A long time ago, we used to be friends

There's been talk about it for quite some time, but apparently its already 70% written and all the usual suspects are on board. So, fingers crossed, and a Veronica Mars movie will be here someday soon. (all kinds of linkage: 1, 2, 3)

Movie Trailers - Movies Blog

If you haven't done so already, watch the whole series--which you can do for free on Joost. (After 2 years, I think Phil's finally into it.)

Preach on, sister!

I might grow a vagina for Rachel Maddow. Maybe.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Wacking vs. Lofting

Firstoff, Circlesquare's new long-player is every bit as good as this track, so if you likey, you go buy-y.
Secondly, yes, I spend too much time watching people dance on YouTube.
However, I thought this was a good showcase for some fine dancing. Early on, you can see elements of wacking and lofting. No voguing this time, but really, I'm fine with that. Once the dancers get partners, you get some really strong modern choreography. All iterations of the partnering work is smart and efficient. So seek out some new music and more importantly, seek out some good dance--or just turn up some music really loud and dance around your living room.

Executive

You do realize that I started this, right?

Twirl it all around

February. Crap aught neener sure is flying by! We're 1/12 of the way through the year, and what do I have to show for it but date rape and AIDS jokes?

Seriously, though, besides the abysmal, ulcer-inducing economy, '09 has begun fairly well.

I've been keeping good on my New Year's resolution to lose 2 pounds a month. My New Year resolution for '08 was to go to the gym more than in '07. I accomplished that goal by mid-March and attendance subsequently dropped. Not to say that I didn't go to the gym at all for the rest of the year, but it was noticably less.

So this year the goal is more long-term and also very achievable. I'll keep you updated on my progress.

So what else with '09? Well, Tennille visited weekend before. She stayed at the adorable Hotel Max. We went to Seattle's only male strip club Centerfolds which is only two blocks from my house. It was a first for all three of us (Tennille, Phil, and myself). Completely strange experience. Tennille and I were the only ones there when the club opened at 8. Of course, Seattle is totally puritanical so there's no drinking, but we stepped out on a couple of occasions for beverages. Only one of the guys had a nice body. I bought Phil a lapdance from a guy with a ponch. It was sorta hot--but I wish I could have watched the lapdance a la Showgirls.

Saturday we checked out the Hopper exhibit at SAM. I was surprised at the size of his painting and also at his brushwork. His color palette is so soft that some of it looked like pastels. That night we checked out Gainsbourg on Greenwood. I liked the atmosphere and the small plates, plus they were projecting Mon Oncle on the wall behind us. Oh yeah, and the hallway back to the bathroom looks like the Black Lodge from Twin Peaks.

Sunday we went to trivia at Bill's Off-Broadway then followed it up with the Re-Bar. My stomach was completely a mess (probably from all the drinking) by the time we made it to the Re-Bar. The place was about half-full, nowhere near Flammable's heyday, but there were a few faces I recognized in the crowd. The place still manages to be the most un-pretentious dance/club night in town and that alone is reason to go.

So that's what I've been up to--oh and watching a shit-ton of movies.

Now that I've caught up on nearly all of the films from '08, I think I can say definitively, "Yawn." Slumdog Millionaire was nowhere near the top of my list. In fact, its creepy romanticization of the Mumbai ghetto puts it on par with Life is Beautiful for me. Add to that a lead that can't act and all you're really left with is some really nice cinematography and nice story structure. Milk was decent but not great. Some of the supporting characters, namely Emile Hirsch and Diego Luna were distracting. Add to that the melodramatic/operatic slaying at the end and one begins to feel manipulated. The Wrestler has to be one of the most boring affairs I've seen in a long time, again with just poorly cast and badly acted supporting characters in Marisa Tomei and Evan Rachel Wood. I realize its adapted from a novel, but to become such a formulaic film for the last hour sucked all life out of it--kind of like the title character serving beef at the deli counter. Revolutionary Road is an example of why a great book should never be put on film--filmmakers trying to include way too much of the novel and not finding the right cinematic references to convey the tone of the piece. And although I adored David Fincher's meticulous Zodiac, I really don't even have the time for The Bi-Curious Case of Ben Jammin' Butthole. Frost/Nixon and Doubt are both examples of why plays should not be turned into movies, but (and I can't believe I'm defending him even a shred) Ron Howard was more adept at translation from stage than John Patrick Shanley.

