I have had the great fortune to see Lady Gaga’s Monster Ball twice now. Once last December in NOLA and then this week in St. Paul. [Thanks again @fablor!]

Both times were amazing and I truly love her music, but despite her appeals to her fans AKA little monsters to be themselves and her donations to the ReGeneration fund, at both concerts she gave a speech that totally contradicts those beliefs:

“…there is one thing I hate more than money and that’s the truth…I’d like a giant dose of bullshit any day.”

What? After all her promotion of equality, being who you are and not feeling ashamed or insecure, why would bullshit be the choice? Wouldn’t authenticity trump that?

I should put my scholarly researcher hat on and theorize/analyze this further, like they do at the FABULOUS Gaga Stigmata blog, but for now let me hear your thoughts on the matter.

And since my dissertation is on blogs, here the Wordle of what’s here at DaisyPignetti.com

BTW if you follow me on Twitter you know that I’m in the final push of formatting the dissertation according to grad school standards. As soon as I’m done I plan to compose thoughts longer than 140-characters and update this blog with details about my defense experience, feedback I received, and ideas for future projects.

This will be an amazing addition to syllabi that currently include Katrina texts:

It’s becoming common practice for those impacted by disaster to use Google Maps to either organize efforts or search for views of homes/neighborhoods, but I was surprised when tinkering around with Street View to see my now razed home still showing up.

Some background:

As I blogged in September 2005, the site Scipionus.com allowed me to type in my address and find this information:

My parents chose to move permanently to Mississippi instead of rebuild and when I went home over Christmas they saw the house had finally been demolished. Here’s a pic of my brother who visited NOLA in January:

While I’m all about the Internet providing more accurate and authentic information than traditional media, I have to say that, especially during this time of finalizing the dissertation, it was comforting to see my home still there…