Art, the Female Form and the Male Gaze

Last summer I went to a midtown art gallery to see an exhibit by Ryan McGuinness entitled "Women: Sketches & Solutions." 

The first thing that struck me about McGuinness' work in this exhibit was the contrast between the often sexual poses of the models and the finished product of the art, which at once seemed to be both enhanced and stripped down. The description of the exhibit, a portion of which I photographed here, says the artist took the "tradition of the male gaze and neutralized the resulting sexualized female forms" to create "a purely aesthetic exercise in image-making."

If McGuinness' goal was to create a "purely aesthetic exercise," I don't necessarily think he succeeded throughout all the artwork included in the exhibit. The images are still recognizable as women, their bodies still bare and open to the imagination. Sometimes the poses are subtle and seductive, sometimes shocking and abrasive. You might find yourself thinking less of them as an aesthetic exercise and more an exercise in the kind of art meant to shock and do little, if anything, else.

Still, other poses reach the ideal McGuinness was going for. Some are truly graceful and gorgeous, and you find yourself following every line of ink on the page.

The most interesting pieces in the collection, though, were the ones that showed the transition from the model drawings to the bare ink. Through these transitions you can see the shadows fade into black and white, see detail disappear altogether. This one, for example, was one of my favorites: The model's leg and toes turn into almost a musical instrument, and the waves of her hair seem to resemble musical notes.

It seems no matter what you do to the female form, one constant remains: It is impossible to stop looking.

 

  

 

 

 

The artist, Ryan McGuinness. Below, a sculpture I got to take a look at: Not part of the exhibit, but striking nonetheless.


 

On Years of (Relative) Silence

Hello everyone, I'm back! It might seem that I've been quiet since my last post a whopping three-and-a-half years ago. Truthfully I've been freelancing and finally landed a fulltime job doing--what else?--writing and reporting. The thing they don't warn you about when it comes to reporting is that it's really, really bad to put in your own opinions (okay, maybe they do warn you.) But having, as the subtitle of this blog suggests, innumerable and very relevant opinions on practically everything, this has been a struggle for me. So I thought I'd start writing a blog again. Here's what I do NOT intend to do: -write about my job. At all. -write about stories I cover at my job. At all. Here's what I do intend to do: -write about the things I see--plays, movies, operas, etc. -write about the things I read--news, magazines, books, etc. -try to reassure my three loyal readers that I won't disappear for so long again, at least, not without warning. So welcome, thanks for reading and enjoy!

Holidays Again?

The World Series is over already? It feels like Opening Day was only a few weeks ago. Or maybe it's just the fact that the weather is exactly like it was on Opening Day that makes it seems so.

It's been over a year since Obama was elected and over a week since the Yankees won the World Series. Don't get me wrong, I've been a Yankees fan for years, but I'm starting to crave a little variety. It might be fun to have something new now and again.

I seem to have blinked and missed the fall. The trees are bare now, and the cold bites at my cheeks when I step outside.

On the plus side, at least I have avoided the swine flu, despite having a roommate who was diagnosed with it on my first day at a new job. I'm feeling pretty good about my immune system right now.

And now it's Veterans Day, and Thanksgiving will be here in two weeks, and Christmas only four short weeks after that. The years pass faster as I get older, and their charm begins to fade. If only we could stay young forever.

Everybody Chill

I find it rather amusing everybody seems to be going crazy in fear over the swine flu, especially considering that two weeks ago, nobody had ever even heard of it.

Not to make fun of a deadly illness, which I know is no laughing matter, but health and government officials seem to get pleasure out of perpetuating this wave of fear. Stay in your homes. Don't go out. Wear a face mask if you do even though we're not really sure how effective face masks are at protecting you from this (did nobody thing that this was a great waste of energy, money, and paper?) Look at this picture from Getty Images. It's laughable.

And then, hardly a week after this deadly pandemic is on the loose and spreading internationally in a lock-up-your-children manner, Mexican officials announce that there weren't 176 deaths from the swine flu as originally recorded, but closer to 101 deaths instead. This isn't like an official accidentally counting the same person twice. Discrepancies like this remind me of a Monty Python skit. "I'm not dead! I don't want to go on the cart! I feel happyyyyy!"

