Things that have made me feel old this week

• Listening to the SXSW broadcasts on the Current, and I had heard of a few of the bands, but there were many many performers I had never heard of.
• Hearing Billy Bragg live from SXSW- I had completely forgotten how much I used to listen to Billy Bragg (I still think he's cool).
  
• I heard today that Ben Folds is on tour, and I have been listening to him all night now. I forgot how much I used to listen to Ben Folds Five. I still love all of it.
  
• I heard The Smiths "Let me Get What I Want" on the radio this week- and I can not get it out of my head! I really don't need to be humming Morrissey at playgroup... they already think I'm weird.
  
• For work, we took a group of kids to sing the national anthem at a Timberwolves game. We were escorted by an intern to the backstage area. I swear he looked like he was 12, but he said he was really 21. (yes, I asked!) Nice guy, but wow. And then, the two actual employees that we worked with could not have been much older. All went well, but it was just a little unsettling.
  
• I watched Into the Wild (hey, did I mention that Eddie Vedder did the soundtrack for this movie and he didn't get a single Oscar nod? What? I did? Well he was still robbed.)
  And I didn't really enjoy it. The guy is just such a prick. I mean, he's had his whole life handed to him on a platter (he graduated from Emory, gets a new car as a grad present, had 24k in a savings account for grad school (that he donates to charity). But he is all bitter and twisty and wears black on the outside because his parents have a bad marriage and should have divorced long ago. So he runs off and doesn't tell anyone where he is. He never writes or calls. He burns money. He wants to give it all up and not have any possessions and live in a wilderness utopia. (Easy to give it all up when you've never had to work for it.) I liked how the movie was put together, it's an interesting story, and Emile Hirsch (who is going to be Speed Racer?) gave a wonderful performance. But I couldn't get over how selfish this kid was. How he just completely disregarded the feelings of his family. How he doubted they even loved or missed him (or he wanted to punish them, I am not sure which). I know that if I had seen this movie when I was younger, or before I was a parent, I probably would have had a different opinion.
  
• I read Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. I saw another blogger review and rave about this book, even though it was young adult lit. The story is about vampires and forbidden love- how could I resist that? (the reviews over at amazon are really quite entertaining "OMG!!1! This is the best book evar! I could not put it down! I love it! 5 stars!") Anyway- it IS a good book. The plot structure is predictable, but I have to give the author points for never dumbing down her vocabulary. It is compelling and it did keep me up late wanting to read more and see what was going to happen next. But the teen angst, and the teen love, and the teen wanting to be together all the time bit gets to be a little much at times. I kept thinking, "Alright already! You want to be together, I get it, MOVE ON!" I am still going to read the next book in the series though.