11.30.07

Sweet Day

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:42 pm by Gregory

It’s raining gently. Occasionally a crow caws. That’s it.

Bit of work today, some good news, bit more work, and as soon as I post this I’m on a hunt for penne.

Then to complete that Golden Compass review: I realise what slowed me down a bit — it’s a beautiful and thought-provoking story (in general), and my affection for it makes me want to filter out any undue cynicism prior to going on record about it.

Most people base their opinions on opinions. The difficult task is looking at any work within a larger context (on those fortunate occasions when one can perceive a larger context!)

Anyway, and then the other projects and the site-tinkering (got some linkin’ to do), and then perhaps something like a nice evening.

May you also have a nice evening.

Don’t drive too much.

 

Chanson du soir: “Good Tradition” by Tanita Tikaram

 

 

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“Come to bed, Dear.”

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:42 am by Gregory

Here are three hints about what kind of man I am:

1. I will do the “inconvenient” things other people often dodge, just to catch a glimpse of something Beautiful and/or Unusual. (Case in point: The night in the Pac NW when the Northern Lights were exceptionally bright — and it was early but not one of my friends [save one; bless her] thought it a good idea to switch off the motherfucking television [for once] in order to step outside and put forth the incredible effort of looking up.)

2. I will be extraordinarily patient unless somebody is lying to me.

3. I will heed the advice offered in the title line above (even if there’s nobody else there saying it!)

 

Thus, tonight, only brevity and sleep.

It’s making the national news that staying up all night is bad for people.

(Actually, apart from reasonable balance in all things, I generally disagree: I think it’s just too difficult to get decent sleep in the daytime because it’s too bright and people are too loud.)

On a personal level, I’m noting tonight that old feeling of striving to complete a review in the middle of the night. I have been here literally thousands of times. There’s never any support. There’s never anybody being nice about it. There is generally pressure and loneliness.

Of course, it was far, far worse when I jumped through all the media and traffic hoops and then had to contend with shit-for-brains preditors first thing in the motherfucking morning — often on three-or-less hours of sleep.

People vanished; people died; people turned into total jerks; everybody around me seemed to be an alcoholic; my cars kept exploding; I was making a living; it was a very weird chapter indeed.

At this exact moment, I’m kinda tuned in to those feelings again — except that they’re not really in the present anymore. It’s like intellectual shell-shock. Except that it’s not really acutely uncomfortable anymore — it’s more like: Why did those years have to be so consistently unhappy?

Oh, well.

As far as movie-reviewing goes, it’s interesting to consider: A few got out there this year — and the Harry Potter review even has fully functional sonnets in it. A few other good ones. It was kind of like sneaking them through — when the shadows of past preditorial miseries were dozing.

Unfortunately, I learnt that my plan to do “Double Features” isn’t practical. Certainly, it’s fun — mixing up absurdly mismatched movies and reviewing them in tandem, seeking common thematic (or whatever) threads. Fun, indeed! Except then, all the “straight” sites won’t re-run them, most likely because they’re simply not sure how to define them. Thus, although more jerking around is pretty much guaranteed, that format may have to die.

Several “almosts” were produced this past year as well. I’d get half or three quarters of the way through a review like Control (Sad Egotist Kills Young Self In Pretty B&W) or Darjeeling Limited (Tennenbaum Hipsterism Takes Hindu Field Trip) and then I’d think: “Okay, and what else is there to say about this, really? That Wes Anderson probably blew somebody to start his career? That suicide boy has only one note but makes millions for it?” The authenticity and enthusiasm would become bigger struggles than they were worth, and then I’d go: “Like anybody fucking talks about Saved! or The Hours anymore. I need a decent paycheck to keep doing this unless I’m totally into a specific movie for whatever reason.”

Of course, that was flat-out stolen from me in the nastiest way possible — thus the philosophy has become My Whim or the Highway.

Now, as for The Golden Compass — I really do like it a lot, and there’s still about a week until its release, thus we’re technically early. I just decided that I want to give it a bit more consideration (and even serendipitously spoke this evening with someone who worked on it, which was illuminating). In terms of being “up,” there’s no need to change the order, because the review is indeed “up” — in the air — and has been filtering through my head like so much Dust. In absolute truth, it’s already mostly written (the opening block would never have gotten past the preditors), and the photos (from many) are selected, and the layout is planned.

However, I just don’t tend to be the rush-job kind of guy.

I am a lover with a slow hand.

(And an easy touch.)

 

Besides, it was such a busy day, and there were nearly infinite other things to consider, and most of the things involving technology didn’t work properly.

