Category: Family

Jarmusch festival

Coffee & Cigarettes & Donnie Darko & Night on Earth. 

After Ghost Dog we figured Time for a Jim Jarmusch Festival.  Woo Hoo! 

Donnie Darko SCARED ME.  Worse than a zombie flick.  Every time that ****ing rabbit showed up, I’d be cowering on one end of the sofa looking through my fingers.  What the heck is wrong with me that a really bad rabbit costume and cheesy f/x could freak me out?  Am I channeling Anya?  What’s happening to me??  Afterwards, Jeff said, “Well, did Jacob’s Ladder scare you?” and I said HELL YA.  “Oh.”

Has anybody noticed that Drew Barrymore doesn’t look like she belongs to this century, or the previous one?  She’s beautiful, and she can act, but she doesn’t really belong in these parts.

Coffee and Cigarettes was interesting and uneven, just like the reviewers said. I enjoyed the ongoing Ghost Dog references.  There were particular segments I enjoyed, including Iggy Pop trying to be ingratiating with Tom Waits.  Parts of it were a very aesthetically arranged and choreographed kick in the goolies to the whole contemporary notion of celebrity.  To slide between “I am your fan”  “You are my fan” “I think you are trying to sponge off me” “No, you’re trying to sponge off me!”  “Do you like me as a person?” “Do you like me as an artist?” “Why isn’t your stuff on the jukebox if this is your favorite hangout?” “Well your stuff isn’t on the playlist either!” “Look, somebody recognized me and didn’t recognize you!” “Look, I’m talking to somebody you want to talk to!”… without losing the humanity of folks involved – that was artistic, and troubling too.  I watched as friendships would blossom and die in the production and interpretation of a single word.

I think ego to art is like the sun to the earth.  The right amount makes a flowering; too little makes ice; or rotten mould; too much a desert.

Night on Earth, while having the same sort of episodic structure as Coffee and Cigarettes, was a lot more satisfying movie.  The drunken Finns at the end are classic. Roberto Benigni talking a prelate to death is pretty funny too; his character’s description of a sheep he was once in love made me gasp with laughter.

This morning mOm came over and she and Jeff pulled weeds; I wandered around Jeff’s garden taking pictures, including what looks to be an entertaining one of Eddie sticking his head out through a hole in the side screen.  Getting pictures of Gizmo is harder; he never bloody well sits still long enough.

So to breakfast, and then to lunch at the parents’, then a flying visit to Esquimalt, then home.

Sweet Bachelor days.

Ah, yesss…

So, last night my boss, may he be praised and venerated, gave me a lift to Scott Road Station, which was the only thing which allowed me to arrive in Victoria at a decent time.  Then I immediately cracked open beer and watched 28 Days. I had heard a great deal about this movie from one of my beloved coworkers, a guy who only gets animated when he’s talking about what happened to him before he turned 18 and movies.  Anyway, I really liked the movie, except the parts where I had to put my head into my own armpit, and Cillian Murphy is one neotenous looking dude.  If you want a scary, unstoppable image stuck into your skullfat… picture him and Bjork having babies.  Zar.

There are so many brilliant moments in 28 Days that it’s hard to line them all out. I know I won’t buy it, but I will definitely watch it again.  Script, cinematography, casting, MUSIC, editing, all great. Plot holes like a screen door in a submarine (just like Patricia told me when it was first released), but o well.  You don’t want zombie movies to be too realistic, that’s part of their charm.  They are fairy tales for adults where, even though things turn out badly, you’re still alive at the end.

And so to bed, where I holed up with Sarah Dunant’s In The Company of the Courtesan that’s bopping around the best-seller lists lately. As a Dunnetteer, I have to read this stuff.  Well, it’s set in Venice in 1527 – 1528, during and after the sack of Rome by the combined German/Spanish forces. 

The Romans, like the feckless duckwits that they were at the time, all riddled with corruption and internal factions and lacking army, intelligent leadership and anything like planning, shot the leader of the incoming army dead in the first moments of the battle. You know how leaderless armies who haven’t been paid in weeks react when they have an undefended, unimaginably wealthy city in prospect, and when half the incoming army is motivated by intense hatred of the tenants’ religion – Papism….  Yeah, it was not pretty, and a lot of folks got put to the sword.  First thing that happens to Our Heroine – an intelligent and energetic young woman – is having her hair cut off with violence by the army’s Calvinist campfollowers.  Way to spend a Sunday.  The story is recounted by her dwarven servant and in the voice of the omniscient author, alternating.  (I’m sorry, it’s just that I don’t get to say dwarven servant in public very often).

