Today I went to the Toronto Book and Brunch Club Meetup. It was at the Prohibition Gastro House near Queen and Broadview, where the food was just under twenty bucks. (I had the Gros Dejeuner meal.) There were sixteen people, with hardly any no-shows!
We divided into two groups and discussed Joan Didion's book THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING. (I didn't know she wrote a second book about her daughter's death.) Afterward we all wrote book titles on slips and had a draw to choose our next book. The winner was Camus' existential novel L'ETRANGER.
Margaret and her children came over from Kingston yesterday for a brief visit, and today they took Moira back with them for maybe a week. I had a DVD she was interested in, of the Stephen Sondheim TV musical EVENING PRIMROSE, but it can wait till she returns. (We would have looked at it earlier but we were busy with the documentary about Christianity's history.)
This evening we saw the DVD of BERTIE AND ELIZABETH, a MASTERPIECE THEATRE production about George VI and the future Queen Mother. They managed to get through the whole of World War II without once mentioning the Soviet Union! (Who cares if they lost twenty-odd million people?) Nor did they mention that when Neville Chamberlain came back from Munich, George let the Prime Minister appear with him on the Buckingham Palace balcony, effectively giving his agreement Royal approval before Parliament could debate it.
As for the 1936 succession, IMHO the British were lucky to learn sooner rather than later that Edward VIII wasn't up to the job, considering that they were about to face a crisis far greater than the choice of his wife. When Parliament forced his abdication they did the right thing for the wrong reason.
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Music festivals
When I was growing up in Sackville, this was the time of year when they had music festivals. Mother was at one of them and said to someone, "Is that piano ever out of tune!" It turned out she was talking to the piano tuner. (That's what the English call "dropping a brick.") When Giuseppe talked about keeping pianos in tune I had to tell him that story: he loves those funny anecdotes!
When I was in Grade 2 my class was going to sing a song in a choir competition in the festival, but we missed out on it because of a bomb scare that day! (Someone went to juvenile court because of it.) That's when I learned that life isn't fair. And I don't even remember what the song was.
When I was nine, I sang in a solo competition. It was some song about going to sea with a line "And I'll bring you a parrot in a cage..." The guy who finished first had a song that went "We are the King's men, hale and hearty/Marching to meet our Bonapartey!" I must admit he had a better song than mine. I also performed some piano pieces, but I hardly remember any of them.
Some of us also played piano in music festivals in Halifax (in February), and Saint John (in May). Moira's always been the best pianist in our family, but Margaret also reached a high level.
Friday, March 29, 2013
I Heart Public Transit
This evening I went to a party organized by the I Heart Public Transit lobby group, which is working to pressure all levels of government to provide more money to fund the public transit systems in Toronto. MP Olivia Chow and MPP Rosario Marchese gave speeches, and somebody gave awards for the group's busiest activists.
Public transit has concerned me for years. IMHO Rob Ford made a big mistake throwing out the TransitCity plans: the planners got it right for once. His hate for streetcars is knee-jerk. Actually, a dedicated streetcar route takes so many drivers off the road that the remaining drivers aren't seriously worse off. It's true that the construction of the dedicated St. Clair line took far longer than it should have, partly because of unforeseeable factors (the plan being fought in court, upgrading other infrastructure at the same time). But now it's finished, and as someone who lives in the neighborhood I can say that it's a great benefit.
A few years ago I did some canvassing of my own in defence of TransitCity. I solicited petition signatures among TTC users in the St. Clair West station, and went door to door in the area just north of Eglinton West on what seemed to be the snowiest day of the year. Half of the locals seemed to be in Florida, but we did meet an Italian-Canadian woman who was baking stuff, and ended up giving us a couple of warm little roles. You can't buy an experience like that!
Public transit has concerned me for years. IMHO Rob Ford made a big mistake throwing out the TransitCity plans: the planners got it right for once. His hate for streetcars is knee-jerk. Actually, a dedicated streetcar route takes so many drivers off the road that the remaining drivers aren't seriously worse off. It's true that the construction of the dedicated St. Clair line took far longer than it should have, partly because of unforeseeable factors (the plan being fought in court, upgrading other infrastructure at the same time). But now it's finished, and as someone who lives in the neighborhood I can say that it's a great benefit.
A few years ago I did some canvassing of my own in defence of TransitCity. I solicited petition signatures among TTC users in the St. Clair West station, and went door to door in the area just north of Eglinton West on what seemed to be the snowiest day of the year. Half of the locals seemed to be in Florida, but we did meet an Italian-Canadian woman who was baking stuff, and ended up giving us a couple of warm little roles. You can't buy an experience like that!
Thursday, March 28, 2013
FILTHY LUCRE
This evening I went to the Non-Fiction Book Club Meetup, which now has a room inside the Reference Library. We discussed Joseph Heath's FILTHY LUCRE: ECONOMICS FOR PEOPLE WHO HATE CAPITALISM. (There were about 25 of us, and we divided into two groups to discuss it.) I hadn't got around to reading the book, but came anyway.
In this book Heath starts by debunk six right-wing economic myths, then goes on to debunk six left-wing economic myths. (But he doesn't debunk any centrist economic myths.) It sounded a bit glib to me, and I suspect it's full of straw men.
On the way there I started reading TEACH YOURSELF ESSENTIAL PORTUGUESE GRAMMAR. One word I like is "bonitinha," which means "cutie."
In the afternoon I saw the last episode of Diarmid McCulloch's documentary on the history of Christianity, dealing with the religion in today's modern world. He mentioned a pro-Nazi German church in the 1930s that insisted Jesus couldn't have been Jewish! (Was He Japanese?) It's rather ironic that the Pope launched an ongoing attack on "modernism" a century ago. Someone defined modernism as the ability to hold two opposite thoughts in your head at the same time, and from what I've seen that's something that Catholics have a talent for.
In this book Heath starts by debunk six right-wing economic myths, then goes on to debunk six left-wing economic myths. (But he doesn't debunk any centrist economic myths.) It sounded a bit glib to me, and I suspect it's full of straw men.
On the way there I started reading TEACH YOURSELF ESSENTIAL PORTUGUESE GRAMMAR. One word I like is "bonitinha," which means "cutie."
In the afternoon I saw the last episode of Diarmid McCulloch's documentary on the history of Christianity, dealing with the religion in today's modern world. He mentioned a pro-Nazi German church in the 1930s that insisted Jesus couldn't have been Jewish! (Was He Japanese?) It's rather ironic that the Pope launched an ongoing attack on "modernism" a century ago. Someone defined modernism as the ability to hold two opposite thoughts in your head at the same time, and from what I've seen that's something that Catholics have a talent for.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Learning Portuguese
Today I bought some books to learn Portuguese. First I went to this Portuguese bookstore near St. Clair & Lansdowne. They had a lot of religious stuff there. (I keep Catholicism at arm's length, but I do have a soft spot for stories about a saint's life.) I got a visual dictionary for children showing the word for things in Portuguese, English, French, German and Spanish. I also got a children's picture book of folktales. They were fairly pricey: a fool and his money are soon parted.
This evening I went to Indigo Books near Bay station and got two more books: one each from the Teach Yourself and _____ for Dummies series. (I also got the magazine CANADA'S HISTORY, which I still think of by its old name THE BEAVER.)
Afterward I went to the Fox and Fiddle near St. George station and did karaoke with a combination of the Fun Lovers Meetup and the INTJ Meetup. The latter refers to people who register as introverted, intuitive, thoughtful and judgmental on the Meyers-Briggs personality test. I think I'm more ISTJ--sensory rather than intuitive--but I may be on the cusp.
At karaoke I sang the Thompson Twins' "Hold Me Now" and Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy." They have an excellent playlist there, including over a dozen Gordon Lightfoot songs!
This evening I went to Indigo Books near Bay station and got two more books: one each from the Teach Yourself and _____ for Dummies series. (I also got the magazine CANADA'S HISTORY, which I still think of by its old name THE BEAVER.)
Afterward I went to the Fox and Fiddle near St. George station and did karaoke with a combination of the Fun Lovers Meetup and the INTJ Meetup. The latter refers to people who register as introverted, intuitive, thoughtful and judgmental on the Meyers-Briggs personality test. I think I'm more ISTJ--sensory rather than intuitive--but I may be on the cusp.
At karaoke I sang the Thompson Twins' "Hold Me Now" and Gordon Lightfoot's "Canadian Railroad Trilogy." They have an excellent playlist there, including over a dozen Gordon Lightfoot songs!
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
A missed event
This evening the Coro Verdi was going to have a meeting to discuss its future. (This may be the end for it.) I went to the Villa Colombo place where we've been having recent rehearsals but there was nobody else except Sergio, either there or at the Colombus Centre where we'd been rehearsing before. I guess the meeting was at Giuseppe's house. (Too bad they didn't send an email making the location clear.) Now I wish I'd gone to see MEET JOHN DOE after all.
So I went home and watched a MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATRE 3000 DVD. This one was spoofing MANHUNT IN SPACE, a movie created by assembling three episodes of ROCKY JONES, SPACE RANGER, a very cheap syndicated TV series from the 1950s.
I've finally quit the Facebook games CANDY CRUSH SAGA and PET RESCUE SAGA. I was stuck at levels 45 and 53 respectively.
On a whim, I've decided to learn some Portuguese. They have courses for teaching it at memrise.com. So far, I've learned that "Please" is "Por favor" (same as Spanish), "Thank you" is "Obrigado," "Yes" is "Sim," "No" is "Nao," and "Hello, how are you?" is "Ola, como esta?"
So I went home and watched a MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATRE 3000 DVD. This one was spoofing MANHUNT IN SPACE, a movie created by assembling three episodes of ROCKY JONES, SPACE RANGER, a very cheap syndicated TV series from the 1950s.
