This is from a few days back, but it seems to me that most of the narratives I've seen that deal with kidnapped babies tend to deal, in some way or other, with the narrative of the Lindbergh Baby. Not to mention Donna's dirty secret.
The thing with Will Bailey and Donna is getting me a bit flabbed.
Okay, so the West Wing is trying its best to tread as lightly as possible between "keepin it real" and ga-ga-land fantasy. It's okay, and it really does seem like such a small step to take.
I'm now officially wondering whether VOIP is worth it. The problem with BroadVoice and X-Lite is that it requires a hell of a lot of bandwidth, so I effectively have to shut down Azureus just to get decent clarity - though apparently it does end up being the best voice quality possible. The problem with Skype and Phoneconnector is that it's not as idiot proof, even though it does seem much more efficient and probably more forgiving of bandwidth sqeezing.
I might give Skype the chance of running without Azureus - but there's still the issue of the USB port fucking up.
But having now discovered that rates have gone up to 10c a minute to the US, all this just seems like teeth.
Someone clever decided to post a list of overlaps between Sports Night and West Wing. I'm gonna e-mail them with ones I think they missed. Eventually.
Fighting about "going to the hot club"
In both series, relationships break up over the guy being too boring/serious, and the woman wanting too much to be exciting, and go out, be seen, go to the right club etc.
In Sports Night this is what breaks up Natalie and Jeremy in Dana Get Your Gun. On West Wing, this is the background story of Sam breaking up with his fiance Lisa Sherborne in 100,000 Airplanes.
This other one I need to tidy up:
With regards to fathers' adultery as discussed here there's also another theme that runs through boths episodes, that both episodes mention maritime, or celestial navigation (a theme repeated in the title of the WW episode "Celestial Navigation"). Both episodes refer to finding out about the father's adultery as changing everything, and this is compared to something as fundamental as maps changing, or in Jeremy's case, wanting to find out how something happened. This is echoed in Natalie breaking down to Isaac ("And the Crowd Goes Wild) about Jeremy wanting to get his stuff back, and giving the tape to the police, as violating a fundamental principle.
And so Louis is not crazy, and Diane Warren did write a song for Chicago based on her overhearing a divorced couple (or some such). Look Away. I'm just wondering now who "Don't Turn Around" was originally written for - I suspect that it's Ace of Base, but that blows my mind, and Aswad?
Getting more convinced that DVD rips aren't the same quality as HD rips. Finding Aphex Twin rather convincing. Ambient thing seems rather enjoyable, and quiet without being melancholy, which is a plus. Now starting to wonder if getting Boomtown was a mistake. More and often. Perhaps. Some things, however, are just too scribbly, and you get the feeling that you're just scratching.
I suppose I could write about the vague watchability of Boomtown, mostly because of the parables it spins. Just tad. I've just said that I've been trying to watch funnier things recently, and that's pretty true. The noodle place people recognise me now. It's probably worse at night with no people and no activity. And if I shower now, I won't sleep for a while yet, which doesn't seem so attractive to me. But my Lacey Chabert's grown up into a babe hasn't she? Less distinctive features, but such come hither hair. Though really it just might have been the same strategy as Mary McCormack, being Mary Louise Parker. Bonnie Hunt just seems so rife with insecurity, an ooze of vulnerability.
It's just that she uses her sentiment like a bludgeon. Fair enough it's not Alanis, but still annoying. That and the gameshow music.
And so the mysticism of Laura Nyro. From what I can hear she seems to be the Carole King of something, her renditions just quiet, sincere, clenching, not the same kind of spunk you hear with the ones that hit. It's probably not more than inevitable that the picting of it should come about, Amy Sherman and Aaron Sorkin, like a ball. It's a kind of plaintive wondrousness to discover these tiny stitchings, when the fabric is blanket and wrapped to everyone else perhaps. And particularly that the scriptor would have been obscured herself by aforementioned spunk. It's a kind of tugging, a kind of happy happy tugging, glad. I suppose a mention of basket weaving would not be out of place in all this. Layers and reusing of old whiskey to retain consistency. Listening with your spine.
Sophia Bush and Kristen Bell really look spookily like each other. If only it was called Hermione. Foghat rocks. Seoul Raiders was pretty awful. And like I told Winston, second day's a charm. Someone really needs to assure me that it's not the bloody drivers, and that the underclocking is making things better.
Oh my. Marti Noxon must be as concerned with ratings as much as she is with comedy. There's only one word to describe how bad it is. Charmed.
The girl girl dynamic isn't even as interesting or arresting as Hex. The non-blonde one is even slightly better than the locus, but they're all too pretty and blank.
How many times to they need to get shot? How much trauma do they have to go through? Someone must really have realised that the most fun you can have is people shooting each other up.
Ok, wow. They really pulled out all the stops for these guys leaving the series. The Doc thing is absolutely breathtakingly distancing and powerful. Bang. Though really, all the people who are good looking enough to still have a career must have decided to leave.
But really, somewhere along the line someone must have realised that there's only so much you can do with fire, so now it's a cop show with paramedics.
Well, apparently there are reasons why some people get to executive produce. Edward Allen Bernero is now interesting to me. The episode was really rather good, not exactly real-time, but done in extended long shots, nicely timed for the ads. Very detective fiction, a really rather lovelily put together. I suppose if I have to show anyone an episode of Third Watch, this would be it. I wonder if they ask very conscientiously for the actors to retain some fashion of how they speak, because the actors seem to talk a particular way, particularly pronounced with Davis and Monroe.
This really did seem to have a kind of lyricism about it, not surprisingly it felt very much like Before Sunset. What I'd take issue with is the symmetry of the dialogue, too neat, too closed off, too bookended and deliberately and contrivedly rambly - like the establishing and closing shots etc.
Yeah, apparently they just needed to get their stride back, took them till mid-season though.
Oh, and Mimi Leder's episodes of Jonny Zero (actually, most of that show so far) has been so absolutely disappointing. Especially for the fact that they're trying to be Angel, with Burly Guy in need of Redemption, Mouthy Sidekick, and Rescued Girl. The direction relied too much on very blarey music, and felt too much like an action film.
5th season third watch is a bit poor. I'm going to say they do rather unearned things, and that they try to "dig deep" in to the concept - but just for perspective I used to say that about Aaron Sorkin's West Wing season premieres. It's nice though, following through on a big narrative, a very large tattoo.
I suppose I shouldn't feel funny about people feeling sorry for me - I feel sorry for me :P. I really shouldn't start writing when I'm going to be distracted.
But really, after you hear John Wells (or whoever) talking about how after a while you have to stir the pot, it makes the stirring a bit contrived. And you'd think that there should never be such a thing as a transitional season, though that's what West Wing 5 was, that's what this season feels like. Also the meshing is starting to get really contrived.
Maybe it's just the start of season blues, along with the new, and not terribly engaging, characters. Tia Texada was much more fun when she first came on, and Nia Long is just so yawn inducing it's not true. Also the police storylines can begin to feel like they dominate, probably because they have that much more scope in many ways.
Mary McCormack was really rather fun on Celebrity Poker Showdown. She, like Mary Louise Parker, have people to thank.
Oh, and Jennifer Paige may be coming out with a new album eventually, having moved to the south etc. Yahoo search is good in that they tend to return the official page first.
I get the feeling it would have been an interesting and probably fittingly dramatic feature project, but as a series it seems to stumble quite badly. Sabrina Llyod is still quite fetching, but...
I've just discovered this lovely site devoted to the Yokas-Boscorelli relationship. Apparently these people refer to themselves as "shippers".
Yahoo Search isn't bad. It's currently replaced my default search from that other search that's getting backlashed as of now. Opera's editable search.ini is a god-send, as it the search.ini editor - both of which are easily searched for. I'm tired of opening movable type in IE, so I've taken to using Opera's notes to manually edit links.
So just to say, if people want to find solace from Chinese New Year, they're welcome to come over. Just remember that you will be required you to bring oranges to bai the stately and matriarchal Prudence. One in each paw. Plenty of prata and mee goreng.
I like Faith being special. I suppose it's all a lot more entertaining that I gave it credit for, as long as you get into it. Carlos was pretty Peep Show, but he was undoubtly effective, and not just a little funny a lot of the time.
Those fingers were gloating, not the expression of anything other than spite and bile. Whether wagging of flipping. It's honestly almost obscene that they should feel the need to abuse symbols in this way.
The gadding tourists abound Beach Rd make me wish I was back in Boston.
