Nashville Rock N Roll Half Marathon

I love going to Nashville and wanted to run my Tennessee half marathon there. It worked out that my friend Audrey also decided to run the half, and Emily had signed up for the marathon, so we all met up in Nashville! I had come off a month of vacation time so only partially trained (typical me). Audrey and I decided to run together and just had fun running through some beautiful Nashville neighborhoods, and along the river. It was hilly and pretty warm, but I enjoyed the race.

The night of the race we went out to the country bars and had a fun girls night! I always love going to Nashville!

Race Results: 2:16:12

Reputation: favorite moments from T. Swift's album

It's taken me this long to write a post about Reputation, because I still don't know how I feel about it. I like it. I enjoy many of the songs, But I don't have clear favorites like I did with 1989. When I listened to 1989, I settled on my faves pretty quickly: Blank Space. All You Had To Do Was Stay. Wildest Dreams. I Know Places. I still love those four songs. My top faves were surrounded by others I enjoyed almost as much. Style. Welcome to New York. Shake it Off. Bad Blood. I even came to love songs I didn't initially like that much: Out of the Woods. This Love. Clean. There was very little not to like.

Reputation had big shoes to fill. I was worried when I heard the first single, Look What You Made Me Do. I didn't care for it. (Although I absolutely loved the music video and consider it one of Taylor's best!) Luckily there are much better songs than LWYMMD on Reputation. I still can't pick one song that stands out above the rest. Here are all my favorites.

Getaway Car
This is the song that stood out when I first listened to the entire album. It's fun, catchy, and has some great lines.

"The ties were black, the lies were white"
"I knew it from the first Old Fashioned, we were cursed"
"We never had a shotgun shot in the dark"

"Should've known I'd be the first to leave
Think about the place where you first met me"

And ultimately, "Nothing good starts in a getaway car"

Delicate
Then this was my favorite for awhile (before it started getting overplayed on the radio). I think anyone can relate to being in a new relationship that feels fragile- when you're afraid of saying too much for fear of scaring the other person away before they even really know you.

"Dark jeans and your Nikes, look at you.
Oh damn, never seen that color blue.
Just think of the fun things we could do"

"Third floor on the West side, me and you
Handsome, you're a mansion with a view
Do the girls back home touch you like I do?"

And finally, "We can't make any promises, now can we babe? But you can make me a drink"

King of My Heart
Took me a couple listens, but I like this one a lot. My sister said it's my song, because it opens with "I'm perfectly fine, I live on my own. I made up my mind I'm better off being alone." lol. I'm not the biggest fan of the chorus, but I love the pre-chorus, the verses, and the bridge, so that more than makes up for it. This might be my current favorite? Other memorable lines:

"Now you try on calling me baby like tryin' on clothes" (loooove how she says "tryin' on clothes")

"Cause all the boys in their expensive cars
With their Range Rovers and their Jaguars (love how she pronounces every syllable of "Jag-u-ars")
Never took me quite where you do"

"Is this the end of all the endings?
My broken bones are mending
From all these nights we're spending
Up on the roof with a school girl crush
Drinking beer out of plastic cups
Say you fancy me, not fancy stuff
Baby, all at once, this is enough"

Ready For It
It's hard to know how much I really like this one, because it was her second single after LWYMMD. I loved it at first, and the rest of Tay's album wasn't out yet, so I played it all the damn time. By the time Reputation was finally released, I was over it a little bit. But I still like it.

"He can be my jailer, Burton to this Taylor
Every lover known in comparison is a failure"

"In the middle of the night, in my dreams
You should see the things we do, bay-bee hmmmm"

This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things
This one is just fun. And refreshingly non-subtle. Taylor gets one more revenge song, but it's way better than LWYMMD.

It starts off so nice:
"Everyone swimming in a champagne sea"
"Feeling so Gatsby for that whole year"

Then all of a sudden Taylor's "shaking her head" and "locking the gates"

She doesn't mince words.
"You stabbed me in the back while shaking my hand"
"Therein lies the issue, friends don't try to trick you"

And the chorus is hilariously condescending:
"This is why we can't have nice things, darling
Because you break them, I have to take them away-a-a-a"

So far those are the top 5. But I also really like:

Don't Blame Me - I like the soulful sound and the comparison of love to a drug. It reminds me of Hozier's "Take Me To Church" and brings back memories of Kesha's "Your Love Is My Drug" at the same time. ("trip of my life, every time you're touching me") ("Lord save me, my drug is my baby, I'll be using for the rest of my life").

I Did Something Bad - I liked this song better once I heard it in concert. It was just exponentially better live. The beat, the drop, the atmosphere, the smoke, the fireworks - the experience was incredible. Favorite line: "this is how the world works, you gotta leave before you get left". Taylor at her most cynical. (PS. I hate the burning witches line, but some people love it??)

Call It What You Want - It's not my favorite song, but I love some of the lines. Of the two softer ballads, I like this one better than New Years Day.

"My castle crumbled overnight
I brought a knife to a gunfight
They took my crown but it's alright"

"All the drama queens taking swings
All the jokers dressing up as kings
They fade to nothing when I look at him"

"And I know I make the same mistakes every time
Bridges burned, I never learn, at least I did one thing right...
Starry eyes sparking up my darkest night"

I feel like Call It What You Want kind of sums up the whole album. Taylor made some mistakes and had to deal with some major blows to her public image, but in the midst of it, she found love. According to her poem, "a love that was really something, not just the idea of something". Taylor disappeared for awhile, but now she's back from the dead, and lets us all know "I'm doing better than I ever was".