I've finally quit the Facebook games CANDY CRUSH SAGA and PET RESCUE SAGA. I was stuck at levels 45 and 53 respectively.
On a whim, I've decided to learn some Portuguese. They have courses for teaching it at memrise.com. So far, I've learned that "Please" is "Por favor" (same as Spanish), "Thank you" is "Obrigado," "Yes" is "Sim," "No" is "Nao," and "Hello, how are you?" is "Ola, como esta?"
Monday, March 25, 2013
Classical Social Meetup
This evening I went to a new group called Classical Social Meetup, another Meetup devoted to classical music. People get together at Fionn McCool's on Adelaide Street and watch a loose group of musicians play chamber music in a relaxed setting. You haven't lived till you've heard Danny Elfmans THE SIMPSONS theme arranged for cello! They also played Beethoven's Egmont Overture, which I've always liked. There was a wide range of instruments, including flute, bassoon and French horn. I met Cecilia from the Classic Movies Meetup there. (I often seem to meet the same person at different Meetups.)
Moira borrowed a BBC documentary series from the libraries titled A HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY, narrated by academic Diarmaid McCulloch. I find these historical documentaries fascinating. I liked his comparing Papal indulgences to selling lottery tickets.
Father and I did more work on the accounts from the book business. We're almost finished, but now we need to find the December receipts!
The Non-Fiction Book Club Meetup is doing READING LOLITA IN TEHERAN in May. That sounds worth reading. (This Wednesday they're discussing FILTHY LUCRE: ECONOMICS FOR PEOPLE WHO HATE CAPITALISM. I'm tempted to go even though I haven't got around to reading the book!)
Moira borrowed a BBC documentary series from the libraries titled A HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY, narrated by academic Diarmaid McCulloch. I find these historical documentaries fascinating. I liked his comparing Papal indulgences to selling lottery tickets.
Father and I did more work on the accounts from the book business. We're almost finished, but now we need to find the December receipts!
The Non-Fiction Book Club Meetup is doing READING LOLITA IN TEHERAN in May. That sounds worth reading. (This Wednesday they're discussing FILTHY LUCRE: ECONOMICS FOR PEOPLE WHO HATE CAPITALISM. I'm tempted to go even though I haven't got around to reading the book!)
Sunday, March 24, 2013
CITIZEN KANE
"I didn't know he was collecting diamonds." "He's collecting someone who collects diamonds"--CITIZEN KANE
Tonight I saw Orson Welles' 1941 classic CITIZEN KANE for the umpteenth time, at the Fairview screening room with the Classic Movie Meetup. Despite all the times I've seen it, I still notice new details. Like in the breakfast-table sequence, when they show them silent, he's reading his own newspaper while she's reading the rival sheet. Or when he meets Susan for the first time, she says "I can give you... hot water," rather suggestively. Or when Leland says, "You should sail to a desert island and lord it over the monkeys," reminding me of the opening shots in Xanadu, showing the monkeys in his menagerie. Or the line in the singer's encomium: "With wealth and fame, he's still the same!" Or Kane jokingly saying, "You don't expect me to keep those promises, do you?"
What more is there to say about CITIZEN KANE? Lots. Like that the older Kane reminded me of Donald Trump. (When Giuseppe was giving me a singing lesson once I mentioned something about Trump and he immediately said, "I don't think much of him." Giuseppe's very upfront about people he thinks little of.) Or that Bernstein's story of seeing the girl on the other ferry and thinking about her ever since has something of an F. Scott Fitzgerald tone. Or that I find the scene where he trashes Susan's room a bit conventional. Of course, the meaning of "Rosebud" is a McGuffin, important only in giving the reporters something to search for. (Welles saw this more clearly than his screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz, adding the speech at the end suggesting that even if they solved the mystery it wouldn't be the big explanation they hoped for.)
The Classic Movie Meetup will be showing MEET JOHN DOE on Monday (they should have let Gary Cooper jump at the end) and THE FRENCH CONNECTION next month. But alas, the former conflicts with my choir practice and the latter is on the same day that I'm seeing the PARSIFAL digital broadcast.
Tonight I saw Orson Welles' 1941 classic CITIZEN KANE for the umpteenth time, at the Fairview screening room with the Classic Movie Meetup. Despite all the times I've seen it, I still notice new details. Like in the breakfast-table sequence, when they show them silent, he's reading his own newspaper while she's reading the rival sheet. Or when he meets Susan for the first time, she says "I can give you... hot water," rather suggestively. Or when Leland says, "You should sail to a desert island and lord it over the monkeys," reminding me of the opening shots in Xanadu, showing the monkeys in his menagerie. Or the line in the singer's encomium: "With wealth and fame, he's still the same!" Or Kane jokingly saying, "You don't expect me to keep those promises, do you?"
What more is there to say about CITIZEN KANE? Lots. Like that the older Kane reminded me of Donald Trump. (When Giuseppe was giving me a singing lesson once I mentioned something about Trump and he immediately said, "I don't think much of him." Giuseppe's very upfront about people he thinks little of.) Or that Bernstein's story of seeing the girl on the other ferry and thinking about her ever since has something of an F. Scott Fitzgerald tone. Or that I find the scene where he trashes Susan's room a bit conventional. Of course, the meaning of "Rosebud" is a McGuffin, important only in giving the reporters something to search for. (Welles saw this more clearly than his screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz, adding the speech at the end suggesting that even if they solved the mystery it wouldn't be the big explanation they hoped for.)
The Classic Movie Meetup will be showing MEET JOHN DOE on Monday (they should have let Gary Cooper jump at the end) and THE FRENCH CONNECTION next month. But alas, the former conflicts with my choir practice and the latter is on the same day that I'm seeing the PARSIFAL digital broadcast.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Washington politics
I sometimes get depressed about the state of politics in the US. Like recently, there was talk of Ashley Judd challenging Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell for his Kentucky seat. AJ's a gorgeous movie star, but she's also smart, outgoing and an independent thinker. If the Democrats are to have any chance in this race, it'll be with someone like her.
So what are the mainstream Democrats doing? Bill Clinton is trying to persuade this state insider to run against AJ for the Democratic nomination in that race. The argument is that she'll be more "electable" since rural America hates Hollywood. It's reminding me of the 2004 presidential race where the Washington establishment declared Howard Dean unelectable because he was "angry." (How middle-class!) And those Democratic voters chickened out and nominated John Kerry instead, just like in 1972 when they turned against Edmund Muskie after he cried in front of the cameras when a New Hampshire newspaper attacked his wife. IMHO if the liberals had bucked conventional wisdom and nominated Dean, he would have won by an unstealable margin.
The other week Attorney-General Eric Holder suggested that the big banks couldn't be prosecuted for their malfeasance because it would hurt the economy. That's exactly why they should have taken over those banks five years ago instead of just bailing them out and letting things run their course. It was a defining moment for Obama, who didn't call for changing the legislation, and he hadn't yet been elected! That's why it's important for progressives to fight against the clique controlling the Democratic Party, instead of just turning out to vote Democratic when they're told to.
When Democrats like Clinton back their people against candidates like AJ and Dean, it's really about controlling the Democratic Party. They should NOT have an easy time of it.
So what are the mainstream Democrats doing? Bill Clinton is trying to persuade this state insider to run against AJ for the Democratic nomination in that race. The argument is that she'll be more "electable" since rural America hates Hollywood. It's reminding me of the 2004 presidential race where the Washington establishment declared Howard Dean unelectable because he was "angry." (How middle-class!) And those Democratic voters chickened out and nominated John Kerry instead, just like in 1972 when they turned against Edmund Muskie after he cried in front of the cameras when a New Hampshire newspaper attacked his wife. IMHO if the liberals had bucked conventional wisdom and nominated Dean, he would have won by an unstealable margin.
The other week Attorney-General Eric Holder suggested that the big banks couldn't be prosecuted for their malfeasance because it would hurt the economy. That's exactly why they should have taken over those banks five years ago instead of just bailing them out and letting things run their course. It was a defining moment for Obama, who didn't call for changing the legislation, and he hadn't yet been elected! That's why it's important for progressives to fight against the clique controlling the Democratic Party, instead of just turning out to vote Democratic when they're told to.
When Democrats like Clinton back their people against candidates like AJ and Dean, it's really about controlling the Democratic Party. They should NOT have an easy time of it.
Friday, March 22, 2013
The master class concert
This evening we put on our master class concert at the Bickford Center. There were a dozen of us, singing 21 songs. Five were by Bellini, and there was also stuff like "Sorry Her Lot Who Loves Too Well" from Gilbert & Sullivan's HMS PINAFORE and the Spanish song "Granada." The singers included TOR soloists Carrie and Tami. (Too bad William and Olivia couldn't make it.)
Of course, I sang "Il Balen di Suo Soriso" from Verdi's IL TROVATORE and "Wohin?" from Schubert's DIE SCHOENE MUELLERIN song cycle. I think I went over pretty well: one audience member said I'd surprised her.
When the concert was over, they had a tribute for Giuseppe on his retirement from the TOR, and they gave him a plant for his garden!
They've announced the TOR operas for next year: Bizet's CARMEN and Mozart's COSI FAN TUTTE. (I really like the trio "Soave Sia Il Vento" in the latter opera.) I was in the chorus when the TOR did CARMEN five years ago, but I don't feel a big desire to do it again: I'll probably skip next season. Beatrice will be directing both shows.
I may be resuming my singing lessons with Giuseppe pretty soon.
Of course, I sang "Il Balen di Suo Soriso" from Verdi's IL TROVATORE and "Wohin?" from Schubert's DIE SCHOENE MUELLERIN song cycle. I think I went over pretty well: one audience member said I'd surprised her.
