Friend mike sent in this winner as “Worst Fight Scene Ever”.=
The one that really sticks out in my mind is, why does the bad guy ( we can tell, he’s the one with the mullet ) lick the knife before engaging our hero ( are those Z Cavaricci’s? ) in morta combat?
Is this to inspire the fear of staph infection in his opponent?
You may see my last post in which I ask, how can it be that here in Austin there is nothing to do on Sunday night?
Well, Lauren and I took a wild stab at a solution and went to the campus area’s venerable “Hole in the Wall” for “shoegaze” night. I figured it couldn’t be all that bad as I always had a bit of a think for My Bloody Valentine.
We headed down and the bar was sparsely populated. Many people were seated out in the hallway alongside and in back of the bar, sitting in the humid night air with sweating bar glasses stacking indefatigably higher.
We played a game of foosball and I got shellacked. Our pool games that came after were much more balanced but I think I ended up losing that series as well.
Eventually the first band came on and sure enough, they were latter–day disciples drunk from the fountain of St. Greenwood.
This morning I got up and watched the ending of “Shine”, the movie that gives you way-too-many opportunities to view Captain Barbaossa’s butt. I thought the pivotal scene of the Rachmaninoff 3 concerto was absolutely astounding. The emotional scenes between young Noah Taylor and Armin Mueller-Stahl are among the most wrenching put to film.
Is it just me or is this town entirely dead after 7pm on Sunday?
This is the nth time in recent memory that Lauren and I looked at austinist, do512, and the chronicle for something to do besides sit at home, eat more mexican food, or watch netflix on a Sunday night and have come up empty.
Seriously, the only thing that sounds remotely good is Shoegaze night at the hole-in-the-wall.
As bad as it may be, rest you assured that it’s better than Sunnyvale, but still…that’s not setting the bar very high.
We went to a Balboa / Bal-swing class workshop all day today.
I woke up around 7:30 to do GRE study until 11:30 when we left.
From 12-3 we were dancing and thus about 3:30 when I got home I promptly took a nap…for 2 hours. It was awesome.
I finished watching Season 1, Disc 1 of “Mad Men” which I consider to be one of the most interesting and best–acted dramas on TV at this moment. It’s a fascinating glimpse into the weird parallel universe that ’50’s life appears to have been.
The beautiful intro to “Mad Men”
Afterwards Lauren and I headed over to Serrano’s Arboretum and had some chips and salsa with drinks. I have acquired a taste for Michelada’s of late and Serrano’s makes a fine one. Lauren had a fruit-a-rita of some sort.
Afterwards we returned home and watched “The Road to Perdition” which was good in so many technical regards, it was surprising that it was such an uninspiring and predictable movie.
I’m hoping to catch Hellboy II tomorrow…maybe if I study real hard in the morning I can make that happen.
Here are choices from “Pre-20th Century Period Pieces from the 1970s”
Based on your interest in:
I, Claudius
The Adams Chronicles
1776
Geez, talk about a niche of a niche of a niche that I fall into. Scary, this data mining.
Bowie: ‘One day in Berlin, Eno came running in and said “I’ve heard the sound of the future” and I said “Come on, we’re supposed to be doing it right now”. He said “No listen to this”, and he puts on I Feel Love by Donna Summer. Eno had gone bonkers over it, absolutely bonkers. He said “This is it, look no further. This single is going to change the sound of club music for the next fifteen years” which was more or less right’.
“I really like Public Enemy, and I think that Donna Summer’s `I Feel Love’ is one of the best songs of the last ten years. It has a mechanical, Teutonic beat with that luxurious voice. Other people wouldn’t think of putting such opposites together. They’d make something that sounds like Depeche Mode.”
Eno Source
Last night we went down to Austin Swing Syndicate’s Thursday night dance at the Fed. At 8:15 we took the introduction to Balboa lesson as given by 4 on the floor directors Matt Jones and Laura Malloy.
Laura has a fantastic way of explaining dances physically. She and Matt did a great bit where she said something like:
“You all know Charleston ( big exaggerated moves ) well, people liked it. But they made the music faster and more people came so the moves got faster, smaller, and closer ( same moves, but just tighter and faster ) and it got faster, and faster, and ( they start dancing Balboa ).”
It’s an interesting dance, it’s a bit more regal than the Lindy Hop’s exaggerated hoppity-hop rhythm. It was also a product of Orange County, CA, just like my favorite dance partner, who knew?
…and they’re doing it to “Sweet Georgia Brown”—pass the ball
This weekend the same talented pair will be teaching a workshop on Balboa at Austin’s Uptown Dance.
