My site posted 'The Kids Are All Right'...
On this one, I have to say I watched it from a predjudicial point of view. But there was so much for me to like about it, and never a false note. It's about a lesbian couple with two children. The kids go and find their biological donor father, one of the women sleep with him, and nearly break up the family. No happy end, but no tragic one either. But lots of quiet insights into a same-sex couple and their marriage, and the problems that ensue. And could have just as well have been about any marriage. It was quiet, hardly anything over the top, but fascinating, and I could relate to so much of it.
I could relate to Annette Bening's portrayal. She was amazing. She has one of those faces.... she doesn't have to SAY anything, it all plays out in her expressions, and is crystal clear. And Julianne Moore was stunning, as usual. They drove the film, and it really wasn't about 'da kids'. If they don't get awards for the film, well... I guess that the general public isn't ready for that yet.
But I really liked this film. And I could so relate. But I think that anyone in a long term marriage or relationship would relate to the story. There was nothing 'shocking', or dramatic, or odd about it. It was about two people, and how they keep going on going on. It could have been about anyone. And that is pretty friggin' remarkable. In that sense, I would rate it 'daring'. Sometimes quiet truths say much more than turning things into psycho stuff.
Mark Ruffalo as the interloper was also interesting. I won't forget his behind for a while.... Stunning. But that was just eye-candy.
So... now am half-way up to speed, and can rant when the Academy does the dirty this evening and yell at my pc.
And the popcorn ran out. I would recommend it... to anyone who isn't a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal.
Just read the Indie Awards were yesterday, and La Portman won again. She didn't convince me.
Oooo... got a bon-bon on Oscar day!
Hmmmm this year have seen
more of the nominated films for tonite's Oscars than in recent years past, thanks to my subscription web site. Last nite, 'Black Swan' was up. I had to force myself through that mess. Because everyone seems sure that Natalie Portman will get the best actress award.
The story? Neurotic ballerina gets to dance the Swan Queen in Swan Lake at Lincoln center. For those unfamiliar... a beautiful girl becomes enchanted and turned into a white swan, a sorcerer bewitches her further, and creates an alter ego, a black swan to thwart the white one from finding a true love to break the enchantment, and it ends badly, and the white swan kills herself. There's a prince who might have been the solution, but becomes seduced by the black swan, making him unpure and not able to break the curse, and in some versions he has remorse and jumps after her. In other words, Swan Lake is more like Grimm without the happy ever after.
I have seen several productions in the course of my life. And in most of them, the white swan and the black one are danced by two different performers, probably because there are few people who can do both roles and pull it off. Those who can are truly exceptional.
So.... Black Swan focusses on that latter aspect, but is really, really weird. Natalie Portman is picked to be 'the swan queen', and her director/choreographer really pushes her to get into the role of Odile, the black swan, which sends her into madness. And it becomes a mess, meaning her grasp on reality and the film itself. Good, you got the neurotic mother who never made it and has a very strange relationship with pushing her daughter. You get 'colleagues' who may or may not have her best interests at heart. There is a very odd relationship with one especially, who may be trying to undermine her, always dressed in blacks and she is always in white or very delicate pastels. And then it gets to be a mess.
Two thirds of the way through, the viewer is about as disoriented as the main character, Nina. Most of the New York shots are dark, and ugly. The black and white themes in the decorating and costumes keep up the main plot and help some in orienting yourself to what is dream or what is reality, but it's too much of a mess.
Natalie Portman spends three fourths of the film wandering about like a robot, and I found nothing about that to deserve all the accolades she has received. She must have worked her toes off for the rehearsal dance scenes. Although the self-mutilation scenes working on her feet and her finger nails were more than disturbing. It was like watching through someone else's eyes, where nothing is real. The last fifteen minutes, which is the premiere, were riveting enough, and involves a murder which turns out not to have been one... and her killing herself, as in accordance with what happens in Swan Lake, but there is never a prince.
Except for the fact that she danced proficiently, I fail to see how she should get the award for best actress. I usually love films about dancers, but this left me so cold, I ended up feeling immensely aggravated. And am glad I didn't spend 14 Euros for a ticket.
This year's crop of 'best films is fairly weak. I enjoyed 'True Grit' because it deconstructed that horrible 1969 treacle version with the insidious John Wayne. Watchted it twice, even, just to make sure my first reaction was viable.
But the jewel in the crown, you should pardon my pun, was ''The King's Speech'. Even a second view held me riveted to the pc screen. There was never a moment of lagging interest. I think the appeal is rooting for someone overcoming a huge handicap, and winning. It seems Geoffrey Rush is going to get robbed tonite for best supporting actor. Too low-key, probably, but an astounding performance. He is so underrated. Seems it will go to someone in 'The Fighter'. How many Rocky variations can you endure, hey.
I've only seen short clips of 'The Kids Are All Right', but think I would prefer seeing Annette Bening get the nod tonight. She's been short-changed so often, it's sad. But they have their own rules out in Hollywoodland.
As to some of the other films... It's one thing to imitate real artists, and another to surpass them and come up with something close to originality. People trying to emulate David Lynch, who could make you sit on the edge of your seat and really cogitate, absorbing the trips he could take you on in your mind, but you end up with 'Inception', which just failed miserably. Or Black Swan trying to go 'noir', but ending up just vexing the viewer without giving a clue as to what was 'real' or not... whether by changing lighting, or giving out some signal. Or the horrible best film 'Crash' some years ago which did not have one redeeming character, tried to emulate the inimitable and unattainable Robert Altmann, they were all despicable.... and led us to this year's film that had me pressing the escape button: The Social Network.
I admire some of David Fincher's films, and they are always dark. But his latest had me really puking. Rich kids without soul or conscience or any sort of morality. I had to pass.
So sometimes I have to ask myself.... what sort of crack-cocaine are these writers and directors ON????? It wasn't a brilliant year in my opinion, in other words. Will see the full fall out tomorrow on my pc. Should be interesting.
Good grief, Preciousses!
Talk about disorientation... who is blowing in smoke of a certain nature into my room when I am having an afternoon nap, hey? Yeah, I take naps sometimes if I get up at four a.m. and look at news cycles. I went out for food instead of writing it all down immediately. Dreams fade.... I should have sat right down and recorded as much as I could, but I woke up hungry from all the running.
