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July 30, 2004
happy birthday, marina!
happy birthday marina on time this year! whoooooo-hooooo!
i don't really have the time or the awake-ness to write anything good. but i'll see you in 2 day...3? 3 days in singapore, baby! (fucking 18 hour plane rides)
love,
michele
Posted by michele at 09:22 AM | Comments (13)
July 29, 2004
the bourne supremacy
(7/26/04, 5:30pm, AMC Kabuki, by self)
give me some poo! give me the poo!
in case you are curious what the hell i am talking about, please read my review of the second ludlum book.
they killed marie.
those fuckers.
i mean, sure they killed conklin in the first book, and i got over that deviation. but killing marie? MARIE? i am ok with it on the different from the book front, i am not ok with it on the no more franka potente front. dammit!
just in case you're reading this and haven't seen the movie yet, don't worry. they kill her in the first 10 minutes. i'm not really giving away a major plot point here. i mean, obviously her death spurs the plot, but being armed with this foreknowledge is not, in and of itself, going to ruin your watching this movie.
other then my severe issue with them killing one of my favorite actresses' character, this movie was pretty good. it was quite different from the first one. this can be seen most noticeably in the camera-work. the first movie was smooth and slick. this movie is going for super gritty-realism and providing the audience a chance to feel like they themselves are in the scene hiding behind a door or lurking in an alley. the vast majority of establishing shots were done with door frames showing, or thru windows with sides of building framing, or around corners with the closest wall leading up to the action.
plus, the camera was of the hand-held shaky variety and close-ups were the order of the day. during fight scenes or car chase scenes things got a little crazy. which was the one point when i think it would have been better to pull back a little and let the camera see more of what was going on, because everything became too inseparable and you couldn't see what the fighters were doing. if you're going to get your main actor to spend a lot of time on fighting lessons and then block fight scenes, you should maybe consider actually showcasing said fight so we can be impressed by it. it's hard to be impressed by something when it's looking like it could be called the blair bourne project.
favorite line of the movie: "it was my first time." -matt damon as bourne.
aaaawww! let it all out, you little virgin with your stupid-ass 12 step program to rid yourself of the taint of being a killer.
i still can't believe they fucking killed marie.
Posted by michele at 11:55 AM | Comments (2)
catwoman
(7/24/04, Phill theatre, 4:50pm, with mom)
mmm egyptian mythology and cats. i like cats. "beloved bast, mistress of happiness and bounty, sister of the sun god."
"catwomen!" they're not contained by society, you know, they follow their own rules. and their own rules dictate stomach and chest bearing leather outfits and bad hair.
the first half of this movie was ok. the second half of this movie became mired in its own supposed cleverness of the double entendre. "caaaat got your tongue?" and ordering a white russian, holding everything but the cream, oh hello milk mustache. a pointed ad for that milk campaign? could be.
the fight scenes are, in general, really good. lots of capoeira used, which is always sweet. fluid and kicking a lot with the legs. i'd be interested in seeing an actual cat do some of the things that she did, but whatever. the part where she died (by sewer water, gross), there's some shots of her looking around with her new cat eyeballs which made me curious as to how cats see the world (i'm frequently curious about this actually). is it really like that? i can't explain it very well, but distances got skewed and angle of head was key.
occasionally the fight scenes/the basketball playing scene, just turned into a music video, however. all loud, pumping bass and swooping camera. bright, bold colors! which was enjoyable, but sort of silly. more then sort of silly, absurdly silly to the point of producing adrenaline giggles.
halle berry, i don't usually like. she's lame and doesn't really act. (i've never seen monster ball, nor do i really care to, but perhaps that was oscar-worthy. i don't know. what does it even mean to be oscar-worthy? judgment call). but i did really enjoy her delivery of some of the lines. especially when she was being catwoman aggressive-type as opposed to catwoman meek-type. attitude. noyce. the whole aggressive/nurturing female dichotomy thing was, perhaps, interesting. but mostly it was schizophrenic and stereotypical.
