compost-level 2

Back in the spring you will recall (ha!) that I made the move to try to reduce the waste we put in landfill by getting a bokashi bin set and fermenting kitchen waste. the idea is that you can then dig the waste into the soil and it decomposes really fast without attracting animals. We discovered one major problem with this theory: Luke the dog likes the smell of the bokashi bran stuff and thus, er, in fact digs the stuff out of the ground, licks the dirt into which it's been dug, and generally addresses bokashi as if it were one huge chocolate bar. I tried planting containers with it and I dug some of it into the front garden (where Luke doesn't go)--that seemed to work. I also put it in the regular rubbish pickup once or twice, reassured that once it got to landfill it would, indeed, decompose faster. Not sure that really works as a justification, but there you are.

So my conclusion now is that the bokashi bin system is a gateway drug. Despite all my best efforts at resisting becoming 'that guy', I have now installed a very simple compost bin in the corner of the garden into which the bokashi bin contents go once they've fermented a bit. Along with leaves, clippings and other crazy stuff. For example, I discovered in 'experiment 1' with bokashi that eggshells don't so much decompose. I knew this from advice from others, but it seemed such a pain, and really crazy gardner talk to do something different with the shells. Now it seems I'm on the path to really crazy gardener.

I now microwave the shells after using them, crush them a bit, and once there's a critical mass of shells (don't ask what a 'critical mass' of shells actually means)--I put them in the food processor and grind them into dusty shelly bits. Now that I have a compost bin these can go in there as well. I'm that guy. so sad.

I still don't like gardening--never fear. It is too much akin to cleaning house: always stuff to do, never done, and frustrating.

so I have now reached compost--level 2. not sure what this means, but I will report back on the compost progress and whether it leads to things like caring about shrubberies and the like.

Gender, Photography, and the Taliban

Surfing around Slate this morning and came across a video-essay that photographer Thomas Dworzak put together with journalist/author Ahmed Rashid. It is an extended commentary on the practice of young Taliban recruits having their photographs taken in studios in Afghanistan under the Taliban regime, a regime that banned images of living things. Many interesting issues intersect in these images, from representation of human beings under a strict no-human-image regime to the relations between the people in the photographs to their own desire to be photographed, despite the repression of such activities by the very people these men worked for.

The photographer who collected these studio images along with the journalist who provided commentary both focus on the 'Gilbert and George'-like effeminization/homoeroticism of the images. Despite Dworzak partially dismissing this interpretation at the beginning of the video, the narration (by Rashid at this point) goes on to discuss various practices under Taliban rule of ancient-Greek-like mentoring relationships between an older man and a younger man, and link what they see as effeminate, intimate (hand holding) poses/images in the studio pictures with this practice. In the end, the video's reading of the pictures links these images to iconographies of homosexuality arising from cultures far removed from the Talibani one. In addition, the video shows no awareness that it is precisely the kind of male-male ancient Greek practice that largely sparked the critique of the search for 'gay history' and produced 'queer theory'--a space where acknowledging that different periods in history, cultures, classes have a wide range of sexual practices, and that just because your particular cultural space labels them as 'gay' or 'feminine' does not mean that those participating would do the same.

The video plays upon a presumed incongruity between the effeminate nature of the images and the perception of a unified strict Taliban regime. This seems to me to misread the images, which can, if read in context, be understood as articulations of power and strength without the overarching femininity Rashid and Dworzak see. It is odd that they did not link these images to well-documented and thoroughly-researched scholarship on 20th century studio photography patterns in South Asia as a whole (including Pakistan and Afghanistan) that include all of the elements found in these photographs: air-brushing, Swiss mountain backdrops, guns-as-props, men holding hands. The work of Chris Pinney in this area is widely known and easily accessible.

I'm not trying to protest the idea that there are certainly both gay men within the Taliban and also male-male sexual practices that may not fall within the 'gay' label. (The assumptive relation between gay and feminine is troubling, but that's another comment for another time.)

I am protesting the simplistic reading of images outside of any local, historical, or visual context. When you read images, just as when you read text or hear about an event, you need to look around to see if these images really are odd or strange, or if it's just your own encounter with them that makes them so. The photographs in this piece are part of a long history of South Asian photographic iconography that goes back to princely photographic portraits of the 19th century. Ripping them out of that context and putting them in the 'Gilbert and George' contemporary installation art context does not provide a responsible articulation of what these images meant to those sitting for them, for those taking them, or for those viewing them.

From a Euro-American 21st century eye alone they may appear effeminate. To assume that assessment is universal is to repeat Orientalist, sexist assumptions about men in the non-West ('non-European men are effeminate and, of course since women are weak, this means they are weak') and to underestimate the strength and power communicated through these images.

Perhaps another greek concept--hubris--might be appropriate here?

onions

this seems to be veering into food blog. but it is that time of year, traditional harvest time in parts of the northern hemisphere, and so one finds oneself in the kitchen cooking warm yummy things and the rest.

we get a weekly organic veg delivery from a farm less than four miles from here. the lovely organic man delivers the big paper bag of veg in his white biodiesel van, much like the one I imagine Willie Nelson drives. or wished he could drive, were he not so famous. Luke finds this van to be extremely aggravating and so barks incessantly at it, in a seemingly odd antagonistic relation with saving the nature of which he is our in-house representative. 'dog of the wild' we call him.

in the veg delivery each week is about a pound of lovely onions. the problem is F doesn't eat onions, or really any of what I call the 'Italian' family of vegetables: red/green peppers, the entire onion family, tomatoes, olives (okay not a veg, but neither are tomatoes, so...). anything you'd find on a traditional Italian-American pizza, aside from the meat (we love the meat). you get the picture.

so the onions pile up and I can't throw them out for, obviously, that would defeat the purpose of receiving the veg delivery, namely: saving the world. if you throw out the onions you're supporting the terrorists, right?

so, yesterday I had about 4 lbs of onions and decided something must be done. opened lovely farm cookbook gifted to us by friends from Mankato (go Mavericks, except when they're playing the Gophers of course). I made two huge batches of onion marmalade. I had encountered this substance before via a gift from an English friend (our rwgbi/football guru) and decided it's the best thing to do with onions, period. it involves, in addition to the obvious, red wine, red wine vinegar, sherry, honey, dates, and lots of butter. then you let it simmer for an hour and a half until it gets all thick and dark and congeal-y. it's lovely on burgers, slab-o-cheddar cheese sandwiches, and, according to the cookbook, as a pizza topping. I eat it on top of meat, myself. but that's me. mm. meat. mm. onions. what's not to like?

Duck update

The duck was lovely in all of the aforementioned ways. I then proceeded to become cooking geek: made duck stock from the duck bones, made homemade cornbread and then used both to make cornbread stuffing for thanksgiving, celebrated last night (Friday) at the Cornish-Scottish-American friends' house with Welsh, French, and English guests in attendance. Much fun and (too much) brandy had by all.

Our menu:
Apricot cranberry sauce
green beans with bacon
Cornbread stuffing
turkey
mashed potatoes
gravy
grilled sweet potato halves with yogurt-dill sauce
ratatouille (completely traditional of course)
slightly mashed parsnips roasted in the grease from one of the turkeys
green salad with pomegranate seeds
french bread (aka 'freedom bread')

butternut squash pie
lemon cheesecake
key lime pie
cinnamon rolls
mince pies

2007 Beaujolais Nouveau
other wine, red and white
whisky
brandy

Advise and Consent (1962)

This Henry Fonda/Washington insider film is amazing, from the framing of the architecture (one of the first shots focuses on the 'In god we trust' inscription in the senate chamber while including in the bottom of the frame a somewhat rancorous debate spurred on by hovering press) to the sugary-sweet construction of the suburban home one senator inhabits, one that is revealed to be both very real and an utter façade. What's great about the film, if you (like me) know nothing about it before watching it, is that the plot is a sleeper plot. It starts out very slowly and vanilla but then grows into something utterly other than that. And the ending is brutal.

