Wow--I made it at the last minute! Had I not posted today, then the entire month of February would have gone blogless. So sad. When you combine that with no Out of the Game podcasts in months, it would appear that I have gone dark on you people. However, if you do feel that way, then I submit that you haven't been paying attention! Because I have been very busy and prolific, albeit elsewhere than my usual haunts, like this here home of mine on the Internet.
I know that none of us, including me, particularly like blog posts apologizing for not blogging, so, I'm not doing that. However, some acknowledgment is still in order. Why? Because I need to confront a weird demon: For the last few weeks, I've had an outright *aversion* to this page. When I accidentally clicked on it a couple times, I immediately navigated away rather than have to look at it. Baffling. Upon analyzing the situation, though, I realize that while this may have been partly a matter of guilt--my standard emotional response--it, in fact, was maybe more a matter of being stretched too thin lately.
Forget Twitter. That's not the issue. The issue is more that I've been trying to step up my efforts lately in blogging at my workplace, ea.com, as well as spending a lot of my time when not blogging sitting in meetings, composing emails, talking to folks ABOUT issues around blogging, social media, etcetcetc. I spoke at a conference about it a little while ago, and I have two more speaking engagements coming up at PAX East in Boston in a few weeks. The point is: I've been a bit tapped out. While I had been kind of informally blogging here on the weekends, over the last few weekends, I have felt the need to tune out entirely. Just: not write. And not be online much.
This was the third weekend in a row--it's now Sunday evening at 5--in which my time was mostly divided between reading (right now I'm plowing thru Kurt Eichenwald's The Informant, an awesome account of the 1990's ADM price-fixing scandal, which then became last year's movie w/Matt Damon...), playing Dragon Age on the PC, and watching movies, both with the family and on my own on Netflix Watch Instantly. In short, I've been hibernating.
Anyway, there's a lot of shtuff I could yabber on about here--like my recent 12 pound weight loss--but instead, before it gets completely out of hand, I will attempt to catch up, somewhat, on my Year of Film mission, which I am hopelessly behind on documenting. In fact, I know I can't date stamp it anymore, which kinda blows in terms of anality. And I know I'm going to forget a couple here and there. And the writeups are going to be perfunctory. But still. THE HISTORY MUST BE RECORDED.
In no order than what pops into my head, here's what I've seen since last we met:
Harlan County USA - An absolutely riveting documentary on the 1973 coal miner's strike in Kentucky. Maybe one of the best documentaries I've ever seen. And if the topic sounds "boring" to you, I guarantee you it is as suspenseful as any fictional thriller, right down to having one of the creepiest "bad guys" in film history. (You'll know him when you see him--he actually pulls a gun on the filmmaker--a woman.)
Big Fan Not what I expected--but not bad. I was thinking it'd be more funny than sad, since it stars stand-up comic Patton Oswalt and was written/directed by a guy from The Onion, but this story of a grown-up obsessed with the New York Giants, who then gets beaten up by one of the guys on the team, is kinda heavy--reminding me of Frederick Exley's great hilariously pathetic memoir, A Fan's Notes.
Brick -- Very very clever mashup of detective/film noir style/dialog within the confines of a high school story. All the kids sound like they walked right out of a Philip Marlowe novel. I liked it, but didn't fall in love with it like some folks. It never moved beyond feeling more like a stunt than anything else, really. Still, some scenes are just terrific. Like the hardboiled "tough guys" all sitting around the kitchen table, while mom serves them food. Worth seeing on novelty value alone.
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room - No-nonsense but thorough and devastating account of the Enron scandal. If you need more reason to hate on wealthy, white corporate execs getting rich of the suffering of others, here's your movie. By the time it ends, you're ready to fry these guys alive. Or dead, in Ken Lay's case.
Crips and Bloods: Made in America - Another documentary, though I was a bit more "meh" on this one, which surprised me, being an LA native. The movie does a good job of tracing the social conditions/racism/economic realities that led to the rise of the gang culture in LA, and the early footage/info on the earliest gangs is interesting stuff. However, I was disappointed that the movie didn't really get much into the rivalry of the two gangs, which itself is so tragic and pointless--and the movie does get a bit bogged down in endlessly repeating the "it's not their fault, they were born into it" mantra. (True or not, it just makes the film feel more defensive than anything else.) Still, some pretty cool archival footage if ya like that kind of thing.
Cool Hand Luke And now for something completely different. My god, what an awesome movie. At the end of it, it led me to tweet, "What happened to all the 'man's man' movies?" Because, seriously, they don't make them like this anymore. Just a great, balls-out adventure story, with beautiful performances by he-men Paul Newman and George Kennedy, as fellow lowlifes on a chain gang, along with great turns by Harry Dean Stanton and Strother Martin and others. Just one classic scene after another, with a great musical score and that now-gone 60s undercurrent of "fuck The Man" anti-establishment vibe that Hollywood was in love with at the time. (The heroes are the crooks on the chain gang; the bad guys are those in authority. See also: Bonnie and Clyde,, Easy Rider, and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, to which this really has a lot in common..) Overall, though, it's just fantastically entertaining--a suspenseful, funny, poignant, action-filled adult drama that seems impossible to imagine being made today.
A Serious Man - Took me awhile to get to the latest Coen Brothers movie, but OMIGOD, what was I waiting for? Goes way high up on the list for me, along with Big Lebowski (of course), Miller's Crossing, and Fargo. I don't think you had to grow up as a Jew in the 60s to appreciate it, but it sure didn't hurt. As usual for the Coen Bros, the film *looked* beautiful, and every bit of casting, down to the smallest part--like the beleaguered faculty member always leaning in Larry's doorway, and, best of all, the insidious "friend" Sy--was inspired genius. Probably my favorite movie of the year now, after The Hurt Locker.
Speaking of which, I finally saw Avatar--and hey, I didn't hate it! Sorry, I know that in the Geek World I was supposed to see this on opening day and love it, but I could never get past the feeling that it was more tech demo than movie. The fact that most people who saw it early defended it by saying, "well, yeah, sure, the story sucks, but it LOOKS amazing!" only really confirmed that for me. If the story sucks---why do I want to see it exactly? But, hey, I finally succumbed, and did it full on--IMAX 3D--and, yes, it is quite the amazing spectacle. As an amazing spectacle, I was thoroughly entertained. Just like I am when I go on Disneyland rides. And just like on those rides, I know that I'm being manipulated, that it's all technology--but it's manipulation and technology in the service of mass entertainment, and, ya know, I'm okay with that. Truly, it was a marvel to look at. I was never bored. I knew exactly where the story was going and how it would end the entire time, and yet I didn't really care. For the time I was in the theater, I was glad I was there. Will I ever see it again? No. Do I think it will hold up in years to come on a TV screen? No. But as An Event, I was happy to take part in it. And when it wins Best Picture, I still won't think it deserves it, but I'll understand more why it did, and won't begrudge it.
And, to catch me up to last night, the only movie on this list actually watched with my daughter: Hamlet, the 1990 version with Mel Gibson, Glenn Close, and Helena Bonham Carter, cuz the kid is studying the play in school, and, hey, Gibson actually doesn't embarrass himself! Zeffereli doesn't do anything radical with the play, but it's a fine mainstream interpretation, and Gibson handles the soliloquies really nicely. I never did like the Olivier version, just because it's so freakin' reductive of Shakespeare's text ("this is the story of a man who can't make up his mind"= ORLY?), and so was glad we saw this one. Others have since pointed out to me the more complete and faithful Branagh version, as well as the recent BBC one with Patrick Stewart, so, duly noted. It's just too bad Kurosawa never tackled this one, though, because both Throne of Blood and Ran are two of my favorite Shakespeare movies ever. Just think of Toshiru Mifune as Hamlet, with samurai swords! It'd be a better world today if that had happened.
Okay, so we're mostly caught up now. Unless I forgot something. I'll think on it.
And this starts and concludes my blogging for February.
Bring on March!
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010
Tomato On a Stick
One of the most off-putting questions I ever get as a dad is when someone, upon seeing my daughter, says to me, "Where did she get her red hair?" The question in and of itself is a fair one, and not off-putting at all, on the face of it. But to me it is, personally, because, as long as I've been alive, I have always identified myself as a redhead. So every time I hear the question, part of me can't understand where it's coming from. Until I look in the mirror, and am reminded that the current reality no longer matches what my brain perceives as "the truth."
Hair color is on my mind today for two reasons: One because I just finished Malcolm Gladwell's great essay in What the Dog Saw called "True Colors," which discusses the changing Madison Avenue slogans of women's hair color products as reflective of and contributing to the attitudes and psyches of 20th century women (from "does she or doesn't she?" to "because I'm worth it"). The other reason is because my kid, the flaming redhead, had a bunch of her friends over for a study group today, and three out of five of them were also redheads, which, given the statistics, is just kinda crazy.
But what's on my mind in particular is my own hair color, and how it has changed, and changed my own psyche, over the course of my 40+ years. Because when you have flaming red hair, as I did all the way up until my early 20s, when it mysteriously started to turn brown, it is an identifier (some might call it a stigma, others might call it a blessing) that you are stuck with, that defines, to some extent, who you are. I had the added fun, too, of having a last name that was also a color, so "Red Green" or "Jeff Red" and so on was my particular stoopid cross to bear.