But this one was a knock-out, so I still remember a bit of it. For some reason, I was on the run... in Seatlle, where I've never been. It was through cellars, and like a maze, and I was carrying something I had to protect. And it was grainy and gritty, like an old film, at first. And ended with me getting a police mug shot, and I was 'seeing' it through the eyes of the photographer. And I was holding a hamster, which opened it's mouf, and it was so pink, it was incredible, and its little two fangs were soooo white being defiant, it scared me awake. And Grace Slick was belting out 'White Rabbit' in the background, which I haven't heard in years... or decades.
Two things about this. Back in the Seventies, I learned that most people do not dream in glorious Technicolor or 3-D. I do, always have. Number two... I am not into drugs. I tried a couple back in the day. Marijuana made me find hilarity in everything. And hash brownies gave me a trip to remember, thinking that the Salzburg bus was a bomb shelter, and the bombs were falling all around me, and seeing 'people' waltzing in the waters of the Salzach river walking home.... I was wrecked. Since then, never. I thave been known to take a few tokes on a joint if offered, and find that nice, but the brownies 'cured' me of being more curious. This morning I ate some bread and a samwich.
But the dream was so 'curious', hey. Optically plastic, and so real, somehow. And that hamster... feisty.
It didn't help to get up, and find that 'da Ven' was talking about getting a new VA doctor, who was better than the 'technician' he had before, a guy, and pleased with the new lady who is assigned to him and cares. And has to catch up on his potion of choice, 'Days of Our Lives' from yesterday. It was absolutely surreal. But par for the course in the B fambly.... Disorienting. Because he said a couple of things he never otherwise says.
I 'have' to add the video, it was exactly what was playing in my mind in that dream, and I love it muchly. It was an anthem of my youth. An enticement and a warning. And no, I never got to Woodstock. It wasn't so far away from where I was at the time. And I saw posters at a head-shop, and thought, 'Oh, WOW, I so want to go there.' But being the epitome of propriety, I backed out at the last minute... and worked. It rained all that weekend, so I was glad I thought better of it.... till I found out what had gone down, and kicked myself, right into this new century. But at least there are videos, and wow, look at the hair! Tja.
I still wanna know why I was dreaming about a feisty hamster with very white fangs, posing in a mug shot. And that very pink throat of his. It was ... unsettling.
I KNOW about Freud's theories of dreams, and when I am conscious, I can be imaginative.... but that was over the top, for me. Now I'm gonna go look at my Dad's Soap, and try to forget about it. And avoid looking at any CSI series on my pay-for channel. Which makes me very happy. I have gotten more out of that by paying 19,99 Euros for three months' access, than I could have imagined. I'm just glad I didn't dream about gladiators. Showtime has this series which is so brutal, that should have given me daymares. Just sayin'... you keep on going on, hey.
Worker's rights.....
Bear with me, this is long....
As I've often said, I grew up in a factory town, a gritty, grimy corporation-run horrible place, lots of brick row houses, lots of despair in the air. And lots of subliminal opression. I think that is why I sort of liked books like all of Dickens' novels, and cried over 'Les Miserables', when I was thirteen, reading it out on the stoop. (Which drove my mother nuts... she wasn't concerned with what I was reading, but sitting on the stoop, the stairs were cement, and cool in the summers, and she would yell at me to get off them, because I'd get hemmarhoids, yup... Her only forbidden book was 'Gone With The Wind'... 'because it told all about life'... I guess it was the birth scene, and it sure didn't tell all about life...)
It was mostly a sad place. But the one thing you had to watch out for were union people, because you could get fired if you were even seen talking to an organiser, which happened to 'da Ven'. You got the fear of Gawwd put into you if you were a parent and scraped to provide for your family. They had them coming and going and there was no place to go except stay in your place. Or you would get black-listed. I've been there, all right.
Dickens gave me a sense of how unjust and unfair. a lot of people's circumstances were. You really have to grow up on the wrong side of the tracks to KNOW what that feels like. And I was determined to box myself out of there, and do something productive.
So I got lucky, and had half a brain. And chose paths that led me to the most important summer of my life. Working in Munich.
1400 college students, and some of the shocks of my life. The first one was early, some JUSO (young socialist) roping me in to march down to the directors' office and demand they not throw away food every day and give it to the poor. Or we would go to the yellow journalist rag, and strike on the opening day of the Olympics. It worked. And for all their bluster, they pushed me to the front as speaker, which was really frightening. I've described that earlier here, somewhere on the blog.
It was a liberating feeling, and what I had heard about 'socialism' and feared was dispelled. We did something good. But it didn't stop there.
The 'bosses' decided to restrict us to our housing only. That was very problematic. Our rooms were four-to six bedders. And everyone in them were on different shifts, so someone was ALWAYS having to sleep. Going into town was expensive, the prices in Munich at the time were outrageous. So when that Ukas (decree) came down from on high, who showed up at my door? That red-headed firebrand who could whip you up into a fired-up emotion, and say, 'This is unfair.'
And before I knew what in the world was happening, I was marching down to the bosses, and that little guy pushed me to the fore again, without me having any preparation to know what I was going to say!
In High School, if I got called to give a report in English class, I was so intimidated, I couldn't get a word out, would turn red, and stammer. I was embarassed because I didn't have the right clothes, and wanted to sink into the floor and land in a corner of the basement where no one could find me again.
I think our first successful confrontation with the management made it easier. And it came so easily. I laid out the problems, our financial one wanting to save money, and if they would ban us, we wouldn't be able to save anything, and that I didn't think it was fair, and how would they like it if the press got a report on how they would treat us badly. They aquiesced. And we had the run of the entire Olympic village on our time off, and not be hidden pariahs.
In the middle of the Games season, they suddenly sent about a third of the students back home.... the ones that lived furthest away, like the Philippines, which was devastating for them, and we tried to stop that too... and lost.
Unfortunately. I wish my paternal grandfather had been alive when I got back... I think he would have liked hearing that.
But when people are talking about collective bargaining... you win some, and you lose a big one, but at least you FIGHT. That is basically what we were doing. It wasn't about personal gain.