From our jaded perspective at the beginning of the 21st century, it starts with the fervor over the nomination the President has made for his Chief of Staff. In fact, the first scenes are very like the short-lived show K Street, with a senator getting the news of the nomination by looking at the morning headline, rushing over to a colleague's hotel room, where he finds him already on the phone with the president protesting the choice.

The rest of the film is about the senate committee hearings vetting the nominee. Wow. Sounds like the action film of the century, no? No. But it's fascinating in the way it exposes the workings of politics, the problem with idealists, the legacy of WWII, the various subcultures (the unmarried hostess of Washington poker games and gala parties; the gay New York club/bohemian culture), gender relations, and the way in which before the penetration of the media into the minutiae of every public figure's life, these people could walk around Washington, have meetings in the open, discuss issues--all without a gaggle of reporters everywhere they went. The unfolding of the plot moves it from political sparring almost to the point of political thriller.

recommended.

Duck à L'Orange and other mistakes

Having eaten a low-sugar diet for four or five years now, the ol' tastebuds have changed such that things others consider to taste 'normal' taste, to me, unbelieveably sweet. Like Havarti cheese. Or low-fat milk. or 85% chocolate. Probably my cooking states unbelieveably bland and/or spicy and/or something to other people. Who knows. But one of my favourite meats (mm. meat. it's all good) is duck. there are several excellent reasons for this. [note: my sole reader who does not eat duck for reasons that they are lovely cute creatures and it is cruel might want to stop reading here. also my other two readers who are vegetarian. so, the one carnivorous friend that's left, read on.]

1. Duck is fatty. Fat is good. It makes meat taste good and it helps with cooking the meat and did I mention it's lovely?
2. Because of #1, duck meat is usually quite moist and juicy.
3. If you like dark meat on a turkey, you love duck. It all has that taste of dense but juicy dark meat. And the ducks aren't (I don't think?) perversely fattened to produce large breasts for the (again perverse) taste for breast meat that the North American public seems to crave.

We like our birds breast-heavy with thin legs. Hm. What else fits that description? Coincidence? But I digress.

4. Duck is often used in fabulous Chinese cooking--and I'm not talking about the drive-up hole-in-the-wall university take-away Chinese that we all know and love for entirely other reasons having to do with fried, breaded goodness.

Duck is often on the menu here in the UK at 'normal' 'British' restaurants of the post-1980s variety (that is, the food is quite good and well-prepared). We went to one such restaurant which is excellent where the duck leg entree is served with this amazing lentil/dal-like sauce. It goes perfectly with the richness of the duck meat, providing a sort of horizontal taste next to the wavy curviness of the duck (spatial/visual thinker here--bear with me).

Our dining companions also ordered the duck and didn't like it. Their complaint: too salty.

But it was not salty at all. No salt was used in the sauce, our friendly waiter graciously reported. My conclusion from this? British/North American palates expect duck + something sweet. Whether it's an orange glaze or a Chinese plum sauce, the idea is that duck is equated with sweetness. To have a lovely perfectly spiced horizontal low-level buzz of dal underneath the duck means to be forced (against their will) to taste the duck itself. And so, Duck à l'orange has ruined duck for an entire population spanning the Atlantic. Very very sad.

This is borne out by my experience today trying to find a recipe to use to cook the duck I purchased this week in my Sainsbury's delivery. It was on sale. I'd never cooked duck before and I thought: hey, I like duck! and then hey, why not? So I have a duck in the fridge. Sorry Ruth. I looked in a variety of cookbooks, and aside from the basic roasting instructions for all birds in the Good Housekeeping, all of the recipes involved apricot jam or some sort of citrus-honey sauce or, in one interesting innovation, a honey-thyme sauce which sounds lovely but frankly still ends up in the too sweet category.

I did find a recipe--Madhur Jaffrey to the rescue once again--she's got a whole stuffed duck recipe in her Invitation to Indian Cooking that looks lovely. It has raisins and dried apricots in it (sweet) but they are in the stuffing, entirely different from a glaze. I may cook dal with it as well. I will report back.

8.5 x 11 is so wrong

isn't it? it just occurred to me (again) that this was the case. A4 is an elite, svelte paper size, is it not? hm.

Activist judges

FFB noted the disparity between the sacrifices that the Pakistani judiciary and body of lawyers has made in the face of martial law (oh--sorry. it's not martial law it's 'emergency-plus' which I think is in fact a vitamin-C drink, is it not?).

This article from OpenDemocracy illuminates some of the reasons for the ire of the lawyers in particular, and also illustrates why the announcement today by Musharraf that elections will be held in January does not, in fact, solve the underlying problem. It also belies what I'm perceiving in the press coverage in the UK the distinct impression that Bhutto is the country's only/best hope--an impression that seems to stem largely from the fact that she feels 'comfortable' to a western audience, where Musharraf never quite did, despite appearing on the Daily Show. She too benefits from this emergency-plus situation with corruption cases suspended against her, as Raja at OpenDemocracy argues.

yea, o holy book review...

I would so much like to write book reviews like this one from time to time. Well, only when it's entirely appropriate, as this one is. Check it out.

Macbeth

1. No, Patrick Stewart was not as brilliant as you would expect him to be. He was quite a bit better than that.
2. And still, it was Kate Fleetwood's Lady Macbeth that almost stole the show.
3. But the real winner was the production and direction.
4. And the icing on the cake? Sitting next to Marina Sirtis in the best seats in the house

What's on My iPod (Touch)

As this otherwise worthless post indicated, I do not have a new iPhone, but I do have a new iPod touch. Like the rest of you (the sane ones, that is) I covet an iPhone, but both options available to me at the moment are really non-starters:

1. Buy a US iPhone and 'unlock' it.

It's simply too much money for a device that could be rendered useless with a firmware upgrade, and frankly, as much as I love the command line, it's all a bit too much work for me.

2. Pick up the UK iPhone on o2 when released in November.

A. 35 quid a month is steep for someone who NEVER uses his phone and who currently pays less than £8/month.

B. The UK and Europe moved their networks from 2g to 3g. The US didn't, really, but instead upgraded to '2.5G' in the form of adding EDGE to the 2G network. The iPhone, as we all know, is not 3g; it's an EDGE device. There are reasons that that sucks, but putting those aside, here's the dealbreaker: there is no viable EDGE network in the UK. o2 is 'bragging' that they have been putting EDGE in place and will have 35% coverage at release. 35% is not a typo; it is, however, unacceptable.

But o2 has done something right compared with AT&T. They have bundled wifi hotspot coverage into their package deal. Even better, the hotspot provider, The Cloud, will give you unlimited access for your iPod touch for less than a fiver a month!

So, until I can experience the glory of the iPhone I picked up an iPod Touch (purchased in dollars - which are worthless, by the way - of course). This gives me a chance to check out the new UI without spending lots of money. And yes, it is all it is hyped to be. And more.

So what's on my iPod Touch?

• a random selection of about 35 albums from my collection
  
• all my contacts and calendars
  
• a bunch of youtube bookmarks
  
• Battlestar Galactica Episode
  
• Deadwood Episode
  
• Brian Manzella's Confessions of a Former Flipper
  
• Radiohead's 'In Rainbows' (the subject of my next blog)
  

misanthrope

I signed up for facebook. I was curious, I suppose. it reveals more deeply than ever that I really don't so much like the people. I'll find people I used to know and I think: huh, s/he looks good. good for them. but contact? ha! no way.

and: it's eerie how happy everyone is in their little pictures. eerie and wrong. it has a sort of uncanniness to it. I'm sure some grad student is working on this busily in some cultural studies department somewhere in the midwest right now. does not detract from the fact that facebook: uncanny. and me: misanthrope. this facebook thing may not work for me. we'll see. here's my uncanny pic.

