Because of You

This song is beautiful, but the music video is even more amazing and beautiful. So heartwarming, really. I think Kelly Clarkson was one of Idol's only real talents, except for maybe Jordin Sparks and Carrie Underwood. A Moment Like This beats everything by a huge mile though. American Idol today really has no talent; none of the contestants really make it big anymore - it's like America's Next Top Model: interesting to watch but of no real significance. Additionally, I have an obsession with string cheese. [That was me fulfilling the randomness quota of the day. And yes, this is the SOTD.]

Expect a couple of dorm photos soon, just because I think our mural (on a pink bedsheet) is the cutest, even though it's incomplete. Kudos to my suitemate, Priya <3

Midterm season and hell week is kicking off, and work's busy as usual (http://www.emcblue.com/) so I wouldn't expect major updates, but I'll try to post random quirky/cute/interesting things if I see them, especially photos or just little things I come across. Also, go check out http://www.lovelyish.com/ - I would embed the links to make them look pretier like I always do but I'm in a hurry (sorry). I love the Lovelyish blog though - it's so cute yet relevant and I can read it quickly on the go since the articles aren't (usually) long!

Can I also just say that I LOVE NYC. I've been there WAY too often this month :| Not a good thing, wallet-wise, but I'm just SO in love with the city. Especially the Platters cart on 53rd & 6th, and all of 5th Ave... and I found the CUTEST little shoe shop that sells AMAZING 4 to 5-inch heels for only $38 - which actually isn't all that expensive for heels if you're buying one or two pairs a month, and the guy gave me a $15 discount last time when I bought two pairs of heels together, shhhh. I got the cutest ones too, I might put up pictures sometime. Hahah my spending habits SUCK, please don't emulate them. But the shop is cute, all you New Yorkers should check it out when you have the time. Just don't overspend!

I hope you guys love the video as much as I do; I think Kelly's so pretty too. More later! =)

Deathtrap Fashion

Since this IS a style blog, I love to share the crazy, the wacky, and the plain NUTJOB style choices surfacing around the York Fashion Week. Lady Gaga, the pioneer of all new questionable fashion choices, allegedly took a tumble in this concoction of a shoe below:

Thoughts? Would you guys be on board with a shoe like this? I'm personally a huge fan of high heels, but I probably wouldn't risk these death traps for the sake of fashion. My fashion's gotta be comfortable. However, I would love to walk a few paces in these shoes just to see what it felt like to be Mother Monster for a day. Maybe I could don a pink wig to complete the look! Or electric blue, since bubblegum-pink is more Katy Perry's MO than Gaga's. Or I could just go bleach blonde. Still. I would not buy these shoes, even with a knockoff pricetag. I wouldn't even know how to walk in these if I tried.

The One That Got Away

Hi guys. I know I've been massively neglecting my blog lately. I've been too busy blogging for work, fixing up my dorm room, keeping up with homework and readings and papers this semester, and to top it all off I've had some issues with my friends. Basically people at school who I thought were my friends really don't actually like me, and really just bitch behind my back about me. It's especially annoying that some of the bitches don't like me because "I'm not pretty or good-looking". Shallow, stupid much? Honestly, I know they're not worth being friends with and I know who my real friends are (pity most of them aren't at school I guess....) but yeah I'm trying to stay positive. Excuse my language in this post, by the way. It's been a long week. On a side note, I plan on getting a new tattoo (finger tat) soon -probably a small dragonfly wrapped around my finger. Or a crumpled butterfly. Both images mean a lot to me and are exceedingly personal. On another note, Fashion's Night Out in NY was AWESOME; I bought 3 new pairs of heels and so many new clothes :) More on that later!!

In this post... well I'm going to leave you with two things: A music video of a song I'm obsessed with, and a link to very pretty nails :)

The Link to Lace-patterned nails (in case you're just as tired of the crackled tips look as I am):
http://www.lovelyish.com/754909951/beauty-how-to-lace-patterned-nails-/

Music video to Katy Perry's The One That Got Away:


It's a very chill, mellow, lazy-or-productive Sunday-afternoon sort of song. Katy's voice is super mellifluous and sorrow-filled, longing, unwavering, and super genuine throughout the whole song. I think this song earned a top ten for several weeks on the charts :) It's too late and I'm too tired to look up the stats properly :| I'm tired and busy and my feet hurt from my sky-high heels that I trekked around NYC in for FNO last night, so I'm gonna skip the long rant I usually go on while I wax poetic about why I love a music video or song so much, but I really hope you guys enjoy the song! -Sidenote: Love You Like A Love Song by SelGo gets stuck in my head really easily. I've had it in my head ALL DAY, ever since I heard it on the commercial for the Dream Out Loud collection exclusively for KMart... lol.