When the concert was over, they had a tribute for Giuseppe on his retirement from the TOR, and they gave him a plant for his garden!
They've announced the TOR operas for next year: Bizet's CARMEN and Mozart's COSI FAN TUTTE. (I really like the trio "Soave Sia Il Vento" in the latter opera.) I was in the chorus when the TOR did CARMEN five years ago, but I don't feel a big desire to do it again: I'll probably skip next season. Beatrice will be directing both shows.
I may be resuming my singing lessons with Giuseppe pretty soon.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
Computers and me
Back when we were in Mississauga in the mid-70s we bought a Texas Instruments pocket calculator back when that was the new thing. Then in 1978 we got a Radio Shack TRS-80 computer. It had tiny memory power by today's measure, but I did learn Basic programming with it. The manual had programs for some simple games, like one where you had to guide a lunar module to the moon's surface so it would have zero velocity when it touched down. If the touchdown velocity was high, it would print out S Q U I D G E!
Then in 1979 my brothers and I would go to Father's university office to play the early game Adventure on his computer, using the early form of the internet. That's a game where you go exploring in a cave system and find a lot of treasures. In one place there's a big troll blocking your way across a bridge and you have to throw him a treasure. You can throw an axe at him, but this is all that happens: "The troll deftly catches the axe, then throws it back, saying 'Nice workmanship, but it isn't a treasure.'"
In 1983, when IBM's PC was the new thing, Donald drove down to Boston to buy one. (He's now a computer professional.) My father bought an Atari home computer in 1987. I have a feeling he chose that one because it was the cheapest in the store, and we had a few problems with it. We got a few games for it, including Bureaucracy, written by HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY author Douglas Adams. At one point you have to eat at a restaurant that accepts only cash but you have no cash, so the only thing you can do is sneak out. (This happened to Adams in real life once.)
We got a Mac computer in 1989, and that's the model I swear by. I got my first laptop in 1992. We got connected to the internet in 1996, on my initiative. Moira had recently got a PC, and it was around then that I started playing KING'S QUEST VII: THE PRINCELESS BRIDE, a game about a fairy-tale princess and her mother wandering through a land perilous adventure after being separated. At first I went online in Moira's room, then the following year we set up a computer in the attic. It's only since 2008 that I've been accessing the internet on the computer in my room.
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
TV and me
When I was a little kid in the '60s in southeastern New Brunswick, we got one TV channel! It was CKCW in Moncton, then the base of the Lionel Network, whose logo was the Lionel Lobster. Then in 1969 the CBC affiliate CHSJ got extended to our area. Note that it was an affiliate rather than a CBC station, so we sometimes didn't get shows that were on the regular stations, or we'd get them at inconvenient hours. In addition to these stations we could also get CBAFT, a Moncton station for Radio-Canada (the CBC's French network) and CBCT, the CBC's Charlottetown station, but only poor signals with a lot of snow.
When Father spent a year on sabbatical in Missisauga in the mid-70s, we got cable TV for the first time. Cable TV then meant less than a dozen channels, including CBC and CTV in Toronto, TVOntario, CITY TV (then at channel 79 near the top end of the UHF range), Global (then a new network), CHCH from Hamilton, and the four American networks in Buffalo including PBS. We could only get Buffalo's independent station WUTV on a direct UHF signal of poor quality.
Back in New Brunswick, we only started getting cable TV in late 1978. Back then cable only included the ABC and NBC stations from Bangor, Maine. (They only added CBS and PBS in 1983, and then they were stations in Detroit rather than Maine.) And we only had a black & white TV back then. We first got color when Father was on sabbatical in England in late 1981. We were in Toronto in early 1982, and the cable system had expanded to about thirty channels.
Back in New Brunswick, we started to get a range of Pay TV channels like CNN and A&E in 1985. That was the same year we bought a VCR, which greatly expanded the content available to us.
When I moved to Toronto in 1990, Moira and I actually went without cable for a few years, and even made do with a black & white TV. But I eventually bought a color set, and when the parents moved here in 1994 we returned to cable TV. (In 2001 we switched from cable TV to satellite TV.) We got a DVD player in 2001 and started renting mail DVDs through zip.ca in 2004. And we bought an HDTV and subscribed to Netflix downloads last year!
My generation was lucky to get introduced to TV gradually. We appreciate it more than people who've been born with a wide available range of content.
When Father spent a year on sabbatical in Missisauga in the mid-70s, we got cable TV for the first time. Cable TV then meant less than a dozen channels, including CBC and CTV in Toronto, TVOntario, CITY TV (then at channel 79 near the top end of the UHF range), Global (then a new network), CHCH from Hamilton, and the four American networks in Buffalo including PBS. We could only get Buffalo's independent station WUTV on a direct UHF signal of poor quality.
Back in New Brunswick, we only started getting cable TV in late 1978. Back then cable only included the ABC and NBC stations from Bangor, Maine. (They only added CBS and PBS in 1983, and then they were stations in Detroit rather than Maine.) And we only had a black & white TV back then. We first got color when Father was on sabbatical in England in late 1981. We were in Toronto in early 1982, and the cable system had expanded to about thirty channels.
Back in New Brunswick, we started to get a range of Pay TV channels like CNN and A&E in 1985. That was the same year we bought a VCR, which greatly expanded the content available to us.
When I moved to Toronto in 1990, Moira and I actually went without cable for a few years, and even made do with a black & white TV. But I eventually bought a color set, and when the parents moved here in 1994 we returned to cable TV. (In 2001 we switched from cable TV to satellite TV.) We got a DVD player in 2001 and started renting mail DVDs through zip.ca in 2004. And we bought an HDTV and subscribed to Netflix downloads last year!
My generation was lucky to get introduced to TV gradually. We appreciate it more than people who've been born with a wide available range of content.
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Two Russian movies
I just saw a DVD with two early Russian movies. Last night I saw OUTSKIRTS, a movie from the early '30s about a small Russian town during World War I. A German POW finds work in the town's shoemaking shop and later joins in the October Revolution. Like many early sound movies, it's a bit stilted and slow-paced. And it's certainly unsubtle, in the manner of Stalin-era productions. But it's still pretty effective overall.
This evening I saw the Russian silent THE GIRL WITH THE HATBOX. It's a pretty manic comedy about a hatmaker who commutes into Moscow then "marries" a homeless student so he can live in the Moscow room she's entitled to. (Maybe you can guess what happens next.) There's also a lottery ticket.
I've been watching GUNSMOKE on DVD. I think I actually prefer the later seasons when they toned down the violence a bit and shifted into character study. The show had a lot of interesting guest stars. (Leonard Nimoy played a Native American in one episode, and definitely looked the part!) In the smaller roles I've even seen western movie veterans like Harry Carey Jr. and Ben Johnson.
The cold I had the other week is gone, but I still feel a bit of a headache. I went to bed at 7:30 and woke up around midnight. Goodness knows when I'll be waking up tomorrow!
This evening I saw the Russian silent THE GIRL WITH THE HATBOX. It's a pretty manic comedy about a hatmaker who commutes into Moscow then "marries" a homeless student so he can live in the Moscow room she's entitled to. (Maybe you can guess what happens next.) There's also a lottery ticket.
I've been watching GUNSMOKE on DVD. I think I actually prefer the later seasons when they toned down the violence a bit and shifted into character study. The show had a lot of interesting guest stars. (Leonard Nimoy played a Native American in one episode, and definitely looked the part!) In the smaller roles I've even seen western movie veterans like Harry Carey Jr. and Ben Johnson.
The cold I had the other week is gone, but I still feel a bit of a headache. I went to bed at 7:30 and woke up around midnight. Goodness knows when I'll be waking up tomorrow!
Monday, March 18, 2013
Languages
The first foreign language I started learning was French, in school of course. In Grades 5 through 7 we used the same textbook and learned the same things over and over. (This was the era of "natural" learning.) It wasn't till Grade 8 that we started to learn conjugation. But in the mid-70s I read several Asterix books in their original French and enjoyed them greatly. In ASTERIX AND THE POT OF GOLD (the one where he and Obelix have to make up a stolen pot of gold) there's a hilarious part where they join a "new wave" acting troop lead by a guy who resembles David Bowie!
When I was 15 I decided to start learning Latin. I even took a couple of college-level correspondence courses. I tried learning a bit of German, but that was a bit too challenging for me. (Moira's the German expert in this family.)
When I was 23, just after graduating, I took some time off and learned a bit of Koine Greek, the Hellenistic version of the language in which the New Testament was written. I also tried learning some Spanish and even a bit of Hebrew, but Hebrew was also a bit too complicated.
Then my main foreign-language interest was Chinese. In my late 20s and early 30s I gradually learned to read about 1200 characters. (Speaking it is beyond me, however.) When I was 34 or so, I actually spent some time learning Esperanto! Then at age 38 I got interested in Japanese and learned enough to read that language.
When I was 40 or so, I actually started to learn Dutch! It happened because I was taking this creative writing course in the TDSB night-school program, and there was this Dutch nurse also in the course... Maybe I'll take it up again someday.
My most recent linguistic interest is Classical Greek, actually the language's previous form between 600 and 200 BC or so. I got interested in that when I saw this movie of the Terence Rattigan play THE WINSLOW BOY, in which British schoolboys were learning Greek. With this language, as with several others, I've been using a book from the TEACH YOURSELF... series. (In addition to the book, the series also has supplementary exercises online.)
When I was 15 I decided to start learning Latin. I even took a couple of college-level correspondence courses. I tried learning a bit of German, but that was a bit too challenging for me. (Moira's the German expert in this family.)