The iBrick

Just so you all know that I can maintain a sense of humour even concerning those things that I typically treat with religious reverence - I thought this was very funny:

blogging from my iPod

nothing else to say!!!

busy and big month

not that this has prevented me from blogging, but the big news is that my sister has just given birth to our first nephew (or niece for that matter--the first of the next generation, more or less, I should say). Welcome to the world Alexander!

the busy bit of the month has simply been the beginning of term usual chaos. on-line content for your teaching seemed such a good idea when we started this years ago and yet it takes an insane amount of management and time. so I find myself updating tutorial sign-up sheets, creating groups for students to meet on-line and collaborate through, uploading slides from the lectures, coordinating the readings and reading questions, and all the rest.

we had a lovely visit from Kristin and Mark last week, which was great. I was in the last sentence going to classify them as our 'denver friends' because that's where they live, but that doesn't quite do it. we know many many people in Denver. And Kristin and I really met at a series of weddings, so perhaps they are 'wedding friends'--you know those people you see once/year for about 3-5 years when every one of your mutual friends gets married and as a result you gain lifelong friends. very cool. but there are earlier connections for fronesis--high school, to be specific. And we are now more than wedding friends. So there you are. uncharacterisable, all-encompassing friends. the best kind. Great to see y'all.

will keep blogging soon.

My Other Excuse(s)

Coming to a bookshop near you in January:

but is it?

first week of teaching over here, bit chaotic. this made me laugh.

Explaining Myself (now on Youtube)

Why haven't I been blogging?

The link to the answer is below, but I warn you: precisely one of our readers is going to be at all interested in this.

my sisters' sister

in the on-going purchasing spree that is our recent lives (we can quit at any time), we have acquired a tiny but lovely digital video camera. it is our first. one of my relatives offered to buy me one several years ago as a gift and I weighed it and decided I'd rather have a high end still camera than a video one. but now times are different. there's the youtube kids keep talking about. and video reviews on Amazon. so it seems 'normal' to own and use a video camera. plus, frankly, there's iMovie and so it seems silly not to be using this free software.

but it is weird. very weird. we were testing the thing (filming the dog, of course--what else would we film?) and I was on the tape for a bit. (tape. ha! what's that, gramps?)

it was like watching my sister. except not. and which one I'm not sure. sort of like watching the sister of my sisters. someone not me. very very weird.

and it made me reflect that the shift from family snaps to family clips is not far off. that the old home movies which somehow because of technological hurdles and all the rest never quite made it into my normal life--they are now inching their way in. it will be odd to hear my younger relatives talking in amazement about the fact that we 'lived without' digital video snaps of our family, blood and not. how do you know what they really look like if all you have is some lame-o still analog photograph, great-great-aunt tekne? oh wait, that's probably not what they'll call me.

but it's a good thing to know that seeing myself is also seeing my sisters in face and mannerism and bearing. weird. but also good.

up a creek

we are very excited about the new member of our furniture family: the concept 2 rower. yes, we finally made the shift from the £8 (delivered) boot sale stationary bike to, well, the machine to end all machines. I'm still startled when I walk by the room. the thing is this huge alien creature akin to some large extended insect (preying mantis?) squatting in our 3rd bedroom-cum-walk-in-closet. quite a change from our old set up:

the workout is great, and it's exciting (I know--I'm a geek) to figure out a new technique, having never rowed before in my life. after rowing sans instruction once (of course), we watched the little video hosted by the Australian 4-man olympic rowing team, realised we were doing nigh everything wrong, tried again, and it's pretty durn cool. the computer is a full-on computer. does more than my Apple IIe did (not to dis my IIe. That was an amazing machine. and to be fair, the rower can't print out banners on a dot-matrix printer with PrintShop, nor can it organise your life through Hypercard. ah nostalgia.) but it can track all my rows, tell me the force of my strokes, how fast I'm going, what my 'split times' are (yes, new vocab part of the attraction!), show me rowing with a 'pace boat' next to me, allow me to row in competition with others on-line by uploading my results, and a whole lot of other things. I plan to be super-buff in next to no time.

Mad Men 2

One of the funny moments in the early episodes of MM is a scene in which two characters share their lunch, but spend it touring the office. What's great about it is that the office is deserted--they are the only ones around, everything is quiet, and it is pointed out as an oddity that one of the middle-management people with an office has 'stayed in' during the lunch hour.

I'm in my office now--it's 5:20. I'm here because I have Welsh class starting in a few minutes. There's no one around. no one, except me and the cleaning staff. deserted. it's Tuesday. I think this is pretty damn awesome. Now if I can only train my co-workers to do the same at lunch...hm. and then there's the constant whisky drinking...

Mad Men

with the lull before the autumn season premieres (FNL is, I think, the only show I'm actually waiting for...) we are re-watching Deadwood season one which is completely and utterly amazing. I believe this is the third time we've watched these episodes but I still can't get over how goddamn good the show is--like the doctor explaining to the preacher that he should get some 'goddamn' rest--all done with this amazing understanding and respect:

Doc: All right. (jabbing the Rev in the chest) You listen to me now, Reverend. You are goddamn exhausted and you give yourself no respite. And your seizures may owe somethin’ to that, but it also wouldn’t surprise me if you had a lesion in your goddamn head…(Jane looks on, eyes filling)…and that’s what’s giving you the seizures and generating your chats with the goddamn divinity. No goddamn offense intended.
Rev: None taken, sir.
Doc: Now, get outta here and get yerself some rest.
Jane: Go on, Reverend. (Doc straightens up.) Doc’s tired too, only reason he’s talkin’ so fuckin’ harsh.
(The Rev mulls on this for a moment, then looks up at Doc.)
Rev: Could not the lesion be the instrument of God’s instructive intention, doctor, if I am so afflicted?
Doc: Well, of *course* it could, his ways not bein’ ours and so forth. But could he not, Reverend, be sayin', just once, you gettin’ outta here and gettin’ yerself some goddamn rest?

Oh how the text on the page is insufficient.

But wait--this post is about Mad Men!
Yes, we've discovered (hello, people out there--where were you when this show started mid-summer to tell us about it!) Mad Men on AMC--yes, AMC. I know! crazy. But there it is. It's a show about ad execs in 1960s Manhattan--the early 60s, back when patriarchy had some bite and wasn't all subtle. Back when everyone smoked all the time. Back when they made the caesar salad at your table. We're two episodes in. it's extremely well written, the acting is all amazing (includes, by former character played: Angel's son, Mrs. Reynolds, Bartlett's daughter, Gabbi's politician husband, and several others...)

It's available on iTunes for download. We've committed: season pass. I imagine this only means one thing: it'll be cancelled next season. But we live in hope.

it's about the love

our friends over at OaO, specifically mtg, seek the love in their television viewing, and desire (if I may be so bold as to articulate said desire on their behalf) entertainment that demonstrates why it is, in the end, that human beings interact in the first place--what the payoff is for living with/amongst fellow beings, and the good bits of that (not necessarily the happy bits--the good bits). The love. even in shows that 'fro' and I find to be full of the love, like, say, Deadwood, do not fit this criteria because of the nasty ickyness they also display in order to, in my mind, show you the love that much more clearly, that much more fully. The love, for example, between Swearingen, the bar owner and town boss, and Trixie, his lead whore. some things are difficult to see, but once seen are the more powerful for having seen them. But I digress. the love, in its more unadulterated form, can be found in Friday Night Lights, which, and I cannot emphasise this enough, is both entirely about football and not at all in any way about football. it is about the love. I say this now because Heather Havrilevsky over at Salon has given FNL the annual 'Buffy' award for the most underappreciated show on television. Link (subscription or short ad to watch first)
this is in large part because of the love:

But what's impossible to express, what can only be experienced by watching a handful of episodes, is that "Friday Night Lights" has so much heart and sweetness, so much love for normal people with big dreams, that it has the power to give you a lump in your throat every single week.

go netflix/buy season 1 and then watch season 2 starting 5 October. in hopes that there might be more of the love.

bombs: now environmentally friendly!