Though I recall getting compliments on it from adult females at the time ("Oh my god I'd pay to have hair that color!"), that didn't really do much to appease my young and adolescent self when all I really wanted to do was fit in and not feel like a freak. I imagine it is probably worse for redheaded boys than girls. Or it was, anyway. I get the feeling now, in the more enlightened 21st century, where kids have all sorts of ever-changing hair color, that maybe it doesn't matter as much now. Or at least here in Berkeley it doesn't. All I know is at the time I hated it. It didn't help, either that I grew up in Los Angeles, where the pale skin that goes with the red hair further separated me from the Tan and Beautiful. "A tomato on a stick" is one of my asshole adolescent "friends" called me at the time--referring to my red hair on my rail-thin body. And the thing is that, whether positive or negative, you hear about it all the time. Daily. It's the way people identify you.
See what I'm talkin' about? This guy is a REDHEAD.
It was only as it started to go away, of course, that I finally began to appreciate it. Even before I had my kid, when I was 32, it had long been turning brown, and so when folks would see my driver's license, which said "red" under hair, or heard me refer to myself as a redhead, they would look oddly at me, or question it to my face. But of course I was a redhead, I'd reply. That was who I was. And when that point was disputed, I realized that I was actually bummed by the new truth. I dunno if it was Stockholm Syndrome or what, but after actually being a redhead for so long, I really didn't want to be anything else. I'd grown into it. I think I actually didn't change the "red" to "brown" on my driver's license until about 8 years ago---right about the time that it really, maybe, should have started to say "grey," simply because I didn't want to believe I wasn't a redhead anymore. Both my dad and my grandmother and my first cousin and now my daughter: all redheads. Redheads in the media and popular fiction, like Ron Weasley: my brethren. This was the club I belonged to. And I wanted it to stay that way.
The brown hair I never really enjoyed too much. It was what it was, to use the past tense of a phrase I hate. Now I'm in a whole different ballgame. Happily, though, I'm already over denying the gray. Hey, it is what it is. I'll admit that it bugged the crap out of me at first, of course, but my period of denial was much shorter this time around. It didn't help that the signals were coming in stronger: The number of times I was being called "sir" multiplied exponentially. I somehow found myself cruising past lines--like airport security lines--that used to seem to take longer. I was in the old white male club! Just like in that classic Eddie Murphy sketch! The turning point, at least in terms of my own denial/awareness, came back at 1up.com, when my friend Dana, after returning from a trip with the 1up gang to the sports bar outside our office, said that the bartender had said to her, "Where's the silver-haired guy who's usually with you guys?" I took it badly at first. "Silver haired guy? Huh?"
But still. Could be worse, right? There's the whole "bald" thing, which, knock on wood, looks like I'm likely to avoid (not that there'd be anything wrong with that). My hair is bozoid thick. Second, if one has to go gray, there are worse ways for it to happen then getting these "wings" I have sprouted. I mean, who doesn't mind looking like these guys:
I get asked all the time now if I'm going to dye my hair. Almost every time I get my hair cut I get asked. But the answer is always the same for me: Why? Who would I be kidding? Anyone who already knows me would know what I did, so that'd just be embarrassing. And anyone who doesn't know me, well, who cares? What do I care what they think? And what would they think, anyway--if they thought about it at all, which is unlikely since they have their own lives to lead and probably aren't wasting a whole lot of brainpower on me, no matter how solipsistic I want to be? "There goes a gray-haired guy!" Well...so what?
That's what I am now. I'm a gray-haired guy. Just like I was a redhead before. Only this time, decades later, I'm going to embrace the hand (or head) I've been dealt. If it's good enough for Paulie Walnuts, it's good enough for me.
Bada Bing!
Hair color is on my mind today for two reasons: One because I just finished Malcolm Gladwell's great essay in What the Dog Saw called "True Colors," which discusses the changing Madison Avenue slogans of women's hair color products as reflective of and contributing to the attitudes and psyches of 20th century women (from "does she or doesn't she?" to "because I'm worth it"). The other reason is because my kid, the flaming redhead, had a bunch of her friends over for a study group today, and three out of five of them were also redheads, which, given the statistics, is just kinda crazy.
But what's on my mind in particular is my own hair color, and how it has changed, and changed my own psyche, over the course of my 40+ years. Because when you have flaming red hair, as I did all the way up until my early 20s, when it mysteriously started to turn brown, it is an identifier (some might call it a stigma, others might call it a blessing) that you are stuck with, that defines, to some extent, who you are. I had the added fun, too, of having a last name that was also a color, so "Red Green" or "Jeff Red" and so on was my particular stoopid cross to bear.
Though I recall getting compliments on it from adult females at the time ("Oh my god I'd pay to have hair that color!"), that didn't really do much to appease my young and adolescent self when all I really wanted to do was fit in and not feel like a freak. I imagine it is probably worse for redheaded boys than girls. Or it was, anyway. I get the feeling now, in the more enlightened 21st century, where kids have all sorts of ever-changing hair color, that maybe it doesn't matter as much now. Or at least here in Berkeley it doesn't. All I know is at the time I hated it. It didn't help, either that I grew up in Los Angeles, where the pale skin that goes with the red hair further separated me from the Tan and Beautiful. "A tomato on a stick" is one of my asshole adolescent "friends" called me at the time--referring to my red hair on my rail-thin body. And the thing is that, whether positive or negative, you hear about it all the time. Daily. It's the way people identify you.
See what I'm talkin' about? This guy is a REDHEAD.
It was only as it started to go away, of course, that I finally began to appreciate it. Even before I had my kid, when I was 32, it had long been turning brown, and so when folks would see my driver's license, which said "red" under hair, or heard me refer to myself as a redhead, they would look oddly at me, or question it to my face. But of course I was a redhead, I'd reply. That was who I was. And when that point was disputed, I realized that I was actually bummed by the new truth. I dunno if it was Stockholm Syndrome or what, but after actually being a redhead for so long, I really didn't want to be anything else. I'd grown into it. I think I actually didn't change the "red" to "brown" on my driver's license until about 8 years ago---right about the time that it really, maybe, should have started to say "grey," simply because I didn't want to believe I wasn't a redhead anymore. Both my dad and my grandmother and my first cousin and now my daughter: all redheads. Redheads in the media and popular fiction, like Ron Weasley: my brethren. This was the club I belonged to. And I wanted it to stay that way.
The brown hair I never really enjoyed too much. It was what it was, to use the past tense of a phrase I hate. Now I'm in a whole different ballgame. Happily, though, I'm already over denying the gray. Hey, it is what it is. I'll admit that it bugged the crap out of me at first, of course, but my period of denial was much shorter this time around. It didn't help that the signals were coming in stronger: The number of times I was being called "sir" multiplied exponentially. I somehow found myself cruising past lines--like airport security lines--that used to seem to take longer. I was in the old white male club! Just like in that classic Eddie Murphy sketch! The turning point, at least in terms of my own denial/awareness, came back at 1up.com, when my friend Dana, after returning from a trip with the 1up gang to the sports bar outside our office, said that the bartender had said to her, "Where's the silver-haired guy who's usually with you guys?" I took it badly at first. "Silver haired guy? Huh?"
But still. Could be worse, right? There's the whole "bald" thing, which, knock on wood, looks like I'm likely to avoid (not that there'd be anything wrong with that). My hair is bozoid thick. Second, if one has to go gray, there are worse ways for it to happen then getting these "wings" I have sprouted. I mean, who doesn't mind looking like these guys:
I get asked all the time now if I'm going to dye my hair. Almost every time I get my hair cut I get asked. But the answer is always the same for me: Why? Who would I be kidding? Anyone who already knows me would know what I did, so that'd just be embarrassing. And anyone who doesn't know me, well, who cares? What do I care what they think? And what would they think, anyway--if they thought about it at all, which is unlikely since they have their own lives to lead and probably aren't wasting a whole lot of brainpower on me, no matter how solipsistic I want to be? "There goes a gray-haired guy!" Well...so what?
That's what I am now. I'm a gray-haired guy. Just like I was a redhead before. Only this time, decades later, I'm going to embrace the hand (or head) I've been dealt. If it's good enough for Paulie Walnuts, it's good enough for me.
Bada Bing!
Sunday, January 10, 2010
2010: The Year of Film
One of the many things I'm grateful to my parents for is a love of and appreciation for movies, which they instilled in me early on. Now I know everyone loves movies, so it's not like some big secret club they invited me to, but, still, what I'm grateful for is that they had good taste, and made sure that I saw not just the obvious popular crap, which, for reasons all its own, I *also* enjoy. I can slum as well as anyone, most of the time, and have a great time doing it. (However, I'm still trying to muster up the energy and conviction to go see Avatar, only because so many people have said, "the effects are amazing but the story is shit" to make me feel that I'm going to a tech demo rather than a movie. And ya know, I kinda *like* good stories with my movies. But, yes yes, I will go. I know it is my Nerd Duty to so, so you don't need to berate me about it.)
