The Neon Vault

What's left

2011-12-31T16:01:00.004+01:00

I had a bunch of funny stuff to link to, but it was way easier (and sounder) to just dump it all into my Facebook feed, so... let's try to take a look back at 2011 instead.

I've done some logistical readjustments and they seem to be working out great. Took some work though.

I'm in a teeny tiny professional rut, but I think I know how to remedy that. We'll see.

I'm still single and I don't really have any prospects in that regard atm.

I remain on good terms with quite a lot of people, or at least that's the impression I'm getting.

I'm financially stable (though I've had some rocky months in autumn).

Family's doing really good - the best they've been in years, I think.

For once I'm actually looking forward to the New Year's Eve party I'm going to.

In other words: something of a mixed bag.

I'll top it off with a surprisingly dashing Dawson. I left him out of the Facebook feed dump, I don't need the abuse.

2012, here I stumble.

Joseph says

2011-12-16T03:12:00.004+01:00

I got a bit drunk tonight while playing boardgames, and then watched too good and too touching a movie (50/50) to go to sleep straight away. So let's take stock, shall we?

Christmas is coming. I've absolutely nothing more to say about that.

I had a major health scare which turned out to be nothing at all. I want all my future health scares to follow this pattern.

I'm trying to figure out whether I should get in touch with my childhood friend via Facebook. I've been trying to figure out whether to get in touch with him since... late high school, I think. I barely remember what he looks like. I just looked him up and he doesn't seem to be an active user (doesn't even have a profile picture), so I guess I'll pass. Could be too weird.

There was a thing, and it went as well as could be expected, so that's cool.

This is turning out to be a very uninspiring blog entry, but I'm in no mood to write about the fluff, and the stuff I actually want to get off my chest I won't, because cmon that's private. Oh human condition, why you so convoluted.

50/50 is really good. Yellow Ledbetter on repeat good.

Not cool, Orphy

2011-12-10T13:24:00.002+01:00

It seems sometimes the good dreams are worse than the bad ones.

It was so weirdly intense that after I woke up, I went into a whole new-agey "maybe dreams matter" thing, because otherwise coping could become an issue.

So weird. Hope it never happens again.

Collapse

2011-11-13T17:34:00.002+01:00

So today that comic thing happened. Hopefully it remains comic. Hopefully I'll learn tomorrow.

Edit: Whew.

The Horse

2011-10-22T21:57:00.003+02:00

Nosze to zdjecie w komorce od 2 lat. Sciana pokoju matki:

Detal:

Pointy nie bedzie.

Overflow

2011-10-22T21:20:00.003+02:00

I had a bunch of stuff to write about, but it's more and more difficult for me to actually post here. Or rather: it's more and more out of the way. I dump all the trivia into my Facebook feed, and the other stuff just dissolves after a day or two anyway, so why bother.

I'd like to have some kind of record* though, especially about the good stuff.

My birthday was last week. I threw a huge party for way too many people (It got freaky, I figured at least half of them wouldn't be able to make it, so I overshot with the invites, but then most of them actually showed up.) I don't remember any single conversation I had, which is weird, since I'm told I wouldn't shut up for the entire evening, and my throat was sore the next day, but that always seems to be the case for the host. Anyway, people claim to have had fun, and I got some awesome gifts, including the first volume of Absolute Sandman (incidentally, it took my mother about 6 minutes today before she spilled wine all over it, so that was fun) and a very cool boardgame, and a new toilet seat (that's right, you heard me), and a Polish, personalized rendition of this song. Because my friends are awesome.

As I was cleaning up on the next day, I kept remembering funny stuff from the evening before. I had it listed in my head for that entry that never materialized, but now I just remember Waste doing a short presentation of nerdcore, completely out of the blue.

It felt really nice to know that people came. As base as that sounds.

Then I went to lunch with a friend who came over from Krakow. It was a very long ride, and the tram broke down two stops before my destination, so I had to leg it. The sun was shining, I had this playing...

Life felt very good.

On the next day I got a full-blown sinus infection.

Took me a week to get better, but I finally did (sort of), so today my parents came over, and took me out to lunch at a bar mleczny in Praga, and a coffee (also in Praga, at a surprisingly hip cafe that they claim is their favorite - apparently they really get around). Life was really, really good again. I hope it keeps doing that, as often as possible.

* and now Famous Blue Raincoat is playing in my head. Brains are silly.

Perspective

2011-10-09T02:21:00.012+02:00

Either I am developing some sort of mild social anxiety disorder, or I am only now becoming aware of having had one all along.

A week ago I was invited to a birthday party. Every single thing screamed: go there. I liked the host, but felt I didn't have enough opportunities or platforms to socialize with them. I didn't know any of the other guests, so it constituted "putting yourself out there". And the guest list consisted almost exclusively of gay menfolk.

My reaction? A bout of anxiety. At some point (at around 3 days to D-Day) I had to tell myself I'm not going *wink wink*, so that I would stop stressing about it. And I didn't make up my mind literally until I had to go out this very second to buy a birthday cake, because they were closing the bakery in 25 minutes. And I only did that after calling a friend on a complete whim (safety blanket response) and learning that I couldn't come over to them instead and whine about being fucked up, because... they had a legitimate reason for me not to do that.

Eventually I did go, even though when I put on my "I am a viable sex object" shirt, one of the buttons fell off, which I took for a bad omen. And of course everything was OK, if a bit awkward at first. And of course the coolest people there (or rather: the people I clicked with most) were a straight couple, since I was built to die alone. No prospects materialized, but, you know, the sky didn't exactly come crashing down either, and I actually had fun and a few good laughs - particularly when I sat down to eat some cake and saw this to my left:

And yet I haven't had this much anxiety about anything in at least the last year or so. Shit really freaked me out. I hope it's a phase.

Tomorrow starts today

2011-09-25T03:33:00.005+02:00

"Absynth features three main synthesis modules which can be customized to a particular synthesis type, such as Subtractive, Frequency Modulation, Amplitude Modulation, or Granular, as well as direct sampling of raw audio data. It has a single filter (12/24 dB LP, HP, BP, Notch, and Comb), as well as a distortion algorithm, and effects including three resonant filters, "pipe" reverb, and multi-tap Delay. A modulation matrix allows the user three LFOs.

Graphically-edited assignable envelopes may be assigned up to 68 breakpoints each. In newer versions, breakpoint times and amplitudes may be manipulated further via MIDI controllers, as well as by curvature of the envelope line between breakpoints.

Absynth relies on user-based waveforms; either drawn directly, by manipulation of a sound spectrum, or else extracted from a WAV or AIFF file. Each can be used as an LFO, or an oscillator."

Was looking up this one band on wikipedia. "Absynth" was listed in their instruments. Sounded like a funny name, so I clicked the hyperlink - and that's the definition of what it does. Substractive or granular synthesis and a modulation matrix. Cyberpunk arrived a while ago, except nobody was paying attention. Ok: I wasn't.

Other Women

2011-09-02T01:36:00.005+02:00

Far from flawless, and hardly revelatory, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. If "enjoyed" is the proper term here.

Reference point #1 - this is how you do a jawline:

The illusion of effortlessness requires a great effort indeed

Reference point #2 - this is how you pronounce "Sarah the Dancer":

Harness

2011-08-22T02:09:00.008+02:00

I have a confession: I believe in petty magic. Or rather - I believe that once it has produced some sort of effect, the nature of a cause is irrelevant. And that the entire human experience is completely dependent upon one's brain/consciousness - which is very fickle. You can have all the reasons to be happy, and still feel miserable if your head doesn't buy it. Therefore the subjective always trumps the objective. And the subjective isn't always rational.

Of course this doesn't mean that I sacrifice goats or try to make sparks fly out of my fingertips, but I do allow myself some leeway when it comes to various trifles. For example, I've always really liked the Moon, for no particular reason. Whenever there's a full moon, I feel a little bit better - and happier. And so, I have made a conscious decision to avoid rationalizing it. To suspend my disbelief just enough so that something as random and easy to come by as the sight of a chunk of spaceborne rock continues to improve my well-being. It's a small price to pay, and I see no harm in it.

Which brings me to The Song of Ice and Fire. I've realized that I respond very favorably to stories that walk that fine line between my brand of "magic" and full-blown fantasy. I really like it when the choice is left up to you - when you're given enough loopholes and backdoors to reality to be able to stitch together a "it's all in their heads" explanation. It's why I loved The Prestige as much as I did (even if my very convoluted alternative reading of the film eventually collapsed under its own weight). And I think it's why I had such a negative response to the appearance of actual dragons at the end of the first book. There's no grey area here, it doesn't get any more high fantasy.

Well, I've almost finished reading book 2, and it only gets worse (or better, depending on your perspective), up to the point where my favorite background player got offed by supernatural means, and the Daenerys sections read like the 1001 Nights. And I have to say it spoils things a bit for me. I feel like this isn't exactly what I signed up for. Granted, Martin worked up a very nifty explanation for this shift, which I totally bought, so the book still gives me a lot of pleasure, but I can't help feeling that the political aspect suffered due to the slew of new dei ex machinae.

Downpour

2011-08-19T20:50:00.006+02:00

We had a hardcore storm today. The sky just tore right open, and in through the hole poured a load of water. I barely made it to the tram stop before the first wave, and was safely in the tram by the time the main force arrived. The guy who got in several stops later was not as fortunate, as the deluge caught him on his way back from gym. Now, I know this because a) he was carrying a gym bag and b) he was wearing one of those thin white t-shirts, or as they're known in the context of freak rainstorms: nothing at all.

He was a good sport about it though. Almost as if sensing that it's the only sensible thing to do, he took a spot at the front of the tram, leaning back against the driver's booth, so that everyone could get a good look. You could almost hear the smattering of polite applause. "Well done, sir!"

Yeah

2011-08-05T13:26:00.003+02:00

I was at my very funniest that year. This was not the Humor of Cure; it had nothing to do with the healing power of laughter. It was more of an airless, relentless kind of quippiness (...) Every time a complex human emotion threatened to break the surface of my consciousness, out would come some terrible cleverness.

I was Thanatos' rodeo clown. I still am. And Eros' as well, as it turns out. Years later, in a tender embrace in bed with my first real boyfriend, he said my name. "Oh, David." I stopped, sat up, and responded in my best Ed Wynn. "Yeeeesssssss???????" This kind of behavior more or less killed things between us.

David Rakoff, Fraud

Finished reading it. Waiting for the paperback version of Half Empty.

Chwila

2011-07-30T20:15:00.006+02:00

Wlasnie zadzwonil Michal spytac, co robie, a ja bez glebszego zastanowienia odparlem, ze siedze w hotelu, gapie sie przez okno na deszcz i czekam, az w moim zyciu cos sie wydarzy.

Maly kneejerk, a cieszy. Mam do niego nawet obrazek.

Bubbles filled with smoke

2011-07-30T19:20:00.004+02:00

I bought my tickets, and I'm ready to go. Wroclaw is ready for me to go as well, as it just started raining. Again. I shall not be defeated though, I'll have the reception SUMMON ME A TAXI CAB as I step out of the elevator in my non-existent shades. Much like the Jet Set do.

I think it's the longest I've ever stuck around. Full 10 days. It's been very mellow and low-key, with just one night of hectic drunken fun (the remaining nights being less hectic and somewhat less fun, but not necessarily less drunken. I'm all alcohol'd out.)

Yesterday, we had a back to basics kind of moment, when our food took so long to arrive that we actually missed our screenings... and didn't feel particularly bad about it, as the sun was shining, the food was good, and the beer kept flowing (not for me, obviously, but the others seemed to appreciate that aspect as well). We reminisced about the Cieszyn days. Apparently someone actually puked during a screening of Cremaster. Didn't know that story. Made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

We tried playing BSG last night, but we started at 1 a.m. so it didn't end well. Tonight it's Southland Tales (again) followed by farewell drinks at the festival club.

Next year I intend to mingle more. I feel I should be... well, maybe not networking, but at least making sure people know I actually exist. I'm pretty sure most of the festival people don't know who I am, or even that I do anything to make this thing happen. I'm also pretty sure I've already made this declaration at least once.

As usual, the city seemed to be filled with eminently fuckable people. Unfortunately, as usual I didn't get to know any of them. I can't say I'm particularly bummed out about it. Homesick, if anything.

Simply bubbles!

2011-07-27T13:05:00.005+02:00

I really don't want to work at the moment, so here's a report from this year's NH festival. Or an attempt, at least.

One of the co-owners of the subtitling company just called another one of the co-owners and said: "Dress up nicely tonight, we'll be doing PR."

I haven't been doing PR at all, not yet at least, but it's been nice regardless. There's less work than last year, and I got put up at a nice hotel very close to the main cinema, so I haven't missed a single screening yet. Not that I've attended that many.

I arrived on Thursday, to torrential rain. Which was nice, since I brought two pairs of shorts and a ton of t-shirts. Wroclaw's main train station is being renovated, so you leave the platforms through this makeshift tunnel lined with aluminum siding. Which apparently gets flooded during the monsoon season. There was actually water streaming down through a crack in the (also aluminum) ceiling, like we were escaping Shawshank, or something. I lugged my ultra-heavy bag through half the city before I found a cab. And the rain lasted two days.

It's sunny now which means that we get to listen to a bad violin rendition of Smells Like Teen Spirit 27 times a day. The office has windows facing the main square of the old town, so there's street performers aplenty. I like the fire dancers, and the ballerina/policeman mime, because they don't make noise. The violin lady is Satan, or at least so we thought until we were subjected to a boy with an acoustic guitar and his own amplifier. Dude wailed like there was no tomorrow, but he didn't return on the next day, so here's hoping in his case there really wasn't.

The food has been good for the most part, and the company - better. It was a bit hectic for the first few days, but things took a turn for the silly and mellow. The moment the braindead gigglefest commences keeps getting pushed earlier and earlier - I think we set a new record with Kasia today, as we simultaneously imploded around 1 p.m.

I saw Southland Tales on a huge screen, and it was hilarious, I'll probably go see it again on Saturday. This movie should not be watched alone.

Yesterday, I got an impromptu in equal parts pleasant, hilarious and disturbing shoulder massage from Rafal, and listened to one of the translators talk about his thesis, the title of which included the words transcendence and singularity. It was really interesting, but also the most challenging train of thought I ever had to follow while drunk. It was all I could do not to pop a blood vessel.

What else... there's lots of jokes, but most of them emerge from the hermetic cesspit of our subtitling coven. The technical guys' favorite pastime seems to be finding quotes from movies that sound like they are referring to us and posting them to Facebook, where they are completely ignored by everyone not currently synchronizing subtitles at this particular festival, and greatly appreciated by the few people who are. Most of whom are in the same room and have already heard/seen the humorous line in question.

Obviously it's great fun.

Unfortunately, now I kind of have to do some work. Asia is stripping in front of me. It's not her point, exactly, but the damage remains, so I'm relocating to the table.

Coordinator out.

Good morning!

2011-07-14T12:12:00.003+02:00

I dreamt that I was being terrorized by someone/something monstrous, and that I had one last chance to try to kill it - before something horrible happened - by severing its spine at the base of the skull with a chisel. The horror of the climactic moment was such that I woke up, and felt my right hand still going through a slack, paraplegic version of the stabbing motion.

Out of sequence

2011-07-08T12:31:00.009+02:00

I have ended up for the weekend at a spa that refuses to call itself a spa; an "institute" with a terror of the world so crippling as to have no newspapers. No surprise, really, had I but taken the time, prior to my arrival, to seriously parse the terms "self-help" and "retreat." The former unabashedly egocentric, the latter alluding to defeated flight.

(...)

The word I most overhear, flying from mouths like spittle, is "intense." But it usually seems to apply to a massage or a movement class. When I do chance to overhear of a true test of faith and character, one person telling another, "My father died last Christmas and it was fairly intense, so I went to a bereavement workshop, which helped a lot," the response she gets is "Yeah, when everyone in the room is facing the same direction and the energy is aligned, it can be a very powerful force."

(...)

The evening's concerts are held in the Lake Theater, a barn-like structure with a small stage. The overhead light is grimy and yellow and flickering as moths and June bugs ping against the bulbs like rice at a wedding. A young folksinger on guitar and piano is accompanied by her ponytailed husband on bass. The audience is sparse, mostly women, alone and in pairs, the demographic hinted at on the first day. They sit with the studied serenity, the composed posture, that broadcasts for all the world to see "I go to things all the time alone. I don't mind."
In Edith Wharton's House of Mirth, the heroine Lily Bart - no longer as young as she once was, the financial promises made to her failing to pan out, her prospects at marriage dwindling daily, has a friend named Gerty Farish. Gerty is also unmarried. Gerty has no annuity. Gerty takes her meals in public dining rooms with other single women. And she does so good-naturedly. Every time Lily sees Gerty, she experiences an interval of panic. Wharton writes: "...the restrictions of Gerty's life, which had once had the charm of contrast, now reminded [Lily] too painfully of the limits to which her own existence was shrinking."
After a day of angry, dismissive contempt, the blood beats behind my eyes with identification. I am uncoupled by this unexpected Gerty Farish moment in this crowd of women trying to make sense of a world that has ruled them out of hand for the cardinal sin of having dared to remain single past the age of thirty-five. I have sat alone in theaters, restaurants, parks, my back straight, a book, perhaps. I am acquainted with this good posture.
At one point the singer looks over at her husband and they give each other a smile of such amiable companionship, a look of such pleased and secure partnership, that it reaches all of us with the cold immediacy of a slap in the face. It turns out to be true: when everyone in the room is facing the same direction and the energy is aligned, it can be a very powerful force.

David Rakoff, Fraud

He's not always this good, but sometimes he is.

Clusterfuck!

2011-07-06T14:20:00.003+02:00

I was just asked how I would translate "commotion [surrounding the treaty]" (except from Polish into English). My brain immediately sprang into action: Kerfuffle! Hubbub! Brouhaha!

None of which, obviously, can be used in a document about some treaty. For I am the master of correct, yet completely useless answers.

