Ch-ch-ch-changes

Yeah, I changed the name of the blog. The name “Puff on Pop,” while cute and clever, would only work if I fully committed myself to the online alias of “Puff.” Yeah, it’s been one of my nicknames for awhile that Lexi and my friends in Chicago use, but I could never quite reconcile referring to myself as Puff, if that makes any sense.

At any rate, I shifted things around a little, renaming the blog “Sheer Puffery.” And I’m just going by Kristin now. ‘Cause, you know, that’s my name.

Other than a simple name change, everything else on this blog will stay the same! I will continue posting (or trying to post with some sort of regularity) content about pop culture and whatever else tickles my fancy, and you will continue enjoying it.

So how’s that sound? Good? Good! Glad we got this all sorted out.

And the walls came TUMBLING down

It’s clear from the sodia media outlets that I already have and neglect (i.e. my livejournal and this blog) that I don’t really need to add any more. However, don’t think that stopped me from creating an account on Tumblr!

To be fair, I’d created my account several months ago, but wasn’t really sure what to do with it … Or really what the hell Tumblr was. I mean, is it another blogging site? After exploring, perusing, stalking, and seeing how the site work and its users interact, I’ve discovered that it’s not just another blogging platform to further compete with WordPress, Blogger, Livejournal, TypePad, and so on and so forth. To me, it feels like a middle ground between Twitter and full on blogging — posts are still expected to be short and succinct, but there’s no word limit. And there are templates for sharing videos, pictures, quotes, excerpts from chats, music … Not gonna lie, it’s kind of fascinating. Plus, there’s a really cool reblogging feature — if you see a picture or a quote on someone else’s Tumblr, then you just click the “reblog” button and BAM, it’s posted to yours, with credit given to the original poster. It’s GENIUS!

At any rate, the point of this is that I’m posting stuff to my Tumblr with some regularity. It’s become kind of a brain dump, which is nice. No worries, I’m not giving this blog up! I realize I’ve been neglecting it, and keep saying I’m going to post more soon and then promising that THIS TIME I REALLY WILL OKAY BELIEVE ME, but .. Yeah. I’ll get back on the horse.

So without further ado, here’s the link:

She’s Waiting

(That’s the title of the thing … It’s named after one of my favorite Eric Clapton songs. IT FELT RIGHT!)

So there you go! I’ll see y’all soon. :)

On John Mayer

I’ve been traveling a lot over the past couple of months, and, as a result, my bedroom has frequently been a complete disaster. I’ve never been the neatest person ever, no matter how hard my mom tried to get me to make my bed every day and not throw clothes on the floor. Lately, though, it’s been a little worse than usual. The other night, fueled by the need to change my sheets/duvet, I decided to pick things up a little bit. In need of some sort of background noise for this mundane, groan-worthy task, I opted for iTunes as opposed to my TV. Out of nowhere, I suddenly knew exactly what I wanted to listen to at that very moment — John Mayer’s Room for Squares (2001), an album I hadn’t listened to from beginning to end in years.

Music has a funny way of taking me back to a time where I listened to a particular artist, song, or album heavily. I get the funny (good) feeling in my stomach, and my brain is in another season and another year and I’m filled with memories, faces, sights, and smells that I’d pushed to the back of my mind to make room for new ones. Room for Squares jogs some very vivid memories — it was one of the only albums I listened to in the summer of 2003, right after I’d graduted from high school.

These days, though, John is just one of those people I can’t quite make a decision on. When I first discovered him, my crush on him was almost all-consuming. What’s not to love about a shaggy-haired boy who writes beautiful songs and plays the hell out of the guitar, right? However, my illusion of who that shaggy-haired boy should have been and the real John Mayer couldn’t be more different. The more I read about him, the more he was in the press, the more Hollywood starlets he dated and dumped, well … My crush on him faded very quickly. He’s one of those people that doesn’t seem to have a filter with what he says, and, therefore, tends to come off as an arrogant prick most of the time. That is definitely not the boy I fell in love with. I’ve always been hesitant to completely write him off as an asshat purely because of his music, namely the aforementioned magic I felt with Room for Squares.

Listening to it again from “No Such Thing” to “St. Patricks Day,” I felt like I got something different about it this time. I’m 24 years old now, the same age he was when the album came out in 2001, and suddenly his lyrics make more sense than they ever did before.

Take “No Such Thing,” for example. This song was all over the radio, and I can’t even begin to think of how many times I’ve listened to it in my life. And yet this verse rings truer to me now than it ever did before:

“Welcome to the real world,” she said to me condescendingly. “Take a seat, take your life, plot it out in black and white.” Well, I never lived the dreams of the prom kings and the drama queens. I’d like to think the best of me is still hiding up my sleeve.

And then there’s “Why Georgia,” which I’m pretty sure is still my favorite song. I don’t know if I’ve ever found a song that captures the “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing with my life” feeling more poignantly than this one.

I rent a room and I fill the spaces with wood in places to make it feel like home. But all I feel’s alone. It might be a quarter life crisis or just a stirring in my soul. Either way, I wonder sometime about the outcome of a still verdictless life. Am I living it right?

It’s one of those things that you can appreciate when you’re younger, but you’ll never fully understand it until you’re there: 24, out of school, in a job that you still aren’t so sure about, up to your eyebrows in debt, still full of all these dreams that you aren’t quite sure how to make happen. I get it, I finally get it. It’s scary as hell, but it’s good to know you’re not alone, right? Even a successful musician felt like this once upon a time.