My first movie memory (and I'm talking about movie theaters here, as my childhood took place in the Caveman Era before VCRs) is going to Yellow Submarine with my mom--and that's a pretty cool first movie! I don't know (and I kinda doubt) it's the first movie I ever went to, but it's the first one I remember. I would have been about 6 years old at the time. And while I obviously missed a good, what, 3/4 of the references, the crazy pop art and (of course) the soundtrack stayed with me. Years later, when the movie appeared on TV--I was watching on the portable black-and-white set in my room--I sat in bed with my audio tape recorder and taped the whole movie onto a couple cassettes, and then replayed it endlessly. My second movie memory is Patton, believe it or not, also with my mom, for which I must have been about 9 years old. All I can remember about that one is my mom telling my brother and I that one did not clap and cheer when the lights went down like we did in kids movies, and then the big opening scene with George C. Scott in front of American flag using really bad words. I was probably too young for that one.
Most of my best memories as an adolescent (and, okay, there's not much to compete with as far as good memories of that time go) are my dad turning me on to a lot of his faves: The Marx Brothers, Woody Allen (this is pre-sex scandal, and also back when he was funny), the great Ernie Kovacs, and more. Recall, again, that this was pre-VCR, pre rentals, pre NetFlix, pretty much pre-fuckin'-everything: You either went to the movies at the theater, or you waited for stuff to show up on TV, where, unless it was on PBS, it was butchered with commercials. So, ya know, the whole universe of movies was NOT available at your fingertips, like now. Netflix Watch Instantly still blows me away. I mean, you all can stop reading this blog right this second, and within less than a minute can be watching any one of a number of Akira Kurosawa's classic movies. In MY day, once I was old enough to drive, I'd have to watch the repertory movie theater calendars--like the Nuart in Los Angeles--like a hawk, circling the movies I needed to see and planning my evenings in advance to make sure I didn't miss them. Because if you missed The Seven Samurai once, you might not have another chance for a year. And that's a movie that you simply cannot miss. My best memory of watching stuff with my dad came a little later--right about the time I started college--when PBS showed, over a series of nights, Rainer Werner Fassbinder's incredible 15.5-hour Berlin Alexanderplatz, a gargantuan, depressing, hilarious, monster of a movie that totally opened up my mind to movies outside the American mainstream.
Anyhoo, the point of all this, beyond babbly nostalgia, is to report that my kid and I decided, while over in Spain this holiday, that 2010 was going to be our Year of Film. (We thought about calling it Year of Movies, at first, but realized that it sounded more appropriately pretentious as "film.") The decision was made after about the third time that I asked her if she'd seen such-and-such movie, and she declared that she hadn't. I can't remember what the movie in question was--it might have been Casablanca, or possibly The Big Lebowski--but in any case we realized that, despite a pretty damn good start, she had too many holes in her movie education still. And with the clock (gulp) ticking until she herself will be off to college (OH MY GOD), I realized I had to ramp up my brainwashing here.
She *has* been off to a fine start. (And I really should lump in music and books with this, too. The day she came in and told me how awesome the Velvet Underground were was one of those great parental triumphs for me--I think I was doing the Rocky theme in my head for like three days following.) She's got a healthy intellectual curiosity and open-mindedness, as well as a budding English (or film!) major's appreciation for subtext and directorial intent (and manipulation). At almost-16, she can sit in pretty much any movie and I know she's going to probably get as much out of it, if not more so, as any adult. Which means that the entire world of movies is now open to us.
So I think I've decided that I will chronicle, or at least list, the Year of Film in this space. I'm going to include both movies at the theater and movies we watch at home. It's not all gonna be the hifalutin' stuff. You'll see. And also, because I'm anal this way, I'm going to include movies that I watch just on my own, or with my wife. Just as kind of a small sub-project on this site. I may just start a separate sidebar list on the site here, so I don't clutter up the posts. Or maybe I'll include them in blog entries with mini-review/writeups. I dunno. Whaddya guys think?
But to start, here's how the year has begun:
1/2 The Dark Knight. Saw it in Spain w/friends--them for the first time, us for the second. Liked it even more this time around.
1/4 The Informant! - on plane back to the U.S., and I liked it so much I went out and bought the book the very next day. Soderbergh took maybe too goofy of a tone with it, I think, but Matt Damon was great, and Scott Bakula was a freakin' revelation. His facial expressions alone nearly stole the movie.
1/4 State of Play Ugh. I wanted to like this. And with Russell Crowe, Helen Mirren, and a subdued Ben Affleck all trying hard, you'd think it'd be good. And it was, for about 2 hours or so. But the movie utterly collapses in the last 15 minutes, with a twist so ludicrous it basically destroys the rest of the movie. The more you think about it, the less it makes sense.
1/5 Oldboy - Netflix Watch Instantly - hyperviolent 2003 South Korean movie that I saw cuz I noticed it was on a bunch of "Best of the Decade" lists. I think I was still too jetlagged to appreciate it all, but the story (guy is imprisoned for 15 years without knowing why or by whom, gets out and seeks revenge) is fantastic, and the one set piece I remember--an extended, long, one-take fight scene that keeps scrolling horizontally like a sidescroller game--was freakin' amazing. Need to watch this again when more awake.
1/6 Pickpocket Netflix Watch Instantly - 1959 Robert Bresson movie is probably too dated for some, but very cool in that it is a clear, obvious influence on Scorcese's Taxi Driver, and some neat choreography of the crimes themselves.
1/7 The Marriage of Maria Braun - Netflix Watch Instantly - 1979 Fassbinder film starts with a poster of Hitler getting blown up, and then tells the tale of a German woman whose husband doesn't come home from WW2 and has to pick up her life from there. Unpredictable, crazy and decadent as always with Fassbinder. Also, completely "adult"--by which I mean that adults actually act like adults. You watch a movie like this (and so many made in the 1970s, even in the US) and you realize just how many movies now have such an infantile emotional range and tone for the adults they portray, and how easily we've come to accept it.
And if all that sounds too pretentious, let me assure you that the movie I enjoyed the most in the past couple weeks, which didn't make this list only cuz I saw it at the end of '09, was The Hangover. Nothing like a few good dick jokes to trump art house ennui!
My first movie memory (and I'm talking about movie theaters here, as my childhood took place in the Caveman Era before VCRs) is going to Yellow Submarine with my mom--and that's a pretty cool first movie! I don't know (and I kinda doubt) it's the first movie I ever went to, but it's the first one I remember. I would have been about 6 years old at the time. And while I obviously missed a good, what, 3/4 of the references, the crazy pop art and (of course) the soundtrack stayed with me. Years later, when the movie appeared on TV--I was watching on the portable black-and-white set in my room--I sat in bed with my audio tape recorder and taped the whole movie onto a couple cassettes, and then replayed it endlessly. My second movie memory is Patton, believe it or not, also with my mom, for which I must have been about 9 years old. All I can remember about that one is my mom telling my brother and I that one did not clap and cheer when the lights went down like we did in kids movies, and then the big opening scene with George C. Scott in front of American flag using really bad words. I was probably too young for that one.
Most of my best memories as an adolescent (and, okay, there's not much to compete with as far as good memories of that time go) are my dad turning me on to a lot of his faves: The Marx Brothers, Woody Allen (this is pre-sex scandal, and also back when he was funny), the great Ernie Kovacs, and more. Recall, again, that this was pre-VCR, pre rentals, pre NetFlix, pretty much pre-fuckin'-everything: You either went to the movies at the theater, or you waited for stuff to show up on TV, where, unless it was on PBS, it was butchered with commercials. So, ya know, the whole universe of movies was NOT available at your fingertips, like now. Netflix Watch Instantly still blows me away. I mean, you all can stop reading this blog right this second, and within less than a minute can be watching any one of a number of Akira Kurosawa's classic movies. In MY day, once I was old enough to drive, I'd have to watch the repertory movie theater calendars--like the Nuart in Los Angeles--like a hawk, circling the movies I needed to see and planning my evenings in advance to make sure I didn't miss them. Because if you missed The Seven Samurai once, you might not have another chance for a year. And that's a movie that you simply cannot miss. My best memory of watching stuff with my dad came a little later--right about the time I started college--when PBS showed, over a series of nights, Rainer Werner Fassbinder's incredible 15.5-hour Berlin Alexanderplatz, a gargantuan, depressing, hilarious, monster of a movie that totally opened up my mind to movies outside the American mainstream.
Anyhoo, the point of all this, beyond babbly nostalgia, is to report that my kid and I decided, while over in Spain this holiday, that 2010 was going to be our Year of Film. (We thought about calling it Year of Movies, at first, but realized that it sounded more appropriately pretentious as "film.") The decision was made after about the third time that I asked her if she'd seen such-and-such movie, and she declared that she hadn't. I can't remember what the movie in question was--it might have been Casablanca, or possibly The Big Lebowski--but in any case we realized that, despite a pretty damn good start, she had too many holes in her movie education still. And with the clock (gulp) ticking until she herself will be off to college (OH MY GOD), I realized I had to ramp up my brainwashing here.
She *has* been off to a fine start. (And I really should lump in music and books with this, too. The day she came in and told me how awesome the Velvet Underground were was one of those great parental triumphs for me--I think I was doing the Rocky theme in my head for like three days following.) She's got a healthy intellectual curiosity and open-mindedness, as well as a budding English (or film!) major's appreciation for subtext and directorial intent (and manipulation). At almost-16, she can sit in pretty much any movie and I know she's going to probably get as much out of it, if not more so, as any adult. Which means that the entire world of movies is now open to us.
