The week that was #1

Because I sometimes lack a specific topic to rant write about (and/or the time to do it properly; I tend to have to do at least a little research), I’ve decided to have a shot at keeping a journal. It doesn’t mean I won’t have one-off posts; it just means I’ll have a post up every week – I’m trying to up my output and maintain a constant writing routine.

I’m not going to do it on a per-day basis; I can’t guarantee that consistency. I’ll just write one post at the end of each week as a summary.

Over the years I have kept hand-written diaries– rarely consistently though – and I have all of those, so what I might do is (once I remember where the blasted things are) is transcribe interesting moments from dates from the past as well.

Anyway, the week that was – Sunday September 6 to Saturday September 12. I’m going to try topic headings since there are a few different subjects to cover.

True Blood (possible mild spoilers)

I finally sat down to watch True Blood, and have now watched (at time of writing) most of season 1. It is indeed as awesome as I was led to believe it was – though I’ve now seen far more of Ryan Kwanten than I ever wanted to. It’s a long way from Summer Bay to Bon Temps, Louisiana; he seems to have lost his need to wear clothes along the way.

At first I wasn't sure what was going on, but then when I actually noticed the title of the books it's based on included the word 'mysteries' it became more clear - there's an arc running throughout the whole series, rather than it just being a collection of standalone adventures.

So it's based on a series of books, but it's been adapted by another contemporary creative genius, American Beauty and Six Feet Under creator Alan Ball. And since it's on HBO there's a lot more sex and violence (about Dexter level) than you might expect. Very clever, often hilarious and absolutely soaked in social commentary.

But it’s not without its flaws; Anna Paquin’s nasal voice combined with a southern drawl sometimes makes for irritating listening. And their vampire concept (i.e. vampire physiology, strengths and weaknesses etc.) isn’t one I like as much as some of the others presented in fiction – though as least they didn’t go with the ‘can’t be seen in mirrors’ trope used in some fictional universes (including, sadly, the Whedonverse); I find that one particularly stupid, especially when it somehow manages to make the clothes they’re wearing invisible as well.

It also has a Cajun character (Rene) in it – not that surprising, considering it’s set in Louisiana – and he sounds authentic, which is awesome; I have a particular fondness for that accent/dialect combination and it’s not one I get to hear very often. I think the only other Cajun character I’ve seen is the one Wilford Brimley played in the Jean-Claude Van Damme film Hard Target. I think Van Damme was also meant to be Cajun, but I don’t think he sounded any different from his usual Belgian French accented English.

What I do wonder, though, isn’t if small town Louisiana is actually filled with vampires; it’s whether or not it’s filled with irate, sweaty, sex-crazed alcoholics.

Suitably awesome music moment: in episode 7 (Burning House of Love) when Amy loads up Jason’s cd player and out comes Sweet Jane by The Velvet Underground.

Inglourious Basterds (possible mild spoilers)

After a few hurdles I got to the cinema to see Inglourious Basterds – it’s not often there’s so much time between a film’s release and the time I see it.

Anyway, short version: it’s excellent. I hadn’t done any reading up on the plot, so all I knew was what I’d gleaned from the trailers – Brad Pitt, team of US soldiers going behind enemy lines to kill Nazis, a very angry Hitler. Obviously there was going to be more to it than that.

Brad Pitt and the ‘Basterds’ aren’t even in it all that much; there are a succession of other characters who the stories – because there’s an intersecting set of stories – are about. But Pitt does a fantastic job as a hillbilly-turned-Nazi-hating-soldier, and his facial expressions and 'Italian' accent was laugh out loud¹ funny.

Only one (minor) complaint: Hitler, in real life at least, had pale blue eyes, not brown like the actor who played him. Obviously not enough to make me dislike the film, but it still bugged me. Still, they take other liberties with historical accuracy, so it could be argued that it didn't take place in 'our' universe; I can live with that.

I’d also expected a lot more gore, based on how it’d been described to me (albeit only by one person) – so I had mentally prepared myself for a bit more blood-splatter than there actually was. Yes, there’s some – but it’s certainly not wall-to-wall heads-exploding-from-bullet-impact.

