we-be-jammin « WordPress.com Tag Feed

My Top 5 Frankenstorm Songs

Megan — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 21:09:26 +0000

Sandy’s brought us a hurrication, and I’m taking this opportunity to put together an unsolicited Frankenstorm playlist. You’re welcome.

#5: “Hello Hurricane” by Switchfoot

Upbeat and optimistic: the perfect feel-good hurricane song, if there ever was one.

#4: “Hurricane Drunk” by Florence + The Machine

However, if Sandy’s got you down, this song might be more your speed.

#3: “Rains It Pours” by The Dirty Heads

This is the song to listen to as you sit in your dark, power-less living room watching the storm rage outside with some leftover Octoberfest in hand.

#2: “I Will Survive” covered by Cake

I may be biased because I love me some Cake, but this is the best cover of “I Will Survive” ever. (Of course, I don’t blame you if you need to listen to the original for some good booty-shaking beats.)

#1: “Sandy” by John Travolta from Grease

Oh, Sandy.

Stay safe, everyone!

Champagne Grape Jam

Christy — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 04:53:01 +0000

This was my second time ever making preserves, uh, jam. You can read about those Muscadine Fig Preserves and make your own.

I had a very successful first attempt at sweet canning. I discussed details with a favorite farming Momma pro of mine. According to her expert awareness, I make jam. It’s not jelly, it isn’t preserves, it’s jam. Personally, I like jam.. jammin. I like jammin to my Positive Beats Pandora station while making jams.. We be jammin!

Yes, I love puns, especially food puns. They make me so happy! Lettuce all be happy!

Speaking of happy, when I was a kid I loved Welches Grape Jelly. You know, it’s not jam, it’s not preserves, it’s not jelly either.. It’s.. Sweet. Boat loads of corn sugar with some tainted grapes.. Chemicals.. Scary stuff. Click the hyperlinks

WELCH’S, JELLY CONCORD GRAPE:

INGREDIENTS: Concord Grapes (with pesticides), Corn Syrup, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Fruit Pectin, Citric Acid, sodium citrate.

Mmm, memories! Seeking a rather similar yet sophisticated twist on this very fond gustatory memory, I decided I better go grape shopping. So off to Trader Joes I went.. It’s really the best place to find low prices on un-scary-looking yet un-local produce items.

You’ll need:

3 Cups of Champagne Grapes: washed and de-stemmed

2 cups of Black Figs: washed, de-stemmed, and quartered

1 cup of raw sugar

2tbs Sure Gel powdered fruit pectin

Cook ingredients in medium saucepan on medium heat. Mash at medium effort for ten minutes. Cook for 25minutes total. Process your jars like a neurotic mother would. Makes 6 2oz jars.

Eat it on Gluten Free Oatmeal!

Lovin you and jammin on,

-Christy

BB 10 Jam World Tour Dates - Ready, Set, Code!!!

Dono — Sat, 12 May 2012 17:02:05 +0000

That’s right the dates are set and Toronto’s is June 21st!!! You better believe “We Be Jammin’”! Developer Devices will be available to those that qualify – SWEET!

Source: http://www.blackberryjamworldtour.com/

World Tour Locations

Take a look at the BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour schedule and watch for more information coming soon.

North America

June 5 – Austin, TX, USA
June – California
June – New York
June 21 – Toronto, ON, Canada

EMEA

May 29 – Milan, Italy
May 31 – Barcelona, Spain
June 12 – Paris, France
June 13 – London, UK
June 26 – Moscow, Russia
June 28 – Berlin, Germany
July 3 – Warsaw, Poland

Asia Pacific

July 4 – Delhi, India
July 6 – Beijing, China
July 9 – Singapore, Singapore
July 10 – Jakarta, Indonesia
July 12 – Sydney, Australia

Latin America

August – Buenos Aires, Argentina
August – Mexico City, Mexico

* A limited number of BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha devices are available for developers who qualify. Apply during the registration process to receive a device. If you received a BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha device at a previous BlackBerry developer event, you do not qualify for this offer.

Hot Links:

Developer Groups

BlackBerry Simulators

Developer Support Forums – Official

footnote:

Last edited by Donny on May 12, 2012 at 12:33 PM

And then we can do anything we want.

Megan — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 16:37:59 +0000

Yes, I actually took this picture. Fourth row, baby!

Last week, I sat in the fourth row of Fiona Apple’s concert at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue. My friend Kim and I are absolutely obsessed with Fiona, and seeing as she rarely tours and this particular tour only had six stops, we knew we just had to be there.

She did crowd favorites — “Paper Bag,” “Criminal,” “Fast as You Can,” ”Extraordinary Machine” — AND her cover of The Beatles’ “Across the Universe,” which I was really hoping for. She also performed some new material from her upcoming album (coming out June 19, named The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do). It’s good:

It was such an incredible experience. I discovered her music during middle school and I never thought I’d have the opportunity to hear her live. To think that a voice that I had only ever heard through recordings out of boombox or computer speakers was creating a live performance right before my eyes – needless to say, it was pretty surreal.