Including the 23-month-old from Texas, Saturday's total death count was 102 people. It's a lot, I'll admit. But all this attention to swine flu is taking away from some of the bigger problems in Mexico and along the border, like drug violence. Over 7,000 people have died from gun-related violence in the southwest U.S. and Mexico since 2007, which makes it a lot more deadly than the swine flu by my count. from which 28 people were killed this week alone in only one city. Interesting how few newspapers and TV and radio news shows picked that up as their lead story.

Two other details about the H1N1 strain of the flu have apparently missed the notice of the public. First of all, according to the CDC's influenza page, approximately 36,000 Americans die of complications to the flu every year. That dwarfs even Mexican drug cartels. Second of all, also according to the CDC flu page, the strain of flu that was predominate in the 2006-2007 flu season was--ding ding ding! You guessed it!--H1N1. We're all going mad about a strain of flu that we all survived less than five years ago.

Remember that the next time you overhear the people in line behind you at the grocery store freaking out as they stock up on chicken soup and fluids.

Ahh, the cheese.

For some reason I'm only tonight watching Center Stage for the very first time. Dear God, how have I lived without something quite this bad in my life?

Generally I don't go for the really truly horrible movies. But there's a bit of a scale to these things that it's important to keep in mind. There's the truly bad stuff that just makes you want to gouge your eyes out, of which Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle is, to me, the most obvious example. And then there's the kind of horrible that makes you glad you decided not to go into acting, but glad these people didn't so you can sit and point and laugh at them. And Center Stage is the best example of it that I've seen in a while. At least that stars people born in the same decade as me.

And now I feel old. I think I'll go watch An Affair To Remember again.

A Small Study of Gender in Modern Times

Over the weekend I had brunch with an old family friend. This man and his wife had been my parents' next door neighbors when I was born. I was my parent's first child; this other couple, too, had a child at around the same time I was born, only it was their fourth. Shortly thereafter they moved to the other side of the country and morphed into that ambiguous sort of character of whom your memories are filled entirely by stories relayed and are not at all based in reality, especially when you don't have even a picture to help shape their forms in your mind.

These former neighbors of ours stayed this way in my mind, with vague rumblings of 'Young Tommy's playing football at such a school' and so forth, for years. The most significant piece of news that stayed in my mind was that the mother fought breast cancer for more than ten years. So they remained until I applied to a college in their area, 3,000 miles away, and my mother and I decided to go take a tour of the school and see if I could get an admissions interview. My mother also took the opportunity to arrange dinner with our neighbors, the first time either of us would be seeing them in over ten years. Eventually I decided to attend school there, and my father got to repeat the experience of catching up with two of the most amiable and kind-hearted people you'd ever hope to meet. Their youngest, too, was attending school in a neighboring state, while the oldest had gotten married and would soon be a new father. Before I left Philadelphia, another of their children married and a few more grandchildren were born.

The matriarch of the family passed away last year after more than 15 years of fighting breast cancer. I cried when I heard the news. Rarely have I seen two people who looked more obviously like they were on their first date, even after 30 years of marriage. He unabashedly called her "babe" as if they were still 20 (in comparison, I've never heard my parents refer to each other as anything more endearing than "honey" or "dear," and always with a rather mocking smile and tone of voice, as if they can't believe they're really being that corny). I called him immediately to offer my condolences, which is always a difficult conversation; words in such a situation are empty enough even from the same room, but over the phone it's even worse because of the human race's crushing impulse to always fill the empty space with words, even when just one more word could tip either party over the edge and into the vacuity of tears and devastation. I've been on both sides of conversations like this. I'm still trying to decide which side I like the least.

Eventually I moved back down to the mid-Atlantic area. I've gone to Philadelphia on brief visits a few times, and eventually managed to schedule a brunch date with this man who, along with his wife, were so kind to me, like surrogate parents, when I was alone and 17 and 3,000 miles from everyone and everything I knew. I learned that yet another child was married, that two more grandchildren had been born, and another one on the way, for a total of seven. Seven! I could hardly believe it. He also gave me some interesting tidbits about his golfing. Most of it went over my head, I'll admit, but it being so soon after the Masters, I'd like to think that I retained at least some of it.

