Get Cultured - Ms. Daisy style

Have you been just laaaaaanguishing wondering about how you could become more "cultured"?  I know.  I totally knew you were, and I am here to help.  You've probably just been sitting around your house, sighing, wishing someone (FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD) would just tell you the lifelong and nagging question: What is Ms. Daisy's jam?  

Now, I can only answer you for my current jam, which by current, I mean, it could change by next week, but for the last (at least) two weeks, it has pretty much been on nonstop repeat.  This is the song I drive to, run to, and dance around the house to, so you pretty much want to go right now over to your itunes or amazon account and download it and do the same thing.  You're welcome.  It's called Insomniac by Trip Lee (featuring Andy Mineo).  Listen here:  

Okay, so was I right, OR WHAT?!  Isn't that the best song, like everrr?  Now, I can not recommend the spelling and lexicon of the person who wrote up the lyrics on there, but who cares, the song is still just that awesome.  

Now, you've got the music side of your brain taken care of, but you're missing art!  I love art.  I love going to the Detroit Institute of Arts and walking around the galleries.  If I didn't have littles with me and the need to run out every two hours to feed the parking meter all of the quarters I've ever owned in my life, I could stay in there all day.  I am drawn to European art, especially Impressionism (but I do have a special place in my heart for art of the Renaissance and Baroque eras - oh, and cubism.).  Mary Cassatt, Picasso, Monet, Manet, van Gogh, Renoir - I could spend half of a day just in that section.  Outside of European art, my favorite thing in the whole DIA is Diego Rivera's gallery room of murals - top to bottom, telling crazy stories about this world with so overwhelmingly much stuff to look at, your brain and heart go crazy at the same time.  And if you are there when the sun is shining, it's like a trifecta of joy.  

There is one, however, who stands out to me strongly and has some strange emotional pull behind his work.  When I was walking up and down the galleries one day, I happened upon his work and it was like something inside the painting pulled me over to it.  It was okay to stare, which is good, because I couldn't stop doing so.  I was like a gawker in a five car wreck on the expressway.  I thought, "I should go look around at what else is here now since I am staring like a dazed weirdo..." and then I didn't.  I kept staring.  She was staring back at me, though, and I'm sure she was trying to tell me something (I don't know what it was), so I just kept staring.  I tore myself away (finally) and looked around the room, but before I left it, I had to go back over again and stare some more.  Who on earth is that artist, anyway?  I had to know.  

It was Modigliani.  If you've seen a Modigliani, you will know instantly when you see another one.  His art has strong characteristics that he repeats in all of his portraits.  The heads are elongated ovals, they are almost always a bit cocked to the side.  The necks are long, shoulders sloping.  The faces carry subtle expressions.  But they are haunting, in a lovely way, if that can ever be said.  They are simple and strange and wonderful.  (He had a unique set of eyeballs in that head of his, if you ever see a picture of his girlfriend you'll know what I mean.  She looks like she was straight out of The Munster's.)  

I am not an artist, but I pretend to be one on tv, so I painted my own painting in the style of Modigliani just for all a-ya'll.  I know, try not to ask for my autograph all at the same time.  Okay, okay, you can.  Go ahead.  I mean, maybe you've already seen my awesome drawings in previous posts?  I just got this new paint app on my tablet and I've been playing with it.  So, here is my awesome (toddleresque) rendition of my own sort of Modigliani for your viewing pleasure to round out your culture lesson for the day.  

Wow.  See.  Did I tell you or what?  Amazing?  Huh?  Huh?  Yeah, I know, thanks.  Try not to cheer aloud at your desk while you're supposed to be working, people will get suspicious.  

Until next time, my dears.  

Peace, love, and dance around the kitchen, 
Ms. Daisy  

p.s.  If you want to read up on Modigliani (here: part 1 and part 2) I wrote a post on a biography of him over on my reading club page.

A Song for Today

Hey my peeps.  I just wanted to share a song today.

David Crowder Band's "Come Awake"

Happy Sunday, lovies.

Peace, love and DCB,
Ms. Daisy

The Best Music Everrrr

So, there I was, cleaning my momentary child-free house (probs my favorite thing to do when nobody else is home since that's the only way it stays clean for more than five or six minutes).  I was listening to a fantastic radio station that plays classical music during the day and jazz at night when ALL OF A SUDDEN the sound that came to my ears made my jaw drop, my eyes widen and my entire body start flipping and dancing around with joy.

You see, I have a bit of odd taste preferences in music.  Well, okay, no.  Not odd tastes. Just probably an odd combination of favorites.  For example, all day long (most days) I listen to classical music (and jazz at night).  

Strangely enough, that is right up there on the top of the list, but then, so is Lecrae - my flavorite gospel hip-hopper.  Or Tedashii, or Flame, or Trip Lee.  Anyone of the 116 Clique (and if you don't know, you betta ask somebody!).  Lecrae and the 116ers are reserved for exercise and car driving.  Unless I'm in the mood to listen to country music, of course.  (Did you just totally barf!?  I know.  I didn't like - correction - I hated - country music until like 6 months ago.  And then one day I bought cowboy boots and decided that I bet my garden would grow better if I did so, and thus, listening to country music was born.  Even though I only know like five songs.  Whatever.)  And then, of course, there are the lovely things like the music of Sofia Jannok (the Swedish joik singer) and Gypsy Kings (from Spain) or Juan Luis Guerra (del caribe).  



