body break

- Disney World was awesome.

- I was skeptical about Batman Begins, and then I was as impressed as everyone else when it came out. The Dark Knight Returns looks as though it plans to deliver much of the action that fans of Nolan's treatment crave. Additionally, it looks as though the film follows an integral plotline from the graphic novel "The Dark Knight Returns", of the mob ("mutants") following a deranged criminal and taking over Gotham. I suppose Harvey Dent won't show up in this, and, disappointingly, there will be no showdown between Superman and Batman. Batman Begins did similarly in taking its basis in "Batman: Year One" But I doubt they'll doll Bale up in old man gear for this. That was part of Batman's bad-assed-ness in "The Dark Knight".

- I've finished Megan McCafferty's third in the Jessica Darling series, "Charmed Thirds". This is probably her weakest novel yet in structure, as only Jessica's breaks from school are covered by her journal. However, Jessica's blossoming into an adult felt threateningly close to the reality of being in a program you're not sure really suits you, living in a place you feel an odd sense of home-yet-not in, and the fragility yet ultimate strength of the relationships that matter. I didn't like it structurally, but I didn't like how honestly it portrayed that transitional period that I still feel ensnared it. It made me uncomfortable, and that isn't a bad thing.

I'd write more, but I don't feel up to it right now. Work is killing me right now; 7am mornings and 6pm finishes while sick are taking their toll. Luckily, there is a glimmering light in sight, and it looks awfully familiar....

Amanda

a neon light that split the night

For the past two and a half days, I have been sick. No, not merely mild sniffle with an achy throat sick, but full blown I-can't-stand-for-too-long-because-I-don't-have-the-energy sick. Not fun sick. As a result, I have watched more TV than I thought humanly possible over the past few days. Things I have realized:

-Friends plays at least once an hour. While this isn't great, as Friends was never a great show, it provides consistent entertainment: you know what you're getting in an episode of Friends. You'll get Ross being geeky, Phoebe being odd, Chandler being sarcastic, Rachel whining, Joey being dumb, and Monica being a neurotic headcase. And while their bit gets old after a while, at least every episode is DIFFERENT, from varying eras in the show's bloated run (which can be measured by the bloat on Matthew Perry's face).

-MTV can always be counted on for cheesy entertainment. I have watched so so much of Next and True Love (which I actually rather enjoy now), and even have started Newport Beach, which is the new Laguna Beach. I have to say, the main character is every bit as whiny as Lauren was, but she also has some serious daddy issues, which makes watching her attempts to win the boy she so desperately covets (the unfortunately named Clay) both pathetic and hilarious. Also, there needs to be more episodes made of My Super Sweet 16 so they don't have to show the same one all fucking week. Just saying.

-I have refallen in love with The O.C. This is not a new revelation, as MuchMusic has been airing the first season for 2 weeks now. However, rewatching just makes you realize how good it was before Seth became the focus of the show (and therefore the most annoying part), how awesome Anna really was, and even, gasp, how likeable Marissa was. Unfortunately, the latter fell to pieces after the T.J. episode, a mere 7 episodes in, so that has not withstood the test of time. Also unfortunate? Their clothes haven't withstood either. The colours seem pretty garish, but that might be Much's characteristic oversaturation or perhaps the cast members it is most noticeable on (Julie Cooper and Summer, most noteably) were intended to be garishly coloured from the start. Or perhaps that is just the warm sunny glow of California transcending the screen. Regardless, I enjoy that it plays every afternoon and evening (at 4pm and 7pm), so you can watch it serialized like Saved by the Bell from back in the day. And if you miss an episode, the 4pm one is a replay of the 7pm one from the night before! Awesome!

-The Rogers digital cable channels do very little for me. In fact, it gives me more shit to sift through, and all the shit is the same shit I've skipped over back in the 10s. I don't care if I can watch the same show on 5 different channels at the same time. I like time shifting, and I like specialty channels, but don't just become lazy fucks and give me the same shit repeated - it means more work for me, and I should be the only lazy fuck in this relationship, TV.