Unlike a nuclear weapon, the bomb doesn't hurt the environment, he added.

This from an AP story about the 'dad of all bombs' (outdoing through patriarchal gender norms the US's 'mother of all bombs') that Russia tested at an undisclosed time in the recent past.

'Full' story here.

It's not nuclear, but it destroys kinda a lot like nuclear but it's not bad for the environment! well, except for the bomb part of the bomb. that might, you know, destroy some stuff. but see how much better than before!

I love that the save-the-environment rhetoric works for bomb making. and what better combo than patriarchy + environment to make your point? can't think of one.

new walk

It has not rained in Swansea in two weeks. in fact, it's been mostly beautiful the entire time since I returned from London--a bit overcast in the morning and then clearing up to gorgeous sun in the afternoon. Not too hot, clear fresh air, lovely. Luke and I have developed a new walk in celebration of the weather. we had discovered the path earlier but that time it had rained (a lot) and thus is was more of a slog through mud than a walk per se. without the water it is a lovely walk. and I can report two things: 1. it is blackberry season. lots of berries hanging from spiky viney things into the path. this is fun. it's like an instant, on-demand snack. how cool is that? 2. people litter. this is odd to me. wonderful walky blackberryness and you drop your litter on the path? wha? and what possessed you to be drinking a Lucozade orange drink in the first place? or eating a monster bag of M&Ms while walking, when blackberries are right there, and if you eat them fast enough they too melt in your mouth and not on your hands? sometimes, i imagine, one accidentally drops things. this happens. but how about picking things up? less accidental. more planning involved there. so Luke and I do. two or three things. and the poop of course.

PS: where do horses get off not picking up, when dogs can be fined? what's that about? and the former's droppings are, well, quite a bit larger than the latter's. not cool.

PPS: how cool is it that I have a path with horses on it 3 blocks from my house? too cool.

champagne

'is the only wine that may be served with any course and at all times during the meal'.* Hear hear.

I have this week received a cheque (stoked!) for £300ish from Oxford University Press (woo woo!) in payment for writing four entries in the forthcoming Encyclopedia of the Modern World. This included the aforeblogged entry 'Art--Overview' in which I cover the entirety of Art for the World since 1750 in 2000 words.

And on some old advice from a dear friend, I'm thinking that rather than deposit it and add it to the ol' bank balance, for it to disappear and meld together with other pluses and minuses, I should instead buy something cool. but what to buy?

Option A: Art (appropriate). Could buy a print from a Pakistani artist I met here in Swansea last year.
Option B: Rug. always love the rugs. sort of wish for my house to look like those orientalist tents in 1920s-50s Arabian-set films, piled with carpets.
Option C: comfy reading chair for the upstairs 'library' currently unpopulated with furniture of use.
Option D: rockstar leather trousers (this was what aforementioned friend suggested back when, and it is still on the table)
Option E: New iPod Touch. Because you know you want one. with exchange rates I could buy two. Hm. who would want the other one though? I can't think of anyone. huh.
Option F: trip to ?? for weekend.

Thoughts? I can report back on my capitalist indulgence. Until then I can drink champagne throughout the meal. huzzah.

*from: Old Mr. Boston Deluxe Official Bartender's Guide, compiled and edited for Old Mr. Boston by Leo Cotton in Collaboration with Old Time Boston Bartenders. Boston: Mr. Boston Distiller, Inc., 1955 (original printing 1935). For more click here...

spiders

my expectation is that spiders come into the house after the summer, as the season changes into fall and then into winter. it seems Britain's lack of a summer has confused said 8-legged friends and thus there are many of them inside the house as I type. but is it a bad sign that there's one that's set up shop across the shower/bath? is the universe telling me I should bathe more often? hm. once a week whether ya need it or not.

reason no. 247

why I cannot move back to the US: customer 'service' and the blood pressure. I no longer have any defenses when it comes to dealing with those underpaid, overworked, hassled and I'm sure otherwise lovely people one speaks to on the phone when calling, well, anywhere in the US. Leaving aside entirely the computers one has to 'talk to'. (there should be another verb for this) I tried to ring S at his fancy-shmancy corporate chain hotel in Chicago and got a computer-generated (female of course) voice that supposedly directed me to the guest directory but then didn't. Had to press 0 for the operator (always try 0, of course) and then finally (through a female human) got connected.

Today I dealt with our lovely insurance company here in the UK, which was sort of fine (they've messed something up, we need to renew, they sent a letter on the 22nd with a 'if you don't respond in 10 days you're no longer insured' notice that I received today, on the 31st). But my blood pressure was unbelievably high. I gathered all of the paperwork around me like some sort of stress barricade, set up my gunmen, ran reconnaissance through the depths of the records, put on my game face, and rang them. It was okay. But I could not do it in the US. I would retreat to my normal fetal, under-bed position in which I convinced myself that (a) we didn't really need a car or house and (b) even if we did, who needs insurance anyway? Better to retreat from the world than talk to someone who will be mean to you on the phone.

Perhaps I sound like a baby. I should just deal with this fallout of late capitalist life--because, hey, I'm not starving, and hey, the person/institution/company doesn't actually have my life in their hands. Or at least only in the abstract--in the accumulation of heart rate and uninsured lifestyle that many of my friends and family live in or have lived in for multiple months/years/on-going periods of their lives. So I guess I do think it's important.

One of the ways I do convince myself to pick up the phone (both here and in the US) is by reminding myself what a crap job the folks on the other end of the phone have, dealing with angry people who have just received anonymous letters that scare them shitless and then make them mad. And then I think how much time and love and space and thinking could be re-routed--time now spent on the phone to Social Security, Medicare, hospitals, HMOs, insurance companies, telephone companies, broadband services, credit report agencies.

How much art, music, genius inventions, great TV, smart solutions to seemingly intractable problems--how much have we lost of that to the barricades of paperwork, lists of anonymous-yet-named customer 'service' people (Ashley, Sandy, Carrie, Andrew), and blood pressure?

no place like it

the A to Z is back on the shelf, the laundry is going, bags open on the floor--it can only mean that the London phase is over and I'm back in Swansea. very exciting and strange. the trip in numbers:

plays seen: 5
films seen: 2
exhibits seen: 3
museums: 6
libraries worked in: 3
hair cuts: 1
bikram sessions: 3
markets: 3
Hampstead Heath: 3
Regent's Park: 2
wagamama: 5
books purchased: 2 (I know! such restraint!)
books read: 1.25 (who has the time?)
days over 25C: 2

I feel like I was away for about 6 months overseas. Well, London is in another country they only speak the one language. what to do?

Welcome to the Wellcome

Should have been researching here all along. they have things like, um, internet for free? Sure they have a fraction of the number of researchers of the BL across and down the street, but still. this is called civilisation. we need our wifi. and we need it gratis. vielen dank.

I heart medical research libraries.

NHS, vol. 2

Turns out I have Plantar Fasciitis. Note to all runners out there: don't forget to stretch and update your shoes! (I did the latter, but have been remiss with the former.) This is good news in that I don't need to stay off my feet, but bad news if walking around London turns out to be excruciating.

I won't provide the detailed time line of my experience, as I did last time. But I have to make one small comment in regard to the health care 'debate' over at FFB. My wager is this: if every American could somehow have their own encounter with a national health system like the one here, then there would be national health insurance in the US within one election cycle.