3OH!3 -SOTD (Song of the day)

Hi guys. I know I promised a whole lotta posts. I was supposed to fill in a bunch of posts, and I'll get to cleaning up previous Blogger posts, shortening/eliminating the rants. I've just been busy with my new internship (!!!), sorta applying for others (since I could probably handle 2 this semester), cleaning and packing for college (move-in day in 4days), preparing for Hurricane Irene (Hurricanes and Earthquakes are SO not even supposed to happen in New Jersey, let alone on the East Coast.....). I still need to look up a list of my teachers/textbooks so that I can rent them all (RENT, don't buy, children), I need to take a closer look at my sociology textbook for this upcoming semester, I need to write an article for my internship that's been sitting in my head for a couple days (about Trace Cyrus and Brenda Song's upcoming preganancy... uh, didn't see that one coming, but Congrats, Aunt Miley! For all her personal questionable choices, Miley actually seems like she'll be a great, supportive role model that'll teach her nephew/neice how to stand up for his/herself and get what he/she wants out of life. Awesome, eh? Sounds like Miley will teach the kid independence.) I also STILL need to visit a dentist (yeah, my tooth fell out -oops... it was an accident and it looks terrible, I just really haven't had the time to go to the dentist on account of jetlag and a messy room and everything. Gotta go ASAP, but unfortunately leaving the house is gonna be impossible this weekend -thanks, Irene.) OH and I have meetings scheduled on Monday, and Wednesday, and I need to go clothes and laptop shopping -I have enoough money for one new; I'll probably get it shipped to my new dorm within the first week of school! Since this blog's kinda slipped to the back of my mind lately, I'll throw y'all a filler post with a song of the day. For those curious, yes, this song was featured during the first few moments of the Pretty Little Liars pilot episode. Can't wait to catch the mid-season summer finale of that, by the way. It's a cute, upbeat song by 3OH!3 (check out their song "We Are Young" featured on Hellcats too, by the way! I hope you guys enjoy it :)

Congratulations, Lizzie !

I'm missing my cute Wordpress background! Time to head back there, maybe? Maybe I really should flesh out and develop that blog more... or just go ahead and get my own website and merge all posts together... I'm also going to start tagging ("labeling") these posts; I know I've been ignoring tags up until now... I wonder why I've been doing that actually. I'm also going to do a blog-cleanup within the next couple of days, and fill out or delete and generally clean up old posts that might flow really confusingly (I do tend to ramble; I apologize :P). I have a great couple of posts lined up though, so let's get started!

First though, quick news that I found out about over at the lovely Lovelyish.com : Clothing brand Abercrombie & Fitch, who previously blasted the infamous Jersey Shore cast for wearing their brand (I guess the brand doesn't want their image being connected to the not-amazing image of the Shore crew?), has now released a GTL t-shirt, possibly looking to boost sales and revenue through Jersey Shore's popularity. I definitely understand how that's a bit hypocritical, and Pauly D said as much over Twitter: "Hmmm if they don't want us to wear those clothes why make GTL shirts" ...maybe because the world is a pretty selfish place, Pauly.

On to the juice: Growing up is confusing. It's been said, it's been done, it's been sung about and danced about and talked about to death. But what I remember about growing up is that I learned so much about it from Disney show Lizzie McGuire starring Hilary Duff of course. (Is it just me or is Hilary the only Disney star who matured gracefully, tastefully and without any major scandal? She ended up an entrepreneur, charitable, in love, married, and is now happily pregnant!) I remember always wanting amazing friends like Gordo and Miranda and wanting that kind of trio thing in general (I had a best friend, never a trio... the closest I came to a trio was fifth grade, which pretty much failed in the worst way possible; I'm not friends with either of the other two-thirds of the trio now.). I remember wishing for understanding, sweet parents like Lizzie's, and I used to quote cartoon-Lizzie to my mom every day. "You're ruining my life!", though dramatic, was something I realized every teen really did say to their parents more-or-less every day (thank you, Lizzie!) I was such a typical teenager in every sense possible, it actually makes me laugh, but I legitimately thought my situation was unique. I laugh about all the theatrics that I put people through now, and some of them were bratty, so plenty were actually funny and oh-so-typical. In light of all of us having grown up past those moments into mostly mature, changed, enlightened individuals, and in light of Hilary Duff's pregnancy (wonder if she'll give her kid a normal name?), I thought I'd list the top sweetest/funniest/most potent "growing up" moments that there were on Lizzie McGuire.

