| Happy Holiday! |
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| 09:43am 23/12/2009 |
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mood:  content music: Otis Redding CD
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I havent posted in a very long time, but hope everyone has a safe and Happy Holiday! |
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Read 3 - Post |
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| Letter from the President - "Why You Should Be Thankful" |
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| 05:29pm 21/12/2009 |
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All,
As we press forward through the traditional holiday season it is easy to get caught up in all of the trappings, or become overwhelmed, or become grumpy in an attempt to avoid the whole affair...all perfectly acceptable feelings as far as I'm concerned. Our community has always been an amalgamation of ideas, values and personalities, and I often find it is our greatest strength and asset.
As we round out the year I just wanted to impress upon you how great a year we've had as an organization and what that means to me. For the first time ever we have had all three of our national events come in the black, all while restructuring a lot of the behind-the-scenes work; bringing on new staff in the areas of marketing, event coordinating and volunteer coordinating; taking on the National Poetry Slam entirely in-house; recovering from great financial distress...all during the worst economy most of us have ever seen in our lifetimes.
As an organization comprised of poets, SlamMasters, staff members, volunteers and executives we realized the mission of PSi in Detroit, Berkeley and West Palm Beach through our national events, and regionally through all of our local shows. As a community we have bonded together to make things happen that people said couldn't be done, and seated powerful champions into the ever-growing history of Slam. Collectively we brought poetry into places it has never been, and proved our worth in the heaviest of times. People who sit in our ranks and who have walked our path in the past have graced the White House. Poets we know and love have gone on to great academic achievement, literary success and paved the way for other poets to realize their dreams through our powerful art form. We have lost and loved and fought and at the end of the day, won...together.
These are all things that you should be proud of, that you should be proud to have been a part of. These are things that, without your direct influence at your local shows and PSI’s national-level events, may not have occurred when they did. At this time of year, when there is so much to reflect on in such harsh times, we have this - Slam - to be thankful for. We have our communities and our venues to be thankful for. We have people crafting flyers and emails and online forums to be thankful for. We have organizers and people who work doors and people who pick out door prizes to be thankful for. We have bartenders and waitresses and back-up musicians to be thankful for. And we have poems – thousands and thousands of poems – to be thankful for.
I am thankful for all of you. And I am proud of you, and I cannot wait to see what you do next year.
Your president,
Scott Woods
Columbus, Ohio
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Read 3 - Post |
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| A final movie rant: Don't strangle it |
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| 08:21pm 20/12/2009 |
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Here is a trend in movies that I hate I feel like talking about to cap off the weekend: I hate when movies strangle themselves.
"Strangling" is when a movie introduces elements that it forcibly resolves to its detriment. Example: every thing that was introduced in, oh I don't know, Avatar, had to find its way back into the movie later in some way, even when no one cared or it didn't help the story. The old village tale, Michelle Rodriguez's entire character...you get the idea. It's like if a coin showed up in someone's pocket it was going to get used later to deflect an energy beam that would destroy a tank and save the day.
A lot of movies do this nowadays because they think audiences are stupid. Many audiences are and cry when they don't get the whole story, even if it would make the movie worse. We've simply been conditioned to want to know it all, and now, dammit, now. And you can tell this kind of movie from its trailer with some practice. When you see the trailer and you pretty much know not only what the film is about but how it's going to end, there is every likelihood that it's a film that's tied everything together too much, that strangled the magic out of the film.
That magic is key. It's what keeps us going back to a film, keeps us talking about what made it cool. It's the stuff we want to see more of but the film only gives so much and we're left writing the story in our heads the rest of the day. You'll see what I mean when I give you this list of things in cool movies you don't know what they mean (or you can't prove its meaning) and made it a richer, better experience for all involved:
- The cause of the destruction in The Road
- What some of the ghosts in The Sixth Sense were saying
- What the Blair Witch looks like
- What the Oracle told anyone else in Morpheus's crew in The Matrix
- The cause of the scar on John Connor's face in The Terminator
- Much of The Hangover
- Why the aliens crashed on Earth in District 9; what was wrong with the ones on the ship; what happened to their leaders; why South Africa...pretty much the whole of District 9
- What Abe from Hellboy is
- What the demon looked like in Paranormal Activity (a movie I didn't like, but appreciated this much of)
- How Rorshach's mask works in Watchmen
- Whether or not Max is bad or genuinely disturbed in Where the Wild Things Are
- Much of Dark City until the last act, but even then...who knows?
