venerdì, settembre 15, 2006

Go on, you little minx, you know you want to

This entry should be full of insh’Allahs and knockings-on-wood because it’s about a future event and I try not to tempt fate. . . but insh’Allah, knock on wood, the Scissor Sisters concert is going to be so awesome!

I finally heard the new single yesterday and came to a realization: they make me feel funny. Like that week of the month when you want to wrap your legs around the whole world and wriggle. I love men who don’t fear the falsetto and Jake Shears embraces it. It makes me amorous. Yes. Falsettos make me amorous. His makes me want to speed away home and express some affection for my sweetheart, and then dance, or vice versa. So does Shear’s cute little rat face and the way he jiggles. His friendly dirty sexiness makes me feel like I’ve drank way too much coffee, eaten way too little, and been keeping my standards way too high for way too long.

So I’ll be back from England before the concert Mr. N picked up tickets for. This will be a fucking, fucking hard trip but the prospect of a Scissor Sisters concert immediately afterwards feels comforting. Which is strange, because I don’t get this way about pop. I’m also comforted by the upcoming COC performance of Cosi Fan Tutte – that’ll be fucking shweet – but I can’t think of another pop act that would make me get all giggly and blush-y and randy. Maybe Arcade Fire or seeing the Brazilian Girls again. I like pop, but it usually doesn’t make me want to do things. The Scissor Sisters are magic. (That reminds me of a Zinédine Zidane quote I just heard that seized on my imagination – “Magic is sometimes very close to nothing at all.” Isn’t that nice?)

The Scissor Sisters, besides being a force to make us appreciate the beauty of the world around us, have found a place in my subconscious. Yesterday was the second time they came up in analysis – they swim up into my conscious mind whenever I need a reminder of how to approach and embrace upheaval in my life, everytime I need to remember fortune favours the brave and one has to holler out the awesomeness. In token of that, I’d like to introduce you to a man who wasn’t afraid to remind us to Lift Every Voice – I give you the Human Horn, Shooby Taylor accompanying Johnny Cash. When you want more, and you know you will, you can get it here. Don’t watch the footage of him at the Apollo, though. It’s too sad. Fucking people.

giovedì, settembre 14, 2006

Thursday, hmmm?

I like my job but I'm in one of those states where every day is a hump day. I'm going to go work it out at the gym, and then eat at my favourite Jap place in Yorkville whose name I don't remember so I can't even plug it here. My parents are in town to cuddle the new arrival and that means, of course, that I'm overeating and don't care.

Anyways . . . thanks to La Boome for direction to the page where I found this:

If I were a hygiene product, I'd be

A Toothbrush


Click here to find out which hygiene product you'd be at BRAINPUKE.COM!

mercoledì, settembre 13, 2006

Turn down the suck

Figaro and I saw Polyester a couple of days ago. We went to the vid store in search of that and of the Christopher Guest mockumentary A Mighty Wind, which was a little unfortunate because I couldn’t see it on the shelf immediately, and so asked the owner lady who I know well enough to salute on the street, “N-y, do you have ‘A Mighty Wind’?” just as she was exiting the toilets. I don’t think either she or I noticed the timing but Figaro did and nearly had a little stroke as we left the store later. So that’s what men do instead of multi-task. Search the subtext of life for poo and flatulence jokes.

Anyways, my point is Polyester really sucked and we weren’t expecting that because we’d both liked Pink Flamingoes. Figaro blamed too much studio interference and I blamed the fact that it just sucked. The timing blew so bad the only excuse I can think of for the level of suck was shitty drugs. I mean reeeeally shitty drugs. Like barbiturates or some other type of crap pill that made housewives all vague back in the 70’s.

I don’t know if we’ve missed the TIFF yet, where another Christopher Guest film premiered (For Your Consideration) but we’re in the process of missing it, no question. There’s been so much else to do, and both of us are trying to sit on our money a little; besides the Reunion I just bought a ticket for England. I’ve asked to work remotely so I can take a full week there; my grandparents have been moved into a residence so besides visiting them and all that other family stuff I’ll have more than enough time to work on the bloody site. I won't be losing money much, but, you know, things are tightening up.

More time . . . I would have liked even more time to go to France, to Calabria, to see everyone again and let them know how I love them. . . Carmen is well again and Paris isn’t going anywhere, but that new beautiful creature of a baby in my family and the situation of my grandparents are making me think of time differently. Not as though there’s just too little of it but as though it’s precious; not like a finite stash of diamonds but like 70% cocoa chocolate that needs to be savoured or else lovingly double-boiled with a little cream into an Italian hot chocolate. Mmmmm. Or a Dufflet Pastries Cointreau chocolate cake. Mmmmmm.

martedì, settembre 12, 2006

The real scam

Another 9/11 has come and gone. I didn't mean to add to the blog noise about it, but I find I'm too angry to resist. Maybe now those of us who were fortunate enough to not lose family and friends in those attacks can let the next few anniversaries pass in relative calm until the 10th. I doubt it, though.