This is often the case in my life. Unlike many, I don’t tend to get angry about it. But I don’t trust machines, either. When the revolution comes, I’ll be the one with my boot in the Terminator’s ass.

Reminds me of one of my many, many, many automotive fiascos. I was a slave in the entertainment industry for a few years — they exhaust you, they really do; it’s vicious — and one night I was returning from delivering some shitty script to some shitty actor (notably, on my very unpaid time — this goes on constantly; think about it when you’re buying movie tickets and DVDs) and my then-Volvo decided to take it upon itself…

…to die…

…cold…

…without so much as a whimper…

…in the very middle…

…of the intersection…

…of Wilshire and Westwood…

…at rush hour.

 

Machines.

 

A couple of weeks and several hundred dollars later, the mechanics still had no clue why it did that. It just did.

I shall never forget the faces of the people staring at me as I pushed that Volvo out of traffic by myself.

 

Anyway, machines tried a few tricks like that with me today — but I wasn’t having it. It did slow things down a bit, though.

 

So you’ll see the review sometime Friday — if that is even to your interest.

Happy to be a part of the process when people do good work, actually.

And now off to bed with me.

Sweet Dreams.

 

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11.29.07

The Golden Compass / Northern Lights

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 12:59 am by Gregory

Viewed it. Loved it. Loved it. Loved it. 

Review up p.m. Thursday.

G’night.

 

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11.28.07

Cure for what ails ya:

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:39 pm by Gregory

When I was an adolescent (rather than just having an occasionally adolescent sense of humour), one of my crushes was on a nerdy musical girl who seemed to pride herself on expressing no discernible emotions.

(”WTF?”)

(I know.)

Anyway, the only time I saw her become significantly emotional was when she would reminisce over witnessing people slipping on the ice and falling down. She loved that!

(”WTF?”)

(I know.)

Anyway, today I was searching for something, and found the video linked below, and I think I finally understand!

Check it out.

(If this doesn’t satisfy you in an acute but deep way, prolly nothing ever will.)

 

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She said, “Don’t I know you from the cinematographer’s party?” And I said, “Who am I to blow against the wind?”

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 12:42 am by Gregory

Immediately upon entering (A – -)Whole Foods this afternoon, I found myself gazing upon an old woman lying on her back on the floor as though dead. Lots of other people were also gazing at her, and even more people than that were pushing rudely to get past the people gazing at her. It was a fascinating study in humanity. The woman herself was glazed-eyed and already had her hands folded on her chest in a coffin-ready, corpse-like pose. (Later, whilst checking out, I was told that paramedics eventually arrived, and that she was “fine.” Whatever that means.)

The cause of the woman’s collapse proved mysterious — for she hadn’t yet approched the bludgeoningly-overpriced hot-food buffet. Or perhaps she had, and was dashing away from it in horror when fate struck.

In any case, going in there reminded me how petty and unpleasant humans can be. Actually, this happens pretty much any time one enters a(n) (A – -)Whole Foods. The pushing! The shoving! The me-first-me-first-ME-FIRST clusterfuck! I like a bit of energy, but it is nonetheless mildly disturbing how customers “saving the planet” or whatever by buying organic suddenly forget all standards of common courtesy and become madpeople (frankly, it’s mostly women, too — go look anytime).

I think literally fifty people physically ran into me. And I’m a good dancer. Weird.

 

A few hours later, I found myself viewing large chunks of The 11th Hour — a new environmental activism movie narrated and produced (go figure) by Leonardo DiCaprio. It would be far too easy to take potshots at DiCaprio for his jet-fuel bill to Brasil or whatever, so instead I’ll say that I’m impressed that he took the time and thought to put his own energy behind a very worthy cause.

(Which is not to say that I didn’t have to stifle a giggle when the outrageously earnest DiCaprio, literally standing on a mountaintop, declares, “So here we are, at the brink!”)

(Me, I believe that “the brink” — much like “doom” and “joy” — is a highly subjective and personal issue, and not one to be projected onto others — regardless of the circumstances.)

The movie itself? It’s your standard feel-bad documentary for the most part: We humans are addicted to the devastating patterns of the Industrial Revolution; we are not only causing our own imminent extinction but that of fifty to fifty-five thousand other species per year (!); we need to redesign absolutely everything in the next two minutes or we’re all dead; oh, and factory farming is bad.