- What planet the Alien alien comes from and what it must be like
This stuff is magic, things that, left to their own worlds, can leave wonder in an audience. Kill the voice overs, don't shoot that back story about their mom...leave us something to take home. |
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Read 10 - Post |
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| The Road |
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| 07:48pm 20/12/2009 |
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Since we're talking movies anyway, how about The Road?
I needed to wash Avatar off of me, so I went to see what is probably the anti-thesis to Avatar: less than two hours, cheap by comparison, muscular acting, and largely devoid of cliche. It's a film based on the 2006 Pulitzer winning novel by Cormac McCarthy, which means I would probably never read it but I would go see a movie of it in a heartbeat. The story, such as it is, is about a man (Viggo Mortensen) who wanders a post-apocalyptic America with his young son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) trying to avoid cannibals, find food without resorting to said cannibalism (the high road!) and make it to the coast, where things are hopefully better.
Because I like this movie and want some of you to go see it, I won't give you any spoilers. The movie is extremely well-made, leveling strong senses of dread, fear and hopelessness with little more than acting to pull it off. Sure, there are some scenes of end-of-the-world carnage, but it's all static and dead. In most of the scenes the only thing moving are the two lead actors, and that is most of the scenes of this film. They shot some of this on New Orelans Katrina land and at Mt. Saint Helens. Desolate, son.
If you aren't into character studies like this (which is an interesting kind of film to make with a cast of unnamed characters), you might find the film kind of boring. It's not, but I must slap the wrist of the filmmakers for cutting out some of the more horrific scenes. I know they shot some of them - they admit they shot some of them - but they cut some of them because they thought it would be heavy and redundant. I assure you that while it might have been horrific, it would not have been redundant. Without that horror, there is some punch missing here. You don't need to leave it ALL up to the imagination of the audience. Give us a little juice. McCarthy did, and if it was good enough for an Oprah Book of the Month (c) selection, it's good enough for your already R-rated film.
I liked this movie a lot. I wouldn't recommend it for everyone, but I would recommend it for everyone that I think reads books or that enjoys a little thinking in their films (as opposed to the friend who gushed over Avatar who I now have to scratch out of my phone book).
By the way: you could have made 15 The Roads with the money it took to make Avatar. |
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Read 4 - Post |
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| Avatar P.S. - 3D sucks, a drinking game, and why evil matters |
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| 01:24pm 20/12/2009 |
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1. Can I also mention the 3D glasses?
I didn't want to see this in 3D, but based on the times it was showing at the theater I was willing to go to, I got stuck watching this in 3D. I'm not sure why this cinematic option has made a comeback, but it really takes away more than it offers. If you wear glasses, then you have to wear these things on top of your glasses, and they barely fit. So you're uncomfortable. Also, the lenses are dark. So you’re seeing the film with a tint. So all of the color and detail that went into the film is cut in half by 3D glasses. The difference in lighting is staggering.
Also, the ticket costs $3 more for half the experience. Even going by myself it's more than I wanted to spend on a movie I wasn't sure I was going to like. Fortunately I had to sit next to three very talky white girls, so I never felt alone (and I point out their race only to illustrate the point that everyone talks during movies, not just black folks. White folks just use "inside voices", black folks obviously use "outside voices" and mullatos must use "trapped in the cat door voices").
2. You want a drinking game? Take a shot every time there's something in this film that was already done in another film that didn't take $300 million dollars to make, wasn't blue and wasn't by James Cameron. You'll be drunk in fifteen minutes.