I just had a dream about the Britney Spears dating reality show. It seemed to be a continuation of something. I wasn't doing too well. My father was there somehow trying, on the train, to get his laptop online. I had an overly intellectual conversation with her and it seemed to go really badly, particularly when she didn't quite get me and she didn't know the word "visceral". Apparently Harvey Weinstein was the one producing the show. I also kept being castigated for not taking out my sheets in the morning, so much that I was fined for it later. I had left for some reason and come back to the midst, only find things had changed, and I had to catch up on my journal writing for her. After dozing I went to get paper from the room. In doing so I stumbled upon one of the guys making out with another girl, probably part of the show, an assistant of Britney's. I persisted, however in getting the paper, then told them to carry on. Later I realised that there had been a sock on the door and I had been too sleepy or something to notice. The guy got kicked off. Reminds me of barging into the greek guy's room with his hot girlfriend naked under the sheets, trying to get rizla. The bizarre shift was when we were suddenly in a kind of forum or tribunal questioning a killer, when the guy next to me said, I'm gonna kill him, kill you, then kill myself. I didn't quite hear him, so I asked him to repeat himself, and while he was doing that I wrestled the gun from his hands.
This probably goes up there with the -- as slayer dream.
And so perhaps Louis should do a kind of TV diary for each day, since that is what Louis does the most each day here.
Currently in freeze frame is the SI Swimsuit Model Search, the (probably) penultimate episode, and I find that they're making me root for Alicia - in a way that says to me this is the choice they want me to make, by stating that clear preference and portraying her narrative as the most compelling. And in such a way that doesn't make me think it's a fake-out. And looking at the shoots, I probably agree.
Project Runway isn't online, but the pictures on the website paint quite nicely the USPS thing that happened, and Austin making his model debut.
Just to mention though, that Louis has reorganised his room, so that the dining table is now right next to the bed, ready to be pulled out for mahjong etc. and the couch is now nearer the kitchen. Most important is that now the route to the toilet is no longer one that has to be traversed with such care.
State of the Union was a bit too showy for me, too much staged, which made the moving portions all the more alienating in retrospect. Immigration is something he seems genuinely to be standing up for, and he did a good job of articulating the need for Social Security reform. The vision of smaller government came out well. The layout of the Democratic response was a bit bizarre.
I'm considering whether to go for another 15" LCD, or should I already be thinking the prices of the 17s are good enough. I'm looking at the entry level 17" DVI from Viewsonic at $469 (all in Sing), or the 15 from Acer at about a hundred dollars less. It would seem to make sense to go for the 17, but first I have questions about how the desktop would span between resolutions, and really, if the S-Video will just clone, whether it's worth it at all to go ahead. Though I really should RMA the CMV one before it's too late. I'll probably just go and take a look at them and make a decision.
Just in passing, Last Train was a bit too reliant on it's OTT scoring, and was very radio watching. Third Watch season 3 similarly.
monkeysgotufty.com
Apparently someone's discovered that self-immolation is funny. All MS all the time. TV Tome, and Channel 4.
How fucked up is the American version going to be?
Somehow it seems that the Economist is the one that is able to write about industry and commerce with that kind of excitement and unseemly desire. And yet they do so by telling stories, creating manifestation - the narrative of sucess. You succeed by having followed the tenets, you fail by having not, or by not being aware of the tenets then; when things change, change your mind. It's just typical that the aspirational tone of it, and the mode in which it is presented, would be the way to make it sound like they were writing about there being no help or pity.
It's always sad when a series you like gets cancelled. Thankfully rips are now pretty much readily available of Grounded For Life.
Just a note to people, could you bring me back my stuff? It's not that I really need it back, but I'm beginning to forget what I've lent out, and I should try and get it back.
These would include Sports Night, any more sets of keys, Robotech, my magnetic card for the main door, Jenna Haze, probably Dead Ringers? Well, basically if you have it bring it back, you know, whenever.
Not bad for $130, 29 inch, Panasonic, about 5 years old, including them delivering it to me :D. 2 S-Video inputs, one for DVD, another for my comp - perfect. They said they'd deliver tomorrow night.
Remember Info.txt in mail. Copy over Outlook files, clean install Acer, install phoneconnector (software first), test skype, get beta of ABC, ask about new features, rip Murder One, rip K Street, laundry, go through mail, install kingston software, clean install klipfolio.
Bridge on Saturday. Buy beer. Buy CDRs. Ramones. Try file transfer with Winrar corp.
Writing suddenly seems to have become incumbent on me drinking, which is always a good sign. I think I've decided that general culling is going be better than obsessive arranging, at least this time round. Stout tastes funny.
I got my reality distorted again. Widgets look nice, but thinking of Opera and Klipfolio, those all seem less and less impressive. And when he goes on about digital music it makes me want to hit things.
First you show up. Then you see what happens.
Watching it brings me to a number of conclusions. I feel the sudden urge to react strongly against Todd Haynes. His politics is more middle-brow than I'd think imaginable - the term "the robots are going to eat us" springs to mind - or my new favorite, a capitalist version of a tin foil hat. Boo hoo, commercial representation, blah blah, oh marxist me. Twat. A large portion of why the film might be thought of as compelling would be due to the music, which is rather lovely. It was pointed out to me one of Haynes' contradictions in the film, that fame and celebrity, more importantly media-ness, come under some kind of limp flailing, when there's this almost fetishistic interest in the persona of a figure that would be iconic for so many reasons. ie he is politically and socially conscious/sentient (barely), but he still loves the trappings of Karen Carpenter. But she does sound like Aimee Mann. And as far as I know, image, or the perpetuation of image, is supposed to have a lot less to do with it than familial control. I refer you to my second chapter. I'd provide a link to the site where you can get it as a direct download, but the rest of the site is annoying beyond words. If he's still going on in the same way, he's that particular kind of rabid. The rabid that eats itself.
And so it seems a bit fun to just treat writing here (avoiding the B word) as a way of staving off desperation - the boring kind. Bunch of things that are slipping away, but whatever. Rachel Ray is on, and it is so much like porn, it's almost not funny.
I've always sort of liked making lists here, so DiscHub, another spindle of 50 Taiyo Yuden, the compact fluorecent bulbs, new thumbdrive, think about the new hitachi drive.
Writing here makes it clear that it's not a new medium, simply another interface - it doesn't seem to fundamentally change the experience. Links I suppose (the pictures could have been clipped in), but...
I almost wrote "it's strange the way things happen", but then decided that I'm not that awful a writer yet.
I had actually just recieved an e-mail from my hosting provider, telling me I had a vulnerability in my forum software (phpBB) that made them want to bale hay, but within minutes they've fixed it so ta-da.
What that led to though, was me actually going to my forum, something I haven't done for a bit, and find out people had actually posted on there. Now I suppose they posted while I was being lazy and holidaying in sunny Boston the last week, but no I probably wouldn't have known anyway.
The first is rather inconsequential, some girl/woman asking for free homework advice on the "meaning" of the flitcraft parable. Not that I'd mind talking to her about it, but she'd have to make a bit more of an effort - an e-mail about what she's got so far and a phone number/IM address would be sufficient. As will become more important later, my e-mail address, which I should make more prominent on my blog, can be found on the main page, www.fallingbeam.org.
I also stumbled upon someone posting in my guest book, you can read it here. Now this is remarkable in and of itself, since he's the first person ever to do so ever. It also probably betrays his age/technical knowledge, which I'm not making note of to scoff or belittle, but it tells me any number of things. First that he might not have spent that much time on this, and being a news person I suppose that fits in with some idea I might have of them. Secondly that he's from the Guardian, and despite(?) what I might otherwise say about it, it is also another one of those that talks about blogs a lot, though since they give prizes for them, they can't be all that silly about it. But I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that google ranks me pretty high in a search for Symrin.
This is what he wrote, which when I read it struck me with a kind of unexpected surprise (sic); and the instance of it was suddenly rather moving.
"Hi there - I don't know if this is the way to send a message - excuse ignorance - but I chanced through Google on a reference to the Symrin takeaway in York in a message on your site from 'subtitles'. This described Naseem Majothi the powerhouse behind the takeaway - though not by name. I thought Subtitles might be interested to know that Naseem is indeed a marvellous person from a marvellous family. Her father Yusuf has just died and I went with my family to a very moving ceremony of tributes to him at Huntington school in York on Sunday - all sorts of people from his brothers to a police inspector and neighbours talking about him. My connection with the family is that my parents took them in when they were expelled from Uganda by Idi Amin in 1972 - with just £55 having had their thriving business taken from them without compensation. The spirit they showed in rebuilding their lives is truly admirable and U hope a source of hope and encouragement to others. They also make extremely good food - if Subtitles doesn't already know, they may be interested to hear that a proper restaurant next to the Symrin is under construction. Anyway, hope that's interesting. It's a small world thanks to the Net. All best Martin Wainwright (Northern editor, The Guardian)"
The occurance of events just seems all kinds of boggly. As Mal would say in reaction to a naked woman in a freezer-box: "huh." The blog entry he found was this one.