If I sound a bit sarcastic, it’s because — apart from the magnitude of our onslaught upon other species — nothing I saw or heard in the documentary was new to me. I am most certainly an environmentalist and I take pride and pleasure in doing all I can to prevent waste and extend and revere Life — however maybe it’s just because Southern Californians (including Leo) are a bit slow on the uptake or something — when I lived in the Pac NW, several of my personal friends were making it their hobby to go get arrested in front of bulldozers (never mind that as soon as they were arrested, the bulldozers pushed forth and the forests were permanently destroyed anyway). Being Vegan was/is fairly common. Recycling was/is practically a religion. 

Factory farming is bad? Fossil fuels are bad? Pollution is bad? War is bad? Duh, duh, duh, double-duh?

I’m sorry — I really don’t mean to be snotty, but watching a bunch of talking heads telling me extremely obvious things — with Leo intermittently appearing as “cute saviour” — proved slightly tedious. It also didn’t help that almost all of the talking heads were white. And old. And bald. And appeared to be chronic masturbators.

I did like the woman who chimed in about how silly humans are to go to absolutely outrageous technological ends to produce a fabric like Kevlar (something involving literally supernatural temperatures and pressures — and almost as indicative of humans’ stupidity as any modern weapon), whereas a simple spider can turn a bug in the belly into webstuff — “ounce for ounce five times stronger than steel — and at room temperature, from natural ingredients.”

This led to the part of the doc I found most fulfilling — the Design Rethink bits. Why pollute? Why overconsume? Why burn up all the world’s resources en route to sticking nine billion crazy-ass humans on this rock?

Instead, why not employ clean, Green resources — and, crucially at this point, science — to create … recreate … a Life on Earth which is not only sustainable for ourselves and all other species — but actually Beautiful and Poetic!

(If only the damned preachy Boomers could even begin to approach the concept that their own fucking greed is largely responsible for the devastation. “Peace”? “Love”? How about Sharing first?)

I also liked the concept that everybody “votes” constantly — every single time we spend our money on absolutely anything. That’s a good thing to consider.

Anyway…screw the disaster-footage and the hand-wringers — that Design Rethink stuff was, for my money (which it wasn’t), the real reason to see the film. Which I certainly recommend — a lot more than any stupid movie about stupid people shooting each other, anyway.

Here.

 

And what else?

Lotsa French people at the screening. I like that. Crossed paths with a woman I met near the beginning of this year, who texted the living hell out of me during the Costa-Gavras tribute because she thought I might be able to help her get her conspiracy-screenplay off the ground. We looked each other right in the eye, and she evinced no personal recognition whatsoever.

L.A.

(Even French people can become “L.A.”!)

 

Anyway, I was going to save this posting until morning, because I’m kinda turned on by the novel (for me) concept of going to bed “early” and actually partaking of eight consecutive hours of sweepytime. However, there is a great deal of work to be done immediately thereafter, thus best to yammer here now then take the day semi-seriously.

The reward, after that, shall be viewing The Golden Compass — forward to which I look. (With any luck, that’ll be the catalyst to get the site refitted for December.)

(And tonight I’m just gonna flip languidly through the copy of Northern Lights my dear friend sent me a couple of years ago, en route to — hey, as long as we’re redesigning concepts — Sweepytime.)

 

Oh: Funny. I did end up spending too much to hit the hot (and cold) food buffet — and it was with surprise and delight that I found myself gazing into a pan of…

…oh, baby…

…vegan potato salad!

(Dear Lord*, before I go to Sweepytime this night, I pray to thee: Help me complete this dear wish. Ta.)

[*Not intended to connote any adherence to, or approval of, any patriarchal system.]

 

As for you, I hope you had your cookie. In any case, might I suggest putting these into your mouth?

 

P.S. No particular reason for the Paul Simon lyric as title — apart from still thinking that it’s sensational.

 

 

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11.27.07

Monday, Monday…

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:42 am by Gregory

…can’t trust that day!

(Actually, in double-checking that lyric — originally wanted to go with “can’t stand that day!” — I discovered that the much younger musical combo Tegan & Sara have a song called “Monday Monday Monday” — that’s three Mondays! (everything is so extreme nowamondays) — however the plangent tone continues: One of their lines is, “I don’t really care for your city anymore.” !!!)

Heh.

Hi.

Well, here’s the brief report, anyway:

Kevin DuBrow, lead singer of Quiet Riot, dropped dead in Las Vegas.

I never liked Quiet Riot, but I always did appreciate DuBrow’s very fake English accent on that line: “You sehve no bettah!” And that he was willing to be loud and obnoxious when the scenario called for it. Beyond that, they were never my band — but I’ll betcha that a dewy Morrissey was sitting around in Manchester savouring them as his guilty pleasure:

“Let’s see here: Diamond Dogs, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Poofterism for Boffins, and — son? Stevie-sweets? — what’s this then? Metal Health?”