Unfailing

2011-07-05T16:31:00.003+02:00

Sheila taught me a survival technique for getting through seemingly intolerable situations - boring lunches, stern lectures on attitude or time management, those necessary breakup conversations, and the like: maintaining eye contact, keep your face inscrutable and masklike, with the faintest hint at a Gioconda smile. Keep this up as long as you possiblt can, and just as you feel you are about to crack and take a letter opener and plunge it into someone's neck, fold your hands in your lap, one nestled inside the other, like those of a supplicant in a priory. Now, with the index finger of your left hand, write on the palm of the other, very discreetly and undetectably, "I hate you. I hate you. I hate you..." over and over gain as you pretend to listen. You will find that this brings a spontaneous look of interested and pleased engagement to your countenance. Continue and repeat as necessary.

David Rakoff, Fraud

Huh

2011-06-29T13:12:00.008+02:00

Several days ago, I suddenly remembered these kids I used to play with when I was little. They were mostly older than me, and I liked them all very much. I remembered this one boy in particular, whom I used to tease quite a bit. It was all good-natured (and still is, most of the time), and everyone would laugh at the jokes, but if I pushed it too far, he'd threaten to hit me. Laughing, as well, but also annoyed. And if I pushed it still - he would hit me. On the arm, usually. I remember knowing that, and still going in for the kill most of the time, if a proper setup emerged. And then laughing over the pain. I just couldn't help myself.

His older brother would often stop him from hitting me - sometimes because he enjoyed the jokes, other times because we were usually playing cards, or something, and this routine interrupted the gameplay. There were also times when I'd get hit even if I resisted the urge - when the leitmotif was already so strong that it only took me suddenly bursting into laughter for the other kids to figure out the new angle and start laughing themselves.

I have no idea why I remembered all that all of a sudden, but it's a very pleasant memory. And somewhat informative.

It has all happened before

2011-06-13T00:48:00.006+02:00

I remember that when Game of Thrones was about to premiere on HBO, I resolved to finally read the book asap, so that the series wouldn't spoil it for me. Unfortunately, with my reading speed, that plan quickly fell through. But as the series got more interesting, I started trying to catch up, and after the last episode I got so hungry for more that I actually did. And now I find myself teetering on the brink, reluctant to read on for fear of the book spoiling the series. Funny symmetry. And a surprisingly faithful and well-executed adaptation. They hardly left anything out.

In the meantime, I did another historical piece for pajiba, and one of the commenters wrote that they should film it and run it as a double feature with the next series of Game of Thrones, which got me thinking that, well... yeah, it would be a good fit, since Song of Ice and Fire is pretty much history at its best. And then I got lost for like two hours, matching big European showdowns and succession crises with the current Game of Thrones chessboard, until I came up with this:

The 30 Years War (of Westeros)

featuring:

The Habsburgs as House Lannister
Bohemia as House Tully
Denmark as House Stark
The Palatinate (Evangelical Union) as House Baratheon
Transylvania as House Arryn
Poland as the Highland Tribes
England as House Greyjoy
The United Provinces as House Martell
France as House Tyrell
The Ottoman Empire as the Dothraki Horde
Sweden as The Others

Obviously, at this point I've yet no idea how the Greyjoys, Martells and Tyrells will actually play into the scheme of things, but I'm still delighted by how it all ALMOST matches up. You could even split up Habsburgs to account for the Austrian ones (Joffrey and Cersei), and Spain (Tywin and Jaime), with the latter bearing the brunt of the warfare, and providing the funding. If The Tyrells end up financing Renly, that will be very much like France aiding the Protestants, England makes sense as Greyjoys (what with the navy and stuff), and should Dorne get actively involved, it has Netherlands written all over it, grudge and all. The Ottomans in the east, not a direct threat yet, but a dangerous enigma, and of course no one expects Gustavus Adolphus sweeping down from beyond the Wall. The only thing I'm not quite happy with is the Poland/Transylvania dynamic - it would make more sense for Transylvania to be the highlanders, since it was Gabor who got sicked after Poland, not the other way around, but that would flip their loyalties, as Poland aided the Emperor. I mean Lannisters.

Come to think of it, maybe that's my next pajiba piece.

Delayed grievances

2011-05-24T01:50:00.003+02:00

I totally forgot to do the last 10 episodes of BSG, and now I don't really remember them that well, but i still have some highly cryptic notes so let's see what I can cook up:

1) "religious Baltar - wtf?" (that's what I jotted down, and I can't really elaborate on that, so I'll just transcribe it verbatim)

2) Roslin's escapist "I'm not getting pulled back into this" was pretty ridiculous. THEN RESIGN, LADY.

3) And then Gaeta's outrage "To let machines network our ship?!" Dude... you networked this ship yourself once, remember?

4) However, the Zarek/Gaeta dynamic was played out spectacularly. I was glued to the screen, watching as it evolves. Some really good writing there. Also: "You've done a very courageous thing." "We can fine-tune our rationalizations later." Awesome.

5) Except... how does Fat Baby have "people reporting to him"? What people? You're a civilian. What CLOUT can you possibly have. Oh Fat Baby, you so stupid.

6) "Roslin's speech - politics at its best" (no idea what this one's about either - see: religious Baltar)

7) Absolutely HILARIOUS (not sure, if it was intentional) scene when Roslin escapes Galactica aboard a raptor and gets shot at, but the missile hits the basestar instead. She charges onto the bridge, and the Cylons ask her "Why are we being attacked?" and she answers "You're not, they were shooting at me." And the first response we hear (quickly covered up by others) is Tory's exasperated "What did you do?!" as if she were saying "Bitch, please, what now?!" I watched it over and over again.

8) Roslin suddenly addressing the fleet despite the com jamming and saying "It worked! They couldn't jam it!" as the camera reveals Leoben holding some blinky box that we see for the first time EVER and going "I thought that would do the trick." Of course! I forgot about the Cylon blinky box technology! How silly of me.

9) behold this logic: Cylon FTL drives are awesome and we should install them everywhere. But cylon structural support is EVIL.

10) John Hodgman had no place being in that series, during the epic conclusion. It felt very awkward.

11) When the final 5 are voting whether to stay or leave, Fat Baby votes to leave. Why? No reason. Because the screenwriters needed a stalemate. Tory wanted to leave from the get-go, but Fat Baby? And everyone accepts it as if it's perfectly normal. No one even tries to talk him out of it. Or ask him WHY THE HELL HE WANTS TO LEAVE THE FLEET. God I hate everything about this character.

12) And on that subject: Fat Baby's arguments against putting Boomer on trial? He had four: "You can't!", "You can't!", "You can't!", and "YOU CAN'T!"

13) And then he let her escape. And steal Helo's baby. And kind of rape him. *sigh*

14) "Hera wrote the notes to a song..." Oh just kill me now

15) Apparently Fat Baby releasing Boomer and Adama's house painting meltdown took place in the same episode. Which means it was a very, very bad episode.

16) Also, the eternal cycle of violence between humans and Cylons will not be broken because of...? You've guessed it - FAT BABY.

17) "Last two eps - so bad, so boring, so pointless"

18) "chief is in the cylon cell. why? how? dunno, but let's have more adama-at-a-strip-joint"

19) "then chief is OUT of the cell and everything is fine and dandy - wha?"

20) The scene with various people laying out the final plan, as they were doing other stuff was... not that great. I get what they were aiming for, but they fell short

21) I kind of loved that they totally ran out of characters and so Hoshi became Admiral and Lampkin - President. Really? REALLY?

22) Oh great. They asked Sam where to jump - and there we go. Why not another deus ex machina.

23) "Now we'll learn everything about each other..." like that Chief released Boomer, who sorta raped helo and stole hera WHICH IS WHY WE ARE IN THIS FUCKING COLONY IN THE FIRST PLACE - but hey, tory killed the suicidal girl who wanted to kill her baby too, so...

24) "Spreading people out all over the planet with no technology... why... ah, never mind"

25) "'We can give the people the best we have to offer." Newsflash: it's not technology that is EVIL, Fat Baby doesn't need a nuclear device to be a raging asshole - in fact, he'll fuck you up with his bare hands or a wrench

26) "filled with bad speeches and truly bad writing"

27) The creator's cameo at the end of the final episode was kind of like saying "Here's the asshole you should blame for the deluge of shit you're about to be hit with"

28) the NYC scene was written so poorly not even Tricia Helfer was able to sell it to me

29) Oh, and by the way, technology-challenged remnants, the Cylons are still out there. You only destroyed the colony, the basestars are still floating around.

And that was that. Time to watch the last Game of Thrones ep.

Dents

2011-05-19T00:13:00.005+02:00

I found myself craving a hug today, as stupid as that sounds. And not even in the metaphorical sense. I sat there, as whole vats of shit were dumped upon me, and the only thing I could think of was that I really wanted something warm, very close, right now.

That's all over now though, thankfully. At least for a time.

For over a week I've had this Word document open and sitting on my taskbar, so that I remember to actually work on it when I have the time. Unfortunatley I don't, but by virtue of my slow hard drive, insufficient RAM, or what have you, whenever i click the "show desktop" button or open a new document, all the minimized windows peel away until that bottom-most one - the script of a documentary on Bruce LaBruce - is revealed for just long enough to deliver its subliminal message:

By the way, you do suck a good cock.

Always gives me pause.

Gamut

2011-05-16T02:35:00.004+02:00

This weekend, I had the full social experience. Boardgames and tightrope walking on Friday, a documentary on the Czech BDSM scene with Natalia and Filip followed by a night of drinking and dancing in the moonlight with Paulina et al on Saturday, and a dinner at Kaska and Piotr's followed by raiding on Sunday. Hitting all the notes.

It was nice, and let's leave it at that. Even I'm tired of my bullshit atm.

Concrete Jungle Wet Dream Tomato

2011-05-08T02:34:00.004+02:00

For the past week I've been trying to write a cover letter. Today my physiological defenses went into overdrive, and just as I completely ran out of distractions and things to watch, my whole body simply shut down. I fell asleep at 5p.m. for no apparrent reason. And woke up at 8.

Finally, I started writing that goddamned cover letter.

Which naturally led to trolling Facebook. At around 9:30 I paused to reflect on how much I adore a certain person.

10 minutes later said person spontaneously wrote me saying they finish work at 10p.m.

At 11 I was at their place. Obviously.

And man, was it a great evening. The highlight was probably a very enthusiastic 20-minute, 2-person tirade on the benefits of cocaine, concluded with one of the most unusual compliments (I hope) I've ever heard: "So yeah, we'd love to do coke with you."

So would I, my friends. So would I.

De profundis

2011-04-30T02:50:00.002+02:00

Dziwnie sie gada w kagancu.

Tyle mialem do powiedzenia.

Battlestar Craptastica

2011-04-23T13:16:00.006+02:00

I just watched the finale last night, and OH GOD it was so bad. So bad. I had to actively remind myself that I had talked to people while I was watching the final season, and I was really into it, before the finale, because after the credits rolled, I was completely convinced that the entire season - if not series as a whole - was bad. That's how truly horrible the finale is.

Luckily, I had notes, so I can say that the first 16-17 episodes of the final season are actually good, at least where they don't concern Starbuck or Fat Baby. Let's go:

1) The Cylon Civil War: awesome. Boomer voting against Eights: awesomer. Removing the Centurions' inhibitor: awesomest.

2) Then Apollo left the service and donned a v-neck... blouse for his farewell. Bad image.

3) When they let Jane Espenson do something with Baltar, she mines him for comedy, and the actor actually has pretty decent timing, but the character is so aimless and deplorable at this point that it just doesn't click for me.

4) When Adama sends Starbuck on her random quest, he gives her a crew that includes Gaeta, who is his best FTL specialist, and Helo, who is his executive officer, except suddenly demoted. I get it that they ran out of people we care about, but it was just hilariously unreasonable.

5) Tory killing Cally - obviously a high point. One of the more satisfying deaths on the show in terms of execution (pun intended).

6) The next ep after Cally's death, Escape Velocity, was penned by Jane Espenson, and stuffed with unintentional hilarity where Chief/Cally were concerned, and otherwise all-around awesomeness:
a) I don't know if Mary McDonnell had a twitch, an off day, or what, but during Cally's funeral she looks bemused/politely interested. I'm pretty sure it wasn't intentional.
b) Fat Baby reminiscing about Cally in the requisite memory montage: remember when I SMASHED YOUR FACE IN AAARGH! - they actually used that footage. I died laughing.
c) This conversation, between Baltar and Roslin: "Are you threatening me?" "No, i'm saying have a quiet life, and I'll die a quiet little death, and everyone will be happy. It's just that I'm not in the mood any longer to indulge you."
d) Caprica Six smashing Tigh's face in with an angelic smile. I actually made a clip of that.

7) The scene where they are aboard the baseship, and one Six loses it and kills a human pilot, and then is put down by another Six for the sake of the alliance - jesus fuck. Compare and contrast with Fat Baby in the finale.

8) The Eights' appeal to Athena to lead them in mutiny against the Sixes - fantastic. That's probably where I finally kind of grasped the nature of the generic Eights (as opposed to Boomer or Athena). Good stuff.

9) On the other hand, Athena killing the rebel Cylon leader was a major WTF moment. I mean, sort of good storytelling, but crappy, crappy logic. That was some Fat Baby shit right there.

10) Sine Qua Non was I thought the worst episode of the season, untilI watched the final ones that is. Either way, it's very bad. Basically 45 minutes of bad speeches and delaying the "obvious" "conclusion", a completely random gunpoint moment, shitting all over the Lampkin character... The man who wrote it is called Michael Taylor, and he also wrote the boxing episode from Season Three. He is, in other words, responsible for a lot of what is wrong with BSG.

11) But in the next episode we return to Jane Espenson who has Roslin saying to Helo with barely masked exasperation: "Captain, you are not married to the entire production line."

12) ...and D'Anna telling Roslin she's one of the Final Five only to burst into giggles a moment after with an: "Oh, the look on your face... ridiculous!" Yes, made a clip of this one too. Rock on, Espenson.

13) However, the resolution of the standoff? Ridiculous. A basestar has nukes trained on the civilian fleet, which needs sseveral minutes to spool up their FTL drives, and the Admiral himself states that the moment they start doing that, the basestar will fire. And then the humans' gesture of good will is "sharing the way to Earth, even though they could have jumped away with it." No, dumbas, you just said you couldn't have. This is possibly the first time where the show didn't make any sense in regard to a major plot point. A whole plot arc was resolved because the writers said it was resolved, as opposed to presenting an actual solution within the narrative.

14) But the last few minutes of the 10th ep, when they land on Earth - awesome.

Final 10 eps in the next post.

BSG: the ionian nebula

2011-04-21T02:20:00.004+02:00

Let's wrap up season 3, shall we?

1) It's official - all Starbuck-centered episodes in the entire series are lame. All of them.

2) Romo Lampkin seems more cartoonish the second time around. He's still a good character at this point, but he does veer dangerously into being gimmicky.

3) Even more gimmicky: hybrid talk. I have absolutely no interest in trying to decipher poorly written obfuspeak. I'm sure you're all very happy with how it all actually makes sense when you're the one writing it, but no. Most of the time it doesn't flow at all, instead it screams "hey look, see how we made it sound seemingly random?"

4) Baltar's trial itself was pretty entertaining. What I think I like most about it is the fact that Baltar himself is more or less a pawn in the proceedings - we never really see the action from his point of view. And that makes perfect sense, because the trial itself is not about him either, it's just the arena in which more universal issues are being resolved. If the writers intended this parallel to play out that way - kudos to them.

5) Apollo's testimony from the witness stand was really well written. I was completely over that character by then (not that he was ever a favorite of mine) and yet I did not cringe, and was even momentarly convinced.

6) Colonel Tigh has added a new weapon to his acting arsenal - in addition to the bug-eye he now also goes slack-jawed. To express anything. Good for him.

7) Finally - the use of Bob Dylan in the finale. Much as I like the BSG version of All Along the Watchtower, I find it grating that they featured a real-life song as a plot device in a sci fi show, and had fictional characters actually recite the lyrics. I understand that they wouldn't have been able to write anything better, but I still think they should have tried.

And that was the 3rd season. By far the worst of them all. Basically the only episode of note, from what I recall, was the escape from New Caprica, and parts of the finale. Not much.

BSG: the downhill years

2011-04-15T01:06:00.006+02:00

This one covers more territory, from post-Pegasus to post-New Caprica. Most of it not that great, unfortunately.

1) Twice in a row, the Apollo-centered episodes resorted to the teaser + "X hours earlier" trick. As if they were trying to say "Look! We know it's Apollo, but something interesting WILL happen at the end. Just bear with us!" Unfortunately, neither episode was that great. And Black Market - aka "Lee suddenly has a hooker!" - was up there with the worst of them.

2) Starbuck-centered episodes still suck. The exception: Starbuck and Leoben on New Caprica.

3) What is it with the fucking flashbacks. Whenever they use one, they repeat it over and over again, like 10 times within one episode. Starbuck was strobeflashed with "Oh Anders my Anders", and Lee with "That random lady on Caprica whose name we never even learned". Ok, ok, we get it.

4) Baltar's political coup (suddenly running for President) was pretty nifty, but unfortunately delivered the first unconvincing Head Six moment of the series - her slow clap for looked ridiculously staged and not even amplifying the sound for dramatic effect helped. I've no idea what didn't work, but it looked rather silly.

5) From some point on, the actor playing Baltar has decided that the only sure way of conveying emotion was trying to eject his eyeballs from their sockets. He just goes bug-eyed, and that covers surprise, fear, shock, anger, pain, sadness... Great. Also, it becomes painfully obvious just how subpar he is, craft-wise, when he has to play Caprica Six's Head Baltar. It's just embarassing. And when compared to Tricia Helfer's Head Six - downright cringeworthy.

6) When Chief went Neanderthal again, this time on Cally, I got this huge neon sign in my head saying FAT BABY ANGRY. And now I can't shake it off. When he suddenly went off to find himself a temple (wtf?!) I got FAT BABY EXPLORE. When he then couldn't blow up the temple and almost went fetal, cuddling the detonator: FAT BABY CONSTIPATED. It's my personal lolcat. He also continues to be the most annoying character around, and that's no easy feat with Baltar, Starbuck and Apollo around.