Well, Martin, my name is Louis Khor, I was a student at the University of York from 2000 to 2003. I started ordering Symrin because I'd heard great word of mouth about it from a friend I no longer talk to whose girlfriend at the time was a muslim and he'd joined the muslim society and heard about this place and told me (amongst others). Coming from Singapore we were all used to a much different tenor of "curry", I would assume south rather than north indian. But intitially the reputation was of big portions and the hottest curry we'd ever tasted anywhere. Initially my house mate would order and he would be know as Mr. Ong, but eventually when i started calling more, she would start to think he was me, Mr. Louis, and that's when he ceded ordering duties to me, because he suspected she was nicer to me. Knowing that Uni fees aren't what they are for foreign students, I'm convinced that if she had children, that I'd helped to put at least one of them through Uni, with the amount and freqency I ordered, or as it might turn out, they might think of naming a table in their new restaurant in my honor :).
She really was unfailingly friendly, though there were times when you could tell that she was no end of busy. After a while, I abdicated my choice of curry to her, since I had tried too many things there for me to trust my notion of novelty. She would sometimes include free drinks, and her free portions of sweet rice got me hooked on to that in turn.
On certain days, if I'm not wrong, it would be her father, the one mentioned above, who would deliver the curry. He was always similarly affable, and the recurrance of his deliveries was uneventful in as much as he wasn't a dolt and didn't get lost/late. It's unfortunate that the memory I have of him is not the most flattering one, the memory of young people thinking old people simply a bit barmy. He had once offered me and my kitchen of housemates the oppurtunity to buy the lovely chicken and spices and stuff that they bought wholesale, and we all smiled indulgently and sort of rolled our eyes. When I tried once ordering curry power, it never appeared, so...
As for her, I only met her, and saw her holding court, that once, and much of that recollection still seems pretty accurate. What I do remember is her being rather more forceful to her local staff, in the way only immigrant figures ordering about brits can be - reminds me of the chinese supermarket in leeds. Though now I think of it, her register did significantly alter even when she shifted from clients to her kitchen staff. She offered us free drinks and chastise me for getting the rather expensive Rani, and for later leaving the cans lying about. I'm so definitely going back there when next we go over to the UK. I hope the restaurant is up by then. Unfortunately I can't even seem to remember the number of the place, much less the address. I'm sure directory inquiries will have it somewhere.
I had to steel myself with a bottle of stout to write this. There's just been too much pre and post holiday trauma with money pissed away for me to be too eager to do too much. I hope my RMA goes well. I suppose there's really no need for martin to contact me again, and he's probably as elusive to contact as he found me to be, so whatever, but my e-mail address, as referenced above, can be found here.
Edit: Michel helpfully pointed this link out to me, the mention is right at the bottom (Opera's search function would be particularly useful). Here's the details of Symrin anyway for those looking for it:
Symryn
4 Saxon Place, York YO3 7UE
Tel: 01904 426293
This is pretty close to what I'm going to submit to Universities. It's an introduction and 3 chapters. Download in pdf here. Oh yeah, and thanks for the unmitigated deluge of volunteers the last time, I really *felt* the love.
Edit: Theres a newer, nicer formatted and spell-check version you can get here. I can't remember, but I don't think there are any huge substantive changes, it just looks nicer.
Ooh, look at me, I'm so wet, what could I do to become even more wet? Oh look, we're women, lets have drama drama drama. You love me, I know it.
Oh my god, the much much of *drama*.
I'm watching the OC preview teaser thing now, and it makes me want to watch the first season again.
Beer's nice. Nice cold beer. I think I've really come around on Becks; Bret Easton Ellis knows his shit - or is it Donna Tartt?
I'm increasingly fond of my new lamp, and am looking forward to the next one. Anyone going to IKEA is welcome to join me. I also need to go to Kino at Taka to replace a pen.
Entourage isn't too bad; again, fondness. As with the first season, Dead Like Me is picking up towards the end of the season. I also now have a nice pretty flower.
I started this post to write about something, which I now think I've forgotten - it might have been the lamp, but that doesn't seem quite right. My Audigy 2 NX is nice, except for the clicks - but I'll check that out some other time.
Michel, apparently, is another satisfied customer of the PX 100 - I was a bit too alarmist about warning him off the PX 200/250, since they're so-called noise cancelling - basically they're not as comfortable and the reviews say they don't sound as good.
I have the sudden urge to use my webcam, but I'm sure no one'd be particularly interested. It's probably because it's now perched nicely on my replaced monitor that is much better than the previous one.
1) Starhub and its addition of "free services" that will later have to be paid for - without advertising the fact anywhere except your bill.
2) The complete and utter inability to opt-out of M1 SPAM. I typically get it about once or twice a week.
3) ATIP labelling on Recordable Media packaging - education on benchmarks and media scans.
4) Console in Sim Lim to check prices - price transparency is essential for consumer confidence.
And so you wonder at there being a John Lennon episode of Freaks and Geeks, beyond the John Bonham one. And again the romance of doomed story cycles. And not milking it.
This is dedicated to someone I asked for something from and never really gave her back what she asked for, and I'm a quite a bit apologetic, which is me for sorry.
I think I'd be pretty upset if I looked back on this period of my life and remembered how one of the last great civil-rights conflicts occured and I did nothing more than mew. I'm going to try stowing some of my mitigation and attempt to be as little ambivalent as possible.
My response for a while now, has been (like "bite - me, who's. yo. daddy.") there is nothing to discuss. I am someone who has a great issue with evangelism - but I've also recently reminded myself that hypocrisy is what springs to the minds of people who lack imagination. Not that this is evangelism, but well, the hypocrisy thing sounded good anyway. Which is my roundabout way of saying - there's nothing to discuss.
I remember an extended and rather torturous conversation with Karen about morals - basically, me say morals = bad. But some things are just Right (up till a minute a go, it was Wrong). So - some things are just Right; there is nothing to discuss.
Another time, I said rather in a forceful way that the economic argument is a great one, since it got around rather silly arguments otherwise. Perhaps I want to say that because I want to be too Post-so many things, or I'm just in a place where aspiration and ideals are crushingly not encouraged. Regardless, money is a good reason, and one that can't be argued against except by people who want to protest globalization.
In many ways, I'm in two minds about any number of things, paternalistic single party states being one of them. With that in mind, I say this: if you have a bully pulpit, use it. Use it not for paltry things, don't be mealy mouthed about genuinely good policies *perhaps* disenfranchising groups of people - but above all, use it for things that are Right. Things that are Right are just that, Right. Republics were formed at least in part to protect the minority from the tyranny of the majority. If it's Right, it's Right.
I sometimes talk about the End of Satire - and I say it in the face of the entirely insensible. Do a search on this site for that phrase and you'll see how this links with free trade and the perception of self.
Some people (who are being repressed) say things to me like they don't need to get married, it's not something they're interested in, that all this is just unwanted attention making people backlash. I know this won't make me anybody's darling, and things will never be Right Right in my lifetime or the next - but it makes me angry and makes me want to do something about it whether they want it or not. I'm curmudgeonly in my own way and I speak like the I/eye of Empire, which translates in to all too earnestly; but like I said, things may never be Right. I wonder whether I really should be comforted by Derrida saying that the process of assimilating the Other is always necessarily a process.
I don't know if I've really changed my mind, but it's probably best that some things just remain Right, though somewhere I really believe some things are just Wrong. As for the lives people live, that's none of anybody's business - except the gossips like me. The act of Being is Being - but only when that Being is not shrouded, not hidden, not In or Out.
People who know me should realise that I really appreciate combative conversations - I'm not trying to beat people or evangelise, but I appreciate conversations where actual opinions are expressed. I love nothing better than being convinced to like something that you sincerely recommend. But at the same time, I'm not about to mince words about what is paltry and otherwise what I want to be effusive about.
There is not need to be offended - I think someone I really appreciate is Chris - someone with whom there can be heated debate with, and then you go out and have dinner.
I'm apologising for moving important posts down in the ranking, but I'm now watching the Bangles episode of Gilmore Girls - and like Paris who has just said it, I really like this band.
I need friendly volunteers to give me feedback on an unfinished draft of my novel - e-mail me if you're interested. In a moment of weakness I'm going to say that anyone can apply - though depending on who you are I might be very strict as to the kind/amount of feedback I want - if you don't want to be offended by this, you can, well, fuck off.
Total strangers can apply, but I can't promise I'll be incredibly enthusiastic - you have to sound friendly and not be stupid. There's an e-mail link on the mail page of www.fallingbeam.org if you don't already know how to get at me.
There's an introduction that I'm working on now, and two chapters that I've just tweaked, and a third chapter that's being finished and a fourth that's in teeny tiny pieces.
I'm suddenly very taken with the idea of Leigh (AllisonLeigh from the MyOpera forums) reading this, so on the astronomical off-chance that you are, e-mail me, since I've lost your address.
And just as a curiousity, the title is derived from this.
Also see this.
You cannot stop me from doing something that is simply possible on the network - it is there, it is available, so it is fair game so long as I affect no one else in the process. If you can find a way to secure your network to stop me doing certain things, all power to you - well actually no, wait a minute, unless it's a serious security breach that will affect others, you can bite my shiny metal ass.
