There and Back Again

So, managed to squeak out around five hours of fun time with the Boys yesterday, before the storms came. Exene and I pitched the tent and they played, and meantime, the weather got worse and worse. We managed to join in on the dinner -- where B1 got go mad/upset at Exene trying to make him eat some of the cookout food (chicken, in this case) that he puked up what he had eaten, which annoyed her immensely. Nice going!

As ever, I crossed paths with the dads -- in this case, one of whom (a cop, no less) comes up and shakes my hand, says "I can't remember your name" and I gave it, and then he keeps a grip on my hand and starts walking me over to the mess tent -- of course, I'm no fan of being manhandled (literally) so I pry my hand loose of his (prompting him to go "Whoa, whoa, you can't get away that easily!") and he introduced me to one of the other dads and told me to wrangle up some kids to fill the collapsible water containers they had (there were a half-dozen of those high-capacity ones). First off, if you want me to do something, just fucking ask me -- don't try that bullshit faux-friendly ballbusting power-gaming crap on me with your control-grip policeman's handshake shit. That's just plain rude.

I pour one of the water containers to fill one of the hot water pots they're using for the dishwater. Then, I look at those water containers, and having worked with'em before on my own, I know that they get damned heavy, and because they're collapsible plastic, they're very awkward. Looking around at the kids (all of whom are still eating), I think two things: 1) these containers are likely too awkward and big for the kids to handle -- they're little kids, for fuck's sake, and 2) they're all busy eating, so why don't I just handle it, myself?

I take two at a time and walk'em over to the water pump, and fill them up. They're damned heavy, like 30-40 lbs. full. In no time at all, I have'em hauled up and back. The cook-dad I met saw me hauling the last one back, and he carped "You're SUPPOSED to have the BOYS do that!"

Now I'm really fucking annoyed, thinking "Forgive me for being efficient about it and doing it myself, and letting the kids eat. Is this some sacred function or something? Will the kids become juvenile delinquents now because I got the water, instead of ordering some kids I don't even know around and having them do it?"

So, I'm peeved and I leave the mess tent, having played Water Bearer long enough, and getting carped at for my efforts. Around that time was when B1 puked, although I wasn't there to see it.

Anyway, the weather turned sour (really bad, as I knew it would, judging from that radar), and we took everything down (but not before getting soaked -- I drove the Sienna up and had the Boys wait in there while we took it all down). We got completely soaked, and were glad we didn't try to ride it out, as the wind was really strong.

The boys seemed to have fun in the time they had, although B1 was peevish about the storm cutting short the camping, groused about that a bit. Still, we got home ahead of the storm (just ahead of it -- it kicked up about 10 minutes after we got home), and that was that.

B2 took one of the play-tents we have and set it up in the living room, promptly fell asleep in there. B1 played with a flashlight I'd gotten him at Target.

Onward and upward. I'm taking advantage of still having the rental van to make a grocery store run today.

Where in the hell am I?

Can you find me on this map?

Now, imagine me driving the boys to a campsite (#$%# Cub Scouts), in a Toyota Sienna, and setting up camp for tonight and tomorrow. Nothing like thunderstorm camping! Woo hoo! Provided no tornadoes come and sweep us up into the stratosphere, I figure we can take refuge in the Sienna, if we have to. The storms are perfectly timed to make a camping trip appear feasible, without actually being so.

A Close Shave

Before I got home, B2 got into the medicine cabinet and snagged one of Exene's Venus shavers, and shaved his chin -- he now was three cut-lines on his chinny chin-chin.

I put all of my razors high out of the boys' reach. Apparently not Exene.

*shaking head*

Two Words

Want to know how to piss me off using only two words? Want proof of a godless, pointless, meaningless, senseless universe?

Diablo Cody.

Everything about Diablo Cody pisses me off. Literally everything about her. I'm getting too pissed off to even iterate all the ways in which she pisses me off, so I'm just stopping right now, because I'm breaking into a pissed-off, red-faced Dave face-sweat right now.

Sunny Delight

So, I've transcribed 93 pages of the screenplay, am nearly done with that part of it, although the work's not yet done (thankfully, plenty of time until deadline). I think it'll probably be 90 pages long when I'm finally done with it, upon revision and tightening it up. Since one page = one minute with screenplays, that's more than enough time, as I see it. I'll do what I can to tighten it all up, once it's all transcribed.