When I was 23, just after graduating, I took some time off and learned a bit of Koine Greek, the Hellenistic version of the language in which the New Testament was written. I also tried learning some Spanish and even a bit of Hebrew, but Hebrew was also a bit too complicated.
Then my main foreign-language interest was Chinese. In my late 20s and early 30s I gradually learned to read about 1200 characters. (Speaking it is beyond me, however.) When I was 34 or so, I actually spent some time learning Esperanto! Then at age 38 I got interested in Japanese and learned enough to read that language.
When I was 40 or so, I actually started to learn Dutch! It happened because I was taking this creative writing course in the TDSB night-school program, and there was this Dutch nurse also in the course... Maybe I'll take it up again someday.
My most recent linguistic interest is Classical Greek, actually the language's previous form between 600 and 200 BC or so. I got interested in that when I saw this movie of the Terence Rattigan play THE WINSLOW BOY, in which British schoolboys were learning Greek. With this language, as with several others, I've been using a book from the TEACH YOURSELF... series. (In addition to the book, the series also has supplementary exercises online.)
Sunday, March 17, 2013
THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING
I just finished reading Joan Didion's THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING. I've been reading it for a Book Club Meetup that's discussing it over lunch in a couple of weeks.
The book's a memoir where Didion describes the year after the death of her husband, fellow author John Gregory Dunne. In addition to being widowed, she also had to deal with her daughter Quintana's medical difficulties, which resulted in emergency brain surgery and a long period of rehabilitation.
Didion's had a long career of reporting, and she describes her state of mind almost like a reporter discussing someone else. It's an excellent book, though it rather trails off in the later chapters. (I think it was turned into a one-woman show on Broadway with Vanessa Redgrave.)
Now that that book's finished, I've gone back to the "Intoxication" issue of LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY. I've ordered the book WANDERLUST and I'm going to read it soon, but it still hasn't arrived and I may have to order it again.
Saw Fritz Lang's MAN HUNT yesterday. It has some style, but credibility isn't its strong point. It's the one where English big-game hunter Walter Pidgeon points a rifle at Hitler for "the thrill of the hunt," then the Nazis throw him off a cliff so it'll look like an accident, but he survives and escapes to England where the Nazis pursue him and Cockney Joan Bennett falls in love with him...
The book's a memoir where Didion describes the year after the death of her husband, fellow author John Gregory Dunne. In addition to being widowed, she also had to deal with her daughter Quintana's medical difficulties, which resulted in emergency brain surgery and a long period of rehabilitation.
Didion's had a long career of reporting, and she describes her state of mind almost like a reporter discussing someone else. It's an excellent book, though it rather trails off in the later chapters. (I think it was turned into a one-woman show on Broadway with Vanessa Redgrave.)
Now that that book's finished, I've gone back to the "Intoxication" issue of LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY. I've ordered the book WANDERLUST and I'm going to read it soon, but it still hasn't arrived and I may have to order it again.
Saw Fritz Lang's MAN HUNT yesterday. It has some style, but credibility isn't its strong point. It's the one where English big-game hunter Walter Pidgeon points a rifle at Hitler for "the thrill of the hunt," then the Nazis throw him off a cliff so it'll look like an accident, but he survives and escapes to England where the Nazis pursue him and Cockney Joan Bennett falls in love with him...
Friday, March 15, 2013
THE STING
This evening I saw George Roy Hill's 1973 Best Picture Oscar winner THE STING at the Yonge & Dundas Event Screen with the Movie Meetup group. It didn't start till 7:30, so I finally had time to make fettucine alfredo for dinner. Afterward we went to the nearby Pickle Barrel, where I had a banana split.
THE STING, of course, is Paul Newman and Robert Redford's second "bromance" vehicle, following 1969's BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID. It's set in 1936 Chicago, the one where young grifter Redford hooks up with veteran scammer Newman to cheat dangerous racketeer Robert Shaw (the real reason for the movie's blockbuster success, IMHO) out of a fortune. Redford's previous caper stealing mob money got his partner killed--the "token Negro who's about to quit the racket but instead gets killed off early" role--but he didn't learn his lesson. I have a perverse admiration for people who don't learn from their mistakes: it's an oddly American trait.
The movie won lots of Oscars, of course, including Edith Head's umpteenth Costume Design Oscar. (TIME magazine groused that she won it for remembering how people dressed in the 1930s.) Spoiler alert: Dimitra Arliss plays a woman the mobsters hire to seduce Redford, but she wasn't so pretty, resulting in this exchange in the MAD magazine spoof: "They hired her to seduce you with her good looks." "Who did?" "The Polish Mafia!" Ray Walston plays one of the scammers who take over the telegraph office by pretending to be painters, and in the MAD version he says, "I'm beginning to appreciate the realism and credibility of MY FAVORITE MARTIAN!"
THE STING, of course, is Paul Newman and Robert Redford's second "bromance" vehicle, following 1969's BUTCH CASSIDY AND THE SUNDANCE KID. It's set in 1936 Chicago, the one where young grifter Redford hooks up with veteran scammer Newman to cheat dangerous racketeer Robert Shaw (the real reason for the movie's blockbuster success, IMHO) out of a fortune. Redford's previous caper stealing mob money got his partner killed--the "token Negro who's about to quit the racket but instead gets killed off early" role--but he didn't learn his lesson. I have a perverse admiration for people who don't learn from their mistakes: it's an oddly American trait.
The movie won lots of Oscars, of course, including Edith Head's umpteenth Costume Design Oscar. (TIME magazine groused that she won it for remembering how people dressed in the 1930s.) Spoiler alert: Dimitra Arliss plays a woman the mobsters hire to seduce Redford, but she wasn't so pretty, resulting in this exchange in the MAD magazine spoof: "They hired her to seduce you with her good looks." "Who did?" "The Polish Mafia!" Ray Walston plays one of the scammers who take over the telegraph office by pretending to be painters, and in the MAD version he says, "I'm beginning to appreciate the realism and credibility of MY FAVORITE MARTIAN!"
Thursday, March 14, 2013
Queen Street art walk
This evening I went on Betty Anne's Queen Street art walk. (It starts at 6:00 so I had to delay making fettucine alfredo again.) She makes printouts of her itinerary, and the one I got reminds me of a lot of details I couldn't have remembered on my own.
The galleries we visited were all on Tecumseth Street south of Queen. The first was the Susan Hobbs Gallery, where Susan has a twentieth-anniversary show called "Simple Present, Future Anterior." The show had stuff like a block of wood carved in the shape of a Samsonite suitcase, and what looks at first glance like a classic Hudson's Bay Company blanket but the colors are slightly different. (I didn't ask whether the chair it was on was part of the exhibit.)
Then we went to the nearby Georgia Scherman Gallery which was displaying paintings by Melanie Authier. They have an impressionistic look that conveys motion. One picture reminded me of a Japanese ballerina doing a Noh drama or something. Another reminded me of a Chinese New Year dragon procession where the guy in front holds up the dragon's head and the others support the tail in a serpentine formation. And one on the north wall was like a white figure holding a black mask near his face. And one nearby was like the prow of a boat breaking out of the picture's surface into the third dimension... (Go see them yourself if you doubt me!)
Then we went to the Birch Libralato Gallery. One room had posters by Andy Patton showing Chinese-style poems printed out with the letters going from the top down like Chinese writing.
I s l
t o i
r k
l t e
o
o o t
k f h
e i
d s
The other room had "photo-based works" by Toni Hafkenshied that showed buildings with a subtly artificial composition style, sort of like the buildings you create in computer games like SimCity.
Then we went on a walkabout along Queen Street, stopping at Balisi and a Slavic restaurant called Czehoski's. They had some food samples at the latter place, but I had a headache and didn't stay for that.
Betty Anne says she got hooked on LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY thanks to me.
The galleries we visited were all on Tecumseth Street south of Queen. The first was the Susan Hobbs Gallery, where Susan has a twentieth-anniversary show called "Simple Present, Future Anterior." The show had stuff like a block of wood carved in the shape of a Samsonite suitcase, and what looks at first glance like a classic Hudson's Bay Company blanket but the colors are slightly different. (I didn't ask whether the chair it was on was part of the exhibit.)
Then we went to the nearby Georgia Scherman Gallery which was displaying paintings by Melanie Authier. They have an impressionistic look that conveys motion. One picture reminded me of a Japanese ballerina doing a Noh drama or something. Another reminded me of a Chinese New Year dragon procession where the guy in front holds up the dragon's head and the others support the tail in a serpentine formation. And one on the north wall was like a white figure holding a black mask near his face. And one nearby was like the prow of a boat breaking out of the picture's surface into the third dimension... (Go see them yourself if you doubt me!)
Then we went to the Birch Libralato Gallery. One room had posters by Andy Patton showing Chinese-style poems printed out with the letters going from the top down like Chinese writing.
I s l
t o i
r k
l t e
o
o o t
k f h
e i
d s
The other room had "photo-based works" by Toni Hafkenshied that showed buildings with a subtly artificial composition style, sort of like the buildings you create in computer games like SimCity.
Then we went on a walkabout along Queen Street, stopping at Balisi and a Slavic restaurant called Czehoski's. They had some food samples at the latter place, but I had a headache and didn't stay for that.
Betty Anne says she got hooked on LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY thanks to me.
Two movies
Last night I saw the silent movie CHICAGO with the Classic Movies Meetup group. We rented a room at the Central pub in Mirvish Village and saw it on a video screen. It's a 1927 version of the story that became the Oscar-winning musical with the same title about a decade ago. It was based on the play of the same title, which was based in turn on the real-life Beulah Annan case. (There was also a non-musical sound version called ROXIE HART in the early 1940s with Ginger Rogers in the title role, but in that version she was innocent!) It's pretty scathing satire.