Woke up and lay in bed and read some more until 9:30ish, when I stirred my stumps and by our unspoken agreement cooked a somewhat low key repast.  The coffee was amazing.  I had three cups.

Then we went through the PILE, and there’s always a bloody pile around here, of Films in Prospect.  I picked Ghost Dog out because it was a Jarmusch film – I find him consistently interesting and watchable – and settled in with the movie from the first frame.  Forest Whitaker was mesmerizing.  Once again, script, music, casting, all uniformly excellent, and I closely followed the excerpts from the Way of the Samurai, which I now wish to read.  This is a buy and hold, in my opinion.

Then to phone my mother and tell her, “I’m having TOO MUCH FUN.  See you whenever.”  You can do this when you are 48.    Then a shower, and a walk perhaps, and then a renewed attack on the dreaded pile of celluloid. 

There are explosions coming from the living room.  What is that man blowing up now?  (later)  No harm done, he’s just flying an ME 2somethingerother in the leaden skies over a European city.  And blowing pixels up.

various

Today is the anniversary of Lexi’s natal day; she’ll forgive me for mentioning it (likely) if I don’t say anything about the year this blessed event occurred.

I had the absolute joy of FINALLY getting to see daughter Katie last night. She demolished the last of the greek salad, brought me bread and yummy treats, passport photos, much in the way of extended family news, and I gave her:

two nose rings

one blacklight sculpture kit

a bag of clothes from said Lexi, which Katie fell upon with a most gratifying avidity (Lexi, I started handing her stuff out of the bag and about half way down she said, sighing, “What I really need is bras” at which point I wordlessly handed her two bras… thanks for sponsoring that extremely amusing family moment)

an hour and a half of job search help on the computer

permission to quit her current job (boss is a liar)

six Robaxicet (back is bothering her see above)

and a bit of a scolding, motherhood being something like riding a bicycle in terms of how fast you remember how to do it.

She took it all in very good spirit and it was only about 9:30 when she left, so she probably managed to get a good nights’ sleep, too.

Off to Victoria today; me happy. I will be conveying birthday greetings to Pondside, and bringing as much earflapping as we can all mutually tolerate with me.

I spent a good deal of time last night reading contemporary libertarian philosophy. Most of it is wretched goo; some of it is pernicious nonsense, but mostly it is characterized by lack of internal consistency, cultism (uh, that would be collectivism, folks) and the most willful disregard of scientific inquiry (uh, that would be REASON, folks) the philosophical world gets to deal with since Lysenkoism. I wouldn’t have bothered (I’ve outgrown Randism & Rothbardism, and prefer the quiet demeanor, basis in fact and ability to reformulate views based on new evidence of persons such as Chomsky and my own DAD for Christ’s sake who really tend more to anarchism) but LTGW is dragging “Well the Libertarian viewpoint is” into every lunch time conversation, while ScaryClown, Robof9 and I vibrate like bobbleheads on crank. (Added later – like there’s a libertarian point of view.  OBVIOUSLY liberty’s a good thing – but only if I get to define it.)

If analysis of libertarianism, objectivism, etc., leads one to understand that a philosophy which does not have a DNA helix for a spine will be at best interesting and well-constructed using current standards in how to assemble an argument, that’s all good. Everything that’s good and bad, inside and outside human scope, hangs around that spine. Attempting a philosophy without making a mighty effort to understand how understanding itself is shaped by those whims and strings of arbitrary protein strikes me as laughable. I tried explaining that to him the other day, but I’m in better shape now and at least the next time he drags libertarianism up, I’ll say, “Okay, given that human beings are inherently hierarchical, how do you grab somebody who enjoys taking orders and get them to enjoy liberty, without either sticking them in a political reeducation camp (uh, liberty?), forcing them to listen to you tell them to be free (uh, Narodnism?), making children listen to it (uh, don’t have parents have the right to educate their children as they see fit?). The only Libertarian philosopher I have any respect for is Robert A Heinlein, and even he was a way better writer than philosopher.

Having stated, ever so briefly, my philosophy (human beings find meaning in the exercise of their mental and physical powers, and happiness along the way as a byproduct) I must address counterarguments.

Human beings belong to God and should get with God’s program. It’s all written down in this here book. But your neighbour has a book too… and her neighbour has another one. So on down the line. My answer. I have a book. It’s coiled in every cell of my body. Like God, it can do things I can’t even CONCEIVE, let alone spell, or do outside of my own skin. I can’t see the book, but I know it’s there, and a scientist (jumps out from behind a curtain, wearing a labcoat, a superhero cape and looking SUSPICIOUSLY like Lady Miss Banjola) can help me prove it anytime we can put together a gene sequencer and some spare change.