“That’s nothing, Mum! Erm…wee John Maher left it here! Blimey, what’s for suppah?”

Etc. Anyway, I know nothing about DuBrow but hope that his people can remember him with love and warmth.

Basically, the trend seems to be that it is potentially lethal to be the lead singer of a rock band — unless you’re boring.

 

Meanwhile, on Monday, 26 November, 2007, a bunch of super-geniuses decided that what the entire Westside of greater L.A. needs is extra fluoride in the tap water.

God damn it.

That is extremely annoying.

How many decades is this behind all the communities who once thought fluoride a good idea but then discovered that it’s not healthy for humans to drink it? (Plus, apparently, the source of this particular fluoride is nastily industrial and really not good at all.)

They say it’s to prevent cavities in the teeth. Okay, then let us carry that logic through to its natural conclusion:

Whenever you drink tap water, exactly how long do you leave it in your mouth and swish it around?

‘zackly!

(One more reason to move, anyway.)

It’s really very simple: If you want fluoride for yourself or your children, just about every store in the U.S. sells varieties of toothpaste with added fluoride. Even the more natural toothpastes (the less common but far better ones without the known carcinogen saccharin in them; read the labels!) usually offer a fluoride option.

So why THEE HELL does everybody have to drink that crap and bathe in it?

Legitimate and reasonable answers welcome.

 

As for the topic of health, I must have run hard enough the other night to jostle my innards — for I awoke (barely) on Monday morning to the not-at-all delightful sensation that my right eyeball was about to explode from its socket. No, not glaucoma. Severe acute headache.

It took all day to shake that bastard, but I feel fine now.

Nonetheless, it is very strange — when even the simplest task feels like a miserable burden. Another reason I don’t drink.

 

Women: Oh, whatever. I simply no longer hope to find a kind, creative, intelligent, reasonable one around here. This does not preclude finding one elsewhere. They certainly exist. I’ve seen them! And if you think that the disappointed observations seem sexist, I invite you (on your next toothpaste run) to go explore the greeting card section of your local drugstore/pharmacy/chemist/whatever-you-call-it. Check out the ones designed for middle-aged women. About half of them are dedicated to the topic of how stupid men are.

 

(Not that I’m arguing with that, either. Today I was walking and thinking, and although many businesses have fallen and been replaced, and cosmetically there’s a tweak here or there, the world is still pretty much exactly as it was when I was a child. Obviously we have the internet and all the zany gadgets –

Incidentally: Gregory officially dubs this chapter of human history The Age of Gadgets

– but basically not much has changed. I’m just a bit taller and manlier. Meanwhile, all the stupid things men have invented — armies, corporations, endless arrays of weapons, enough nuclear missiles to kill all life on the planet many times over — all that shit is still there.

What are we gonna do about it?)

 

Well, I’ll tell you what I’m gonna do about it.

Despite many fast’n'weird encounters with friends throughout the year, this has been yet another solar orbital of loneliness and nagging futility for me. And everybody’s always got bullshit advice, too:

“You just have to try a little harder.”

“As soon as you do [whatever random, largely unrelated thing], then everything else will just work itself out.”

“You Just Haven’t Earned It Yet, Baby” (Thanks, Moz. Bang your head.)

“She’s out there for you, somewhere.”

Etc. etc. etc.

Well, that’s fine — people have to talk, even if it’s largely in cliches — but (as is likely apparent by now) I just loathe fake happiness. Real happiness, great — even if it’s over something silly or trite. But otherwise, I tend to feel that emotional honesty leads to the best overall path. Even (sometimes especially) if that means being despondent or mopey or whatever you want to call it.

Which I’m not, always (far from it; it took me years to learn what “emo” means).

It’s just about calling it as it is. Today, for instance (despite the wicked headache) was better than yesterday.

So…

What I’m Gonna Do About It is:

I’m gonna keep learning how to see and reveal Beauty in the midst of apparent Nothingness.

 

(This appears to be what I’m supposed to be doing now.)

 

Oh, and:

The official handwritten edition of my first proper novel has launched!

(Since I really can’t wait to fill up all those pages, I’m going to shoot for a Winter Soltice delivery.)

(Life, of course, will do everything in its power to thwart that — but either way I win, because the Life stuff is bound to be better than being weirdly and unnecessarily adrift most days.)

(And I think it’ll flow fairly smoothly. Touch wood. Huh-huh.)

