Overhead

A rather scathing variation on an old game show format.

This clip is fun on a couple of levels. Most obviously, of course, there's a glimpse at John Belushi before anyone outside of the Chicago comedy scene knew who he was.

Also improv theatre, even a very prominent one, has somewhat limited resources, and it's interesting to see how they'll stretch them out. Putting Joe Flaherty in an old-time peanut vendor outfit, for example.

In the affirmative

Asserting yourself, I guess, comes more naturally to some people than others. Some of us have to work at it.

A problem for me is that I have in my mind an idea of what actions are fair and reasonable, and on some level I believe that this is what people actually will do. Which can result in getting caught flat-footed at what people actually do.

Anyway, like I said, it's something to work on.

Super anxiety

Currently the big story at the movies is Avengers: Endgame. I'm assuming for the time being that it's well-made, if not quite what I'm into right now. These flicks do seem to be made by people who know what they're doing. Robert Downey Jr. knows he's found a good thing playing Iron Man.

But there's something jittery about the hype. There's a huge amount of money at play here. And blockbusters take time, too. That's a huge quantitative difference in regards to the source material. Mainstream comics have gravitated to much longer stories in my lifetime, but they still come out pretty quickly. The bottom line is that if you read an Avengers comic and it doesn't strike your fancy, there's another coming out next month you might like better, and will only cost a few bucks. That's not true of an Avengers movie, where if it falls flat for you, well, that's that.

What this means for how this period of film making will be remembered is an open question.

The quiet storm, my friends

Today I spent some time waiting for the bus. In one spot where I was waiting is a cherry tree. So today I was at this bus stop and the cherry tree was in bloom. Blossoms out, petals raining down, floating in the breeze. Automatic mood lifter. Not sure which sense makes it so. Maybe it's a team effort between the sense.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Started thinking about sleepwalking. No, not as a career. But the phenomenon. The potential to be disoriented when you wake up in a place you don't remember being before.

I've had hypnagogic episodes. Which is to say, there have been times when I've had and remembered states between wakefulness and full sleep. But I'm pretty sure I've never gotten up and walked around while sleeping. A friend and old roommate of mine might have. There's at least one story from when he was married the first time. Probably not a frequent somnambulist, though.

At least one young lady has posted a video of herself getting up and sleepwalking in the middle of the night. Or so she says. I can't quite tell if it's legit.

Rainy season

It's raining out, hard enough and thick enough to notice. Not a total surprise, as there were hints throughout the day. I guess you could say I'm lucky to be indoors. And yes, I wouldn't relish being out in it all that long.

On the other hand, I also feel fortunate to be hearing it. Rain is good. It refreshes and renews. And it's an outer expression of something within us too. Water, of which we are three fifths? Melancholy? Maybe both.

A note on Notes on "Camp"

I'd heard of Susan Sontag, but mainly as a name that was dropped at cocktail parties in Woody Allen movies. Or something like that. But due to one thing and another I got curious and read her book Against Interpretation. So now I have a frame of reference for what those swells in the Woody movies were talking about.

That sounds dismissive, but I don't mean to be. Some of her ideas resonate with me more than others. Her Notes on "Camp" is pretty vivid, perhaps because by her own account she's not entirely for or against the quality of camp.

For myself, I plead the goal of self-edification, and a goad of a sharp conflict in my own sensibility. I am strongly drawn to Camp, and almost as strongly offended by it. That is why I want to talk about it, and why I can.

Whether camp, the quality of "too much" means the same thing now as it did then is questionable, but it still means something. Which is something.

A honking good time

Today in a parking lot. The parking lot of an outdoor mall that houses an Aldi's and a couple of furniture outlets, among other things, I saw a sight. Two geese, not flying, just bopping along. There was enough of a size discrepancy to make me think it was a gander and a goose. But they're big birds, overall.

No pictures. My phone does have a camera, but not necessarily a good one. Anyway, I'm not into taking indifferent snapshots of everything that happens around me. Also, I've heard geese can be volatile and I don't want to piss them off.

Kinda cool, though.

Witchery

Master and Margarita /demo from Katariina Lillqvist on Vimeo.

I actually read The Master and Margarita sometime in the past few years. Would have a hard time summarizing the plot, but an interesting aspect of it was the presentation of the Devil as a somewhat sympathetic but in no way trustworthy actor.

This short animated film does have an eerie feeling of magic realism that suits the source material. Little things like the alarm clocks look great.

Stricken

I set out this afternoon towards the Stop & Shop near the post office, intending to grab just a couple of things. What I hadn't heard about, because it had literally just happened, was this. Well, I have no great desire to undercut the strikers, so I wound up buying those things later at CVS.

Of course I'd also hoped to pop into the S&S bathroom and take a whiz, so you can imagine my relief upon getting home.

Forward March April

Caught the Brown University marching band today. Maybe not their main marching band? Like these were goofy hipsters (and I mean that as a compliment) and I'm not sure they're the ones who play at football games. Their repertoire was what you could call eclectic. Notable numbers included "Rock Lobster", The Jacksons' "I Want You Back" and "Livin' on a Prayer". I thought their version of the song below was quite nice.

woof

I no longer have a neighbor with a cat. That I know of. The young lady who kept the black cat has moved out of the building, although not far from what I understand.

What I do have now is a neighbor dog. The guys who live upstairs have...I'll say a German shepherd. Maybe not pure German―and boy is that a historically loaded phrase!―but has most of the traits. She barks a fair bit. When I see her in the halls she goes off her head and the neighbor shushes her. It's all good. I know the difference between excited barking and aggressive barking. In people, too.

Flying off the handle

Today I went out. On the way to going out I tried using the door to/from my apartment building. Kind of a glitch there, because when I grabbed it and turned it the inner part...Well, it didn't fall off, but something inside the knob had been detached so that when I pulled, it stretched but the door didn't move. After a few tries I remembered the other entrance. Not that it took much remembering, since it was in my line of sight. Anyway, when I came home, the doorknob had been replaced.

So, you got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, I guess.

Hugh know

I don't know who made the artwork above. I do like it a lot, though, so I'll see if I can find out. Offhand I'd say the subtle use of diagonal lines gives it a certain dynamism.

The song below is best known for being a Tom Jones vocal piece, of course. Masekela's trumpet version is really something else.

With forgotten languages

History is messy. European history no less so. Even, or especially, in what could be called ancient times or antiquity. Groups that have now been considered the norm for centuries or millennia might be considered invaders, or ripe for plucking. At turns dismissed, vilified, and romanticized. A pattern that would be repeated elsewhere in the world.

Reading and looking at the museum exhibit companion Ancient Gold: The Wealth of the Thracians shows an example. The Thracians lived in Eastern Europe, their turf overlapping with much of modern day Bulgaria. Herodotus characterized them as single-minded cruel warriors. There was probably some measure of propaganda to this, although they do seem to have been a martial society. A belief in divine right of kings is still ascribed to them.

On the romantic side, the tragic mythical musician and poet Orpheus is said to have been from Thrace. Possibly tied into this is evidence of shamanic ritual.

Difficulty in saying anything more definitive results from the fact that there's very little written record from their societies. The Thracians didn't have their own alphabet, or at least none that was widely known. The few fragments of their language that have survived are in the Greek alphabet. Eventually the Greek language itself took over.

This was the time in history when Greece and Rome were ascendant. That's a good thing in a lot of ways. Their legacy includes equality before the law and at least some form of democracy. It's a shame some peoples were destined to be forgotten, though.