- I finally watched the first episode of Flight of the Conchords, and I have to say, I kind of loved it. So thank you to everyone who has been recommending it to me.

But really, having sick days just reminds me of how awesome tv was back in the good ole' days. Remember Sally Jesse Raphael? And the Price is Right when Bob Barker was still on? And when Jeopardy wasn't shown in the middle of the day because that is just sick?

I've just learned there's a film adaptation of Atonement coming out, which delights me greatly. I'll admit to very much liking both James McAvoy and Keira Knightley, and even that chick from Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights (who was terrible at an American accent but danced with both old leatherface Swayze and young hearthrob Diego Luna well). The fact that film adaptations generally do disservices to the books they emulate deters my heart naught, because I've come to the conclusion that anything starring that McAvoy boy is good in my eyes (and his track record is good), but also that the trailer is GREAT. No voiceovers, no plot giveaway, and a bit of naked Keira Knightley. It looks like it will be simply stunning, and I can't wait until December to see it. But you can watch the trailer here, if you'd like to see for yourself.

That's enough from me. I have blue Jello waiting for me upstairs, and with that, I have all.

Amanda

listen up

For the sake of my dear friend Meghan, I'll talk about what I've been listening to lately.

I'm loving Cookies by the 1990s. I believe the founders of this band are the other half of the band that produced Franz Ferdinand, and while Franz certainly has a great sound, it's a little too distinct and I think they've pigeonholed themselves. That is not 1990s issue - this is an all around fabulous rollicking summer album that I'm sure I'll be listening to for a long time.

I've also been talking up Kate Nash's Made of Bricks to anyone who will listen. She's reinvigorated my love for Regina Spektor, which comes not a moment too soon, as I'm going to her show in October. She sounds like Lily Allen and Spektor's hot love baby (and maybe the Pipettes were in on the love making), and sweet jesus, it's good. "Birds" was not at all indicative of the rest of this album, so if you've written her off as a folksy singer songwritery type, try the rest of the album. Also, would that NOT be a really hot... er... five-some?

The Kaiser Chiefs' latest, Yours Truly, Angry Mob, has also given me some happies lately. "Ruby" is simply a fantastic single, although the rest of the album sounds dissimilar. It's a decent album, a maturing sound for these guys, and it works in their favour. "The Angry Mob" and "Love's Not a Competition [But I'm Winning]" are good tracks.

Jakalope's "Feel It" is an incredibly hot song in a Sia sorta way, but it has to be listened to loudly. The rest of the album is eh - too Evanescencey for me

I'm still giving The New Pornographers' Challengers a listen, but I'm not super impressed as it stands. This could change upon a few more listens, but I don't feel they're doing much new. This is an album I need to sit down to listen to though, so we'll see; setting does much to influence perception.

Rooney's Calling the World is crap. I thought I'd include it simply because I feel so goddamn disappointed and I need to fucking rant about it. Rooney was by no means stellar, but it certainly ended up representing a very specific place in musical and teen culture history (remember how huge they got over the OC?), and it was great for what it was - breezy California pop with interesting characters lyrically. I will admit I may feel slightly warmer towards Rooney than most, but I think they were a fun band and I still love Rooney. That said, Calling the World is utter shit. I heard they had recorded this album 3 times before "nailing" it, and it shows. "When Did Your Heart Go Missing?" makes me SO ANGRY. Seriously. Look at this bit of the chorus:
When did your heart go missing?
I treat you like a princess
But your life is just one big mess
When did your heart go missing?
WHAT THE FUCK? THIS from the guys who once so brazenly spouted,
Hey digital
You're nothing but a bitch on strings
You'll be back milking cows before you cash the check
Well I'll just wait around till you fade away like the rest
and sang about fucking girls around callously. What happened, Robert? Why why why? You're Jason Schwartzman's BROTHER, man. You have Sophia Coppola as a cousin. It's surprising and disappointing that you could produce this big of a turd. I am sad. Also, your voice hasn't aged well. The sophomore curse makes me so sad.