I'm drafting a lot of notes for the next book, while I'm also currently working on one (which is still nearly all written longhand, unfortunately -- I haven't yet gotten a Netbook).

Very sunny today, although chilly, too. Brrr! Yesterday was downright cold, but I think that's just the vagaries of weather here.

B1 got his report card yesterday, and did very well -- 6 A's, 4 B's. His teacher had nothing but good to say of him. He's such a sweet, good boy. Genuinely decent. We jaywalked the other day, and he said "We shouldn't jaywalk, Daddy." and I said "I know, but the bank's right across the street from here, it's not a busy street. Normally, I'd never do it, but we're RIGHT THERE." and he said "I know, but I just don't like breaking the law." Oh, my. My Lawful Good son. Such a sweetheart. I wonder how that'll stack up against the world at large, how that'll play out. I hope he never loses that sweet heart of his.

B2 is a wilder child -- he's sweet, but he's wild and wicked, too. He likes stirring the pot. He absolutely loves chaos -- you can see it. I'm a fan of chaos, myself, up to a point, but B2 is a maelstrom when he really gets going. He's also incredibly scrappy -- he seems to have gotten my fighting instincts, only wilder. Good lord, yes. I try to gently offer some moral guidance for B2, but he's still pretty resistant to it, when it suits him to be. Although he is keen to join in on things, and I can sometimes hoodwink him into being responsible by going to work on something and his desire to join in brings him to me where if I asked him to do something, he'd just blow me off.

Oh, and this should've been the theme music for my bus ride this morning.

Holy Shit

One thing I notice a lot on Facebook is how people who likely self-identify as "Christian" are so often hard-hearted little souls who snarl angrily about the poor and the needy. It galls me that me, the resident atheist, apparently has a bigger heart than these supposed Christians. And when I see it over and over again, this stew of hatred and anger and malice and lack of empathy (to say nothing of sympathy) from folks, it bothers me more than a little. The jester in me wants to comment to these people "What Would Jesus Do?" when they go on one of their little tears, although that would likely just be "Oh, Dave's being a smartass" kind of thing, even though I'm really calling them out a little.

I'm busy teaching my sons to be kind and compassionate (with B1, it's hardly something I even need to do -- he's kind and sweet and sensitive and already has more moral sense than most of the adults I know), and I see these other people who purportedly embrace Christianity spouting hate and venom, and I think "My poor sons are gonna be sharing the world with these hard-hearted people's spawn."

It is haunting and frustrating and makes me sad. I'm kinder-hearted than most people probably actually think -- behind my sarcastic, snarky, cynical exterior, I'm fundamentally kind. I routinely give to the poor and the needy, and I'm reflexively empathic to the suffering of others. In a purely philosophical, Judeo-Christian ethical sense, I am more Christian than most of the Christians I know.

My least-Christian quality is that I don't hurt those who don't deserve to be hurt -- sorry, but if smacked in the face (literally or figuratively), I will smack back -- I'm far too Celtic to truly turn the other cheek, although I'm far more forgiving than I ought to be, and I never start anything, but I'm sure to finish it, if provoked -- I don't believe in initiation of force, but I do believe in self-defense, and that applies in a variety of settings, whether physical, emotional, mental, social, or spiritual. I do believe in Live and Let Live as an atheistic detente with the world around me. I won't hurt you if you don't hurt me, but Tit for Tat definitely is part of my character.

Anyway, it just bothers me to see hate and vitriol flung by people who've clearly been drinking the Christianist Kool-Aid and spew that kind of partisan venom at the poor and the weak and the needy. C'mon, people. It's very, very American to do that, really -- like to think that Christianity is more "God helps those who help themselves" than "Love one another." Or that Christ was somehow this oily entrepreneur, this venture capitalist for the soul, instead of a genuine spiritual radical who embraced the weak against the dictates of the strong and the powerful. Yet this obvious theological point seems lost on so many people.