3. And before someboy gets on their high horse to joust with my high horse to make the point that it's just a popcorn movie, consider this: Hollywood is in the worst economic lurch in the history of film. Production companies - the people who determine what films get made - are closing left and right or firing so much staff that they can't greenlight anything. Half of the CEOs in Hollywood have been fired or turned around in the last six months...HALF. Thanks to the gestation period of making a film, the industry is still reeling from the hiatus of the writers' strike only to be hit with economic armageddeon. Movies that have name actors in them are being cancelled. People are leaving the film industry and going to TV, not to make good art, but to survive.
What does this mean to people who aren't actors (ie. us)? This means that the only types of films Hollywood will be releasing are sequels to previously well-performing films regardless of quality (yay...another Transformers film. Whoopee.) and cheap comedies (yay...another riff on relationships by Rudd and Rogan. Whoopee). You think The Road is depressing? Find an interview with its director and see what depressing really is.
What does this have to do with Avatar? At a conservative $300 million Avatar cost twice as much as all three Lord of the Rings films. You know what else you could make with $300 million?
- 2 The Dark Knights
- 3 The Departeds
- 4 Inglorious Basterds
- 4 Surrogates (talk about avatars!)
- 5 The Matrixs
- 6 Sweeney Todds (I don't even like musicals and I liked this)
- 6 Changelings
- 8 Burn After Readings
- 9 Sevens
- 10 Million Dollar Babys
- 10 9s
- 12 Mystic Rivers
- 15 Silence of the Lambs
- 30 Dogmas
All of these films are better than Avatar. Think about the cool scenes, the awesome dialgoue, the powerful effects...then think about Ava-fucking-tar. I would want to see more of all of these types of films (done right, not done like the clones that did indeed follow some of them). It takes an enormous amount of hubris to commit a dying industry to an enterprise like this, especially when that enterprise is wack. Cameron is a dick. He could have made any film he wanted, but opted to make a film that clogs up the coffers for anywhere from 3-4 huge budget films to 30 or more low budget films. |
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Read 12 - Post |
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| Avatar sucks. |
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| 12:38pm 20/12/2009 |
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I find it impossible to spoil a movie that essentially reveals itself in a 30-second trailer, but for the crybabies out there: spoilers follow.
If Cameron did one thing in this movie that is worth noting besides spend 300 million dollars on it that one thing would be that he has made the most realistic-looking cartoon to date.
That's it. It revolutionizes movies in no other way than the CGI is extremely well done, to the point of really fine-tuned interaction with actors and the human eye. But that's it. No original plot, no serious acting, no engrossing theme, no new points to share...nothing. It is Dances With Wolves mixed with a dash of The Smurfs. The movie so blatantly relies on Dances With Wolves Cameron should be getting sued for stealing someone's story...AGAIN.*
I cannot express enough how gut-wrenchingly predictable this movie is. The dialogue is stock. The character types are stock. The casting is stock. The story arcs are stock. You have seen this movie a dozen times in the last year. It may have taken Cameron ten years to "make" this film, but it only took him ten minutes to come up with the story. He just watched Dances With Wolves, cribbed some military styles from thirty year old anime, flipped through a few issues of Heavy Metal for design notes, and shit this story out. No one dies that you don't see coming in the first twenty minutes, no one says one surprising thing, and generally the movie comes off hackneyed and boring. I already know the female alien is going to fall for the human-pretending to be an alien and that she's going to be the princess of the tribe and that the human-pretending-to-be-an-alien is going to fight against the humans who come to run the docile Native Americans off of the their oil-rich plains. You get the idea. You had the idea before you even saw the commercial. The idea came rushing back to you when you saw the 30-second trailer. You farted this idea yesterday.
How evil is this movie? This movie is Tyra Banks: a perfectly-constructed beauty designed from the follicle to entice, only to discover that all of her insides are vapid and base and empty and downright stupid. And just like having to spend two months with Tyra might start off awesome (sexually anyway. I mean really, how else?), eventually you want more. And sitting through two hours and forty minutes - TWO HOURS AND FORTY MINUTES - of this movie is like sitting across a dinner table from Tyra Banks after a couple of weeks and realizing this woman doesn't read books, doesn't know anyone who would tell her no, and has been making you do all the work in the sack so she doesn't mess up her hair...and you have a month and a half to go. The movie is a mannequin. It's too long to be dumb fun, too predictable to be good, and too empty to watch more than once no matter how impressed you are by the effects. You could skip this film entirely and get everything you might like out of it when it's on DVD. You can even use it to judge the intelligence and value systems of your friends. In fact, I encourage you to do so; it might save you some money on Christmas gifts.