7) New Caprica meant that Helo got a terrible haircut, and Adama grew a moustache which made him look like Paco the friendly plumber.

8) Starbuck is a terrible asshole and there's really nothing redeeming about her anymore. My favorite part was when she was all traumatized post-New Caprica, and acting like a major jerk, and then had some sort of epiphany, and cut her hair, which was very very meaningful... and proceeded to be the same gigantic asshole as before. Another crowning achievement: literally driving Cat to suicide by heroism for no apparent reason, and then visiting her on her deathbed and giving her sleeping pills, so she can finish herself off. And then we get 3 minutes of Starbuck not-quite-crying (cuz she's tough, y'all) while putting up Cat's picture in the memorial hall. Say... Wh... You gotta... Huh?

9) Dualla is nearing Stockholm Syndrome in her relationship with Lee. Anders I kind of get, he outright said that he knows she's fucking around, and he's accepted that, and he won't leave her anyway. I can respect that: you relinquish any semblance of self-respect, don't ask the tough questions, and just take whatever you get. Dualla though... She's aiming for moral highground, she's disgusted with the whole situation, she knows the best solution is to extract herself completely from this mess... and yet she allows herself to get sucked in again. I refuse to see the parallels and instead choose to treat her with utter disdain. I said shut up!

10) Helo has become something of a safety valve for the viewers' frustration with various characters. Whenever one of them gets too annoying, he punches them in the face. So far, he's done Apollo and Tigh. I'm hoping he'll do Starbuck next, but from what I recall that never happens :(

11) The Threes' suicide obsession - amazing. Love that idea. Sad to see Lucy go.

12) Gina's last appearance was heartbreaking and kind of awesome, I have to admit. And the escape from New Caprica was cool. But aside from those two eps - no real highlights so far. It's really sad to see how much better plotted the first 2 seasons were.

13) Unfortunately, I also got to the point where the series started contradicting itself or being just downright ridiculous:
* Caprica Six killing D'Anna as "the first act of Cylon on Cylon violence". Because Athena killing those Cylons on Caprica was just vocational training.
* When that pilot comes back in a stolen Raider after 3 years, they determine he's not a Cylon because "his blood matches the sample from his military records". Huh? And Boomer's doesn't? How does that prove anything?
* Wrapping up the Cylon-killing virus storyline as a one-off (so that people won't expect it to ever pop up anymore) by Gaeta saying that it matches a virus reported 3000 years ago, when the 13 tribes were departing Kobol. Let me reiterate: they have precise records of a virus from Biblical times. They have to get all the other information about that period from their religious texts, but they're fully stocked on biological samples from that era. Maybe their Corinthians is a medical database or something.

Stop flaring your nostrils

2011-04-14T15:38:00.005+02:00

I didn't give a crap about James Marsden and Chelsea Handler isn't funny more often than she is, but I literally can't stop watching this interview (I've tried embedding it, no dice). I've seen it close to 15 times already, and it still amuses me. The barbecue bit is priceless. I also think this is probably what it would look like if I were asked to do an interview with someone I knew well and really liked.

I might actually like James Marsden now. He gets really cute when he's being obliterated.

Marlowe

2011-04-11T02:50:00.002+02:00

Ditto.

Yet more BSG!

2011-04-08T14:18:00.012+02:00

Quite possibly my favorite image out of the series so far (maybe with the exception of the vista of Pegasus and Galactica tearing into two basestars, but that's all CGI):

Six gone casual

The scene was hilarious. Conversely, here's the perfect image to demonstrate why I hate the Chief:

Me smash you argh!

It really doesn't get more Neanderthal than that. Additional points for going apeman on a guy who did not want to fight and refused the urge to kick his ass twice in a row. Go, grease monkey, go! I realize that not all characters need to be smart and have their shit together, and that you need this type of people for narrative purposes as well, but it doesn't mean that I have to like them.

Back to bulletpoints now (are they still bulletpoints when they're numbered? What do you call that?):

1) As a general rule, all planetside scenes in this series are boring. New Caprica may be the exception - but I'll only be able to verify that once I get to those episodes. The resistance bits on Caprica and most stuff on Kobol are fast-forward material for me (except fast-forwarding is wrong and I never do it).

2) Helo post-impregnation is actually a pretty nifty character, and an integral part of the whole equation. He's not a gamechanger, but he has his own agenda and makes a good pawn (or even knight) to Sharon's rook. His presence alone alters the power dynamics - and in my book, the more factors the better, so I'm on board. That being said, his "rehabilitation" in the eyes of the crew was completely unconvincing. One second he's a Cylon-lover and they won't even shake his hand, but the moment he goes "hey, let's use a different kind of colored paper for this arts and crafts project!" he's one of the crew? Huh?

3) Apollo is already being moved towards the "whiny asshole" end of the character spectrum, so I guess the middle of the 2nd season is where the change begins to occur. Too bad. He wasn't the most captivating of people, but he had his moments and you could actually empathise with him.

4) There's a very nice scene after half of the fleet jumps away with Roslin, in which Adama is assembling his ship in a bottle, or doing something along those lines, and absent-mindedly airs his various grievances to an unseen interlocutor. After a while it is revealed that he is actually talking to Dualla - quite possibly the last character you'd expect to see in this scene (or any scene for that matter). And she calls him on his bullshit saying: "I think you called me in here to talk to me, because you don't think I have anything to say. But I do." Not only was it a good - and perceptive - line in and of itself, but it also worked nicely on the meta level. I actually found myself thinking: "Oh right, Dualla, what's her deal anyway?"

5) I was convinced that the Pegasus arc lasted around 10 episodes, that it constituted the latter half of the 2nd series. Turns out, it's just 3 eps. The actual PEGASUS part I mean, before it' was reduced to being "that ship we can sacrifice". Also, a funny thing happened: I'm devouring BSG at a very rapid pace atm, but when I got to the Pegasus part, I almost started watching something else instead - not because I was bored (it's my favorite part after all), but because I remembered how intense and upsetting it was, and didn't feel like coping with that stress. Which I think means it's the first moment in the series where I was (and am - it was the same way this time) actually invested in the plot to the point of being unable to switch off kneejerk reactions.

6) There's a scene between Baltar and the captured Six in which he recalls a memory that Head Six had told him about, and claims it is his own, quoting it to to her word for word, as Head Six watches, mortified. I remember I was really impressed with it (I can't really say I "liked" it because it was very unpleasant to watch), but I don't think I understood it the first time around. I figured it was either a cynical attempt to establish some sort of rapport with the captured Six, or his revenge on Head Six for her various mind games. This time it struck me that he might actually be in love with this woman, and is making a choice: picking the tangible, if broken, version over the ghost in his head. Which, too, seems a bit cynical on some level, but also very... human? I don't know. Less deplorable, Head Six's pain notwithstanding.

7) Michelle Forbes is just so very, very good. And I appreciate the fact that they didn't make her go full-on monster, and that some of the characters actually got Admiral Cain's rationale (see Starbuck's eulogy).

8) Finally, those 3 episodes apparently also contain my favorite musical cue from the entire soundtrack:

BSG continued

2011-04-07T01:46:00.007+02:00

More randomness:

1) Baltar's conversation with Boomer as she is trying to kill herself - wow. Really, wow. It's hard to imagine an exchange more densely packed with layers of meaning. And when you inject Six's reaction to it... again, wow. Basically, when they play the Baltar/Six dynamic right, it's just stellar narrative work, and here they literally flipped it on its head. Watching the usually dominant Six listen to him and watching her condescension turn into confusion, alarm, and then this sort of suspicious not-quite-respect was such a pleasure. And Tricia Helfer delivered once again

2) Leoben is another great character. More Cylons plox.

3) The Cylon refinery ep - another solid one

4) The series one finale/series two premiere - overall decent, but the Kobol planetside scenes were just horribly dull. They killed off 2 characters we hardly knew anything about, and then spent a ridiculous amount of time on "mourning" them. I might be biased, because most of the mourning was done by the Chief, and I still loathe him, but I'm almost certain it was objectively dull. At least there's some Crashdown in the mix. Too bad they paint him as an incompetent asshole.

5) A little bit of cryptic and spooky awesomeness, courtesy of Six. When the Kobol party bury those two anonymous dudes, she states that "nothing awaits them here - no afterlife, no damnation. Only oblivion." And when Baltar, still trying to find his footing religion-wise asks "Because they haven't seen the face of God?" she replies with surprising and creepy clarity: "Because they died here. On Kobol." This is later echoed in an even more menacing manner, when Baltar deflects her warning by asserting that he can't die yet, because he's an instrument of God, and she replies: "God turned his back on Kobol. What happens on Kobol is not his will." I don't get why yet, but I love me some fine print.

6) Saul Tigh flashbacks. I don't care. I really don't.

7) The crib, the opera house, and the baby have all made their first appearance. I'm already fatigued.

8) I had a short discussion with Janek about the differences between Six's zealotry and Leoben's, but it's too chaotic to copy and paste, and I'm too tired to parse it. Either way, conclusions were reached. Take my word for it.

9) I can't help but see the events in the series through the lens of the boardgame mechanics. Autojump executed, but heavy raiders were activated first, ergo: Centurions on board. Boomer gets an executive order and nukes a basestar with her first action, and then reveals she's a Cylon with the second one (effect: send a character to Sickbay). And the Admiral just sent the President to the Brig (failed to strip her of her title though)

BSG revisited

2011-04-05T18:28:00.005+02:00

Lately I've been playing the Battlestar Galactica boardgame a lot - it's ridiculously good and very, very addictive. So much so in fact, that I've decided to re-watch the series which, from what I recall, I was never that wild about. It was more of a love/hate thing.

Anyway, I'm after the first 8 episodes or so, and wanted to jot down some general impressions:

1) the first episode (33 - the one where the Cylons catch up with the fleet every 33 minutes, and they have to keep jumping) is just fantastic. It should get an Emmy, or something. A perfectly paced, oppressive mini-movie.

2) the next one, Water, is really good too, actually, and establishes the "enemy within" problem almost as well as the previous one laid out the constant pursuit factor.

3) come to think of it, almost all the episodes I've seen so far have been good, with with the exception of two, both of which were Starbuck-centered. Number 4 (Act of Contrition) kept hammering home the whole Starbuck "killed" the Admiral's son motif over and over again, and number five (You Can't Go Home Again) is the one where she finds a dead Raider and miraculously learns to pilot it in several hours, or something. After ripping out its brain. It made about as much sense as if she had found a dead cow, ripped out its brain, crawled into it, and galloped home. Except that cow was now once again magically airtight and spaceworthy. Oh, and produced oxygen, even though it was dead.

4) the guy playing Baltar is a horrible actor. And I find I can't suspend my disbelief enough to see how anyone would treat him with even a sliver of respect, seeing as he spends half the time talking to air in public, fidgeting, and at one point even fucking an empty table. I'm not completely on board with the character psychologically either, and so I couldn't understand why he would hide the fact that Boomer was a Cylon from the rest of the fleet, but in the last episode it was hinted that he kind of did the same for Ellen, so now it seems he has simply disassociated himself from the human race. If they keep pushing the assumption that he's basically only interested in his own survival and believes in this "God's plan" Six has been brainwashing him with - I'll bite. That actually seems plausible.

5) Adama is a pretty shitty Admiral. I hope they didn't try to sell him as some sort of military genius anywhere down the road, since he already risked the entire fleet for Starbuck, and said outright that if it had been his son who crash-landed, they'd keep looking until the Cylons killed them all. Horrible military leader. Also, Adama/Apollo bonding scenes are excruciating. I think they have their own musical cue too - it involves bagpipes and induces vomit.

6) Apollo is very pretty though. He has those insane cheekbones that actually result in concave cheeks. Pretty, not handsome, but pretty works for me.

7) On that subject, there was a sex scene with Helo on New Caprica and they didn't show even a bit of skin. That's what I call wasting your actor's major (only?) asset. Made absolutely no sense.

8) Final bit of eye-candy roundup: Crashdown. I didn't remember this character at all, but he's there, kind of hulking and sickly pale, like a sexy sexy cadaver.

9) Tricia Helfer is spectacular as Six. Sensuous and menacing and fragile and pious and zealous. She does it all.

10) Cylons in general are fascinating and - at least so far - very well-written. I was surprised to find that certain characteristics I had learned to associate with various models were hinted at from the very beginning of the series, which means that they actually knew where they were going with it all, or at least were mindful not to contradict themselves as they made things up on the go.

That's it for now.

So elegant and sleek

2011-03-27T20:40:00.014+02:00

Ok, this one's been haunting me for 3 days in a row, to the exclusion of all other music:

It works on so many levels that it landed squarely in obsession territory.

Firstly, ever since bumping into Flesh Tone, I've had a weird thing for Kelis. Intro notwithstanding, the music took a backseat to the look and the person(a): I just found myself being fascinated with her, in that iconic capacity reserved for things unapproachable and unrelatable. So I had that going, and then this performance happened, and took it to another level. I know it's completely subjective, but I find her absolutely awestriking in this video - at least in those fleeting moments when you can actually make her out from behind the craptastic visualizations courtesy of David Lynch.

Secondly, the song is great, obviously. Grand and darkly romantic with a touch of menace - it's right up my alley.

Finally, the lyrics. Take a moment to read them:

Do you know where we are?
I'm longing for the dark
Of our nocturnal life
It begins and ends with you
Don't spill my secret

You were once running wild, hiding in the morning mist
Game demands I make you mine
I thought that I could resist, but the leopard in you
Silently preyed on me.

I made my way back home (Did you follow her?)
I handled her with care (Were you in control?)
So elegant and sleek (Were you not afraid?)
I need her to be near (Does she belong to you?)
Don't spill my secret

You were once running wild, hiding in the morning mist
Game demands I make you mine
I thought that I could resist, but the leopard in you
Silently preyed on me

Deserted by my friends (Don't they understand?)
She's so much more than them (How could they compare?)
So now she's just for me (No one else can see)
I watch her while she sleeps (Be sure she dreams of you)
Don't spill my secret

(It's been quite a while) Since we were last outside
(And do you miss the chase) Now that we've both been tamed
(Inside this gilded cage) Prisoners of our thoughts
(You saved me from myself)
Don't spill my secret

Today a man was taken from his apartment at the New Jersey Shore, and arrested under suspicion of entrapment of a wild animal. Police from forced entry discovered a caged leopard in the building. The fully grown feline was said to be surprisingly domesticated, by zoological experts who gave her a thorough examination before preparing her for relocation. A large crowd has gathered outside to watch the beautiful creature, and the giant cage was lowered slowly onto the street by a crane. From here, the leopard was transferred into the back of a truck for it's journey ahead. A startled onlooker said, it's extraordinary to think that any human being could have lived in such close quarters with such a dangerous animal. Police are saying that the captive was simply besotted with the creature, and barely left her side. It's alleged that he hunted her in the wild and expertly forged documents to facilitate her illegal export to the United States of America. The incident has already created much controversy, and is now likely to lead to a major international investigation into the life of the man who stole a leopard.

So yeah, it starts out pretty generic - at times even cringeworthy - only to turn into a psychotic ode to bestiality. And a superbly crafted one at that. I like the call and response structure of the verses. I like that they picked a female vocalist for the counterpart, which makes the number sound like a bona fide - if a bit dark - love song until the final reveal. And I absolutely love that she doesn't sing from the leopard's point of view, which would be tacky, exploitative, and put the animal on equal footing lyrically, implying that it could have ever been anything more than a passive/unwilling object of obsession (I'm trying to use neutral wording here).

In fact, I think the song is a really kickass depiction of someone's descent into madness. The male vocals are initially focused on the tangible; they're pretty straightforward. But as the song progresses, they become increasingly warped by the second, more twisted vocal line, until they are eventually overtaken by it.

If you follow Kelis' lines, you'll see that the second voice starts out very disassociated - inquiring and doubtful, as if it were voicing concerns which the protagonist doesn't want to address. By the next verse, it has become more integrated, echoing and complimenting the still relatively pragmatic male narrative, though with darker and more abstract undertones ("Be sure she dreams of you"). In the ultimate verse, the second voice finally takes over: the female vocals assume the lead, and the twin narratives reach perfect cohesion, becoming one. The psychosis is complete.

Pretty nifty for a little pop number, huh?

Bellringer

2011-03-16T03:22:00.005+01:00

People get compartmentalized, you get labelled, and I thought: "I don't want anyone to label me as anything other than the Funny One." Because if they say: "She's the Funny One" they haven't then got to say: "She's the Ginger One" or "She's the Speccy One". "She's the Funny One" and that's it. I wanted "funny" to define who I was (...) I suppose it is a survival instinct, and it is one I think I still use now. I would still rather... I just think if people think that I'm funny, they are not going to look any further. They're not going to delve any deeper. "I'm funny, don't look at me! Look at me with your eyes closed, look at me with your ears."

- Catherine Tate, Girls Who Do: Comedy

Red Dot

2011-03-13T02:34:00.005+01:00

I think I've finally triangulated the exact position of my "let's write another blog entry" button. The formula is: if I'm at least a little bit drunk, and too tired to log into WoW, but not yet incapacitated enough to just lie down and watch something before going to sleep, AND if Ana is not online for me to dump whatever happens to be leaking out of my brain at the time... on.

As you can see it's a tiny spot indeed. And I'm already talking to Ana...

And now I've updated the borgs, and I'm completely out of steam again. Until next time.

I felt like I was cheating, so I figured I'd at least throw in a song. It's one of those bands that popped up on too many websites and was advertised by too many of my music-savvy friends for me to ever properly check out, but it played in the background on our last evening in Bham - the only one, I think, during which we flirted with some sort of collective nostalgia - and got inset into that snapshot. I've since listened to the whole album a bunch of times and now know that I only like 2 songs from it, so it wasn't exactly a miraculous conversion, but still. This one's really good.

Previously on...

