Seperated At Birth?
Belle and Sebastian's Sarah Martin
(The one in the back)
And
Gilmore Girls actress Melissa McCarthy.
Friday, July 02, 2004
Thursday, July 01, 2004
Top Four Words I Have Learned...
...from watching French* Subtitles for Gilmore Girls: Complete First Season.
1) Desole -- Sorry
2) dingue -- Crazy
3) Fou -- Crazy
4) Tu plaisantes! -- You're kidding!
Okay. So it isn't /French/ French. It's Quebecois. But now I can be quirky in Montreal AND Paris.
Also, I picked up a copy of The Da Vinci Code last week at the used bookstore on Franklin Street. My god, is it awful. The writing is about on par with a talented fourth grader's. Rather than artfully slip in exposition (and there's a lot that needs to be), Dan Brown hammers it in clunky, completely unbelievable dialogue. The prolixity is in humourous contrast to the elementary French spoken by the French characters.
This is aside from the incredible thickness of the protaganists (It's an anagram, dammit, just like the first fourteen clues were!) -- the world's least convincing Art Historian and cryptologist.
Then again, if you can tell them apart, you've done better than I: the author does little work in making them believable as characters or even noticeably different from each other.
You may also want to ignore the research the author did -- apparently consisting solely of cracking open a used copy of Holy Blood, Holy Grail. Which he cites in the story (authenticity or lack of creativity -- you be the judge!) and whose authors are condensed into another unbelievable character (he's British 'cause he's stuffy!) with a name that's another tired anagram. It is Sir Leigh Teabing, which comes from Richard Leigh, one author of the Holy Blood book and Michael Baginet, the other.
And since he's English, he must like TEA.
The book's overweaning feature is its cocky assurance that this sort of juvenile thinking isn't just clever, it's genius. Of Da Vinci stature. It isn't. It gets a lot plain wrong (the word for a papal bull in French would never create a pun for a bullish person, since the words are different bulle and taureau where we have just 'bull') and a lot close to.
If this is the work of genius it commonly ascribed to be, we're all in a lot of trouble.
I did get on the same trip a compilation of pre-Shakespearean English drama -- it includes Gammer Gurton's Needle, The Shoemaker's Holiday and some liturgical plays. Actual clever stuff and worth reading.
...from watching French* Subtitles for Gilmore Girls: Complete First Season.
1) Desole -- Sorry
2) dingue -- Crazy
3) Fou -- Crazy
4) Tu plaisantes! -- You're kidding!
Okay. So it isn't /French/ French. It's Quebecois. But now I can be quirky in Montreal AND Paris.
Also, I picked up a copy of The Da Vinci Code last week at the used bookstore on Franklin Street. My god, is it awful. The writing is about on par with a talented fourth grader's. Rather than artfully slip in exposition (and there's a lot that needs to be), Dan Brown hammers it in clunky, completely unbelievable dialogue. The prolixity is in humourous contrast to the elementary French spoken by the French characters.
This is aside from the incredible thickness of the protaganists (It's an anagram, dammit, just like the first fourteen clues were!) -- the world's least convincing Art Historian and cryptologist.
Then again, if you can tell them apart, you've done better than I: the author does little work in making them believable as characters or even noticeably different from each other.
You may also want to ignore the research the author did -- apparently consisting solely of cracking open a used copy of Holy Blood, Holy Grail. Which he cites in the story (authenticity or lack of creativity -- you be the judge!) and whose authors are condensed into another unbelievable character (he's British 'cause he's stuffy!) with a name that's another tired anagram. It is Sir Leigh Teabing, which comes from Richard Leigh, one author of the Holy Blood book and Michael Baginet, the other.
And since he's English, he must like TEA.
The book's overweaning feature is its cocky assurance that this sort of juvenile thinking isn't just clever, it's genius. Of Da Vinci stature. It isn't. It gets a lot plain wrong (the word for a papal bull in French would never create a pun for a bullish person, since the words are different bulle and taureau where we have just 'bull') and a lot close to.
If this is the work of genius it commonly ascribed to be, we're all in a lot of trouble.
I did get on the same trip a compilation of pre-Shakespearean English drama -- it includes Gammer Gurton's Needle, The Shoemaker's Holiday and some liturgical plays. Actual clever stuff and worth reading.
Tuesday, June 29, 2004
You know...
Carly Simon should totally do an Amish version of "You're So Vain" and call it "You're So Plain"...
Oddish
I've mentioned before about recurring dreams -- go to the 9/25 entry. I have my Doctor Who book one. I have my teeth one (though not lately -- I think I have enough real things to worry about right now).
I had one last night that I've had a few times, but this one was the most vivid of the series.
The Hasty Heart is a bad play, so bad that the 1949 movie starred Ronald Reagan. (I can't even be bothered to tell you the plot, but you can read it here) but it was my first paid gig in the theatre. I played an Australian named Digger. I was in it 8 years ago, after my freshman year of college, at a little school in the town my parent lived in. Anyway.
