Covers

I'm very picky about listening to covers of songs. However, these are some covers that I've been listening to over and over all week.

The Scientist by Coldplay, cover found on Youtube.

Skinny Love by Bon Iver, covered by Birdy and Ed Sheeran.

I know I've talked about this song before, but I love it, so I'm going to keep talking about it.

Love,

Scout

Friday Love

Yet another reason to love OK Go.

Pretty pictures from Cubicle Refugee.

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This free downloadable calendar. It has owl stuff. Those are trendy now. You know you want it. You can even pick which pictures you want to use. Get it here.

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Pretty dried flowers.

Here via here

These hilarious pictures. Poor Ryan Gosling - what an awkward life.

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Finally, this beautiful song that's going to be part of the Hunger Games soundtrack. I'm so excited!

Love,
Scout

Oh, 80s.

I'm sure you all know by now that I really love 80s music. I'm also sure you've all heard Gary Jules' version of Mad World. However, I'm here to share the original version by Tears for Fears, because I happen to think it's pretty boss.



Love,
Scout

Artist Spotlight: Billy Bragg & Wilco

I don't know much about Billy Bragg & Wilco, nor do I know much about either artist on their own. I do know that I love their Mermaid Avenue albums. 

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A while back I came across the song Way Over Yonder In The Minor Key. I first heard this live version of Matt Costa singing it. I loved the song so I went searching for it, hoping to find it in better quality. I found that the song was originally sung by Billy Bragg & Wilco. I wasn't as excited about this version, because I was already a fan of Matt Costa, but I did like that I could hear the song clearly, and I eventually ended up buying the song because I like it so much. 

Later, when I was reading Bob Dylan's Chonicles: Volume One, I heard the story behind the two Mermaid Avenue albums, and how they were almost connected to my favorite folk singer of all time. 

Back in the day, Woody Guthrie was THE folk singer - right up there with Joe Hill. He ended up in the hospital, and Bob Dylan ended up visiting him and becoming friends with him. At one point during one of Dylan's visits, Guthrie told him that he had a bunch of songs back at his house that he'd written but never sung, and he offered them to Dylan. Dylan went over to his house later, but never ended up getting the songs because Mrs. Guthrie was not at home - it was just little Arlo Guthrie and the baby sitter who didn't know where the songs were. Bob Dylan left and never went back for the songs. 

Eventually, Woody Guthrie's daughter, Nora, put together the idea for Mermaid Avenue - two albums of songs written by her father and sung by a current artist in order to reach a new generation. 

In my opinion, it worked. Here are a few songs.

Read more about the albums here. 

Billy Bragg's website.

Wilco's website. 

Love,

Scout

Vamlumtimes is Serious Times

Check out last year's Valentine's playlist here. Boy, do I feel lame reading that post, but the music is great.

Love,
Scout

To Be Read

One of my New Year's resolutions was to read two books a month. So far, I'm off to a good start - because so far this year I've read very short books and The Hunger Games trilogy. Easy peasy.
This is the pile of the other books that I'd like to read this year. The first Hunger Games book is also on the list, but it didn't make it to the pile yet because my grandma is borrowing it from me.

The list (in no particular order):

• Walden, Henry David Thoreau 
• The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis
• Tex, S.E. Hinton
• The Three Faces of Eve, Thigpen & Cleckley 
• Gulliver's Travels, Jonathan Swift
• The Communist Manifesto, Marx & Engels
• Crime and Punishment, Dostoevsky
• Why We Can't Wait, Martin Luther King Jr. 
• The Mysterious Affair at Styles, Agatha Christie
• King Solomon's Mines, H. Rider Haggard
• Media Sexploitation, Wilson Bryan Key
• Catch 22, Joseph Heller
• Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, R.L. Stevenson (can you believe I haven't read this yet?)
• Confessions, St. Augustine, 
• The Sword in the Stone, T.H. White 
• The Ragamuffin Gospel, Brennan Manning
• Ruthless Trust, Brennan Manning
• The Hunger Games trilogy (again), Suzanne Collins
• Harry Potter 5-7 (again), J.K. Rowling 
• Shout, Philip Norman
• Jayber Crow, Wendell Berry
• Pornified, Pamela Paul
• The Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling
• Little Women, Louisa May Alcott 
• Age of Propaganda, Pratkanis & Aronson
• The Last Days According to Jesus, R.C. Sproul

I will be honest and say, some of them I have already started and just mean to finally finish. For example, I definitely started Jayber Crow last summer. It's really good - I just haven't finished it. I do that a lot, hence the resolution. 

What books are you reading? 

Love,
Scout

Snapshots

Making Valentines. It's not very fun.

 Mailing merch from my store.

Finger knitting. Also, the nail polish that's coming off and looks terrible? It's "xtreme wear". Yeah right. 

You could hear the hum of the electricity. 

(Hm. Reminds me of Hunger Games.)

I sold a picture at the coffee shop, so I'm getting this one ready to sell. 

I'm working on illustrating a children's book and I found I work better with markers - which I had to arrange so the colors flowed together. I also had to leave out three that didn't flow as well. 

"They used to call me anal girl"

Pretty shadows.

This is a drawing I did sometime earlier this year. I wanted to do a quick, simple, sketch, with at least a hint of a 60s vibe. It came out exactly like I wanted. I love doodles. 

I've been eating a vegetarian diet this week. The first two foods are apple and feta pizza and bean burgers. Read about them here! 

It snowed again. I'm so ready for warm weather - more than I've ever been in my life, but I still find snow beautiful and magical. I wish I could capture on film how slowly the snow falls. 

Love,

Scout