2011-02-26T01:50:00.007+01:00

Hello, dear diary. It's been ages, as usual. But I'm tipsy and retrospective, so let's try to rehash the last month or so.

For a long while I've been convinced that if I ever was to have a piece of music that got played whenever I entered a room (you know, my personal intro), then it would be the guitar part from Hazy Shade of Winter. Because obviously.

Now I'm listening to Hazy Shade of Winter on YouTube.

Anyway, there's another contender. I think it's an intro for those precious moments when I feel totally in touch with my mindblowing sexhualitay:

Seriously though, it's pretty haunting.

We went to Birmingham for about a week. It was yet another one of those low-intensity episodes, and I couldn't shake off the thought that it's weird to fly all the way to Britain to play WoW in the evenings and go to movies and stuff... but when I was able shove aside this nagging and somewhat abstract preconception of a "foreign adventure", it felt great. We went to a really fun poetry event, which incidentally is a phrase I have just retired, as I doubt I'll ever use it again. We saw Stratford-upon-Avon, and don't. And we went to Jamie Oliver's restaurant, which for some reason became my most vivid memory of the batch. I think it's a case of retroactive retouching, but I really loved the place, as a space to sit around in and feel vaguely jubilant (the food itself was ok, but so not the focal point). In hindsight it seems so warm and golden-bronze. I'd get into details, but i don't think I can do it justice, and I'm not even sure there's any justice to be done. It's just one of those subjective time capsules, and I've already dwelled on it more than enough.

If I have one regret it's probably that Karolina was so overworked and tired from the baby's antics, that we hardly had a chance to have any "moments" (I'd say "talk to each other" but it's sort of a different animal).

Ok, I was certain I had enough fuel for a huge sprawling tirade, but I'm literally falling asleep at the desk, so that's it for now. Hope to continue at a more convenient date.

Sun pokes through my lashes

2011-01-20T16:47:00.003+01:00

I have a new wallpaper. It brightens my day:

I firmly believe that blond stubble can cure cancer.

I'm also much better, although I did puke unexpectedly at 8a.m. Didn't see that one coming.

For 29 years

2011-01-18T02:16:00.004+01:00

I had a mild, extended anxiety attack today. That was fun. A kind of dull, barely palpable pain in my chest and a slight shortness of breath I've learned to associate with either pre-exam stress or a distant aftershock of heartbreak, suddenly emergent. I identified the immediate basis, but the feeling lasted - lapsing when I had company - until midnight, at least. Even though I was utterly certain I had nothing to feel anxious about. It dissolved only after some mental gymnastics which finally revealed other, underlying causes. All the necessary buttons got pressed and I'm fine and dandy now, but that was a fucked-up episode. I hate not knowing where my emotional responses come from.

I'm closing up. As if something kicked in, a latch fell into place, and I've begun nesting. Except I'm plugging the holes up with just me inside.

The observer worries, the glacial drift continues unaware and unabated.

Ana sent me this a short while ago, saying she heard it first when she was 29.

Out of words now.

5:25

2011-01-02T05:25:00.000+01:00

I'd much rather be sleepless in Seattle.

Poetic faith

2010-12-26T02:57:00.006+01:00

Gosh, it's been a while. Checking in since I'm not quite sleepy enough to collapse, but already too braindead to do anything constructive or even relaxing. Obviously a perfect niche for blogging then. There's your marketing campaign right there.

So, what's new... I guess the main thing is I got published on Pajiba, a site I've been reading daily for... God knows how long. Actually, two of my pieces already went up, and I just submitted the third one, which constitutes a big deal in and of itself. The first two were history articles, i.e. novelty items, since it's a film/tv review site. I was offering an off-kilter distraction and writing with some authority (even if it was but a thin veneer) about stuff most people don't know anything about. The piece I just sent them, however, is a TV review. Actually, it's a review of my favorite TV series , so it's kind of a different ballgame, both stress-wise and since they're actually going to publish something non-historical of mine. And so soon, too.

Seems someone's looking out for me, at least in this regard. I wrote them after they published a short piece on the Hungarian revolution of 1956, figuring that if my favorite site was getting into history, it at least wouldn't hurt to ask if I could contribute. The author took his time responding, but it turns out he's writing a thesis in political studies on post-communist countries, or smth, so my Polish pedigree at least gave my email enough anecdotal value for it to be passed on to the chief editor, who in turn liked my history stuff, and so it happened. A month later I randomly wrote the editor asking if they'd ever pimped Slings and Arrows on the site, since they totally should, and he replied that it's funny I should mention it, as he just finished the 2nd season, is in love with it, and was going to do a write-up, but I could do it instead if I wanted to. Kismet struck yet again.

It's been an interesting experience. I've always dreaded creating things from scratch on a daily basis. I figured translating is the perfect venue for me - it allows for some creativity, but you're always just riffing on a source, you don't have to whip anything out of thin air. Now I know I couldn't do it constantly (and on a deadline), but I also learned that there is something there to be plucked from the ether. And it's a completely different process, which right now feels exhilirating. These ready-made sentences or concepts just pop into my head, completely out of the blue, and I get to move them around, looking for ways to piece them together and make the narrative flow smoothly. And then people actually read it, and some of them like it.

At this point it's basically a dream scenario. I don't get paid shit, but I can write about whatever I want, at the pace I want to write it at, and am pretty much guaranteed it will get published. I can exorcise my historical fetishes without having to force them upon random and often unwilling friends, and just now got to preach about Slings and Arrows to a whole bunch of strangers. I'm still smelling the roses.

That being said, writing about the series was quite difficult, and it was the first time when I had to force myself to even begin. God. "It was the first time..." - and I'm only on my 3rd text. Great. Anyway, it's really hard to do justice to something you like so much, and I'm not exactly thrilled with the end result, but I know it's the best I can do for now. It's possible it would have been a bit easier had I rewatched all 3 seasons, but I've seen them at least 4 times now, so it seemed a bit excessive. And I prefer to think that in this case there's no escaping this feeling of vague disapointment. Nothing I could have written could have lived up to my - completely abstract, of course - vision of the perfect ode to Slings and Arrows.

As for other stuff... Behold my mighty youtube-bending skillz, as I make the song start at a very specific point! (Don't mind the absurd video - couldn't find a different one.)

Probably my favorite lyric of the last few months, Freudian slip and all.

Self-preservation continues to be the name of the game.

Census

2010-12-02T03:27:00.010+01:00

In 1593, John Sanderson compiled a list from information given to him locally to show the population of Istanbul, which arrived at a total of 1,231,207 inhabitants, but what is really interesting about this list is how the census is framed:

Viziers (I say Viseroys) ....................................................................................... 6

Muftie ................................................................................................................. 1

Women and children of all sorts, christians, Jues, turks, etc .................... 600,000

The U Factor

2010-12-02T01:15:00.002+01:00

In yet another attempt to burn through my backlog of movies, I watched Eulogy and Elegy. The first one was pretty atrocious - I actually groaned outloud several times. An ensemble dramedy with a lot of wasted ensemble. Elegy was better, but unfortunately too remote to make some sort of connection. It dealt mostly with aging and adultery, subjects I'm not intimately familiar with, so my mind wandered. Still, it had Patricia Clarkson (in a small role, unfortunately), and was quite beautifully constructed and shot. Very subdued, but evocative. Only once the credits rolled did I realize that it was one of Isabel Coixet's - which was probably why I got it in the first place.

And there was one brilliant exchange, between the main character, played by Ben Kingsley, and his estranged son (Peter Sarsgaard). I've uploaded it here, if anyone feels like watching 2 minutes of solid acting with a deliciously scathing conclusion.

Sebastian

2010-11-30T19:33:00.004+01:00

Winter is here. Beautifully irrefutable, Eastern European winter. I wish the moon was out, it always brings the resonance up a notch for me.

Drinking Bailey's out of a martini glass, contemplating the merits of self-preservation.

Books

2010-11-22T02:40:00.006+01:00

This one's long overdue, but oh well.

I've finished reading The City and the City a while back, and was really impressed, though it resonated mostly on an intellectual, rather than emotional level. Which was either an inevitable side effect of the way it was constructed, or indeed the whole point of the book. It starts out with a pretty fantastic premise, and then, as the plot develops, the mysticism is gradually, almost imperceptibly chipped away. When you reach the final act, there's almost a sense of disapointment in how... realistic the entire affair has become, but still - there's never a big reveal, any sort of "Ha-hah! And in reality, this is what's been going on". It's still an evolution, and the best part is that things are not revealed as being different than previously described - they're instead simply being described in ever greater detail. The book doesn't change its course, it's the reader who is forced to gradually abandon his overblown preconceptions.

Another cool thing is that the mercurial aspect of the twin cities is carried through the entire novel. At first I felt this itch at the back of my brain, because I couldn't quite place the city on the map. But with time (and information), it turned into another kind of frustration - one born out of being unable to visualize the actual layout of the cities - the way they intersected, and the way their boundaries worked (or didn't).

But the best part, at least for me, was that once I resigned myself to the tedium of truth, everything clicked into place. Again - there's no twist. It's just that everything could be now interpreted differently, in retrospect. And you could actually come to the conclusion that there were absolutely no supernatural elements to the story whatsoever. You didn't have to, but the door was at least half-open. And I absolutely adore such stories, to the point where I cooked up a ridiculously convoluted theory* about The Prestige where you could completely dismiss the Tesla part of the plot. It's also why I really love Like Minds, which I have to admit is a middling film at best.

And now I've moved on to Lords of the Horizons which I was really disapointed with for the first 10 pages, and now can't seem to put down for even a moment. So much hilarious Ottoman trivia!

* unfortunately, it collapsed under its own weight; still like the movie though

Mother dear

2010-11-06T00:01:00.006+01:00

I visited my folks today, to check in on them, and to give my mom The Sputnik Film Festival catalogue & assorted merchandise, which Marta benevolently gave me last night hoping she'd get another welcome package today, with her press credentials. Which she didn't. Sucks to be Jesus.

Anyway, it was the regular stuff - a tote bag with the catalogue, a screening schedule and assorted promo trash. I was sitting with mom at the kitchen table, waiting for the soup, and idly rifling through the stuff, when suddenly two condoms fall out from between some cosmetics brochures. My brain went AAAAAAAAAAAA! and I instantly palmed them and slipped them into my back pocket, which was no easy feat. Half a minute later another condom-looking packet appeared, and was also spirited away (I had become a pro by then, apparently). All the while I was trying to avoid thinking that I just almost re-gifted my mother condoms.

Back home I took a closer look at them and it turned out they weren't actually condoms, but hand cream samples, and there's actually some red-headed girl weirdly almost-kissing a middle-aged woman on them (which would make for a somewhat confusing condom wrapper), but trust me, they look the part. And now for some choice quotes (in Polish):

(przegladajac katalog mama natrafia na sekcje dziecieca i wlacza jej sie nostalgia, z pelnym zaangazowaniem i wzruszeniem) ... ale moja ulubiona bajka to byla taka szwedzka, Carsson (sp?), o panu z broda ktory mial smiglo w tylku i odwiedzal male dzieci...

(o kompocie, ale znienacka, nowa mysl) Wiesz, bo ja to po prostu robie do dzbanka.

It was a nice interlude.

And the weather was great. Very windy, but warm, with heavy, rolling clouds racing across the sky. Perfect for walking, though it did remind me a bit of a cartoon someone told me about: a gray cityscape filled with downtrodden, gray people, and a gray strip across the sky, with the caption "A Rainbow Over Warsaw".

I promised myself I wouldn't harp on about weather so much, because at one point it seemed all I did was weather, music and obfuspeak, but I can't help it, I get such a kick out of just watching the city skyline. Also, tried a little experiment and it's amazing how many different shades you can pull out of those clouds depending on whether you're listening to this, this or this.

AFF, revisited

2010-11-01T00:24:00.005+01:00

This one's been sitting on my hard drive for almost a week now. I'll try to wrap it up somehow, but things have gotten a little hazy by now...

***

It’s the last day of the American Film Festival, and I’m not sleepy at all so here we go with another update. Unfortunately, the Internet at our suites went bust yesterday, so I’ll probably post this tomorrow evening at best.

We departed on Friday. I was supposed to meet up with ao, pauli and her suddenly new boyfriend at ao’s place, which meant I found myself on the subway, on a weekday, at 8 a.m., with a pretty sizable travel bag. I was not prepared. Not exactly Tokyo at rush hour, but quite an ordeal nonetheless. Oh, the sheltered life of a languid freelancer.

Once there, we packed ourselves into ao’s Micra and off we went. The drive was pretty uneventful, but also very pleasant. We listened to various mix tapes, including the one from Piaskowa (according to pauli, that was five years ago. Jeez.) with some songs no one but me liked, and others with songs no one else but me objected to. It was kind of funny to realize how easily we (i.e. me and ao) can relapse into this catty back-and-forth which characterized the first years of our interactions, but also comforting to see we both now know to rein it in and pull out of the contested zone once we notice the pattern.

Oh, we also saw a wonder of WTF architecture called “The Highland Inn”, which stood in the middle of the Mazovian plain, and looked like a mountain cottage gone berserk. It was this enormous, baroque… castle, really, except one made from the building blocks of Carpathian mountain cabins. It completely blew my mind, and also – incidentally - reeked of manure.

We got to Wroclaw at 3 p.m. or so, and my companions went to see the Banksy movie, while I saw Sons of Perdition – a documentary about teenage runaways and exiles from this Mormon sect which still practices polygamy. The movie was excellent, and told me that Big Love is ridiculously well-researched. There wasn’t a single element of that reality that wasn’t somehow touched upon in the series, and sometimes the similarities were so striking that I started wondering if the show wasn't based on this particular community (I’m not sure if there is more than one sect, but there are many different communities – the movie focused on the one in Colorado, or Arizona, or both, I forget, but there was also talk of one in Texas). The screening was followed by a Q&A with the directors, which was conducted by a friend of mine who was so competent at what he did (both translation- and moderation-wise) that it made me seriously ponder trying to take a crack at it sometime in the future. Which is saying a lot, since I’m terrified of public speaking.

The day ended at the Kropka HQ with quite a lot of alcohol and a joke about the theremin that made me and Iza have a total meltdown – unfortunately, it requires visual aids. At one point Blazek started a story with the words “There’s this guy on the Internet who criticizes stuff…”, and that became his thing for the duration of the festival – later on he also described a movie as “being about people”. I also remember talking to Asia about something, and then suddenly it was 5:30 a.m. and I was asleep.

On the next day I left my cellphone AND my earphones at the apartment, and was unable to retrieve them despite having both the code for the buzzer thingie and keys to the apartment (I was sure I was pressing “2” when in fact I was pressing “3” on the dial, and the front door key sometimes didn’t work, so I couldn’t get into the building). That was fun. Then we waited for an hour to get served at a restaurant, and ended up having to cancel our order, or else we’d have missed our movies. The ones ao, pauli and her suddenly new boyfriend went to started at 4:15 p.m., mine started at 4:00. They made it.

3 hours of background frustration later, I rejoined ao and we went to see Please Give. Which was fantastic. Catherine Keener is always great, but so was Rebecca Hall, who I’m starting to really like, and – surprisingly – Amanda Peet. Very funny movie, and very, very well-observed.

Afterwards ao went to raid Sunwell, and I tried to join her, but the Internet was down, and my laptop refused to acknowledge the unsecure network ao was leeching hers from, so out I went into the city with my less-than-trusty laptop, looking for hotspots. To make a long story short: I ended up back at square 1 one hour later, sitting next to and her watching her do stuff. Which was riveting. But then we went out to join all the Kropka people, and stayed in Mleczarnia until they threw us out. At one point Blazek got accosted in the toilet by a strange man, who tried to sell him a ticket to the land of eternal bliss using a picture of some poor lady's vadge. True story. And towards the end I unexpectedly had a very serious and honest conversation with Rafal. Or rather, listened to him having a serious an honest conversation with me. It was in equal parts eye-opening and warm-feelings-inspiring.

Sunday was opened with a really good documentary on the Star Wars fans' complicated love/hate relationship with George Lucas (The People vs. George Lucas was the title, I believe), and at 7 p.m. we went to see the one we had all been waiting for - Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. It was glorious. I hate watching stuff I translated, but this time the awesomeness that poured from the screen was so overwhelming that I forgot to cringe at my - supposed or actual - slip-ups. Most of the time, at least. For some reason I have a very strong emotional response to it. To date, there's only been one movie that really made me want to inhabit the world it presented, and that movie was Angels in America. I totally wanted to be a witty gay dude living in picturesque New York. Obviously, not necessarily dying of AIDS. I remember this very acute longing that stuck with me for over a week, completely shoving aside reality, and then lingered for... months, probably. Well, I kind of had the same reaction to Scott Pilgrim. Granted, it was much less powerful, but for a day or two I really wanted to be young and in Toronto. There wasn't a false note in the entire film, as far as I'm concerned. I love absolutely everything about it.

That was the high note. And on the next day there were car problems, tow trucks, mechanics, complications, and eventually - the long train ride home with The City and the City, which I've already covered.

All in all, I'm totally going next year.

Crosshatching

2010-10-26T01:04:00.007+02:00

Back in Warsaw. The festival was great, and I'll try to do a proper post about it, but only after I've gotten some sleep.

On my way back I dug deeper into China Mieville's The City and the City, and I really like what it does with my head. It starts out as a pretty straightforward noir crime novel, but as the camera pans out, you learn it's something much more complex. And you're not really given any sort of systematic backstory to all the weirdness, you have to kind of reverse-engineer the big picture from various everyday practicalities. These hints are delivered so subtly that at first I actually took them for witty turns of phrase.

An elderly woman was walking slowly away from me in a shambling way. She turned her head and looked at me. I was struck by her motion, and I met her eyes. I wondered if she wanted to tell me something. In my glance I took in her clothes, her way of walking, of holding herself, and looking.

And with a hard start, I realized that she was not on GunterStrasz after all, and that I should not have seen her.

Immediately and flustered I looked away, and she did the same, with the same speed. I raised my head, towards an aircraft on its final descent (...) after some seconds I looked back up, unnoticing the old woman stepping heavily away...