Nothing about what we see around us is real. My answer. C’mere bud, lemme talk to you a second. (Thumping noises followed by a faint voice calling “Medic!”) Not very philosophical, but o so satisfying.

Human beings could maximize (pick any or all, or pull your own from the hat) wealth, utility, oneness with Gaia, sexual opportunity, peace, health, intelligence if they followed program x. My answer. You are daft as a brush, matey. My sequence of genes pushes me in certain directions; my upbringing in others; my learning from others in other ways yet; the thinking I’ve done independent of all of you in weirder directions still. Given that my genetic sequence is UNIQUE IN ALL OF TIME AND SPACE AND ETERNITY, and dude, so’s yours, how could one universally prescribed philosophy possibly work, let alone survive a sunny afternoon? Nobody is ever going to hold the same views in large enough numbers to get a crack at converting everyone. And when you do have a lot of people holding the same views….

BAD

SHIT

HAPPENS!

There is only one free market. It is the market of ideas. The Gold standard is knowledge; reason is the nitric acid we apply to the gold to make sure that it is pure. The free market of ideas, like the one we’re told exists in Adam Smith’s vision, has ups and downs, and ideas rise and fall in value every day. As in everything else, the smart investor buys and HOLDS the good ideas and dumps the dogs as soon as she practically can.

Very few human beings wander through life with the same philosophy from beginning to end, and I’m no exception. Given that idea, the ferment and jostle of ideas and realizations of ideas, a broad philosophical prescription seems foolish. I don’t even want to convert somebody else to my way of thinking. The smartest thing an adult can do is learn to be comfortable in being the only person ‘who thinks a certain way” and that what you think, and how, “is subject to change without prior notice to you” – because no matter what anybody says, you are not 100% in control of what you think, no matter how hard you try. (Added later…. not even Ayn Rand – read Nathaniel Branden’s magnificent, brutal book “Judgement Day” on that score – could control what she thought.  She was super hot in bed, too!  Take THAT, Murray Rothbard!  My point being that it’s in accounting for the cheap physical stuff that skews SO MUCH of our little lives that a lot of libertarian theory morphs between Tom Paine and Mr. Bean – while wearing a cute bikini.)

Not only can you be assured that this is true (added later – “Cause I SAY so, that’s why!), it is the surest safeguard against being a complete doctrinaire butthead when you run into somebody else’s ideas. Then you can pull out the blessed mantra, “Let’s agree to disagree on that one,” and move on to something you have in common, like grandchildren, or getting funds for a breast cancer research facility.

If you are one of those people who, having found Jesus or homeopathy, is smiling indulgently at my foolishness, good for you. We may still have common cause when the person who hates both of us wants to kill us for thinking as we do. If you are one of those people, who, having found my words objectionable, wants to kill me, gosh, I’m sorry, but the line forms on the left, and things aren’t looking good for an appointment today.

Lost mail

It appears I haven’t been receiving mail at two of my different addresses.  My apologies for not responding to any mail which I didn’t actually get to read.

Ran into cousin Laurel in the Granville Station the other day.  When she told me she’d emailed me I went, “Hunh?” because I certainly had no recollection of receiving anything from her, and it would be a red letter day if I did.  I’ve also sent mail out in the last week that never got to the recipient, so it’s good not to assume malfeasance in these cases….

I’m heading to Jericho tonight and Victoria on the weekend, and hopefully somewhere in there I get to see daughter Katie.  So I have a nice week in prospect.

Work continues to rapidly improve.  I wish I could say the same about my back.  Other parts of me are grumbling too, but the back is loudest; I’m doing my exercises, including (since I couldn’t sleep anyway) getting up and doing them at 4 in the morning.

I had one of my favourite coworkers say to me yesterday, “What the hell am I good at?” so I wrote him a paean of praise (disguised in the dreadful, eviscerated language of “the resume”) which outlined exactly what he does that is SO bloody amazing; I am looking forward to his comments, especially the last line, which was, Holy crap! after rereading that even I was impressed, and I’ve seen you plastered.

Ah, workmates.

Today is the all staff meeting.  I found out from the CEO that somehow my email outlining my questions for the townhall had disapparated, so I re-sent it (lot of that going around), only this time I took thought to include one of Scary Clown’s questions.  We shall see if anything comes of it.

