weekend update

[winterbadger]

Well, that weekend mostly sucked. Principally because something I ate towards the end of last week, or some bug I picked up, really disagreed with me, so instead of going to work Friday, going to Chris's birthday dinner on Friday night, gaming, bike riding, or seeing Ellis Paul play, I spent the last three days either in bed or in the loo. :-(

I did get to catch up on reading (in between large bouts of sleeping, another of which I'm feeling like indulging in, so I'll be quick). I watched a bit of telly, and a couple of movies*, and Peter came over yesterday and we painted for a bit, which was actually fun (I realized I'm not sure I've ever painted figures since I got Nick--he seemed very confused by the activity, as a cat would at anything that occupies humans' attention and doesn't involve laps for cats).

I've gotten mostly better, but I think the whole episode has reinforced the need for some minor but inconvenient surgery I was told recently I need. :-( Just when, of course, I have no leave.

* ratings for which:

Bourne Supremacy: 7 out of 10. Good pace, good camera work, well plotted for what it was, and lots of groovy locations (the places I've been they got right or very close; the places I haven't they at least made very convincing.) There wasn't a *ton* of actualy acting, and the premise, good for the first movie, felt a little stale in the seocnd one. I gather it got spun out to one or two more books, which is really beating a dead horse.

I Heart Huckabees: 2 out of 10. Tiresome. Annoying. Felt like I'd wasted two hours of my life. Not funny enough to be a comedy, not serious enough to be a real drama about existential philosophy. It's remarkable strengths, if you can call them that, were to make me actually get tired of Jude Law (pretty astonishing) and to make me realize (unintentionally, I think) that Lily Tomlin is actually quite sexy in some ways.

Dear Frankie: 8 out of 10, maybe 9. Sweet but not saccharin. They didn't wrap up everything with a neat bow in the end. They didn't have a deus ex machina or amazing miracle save the characters from the consequences of their actions. Good acting from all the principals, I thought. And the backdrop of Glasgow of course made me like it.

That caused me to realize something, that last. I was watching the characters sit on a hill and look out over cranes and water to mountains. I amused myself by figuring out right away where they were sitting, before I even got the atlas out or saw the filming credits. But what really struck me was that seeing that, and all the settings, even the grungy streets of their neighborhood, made me homesick. HOMESICK! For someplace I've nevere LIVED! How irrational is that? I can't remember the last time I was homesick. I went on a month-long deployment to TX once, but while I remember missing Chris, I don't think I ever recall missing DC as such. I've missed Williamstown many time, though not with great sadness recently, and occasionally I miss Boston. I don't think I've ever missed Newport News, though I've certainly missed my parents and hier home from time to time.

Comments

[azbound.livejournal.com]

First off....Good camera work in the Bourne Supremacy??? I referred to it as "Cerebral Palsy Vision".

Second, let's find a night to hook up. You think you and Kim are up for meeting for dinner? I get in on Saturday night, leaving the following Saturday. So I'm good on Monday or Tuesday.

[winterbadger]

[camera work] I thought that some of the fight scenes and the car chases were very effectively filmed and edited in a way that leant pace and energy to them. No one does the "coffee jitters" camera work that used to be popular about ten years ago, even in TV commercials, and thank god for it! And if people insist on spiralling surround shots as the acme of artistry, well, they aren't. The one of Redford and Pitt on the hotel roof in The Spy Game nearly made me lose my lunch, simply because it was messing with my inner ear so badly. Human brains aren't designed to keep seeing something go around and around something else, looking inward.

Dates! What dates are you talking about? Days of the week are not handy to me unless I know what week is invovled. :-)

[azbound.livejournal.com]

The 21st and 22nd. And to be honest, the 22nd would work best.

[winterbadger]

Either of those would be OK with me; I'd have a slight preference for the Monday myself, but you're the out-of-town person, so I think we should be working to your schedule. I'll check with Kim, in case she isn't reading this.