No. 3's experience, by the way, perfectly mimics the one that R had about 5 years ago. They don't know what to do if you don't smoke, and getting through the bureaucracy is impossible.

In stark contrast, this morning I made one phone call at 8.35am, was on hold for less than 1 minute, made an appointment for 9am the same day, saw the doctor at 9.04, and then had an actual intelligent conversation with him. I left his office with (free) prescription in hand at 9.10.

walking

we're off to London tomorrow for a few weeks, which will be lovely. we are staying near the BT tower, going to the BL for research, sure to see the BM show on Japanese consumer aesthetics (shiny! smooth!), and generally doing things that involve two-letter acronyms starting with B. I don't think we'll be doing BY (Bikram Yoga) because it's insanely expensive. but it does have the acronym. hm. dilemma.

fronesis bruised his foot while running on a beach barefoot the other day, and thus cannot walk. this is a problem not only for London but for *life* which I suppose is a good sign about our lives right now (we commute on foot) but not so good in terms of immediate plans for the London. we are off to procure crutches today so that other bits of his body--arms, armpits, shoulders--will hurt as well. good plan? don't know.

much jealousy re: iPhone, and how unfair it is that Apple didn't merely send us one for free given that we have single-handedly (or four-handedly, as there are two of us with two hands each) converted about 2.2 million people from PC to Apple. Okay more like 15. But still. And we want a new iMac too, since we're wishing.

more from the big city.

nothing to report sir

not much going on around here, except that approx 50% of our blogging audience will be or has already visited in the weeks plus and minus this post. and so it seems pointless to blog in this situation.

or entirely pointy.

Finished HP7 (reading)
Saw HP5 (film)

Review: mixed. See FFB's point regarding the references in the film to WWII and various 1940s (and earlier) era films that incorporate the media-as-character/narration/exposition. Well done here. Effects kinda sucked--esp. in the last quarter. What happened there? I mean--it seemed like they just decided not to really 'do' the last quarter of the book, am I remembering right? Hm. It just seemed a lot more engaging/complex/interesting in the book. I suppose this is almost always the case. But I remember it being more visually interesting in the book.

I'm not a Harold Bloom like snob (okay maybe a wee bit snobby, but not Bloom-like) so I found book 7 satisfying in its genre. But it's not a well-written series. I yearn for well-crafted, well-written fantasy/anglophile work, and book 7 only made me cringe about 10 times, which is pretty good. Rowling can't do transitions (hence the 'endless series of previews' effect of the movies from the books) and she doesn't really foreshadow--she has the characters notice things that obviously will become important later--it's: Harry notices X, can't quite remember why it's important, shakes it off. reader: note to self. remember X. will be important.

These sorts of things can be done with more skill. But the books are worth the few hours they take to read. Still. yearning for quality fantasy stuff. and not in the Azimov vein. In the Marion Zimmer Bradley/Phillip Pullman/Neil Gaiman vein. Suggestions?

new feature! Boot Sale Update™

'Reading the Tarot of the Boot since June 1923'

This week it was, as we expected, all hamsters. Initial sightings of the top seller I Am Your Pet Hamster (I Am Your Pet) ominously presaged an entire bootsale's worth of Hamster-related paraphernalia, primarily in the form of cages, runs and what came to be referred to as 'hamster kit'.

Golf faded a bit this week in relation to earlier weeks, with only two boot-salers offering an assortment of rusted clubs and a selection of discarded, yet well-meaning golf gifts, including the knock-off nalgene bottle stuffed with cheap plastic tees. A sign of the impending apocalypse? perhaps.

We await confirmation in next week's boot sale reading, when we anticipate a turn to the mundane echoing of broader consumer culture with 'Potter mania'.

Perspective

The amazing thing about this speech from Olbermann is that his level of anger and the depth of his utter indignance are both perfectly reasonable and rational in light of the facts – yet no one else sounds like this. That is, the amazing thing is that most Americans' response to the news this week was to see it as business as usual. Every analyst noted the brilliant tactics of Bush in the first debates in 2000: he lowered expectations to such a depth, that even though he looked like a moron compared to Gore, people thought he'd done well. He seems now to have reworked that chapter of the playbook: he has normalised the subversion of the rule of law to such an extent that nothing he does is surprising. I think the normalisation is more frightening than the basic facts themselves.

Here's to Olbermann for maintaining his indignation.

Of Course it's the UI!

The Fly makes a quick mention of his first live iPhone experience, and he comments as follows:

I got my hands on an actual iPhone over the weekend, and I'm now buying into the hype. It's not so much the phone itself that deserves the hype as the UI.

My response: of course, of course, of course. Most of the critics and some of the fans miss the point: the iPhone doesn't really perform all that many functions not already performed by other phones. That's not why it's important - indeed, revolutionary.

Remember, it's not as if the original Macintosh was so amazing because it ran applications or performed functions that no computer had ever performed. It did pretty much the same stuff as an IBM machine running early DOS did. It's how it did it. And the how effects the who and the future what. (I'm thinking of Trademarking the 'future what'.) Because of the way the Mac did what it did (because of the mouse and the GUI) the personal computer revolution was possible. Now almost everyone uses computers, and they use them to do things almost unimaginable 25 years ago.

With the iPhone all this means that so-called smartphones that were once the preserve of geeks and Business-Types (different kind of geeks), will go mainstream (but please let us hope we stop calling them 'smartphones'). The device is revolutionary because at a certain point down the road everyone will think it is normal and necessary to check your email, surf the web, and watch a movie on your 'phone'. And we will do all sorts of other things on our 'phone' that I can't really think up right now, but with the iPhone UI in place I'm confident that lots of other clever people will think up.

I also wonder if we can't speculate about the iPhone and its followers in their capacity to eventually encroach on the laptop market. For people that don't write a ton of text, there will no longer be any reason to have the laptop with them when they go places. It's thus conceivable that the iPhone will replace the personal computer for many people for many tasks.

Much of this gets lost in the hype, because the hype focuses so much on marketing, sales, and money, on the one hand, and on the personal consumer choice to buy an iPhone, on the other. But the revolution that the iPhone is launching will go ahead whether or not Apple makes billions of dollars on it, and it will go ahead whether or not your or I buy an iPhone. Most importantly, these three dimensions (1. Apple sales 2. consumer choice 3. revolutionary status) must be separated when judging the iPhone. I can only speculate wildly about the first as I don't know the ins and outs of the phone market, of Apple's business model, etc. I'm sure Ryan could give us a guess that is much better educated. My guess is that they will make tons of money, but there are a million ways that they might not. And I want them to make money simply so that Steve Jobs can invest it in the next great thing he's dreaming up. As for the second, I doubt I'll buy an iPhone within the next 8 months, as I don't want to pay the price premium, and as I remarked earlier, my current uses for such a device are extremely limited. I know that the fly won't buy one within the year, and I'm sure that many people's parents will never buy one.

But I'm confident about number 3. One day in the future folks will wonder how all of us ever got on with life without the ability to tap and pinch and drag our fingers on our 'phones'. (Also be sure to check out Dan's great iPhone-related entries, here, and here. It's probably not my place to out the guy, but I have to tell you: 12 months ago he'd never even owned a Mac.)

what I've been waiting for

FFB has posted about running a few times over the past week or so--they are much more serious about the running than I, but I am very excited about the gmaps pedometer they have linked to today. While it doesn't work so well if you run on an un-mapped trail (as I do, which is awesome), it does give a sense of length *and* allows you to map out routes in new cities/areas you might be visiting. Well, that is if you are in the US, Japan, China, or the UK. Still--very cool.

This pic is our running route when we lived in London for a month or so ages ago. pre-9/11, if you can believe that. I know! I thought nothing happened before then too!!