To my surprise, they turned out to be quite literal. Without giving away too much, it's the story of two cities (city-states, really), Beszel and Ul Qoma, occupying the same space, with parts belonging to just one (referred to as being "total" from one's perspective, or "alter" from the other's), and a whole patchwork of shared areas. The citizens of both are trained to only perceive their home city, or rather, to fail to perceive the other one, and its inhabitants. Openly and deliberately noticing the other entity is a very serious existential offense (again, trying not to reveal too much), and inadvertently doing so causes great unease:

I policed a music festival once, early in my career, in a crosshatched park, where the attendees got high in such numbers that there was much public fornication. My partner at the time and I had not been able to forebear amusement at the Ul Qoman passerby who tried not to see in their own iteration of the park, stepping daintly over fucking couples they assidously unsaw.

The fun part is both cities are sovereign entities and it is for example revealed that they were on opposing sides during World War II, and that to this day Ul Quoma is the target of an American embargo (think Cuba). Another neat, and I'm hoping deliberate twist is that you can't pinpoint the city's whereabouts. You are given plenty of context: ther's mention of Balkan refugees, direct flights from Budapest and Istanbul, and Beszel street names sound decidedly Hungarian... but then, the city is a sea port. So whenever you are given another scrap of origin information, you feel this low-level anxiety/frustration as the exact location keeps eluding you - which echoes the descriptions of people "unseeing" its phase-shifted streets.

I read most of the book on the train from Wroclaw to Warsaw, and when I got out of the train station, I couldn't help but look for glimpses of the city I just left - fully realizing how silly it was. I couldn't shake it even on the tram home, and kept comparing the two, noticing how empty Warsaw streets look in comparison.

Between the cities, Breach watched. None of us knew what it knew.

You couldn't get in

2010-10-09T02:58:00.004+02:00

It's been quite a while. Guess it's a testament to how... settled my life's become (the word "routine" was quietly put down behind the shed before it had a chance to get a foot in).

Anyway, tonight was unusual and hilarious.

It started out with a delicious dinner at tiny new Sri Lankan place (although they use the name Ceylon, which I thought was politically incorrect - go figure), followed by the Warsaw Film Festival opening gala. The gala itself turned out to be something of a black tie event, with an actual red carpet and stuff, so we - me and... let's call her G, as she always makes a fuss about being featured in online stories - were a bit screwed from the get-go (her moreso than me), but hey, free champagne and people in costume! Yay!

We immediately devised a score system - 3 points for every celeb you spot, 2 points for a pretty person, and 1 point for someone you personally know. G was way ahead of me within minutes ,so I decreed she was cheating (she claimed 6 points for someone she then refused to point out in the crowd, for example, how's that kosher?). It didn't help matters that the first familiar person I saw was someone I didn't really want to interact with - one of those very distant, awkward acquaintances - so I ducked out of sight. G schooled me in the best way to deal with these situations: you avoid eye contact, and if for some reason that fails, you look them straight in the eye, say "Hello!" and walk right past them. And sure enough, that's exactly what they did two and a half hours later when we incidentally locked gazes.

The movie itself was pretty bad. The best part was when halfway through half of the screen was filled with the logo of the subtitle projector - the machine went into some sort of standby/screensaver mode, so several minutes of the huge fucking festival premiere in Sala Kongresowa went without Polish subtitles, while the tech guys scrambled to restart the system (we even got a glimpse of Norton Commander, how old school is that). For someone who knows people who work in subtitling it was the equivalent of a spectacular nip slip.

Afterwards we mingled, bumping into various acquaintances, including G's friend Ewa, who in my cosmology features as probably the only strikingly beautiful girl I know who is also perfectly aware of her good looks. She isn't obnoxious about it, or anything, but it seems like she certainly knows how to get her way. I also met another friend of G... but for that, we need to go back ten years.

It is 2000, I'm 18 and about to apply for uni. I'm taking these weekend preparatory courses in history, organized by the university, and so is W., my best friend from high school. I've always been too intimidated to yell out answers to the teacher's questions in class (omg what if I'm wrong?!) so whenever I knew one, I would mutter it under my breath to W. Now, there was this guy who sat in front of us, and whenever I muttered the answer, he would repeat it to the teacher, only outloud. I shared this observation with W. and at first we both thought that he might just know the same things I do, but we tried it out a few times, and he only spoke up in class after I'd croaked out the answer in my impotent nerdiness. Needless to say, he became our running joke for the rest of the course.

And so, who comes waltzing up to G at the gala? That's right. At first I wasn't sure if it was really him - it was ten years ago, after all - but it turned out he's my age and he majored in something that likely required a history test, so... Yeah, I got a giggle out of it.

Meanwhile, another one of G's friends called (they are legion - let's call this one "DJ friend") that there's some sort of party in the basement of the Europejski Hotel, so we decided to move there. The history prep guy actually works at the festival and said he'll try to get us to the venue in one of the festival town cars if we only pretend that we're some sort of festival guests. He sized us up and decided we should pose as "short film directors" which I thought was spot-on - "director" sounds impressive, and the "short film" part somehow gives leeway in terms of age and general blubbering idiocy, at least in my head. We agreed we'll pretend to be FOREIGN (because of course we did) and poured into the car spewing English platitudes. History prep guy immediately blew our cover by asking us something in Polish, so we spent the next couple of minutes trying to supress a bout of decidedly undirectorial giggles.

When we arrived at the spot, we learned that G's DJ friend would come get us in about 20 minutes. We weren't really sure how to get in there on our own, so we hung out in front of an inoperational automatic door to the hotel, watching equally confused people try to get in and bounce right back. Until suddenly, a girl with two guys walked up to the door and without missing a beat just pried it open with her hands, like they do to elevator doors in movies. We went "score!" and followed her inside, but once we entered the dark lobby, the girl turned around and said "I wouldn't follow me if I were you - I actually work in this place". This initially confused us, so we stopped dead in our tracks, uncertain, but before we could discuss this new development amongst ourselves, one of the girl's male companions apparently felt the force surge strong within him, so he extended his hand towards us dramatically (fingers spread out and shit), uttering with deep conviction "No! ^* Stop!" Ewa, as I mentioned, is very pretty, and probably oblivious to inadvertent Star Wars references, so this bizarre little display merely inspired her to walk right past the dude and into some random corridor. I'm good at doggedly following in other people's wake, so off we went.

Now, the party was supposed to be in the basement, so obviously G led us to a staircase leading up to the next floor. It's good that she did though, because the hotel was quite incredible at night - totally deserted, and really Shining-esque, except the corridors are green, and when you stand in them, the light reflected off the walls makes you look greenish as well. It's very creepy. Hopefully there's even a photo to prove it, but I didn't take it, so I'll have to get back to you on that.

It turned out that we went upstairs to find an elevator that would take us to the basement. Long story short: it didn't work out, we got caught by the security guy and asked to leave. We ended our little escapade just in time for G's DJ friend to appear and "get us into the club" which translated into paying 1/3 less than the regular folks, so not exactly the stuff of glamour fantasies, but at least we didn't have to stand in line. There was also a pretty hilarious "I got in, you couldn't get in" moment, as the DJ got stopped by the bouncer, and did a little "They're with me" spiel (even though we had already actually paid to get in), to which the bouncer replied "Great, dude, but where's YOUR pass?"

The music inside was the thumpy stuff of CSI murder-at-a-club montages. There was some more drama with additional passes to the "chillout room" which to everyone's confusion and dismay was revealed to be the nightmarish club next door, but apart from that, nothing else of note happened. To my surprise, there was quite a lot of talent around (that is what the kids are calling it, right? At least the sleazy ones?) but it was all of that peculiar variety that comes up as white noise on my scanner, so I honestly couldn't tell which ones - if any - worshipped the schlong. And that's sort of demoralizing, even if you're just window shopping.

Unfortunately, the free booze from the reception had evaporated from me around the time of our short film director town car extravaganza, so I soon vacated the premises, feeling a bit like I'd just recaptured a managable slice of the crazy youth I never had.

And now it's fucking late. Good night.

* ^ is voiceover lingo for short pause in delivery

Whistling sound

2010-09-21T03:12:00.004+02:00

We went to Cambridge and ate huge baked potatoes stuffed with butter and cheese and beans and oh my God my left ventricle just collapsed. Wanted to go to Hitlerton upon Ruhr too, but never made it - we did glimpse Lolworth though. Had awesome balti, played some Civ4 hotseat, swapped spit (by way of inflatable mattress) with our host, saw Tamara Drewe (so British), bought a bunch of pretty awesome books (like this one, and this one). In other words, had quite a lot of lazy fun.

It's strange to think this was the last one of these trips (in this format, at least). Maybe that's where that need for instant gratification came from - knowing that I'm working on a deadline.

I always feel sad leaving, even if I really want to be back home already. It's a funny sort of sadness though, completely divorced from reality. Like a shot of nostalgia for something that never fully materialized. Could be a byproduct of partial idealization. Could be that they don't play movies on intracontinental flights and getting out of my own head was never my strong suit.

I love inorganic emotion.

Undelivered

2010-09-19T03:16:00.005+02:00

It's tricky when an ongoing thread becomes part of your personal narrative. Once you've used that shorthand enough times, you start expecting reality to follow suit and wait for it to provide you with the encoded experience. As opposed to experiencing it in real time and expanding that code. That's about as close as I was able to get to what I wanted to say.

My narrative is that these little trips to the UK are what's been keeping me sane for the rest of the year, since - short as they are - they constitute my only holidays. The pattern has been established, the mental shortcut made, so I expected heavenly bliss to blast a hole clear through my head upon arrival. Instead two really nice, relaxing days happened.

So yeah, ongoing threads are tricky. But when you drift off for a moment on evening #3 and upon return notice you're looking at the people at your table through a vaguely bliss-shaped hole, you realize that sometimes they become part of your narrative for a reason.

Roses, condensed

2010-09-12T23:01:00.005+02:00

Sometimes I really love my job. Probably never more so than over the past week. I was contracted by three different people to translate three different movies, and... well, let's just say Banksy's hilarious mockumentary turned out to be the least engaging of the crop.

Unfortunately, the trailer for the only feature offering of the bunch is a bit lackluster and all over the place thematically, so I'll showcase the last one:

The scripts I translate movies from often aren't 100% compatibile with the finished product - they contain scenes that were later cut, present the dialogue in a different sequence, or in some severe cases are only superficially related to the actual movie. It's a pain in the ass, but there's nothing I can do about it. This time it led to me translating a story that as it turns out never made the final cut. For once, though, I'm really glad it did:

There was this kid I grew up with, sweetest person you’ll ever meet, and could sing just like James Taylor, had a beautiful voice. His daddy was a Pentecostal preacher and he grew up in the church and ended up marrying a girl whose daddy was a preacher. And he was just surrounded by Jesus and he was a sensitive soul and he didn’t fit in the church. Didn’t fit there, but kept trying and trying until one day he just went to the hardware store and bought him a can of paint. He went to the church, he painted love on one side, he painted hate on the other. And then he sat down on the front steps crying. He just couldn’t find the middle.

Ok, back to work.

Side road

2010-09-12T10:44:00.006+02:00

I've been going to sleep around 4-4:30 a.m. and waking up at almost 2 p.m. for the past few days, but today I have a breakfast appointment and had to drag myself out of bed at 10. I was totally zombiefied and had very little control over my thought patterns, so my brain was going off on all sorts of tangents. I got out of the shower somewhat more conscious, but with a very specific, and unshakeable soundtrack in mind.

I popped it on, and as I was pulling on my socks, and the ruckus in my head subsided, I had the oddest bout of nostalgia for that fleeting pocket of quiet before the shitstorm I associate with my school/university days. That stretching of of every second in your rapidly collapsing bubble, when you've already resigned yourself to your fate, but decide it's perfectly within your rights to ride out those last moments of escapism.

I never thought I'd miss that. And actually, I don't think I do. But the wistfulness stands.

There's not much chance of coming out clean

2010-08-29T02:08:00.009+02:00

Sometimes i forget how amazing this movie is. Never for long, though. Never for long.

Gulliver's Travels

2010-08-25T02:18:00.008+02:00

(Previously called voyages, until I googled Gulliver to learn how his name was spelled).

Went to a small party tonight, full of circumstantial acquaintances at best. At one point a guy who as far as I know is a DJ and has nothing to do with translations reacted to something I said with "Oh yeah, I heard you're problematic profesionally". When pressed, the most diplomatic answer he could come up with was "Well, I mean, you're demanding." He wouldn't divulge any personal information, so I'm just gonna resent whoever the fuck I want for that little piece of gossip.

I returned home by cab. As I settled into the backseat, the driver asked me if I wanted to take Wolska or Kasprzaka. Disclaimer: I'm the shittiest Varsovian on record. I don't know anything about my home city's topography. I did remember checking the route on google maps before leaving home though, and the name "Wolska" popping up, so I just said that, in a confident voice, feeling very proud of myself.

The trial wasn't over though. After about 5 minutes, the driver went "But do you want me to actually drive into Plac Mirowski? Because then I'd have to take Grzybowska and turn around..." I mulled this over for a moment, and summoning all my cognitive powers, I asked if it was possible he took Solidarnosci, and then took a right turn into Orla, and then another one into Elektoralna (something I vaguely remember my father doing at one point). He went "Ok, we can do that."

It was all I could do to keep myself from demanding that we invade Finland next. I felt like the master of the universe.

There was more. But I'm sleepy, and drunk.

Maybe later. I hope.

Nowhere bound

2010-08-17T20:33:00.003+02:00

Had a wonderful weekend which kind of proved that a temporary absence of work can be a blessing when mixed with people and spritzers.

Also, my running water's back. I totally Papa Bear'd this crisis, so I'm extremely proud of myself now. Another morale booster.

Finally, the vague uneasiness surrounding the Breslau Epilogue has dissipated. It's a chapter very neatly closed.

Sealed

2010-08-13T02:31:00.003+02:00

And so, after a brief delay, the Breslau File has finally been closed. Not exactly a story for the ages, but at least an interesting episode. Complete with time warping and a sort of out of body experience. I have to say that last part was pretty unnerving, but I've been assured that the problem might only pertain to this particular scenario, and not be a systemic issue.

Sorry for the obfuspeak, I don't feel like dragging this thing out into the open, but I'd still like to have a marker for it in here somewhere. And so, here it is.

I still have no cold water in the kitchen. It's been about ten days now. While trying to fix it, I broke my toilet seat. I also have absolutely nothing to do, work-wise, and it's driving me crazy. I was supposed to get this awesome assignment next week, but today I got a call saying "really sorry, but the boss's son is going to get it". It really bummed me out, so I decided it was time for little pick-me-up in the form of a banana milkshake - my go-to comfort food this summer. And the blender died on me.

My world is literally crumbling, it seems.

But tomorrow I'm taking my laundry to my parents'... This was supposed to be a motivational list of the things I'm gonna do tomorrow to turn this trend around, but that's literally all I could come up with. Let's hope it's enough.

The Breslau Files, Closure Pending

2010-08-05T01:14:00.007+02:00

Back in Warsaw. This year, Wroclaw was... weird. Filled with work, and not much else. I think I only managed to leave the office before midnight once throughout the entire festival. And in this case, by before midnight I mean around 11:45 p.m.

Still, inexplicably, I did have some fun. And ate a lot of good food. And experienced some requisite social anomalies.

I also had a Disney moment. On the last day, as I was being gallantly escorted through the empty city to my hotel at daybreak, my companion asked if he could wrap his arm around me. I agreed, he did, and after literally 2 seconds we heard some two drunk girls down the street yell FUCKING FAGGOTS! Cartoon fireworks exploded, the last meatball rolled to the middle of the plate, etc.

Oh, how we laughed.

The Breslau Files

2010-07-27T03:49:00.005+02:00

So I'm in Wroclaw, doing my festival gig. It's way more hardcore than I remembered. On the first day, we left work at 4:30a.m. And it wasn't the happy go lucky kind of "oh my look at the time" 4:30. It was gnaw your arm off get me outta here 4:30.

And then the same thing happened on the next day.

Now we're down to leaving around midnight, so I feel almost relaxed.

I'm eating tons of really unhealthy food and quite possibly already gained a couple kilos. Perhaps in response to that, my jaw stopped working today. It's happened to me once already, and last time mild anti-inflammation medicine worked, so I went to the doctor and told him just that. And he prescribed me Ketonal, which from what I understand is something akin to a horse tranquilizer. Anyway, I popped one and suddenly I was able to chew again, so I'm not complaining.

The work itself is kind of a pain, but the company is good. My co-translator was a very good bet. She is probably the most effortlessly cool person I know, has a good sense of humor, and appears to be completely unphasable, which comes in handy when dealing with the assorted freaks and geeks of ENH. Case in point - tonight, festival club:

bdq, walking up to her at the bar: Hello. I just wanted to look into your eyes.
dorota, meeting his gaze levelly, after a beat: And now, good bye.

There's humor, but it's of the unquotable, highly hermetic variety - either related to the sometimes absurd nature of our work, or springing from exhausted brainfarts. The current expression du jour is "shut down the reactors!", inserted whenever we have absolutely no idea what the person in the movie we're translating is saying (it's an actual quote from one of the translations, which inexplicably appeared on the screen instead of "I have a headache" or something equally unrelated).

I took it easy with alcohol tonight on account of the horse tranquilizer, so I had a rather Sober and Unkissed evening, but that was more than made up for by the unusually flirty Consort to the Beast, and the server goblin, who has taken to - literally - humping the wall. Something's gotta give soon, and I just hope I'm not anywhere near when it happens.

Oh, also: met (well, got better acquainted with, really) two new, potentially stellar people. So there's that.

Quickie

2010-07-14T13:52:00.005+02:00

I already wrote about Pajiba vs. io9, but I forgot to mention that while io9's True Blood recaps are absolutely hilarious, Pajiba's are... just terrible. Bloated, boring, and utterly devoid of wit. (Yet their Entourage coverage is inspired. Go figure.)