As long as the work gets done, what the hell business is it of yours what I do while I'm getting there? If I'm not doing my job properly, you can avail yourself to the channels in place to have me disciplined/fired. What I do doing company time, goofing off included, is none of your god-damn business, as long as at the end of the day the work is done.
I don't even claim that there's any positive work aspect to porn (hence people in some places having porn accounts signed up for them) - it's simply none of their business. What exactly is a misuse of "company" property anyway? You're given a tool, and you use it to accomplish a task - but unless you want to at least partially break the tool, and waste your own expenditure, whatever else that tool can be used for, it should be used for. If I want to shove a staple remover up my ass to get me off, why not? No harm is done to others.
If I use the company car to ferry grapes, that was otherwise scheduled to be used by some other freak, then okay - but it is the incident of misuse, not the principle. If there are limited resources, fine, you can say that when there is excess demand, that users curb behaviour that would otherwise infringe on the resources of others, that's sensible. If I use excess capacity on the network at night to play online games and download pr0n, warez, gamez, mp3z, whose resources am I taking away from? If there is talk of legal liability, it is the end user who might be the subject of a sanctimonious and contrary government directive, the network itself is dumb and innocent - or it should be.
The only issue is an (at best) idiotic moral one - or a matter of PR. So you find out that a government agency is rife with porn surfers, so what? Government has no right to monitor the actions of individuals, much less people under their employ, unless there is a significant suspicion of wrongdoing that is to the detriment of others. Legality and government action is not to act as a censorious moral unity - it is there to prevent harm to others, or to help those that require help: if they can't find help elsewhere.
Not that PR is a bad thing in the way morals are, at least PR is honest. People are not normally like this, but in our company/government, we uphold a higher standard of professionalism. So if you accidentally e-mail your client pictures of you eating messily or dressing like a tramp in a sex-game with your partner, the company might castigate you for the slatternly manner of your portrayed deportment or bearing - would you that it were otherwise?
Sometimes how you get there is none of your fucking business. If you cut corners and endanger others or profits by doing so, that's an issue, not when you simply do things in a way other people have an irrational dislike for.
So they discover this about your company - are you so taken with your corporate ethos and identity, by even your national/religious rectitude that you fail to recognise that individuals are people too? Can you no longer differentiate your image of professional ability, which you rightly demand from your emplyees, from their entitlement of rights and opinions and desires?
I've discovered a cool thing to do with e-mail filters in Fastmail. If you include a "secret word" in your subject line, or use e-mail+secretword@fastmail.fm as the recipient, it will bypass all filters - ie it will definately get through to me.
I now designate my secret word to be batchcakes - but replace the a with an i where it most counts. This refers only to my public address that I tend to send mails out to friends with by mistake instead of my personal address.
Hi, I've put filters on my public e-mail account - so don't include anything that might set off my rather crude filters that will reject your mail and not notify you of the rejection. This includes the sure sign of spam: ...
So be more certain about your mail.
Or you can be good and send mail to the personal address I give to people, not forms. Yes I, by mistake, send personal mail from my public address, but people just got confused with the whole business of my rather more tart and extended instructions in the form of a signature, so deal with it.
Hypocrisy (the accusation of) is the last refuge of a lack of imagination.
Makes me wish I was a communist.
There are times when you really wonder whether Republicans don't deserve to be thought of as stupid.
M1 sends SMS Spam. I'll say that again. M1 sends SMS Spam.
You *cannot* opt out.
They do not ask if they can send you spam.
It is unsolicited marketing and it is *Unethical*.
They claim that because I'm using a pay as you go mobile and hence it is "technologically impossible" to not send me spam.
It appears that it is an extra service not to be harrassed.
It is an extra service not to recieve spam from the people who are sending it. Where do I sign up?
I cannot be removed from their database. "Technologically impossible".
Their site also happens to be BROKEN.
Isn't Zhang Yimou a clever clever man? It just shows that if you're intelligent enough, you actually can present melodramatic farce in your film to a fantastic end. You'd think only the middle-brow amongst us would walk out without feeling either pleased, sobbing, or smiling. Of course it helps if you still understand how to convincingly present spectacle. Though I'm convinced that Zhang Ziyi's appeal (sexual and otherwise) is in seeing her looking frustrated. But yes, if you want to see sexual charge, the film is also, in that regard, breathtaking.
It's a pity that he should be associated with a jingoistic rally (allegory-style) round the exclusion of foreigners and immigrants. So *that's* what that kind of masturbatory chest-clasping does to people. It's almost stunningly symmetrical, how the declamations of predjudice serve as a moralistic sheen for a more fundamentally racist political agenda - it's almost like classic hollywood.
I feel a bit (not quite exactly the same though) like Daisy right now.
I think I rather like this, considering films suspiciously after their DVD release rather than when they're in the theatres - especially the ones I wouldn't otherwise touch. It allows you to actually see the film. (subtle reference to barn isn't it?)
Who would have thought that Richard Curtis could write better, more convincing, more sincere, and much gentler swaying political commentary than people would credit Michael Moore with? In so many ways I should be offended by how polemical it might be thought of as - but if nothing else, at least he tries to be complicated despite the insistence towards referencing the puerile and sentimental.
How could those people have trailed the film so badly?
I suppose it's not the thing itself that impresses me - but predictably enough for my understanding of myself - it is the avoidance that seems so heartfelt. It's a film with a very fragile insistence that is brittle despite being soft, and whether they realise it or not, very very hard. I suppose it does what good comedy does, show and then do really good gloss. I'd have to watch it again, but I'd like to think it has that same undercurrent of desperation that comes with all declaration - with all marvelous fictions that gesture towards the impossible.
I don't think I've ever been offended by the first couple of frames of a show's theme - much less started an entry being supremely annoyed by it before the end of said theme. The words fuck and me come to mind. I feel like I should be Toby right now.
Huh, I don't know where they've been all my life, but now I'm starting to understand what the Manic Street Preachers were. Game On doesn't lie.
Just got the pilot for Freaks and Geeks, and Linda Cardellini does really really well. Not to mention that it gives me a much better understanding of James Franco's appeal. Dawson's Creek really did a disservice to Busy Philips, and yay for geeky slayerette.
Part of me really dislikes the image of myself that came to being when I started running. It's just too much an accomodation.
It's not quite the right shade of blue, but it's actually solid and not flimsy plastic, so it's a good seat - all are welcome to come and gaze in wonder at mad skilz.
I suppose consumer advocacy is more what I want to do, rather than simply commercial consultation.
And it's lovely to have a full 256 of upload to complement the 3000 downstream - I recommend it to anybody. 1500 is for chumps (yes, this means you).
And to think that the place is actually clean - not perhaps in spite, but independant like Hedda Gabbler.
I suspect I'll succumb to my spending instincts by the time I talk to Leong - dual-layer is too far away for me to wait like that, and anyway it should be affordable before I jump. And hopefully they don't run out of Ritek so soon.
There really is a certain poetry about Anna Paquin - the wispy album cover kind. DJ boyfriend indeed. I suppose it wouldn't be me if I didn't complain how the development of Fly Away Home really lets down the really lyrical evocative beginning. I mean but she really is beyond being good for a child actor. There's something about this particular film that just allows her to be the focus, it's not the importance of the Piano, and it's not the shrift of X-Men - it can really be a film that has her in it. It's a certain kind of breathtaking.
The impression of things being wrong isn't and shouldn't be cause for anything. In envisaging a more open society, I can't think of anything that annoys me more than the advent of rabidly adversarial sniping. I'd like to ask myself though, what I'm to do with the fact that people take advantage, and that calls to responsibility are probably more regressive than I'd give them credit for.
I can't believe that a single party is the product of the fact that there is only a single issue. Though to be sure, there probably is only one broad vision that is most congruent with momentum - and that should be a matter of education rather than the debate of the ignorant.
That said, political lineages are much less subject to scrutiny when there are aggressive and legitimate elections where someone else can actually win. Sonia Gandhi and genuine surprise are probably too much to ask for. Regardless, people are just more complicated than all that in person (hopefully) anyway.
And because ideologies should not be forced on anyone, money is the best reason - who wants to join my libertarian party?
Obviously the Economist just doesn't want to be anything other than clear about their opinion - but making it snarky just makes it seem all too personal - the principles they state are as like universally acknowledged truths, and they know how not to sound preachy. It is simple, when there is no Glasnost, you put the principles of Perestroika at risk despite the seems. Repeat after me - no shirt, no shoes, no dice - there are many roads to socialism.
You'd hope that when it's so flagrantly obvious that it looks like rubber that the rubber/not is not the issue. What should be the cause for national reflection is why the song and dance has to take place - the performance of legitimacy and the thing itself are not necessarily congruent. Mistaking that the hopscotching deftness is as good as, or is, the legitimacy, is the most damaging thing when there are no checks and balances.
When you can actually touch the surface to scratch it, then maybe you'll know when you're seeing the real thing. If it's right then it just is - all the flapping and tickling just makes the seems more seem. Similarly if it's wrong then it should be able to not happen, pretending otherwise is that other kind of momentum, and it's not always just farce.