I was happy to see both Melissa Leo and Richard Jenkins nominated. Frozen River was such a peculiar little film and Leo in particular was spellbinding, but I really would have liked to have seen her acting partner in the film, Misty Upham get some recognition, as well. Jenkins in The Visitor brought a type of believability to his role that none of the other acting nominees could muster. Sure, the film overall was a bit on the melodramatic, Oxygen network, side of immigration morality, but like Leo, Jenkins grounded the work with his performance.

So now I should rail against The Dark Knight, but Jim Emerson has done a much more thorough job. My problems with it came mostly from its hole-riddlered(!?) plot and inconsistent tones and styles. It wasn't helped any by Christian Bale nor Heath Ledger, both of whom are so much more fixated on the minutiae of creating a character than the realities of delivering lines and progressing the plot and tension.

Ok, so that's my take on the mediocrity of this year--so what were the good films this year?

Not a lot--Let the Right One In, Synecdoche, New York, Burn After Reading, and Wild Combination were my favorites. If you haven't taken the time to see them, do so now.

Class dismissed.

Remix

Has anyone read that book by Lawrence Lessig? I was supposed to read it for work. The subtitle is Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy. He was on Colbert the other day and I Tivo'd it. Pretty soon I'm gonna Remix that interview and post it to my YouTube account. But something else happened--one of those synchronistic moments when the planets align and the disco lights of heaven shine down . . .
See, the other day Jimbo posted this funny jpg of Wilford Brimley with one of those motivational sayings, work poster-y borders around it with "Diabeetus" as the title and "Medicare can help" as the subtitle. Matthew and I, and I'm sure a lot of you, have chuckled multiple times at Mr. Brimley's pronunciation of the affliction.
So then, I was at home playing WoW (raiding 25-man Naxx tonight, y'all!) and watching Government Access (what? I can't enjoy a little local policy from time to time?) when lo and behold, the woman on television mispronounciated (read as: Buster Bluth) diabetes the Brimley way. Luckily, my Tivo loves me and sent the mispronunciation (read: correctly) to my computer and I quickly hacked it up and slowed it down.

Here are the results:


Be warned, there is a Wilford Brimley conspiracy.

The cats are trying to warn us.

P.S. If anyone did read that book, a report no more than 1500 words on my desk in the morning.

Moratorium '09

"It is what it is."
". . . at the end of the day."
". . . in this economy."
"Its a no-brainer."

For Phil

Please stand up

Apparently Frank Rich is just as disappointed in the Rick Warren's invovlement in Obama's innauguration as I am. [Op-ed piece]

Peeved

Chalk it up to me being me, but I really hate when people say "two thousand AND eight," instead of, "two thousand eight."
When someone says it, I want to ask them if they said "nineteen hundred AND ninety four" or "nineteen hundred ninety four?"

You're my double shadow

The long nights and cold weather has made me hunger for comfort food. First was the navy bean soup, then the Frito pie. I realize the latter may not be familiar to many of you. I have my youth in Texas to thank for acquiring that taste.

I think the psychological underpinnings of needing comfort come from learning how to share space with the guy I love. Phil moved in at the beginning of the month. Some of his stuff is still in boxes, but most of it unpacked. Half of the bedroom closet contains his clothes now. The laundry pile in the bedroom has (more than) doubled.

We need a bigger bed. Luckily (or unluckily) my graveyard schedule and his swing shift schedule means that he sleeps when I'm at work and vice versa. So its not a pressing matter . . . yet.

I need to say "our" more.

I want him to be comfortable, too.

The broader, social context of needing comfort comes from the residual Prop 8/Rick Waren madness that is nearly inescapable. In my 16 plus years of being an "out" gay man, it hasn't been until recently that I feel the societal ill-will toward my natural proclivities. The latest attack comes from the man that I helped elect to the presidency.

Last week the snow came and justified my agoraphobic tendencies. I had two extra days off work. This city does not handle snow well, which is fine because we only see it every few years.

I played lots of Warcraft. I looked outside to see if the snow was still falling (most of the time it was). We downloaded movies to Tivo. Movies we generally wouldn't watch, and definitely won't watch again.

Trivia:

What movie stars Academy Award winners Kathy Bates and Kevin Spacey, as well as Academy Award nominees Paul Giamatti and Miranda Richardson?

If you answered Fred Claus, pin a rose on your nose!

So that was one of the movies, along with the simply atrocious Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

So all this comfort has got me lazy. And all this being attacked has made me feel victimized.