Anyway, I loved the last episode so much that I even checked out the Pajiba recap, and sure enough - the things I liked about it most were the exact same things that got panned in the first paragraph. And the entire episode was written off as a disaster.

Meanwhile, I thought it was absolutely hilarious. Anna Paquin's delivery killed, I watched her crying scene at least 3 times... (actually, you can watch it here, in the io9 recap, and read the whole damn thing while you're at it. "Miley Cyrus, is that you?") I now firmly believe that all the flak she gets for playing Sookie is completely undeserved, it's not her fault her character's unlikable, and whenever they let her fly, she soars. I'm so happy that her Bill Compton's "Sookeh!" impression was just a first taste, and I hope they keep giving her comic material.

The new werewolf guy is a very nice addition, and I'll be completely on board once 1) I get over how cartoonish his body is and 2) he stops reminding me of Felicity's Scott Foley gone the way of the steroid.

The deranged new vampire guy is pure win, and he was Alvaro de la Quadra, the Spanish ambassador in Elizabeth, so obviously he was meant to rock (the laughable post-orgasmic void line from the previous ep notwithstanding). His car conversation with Tara was golden.

"It's skinny!" Even background characters got good material!

And they played that beautiful Massive Attack song in the strip club scene.

Ok, to play us out: a short interview with Sookie and the new werewolf guy.

I'm getting over the body as we speak, but at some angles, Noel Crane still rears his wholesome head.

Otherwise we'd go crazy

2010-07-14T13:35:00.006+02:00

The festival is almost upon us, and it has imbued everyone involved with a seething hatred for Jean-Luc Godard. I get to translate a metric ton of his brain sewage into English, so I've developed a bit of an immunity, but still, sometimes the pain pushes through. To wit:

So, we asked to be told only about this, not about us, not about you – about something between us and you, you, who are we, we, who are you, we, who came from you. We placed “us” among “us”. We’re among us. Television is a family matter. Dad – day and mom- night. Dad – before and mom – after.

And then 20 more hours of that. Fun!

Anyway, I'm in more or less constant contact with my boss/server goblin, who uploads* the movies I then distribute among our translators. Whenever she's about to leave her house, she asks if I need something uploaded before she goes. It's a sort of ritual. At one point, when I copy-and-pasted my order from our Big Spreadsheet, she went "Pfff! How about a challenge for a change?" So when I sent her my next order, I snuck in Inception, in full Big Spreadsheet regalia (director, running time, language, etc). This became a sort of running joke, until last night I got another yousendit package with a file called Inception. Inside it was this:

You've guessed it. That's Jean-Luc Godard.

Sometimes it's worth it.

* through a series of trial yousendit accounts, so I've already received files from: Buffy Summers, Amber Benson, Sookie Stackhouse, James Marsters...

Mosaic

2010-07-03T02:01:00.004+02:00

As I grew up, I discovered that I loved to wear women's clothing as a way to express my sexuality and myself, even though I was quite evidently straight (...) My later girlfriends usually found it a huge turn on and we'd always have fun trading clothes, amongst other things (...) The story I always tell people is I was about ten years old, swimming at my grandmother's house. My cousin and I were in front of a mirror, he had a buzz cut hairdo, and I had a little kid mullet. All of a sudden, he bursts out laughing and pointing at me and the bit of wet hair that was kind of curled around my neck and says,"HA HA, you look like a girl! You look like a girl!" I did look like a girl. I had very soft features for a boy and with my hair a bit longer, it wasn't a hard sell. But his teasing didn't make me feel bad. I thought I looked kind of... cool. I was intrigued by my androgyny and felt almost empowered by it. So I grew up thinking that since I certainly wasn't born to look like some gruff, muscled out Dude-Guy, I might as well work with what the good lord gave me, which happened to be a good, sassy pout and a sweet ass. So, off I went.

Godspeed.

Charting out and analyzing all the different permutations has never been my thing, but something about this quote fascinated me. Well, not something, it's not nearly as vague as that: straight guys acknowledging they have a sassy (sassy! I died and went to heaven) pout and a sweet ass fascinate me. That's such an... abundant, multi-pronged space. Every time I stumble upon someone of this ilk, I feel slightly better about the world at large.

Oh, and here's the author:

Airbending

2010-07-02T11:59:00.003+02:00

I already love M. Night Shyamalan's Avatar: The Last Airbender, just for inspiring critics from pajiba and io9 to reach new heights of enlightened hilarity. Here are some choice bits:

And yet, there is no life. It feels half-speed like a dry run of the production. In fact, Shyamalan went out of his way to suck any and all life out of the original material, like a Twihard horking feathers as she chews through her Cullenpillow.

Aang’s animal companions are practically an afterthought. Given personality in the series, here they were a burden on the budget. Momo, the lemur-bat, is akin to the monkeys from the Indiana Jones series. In the movie, we seem him occasionally flying around in the background. There might be one scene where we actually get shots of him rifling through a closet. He looks cool, which is more than I can say for dear Appa, the flying six-legged furry bison. Appa was my favorite part of the series. Here, it’s like Snuffleupagus washed up on the island Where the Wild Things Are and got gang raped repeatedly, until one of the offspring developed the ability to fly and escape.

- Pajiba

All the story beats from the show's first season are still present, but Shyamalan manages to make them appear totally arbitrary. Stuff happens, and then more stuff happens, and what does it mean? We never know, because it's time for more stuff to happen. You start out laughing at how random and mindless everything in this movie is, but about an hour into it, you realize that the movie is actually laughing at you, for watching it in the first place. And it's laughing louder than you are, because it's got Dolby surround-sound and you're choking on your suspension of disbelief.

And then there's Shaun Toub, who stands out for the opposite reason: He's an honest-to-shit actual actor, and he looks as out of place as a zebra that's wandered into an alpaca farm. You can actually watch the realization dawn over Toub's face that nobody else is doing any acting in this film, but he soldiers on, dedicated to his craft in spite of everything. Toub, who's playing the uncle of Dev Patel's tormented Prince Zuko, is the real tragic hero of this movie, as you watch him struggle to cling to his dignity as everyone around him drowns in narrative sewage.

- io9

Both are worth a read, though lately I've found myself favoring the io9 stuff. Pajiba is great at these thorough, profanity- and vitriol-laced critical behemoths, whereas io9 is more of a breezy zinger acrobat. And with all the Godard bullcrap sloshing around my brain, I'm currently in the market for something lighter.

Also, they have a real knack for killer lead-ins. My favorite one of late is this: "Taiwan's NMA News creates computer-animated depictions of current events that drive a flaming dune buggy into the uncanny valley. NMA's 3D take on the Leno-Conan tiff was amusing, but their version of the Al Gore sex scandal allegations is transcendental..."

I giggled like a lunatic, and that was before Janek reminded me what the uncanny valley actually was.

The loveless fascination

2010-06-29T01:59:00.002+02:00

The chorus disappoints, but the opening is pure magic, and enough to make ma crave it every once in a while.

Ever played low-intensity gaze tag with a stranger for an entire evening? Ever wondered if that's actually the case, or if it's just a random glance that's somehow snowballed to become its own, increasingly awkward thing? Ever found out before the night ran its course?

'Cause I didn't.

lower case society

2010-06-23T01:37:00.009+02:00

Today, pretty much out of the blue, I got depressed, because I'm a horrible human being. Well, not because I'm horrible - I'm quite fine with that. To be precise: I got depressed because of something that a non-horrible person wouldn't be bothered by at all.

So, that was fun.

But now le'ts move on to Marina and the Diamonds. Zuzia sent me this a while ago:

Which was, I suppose, as good an introduction as any, if you're into vocals-driven music. I listened to the whole record and it turned out to be really good, if completely different from the above clip. Think less stripped-down and sweater-clad, and more... hrm... wrecking mirrorball. While I was turned off by the most aggressively thumpy numbers (Girls and Oh no), I couldn't help but love the glamorously wasted Shampain - though I have to admit much of the charm lies in the imagery. It's just such a nice bitter survivor snapshot:

Elderly stars slide down the morning sky
Slipping away to find a place to die
I wonder when the night will reach its end
Cause sleep is not my friend

Drinking champagne, meant for a wedding
Toast to the bride, a fairytale ending
Drinking champagne, a bottle to myself
Savor the taste of fabricated wealth

But the album is all over the place stylistically. There's a legitimately beautiful - albeit spunky - ballad (Obsessions), a quirky indie something-or-another* (I Am Not a Robot), a Nellie McKay-esque acid trip (Mowgli's Road)... And towards the end of the album shit suddenly gets gothic. Seriously.

The disparity makes it difficult to pick out any favorites, but seeing as I've just come off my Florence and the Machine phase, and had a brief fling with some bombastic Muse numbers, I currently lean towards the aforementioned gothic finish, built around Rootless. I actually have no idea what that song's deal is, it really is shitballs crazy, but if you herald the imminent arrival of the chorus with fucking bells, chances are we're on the same page.

(Sidenote: is there a technical term for a distinct run-up to a chorus? Like a mini-bridge? A ponton maybe? Because that's often my favorite part. And on this album, both Rootless and Hollywood have awesome ones.)

And if that wasn't enough, it gets followed by Numb, which for the first few full album listen-throughs I thought wasn't even a real song, but rather some sort of Hollywood: Reprise (because of the WTF factor, and the mirrored "golden lie/light" motif). It makes absolutely no sense out of sequence, and might only be palatable after you've been stunned into stupor by the divebomb cathedrals from Rootless. And even then you're not quite prepared for the chorus valkyries warping in. Finally, she tops it of with Guilty, which somehow combines all of the elements found heretofore on the album - 80s synthetics, catchy pop fluff, unabashed theatricality, weird-ass transitions - into... well, something that clicks. At least with me.

Oh, and apparently she's awesome live:

Watch out for the camera guy's OMG BOOBIES moment

And she's playing Birmingham in October :)

* I think that's the song someone tried hooking me with a while ago, and failed. So it's Florence all over again. Except I actually like this one now.

Fadeouts

2010-06-19T00:42:00.006+02:00

Marta dropped by with two bottles of rose wine in the evening, so work went out the window. She left around 10p.m. and I've been trying to resurface since. Right now it's raining outside, and I'm looping this:

It's not exactly groundbreaking, but it's definitely doing the job. As for what job that is... Who's to know.

I recently saw short documentary called Birds Get Vertigo Too about an aerial acrobat and her rigger, who are a couple. It opens with a shot of the guy shaving in the morning and a question: who gets more scared - the riggers or the artists? He says the aerialists (love that word) cry a lot before the shows, but they won't admit to being scared of heights. The last dialogue between them comes from some rehearsal, where he starts apologizing for being tired, and she explains that she just asked whatever it was that she had asked him about, because she wasn't sure if there was a problem, or if he was just worried she was too high. To which he replies that he was worried she was too high, but that that was just "his headspace".

It ends with footage from the actual show, with her doing her routine on a big silver hoop suspended in the air, and him darting up and down one of the poles as her counterweight. Halfway through, the spoken word background gives way to sounds of muted sobbing, probably recorded before the show, when the girl was getting ready to perform. Eventually they fade as well.

It's a really beautiful, and beautifully constructed piece. The author's name is Sarah Cunningham. It's her first film.

Brief Interviews

2010-06-16T02:54:00.004+02:00

Saw two movies recently - an universally acclaimed one (The Squid and the Whale), and something that had been sold to me as a questionable first-time effort, with the emphasis on "effort" (Brief Interviews with Hideous Men).

The first one left me mostly cold and a wee bit annoyed. It felt like the lovechild of Wes Anderson and Todd Solondz, filled with frighteningly real and unlikable characters. I appreciated the whole hall of mirrors effect, with various people unwittingly echoing each other's sentiments and mannerisms, but there was nothing there that I could latch onto. I don't come from a broken home, I don't have siblings, and my sympathy compass is totally messed up. It's actually one of the reasons why I was never able to fully immerse myself in Mad Men - I usually empathised with the women, which was a very ungrateful exercise for the most part, and was primarily annoyed by Don Draper. The same thing happened with The Squid and the Whale - the father and the sons irritated me, so I was left with the mother, who didn't really provide an emotional anchor either, seeing as she was equally... three-dimensional.

Cue Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, which I really liked almost from start to finish. I remember reading on Pajiba that the book it was based on is basically unfilmable, and that despite their general good will towards John Krasinski (who wrote the script and directed) they felt it fell short. Well, I haven't read the book, and so find myself paraphrasing Kathleen Madigan yet again: "You don't see a frown on my face, do you? Should have waited for the movie instead, like a good American."

Now... it definitely feels like a book adaptation. A theatre play adaptation, even. The dialogue is actually more of a series of monologues, and all of them are very dense and verbose. Still, the only time I felt the pomposity explode the cinematic framework was when they saw it necessary to amp up an already larger-than-life tirade with some of that trademark indie movie discordant electric guitar and drums... jazz... thing.

As for specifics... the title basically says it all. It's a string of guys talking about their expectations, desires and thought patterns with brutal candidness, held together by a rather rudimentary plot. It works though. The monologues are very compelling (the book must be awesome), and there's quite a lot of talent involved. And by talent I mean fun faces - Bobby Cannavale, Lester from The Wire, Josh Charles (aka the dude who had Lara Flynn Boyle after him and still went for Stephen Baldwin. STEPHEN Baldwin, for crying outloud), Ben Shenkman playing a straight Louis Ironson, and a bunch of Hey, It's That Guy's. And John Krasinski himself, who got to perform the most harrowing of the monologues, and - in my opinion - sold it.

So yeah, if you don't mind your movies not trying to hide they're purely intelectual exercises - I highly recommend it.

Triple Threat

2010-06-13T14:41:00.003+02:00

Today I was woken up by a call from yssy, who was waiting outside my house and took me out for breakfast and S&S (strawberries and sunbathing) in a nearby park. I doubt I got any tan - after decades of neglect it would take a plasma torch to burn away the alabaster - but bliss was featured prominently.

Tomorrow some cartoon birds better braid my fucking hair. I have come to expect a certain standard.

Heatwave

2010-06-13T03:15:00.005+02:00

I hate this blistering heat. I'm completely useless during the day, barely scrounging up enough energy for cooling efforts, and then in the evenings I get inexplicably horny, which is equally bothersome.

But you do what you can to alleviate the situation. Yesterday, I went for short evening stroll, which turned into a very long evening stroll all the way to Filip and Natalia's place. I didn't get winded at all, it cleared up my headache almost instantly, and I was really quite elated until I stopped at their door to buzz them and for the first time felt what several kilometers covered at a brisk pace do to sandaled feet. It wasn't pretty, but the evening itself was. Managed to completely ignore the last 15 minutes of some soccer game and relax in choice company.

And tonight Darek suddenly popped out of the blue saying he was going for a joyride around the city and asking if I wanted to come with. Which of course I did, especially since it was raining. The minute I sat down in the car I felt drunk on life, and started babbling uncontrollably. I don't really know where we went, but at one point I saw a sign saying "Warsaw - 30km", so we must have crossed city limits at least once. The rain was pouring, there were no people around, and things were good, in general.

Which is the thought I'm taking to bed with me. Good night.

Closure

2010-06-13T03:10:00.002+02:00

The answer to the riddle from the previous note is: Christina Aguilera, in a song penned by Sia. It was tough to pick a winner out of the deluge of submissions, but I suppose the award goes to anonymous. Unfortunately, it will never actually get delivered on acount of their anonymity.

Suffused

2010-06-05T19:57:00.005+02:00

After drifting in and out of consciousness for several hours, I finally climbed out of bed at 1 p.m. Took a shower, grabbed a book, and got on a tram to the Morskie Oko park to join Natalia, Filip, Kazia, a cute little dog, and an even cuter baby girl. Plopped down on the grass and proceeded to have the nicest, most ridiculously relaxing day in ages. At one point Filip hopped off to grab some blankets and - get this - bring people home-brewed coffee in one of those "to go" paper cups. He actually called my cell from his place to ask if I take sugar in mine. I'm making a conscious effort not to hyperbolize, but it was amazing.

Around 4 we slowly made our way to Filip and Natalia's place - where we were joined by Szymon - had some delicious Indian take-out (I already warned them that I'll drop by just for the food), drank some wine, and lazily dispersed. I got home almost two hours ago and have since been half-heartedly trying to pull my brain out of molasses, as I really need to get something done by Monday. So far it's mostly been a book and music though.

Speaking of... this is one of those moments where I kind of regret only 5 people ready this thing now. Anyway, here's a little musical riddle - and my soundtrack for today. If you're in the mood for a simple, but really quite beautiful lullaby, give it a try. And then tell me who sings it. It's not a difficult one, so don't expect a huge challenge, but maybe you'll find some use for it on a blissful summer evening of your own.

Corpus Christi

2010-06-04T00:25:00.004+02:00

For the past 2 days I've been doing an express translation of a documentary on how it sucked to be gay in Paraguay during the previous dictatorship. I thought was really well done, and not overly traumatic. It helped that the story was told from a personal angle - the filmmaker was basically just trying to figure out what happened to her uncle (who was found dead in his apartment several years before), and the whole familial and political context was only gradually revealed. Still, rape with a broken bottle was invoked at one point, and it was by no means a relaxing thing, so I desperately needed to unwind.

And unwind I did, scheduling a "lazy day with ice cream and waffles" with Ana. It is Corpus Christi after all (though it turns out neither of us knows exactly what the God-fearing folk are celebrating today). Met up downtown, went for a lazy stroll, plopped down by the river - where it was nice and cool - and talked. Well, to be precise, I spilled family scandals and saucy stories, while Ana kvetched. About students being dumb, about wages being too low, you name it. Fun was had. Then we went to that Mexican place at Plac Teatralny, where the waiter explained to me that a burrito is a tortilla baked in a pancake, and to Ana that the non-alcoholic drink called "Mandragora" consists of rum, lime and sparkling water.