Afterwards was the main dance, it was one of my favorite co-student’s birthday, so I even dashed into the birthday circle to give her a birthday twirl. The other fun game that was played was called “Snowball”. You start with 2 people at the center of a circle, they dance until “Snowball” is called and then they each get 2 partners from the circle. Well, it gets bigger and bigger, and partners get harder and harder to come by, so it winds up becoming a mad dash for free partners.
Lauren and I booked out at 11:30, got home and a few snacks down the gullet, slept like the dead.
Once upon a time there was a genius software developer named Hans Reiser. He used to join Linux forums and lambaste other hackers as being foolish, prodigal, indolent, and was generally a bit of an egomaniacal ass.
In other words, par for the course in the world of software development.
But then he was indicted, and convicted, for the murder of his wife amid a tale of S&M, Linux development ( intimately linked ), Russian internet-ordered brides, and infidelity.
A crucial feature of the trial was, well, that the cops couldn’t find the body. Upon being found guilty, Reiser seems to have copped a plea with the judge such that he could get a lesser sentence in exchange for the victim’s family and, nota bene, his own children being able to lay the body of their daughter / mother to rest.
Here was Gawker media’s “Valleywag” summation picture:
First of all, and not to be juvenile, but a copy-editor would have caught the phrase “fingers corpse”—oh right this is blogging, ahem, never-mind.
Secondly, the incapacitated girl in the ad in the party dress appears dead if not really whacked out on laudanum. One could foreseeably think that that was the corpse under discussion.
The whole post is pretty distasteful, I’d say.
I’m reminded of pro-feminist blogs decrying things like “new bikini’s are scandalous” or left-leaning blogs that decry “It’s insane that McCain can run for president in the 21st century given that he can’t even use a computer” only to be served up, guess what, an ad featuring said bikini’s or a clip of the blogger-hating senator as an ad.
Items of Interest:
I.
This weekend I finished the hilarious Diary of a Wimpy Kid. I bought it a CostCo for eight dollars. It’s a cartoon + diary written by an average Junior High kid who manages to capture the humiliating, elating, confusing, and baffling experience that society inflicts upon youth: Jr. High. Much like “Freaks and Geeks”, “Diary” hits a little too close to home a little too often to have left me without a few “squirmy” moments, but it was tender, never-patronizing, and rather funny.
I mean seriously, I have never met anyone who said of Junior High, “Wow, those were the greatest days ever”. It’s like there’s some sort of social amnesia that kicks in around 16 such that, some decades later, adults can consent to inflect said aforementioned Hell upon their own children.
II. I had my first tutoring session for the GRE. I have a lot of work to do to get to the score I want.
III. I am doing my first day of volunteering at the Texas Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic. In these first few sessions I have to get the hang of the system and process: after that I am eligible to do a voice audition.
IV. I finally finished Gaiman’s Sandman Volume 9: “The Kindly Ones” collection. I’ve really been avoiding this one because of where the story arc was going. Nevertheless Gaiman is very conscious of the story threads that have been introduced in the previous 8 volumes and makes use of characters and insights that you should remember from the very earliest threads.
In this, due to a primeval crime, Dream is hounded by the Eumendies and the domino effects of revenge are explored.
Preludes and Nocturnes remains my favorite, ( thank you Tim ) from my Senior Year Creative Writing class.
V. Lauren has a huge spider bite on her leg. Steroids and Benadryl have been deployed and she’s responding well.
VI. Starting 7th month of dancing!
Wow, has Austinite Jim Freeze et. al. really outdone themselves this year. They have organized the second Lone Star Ruby Conference. This year none other than Matsumoto-san, creator of Ruby itself, will be presenting! Talk about a coup!
The presentation will even be at the terribly-convenient intersection of Anderson and Burnet but a mere 4 miles from my home. I hope opportunity shall be found to introduce the intrepid father of Ruby for a Hunger Buster at the DQ up the street.
This also means that the closest and best bar in the area will be Ginny’s Little Longhorn. I can totally see Dale Watson and Matz rocking a “Heartbreak Hotel” cover.
You can also take an chock-full day long training session for a mere 125 on top of the incredibly reasonable 250. My ticket, all told was less than 500 dollars. Hotel costs at most conferences are more than that.
If you’re doing Ruby, come on down to Austin in September and say hello. Being September it may be a pleasantly cool fall or the final month of the boil-‘em-‘til-they-say-uncle crucible. No promises on that one.