I hate this question. Seriously. I really hate it. I don’t have a hidden talent. To be completely honest, I don’t really have any talent that is particularly spectacular.

I’m a pretty good writer. I’m not the worst athlete in the entire world. I’m learning photography, and I’m doing fine in it. I guess I’m a fast reader, like.. really fast. Not the fastest in the world, but fast. I’m really good at spelling. So I’m, ya know, good at a lot of things. But I don’t have any hidden talents. I guess the only “hidden” talent I have (the rest of what I do isn’t something I hide. I mean.. I have multiple blogs, I’ve played a number of sports, and I’m taking a photo class and have pictures online) is that I have a halfway decent voice. With some legitimate training I might even be able to call my voice “good.” Not yet, though.

If I were to have a talent, though?

I would LOVE to play an instrument. Piano or guitar would be great. I would love for musical ability to be my hidden talent.

I’m really lucky. I’m in college, but I still have some amazing friends from high school. In fact, one friend of mine was not a friend in high school. We didn’t hang out. We didn’t have anything in common. We just weren’t friends. That somehow changed when we went to separate colleges. We found out that, actually, we had something huge in common; a passion for music. Laura and I both love the Jonas Brothers, Honor Society and countless other bands. We were always bumping into each other at concerts – and finally decided to go to them together.

We had a common love for one band, More Like The Movies. They were from Minnesota and doing a short tour on the East Coast. The one thing missing? A Boston tour date. Laura was going to Community College near our home town, and I’m a student in Boston. Why would we ever have to drive to another state to see a musician when we had a city full of awesome venues and musicians?

Well.. we did have to go to another state. We decided that I would skip my Friday French class and go home to grab my car so we could drive to Connectictut. My mom’s old college friends live in the same town as where MLTM was playing, so we had a place to sleep that night. I had no interest in driving home late at night after a concert.

I picked Laura up and we plugged in the GPS. Instead of taking me to the highway down the street from Laura’s house, it took me through town, then it took me backroads through other towns. Then it told me we were 6 hours away and would not be getting there until the concert was over. Fabulous. Our first crisis, not even an hour in. I finally pulled over and messed around with the GPS that decided to avoid all the highways to get to Connecticut. Once that was settled, we were on our way.

Fifteen spins of MLTM’s CD later, we had pulled into Nancy’s driveway. She provided us with a delicious pizza dinner, and then let us follow her to where the concert was being held. We parked in the library’s parking lot and walked through the slightly creepy alley-way that would take us to the entrance. We paid for our access, but they weren’t letting anyone in yet, so we decided to walk around the center of town before taking cover in my car from the misty rain thing that was going on.

While we were sitting in my car, a giant van with a Minnesota license plate pulled in. That van could have only belonged to one band. When it hit 7:00, we were allowed in – so we hurried out of my car and into the cover of the venue. We hung out with the musicians, made a few new friends, and headed back out to the car and to Nancy’s house for a good night’s sleep. (Thanks to Nancy’s son, Michael, who was up at school so I could take his bed. I like the solar-system of glow-in-the-dark stars you have on your ceiling. At 19 years old.)

The next morning we scarfed down some donuts and bagels, made a pit stop at Starbucks, and began our drive home.

When I say drive, I obviously mean our sit-in-traffic. Yes. Boston to Connecticut should be about a 2 hour drive. We got to sit in traffic for 3 to 4 hours on the way back, and it was an extra hour on the way there while we avoided the damn highway.

Problems aside, Laura and I had a blast.

I even made this movie:

Alert the media! I am a college student who has never lied about their age in order to enter a club or purchase alcohol.

Could it be? An honest college student who does not use a fake identification card in order to procure alcoholic beverages? It’s true. I don’t have, nor have I ever had, a fake ID. I turn 21 in a few months, so I don’t plan on getting one, either.

Why haven’t I? To be honest, when I first started college, I did not drink. Period. Done. End of story.

I went to London… things change. Now I’m frustrated because I’m 20, a mere 5 months away from my 21st, and I have proven that I can handle a drinking age of 18 by living in another country where I could go to a club or bar or grocery store to buy alcohol.

