Thursday, December 31, 2009

Amber and garnet

About a week ago I suddenly had to decide whether I wanted a Christmas tree or not. Seems trivial, but it kind of meant that for the first time in my life I was forced to wonder if Christmas actually means anything to me. And it kind of snuck up on me. So yeah, that was interesting.

I got a tiny one, some colorful lights, and a couple of ornaments from my family home. The small ones, obviously. For some reason I really hoped I'd find a couple of these small glass lanterns among them. There were two left. I put on... River, I think, and dressed my very own tree. That was... interesting too.

I leave the lights on for the night and turn them off during the day. Dad says I'll burn in my sleep, cause they don't make them like they used to.

It's New Year's Eve tomorrow. Every year the ritual is repeated - declarations of disaffection (probably not the right word, but what the hell), plotting exit strategies... This time I simply refused to think about it though, and it seems that I really don't care. The pose was made flesh. I'm contemplating binging on expensive sweets and trying to make a dent in my movie backlog. Or swapping sweets for booze, and doing the same in the company of Filip. There are other, more social options, but... there are also some ghosts I just don't want to face come midnight. Say what you will about New Year's irrelevance, that one moment is culturally charged enough to punch some realities right through your shell.


I get chills every time I listen to this performance. The first clusterfuck of sound at 1:28 just awestriking.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Collision

Had a wonderful evening. Monika came home from Luxembourg for Christmas and held and an impromptu audience at Ormus' apartment - though I think I was the only person to go there specifically to see her, as most of the other people in attendance didn't even know who she was.

Still, we had a blast, mostly due to a lengthy session of... charades. Yes, apparently we're now all old and bourgeois. It should be noted that our team (me, paivi, Monika and Pawel) won, but the main attraction was watching people try to mime absurd and/or obscure movie or book titles. Special mentions (all successful) go to: Darq for the Charter of United Nations, Monika for Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead (none of us knew the book), Ormus for The British Museum is Falling Down (same as above), and my teammates for guessing my mime of The Salmon of Doubt even though none of us had read it. Surprisingly, the most problematic - and most fun to guess - title of the entire evening was Kapuscinski's Empire, but that's mostly because first we ended up in China and refused to leave, and then Pawel, in the process of trying to steer us back towards the right area, mixed up his books and got fixated on the Shah of Iran.

I've also been catching up on music. I've yet to plow through Florence and the Machine (was less than impressed by Kiss With a Fist, but Janek sent me Howl and my endings were more than tickled) and the new Regina Spektor album, but have already digested Little Boots. I can't say I care for the record as a whole, but towards the end I've found a definite keeper. It's basically Kylie at her best: thoroughly synthetic, clean and clear. A tiny little plastic bauble, all pink and translucent. The soulful kitsch of Scissor Sisters' It Can't Come Quickly Enough, but without the melancholy. The girl's voice is perfectly smooth and featureless, woven seamlessly into the rudimentary synth background, and then there's that tiny flourish in the chorus, when the afterglow of the last consonant in "over" unexpectedly soars higher than the preceding vowel... Yum.



And to top it off - totally random and unsollicited Tom Lenk. My crush lingers on.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Too steep to scale

My slow burn has finally sputtered out completely. It was an easy, gentle way to go. Like what they tell me freezing to death feels like, complete with that sensation of comfort and relief right before the end.

And when I woke up today it was snowing. Externalization complete.

I'm feeling quite good, almost giddy. I think the cold cleared the air or something, and my brain seems to work better as of late - though I still tend to get drowsy at the oddest hours.

I made it to season 4 of Angel. Good God, I don't like any of the characters anymore. And the whole Connor debacle was just beyond painful. The guy that plays him has the most annoying manchild face... he's playing Pete Campbell on Mad Men. Yeah. THAT one. Gunn was boring from the get-go, and they never really figured out anything specific for him to do, so he's just left to lumber around awkwardly, butchering every humorous line they feed him. Fred's twitchy and really blah. I heard Amy Acker was really good on this show, but I'm still waiting to see that. For a moment I thought at least the green demon guy was gone for good, but no. He had to make a return appearance.

And can we please take a moment to talk about Alexis Denisof being all dark and edgy and oozing manliness? The guy's name is Alexis, for crying outloud. He's the posterboy for pansy. That's why they hired him in the first place! He was comic relief on Buffy. Pitful, effete comic relief! Now they got him brandishing axes, playing S/M mindgames and having phone sex with evil lawyers. Worst of all - they had him grow a stubble. A stubble!

Cordelia was fun, but she went poof, so I'm left struggling with a truly terrifying concept - namely that my favorite character on Angel seems to be... Angel. Brrr. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

In better news, the Christmas episode of The Office is true genius, and it's written by Mindy Kaling (aka Kelly Kapoor), which sort of means that all is well with the world.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

On the Radio

Wlasnie mi podeslano klip do On the Radio Reginy Spektor i znalazlem w archiwum starego bloga swoje pierwsze impresje z tej plyty.

I po raz n-ty sie ucieszylem, ze mam takie pierdoly spisane gdzies. I zrobilo mi sie przykro, ze teraz tak malo juz pisze i nie bedzie czym pobudzac pamieci.

Problem chyba w tym, ze nie mam jednak az tak duzej swobody w angielskim jak myslalem, wiec kazdy wpis jest jakims wyzwaniem.

Tak wiec... ewolucji ciag dalszy. Zobaczymy, co z tego bedzie.