So I think I've decided that I will chronicle, or at least list, the Year of Film in this space. I'm going to include both movies at the theater and movies we watch at home. It's not all gonna be the hifalutin' stuff. You'll see. And also, because I'm anal this way, I'm going to include movies that I watch just on my own, or with my wife. Just as kind of a small sub-project on this site. I may just start a separate sidebar list on the site here, so I don't clutter up the posts. Or maybe I'll include them in blog entries with mini-review/writeups. I dunno. Whaddya guys think?
But to start, here's how the year has begun:
1/2 The Dark Knight. Saw it in Spain w/friends--them for the first time, us for the second. Liked it even more this time around.
1/4 The Informant! - on plane back to the U.S., and I liked it so much I went out and bought the book the very next day. Soderbergh took maybe too goofy of a tone with it, I think, but Matt Damon was great, and Scott Bakula was a freakin' revelation. His facial expressions alone nearly stole the movie.
1/4 State of Play Ugh. I wanted to like this. And with Russell Crowe, Helen Mirren, and a subdued Ben Affleck all trying hard, you'd think it'd be good. And it was, for about 2 hours or so. But the movie utterly collapses in the last 15 minutes, with a twist so ludicrous it basically destroys the rest of the movie. The more you think about it, the less it makes sense.
1/5 Oldboy - Netflix Watch Instantly - hyperviolent 2003 South Korean movie that I saw cuz I noticed it was on a bunch of "Best of the Decade" lists. I think I was still too jetlagged to appreciate it all, but the story (guy is imprisoned for 15 years without knowing why or by whom, gets out and seeks revenge) is fantastic, and the one set piece I remember--an extended, long, one-take fight scene that keeps scrolling horizontally like a sidescroller game--was freakin' amazing. Need to watch this again when more awake.
1/6 Pickpocket Netflix Watch Instantly - 1959 Robert Bresson movie is probably too dated for some, but very cool in that it is a clear, obvious influence on Scorcese's Taxi Driver, and some neat choreography of the crimes themselves.
1/7 The Marriage of Maria Braun - Netflix Watch Instantly - 1979 Fassbinder film starts with a poster of Hitler getting blown up, and then tells the tale of a German woman whose husband doesn't come home from WW2 and has to pick up her life from there. Unpredictable, crazy and decadent as always with Fassbinder. Also, completely "adult"--by which I mean that adults actually act like adults. You watch a movie like this (and so many made in the 1970s, even in the US) and you realize just how many movies now have such an infantile emotional range and tone for the adults they portray, and how easily we've come to accept it.
And if all that sounds too pretentious, let me assure you that the movie I enjoyed the most in the past couple weeks, which didn't make this list only cuz I saw it at the end of '09, was The Hangover. Nothing like a few good dick jokes to trump art house ennui!
Monday, January 4, 2010
Black Out in Madrid!
Well that was different.
If you are a frequent traveler, like me, you might long, at times, for an "authentic experience" when in a foreign country--something off the beaten path of the normal tourist route. You might even hope to pass as a native, rather than just another slack-jawed, mouth-breathing, Fodor-toting American. This is understandable. But now that I have paved the way on at least one authentic experience in a foreign country, let me publicly state that it's really not all it's cracked up to be. Yes, two days ago I got to take a ride in an ambulance in Madrid and check in to a hospital, after passing out on the floor of the Prado museum, and after enduring all of that, I'm going to go ahead and strongly recommend that you just stick with the tourist tour. Trust me on this one.
In retrospect, it's funny how much the body and brain try to warn you in advance. Why we don't listen, I do not know. But consider it a New Year's Resolution that I will be doing that more in 2010.
New Year's Day in San Lorenzo de El Escorial was spent in much the same way as New Year's Eve was: Eating (a LOT) and drinking (alcohol). On the eating part, there's no two ways around it: I pigged out. As did everyone. The food here is phenomenal--especially if you are a carnivore. So even though I was still full from our New Year's Eve feast, on New Year's Day we had yet another feast, which went on, in true European style, for hours.
This was accompanied, as of course it should be, by booze. I am not a very good drinker. I'm a lightweight, and I honestly don't really enjoy it all that much, other than beer---and even then, if I order a second pint it's a somewhat rare occasion (needing to get on a motorcycle afterwards contributes to this, but even at home, not driving or riding, I'll only ever have one.) I do enjoy wine quite a bit, which is a requisite if you are going to marry a French person, but, I don't know my 50 year old vintage Cabernets from my 2009 Boone's Farm. That's one of those Life Projects I have yet to attend to. And hard liquor? Forget it. It sure looks great in the movies when tough guys pound down shots of whiskey, but, sadly, that is not the lifestyle for me. And yet, it was New Years Day. And we were eating a ton. So, really, the red wine, white wine, champagne, and whatever that hard liquor was at the end did not make any of us actually "drunk". And I poured less, and stopped earlier, than any of the other adults anyway, knowing my limits. Still, there was way more alcohol than usual in my body, and guess how much water it was all accompanied by? Zero. Not one glass, not one drop, either during the meal, or the rest of the night before falling asleep (sober) hours later.
The next morning, we got up to go to the Prado. Whether the subsequent incident was entirely alcohol related is, in fact, not entirely clear. Two other people--our friend Belen, who has been hosting us and cooked the fabulous feast, and her 8-year-old son David---both were feeling queasy, and it's certain that David did not have any booze, at least that we saw. So there's the possibility that there was some kind of virus floating around.
In any event, by the time we were in the car, I clearly was not 100 percent. As we had been doing the entire trip, our party was divided into two cars: The Woman Wagon and The Manmobile (or Der Mensch Machine, in deference to both my and Eric's love of Kraftwerk), due to the large size of our group. The great thing about Der Mensch Machine is that we had the iPod with us, piping through the car stereo speakers. On most drives, this is cranked to something appropriately loud and rockin: Mastodon, Aerosmith, and Primus all were prominent soundtracks to our Spanish voyages. On this morning, however, I asked for something mellow, because I was not feeling too good. Andres Segovia was the music of choice. And because I had woken up feeling a bit queasy, I passed not only on coffee (a true sign that something was wrong with me), but also on any food whatsoever--until The Wife force-fed one lone piece of bread on me.
But we were no more than a few kilometers from home when my brain/body began sending out an urgent message. As we drove out of El Escorial on the highway, I announced to Eric, "Ya know, I'd like to buy a bottle of water before we go to the museum." I personally felt no particular urgency about it--yet--but it definitely was on my mind that I wanted water. Nothing else. Just water. We drove along into Madrid with no further incident, but after parking in the garage near the Prado, I got out of the car and immediately felt lightheaded. I gripped, for a moment, on one of the cement columns in the garage, just to regain my balance. No one noticed, and I didn't comment on it, but at this point I knew something was up and that I needed to do something.
The Woman Wagon arrived moments later, and we walked the two short blocks to the museum, amidst the New Years Day crowd. A gigantic line awaited us at the museum, but being the resourceful, modern humans we are, we had smartly purchased tickets online earlier, and were thus able to go immediately to the Smarter People's Entrance, where there was no waiting. But my situation was rapidly worsening.
It turned out there was a snafu with the online tickets, and so The Wife and I were allowed to enter, while the rest remained outside for a couple minutes while the problem was being cleared up. But no sooner had The Wife and I set foot in the museum (we had been told to "go ahead and get started") than I said I needed to sit down, and that I needed her to find me some water. I sat on a bench, next to some other tourists, and, remembering multiple movie scenes, put my head down almost between my legs, because I vaguely recalled that might help me in some way. It didn't, but it didn't make things worse either.
The Wife came back a few minutes later, with a 7Up, all she could find, and just as the rest of our party was arriving inside. Happy that I had some kind of liquid, at least, I chugged half the can immediately, and got up to join them as we all beelined to Heironymous Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, not only one of the most famous masterpieces at the Prado, but also, conveniently, one of the paintings located closest to the entrance. As expected, there was a huge mass of humanity clustered around the painting, and I only survived about 30 seconds in that dogpile before having to bail out, without really getting a look at it, because the heat and crush of people was about the last thing my body could take at that point. Instead, I went solo to a couple paintings that had no one around them, and was trying to enjoy them but was now feeling worse than ever.
So I made a quick decision: I needed to sit down. Or even lie down. I needed to tell everyone else to go ahead. I'd catch up. After the rest of our group emerged from the Boschpile, I announced said plan, but, because they were all heading up one floor and they didn't want me to get lost, they said to come up with them and find a bathroom and/or place to sit down up there. I was feeling like this was a mistake. I wanted to sit down RIGHT NOW and not take another step. But I was outnumbered and was rapidly losing energy.
So we walked to the elevator. It felt, to me, like it was taking hours to arrive. I said to The Wife I need to sit down now, I can't wait for this. The doors opened. A mass of people were already inside. We inched our way in. I put my hand on The Wife's shoulder. My head was swimming. I felt myself leaving the scene, rising somewhere above the elevator. The last thing I remember was hearing her call my name. And that was that.