Actually, yesterday I went to a vegan cafeteria, and the guy behind the counter served me rice instead of kasha* and some sort of lentil thing instead of a kofta. I only called him on the rice, cause it was GLARINGLY OBVIOUS, to which he apologized and said they were out of kasha and that he just inquired about my preference out of habit. Still, I felt like I was being punked. And now the tortilla pancake. A pattern? Is someone trying to test how much shit I'll eat to avoid a confrontation with the service sector? Cause man... "buckets" doesn't even begin to cover it.

And in the evening we had apocalypse weather again. This time a bizarre, intensely yellow dusk that made all the colors seem richer somehow. And then it turned to sepia. Still waiting for random people to supply me with images.

Oh, i went through the entire Muse album and only one other song caught my attention, but it did so with a fistful of grappling hooks - been looping it since. If you're into epic, Depeche-y, space opera sort of stuff, take a listen:

Several things. The title: is kind of awesome, and apparently a Club of Rome reference, so the IR major in me rejoices. The voice: I actually kind of hate, pitch-wise. I sometimes listen to people whose voices I'm not wild about (Tori, Alanis), but still, this would usually be a dealbreaker. However, something weird happens when I listen to live recordings, where the lead singer's vibrato is even more pronounced. Somehow this pushes the sound past Annoying, and into Gratingly Bizarre territory, and my brain starts treating it as yet another instrument. Also - I have to give him props for totally delivering live. He belts it all out effortlessly, and with studio quality. It's almost uncanny. Finally - while digging up info on the title, I happened upon a passage that said the opening line - Fear and panic in the air - is likely a reference to Mars, whose two moons are Phobos and Deimos, gods of fear and panic. Which, be it true or not, adds a very nice twist to an otherwise pedestrian lyric.

* how cool is it that kasza is kasha? Is it really that local a thing?

And the superstar is sucked into the supermassive

2010-06-02T17:23:00.004+02:00

Heavy, boiling clouds over Warsaw, man. The sort that form just before the death ray strikes. Looks awesome.

Edit: and Ana provided me with visuals.

Edit2: And I stole another one from Kazia - this one shows the "death ray" clouds better

Oh my God, are you 12?!

2010-06-01T01:29:00.007+02:00

Twilight persists, most recently due to this gem:

But also, I finally remembered that I actually liked one of the songs sloshing around that cesspit, so I got the soundtrack to track it down. And apparently it is time for me the go up against the zeitgeist and check out Muse, universally reviled as they are. Supermassive Black Hole is just too fucking good.

In work-related news, I'm practicing diplomacy in an attempt to stem the tide of people who hate my guts. I think I've grown much better at it since last year. Fingers crossed.

And Parenthood has officially gone the Brothers & Sisters route. There's hardly been any comedy at all in the last few episodes, and they just keep laying on the melodrama. I also suspect that the "I consider myself too big to fail" speech - the first piece of truly atrocious dialogue the series has served me - was merely an opening salvo.

Cmon, people, look poignant! We're resolving issues here!

Ah well, I'll stick with it until the season finale. Unless that was the season finale, in which case are you fucking kidding me?

Also, reading Kathy Griffin's Official Book Club Selection and finding it better than I anticipated. Light, breezy, kind of informative, and funny without trying to be standup-ish.

Oh, and Mass Effect 2 kicks major Krogan ass. The dialogue sharp, witty and - on occasion - badass, and the voice acting is superb. I checked out the credits and it turns out my favorite NPC so far was voiced by Carrie-Anne Moss, and I still have Adam Baldwin to look forward too. And Claudia Black! Have you ever heard Claudia Black speak?!

Wormholes, man. Wormholes.

I've ruined World War I for myself

2010-05-27T00:17:00.012+02:00

Let us take a moment to appreciate this:

I actually like to pretend that it's a screencap from some Joss Whedon show starring Jonathan Groff as a series regular, but you know, different strokes for different folks... And now let's move on to Showtime, because honestly, I'm kind of amazed. Here's why:

At first I found the second season of Nurse Jackie to be a bit lackluster. It wasn't as sharp and funny as before, and things got kind of heavy the more they got into the whole daughter's anxiety plotline, but I stuck with it and it turns out all that seems to have been a conscious choice on the writers' part, and the conclusion was spectacular. I think it might actually be a textbook example of how to build on a solid premise and weave all elements of the series into a dramatic and fully cohesive whole (as opposed to just making shit up as you go along and coming up with new problems for the characters to face). The one thing I'm worried about is that after the 2nd season closer - the last minute of which was a fucking masterpiece - it now feels almost too cohesive and self-contained, as if the full tale has been told. You can now kind of summarise it in the vein of Neil Gaiman's Sandman synopsis: Nurse Jackie is the tale of a woman who is faced with the consequences of her recklessness and must choose whether to stay true to herself. So where do you go from here?

As for United States of Tara, I wasn't entirely sold after the first season, but I started watching the second one because... well... I had nothing else to watch, really, and it really drew me in. They fleshed out the characters, especially the daughter, and somehow, somewhere halfway through, the whole multiple personality angle stopped seeming like a gimmick and became a natural element of the, up to a point where I actually started thinking I get why a transition occured at any given moment and, while not exactly able to predict which alter would make an appearance, I could still sort of understand and appreciate it in retrospect.

Plus, in the last episode there's this one line that's probably the closest approximation of my particular experience I've ever encountered in... well... culture. Which would be a tad more comforting, were it not uttered by a 14-year-old.

Dusk

2010-05-21T22:07:00.004+02:00

The party was on Sunday. People delivered. We had - among others - Poison Ivy, the Kingpin, V (the one with a vendetta), Brenda Starr, Ramona Flowers, Corto Maltese, two Supermen, two Rorschachs, and three Endless - Death, Delirium and Desire (though with my deathly pale complexion I looked more like an 80s Toreador). We also had a rather freaky moment - suddenly several people (including myself) started coughing uncontrollably. At first I thought something got stuck in my throat, but then I noticed it was spreading. After a while three of us had had enough and we decided to get some fresh air. As soon as we stepped out of the club, the bouncer whipped around and barked "Get back inside!" So we did. At this point I started wondering if somebody's tryng to suffocate us, comic-book style, and actually asked Karolina if this was part of the festivities - a bizarre party trick, or something. But the hosts had no idea what was going on either. We learned the answer 10 minutes later - apparently some drunk guy tried to crash the party and the bouncer used pepper spray on him. Then he went into the club bathroom to wash up, trailing pepper spray residue, and returned to his post in case the guy came back. We were ordered to go back inside becuase he wasn't sure the coast was clear.

When it was time for cake and Happy Birthday, people started chanting "Speech!" and "More pepper spray!" The bouncer seemed amused.

Since then, we've had a flood. It started in the south, but as the wave is moving north towards the Baltic Sea, it inevitably has to pass Warsaw. The water level in Vistula has been rising steadily, and the wave is supposed to reach zenith tonight. So after sushi with Bohdan and Karolina, I took a walk down to the river bank to "see the flood" with my own eyes. The city looked almost Mediterranean - music and laughter spilling out of cafes, patios and courtyards packed with smarty dressed people... As I passed Nowy Świat and continued towards the music conservatory, I started seeing more and more cameras, and kind of regretted I didn't have one. It was a lovely evening, too - just warm enough to bring out all the carefully mixed scents of a metropolitan Friday night and get your blood pumping.

As of 9p.m., the water level was almost up to the bridges, and it was quite a surreal sight. I took a walk down the upper embankment (the lower one is already flooded) and saw that the entire right bank is lined with people - chatting, drinking, pushing strollers, taking pictures... River-watching has turned into a social event. In fact, I hear that last night - which is when the water first started rising - so many people flocked to the site that a spontaneous party broke out.

I had my music. There was a pleasant breeze. Some sort of gymnast was performing at Plac Zamkowy, and for some reason all the lights were out in Park Saski, except for the fountain illumination. As I negotiated a path between the trees and statues it occured to me that for a while now I've been featuring less and less prominently in other people's lives. And that I'm not really adverse to this tendency.

Maybe it's a Toreador thing.

Trials

2010-05-15T00:34:00.007+02:00

The Ducal Pair's birthday is coming up, and once again it's a theme party - this time it's comic book characters. I had a lot of fun at the last one, so I decided to play ball once again and actually dress up. I even came up with a character I could do, though I actually can't pinpoint when I made the decision. I just remember not knowing who I would go as, and then having known all along.

Anyway, the character demands either serious cross-dressing, or very swanky formalwear. Needless to say, I went with option #2. I checked out tux rental places and learned that renting one for 2 days would cost me around 800PLN (though part of that is a deposit), and GOD FORBID it gets damaged somehow. Oh, and that I should have booked it 4 months ago. The tux rental idea morphed into snatching something from a theatre costume warehouse using my legendary connections, to finally emerge as Oh well, I might as well just buy myself a suit. Which was logical inasmuch as I don't actually own one. The only one I have was bought for my graduation and a) doesn't fit me, b) is filthy, and c) I seem to have misplaced the pants.

Still, it was one of the dumbest ideas I've ever had. Buying a suit is a gruelling, humiliating experience filled with vaguely condescending store attendants, four different sizing systems, outlandish pricetags, and clothes that should look awesome, except they don't seem to do that on you.

I braved that gauntlet with the aid of Ana and Miles, who had to be consulted in English. The teenaged fey goblin at the first store apparently took umbrage with that and started talking to his friend in Spanish, giggling while I changed from suit to suit. Ana wisely put herself in his good graces by loudly pointing out twice that naturally I wore the wrong kind of shirt. After three spins on the merry-go-round, I went back into the changing room with a rather strong conviction that I really don't need this shit. When I emerged, Ana took one look at my face and decreed that we should take a break and get something to eat.

So we ate. And then went to another store. Where the prices alone were enough to make me groan. At that point we were almost out of places to check out, and I fessed up to the fact that I actually dont even know what color I wanted (it's kind of difficult to find one that would be appropriate for a comic book character and all subsequent events with a dress code). I just knew I didn't want anything metallic or blue. In that moment we stopped in front of the last store, and in the window there was this weirdly textured, kind-of-black-but-not-quite one. Miles asked if that's the sort of thing I would want, and to my own surprise I said yes. It was worth more than my computer, and even at half price cost almost twice as much as I was initially prepared to spend. But we went in, I tried it on, and it fit me, and actually kind of resembled the cut of a jacket I had tried on a couple of days earlier, during my initial scouting mission, which magically transformed me into a very smart young gentleman, except one dressed in the ugliest shade of navy imaginable.

So I bought it. And then stormed through shoes (I had to be literally forced to even try the other one on, as far as I was concerned it was an in-and-out operation by then) and shirts. On the next day - undershirt, belt and tie. And today socks and... bling. That last part was the funniest. For some reason I was set on kitschy earwear, but it turned out that the type I was thinking of is considered GOTHIC JEWELRY, and - believe it or not - there don't seem to be any actual gothic stores in Warsaw. Goths have to make do with online stuff. And the online places don't make deliveries over the weekend. So I braved several trashy mall jewelry outlets, feeling very sheepish and - I would imagine - looking highly suspicious, until I found a ridiculous piece that seemed to kind of sort of go with the whole costume.

And so, my odyssey is over. The party is tomorrow, and then... then I'll be left with a Versace suit and a flashy gold ring, to do with as I please. So many options.

Good loglines

2010-05-09T14:03:00.002+02:00

Via Pajiba. Kristen Wiig has optioned Clown Girl - a movie about Sniffles the Clown, a girl who tries to resist the lucrative clown-fetishist prostitution trade.

I'm so on board.

Spectacular

2010-05-08T21:46:00.002+02:00

Hey, remember Pete Campbell's pristine little wife from Mad Men? Or repressed Annie from Community?

Even if you don't - read this.

Now in widescreen

2010-05-05T12:17:00.006+02:00

I finally got pissed off that no youtube video I tried to post fit in the teensy little middle column of the previous layout, and switched templates. It's not as clean and polished, but definitely more embed-friendly. Comments, suggestions?

Back to the old thing until I figure out a way to mess with templates without getting rage blackouts.

Molten spike

2010-05-05T02:05:00.004+02:00

So, anybody seen Kickass?

Strands

2010-05-02T18:18:00.014+02:00

It's been a headachey day. I've been trying to shake off a cold for a few days, and finally decided that what I need is some good old chicken soup. This being my world of nevercook, the part of chicken soup ended up being played by Vietnamese Pho from the takeout place. I hope it works.

I ended up in a professional cul de sac. I can either work on a Romanian documentary featuring quaint, rhymed folk ditties, a Polish newsreel featuring quaint, rhymed folk ditties, or a fairy tale featuring quaint, rhymed invocations. I've no idea how I got here, but I blame Twilight.

Which I finally watched, last night. I don't think it's possible to write anything new about the movie, and to just sum it up as "bad" seems completely beside the point. It was such a weird, disjointed creation. Definitely had that Harry Potter adaptation feel of trying to cram and stich together all these elements on a strict deadline, except without any... you know... action. The end credits took me completely by surprise (and were a total what the fuck of their own - who the hell chose that song?)

I genuinely tried to find the appeal, but I suppose I just didn't have the adolescent ovaries. I did like the cinematography. Well, ok: I liked the forest. The landscape shots. Seemed like a place I might want to live, or at least spend some time in.

Then again, I'm guessing they shot it in British Columbia, so that's not exactly news. I also liked some of the music, but my taste does have several glaring, gothic-skewing loopholes...

I could not, however, wrap my head around how remote the whole experience seemed to me. I felt like I was watching a film that was simultaneously its own, ready-made parody. The dialogue was so clunky and hollow at the same time. The girl's acting so... catatonic. She conveyed brain death with very limited means of expression (I swear, there was not a single line she did not either begin or end with a snort or an "um"), but maximum zeal. And then there was the creepy subtext of a mindless, infatuated drone clinging desperately to a guy who keeps saying - sometimes even jokingly - that he might physically hurt her. It all came together perfectly during the shitballs retarded Watch Me Glitter sequence, and the subsequent exchange:

E: I'm designed to kill.
B: I don't care.
E: I've killed before.
B: It doesn't matter.
E: I wanted to kill you. I've never wanted a human's blood so much in my life.
B: I trust you.
E: I try to play marbles with my ex-girlfriends' clitorises, but they're too squishy
B: I totally get that.

Ok, that last part might not have made it into the movie, but it really wouldn't look that out of place. Weird, weird thing.

What else... Ah. I'm madly in love with Jesse St. James. Not the pornstar. The fictional person who says stuff like "I picked the Stephen Sondheim biography section for our clandestine meeting place because only he would be able to express my melancholia." Now with video!

Over and out.

Data dump

2010-05-02T14:50:00.002+02:00

Cayce puts the card facedown on the trestle table and signs its virgin back. Something seems to clunk heavily at the rear of her ethical universe.

---

[hilarious perfection]

Looking up now into the manically animated forest of signs, she sees the Coca-Colo logo pulsing on a huge screen, high up on a building, followed by the slogan "NO REASON!"

---

Curled in a body-warm cave of cotton broadcloth and terry, the remote in her hand, she unforgets her father's absence.

---

Cayce and the German designer will watch the towers burn, and eventually fall, and though she will know she must have seen people jumping, falling, there will be no memory of it.
It will be like watching one of her own dreams on television. Some vast and deeply personal insult to any ordinary notion of interiority.
An experience outside of culture.

---

"Thank you. Just a moment, please, while I find my key." Actually it's in the pocket of her Rickson's, ready to be palmed when needed, but she checks the bathroom, the closet, glances behind the black furniture, then notices a large gray carrier bag, with the Blue Ant logo on the side, at the foot of her bed. She kneels to look under the bed, discovers it isn't the kind you can look under, and comes up, still kneeling, with the key, a plastic mag-strip card, in her hand. "I've found it. Thank you very much."

---

[incomprehensible without background information, so you'll have to take my word that it's cool]

"Yes, it ends in .ru Observe the protocol H-B"

Baranov, emailing from the hyphen.

---

Her mother had once said that when the second plane hit, Win's chargin, his personal and professional mortification at this having happened, at the perimeter having been so easily, so terribly breached, would have been such that he might simply have ceased, in protest, to exist.

---

[and an absolutely brilliant conclusion to the story, snuck in by way of an e-mail message from a background character]

Prion now has some connection with a Russian yogurt drink that is about to launch here, purchased I think by the Japanese. I know because it is part of my briefing for work now, this drink. Also because he has it in a cooler at the gallery - revolting! I think he will try to serve it at the opening but absolutely NO! So mystery Internet movie is out, yogurt drink is in.

---

The ending wasn't exactly stellar, but it was a very enjoyable read nonetheless. Next up... The Graveyard Book, I guess.

Strings

2010-05-01T02:08:00.006+02:00

Several things, mostly musical.

I've struggled with it for a very long time, but it seems inevitable - I am going to like the Katie Melua atrocity, even with its twee, miscast vocals and crazy transitions. I hear everything that's wrong with it, but at the same time I can't help but see what it could have been, given a better delivery and perhaps a stronger oriental motif. Sidenote #1: the uptempo part reminds me of this thing, which is surprising in that I had managed to completely erase it from memory. Or so I thought. Sidenote #2: amping the poor girl's vocals up to an operatic echo is just setting her up for failure during live performances. She simply does not have the pipes.

Next up: I found a new erogenous zone - classical renditions of pop tunes. Which is what a bunch of kids from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music are doing (though I'm sure they're not the first). Now, if you're a kid from Australia looking for a song that lends itself to a classical interpretation, chances are you're going to end up doing this. And good for you. This, however, seems much less obvious, and therefore all the more... well, fun. Sidenote #1: apparently it's very difficult to look badass while playing the kettle drums (if that's what they're called). Sidenote #2: the lady straddling the cello seems to have no such problem.

Finally, last Friday ao treated us to a musical flashback which included this:

Someone at io9 wrote that this song sounds like losing your virginity at the Rennaissance Faire - and by God, yes it does! But I also used to firmly believe that "To me you're like a growing addiction that I can't deny" is the most perfectly delivered lyric ever. Though I have to admit part of its charm laid in the fact I had no idea that's what it said. And omg Nicole Kidman was in Batman Whatever? Who knew?