And yeah, I know... people's motives aren't always pristine, and you can get a knife in the back. But that summer was a catalyst that made me feel I wasn't just this small invisible person, and could DO something good for a majority of people.
Collective bargaining always happened later on in my life. It's about sitting down, and explaining what you think is wrong, and being listened to. It should be a major principle in one's work life. And it served me well.
And I never even realised it before, but I never gave up on it. In the year 2000, the place I worked in was taken over by corporate types, and of the four new guys, the one overlooking the financial end was a hard nut to crack. He could really come down on me if he thought I was going rogue on him, and didn't like independent thinking.
I switched the pc's browser at work from Microsoft Explorer to Firefox, because the security is better, after we got a deadly virus that killed our system, for instance. He was livid. I demonstrated it for him and explained why it was better. And he was still pissed, and said, ''Where are the drawbacks?'
'Well, there are reports that the browser 'might' freeze, but I've seen no sign of it.... AND I have been using it for over a month on my low end outdated pc, and it works fine. And I would NEVER put anything on the company machine unless I tested it thoroughly.'
He begrudgingly let it stand. Begrudgingly. Because corporate types don't LIKE being shown there is something better than what THEY decide, and he was the 'expert' for the computer stuff.
But he got over it.
We often got into policy issues, and really talk (between four eyes, as we say). And I would come up with an idea, and often he wouldn't like them. But he wouldn't dismiss things out of hand. He'd narrow his big eyes, and say, 'Why do you think that?' 'And we would go back and forth, and yes, sometimes his counter-arguments were so good, I would say, 'Oh. Good point, hadn't thought of that.' 'And concede. Or often, I could make the case, and he would acquiesce.
Those discussions were always respectful, sometimes got heated in tone, but never acrimonious. It was sparring. And for my part, trying to acheive something good for everyone.
That is what collective bargaining is about. Let's face it... if you are working for a company, you want that company to do well. Because it is also your livelihood, and if you think some policy is going to be damaging, you speak up, and try to get your own point of view across, because 'da MAN' is somewhere else most of the time, and doesn't have the day-to-day view of what is happening. I may not have been 'liked' by two of the four. But I received respect, and wasn't turned off out of hand.
Half-bullies like it if you have the balls to stand up to them.
Except----I liked that guy, because he listened---and would say I was right when I was right.... and I was never afraid to say I'd been wrong in an assumption. It's about respect, and coming to decisions that are best for everyone.
I've been a union member since I arrived here. My chapter did doodley squat for our sector of work. But I knew that if things were bad, I could go to them. And they would help. And I had a really bad KRIPO guy go after me one evening, (criminal police) dissing me for being a fat-cat unionist, I mean he was one really bad-assed cop with issues. And I was so sick of this guy terrorising my people, I pulled up the pay document of the union, and what they had given us, plunked it down, and said, 'I've been here 25 years. And this is what I earn. I speak four languages, I worked twelve hour days for most of that time... how' do you think I'm scamming people?'
He was shocked. Because my branch is the most underpaid in the country. And after that he backed off, and was respectful.
Sigh.... unions. There is lots to be said.
But the good people of Wisconsin should be proud, and remind me of better days, and I wish I could be there for moral support. Walker is such a wanker, words fail me. But that fight is about a lot more than people 'wanting more'.
I understand that from a very different perspective. What is going on there is just unspeakable.
Obama on a Road Trip?
OW!!! Ed Schultz! Tell us how you really feel??? Super rant.
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Have I said
how much I admire Rachel Maddow? That woman has style and class, and is honest. And a great team.
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Walker's taped call...
Rats and whores.... just as I always thought...
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Hokay.... what is going ON there?
I expressed unease at hearing that zombie eyed so-called governor of Wisconsin referencing calling in the National Guard and today, there was a report that the Guard is going in and scoping out the prisons in case Walker is gonna lay off the prison guards, or something.....
Why on earth would he do that unless he wants a scorched earth policy and punish prison guards, huh?
And we all SAW what they did after Katrina and the national guard in New Orleans.... this sort of stinks to high heaven, and something is up.
I got a mail about a Tweet some idiot from Indiana posted calling for people to use live ammunition on the protestors in Wisconsin . And it was from a pol. Sweet.
Faux keeps ginning it up... oh, those violent protestors, and oh, they're gonna be violent. Yadayadayada till some idjit actually goes out and wreaks havoc, and then it will be, oh no, wasn't us... they're all crazy and we had to stop them.
And then there is the non-delightful arsehole Rush Limpballs calling the middle class bottom-feeders, and lazy, among other things. This from a guy who has a forty million dollar tee-vee/radio contract, is a druggie who lurvs his oxycontin, and has a taste in what he thinks is 'good living' that would send any gay person screaming out of his former NY apt. and running for the hills or the nearest pharmacy for eye-bleach. ('There was a spread in the NY Times when he put that horror on the market. Words fail to describe the horrors in it. Ed Schultz doesn't call him 'the drugster' for nothing....)
Well, this has way reached the creep level. The most violent video from Madison really had me going. Filmed in the State House, it creeped me out. Young people throwing themselves on the floor of the foyer, and nearly breaking their necks in what seemed to be a horrendous temper tantrum.... but oh... the clip said it was break-dancing... but it's a ruse. They were violent and trying to break their necks, oh yes, Preciousses. How evil can you get. I saw it on First Draft, but it was not embeddable. But skeery.
I don*'t wanna know what sort of 'frivolous lawsuits' are gonna come out of THAT Volksfest.... Can't you just IMAGINE it? Paraplegic teens having gone on the RAMPAGE, and suing the state for having over-waxed the floor of the foyer in the rotunda. They'll bankrupt the state for sure, millions and millions of dollars.... But Scotty will surely take care of it, that narrow-eyed weasely looking liar who can't speak one true sentence.
Ok, I'll get my tongue back out of my cheek regarding that last excess and flight of fancy...
However.... depicting the good people of Wisconsin as being violent protesters, and painting them in the worst terms, when the videos depict people who may be angry, but voice their grievances honestly, and the mood being a sense of community with a purpose, and trying to portray them as sinister... Well... that sort of takes the cake. Or your apple pie, whatever fits. Bunk.
