The Tiara of the Moment

With a blog titled Tiaras Optional, I would be remiss if I did not comment on Queen Elizabeth’s tiara at Tuesday night’s state dinner. Sadly, she wore one of my least favorite tiaras from her large collection. She wears it fairly often, so I’m guessing it’s one of her favorites. I was hoping for the Hannover diamond tiara (the tiara she wore at her wedding), which is a spike tiara (modeled after the Russian kokoshnik, traditional headdress). The one she wore is certainly glittery, and she had lots of other glitter, in her necklace (three strands of big diamonds) and earrings. (I can’t give the name of the tiara, as the fantastic site I used as a reference is no longer available and it’s one of the few British tiaras not mentioned in the fabulous book Tiaras: A History of Splendour, which holds a place of honor on my shelves.) Although the British royal family has probably the largest collection of tiaras of all the royal families, I much prefer the Swedish and Norwegian collections, which have some truly stunning examples.

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I need your help, readers who read. I would like some book recommendations, as I will be on a business trip later this month, and I’d like to be well stocked with reading material. On my last business trip, I got through 3 or 4 books (there was a lot of downtime), so please recommend anything you think I might like. Unfortunately, I’ve been in one of my not reading phases for the last few months, so I don’t have my normal pile of “stuff to read next.” I go through these phases every once in a while. Normally, I probably read two to five books a month (depending on time and length/difficulty of book), but since the beginning of the year, I’ve read maybe 6 books total. This is worrying me a bit. It might have something to do with the insane amount of TV shows on DVDs that I’ve been watching lately, which has cut into my reading time.

I received about 8 books for Christmas. I’ve read only one of them. I suppose I could bring some of them with me on my trip, but they’re not necessarily the kind of books I want to travel with. The kind of books I’m looking for are lightweight, engrossing, not terribly thought-provoking (do I really want to be awake all night in a hotel room pondering the implications of an airborne toxic event?), and not scary (I don’t want to be awake all night thinking a serial killer is under my bed either). So, if you have any recommendations along those lines, please let me know.

You Liked Me I Like

I don’t post much about the weird searches that directed people to my blog, since the vast majority of people who end up here were looking for info on “shrinking breasts.” That’s right, I’m number 1 on google for “shrinking breasts.” Which is actually pretty sad if you think about it, since I assume people who are googling shrinking breasts are actually looking for medical advice, which they sure as hell aren’t getting here.

Lately, though, I’ve had a few interesting searches.

Someone got here by searching for "you liked me I like." I liked you? Really? But I hardly know you.

I think someone is planning an emo wedding, because I’ve gotten two related searches: “emo wedding first dance songs” and “girl emo tiaras.”

I obsessed over the first dance for my wedding, so I have some experience here. The problem with choosing an emo song for your wedding is twofold: 1) Most emo songs are fast and thus not really appropriate for the traditional slow first dance, and 2) although many emo songs are about love, they are generally of the “my girlfriend dumped me and I totally miss her and now I just get drunk a lot” variety, making many of them not the best choice for a wedding. That said, I do have a couple of suggestions:

“Hear You Me” or “23” by Jimmy Eat World
“I’ll Catch You” by the Get Up Kids
And if you don’t mind not having a slow song, “Skips a Beat (Over You)” by the Promise Ring would work well.

Although it’s not exactly what I would call emo, “Heaven” by the Fire Theft is an awesome song, and it’s by the guys from Sunny Day Real Estate, and they totally qualify as emo.

As for girl emo tiaras, although I know way too much about tiaras, I don’t think I can help you with this one. Because you know what’s not very emo? Tiaras.

I got two people searching for the meaning of the lyrics of “Blue Skies” by Strays Don’t Sleep. Actually, maybe it was the same person phrasing their query slightly differently. I’m too lazy to try to match the search up with an IP or location. From the first verse it seems like it’s about someone thinking about their ex (“It’s been a long year since we last spoke”) and forgiving them for whatever went wrong in the relationship. The second verse hints that the ex in question is now dead (“Could I have saved you?”), perhaps from suicide (“You alone with those pills”). It’s all about forgiveness and shit. I know this because they played it on One Tree Hill during a scene where Nathan forgave Haley for leaving him to become a rock star and Lucas forgave Brooke for sleeping with Chris Keller (which was far less forgivable in my opinion, since Chris is a douchebag who refers to himself in the third person. But I digress.). Yeah, I need to get out more.

Someone asked “is it ok to send mass card to family after the funeral?” Yes, it’s absolutely fine to send a mass card after the funeral. This is what people who can’t make it to the funeral generally do. It’s what I did recently when my uncle in another country died. Please stop by Tiaras Optional for all your funeral etiquette questions.

Apparently, all my posts about mixed tapes have made me a go-to girl for mixed tape suggestions. To the person searching for “make a mix tape, songs, he broke my heart,” first of all, I’m very sorry, but remember, there are lots of other fish in the sea and all those cliches. For an awesome breakup mix, try the following songs:

Yeah, Oh Yeah by Magnetic Fields
My Friend Peter by Alkaline Trio
Your Cheatin’ Heat by Hank Williams
Rootless Tree by Damien Rice
The Mixed Tape by Jack’s Mannequin
Breaking My Heart by Aqualung
Is She Really Going Out with Him by Joe Jackson
Goodbye Forever by Alkaline Trio
Fuck and Run by Liz Phair
This Is Getting Over You by Alkaline Trio (actually pretty much anything by Alkaline Trio will work. Those guys know breakups.)

Listen to the mix nonstop for two weeks. By the end of that time, you’ll be really sick of wallowing in misery. This is a crucial first step to moving on. Good luck.