This evening I saw the documentary GREENWICH VILLAGE: MUSIC THAT DEFINED A GENERATION at the Bloor. It's about the folk music scene that emerged from Greenwich Village dives in the 1960s and went on to, uh, define a generation. They interviewed a lot of musicians, including Pete Seeger, a true hero of mine. (During World War II Woody Guthrie put a label on his guitar saying "This machine kills fascists"; Seeger's banjo says "This machine surrounds hate and forces it to surrender.") I didn't realize that the House Un-American Activities Committee still had enough pull to quietly wreck Buffy Sainte Marie's career in the United States, though she stayed a star here in Canada.
I'm going to make fettucine alfredo one of these days, but the timing is never right. I had planned on making it today, but John and Kathrine are back from visiting Australia and came over for dinner. (They're vegans.) The next two days I'm going out early, so if I make it either of those days, I'll have to get started earlier than usual. It takes me about 45 minutes to make it.
This evening I saw the documentary GREENWICH VILLAGE: MUSIC THAT DEFINED A GENERATION at the Bloor. It's about the folk music scene that emerged from Greenwich Village dives in the 1960s and went on to, uh, define a generation. They interviewed a lot of musicians, including Pete Seeger, a true hero of mine. (During World War II Woody Guthrie put a label on his guitar saying "This machine kills fascists"; Seeger's banjo says "This machine surrounds hate and forces it to surrender.") I didn't realize that the House Un-American Activities Committee still had enough pull to quietly wreck Buffy Sainte Marie's career in the United States, though she stayed a star here in Canada.
I'm going to make fettucine alfredo one of these days, but the timing is never right. I had planned on making it today, but John and Kathrine are back from visiting Australia and came over for dinner. (They're vegans.) The next two days I'm going out early, so if I make it either of those days, I'll have to get started earlier than usual. It takes me about 45 minutes to make it.
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Recent DVDs
Here are some DVDs I've been seeing recently.
MONTE WALSH: A 1970 western with classic tough guys Lee Marvin and Jack Palance as aging cowboys facing the end of the cowboy era. (In a way, every western is about the end of the west.)
RICHARD III: A silent film from 1912, it's the earliest surviving American feature film.
ELECTRIC EDWARDIANS: Early films of British people in the decade before World War I. (They filmed a lot of processions.)
CHARLIE CHAN AT MONTE CARLO: Warner Oland's Charlie Chan 1930s detective series is a guilty pleasure for me. (He was a cool actor, born in Sweden, who also translated Strindberg plays!)
LA TRAVIATA: We've been looking at a Glyndebourne production of the Verdi opera directed by Peter Hall, but the singers are oddly dispassionate. (Moira says they sound more English than Italian.) I preferred Hall's Glyndebourne production of Rossini's Cinderella opera LA CENERENTOLA.
ANYTHING GOES: A kinescope of a 1950s COLGATE COMEDY HOUR production of the Cole Porter musical, with Ethel Merman (who else?), Frank Sinatra and Bert Lahr.
I'll soon be seeing a French production of the Mozart opera THE MAGIC FLUTE, Fritz Lang's anti-Nazi thriller MANHUNT, and the early Russian movies OUTSKIRTS and THE GIRL WITH THE HAT BOX.
MONTE WALSH: A 1970 western with classic tough guys Lee Marvin and Jack Palance as aging cowboys facing the end of the cowboy era. (In a way, every western is about the end of the west.)
RICHARD III: A silent film from 1912, it's the earliest surviving American feature film.
ELECTRIC EDWARDIANS: Early films of British people in the decade before World War I. (They filmed a lot of processions.)
CHARLIE CHAN AT MONTE CARLO: Warner Oland's Charlie Chan 1930s detective series is a guilty pleasure for me. (He was a cool actor, born in Sweden, who also translated Strindberg plays!)
LA TRAVIATA: We've been looking at a Glyndebourne production of the Verdi opera directed by Peter Hall, but the singers are oddly dispassionate. (Moira says they sound more English than Italian.) I preferred Hall's Glyndebourne production of Rossini's Cinderella opera LA CENERENTOLA.
ANYTHING GOES: A kinescope of a 1950s COLGATE COMEDY HOUR production of the Cole Porter musical, with Ethel Merman (who else?), Frank Sinatra and Bert Lahr.
I'll soon be seeing a French production of the Mozart opera THE MAGIC FLUTE, Fritz Lang's anti-Nazi thriller MANHUNT, and the early Russian movies OUTSKIRTS and THE GIRL WITH THE HAT BOX.
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
FUNNY FACE
"Why did you do that?" "Empathy. I put myself in your position and decided you wanted me to kiss you"--FUNNY FACE
We got a break from choir practice for a couple of weeks, partly because Coro Verdi's future's still uncertain. I could use it. After the second MACBETH performance yesterday, I had a headache so big that I went to bed right after supper. Moira went to the second performance and enjoyed it. (She borrowed the score from the library and learned lots of details about the opera.) She's surprised that after it was finished Giuseppe, Adolfo and the soloists weren't too tired to make conversation.
So this evening I went to see Stanley Donen's 1957 movie of the Gershwin musical FUNNY FACE, with Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn, at the Yonge & Dundas Event Screen. The best thing about it was the look, back from the age of three-color Technicolor. Famous photographer Richard Avedon was a visual consultant and designed the striking opening-title sequence. Astaire plays a fashion photographer called Dick Avery--sound like any visual consultants we know?--who discovers "new look" model AH in a Greenwich Village bookstore and takes her to Paris for a Big, Important fashion shoot. (Hollywood kept making romantic pairings of AH with visibly older actors--Humphrey Bogart, Gary Cooper, Rex Harrison--which seems a bit creepy today.) Kay Thompson, author of the Eloise books, plays a fashion editor clearly based on Diana Vreeland.
The story is pretty weak. The plot requires AH to be so flaky that she keeps disappearing when she's needed at her workplace. (Say, maybe they should have hired a more experienced model!) And it's rather predictable: just when I was thinking "It's time for the Big Complication to almost destroy the romance," the big complication came along in the form of the Paris philosopher AH worships. I did like the scenes set in Paris' bohemian world, including a cafe where AH does a funny free-form dance.
The 1950s was a depressing time in some ways, including the popular assumption that women were supposed to make beauty their highest priority. (Audrey Hepburn once said "Laughter is a calorie burner," and she must have laughed a lot!)
We got a break from choir practice for a couple of weeks, partly because Coro Verdi's future's still uncertain. I could use it. After the second MACBETH performance yesterday, I had a headache so big that I went to bed right after supper. Moira went to the second performance and enjoyed it. (She borrowed the score from the library and learned lots of details about the opera.) She's surprised that after it was finished Giuseppe, Adolfo and the soloists weren't too tired to make conversation.
So this evening I went to see Stanley Donen's 1957 movie of the Gershwin musical FUNNY FACE, with Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn, at the Yonge & Dundas Event Screen. The best thing about it was the look, back from the age of three-color Technicolor. Famous photographer Richard Avedon was a visual consultant and designed the striking opening-title sequence. Astaire plays a fashion photographer called Dick Avery--sound like any visual consultants we know?--who discovers "new look" model AH in a Greenwich Village bookstore and takes her to Paris for a Big, Important fashion shoot. (Hollywood kept making romantic pairings of AH with visibly older actors--Humphrey Bogart, Gary Cooper, Rex Harrison--which seems a bit creepy today.) Kay Thompson, author of the Eloise books, plays a fashion editor clearly based on Diana Vreeland.
The story is pretty weak. The plot requires AH to be so flaky that she keeps disappearing when she's needed at her workplace. (Say, maybe they should have hired a more experienced model!) And it's rather predictable: just when I was thinking "It's time for the Big Complication to almost destroy the romance," the big complication came along in the form of the Paris philosopher AH worships. I did like the scenes set in Paris' bohemian world, including a cafe where AH does a funny free-form dance.
The 1950s was a depressing time in some ways, including the popular assumption that women were supposed to make beauty their highest priority. (Audrey Hepburn once said "Laughter is a calorie burner," and she must have laughed a lot!)
Monday, March 11, 2013
My Daily Ink subscription
I've subscribed to King Features' dailyink.com for over six years. Each day the new comics appear at 1:00 in the morning. (Yeah, I stay up too late.) Here's the comic strips I read there.
Current strips:
JUDGE PARKER, APARTMENT 3G, MARY WORTH, REX MORGAN MD: Four "soap opera" strips that I read so I can keep up with Josh Fruehlinger, who often discusses them at The Comics Curmudgeon.
JUDGE PARKER is about rich, relentlessly successful people (Tony Soprano said "In this house it's still 1954"; in Judge Parker's world it's still 1986!); APARTMENT 3G is about three single women in a Manhattan flat; Mary Worth is a biddy relentlessly giving her condo neighbors free advice; Rex Morgan MD is, of course, a doctor.
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: The superhero comic strip, also frequently discussed by Josh. (He may be the laziest superhero of our time: in a recent episode his alter ego Peter Parker, secretly hitching a ride on a truck, used his superpowers to craft a super-hammock!)
MARK TRAIL: A rather goofy strip about a nature journalist always getting into fist fights with villains who wear mustaches. (I remember reading the Sunday "Trail Ways" feature back when I was a kid.)
THE PHANTOM: A non-PC strip about a masked jungle vigilante fighting pirates and crooks. Lee Falk created it in the 1930s, a period that produced several masked vigilantes: other examples are The Lone Ranger and Batman. For me, it's a guilty pleasure. (It's one of the only comic strips that still runs separate continuing stories on weekdays and on Sundays, which used to be the norm for King Features.)
MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN: Lee Falk's other classic strip, now weekdays only. I read it out of nostalgia for when it was better.