And a route I ran with a friend in SF last time I was there...

technology is cool.

spooks

not the best week to be in Britain, this past week. what with car bombing attempts in the west end (er, not too far from a flat I'm attempting to rent for a week or two mid-August, er, may indeed have to rethink that one), floods up north, and then oh yeah the whole flaming gasoline/kerosene filled vehicle airport bombing attempt at Glasgow.

I am oddly and utterly fictionally calmed by having watched the entirety of series 5 of spooks over the last few weeks. I know Adam Carter can save us. I know he's on the job. despite the fact that he's utterly having the breakdown because of his wife's death and being tortured by his best childhood friend that one time in Serbia and all the rest...I know he can save us. oh yes, and despite the fact that he's, well, a television character. works for folks in the US with Jack Bauer, right? (only Adam is so cuter and hotter and smarter. y'all must see spooks. all y'all.)

In the US it's called MI-5, runs on A&E, available on DVD under that name as well....

the book list at right is a lie.

I have recently discovered that I am in fact reading about 347 books simultaneously (give or take 336ish. Okay pretty much take 336ish) I didn't realise this, and I suppose it depends on your definition of 'reading' and how actively one wishes to interpret that particular verb. One could also say that I am currently in the midst of many many more books than I realised. Not counting books of short stories, which of course, can be read in smaller chunks (hence the 'short' bit), and not counting books I'm reading that are 'work books' I am currently reading/in the midst of:

Understanding Media, Marshall McLuhan (in the edition at right)
Blue Arabesque, Patricia Hampl
The Other Side of Silence, Urvashi Butalia
Prisoner's Dilemma, Richard Powers
The Historian, Elizabeth Kostova
Foucault's Pendulum, Umberto Eco (part of the mystery of this book, I'm convinced, is that in fact one never finishes it.)
and of course,
Merch y Felin: Dyddiadur, Eliza Helsted, Manceinion, 1842-1843, Sue Reid and Meinir Wyn Edwards

As someone who is normally a one-book-at-a-time type reader, this is a bit weird. Oddly, I feel fine picking up on page 2million, 94thousand of Eco's text after a gap of several weeks. I'm not sure how this happened. it is nice, once again, to have books scattered around the house.

update: forgot one...The Dictionary of Maqiao, Han Shaogong, trans. Julia Lovell

new spam phenomenon

has anyone else been getting this new form of spam? I can't find the post that someone in my small hermeneutic blog circle wrote ages ago about those image-spams to get past the text spam-filters and thereby sell you things. The post detailed the problem of load to the e-mail system: these spams were larger than text spams and thus more problematic for the overall health of the interwebs.

The ol' viagra-image-spam weighs in at about 10-20 Kb; the one with the attachment of random devotional music in the picture above weighs in at 500K. I've received this as well as a scanned 'personal letter' of fairly random sentences and other things--none of these seem to be attempting to sell me stuff directly. Leading me to conclude they're of the spam variety that seeks merely to get a reply of some sort in order to confirm your email address and then truly spam you. Or there could be something hidden in the jpg files to destroy my computer (doubtful). Or maybe if you play the hymn backwards it spells out L-U-C-I-F-E-R or similar. Or, if you start singing it at the moment the lion roars in Wizard of Oz....hm. Anyone else getting these? or just me?

on silence

been busy, I suppose, although not in the traditional hyper-Protestant work-work-work sense. more in the: it's the weekend. one should not open one's computer sense. and the: wouldn't reading a book be a Good Thing right now? and talking/iChatting/video chatting with friends in various portions of the globe. and during the week, some working. and cooking. and (horrors) gardening. so the silence on the blog.

part of it also is the enjoyment of reading other folks who are smart say stuff, whether friends in this small blogging universe or the essays at opendemocracy.net. I've also become addicted to woot.com's posts despite the fact that the chances of me buying something from them are slim to none. but they are funny.

Also funny: Flight of the Conchords (HBO, see also here)
also fabulous: John from Cincinnati. almost makes up for them cancelling Deadwood a season early. not quite. but almost.

watch more TV.

tide is changing

mtg posted earlier about the glories of mac and the odd speed of time as regards technological breakthroughs--bathrooms and running water inside the house! films and news delivered to your living room through the air! then in colour! intercontinental verbal communication facilitated by booking through an operator! now video chat instantly with multiple people around the globe (some of whom will no doubt be in their pajamas as, well, we haven't solved that whole 'world is somewhat round' thing with the time and the sleeping at night and the similar issues. but still cool!)

I think the tide is changing. who would have possibly predicted, during the era of the Netscape wars (remember? when Bill Gates was evil and hadn't yet given away lots of money?) that Apple would be launching a web browser for both PC and Mac. I wouldn't. I'm flabbergasted. Our IT person has decided to purchase a new computer at home--a 20-inch iMac with iTV and the works. Why? because she thinks the tide is turning. she thinks she might need to know Macs as well as she knows PCs. intriguing.

'all girls' big brother

someone must have posted on the gender-bending nature of big brother's voice itself--it can be female, male, a bit of both, and it is always referred to and addressed as 'big brother'. this small, perhaps too subtle element of gender twisting was enhanced at the start of this current series of big brother, which began with an 'all girls' house.

but was it?

the rhetoric circulated around the girl-only nature of the house for the first two days they were in there (a 'male' joined the bunch on Friday). the 'girls' were far from uniformly 'feminine' 'girly' or even 'girls' at all. the age range stretched from the 17 year old blonde twins who screeched for most of the first day or so and were over-the-top girly, well past the point of purposive performance of girliness. (one of the other housemates commented that she felt herself becoming more girly in the face of their girliness. is it catching?) On the other end, a 60-year old grandmother represented a different kind of person, it seems to me not very 'girl' at all--er, woman, perhaps? and then the raver whose bios on-line centre on the fact that she 'has not worn makeup in 15 years'. omigawd! how can she live like that!

so I argue that in fact it was never an 'all girls' brother-hood. rather it was a range of competing genders, some very much queering the norm, from the dress-alike twins bouncing around the sofas to the woman sunbathing to the pink-haired, no makeup individual defying all gender categorisations.

I'm pulling for the lovely Welsh girl, of course.

Just in Case

I know that the chances of there being a person out there who reads this blog but does not read TheOddsAreOne are very slim indeed. But, just in case, I feel it necessary to point out to you that over the past month or so while things were going nowhere here in SecondAmericano land (to be honest, I'm on my third one right now), The Fly has been becoming the blogging Rock Star that he always already is.

Don't miss the poignant insights on everything from AI to the 2-4-6 double play, and don't miss the fantastic, free music.

Go now, Go!

Next!: I don't know, reports on the new Big Brother; questions about how to write a preface?

Socialised Medicine

Last night T's (R's?) illness got much worse, turning into a very painful ear infection. This led to new cultural experiences, as medicine, drugs, doctors are all different under the dreaded 'socialised medicine'. Here's the timeline:

9.30pm, last night
I rushed out to pick up some paracetamol, as we had none in the house. So I had to go to a tiny corner shop that was open late, and wasn't even a pharmacy. I expected to pay that ridiculous premium for buying drugs at tiny stores. Sure enough, they only had a small selection of things behind the counter that I had to ask for. Cost for a bottle: 39p.

9.15am, this morning
We call the local surgery. They pick up on the first ring. The conversation goes like this:
T: I've been sick for a week and think I need to see a doctor
Nurse: OK, what's your date of birth?
T: blah/blah/blah
Nurse: OK, how is 10.30 this morning?
T: OK

10.28: Leave the house for the surgery, it's easily 1/4 mile away.

10.29: Arrive and check in at desk.

10.30: Name called.

10.36: T returns from doctor with filled out prescription

10.39: We drive up the street and arrive at the pharmacy.

10.42: T returns from pharmacy with prescription. Cost: free.