This is a dumb post. I really don’t have anything to say and I haven’t liked the topics this week, so I haven’t posted. Hopefully next week will be better…

Have you ever seen the movie Almost Famous? If yes, then just watch the movie again and stop reading (or keep reading anyway because I’m funny). If no, then keep reading, you are in for a ride.

So, essentially my dream job is to tour with a band and write about my experience. That’s the nutshell version of my dream career. Here’s the long version…

Let’s say I’m a journalism major (I am) and I like music (I do) and I want to write about music (I do) and Rolling Stone is my dream job (it is). Let’s imagine, now, that Rolling Stone sees my writing and likes it. In this day and age, this is totally possible with blogs and social media taking over the world like it is. I could totally write about music and have a big shot from Rolling Stone stumble upon it and love it. It’s kind of possible.

So let’s say that happens, and they want me to tour with my favorite band in the entire universe. Like, I love this band; they have changed my life and they’re my heroes and I pray that this is going to be the most amazing x amount of months of my life. My parents will be worried sick about my safety, but I know that it’s going to be so fun. Hanging with the band, learning the ins and outs of the music industry, seeing every bump in the road and triumph over an obstacle.

That is my dream.

However, there are two differences between my dream life and Almost Famous.

A) I would not be corrupted on the road. Just because good looking (male) fans of the band fawn over me and my innocence does not mean I will be swayed. I am there to do a job, and that is what I will do.

B) My heroes wouldn’t disappoint me. They would show me all their flaws, and they would accept that I had to write those down and report on them. Even better, they wouldn’t have flaws. My heroes would be just as heroic as I imagined.

And that is my dream career. If I could do anything in the entire universe; that is what I would do. It would be totally awesome, too.

And you know what… I think I could do something similar to that one day. I think I could befriend a band and go on tour with them; be their personal blogger. Someone who updates their fans on what they’re doing. Who gives the fans an inside view on what it’s like to tour, the ups and downs, ins and outs. All of it.

If not, then I’m cool with concert reviews. If I could go to a concert once a week and write about it, that’d be awesome.

As long as there’s music and writing in my life, I think I’ll be happy. That’s my dream.

Asking me to choose my favorite album is like asking as mother to choose her favorite child. It’s impossible to do, and you start pointing out the parts that you love the most, trying to show the question-asker why you will never be able to choose.

With that said, I am going to list 5 albums that I cannot live without. These are in no particular order, and I’d love to hear what you think of my choices and what your own album (or top 5) would be.

1. Jonas Brothers – Lines, Vines & Trying Times

I am a huge Jonas Brothers fan, and I had to choose out of their four albums. This in itself was a hard decision. I do love their first album, It’s About Time, but I’d rather have today’s Nick than pre-pubescent Nick. Why not Jonas Brothers or A Little Bit Longer? Well, as much as I love their pop music with all of my heart and have a list of songs I could listen to over and over again, there is just something about LVaTT that makes me want to listen to every song over and over. They mix genres on this album, going from country to good old Jonas pop to a collaboration with Common. Favorite songs from the album? Turn Right, Black Keys and Don’t Charge Me for the Crime.

2. Taylor Swift – Taylor Swift

I am going to put this right out there: I am not a country fan. Do I listen to some country music? Yes. Do I love Kellie Pickler, Rascal Flatts, Carrie Underwood and Keith Urban? Yes. I love pop/country. I’m more of a country crossover type of person. There are some songs by some more “real” country artists that I love, but chances are if I have a country album on my iPod, it’s because it’s a little less country, a little more pop. Choosing a Taylor Swift album was even harder than choosing a Jonas Brothers album. I can live without some JB albums – I cannot live without a Taylor album. I chose her first, self-titled album because it’s country enough that I have that to listen to, but there’s still a few good pop tunes on there. I would really miss a lot of songs off her other albums, though. Here are the ones I’d miss, just to name a few: Long Live, Ours, Fifteen, The Best Day, Never Grow Up and Mean. But if we want to be real here… I need to have The Best Day with me. Let’s pretend that was on her first album. It means too much to me not to have.