As I've long said, I think Christianity came to America to die -- Europe bled itself dry of religiosity in countless wars, and our young country gleefully embraced (and distorted) Christian theology to its own end. Clearly, the nearly communist doctrines of actual Christianity are entirely un-American, so I wonder just what kind of Christianity those folks are embracing, precisely -- a "Christianity" where the strong kick the weak in the teeth, where the rich are free to enjoy the fruits of others' labors with impunity, where the powerful ride roughshod over the poor, where the bold inherit the Earth (standing on the backs of the meek, mind you).

The hostility people felt toward the health care reform is only one symptom of this spiritual sickness -- that reform was very, very mild (and, shhh, very conservative and pro-business) -- but those venom-spewers (good "Christians" one and all, for sure) got seething mad about it. And I looked at it and said "It's giving health care options for people who didn't have them. If Jesus saw that, He'd approve -- if anything, He'd say it didn't go nearly far enough to help the helpless." But noooooo, they lost their minds over people getting health care!

It doesn't bode well for this century, truly, that these cockeyed crusaders are busy taking swords to whetstones to "save this country" when, in truth, they are going to destroy it. And under the banner of "Christian values." Holy SHIT, people. The reactionaries a century ago realized that religiosity was the perfect shield for them to hide behind, and they surely are. We are seeing their foot soldiers marching under that banner of moral certitude and righteousness, while pursuing an agenda of anger, fear, and hatred. Yeah, good things will come of that, Lord knows.

Public Service Announcement

Q: Do you know what all of these actresses have in common?

Winona Ryder.

Neve Campbell.

Selma Blair.

Katie Holmes.

Natalie Portman.

Camilla Belle.

A: If you answered "they're all brunettes!" You'd be WRONG! That is not what they all have in common! Rather, the answer is: They all suck -- they're non-acting actresses! "Hacktresses," if you will! All of them are distractingly boring and wooden in any role they play in any movie they star in. They are a flock of albatrosses sure to sink any film they're in, if directors aren't careful. I imagine if all of them were put in one movie (I don't know, like "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants III: Dude, Where's My Pants?" there might be some rift in space-time, killing us all with boredom).

Seriously, start a drinking game if you want, and any time

1. You CANNOT guess what emotion they're trying to portray in a scene, take a drink.
   
2. You catch them attempting to act, too, take a drink.
   
3. They unconvincingly try to portray some occupation or lifestyle in a scene, take a drink.
   

You'll be hammered in no time.

Even in the above stills, you can see the doe-eyed inertness they represent.

What's more?

I have nothing worthwhile to share today. It's been sunny-but-cool lately. The birthday weekend blew, nothing fancy. I just played with the boys, mostly, did a little transcribing. I'm trying to get the various writing projects done, but need to carve out more time for them. And I really need to find a job in the Loop. I'm sick to death of Hyde Park; I miss working downtown.

I really don't want to do freelance editorial work. Urk. This weekend, B1 has a camping outing with the Cub Scouts. I have to remember to pack cold-weather gear aplenty, because I'm sure it'll get frickin' cold! I nearly froze during last year's spring camp-out (shivering at the memory -- seriously, it was the coldest I've ever been, I think). I also have to rent a Zipcar or the like to get out to the campsite. While I don't miss the pain in the assery of owning a car in the city, there is a bit of PITA in renting, too.

I need to start making lists, just to get things all done. It's so easy to get distracted.

Flicks

I got the "Justice League" movie (direct-to-DVD) and was pleasantly surprised by it -- much of the Bruce Timm-directed production team was involved with it, despite the different animators, and the result was very solid. My boys LOVE the movie, and I've watched it a couple of times, think it was fun, well-done. Not treading new ground, storywise, but it was marvelously well-executed and fun. A lot of in-jokes for comic book fanboys and -girls, but it was a compelling work, and I look forward to seeing what else Bruce Timm and company turn out. They have making good animated superhero stuff down pat!