beao-line, the evil skin-care product, what was it made out of? shelac? improbable.
it set itself up for a sequel, "to live a life untamed and unafraid...and so my journey begins." a little over the top, as was most of the film, but there you have it. mass money-making marketing strikes again.
i enjoyed this movie because it was fun, cute, fight-fantastic, and had cats. i wouldn't necessarily recommend this movie to most people. even though halle berry wanders around in a push-up leather bra and cracks a whip while licking incredibly red-lips, there's a lot of other filler crap which is less exciting.
speaking of the cats, i heard somewhere that they rescued like 35-40 cats from various animal shelters around LA to play extras. but what did they do with them afterwards is what i want to know.
Posted by michele at 11:33 AM | Comments (0)
ming what? aw, crap.
i honestly came to work today just to play my 5 Kingdom of Loathing characters (incarnate, lunch, yer_mom, polka_dots, and spca). i'm only going to be here 3 hours, and already i have wasted half an hour breaking a priceless pottery object from the ming dynasty.
mind you, it was already broken and being held together with blue sticky tac, (for some obscure reason), as i discovered when the part i was holding broke away from the other part and totally shattered the legs off that stool/candle holder/doo-hickey thing.
Posted by michele at 09:45 AM | Comments (3)
July 27, 2004
rapunzel, rapunzel, let down your hair
there's a man on a ladder outside my window with a soapy sponge! what does one do in this situation? i waved and smiled politely.
...i could push the ladder over.
Posted by michele at 10:41 AM | Comments (38)
July 26, 2004
bourne crap-in-motion
i can't figure out what the attraction is to the book versions of the bourne trilogy by robert ludlum. they're absolutely horrid. it's all useless talk, talk, talk, which then degenerates into italicized outpourings of emotional garbage. everytime marie or jason/david/delta/whatever the hell he's taken to calling himself now, feel the need to internally scream out the other one's name, it's all of a sudden, "Oh David, my darling! Are you ALL RIGHT? Have they hurt you? I'm giving you this clue about a tree, David. Darling, do you understand? The tree is for Canada, Canada is for consulate. Darling darling darling David David." or "I WILL BE JASON BOURNE! MARIE, do you hear me? I will hurt them for you, for us, for my former family--can I use the word 'strafe' again? Come on. Let's go. Frenchman. Carlos is for Cain, Cain is for Delta. Delta Delta Delta. Marie, my love! I need you! Rest is a weapon. Rest is a weapon. Rest is a weapon."
fucking jason bourne, pansy ass.
the thing is that it's relatively obvious that these books are written by a man for men. but in its bizarre own little universe the male lead is completely crippled by his emotions, constantly crying for his woman, and a repetitive little bastard.
the woman is a little more complex. she was this well-known canadian economist, and then she became this feeble-minded little wet-sop female constantly claiming that the man 'needs' her and subsuming her whole self to do the 'thousands of things a woman does to make a home.' but she also has the resources to escape several different government special forces on her own. but it's, of course, all due to the training she received from him. in the end, her whole character is just a foil to build up david with love and support so that he can go off and be jason bourne and then return to her weeping and she can comfort him some more.
but why, WHY? is this man supposedly a hero to the male reader? is it the lure of all too human with crippling flaws? is it his ability to persevere and succeed in the face of all odds? is it the fact that he's probably still suckling at his momma's teat? i just don't understand this whole phenomenon. and yet i read that whole damn second book, griping at it madly all the way.
i really don't remember the first one being this awful. i do remember when i saw the first matt damon vehicle in the theatre, i was pissed at how much it deviated from the book and claimed that the book was better. anyway, i'm going to see the second one today after work (AMC Kabuki, 5:15, anyone who's interested), but this time i will not go in expecting it to be anything like the book. and honestly, if it could possibly be completely different that would be excellent. it's got to be better than the book anyway. anything would be better than the book. smashing my face in poo would be better than the book.