10.44: We arrive back at home.

under the weather

what does that phrase even mean? when was I over the weather? I've been sick for all of bank holiday weekend, which, while a bit rainy was glorious on Monday, the actual holiday. So I've been out of the loop on the whole 'world events' thing. which is dangerous these days when you're sick:

The bird flu outbreak in Wales
From my favourite epidemiology blog. oh yes. we all should have a fave. Effect Measure is mine.

The story doesn't list where in Wales, as well, it's a smallish place. But mountains make a difference, as does lack of infrastructure joining north and south. luckily for me, outbreak is in north Wales (the 'ol gogledd cymru, folks) near Conwy. Lovely castle town up there. nice bridge.

but not to panic. very rare. I have not plucked any chickens or been near live poultry for many years (blocked memories of farm camp in Byers, CO). so my illness is likely just a run of the mill cold.

it does mean that we've been catching up on the movies. so flash reviews (in order of viewing):

Miami Vice: don't see it. so sad. could have been so great. and yet no.
Inside Man: um, I wanted to see the hotness of Clive Owen [see his hot BMW films--perhaps his best work] and all I got was a horribly-done flashback movie [see here and here] with him in a jumpsuit and mask? I don't think so.
Casino Royale: decent bond film. they actually kept the ending until, well, the end. interesting concept. perhaps something new sweeping Hollywood. doubt it. great baddies (crying blood? love it.) and good bond girl. even some depth. and perhaps most analog and awesome opening chase/stunt scene ever. nice.

Also: Spooks--British TV show--not sure if it's available outside of the UK but it's awesome. It's like Alias. Only good. I know. I just blew your mind.

Why I'm Failing as A Capitalist Consumer

As most readers already know well, any pretensions I might have toward radical political positions are completely undermined by my enthusiastic enjoyment of capitalist consumption. To be fair, for me it's less a matter of consumption for its own sake, or of the quantity of consumption. Instead, my joy comes from playing the capitalist game as well as I possibly can. Indeed, for me, the 'deal' is almost as important as the object itself.

The high point for me probably came right before the metaphorical internet 'bubble' did its metaphorical 'bursting'. This was a time when even companies that sold actual tangible products had decided that the 'new economy' dictated giving everything away. This made it possible - for a while - to purchase new technology items and then sell them 6 months later on eBay for more than one had paid for them.

So it saddens and frustrates me to find that our new lifestyle just doesn't lend itself to much consumption. I have found the deals, I just don't have any reason to carry through with the purchases. And by 'reasons' I mean to say that even within the terms of constructed capitalist desire and fetishisation, I still can't find a way to 'justify' a purchase. Here are a few items on my list:


What I want: Nokia N95 Mobile Phone

Why I want it: 5 megapixal camera, micro SD, gps sat-nav, wifi, voip, and the list goes on, i.e. it is the cool phone right now, and will be for about a month (here comes the iPhone)

The deal: it's going for £200 or more with expensive contracts, but there's this thing where you ring Vodafone directly and order a pay-as-you-go SIM at the same time, and then....well, trust me, it's quite a deal!

Why I don't 'need' it: I use my mobile for about 40 minutes and 30 texts a month. I have no one to call, really, and those that I would call aren't on their mobiles. In the states I used 750 minutes a month regularly, but not so now.


What I want: BMW 120d M Sport 3 Dr

Why I want it: RWD BMW goodness, in better-looking 3-dr shape, oodles and oodles of torque, and unbelievably good mileage (around 60mpg combined) and emissions (band C), and £170 gets you free maintenance for 5 years

The deal: around £3k under list through broadspeed

Why I don't 'need' it: well, we've had a car for about 6 weeks now, and it hasn't changed a lot. It looks like we're averaging about 30 miles driven per week, and that's usually taking the car to parking places that don't score high on the Rebecca scale


What I want: Panasonic PHD10 42" Plasma

Why I want it: Panasonic commercial plasma panels are simply the best, in my well-studied opinion, and this is the brand new 10th generation panel in HD

The deal: AV-sales have outdone themselves on a package that includes delivery, along with Panasonic's new 3 year in home warranty

Why I don't 'need' it: We don't watch anything in HD, and the picture difference in SD will be no better than what we already have

why buying books is good

obviously one need not even argue the above statement. buying books = good. end of argument. QED. But I've gone back and forth on this over the past few years as a global nomad--went on an amazon/bookfinder embargo for a couple of years there, using the library (horrors!) instead of the bookstore. occasionally, when the library didn't have the book and I needed it sometime between now and 5 minutes from now, I've bought the book. But the collection hasn't grown too much over the past few years, and now that we're settled there's been a bit of a loosening of the book purchasing belt, but not too much.

It used to be, when I had no income in grad school and yet I was in grad school and surrounded by used book shoppes, remainder sales from the university press, and obsessive friends who knew the market and their collections by heart, that I bought quite a lot of books. too many, some might say. most might say. did I need the boxed, beautiful Topkapi multi-volume set? probably not. but how pretty! I claimed I could stop at any time, and well, I did. a lot of books I'd buy because they looked interesting, smart, intelligent, and potentially useful. or because they were Important. in 1994. now, not so much.

I learned today, however, what a boon bookbuying is. I was looking for folks who have written on Ambedkar, the advocate for the untouchables and leader of the anti-colonial movement in India who converted to Buddhism towards the end of his life. I haven't ever been fully interested in him before, but I'm looking into the Buddhist symbolism of early Indian nation-building, and finding a lot there. Ambedkar is central. Fishing on google books (favourite pasttime), I found a reference to a book there. partial preview. intriguing. does the library have it? no. wait! do I? huzzah. thank my graduate school self for purchasing the 'it' book of 1996 and keeping it until now. So I'm good to go. probably should start buying books again, right?

must check with budget manager.

Art and politics

It seems that if one wishes to post on things about colleagues across the world such as this (or here), related to topics such as this, one might consider doing this. the world is a horrid place.

update BBC finally picked up the story

Four Weddings and a Funeral, 1994

they were showing the above film on tv this weekend, and so of course I got sucked in. and like many of us I imagine watching films of yester-decade, I was surprised at this film and the contrast between what I remember (hilarious hilarious hilarious, sparks of love, touching, hilarious) the film was less of all of that. perhaps it was my inability to force from my mind the philandering of Hugh Grant in later years. perhaps it was the fact that the English stereotype he plays to a T seems, now, in my current context, rather dull and a teensy bit offensive. I realise in my distance and in my space as an expat that this film is indeed for a US audience. only a US audience could buy Grant and 'the american' Andie MacDowell were in love. Yikes is she wooden.

I remember the film as being tightly woven, clever, and well-written—it was some of those things, and the comedy was still there, but it's so unbelievably dated (read: I'm old) and the story isn't really even a story. we have no back-story about the group of wedding-friends, no idea what they do for a living--it's just wedding wedding wedding funeral wedding. Not that they have time for much more, but still.

I had missed the comedy of the serial weddings in my earlier youthful viewing. This film is like a rehash of all films with weddings, except that they start and end with them instead of just ending with them. The Princess Bride wedding (inept priest), the 'forgot the rings' moment, the 'forever hold your peace' not held moment--these are classics. In putting them all together, the filmmakers make a statement about the centrality of the wedding for our tradition of storytelling (esp. comedies) and therefore kind of take it over the top. we see the formerly married couples with a baby at the following wedding, and then two at the next one, heightening that cycle of feasting--sex--babies at the end of every comedic adventure.

I still cried during the funeral. who wouldn't? the tokenism of the gay characters and the painful groping for normalisation of their position within the group is sooooo early 90s, no? And yet in contrast to this-- it is actually spoken in the film--actually noted aloud--that funerals, unlike weddings, are among the few official ceremonies that gay people may take part in (as the central participants) in our culture.