The worrying thing is to consider calling in the national guard.... and pols who are so out of the loop, they would call for shooting fellow citizens with live ammo.
THAT.... is unsettling. Although there wasn't a name for the deputy attorney general there.
A deputy attorney general in Indiana on Saturday suggested on Twitter to "use live ammunition" against protesters in Madison, Wisconsin. In a back-and-forth with a writer for Mother Jones magazine, he followed up, "You're damned right I advocate deadly force."
There's one word for this: Unacceptable.
Quick somebody tell me what rich is...
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We shall take a bit of a break here....
I was pretty horrible the past twelve days. I left my phone off-hook, so that Peter wouldn't call every forty minutes, run up a bill, and cry a lot. It upset me. That is not a nice thing to do. So I broke my silence, because... I got the what-ifs.
Actually, I wanted to go down there last week, but was too depressed, and the weather matched my mood. And this week, schools are out, for some lame thing about saving energy. So I can only go next week, because the busses aren't running.
Peter cried throughout. It was gut-wrenching.
So I promised to visit next week. And felt terrible. Tja, finances.... the pits.
At least he still knew who I was. It was horrible.
Da culture wars are back on the agenda, bitchez...
You can't defend your new-fought-for freedoms enough. I should file this under one step forward, three decades back. Herrgottnochmal. One should always be vigilant. Link here.
Scott gets it right...
And what most of the media isn't saying.... well, Rachel did, but her viewership doesn't approach that of Faux...
"See, back before the November elections that brought Governor Scott Walker to power the state of Wisconsin had a projected budget SURPLUS.
But Governor Walker gifted the richest people in Wisconsin and the corporations based there with tax cuts that he signed into law just weeks after taking office. And it was these cuts that benefited only corporations and the rich that resulted in the state’s budget surplus becoming a budget deficit.
Literally overnight.
What Governor Walker did was to create a fiscal crisis so that he could punish union members and their families and permanently break the unions in his state.
Walker’s actions are analogous to a plastic surgeon who shoots you in the face so that he can get you to pay him to perform surgery on you to fix what he fucked up."
Scott at Bill in Exile. I couldn't have expressed it better, so quote him here.
How can this debate still be going on????
My father was banging his head on the keyboard today...
Had to do with a Soap, and how one character got punked, and was talking to his tee-vee screen. He's so rational. I throw things. Soft things, don't wanna break it....
I was catching up on things I do not watch regularly. Like what people call 'Tweety'... Chris Matthews.. Now I have no problem with diabetic vitriolic people... obviously. However.... the man is so looking in his rear-view mirror, he is ignoring one of the biggest stories which are right in front of him. People are sick and tired of being preyed on by corporations.
And now he tells us... OH, GASP!... the reasons for going to war in Iraq were bogus. Which anyone with a wisp of reason in their head KNOWS, but oh, it gets better... he wants inquiries.
I have always suspected that he was a lower intestinal acrobat. So why now particularly, when Wisconsin and Ohio are up in arms, and going against the Rethugs. Mr. Matthews has always looked at which side his bread was buttered on. But secretly loves the Rethugs. He is just playing chess to make himself look good, and the ploy is so stupid even I can see through it.
Gawwwd, another year and the dread Eurovsion song contest again? Shoot me now....
The hugest arbiter of bad taste. ABBA was the only thing good that came out of it and it took thirty years for people to get that. Malta for 2o11. I don't understand one word of it other than Wild Heartbeat, and the rest is like tapioca pudding, smooth with odious lumps in it. And WHY do the dancers have foil red face masks? Is there a hockey game going on nearby? Ok, must say I delight in the absurdities of the Eurovision song contest.... but believe me... you have had to have BEEN here....
Some people would call such ideas and threats fascist...
Walker's threat to use the National Guard in Wisconsin reminds me of things my grandparents told me.
As one of our greatest chancellors said, 'Learn your history, young man!'
Interesting analysis... Rachel and -Ed make for some insight...
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Ground Swell???
Could it be... that corporations in the US have bilked so many Americans that they are going to fight back?
Thirty-thousand 'everyday' Americans took to the streets in Madison WS, because they were tired of being the scapegoats. Their governor basically wants to dock federal employees twelve thousand dollars a year so he can pay off the corporation hacks who paid for his election, under the guise of a non-existant deficit.
One really has to hand it to the Re-thugs. They'd throw their own grandmothers under a bus if they could get the will in their favour. Greedy, mercenary, horrible people.
Judging from the past year or so... everything they accused the Dems of... is what they wanted to do themselves and are doing. Isn't that a kick in the pants, hey?
So they want to break the unions again. If the people in Madison WI go out and protest in tens of thousands... and Madison isn't a big city...
I have a feeling that there is going to be protests in places no one had anticipated.
And good so.
Ok, two more films on my channel up for Oscars
If you want to lose two and a half hours of your life being aggravated by a vexing illogical puzzle.... and probably go through two jumbo containers of popcorn in a movie theater, chewing to help yourself THINK... 'Inception' is perfect for you. The basic idea wasn't bad, mind you... but turning it into an Escher painting wasn't exactly the way to go. Oh yeah, you can follow it, if you can stay awake enough... except it doesn't make sense. If the makers wanted to go the way of 'Donny Darko', or 'Mulholland Drive', at least it would have been interesting enough to want to find out what it was ABOUT. This film is a mess, and in the end, boring in the extreme. And whoever made it is on something that really messes up perceptions so badly, they should run for the next Betty Ford clinic. I WOULD suggest that it might have a chance for an Oscar for set design. But it wasn't anything new either.
And 'Burlesque' was up. Only one nomination, for best song. Rightly so. The makers should be sued for gross plagiarism. The first half-hour seems promising.... but then, oh then! Someone spare us all! If you want to plagiarise... I wish for zombies, so that Bob Fosse rises from the grave and takes the choreographer and lighting director to an early demise, as they are being ghouls themselves. We SAW this all in the 70's with Cabaret.
The first half hour of the movie is good, as said above. But then it descended into 'quoting' every damned cliché about show-business you can think of.
I left after nearly an hour and a half. And left the popcorn behind me.
And Cher got screwed, minimal role.