turn it around everyday

There's so much new stuff coming out soon! Here's a little recap of everything shiny, bright and new to come this fall.

The new ABC Family series based on another one of Sara Shepard's series, The Lying Game premieres today, as does another episode of Pretty Little Liars during its usual timeslot, so I'm super excited for all of that tonight. There's only 30-some odd days until The Vampire Diaries Season 3 premieres on the CW, and that should be an interesting season -the year of the originals, with "Delena", more focus on witches, surprising twists and turns and old love interests galore (Malese Jow as Anna, Kayla Ewell as Vicki and Emily Fields' belle, Samara (Claire Holt) features as Stefan's ex). Gossip Girl's season 5 returns to the air soon as well, after one very long summer away from the Upper East Side. Demi Lovato's new album, Unbroken drops on September 20th, and I'm so excited to hear her amazing new soulful sound, debuted on Skyscraper. Big Time Rush's new album releases later this year in November, too, and that should be exciting. For anyone keeping up, a new iCarly episode dropped just two days ago- iLost My Mind, kicking off Volume 5 of the ever-popular show. One of my favorite bands, Every Avenue (featured in an earlier post with the video for song "Tell Me I'm A Wreck"), recently dropped their new album, Bad Habits.

Caught up? Great. The release of so much new music especially really made me question what kind of music I like. I love pop-grunge-alt-rock, bordering on hard rock for sure (I really wish I could catch The Pretty Reckless in tour, or that they would release a new album.) but I've realized that I also love softer power ballads far too much too. The skill to play piano is one that I really wish I had (though it pains me to say that my efforts at learning guitar were derailed by a trip out of town and upcoming things, both good and bad, in my own life.), and so I thought I write a post about a few of my absolute favorite acoustic-y power ballads, some of which are played on piano and others on guitar, but all of which have astounding vocals/talent and truly beautiful messages. Some of these songs I've covered individually before as songs-of-the-day, because I'm thoroughly in love with each and every one of these songs, so I won't do full commentary on any of these songs, but I just want to give them the sort of shout-out these songs and artists deserve, and make a sort of list of some of the best (in my opinion) soft, meaningful, pop-rock power ballads that I think everyone should check out at some point.

-Demi Lovato: Skyscraper
-Kate Voegele: Forever and Almost Always
-Victoria Justice & Leon Thomas III: Tell Me That You Love Me
-The Band Perry: If I Die Young
-Anna Nalick: Drink Me
-Birdy: Skinny Love
-Vanessa Carlton: Who's To Say
-Vanessa Carlton: White Houses
-Vanessa Carlton: Ordinary Day
-Victoria Justice: A Thousand Miles
*This last cover by Victoria Justice is even more talented than the original version by Vanessa Carlton, which was absolutely amazing to begin with. Victoria Justice is actually a really bright, inspiring, aspiring star in the music industry... can't wait to see what her upcoming solo album sounds like, too.

Make sure to check out some of these amazing songs for your own sake -you won't be sorry; they're absolutely beautiful. My current favorite of them all is definitely Kate Voegele's Forever and Almost Always, just because it's so honest, so expressive and so relatable -every girl can relate to the emotions offered, evoked and stirred by the song, much like a Taylor Swift song without all the idealism and/or excessive bitterness. (Idealism and bitterness are so mutually inclusive; can't have one without the other, whereas happiness and sadness are both necessary in order to feel the full impact of the other, but they don't coexist -when you're happy you're not sad. But you can't be an idealist without being bitter, and if you're bitter about life, chances are that on some level you're an idealist whose idealistic dreams have been tossed around by reality.)

That's all for now though; be back soonish.