So yeah, she still has it: the voice, the honesty and, yes, the fans. Rolling Stone called her Chicago show “manic.” Whatev. That’s how I love my Fiona: “manic”, eccentric and however else she wants to act, cause she’s Fiona freaking Apple and she can do anything she wants. </fangirl ramblings>

Set list: Fast As You Can / On The Bound / Paper Bag / Mistake / Anything We Want / Valentine / Sleep o Dream / Extraordinary Machine / Every Single Night / Carrion / Criminal / Across the Universe

Cover up.

Megan — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 12:51:14 +0000

I love covers. I actually actively seek out quality covers, and I think I have a good collection so far (a ska/reggae cover of Radiohead’s “Creep” is among my favorites). Here are three covers I’ve discovered recently that I’m obsessed with at the moment:

Lindsay Pavao’s cover of “Say Aah” by Trey Songz

I’m making a pact (with myself) to follow and keep up with season 2 of The Voice. The blind auditions are just so entertaining (Will they press their buttons? Oh, the judge banter! Why is Cee-Lo holding a cat?). It also makes me happy that at least for the first season, judges were required to live-tweet, and that contestants were given training in social media and blogging.

I’ve only seen the first 2 episodes, but Lindsay’s performance was the standout by a long shot for me. I just hope it’s not an Andrew-Garcia-on-American-Idol situation and she didn’t peak on her first performance.

Becca Stevens Band’s cover of “You Make Me Wanna” by Usher

My friend Toni shared this on Facebook, and I was immediately hooked. I love it when artists totally deconstruct a song and put it back together in their own way. So. good.

Relient K’s cover of “Baby” by Justin Bieber

I’m not a Belieber, but I don’t hate the Biebs. I’m actually quite interested to see what’ll happen over the trajectory of his and his hair’s career. But that’s beside the point. This cover nearly outshines the original, which is saying a lot for such an iconic tween song. (Yes, I just typed that.)

Anyone have any covers you think I should hear? Send them my way!

I want THIS as my ringtone.

Megan — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 16:26:07 +0000

You may find yourself standing for the Hallelujah Chorus sometime this holiday season, so I present to you an interpretation of another part of the Messiah that’s sure to get you on your feet (or not?): Handel’s “Every Valley Shall Be Exalted” as interpreted by First Call:

The hair. The clothes. The needless walking around. I. love. it. Can this be my ringtone?

Soon it will be Christmas Day.

Megan — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 22:20:58 +0000

Now that it’s December, I feel no shame in obsessively listening to holiday music day in and day out. A new addition to my playlist? She & Him’s holiday album, appropriately titled A Very She & Him Christmas. Not only do I love it because Zooey Deschanel can (almost) do no wrong, but it’s a purchase for good: proceeds benefit 826 National to support their eight writing and tutoring centers across the U.S. Good music, good cause — it’s a win-win!

One of my favorite tracks off the album is “Silver Bells.” It’s unperfect and unproduced, and according to Rolling Stone, it was unplanned — Zooey was just jamming on her uke during a break and the tapes happened to still be rolling. Lucky us.

Download A Very She & Him Christmas off Amazon MP3 for $5.

February's Problem of the Month: Lilian's Palooza

problemofthemonth — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 01:08:48 +0000

Hold on now, Lilian is very serious about her music. She would totally get upset if you picked the wrong music for her party this Saturday. So before we let you join the party-planning committee, you need to pass a little test. It goes like this. We’re going to give you a pile of records, and you need to put them in order from lamest to coolest (in your opinion). We’ll then give the pile to Lilian, and she will thumb through them one by one. Every time a cooler album is followed by a lamer album (in her opinion), she will let out a scream. If she screams twice or more, you’re out!

Wait you don’t understand? Okay, let’s say for example that we give you four records: Abba, Björk, Counting Crows, and Dances with Wolves: The Soundtrack. Let’s abbreviate those as . Now Lilian would order those as . If you gave us , then she would scream at and scream at , and won’t be needing you. Hey look, there are exactly possibilities for her to let out screams with albums:
,

That reminds me, you’re like a math champ aren’t you? Why don’t you explain something to me while we’re getting those records?

How many possibilities are there for screams with albums?
How many are there for scream with albums?
How many are there for screams with albums?

If you think Lilian would rank any two albums equally, we’re gonna dump you right now because she’s got her preferences on everything.

Hey, when you get all those figured out, you should like, submit them to the OU Math Department for a prize or something.
Hmmmm…on the other hand, maybe lots of other math hot-shots could work that out too. They’d have to come up with a crazy-hard version to separate the top answers in that case…something like:

How many possibilities are there for screams with albums?

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