But perhaps West Wing has taught me nothing? Perhaps posturing is par for the course? But you have a better chance of saying the right thing, emanating the right thing, when you are the real deal, yes/no?
Anyway, now I can feel justified in pointing you to the only place I really get news from about where I am. Take a wild guess.
I feel the need to explain to him, perhaps on the off chance that he sees this, or not, whatever.
What happens when you have no future is that you come, literally, to live in the past. You see, he, perhaps you, don't/can't understand this, certain fuckwit doesn't understand it, but it's true.
And your reaction, after a while, is to think to yourself, that this is not what you want to do, that there is nothing noble or transcendent about confronting that aspect of horror, of concieving of the world around you as an attic.
There are some people who simply do not want to talk to you (ie: me) and for all that, I think I'd rather have an empty attic.
You see, even though my third chapter is meant to lead up to a descent into hell, perhaps there's a reason it's not written yet.
That said, wouldn't you rather go back to Tekong?
Tell you what, let's go and watch Elephant together and then you'll understand better.
I'm trying to stave off watching yet another episode of Sports Night, largely due to the fact that I can't stop, and one day there will be no more.
And also, I'm here to remind myself that I should write about how Sorkin's reliance on rock to express jubilation and exuberance - happy things - is a lot more convincing with sports than it is with politics. With politics it comes off as being - I want to say smug and exclusive - self-congratulatory, perhaps indulgent.
Part of me thinks the way he handles love is the way most people of a certain kind handle it, though obviously he does it with a breathtaking deftness in a way that is eloquent and moving. And there are times when I think those people are hideous.
Did anyone else notice that the Simpson's had a rather extended reference to the Economist? What's that about? It was in the one that just aired in the US, I think 15x18.
I'm missing being in the US right now. Largely because I've actually been watching most of the TV I download with the ads cut out, since people do that as a service, and also to reduce file size. I downloaded however, an episode of Conan, and while it's dated 22nd of April, it's an older show. Regardless, I'm watching a Zelnorm ad now and it's rather gratifying. What was also cool was watching Jewel do an ad for Loreal, and if I'm not wrong, having her music in the background.
Good times.
Sports Night is absolutely breathtaking. Sure there are episodes that aren't quite as pleasing or as lyrical, but there's an inescapable (I don't use this word often) verve about the show.
I don't like sports, I don't watch sports, which is why the tagline as quoted by IMDB is pretty cool: "It's about sports. The same way Charlie's Angels was about law enforcement."
There are also significant reasons why Aaron Sorkin should choose to work so often with Joshua Malina, and within a couple of episodes this comes into clear focus, he's absolutely brilliant. I must say though, that the women in the series are exceptional, who would have guessed Natalie used to be in a cheesy rip-off of Quantum Leap (Sliders). And as the title of this post suggests, Felicity Huffman is officially my new favorite actress, for a while at least.
I want to write a glowing entry on Sports Night and Aaron Sorkin, but I really can't muster up the will to do much more than link you to the TV Tome page and the DVD that's on sale, and tell you that some friendly fellow is posting it on Suprnova.org.
Very much in the same way as people are doing for Dead Like Me. Now I'm not saying that DLM is the best series, but I do really like "A. Cook", and once Bryan Fuller got done with the considerably stiffer early episodes, and esp. once Laura Harris comes on, the series really picks up. But yes, penchant for the character of the slacker girl, and a recurrent theme of family.
I can't seem to sleep. So let's tell you what's going on. I got my debit Mastercard today, which is fun, making my life in this place complete (aside from the fuck-you glasses). Apparently you should remember to notice the words in bold on the instruction slip that tell you to use your ATM card to activate your debit card. Anyway now I won't have to carry my ATM card any more and I can stop carrying around my HSBC cards (they sent me another debit card, my issue no. is now 7...)
I've applied for a job writing about games for this place called GameAxis, which I think is a subsidiary of HardwareZone. Sounds like an ideal situation for me, but we'll see how it goes, Louis has learned how not to hold his breath. But honestly I don't think I can be bothered to try for SPH till after these guys blow me off...
I've worked my way up to doing 3 rounds round the convenient circuit near here, which takes me a nice round 30 mins. If I keep it up I really should get new shoes. I should also get more CDR, an 80 pin IDE cable, buy some M&S shirts, and perhaps more pairs of socks. Shorts I think I'm doing okay with so far.
And yes, Overnet is doing exceedingly well, with my downstream being consistently about 90-100, which is pretty amazing. And as tends to happen, it just got around to completing a whole bunch of things that had been languishing for a while, so my queue is starting to see 300...
And the ficus election episode of The Awful Truth has somewhat renewed my idea of Michael Moore. Not to mention that Louis Theroux meeting the Hamiltons was quite a bit of a hoot if I should say so myself.
I suppose again that it doesn't matter how flawed Enterprise is, it doesn't matter how mediocre it is, there are just moments when it is simply sufficient. Part of me thinks of it as the uglier twin of Firefly, since they debuted at the same time. I mean I didn't have to watch beyond the teaser to just sense that this could turn out to be a good one - perhaps more moving that I'd give it credit for, maybe less.
And it's not that it evokes particular memories, it's more likely that it triggers some subconscious response that recalls without recalling. You can read one of my previous entries on Enterprise here.
I'd like to think that my cryptic titles would be at some point an interesting study or at least a point of consideration.
Tim Minear is a clever, clever man. Part of me is just convinced that he out-Joss-es Joss Whedon. He's the reason Out of Gas is the high water mark of Firefly, and why I've just watched the second episode (actually 11th) of Wonderfalls again with a certain kind of wry, loving relish. For all Joss' talk about space and imbuing, Tim Minear is the one whose handling of it is most deft, most "organic".
And so it's done. I now have socks and shorts, so that the world may tremble. I've also bought film fest tickets, after staving off inquiries by su-lin as to whether I had actually bought them yesterday as I had said I would. For better or worse, some of the seats are couples' seats, but I'm sure we can handle that.
Uh, so what's that?
The fuck you table.
The what?
The fuck you table.
Huh?
Fuck you.
And so I went to get my new table leg and to have my chair fixed, and was happier.
It's sort of happy making, and quite calming, rearranging the stuff in the room. My secret plan, which might actually come to fruition tomorrow, involves rug for the floor and probably table for me to work at. Ask, and IKEA will provide.
Oh, and I now have tumblers, ones where you can actually pour a whole can of coke (diet vanilla) into.
I'm probably better off not using the external keyboard in all this, my right arm is feeling marginally more comfortable this way. But thankfully the table I'm looking at will actually be able to have adjustable height, so that I can lower everything to the appropriate level.
It's nice having Angel Season 4 pour into my lap, and "Spin the Bottle" is a rather very good episode, restores some of my faith that Joss does certain things fantastically.
Must remember I should buy film fest tickets some time soon, though probably won't get the chance tomorrow.
It's not an anxiety by any means, but it is something I wonder about, that my physiology has really changed after. It's just a sense of your body being different, not to mention the short term memory loss.
So you see, when you're making fun of it in the way you make fun of mechanical (or electronic) reproductions, it is a private thing, away from the intrusion of society. So you're making fun about your own, non-present, anxieties. When people who live in a place where we have the end of satire talk about it, it becomes what kettles of fish become.
So no, how would that be personal?
I've entirely forgotten that it was the Alias pilot when we have Jack Bristow telling the guy from Shindig that it really is like asking your neighbours whether you can have a loud party.
Mean spirited.
This was a couple of days ago, but just to say, Borders Singapore makes fuck-off stupid plastic bags.
Went to buy tickets for Hellboy, remarkably few pre-sales, though I suspect that Winston and I will be sitting just in front of the Hellboy Fanboy Collective who got the entire row behind us. I'm hoping this means that I did not, in fact, get seats too far to the rear of the cinema. And that dead centre on the seating chart really is dead centre in the cinema.
Overnet has been behaving itself remarkably well since I changed ports, I suspect the cable company's trying to limit usage of the default ed2k port. And I'm no longer getting the same annoying firewall messages.
I actually should be listening to "Painted from Memory" now.
It's just so typical that the reason why they didn't cut Irreversible is more reprehensible than if they had cut it.
Spartan is good, but did they have to use a hacksaw? I can only imagine what they would do if jesus was spelled as fuck in aramaic. But to a certain extent, I would say that Spartan does for the political thriller what the Wire did for crime drama. It was good. I'll get the DVD, pity I won't want to watch it in the cinemas here again.
I'm sorry, but just the idea of Peishan and her nice spanky new Bible thumping, snuff film watching fuck-buddy was just too tempting to pass up. I apologise. I should have had more faith. And by that I mean Eliza Dushku.
Being funny makes up for a multitude of sins, which, if you've watched Firefly enough times, you understand. Wonderfalls is pretty funny. Lesbian porn :).