On Monday my mother called to ask how brunch had gone. It had been the first time any of my family had seen him since his wife had died. I told her about the seven grandchildren. Her reaction was rather like mine. "Wow! Seven grandchildren! Wow."

My parents, you must understand, have never been the sort to bemoan the fact that they have no grandchildren. I think sometimes that my mother wouldn't mind having a little baby to fuss over, but then it sort of dawns on her that in order to have grandchildren, one of her kids would have to either pregnant or get somebody else pregnant. And then she changes her mind and decides that things are quite fine the way they are. And I think my dad still fancies himself, at least in some corner of his mind, yet somewhere in his mid 30s. The scarcely receded hairline and roughly the same knee pain from two decades ago do nothing to dissuade him from this illusion. Last year on his birthday when I pointed out to him that he was now the same age as my grandmother had been when I was born, he was not grateful to me for the revelation (I got a good laugh, though). In any case, if you asked him, my guess is that he'd say he's too young for grandchildren.

At least, I used to think so. After I hung up with my mom, I called my father to relay the message about golfing. Something about drivers and Cobra, but it all sounds to me a bit more like your average Congress meeting these days than a golfing demonstration. In any case, after the golfing conversation was over, my dad naturally asked after Tom the man himself. I told him about the growing numbers of the family.

"Seven grandkids. Wow," he said (can you tell they've been married for over 30 years?) And then after a pensive moment he said, "You know, he's the same age as me."

I countered by pointing out that Tom's oldest child is ten years older than I am. Obviously he'd gotten started a lot earlier than my dad did.

Taking Comfort in the Familiar

I know it's cliched, I know it's the epitome of corny, I know it's so melodramatic that it serves as the basis for two more movies, and who knows how many references within movies (even I don't dare try to calculate that one), but I simply love 'An Affair To Remember.' I love the elegance of Deborah Kerr, who sits and stands so straight--her grandmother used to make her lie on the floor for hours to ensure good posture--yet always seems so comfortable; and of Cary Grant, who manages to look elegant even when he's doing somersaults and cartwheels (if you haven't seen 'Holiday' and 'Monkey Business,' rent them immediately, if only for the acrobatics). The two of them have such excellent chemistry in this film, easily playing off of each other's quick and easy conversation without missing a beat. And I have a soft spot for the back story, too. The writer and director, Leo McCarey, had originally made the film 'Love Affair' with Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer, one of the few silent film stars to successfully transition into talkies; and while the script is nearly identical to 'Remember,' and the actors performed well, they can barely capture the ghost of the charm of Grant and Kerr.

Here's a link to a YouTube video with some of my favorite moments from 'An Affair To Remember.' Try to ignore the music, since it just doesn't seem to fit, but don't blink lest you miss a moment of the gloriously understated interactions of these two splendid actors.

Ahh, life.

It's amazing how quickly life gets away from you. You set yourself a sack of goals - "This week I will finish reading that book I started two months ago," "I will finally go browsing at Blue Mercury (but not buy anything," "I will call that friend of mine I haven't seen since Christmas," "I will watch that Netflix movie that's been sitting around for a month." All these things you say, and you honestly do intend to follow through with them. But life gets away from you. The daily musts of the world - work, bill paying, groceries, eating those strawberries in the fridge before they go bad - take up so much energy that you forget to complete the goals you set for yourself, whether they be obligations or indulgences. It's sad, but true.

I find lately that trying to fit in these things is almost as energy-consuming as getting up in time to catch the bus for work, but generally they seem to have rewards that are just as fulfilling as earning a steady paycheck (which I, along with so many others this past year, have come to see as a privilege rather than a right, or a chore.) I force myself to actually take the full hour I'm allotted for lunch (or maybe closer to 45 minutes of it) and not just eat, but read at my desk from that book I should have finished by now. I save Blue Mercury field trips for Fridays as to make them extra special--and yes, I'll admit, I did make purchases - but I waited until I ran out of moisturizer so that I bought things I actually needed. I make sure that my roommate and I do watch one of the Netflix movies I've rented (why, oh why didn't Thandie Newton get an Oscar nod for her portrayal of Condie Rice in 'W.'? It's a shame, I tell you, a damn shame ... though perhaps, upon reviewing her performance in 'The Truth About Charlie' in which she simply butchered the role originally played to perfection by Audrey Hepburn, it's only fair.) And after that's done, before I get ready for my nightly routine, I actually do pull my phone out and call that friend of mine from Christmas.

