I stand up straight and tall

Recently I've discovered isometric exercises. The purpose of them is, I guess, to build strength by using muscles against each other. Mainly for me it's a way to jumpstart creative thinking. Or sometimes just to stay awake when I need to be.

Of oourse bullies aren't so quick to kick sand in my face either. This is partly because I have the look of a world-weary loner who has nothing left to lose. And partly because the beaches are closed.

Anyway, using that particular header, it would be a cheat not to show the song as well.



Rock and roll.

Minimalist blog post

I've been thinking.

Down in front

Not sure what's going on, exactly, but the chicken and the snake/earthworm thing are really gettin' down.

Wow. I just thought that should be shared.

FoggyFriday Random Ten

Ro be clear (arf arf) it was I and not the weather that was foggy on Friday (yesterday). To the point where I put the header up and then wandered off, eventually going to sleep without filling in the list. Well, I was a little Nyquilized. Anyway, the songs are from stuff I heard yesterday.

1. Chic--Dance, Dance, Dance (Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah)
2. Yo La Tengo--When It's Dark
3. Nancy Wilson--But Beautiful
4. Beck--Emergency Exit
5. D'Oyly Carte Opera Chorus--On a Tree by a River a Little Tom Tit*
6. The Go Go's--This Town
7. David Bowie--Time
8. Todd Rundgren--Some Folks Is Even Whiter Than Me
9. The Knife--From Off to On
10. Stan Kenton and His Orchestra--Ecuador

* From The Mikado, natch.

Alimentary, my dear Watson

I... What can I even say?

Unless the trailer is badly representing the movie--something that admittedly does happen--this is a horrible mistake for everyone involved.

Rough Victorian sex? A [BEEBEEP} Roadrunner dive out the fifth story window? Really?

In isolation, Robert Downey would seem a good choice for Holmes. Brooding, intelligent, a bit aristocratic. Hell, if he wanted to play the great detective as one of his patented troubled drug addicts, Doyle gave him cover.

But this doesn't look like Sherlock Holmes. It looks like Eddie Murphy's Axel Foley soaked in bleach and stuffed with a flimsy English accent. I'm not sure why it's not called "The Playboy Action Figure." It would probably sell.

Doen these trippy streets

Reading Jedediah Berry's The Manual of Detection was so enjoyable that it behooves me to talk about it. It also makes me envious that Berry wrote this before anyone else did. Hero Charles Unwin is a sheltered clerk who edits the cases of a two-fisted detective into proper form for the archives. He gets an unwanted promotion to detective himself when (palindrome alert) Travis T Sivart goes missing. Beyond that I don't want to say much.

But the telling of this story is informed by dreams and fairy tales. It's appropriate that the speakeasy where Unwin must trawl for clues is called the Cat and Tonic. (Say it aloud.) There are a lot of influences at play here: German expressionism, film noir, Calvino. Sort of like if Thomas Ligotti scripted The Big Sleep, although that only takes you so far. But really the important thing is how the elements are jumbled as if by an unconscious mind.

What the New Yorker reviewer was thinking I don't know. A 9/11 allegory? Berry may well have been influenced by living through the War on Terror and the PATRIOT act. But reducing it to simple political allegory takes you far away from what Berry is doing. I mean, find a new buzzword already.

Hey! Fever! and the Friaday Random Ten

Yes, it's that time of year when all the crazy stuff is floating around on the breeze. Think I have my own allergies medicated into abeyance now. Which is probably a relief to my neighbors. Lordy, who did I wake up last night.

Anyway, the music.

1. Sun Ra--Of Sounds and Something Else
2. Chic--Just Out of Reach
3. The Fiery Furnaces--Even in the Rain
4. Stone Temple Pilots--Bi-Polar Bear
5. Little Richard--Baby
6. XTC--Travels in Nihilon
7. The Who--A Quick One, While He's Away
8. Grizzly Bear--While You Wait for the Others
9. The Kinks--Berkeley Mews
10. Ladytron--Flicking Your Switch