My next conscious moment was right out a movie or TV show. Now I know why they have scenes like that. From a totally black screen, the camera opens on a shot of a whole mass of faces looking down on me, looking concerned. I had no idea where I was. I had been dreaming. I thought I was back home in bed. I only recognize my wife's face. All the others are unfamiliar to me. I feel someone holding my legs up. I can't keep my eyes open. People are talking to me but it sounds as if I'm underwater. I can't really understand what anyone is saying to me. Then it starts coming through: "Can you hear me Jeff?" my wife is asking. I can. I tell her. Yes. I can hear you. I feel the cold on my back now. I'm on the floor. The mass of faces looking down at me: Oh jeez, I'm at the museum. I'm on the floor at the museum, and there is a crowd around me. I can't keep my eyes open and I am freezing. I'm hearing various English phrases "He's American", "he fell on me in the elevator" accompanied by lots of Spanish I can't understand. I'm trying to talk and keep my eyes open but it's a struggle. I realize that everything is completely blurry out of my right eye, and only find out later that my contact lens had popped out when I fell.
As I start to come to, I feel terrible. I mean, emotionally. It's the first conscious thing I really remember: I've ruined the trip to the museum. I've turned this big outing for two families into a personal emergency. I start telling them to go ahead, I'll be fine. I start apologizing. I keep trying to get up, but I'm being held down, gently, by two women now, both doctors who have arrived on the scene--one employed by the museum, another an Italian tourist who stumbled upon the scene of the collapsed American. Her husband handed me a water bottle. I am alternating between feeling better and wanting to sleep. My hands and feet are freezing. The museum doctor has taken my pulse and blood pressure, and my blood pressure is low, but not alarmingly so. I'm feeling like it's starting to pass. Which it kind of is.
The worst of it is all over.
Sensing no further drama--I'm not going to die, or cough up blood, or go into some sort of raving spasm--the attendees begin to disperse. I'm no longer experiencing life as a second-by-second alienated befuddlement. I can start to joke about it. Even though I'm still feeling pretty crappy.
It's just a few more minutes before a wheelchair arrives for me, and I'm taken down a couple floors to the museum's little medical room. It makes you wonder how many public buildings like this have secret built-in medical facilities, filled with all sorts of equipment and beds and stuff. How did they know? I'm glad, in any case, and lay down with my wife at my side, my daughter (who has been crying and scared to death, though I've already begun to reassure her that I'm fine) and friends right outside the room. The doctor says I can stay here for awhile and rest up. They bring me water. It's at this point that the diagnoses begin, and we start going through what might have happened, and why. And among all the adults, it's the first time we really realize that no water has been drunk, combined with the previous night's alcohol, combined with the possibility of a virus, combined with the crush of people at the Bosch painting. Not a particularly promising combination, ya think?
I want my family and friends to now move on and try to enjoy the museum. I'm going to be fine. My wife dutifully insists that she wants to stay to me, for which I am reminded once again why I married her. And just at the point where we think I can probably get up and move on, I have a small relapse: My head begins swimming again, I tell my wife I need to throw up, we hurry me over to a sink, with the doctor, and I kind of almost do. This actually makes me feel a little better, but the doctor has now seen enough. Her prognosis: It's time for me to go to the hospital.
I really don't want to do this. It feels like overkill to me. And I know it's suddenly going to turn a relatively small incident into an ordeal. But, we understand where she's coming from. She's not being Nurse Ratchet here. She's just doing her job. An ambulance is called, the paramedics come, ask me questions that I am helpless to answer, thanks to craptactular public high school Spanish from which I've only retained one single phrase ("Donde esta la casa de Pepe?") that does me no good here, and then soon I am being wheeled through the museum and into the ambulance, once again a cool new exhibit for the tourists to observe. It's The Collapsed American! Today Only! Take your pictures now!
We cruise through the streets of Madrid. There's no windows in the ambulance, so I can't see any sights. I hear the siren going occasionally, which is cool and makes me feel important. I remember I have my Flip videocamera in my pocket, and instantly realize that filming this might make for a cool YouTube video, but I only get about a minute in before The Wife yanks it away with a kind of "are you kidding me?" remark. But, hey, I was a journalist! It's what we're trained to do!
By the time we get to the hospital, the feeling shared by me, The Wife, and Belen, who has accompanied us in the ambulance to help with translation, is that we are approaching overkill. And Belen's worry, shared by the ambulance driver, is that because we are now entering the largest public hospital in Madrid (socialized medicine--it's free! HEY MAYBE WE SHOULD TRY THAT TOO, AMERICA), it's going to take hours to get me settled in, and that this is liable to only make me feel worse, when what I really outta do is just go lie down somewhere. Unfortunately, the paramedics' hands were tied: They can't defy the museum doctor's orders. And, like I said, we understood why she ordered it. But now we just kinda want to get out of here and get me home.
It only takes about 3 minutes before a doctor approaches me in the wheelchair and looks at my chart, takes my pulse and blood pressure, and says that I seem to be okay now, if a bit cold. Belen explains the situation. The doctor looks around the waiting room, which is full, and then down at me, a clearly recovering dumb American, and pretty much agrees. Get this moron home and into bed. She does, graciously, say she wants to do one thing first before actually releasing me: An electrocardiogram, just to be sure. If anything is up with my heart, I'm staying. But otherwise, I'm free to go, and they'll just not type up anything and forget I ever walked in here. No paperwork for them, no day in the hospital for me. Win win.
I pass the electrocardiogram. Hallelujah. We cab back to the museum. I joke that maybe now we can go back inside and I can see the damn museum at last. But, yeah, no. They drive me home. I fall asleep in the car. We get home, they put me in bed, and other than one 1/2 hour revival, in which I stumbled downstairs to watch a game of Risk begin, I proceed to sleep for the next 16 hours, straight.
And that's pretty much The End! Yesterday, the day after this fun event, I was back up, and we had a completely normal, touristy day in the wonderful, walled town of Avila. The only difference for me? I was now carrying around a humongous bottle of Aquarius, which I believe is the Spanish equivalent of Gatorade. I had chugged two full bottles of it before leaving the house, and will drink this entire tank of it before the day ends.
I could have done with that out-of-body experience. More important, I could have done without scaring my loved ones, who got it worse than me. They had to watch me lose consciousness with my eyes open, talking to me and getting no response, my contact lens flopping out of my eye, my face going bloodless. No one should have to experience that.
So listen to me when I tell you, gang: Drink water. Drink it a lot. Keep your dang selves hydrated, for cryin' out loud. It's just basic survival we're talking about here.
But if you do have to collapse in a foreign country, I can say, as an experienced traveler now, that you may not get any finer care than in the Museo Del Prado in Madrid. Museum experience: Unknown. Medical facilities: 5 stars! Highly recommended!
I'll see y'all back in the US real soon.
Hasta luego,
--Jeff
Editor's Note: Two late edits, one for political correctness by my kid, the other for accuracy. "Girl Wagon" is now "Woman Wagon", and Spanish drink now correctly identified as "Aquarius."
If you are a frequent traveler, like me, you might long, at times, for an "authentic experience" when in a foreign country--something off the beaten path of the normal tourist route. You might even hope to pass as a native, rather than just another slack-jawed, mouth-breathing, Fodor-toting American. This is understandable. But now that I have paved the way on at least one authentic experience in a foreign country, let me publicly state that it's really not all it's cracked up to be. Yes, two days ago I got to take a ride in an ambulance in Madrid and check in to a hospital, after passing out on the floor of the Prado museum, and after enduring all of that, I'm going to go ahead and strongly recommend that you just stick with the tourist tour. Trust me on this one.
In retrospect, it's funny how much the body and brain try to warn you in advance. Why we don't listen, I do not know. But consider it a New Year's Resolution that I will be doing that more in 2010.
New Year's Day in San Lorenzo de El Escorial was spent in much the same way as New Year's Eve was: Eating (a LOT) and drinking (alcohol). On the eating part, there's no two ways around it: I pigged out. As did everyone. The food here is phenomenal--especially if you are a carnivore. So even though I was still full from our New Year's Eve feast, on New Year's Day we had yet another feast, which went on, in true European style, for hours.
This was accompanied, as of course it should be, by booze. I am not a very good drinker. I'm a lightweight, and I honestly don't really enjoy it all that much, other than beer---and even then, if I order a second pint it's a somewhat rare occasion (needing to get on a motorcycle afterwards contributes to this, but even at home, not driving or riding, I'll only ever have one.) I do enjoy wine quite a bit, which is a requisite if you are going to marry a French person, but, I don't know my 50 year old vintage Cabernets from my 2009 Boone's Farm. That's one of those Life Projects I have yet to attend to. And hard liquor? Forget it. It sure looks great in the movies when tough guys pound down shots of whiskey, but, sadly, that is not the lifestyle for me. And yet, it was New Years Day. And we were eating a ton. So, really, the red wine, white wine, champagne, and whatever that hard liquor was at the end did not make any of us actually "drunk". And I poured less, and stopped earlier, than any of the other adults anyway, knowing my limits. Still, there was way more alcohol than usual in my body, and guess how much water it was all accompanied by? Zero. Not one glass, not one drop, either during the meal, or the rest of the night before falling asleep (sober) hours later.
The next morning, we got up to go to the Prado. Whether the subsequent incident was entirely alcohol related is, in fact, not entirely clear. Two other people--our friend Belen, who has been hosting us and cooked the fabulous feast, and her 8-year-old son David---both were feeling queasy, and it's certain that David did not have any booze, at least that we saw. So there's the possibility that there was some kind of virus floating around.