These things aren't easy to remember; it takes effort and energy to do so, and to follow through on them: It takes so much energy, in fact, that my laundry basket is overflowing, and the strawberries in the fridge have actually started to turn on me, and the dog's hair is beginning to clump together in the corners of my bedroom (though the hallway is clean of them - took care of that last weekend.) But the way I see it, I doubt that I'll sit on my deathbed wishing that I'd done laundry more in my 20's, or cleaned up more dog hair in my life. Watching movies that mock George Bush, however, will probably still make me smile.

Reeeecap!

Good lord, has it really been over two months? You've got to love the way the time just flies by between Thanksgiving and Single's Awareness Day ... oops, I mean Valentine's Day. Especially when the interim involves, besides the usual holiday festivities, the inauguration of the first African American president in the country.

I spent Inauguration Week crashing on a couch in Georgetown. I ended up with no tickets to the main event (I know, cry your tears for me) but that just meant that I got to sit around and sleep in while the rest of the town was freezing in the 20 degree weather. But don't think I got away completely hassle-free; trying to make my train meant that I had to spend more than one hour in a taxi trying to get from Georgetown University to Union Station. That's about five miles.

Yeah. An hour.

On the other hand, and to quote Helen Fielding, the wilderness years are over! I have employment again! And it pays and everything. And I've gotten back to doing (some) regular blogging over at GameFace, which, by the way, is also a great book that everybody should buy, especially women who want to prove that yes, we CAN follow sports just as well as any guy.

Only a part of what's great about employment is that it actually gets you out of the house. And into the city. I'm daily exploring a part of town that I've only ever looked at through a car window. And, I'll admit, I have a certain glee when I go to Panera not to serve annoying customers, but to be an annoying customer. Ahh, order is restored to the universe.

Okay, I try not to be too annoying. Most days. But I do flirt with the sandwich line guys in order to get a second piece of bread.

Also, it's nice to know that at the end of the day I've accomplished more than watching endless episodes of 'West Wing' or 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer.' Because good as those shows were, staples of my youth and all that, it's not quite the same as "I contributed to the welfare of the nation today." And plus, you just feel better about yourself when you know that you're more than a statistic. I'm feeling so good about myself, I've hardly even noticed that Valentine's Day is almost here. Does it seem to anybody else that the recession (isn't it nice that Bush finally decided to start calling a spade a spade?) has put a major damper on the usual shmoozy love-fest that generally is February 14? Other than two tables (spread very far apart) at the local Barnes & Noble, there's been a noticeable lack of cheesy pink and red heart-shaped balloons and stickers in every window. Ironically, the lack of focus on couple-y love has put me into a more generous and giving mood for Valentine's Day. I want to buy a big box of chocolates for my sister (and maybe even some small ones for her roommates.) I want to cook dinner for my housemate. If the nice weather keeps up, I might even be tempted into letting the dog take me for a walk.

Yes, I know it's supposed to be the other way around, but you haven't seen this dog. Any illusion that I'd be the one in charge of this walk would be pure fantasy.

Maybe this holiday for couple-y lovers has led us all to believe that love has to look a certain way, has to be a certain thing. When we don't have that, it leaves us feeling inadequate and like there's no place for us in this holiday. But we forget that there are so many different kinds of love besides romantic. There's love of your family, love of your friends, love of the people who fill up your day (if you're me, this especially pertains to the guy who gives me coffee every day.) And perhaps the easiest and most overlooked, particularly on Valentine's Day, is love of yourself. No smut intended or required. You drink one more glass of wine. You can eat another piece of cheesecake. Run a bath and fill it with the flower petals from the bottom of the box - go ask your local florist, they'll give 'em to you. Buy tickets to something, a sporting event or a local community thing that you'd usually just skip in favor of cable TV. Do something special for yourself, something you wouldn't normally do. And prove the card companies wrong about this holiday.