"Push," an ostensibly SF paranormal thriller (involving superhumans) had some arresting images and at least a theoretically usable premise, but it didn't fully cohere the way it needed to -- the whole didn't equal the sum of its parts, and one of the characters (played inertly by Camilla Belle, who appears to have taken the Katie Holmes School of Acting to heart) is a big drag on the overall story. It could have been a good thriller, but I think it got out from under the creators of it, and didn't fully deliver. I think my favorite sequences involved the Screamers/Bleeders, who had a sonic scream attack...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fwaiD8ZVYOU

Although the precognitive Watchers were also interesting. Surprisingly, Dakota Fanning did a good job in her role as one of the Watchers (although she was distractingly hunchy -- is that just her being "in character" or does she always have such rotten posture?) She's kind of a pint-sized Kate Hudson, and her relationship with lead character "Nick" (played by Chris Evans) was more convincing that the cobbled-together love interest Evans was supposed to have with Camilla Belle's wooden character (who reminded me of Selma Blair's "Why Is She In This Movie?" role in HELLBOY).

"Coraline" is the latest Neil Gaiman triumph -- and I say that as a bad thing -- I'm not a fan of Neil Gaiman's work. He's just too British for me, too affected, too something. Some people love his work, his dark fairyland, gothic-infused mentality -- the same folks who worship Tim Burton worship Neil Gaiman as their Tolstoy. But it doesn't quite ring true for me -- his work doesn't reach me, and I can't exactly say why. Something about his writing style, his sensibility, something. The technical achievement of the movie outweighs the larger themes of it, in my view -- a movie that's fun to watch but which doesn't particularly deliver the goods. I just kind of watched it, enjoyed it after a fashion (despite the constant, cloying British eccentricity routinely demonstrated by the supposedly American characters in it).

Movies

Over the weekend, I watched (on DVD), "Justice League: A Crisis on Two Earths," "Push," and "Coraline." I didn't get around to catching "Kick-Ass" as of yet. I'll offer my comments on the above movies in a few. Gonna make pancakes for the boys this morning.

The Day of Cosmic Comedy

Today's my birthday!

According to "The Secret Language of Birthdays," today is The Day of Cosmic Comedy, which is actually pretty appropriate, for those who know me. I laugh early, and I laugh often, I laugh with, and I laugh at. I can get very nearly anybody to laugh (except for supreme assholes, fussbudgets, and sourpusses, who get annoyed at my sense of humor). The name of this day amuses me, too, because I often joke about how the Cosmos is having a laugh with me.

Some famous birthday fellow travelers: Charlie Chaplin, Peter Ustinov, Henry Mancini, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Ellen Barkin, Herbie Mann.

Holding Back the Years

This is the song I was alluding to the other day -- the original "Holding Back the Years" by the Frantic Elevators (who?) -- the punk band Simply Red singer Mike Hucknall was in before attaining Blue-Eyed Soul superstardom with his syrupy remake...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-L8hlgkGmo

I love this original. It is beautiful and forlorn and wistful, and has more than a trace of a Bowie vibe to it. It's funny to me, because I've mocked the Simply Red tune for almost as long as I've paid attention to music (as symptomatic of what, exactly? I don't know what -- Spandau Ballet's "True" conjures up almost the same kind of loathing in me -- is it sentimentality? Faux-new romanticism? I don't know), but the original is a very impressive song.

It is striking to me, just how a slightly different arrangement can lead to such a rich reward, how a slight change can create such monumental improvements in something. Of course, Hucknall ladled on the soulful treacle on this beautifully barren original and parlayed into a massive hit for him, but the original is amazing.

So, I put this song up as the last tune of my 30s, to show how the same song can yield such amazing results (and improvements) with just a little tweaking. It'll be that way with my life from now on. I don't regret my past -- so much of what makes me who I am comes from that past, but I'd be lying if I didn't think that while I experienced great things in my 30s (largely centered around fatherhood and my two wonderful sons, and also finally, truly getting serious about my writing), I feel that my life has only just begun. It's a cliché, the whole "life begins at 40" idea, but maybe there's some truth to it.

A chapter of my youth is closing, and a chapter in my adulthood is beginning. I've felt some amazing, life-changing things in the past decade, and feel that, for the first time in my life, I'm being truly who I am, for better or worse! Onward toward 40. I face it without regret or fear or sorrow. I'm hopeful and I'm happy.

Anyway, enjoy the tune. I know I sure did.

(Post)Modern Way

Musical accompaniment to my musing of the post before...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SnxNJbWCcng