 

Speaking of which (and yet not), if there were three things I could be doing right now — in utter candour, mind (but in no particular order):

1. Recording the songs for my totally-hobbyist covers album I’ve been wanting to do for years.

2. Eating (and sharing) chilled vegan potato salad from the bosom of a pretty woman*.

3. Climbing a rope all the way to the top of the gymnasium. (I’ve never been able to do that — not even close — but I’ve observed friends doing it, and strongly suspect that it imparts to the climber a sense of self-worth which may be directly parlayed to the business world.)

[*One who is totally in on the deal, and not being paid.]

 

Was there anything else? Oh, yeah…

Martin, I don’t know if you ever drop by here or not, but if perchance you do, please know that I am deeply and truly sorry for the delay on the pieces I promised for your wondrous festival, and I explain only that it’s been a time of both overload and catharsis, and sincerely look forward to providing you with appropriately enthusiastic words just as soon as I can either raise my DV camera from the dead (so as to transcribe the utter brill-ness) or afford a new one.

Friends elsewhere: It may not be as bad as it sometimes reads. Since I’ve beheld people stuck in holding patterns my whole life — refusing to act upon or even acknowledge the most vital and crucial aspects of Life — I tend to say as much as possible while the window is open, that at least something of use may stick. (Fret not.)

Friends here: For what are we waiting? Don’tcha wanna get out there and make legends (and run the show) while the previous generation begins to decay and before we end up working for their children?

Poll: Should I move to New York? Or not?

 

Sorry, no pix this time — but whoever you are, Happy Tuesday! Have a cookie!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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11.26.07

Dark Night of the Soul Redux

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:39 am by Gregory

Only one good thing happened on Sunday: I bought a book. A blank book. Within which to rewrite that novel from earlier this year. By hand. I’m weary of staring at screens.

(The irony, of course, being that then I’ll have to transcribe the whole thing via a screen — but this part of the process, even with significant alterations likely, will be quick compared to the actual writing…re-writing…something in between there but closer to the latter…)

Nothing else good happened. (Well, actually, that’s not entirely true: Had a brief hello with S. and later T. sent some truly awesome notes for a shared project; noted!)

The blank book is of my fave design and was the last one on the shelf. I acquired it via a portion of a birthday present gift-card thingy from (initials are sometimes problematic) MPG. Thanks!

Part of the day’s many disgruntlements, however, involved two different young women in the employ of the bookstore who proved not only utterly useless but almost offensive in their nonchalance toward a customer request. These places have backstock. I know. I have purchased some of it in the past. So I asked. Their responses were both so very: “Fuck you! Like I’m gonna go back there and look on your account!” that it was nearly shocking.

(American girls. Go no further.)

As a bit of a clue that this may have been a gender issue, I then asked a young male wearing a stupid apron, and he also seemed very hesitant to be forced to do anything involving movement — but he did flatly state that he’d go look if I really wanted him to go look. By that point, I was all sighs, so I let him off the hook and gift-carded just the one.

For the record, at the checkout, the slightly more mature American woman of color with the lip-piercing was very pleasant and nearly chummy in her insouciance — not as if I were the problem — but rather as if the whole game of pretending to care about corporate retail were sort of silly and amusing. That tone worked for me.

Perhaps the rudeness is a combination of gender, age and race elements?

In any case — although I promised myself that I wouldn’t make any absolute statements tonight — I have very much given up on American girls. Oh: I’ll be friendly toward the ones who are friendly, and I’ll be supportive of those who need that of me. But I really don’t wish to be close to one ever again. It really has been horrible.

By “girls,” incidentally, I mean Female Adult Human Americans of Reasonable Mating Age — and tell ya what: You F.A.H.A.R.M.A.s can have this country, do whatever you want with it, and I’ll make sure the door doesn’t swat my pert little buns on the way out. Deal?

(This after how many years of utter failure to achieve any true communication? Ladies — and I do use the term most loosely — your deceit over the years has finally concluded my interest.)

(I feel so much lighter and happier having stated that.)

With that prospect dimmed into nothingness (Whew; at least there’s no more waste), I look about and see essentially that I need to pull a “Dune” on my whole existence: That is, to make it rain on (eerie, whispery voice here) Arrakis…Dune…desert planet. Yep. That’s all.

Alone.

On a Monday morning, the more cynical reader may now delight in using me for target practice — but really it’s just a huge puzzle, out of which all the pieces I need keep falling exactly as I genuinely need them. Family? Pfft! Friends Who Wanna BEAT the Intertia and DO SOMETHING? Pfft! Employers? Pfft! Girlfriend? PFFFFFT! Reasonable Abode? Pfft! And so on.