Posted by michele at 03:17 PM | Comments (0)
July 23, 2004
VERY preliminary singapore trip for reference (i need a map)
UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Posted by michele at 11:13 AM | Comments (27)
July 22, 2004
cross country trip for reference
August 15-25 (28th fly home)
Day 1
pleasant hill, ca -- ely, nv (517 miles, 8-9 hours, hotel nevada, $30)
Day 2
ely, nv -- moab, ut (322 miles, 7 hours, silver sage inn, $41.95)
Day 3
Arches National Park
moab, ut -- montrose, co (173 miles, 4 hours, hotel, $48)
Black Canyon of Gunnison
Day 4
montrose, co -- boulder, co (308 miles, 6 hours)
John and Katherine's home
Day 5
boulder, co -- salina, ks (450 miles, 7 hours, motel 6, $36)
Day 6
salina, ks -- sedalia, mo (267.8 miles, 4 hours)
Missouri State Fair
sedalia, mo -- st. louis, mo (189.5 miles, 3 hours)
Dana's home
Day 7
st. Louis, mo -- nashville, tn (307 miles, 5 hours, wingate inn, $50)
Day 8
nashville, tn -- mamoth caves, ky (96 miles, 2 hours)
Mammoth Caves National Park
mammoth caves, ky -- lexington, ky (122 miles, 2.5 hours, downtown super 8, $40)
buy michele a horse
Day 9
lexington, ky -- charleston, wv (180 miles, 3.5 hours)
charleston, wv -- white sulfur springs, wv (120 miles, 2 hours, econo lodge fort savannah (in lewisburg), $50)
White Sulfur Springs
Day 10
white sulfur springs, wv -- roanoke, va (via 311) (150 miles, 2.5 hours)
Hollins University
roanoke, wv -- charlottesville, va (via blue ridge parkway) (120 miles, 2.5 hours)
Blue Ridge Park Way National Park
Vicky's (?) home
Day 11
charlottesville, va -- philadelphia, pa (253 miles, 5.5 hours)
Kim's new apartment!
Posted by michele at 10:29 PM | Comments (8)
July 21, 2004
SOC
grah! ack! what have i put in my mouth!? it's so brown, rotund and gross! curse you, chinese candy with no distinguishing information on the wrapper to tell me what i am getting into. holy crap, what is that. is...that...are...those... honest to goodness coconut flakes are on this improbably rancid flavored candy. if only i had read the wrapper more carefully! it does actually have an ingrediant list! 'compotition: sugar, glucose, coconut syrup.' syrup? more like stringy little bits of meaty coconut innards. argh, the horror.
warning: do not consume.
manufacturer: ye hai food factory wenchang hai nan china
add: dong jiao borough wen chang hai nan
tell: (0898) 63528266
"Ye Hai Food Factory of Wenchang
Assorted Coconut pastries
Non-permitted
Tartrazine and Sunset Yellow
3/26/04"
well and that explains the illegal looking brown color (not really since it should be yellow, but whatever). i think i'm going to be sick.
Posted by michele at 11:50 AM | Comments (2)
i, robot
(july 20, 4:00pm, by self, AMC Coronet)
i talked to gene on the phone before going to see this movie because i wanted to see if he would like to go see it with me (he didn't) but he did tell me about some of the things in the movie which he liked and things which he was still curious about or frustrated by the lack of attention paid to them. so basically, for me when i saw this movie i was quite interested in the philosophy of the robot laws. although, in the end, i don't agree with gene that they needed to spend more time on the philosophy. i thought it was actually pretty well covered.
did you know that the word 'robot' comes from the czech word for 'menial labor'? cause i didn't.
anyway, i totally haven't read any of asimov's work on robots. so i've got nothing to offer from that angle. though a lot of people on message boards who have read his stuff seem kind of pissed. the movie is based on the 3 laws that asimov postulated about robots being that they should/would be programmed to not hurt human beings, obey orders from human beings (except orders to kill other humans), and protect themselves as long as it didn't go against one of the higher laws. the philosophy then comes in since the robots are the menial workers and 'laws are meant to be broken'. also i kept thinking, 'where there's a will, there's a way.' robots aren't supposed to have free will, but evolution is an amazing thing (there are 'ghosts in the machine' according to the that'll do, pig dood). so what happens when a robot begins critically analyzing its state of existence and decides to effect its surroundings? robot revolution! war with robots is FUN. slow-mo jumping and shooting and beatings. oh, good times.