All that aside, it’s worth seeing. Chock full of some great characters, good dialogue; all with the quirky Tarantino touch. The soundtrack – most of which is songs by the amazing Ennio (The Good, The Bad and The Ugly) Morricone – is brilliant as well.

¹ I am, of course, aware that there is a three-letter abbreviation for that expression; I just happen to loathe it.

Book of the moment

Current reading material is Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer; it’s the story of a young Jewish American who travels to Ukraine to find the woman who helped his grandfather escape from the Nazis (there seems to be a bit of Nazi theme running through this week’s adventures). He enlists the help of a local man who subsequently enlists the help of his own grandfather and his grandfather’s dog, who goes by the unlikely name of Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior.

It’s very much a work of contemporary literature – tragicomic magical realism, mixed styles (1st and third person; epistles) fractured non-linear plot, unreliable narrators (because there’s more than one) and so forth. As can be the case with writing like this it’s sometimes hard work. But it’s worth it; he manages to blend humour and strong emotion well, and his characters are quirky without being ridiculous.

Teh Internets²

I’ve fallen under the spell of a wiki called tv tropes, which is a site devoted to categorising and describing tropes, or regularly used concepts in storytelling. There are literally thousands of these tropes, and each has numerous examples throughout different media – anime/manga, comics, tv, film, literature, theatre, music and so forth.

Since it’s a wiki it’s able to be edited by anyone - so I’ve been adding to the examples. I’d like to think that I’ll eventually identify something that hasn’t already been defined and create a new trope. But considering there are lot of people with (apparently) far more time on their hands than I have who have been doing this for years, I’m not going to hold my breath.

The beauty of it is that, apart from being educational, it’s also terribly entertaining – mostly because it’s written in a humorous, snarky style; obviously, that’s going to be right up my alley. An example, from the entry on director Uwe Boll:

There are two camps—summarily divided—on this man's work.

One camp is convinced that he is "the only genius in the whole fucking business " - a better filmmaker than Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, Fritz Lang, Akira Kurosawa, John Huston, Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Billy Wilder, Franco Zeffirelli, Robert Wiene, Sergio Leone, F.W. Murnau, and Ingmar Bergman combined, and that Video Gamers Are Morons.

This camp consists of Uwe Boll.

I don’t know about you, but reading stuff written like this makes me feel all tingly. Of course, the best thing for you to do is check it out for yourself. But I take no responsibility for any subsequent addiction, or hours lost while you open link after link after link - like I do.

²That's not a typo. That's a joke.

Other bits and pieces

The work week started out okay, but a few hours into Monday I started feeling like crap and went home. I wasn’t quite sure what it was I’d been inflicted with; my major concern was that I would develop ‘flu-like symptoms’, meaning that I’d either have swine flu or – since the company I work for is still on high alert – have to get tested to make sure I didn’t have swine flu before I could come back to work.

As it was, I’d have been okay with actually having swine flu; it’s not too unlikely a possibility since I know a few people who’ve had it. The idea of not having swine flu but having to go to through the ordeal of getting tested and certified as swine flu free was actually more of a concern.

I had Tuesday off ‘cause I was still feeling crappy, but we good enough to go back to work on Wednesday. I probably could have justified having another day of rest, but that would also have meant a trip to the doctor for a medical certificate and either an extra couple of days off work trying to get an appointment, or a day spent in a walk-in clinic – neither of which I fancied.

While at home I found they were showing Hello Dolly on tv – notable because it’s the musical version of a play called The Matchmaker which I did in 2003. The musical has songs and dance numbers added but has copied a lot of the dialogue (it’s a book musical, not a sung-through) verbatim from the play – so I was watching a very young Michael Crawford saying the same things I’d said just over six years ago, word for word.

I also ended up watching an entire episode of The Nanny and spent most of it wondering if it’s in any way wrong that I found myself thinking about how attractive Fran Drescher was. Well, at least when she wasn’t talking...

And that’s about it ‘til next week.