All Roads Lead Back to Neil

I've been on a bit of a walkabout for the past week, what with the guest posting - first at ScaryMommy and then at WorkingMomsBreak. One of the most exciting rewards of a guest post stint is having new readers stop on by Normalarkey, and finding out from their comments what they're all about. Humor? Parenting? Dogs? Mexican beer stands?

Turns out, the topic category most remarked upon by my new readers this week: Neil Finn.

I am convinced that if you take any sentient human female between the ages of 25 and 50 and shake her upside down by the ankles, a little Neil Finn love will tinkle out. I think it might also be the same case if the sentient human is male, too.

As my little tag cloud will show you, this blog, in particular before it got all gussied up and Normalarkey-ed, gave quite a bit of press time to the Antipodean crooner who used to sing with Crowded House and before that, Split Enz. Not so much lately, for no real reason than that other songs and bands captured the gestalt of what I was writing about on Fridays a bit more accurately.

But friends, if you love some Neil, far be it from me to deny you. Apropos of my virtual wandering this past week, here he is singing the Split Enz song "Take a Walk" with Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam at the 2001 "7 Worlds Collide" show in Auckland. I could have cared less about Pearl Jam before I saw this performance, but once I heard Vedder laying down the Finn gospel too I started cutting him some slack, and now I quite like his music. 

See? Neil is all about bringing people together, and so is blogging. Here's to you, readers - have a great weekend.

I'm a bona fide Scary Mommy

One of my most vivid childhood memories was being awoken in the early hours one morning by my dad, who was rummaging around under my pillow for the tooth I'd placed there the night before and leaving two shiny quarters in its place. When I arrived at the breakfast table, indignant, I said, "DAD! I know you are the Tooth Fairy! You woke me up!"

To which he answered, "Me? I was just making change."

Lies, lies, lies, yeah - it's not just a song by the Thompson Twins but a bona fide parenting technique (used judiciously, of course) for keeping a kid happy. So imagine how thrilled I was when Jill at ScaryMommy.com - motto: "An honest take on motherhood" -  invited me to guest post on her site today, about the four lies I tell my kids to keep the peace. 

Just to give you some context: ScaryMommy.com is the site where I go when I want to dream big about being a blogger with a capital B. She has serious cred, in part because she's a great writer, in part because she bends over backwards to build community with her readers, and in part because she may have the best blog name out there. It's an honor and thrill to be part of the ScaryMommySociety today so I hope you'll click through here and take a look! (Except for you, my two darling daughters. If you figure out what the four lies are, I'm sunk.)  

No Phone Zone for the Old Crone

Is there anything worse than listening to a 13 year old girl make plans with a friend over the phone? "So, I'll walk to your house after I babysit. What? What time is your soccer practice over? What? Jennifer, I talked about this with you already! Oh my god. So what if I come over…what? (long silence.) Ok, so if come over after I babysit then I will just wait for you. I can do my homework on your computer…what? Your mom and dad won't care! What time is soccer practice over?"

Yes, there is something worse. Having that conversation unfurl while you are driving that child home in your carpool, fuming over whether she thinks you are a taxi driver or WHAT. Just give me the root canal without anesthesia, why don't you?

My oldest daughter is in middle school. As soon as the kids spew onto the lawn each day to wait for pickup, the phones that have been set to the off position since 8:15 and tucked into a pocket are flipped open, up, and on. Never mind that they've just been given a rare interval between school and homework to connect with friends who are standing within arm's reach. They're all peering into tiny screens too. I sit in the idling car watching them and resisting the urge to shout, "You're 12! You're just not that important!"

My husband and I have a few families in the neighborhood with whom we confer on things like how old you have to be for pierced ears, makeup, and unaccompanied walks to the overpriced yogurt store. Our kids spend a lot of time together and we like to freak them out by presenting a united front. The rule of thumb for cell phones has always been, "When I don't know exactly where you are, 24 hours a day, you can have a phone. We're not there yet."

But by the end of sixth grade our daughter was starting to do some babysitting, and also wanted to walk to her friend's houses to visit them instead of asking us to drive her - give her credit for knowing which buttons to push. I also began to realize that texting is to today's middle schoolers as epic three hour phone calls were to my friends and I back in the Twelve Corners Elementary School days: just behind breathing, food, and water on the Maslow needs hierarchy. My parents surely wondered why Mary Beth Fitz and I couldn't just cross the sixty feet between our houses to talk in person, instead of rehashing our day on the banana yellow wall phone.