Hey, the rest of the world is falling apart. Why should Valentine's Day be an exception?

The Paradox of Employment

In light of my persistent unemployment and my friend T's polarly opposite dilemma, I am here posting. Again. By special request of T, who recently posted on my Facebook profile that she's bored and begs me to update. Thank you, T, for checking my blog. That makes ... two people this week. And yet, the site traffic monitor says nobody reads me. Take that, traffic monitor!

It's amazing to me that T has time to be, as she says, bored. No offense to T, because she's wonderful and brilliant and beautiful, but I just don't get how it's possible. I'm currently unemployed, and yet the things that seem to fill up my day stagger me. There's laundry. There are dishes. There's food to make. There's the never-ending trail of dog hair that needs vacuuming. Not to mention there's gift-wrapping, packing for the weekend trip to celebrate a friend's birthday out of town, and the soon-to-follow Christmas pilgrimage back to the house of my youth and all the glory therein. There are trips to the bank, and of course I still have to find a gift for my grandmother.

Grandmothers, actually. But that's beside the point.

The point is, there's just so much to do! The above list doesn't even include job hunting, but then again, with the economy the way it is, that usually takes less than five minutes out of the day. But there's still the trip to the bank, another to find eggs so I can make something that resembles food today. Because sustenance is good.

All these things fill up my day, and I barely have time to change my socks, let alone do all these things. And yet, T, who must face the same list of laundry, dishes, food (doubly so since she's working on a baking business), Christmas presents, and probably three times as many bills as I have at the present time.

The point is, so many people I know complain of boredom when their lives should be filled with, if nothing else, their jobs and all the things that people keep their jobs for. And yet here I sit, writing this blog article, and I can hardly keep my mind off of all the things that I'm putting off in order to write the above paragraphs.

Amazing how that happens, isn't it?

It's Saturday Night!

Just taking a moment to say how happy I am that 'Saturday Night Live' is funny again. Granted, it has been for a few years now, but don't you remember those awful days of the '90s when America's oldest comedy skit show wasn't comedic? Hard times indeed.

Favorite clip of the night:

"This song reminds me of the time I got engaged. My girl came in and said, 'I'm pregnant.' I said, 'Great!' and then as soon as her back was turned, I ran out the back door. Then, a couple of weeks later, I decided to do the right thing by her, so I went back."

Friend: "What changed your mind?"

"Her mom got nominated to be Vice President of the United States."


Video will be added as soon as it's up on the NBC website.

What was less impressive, though, was Beyoncé as the musical guest. Not quite sure what happened there, but her performance fell about as flat as her shoes, well, weren't. The minor notes of 'If I Were A Boy' are a strain for her, out of place for her voice. This song was meant to be touching and ended up laughable when lost amid Beyoncé's poor screeching, her leg-stomping, and the wind machine blowing her hair out of control.

No, really. She had to fix it about four times.

And the dress seemed a total fashion disaster. Maybe it was just me, but as soon as I saw it I predicted another Nipplegate; by the time she was done singing, I began to believe I wasn’t alone in thinking so.

But at least Justin Timberlake showed up and saved the day. And if that isn't a sign of the apocalypse, I don't know what is.

Grandmas Love Their Granddaughters

A few weeks ago, my friend's great-grandmother passed away. She lived with her, and with her grandmother (great grandma's daughter) and though it wasn't entirely surprising, it's still been a sensitive time for the family. As it is for any family that experiences a loss.

My friend E has been doing a lot with her own life lately as well, trying to balance her pending move to California to be with her husband, who is stationed there, and managing to send all of her things from Texas to the beautiful Sunshine State. And her family seems to be taking her move, and the passing of the family matriarch, in stride. Of course, it helps that the city clean-up is this weekend, and they want to get all of the great-grandmother's things out of the house in hopes of selling.

So E has inherited a nice little pile of things that formerly belonged to her great-grandmother. She told me, "So I have scarves, old books that I wanted, a purse she had when she was younger, et cetera.