FUNKY WINKERBEAN: This Tom Batiuk strip's gone through a remarkable evolution. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was about a group of high-school kids; later they skipped ahead and made them young adults; in recent years they've been middle-aged. With these changes, the strip's got more serious and mature. Josh often makes fun of the strip's depressing storylines. (I used to follow its spinoff strip CRANKSHAFT, about an aged, curmudgeonly school bus driver.)
SLYLOCK FOX: Another guilty pleasure. I read it for the kiddie mysteries, though they're often easy to solve. (I used to enjoy the Encyclopedia Brown books too.)
PRINCE VALIANT and FLASH GORDON: These strips only appear on Sundays, and I read them out of nostalgia too.
Now for the classic strips, the real reason I pay good money for my subscription. (As Giuseppe would say, "Now we can cook with gas!")
RIP KIRBY: Created by a post-FLASH GORDON Alex Raymond just after World War II, it's about a supercool detective who's a man of action but uses his brains as much as his weapons. I read it faithfully when I was a kid.
BRICK BRADFORD: A 1930s Clarence Gray action strip notable for the sheer range of its stories. It's title hero visits the Amazon jungle, the land of the Vikings, western frontier lands, the inside of an atom, and there's even been DICK TRACY-style street fighting with gangsters.
BUZ SAWYER: A 1940s strip created by Roy Crane after he left CAPTAIN EASY. Its title hero started out as a navy pilot fighting Japan, but just now he's a professional trouble-shooter working for an international corporation. (There was a fad for that type of postwar hero: Captain Easy did it too.)
FLASH GORDON: They're reprinting episodes from the 1950s here. Even after Alex Raymond left, it still attracted some good artists: at this time Mac Raboy did the Sundays and Dan Barry the weekdays.
THE PHANTOM and MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN: Both Lee Falk strips in their early years. (I like the catchphrase of Mandrake's sidekick Lothar: "Me smash!")
THE HEART OF JULIET JONES: Roy Crane's romantic strip, from its early days in the 1950s. My favorite character is Julie's erratic little sister Eve.
BIG BEN BOLT: Another 1950s strip, by John Cullen Murphy (who later took over PRINCE VALIANT). This one's about a young white man from a Boston Brahmin family who becomes a champion boxer. The concept wasn't laughable back then.
BEETLE BAILEY: The classic military humor strip, from its early days in the 1950s.
RADIO PATROL: A police strip from the 1940s. (In its most recent story they were catching Nazi spies.)
KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED: I'm interested in this strip just because I'm Canadian. (When we were briefly in Britain in the 1960s we got a couple of comic books reprinted from the strip for the British market.)
JUDGE PARKER: Stories reprinted from the Swinging Sixties when ace lawyer Sam Driver first met zillionairess Abby Spencer. (They're now married, and successful as ever.) Fascinatingly dated.
Current strips:
JUDGE PARKER, APARTMENT 3G, MARY WORTH, REX MORGAN MD: Four "soap opera" strips that I read so I can keep up with Josh Fruehlinger, who often discusses them at The Comics Curmudgeon.
JUDGE PARKER is about rich, relentlessly successful people (Tony Soprano said "In this house it's still 1954"; in Judge Parker's world it's still 1986!); APARTMENT 3G is about three single women in a Manhattan flat; Mary Worth is a biddy relentlessly giving her condo neighbors free advice; Rex Morgan MD is, of course, a doctor.
THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN: The superhero comic strip, also frequently discussed by Josh. (He may be the laziest superhero of our time: in a recent episode his alter ego Peter Parker, secretly hitching a ride on a truck, used his superpowers to craft a super-hammock!)
MARK TRAIL: A rather goofy strip about a nature journalist always getting into fist fights with villains who wear mustaches. (I remember reading the Sunday "Trail Ways" feature back when I was a kid.)
THE PHANTOM: A non-PC strip about a masked jungle vigilante fighting pirates and crooks. Lee Falk created it in the 1930s, a period that produced several masked vigilantes: other examples are The Lone Ranger and Batman. For me, it's a guilty pleasure. (It's one of the only comic strips that still runs separate continuing stories on weekdays and on Sundays, which used to be the norm for King Features.)
MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN: Lee Falk's other classic strip, now weekdays only. I read it out of nostalgia for when it was better.
FUNKY WINKERBEAN: This Tom Batiuk strip's gone through a remarkable evolution. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was about a group of high-school kids; later they skipped ahead and made them young adults; in recent years they've been middle-aged. With these changes, the strip's got more serious and mature. Josh often makes fun of the strip's depressing storylines. (I used to follow its spinoff strip CRANKSHAFT, about an aged, curmudgeonly school bus driver.)
SLYLOCK FOX: Another guilty pleasure. I read it for the kiddie mysteries, though they're often easy to solve. (I used to enjoy the Encyclopedia Brown books too.)
PRINCE VALIANT and FLASH GORDON: These strips only appear on Sundays, and I read them out of nostalgia too.
Now for the classic strips, the real reason I pay good money for my subscription. (As Giuseppe would say, "Now we can cook with gas!")
RIP KIRBY: Created by a post-FLASH GORDON Alex Raymond just after World War II, it's about a supercool detective who's a man of action but uses his brains as much as his weapons. I read it faithfully when I was a kid.
BRICK BRADFORD: A 1930s Clarence Gray action strip notable for the sheer range of its stories. It's title hero visits the Amazon jungle, the land of the Vikings, western frontier lands, the inside of an atom, and there's even been DICK TRACY-style street fighting with gangsters.
BUZ SAWYER: A 1940s strip created by Roy Crane after he left CAPTAIN EASY. Its title hero started out as a navy pilot fighting Japan, but just now he's a professional trouble-shooter working for an international corporation. (There was a fad for that type of postwar hero: Captain Easy did it too.)
FLASH GORDON: They're reprinting episodes from the 1950s here. Even after Alex Raymond left, it still attracted some good artists: at this time Mac Raboy did the Sundays and Dan Barry the weekdays.
THE PHANTOM and MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN: Both Lee Falk strips in their early years. (I like the catchphrase of Mandrake's sidekick Lothar: "Me smash!")
THE HEART OF JULIET JONES: Roy Crane's romantic strip, from its early days in the 1950s. My favorite character is Julie's erratic little sister Eve.
BIG BEN BOLT: Another 1950s strip, by John Cullen Murphy (who later took over PRINCE VALIANT). This one's about a young white man from a Boston Brahmin family who becomes a champion boxer. The concept wasn't laughable back then.
BEETLE BAILEY: The classic military humor strip, from its early days in the 1950s.
RADIO PATROL: A police strip from the 1940s. (In its most recent story they were catching Nazi spies.)
KING OF THE ROYAL MOUNTED: I'm interested in this strip just because I'm Canadian. (When we were briefly in Britain in the 1960s we got a couple of comic books reprinted from the strip for the British market.)
JUDGE PARKER: Stories reprinted from the Swinging Sixties when ace lawyer Sam Driver first met zillionairess Abby Spencer. (They're now married, and successful as ever.) Fascinatingly dated.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Three Meetups
This afternoon I hosted the March ROLT Meetup, whose subject was "lives lived." Seven people showed up. One was a Pakistani-Canadian called Gula, who recited an entertaining autobiographical sketch she'd written. (She'd just come from an Indian wedding and was dressed fancy.)
For my part, I read a section of Tobias Wolff's memoir THIS BOY'S LIFE where he went joy riding in his stepfather's car. Then I read "Grown Up," a chapter in BY THE SHORES OF SILVER LAKE, one of Laura Ingalls Wilder's wonderful "Little House" series (the books are way, way better than the TV show), in which their dog dies.
In the evening I went to an Awesome People Meetup for "awesome conversations." A dozen people came, but I had to leave fairly early because the location (a pub called the Pauper) was too noisy for me.
Then I went to the Karaoke Meetup at Kramer's Bar and Grill. A karaoke bar is cheaper than BarPlus, but you often have to wait a long time between song terms. I sang Dean Martin's "Sway," which doesn't seem to be on the BarPlus song list, and intended to sing the Thompson Twins' "Hold Me Now" too, but the wait proved too long. (At these places I step outside from time to time just to get a break from the noise.)
For my part, I read a section of Tobias Wolff's memoir THIS BOY'S LIFE where he went joy riding in his stepfather's car. Then I read "Grown Up," a chapter in BY THE SHORES OF SILVER LAKE, one of Laura Ingalls Wilder's wonderful "Little House" series (the books are way, way better than the TV show), in which their dog dies.
In the evening I went to an Awesome People Meetup for "awesome conversations." A dozen people came, but I had to leave fairly early because the location (a pub called the Pauper) was too noisy for me.
Then I went to the Karaoke Meetup at Kramer's Bar and Grill. A karaoke bar is cheaper than BarPlus, but you often have to wait a long time between song terms. I sang Dean Martin's "Sway," which doesn't seem to be on the BarPlus song list, and intended to sing the Thompson Twins' "Hold Me Now" too, but the wait proved too long. (At these places I step outside from time to time just to get a break from the noise.)
Saturday, March 09, 2013
Performed MACBETH
This evening the Coro Verdi performed Verdi's MACBETH in the first of two concerts. We have pretty good soloists: Carrie is a stunning Lady Macbeth. My favorite part is the witches' choruses; it's Giuseppe's favorite part too. The finale in particular reminds me of Bellini's NORMA.
We rehearsed the opera Monday night and dress-rehearsed on Tuesday. We're rehearsing at the Villa Colombo now, but the dress rehearsal was at the Columbus Centre where we're performing it. (During Monday's rehearsal the Villa Colombo fire alarm went off, and Giuseppe said it was the Macbeth curse!) We had to spend some time on the finale: the original opera divided the baritone-basses into soldiers and bards for this number, but our group is so small that we had to do both parts at the same time.