And finally, for those who know the series, did this life totally steal its grab bag of characters from this film? hm. discuss....

a film we actually enjoyed (and other strange things)

saw Walk the Line last night, finally, after waiting until we had a worthy sound/tv set up, which, well, we do now. Again with the flashback framing, which was not super annoying but at this point my bar is pretty high for the use of the flashback. you better have an incredibly good reason to use it, and most of the time you don't. that aside, the film was a nice change. I'm not a biopic fan--perhaps it was an overdose of VH1 behind the music in the mid-90s. But this one manages to do the spiral into drugs rehab narrative a bit differently--not that there's not a spiral into drugs/withdrawal narrative going on here, and not that the parallel love narrative doesn't in the end produce/enable the redemption/rehab. It's that the story is told differently: she doesn't 'save' him by giving herself to him (although she does) it's that he saves himself with her help, she sees that, and they work as a pair. a nice representation of relationships, I thought.

Plus, there's a queerness represented through the early history of the woman-as-rockstar identity that Reese Witherspoon's brilliant acting makes completely clear. Particularly in the context of the blues/gospel heritage that these early musicians were so reliant on, the Christian thread running throughout the film is nicely handled. June Carter's very public living of her life, divorcing at a time when that was considered utterly taboo, and living her relationships partly on-stage--we see all of that in the film, plus her space within the group of guys (Elvis, Buddy Holly, Johnny Cash etc.) that shows how strange and out-of-sync her life is with the world's expectations at the time. Or even now: how many people would think it's okay for mothers to spend weeks and weeks away from your children while on tour? Completely 'not acceptable'--Witherspoon gives us June Carter's strength as someone who does do this and yet still remains a 'good mother' to her children.

I guess for me the film was about June Carter. If you haven't seen it definitely worth watching.

Constant quasi-aesthetic, predictable, bleeding-heart liberal nonsense

In the interest of upping our post count, we're thinking of turning el segundo americano into a movie review site - by which we naturally mean a site for reviews that are actually ranting critiques.

Hard for me to say all the ways I hated Constant Gardener, but we can start with the fact that the opening 5 minutes show you the climax of the film that will come halfway through. What is up with this trend of telling you what's going to happen first, and then tracing out the logical story toward its happening? Worse still, 15 minutes into the movie you know EXACTLY what is going to happen and why. It's told like a mystery/thriller, but there's absolutely nothing mysterious here. It's painfully obvious from the very beginning what's going on. In the end, I suppose liberals are supposed to feel good about the fact that there was great acting and good cinematography, and the message was put out (but without causing any real conflict) that it's a bad thing to, as Bono puts it, 'flush the continent of Africa down the toilet'.

But the movie isn't willing to say that; instead it tells us that 'each and every life is precious', although the narrative itself doesn't believe that since we're clearly meant to greive for the white woman (and to nominate Ralph Fiennes for an Oscar because of how well he grieves - though mainly he keeps his English stiff upper lip and looks pretty).

And finally, as Rebecca points out, who the hell writes hand-written letters today?

Untitled

I was going to title this post 'April is Not the Cruelest Month'. But then, I thought to myself, 'where does that line come from'? Yes, it's Eliot's The Waste Land. I think I knew that and then forgot it, but I don't think I'd ever read the poem. And it occurred to me that perhaps I should, since maybe Eliot didn't really mean that April was cruel in the first place. After all, the opening lines read:

April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.

This all set me off on a long detour of reading the poem and trying very hard, but utterly failing, to understand it. Eventually I just tried to grasp the first section, and maybe I got some of it, but I'm still not certain whether he meant to say that April was cruel or not.

And this meant that I couldn't really use that title for my post, and besides, I'd now wasted all the time I was going to spend describing what went on in April (and trying rather lamely to justify or explain my blogging absence) – I'd spent that time reading Eliot and realising once again that I'm just not cut out for poetry exegesis.

those apple folks are genius

Two words: Save PDF to Web Receipts Folder.

Obviously. This is what I do all the time in order to record my on-line purchases and keep track of them without actually having to keep track of them--I print the receipt as a pdf and store it in my 'receipts pending' folder on my desktop. wha? you don't have said folder? you don't normally use words like 'pending' in your own personal space? well sure. but now the glorious people at Apple have added the above selection to the drop-down menu in all print dialog boxes. It's so exciting. I can't tell you. go try it now. super fun. go buy stuff so that you can try it. very cool.

and you know what? it doesn't matter that it just automatically saves it under whatever random name the webpage has. that's what spotlight is for. huzzah.

bokashi bokashi des ne

in an attempt to reduce the amount of waste we are generating, we have invested in a lovely compost-like system that breaks down all of your food waste (including meat etc.) and is designed for folks with no garden at all. we have a garden, but we are lazy. so our plan is to try this thing out--you put food in, sprinkle on this magic powdery stuff which has an exotic Japanese name (bokashi bran) and contains EM-powered nutrient stuff (technical biological term here), which instead of speeding decomposition of the food in fact ferments the waste. which means not as smelly. we just put our veggie discards, cooked foods, raw foods, and the lot in, toss in a handful of "Bokashi Bran!" (which must always be accompanied by one saying in heroic tones: Bokashi Bran!) and then repeat until the bin is full. let it sit for a couple of weeks, and then we have 3 options: dig it into our soil (yeah right--as if we have the energy to do that. hello, that takes effort!), pitch it into the garden waste at the tip (not sure they'll let us do that), or toss it into a biodegradable bag and put it out with the rubbish (less environmentally correct, but it will break down quicker than just tossing those egg shells out normally, right?)

Pretty cool. We'll report on our progress.

April is here!

April in Showroom
Originally uploaded by doppio macchiato.

After much stress, research, worry, and oikos-time, we have finally purchased a vehicle in which to explore surrounding area and about which to spend some of our day-to-day worry allotment. And we are very excited.

April--because she is the colour of spring (silk green, aka Martha Stewart green), quiet and yet strong, and oh yeah, we bought her in April the month. A Mini One, 2002 vintage. For the first time ever, having purchased several new cars in our time and several cars much more expensive than this one, the dealer took the time and care to (1) have the car ready for us when we arrived (2) have it fully detailed and (3) put it on the showroom floor, replacing the brand new (as in last week) Mini Cooper D normally occupying this spot. Very well done and much appreciated. Contrast with the new Golf R32 we purchased which they barely washed and then had a door-ding in it when they pulled it around. Nice.

Pics of April in showroom and at home on flickr...now it's on to the inevitable upgrades, right?

the un-blog

still tastes great, but less filling!

Paris for a week: fab, spoke French, saw tower, walked a lot, ate food, shopped markets, took no work.
work oddly waited for us while we were away (damn you work!) and thus: grant applications, revising articles, books, reading undergraduate dissertations and the like. work not so bad, all in all.
weather: lovely lovely lovely. could not be more perfect. highs 16-18, sunny, nice sea breeze. reason enough to stay here for sure.
capital improvements/expenditures: the car. nightmare. problems include: how to find a car when one does not own one? how to insure a car when you have never driven before in your life and didn't exist before 2 years ago? Oh wait, except I think we did exist before two years ago, and I think there was that almost 20 years of driving experience and numerous years of claim-free driving and spotless record and blah and blah--doesn't count! For it was in the great US of A. Were it in Europe or Australia, no problem. But the US? you kiddin me? do they even drive normal (manual) cars out there? Insurance estimates on car: £1200-2500/year. Cost of purchasing car: £2500. Hm. no need to do any math to see the insanity.

obvious solution: increase shoe budget. clearly.

Hometown Baghdad

Worth spending a few minutes watching some of the episodes--obviously the three main subjects are of a certain class and are all men--I'd love to hear more women's voices, and some insight into the lives of poorer segments of the population--nonetheless the series of short films gives you a small sense of life in Baghdad.