So we finally took the leap (as did the other families in the cabal, within a few weeks of one another.)  We bought her a new phone at the end of June, saddled it with lots of rules regarding phone etiquette and usage limits, and stood back with trepidation to watch what happened.

Three months later, I would estimate that the amount of time the little blue phone spends uncharged or left behind on the kitchen table is about 80%. To paraphrase the book title, She's Just Not That Into Her Phone. I don't know why, and I don't plan to ask. So a rule for "no making calls in the car when someone is kindly giving you a ride somewhere" was unnecessary until the autumn carpool season kicked off.

Of course it's not just a matter of politeness; today's backseat yakkers will be tomorrow's drivers, trying to update their Facebook profiles as they swerve into ditches. According to Distraction.Gov, the official US Government web site for distracted driving:

• In 2008, almost 20 percent of all crashes in the year involved some type of distraction. (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration - NHTSA).
• Nearly 6,000 people died in 2008 in crashes involving a distracted driver, and more than half a million were injured. (NHTSA) 
• The younger, inexperienced drivers under 20 years old have the highest proportion of distraction-related fatal crashes.
• Drivers who use hand-held devices are four times as likely to get into crashes serious enough to injure themselves. (Source: Insurance Institute for Highway Safety)
• Using a cell phone use while driving, whether it’s hand-held or hands-free, delays a driver's reactions as much as having a blood alcohol concentration at the legal limit of .08 percent. (Source: University of Utah)

One of my friends said, "I just put on my biggest fakey smile and said, 'Hey kids, there's a new rule in my car this year! No phones!'  As if that is a big treat for them." She added, "My daughter's eye rolling was actually audible." Now, this friend has a leg to stand on; she will not talk on her own phone while driving because she never figured out how to hook it up the car's hands-free microphone, and her kids know it. She is modeling polite and safe phone use in the car, which is to say, not using it at all.

I, on the other hand, am on much shakier ground.

As a freelance writer juggling clients, deadlines, the driving needs of two children in two different schools, and a whole passel of family living three time zones away, I often find myself needing to return calls and drive places simultaneously.

I know I shouldn't talk on the phone when I drive, hands-free device or not, so I fight the urge to dial or try to pull off before answering my snappy Neil Finn ring tone.  But I succumb now and then. For what it's worth (not much,) any luck I've had in not hurting anyone or getting arrested by the cops for talking and driving has been more than subsumed by my own self-loathing as I place a call.

So how can I get uppity and tell the kids the car is a Oprah-sanctioned "no phone zone" when I don't abide by it myself? The answer is, I can't.

Would you parents out there agree with me that the hardest part of raising kids is raising your own standards of behavior?  I've already learned this lesson as it pertains to making my bed in the morning, sending thank you notes promptly, and not consuming a 100% starch diet. If I can't stick to house rules, teaching them to our two daughters is made infinitely more difficult.

So come Monday I'll be plastering on that hammy smile as I inform my passengers that from here on out, the only talking allowed in the car is to the other occupants thereof.

Which is all just a long way of saying, if you're waiting for a call for me about what time I'm coming over after babysitting but before soccer practice, you're going to have to wait. I'm just not that important and besides, the kids won't let me use the phone in the car.

Friday's Music Moment - Saturday Sun by Crowded House

Over the years I may have blogged a time or two about Neil Finn and Crowded House. But I was AWOL here on the blog during 2010's biggest Crowded House news - the release of their new album Intriguer, and a spate of Northern California concerts (which I missed because of Family Camp, but I'm sure they managed without me.)

So playing a bit of catch up here with a post of "Saturday Sun" for today's music moment.  Love the song, and the video's definitely different.  The bad news about the video is that it actually makes the already awful porn 'stache sported by Neil throughout this recent tour look like a Hitler mustache. The good news is that he's now clean shaven, so future videos from this album should be more palatable for Finn fans like me.