"And a bottle of 500mg Naproxen pills that expired in November of last year."

We shared a nice little laugh when she said that somebody ought to tell Jeff Foxworthy about this, and then began discussing possible ways of getting rid of them. I suggested returning them to the doctor or pharmacy. E wanted to flush them, since they have a septic system.

Or, she said, she could sell them.

I don't think E understands that she's just become a deeper part of her own joke than she realizes.

Revelations

It was one week ago today that I realized the extent of my stupidity. And let me tell you, it's staggering.

The place: Slider's Bar & Grill, across the street from Camden Yards in Baltimore.
The time: Middle of the last presidential debates, approx. 9:45 p.m., Oct. 15.
The company: My good friend M and several of her law school friends.

I worked very hard with people of various ages and political persuasions in order to come up with this election year's Drinking Game for the debates. The rules were as follows:

Every time McCain touts to veterans or troops, you drink.
Every time Obama says “When I am President,” you drink.
Every time McCain refers to the Cold War, you drink.
Every time Obama says “change,” you drink.
Every time McCain sounds like a puppet of Bush (a la “We Both Reached For The Gun” from Chicago), you drink.
Every time Obama says “tax cut(s),” you drink.
Every time McCain says “maverick,” you drink.
Every time Obama says “John is right” or concedes a point to McCain, you drink.
Every time McCain talks about Gen. Petraeus, you drink.
Every time Obama starts a sentence with “Listen, …” you drink.

And in return for my gracious generosity in making an even number of rules for both McCain and Obama, here are the rules for the VP debates:
Every time Palin opens her mouth, you drink.


Naturally, like any good drinking game, the rules are subject to change as circumstances change. Obama's "tax cut(s)" and "Listen" rules went out the door in favor of things like mentioning his humbled background, or any mention of the now-infamous Joe the Plumber. And the rule about McCain mentioning the Cold War was nixed in order to make room for him talking about how great Sarah Palin is less than a week after a legislative committee determined that she abused her power in her well-publicized efforts to get her ex-brother-in-law fired.

Must be nice to get an ego boost like that. Globally broadcasted to boot.

About ten of us were watching the debates and enjoying our drinking game quite well when McCain started to talk about how wonderful Sarah Palin is and how proud he is of her. And then he said something that everyone else drank to, but that I couldn't make a joke out of.

McCain said, "She [Palin] also understands special-needs families. She understands that autism is on the rise, that we've got to find out what's causing it, and we've got to reach out to these families, and help them, and give them the help they need as they raise these very special needs children."

Some of my companions thought it was okay to drink at any mention of the remote possibility of Palin having a characteristic that might vaguely resemble a virtue. But as someone who grew up with, as McCain called her, a "special needs" friend, I cannot laugh at this. But something made me stop and think about my friend's family and Palin's. Is Sarah Palin like my friend's mother? Are the two of them comparable?

The only answer I could come up with was an unequivocal. They're not similar at all. They are both mothers of "special needs" children, but that is the end of their similarity. My friend's mother is the embodiment of unconditional maternal love. I'm not related to her by blood, and even I have felt that love from her over the years. Every member of my family has. It's impossible not to notice the enormous heart that she has, and the incredible combination that comes of having a sharp mind to go with it. And she loves her children, all of them. Unconditionally. Her daughter's "special needs" status has nothing to do with whether or not she loves her. She loves her kids because they're her kids. And never once have I seen her hold up her child as if to say to the world, "Look at what a great mother I am for loving this child, even though she's a special needs kid."

And that's when I realized what it was that bothered me so much about Sarah Palin. I always knew that her politics were about 100 years old and that her only concern for the environment was how much money she and other Alaskans could get for the systematic destruction of the earth for the sake of oil drilling. And that she was blissful in her ignorance of the world, suffering from the delusion that America exists in a vacuum. And that she paraded her oldest daughter's boyfriend around like a trophy - because every parent just hopes and prays that their teen will get pregnant or make another teen pregnant.