Moira's seeing the Sunday afternoon show. She's been listening to the opera on CD all week, and she says that the third time she heard it BANG! she suddenly loved it. The parents aren't quite up to going (neither to this nor to the TOR operas).
It isn't clear what we'll do after Sunday's concert. (The Coro Verdi schedule has a question mark next.) Monday night we'll presumably have a discussion about it: Giuseppe wasn't happy about all the absenteeism as we were rehearsing MACBETH.
We rehearsed the opera Monday night and dress-rehearsed on Tuesday. We're rehearsing at the Villa Colombo now, but the dress rehearsal was at the Columbus Centre where we're performing it. (During Monday's rehearsal the Villa Colombo fire alarm went off, and Giuseppe said it was the Macbeth curse!) We had to spend some time on the finale: the original opera divided the baritone-basses into soldiers and bards for this number, but our group is so small that we had to do both parts at the same time.
Moira's seeing the Sunday afternoon show. She's been listening to the opera on CD all week, and she says that the third time she heard it BANG! she suddenly loved it. The parents aren't quite up to going (neither to this nor to the TOR operas).
It isn't clear what we'll do after Sunday's concert. (The Coro Verdi schedule has a question mark next.) Monday night we'll presumably have a discussion about it: Giuseppe wasn't happy about all the absenteeism as we were rehearsing MACBETH.
Friday, March 08, 2013
Making fun
One part of TALES OF HOFFMANN that I didn't like doing was the moment after Olympia gets busted when we had to all make fun of Hoffmann. (I felt the same way when we put on THE ELIXIR OF LOVE and we made fun of lovestruck Nemorino.) It reminded me of the times people have made fun of me, like the incident I mentioned a few days ago when I got scared at the miner's museum.
Some people dislike others talking about you behind your back. I don't mind so much, because it means they respect me enough to avoid talking about me in my presence. When I was in school, there were kids who'd talk about me in the third person right in front of me, as a show of power. When they saw me coming that would remind them to talk about me! When they quoted something embarrassing that I'd said, of course, they'd start not with "He said..." but "He goes..."
I remember how these people would be walking along in a group, I'd bicycle past them, and they'd jeer at me every single time. It was their automatic reaction, really. It's easier for a grownup to say "Don't let it bother you," but it's really the elephant in the living room. If it doesn't bother you, he doesn't need to say it. But if it does, he's just making things worse.
Fellow schoolchildren deliberately being nasty toward me was something I could never deal with. I'll admit that when I was a kid, ignoring people just never made sense to me. Does a grownup decide to do nothing about his biggest problem and call that a solution?
All these years later, it still bothers me. I don't get nostalgic about childhood. What particularly bothers me is the sense that my feelings were "the weak link": if only I hadn't been sensitive! But I WAS sensitive and that's the central fact.
Some people dislike others talking about you behind your back. I don't mind so much, because it means they respect me enough to avoid talking about me in my presence. When I was in school, there were kids who'd talk about me in the third person right in front of me, as a show of power. When they saw me coming that would remind them to talk about me! When they quoted something embarrassing that I'd said, of course, they'd start not with "He said..." but "He goes..."
I remember how these people would be walking along in a group, I'd bicycle past them, and they'd jeer at me every single time. It was their automatic reaction, really. It's easier for a grownup to say "Don't let it bother you," but it's really the elephant in the living room. If it doesn't bother you, he doesn't need to say it. But if it does, he's just making things worse.
Fellow schoolchildren deliberately being nasty toward me was something I could never deal with. I'll admit that when I was a kid, ignoring people just never made sense to me. Does a grownup decide to do nothing about his biggest problem and call that a solution?
All these years later, it still bothers me. I don't get nostalgic about childhood. What particularly bothers me is the sense that my feelings were "the weak link": if only I hadn't been sensitive! But I WAS sensitive and that's the central fact.
Thursday, March 07, 2013
The master class continues
This evening I went to Giuseppe's master class again. (It was on Wednesday instead of Tuesday this week because last night they were putting away the TOR sets.) The heating in the auditorium wasn't working, so Giuseppe decided to use a downstairs classroom instead--he'd done the same thing Tuesday of last week. Unfortunately, the room was locked and it took an hour to find the caretaker so he could unlock it. It seems he'd left it unlocked that afternoon but somebody locked it again. Of course, Giuseppe wasn't pleased.
I've been hearing an interesting variety of songs in this master class. Stuff like "Ave Maria," "Streets of Laredo" (what a sad song that is!), "Granada," "Danny Boy," the song from Ennio Morricone's CINEMA PARADISO theme, "You'll Never Walk Alone," "Panis Angelicus," and a Scarlatti song about the sun on the Ganges which I might like to learn someday. William has even been singing "A Wand'ring Minstrel I" from Gilbert & Sullivan's THE MIKADO. (My favorite part of it is the sea song.) Remember when I said that "I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls" was an operetta song? It turns out that THE BOHEMIAN GIRL was actually a full-fledged opera!
I'm afraid I might be coming down with a cold, so my singing wasn't at its best today.
With the TOR run finished, I went to the Hungarian barber shop and finally got my hair cut and my eyebrow hairs trimmed.
I've been hearing an interesting variety of songs in this master class. Stuff like "Ave Maria," "Streets of Laredo" (what a sad song that is!), "Granada," "Danny Boy," the song from Ennio Morricone's CINEMA PARADISO theme, "You'll Never Walk Alone," "Panis Angelicus," and a Scarlatti song about the sun on the Ganges which I might like to learn someday. William has even been singing "A Wand'ring Minstrel I" from Gilbert & Sullivan's THE MIKADO. (My favorite part of it is the sea song.) Remember when I said that "I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls" was an operetta song? It turns out that THE BOHEMIAN GIRL was actually a full-fledged opera!
I'm afraid I might be coming down with a cold, so my singing wasn't at its best today.
With the TOR run finished, I went to the Hungarian barber shop and finally got my hair cut and my eyebrow hairs trimmed.
Wednesday, March 06, 2013
It's March
Lately I've got into the practice of waiting till the last minute to think of the subject for my daily blog post. Oh well, I could use some spontaneity. When all else fails, talk about the weather.
March has come in like a lion, pretty well. I stop wearing long johns when February turns to March, even though it can still get pretty cold. (I guess it's my rare concession to rugged living.) But I'm still wearing my furry cap. They say another snowstorm is coming, so I won't be finished with it just yet.
Now for a March memory. Some of the world's highest tide variations happen around the eastern end of the Bay of Fundy, near my hometown of Sackville. They used to have occasional flooding in Sackville until they built a tidal dam in the 1960s. One memory I have from Sackville is March in the area next to that tidal dam. Around March, when there was an especially high tide during a full moon or such, big, dirty chunks of winter ice floes would wash up in that area.
Another book club Meetup group I'm in--it combines books with weekend brunch--is going to read Joan Didion's memoir THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING. I've decided to attend that event. Fortunately, the book is widely available in libraries: they even have it at tiny Davenport library in our neighborhood. (We used to own a copy, but it got sold.) With this and WANDERLUST, I'll be a while finishing that LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY.
March has come in like a lion, pretty well. I stop wearing long johns when February turns to March, even though it can still get pretty cold. (I guess it's my rare concession to rugged living.) But I'm still wearing my furry cap. They say another snowstorm is coming, so I won't be finished with it just yet.
Now for a March memory. Some of the world's highest tide variations happen around the eastern end of the Bay of Fundy, near my hometown of Sackville. They used to have occasional flooding in Sackville until they built a tidal dam in the 1960s. One memory I have from Sackville is March in the area next to that tidal dam. Around March, when there was an especially high tide during a full moon or such, big, dirty chunks of winter ice floes would wash up in that area.
Another book club Meetup group I'm in--it combines books with weekend brunch--is going to read Joan Didion's memoir THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING. I've decided to attend that event. Fortunately, the book is widely available in libraries: they even have it at tiny Davenport library in our neighborhood. (We used to own a copy, but it got sold.) With this and WANDERLUST, I'll be a while finishing that LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY.
Tuesday, March 05, 2013
Field trips
When I was in school in Sackville, NB, we went on a few field trips. One was to the nearby National Historic Park Fort Beausejour. (There was a sign there that you had to keep all your guns in your car unloaded and dismantled.)
Another place was to the Enterprise Foundry, a local factory that produced stoves and stuff. When Moira's class went there and they offered to answer any questions, she asked, "How much money do you make?" Today she's ashamed of having asked such a stupid question, but at least it was less stupid than the one I asked when my class visited. We had a Westinghouse stove at home, so I asked, "Do you make Westinghouse stoves?" He replied impatiently that they only made Enterprise stoves. Another kid asked, "What's the most serious type of accident?" I was jealous that I didn't think to ask that instead!
In grade 5 my class went down to Springhill to visit the Miner's Museum there, commemorating the 1956 and 1958 disasters. That place included a mini-mine that we could enter in hard hats and even gather some coal. Our guide was a man who'd survived the 1956 explosion. To show us what it was like being trapped underground, after asking our permission, he turned the lights off for a second. I freaked out. (Goodness knows, I was a sensitive kid.) The worst thing about it was that a classmate made fun of me on the bus going home.
I could never work in a mine.
Another place was to the Enterprise Foundry, a local factory that produced stoves and stuff. When Moira's class went there and they offered to answer any questions, she asked, "How much money do you make?" Today she's ashamed of having asked such a stupid question, but at least it was less stupid than the one I asked when my class visited. We had a Westinghouse stove at home, so I asked, "Do you make Westinghouse stoves?" He replied impatiently that they only made Enterprise stoves. Another kid asked, "What's the most serious type of accident?" I was jealous that I didn't think to ask that instead!