Project Trio's Brooklyn CD cover.  Awesomesauce, I think OBVIOUSLY.

This is somewhat out of the way from pop, rock, classic rock, Top 40, Gangnam Style (although I must admit, I am somewhat entertained by that song) and whatever else I don't listen to.

So anyway, all this to say: I've found something so lovely, so intricately amazing and both beautifully bumpy and fancy at the same time that I couldn't believe it.  

This is the addictive music of Project Trio - a classical trio out of Brooklyn, New York.

Let me freak you out right here - the flutist beatboxes his FLUTE on Beethoven's 5th Symphony AND IT IS THE COOLEST THING I HAVE EVER HEARD. 

Check out their music! Prepare to be amazed.  Seriously.

Go quickly and buy some stock in these guys itunes because I'm about to buy the whole 9 yards. 

Peace, love and put it on repeat,

Ms. Daisy

Urban Farming, I Hate Cold and Love Sofia Jannok

You'll be so surprised to hear that I picked up a copy of a magazine that I never knew existed before called "Urban Farm".  Here's their website: Urban Farm Online

Oh to see the shock on your face, eh?

Yes.

Well, anyway, I was reading an article on chickens and the author was talking about how the egg production slows as the days get shorter (darker) and she lets them just take their rest and do their thang.  (Apparently there are other people who are so intense with their egg production that they force their chickens to keep on laying by introducing artificial light or something.  I do not know.  I do not have chickens.  Yet.)

But even though this is awesome and great, that is not the thing I loved most about this article.

This woman, I'm pretty sure, is 100% (maybe even more than that!) awesome.  Her name is Kelly Wood (from Portland, Oregon) and the name of the article is called "Egg-laying in Winter". (Urban Farm, p. 52-55)

She starts off her article describing how she loves the summer.  She loves waking up to the sunshine, it makes her feel productive and energized.  She gets in her garden and works it and often doesn't come in until the mosquitoes have bitten her up in the evening.  She says she even LOVES THE HEAT AND HUMIDITY.  Sigh!  (I was nearly jumping and screaming with joy at that sentence.)  Then she contrasts it with the disgusting cold and (okay, I may have added the "disgusting" part) the short days.  She says it makes her want to sit on the couch with a blanket and knit and read books.  

And probably just cry and wish it were summer again.

(Okay, fine.  I may have added that last bit, too.)

So I read it to my husband aloud and he remarked that she sounded just like me.  Maybe I have a twin out there somewhere.  Probs.  Except she already HAS chickens.  So jealous.

I love being warm.  When I have the somewhat rare opportunity to be in a car by myself, I turn the heat up all the way as hot as it can get and then turn the fan blasters on at the highest level to replicate a sauna (shout out to all my suomis out there!).  In fact - when I drive home from my morning post-pool workout, I often dry my hair with my car.  This is very effective when you want to look like Medusa.  So pretty, oh, so pretty!  I'm pretty sure if I do it often enough, it will eventually become a very popular style and everyone will try to emulate me and then I'll be in Vogue magazine in an interview and tell everyone my secret to great hair is to saturate it for an hour with chlorine and dry it with a car. 

It is dreadful to be cold.  And all those layers!  Ugh!  Your seatbelt has to stretch farther, you get all squooshed in your clothes and on your neck, you can't do cartwheels as easily (or other super important things!) - I could go on and on! 

Do you know in the summer when it is 100 degrees F or so, what one of the most fun and amazing things to do at 3:00 in the afternoon is?  Why, sit/lay on cement and absorb heat and sunshine, of course!  It is like your own personal outdoor sauna (If you just said "sana" in your head, you pronounced it wrong.  It's "sow-na".  It's Finnish.  Get it right or we'll come after you.  That's like saying "tortiLLa" with an "L" sound.  Ick!  Or pronouncing the "S" on the end of Illinois.  Epic failures all around.)  And that, my dears, is delicious.

Why on EARTH are you looking at me like that?  Pish posh.  Have you tried it before?  See.  There ya go.

Okay, so you're one of those people who likes that gross thing called "cold weather".  Okay, I get it.  I must admit, I do have some things I like about winter too.

One of those things is (OBVIOUSLY) snow skiing.  It is pretty much the funnest (yes, I am a word inventor) thing you can do in the snow.  Another fun activity is putting on your Yaktrax and going out for a run in the softly falling snow (even though you can't feel your legs or face for like eight days afterwards).  Probably worth it.  Frostbite what?

And then there is the landscape of winter in it's clean delight.  One video makes me appreciate this very much.  You can see it here with Sofia Jannok singing "Irene".  It's in Sami and she sings joiks (Swedish yodeling).  And it's probably the cutest thing you'll ever see on earth.  She is adorable.  She flops around in the snow and can really crank out the sound with a passionate flourish.  She is so one of my flavorites.  Oh please, go watch that. 

Did you do it?  Why not!?  You'll totally love it.  I promise I'll wait for you.  Please, oh please, oh please, oh please, oh please, pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease????

Thank you!

That's all that I can think of at the moment on the positive side of frigid death. 

Well, gotta go out to the sauna car now.  Stay warm and cozy, my dearies! 

Peace, love, chickens, summer and joiks,
Ms. Daisy