So skip it.
* - Any day-one nerd already knows what I'm referring to. |
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Read 19 - Post |
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| Haiku feature! |
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| 03:38pm 19/12/2009 |
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Heads up: I'll be featuring at First Draft in January!
As you know, the rules are that all material be new. And since it's traditionally a haiku show (complete with deathmatch), all feature material must be haikus. So I need to come up with an engaging 15-20-minute set of brand new haikus.
I'm chomping, son. What better way to kick off a new year than by kicking poetry in the nuts? |
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Read 7 - Post |
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| no subject |
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| 10:42am 19/12/2009 |
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Since I am here in the Land of Le Beagle for several more days, I am totally going to use the fast internet itunes hook up to make a cd of Christmas music for my dad.
I found a lovely Diana Ross version of "My Favorite Things." But Erin protests quite vehemently that "My Favorite Things" is not really a Christmas song at all.
Evidence that is include the fact that it is frequently played around the time of Christmas, and that it includes mention of: copper kettles, warm woolen mittens, brown paper packages tied up with string, crisp apple streudel, sled bells, snowflakes that stay on your nose and eyelashes, silver white winters that melt into spring, etc.
Evidence, as presented by Erin that it is not: raindrops and roses and whiskers on kittens, cream colored ponies, and wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings have nothing at all to do with Christmas. I feel this is inconclusive, because any one of these items could be given as a Christmas present. (Well, hopefully you would get the whole kitten, not just the whiskers, as that would be weird and disturbing.) Her most definitive argument is that although a dog might bite you during the holidays, "when the bee stings" proves it is a song of warmer seasons as bees are not very prominent during Christmastime. But that depends on where you live.
Erin's favorite Christmas song is Little Drummer Boy, on account of when she was in the med center in Africa, listening to WDOK online, and just happened to be tuning in when the dj read an email from my dad on the air talking about how his daughter was listening to their station while in the Peace Corps and asking them to play the Bowie/Bing Crosby version for her.
My grandma's favorite, she once told me, was "Away in a Manger." But that was the year that my mom had signed me up for the Christmas choir at church, and I really liked that song because it has a part where the cattle all are lowing, and I was one of the kids who got to make a mooing/lowing sound in the background, which I really liked. So, perhaps my grandma's choice was influenced by my seasonal festive cow impression, which I did all December long. My favorite religious carol is probably O Holy Night. My favorite fun one is Christmas in Kilarney. I may try to teach the beagle how to jig. |
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Read 1 - Post |
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| Bayou Christmas |
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| 10:12am 19/12/2009 |
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I got a very cool gift from my buddy/co-worker Megan.
I love this comic, and she got me volume one.
You can read it at the link for nothing, but *I* get to take it home and lay on the couch with it.
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) tahmthelame is dreamy. Thank you, sis! |
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Read 15 - Post |
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| First Draft |
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| 10:51pm 18/12/2009 |
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Rachel Reid was as fantastic as I ever imagined she would be!
My energy was low all day, but the poetry and a Santa hat chock full of holiday bling acted like a battery pack! The hat does not just light up. It also sings. And has an animatronic jingle bell. You know that it is super great because my sister was so embarrassed by me wearing it.
Now I am watching as the world transforms itself into a snow globe. |
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| Lost Dog |
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| 12:22pm 17/12/2009 |
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No, not the beagle I am currently dog sitting for.
After I got back from Writers' Block last night, the beagle and I went for a walk down half of Walhalla and were heading home through the dark streets of Clintonville, when the beagle stopped to sniff at an interesting tree about a block from a busy High Street intersection. Suddenly, a large black wolf dog emerged from the shadows and bounded over to us.