But I finally understood that what bothered me about Palin - what truly bothered me about her - was that she paraded her oldest daughter Bristol (the afore-referred to 17-year-old, now about to enter her seventh month of pregnancy) and youngest son (Trig, who has Down's Syndrome) around as if to reassure herself and show off to the nation what a good mother she was for loving her children in spite of their mistakes and handicaps. She makes a self-congratulatory show out of it, and you can almost see the sneer she sends to every other woman out there. "Don't you wish you were as good and humble as me?" she seems to say. And it's this condescension and blatant manipulation of her family, her back-handed "love" before the cameras, that bothers me so deeply. And I cannot believe it took me so long to figure it out.

The daughter of a U.S. state governor has plenty of options open to her. Such a ticket would be equivalent to carte blanche access to any college in the country, and possibly in the world. Bristol's future will have another path now, one that won't include a lot of the traditional experiences that many of her peers will have. What it will include is being turned into a pawn to further her mother's right-wing image and agenda. Palin will become the poster mother for the conservative side of any debate about abortion. And she'll hold her kids right up there with her, whether they want to be there or not. And that's why I doubt she'll ever be on any list of World's Greatest Moms. At least not one that I ever write up.

McCain - A Born Politician

Don't you just love how McCain never, ever actually answers a question during these debates?

Things Mothers Should Never Say

Me: God, I hate D.C. sometimes.

Mom: Why's that?

Me: Too small. And apparently there's something about me that attracts homeless and drunken men.

Mom: What?!

Me: Homeless men keep hitting on me on the subway! Today this guy came up to me and said, 'Hi, I was just wondering, would you like to have dinner with me sometime? About me: My name is Dan, I'm 43, and I've been clean for three months and thirteen days.'

Mom: Well, Laura, everybody has needs.

The Perks of Being an Unemployed Loser

You might think that being unemployed is a lazy, lazy life.

You'd be wrong.

Today, for example: I have to move my car to avoid getting ticketed. I need to clean the house before my housemate gets home. Then I have a phone interview - my third interview for the same position in almost a month. And still no guarantee that it'll get any further than this. And then there's the unpacking and washing that must be done from my job-hunting trip, which I just returned from last night. Plus a run to the grocery store, do something to entertain the dog so he doesn't shit on the carpet again, and the compulsory daily check of Monster, Reed, CareerBuilder, and Craigslist to see if there are any new job listings that I can apply to.

And of course, if I manage to get a shower in, that's always good, too.

Meanwhile, the interest on my student loans accrues interest every month. And as we approach the first of October, marking my last month of my 24th year and the fourth month of my unemployment (in 2008, anyway), I have to admit that hope is fading fast.

Random Thought of the Day

It's a little frightening to me that the safest method of travel - by airplane - is by far the most expensive.

It's almost as if the FAA, the government, and the airlines wanted us all to die. That's their gratitude for our keeping them in business for nearly 100 years. Not to mention, so many airlines (and airport staff) make traveling such a chore, such a burden, such a pain in the arse, that spending several days in a car, truck, trailor, cruise ship, or canoe to reach your destination is infinitely preferable.

Your tax money hard at work, ladies and gentlemen.

A college mate of mine has gone missing from her apartment in New York City. Have you seen Hannah Upp? Reward for any information on the whereabouts of this 23-year-old Spanish teacher.

Death To Remakes!

One year ago tomorrow, a film came out into wide release in the United States that, even then, I cringed at. The film was No Reservations, starring Aaron Eckhart (late of The Dark Knight where he plays the idealistic Harvey Dent who succumbs to his evil alter-ego, Two-Face) and Catherine Zeta-Jones, who hasn't needed much of an introduction since she burst onto the pop culture scene in 1998's The Mask of Zorro.

The reason I cringed then was because I knew, as few of my contemporaries did, that this film was based on a German film from 2002 called Bella Martha, better known to English-speaking audiences as Mostly Martha. During the summer of 2004 I went on a foreign film frenzy; I devoured almost three per week, and that few only because Netflix doesn't offer same-day delivery. A friend of mine got me started on this frenzy by lending me Babette's Feast and Mostly Martha. These films remain two of the finest films I've seen in the last ten years, and Mostly Martha in particular for its themes of grief, loss, and hope, all expressed and portrayed with such poetry and grace that I have rarely seen anything to rival it.