As for the album itself, it won't punch you between the eyes with the over-the-top pop genius of, say, Together Alone or Woodface. But no one can contest the sheer musical talent of this band, and Intriguer has its own quiet appeal. I find myself playing it more and more frequently as the lyrics to songs like  "Either Side of the World" and "Archer's Arrow" sink in. If  you're looking for the old "jump up on the stage and sing" style beloved by Frenz everywhere love, "Twice if You're Lucky" fits the bill.

And I hope you have a sunny Saturday!

Mimes in the Mist

I took a break from holiday baking on Saturday to sneak out and see New Moon. I haven't read any of the books, and only watched half of the first movie, without sound and through the gap between airline seats, as we flew to New Zealand last spring. (What? There were 80 channels and one of them had a Neil Finn retrospective, as if I'm going to choose vampires over THAT.)

But the Stephanie Meyer books and related movies have entered the American pop culture landscape with such a whooooosh that I felt like I should at least see one of them, just to know what everyone is talking about.

Have you ever seen Mystery Science Theater 3000? It's an old TV program where they play old sci-fi movies and three characters sit in the front of the theater, cracking wise over the actual dialog, and from 1988-1999 it was one of the funniest things on TV. Well if you were in the Orinda Theater last Saturday afternoon (and you weren't, because I took a headcount) my friend Andrea and I played our own version during the angst-y, dopey, dorky movie that is New Moon.

Where do I even start? The fact that the vampires are so ghastly pale they look like Marcel Marceau - or, as Andrea reminded me, like HER the time she tried the wrong color foundation at a Mary Kay home party and immediately began moonwalking? The fact that Bella Swan, the extremely average girl in the dank and moldy Washington town over whom werewolves and vampires are ready to slash each other to pieces, looks like most "before" pictures in fashion magazines? The fact that all around her, ripped men are taking their shirts off, and she can't even get anyone to touch her boob until she crashes her motorcycle? THE SIZE OF THE MUFFIN TRAY THAT THE HEAD WEREWOLVES' GIRLFRIEND CARRIES OUT?

I mean, seriously, we could not stop laughing, and the one guy who was in the theater with us - how do I say this in a P.C. way, he really looked as though he'd mistaken New Moon for a Boyz In the Hood remake - was busting on it as much as we were.

Just read Mick LaSalle's brilliant review of the film in the Chron.(oops, I see he went with the French mime reference too, well, it's an obvious one.) He was right, every word of it. I cannot wait until Number Three comes out, it's a super way to brush up on my comedy improv skills.

Friday's Music Moment - Pineapple Head

It's been awhile since I've posted some Neil Finn...here's a live clip from a Crowded House show on the 2007 tour. The Kinks riff is just a bonus - typical live improv from these guys. The song comes from my all time favorite CH album, Together Alone - makes a great Xmas gift for your favorite music fan.

It's my favorite album for now anyway...CH has a new album coming out next spring, and this week I dutifully mailed off my payment for the special fan club version, signed and with a bonus DVR. Slight disillusionment aside, this music always resonates.

Happy holidaze...

The 80s - A Great Era for Australians on Horseback

According to my Kiwi Diary, it was on November 4 1930 that Phar Lap won the Melbourne Cup. (Yes, that's more Australian than Kiwi news, but Phar Lap was foaled in NZ so stick with me.) Reading it, I was immediately taken back to the early 80s, when my penchant for new wave music was matched only by my devotion to movies featuring Australians on horseback.

If you were a straight girl during the first half of that fashion challenged decade, you know what I'm talking about. First there was the 1981 film Gallipoli, featuring sweaty, tanned men with fleeet eeksents running around the Turkish coast, getting tragically picked off by fez-wearing riflemen. Only a smattering of horses in that one, but for a girl just emerging from the horse-love phase into the boy-love phase, it was a smattering that eased the transition.

A year later came "The Man From Snowy River," which had to be Kirk Douglas' most over-acted movie ever. No matter - the real action was Tom Burlinson, riding stallions vertically up and down cliffs and pining for Sigrid Thorton, who had the collagen-plumped lip look before that had even been invented. Aussies and stallions and romance - is it any wonder that Split Enz, with their Australian/Kiwi provenance, took a hold of me during those years?