I am now officially a bit baffled by why Fox fucked with the series run order. It was a great episode, if only for "destroy her". There really was nothing to be gained by putting those episodes first other than to pump up the concept, which to be honest is exactly what they didn't want to do if they put this as the follow up to the pilot.
It's about the family. Not about the shop.
I can't remember if Kristeva is the one that talks about this, but there is the assertion that the process of pornography is to create metonomy - to reduce the thing itself to one of it's functions or appendages. Hence, they talk about how in sexual pornography, the woman is reduced to the vagina, or in "Not I", where the woman is reduced to a virtual vagina.
So an aspect is substituted for the thing itself. Affective piety is offensive.
I'd like to say (in this case) that I don't watch pornography, but that's patently untrue in at least one (if not more) definitions (colloquial or otherwise) of the word, even though I think the statement itself is pretty accurate. I'd like to say that well, I watch porn, but I don't watch snuff films - which is true, but not quite accurate.
Hitler-Cartman is endlessly amusing.
I'm altogether too happy about the fact that I now have claritine - or actually, a form of generic loratadine. Tufty.
Oh, and that christian rock episode of south park is funny beyond words.
So... West Wing concept episodes... It's probably easier to criticise because it wasn't quite fantastic, but the gesture again is that of "we've had 4 seasons of Sorkin, and that can never be reclaimed, so lets go get dialectical on everyone's asses".
Perhaps it's because I've been watching Chris Marker documentaries (which I was trying to tell Cari about) but I had high hopes for the episode at the beginning. The immediate reaction at the end was of "not too bad", and yet 5 mins after, now, here, things are rather more like puddles of piss (ie fluid). The way the episode resolved, not even polemically, stating accusations and then putting the bow around at the end, demeaned the enterprise.
This is the reason we stopped watching the west wing after the first season, because it became insufferable at a certain point for the soft core of it's politics and the ejaculation of it's glow. What's more, the collusion of the diegetic documentary maker was all the more cloying for the looping sensationalism. Granted I came back to the earlier episodes later and couldn't find it, but I find it now, and something tells me it's different.
The digital look was fun, the press staff was fun, the use of sets was fun.
You get the feeling that the meandering of the earlier seasons served the broader aesthetic purpose, that resolution is constantly deferred, that like the trope of nation building, there is always constantly more work to be done. Now when things wrap up like candy wrappers, the twisting at the ends leaves your fingers sticky like cookies when you eat me.
It's all the more infuriating that the documentary is meant to have gestated till after the end of everything, the end of the second term. I'd never wish any series cancellation, but I wonder if I'm missing something.
I want a muffin.
I'm sorry I ever doubted how moving the West Wing could be despite everything. It's a pity that I didn't get to see the budget storyline before the later episodes. Everything really just makes Mary Louise Parker's lusciousness all the more central, all the more pregnant.
And I thought Overnet was starting to seem overrated.
Now this is what I mean and this is why I get pissed off. I don't like John Kerry enough to forgive him his demagoguery. Howard Dean is doing the right thing by his party, but he is the victim of his own sincerity.
People of integrity should be able to stand up and say what is right even when it isn't popular, and even when Lou Dobbs and the Trade Police are vershnickt. Kerry isn't stupid, Kerry is educated, and he should be standing up for smart not for ball tickling. Who would have thought that anyone would get to accuse Bush of being on the smart side of the fence?
It does make sense to send jobs overseas. I'll reference the economist to you again so you get that it is my newspaper of choice. The amount of jobs lost overseas are a tiny fraction of the workforce. There isn't enough of it to make up too significant a proportion of cyclical unemployment. Jobs are lost and gained as bad companies die out and new companies are formed. Good companies are good because they make money, would you have it otherwise?
People's jobs are more secure when the company they work for remains focused on being economically viable, which means it needs to make profit. If that means sending jobs overseas, they should be applauded with both hands. Going on a witchhunt against people who are doing exactly what they should is irrational - tell the leopard not to have spots.
More jobs overseas means what? More, and richer, people to sell your goods to. Expensive goods that only you can produce. Expensive goods that require highly paid staff to produce. And in the mean time, have you noticed that it now requires less people to do what you used to do before? A jobless recovery where production increases means a leap in productivity, which means you're getting better at what you do, which means in the future you can create even more than before - prosperity that is.
It's like Old Norse notions of honour, only this time, instead of reductive recycling of finite commodity (which seems increasingly unlikely), you have an ever expanding cycle of wealth and renewal.
And people wonder why I dismiss the Passion as affective fallacy.
People who criticise Bush on spending money on Iraq are the very isolationists that claim Bush to be so. You help yourself by helping others - if anyone should know that giving to others does not mean taking away from your own, it should be the Democrats.
Non-paltry comments can go to the forum - though for once I wonder if I shouldn't enable comments to the post. If you're not a fuckwit I'll reference you by editing this post.
Obviously I'm going to burn in that very special level of hell for this, but it's done, and I'm sorry it happened.
I can already feel like my mind is contracting and I feel dirty, not to mention paltry.
It's just the fact that the conversation takes place, that the rating should be lowered because "it's a good film" which makes me just want to point out that what government anywhere should be allowed to legislate value? Applying arbitrary notions like lines in the sand apparently isn't enough. The suppression of thought leads to impoversishment and inefficiency - the disruption of market forces, as some might say.
I wonder what the rating would be if Jesus was sodomising Mary, both of them.
Hi, I'm Louis, and I read (past-tense) today's Life.
Is there any doubt that despite the extreme close-ups, that Wonderfalls is Tim Minear's show? I'm sure no one likes that they messed with the airing sequence, but to be fair, those were pretty good episodes, and also good episodes to start with. I still get a bit disoriented when I watch Firefly and Shindig comes so early.
But yes, I must find the time and way to organise a Firefly screening party of some sort or other some time. I should also finish my third chapter.
It was quite fun the way that L word used Nick Cave, though I just remember when I first heard the song, that I wanted the interventionist god to be direct her away, out of some kind of spite or pique.
William Sadler wasn't inaccurate then in describing his character, the Bush thing was hilarious. Almost makes me want to watch the Roswell boxed set I bought.
It's not just that I terrorise, it is also that I am beset by anxieties. Things annoy people, people annoy people, certain things with certain people annoy people.
Is it any surprise to anyone that Howard Dean should be so heartbreaking to me right now? His comment is here, and he was replying to this.
And so good starts are just too much pressure. It's very satisfying not having to be polite. Simmering tension humbug boo hoo.
I, I, I. Am a man more sinned against than sinning.
And so it was that three years of his life, by passings and mishandlings, and the carelessness of listening and the slap-thwap of whispers, became transmogrified into not things.
S- had a habit of wailing on CP, oh wail, oh wail. And so when it came to money, everyone just sort of nudged about the fact that it wasn't just in money that higher ground was gained, which is what friendship is all about.
Who would have guessed that all (as far as I know) of George's stuff is being re-released. I'm suddenly really missing the Travelling Wilbury's albums. The boxed set is this, all his Dark Horse albums, even though I already have a couple of the discs already.
Unfortunately I'll end up waiting for a bit to get it, unless it's available for cheap in Singapore (not a chance), probably waiting for another more comprehensive collection to come out, or at least a complementary one. I already have the albums that aren't dark horse anyway I think.
Note to self: blogs are not meant to be pretentious(?).
And so I would sit in front of the window and stare out longingly at the curtain. All the idle lying on duck shit. It's nice to cuddle sun-block.
Return Argos stuff. Buy Bikram Yoga. Buy Shooting the Past. Nuts for dad. Trains on Sunday leave at 5.10 and 6.10, arriving at 7.19 and 8.24.
It seems ShareReactor has been the target of some governments sting, so it's offline and the owner is facing criminal charges. But well, there's still Shareconnector, fileheaven.org, therealworld.de, bucktv.com, and others who might never reach the scale of SR, but that's what suprnova is for. The wheel's always turning, but it only matters to the people on the rim.
So yes, Paul Smith shoes. 2 pairs of them no less. Lightning struck hell freezing over.
Easy racism (against mainland chinese for instance, or boat people) on the part of someone from a racial minority is fantastic, especially in the way it discomfits those in the majority who experience it with a kind of shock at the non-fraternal illiberality of it all. Of course it happens easiest from those who come originally from a place where they are anything but the minority.
And so Joss Whedon really inhabits that kind of mediocrity, the kind that Karen seems intent on bringing out in me. It is perhaps how much not I want to be intervened in that makes me so unprepared to be inadequate and unconsidered. Go fill your anxieties like a well - exactly like a well. Other people probably realise that suicide is a solution. And one that is fed.
Gone, but I don't know wh....
Need to remember to keep notebook charged so have to go to smokey area. Have a look at Karen's prospective lamp. Need to download all the crap required for creative, just in case, though the driver's what's most important. Must bring CD and DVD to test playback. Must check that they've credited my account as and when they do. Check the train timings for friday. Remember to buy watch and liquitabs. Collect pin no. Go crazy and buy a powered usb hub.
