Fan_3 just sent me this video that she made.  Homegirl has BALLS.  I love this.

 I’m just about finished packing for my flight to NY tomorrow where I will be joining the Miley Cyrus Experience for the Z100 show followed by a private event for Net Jets.  To answer your obvious follow up question, no, I am not flying on a Net Jet.  I have a cozy little compartment in the baggage hold of an early morning FedEx flight.  This works out fine because I have a couple of Xanax, a flask of Southern Comfort and Hello Kitty sleeping bag.  I’ve been told that these planes only fly at 32,000 ft so I will most likely have enough oxygen to survive the trip but even if I don’t, I will be none the wiser. 

 The past week was pretty eventful.  Saturday, Miley played at Wango Tango, the radio fest for KIIS out here in LA.  I got to see the Jonas Brothers and their band, whom I adore, as you may know.  We played some new songs and we also got new wardrobe.  It doesn’t take much to make me happy.  Candy-o and I went to the celebrity gifting suite, which is a thing that I’ve heard about, but have never gotten to partake in.  In a nutshell, a bunch of retailers set up booths in a location where celebrities may or may not be and they GIVE their stuff to them in the hopes that their stuff will show up in US Weekly.  Please kill me for knowing this. 

free stuff?  for us?  no we couldn’t!                

i like the jobros.  they’re nice. 

 After the show we booked it to our van as fast as we could and blazed back to LA for Justine’s birthday party.  We arrived with plenty of time to spare.    

the best sister-in-law EVER  

i suffered a booty shaking injury because of conroy’s dj skillz 

  Sunday was 

Mothers Day.   I had a leisurely morning with the people whom I gave birth to and the father of those people.  It was lovely.  USA Mike knows how much I miss the the WRKO broadcast of the Red Sox games so for that reason (among others) he got me XM radio for my car and the house. Yay. 

 Then Z and I went over the hill to check out the video shoot where Miley & Mandy were doing their thing.  Apparently they’ve got some kind of dance feud going with the ACDC Crew so they decided to lay the smack down with a huge production.   Ah, the world would be a much better place if we could all just lay down our weapons and settle our conflicts through dance battles.  

 

b-girlz!!!! 

 

 

 

 Time for sleepy.  Be back soon with reports from the weekend..

 

xok 

 

 

I grew up in Boston during the 70’s & 80’s.  Anyone who knows anything about this period in America’s history and still thinks that modern blacks in America simply have to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and stop whining is just not being honest. 

  It is with this in mind that I offer my my happy astonishment that Barack Obama has accomplished so much as he runs for President.

all bootstraps, no whining.  gorgeous.

 No matter what happens after this, our world has changed forever.  Thank you, fellow voters.

Kay 

I got my album artwork back from Aaron Belyea at Alphabet Arm Design today.  I’ve been friends with him since our slacker-kid days in the Boston music scene, but he has since become a formidable presence in the world of graphic design.  In 1997, our band convinced Irving Azoff to let Aaron,  a fledgling graphic artist/indie rocker design the final Letters To Cleo album, “Go!” and I have not used or recommended anyone but him for this kind of work since.  Even though he’s a fancy-pants award winner now, he still takes my calls and churns out the brilliance super fast for my procrastinator ass.  He understands me.

 My new album Weaponize will be dropping on yo ass May 27, 2008.   Pre-sale of CD & vinyl coming soon.  

xok 

USA Mike has been in the studio producing an album for the lovely Lauren for the past week and a half so I have cut back my work schedule to take on some serious mommy duty.  Honestly, I don’t know how stay-at-home moms do this job 7 days a week.  It’s really exhausting.  The nice part, aside from spending rare daytime hours with the kiddos, is that I’ve been doing a lot of cooking and entertaining at home.                 

Jack had a few weeks off from the Jonas Brothers tour so he and Ashlee, one of my favorite ladies from the Miley tour, came over last Friday for dinner.  It was great to catch up with them and get all of the latest news of their lives.  Ash is putting in some major time with her drum lessons and Jack is about to embark on a hugely ambitious year with the JoBros.  Henry and Z are always over the moon to hang out with cool people that they met on tour.

jack, ashlee & z 

ash & z with the lushis-mobile                 

 Over the weekend, we had our somewhat regular Sunday pool party bbq.  During the summer months (when we aren’t in boston) we try to get as many people as possible over to our house on the weekends to swim, eat and drink.  The last variable of that equation usually has me feeling like shit on Monday morning, but it’s always worth it.

luke, kate & henry 

luke & isabel 

 omg, it’s milo & jackson!!!

