November 30, 2005

Go listen to Jens Lekman. All the metrosexual boys have started writing twee folk music, the verse is urban vernacular - I am still not sure how I feel about it.

I think it might be Ani Di Franco for boys who wear american apparel tee-shirts and flood pants.

Just finished the Red Tent which is like; "The Biblical Horse Whisperer" except for the part at the end where Dinah dies that made me cry and think of my mother.

Why try to squash a dynasty into 300 pages? Why are poorly written romantic stories so infuriating. All the looks of longing in the world can't disguise poor writing about love it's so annoying.

Okay, I should go addendum my masters application

What to make of song with a viola where the chorus is;

"f word f word pardon my french but that's BS"

Ani would have at least said bullshit.

I was in the park yesterday with the dog after a strangely fulfilling day, not that I got anything done mind you, it just felt good all day, even the bad news felt good.

Anyways, who knows what that was about. But I was out in the falling dark with the crazy mutt and I noticed one of the houses facing the park had gone seasonal decoration crazy.

There were these spastic blinking lights on the staircase and an 8 foot tall inflatable santa bobbing his gas-filled head. It was all kind of demonic and disco, and not terribly festive at all. I think the arhymthmic fairy lights put me in a trance because I stood there staring for about 10 minutes.

I managed to break the spell and continued up the park where I ran into nancy, "Hey Nancy," I said "check out the house down the street - it's gone christmas light crazy!" Which is when I noticed that not less then 7 other houses facing the park had also decided that christmas spelled fairy light frenzy. It was madness and also competitive, which is weird. I don't personally view christmas as a season to "whup thy neighours ass at decorating" but then again, I am Jewish, what do I know.

My favorite dwelling on the park offered a turner-esque welter of lights in no specific form or pattern, an expressionist thing I think,a nd an aesthetic slap in the face to those kitcshy reindeer shaped light holders.

But my real favorite was a house I found on my very own street that had an oddly sexual cardboard santa pasted in the front window backed by a giant red disco blinking spotlight. This santa had his thumbs tucked saucily in his big black belt and was thrusting his pelvis forward with a naughty gleam in his little button eyes. ho ho ho.

November 27, 2005

This is pretty neat;

unmediated.org: Tracking the tools that decentralize the media.

I found it while i was looking for an article about this book I am reading, it's called mediated by Thomas de Zengotita. The basic premise of which is that as a culture the west has become so mediated that out basic conception of reality has become one of artifice. We are all method acting our way through the days, and things are slated to become even more mediated, with the arrival of biotech and real virtual space. See I can't even write this without accepting that the failure of language to express new developments in perception is proof of the premise.

I was going to write a long blockquote. But I am feeling a little over-mediated by my week-end and need to go make some soup and walk the dog.

here's a review from site dedicated to reducing some of the intake load.

Book Review: Mediated by Thomas de Zengotita

This mediated (but lazy) post is officially dedicated to ms. bad-pants flink, alive on vhs after all these years.

** last minute addition.. ***

I was just making soup and listening to the radio and this amazing music came on.

Turns out, (and how lucky I am the announcer actually said the name..) that it was ladino music by an Isreali named Yasmin Levi

Ladino music is..

Ladino (Judeo-espaniol)

The Spanish Jews who fled Spain in 1492 after the Edict of Expulsion took with them a rich cultural heritage including the Spanish language. For nearly five centuries Sephardi Jews have kept alive the language of those Spanish exiles. Ladino, as it is popularly known, is an archaic form of Spanish with structures and vocabulary that can be traced back to the fifteenth-century. Over the centuries it has absorbed vocabulary from the countries in which the Iberian Jews had settled . Its Hebrew content mostly consists of religious terms such as haham, a rabbi. Whilst there remain very few native-Ladino speakers today, there has been a recent worldwide revival of interest in this ‘dying’ language.

Likewise enjoying great popularity today are Ladino songs. These can be divided into romansas, ballads (dramatic narrative poems) and kantigas (lyric songs), the most popular of which are love songs. Yasmin Levy’s repertoire includes both these types of song. Most of the ballads she sings and several of the songs can be traced back to medieval Spain.

That's from Levis website.

I know, I know it's world music. It sounds amazing though.

...and about this whole mediation business. If it weren't for the media I would be living in ignorance of heartwrenching (...and actually kind of yodel-ly but in a good way ) spanish jewish romance ballads. So mediate away, just make sure I catch glimpses of the good stuff between episodes of survivor.

Can someone buy this for me for the holidays?

The Gardeners of Eden

kwanzaa, christmas, chanukah, i care.

Ned and I watched these videos we made in highschool last night.

And I probably shouldn't even say this in public but chhhhheeeeerrriiist was I ever a nerd, loser, lame, fugly-ass kid.

Here's what I was wearing no-joke.

- 1 pair of tomato -red adidas style training pants - too large oh yeah, way to large, cold-lamping too large, but though baggy enough at the crotch to hide a small melon, oddly tight at the ankles. Why? Why would I choose to wear such pants. I actually remember thinking they were somehow "ironic spice girls chique" or something.

- 1 pair of green adidias running shoes, to go with the red.

- 1 over-sized mens golf shirt to hide my awesome boobs and effectively make me look like I was either pregnant or seriously cow-chested. Hey I was 18, I believed I *was* cow-chested because all my friends were B's or smaller..Of course wearing over-sized shirts all the time helped turn the erroneous belief into fact. Seen through the eyes of experience this was probably my fundamental error.

- 1 also oversized black hoodie. I always bought everything sized appropriately for my gigantor of a little brother. I also borrowed his clothes, despite the fact that we differed in proportion vertically and horizontally by almost a foot. I ask you, what teen-age girl borrows her little brothers action pants? crazy.

Of course at this time ( approx imately age 18). I hadn't explored all the more exciting facets of my pomo-sexuality, at all. At one point in the video Catto asks;

"Hey mir, do you think you're gay?"

and my video self started saying something like;

"Well you know, I've thought about it alot.. and frankly I don't think I am.."

While present-day mir is bouncing off of neds couch screaming at the television; "It's SO obvious you reprobate dressed-like-a-gym-teacher little shnerd. Go find yourself a nice girl with some taste to dress you for the next 7 years and save me the hassle!"

..until I realized time just doesn't work that way.

Also I interrupted people a lot, and never listened.. sound familiar anyone? I like to think all that's changed but if this blog is any indicator things really haven't.

Oh well, at least my pants fit now.