By the time the movie Phar Lap came out in 1983, also starring Burlinson, the story had moved mostly to the horse, but its "David vs. Goliath" theme had eternal appeal.

I came out of that decade, and high school, fairly certain that I would marry an Australian man (or at the very least a Brit,) end up in Sydney, and have my own horse.

Close. I married a Chinese guy who once drove me in a campervan to a horse stud farm in New Zealand. So, almost.

Friday's Music Moment - The Sun Came Out

Next Tuesday Sept 29th is the long-awaited (by me) release date of The Sun Came Out, the Neil Finn-helmed project that is a fundraiser for Oxfam. A bit different from his first "supergroup" effort, Seven Worlds Collide, in that this album features all new material, we had a chance to hear the feminine side of of it at the Largo shows in LA last month.

But lest you think it's just Neil and the ladies on The Sun Came Out, rest assured he has some pretty heavy-hitting guys on the album too, like Ed O'Brien of Radiohead and Johnny Marr of the Smiths. This song, Learn to Crawl, was written by O'Brien and features the harmonies of Neil and his son Liam - proving that the Finn harmonic convergence has been passed down through the generations.

Happy Friday and Happy Pre-orders!

Friday's Music Moment - Bic Runga

One of the multi-talented musicians who sat in with Neil Finn last week at the Largo was the ethereal Bic Runga from New Zealand. (She's hapa - half Chinese Malaysian, half Maori, or - as the man in line behind me at the show told everyone so confidently yet inappropriately - "Oriental Australian.") One of the best songs of the night Sunday was when she and KT Tunstall played a new song called "Black Silk Ribbon" - as KT put it, "it's a murder ballad because Bic said [in a squeaky little voice] 'Shall we kill him off?'"

That song won't release until September on the Oxfam album, so in the meantime enjoy "Sway" from her 2007 album Drive. I have to laugh at the video a little, though - seriously, would a convenience store clerk really stand a chance at NOT falling in love with Bic?

Friday's Music Moment: Aoteoroa

We were in Te Awamutu last week, to visit the town museum in which there is a permanent Split Enz exhibit called True Colours. A bit of a pilgrimage, really, and when we walked in this video, "Six Months in a Leaky Boat" was playing on the video screen. It's one of Split Enz's best known hits especially outside the Antipodes, and a catchy song...just ask my friend who played it for her sons while we were gone and now has two sub-11 year old Split Enz fans in her house.



It's certainly not a new song, but now that I've been to NZ I see it through new eyes. To wit: the boat motif is pretty obvious in a country where the furthest you can ever be from the ocean at any time is something like 180 km. Auckland (the Finns' home base) has the highest per capita boat ownership rate in the world. And I love seeing the Maori dancers and their moko (facial tattoos.) We saw a lot of Maori people in NZ with partial or full moko, and picked up the latest issue of MiNDFOOD magazine with a big photoarticle on the subject.

And, OH! Aoteora! THAT's what they're saying at the 2:30 mark, the Maori word for NZ that means "land of the long white clouds." It was the wife of the first Polynesian explorer to NZ, Kupe, who coined the term - thanks Wally theMaori bus driver in Paihia for the explanation.

Finally, and I'm just keeping it real here, there's the suggestion in this video of Neil's monobrow. According to some of the archival footage at the museum, that was fully present back in his Te Awamutu days. Then again, if anyone hauled out photos of any of us at 17 and put them in a museum, we'd be in for a world of embarrassment.

Friday's Music Moment - All Blacks Edition

We're going to New Zealand. Can't believe it; this is the trip I've wanted to make for about 30 years and the whole thing is coming together in about 7 days. I couldn't be more excited.

In a nod to all things Kiwi, I bring you the anthem "Can You Hear Us?" by Neil Finn, written for the country's famous All Blacks Rugby team. See if you can spot another Kiwi icon, Lucy Lawless...and send me some good organizing thoughts!

Knowing Pains on View from the Bay

Yesterday Molly Rosen, editor of Knowing Pains, and two fellow contributors, Esther Gulli and Liz Becker, appeared on local talk show View from the Bay to talk about the anthology. Esther was kind enough to call out my essay on my lifelong passion for Neil Finn's music as one of her favorites, which has earned her a big drink on my account. Here's a link to the clip if you're interested!

