.)
Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI
11-04-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=54654889989
La Ciudad de las Ideas, Puebla, Mexico
11-07-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=123761684771
University of Texas at Arlington, TX
11-11-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=107083078765
Stetson University, Deland, FL
11-12-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=126952807077
Bradley University, Peoria, IL
11-17-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=132997630852
Southwestern Oklahoma State University, Weatherford, OK
11-19-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=101555234302
University of Scranton, Scranton, PA
11-30-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=129923494471
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
12-04-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=107469192412
Changing Hands Bookstore, Tempe, AZ
12-07-09
Call for Details (480) 730-0205
Tattered Cover Bookstore, Denver, CO
12-09-09
Call for Details (800) 833-9327
Penn State Erie, Erie, PA
12-10-09
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=109987144015
Book People, Austin, TX
12-12-09
Call for Details (512) 472-5050
Please give your friends a "heads-up" if I'm coming their way and consider becoming a PostSecret fan on facebook to receive new schools and dates.
Sunday Secrets (April 13, 2008)
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Monday, April 14, 2008 12:29 AM
Subject: Racing at CVS
Dear Frank,
Just thought I'd share my first secret. When I give communion at mass, I race the priest to see if I can make my line move faster.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2008 9:51 PM
Subject: college dream
Neither my Ivy League degree nor the successful career that followed ever made me happy... The only thing that has worked is taking care of other people -- wondering what would make them happy and doing my best to make it happen.
-----Original Email-----
Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2008 1:59 AM
Subject: UNLV Event
Dear Frank,
You invited us tell our secrets tonight and I was going to go up but then boom, everyone was up there and I didn't get to tell my secret. I thought about it the whole rest of the night and as I drove home with my boyfriend I started to tell him some of my happy secrets than, the one I fear the most.
I cried my eyes out, the type where you can't breathe, he listened and simply held my hand.
It has never felt so refreshing and wonderful to get something off of your chest after almost 15 years.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Friday, April 18, 2008 7:35 AM
Subject: shaving the pubes
My boyfriend didn't want to have sex with me because I don't shave my pubes. He broke up with me shortly thereafter. We're better off without him.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2008 11:32 AM
Subject: littel+bird secret
My mom used to do the same thing when she did my laundry. It's how she got me and my brother to learn how to wash our own clothes!
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Monday, April 14, 2008 8:50 PM
Subject: little bird postcard
it's okay, mom. i got it from your purse anyway. sorry.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, April 15, 2008 3:16 PM
Subject: re: Sunday Secret - "Rainbow Alliance Pride Week"
I feel obligated to take pro-life flyers from groups at school so they won't think (know) I had an Abortion.
-----Email Message-----
Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2008 8:27 PM
Subject: my school painted over our secrets.
I got my first PostSecret book a few weeks ago, and was inspired. A few close friends and I came up with the idea of making a secret wall in the stall of one of the girls bathrooms. It started with about 5 secrets, and within the next few weeks there was about 50. The secrets ranged from crushes to friend problems, and from rape and cutting.
Everyone knew about the secret wall. Today my best friend and I go into the stall to see if there were any new secrets, and all we saw was a large, tan, wall. Our school had painted over the secrets.
Tomorrow i'm starting the wall again.
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