Blindside

2010-04-19T02:08:00.006+02:00

It seems I finally got hooked on a new TV series. It hasn't happened in ages, and I must have really been jonesing for an addiction, because I latched onto a huge, sprawling family drama, of all things. No homo.

Well, kinda. Anyway, it's called Parenthood (ugh), and it's kind of like Brothers and Sisters, except well-cast, -acted and -balanced, and without the ridiculous politicizing or hamfisted pathos. It has Peter Krause doing his best everyman-but-way-cooler and Lauren Graham as a disorganized, wild-ish single mom (shocker!), as well as a whole bunch of other actors I don't really know and that old guy who went ranted on Fox about how when he went on welfare the state didn't help him out (I'm not kidding, he really did.) Oh, and a guy who looks exactly like Zach Braff, so I hate him (the Scrubs trauma runs deep), but according to yssy is actually Kristen Bell's husband. Horrible, horrible mug. All of them have genuine chemistry with each other (even the repugnant Zach Braff clone), and at least some of the dialogue seems improvised - they keep talking over each other, cutting each other off, etc., so the whole thing has a very natural feel to it.

The writing is surprisingly good. I've watched 7 episodes so far, and there were only two unintentionally cringeworthy moments - or one, if you happen to have the stomach for watching slow-mo scenes of the "daddy & son on a bike" variety. And even the seemingly stock characters - like the requisite blond career woman with a big burly stay at home husband - have some depth. Blond career woman is actually my favorite character so far, by the way. She's kind of brusque, offputting and doesn't suffer incompetence lightly, so I totally identify with her and wait for the universe to realign itself and provide me with a big burly appendix of my own.

Hrm. Since I already cut the clip out anyway, I might as well post it (but via yousendit, I'm still wary of the youtube copyright hounds). Here's the aforementioned lawyer + husband teaching us all a valuable lesson about the subtleties of comedic timing and delivery.

Incidentally, the series made me realize that I missed out on absolutely all of the hallmark family experiences (well, American, serialized family experiences anyway). I never underwent a teenage rebellion, never had an embarassing conversation about the birds and the bees with my parents, never brought my significant other home for the first time, never spectacularly failed at group sports... then again, I've never had a son with a behavioral disorder either. And what really sold me on Parenthood, I think, was that I still found myself responding to what was going on onscreen. And pretty strongly, too.

Also, Peter Krause gives great overwhelmed father. Seriously, dude can act.

I hope they don't fuck it up too soon with some melodrama. I really do.

Keeping tabs

2010-04-09T02:45:00.004+02:00

He was a good find. I hope he keeps putting out music, because this definitely hits the spot. I actually wanted to post this clip instead of the full song, but it could only be embedded as this huge blob that wouldn't fit into this layout... which is an issue I keep running into, actually. Anyway, hope you enjoy.

Abridged

2010-04-08T14:41:00.002+02:00

Gonna chuck some quotes at you, as promised. No preface, so just try to keep up with me now (01:23).

Not the first time she's used [the forum] that way. She wonders, really, if she ever uses it any other way. It is the gift of "OT," Off Topic. Anything other than the footage is Off Topic. The world, really. News. Off Topic.

---

Seated, not bothering with the menu, Cayce orders coffee, eggs, and sausage, all in her best bad French.
The girl looks at her in amazed revulsion, as though Cayce were a cat bringing up a particularly repellant hairball.
"All right," says Cayce, under her breath, to the girl's receding back, "be French."

---

Assuming the footage is entirely computer-generated means that your maker eithyer has de-engineered Roswell CGI capacities or a completely secure rendering operation.

Thank you for your attention.

Down for a Jack Move

2010-04-07T16:19:00.011+02:00

Here's a small convergence of popculture flotsam that is probably only amusing to me and no one else, BUT each of the individual components is at least a teensy bit noteworthy in and of its own, so...

I'm still reading Gibson's Pattern Recognition. There will be quotes, at a later date, but this is about a chapter title - Jack Moves, Jane Faces. It caught my attention, because I thought it was verb-based (and thus vague in a pretty clever way), and implied a cause and effect thing. Later it was explained that a "Jack move" was actually the main character's ex-boyfriend's name for an unorthodox action, while "Jane faces" belonged in the bedroom.

Part two: Bohdan recently sent me this bit of genius. And today, as I was linking it to someone else, I found out that the best thing about Shortbus seems to appreciate it as well:

So I listened to it again, this time actually paying some attention to the lyrics, and caught the bit around 0:52. Which gave me a smile. Then I started wondering if it's really kosher to mimic a dead person's lisp, but pretty guy guitar where was I?

The final bit of serendipity happened as I was writing this post and realized I have absolutely no way of working my new favorite photo into it. If you watched the above clip in its entirety you know that is no longer the case (the one I wanted to post originally had no umbrellas in it). So feast your eyes:

The entire glorious buildup can be found here.

Over Indeed

2010-04-07T01:48:00.003+02:00

This one's been brewing for a while, but somehow I never found the words. Still haven't, to be honest. Other than Spring is here, and life does not suck.

At around 4:30p.m. the sunset-ish light hits the kitchen windows just right, scattering rectangles of warmth all over my floor.

Mom showed me a peculiar toy store across the street from my apartment. It can only be accessed from the courtyard, and it's filled with really old school teddy bears, hand puppets, caleidoscopes - generally all the stuf that makes you go mushy and nostalgic. And in the back there's this short flight of winding stairs that leads you to a small salon with an old couch, a tea table, a wooden horse, and shelves filled with old, used fairy tale books, music boxes... the decor is so perfectly infused with the essence of childhood it's almost creepy. But it's not. It's wonderful.

I had lunch with Gosia at an Indonesian restaurant nearby. The food was sublime, I'm totally going back. Although the place was deserted - we were the only guests. I hope they don't go out of business or something.

I'm going to Krakow at the end of April, to Berlin towards the end of May, and to a land of comic book make-believe shortly after. Kind of figured out a costume for the last one. Just need white pants.

Yoav's new record is coming out in a few days. Really looking forward to it. After that Natlie Merchant, Sarah McLachlan, Sia and Roisin Murphy. And possibly some others.

The dog days are over.

Bird's Eye

2010-04-05T02:42:00.003+02:00

I had a bizarrely unpleasant learning experience recently - namely I came to realize how difficult it is to unequivocally relinquish something, even if you're not really interested in having it. It really caught me off guard and completely shut down my brain, leading to general unpleasantness and a bout of self-loathing. On one hand it kind of gives me insight into why certain situations in my life developed the way they did. On the other - it's certainly not the sort of insight that might result in empathy. Yes, it's human, but it's also low and ugly.

On the other end of the scale, I was also the recipient of a very clever and sweet romantic gesture straight out of a decently written romcom. Something from Sandra Bullock's oeuvre, maybe.

So there it is, the yin and yang of random encounters.

The Pitfalls of Guerilla Warfare

2010-03-23T00:21:00.011+01:00

I went to Amanda Palmer's "ninja gig" in Warsaw tonight, and it was a fascinating experience. It took place at Powiększenie, which is a club near Nowy Swiat, in downtown Warsaw. It was basically Amanda passing time - until Neil (Gaiman) finished his book signing and took her out to dinner - by rambling hilariously about anything and everything (including Lady Gaga, her visit to Australia, and her attitude towards drugs) and playing some songs on a ukulele.

(Cue the story of the ukulele, which I need as foreshadowing: she bought it just for laughs, but then it turned out to be very useful, because she didn't have to lug around a keyboard everywhere, and could just do these gigs with a ukulele. She can't really play it, only knows 7 chords (but not what they're called), and refuses to learn more because then she would be a "ukulele player", and nobody wants to be that. Also, even though she got it 2 years ago for 19 bucks, and it's always a bit out of tune, she won't buy a proper one "the same way really beautiful people sometimes insist on staying fat so no one will love them". She only knows how to play about 4 songs on it, including Radiohead's Creep, which she learned for a corporate showcase of her album, because she figured people would find it charming. And they did.)

I had a great time, laughed my ass off throughout, and wished she would just sit there telling stories all night long. She actually made a comment about Henry Rollins doing just that, deciding at some point that he's just gonna do tours being Henry Rollins, and people going "yeah, ok". Apparently there's already some footage up on youtube, so here are her musings on Lady Gaga in song format (she meant to write a blog entry about it, but couldn't make it work, so she wrote a song instead. She hasn't memorized it yet, so she's reading the lyrics off her iphone, which is being held up by an audience member - hence the "scroll..." plea towards the end):

And now for the part where I try to wrangle my - still quite nebulous at this point - impressions into some sort of cohesive... thing. Basically: Amanda Palmer doesn't really have a stage persona. I'm not saying she's not charismatic - she oozes charisma. I mean it in the sense of a filter, a screen separating her from the audience. She essentially wears her heart on her sleeve, and seems to telegraph everything that's going through her head, either consciously or subconsciously, and in this case - mostly self-consciously. It's a bit tricky when you're a performer, because you're relied on to shoulder the show, to put on a brave face and soldier on, no matter what. And that, in turn, is tricky when you're doing a spur of the moment, guerilla gig, and the audience doesn't deliver the requisite spontaneity. There's a real fragility to these transient, unscripted moments, and I suppose it's very easy to suddenly find yourself sprinting in place, several feet off that cliff, cartoon coyote style, desperately trying to keep the illusion going.

Well, this time the audience did not deliver, as people verged from non-responsive to embarassing, and the place seemed to put her in a different mindframe too. From what she said, the way these ninja gigs usually work is she posts online that she's going to be at a particular location (usually al fresco), people show up, she fucks around with the ukulele, and everybody has a laugh. This was the first one organized in an actual music venue, with a stage, an audience, and proper sound equipment. As time wore on, she seemed to grow more and more self-conscious about fucking up chords on the ukulele, and not giving people a "proper" musical experience. She kept saying how now she has to come back and do a proper show, because this way she can't show us what she actually does, which is play the piano well and perform her own music. And that this was just her being charming. The real "moment of truth", in my opinion, came at the end of the show. She reluctantly did a request (cringing about butchering the song on the ukulele), and after the applause died down, she said it was a really weird ninja gig ending, and probably the most anti-climactic one ever. Then, as people were starting to get up, she asked if she could just do one last, short song. And played Creep - i.e. one of the only songs she actually can do on the ukulele. And she really belted it out, gave an awesome performance, as if trying to say: "Look people, I really know how to do this. REALLY. Ok?"

Feeling complicit and co-responsible for a performance is a rather odd, and not entirely pleasant sensation, especially when you have nothing to bring to the table (I was too inhibited to ask what her attitude towards slaying vampires was during the Q&A session), but at the same time, I left the club adoring Amanda Palmer to bits and wishing there were more people like her in the world, so hey... maybe that was the plan all along?

Jumping bones

2010-03-15T14:47:00.006+01:00

I was reminded recently of Dead Man's Bones. Apparently the record's out already. Will give it a listen once I get over the photo. To balance things out, the other guy is a complete uggo:

Fucking genetics.

She takes off her clothes, brushes her teeth, limbs wooden with exhaustion and vibrating with caffeine, turns off the lights, and crawls, literally, beneath the stiff silver spread on Damien's bed.
To curl fetal there, and briefly marvel, as the last wave crashes over her, at the perfect and now perfectly revealed extent of her present loneliness.

I've started reading Pattern Recognition and was surprised at how easily I slip into Gibson's prose. Brisk and concise, with sleek, cleanly executed flourishes. I find it strangely comforting - instant insulation in a perfectly accessible pocket universe.

Days of begging, days of theft

2010-03-07T14:43:00.004+01:00

I went to the Florence and the Machine concert last night, and it was an interesting experience. The place was dreadful, the audience - young. One of the first things I noticed was the seemingly universal understanding of the (English) stage banter. Literally the whole room - around 2000 people, give or take - laughed when she said she'd only been on a "quiet tour of Poland" so far, so she'd seen a lot of Polish churches, but hadn't sung in a Polish warehouse before. Lingua franca, no two ways about it.

As for the performance itself... let's put it this way: the audience delivered, and the artist quickly caught up with it. She opened with Howl, which is one of my 3 favorite songs of hers, and it was very disapointing. Sounded really lackluster, almost phoned-in. She didn't even try to hit any of the high... well, I don't even know if you can call them "notes" if we're talking about four full verses of the chorus. Then went Kiss With a Fist which really got the audience going, and I think over the course of the next few songs it dawned on her that these people were really responsive, and really into her. By Between Two Lungs (#6) she was belting it all out to the point where I was actually awestruck - and I don't even like that number. The absolute turning point, however, was The Drumming Song, which was just balls-to-the-wall awesome, and drove the audience into a bona fide frenzy. To wit (unfortunately the clip cuts off before the best part, which can be found here, but with shitty audio):

I think it was after this one that she suffered a mild sensoric overload and started just walking back and forth along the edge of the stage, staring slackjawed at the audience, hand on her mouth. I doubt I'll ever get tired of seeing musicians' first reaction to Polish audiences. The requisite declarations of this being the best gig of the tour followed, and kept resurfacing throughout the rest of the show. Which was from then on stellar, in a very frantic, heartfelt, no holes barred kind of way (I could almost feel her vocal cords fraying as she charged through Dog Days Are Over). Awesome, awesome stuff.

My only gripe is subjective: 2 out of 3 of my favorite songs were disappointing live. I wish she had opened with something else, so I could have heard Howl treated with the sort of reckless abandon she tapped into during the 2nd part of the show, but Blinding was actually the last song before the encore, and it still did not work. Once it's stripped of the gothic, spatial studio trimmings, you're left with just drums, an overwhelmed harp, and flat, militant vocals.

My last impression, as I watched her dart around the stage in that flowy frock, singing about Midas, bloodied feet, and the walls of Dreaming, was feeling really grateful that the current musical Zeitgeist actually allowed this sort of sensibility to enter the mainstream, because I can't wait for next offerings.

Slow

2010-02-25T19:06:00.004+01:00

The thing I'm translating now is literally so stupid that I can't get through it. I lose my grip and fall off into the Interwebs every other sentence. Gruelling, low-paying, ridiculous shit.

So maybe it's time to write that I saw The Ghost Writer last night, and loved it. The cinematography, the color themes, the grand, classical feel of it, the way the threat was always only implied, the fact that I was actually constantly engaged and kept wondering where the plot was going, the way some bits were included only to build and enhance the mood (the constant phone conversations behind closed doors, the "false alarm"), and how seamlessly they were woven into the general story.

But I think my favorite element was the sense of deliberate containment, as the story unfolded in that isolated island manor*. I felt as I were watching some sort of intricate clockwork ballet, with various players fading in and out of the center stage spotlight in ever more intriguing configurations.

Oh, and they actually used the International Criminal Court as a plot device! The international law nerd in me rejoiced.

* I actually tried to find one of the shots showing the study, because they were so exquisitely framed, but no luck

When it falls

2010-02-24T01:37:00.005+01:00

So yeah, not really of use in any sense that matters, but when it comes to party tricks I'm a very deft monkey indeed.

The Scotsman appeared out of the blue saying he's visiting Poland with his boyfriend and asking if I could maybe show them around Warsaw. I was ready to reply that I'd love to, except I'm having a nuclear charge detonated in my eyeball around that time, but it turns out I'll be in Wroclaw then anyway. Still, the mind boggles.

I think the hardest part is being stuck with the thought that you could have somehow done more. As for the other 54 hard parts, I imagine I'll get acquainted with them pretty well in the coming weeks. Hey, maybe I still have the roadmap lying around somewhere.

Also: The Hurt Locker was somewhat underwhelming.

Memento Whori

2010-02-21T23:13:00.004+01:00

I never expected cliches to start crawling out of the woodwork so soon, and yet here they are, in all their prosaic hilarity. I guess all I can do is laugh and be thankful. God knows I need all the reality checks I can get.

I like to think so too.

Parenthesis

2010-02-19T12:05:00.006+01:00

I finally watched Up in the Air last night. At first I felt it was another case of a movie not really living up to my inflated expectations. I wasn't bored while watching it. I liked the structure - how the city names, popping up randomly at first, became gradually infused with meaning, providing a nice dose of foreshadowing. The dialogue is really good, with a few choice sit-back-and-go-huh moments. There was even a scene with some serious emotional impact (when the girl has to do the remote sacking for the first time), and I really liked the ending, but it seemed like the movie as a whole didn't quite connect with me.

The scene I mentioned before actually seems exemplary of that - it's well crafted, there's real substance there, but the "message" somehow gets underdelivered at the last moment, that final hammer stroke just glancing the nail. And I'm not sure if that wasn't intentional.

The thing is: when I sat down to pick out a screencap to go with this post, and flicked through the whole thing all over again, I found myself pausing and going "oh, this bit was actually good..." at almost every scene. Which leads me to believe that if I had let it set and wrote this note in a week's, or a month's time, possibly after a second viewing, I might have gushed. Then again, I might have not.

Tonight, most people will be welcomed home by jumping dogs and screaming kids. Their spouses will ask about their day, and tonight they'll sleep. The stars will wheel forth from their daytime hiding places. And one of those lights, slightly brighter than the rest, will be my wingtip, passing over.

Idoru

2010-02-19T01:13:00.005+01:00

I've never fully embraced the whole Gaga phenomenon. I find her utterly hilarious at times, was somewhat content to learn that she seems to be very articulate and thoughtful, and for a few weeks I couldn't get Paparazzi out of my head, but that's about it. Enter this performance:

I'm still not sold on the music, and I suspect I might never be. But the truth is, I was completely hypnotized, especially during the 2nd part. It's like a scene taken straight out of The 5th Element, or some other over-stylized vision of the future. So completely otherworldly and performance-oriented... It's like she fast-forwarded a couple of hundred years and reached a point where showmanship is the substance.

I'm not saying there weren't great performers before her, that she's one of a kind, or anything like that. I'm not making any universal claims. But try watching the 2nd part of that clip and imagining the darkness beyond the stage is filled with extatic aliens. Wasn't difficult, was it?

Dead ends

2010-02-13T14:39:00.002+01:00

My kingdom for an anonymous, hermetic, or at least dedicated landfill.