And Christina Aguilera? After three songs... nothing new, gets old, and boring.
Blech....
Oh... robbers, rats & whores....
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Not so good news...
When it comes to war against the middle class, Big Ed does it best.
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Oh, this is cute.... telling someone the time in different regions
It's here. Words mattter, and people don't say things the same way, which leads to people knowing you aren't from 'their' neck of the woods. and it gets freaky. I have touched on this on one of my Gamblitz trips. Telling time is pretty odd, depending on where you are.
So... if it is quarter past ten in the morning... and in Europe, they work with the 24 hour clock, so ten in the evening is 22 o'clock... how y0u would say it varies and can cause confusion.
In the light blue, they say 'quarter after ten'.
In the violet, which coincides with my region, you say, ' a quarter to eleven'. (No shit, it messed my mind at first. If it had meant a quarter of an hour on the way to eleven, it would have been rational, hey.)
The green is a quarter (beginning from) ten....
And the orange is a quarter over ten. I just hope they never go UNDER something. For measurements.
'So.... We all get messed up over time, and time zones, and not even people within one country can agree on how we define or answer the question: ''What time is it? Got the time?'
Isn't that irritating.... or something.
Oh wow... talk about wavelengths...
I ran out of food, so went to the supermarket at the train station to get a samwich.... and went to get my bus back down the hill to the square. When a man behind me was on his cell phone.
His voice was so young, the content was disturbing to me. He was expressing exactly what I was feeling.
'Gawd it's so grey, it's terrible! ... Well, yes it's a bit warmer, but I am afraid it's gonna turn again before the end of the month... What?.... Well, maybe.... And did you hear? Peter Alexander died. He was only eighty-four.... That's waay too young....'
And I thought, 'uh-oh.... my generation behind me.' The way too young thing... ok, understand it, but the man lost his only son in a racing car accident about fifteen years ago, and it broke him, and then he lost his wife to cancer about five years ago, which broke him even more. He lived for his family. But up until all the tragedy began, he had a very rich and wonderful and fruitful life, so I think he was ready to be called off the island, or globe, so to speak.
It got worse.
'No, am on the bus..... I'm just going to ride around for a while..... Stop at Hilmteich, maybe.... What? ---No, if I'm at home, I'm only going to watch tee-vee, or maybe a dvd, or Norway.' ('Whatever that means... probably ski jumping) 'I just want to drive around, and after Hilmteich (a pond) I will go back to the Main Square for a while, and then I will go home, and go to bed. ....Yes. ....Bye.'
Whereupon it was my stop, and I was on the seat in front of him, the exit door was behind him, and there he was, head bent, sorrowful, black-framed glasses, going a bit bald and the picture of depression. Hell, I thought I was looking into a mirror.
It wasn't so much the content as the tone. He sounded so defeated, my heart nearly went out to him. Except two depris do NOT a happy couple make. sigh....
But seriously... he was saying a lot that I would NEVER say, and it hit me hard.
Except---I'd have been of no help since I feel exactly the same hopelessness. Recipe for disaster.
But he made me very sad.
How to put this????
Imagine coming to another world, one where you can communicate, but know little about. And there are people who stun you with intellect, like T'homas Bernhard, or Hilde Spiel, or politicians who are so amazing in comparison to what you knew, you stay in the game in order to be a part of something.... and over decades, there are entertainers who become very beloved. First, something from the year after Austria became the second republic in 1956. A silly comedy, has something to do with twins, but typical for the times. I love the last moment of it.
Peter Alexander influenced generations of the tee-vee public. He had variety shows, he could sing well, did killer parodies of local legends, was never afraid to push the envelopes just a little bit..... I guess you could put him up as our version of Ed Sullivan, as far as the tee-vee shows went, just legendary. That is what he became.
But the main thing he projected was a quiet decency and sense of dignity. He was a very talented man, and passed on I just read. He was 84, and had a very productive life and was a good influence on people. And made them smile.
Stupendous news this past week, wasn't there?
I really didn't find it necessary to comment actually. Other than to shed some silent tears of joy to see the outcome of a revolution that succeeded. I think it was just overwhelming. But I have some more than passing knowledge of Egyptians, and like them very much.
One of the things that really impressed me today looking at yesterday's news was about the organizers. They didn't trash Tahrir square. Today, they cleaned up and repaired damage done. That is telling. It means they take pride in that place and responsibility.
I got really irritated with some US commentators, and all their 'worry' about 'what's gonna happen now?' Well, seeing as they have ALWAYS been for greatest short-term gains without considering long term losses..... Bingo.... didn't they do it again, hey. You could just throw up. And then they get stuck in the line of the camera like deer in the headlights and say 'WHAA???'
Buried in the lead is the fact that three hundred people died to make that happen. They should be held in honor. Am sure there will be a monument later on.
What really jarred me was hearing that it has been TWENTY-ONE years since the Berlin Wall fell. No, will not go ON, it just surprised me, it didn't seem that long ago. It's a generation, hey.
I was there less than a week after.... and oh the exhilaration, it was just in the air, and so wonderful... the radio kept telling which parts of the Wall were coming down, and we'd zoom over to the former East just to see how it looked, it was sort of insane.
And I think that will be what it will be like in Cairo this next week. But there was another aspect setting in that week... people from the East were suspicious, they had NO idea how to function, it was like their reason for being had been removed, most of them and they were so bewildered, it was sort of pitiful.
At least Cairo doesn't have that apartheid.... but there will be differences. I think that right now... they feel united, and one people, and it might be the cement that enables them to work together and form something new and amazing, and right for everyone. We all like our wet dreams of Democracy to turn out to be happy endings, and that people prosper.
Peter always wanted to go to Egypt... but he was already sick with an open foot. His grandparents went to Cairo for their honeymoon. It was 'chic'. (Tja)
Now I wish I had.
Illogic
This makes my head spin, and I love it when O'Donnell gets his Irish up.
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Oh my!
Glee is on tomorrow... And I don't know the context yet, but seems like Kurt is in for some heartbreak. And mashing up Beethoven with hip hop is sort of interesting. Cripes, can't Chris Colfer have at least ONE episode where he's happy????? Is it asking for the impossible? Sheesh.