Guess I'll just have to turn all this shit around in 2009. Who's up for being active and pro-active?

She wept here, she slept here

I swear I'll do a real post sometime soon. I was gonna write about the navy bean soup I made this weekend and about Thanksgiving and about Milk, but I'm not feelin' it.

So, in the meantime, young master Phil had never heard of Ann Jillian but was familiar with her turn as the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland. So, for a trip down memory lane, I give you two intros 80's sitcoms that sorta kinda made me queer(er).

People always ask me

What's the difference between wacking and voguing?
Now I can direct them to this video, which is accurate for both the music and fashion chosen to represent each style.



Oh, and I don't think I mentioned waaaay back in October that the documentary about Arthur Russell played at the Gay and Lesbian Film Festival. I wish I had gone to see it. It would have kept in the tradition of Godfather of Disco from the year prior. And, along with Mel Cheren, Morricone, Moroder, and others, Russell was a founder of some of the best music I've ever heard. Anyway, here's the trailer:


And as an added bonus, one of Russell's brilliant tracks.

Can't you just imagine a Mia Michaels routine to one of his songs?

It would probably look something like this:

Ding!

Ten levels in less than 7 days.
Eat that!

Add more pizazz to your face!

I realize that I have the sophistication of an eight year old, but this still cracks my shit up after multiple views.




And I don't know if you caught it, but Rodney King extinguished any doubt of the love homos have for their melanin enhanced brothers and sisters on this week's Celeb Rehab.

Fried

Yeah, posting's been a little sparse. I think the election really took a lot out of me. Of course I was excited at Obama's win, but the flipside of that was Proposition 8's passing in California. I took last Wednesday off of work and stayed up til six in the morning watching returns.

Keith Olberman just made an emotional plea regarding Prop 8. It is quite good and I recommend passing it along to anyone who maybe doesn't quite have a handle on the issue.


Obviously, I believe that if two people can enter into a civil contract called marriage, that that contract should not be predicated on the basis that the two parties are of the opposite sex.

Add to California's misstep Florida and Arizona's similar amendments. Then Arkansas' refusal to allow "unmarried cohabitating adults" to foster or adopt a child, and finally Kansas' repealing of Affirmative Action and all I see is white man's rage--oh and a lot of self-righteous Christianity.

So . . . I'm just waiting out these final days of the Bush administration.

I'm waiting for President Obama to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

I'm waiting for Supreme Court Justice Hillary Clinton to write a majority finding that states cannot write bigotry into their constitutions.


I'm waiting for . . . Wrath of the Lich King to be released on Thursday--when I'm playing my video game, I almost don't care that there is much work to be done.

You're my disco

To the guy I've been dating for the past two years (as of Sunday),

You're My Disco, baby.

One of my darkest secrets . . .

. . . is that when I come home from work, after I watch the previous evening's Daily Show and Colbert Report, I watch The View.





If you ask me about it in person, I will deny it.





But I had to say something, because today, Sherri Lewis (ok, I know that's not her real last name, but I can never remember her real last name) got into it with that dumb bitch Elisabeth Hasselhoff (ok, I also realize that is not her last name, but I like to imagine that her husband is the Hoff and not some football player).





So as I was watching them hiss and show their claws, I thought, "I would really just like to give that highstrung, uptight bitch a hit of ecstasy, hold her in my arms, stroke her hair, and extol the virtues of analingus to her."



Also, I would like to encourage the studio audience to begin booing Elisabeth.

In the year 2525

I'm too anxious about all this election crap. So in the meantime, please choose your favorite:

Visage v. Zager and Evans




See comments for my vote

No more sad times, only glad times

Well, another year of Decibel has come and gone. Saturday night was the highlight with Audion as a nice warm up to the unbelievably poundy, relentless assault of Carl Craig. He's been around for over 20 years and Saturday night, I learned why. He laid the smack down with a smattering of Detroit regulars like Derrick May and Plastikman. The crowd was attentive and, by the end of it all, moist.
The night ended with C2's killer remix of ultra-classic "Good Life" by Inner City.


I wish I could say that Sunday's show was as solid, but Supermayer, while raising the bar from ear-numbing opener Flying Lotus was only mediocre. Their set never really took off and they seemed more intent on branding a sound than on shaking the dancefloor. That's ok, though, leaving early gave me time to watch the newest episode of Mad Men when I got home. Plus, I was still recovering from the work over Carl Craig gave me.

Previously:

Decibel Festival '06
Decibel Festival '07