Kay Hanley

Last week was a bit bumpy in terms of launching the new website, but I consider the temporary glitchiness well worth it. Tea Brennan did a bangup job with the design and I think that we will all be very happy in our new home.

For those of you who only know me as a bedazzled Hannah Montana employee, you may be wondering who the heck I think I am, having a show-offy website to celebrate my own worthless crap. Normally I wouldn’t argue with you for wondering that, but I actually have some top-notch worthless crap that I’m gonna be laying on you in the next few months: my highly somewhat anticipated full length album, Weaponize! I may also have a teeshirt or a bumper sticker with my name emblazoned on them that you’ll be able to buy. Up until now, I have had to emblazon other people’s names onto my shirts.

for example:

Any comments or suggestions regarding the new site should not be directed at me. I’m sure there are links around here to some other people who can probably help you with that kind of thing.

xok

When I was a kid, Easter Sunday meant 3 things:

1) Very rare Hanley family clothes shopping trip for new patent leather shoes and frilly dress combo

2) 2 hour Mass

3) Spring had sprung

Nowadays, Easter is a harbinger of Summer in Los Angeles because Spring is pretty much a thing of the past by late March. I don’t go to Mass anymore because nobody makes me. But come to think of it, I did wear patent leather shoes today. I didn’t even do that on purpose!!! Most of my friends are Jewish or Protestants of some kind, so at this time of year we all do a mishmash of holiday celebrations that are meant to acknowledge our cultural backgrounds. We eat a ton of food, drink a ton of wine and the kids and dogs are stoked. Yay.

I have no idea where I was going with all that. Let’s get to the fun of my non-denominational Easter weekend!

On Friday I had a sort-of-but-not-really business lunch at Alcove in Los Feliz with my dear friend Chad. I wish I could have lunch with him every day because he is just the bee’s knees. If I wasn’t a married woman and Chad didn’t think girls were yucky, we would be like totally whatever, y’know?

sigh…

Friday night was a typical StuCid yuppie fest with the Soccers, a few other neighbors, all the kiddos and many, many bottles of wine. Do people still say yuppie, btw? Now that I kind of am one I would like to be able to finally claim this pejorative as my own. Girl cannot live on liberal elitist alone, y’know.

My friend Mario runs this website that he’s been trying to get off the ground the entire time I’ve known him. I don’t get all show-offy with him about my blog getting upwards of several hundred hits a week because I don’t want to shit on his happiness or diminish his accomplishments. Or maybe that’s hits per month. Whatever. The point is, he’s got his little “thing” and I support him entirely because that’s the kind of person I am. Last night was Mario’s 30th birthday so Fan, Kristen, Kaylyn and I slapped on some lip gloss and went to his birthday party. For some reason, The Pussycat Dolls got lost on their way to the street walking whore convention and ended up shaking it for us at le petite soirée. They were so nice to humor him by being good sports and not acknowledging their blunder. Klassy.

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fan & mario

marc, you know i adore you but the summer ‘08
collection is not that fierce. it’s just alright for me, dawg.
your new bf is super cute though.

ted and k-squeeze

hooligans

hey z, look at me!!!

If you know me, you know that I am a big fan of the gay people. But for some reason I cannot get with the tranny lip synchers. Why do the gay boys like that crap so much? And here’s an even better question: Why is Andy Milonakis still showing up at stuff and acting like a moron? I remember cracking a smile once when I thought he was 12 and he was singing “the superbowl is gay” but a lot of time has passed since that smile crossed my lips lo those many years ago. That passing time has not been filled with laughter. Here’s Andy wacky-ing it up in front of Kiki & Herb who were performing Total Eclipse Of The Heart. Of course they were.

oh andy, will the fun never start?

We had a really fun night. And then I went home and slept like a rock. A somewhat inebriated, gussied up rock. Thanks for the always excellent party, M. Yer the best.

I’ll try and post my pix from Gil & Nina Junger’s Easter egg hunt tomorrow. Sleepy.

xok

Los Angeles is at its Springtime-y peak and the Hanley-Eisenstein posse officially kicked into high gear, Val-stylee. I’ll go through the weekend’s pictures and stories when I’m feeling more industrious but I can’t let the day pass without showing you these pix that Justine took last night.

Zoemay and I were returning from Jessie’s 20th birthday tea party in Santa Monica. We decided to meet USA & Henry at Justine & Gary’s new house, where the boys were working on the unenviable task of setting up surround sound, wireless, Vonage, etc.. Since Z & I were all dressed up, Justine decided to set up an impromptu photo shoot:

Check out Justine’s blog for more photos. She rules.

xok

Ok, let’s! Well it appears that the markets have decided that if you remove all the rules and regulations from the way in which American corporations can operate, some corporations will eventually operate with myopic gluttony, blow off time tested risk aversion strategies in the pursuit of unreasonable profit margins and the American economy will implode. Dude, lesson TOTALLY learned.

The shocking near collapse of Bear Stearns this week is a reminder that government regulations on corporations are not handcuffs meant to impose needless restrictions on free enterprise. Government regulations are meant to protect corporations from the single most dangerous threat to themselves: greed.

The Federal Reserve is now involved in the Faustian task of recklessly bailing out all the greedy assholes that could not restrain themselves from gorging on poisonous sub-prime loans and cheap cash bundled up by the billions in unregulated hedge funds.

Why can’t the Fed let Bear Stearns die in the fiery wreck of its own stupidity and hubris, survival of the fittest style? Well, first of all, the Federal Reserve and the Bush administration have shown their true colors during this mess by revealing that they only care about letting the markets decide when the bulls are running, not when the markets are deciding to exact punishment on bad corporate actors. The other reason is the only acceptable one: If this “venerable” old institution collapses, it could take the entire American economy down with it. And as the American economy goes, so goes the rest of the world.