You might think, then, that the release of No Reservations would have excited me beyond belief. Many of my friends, when I told them about how wonderful Mostly Martha was, took it for granted that I would want to see this American remake. But experience has taught me that Hollywood remakes are more than often guaranteed to disappoint. And so it was with No Reservations. I finally buckled down and watched it today in honor of the (nearly) first anniversary of its release. Zeta-Jones and Eckhart demonstrate a great friendship on screen, but their sentiment fails to strike any deeper than that. At their first (and even second and third) kiss, I almost expect one of them to say, "So much for that," and get back to the business of the movie. They are too casual to be awkward, too warm to be aloof.

The film also stars Abigail Breslin, who tied with Tatum O'Neill for the youngest actress ever nominated for an Oscar in a competitive category (O'Neill won at age 10, while Breslin lost to Tilda Swinton in the Supporting Actress category; Shirley Temple won an honorary Oscar at age 6). While Breslin delivers (seemingly) real tears as a young girl orphaned when her mother dies in a car accident, she doesn't breathe any life into her lines, which weren't that stellar to begin with.

The film cannot decide whether to be about food, or family, or death, or female bonding (it tries for the latter with the compulsory pillow fight, complete with feathers flying all over the place). This adaptation of Sandra Nettelbeck's poignant Mostly Martha turned enchanting and genuine characters into caricatures of themselves, and the cast doesn't help sway the transformation at all.

Only in a few moments does this film tap into the original allure of Mostly Martha; but by the time those moments come along, you're so dejected and disappointed that you give no more thought to them than to a dead raccoon on the side of the highway.

People of the world, I implore you: don't tolerate lousy remakes and sloppy seconds. Hark ye the old adage: the original is the best. It's true about James Bond, Law & Order, and it's true about Mostly Martha. Do yourself a favor and give the original a shot.

One Thing Mick Jagger Should Never have Started Up

It's said that there are two kinds of people in the world; the kind who, if their house was burning, would save their Beatles collection, and the kind who, if their house was burning, would save their Rolling Stones collection.

I've always been one of the former. I just never understood what people saw in the Stones. Sure, I've got a few Stones songs in my music collection - eleven or twelve, in fact - and you have to admit that, overplayed though they are, some of their songs are so emblematic that they embody not just a mood but an entire generation.

That, I get. What I don't get, what I've never gotten, is the thought that Mick Jagger is sexy or a god of rock n' roll. I remember watching some TV show about him when I was 12 or so that had all these famous women he'd slept with, swearing up and down that they'd never met any man who was sexier. They juxtaposed these confessional interviews with concert footage of Jagger doing what I guess is supposed to be a dance, but looks more like marching in place, bringing his knees up to waist level and moving his bent arms back and forth as he sang "Start Me Up." Right then and there, I knew that these women either had no taste, or that Jagger's sex appeal must be something that doesn't really come across on film.

In spite of this conclusion reached at a young age, I like to keep an open mind. So when I found the movie Ned Kelly on Netflix, starring Mick Jagger as the title character, I decided to give it a shot.

And my oh my, what a waste of two hours. I wonder how well this film performed at the box office in 1970, or if Mick Jagger's star power was even enough to carry it that far. Because from beginning to end, the acting was just plain bad, and not just by Jagger, who couldn't seem to decide if he should have an Irish accent (as Kelly was purported to have), an Australian one or a British one. So he opted for all three at different moments. The motley supporting cast, I'm sure, didn't help him in that regard, never mind that hardly any of them could act, either. Combined with the abysmal script, and the whole thing becomes a recipe for disaster, and not even Tony Richardson, the two-time Oscar winning director, can save the project.

It's sad but true. There is absolutely nothing redeeming about this film. The opening scene of Kelly's execution by hanging is utterly flat and emotionless, and from there the film segues into corny and overblown, devoid of charm, grace, or even that most elemental of filmic qualities, timing.

Though it does have some very pretty scenes of the Australian outback.

Then again, so does National Geographic. Minus all the bad acting.