In this dream, I'm doing the play again. Now. And I have absolutely no idea what my lines are. (The dream prompted me to try to remember some, and I can't.) And I'm about to go on stage. But rather than being upset about it, I'm totally down with it. I'm reading the script and happy to go on and make shit up. Weird.
I feel bad about whining about my birthday. I actually had a really good time. Helen and I went to Outback Steakhouse in honor of Helen's visit. We had the World's Skeeziest Waiter (tm). When he oiled his way up to us the first time and asked "You guyz evah been to Outback b'fore?", Helen and I burst out laughing.
The rest of the night, the Skeeze worked his way closer and closer to Helen, eventually sitting on the seat next to her as he took her entree order. "Do waiters usually do that?" she asked. We lost again it again when he showed his observant side: "Do I detect an accent?"
I was just glad she was too polite to demand I pay her dry cleaning bill.
After that, we were all pretentious and went to Chapel Hill's wine bar and played video games to balance things out. I played Galaga - the world's most advanced form of fun. (Giant. Space. Bugs. What more do you need for fun?) Ms Pac-Man was also played.
Then we went to The OCSC.
On our way home, we stopped at the Harris Teeter, where Helen got me a cake. Yay! It was the first one I'd had in years. It was a chocolate/yellow marble cake with chocolate icing. So good! Then I watched an episode of Dr Who.
My Haul? I got a totally overpriced Dr Who coffee table book called Doctor Who: The Legend which I've been poring over ever since. My parents got me a third Doctor video, The Ambassadors of Death. Miss Helen got me a little spiny anteater keychain and a marvy little book called "50 Places to Eat Southern in New York". Very savvy, no? Miss Laura Llew also mailed me the lovely and below-quoted book Meat is Murder.
Yay!
Carly Simon should totally do an Amish version of "You're So Vain" and call it "You're So Plain"...
Oddish
I've mentioned before about recurring dreams -- go to the 9/25 entry. I have my Doctor Who book one. I have my teeth one (though not lately -- I think I have enough real things to worry about right now).
I had one last night that I've had a few times, but this one was the most vivid of the series.
The Hasty Heart is a bad play, so bad that the 1949 movie starred Ronald Reagan. (I can't even be bothered to tell you the plot, but you can read it here) but it was my first paid gig in the theatre. I played an Australian named Digger. I was in it 8 years ago, after my freshman year of college, at a little school in the town my parent lived in. Anyway.
In this dream, I'm doing the play again. Now. And I have absolutely no idea what my lines are. (The dream prompted me to try to remember some, and I can't.) And I'm about to go on stage. But rather than being upset about it, I'm totally down with it. I'm reading the script and happy to go on and make shit up. Weird.
I feel bad about whining about my birthday. I actually had a really good time. Helen and I went to Outback Steakhouse in honor of Helen's visit. We had the World's Skeeziest Waiter (tm). When he oiled his way up to us the first time and asked "You guyz evah been to Outback b'fore?", Helen and I burst out laughing.
The rest of the night, the Skeeze worked his way closer and closer to Helen, eventually sitting on the seat next to her as he took her entree order. "Do waiters usually do that?" she asked. We lost again it again when he showed his observant side: "Do I detect an accent?"
I was just glad she was too polite to demand I pay her dry cleaning bill.
After that, we were all pretentious and went to Chapel Hill's wine bar and played video games to balance things out. I played Galaga - the world's most advanced form of fun. (Giant. Space. Bugs. What more do you need for fun?) Ms Pac-Man was also played.
Then we went to The OCSC.
On our way home, we stopped at the Harris Teeter, where Helen got me a cake. Yay! It was the first one I'd had in years. It was a chocolate/yellow marble cake with chocolate icing. So good! Then I watched an episode of Dr Who.
My Haul? I got a totally overpriced Dr Who coffee table book called Doctor Who: The Legend which I've been poring over ever since. My parents got me a third Doctor video, The Ambassadors of Death. Miss Helen got me a little spiny anteater keychain and a marvy little book called "50 Places to Eat Southern in New York". Very savvy, no? Miss Laura Llew also mailed me the lovely and below-quoted book Meat is Murder.
Yay!
Sunday, June 27, 2004
Dear My Computer:
Why do you have the address for IanSomerhlader.net? I have never navigated you to this site, nor have I even heard of it before you showed up in my history bar. But there was this picture there so it is okay. Please feel free to find such sites for me in the future.
And Just in Time:
ADVICE FOR RECENT ARRIVALS
Dos & Don'ts & More Don'ts for Gay Boy Refugees
Where we learn I am not a Strong Black Woman.
Why do you have the address for IanSomerhlader.net? I have never navigated you to this site, nor have I even heard of it before you showed up in my history bar. But there was this picture there so it is okay. Please feel free to find such sites for me in the future.