Despite everything that’s going on (some of my rellies are having a hard time with one thing and another, and I’m up to four painkillers a day, again, after not being that bad for a year) I’m actually happy.  And I’m working on a tune, which I think is going to be an instrumental, and I’m using chords which I don’t know the names for.  I love the mandolin, but it’s still very much a foreign language.  Oh, and I sliced myself in the kitchen on the weekend, so I bled all over the fretboard as I was practicing for Jericho tonight.  It doesn’t really hurt, but it was a surprise to see the blood.  I immediately started riffing on “Ya gotta suffer if you want to sing the blues.”  But really, I haven’t, and I don’t.

Peaceful day.

I had a nice slow start, and then Paul turned up around 11:30 and we hacked away at the separation agreement. I’m fine with it – Paul has to go away and think about one last issue, which is not a deal killer in my opinion. Either way, I’m ready to sign. It was embarrassing to realize we didn’t know how to spell one of daughter Katie’s middle names though – good thing the birth certificate is here.
After that we went into New West and got my name off the joint account (I’ve not touched it since long before I moved out, except to put money in it, but it makes sense to stop having a joint account) and then had a nice shop (more batteries, epsom salts, that kind of thing) and I left a message for the woman I want to do a video of me doing the Tapioca song so I can get it on Youtube. Tapioca belongs to the world! I kinda went nuts in my old butcher shop and dropped about $40 on meat, but Paul didn’t complain when I cooked him an early dinner (I MISS COOKING) of pork souvlaki, rice and greek salad (which he mostly prepped) rounded out with that lovely McAuslan Apricot wheat beer.  Strawberries, blueberries, powdered sugar and cream for dessert, and we ate out on the balcony, with Paul occasionally wincing as the buses went by – he really hates bus noise.
Then we worked on each other’s feet and he napped on the Dreaded Sofa of Morpheus. He told me to wake him up about 10 to 7 but he looked so peaceful I let him snooze another 10 minutes. It was a very odd way way to spend the 25th anniversary, but we’re plenty odd people, and it was very peaceful. And productive. And hopefully quite typical of how things are going to be in future.

Weekend continues

Mike appeared looking like he could use a break from plumbing issues.  How many weeks has it been since the drainage went verklemt in the old place?

I need to do laundry, like instantly.  Fortunately Mike, who decided to crash on the sofa last night after slaughtering the last beer, is up so I can start.  He and Paul got on the phone and I must say the part of the phone call I overheard was most entertaining as it had to do with making beer.  Otherwise my conversation with Paul went quite well, and we continue to mosey through the last ten percent of the separation agreement with high levels of communication and trust.  Although not a lot of speed – I’ve been overly engaged in my social life and not sticking to my best interests.

Note to self- make sure people are parked downstairs in the secured lot on weekends.
I sent flowers to Catherine’s mum, who is about five weeks post op, and I send her a special hug.  I will share why this is the case off line with my earflapping posse.  Tact came late to Allegra, but it’s still a welcome thing.  The flower people called me to tell me that the flowers would be not exactly as shown and a day late, but I told them I authorized them to do what was necessary and they are supposed to show up today.
I gotta get daughter Katie’s (and my) passport apps in. And now I gotta run, period, because I’ve got two hours to get some food and get into New West for my haircut….

Personal remarks is rude

Okay, yesterday was a day crowded with life and incident.  Woke up around six and reheated naan and chanar bhatur (sp?) for brekky, with mint tea.  Jeff dozed while I went downstairs and did a very scant and not very repetitive 20 minute workout…. okay, of all the movies, in all the world, on all of IMDB, which movie is on TV when I come downstairs?  A Monty Python movie, and I walk in in the last minute of the Parrot Sketch, which segues into the Lumberjack Song.

Good morning, Burnaby!!! 

While I’m in the weight room, this Asian dude in his early twenties, dressed a la Jackie Chan (ie, no shirt) and holding a clear plastic container that you could tote two or three dead babies in (just to give you some idea of the volume) comes in, fires money into the drink machine, removes a soda at speed, and departs like vapour under a door.

At this point, the day signs are all REALLY pointing to a truly spectacular day.  It was not until 24 hours after this moment that I discovered that I had not, indeed, packed underthings.  Time is no more linear than memory is.

Ahem.  Anyway, working backwards from this moment, I watched Coronation Street, drank coffee, took a shower, woke up, dreamed all night about somebody (Patricia knows who, and is laughing at me), crashed at Patricia’s, came back to Patricia’s from Leanne’s place, watched fireworks, ate Greek, shot the breeze, hung out at Lexi’s (and got just enough into a Colette bio to get my mouth all ready for more – who could resist something called Secrets of the Flesh by Judith Thurman).

Prior to that I spent a glorious afternoon with Katie K and got sunburnt.  Prior to that I went to an NDP fundraiser at which Jack Layton spoke.  It was the 12th annual NDP Pride Brunch.