Underplaying the importance of that day should be impossible, but there should also be an element of discussion, even shame in American sentiments. Around 3000 people dead, and what do they do? Clumsily topple an evil, oppressive regime in Afghanistan that had already been evil and oppressive for years by arming corrupt, heroin-pushing, evil, oppressive warlords to the teeth? Kill thousands and thousands more who had nothing to do with it in Iraq? And not learn a goddamn thing about how the world works? I have never heard so many conspiracy theories about the attacks get bandied around as I have this year, but it's as though Americans are completely incapable of seeing the real scam; they've bought hook, line and sinker that Muslims are by nature America's enemies, and that Muslims somehow have it in their power to make up for or be punished for those attacks.

Americans saw dancing Iranians and Palestinians after the attacks and found it easier to believe they were dancing because Muslims hate the United States than because of very immediate reasons that have more to do with living standards than religion. They rant at Muslims for not having spoken out louder against the attacks, never having worked out lots of Muslims did, and that the real reason they didn't hear them is because it wasn't attention-grabbing enough or newsworthy enough. "Global Jihad" and warring civilizations sell more newspapers.

I remember back in the fall of 2001, though, being confused by the apologies of all those clerics and Muslims off the streets. I wondered, how can one Muslim apologize for the actions of another? Muslims as a group didn't plan and certainly didn't benefit from 9/11. The Qu'ran isn't a peaceful book, but that sort of mass murder is contrary to it. So why should they apologize as a group? Did Christians apologize when the Branch Davidians set themselves on fire? Did mainstream conservatives apologize when that building in Oklahoma got bombed? Did all the British tourists in Brazil apologize for Menezes's head getting blown off in London because he was wearing a jacket on a warm day?

What the fuck do they want from the Muslims of the world? How can Muslims help Americans deal with the pain of that attack? And why should they when most of them live in countries with their own horrible problems? How can Americans whine about Muslims "sheltering terrorists" when post-colonial Muslim countries are in such fucking messes that people getting blown up on the other side of the world are the least of a common person's worries?

Think about the Taliban. The population of Afghanistan was miserably oppressed under them. The fact that it gave amnesty to Bin Laden was the least of a typical Afghan's worries, not least because there'd be no reason for him to know. But the Taliban were able to keep power for a long time because they had enough guns and men to keep the country stable after years of civil war sponsored by Pakistan, the Soviet Union and the United States. People pay high prices for stability. Bush won the election in 2004 after the snatch that was the 2000 election because people wanted stability during uncertain times, right? And Americans didn't even have a civil war, territorial encroachment or heroin-cultivating warlords to worry about.

I've had enough. I'm sad this has become an anniversary of useless, spurious, propogandized finger-pointing. I'm horrified Al Quaeda's aim of setting us on a course to a clash of civilisations has worked so well so far. I don't understand how the fact more people worldwide care about the murderous after-effects of 9/11 than about those poor 3000 people who were killed on the day hasn't taught America a lesson about its place in the world. Or even fucking empathy. I wonder how many Americans actually read the article instead of glancing at the headline about the same number dying in Bangladesh every year because the government is too impoverished and corrupt to fix flood barriers. I wonder how many moments of silence dead Iraqi children get at Lockheed Martin. Jesus, it's frustrating.

lunedì, settembre 11, 2006

Auntie Mistress!

I have a new nephew. Slowly but surely the list of potential bone marrow donors grows . . . as does the list of bone marrow demanders but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. What a beautiful boy he is. It’s almost criminal for a family to be as good-looking as we are. Criminal.

That sort of dominated the weekend – otherwise the brunt of the dragon ride played out to the accompaniment of pain, pain, pain and Figaro illustrated to me how absolutely I grew up in a house of men, that he had to be the one to tell me, based on the experiences of ex-girlfs, that I should be cuddling a hot water bottle. That helped while it was on but hindered my walking.

I did pull myself together for the Cabbagetown fair/massive garage sale thingummy to buy a salad spinner, books and assorted other crap. I also managed to graze the yummy food at the street festival and admire how awesome it is that my neighbourhood is so diverse that at one end of it you had an Elvis impersonator and at the other you had blaring Singhalese horns while a Falun Dafa brass band marched around.

And yesterday we joined Mr. C at the Junction art festival. I like that neighbourhood so much! I know it’s the way it is because it’s at the back of beyond . . . still wish it wasn’t the back of beyond though.