Forever and Almost Always

So the story goes on down the less-traveled road
It's a variation on the one I was told
And although it's not the same
It's awful close, yeah

In an ordinary fairytale land
There's a promise of a perfect happy end
And I imagine having just sort of that
Is better than nothing

So you'll be mine
Forever and almost always
And I'll be fine
Just love me when you can...
And I'll wait patiently
I'll wake up every day
Just hoping that you still care.

Life is full of conflicting messages. My favorite conflict in love might be between "Some sort of relationship is better than none at all", vs."Never settle for halfway commitment; look for someone who gives you everything they have." I'm not sure which is truer. At times, when I'm feeling strong and independent, like I can do anything if I just stay determined, I feel like I need to wait for someone who'll look at me like I'm their whole world, and I feel like I shouldn't settle for someone who isn't quite right for me or someone who just can't always be there for me. At other times, I feel like I might never meet someone better than the people I've already met. I have so many people in my life who love me. They don't love me all the time, but they love me sincerely all the same. I feel like love, no matter what form its in, should be enough, and I shouldn't be picky in waiting for the "perfect" all-the-time love, because it may never come. Maybe I need to make the best of the love that I have and just appreciate the fact that I'm loved sincerely, and will be loved forever, even if the love isn't mine to have all the time. (This doesn't refer to cheating or being the mistress; it refers to loving someone whose heart you can't have all of the time, but you have their attention and their love some of the time, but you'll have that sometimes-love forever.). I don't know if I'll ever be sure. At some point I may decide that if the connection is genuine, true, and will last forever, I can settle for it, even if I don't have that person's love all the time because of their own personal issues with love and trust and all. Or maybe I'll remain an idealist for good, and keep waiting for that person who can love me forever and all of the time. I guess we'll see. The real reason I'm thinking about all of this is because of a song that I heard, and a story that I read, and I was wondering how to interpret both the story and the song.

Love is love. Is it better to be satisfied with the sincere, sometimes-love that you have, even if it's not the great, perfect all-the-time love? Or is it better to wait for the all-the-time, great, perfect love and never settle for anything less than what you deserve - 100% commitment and attention? To find someone who loves you all the time because they look at you like you're worth it, or to stick with someone who loves you when they can, loves you all the same even though they can't be with the one they truly love, or are incapable of truly making love into a real commitment? Finding love is half the battle; any form of true love is a near-fairytale, but it's not the perfect fairytale if you can't have that love all the time. Part of me says to stop looking for the ultimate fairytale and hold sacred the love that I have, while part of me tells me I'll find a more consistent, a more stable kind of love too. This might make more sense if you read the story and listen to the song.
The song itself released a couple years ago, but I never really got around to listening to it I guess. It's beautiful though. It's by Kate Voegele, who also played the role of aspiring singer-songwriter Mia Catalano on One Tree Hill. Mia is a televised representation of Kate's own reality, and the show is really the inspiration for a lot of Kate's songs. It's a beautiful, beautiful, very honest song that I love. It makes me question a lot about love and life, and I hope it makes you think too.

Is having just short of the fairytale really better than nothing, or would that mean settling for less than you deserve, because everyone deserves their perfect fairytale?
I wonder. The song leans towards finding someone who can love you always, but I say, in typical slightly cynical fashion, that maybe we ought to be more satisfied with the sincere love we have, even if it is only part-time due to personality and other issues, not due to another person. The jury's definitely still out, and if I ever figure out my personal love life or even how to be happy in life in general I'll keep y'all updated. I guess the biggest issue in humanity is that no one really knows what they want long-term outside of the materialistic box. Everyone knows what they don't want, but no one really knows what they want in terms of life or love (realistically; wanting the fairytale love life isn't an adequate answer past the generous age of 9). When I figure out what I really want -a strong independent life vs, keeping my friends in my life no matter the personal cost/pain, or a strong independent life vs. the fairytale romance, etc- I'll let you know. For now, suffice it to say that I'm confused, but still forging ahead and trying to figure it out and make the best of the opportunities that I do have (sidenote: I really need to stop sabotaging myself and seize the long-term opportunities that I have instead of focusing on instant gratification -which is another fatal human flaw, really. This is the semester I get things together academically and professionally and even personally, instead of just socially. Pinky promise.)
I'll post the link to the story after I've gotten permission from the author to do so, and you can head over to iTunes and buy the song "Forever and Almost Always" in the meantime :)