Oh and of course there had been a ridiculousness about soliciting friendship, or the feeling of it, remotely, and by proxy, which he admitted later; but you get lonely after you leave and you wish the ones who could make it otherwise weren't either. But cradle snatching happens, and well, that's something.
"Is it time for the descent into hell yet?"
"Oh we love those, ."
"You remember that last one, with the buttons and the fringe?"
"Oh no, was it...? Oh yes, yes... no."
"Excuse me, are you writing stairway to heaven in there?"
And so it was an overly bright day in Manchester and K and D2 were in The Filmworks, after it was a multiplex but before it was sticky. K felt it was very much like a the painting of the open door, both in the hanging and the brushing, and especially with the unintentional red lights, and that smell that smelled like pre-haunting emulsion. That was the day when they'd both discovered why you always have a pair of sunglasses on overly bright days in Manchester.
First off, let's send you to C-Span.org, it's the website for a public interest broadcaster in the US that has loads of content on the elections so far and in particular, content on Dean. His remarks at the Gridiron Luncheon are a good place to start. And well you could have a look at www.deanforamerica.com.
I'll say it here. I don't think John Kerry will win it. And if he does, I really don't think he'll be the kind of president envisaged by those who support him. Put simply, he doesn't have the brass. "He's better than the other guy" is not good enough.
But enough about that. You can find a nice simple bittorrent client here. More info, and an introduction and useful FAQ can be found on the original bittorrent page.
Once that's installed, you should go to www.suprnova.org (yes it's misspelled) and go crazy. The link for Firefly, though, is here.
The problem, though, is that you're behind a router, and without you reading a router manual (they're actually really short and clear though) this is what you should do. You have a Netgear router. I'm not sure of the exact model no. but I suspect it's this, the manual for it is here. Anyway, you need to know about port forwarding, so you should read this to figure out what to do. The ports required are supposedly 6881-6999, but you can read more about it at the rather more informative d-link page, they're another company that make networking equipment, but the info is similar. Oh, and you find out your IP (which is where the ports will be forwarded to ie your computer) by looking at this.
You wonder when "they'll like us when we win" stops being enough. If there was one thing that made Dean stand out it was that he was willing to say that he's willing to make the right decision, whether it's popular or not. I'm not saying his rationale for revisiting trade agreements wouldn't have been fallacious, or that they wouldn't be fueled by the same affective fallacy that afflicts so called "liberals", but at least the gesture was there. Kerry can still bite me.
Now it just seems that jobs has become such an Issue that only the Republicans can sound the right note. And as for Lou Dobbs, you wonder whether there was some point when the media said to itself that a part of their service to the public should not be to feed its anxieties under the pretext of assuaging them, but rather be a tool for public education.
For a government that is founded on it's ability to educate it's electorate, it's unwillingness to promote what is right and things that are irrepressible, is simply irresponsible - a lacking of will and information.
You claim that people aren't going to like it and yet you concieve of yourself as being able to guide people into thinking the right way. You can stick your neck out and say unreservedly that free trade is the way to go (as they admirably should) and yet this truth is just too difficult for people to swallow even when it has no effect on them or their perception of their pocket books.
I wonder if I would ever explain to Mary the feelings I have of antagonism towards people who previously had authority over me. Or if I could explain, as I could to Cari, that I (like her) live in morbid fear of bumping into people I might know on the street.
So yes, I've always gotten bad vibes from certain people, and others well probably don't have the time or inclination to be that friendly. Not that I don't understand this, I never really want to see any of my recruits' ever again, as might be rather explosively been shown when that guy turned up in Su-lin's room. But translation man.
I think I will try to make the first step and try to e-mail Matt.
As you'd think, the Economist probably does a lot better at making the case that trade and capitalism have to be accelerated, not retarded, to make the world a better, and less poor, place.
That, and why Americans really shouldn't be so obsessed with the movement of jobs. And basically that they're better off now than they ever were. (The first link requires subscription)
Just right now, Aimee Mann is making me want to cry.
It's all about drugs, it's all about shame.
There's just an emptiness of feeling in the inability to make connections and the inability to think and have thought. It might a bit be about superiority and pity but it's also a great feeling to have access to that well of feeling and that grasp of intellect and thought. You wonder if righteous anger might not be seperated from it.
I'm just here, not really wanting to look at my scribbles, wondering if I should go to Borders. I'll be off to have dinner in a minute probably, likely to be burger king. Don't feel like browsing DVD's or CD's, feeling a bit tired, wishing I wouldn't end up smelling.
It's pretty goddamn cold today, about 4 degrees. I'll probably eat, then go back to Karen's, hang out till I got to Delwyn bearing eggs and hopefully a working copy of DVD-Region-Free.
And I don't feel like playing Ultima 9. Is this really a genuine sense of not wanting to be immersed to come up and want againt to be swept away? Only this time the Oceans have stopped and the waves are too embarassed to crash anywhere except Karen's room.
I'm seeing Ve-Yin tonight, hopefully for a nice fulfilling dinner. It'll be a bit strange no doubt, I hope he figures to come upstairs to look for me, though I'll take a stab at staying downstairs for a bit.
And so aside from thinking I should get the Echo Indigo, I wonder if I should just sit in front and try like it matters. Lost lost lost. For better or worse, I think I'm going off to go and write to Cari.
Just feeling a sudden desperation to write, despite being on Karen's computer and her ancient keyboard. It's not like shuttlecocks, it really is like being stuck, breathless and dazed, unable to move.
And thinking about the past isn't all that happens when you have no future, the present just seems to loom. As with all panic attacks, things go away, but it's just a feeling of wanting to sleep perpetually, and of worry and sinking.
The Corner is a bit disappointing. I suppose if I was expecting the Wire, this isn't it. I just hope the rest of it is better. But the landscape is similar though, and not in buildings of people so much, but in language and lingo. I've only really seen 2 actors who would eventually go on the Wire, but here it just seems they're all not quite where they should/would be.
I suppose though, that this really is much more of a journalistic work than The Wire is - it's just that the breadth and subtlety of The Wire is so much more appealing, and so much less Gritty.
For some reason, the wireless link has shaped up in the past couple of hours, so that I might actually have a ghost of a chance at watching Angel soon. Of course I could just wait 3 weeks, but it's the principle of it.
It's getting a bit annoying sitting here, but that's being sort of paliated(?) by my looking for sound solutions for my lovely new laptop. So far the Echo Indigo seems the most promising - PCMCIA, so no dangling about. Thing is that it's about 130 US, and it would probably cover up my wifi switch, which might be a bit annoying.
Also I wonder if I would really need to try to get along with WinDVD 4 to get the most out of it - I'm finding since DVD Region-Free that I really like WMP as playback software in favour of PowerDVD.
I can't be bothered to write another entry, and I'm sure these cafe driven ramblings please no one but my fingers, but I just watched the West Wing where Toby tries to save social security; and it's still good. But obviously that's what really precipitated me wanting to spend 130 dollars.
And so Caffe Nero is all that bad. It's not so smoky today, the music is a more sedate weekend version of the usual frenetics.
I've tried the food and it isn't horrible. The pasta is okay, not something I'd recommend even as microwaved food goes. The soup wasn't all bad though, and is palatable.
It'd be nice if they had a toilet round here.
I wonder if I would have been better off having Eggs Benedict at City Screen, but then it's not Eggs Michael, and City Screen ain't the Original Pancake House.
Doesn't everyone love spotty wifi connections :P.
It really is just too noisy and far too smoky to write comfortably at Caffe Nero. I wonder when they're going to start recognising me and bugging me about not ordering drinks. I suppose I could buy overpriced water, but it all just makes me want to go to the toilet.
I suppose Cari won't be able to find a fourth for mahjong, so if they want to play anything it'll have to be Tai Di.
Oh, and clever man at this electronics shop near the Shambles managed to get me the requisite cable I'd want to plug in in the UK without an adaptor. Apparently those small plastic things aren't allowed here. I suppose the fact that it leads to me sticking pens into sockets doesn't cross their mind. But yes, adaptor cable is good.
Isn't it just predictable that the table next to the power point should be the one with the spotty wireless coverage? The Bastards.
But at least now I'm getting my money's worth from my access plan. Fat chance of me buying much coffee from this place though. I get the feeling wifi is not a priority for most of the latte sipping crowd here.
So yes I'm back in York in the most surreal way possible. Luckily Karen's friend just got back from Mecca, and "know's a guy".
Got confirmation that I'll be going to see Cari on Monday. House of Sand and Fog is still showing here, so some time next week maybe. I'll probably try to move to Delwyn's after dinner or something.
Amazingly, torrents are doing fine, and Angel is on it's way.
And so the West Wing has decided to go Bigger. It's now Topical and it deals with Issues. I feel a bit guilty saying that with Sorkin and Schlamme gone it's now gotten more middlebrow, but that's at least partly the truth. There is a sharpness, a snappiness, a deftness and a more subtle understanding of subtext, that has been changed into something else.