When I consider myself, I think: You, Sir, are several years late and several thousands of dollars short.

But the thing is: I can’t really pretend to care. Case by case, sure, I’m down with the humans. But the motivation to build anything here has blown away. I know we’re supposed to imbibe alcohol and pretend everything is okay — but I just can’t stand the nothingness anymore.

Well — the nothingness and the hideous greedy shits. Both.

I was eating pistachios earlier, and suddenly it occurred to me that a truly ridiculous actor is the actual governor of California! It’s INSANE. Does anybody else notice that this is INSANE?

And the bigger political picture — that’s way too depressing for a night like tonight.

Anyway, with the motivation completely gone it is unlikely that I’ll continue to play along here and pretend that this is a good place to live. Interesting, sometimes. But good, not. I know I’ve said this (many times) before — but always some teensy incentive would roll along and I’d forget again for a few weeks or months that this place is retarded.

Now there are no incentives whatsoever, so I am free to leave.

I still hope to do good work with good people; it’s just not going to happen under the present circumstances.

No author-mockery tonight. It’s amusing, and could even become literary — but mainly it’s just jerking around. Tonight I desperately need the sleep (and early mornings here with these insanely noisy neighbors are the very definition of Hell).

Cold. Perhaps I’ll go somewhere cold.

Here’s a local photo via a borrowed camera from last night (the white dot is the Full Moon):

  

Song of the Week: “Ricochet” by David “Bowie” Jones

 

 

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11.25.07

Blip (Guest Artist Symposia: III)

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 2:42 am by Gregory

There have been more strange and unexpected variables in the past twenty-four hours than can be processed here, but shall report…ASAP! Also, doing best/can to motivate confused hardware and dongly things to allow me to add more images – for people who don’t like words (or, at least, words on their own).

Life definitely Obstacle Course. Thus defined, though, it’s easier to run.

Otherwise, my alleged Day of Rest will be devoured by a sick amount of work needing doing, and then I’ll get computery again and mess about with the site and the backlog and etc.

Meanwhile, continuing this weird trend for my entertainment (and possibly yours), here’s this:

The last day of summer slammed into Castle Rock like a candy-apple black ‘74 Nova on nitrous careening through the plate glass of old Mick Jasperson’s greasy spoon near the interstate en route to tearing through the front counter and driving the illegal Honduran fry cook named Benny into the crack-o’-dawn blistering heat of his smoking grill, neatly bisecting him from his shitty Yankees belt buckle to his lumbar vertebrae as Hortense the slutty old waitress whose wont was blowing college boys back home on holidays for sometimes double or even triple tips began to scream and scream and scream so loud she woke up even the drunks as far away as Derry and then the blood, the blood, the blood — Lord, have mercy! — flooded the cheap-ass linoleum like some creature from a Steve McQueen B-movie, and friends, such outrageously imaginative horror since my last book has never been beheld. Howdy, Constant Reader! Stephen King here! Anyway, in that hideous instant from somewhere deep down in the sewers of Castle Rock where the church folk never dare to venture there came a mewling, a mewling like the mewling of dozens or even thousands of giant mutant rats who all happened to be mewling in unholy unison, and then poor Benny — Oh, Jesus! — his top half watched his bottom half hit the blood-soaked cheap-ass linoleum and then his top half hit it, too. (¡Dios mio! thought Benny to himself. Maybe I shouldn’t have spent all that time playing four-finger nasty with that St. Bernard in the ping-pong room of the rectory on Maple Avenue — but then again, the priest will turn out to be the real villain — he always does. Hey, my scrotum itches. But wait a minute: How could I possibly know that? And I don’t even espeak English. Oops — I’m dead.) Then the Walkin’ Dude took his home fries and went outside. And on that fateful last day of summer something truly godawful evil stole into the town of Castle Rock, the “surprisingly” deceptive Norman Rockwell ordinariness of which will take about 15,000 pages and several weeks of your life for me to reveal, but under the circumstances let me cut to the quick and say that it was really quite shocking in such a quaint and provincial milieu that the driver of that Nova turned out to be none other than a massive spider from outer space cleverly disguised as a terrifying circus clown, and only twenty minutes later when Castle Rock’s finest showed up doing the two-fisted cha-cha with low-end java and a cruller each was that massive space spider jauntily taking its leave astride a sixteen hundred pound mewling sewer rat very likely up to no good (and mewling mewlingly!), so Hortense, ever the hostess, offered the boys in blue complimentary bee-jays and two of her three remaining Virginia Slims as Benny’s torso slid like some sick kid’s art project in the flaming puddle of blood and bile and bacon grease under that no-good Nova’s grimly grinning grille. (Why the hell didn’t I stay home today and do unspeakable things in order to delight housewives and confused teenagers who buy these books thinking that they’re somehow being liberated by the iffy prose and naughty words? thought Hortense to herself. Oh, but maybe I should ask these cops after I’m finished blowing them if I can have the Nova?) But Hortense would do no such thing. For Castle Rock was never a Chevy town, and never would it be. Hey, thanks, Constant Reader! Remember to keep buying my books over and over again! Oh, and: BOO! Bwah-hah-hah-hah! Back to you, Gregory!