Last week, I went to the 40th birthday party of one of my best girlfriends, Kaylyn Thornal.   At some point during our 15 year friendship, I became a soccer mom and she became a hot lesbian director.  It’s as if that song “Ebony & Ivory” was written just for us, but instead of a song about blacks and whites, it’s breeders and dykes.  I’m not sure who’s Stevie Wonder and who’s Paul McCartney in this relationship but I love her a lot and she, me.

mish, kaylyn, fan & kristen 

me & my besties.

Michael & I just bought a painting  by the artist Tim Bavington.  As always, the brilliant Naomi was the person who introduced this beautiful piece of art into our lives but I have to be honest:  I am terrified now that I have this thing in my house.   If Henry throws one of his Indiana Jones daggers in the wrong direction, we will be screwed to the tune of a new car and then I will be forced to administer a near fatal beating to my own flesh and blood.  Trust me when I say that I can think of a dozen similar scenarios between my children and this painting that might reasonably result in me resorting to some kind of violence, and that’s kind of scary.  Hey, beauty is truth. Sometimes brutally so.  Check out our awesome new painting!

naomi & the bavington   

 For those of you who have asked for my opinion on the Miley Cyrus maelstrom, here is my answer.  

 i don’t care. nor should you.

Solidarity,

Kay 

Due to the nature of my work, I have acquaintances from all over the world and from all sorts of backgrounds.  Some of the people that I know start out as Cleo fans or posters on my message board and then somehow they just become part of my life.   A few weeks back, one of the KH message board peeps sent me an email saying that he and his wife were coming to LA from Chicago to hang out, so despite having never met in person, we made plans to have lunch.  It’s funny how in this day and age, when we do so much of our communicating over the web, that you can meet someone for the first time and connect as if you already know each other because you DO know each other from sharing similar virtual interests, sometimes for years.  It’s a strange kind of vetting process, isn’t it?

Adi and Shayna showed up at 11:45am.  I showed them around our house and then brought them out back to check out our recording studio and introduce them to USA Mike, who never leaves the damn place, and then we strolled over to Mexicali on Ventura for some people watching and grub. It was a gorgeous afternoon even by LA standards so we chose a table outside and caught up on what has been happening with all of us; their years in Israel before they were a couple, my cockamamie schemes, real estate in Los Angeles, blah, blah.  Because Adi and Shayna are newlyweds, the conversation about how they met and got married came up quickly.

• • adi:   “it was kind of a saga.”
  • me:   “the best stories always are.”
  • shayna:   “does she know?”
  • adi:  “no.”
  • me: “what are you talking about?”
  • shayna:   “i was shot in the chest during a terrorist attack in israel.”
  • me:   “……….” 

 Hands down, they are the all time winners of the “how we met” contest with their star-crossed, globe-trotting, death-defying tale of love ignored, found, lost and then found again.   The tale also reminds me that even one life lost to violence and war diminishes all of our lives.   The innocent woman blown up by a god driven terrorist in Kabul, Jerusalem, Karachi, New York, Mosul, Yemen, London or Mogadishu is surely someone’s daughter, sister or mother, but she may also be your future wife and mother to the children you hope to have someday.

 That was the the most fascinating lunch conversation I’ve ever had guys, and I thank you for sharing the story with me.

  shayna & adi     

After I parted ways with my fabulous lunch companions I had to get back to the house and take care of a bunch of stuff and then get ready for sound check at the Henry Fonda Theatre.  Michelle had been asked by our friend David Gray at Island Records to put together groups of backup singers for an Aussie superstar by the name of Delta Goodrem who was performing industry showcases in NY and LA.  Since I am totally a profesh backup singer now, Mish roped me into generously offered me a job on her LA team.   It was actually a lot of fun.  The other singers, Nadia and Brandon (stacy lynes, i’ll give you one guess where you know brandon from) are ridiculously good, as is Michelle, so I’m sure nobody noticed when I stopped singing at a critical moment at the end of the very spare piano/vocal song because I started choking.  Literally AND figuratively.   Sorry about that, Delta.  At least we know it will never happen again. 