To be sure the new episodes are stunning, whether it's just the HDTV rips or not I can't be sure. Mary Louise Parker has never looked more luscious - and perhaps the largest iconographic change has been the entry of the window and entrance into the Residence. It's a more personal, more "character driven", and they've made it very clear that this is not last season's West Wing.
The aesthetic shift is a purposeful one, and they're trying to be bold and being unapologetic as they would have to be. And as much as I enjoyed a number of the episodes, I can't help but feel that they're making better TV at the expense of artistic deft and lyrical subtlety. But that doesn't quite exactly characterise it so accurately as I would like - it's okay, it's different, and there are episodes that really benefit from being taken away from the flow of a greater arc, existing as if in suspension; for all the insistence in that episode on the real world, the very circumvention.
Season 4 was a good season, and I'm starting to get a new appreciation for Sorkin doing a Season Premiere.
Okay, so this is what the plan is going to be - if at all possible, I'm going to stay with Delwyn when I arrive on he 3rd - and stay with him over the weekend. On Monday I'll likely be going to Scotland to visit Cari, and will stay there till Tuesday (hopefully).
At that point, when I come back, I'll go to Karen's place and stay there till the 18th when Hiaw Khim comes, she might arrive on the 19th I'm not sure, and after maybe straddling a day or two with people we'll end up back at Delwyn's room while he's away.
If Delwyn is really too busy, I'm hoping I can do a rotation between Dion/Emen an Delwyn. I know you're all busy, but maybe you could squeeze me in for a night or two when you don't have something immediately pending?
I'll need someone to lend me a sleeping bag, and please don't get ideas of letting me sleep on the bed, I feel bad enough; though I might take a nap or two while you're at class etc.
I promise I will be as inobtrusive as possible. I've discovered that CaffeNero in town has a wireless hotspot and that will be my best bet to remain connected while I'm in York. Hopefully they support torrenting. Otherwise I'll be ankle deep in TV marathons, I'll be watching the Wire, Roswell Season 1, The O.C. if I feel like it. I hope as well to bring lovely samplers of lovely series over, an Angel, a Spooks, the Firefly pilot etc. Oh, and Nip Tuck if that turns out well.
So hopefully I'll be interested in getting exercise most days and going into town to get my fix, and try my best not to spend too much time in your rooms. I'll be trying to write as well.
The only imposition I can imagine is that I'll be on the phone at odd hours, but I'll either take it out into the hall if possible or find a nice calling card plan and an obliging pay phone. I still have my Dog/Bone card, so that should work out.
I could go to other hot spots, The Cloud is supposed to be more widespread, but they focus on pubs, and it really won't be good for me to spend the whole day in a pub. No indeed.
Or I could just end up too stoned for words and sleep all the time.
So unless I hear otherwise, I'll be landing at Delwyn's doorstep, wherever that is, on the 3rd, sometime after noon. Yay me.
There is probably nothing quite like having an entire series/season of a TV show at your disposal to just marathon your way through. I'd probably credit Season 1 and 2 Buffy that really set me on to this, that time when I was staying in Coventry one time over the holidays. Close on the heels of that was the Pacey loves Joey storyline on Dawson's Creek. I suppose Soprano's season 1 would count, back in Singapore...
But yes, The O.C. is doing well on that list, along with Cold Feet, Ultra-Violet, Spooks, Once and Again, West Wing, 24 (Season 1), Twin Peaks etc.
And I mention no caveats with The O.C., it's not good for it's genre, it's just good. It's engaging and it's really funny in a way that Angel can only achieve (fantastically though) with muppets...
The Wire though, is climbing the charts - I've just ordered Season 1 of Roswell, and I'm hoping Nip/Tuck isn't just a signal of my desperation.
I've been putting off writing this entry for a while now. It just feels strange coming out of the system and being left stranded. You know there's nothing to be embarassed about but it still feels weird telling all this to people.
I'm (obviously) not being sparklingly academic at UChicago, that ship sailed long ago. I'm now having problems coming into the US under Visa Waiver because I'm not able to prove I live somewhere else. Hence my going back to Singapore.
I've been applying to Creative Writing courses in the US of course, but Northwestern has already said no - though I will be reapplying, since they have rolling admissions. I'm also now applying to Boston, which looks more promising, but I'm not holding my breath. I'm sure I'll be plying Richard and Mary for recommendations for a while yet.
That wasn't as volumnous as I thought it would be to explain. I'm sending a bunch of people who I have to e-mail this post link so I don't have to keep repeating myself. I'm going around to find out who can put me up while I'm in the UK from 3rd March to 28th March.
I would say though, that my parents have been remarkably supportive about me being a bum :P.
Doesn't anyone else just think John Kerry is a boring pathetic prune? Why is it that I don't trust Clark, much less John Edwards? There is just that suspicion of insincerity and avoidance that you get in the eyes of most of these candidates, Dean being the exception. Look at them at moments of private publicity and you see the shadow leavening their hidden guilt and shame. They all have their politician smiles. The conflict in Dean seems so much more of a felt one, of where speaking the truth goes beyond the pale.
The theme of this, as it was in Twin Peaks, has to be reversal - where the civil war of self, and the imposition on self flap.
Dean is a orator of conviction and moves me. He is a man of humour and intellect. John Kerry couldn't excite Louis Theroux. You'd wish someone who talked the talk so convincingly and resonates that feeling so palpably would do better, as he will.
Why do I feel that all the rest are just running?
Aside from a general feeling of unease, discomfort and overall worry, I can't say I'm particularly happy. I haven't written at all since. It would be a kind favour if everything went smoothly and things didn't get butternut shaped so quickly or so adversely.
Perhaps I'm looking for my own reversal of the Civil War.
Howard Dean was not angry, he was not displaying any particular loss of control except the melancholy exuberance you get from that twinging of defeat. He just strikes me as someone who speaks his mind and is so envelopingly sincere. Wesley Clark probably wouldn't be the worst candidate, but he doesn't give me that sense - that sense of unequivocal belief in the will to be conscientious and work to the fulfillment of belief.
I just watched a bunch of people who wouldn't - I'd rather think couldn't - see the barn. Anger had no part in it.
I suppose a couple of significant things have occured for me in the last 24hrs or so. Well perhaps not Important, but striking nonetheless.
I was up till 7 in the morning watching Michael Moore's 'Roger and Me' - and while I might have just been in one of my overly sentimental moods as I can tend to be that late at night, I found it incredibly moving. And despite a broader picture of economics calling out to the rational part of my mind, the depiction of devastation and in a real sense the personal and human tragedy that attends to it - the unwillingness of parties to make even the smallest show of claiming responsibility, of recognising the human cost of their decisions, makes me want to make a bonfire out of issues of the Economist. The casual dismissal of human degradation that the film depicts is appalling to the extent that my self-consciousness about my own outrage at it becomes almost laughable.
I've also been watching the Democratic debates that are now leading up to the Iowa caucus. And while only Lieberman can present anything approaching an intelligent way of selling free trade, Dean is a stunningly charismatic orator. You really get a sense of how he has such self assurance in the integrity of his pragmatic beliefs, especially when he talks about health care, and when he talks about the will towards honesty.
Of equal import is that I sat through the majority of a marathon session of Real World Las Vegas. Brynn is rather comely - most of the rest are really rather funny, or perhaps just dumb and boring. Frank is impressive in his own way, in the way he handles people and the way he comments on himself and others.
Also there has just been "Faking It Changed My Life", and a lovely revisiting of some of the favorite people from that first series, the chef, the cellist, the jockey, the bouncer. The chef wants to become a writer and I can't help but feel warm feelings towards his self-effacing manner and his will towards aspiration - ambivalent beckett quotes notwithstanding.
And here is the load of tripe article of the day, such a lot of utter fear/guilt mongering that makes you want to slap people. The CDFreaks article links to the original gall.
It's nice to be putting words together again, particularly pleasing that it is in a public dialogue.
In case you don't get it, new Opera Beta = Louis goes back to posting on the MyOpera forums :D.
It irks me that more people don't use Klipfolio, and that there's not more activity on the forum, so here's a plug for you - Klipfolio is absolutely lovely. It lets you view at a glance all the newest headlines from your favorite sites, as well as showing you the weather and a bunch of other useful things. And you can find my very own klip for this blog here. I suppose the lack of forum participation is also a function of ease of use and lack of problems, other than my pet bug.
Anyone who wants me to ship the Firefly DVD to them from here in the states just drop me a line. It is the one thing that I promise not to gripe about people asking me for. Details we can work out, but more people must buy and watch Firefly - if it were running for president it would get my unambiguous endorsement. Email link's on the main site, on the right.
Mike managed to fix my chair arms; it doesn't wobble anymore. I hope my Palm OS upgrade arrives today or I'm gonna have a cow. My keyboard is too nice for that. Why have I been finding the Economist so very racially problematic recently? That despite a rather good article on punctuation.