In any event, by the time we were in the car, I clearly was not 100 percent. As we had been doing the entire trip, our party was divided into two cars: The Woman Wagon and The Manmobile (or Der Mensch Machine, in deference to both my and Eric's love of Kraftwerk), due to the large size of our group. The great thing about Der Mensch Machine is that we had the iPod with us, piping through the car stereo speakers. On most drives, this is cranked to something appropriately loud and rockin: Mastodon, Aerosmith, and Primus all were prominent soundtracks to our Spanish voyages. On this morning, however, I asked for something mellow, because I was not feeling too good. Andres Segovia was the music of choice. And because I had woken up feeling a bit queasy, I passed not only on coffee (a true sign that something was wrong with me), but also on any food whatsoever--until The Wife force-fed one lone piece of bread on me.
But we were no more than a few kilometers from home when my brain/body began sending out an urgent message. As we drove out of El Escorial on the highway, I announced to Eric, "Ya know, I'd like to buy a bottle of water before we go to the museum." I personally felt no particular urgency about it--yet--but it definitely was on my mind that I wanted water. Nothing else. Just water. We drove along into Madrid with no further incident, but after parking in the garage near the Prado, I got out of the car and immediately felt lightheaded. I gripped, for a moment, on one of the cement columns in the garage, just to regain my balance. No one noticed, and I didn't comment on it, but at this point I knew something was up and that I needed to do something.
The Woman Wagon arrived moments later, and we walked the two short blocks to the museum, amidst the New Years Day crowd. A gigantic line awaited us at the museum, but being the resourceful, modern humans we are, we had smartly purchased tickets online earlier, and were thus able to go immediately to the Smarter People's Entrance, where there was no waiting. But my situation was rapidly worsening.
It turned out there was a snafu with the online tickets, and so The Wife and I were allowed to enter, while the rest remained outside for a couple minutes while the problem was being cleared up. But no sooner had The Wife and I set foot in the museum (we had been told to "go ahead and get started") than I said I needed to sit down, and that I needed her to find me some water. I sat on a bench, next to some other tourists, and, remembering multiple movie scenes, put my head down almost between my legs, because I vaguely recalled that might help me in some way. It didn't, but it didn't make things worse either.
The Wife came back a few minutes later, with a 7Up, all she could find, and just as the rest of our party was arriving inside. Happy that I had some kind of liquid, at least, I chugged half the can immediately, and got up to join them as we all beelined to Heironymous Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, not only one of the most famous masterpieces at the Prado, but also, conveniently, one of the paintings located closest to the entrance. As expected, there was a huge mass of humanity clustered around the painting, and I only survived about 30 seconds in that dogpile before having to bail out, without really getting a look at it, because the heat and crush of people was about the last thing my body could take at that point. Instead, I went solo to a couple paintings that had no one around them, and was trying to enjoy them but was now feeling worse than ever.
So I made a quick decision: I needed to sit down. Or even lie down. I needed to tell everyone else to go ahead. I'd catch up. After the rest of our group emerged from the Boschpile, I announced said plan, but, because they were all heading up one floor and they didn't want me to get lost, they said to come up with them and find a bathroom and/or place to sit down up there. I was feeling like this was a mistake. I wanted to sit down RIGHT NOW and not take another step. But I was outnumbered and was rapidly losing energy.
So we walked to the elevator. It felt, to me, like it was taking hours to arrive. I said to The Wife I need to sit down now, I can't wait for this. The doors opened. A mass of people were already inside. We inched our way in. I put my hand on The Wife's shoulder. My head was swimming. I felt myself leaving the scene, rising somewhere above the elevator. The last thing I remember was hearing her call my name. And that was that.
My next conscious moment was right out a movie or TV show. Now I know why they have scenes like that. From a totally black screen, the camera opens on a shot of a whole mass of faces looking down on me, looking concerned. I had no idea where I was. I had been dreaming. I thought I was back home in bed. I only recognize my wife's face. All the others are unfamiliar to me. I feel someone holding my legs up. I can't keep my eyes open. People are talking to me but it sounds as if I'm underwater. I can't really understand what anyone is saying to me. Then it starts coming through: "Can you hear me Jeff?" my wife is asking. I can. I tell her. Yes. I can hear you. I feel the cold on my back now. I'm on the floor. The mass of faces looking down at me: Oh jeez, I'm at the museum. I'm on the floor at the museum, and there is a crowd around me. I can't keep my eyes open and I am freezing. I'm hearing various English phrases "He's American", "he fell on me in the elevator" accompanied by lots of Spanish I can't understand. I'm trying to talk and keep my eyes open but it's a struggle. I realize that everything is completely blurry out of my right eye, and only find out later that my contact lens had popped out when I fell.
As I start to come to, I feel terrible. I mean, emotionally. It's the first conscious thing I really remember: I've ruined the trip to the museum. I've turned this big outing for two families into a personal emergency. I start telling them to go ahead, I'll be fine. I start apologizing. I keep trying to get up, but I'm being held down, gently, by two women now, both doctors who have arrived on the scene--one employed by the museum, another an Italian tourist who stumbled upon the scene of the collapsed American. Her husband handed me a water bottle. I am alternating between feeling better and wanting to sleep. My hands and feet are freezing. The museum doctor has taken my pulse and blood pressure, and my blood pressure is low, but not alarmingly so. I'm feeling like it's starting to pass. Which it kind of is.
The worst of it is all over.
Sensing no further drama--I'm not going to die, or cough up blood, or go into some sort of raving spasm--the attendees begin to disperse. I'm no longer experiencing life as a second-by-second alienated befuddlement. I can start to joke about it. Even though I'm still feeling pretty crappy.
It's just a few more minutes before a wheelchair arrives for me, and I'm taken down a couple floors to the museum's little medical room. It makes you wonder how many public buildings like this have secret built-in medical facilities, filled with all sorts of equipment and beds and stuff. How did they know? I'm glad, in any case, and lay down with my wife at my side, my daughter (who has been crying and scared to death, though I've already begun to reassure her that I'm fine) and friends right outside the room. The doctor says I can stay here for awhile and rest up. They bring me water. It's at this point that the diagnoses begin, and we start going through what might have happened, and why. And among all the adults, it's the first time we really realize that no water has been drunk, combined with the previous night's alcohol, combined with the possibility of a virus, combined with the crush of people at the Bosch painting. Not a particularly promising combination, ya think?
I want my family and friends to now move on and try to enjoy the museum. I'm going to be fine. My wife dutifully insists that she wants to stay to me, for which I am reminded once again why I married her. And just at the point where we think I can probably get up and move on, I have a small relapse: My head begins swimming again, I tell my wife I need to throw up, we hurry me over to a sink, with the doctor, and I kind of almost do. This actually makes me feel a little better, but the doctor has now seen enough. Her prognosis: It's time for me to go to the hospital.
I really don't want to do this. It feels like overkill to me. And I know it's suddenly going to turn a relatively small incident into an ordeal. But, we understand where she's coming from. She's not being Nurse Ratchet here. She's just doing her job. An ambulance is called, the paramedics come, ask me questions that I am helpless to answer, thanks to craptactular public high school Spanish from which I've only retained one single phrase ("Donde esta la casa de Pepe?") that does me no good here, and then soon I am being wheeled through the museum and into the ambulance, once again a cool new exhibit for the tourists to observe. It's The Collapsed American! Today Only! Take your pictures now!
We cruise through the streets of Madrid. There's no windows in the ambulance, so I can't see any sights. I hear the siren going occasionally, which is cool and makes me feel important. I remember I have my Flip videocamera in my pocket, and instantly realize that filming this might make for a cool YouTube video, but I only get about a minute in before The Wife yanks it away with a kind of "are you kidding me?" remark. But, hey, I was a journalist! It's what we're trained to do!
By the time we get to the hospital, the feeling shared by me, The Wife, and Belen, who has accompanied us in the ambulance to help with translation, is that we are approaching overkill. And Belen's worry, shared by the ambulance driver, is that because we are now entering the largest public hospital in Madrid (socialized medicine--it's free! HEY MAYBE WE SHOULD TRY THAT TOO, AMERICA), it's going to take hours to get me settled in, and that this is liable to only make me feel worse, when what I really outta do is just go lie down somewhere. Unfortunately, the paramedics' hands were tied: They can't defy the museum doctor's orders. And, like I said, we understood why she ordered it. But now we just kinda want to get out of here and get me home.
It only takes about 3 minutes before a doctor approaches me in the wheelchair and looks at my chart, takes my pulse and blood pressure, and says that I seem to be okay now, if a bit cold. Belen explains the situation. The doctor looks around the waiting room, which is full, and then down at me, a clearly recovering dumb American, and pretty much agrees. Get this moron home and into bed. She does, graciously, say she wants to do one thing first before actually releasing me: An electrocardiogram, just to be sure. If anything is up with my heart, I'm staying. But otherwise, I'm free to go, and they'll just not type up anything and forget I ever walked in here. No paperwork for them, no day in the hospital for me. Win win.
I pass the electrocardiogram. Hallelujah. We cab back to the museum. I joke that maybe now we can go back inside and I can see the damn museum at last. But, yeah, no. They drive me home. I fall asleep in the car. We get home, they put me in bed, and other than one 1/2 hour revival, in which I stumbled downstairs to watch a game of Risk begin, I proceed to sleep for the next 16 hours, straight.