Now, whatever your private opinion of Jack Layton, here is one simple truth that will not go away.  He was one of the first Canadian politicians of any stripe who stood with gay people.  Like, marched in Pride Day, voted in favour of it at City Council meetings in Toronto, took the time as a young politician to hear what it was like to be a gay man in Canada in the sixties and seventies and on hearing the story thought, “This sucks, and I’m going to DO something about it.”  When he gets up and starts reminiscing about ‘my first Pride’ he’s got 25 or so years of Pride to be proud about. 

Moved by the mindless obedience which characterizes so much of my behaviour, I bid on something – a night in a hotel, and won.  Zoing…. Now my brain leaps forward, into the fireworks, which, apart from Michael jeezly Bolton music (Patricia’s disgust was subtle but effective) were truly, deeply wonderful.

To return to something like conventional chronology, after our brief repast and some messing around on the intertnests, Jeff drove me to the hotel where the NDP function was, which, strangely enough, was four blocks from Lexi’s place.  Among other speeches there was a list of four recent queer rights issues raised in countries overseas – Bolivia, Poland, South Africa and India.  I was particularly impressed by the references to trans issues because there are definitely ongoing legal and humanitarian issues about transgender and transsexual rights, globally.

But holy cats, imagine marching in the first Polish Pride Day!  Ten t’ousand marchers and seven bleeding thousand cops, militia and regular army to stop you from getting your faces stomped in!?  I’m marching in Pride this morning and the only gun that will get pulled on me is a super soaker.  One of the organizers of the first Polish Pride will be a grand marshal of this year’s Pride Parade.  I’m sure it will make a nice change from what he went through in Poland.

As you may ascertain from the foregoing, it was a busy day.  I only drank three beers all day, I stayed close to a bathroom, I didn’t lose my blanky, and all was well.

Candles for womenfolks….

Foremostly, Peggy! Praise her with great praise!

Patricia, for being such an awesome coworker!

Deb for the wonderful comments and the wry observations.

Chipper, for providing the venue for one of my most extreme religious experiences. I just found a pic of us moving the outhouse. Happy sigh.

For Katie K and her job prospects. I am SO hoping you get the job.

For Lady Miss Banjola and her continuing recovery, I hope to full health and mobility, after her accident.

For Daughter Katie, who hasn’t phoned in the best part of a week despite Harry Potter being here!

And Me Mum.

I light some candles for menfolks

I light a candle for Cousin Gerald’s kinsman and his swift recovery from a horrible car accident.

I light a candle for a man who cannot keep his mouth shut. I hope and pray that this last incident teaches him at last some scintilla of tact; I light this candle in spite of my doubts. Also, may my quite large and rude crush on him please die an immediate death.

I light a candle for a former close friend.  Closets are for clothes.
I light a candle for my brother’s birthday. Jeff is so brilliant, funny, creative, hospitable and widely read that I wriggle like a happy Lab puppy when I think he’s my only sibling. And he’s coming to Vancouver and he may even stay with me a bit. Yip!

I light candles for Ben’s birthday, in binary. (This is the tradition with the ‘Villeans’ (pron. Villains)). Unusual cakes with candles for the age in binary. Highly recommended, and faster to light (because you leave some unlit, because they’re binary…)

I light a candle for RobofNine, ubergeek!

I light a candle for Paul, for keeping the negotiations real, with my thanks.

I light a candle for Keith, may he ever grow in enterprise, wisdom and compassion.

And of course pOp.

Oh, man – from Cousin Glenn (as the kids say, WORD)

Glenn’s List of Unfortunate Relationship Truths

  1. It is possible to find that you no longer love someone, regardless of how nice, intelligent, sensitive or deserving they may be.
  2. It is possible to love someone very much, but not want to have sex with them.
  3. It is possible to love someone very much, but not be able to live with them. Maybe you feel stifled, or something about them simply sends you batsh*t (or vice-versa).
  4. It is possible to love someone very much and still want to do something else more, and if necessary you will sacrifice the love.
  5. It is possible to stop loving someone, refuse to admit it even to yourself, and put yourself and all around you through five or ten years misery because of it.
  6. Same as number 5, but refuse to admit that there is something you really want to have/do/be and this ain’t it.
  7. Sometimes it rains.

Dinner

Went out to dinner at the Keg with Katie K last night.  I had an excellent time.  The rest of yesterday was domestic stuff – all my clothes are clean tra la la –  and scanning photos and shipping them off to my mom.
Daughter Katie is supposed to turn up and give herself a Harry Potter readathon sometime this week, we just haven’t scheduled when yet.