Friday's Music Moment - Give Me Something I Can Write About

Leaving today for three days in the dripping wet redwoods for a writing conference at St. Dorothy's Rest, the oldest continuously operating summer camp in - California? The U.S.? I can't remember, but it's been around a long time. The conference is fairly free-form from what I can tell, lots of time to write and hike and read. I am packing up the laptop, hiking boots, and some books for inspiration: Last of the Mohicans, Loving Frank, and The Women by T.C. Doyle. As Elizabeth Gilbert suggested in her TED conference, I will then wait for Dobby to spring out of the cabin walls and rub some of his genius juice on the Helen Pitts project.

Or as Neil says:
"I wait with a blank piece of paper
On the top of my head
And all I want is something I can write about
All I want is something I can cry about."

That about sums it up. BTW for you purists - the 5th (and temporary) Crowdie in this video is Davey Lane, an Australian musician who lead guitarist of You Am I (since 1999), and frontman of The Pictures.

Friday's Music Moment - Valentine's Edition

Today's song has to be romantic, so I'm posting what I considered the most romantic Split Enz song ever - Message to My Girl. (This version comes from a reunion tour circa '99/2000 in NZ.) I just loved the vulnerability in this song when I first heard it. Then I turned it into a lullaby for my daughters when they were infants which was probably weirdly inappropriate (I don't want to say I love you, that would give away to much?) but the title worked.

This a.m. I was walking and listening to my iPod. I'd been reading recently about AutoTune, an automatic pitch corrector that is taking the recording world by storm but makes the singer's voice sound a little robotic and way too perfect. Seemed like every fast pop/dance song that came up on my shuffle (I'm trying to keep my heart rate up, after all) has Auto-tuned the interest right out of it.

So enjoy this video along with Neil's imperfect, perfect voice.

Friday's Music Moment - Vampire Weekend gets architectural

Here's a song for you. I love this little tune. Something about how it starts off with such a simple opening and then builds and builds...the fact that there is something of General Public, Duran Duran, and Split Enz "Six Months in a Leaky Boat" to the song surely contributes to my affinity for it. Also, there is simply not enough music about architectural details.

Herewith, Mansard Roof by hipster doofus band Vampire Weekend.

My feet will be on national TV

On Friday, Jan 23, Knowing Pains will be featured on the Today Show. This anthology, to which I contributed an essay about the rejuvenating effects of rock fan-dom, is a grassroots fundraiser for breast cancer research and access to care. All of the contributors waived their royalties and everything else from photography to illustrations and PR has been donated by people eager to support the cause. (Besides my essay, I contributed my feet to the photo on the cover of the book.)100% of the books' profits go Breast Cancer Action.

So it's pretty exciting to think that after Friday the demand for KP will jump (no, not to Oprah-like dimensions, but still) and all that $$ will flow in BCAction's coffers. I have no idea what time the segment is on - editor Molly Rosen will appear along with two NYC-based contributors, Amy Smith and Cari Shane Parven.

Back here in the Bay Area, I'm scheduled for two readings in the next few weeks: Thurs. Jan 29th at a private event in Oakland and Thurs. Feb 12 at Books Inc. in Laurel Village. Hope to see some Finn fans and 40-somethings and breast cancer haters there!

Friday's Music Moment - 7 Worlds, round 2

I'm sure I don't need to tell YOU what went on in Auckland, NZ on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of this week...surely you were watching the calendar and sighing in envy just like me.

No?

Ok, I'll tell you. Neil Finn reassembled the crew (and a few new names) from his 2001 7 Worlds Collide project this week, this time in support for Oxfam International. They played three shows at the Powerstation in Auckland in front of small audiences; the shows were all taped and I presume we'll see the concert DvD and CD within the next six months.

Among the old players were Johnny Marr (from the Smiths) and Sebastian Steinberg; this time Neil's very hirsute sons Liam and Elroy were there along with Wilco and Don McGlashan, who we saw last summer at the Fillmore. Each featured artist did a couple of their own songs with Neil and Co. sitting in, and this one - of "There is a Light" by the Smiths - rocks the bells. Hope you'll agree. That's Marr in the striped shirt, McGlashan playing the tuba-like instrument, Neil to the left (guess the film maker is more of a Smiths fan) and anyone with a beard is Neil's son. Enjoy!

