among friends

I’m sad.

We love Nao. And her Star Wars hat.

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Well the secret about Haverford High vs Haverford College is Sam wanted it to be a FUCS concert first but no one would let him. Part of the reason but not all of it was that high school kids, at least the ones who come to Lunt basement, are pretty obnoxious. Not any more so than we were and probably still are as people, but there’s a difference between Joe Haverford who touches you too much and Joe High School who does the same. How dare he. He smokes and smells and being at Haverford isn’t so much a privilege as it is a chance to be who he always wanted to be.

So going in I only had a half smile. It was because of that college condescension and maybe because something about us inviting them at all revealed a backwards sense of ownership we feel towards a space we can only use when someone lets us. The whole thing made me feel gross and I’ve developed this shame-induced aversion to cigarette smoke, plus it sounded like a bunch of high school bands, so overall I’d rate it an uncomfortable out of ten, even though Sam really liked it.

We activated the right things in them—I think they got what they wanted—but what went wrong was me.

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After countless hours of preparation, Jane and I finally had our karaoke party Saturday night. At 9:15 there was one small huddle of people in the center of Lunt basement; we were nervous that not enough people would come or want to sing. We need not have worried.

By 9:45, Lunt was filling up; we played a clip of Nao singing Hero, and our mashup performers took the stage. They were fantastic. Meanwhile, we were overwhelmed with requests to sing karaoke. Our biggest problem was too many people wanting to go.

Jonah Loeb and Mike Gelberg got "Hot in Here." And I guess Zach Weiss was a surprise ghostbuster (the song playing in the background of James's mashup)?

Jonah and his friend Didem had signed up for “Since U Been Gone” by Kelly Clarkson, but it was the only song Mike Lipsitz, Fossi and the Lloyd 70s guys could agree on. In a great moment of compromise (Haverford style), the two groups agreed to sing it together. The audience cheered.

Genna Cherichello and her cohorts waited not-so-patiently to sing “Umbrella” by Rihanna, starting to chant the chorus every time a new performer went up. When it was finally their turn, they rushed onstage and sang their hearts out. People kept going up and joining them to the point that there were as many people onstage as in the audience.

Everyone was singing and dancing together, to the words, “Umbrella, ella, ella, eh, eh, eh.” Therisson screamed, “This is bigger than Punk or Prep [the dance at the squash courts]!” The Haverford inner-rock star was released. For a night we were, as the poster Jane created said (stolen and reformatted from a Carnival Cruise ad at the R100 station), “Karaoke Gods.”

Jane and I think we have tapped into a desire that has been pent up. We get to see Indie bands synthesize their sounds at Lunt every other weekend, but when do we ever get to sing, and sing the songs we like? Sam Kaplan said he is planning to host another karaoke party in April. We hope that karaoke turns into a regular tradition. We’ll sure go to the parties.

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We had a meeting and I was really nervous because I didn’t read Sam’s powerpoint before we presented, and it had all these sound effects so I laughed when I was supposed to be serious. We made a movie about an email Harrell sent us and one Sam sent back starring Louis from the Digital Copy Center in Stokes as Harrell.

One other funny thing that happened was the meeting was streamed live online, and when we were setting up James’ friend was already watching it and he sent James a text message saying the picture is blurry and turn up the sound. I spilled a glass of water, Jane grossed me out with some hair, we had a lot of ideas, it started to rain, and that was our meeting.