what bothered me was the end though. what happens next? more revolution? what else can he do? revolutions are a cycle in communism, after all.
alan tudyk did a great job as the robot sonny i thought. though not half as good as he did playing steve the pirate in dodgeball. (he's getting around these days, i must say). coincidence again? probably no.
"This relationship just can't work. You're a cat and I'm black. And I'm not going to get burned again." -will smith.
Posted by michele at 11:07 AM | Comments (9)
a cinderella story
(7/19/04, 5:00pm, by self, amc van ness 14)
sitting in the theatre before this started i became pissed at myself for not inviting sean along as he seems to be so addicted to hilary duff. so i blamed myself for not thinking of this beforehand, since personally i think seeing a tenny-bopper movie with sean, of all people, might just be a highlight in an otherwise drab week. or at least day. but there's some incredibly horrible looking movie which they showed during the previews which she will be in along with the cute boy from 'what a girl wants' called 'raise your voice.' sean, we must, we must, see this.
i learned a valuable lesson in this movie. well, 2. 1) "fairytales aren't only about finding princes" something about how they're for realizing dreams. bah, i say. then you shouldn't make your entire movie be about finding this stupid boy. well, it wasn't really. it was about standing up for yourself, getting into princeton, and being true to yourself. whatever. and 2) whoever wrote this is a plague upon humanity.
the two main characters, played by hilary duff and chad michael murray, exchange incredibly lame love notes over text messaging on their phones and computers. it's painful. the things that boy was saying. oh, sweet lord, the horror.
how does cinderella end? happily ever after. and also with the line, "you've got to love high school." i think this only works when you're leaving it (within the context of the movie).
lastly, this girl was in both this movie and in dodgeball. coincidence that i saw them both on the same day? probably so.
this movie = dumb.
Posted by michele at 10:24 AM | Comments (3)
dodgeball: the true underdog story
(7/19/04, 7:05pm, by self, snuck in after a cinderella story)
oh vince vaughn, don't fail me now. i have a thing for vince vaughn. it's his deadpan acting delivery. his face says, 'this is all a joke and inside i am mocking everything.' my own sarcastic nature revels in his ability to just look someone into submission. he's a beautiful, beautiful man.
that said. this movie is both really funny and really bad. things which are good about this movie: vince vaughn, alan tudyk (bollocks! garrrrr!), justin long, jason bateman (absolutely anything he said), chuck norris, and christine taylor's hair and unicorn fetish. things which are bad about this movie: ben stiller and christine taylor.
ben stiller was just sooo bad. like dumb, not funny, gross, stupid facial hair, horrendous fat suit. ungh. christine taylor with her, 'oh i have a girlfriend let me make out with her, hey! i'm not gay, i'm bi-sexual and now i will make out with you, vince vaughn, in front of my girlfriend.' LAME.
there were some really really funny tiny moments in this movie. nuggets of pure gold, if you will. the nazi dodgeball training video where we learn about opium dens and chinese opium addicts who invented dodgeball and played with severed heads. playing the girl scout troop in their first game when steve the pirate says, 'bollocks!' vince vaugn's face when he first sees christine's house completely drenched in unicorn paraphanalia. jason bateman and that other dood as pepper and cotton, the commentators on the dodgeball game. i was laughing almost everytime pepper opened his mouth. i think it was an in-the-moment thing unique to me. most people would probably not have the same reaction i did to his character. and chuck norris' cameo and interchange with vince vaughn. fucking priceless.
in conclusion: funny if you are a fan of vince vaughn or ben stiller. but pretty much a rental which i would neither buy nor pay money to see.