Joanna: Hello, Giant Dog. (Looks around for owner, who is perhaps walking a dog the size of a small pony/large wolf unleashed. And a block off High Street. Moron.) What's up, Giant Dog? You're not out here by yourself, are you?
Giant Dog: (Pants inscrutably)
Joanna: (Now scanning the street for signs of Moronic Owner possibly injured in a ditch. Listens keenly for pitiful moans. Nothing.) Are you lost, Giant Dog?
Giant Dog: (Sniffs at beagle)
Joanna: Hmmmmmm. (Decides to continue walking beagle, to determine whether Giant Dog will stay put - indicating he is near home - or follow.)
Giant Dog: (Follows delightedly, as if Joanna is leading an exciting Doggie Parade.)
Joanna: (Examines street for signs of a wolf pack sniffing around for missing leader, and/or Iditarod making unscheduled swing through Clintonville. Still nothing.) Do you have tags, Giant Dog? Let's see where you belong, huh? (Reaches for dog to see if it has a collar and tags beneath fur, hoping to not have hand bitten off or wind up needing rabies vaccination, etc)
Giant Dog: (Does not like being reached for, bounds across the street, almost gets hit by car in the process.)
Joanna: Giant Dog! Be careful! (Tracks Giant Dog across the street)
Giant Dog: (Joyful at being reunited with New Best Friend the Beagle)
Joanna: I will see your tags, yet, Giant Dog. (Pets Giant Dog into submission, then grabs tags.)
Tags reveal Giant Dog's name to be Trooper, and list two phone numbers but no address.
Joanna: (Realizes this is exactly the ridiculous kind of situation that makes some people argue that everyone on the planet should be issued a cell phone at birth. What if find a lost dog after dark and it's tags only list phone numbers to call?) You probably don't have a cell phone, do you, Trooper?
Trooper: (Looks on balefully.)
At this point, it seems like I could either walk Trooper home with Bonnie the Beagle and call the owners from there, or be sleuthy enough to figure out where Trooper lives.
My dad, who I suspect has spent a lot of his time in retirement trying to teach his dog to talk, has told me that all dogs recognize their names, and the words walk, dinner, and home. I have no idea if this is true. But it seems worth a try.
Joanna: (In voice of command) Trooper, HOME. HOME, TROOPER! HOME!
Trooper: (Appears to understand, and trots off down the block.)
Joanna et Beagle: (Follow. Follow. Follow some more. Down a few blocks. Across a few streets. Cut across a few yards.)
Trooper: (Arrives at porch of a house, and sits looking expectantly at front door. Makes a whining sound.)
I waited to see if Trooper's people would come to the door, frantic with worry. Again, nothing. I go up and ring the doorbell myself. Trooper pushes his nose against the door, and it just swings open. Unlocked and unsecured. At 11 o'clock at night! Now, I begin to worry that this is the opening scene of a Law & Order episode, and that Trooper has been out roaming the streets in an effort to find a human to alert them that some kind of grisly crime has taken place. But no! A woman in pajamas arrives at the door.
Joanna: Is this your dog? We found him wandering around a few blocks from here.
Pajamas: Oh yes! Hee-hee-hee! I forgot he was even out here! Thanks!
Joanna et Beagle: (Roll eyes)
Upon telling this story to my coworkers this morning, they seem to have divided opinions about it. When I got to the part about going up to the house and discovering the unlocked door, one of them said that I was totally lucky that my cellphoneless self was not kidnapped/snatched off the porch, as crazed killers could have lived there, and what if they had just let their dog out to lure animal loving victims back to their Evil Lair?
She said I should have memorized the number on the tag, and called when I got home to report that the dog was on the streets, and give its last known location.
Another woman said I should have walked the dog home and called from there. But if they were serial killers, then they would know where I lived. Or where Eva and Greg live. But that's no good, either.
Then there was a whole discussion about whether I should even have touched an unknown and possibly stray wolf dog. It could have fleas, rabies, be viscious, etc. But what is the alternative on that? Walk away and let it bite someone else? Plus I would have been awake all night worrying that the dog was cold and lost and had maybe been hit by a car or something.