And Just in Time:
ADVICE FOR RECENT ARRIVALS
Dos & Don'ts & More Don'ts for Gay Boy Refugees
Where we learn I am not a Strong Black Woman.
"I want a badge that says 'SHUT UP ABOUT YOUR BAND'!"
-- me
So, I'm growing tired of Chapel Hill. I think I've lived here too long not to be a) a dirty hippy b) a post-graduate student or c) washing down my valium with wine as I pick up the kids from soccer practice.
Or maybe I'm just sick of hipsters in general. I have not discussed my birthday in any great length not because it wasn't fabulous (which it was) but because of one slight incidence that upon reflection, made me peeved.
I called seven people inviting them out to drinks that night. None showed. I had a really good time though, and the free flow of booze kept the sound of me cursing Dirty Hipsters to a minimum. The event nevertheless brought home to certainty my working assumption that hipsters are relatively shallow, undependable and flighty group. As does the fact that not one has called since my car died.
Yeah, I'm fine, actually. Thanks for asking.
Then there's the people I work with. Mostly good people, it's true, but then there's this story.
Dan the Man is one of the cashiers I work with. Dan the Man is special, as in the Olympics. He disappears every year for a few weeks to go to Viet-Nam, his homeland. Not too long ago, he came back with a wife.
Who didn't speak English.
Now, while I can't imagine the hijinks THAT household got up to, it appeared that it had an issue. Dan the Man's Wife has a sister left in Hanoi. DTM's Wife apparently constantly worries over her and sends her money from the Nail Shop she works in. But they want her to come over to our country. Specifically, they want her to marry a nice American boy to make it nice and legal.
They've been cogitating over this for some time. Recently, it came to Dan the Man's simple mind.
He'd pay our co-worker C-Space to take marry her.
C-Space needs money, you see. He has nowhere to live (he rents the living room of an apartment where I used to live, if that tells you anything) and no money. Why no money? C-Space has los problemas con drogas. He likes the coca leaves. A lot.
Yeah, Dan! Marry your sister in law off to the local cokehead.
Honestly, it sounds like the set-up for a new FOX sit-com...
Announcer: "He's mildly retarded! She can't speak a word of English! Together they're SPECIAL WED! Friday nights only on FOX!"
DTM: "Honey! C-Space and I are in jail! Send help!"
C-Space: "Ohmanohmanohmanohmanohmanohmanohman!"
DTMW: "Me rove you rongtime!"
DTM: "No sweetie! Get a lawyer! A law-yer! Like Matlock!"
Fresh Original and X-citing!
-- me
So, I'm growing tired of Chapel Hill. I think I've lived here too long not to be a) a dirty hippy b) a post-graduate student or c) washing down my valium with wine as I pick up the kids from soccer practice.
Or maybe I'm just sick of hipsters in general. I have not discussed my birthday in any great length not because it wasn't fabulous (which it was) but because of one slight incidence that upon reflection, made me peeved.
I called seven people inviting them out to drinks that night. None showed. I had a really good time though, and the free flow of booze kept the sound of me cursing Dirty Hipsters to a minimum. The event nevertheless brought home to certainty my working assumption that hipsters are relatively shallow, undependable and flighty group. As does the fact that not one has called since my car died.
Yeah, I'm fine, actually. Thanks for asking.
Then there's the people I work with. Mostly good people, it's true, but then there's this story.
Dan the Man is one of the cashiers I work with. Dan the Man is special, as in the Olympics. He disappears every year for a few weeks to go to Viet-Nam, his homeland. Not too long ago, he came back with a wife.
Who didn't speak English.
Now, while I can't imagine the hijinks THAT household got up to, it appeared that it had an issue. Dan the Man's Wife has a sister left in Hanoi. DTM's Wife apparently constantly worries over her and sends her money from the Nail Shop she works in. But they want her to come over to our country. Specifically, they want her to marry a nice American boy to make it nice and legal.
They've been cogitating over this for some time. Recently, it came to Dan the Man's simple mind.
He'd pay our co-worker C-Space to take marry her.
C-Space needs money, you see. He has nowhere to live (he rents the living room of an apartment where I used to live, if that tells you anything) and no money. Why no money? C-Space has los problemas con drogas. He likes the coca leaves. A lot.
Yeah, Dan! Marry your sister in law off to the local cokehead.
Honestly, it sounds like the set-up for a new FOX sit-com...
Announcer: "He's mildly retarded! She can't speak a word of English! Together they're SPECIAL WED! Friday nights only on FOX!"
DTM: "Honey! C-Space and I are in jail! Send help!"
C-Space: "Ohmanohmanohmanohmanohmanohmanohman!"
DTMW: "Me rove you rongtime!"
DTM: "No sweetie! Get a lawyer! A law-yer! Like Matlock!"
Fresh Original and X-citing!
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