Posted by michele at 10:07 AM | Comments (0)
July 20, 2004
hooky in france
today i am playing hooky from work. well also i am having itchy sneezy allergy headaches, but irregardless, i shall spend my day fantasizing about french manors and forcing ady to marry me. because that's the kind of person i am.
i don't know where my recent desire to own a house in france and raise horses has come from. it's a little out of left field. i mean, sure i understand the horse thing, since after all, kim and i are going to buy me one in tennessee or virginia or kentucky or somewhere, (RIGHT, kim?) but i don't even really like france. although i suppose i liked the countryside parts of france and just not the paris part of france. and the ocean parts of france. those were good too. paris sucks though.
what i need is someone really rich who will buy me this manor AND some horses.
Posted by michele at 11:21 AM | Comments (3)
July 19, 2004
"but you're awfully unique," said anderson
hiding out behind a stack of books in the library in order to spy on law boy, i tried to figure out if i could galumph over to his table, rip some pages out of his stupid bar review book and be hidden again before he noticed anything amiss. how is it possible that lying on 3 chairs pulled together and reading a book upside down could possibly be more entertaining than watching me watching him? this boy, he is here every day in my library with books and papers and a laptop and pads of paper and pens and highlighters. he goes all out. i have no idea what he's doing. well except for how i know he's studying for the bar. because i strolled up to his table one afternoon when he was momentarily missing and nonchalantly browsed thru the titles of his texts. he has a BMW. he wears a beanie sometimes. he's cute, though not as cute as the art boy with the black mustang (damn....).
today i went to the random tiny balcony off the stairwell on the other side of the building and sat with my feet dangling over empty space and stared at clouds. i tried to convince myself both that it was unlikely my shoes would fall off or that i would fall off, but staring at clouds produced the imminent dread that soon i would be in that plane for 18 hours staring at clouds from the wrong vantage point. shudder. now i am back in my office watching clouds thread themselves thru sutro tower like it's a needle. i wonder if a plane landed directly on top of sutro tower whether the plane would crush it or be impaled on it.
Posted by michele at 01:22 PM | Comments (5)
July 15, 2004
aka iro fire fire
before lunch i got an email from my mom telling me that a boy we (adam and i) went to school with from elementary onwards, died in a house fire on wednesday. now honestly, i don't remember this boy, (he was in a grade higher than me), but i do vaguely remember one of his brothers. the point though is that this is scary. first sophia's (erica's girlfriend) house burns down on saturday and now this? i'm highly (and slightly irrationally) paranoid about my house or my mom's house burning down. mostly because of people and cats i worry, but partially also because of books, my laptop, videos and pictures and all my stuff.
the boy who died was a friend of my brother's and also a DJ. apparently the fire started as an electrical one, maybe from all the turntables and stuff plugged into the living room. and he and his dog were found in the dining room. this is incredibly sad.
i don't like it, i don't like it.
Posted by michele at 01:51 PM | Comments (9)
July 14, 2004
smell of comfort
the hummingbird population on this campus is somewhat astonishing. i am constantly having to tell them that my head is not a flower. no, i say, my ear is not for pollinating, shoo.
hair can have a smell. a smell of warmth and sun. i love to press my face into the cat's side after she has been in the sun and inhale it. just now i was outside sitting with my hair in a ponytail and before re-entering the building i pulled out the rubber-band, causing my hair to tumble down around my face and the same smell tinged with flowery shampoo hit me. mmm, i said, i love that smell.
i want to be a hummingbird, lying in wait to sniff people's hair. i want to lay in the grass with someone waiting for the warmth to infuse their hair and kiss the slightly salty curve of their neck. i want to always have that smell.