Um…

Whatever.

Thanks, Stephen. Can I have over half of your money immediately?

As for you, Gentle Browser, I hope you have a yummy lunch or a warm bath or something. I’m going off running under the Full Moon now.

Chanson de Dimanche: “Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)” by Eurythmics

 

 

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11.24.07

Ray-Age Moondream

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 12:01 am by Gregory

The Moon right now is high and outrageously bright — really quite beautiful, especially with the chilly winds whipping through the region and the very rare (in SoCal) sense of being in touch with the elements.

A bit of late thanks-giving: For some reason, hits to the site have been way up since yesterday. Particularly strange, since I haven’t added new material in weeks (and I think some of the links are presently missing, too). Well, shucks – all of us at ÜberCiné thank you for your patronage.

Was that too crude, the past couple of days? It’s hard to tell, really. One thing I’ve learnt as a writer is that words can be far more volatile even than actions (I know of a lousy writer who’s still on the payroll even though two witnesses — his superiors — told me he picked up a chair in rage and threatened to hit them with it). But sometimes an elegant discussion of highly inelegant circumstances is impossible. I just don’t hit anybody. If they read something they don’t like, that really is their problem.

Fuck-fuckity-fuck-fuck, fuck-fuck!

Did anything good happen today?

Yeah, actually: I saw some friends, viewed some classic French cinema, ATE OUT TWICE, (panicked over my dauntingly inappropriate fiscal condition), saw some more friends, found some truly excellent and little-known writing by Ray Bradbury (more with Ray in a bit), and decided that My New Life has to start before what is traditionally called “Christmas.” Oh, and I got my laundry done.

That’s pretty good.

Have also decided, sitewise, to forget about trying to salvage November, and just dive right into December — summed up in the most popular bit of Entertainment Industry parlance (until the Strike, anyway): ASAP.

During the Strike, incidentally, some friends and I have decided to take over the Entertainment Industry. We will hire you and pay you fairly.

Erm…

Yeah, depending on how much personal mumbo-jumbo infiltrates my existence in December, the last movie reviewed this standard Western calendar year may be The Golden Compass — but there’s a bunch of backlog before that, so there should be something of a cornucopia there while I’m off cavorting through the Wintertime.

I’ve got about a month to finish four books plus the album, too! Wish me BIG luck, and feel free to massage my hands and feet.

(Oops. Did I only think that — or did I type it out loud?)

Not much to say about the dead baseball player or the sunken ocean liner (who takes ocean liners to Antarctica?) or why U2 are still around but Midnight Oil aren’t (are they?). Oh…however…

BIG COUNTRY is back! Obviously a bit different, with Stuart permanently missing (that’s still a shock). But as someone who reviewed The Crossing at the time of its release (and I’m still wowed by it — and by everything up to, ironically, Peace In Our Time), I remain a fan and enthusiast. It pleases me greatly to know that BIG COUNTRY still has a presence in the world, and (although I don’t particularly like what this site does to people’s brains) that BIG COUNTRY is even touring again!

Considering the shit I hear whenever I accidentally walk through a Starbucks, I feel not one whit of squareness about this revelation.

I saw Big Country only once — with fine friends at the Hammersmith Odeon in ‘88 or ‘89 — and the band were just beginning to take on a bit of that “saviour” ethos that has often made Paul Hewson sickening — but otherwise, although there are equally great musicians in the rock idiom, superior ones you will not find.

Good on ‘em.

(Hire me on vocals. Really.)

 

Addressing the bit of Gaiman tomfoolery, I hope that he and his minions can rest easy. I believe I’m too sharp to fall into some crude “Salieri” trap — it’s only a bit uncomfortable to watch one man attempting to take over a whole (beloved) genre and mostly (via not only his talent but what must be a totally top-notch management army) succeeding at it. Otherwise, it’s great to have him around! (Even when his personality strikes me as hilarious.)