Friday's Music Moment - Is there a prescription for all this stress?

Market's crashing, venom is being spewed on the campaign trail, and it's hard to find a light at the end of the tunnel right now...

but then again the kids are out of school, the sun is shining, the dog is walked and it's a Friday. So here's today's music inspiration - Neil Finn singing "Rest of the Day Off" from his 2001 solo album, One Nil. And that's what I'm taking.

Knowing Pains Update

The anthology "Knowing Pains: Women on Love, Sex and Work in our 40s" hasn't even officially launched yet, but it's making quite an impact. This book, in which essayists (like me) ponder the nuances of midlife, is a fundraiser for Breast Cancer Action (BCA.org) - 100% of net profits are going to the organization, which funds breast cancer research and access to care. And the margins are big for a book, simply because everyone involved donated their time and talents, from the contributors to the photographer to the graphic designers.

The brains behind the operation, Molly Rosen, decided from the get-go that self-publishing and word of mouth advertising would be the best way to make sure that the funds go to BCA. She was wise enough to involve a group of "connector" women, the ones who seem to know everyone in the community (virtual or IRL.) You know the model - I'll tell two friends, and they'll tell two friends, and they'll tell two friends...I've done my part via Facebook, LinkedIn, my giving circle, a couple of retail outlets near me like Who's Your Betty, and the ones whose opinions I'm REALLY interested in: the Neil Finn fan community, aka Frenz. I still have to hit up college and grad school networks. Normally I'd feel a bit queasy about the self-promotion but since it's for cancer research I'm a bit bolder.

The result? Since early September, without a penny spent on advertising, Molly estimates that we've gotten in front of at least 30,000 people, and perhaps twice that. Our ranking in Amazon reflects it - Knowing Pains is now the #2 book in the Breast Cancer category, and #3,755 overall in books - up from #145,000 or something like that just a week ago. Our goal is to donate $50,000 to BCA and it looks like we're on our way. This weekend is the big launch celebration at the Scharffen Berger Chocolate Factory in Berkeley, because really, how can you negotiate this decade without chocolate?

Now I'm looking forward to the next stage of promotion: readings. Next week, along with other contributors, I'll be reading at Great Good Place for Books in Montclair, where I'm normally sitting in the audience for author events, and we have events scheduled in Oct and Nov as well. Check out the Events section at www.knowingpains.com for more details - and please, let your two friends know about this worthy cause, and ask them to pass it on!

Knowing Pains Anthology has launched

I have an essay called "Fanning the Flames" in a new anthology called Knowing Pains: Women on Love, Sex and Work in our 40s. Here's the jacket blurb:

Have you ever wondered how other women survived their 40s? You'll get an earful in Knowing Pains, an honest, humorous, thoughtful and diverse collection of essays by real women who aren't afraid to tell their age and tell it like it is. Sex, marriage, love, divorce, motherhood, singlehood, passion, obsession. Nothing is off-limits to this startlingly fresh group of new female voices that Molly Rosen has brought together to swap stories and compare notes on the desires, influences and events that have impacted and shaped their midlives. Collectively, they form a true picture of how real women not only survive their 40s, but thrive with dignity, courage and laughter.

The book was a labor of love fueled almost entirely by volunteer efforts, from the essays, illustrations by Jill McCleary and right down to the cover photograph. And 100% of net proceeds from the book will go to Breast Cancer Action (www.bcaction.org) to fund research and access to care. The book is available now through Amazon and should be in local bookstores soon as well.

My essay probably falls into the obsession category, though I sort of hope not. It's about how my 26+ years as a fan of musician Neil Finn has always connected me to the thoughts and passions of my younger self, no matter how old the outer shell has grown, and how helpful that sort of obsession (be it for musicians, road bikes, travel, books...) can be. I'll have a chance to read in person at the following venues over the next few months - hope to see some of you there!

• Friday, Sept. 26 at Great Good Place for Books, Oakland 7 pm
• Tuesday, Oct. 14 at Simayof Mansion, San Francisco (AICI Chapter event - entry fee)
• Thursday, Nov. 13 at the Lafayette Library 7:30 pm