And that's pretty much The End! Yesterday, the day after this fun event, I was back up, and we had a completely normal, touristy day in the wonderful, walled town of Avila. The only difference for me? I was now carrying around a humongous bottle of Aquarius, which I believe is the Spanish equivalent of Gatorade. I had chugged two full bottles of it before leaving the house, and will drink this entire tank of it before the day ends.
I could have done with that out-of-body experience. More important, I could have done without scaring my loved ones, who got it worse than me. They had to watch me lose consciousness with my eyes open, talking to me and getting no response, my contact lens flopping out of my eye, my face going bloodless. No one should have to experience that.
So listen to me when I tell you, gang: Drink water. Drink it a lot. Keep your dang selves hydrated, for cryin' out loud. It's just basic survival we're talking about here.
But if you do have to collapse in a foreign country, I can say, as an experienced traveler now, that you may not get any finer care than in the Museo Del Prado in Madrid. Museum experience: Unknown. Medical facilities: 5 stars! Highly recommended!
I'll see y'all back in the US real soon.
Hasta luego,
--Jeff
Editor's Note: Two late edits, one for political correctness by my kid, the other for accuracy. "Girl Wagon" is now "Woman Wagon", and Spanish drink now correctly identified as "Aquarius."
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Greetings from Spain!
Hi everyone! I'm writing from our home base in San Lorenzo de El Escorial, where we're staying with friends here for our 10-day visit in Spain. And yes, I double-checked the name/spelling of the town, because, as Twitterites know, I've been suffering from an affliction over here that is rendering me unable to correctly name Spanish cities. Thus, yesterday's day trip to Segovia somehow became a trip to the mythical land of "Sevonia," which I've since decided is going to be the name of Xanthor's land. This is what you would call a repurposing of one's own lameness.
Speaking of lame, my back continues to be a source of utter misery, I'm sorry to say, pretty much putting a damper--or at least strain--on this entire vacation, both for me and for everyone else. I've been dealing with some form of sciatica for about a year now, but, two days before I left the U.S. I must have done something else to myself, because now, instead of just my lower-right back being occasionally sore, now it's my entire lower back, and it's pretty much constant. Sleeping has been tough, walking is a chore, and steps--forget it. So I've had to skip out on some of the events--like climbing to the top of the castle tower in Segovia--like a gimpy old man, and I've had to have my wife help me hobble along at times. We had a great, full, adventurous day in Segovia, but by the end of it I was utterly exhausted and hurting, and, as a result, couldn't move at all today. Not exactly the memories of Spain I was hoping to have--but whaddya gonna do?
Still, it's vacation, and being out of the U.S., with no work to deal with, with all new sights, and old friends, to see--I can hardly complain. And there's something in particular about being out of the country, in a place that doesn't speak your language, that helps provide a satisfying bit of distance and perspective from one's own life, which I was most decidedly due for after a rather busy 2009. And even with the backache I can appreciate the Old World architectural splendor, the feel of a country that's been around for forever, the absolutely heavenly food (the jamon!) and wine and coffee.
Today's trip to see Picasso's Guernica in Madrid had to be postponed cuz of ye olde back, but we'll probably get to it after New Years, along with a trip to the Museo del Prado. I'm laying low--and flat on my back--for most of today in hopes that I can actually enjoy New Year's Eve tomorrow. My downtime today has been an alternating routine of napping, reading William Gibson's Pattern Recognition (shaping up to be my fave Gibson book since Neuromancer),and playing Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes on my DSi, which is a surprisingly addictive, great little strategy game. I played it so much the other day I wore out the battery twice in a row--first time I've ever done that, I think. Great oddball combination of match-three game and turn-based combat. I can't even imagine how they thought this up, let alone made it so addictive and fun. So thank goodness for friends' recommendations, because I had no plans to ever buy a Might and Magic game again.
This would be the part of the post where I might normally post some photos, but, to do that, I'd have to email them to myself from my iPhone, and then upload them to PhotoBucket, and then link here, which is too much work--SORRY. And anyhoo, the best ones are up on Twitter already. So go there!
Okay, that's enough sitting up for one day. Back to the prone position for me, because tomorrow it's New Year's Eve, and I have a big date with the White Man's Overbite pretty dang soon!
Adios!
Speaking of lame, my back continues to be a source of utter misery, I'm sorry to say, pretty much putting a damper--or at least strain--on this entire vacation, both for me and for everyone else. I've been dealing with some form of sciatica for about a year now, but, two days before I left the U.S. I must have done something else to myself, because now, instead of just my lower-right back being occasionally sore, now it's my entire lower back, and it's pretty much constant. Sleeping has been tough, walking is a chore, and steps--forget it. So I've had to skip out on some of the events--like climbing to the top of the castle tower in Segovia--like a gimpy old man, and I've had to have my wife help me hobble along at times. We had a great, full, adventurous day in Segovia, but by the end of it I was utterly exhausted and hurting, and, as a result, couldn't move at all today. Not exactly the memories of Spain I was hoping to have--but whaddya gonna do?
Still, it's vacation, and being out of the U.S., with no work to deal with, with all new sights, and old friends, to see--I can hardly complain. And there's something in particular about being out of the country, in a place that doesn't speak your language, that helps provide a satisfying bit of distance and perspective from one's own life, which I was most decidedly due for after a rather busy 2009. And even with the backache I can appreciate the Old World architectural splendor, the feel of a country that's been around for forever, the absolutely heavenly food (the jamon!) and wine and coffee.
Today's trip to see Picasso's Guernica in Madrid had to be postponed cuz of ye olde back, but we'll probably get to it after New Years, along with a trip to the Museo del Prado. I'm laying low--and flat on my back--for most of today in hopes that I can actually enjoy New Year's Eve tomorrow. My downtime today has been an alternating routine of napping, reading William Gibson's Pattern Recognition (shaping up to be my fave Gibson book since Neuromancer),and playing Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes on my DSi, which is a surprisingly addictive, great little strategy game. I played it so much the other day I wore out the battery twice in a row--first time I've ever done that, I think. Great oddball combination of match-three game and turn-based combat. I can't even imagine how they thought this up, let alone made it so addictive and fun. So thank goodness for friends' recommendations, because I had no plans to ever buy a Might and Magic game again.
This would be the part of the post where I might normally post some photos, but, to do that, I'd have to email them to myself from my iPhone, and then upload them to PhotoBucket, and then link here, which is too much work--SORRY. And anyhoo, the best ones are up on Twitter already. So go there!
Okay, that's enough sitting up for one day. Back to the prone position for me, because tomorrow it's New Year's Eve, and I have a big date with the White Man's Overbite pretty dang soon!
Adios!
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Well lookee here! I'm alive!
On the downside, this is my last blog post of 2009. On the plus side, I'm blogging! On the downside, I haven't been around here much. On the plus side, I wrote a novel! On the downside, I'm now off to Spain for a 10-day vacation with family and friends, so I won't be here again for a bit, most likely, unless I muster up the energy to blog on the road and don't get yelled at by my family. On the plus side, I'm going to Spain! (And on the down side of that, again, my back is freaking killing me, so this flight couldn't be more ill-timed.)
So, to those of you who tend to spend more time here than I do, well: Hi! How've y'all been! I know that I proclaimed "novel writing is hard" way back in my last blog post, but, you know what, it's totally true. It utterly sapped me of creative/writing energy, which was a bit unfortunate not just for this blog but for my new job as well. So thank goodness for vacation, so I can recharge the ol' brain batteries a little.
This is going to be an extremely interesting 2010 for me. The rusty gears at EA.com are just starting to turn a little bit, and once we're all back in January I am hoping you all will start to see what I have in store over there, which is either going to be a great success or flop wildly. Or maybe just die of indifference. See? I need a vacation. Truly, I'm thrilled that, so far, EA is letting me post whatever kind of nonsense I want, though the sad truth is that might just be because they haven't noticed me yet. But what I really hope is this Brave New Venture into, err, "corporate editorial", or whatever you want to call it, will yield true "transparency" for EA, and help set an example for how a bigass company can communicate with folks in this new age of ours, without resorting to layers and layers of BS. Or maybe I'm just naive and stupid! Time will tell.
All I can say, right now, as the year closes out, that I couldn't be happier in the job change. My time with The Sims group was extremely educational to me, and I have no regrets. (Though they probably don't feel the same way about me!) I have a much greater understanding of How Games Are Made than I ever could have on the press side, and this is now informing everything I do at EA.com. And, hey, some of my bestest pals at EA now are in the Sims group. So all is good.
There is an endless amount of topics I need to catch up on here on this page. More motorcycle diaries. My foray into heavy metal, which turned me on to the splendiforous Crack the Skye by Mastodon. My new love affairs with Dexter, Sons of Anarchy, and Glee. The usual random nonsense and ranting. And, oh yeah, some Cudgel of Xanthor excerpts!
And part of what I need to figure out in 2010 is how to do all of this. How to cover my bases on all the public places I find myself communicating: Here, EA.com, Twitter. I'll be writing more over at EA.com, including a column/blog, but those topics should be different than the ones I do here, which should be more personal. Yet I don't want the ease and immediacy of Twitter to suck away the always-more-satisfying blogging I do here.