Then the whole thing devolved into the more familiar "Why don't you have a cell phone" debate that happens at least once a month.
Poll #1500250 Lost Dog
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 15Upon discovering the presence of an untended stray wolf dog, Joanna should have: In the modern world, what are the chances that a lost dog could possibly be an elaborate plot laid by serial killers/cultists/speed freaks to lure victims to their porch for evil purposes? In the event that the house were populated by evildoers, would Bonnie the Beagle have protected me? |
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Read 8 - Post |
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| Come On, Week. COME ON! |
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| 09:49pm 16/12/2009 |
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UGH!
This week has been dragging by, micro-moment by micro-moment, wringing the life out of me with violence and anger and pain. END, WEEK! END!
Here's the run down:
Sunday: rain, cold nasty rain, not enough sleep, flying solo with kids all morning, not wanting to go to church, taking my bad attitude anyways, God makes me work through immature (non) forgiveness issue involving snot and tears (thank you, Kirstin, for praying for me), more cold rain, exhausted carrying of son through cold rain, chaotic church lunch thing, restless-too-deep nap from which I could not wake up, slowly improving but stumbling evening.
Monday: hello period! hello migraine! hello student slipping on wet playground pavement and splitting his lip open into a bloody, 8 stich mess! hello writing in pain in my bed all afternoon and evening! except for that hour when I sat at dinner with my friend who just got some of the suckier job news I've run into recently! hello 12 hours of misery with ice packs utterly powerless to help anyone or anything, including myself!
Tuesday: Migraine, why did you stay? You are supposed to go away after a night's sleep (read: suffering). Emma's Christmas program in which she sat on stage and sucked on her lips and chose to do neither singing nor hand motions and wait, where is MY daughter? Ohhhhh, riiiiight, it turns out Erica gave birth to an individualist who cannot be bothered to conform to the group norm WHO COULD HAVE PREDICTED THAT ONE! Mom and Dad come for dinner - A BRIGHT SPOT! YES!
Wednesday: Can we do origami Ms. Foster? No. Can we participate in Settlers of Catan, Ms. Foster? No. Can we talk all day while you're talking, even, hum through every word you say? Um, no, but I see you're doing it anyways. Wait, what's that? HELLO MIGRAINE! And then my husband twisted his ankle, debilitatingly so. Therefore: come home, three needy people all reaching for me and talking at me at once, hug them all, get them all snacks, clean living room, clean dining room, clean kitchen, do dishes, set table, make dinner, serve dinner to eight, leave early to clean kids room, lay out jammies, leave kids with friends, go to reception, have very cold fun (I was so cold. So cold.), still, BRIGHT SPOT!
Aaaand, scene.
I swear, tomorrow better go faster, and Saturday had better GET here. It feels like last Friday was a month away. I need a break. |
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Read 2 - Post |
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| Houston, We Have a Lesbian Mayor |
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| 11:57pm 13/12/2009 |
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From MSNBC
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34399468/?GT1=43001
"A lesbian candidate won Houston's mayoral election Saturday night, a vote that made the city the largest in the U.S. to ever have an openly gay mayor.
Parker's sexual orientation became the focus of the race in recent weeks after anti-gay activists and conservative religious groups endorsed the 61-year-old Locke and sent out mailers condemning Parker's "homosexual behavior."
365gay goes into a bit more detail on that, including the fact that, "Dave Wilson, a longtime anti-gay activist who once led a successful campaign to prohibit benefits for the domestic partners of city employees, sent out 34,000 mailers opposing Parker.
The flyer shows a picture of Parker being sworn in as controller with her partner by her side. The headline asks: “Is this the image Houston wants to portray?”
http://www.365gay.com/news/anti-gay-rhetoric-rises-in-race-for-houston-mayor/
And yet, she won 53% of the vote, deep in the heart of Texas! I think I will send her a Christmas card. Also, wonder if she and the lesbian leader of Iceland will now form a secret lesbian governance cabal. Maybe they are accepting applications? |
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10 (66.7%)