3. Honor Society – Fashionably Late

Everyone has something that gets them through the tough times. I have Honor Society. I’m lucky enough to have a few songs off their EP and a lot of songs from the Honor System Mix Tape – but this was the album that I spent hours listening to and dancing to and forgetting to. Bad day? Honor Society. Stressful walk to class? Honor Society? Regular walk to class? Honor Society. I have seen them five times in concert, going to see them just because they were opening or would have a couple of minutes to hang out afterwards. They follow me on Twitter and are always replying to my wall posts on Facebook. These four guys mean more to me than the world, and their music keeps me sane.

4. All Time Low – Nothing Personal

All Time Low are some of the best performers I have ever seen. Nothing Personal is my favorite album of theirs thanks to some fabulous songs like Break Your Little Heart, Lost in Stereo, and Therapy. Songs from them I would miss? Dear Maria, Count me In; Shameless; Remembering Sunday and Poppin’ Champagne. As much as I would miss those songs, however, I am more in love with Break Your Little Heart than any other song ever, and that alone would keep me with Nothing Personal.

5. The Beatles – Abbey Road

The Beatles are the epitome of all things Pop. They were the start of crazed fan-girls and huge, sold out tours. They brought Beatlemania to the US and were a huge part of the British Invasion. Everything I listen to today has roots in the Beatles. Paul McCartney is still one of my favorite musicians, and it breaks my heart every time I think of John Lennon. I would list my favorite songs from the album, but I figured it would be tedious to list the first ten. Even if you’re not a fan of the Beatles, there is no way you don’t know where Abbey Road is or what that iconic album cover looks like. People are constantly re-creating it both at Abbey Road and wherever they can find a crosswalk.

Easy. It took me about 30 seconds to figure out where I would want to go and what I would want to do when I got there.

February 9, 1964. New York.

Let’s put this date into perspective. My mom was four years old. My dad was eight. I wasn’t even a twinkle in anyone’s eye, never mind my mother’s.

Why this date? The Beatles performed on the Ed Sullivan Show. If I could spend even 10 minutes watching the Beatles perform, I would die happy. I mean.. these people are what started everything I love about music: devoted, loyal and sometimes batshit crazy fans, concerts and shows that connected with people, awesome pop/rock tunes, and music that spans generations.

How many other musicians can say they’ve accomplished any of that? Not many. I love music. I love the Beatles. I love concerts. I love England.

So that is where I would go and what  I would do and a little bit of why. Kind of explains why I’m the type of person I am, too. Beatlemania sounds like it’s right up my alley.

I guess I should start from the very beginning. Livejournal. Yes, it counts. I started on livejournal in middle school. It was literally just supposed to be my diary on the internet. I kept it going for quite awhile, but like all diaries, I forgot about it and stopped updating. I was just too average, too boring. Who wants to read about the life of a 12-year-old girl? School. Sports. Homework. Dumb little brothers. There was nothing interesting or worthy of being publicized like that. So I stopped. For awhile I’m guessing myspace and Facebook took the place of blogging. The little bulletins with notes or surveys that were posted up from time to time. Quiz results. Little things. Important to your friends – no one else.

I started really blogging my first year of college. My friends had started them up, and as a journalism student, I figured why not? I might as well have somewhere to post my ramblings about life. I signed up on blogger and posted a few times right away. Then the posts got fewer and farther in between. Soon I stopped. Then I did one of those, “Well, maybe if I try blogging like this…” So I decided to start blogging about something specific. Well, I realized I didn’t actually have as much to say as I had thought on the subject. So that went debunk, too.

I finally figured it out, though. Why have one blog? I can do whatever I want on the internet. I discovered WordPress. I liked it better than blogger. I liked how it was set up. I didn’t like how I was limited to certain themes, but then I learned that some are customizable. I started figuring out how to make it look nice, something I would like to look at, something that would draw me in to read it, too. I started blogging about my concert experiences and daily experiences. My pictures and videos and reviews. I realized I liked that, and wanted to make a more official blog for just that stuff.