As far as the man himself (I can’t call him the shaggy-haired boy anymore), I think I’m coming around. Since following him on Twitter, I find that I actually like what he has to say in 140 characters or less. Everybody changes, right? Here’s hoping his douchebaggery is done with and that I don’t have to try so hard to seperate the real JM from the fantasy one who writes this beautiful music.

Top 15 Dance Movies of All Time: #10-#6

Aaaand I’m back for part two out of three of my countdown! We’re right in the middle, so I’m not going to waste anytime. But here’s a preview of what I’ve got for you after the jump:

This Week in TV: Frenemies, bitch!

Another week, another recurring theme! And the theme still seems to be bitchy girls … What can I say, crazy people are fun (and slightly scary) to watch! So lets move on with this. Here are my favorite moments in TV this week:

The Hills — 5.1 “Don’t Cry on Your Birthday”; 5.2 “Everything Happens for a Reason”

Ugh, yes I still watch this show. And I still complain about it. And yet I still cannot make myself stop watching!! Honestly, everyone I know that watches this show has absolutely no idea why they do. You’ve got us all under your spell, MTV! You damn evil geniuses!

The beginning of the fifth season started with some pretty intense fake drama, though. The saaaaaaame tired story line that’s been played out season after season reared its ugly head again: Lauren vs. Heidi. Except now it’s gotten pitiful, in that Heidi realllly wants to be friends with Lauren, and Lauren is hesitant. They both miss each other and have told each other repeatedly, and yet Heidi still won’t do the smart thing and fucking leave Spencer already and Lauren won’t let go of her grudge because then she wouldn’t have anything to hold over Heidi’s head anymore.

The moment I liked, though, came at the end of the first episode: Heidi’s been freaking out because Spencer just got in a bar fight, and they’re both drunk and emotional. They both end up drunkenly slurring to one another about how much their miss their friendship, and the scene gets an intense climax with both of them hugging and sobbing to one another. Honestly, if my heart weren’t so black, I might have actually teared up, myself. I suspended my disbelief for long enough while watching to buy that it was genuine, and I was touched. I’ll admit, this godforsaken show touched me.

But don’t worry, Lauren effing Conrad managed to ruin it all at the beginning of the second episode. She starts talking shit about Heidi once more and then has the audacity to complain about the swanky surprise birthday party her friends threw her on a private yacht. Way to be an ungrateful asshole, L.C.! Good job!

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Pretty Wicked — 1.1 “Mirror Mirror Not on the Wall”; 1.2 “Sell Your Soul”

Oxygen’s been ramming this show down its viewers throats, and, I have to say, I was definitely intrigued when I saw the promo the first time. Since Bad Girls Club just ended (GOD DAMN I CAN’T WAIT FOR THE NEXT SEASON OF THAT SHIT SHOW), I needed some more crazy bitch-fighting to take its place in my weekly TV rotation, and this seemed like it would fit the bill. So far, it has.

Apparently the producers lured ten(ish?) mean, bitchy girls to be on this show under the pretenses that it was some sort of “OMG who’s the prettiest princess” reality competition. The competition part is right, but the rest of it was all a sham. See, the show is really about getting these contestants to stop being evil hags and turning them into good people who can actually give back to society. It’s very similar to the show Queen Bees that aired on The N, though I have to say that I liked Queen Bees a little bit more. But that comparison could turn into a whole different post, so I’ll leave it at that.

The girls are just as crazy as I hoped they would be, but it doesn’t get any crazier than Ana. Honestly, I’m fairly positive homegirl is a complete and utter psychotic sociopath. In the first episode, she managed to start a fight about which bed she got, try to coordinate and control an entire party,  and blames everything on her tiny yappy dog. She yells to the other girls, “I DON’T CARE! NOBODY TREATS MY DOG THAT WAY!”

Super crazy … but also super hilarious. I’m excited to see what else this show has to deliver!

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America’s Next Top Model — 12.6 “Acting Like a Model”

Let me get straight to the weird shit in this episode: Clay Aiken is in it. No, you’re not hallucinating. I did actually just say that. Clay Aiken is in this episode to the the contestants about acting. I mean, it makes sense, seeing as though he was(/is?) in Spamalot on Broadway, but still … CLAY AIKEN?!

What’s even weirder is that Paulina Porizkova introduces him as a “close, personal friend” of Tyra’s. I’m sorry, but I really have a hard time believing that Clay Aiken and Tyra Banks are besties. I can’t see it! I mean, I suppose one could argue that Tyra is one of those people who just assumes everyone she meets is a “close, personal friend.” Those people exist! One of my friends I grew up with is like that, and it always drove me nuts. She could have met someone once and then five minutes later, “Oh, I love her, she’s my best friend ever!” No, honey, she’s not. You don’t know her like that, and vice-versa. Get with the program! Get your head in the game!

At any rate, I’m getting off track. Tyra and Clay are supposedly BFFs, so take that as you will. The part I both loved and hated about this episode was London winning the challenge. Along with Aminat and Fo, London’s one of my favorite girls, and I was happy that she won the acting challenge. Her prize was $5,000 worth of Joe’s Jeans, which apparently are sweet ass designer jeans. I have this thing where I don’t buy expensive clothes, so I really wouldn’t know. What broke my heart a little thought is that London admitted to struggling with her weight, and assumed she wouldn’t fit into any of the free jeans she got. So instead she gave them away to her roommates. Oh, London! While that was a sweet thing to do, I just knew the fact that the editors included that detail in there meant that London’s weight is going to be an issue in episodes to come. And I do not want to see her go through that and for it to be her ultimate demise. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for her!