In grade 5 my class went down to Springhill to visit the Miner's Museum there, commemorating the 1956 and 1958 disasters. That place included a mini-mine that we could enter in hard hats and even gather some coal. Our guide was a man who'd survived the 1956 explosion. To show us what it was like being trapped underground, after asking our permission, he turned the lights off for a second. I freaked out. (Goodness knows, I was a sensitive kid.) The worst thing about it was that a classmate made fun of me on the bus going home.
I could never work in a mine.
Monday, March 04, 2013
TOR finished
Today we finished the latest season at the TOR. I returned my scores but waived the return of my $20 deposit. (It's a donation, but it also saves a bit of work for the people in charge.)
Will I do it again next year? Every March when the season finishes, I plan on taking a break the next year. And every September I'm back...
At the curtain call, Giuseppe came out and announced he's retiring from the TOR. I knew it was going to happen pretty soon. (He's 73.) I'm glad he got to leave on a high note: he'd been wanting to direct TALES OF HOFFMANN for a while and he was pleased with this production. I remember when Coro Verdi had a discussion about its future and someone told him, "We couldn't do this without you!" Giuseppe scoffed, "When the Pope dies, we'll get a new pope."
A book club Meetup I'm in is going to discuss WANDERLUST, A SOCIAL HISTORY OF TRAVEL. I'm interested in reading it, but it's in short supply at the library and none of the Toronto-area Chapters and Indigo bookstores carry it, so I had to order it from C&I's online sales.
Last Tuesday this blog had a record number of hits: 92! I think it's because my friend John George had had trouble accessing it but finally got it straightened out. I'm only mentioning it now because I was waiting for a day when I was running short...
Will I do it again next year? Every March when the season finishes, I plan on taking a break the next year. And every September I'm back...
At the curtain call, Giuseppe came out and announced he's retiring from the TOR. I knew it was going to happen pretty soon. (He's 73.) I'm glad he got to leave on a high note: he'd been wanting to direct TALES OF HOFFMANN for a while and he was pleased with this production. I remember when Coro Verdi had a discussion about its future and someone told him, "We couldn't do this without you!" Giuseppe scoffed, "When the Pope dies, we'll get a new pope."
A book club Meetup I'm in is going to discuss WANDERLUST, A SOCIAL HISTORY OF TRAVEL. I'm interested in reading it, but it's in short supply at the library and none of the Toronto-area Chapters and Indigo bookstores carry it, so I had to order it from C&I's online sales.
Last Tuesday this blog had a record number of hits: 92! I think it's because my friend John George had had trouble accessing it but finally got it straightened out. I'm only mentioning it now because I was waiting for a day when I was running short...
Sunday, March 03, 2013
Finished WORKING
Today I finished reading the Studs Terkel book WORKING. Some really good "slice of life" stories in it.
I've resumed reading the "Intoxication" issue of LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY. I was reading it during the idle periods at the opera this evening. Intoxication was an appropriate theme since we were putting on TALES OF HOFFMANN. Lawrence mentioned that it's one of his favorite periodicals. I found a quote where Rossini told Balzac: "Coffee is an affair of fifteen or twenty days; just the right amount of time, fortunately, to write an opera." William said that quote was awesome.
In the master class, William and Rob are singing "Au fond du temple saint," the famous duet from Georges Bizet's THE PEARL FISHERS. A wonderful number, but very challenging for singers. Giuseppe mentioned that Jussi Bjoerling and Robert Merrill did a famous version of it, so I listened to it on Youtube. I also heard Bjoerling doing a nice aria from the same opera, "Je crois entendre encore."
Bizet was just 25 when he composed THE PEARL FISHERS! (Rossini was even younger when he did THE BARBER OF SEVILLE.) He died before he was forty, just after he achieved immortality with CARMEN. Mozart, Schubert, and Chopin all died young, but they were so prolific during their short time that their careers seem full. Of all the early deaths in music, Bizet's is one of the most tragic because he hadn't composed so much. (And his widow was careless with his archive: his original handwritten PEARL FISHERS score is lost.) What other great operas might he have come up with?
I've resumed reading the "Intoxication" issue of LAPHAM'S QUARTERLY. I was reading it during the idle periods at the opera this evening. Intoxication was an appropriate theme since we were putting on TALES OF HOFFMANN. Lawrence mentioned that it's one of his favorite periodicals. I found a quote where Rossini told Balzac: "Coffee is an affair of fifteen or twenty days; just the right amount of time, fortunately, to write an opera." William said that quote was awesome.
In the master class, William and Rob are singing "Au fond du temple saint," the famous duet from Georges Bizet's THE PEARL FISHERS. A wonderful number, but very challenging for singers. Giuseppe mentioned that Jussi Bjoerling and Robert Merrill did a famous version of it, so I listened to it on Youtube. I also heard Bjoerling doing a nice aria from the same opera, "Je crois entendre encore."
Bizet was just 25 when he composed THE PEARL FISHERS! (Rossini was even younger when he did THE BARBER OF SEVILLE.) He died before he was forty, just after he achieved immortality with CARMEN. Mozart, Schubert, and Chopin all died young, but they were so prolific during their short time that their careers seem full. Of all the early deaths in music, Bizet's is one of the most tragic because he hadn't composed so much. (And his widow was careless with his archive: his original handwritten PEARL FISHERS score is lost.) What other great operas might he have come up with?
Saturday, March 02, 2013
MORTADELO Y FILEMON
Another European comic book series I've been reading lately is MORTADELO Y FILEMON. Drawn by Frederico Ibanez, it's a Spanish comic about a pair of goofy secret agents for TIA (Spanish for "Auntie"). Mortadelo is a bald master of disguise ("mortadela" is a Spanish sausage, which his head resembles), who can even transform into animals. He must keep all his costumes under his collar, because his glasses and collar are the one constant in his disguises.
I first encountered the series in the French translation MORTADEL ET FILEMON when I was 14. (I could follow French comics with a dictionary.) I read three of their early adventures, including their first: in THE ATOMIC SULFATE they entered the realm of a Nazi-like dictator to recover an insectide developed by the inept Dr. Bacterio, which made insects huge! In another they took on the ten crooks in the Pork Rind Gang, and in the third they searched for a bull carrying a cache of crucial microfilm.
Recently I obtained several in the original Spanish through the miracle of Ebay and started writing translations of them with the help of Collins' excellent Spanish-English dictionary. The first was THE ATOMIC SULFATE. Later I translated CRITTER WEAPONS, a satire of biological warfare; THE CANDIDATE, with their boss Mr. Superintendent running for elective office; and NIGHTMARE, a NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET parody with Freddy entering their dreams. The next one I'll be translating is FORMULA 1, a comedy about auto racing.
These stories largely have a pretty episodic structure, with lots of slapstick humor of the sort that little kids like. Among the supporting characters, my favorite is the zaftig secretary Ofelia, whom the two heroes are constantly driving to distraction. I'd like to see her in a story of her own!
I first encountered the series in the French translation MORTADEL ET FILEMON when I was 14. (I could follow French comics with a dictionary.) I read three of their early adventures, including their first: in THE ATOMIC SULFATE they entered the realm of a Nazi-like dictator to recover an insectide developed by the inept Dr. Bacterio, which made insects huge! In another they took on the ten crooks in the Pork Rind Gang, and in the third they searched for a bull carrying a cache of crucial microfilm.
Recently I obtained several in the original Spanish through the miracle of Ebay and started writing translations of them with the help of Collins' excellent Spanish-English dictionary. The first was THE ATOMIC SULFATE. Later I translated CRITTER WEAPONS, a satire of biological warfare; THE CANDIDATE, with their boss Mr. Superintendent running for elective office; and NIGHTMARE, a NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET parody with Freddy entering their dreams. The next one I'll be translating is FORMULA 1, a comedy about auto racing.
These stories largely have a pretty episodic structure, with lots of slapstick humor of the sort that little kids like. Among the supporting characters, my favorite is the zaftig secretary Ofelia, whom the two heroes are constantly driving to distraction. I'd like to see her in a story of her own!
Friday, March 01, 2013
The Manning trial
I haven't been so active at THE HUFFINGTON POST lately. There isn't much I can say about the sequestering crisis, except that Obama should have gone "over the cliff" last month instead of making Dubya's tax cuts permanent for all but the richest 1% of Americans. Obama's the kind of negotiator who demands half a loaf, will settle for a quarter loaf, but in an pinch will settle for an eighth loaf, not unlike Bill Clinton. That compromise seems likely to be remembered as the last appeasement before the policy was finally abandoned, which will be depressing. (A bit like the 1938 Munich agreement.)
Just lately I became active again writing about (surprise, surprise!) Bradley Manning's trial. When certain people write posts like "He aided the enemy and should be shot!" I've taken to replying "How did he specifically aid the enemy?" They respond with lines like "You've got to be kidding!" but they hardly ever answer my question.
I've also been reading about the trial at the website run by the British newspaper THE GUARDIAN. Many of its reports and articles are about British stuff, but it's done a better job of reporting the Manning case than American newspapers like THE NEW YORK TIMES. Most of the Englishmen who post in that site's forums seem to support Manning.
Just lately I became active again writing about (surprise, surprise!) Bradley Manning's trial. When certain people write posts like "He aided the enemy and should be shot!" I've taken to replying "How did he specifically aid the enemy?" They respond with lines like "You've got to be kidding!" but they hardly ever answer my question.
I've also been reading about the trial at the website run by the British newspaper THE GUARDIAN. Many of its reports and articles are about British stuff, but it's done a better job of reporting the Manning case than American newspapers like THE NEW YORK TIMES. Most of the Englishmen who post in that site's forums seem to support Manning.
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