That’s when Overnight Sensation was born. I made that over a year ago and I still write in it at least once a week, sometimes more (recently at least twice a week) and I loved it. I didn’t limit myself. I fashioned it off what I liked to read: magazines. It became my magazine, my baby. I posted music reviews, new bands I liked, fashion trends, movies, celebrities. I wrote about what I liked and let people do with it what they wanted. And people liked it. I showed it to my friends, people with similar interests. I posted the link all over the web. I recently hit 10,000 hits. Even when I went on a three month hiatus, at least 20 people were checking in each day, waiting for me to post again.

But during that hiatus, I was blogging somewhere else; Letters from London. I had gone abroad and wanted to focus on being in another country. I wanted to blog about that and only that. I wanted to spend all my days exploring and passing on what I found to my family stateside. That one wasn’t about getting readers. It was about connecting with my loved ones who couldn’t share all those perfect moments with me. I still got plenty of views and a website picked it up and loved it (they found it towards the end, unfortunately). It was successful because I was focusing on it and loving it and not expecting too much.

Since coming home, I’ve ended that blog and gone back to Overnight Sensation. I am focusing on that one, now. I’m not focusing on success. I’m focusing on writing about what I love and if it falls into someone’s hands, then great. I hope they love it, too. If not, then I’m sure they’ll find a blog that they do love.

Now I’m trying to pick this one back up. Trying to make it about me again. Maybe not my day to day ramblings and silly little musings, but what I think. That’s where Post A Week 2011 comes in. It gives me a prompt to do something with. It’s a challenge.

I love challenges.

Since I’m posting weekly, I’m taking the liberty to choose any topic that the Post A Day blog puts up, even if it does not correspond to today’s date. If you’re interested, find out what today’s topic is HERE.

In the meantime, I’ll answer their first prompt.

I have visited the following countries: Canada, Bermuda, England, Ireland, Wales, Scotland, France and Italy and I live in the US. So, there are a lot of countries to visit if I want to visit the entire world (definitely on my bucket list…) but I can easily narrow it down to the top 3.

Israel

As a half-jew, I have the inherent right to visit Israel and become a citizen should I so desire. I don’t want to be a citizen, but I do want to visit. And I want to go for free. I plan on going with Birthright or a similar organization (for free) in the next few years, preferable in the next year, as in this year. My brother will be 18 in July which means he is eligible to go, and I’ll be 21, which means that, while I’m still eligible for 5 years, I’m running out of college time. I’d like to go before I graduate.

I want to see everything: the wailing wall, Jerusalem, Haifa, the Dead Sea, the Negev. All of it.

For free.

Australia

There is something about Australia that screams “adventure.” My friend studied there this past semester. While I was freezing my ass of in London, he was surfing, scuba diving the Great Barrier Reef and sky diving. Jealousy is an understatement.

Russia

I’m Russian and slightly obsessed with Anastasia. I want to go to St. Petersburg to see the palace Anastasia lived in and the city she was allegedly lost in. More importantly, I want to go to Moscow and see if I can track down my grandmother’s father’s documents. We know he came to New York from there (though he claimed to be a natural born citizen) and I think it’d be cool to find out more.

Honorable Mention – Vatican City

I went to Rome. I didn’t go in. Fail.

Could I be making a New Year’s Resolution to post here once a week (note: my other resolution is to lead a healthier lifestyle)?

Oh, it’s true, folks. Very true. With the help of my handy dandy (not notebook) Daily Post Blog! I will be posting at least once a week using their prompts.

“But Jillian, didn’t you already try this with Plinky?”

Shut up. This one will be on my main page every day so I don’t have to go to an external website to be reminded. It makes sense.

So, starting tomorrow (or Saturday/Sunday) (my other blog has Fashion Friday so that day is taken for me blogging) I will post each week, usually on the same day, unless I really like one of the prompts. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even start posting more often than that!

RUN THE FUCK AWAY!