Grammar, Manderly

/something ornery this way comes

So I'm logging into the portal to write another lame-ass update for this blog o' mine, and I'm downloading a shit-ton of stuff on the side so my connection is a bit slow, giving me about 7 seconds to actually pay attention to the following text on the login screen:

The new version of Blogger now has all the original features you're used to, plus new post labels, drag-and-drop template editing, and privacy controls. And, it's a lot more reliable.

Raise your hand if you see something wrong with this... wait for it... and... --- oh wait, that's precisely it. HEY GOOGLE (ASSTARDS WHO JUST BOUGHT BLOGGER.COM), I THOUGHT YOU GUYS WERE SMART ENOUGH TO MAKE BILLIONS UPON BILLIONS OF DOLLARS AND A SWEET CORPORATE JUMBO JET. HOW ABOUT YOU FOOLS NOT START A SENTENCE WITH "AND [comma]", YOU BUNCH OF TURDS.


/blogger.com's copy editor

rEGARDLE OOPS regardless, I'm two sips shy of blazed on cheap sauvignon and typing away on a brand new laptop (God bless you Mr. Claus) having just rediscovered the joys of computing sans virii and doing a little research on a movie I just watched.

That movie is Rebecca.

Now, I've always had a thing for this story, and I can't say why exactly. Just call me a sucker for simplistic neo-Victorian claptrap. Handful of Dust? Word up. The Secret Garden? Hellasweet. Remains of the Day? Tears to my eyes. No surprise then, that a story that begins on the Cote d'Azure and ends with a stately home burning to the ground in Cornwall appeals to my personal aesthetic. I first had to read the novel for a teacher I hated in 8th grade, and it was only the night before the final test that I actually read 160 of the total 180 or so pages. To make a long paragraph shorter, I became totally immersed and it remains to this day one of my favorite novels of all time. There, I fucking said it.


/bu-ya

It was only five or six years later that I actually saw the 1940 cinematic adaptation of the story (which, incidentally, was Alfred Hitchcock's directorial debut) starring Lawrence Olivier and that most angelic and painfully demure of 40s starlets, Miss Joan Fontaine. This, friends and anonymous lurkers, is my embarrassing crush: a movie star from 1940. Yes, it's true... Joan Fontaine gives me fever.

For you, Joan:


Fast forward another (x - y) years, and I'm standing in the Martin Luther King Public Library in downtown DC, my new library card burning a hole in my wallet, prowling the AV department looking for something to watch. Lo and friggin' behold, I spy a recent remake of Rebecca sitting quietly on the shelf.

I check it out.

Turns out it's pretty damn good, in a long, drawn-out, BBC meets PBS in the 1970s and they have a kid that they home-school who ends up making this movie sort of way, and I recommend it highly if you're sitting alone at home with a cheap bottle of wine and you really should be tending to other more important things but you desperately need some sort of distraction to stave off the abyss of your pathetic life. The only issue for me is this: she-who-remains-nameless-throughout-the-story is now played in a different sort of way by a different sort of actress, who also happens to be friggin' stunning: Emilia Fox.

So it comes to this: Who will haunt my dreams of fancy cigarette holders, falconing, and oppressing the working class?


old and busted

vs.


new hotness

You saw the word "ennui" in the title but you read on anyway, people.

fun with embedding

does this work?



EDIT: SWEETNESS. STAY TUNED FOR NACHTMUSIK. oh yeah and this track is called "Throw me corn"

Better than Winchester

HEAVENS TO BETSY, I JUST LISTENED TO THE NEW CLINIC ALBUM AND IT IS OUTSTANDING.


/belated thanks to Peter for bringing this to my attention

Ramblin'

The past month has been, in a word, super.


/[insert philip glass score here]

Immediately prior to Thanksgiving I embarked upon a tour of graduate schools in the Northeast. I learned a great many things on this trip, chiefly that modernist architecture of the 60s was a sham and that schools with boucoup endowment should think twice before running with the style of the times. I imagine the Cold War was the main impetus for throwing money at International Policy programs; perhaps that in itself explains the tragic lack of imagination manifested in the design of the facilities.


/wtf, Wilson?



/wtf, SIPA?




/wtf, Kennedy?


/wtf, Fletcher?!

Shitty architecture notwithstanding, I learned a lot about potential futures. Moreover it was sublimely relaxing to spend 10 hours listening to music while riding Amtrak, and more importantly, I was able to spend time with sundry Grade-A people, some new, some old, some of whom I hadn't seen in a long, long, long time.

I also got to experience the magic that is Hoboken, NJ.


/"oh a song by the fire, pass the pipe, pass the bowl"


/and feel the wheels a'rumblin 'neath the floor


/I saw the lights fading out


/leavin' Boston, however, a real pain in the ass

Then came Thanksgiving. Warmly predictable, tranquil, refreshing.


/extra gravy

I painted a fence green and was taught the rules of the "Anal Car" game, which is nothing more than the word "Anal" followed by any model of car, thus: Anal explorer, anal odyssey, anal escape, anal fiesta, anal ram, etc. Juvenile, sure, but undeniably fun on long car trips. John you anal voyager.


/pre-game

A bitchin' Christmas party, another week, and by the grace of God another surprise jaunt, this time via fucking Learjet, back to New York, where I was called "Santa", ate some delicious sausage, and saw Lou Dobbs in person, all within a two-hour span. Fog in Richmond led to an unplanned overnight layover in New Jersey, and now here I am.


/dad, pensive



That's it and that's all. I feel beat.


hoo-ha!

Can't be bothered

Stay tuned!



In the meantime, here's some advice.