Anyway, that's all I have to say for now.

Oh wait! I finished Stevie's present. I used the same pattern as the blue pithy hat and somehow got a completely different looking product. But trust me when I say it's awesome. Pictures to come. I'm getting much faster at this.

amanda

more words than I have ever heard

This is officially labeled "My Summer of Reading". And all it took was to finish my degree! Ha!

But seriously.

Saturday by Ian McEwan
The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde
Fun Home by Alison Bechdel
Clumsy by Jeffrey Brown
Sloppy Firsts by Megan McCafferty
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs by Chuck Klosterman
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

and I am halfway through both Beloved by Tony Morrison and god is not Great by Christopher Hitchens.

Okay, so I've finished 9 books in 15 weeks. Which doesn't actually seem all that impressive saying it aloud. But it is considering how much I've read comparatively the past 3 years. I used to read myself to bed every night, and all I could manage recently were magazines and the odd graphic novel. Finishing 9 books is probably more than I finished throughout my entire post-secondary academic career (including my Jasper Fforde phase). Thank you, English degree, for majorly trying to kill my love of reading.

But also, I have been reading awesome books. Which helps. Except Beloved. Man, I don't like admitting, but I hate that book. But I need to finish it, I need to defeat it. It doesn't help that it was given to me long ago by someone I don't like very much. But that also motivates me because I want to stick it to him and his awful book too.

And god is not Great is amazing. Just amazing. It's so inspiring to see a cohesively organized argument against religion. I'm tired of feeling like I am judged as being a less moral person because I don't believe in a bearded man up in the clouds. Because I can't accept mythology as fact. It seems as fucked to me as the Greek gods do to modern readers; entertaining, but factual? Less likely. And modern religions aren't even entertaining. I just hope I don't become a tortured Stephan Daedalus in the future for it.

Did I just liken my future plight to one of the Big Names? Why yes, yes I did. And that's why he's a Big Name.

I need to be doing something where I'm required to think for a living. Fuck you, manual labour.

But am I doomed to a cycle of love/hate? I really hope not.

amanda

open your eyes

So this is my most recent knitting project. This is that hat I wrestled with for a while (a pattern titled "Mary Jane's Pithy Hat" found here for the brave).

But I am generally pleased with how it turned out. I learned the purse stitch, and the knitting was a little tedious, but not boring.



My beginning of the summer project was a pair of red short shorts.

Yeah, they're that awesome. They also show off a lot more ass than I was expecting, so I'll eventually get around to knitting a band on the leg entrances.

A fun knit that taught me increasing and decreasing methods! Yay!

Also, for my mom's birthday, I made her a hella awesome flower arrangement. And yes, I took pictures. Suck it, naysayers.



On my days off, this is where I hang


My backyard. With Wicket.


so yeah. this is what my life looks like right now.
amanda

haaaaaaaaaave you met ted?

okay, this seems to always happen. I read my course notes for my EarthSci class the week before the exam, and am utterly delighted by them. Sometimes, this is because of the content, which can be pretty fascinating (or just make you feel infinitesimally small, but not in a bad way), but it is often because of my prof's lecture notes themselves. This is a guy who gets offended (so much so that he makees surre to put it in the course introduction) that people refer to Earth as "the Earth", as it is a proper name. I get it man. I feel your pain. As one who loves this great hodgepodge language of ours (a linguophile? an anglolinguophile? awesome), I am, by extention, one who loves the rules of language. So right on man. I've just experienced someonee getting feisty over people referring to Moon as "the Moon" (Moon is actually a satellite, just so you know).