Good vocals.
Well... here we go excitement over....
The Packers won the Bowl, and the B family will be over the moon. And today... actually yesterday, they finally resumed the second half of the second seasson of Glee so it's up on the internets to see. And cleverly revolved around an over-regional football game, and villainess Sue Sylvester losing the national cheerleader championships after seven straight seasons and attacking cameo guest star Katie Couric ending with 'I hate you, Diane Sawyer...' She had hilarious lines in there. They had some good numbers in it.... Where the glee club has to double as the half-time entertainment... nicely done number... The rival school had one that is sort of gay, but perfect....
Yup... cute... but the mash-up of Thriller with 'Off with their heads, dance till you're dead' was sort of awesome. Zombies. No clips up yet. Go figure YouTube.... I can't
How STUPID can you be, hey, How STUPID?
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I don't know.... I was so infuriated by that film yesterday.... I deactivated my account, but WOW... the arseholes don't delete it. So you just stay on there in limbo or something.
I'm so glad I never put personal stuff 'out there'.
Bollocks to them. Don't need it.
Who needs that shit.
Tomorrow... as everyone in the US knows...
IS Superbowl. Let's clear up some facts regarding this, ok????
I would NEVER even mention shit if the Packers weren't in the finals this year. I wouldn't.
I HATE American football. My brother got hurt playing it on the street, and I hate it. Period.
However... my progenitor LURVS him some Packers, to the point of having gone to Wisconsin (where's dat?) to see them play.
I am sort of Churchill 'no sports', although I did like watching baseball and even went to Boston to see the Red Sox... Once... I loved playing basketball in grade school... as a sawed-off little shot-gun, and scared people by being ferocious. I wasn't big, but I knew how to score points.
I 'think' I know how cricket works, after closely listening to my cousins grill a young English airman in Munich's Hofbräuhaus. Gawwwd, was he cute. He 'might' have spent a bit more time with me... if one of his comrades wasn't totally wrecked and he had to see him home... understandable, oh, how regrettable... and the funny thing was, he wasn't lying. And was all 'Yup, Ok, understand' thinking, oh cripes, why me?' You don't get 'cute' that often. What a near miss, and he was in regret mode as well, said so, quietly. And had interesting tatoos.
Soooo... yeah, I play and played the game. Jock fan, right? Except most sports turned me off? Well, I did skate with fervour, but that won't get me any points.... I loved skating, and worked hard at it. It was using your entire body, and being expressive, and oh wow, you could knock yourself out playing that one as well. Literally. Knock yourself out. That's why I'm wonky today.
(Shakes self awake again....)
Ok, Ven.. Your Sunday is gonna be about five times what I see what Oscar nite means to me, ok? I Know dat... Yup... And I KNOW you are gonna be snuggled up to your tee-vee and have some brewskis, and may have my brother drop in, or a neighbor, and just go off the charts for guys goin' wild over testosterone-built up GUYS knocking the crap out of one another just to get a ball down the field.
Yes, that is cynical, and yes, probably not fair.... but I hope you have one hell of a time watching, and that your team wins that friggin' thing.
My only preparation was going shopping for the weekend. I got toilet paper. If you need any, give me a call, am well stocked. (smile)
And above all... have fun.
FAUX crazy and science...
And people LISTEN to that ass-hat who pretends he grew up poor, but was well off, and denies science and is crazy and played hookey for all his science classes. How'd it get there inDEED. Ok, enough morning exercise.... am off to barf. Literally. Who LETS such stupidity onto the airwaves disguised as 'knowledge', huh? Sigh. I have had my overdose of 'Murka assininity for one morning. Eeeewwww.
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And oh yes... that station couldn't even present the American populace with a map of where Egypt actually IS, which didn't surprise me. I remember only too well what they did after the invasion of Iraq with maps, and vaguely referred to 'da Stans'.... Afghanistan, Usbekistan, and on and on... Hey, it was 'da Stans'... As in, 'Well, they're all alike and pinheads, y'know...' That was in 2001. I threw sponges at the tee-vee, because I didn't wanna break it, and was SO relieved when my cable removed Faux after six months. My tee-vee was SAVED, hey.... Well.... if you wanna be dumbed down, I can't imagine a better place to acheive thought obliviousness than Faux. And Bill O' drives me crazy with his cant. I still don't know why the woman he stalked never took him fully down. Money, I suppose, the man is disgusting.
Facts I NEVER knew about the Green Bay Packers
This is for 'da Ven.... It is superbowl weekend, after all.... And Rachel knows an awful lot.
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What the worst of 'Murka does....
No further comment needed
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Can't they stop the stupid?????
Faux NEWS.... not. Can we all thro up now? Chris Hayes is smart and fun... Rachel once slipped and called him Lambchop.
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Protests
Interesting. Richard Engel's smile is enough to make me happy. That guy has so much courage, it's amazing.
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Superbowl Sunday.... If you want fun for coaches...
You need Sue Sylvester. That woman can deliver a line so dry, a martini would shrivel an olive.
This film is really upsetting me, because I hate every entitled son of a bitch depicted in it.
I'm only a half-hour into it, and I want to crush every one of the people in that film.
It should not get one award.
Harvard. I used to love running over to Ha'vad, and getting German magazines at the tiny store, after getting off the red line, and strolling around the campus, imagining how it might be to be a student there.
Which was unnatainable. Thank gawwd I NEVER had anything to do with the scum who attend that institution. Thank gawwd. Soulless bastards and bitches.
Oh, this film is making me so angry, I can't even express it at the moment. It's so precise. And it doesn't pretend to show a 'good' side of 'Murka, it shows the opposite, the greed, the destructiveness, but oh hey, if you're a rube with a good idea... you're gonna get TAKEN DOWN.
But what the hey, if you're on the losing side... you get fucked, but you aren't going to starve.
I had to stop watching. Mr. Zuckerberg and his story disgusted me to the point where I wanted to throw up.
The film is good. It is. But toxic for myself. I can't take watching that, I despise the people depicted, I'd like to be in their face for what they do, and I am disgusted by the people who raised such amoral monsters. I don't need to see the rest of the movie. It's well done.