With this in mind, just to show that it’s all in fun, what say we close tonight with a bit of faux-Bradbury:

Greetings and salutations, you dreamers of dreams! Ray Bradbury here! I remember my own birth! A doctor friend has told me that this is impossible! I tell him, “I was there! Were you?” Look at the stars! We are made of the stuff of stars! My body overflows with the beauty of my body’s beauty! I am beautiful! Like stars are beautiful! I romp in the sweet, nectary playgrounds of the nether-regions of the Gods of Olympus and also Buck Rogers! Gil Gerard! Oh, corpulent poet of the ten-buck autograph table! I sing, I sing, I sing to thee! Rockets! Space! Space rockets! Let’s you and I fly like a dream that is dreamlike in the dreams of space where the dream-rockets are! And sing! Sing! Sing of leafy Saturdays in what seems like rural Illinois but is actually Crete! The Minotaur! He is in my 7-11! I SING to the Minotaur, and we drink a Cretan Slurpee together in my singing dreams of space rockets and dreams and space rockets! Did I mention that I wrote the screenplay adaptation for Moby Dick! I did! Do you know what John Huston sang to me! He sang: “Ray, you must dream of dreamy dreams!” I am the mighty Ocean! I am the Circus Guy who is Weird! I sing to the Ocean that is the Circus Guy’s dreams and back to me it sings: SING! Dreams! Ocean! Pumpkins! Rocketships! God damn it! Back to you, Gregory!

 

Ray. Living legend. Have met him several times. Feel blessed by this. Please keep him around awhile. We need him.

 

(Oh, and: I wished on the Moon tonight; please let it come true.)

 

Chanson de Samedi: “One Great Thing” by Big Country

 

 

 

 

 

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11.23.07

Gauche Addenda:

Posted in Glögg Is Life. at 1:42 pm by Gregory

Amusingly, I hadn’t checked Neil Gaiman’s website in several weeks prior to scribbing that recent lampoon — however, swap Finland and Western Australia for Britain and the Philippines, and the sarcastic portraiture turns out to be reasonably accurate. I just clicked over to him today, and there is all the expected material — exactly as expected.

This is simultaneously comforting (I like Neil Gaiman; a mockingbird he very much is, but a hack is absolutely isn’t) — as well as enlightening (regardless of the magnitude of one’s endeavours [partying with one's family at the London Beowulf premiere for one's birthday is no small thing -- and for him, regardless of the trademarked faux-humility, whatever it is, it never is], repeating patterns eventually become obvious — particularly where self-promotion is concerned).

Same drill, different commodity.

That’s fine.

 

Besides, I don’t mean to play the underdog to any ridiculous extent — it just reminds one to get busy and keep at it when somebody else gets everything they want and you get almost literally nothing.

 

Recently said the same thing to a friend, re: Johnny Depp. Why does he get to have all the fun? Move aside, boy!

 

Goes it so.

 

Onto the topic of assholes — one may note that I’ve made mention of them quite frequently lately. Why? Well, I don’t like the term either (a high school girlfriend of mine used to use it constantly — and it really turned me off) — butt…er…but sometimes the correct term is the correct term.

If someone inhabits an executive position in the Entertainment Industry, chances are very, very good that they are an asshole. (As in any field at any level, however, it’s usually the less powerful people who are the bigger assholes — owing to their desperate need to prove themselves all the time. It’s also, usually, the short people.)

Executives in “alternative” journalism are guaranteed assholes.

And when it comes to traffic — the other night, as S. and I struggled for ninety minutes to travel a few miles (to give Neil Gaiman some money; but he did entertain us for our coins) — those assholes are assholes because: 1. Most of them drive SUVs (it ought to be a dictionary definition); and 2. Under no circumstances — including signalling and waving desperately for several minutes — would ANY of them allow us to merge into their lane, given quite standard and fair rules of the road, of which friendly humans would not think twice before doing the helpful and courteous thing. Thus: Assholes.

(Like you’re going to get where you’re attempting to go any later due to letting a single car merge!)

So sometimes, when I write harshly here, and use “bad” language (a highly relative term), please remember that environmental circumstances contribute significantly to content and tone — and if you were to put me in a beautiful place inhabited by nice people who enjoy giving away free dark chocolate (that’s not code for anything: I mean, literally, dark chocolate) — then most of my tapping here would concern how dreadfully happy I am that Life is pleasant.

Since there are a lot of assholes here, while some people get to fly around the world constantly being celebrated and enormously rewarded for having fun, then it is quite reasonable to note the massive contrasts — until such a time as the terrain between the poles is bridged.

Oh, and: FEED THE WORLD (on your leftovers?)

Cheers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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