But yeah. In this evening's readings, I have come across:
Several interviews with satellite hunters and top theorists reveal that the definition of a satellite is not clear and that there has been almost no discussion, professional or casual, about whether there should be any lower size limits set to separate real satellites from miniature imposters. And nobody is in a rush to do anything about it, apparently!
"Imposters"? And his sense of annoyance in the end? Brilliant!

Also:
However, in the next chapter we’ll be looking at Jupiter’s satellites, and their geology is awesome!


So yeah, it all boils down to the fact that I totally think my prof's excitement about this stuff is pretty adorable in an old-prof-who-retired-but-still-wanted-to-teach-this-stuff sorta way.

Luckily, my exams are this week. I'm kinda fucked for them, but when these courses are through, I have a feeling I won't be avoiding the computer nearly so much, so I'll be around more.

Oh, also, I strongly strongly urge you to watch "How I Met Your Mother". I find it endlessly entertaining, and it stars Jason Segel, Alyson Hannigan, Neil Patrick Harris (who is SO good), the stunning but unfortunately named Cobie Smuthers, and the pretty adorably awesome if not kinda pathetically romantic Josh Radnor (well, I'm sure he isn't, but his character, Ted Mosby is, but I still love him). And Bob Saget narrates! Who could ask for more? You just have to get over the fact that there is a laughtrack (boooo hisss), but this show is pretty much a staple of my evenings now.

More to come. I know I keep saying it. I'll be done with this tedious student life soon, and onto freed up time and focused creative efforts. Big things are coming friends, big things.

amanda

I'm well aware that it's been a while - practically a month, to be precise. So hey there, howdy if you still check this out.

I just saw Transformers. Anyone who has ever heard me bitch has heard me bitch about Michael Bay, so these kudos taste pretty salty. But they come well-deservedly, so whatever. THAT is what a summer blockbuster should be, rather than shitty sequels. I feel like I just came off the greatest rollercoaster in the world, and I don't even like rollercoasters. Yes, it was typical Michael Bay in that the camera moved too much, the shots were often too close, and half the time you couldn't tell what the fuck was going on, but it's a movie about fucking robots fighting in the street, so that didn't come as a surprise. Surprisingly, there was a lot of humour (which I think was Steven Spielberg's added touch, but I'm not griping). I was thoroughly entertained, and if Harry Potter is half as good as I've been hearing it is (and Ratatoulle as well for that matter), then my summer of blockbusters (well okay, Rat's not a blockbuster, but whateves) is golden.

And I've read Allison Bechdel's Fun Home, which was a great read (and a lovely gift :) ). It was obviously written by and for English majors, as the chapters tend to mimic (or at least excessively relate the text to) certain "biggies" (a chapter on Joyce's Ulysses, one on the myths of Icarus and Daedalus, one on the anti-hero). I didn't find it pretentious, but I think I was also the target audience, so who am I to judge (snobs do love snobbery). I felt the references were written for people familiar with the stories rather than to show off how widely-read the author is (and speaking as someone who adopts storylines, I know it can be unavoidable; I too am guilty of experiencing and interpreting my world through the narratives I read). So anyway, a lovely story about a father and daughter who are running at parallels. I highly recommend.

Also, today I was listening to Icky Thump (the single), and was overcome with how it reminds me of Allen Ginsberg's Howl. I don't want things to remind me of Howl. While I don't think Icky Thump is as disturbing, it expresses a similar sentiment, or perhaps I am just crazy for trying to read a guitar solo. Anyway, there is something profoundly sad about Icky Thump, but angry too - there is frustration, there is irritation, there is a squealing guitar and a rough, constant drumbeat. There is foreboding and threatening, but there is loneliness. And then I realized a different sadness: it's going to be impossible for me to find someone who can read the profound sadness inherent in a rock song guitar solo. Perhaps this is my descent into madness, but things seem to be becoming more clear.