The film is good. But I hated it. And I couldn't stay with it to the end, because it goes against EVERYTHING I believe and think and would never support.
I don't want this nor do I even LIKE Facebook. I think it is just as superficial, vindictive, and sometimes as assinine as people masturbating in an open park.
The King's Speech....
Woke up at three a.m. just sort of weirded out, and whaddaya know.... the film was available on the channel I subscribed to.
It's seemingly a favourite for the Oscars next month. It's about King George VI, father of Queen Elisabeth, who stammered terribly, and an Australian commoner who helped him.
Now, I know.... period film, Brits at their best, some people would say 'bo-ring'.
But it wasn't at all. To see Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush being brilliant to the point of inspiring awe for how good, was suspenseful. It helped that it is a true story...
I would recommend seeing this film. All the values are so perfect, it's amazing just for that alone. But the pivitol thing is the focussing of the script to two very diverse men, and the forming of a friendship. Colin F'irth was sometimes nearly painful to watch, the figure so tormented by his handicap. Geoffrey Rush hasn't been praised enough, for his portrayal of the man who helped him. It's very subtle, and he should have gotten a nomination for a very solid performance.
Again, I would recommend it. It's history. Beautifully done.
But I could relate, actually. When I worked as assistant in the cinema, we had ushers. Yeah, those were the good old days.... and girls on the candy stand.... and later usherettes... It was always the guys. Always. Some shy to the point of going beet red, really struggling to get one word out. And stammering.
I'm just glad I did the right thing. No self-praise here, but I sort of figured it out. I took the rest of the staff to a quiet moment, and laid down a law. 'I don't want to hear ANYONE making fun of ---whomever--- I do not want to hear ANYONE finishing his sentences, pretend everything is just normal. And be kind.'
Oddly, it always seemed to work. Within about three weeks, they suddenly started chattering up a storm, and some of them were usually the funniest people on the staff. There was no pressure.
The worst was HJ. The guy from Berlin who stuttered when he met new people. He spent six months, and worked in the drive-in and hung around the theater, and had this 'clicking' thing... it wasn't good. I did the same thing, and the result was the same. He had never relaxed among people before.
There are hints that it all goes back to childhood, and the film made that very clear.
What I never understood was a visit to Berlin, and hearing that man berate HIS son for stammering. I was shocked. As in 'this is beyond belief, how can he DO that?' And I got his wife out to the kitchen and asked her what the fuck hell was he DOING to his son, and didn't she know he had the same problem decades before?
My friend looked at me as if I'd delivered the biggest bitch slap she'd ever gotten. 'He never stammered.'
'You are so mistaken, when I met him he could hardly get a word out, and now he's doing this to your SON?'
The rest of that conversation is hereby censored, but you can imagine....
And of course, I had my own problems in communicating. I got bad grades in high school. I could be a motor-mouth in private, with people I trusted. But to have to speak in front of a hostile classroom, I just tried that twice. And I couldn't get a word out, and wanted to sink into the floor-boards.
I didn't even think I would survive the first two weeks I worked in the cinema. Because I would have to do 'the rounds', traverse the aisles, and ask people not to put their feet on the chairs in front of them.
Around week two, something happened, and I learned to be confident.
So yeah, the film resonated, and I wasn't thinking about all that directly while watching, but I so recognised and empathised with the people I was seeing. I should have made some popcorn, but at three in the morning... too much trouble.
I see the channel has put up 'The Social Network', so might go there the next time I have insomnia.... Facebook sort of makes me wary, so don't know.
Ok... why.... WHY? is anyone so stupid as to formulate
the phrase.... 'Forcible rape'??? Wanna tell me about this? RAPE.. is forcing yourself sexually on someone who is violently unwilling to engage in a sexual act, against their will. (Dusts off hands, mission aolved). And there are some very twisted minds in 'Murka, who want to actually change the defininition of what anyone and everyone should agree is a heinous crime....
I'm not good on this one, just warning you....
HOW in the friggin' World... can anyone stand by, and know that someone in their family is being sexually abused... often from a young age.
What sort of people without conscience, can bring up a law that would protect Perpertrators, so that children fall out of the definition, or be raped once again by jackals who ride paragraphs and distort the meanings of words in law?
What sort of people think, well it's ok to get raped by your father or brother, and hey, the Mom doesn't really register because she doesn't WANT to.. and destroys a family....
That is what some legislators want. Because.... if a pregnancy ensues.... they would have to carry that child to term.
A young woman whose father RAPED her... I thought we got that out in the book Peyton Place, which took place in my state and was true.
What bugs me is the word forcible.
How much more 'stupid' can we see here?
And now I will quietly throw up.
This report is so unacceptable, I can't even begin..... Not the report, the people behind this fuck-up. Just seeing what a couple of 'suits' decide to starve some people, and interesting that they do it to people in Louisiana as well.
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Demagogues....
Gawwd save me from Glen Beck... I'm glad I only see tiny clips of this crap on the internets, and someone should put him in a rubber room. And New Zealand should really watch their backs.
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these two make news exciting...
and interesting. And don't leave you feeling dumb.
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Daytime Emmy Material....
General Horspital went over the top on Monday. Everyone knew that the kid got raped in jail, but he admitting it was the capper on Friday. Here you can see twelve minutes of good acting, and don't need to know any background. Laura Wright as Carly normally drives me up the walls, she's so good at being selfish, vindictive, and outright disgusting. And why don't I ever see anyone who looks like Steve Burton out in my neighborhood.... just wondering.
Right click for full screen on YouTube.
Oh, six days without a snigarette... so why does my mouf feel dirty???
I have a trick, in the meanwhile... I hold a Bic lighter, and turn it round and round in my hand, while I watch the news. It seems to help. I don't eat all the time, can't afford junk food.
But the BRAIN.... is tricky. Last night I kept dreaming about spending ten Euros a day and thinking I had ten E'uros, and if I subtracted the price of one pack of cigarettes, what I could get on the rest of the money, and got agitated, because it would not cover what I wanted. And WHOA, I wanted the sniggies. But was equally hungry.
Which was weird enough. I wanted a baked potatoe.... covered with crème fraiche, and herbs, and with baked mussels.
The latter really gave me pause when I woke up. I never heard of anything so weird.