Dump your stock portfolio first thing Monday morning.

xok

Geek Sasha posted this video on my message board a week or so ago. At first I laughed and laughed but then I became engulfed in fear that I have resembled this person on occasion. And then I shrugged it off because Blackbird is TOTALLY a better song than Fergalicious which means she’s stupid and I’m charming. Whew!!!!

Miley was the featured performer at the Houston Rodeo and Livestock show last night so the whole lot of us - band, dancers and crew- got together again to put on a show for 74,000 people. Billy Ray joined the band for 2 songs while Hannah changed into Miley and absolutely brought the house down. If you had told me 6 months ago (or ever, for that matter) that I would be two steppin’ and singing backup vocals on Achy Breaky Heart I would have, um… I have no idea what I would have done but it would have seemed unlikely. Now that the absurd scenario has become reality, I will state for the record that it was totally awesome.

Rodeos are kind of weird if you don’t mind my saying so. After our 3 hour sound check (grr…) I took care of what I needed to in a hurry so I could get back and watch the cowboys riding the bulls.We had plum position from our backstage area, which literally put us within spitting distance of the riders and animals. The cowboys were looking sharp with crisp shirts tucked perfectly into brand spankin’ new dungarees. Top that look with a sweet cowboy hat, some well-worn boots and a lasso and I turned into a drooling fan girl. Who knew? Needless to say, I was giddy to see the guys do their thing, which I was guessing would involve riding and then getting thrown off of a very strong and scary beast. Yum! The first guy came out of gate on a turbo charged horse. But hold on a second, he’s chasing a calf who is running for his life to get away. What the…?? Within 20 seconds, the cowboy had lassoed the calf by his neck, an action that jerked the calf’s body violently and slowed him down enough so that the cowboy was able to leap from the speeding horse and wrestle the calf to the ground where he tied the hind legs together and threw his arms into the air to stop the clock. The little calf just laid there helplessly until he was untied and led back to the cattle area. I started bawling. What a buzzkill. I watched this same scene unfold about a half dozen more times before I shuffled back to the dressing room all woebegone. I ended up missing the bucking broncos and stuff. Meh.

The good news? Anyone can be a sexy cowboy with the proper acoutrements! You can buy everything you need right there at a rodeo. One need not wrastle one single calf, either.

vashon, i do declare! 

Our stage was a huge disc that spun like a carousel. Not slow either. The stage would do 3 revolutions in one direction and then stop with a lurch to begin turning the other way. One of the stage hands told me that the clunkiness of the turning experience was due to the fact that the stage was built a long time ago and was operated by a guy using little more than bathtub knobs to control the thing.

Yee haw!  It was great seeing everyone. Can’t wait to do it again real soon.

margaritas are tastier in texas 

xok

I just got home from the Knitting Factory where Michelle and I went to see a band called Haim that we are absolutely in love with. They are 3 sisters in their teens from the Val (holla!), write weird, amazing pop songs and can play their asses off. Mish and I left with a new sense of hope that the next generation of bands might not be lost to the cult of posing and selling out after all. 

After the show, Mish and I stood out on Hollywood Blvd. in front of the club talking shop for about 20 minutes before we finally realized that our kids were asleep for the night and that we could actually stay out if we wanted to. With great vigor and vim, we skipped across the street to the Roosevelt for a drink and somehow managed to avoid the papparazzi who sneakily pretended to not notice us. Hint: if you ever find yourself in that part of Hollywood, don’t be afraid of the Roosevelt. Even though you have every reason in the world to loathe the vapid, disgusting, cultural and moral bottom feeding that the owners have chosen as their “re-branding” mission, you will be pleasantly surprised as long as you avoid the mucky muck. Go directly through the front doors and find Dakota, which is the steakhouse there. It’s really comfortable and chill and the staff happily sidesteps the douchebaggery usually associated with the Roosevelt.    

We started rehearsals today for the Hannah/Miley gig at the Houston Rodeo, which takes place this weekend. Highlight from today’s rehearsal? Singing backup vox on Achy Breaky Heart and I Want My Mullet Back with Billy Ray Cyrus.

My favorite verbal exchange??

candice: “i cant wait! i haven’t been to a rodeo in sooo long!!”

me: “…….” 

I’ll post new pictures and stories as soon as possible, but right now I must sleep.  I will leave you with a picture of me and Angie C (now shaw) whom you Boston people may know from the ‘FNX days. Angie and her sweet little family just moved to LA (redondo beach, actually) but we haven’t been able to coordinate and hang out. That is, until the MIGHTY MIGHTY BOSsTONES SHOW LAST WEEKEND!!!!! We had a blast. I really wanted to see The Streetdogs, but sadly, I missed them. The Bosstones made me and Angie feel like we were at the Rat in 1991 again. Thanks Joe the Kid for the list action and also for being a sweetie.    

last hurrah uh-huh, do it again!!

 xok

That’s right asshole, keep on walking. If you wanna keep your teeth in your head tonight, you better respect and recognize. When you see us walking towards you down Ventura Blvd in Studio City you’d be wise to cross the street and keep your eyes down low, son. We got babysitters and/or permission slips from our baby daddies and we are NOT FUCKING AROUND. Check out my bitches: Moms I’d Like To Form A Streetgang With. We’re so crazy, we don’t even care if our acronyms match perfectly or not. Yeah, fucko, we’re talking to you.

ooooh! new zealand sauvignon blanc!!