Life becomes very isolating when you are within a certain intelligence bracket. I am generally modest, but fuck it: I know that I'm smart, or at least that I'm not stupid. I'm also well informed on a variety of subjects, and as such, like to philosophize on combinations perhaps unexpected (for example, finding similarities in Ginsberg's Howl and the recent White Stripes single). The difficulty in this is that I don't really have people around here to discuss these things with. I'm used to living in a university setting, where even though I was still surrounded by idiots, they were idiots with a certain amount of intelligence. Your average Western gal or guy still had to manage an 80% entrance average. That isn't to say I am completely surrounded by fools here - there are people who I work and live with who I can bounce some crazy ideas off of, and I'm appreciative of that. I've just realized this creeping sense of dread: this is it, guys. For the rest of our lives. There are more idiots than smart people out there, and this is where we operate.

But before I sound like a complete snob, which I know is a hole I've already dug, this is really just incited by worry. I know that I am of "the floating gender", as The Art of Seduction would put it. But beyond that, I like graphic novels AND knitting. I like country AND rap. I like Transformers AND The Bicycle Thief (actually, I don't really. But I have seen it, and I do think there are merits, but I'm not in the habit of saying I like things I don't just because it would make me seem more hipster cool, even though I just did, but I feel this parentheses remedies that). Anyway, I just can't help feeling like I'm too diverse. My interests seem varied and opposing. I think I'm a bit of an anomaly, and I rather like myself, but yeah, isolating. So while living here is clarifying in that I knowing who I am, and I like who I am, I don't like that I am who I am living where I am, which is in the big world, and not in the little university swimming pool where quirky girls are considered cute and not weird.

So this wasn't intended to be a tell-all about how I feel about me in the world, but fuck it. What's a blog for if not airing out insecurities.

Oh, also, photos WILL be coming soon, and I WILL get around to scanning in that comic. Eventually. I think I may try doing more of them, because I rather enjoyed it. Current knitting project is a hat, and it is causing me some mighty problems (I'm learning a new stitch called the purse stitch, which is damn near impossible to do because I have no idea which stitches I'm supposed to be stitching into what, or even what the finished stitch is supposed to look like, so if you can imagine that confusion, you can see why my knitting project is taking me forever (which is also because it's knit on these tiny needles, UGH)). I've also purchased a Boye Needle Master, which I know no one has ever heard of, but it's basically an interchangeable needle kit, and it makes me SO HAPPY. seriously. Knitting needles should not make a girl this happy, but my god, do they ever.

I have photos from Pride, but they're on a camera that has 8 photos left to be taken on it, and I'm not one to waste film. So something exciting will come along eventually, and I'll bring my glam cam, and when that happens, I'll develop the photos and post them - scout's honour.

I should probably go, now that you have a tidbit about what's going on. I am generally happy, which is good. I'll be happier once my summer courses are over, which isn't soon enough. I have one essay left to write of my university career - crazy amazing stuff. I can see finding the motivation to do it will be challenging. Later dudes, keep it chillin'.

amanda

PS. I am currently reading Toni Morrisson's Beloved, and it's not as creepy as I thought it'd be. Her prose reminds me of Atwood in that it's very poetic and non-linear, so it's been a rather enjoyable read, although disturbing. More after I finish.

PPS. oh, also I forgot to add that in my absence, I became an extra in a Tim Burton film! Not actually, i just got stitches. I sliced open my arm on the inside part of my elbow. While I was at the hospital, a nurse had the kindness to point out that the big gross mucus-yellow jelly thing was my exposed arm fat. YEAH I saw my own arm fat. I didn't even know elbows were fatty. Anyway, they're out now - my dad and I took them out on my kitchen table, which seems very homespun and sorta badass in a weird way ("Yeah, I cut out my own stitches"). My scar is killer; I'm using it as street cred. Or I've been telling people that it's where the government implanted a chip with super secret confidential information for safekeeping. You know how it is.

PPPS. http://ethanhaaswasright.com/
Just sayin'.