 On that note, I’m deciding that being a professional backup singer kind of sucks.  I’ve only ever done the backup gig with Miley and I LOVE that job so I assumed that you get always treated a certain way.  Even though Delta was super pro and respectful, I had this weird “faceless employee” feeling all night that made me think that the backup singer career has the potential to be a little dehumanizing.   No matter, even at its crappiest, any career where you get to sing or play music all the time beats punching a clock.  

we will not work under these conditions!!  unless you pay us. 

 xok  

I used to be a waitress.  I dropped out of college and needed to earn a living so from ages 18-25 I served people food and drinks.  My hobby was being in a rock band so the demands on my evenings and wee hours required me to have a job that took my rock & roll moonlighting into consideration.  It was said to me on many occasions by various bosses and diners that I was in fact, the worst waitress they had ever seen.  The reason I was such a hopeless waitress was due to a variety of factors:  my horrible time management skills, failure to consolidate tasks, the afore mentioned attention deficits and inability to prioritize, among other things.  If I needed to get a diet coke for table 1 and ketchup for table 2, i would invariably make 2 trips even though the diet cokes and ketchup were in the same place.  Extrapolate this stupidity forward to include 8 tables, a lunch rush and and a dozen other customer service requirements and you can see how my disorganization might result in unhappiness for everyone involved.  On my end, the chaos that ensued every time I put on an apron and stuck a pen behind my ear has a chilling terminology that every person that has ever been in the restaurant business will know and fear:  I was always in the weeds.

I would frequently dream about showing up for my waitressing shift only to find out that all the other waitresses had called in sick just as a busload of elderly sightseers came pouring into the dining room, demanding to be seated all at once.  They would want separate checks, ice water with lemon (which I would have forgotten to slice during set-up) and endless substitutions, thus rendering the menu pointless.  A couple of 4 tops of businessmen would get seated and they would be in a hurry because they only had an hour for lunch.  The owner of the restaurant would decide to pop in with a bunch of sommeliers to show off his amazing wine list and reasonably expect me to open, describe and pour every one of them  I would wake up in a flop sweat;  just as terrified as if I had dreamt of a knife wielding rapist cornering me at a deserted truckstop.   I anticipated every shift with crippling knots in my stomach, knowing with bleak certainty what was coming.   

 

In the last few years of my restaurant career, I was taken in by a group of incredible restauranteurs who quickly identified my absurd lack of ability while taking into account that I possessed some mitigating qualities that made my employment salvageable.   Some examples?  Excellent penmanship (for addressing invitations), superior phone voice (taking reservations), reasonable knife skills (chopping stuff for the expo line), and good old fashioned Boston Irish Catholic charm (bartending, of course. but only on slow nights).  Even after Cleo was earning a living and I was touring the world, I would go back to work for them in between tours and recording, wherever they were.  It was in those years, tagging along with Christopher and Esti like an over-eager puppy, that I became passionate about food and wine, which has in turn become the basis for the happiest and most enriching substance of my life.  If you are ever in Boston you MUST check them out at Radius, Via Matta or Great Bay.

 

Back to my initial thought that triggered this ramble.  In the weeds.  Those words still make my blood run cold.  I am so grateful that the universe found a way to spare me and the dining public the misery of Kay Hanley, the worst waitress of all time.

-xok 

You see, the lovely Cruiserweight kids are staying at our house because they’re opening for American Hi-Fi tomorrow night at the Troubadour. While they are here, USA Mike is producing their version of “American Girl”, the essential classic by Tom Petty. That got me, Stella, Dave and USA to talking about one of our favorite iconic scenes in American cinema: In Silence Of The Lambs Catherine Martin, who happens to be a senator’s daughter is driving alone at night, singing along to American Girl on the radio. Then some major shit goes down.

This song and video by The Greenskeepers pay homage to the creepy awesomeness.

Anyhoodles, Stacy is producing this band from Atlanta called The Modern Society and they invited me down to the studio to sing a couple of background bits on their new album. They are totally super-dee-duper. When I listen to their music over and over, alone in my secret room with lit candles, a bottle of scotch and The Modern Society posters as wallpaper I think of J. Mascis fronting Superdrag. If you know me, you will realize that this is high praise indeed.

hi. we’re the modern society. you may swoon now.

A few weeks back I did an interview with Vivian Manning-Schaffel for a parenting blog called Babble.com. I’ve never done an interview that focused on motherhood before, so it was kind of a nice shift of focus from the typical Q&A, which after 20 years has gotten pretty tedious. Thanks for going easy on me my first time out, Vivian. Check out the article here

Okay, then. Have a nice weekend. Bye.

xok

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

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.

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