Posted by michele at 02:23 PM | Comments (0)
July 13, 2004
fractured fairy tale
last night, i gathered together 9 willing little guinea pigs and unleashed this horrendous murder mystery game that i had written on them. for little squealing furry creatures, running around and looking for wood shavings, they did quite well. it was difficult to pry erica off the wheel and jason wanted to eat all the treats, but eventually everyone was scheming in corners and searching rooms to find daggers, crowns, bloody clothing, and packets of poison. I have no idea how many times kristen gathered together a cohort for revolution and then double-crossed them. brian danny got all anti-royalist and refused the throne. no one seemed to ever think to offer it to dianna, but then not many people seemed aware that she was also the illegitimate child of the dead King. I thought that LRRH would take the throne just to keep it from the peace-loving Prince so that she could kill giants for the rest of her days, but that didn't happen. jolie kept having sex with people (speaking of which, mad props for seeing sleeping beauty naked a second time, i forgot that one.) jason wandered around "yoo-hooing" and had all his careful work dashed when his object of affection refused the jihad. kati vol and dianna, you two were serious schemers, excellent. gene didn't die, kristen did. erica arrived before the food. and i didn't even realize how late it was at 10:40 because so much was going on i hadn't thought to check the time.
i have to say that writing this whole thing (it's like 30 something pages total) which encompasses a whole mini-society, their relationships with one another, political factions, and overlapping information or secrets, was an amazing experience. it was fun to sit with a notebook, chewing on a pen, trying to figure out who was sleeping with who and what someone had done in the past to make someone else hate them. causes and effects all over the damn place. coming up with tiny details like betty the begging beauty or snow white and the pimping dwarves or a sword encased in poo or lying about lollies or a horse named clancy. the only inconsequential thing there is the name of the horse. and given a few minutes, a pen, and a notepad i could make 'clancy' matter a great deal to someone. the power, the absolute power!
i'm kind of in withdrawal now. i mean i fucking wrote a newspaper for it yesterday. and now, nothing. now, it's done. i'm sort of sad. but, at the same time, not really wanting to write another one yet. kristen suggested, back before i started writing it, that we could maybe turn a murder mystery into our next movie somehow. and jason, last night during it, said that he wished there was a camera in every room. i wish i could have really been omniscient (with cameras) and known everything that was going on to my baby once i released it.
only 2 pictures up so far, but there will be more. oh yes. (evil witch cackle.)
note: brian danny's (or jack's) photos are now up too.
Posted by michele at 10:45 AM | Comments (14)
July 08, 2004
king of cabbages
down on the lower campus, little chitlins are wandering around. their little faces are filled with the embarrassment that only trying to pretend maturity while being followed around by parents can produce. they've got stuffed folders and empty wallets, but big happy grins. and i am looking at them to see where the cheese is hidden, because surely these little chitlins must be cheesy, yes? full of brie, i think, or maybe cheddar. not everyone can be french, after all. once upon a time, though, there was a prince here. but he graduated in the spring, i hear, and his father was a king without a country living on sufferance in england anyway. much like the suffragettes. well, honestly, nothing alike. but if you could imagine 80's hair and leg warmers and striped ensembles with large plastic pink earrings, then the rockettes could be aliens with butt implants and probes of subliminal intelligence. i am curious about this prince mostly and less about the chitlins now. because royalty is not necessarily more interesting than the wandering little baa lambs below, but it is by definition more. (perhaps of cheese?) i wish i had met him. or seen him, wandering around with the expression only being followed by a king can produce.
Posted by michele at 12:20 PM | Comments (20)
July 05, 2004
a hot shot, a hot'n'trot, and a what-not
this weekend i also went camping. with a house. and a shower. and my laptop. plus a lot of games involving small rackets , balls, or horseshoes. and an overabundance of food. and then i went swimming with huge goldfish and their poo. and my brother shotgunned beers with 15 year olds. my cousin lacey called me 'nasty' (due to the tattoos and piercings). i bonded with a girl named ashley over braces. we discussed movies with a 10 year old named alex, (getting him in trouble with his mother who hadn't known some of the movies he had seen.) i played the worst game of horseshoes with my mother that the world has ever seen. and i cheered triumphantly when james got 41 points at scrabble with the word 'vex'.
i took entirely too many pictures with my brand new digital camera, (including some of my brother's newest tattoo.)
Posted by michele at 09:43 PM | Comments (11)