So I went OUT today, my account being replenished... and I did what I dreamed. It tasted ok, but I still can't figure out why.
Hassan and how you can never make anything right ever again...
Hassan was from Egypt.
He was tiny. He was like a doll, in that he was perfect in every way, very delicate, tiny brows, lovely deer-in-the-headlight eyes, he always looked a bit startled. I could estimate he stood about five feet two or three. Delicate. He hardly came up to my shoulder and I am five-nine.
His older brother helped him get here. His older brother drove his little brother into a marriage that had been more or less arranged by the family.
Hassan was ok with it. He seemed to love her. And soon produced three children whom he loved ultimately.
And because he wanted to provide for those children.... he soon had three jobs, and I don't know how or when that young man ever slept.
And one night... late in the middle of the morning.... in a country which never sleeps, really, you see lit windows everywhere all hours of the night... and that is a true statement... that night, Hassan delivered newspapers, just to top off his weekly income.
He was just a couple of blocks up from my house delivering papers.... and some incredibly drunk racist local asshole KNIFED him in a building... because he was different.
Hassan didn't die, thank whomever.
And he didn't lose that equanimity that made him exceptional. But he did lose his main job. The Austrian bastard cut a major nerve in his shoulder, and he couldn't work in the restaurant any more.
I tried to stay in touch... but I wasn't 'kin' or 'family'.
And our government is beginning to do to us what they did to him. Death by ignoring. and cutting your paid in money to the bone, whereupon comes the saying 'too little to live on, too much to die on...'
I'm really fed up.
I wish to add....
Those young people from Cairo I lived next to once, and integrated with...
Were amazingly kind, and open. They all had some sort of degree from their own universities, in engineering, whatever....
However..... they weren't enough for them to get a job here, because their schools weren't 'good' enough, and what did OUR idjits do? Restrict what they could do, because oh, wow, they wouldn't be able to LEARN or anything, oh, no, they had to go out selling newspapers, and doing the most menial jobs no one here wanted.
Europe hasn't treated them well either, although individuals did.
I learned some important lessons from Egyptians over the years. They were incredibly kind and tolerant. They were Christian in the real sense of the word. And are, they are wonderful, and it has been seldom that I can see a 'revolution' and say, 'oh... you go for it, you've deserved it.'
The US gov't? I don't want to even get into it. But they don't look good, never have, and propping up dictators to the point of letting their people starve?
They are very good at it if it serves their purposes.
This week will be interesting.
Huh... went out to get my living abroad food on ten Euros a day...
And I opened the letter box...
I was surprised at what was there, and what was not! Gawwd I want to smoke... but nope, will not. It's part of my posting, dumb thing, put a lit one in the in the big ash-tray, and some how comforting, but no... not today...
OK.... I got my first 'Inkasso' letter. That is where someone is gonna attach something you own for what you 'owe' them. The hospital initiated it. I didn't pay my co-pay for the costs of my unwanted, unnecessary stay in lock-down in the hospital, you see... because I was put there against my will and there was no need for it.
So let's clap our hands, hey. Brilliant. Now up to 90 Euros... because... it was 6o... which means some poor secretary had to work so friggin hard to type up a 'pay-up' letter, and lick a stamp and take it to the post office. So now I owe 90. Cripes, I'd be rich by now.
My pension fund let me know I'm still just above the poverty level.
As if I DIDN'T know... (spent four days on old noodles and rice, just to get through the friggin month of January, hey, how wouldn't I notice?)
I did NOT find my yearly Christmas Greetings from my realtor with a financial report, and what I should pay for the new year. And that is very strange. That woman LOVES to torment me. Who else would wish you Merry Christmas and up your rent? She's the sexual opposite of Scrooge, hey. With the voice to go with it. She's toxic.
And the bank gave me a rep0ort on my life insurance policy, on which I have some very pointed questions, and I HATE banks, and I HATE bank officers, and I would wish they all existed in a parallel universe, because, whatever they do, they just come across evil.
I promised I would go to Gamlitz tomorrow, so I will. Now my monthly visit, and if I stay off the snigarettes... will eat.
Isn't life fun.
Five days without a snigarette.
And was asked why I was quiet.
So I slept.
As much as possible.
Besides which my account got overdrawn to the max and was happy to have some rice and noodles in the house to cover for four days. Not that I usually get hungry....
I didn't miss much.
The 'elites' of the Washington journalists drove me so crazy, I wanted to chain smoke and yell at the pc screen. They EXUDE this 'know-it-all' attitude that makes me so angry, I want to bitch slap them.
They were all about what 'Murka wants, and what oh gawwd, could happen if 'da PEOPLE' decide what government they have, after they put BIllIONS, sixty per-cent military aid, 40 for the poor, but you count in corruption, propped up by the gov't.... not much gets left, does it?
And all these 'mouthpieces'.... and am talking Tweety who loves hearing himself talk more than listen.... And the VEDDY 'elite' Mika Brzezinski and the incredible Arsehole Joe Scarborough...
Those people provide news 'infotainment'. They aren't journalists, to my mind. But they help form public opinion. Hell, Oprah does even that.... With bribes....
I was in a hotel in the beautiful city of Trieste.... once. for a week. And there seems to be a super-duper, absolute friggin' INSTITUTE somewhere there up on a hill, and I had the dubious distinction of being in the ho-tel restaurant for breakfast, Peter had gone for a WC run, and I had to LISTEN to their uninformed, disgusgting drivel.
And all these people were running on, trying to out-do one another for 'what they knew' about history and culture in Trieste, and Italy in general. These people had graduated.... but they knew nothing. Nothing whatsoever.
I was incensed with them. Mediocrity can be not so good if the mediocre have power....
The 'Elitist' crap came back with a vengeance once Bush II was in.
There are so many ex-pat Amis-..... probably many who dabble in some sort of intrigue around the world but I don't want to know about it. I can think of a few examples, however.
Like the arsehole who dropped his suitcase on my head... and looked at me as if I were to blame.
If you want some arrogance... try to get in touch with that breed.
And that breed is driving the current crisis.
They don't CARE about people. They care about power and I will BET you that they won't get what they want, and I hope the Egyptians get what THEY want.
Just sayin'