In any event, I do thank all of you who ever take any of your time to come here and read this dribble. It's always humbling and flattering to think that anyone actually cares about what I have to say. Have a great holiday/New Years y'all. If I don't blog/twitter at you from Spain, I shall return January 5!
Adios for now,
Jeff
So, to those of you who tend to spend more time here than I do, well: Hi! How've y'all been! I know that I proclaimed "novel writing is hard" way back in my last blog post, but, you know what, it's totally true. It utterly sapped me of creative/writing energy, which was a bit unfortunate not just for this blog but for my new job as well. So thank goodness for vacation, so I can recharge the ol' brain batteries a little.
This is going to be an extremely interesting 2010 for me. The rusty gears at EA.com are just starting to turn a little bit, and once we're all back in January I am hoping you all will start to see what I have in store over there, which is either going to be a great success or flop wildly. Or maybe just die of indifference. See? I need a vacation. Truly, I'm thrilled that, so far, EA is letting me post whatever kind of nonsense I want, though the sad truth is that might just be because they haven't noticed me yet. But what I really hope is this Brave New Venture into, err, "corporate editorial", or whatever you want to call it, will yield true "transparency" for EA, and help set an example for how a bigass company can communicate with folks in this new age of ours, without resorting to layers and layers of BS. Or maybe I'm just naive and stupid! Time will tell.
All I can say, right now, as the year closes out, that I couldn't be happier in the job change. My time with The Sims group was extremely educational to me, and I have no regrets. (Though they probably don't feel the same way about me!) I have a much greater understanding of How Games Are Made than I ever could have on the press side, and this is now informing everything I do at EA.com. And, hey, some of my bestest pals at EA now are in the Sims group. So all is good.
There is an endless amount of topics I need to catch up on here on this page. More motorcycle diaries. My foray into heavy metal, which turned me on to the splendiforous Crack the Skye by Mastodon. My new love affairs with Dexter, Sons of Anarchy, and Glee. The usual random nonsense and ranting. And, oh yeah, some Cudgel of Xanthor excerpts!
And part of what I need to figure out in 2010 is how to do all of this. How to cover my bases on all the public places I find myself communicating: Here, EA.com, Twitter. I'll be writing more over at EA.com, including a column/blog, but those topics should be different than the ones I do here, which should be more personal. Yet I don't want the ease and immediacy of Twitter to suck away the always-more-satisfying blogging I do here.
In any event, I do thank all of you who ever take any of your time to come here and read this dribble. It's always humbling and flattering to think that anyone actually cares about what I have to say. Have a great holiday/New Years y'all. If I don't blog/twitter at you from Spain, I shall return January 5!
Adios for now,
Jeff
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Novel writing is hard.
Hi gang! Not many blog posts from me here as November gets going, but for once I have a good reason! This is NaNoWriMo month, the National Novel Writing Month, and I, your humble blogger, was stupid and crazy enough to participate. Look, you can see me right here! That's me! My own page! It's like I'm famous! Yay!
If you're not familiar with NaNoWriMo, it's a collective bit of organized group insanity, in which tens of thousands of people around the world voluntarily agree to set a personal goal: We will each write a novel, in 30 days. More specifically, we need to write 50,000 words in 30 days. There's no "prize" per se, other than the bragging rights that you did it, kind of like running a marathon.
The beautiful thing about it is that they--the organizers, I mean-- go out of their way to empower you to write crap. Because, obviously, unless you're some kind of insufferable demigodlike prodigy, that's what you're going to write in 30 days. All you are really doing is writing a first draft. Which anyone can do of course, and which many of us writerly types say we are going to do "some day"---but what NaNoWriMo forces you to do is commit, to keep going, to not bog yourself down in blood-from-a-stone word-by-word hyperediting or self-criticism. You can't possibly make the goal that way. And so, you write write write. I'm going to quote directly from the official website:
Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.
Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.
Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that's a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.
For someone like me, this was just perfect encouragement. Knowing that the official group is giving me permission to suck has given me the strength to just do it. And as I'm seven days and 10,000 words into the writing, I can testify in a court of law: My book sucks! My god, I never knew how hard it was to actually do the things that novelists do. I've written, I'm sure, millions of words for public consumption by now, but never in this form. The closest I've come is the Mankind's Last Hope play/sitcom that I co-wrote with my pal Cecil Vortex, but, ya know, that was 1) a co-writing effort and 2) a script, a different beast entirely.
Two images from the live production of Mankind's Last Hope--also with a character named Xanthor!
Not surprisingly, the part that's coming easiest to me, in the novel, is the dialog writing. Lots of fun and I think I've managed to concoct a few laugh lines. The Xanthor sections, too--the mock high fantasy--have been a blast to write so far. But all the rest of it? The character arcs and scene-setting and pacing and descriptive text? So out of my league here. Kinda wish I'd taken more creative writing classes right about now, which would have helped me get experience in some of the basics here. Essay writing, critiques, confessionals, all that I can do, for the most part. But this? This is like telling me to fly a plane.
Still, I persevere! Why? Because NaNoWriMo has given me permission to suck! As I sit down early every morning to grind out 1600+ words a day, I just do not look back. I have no idea where I'm going, who all these characters are yet, and only the vaguest notion of how it's all going to end. But who cares! What laws am I breaking? The chance that anyone is even going to read this first draft, at all, are slim-to-none (sorry!) But if I can emerge at the end of 30 days with a 50,000 word "finished" clump of garbage, it at least gives me something I can actually do a rewrite or edit of, something I didn't have 30 days earlier, and it, if nothing else, is one of those classic "learning experiences" that are so good for all of us no matter how much they usually blow.
Anyhoo, that's what I'm doing this month! So forgive what's likely to be the even-less-frequent-than-usual blog posts. Maybe I can post the occasional excerpt. Maybe. Oh, and, please keep your comments/criticisms/suggestions about EA.com coming, as I'm still actively reading them all and bringing them up with the staff. Lots and lots of work-in-progress behind the scenes at my day job. It may take awhile to see the fruits of my labor, but hang tight. The Master Plan is in effect.
Happy Sunday, everyone!
If you're not familiar with NaNoWriMo, it's a collective bit of organized group insanity, in which tens of thousands of people around the world voluntarily agree to set a personal goal: We will each write a novel, in 30 days. More specifically, we need to write 50,000 words in 30 days. There's no "prize" per se, other than the bragging rights that you did it, kind of like running a marathon.
The beautiful thing about it is that they--the organizers, I mean-- go out of their way to empower you to write crap. Because, obviously, unless you're some kind of insufferable demigodlike prodigy, that's what you're going to write in 30 days. All you are really doing is writing a first draft. Which anyone can do of course, and which many of us writerly types say we are going to do "some day"---but what NaNoWriMo forces you to do is commit, to keep going, to not bog yourself down in blood-from-a-stone word-by-word hyperediting or self-criticism. You can't possibly make the goal that way. And so, you write write write. I'm going to quote directly from the official website:
Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.
Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.
Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that's a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.
For someone like me, this was just perfect encouragement. Knowing that the official group is giving me permission to suck has given me the strength to just do it. And as I'm seven days and 10,000 words into the writing, I can testify in a court of law: My book sucks! My god, I never knew how hard it was to actually do the things that novelists do. I've written, I'm sure, millions of words for public consumption by now, but never in this form. The closest I've come is the Mankind's Last Hope play/sitcom that I co-wrote with my pal Cecil Vortex, but, ya know, that was 1) a co-writing effort and 2) a script, a different beast entirely.
Two images from the live production of Mankind's Last Hope--also with a character named Xanthor!
Not surprisingly, the part that's coming easiest to me, in the novel, is the dialog writing. Lots of fun and I think I've managed to concoct a few laugh lines. The Xanthor sections, too--the mock high fantasy--have been a blast to write so far. But all the rest of it? The character arcs and scene-setting and pacing and descriptive text? So out of my league here. Kinda wish I'd taken more creative writing classes right about now, which would have helped me get experience in some of the basics here. Essay writing, critiques, confessionals, all that I can do, for the most part. But this? This is like telling me to fly a plane.
Still, I persevere! Why? Because NaNoWriMo has given me permission to suck! As I sit down early every morning to grind out 1600+ words a day, I just do not look back. I have no idea where I'm going, who all these characters are yet, and only the vaguest notion of how it's all going to end. But who cares! What laws am I breaking? The chance that anyone is even going to read this first draft, at all, are slim-to-none (sorry!) But if I can emerge at the end of 30 days with a 50,000 word "finished" clump of garbage, it at least gives me something I can actually do a rewrite or edit of, something I didn't have 30 days earlier, and it, if nothing else, is one of those classic "learning experiences" that are so good for all of us no matter how much they usually blow.
Anyhoo, that's what I'm doing this month! So forgive what's likely to be the even-less-frequent-than-usual blog posts. Maybe I can post the occasional excerpt. Maybe. Oh, and, please keep your comments/criticisms/suggestions about EA.com coming, as I'm still actively reading them all and bringing them up with the staff. Lots and lots of work-in-progress behind the scenes at my day job. It may take awhile to see the fruits of my labor, but hang tight. The Master Plan is in effect.
Happy Sunday, everyone!
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