Dear President Obama,

Posted on by
Reply

I’m not sure why you need reminding of this, but hey: DID YOU FORGET YOU RAN AS A DEMOCRAT?

Democrats support unions. Democratic presidents do not sit silently by while Republicans rip apart the lives of public sector employees.

Is it really too much to ask that my President open his mouth and support the causes THAT HE RAN ON? Remember the man who was going to be the Education president? Teachers = public sector employees = UNIONIZED. (At least in most states. Sorry, Georgians.)

Was Candidate Obama not the person who was elected? Because President Obama does not bear much of a resemblance to him. Right now, he appears to be the Republicans’ most powerful secret weapon = presidential silence.

Sincerely,
you are losing my support and upsetting me very much,
Duff.

In Concert: Greg Laswell

Posted on by
Reply

What a wonderful evening. Not only does this guy give possibly the best stage banter I’ve ever heard–at one point I was laughing so hard my cheekbones hurt–but his tunes are beautiful.

He played both my favorites (Sweet Dream and [his cover of] Your Ghost) and I went home very happy.

I try to avoid seeing the same people over and over, but I would buy tickets to see him again in a heartbeat!

Also: SPACE in Evanston = awesome. Small, intimate, good acoustics, reserved seating (if you pay for it), lovely.

Those are indeed the things we think about.

Posted on by
Reply

“She wonders whether the sentences go out looking for people to utter them, or whether it’s just the opposite and the sentences simply wait for someone to come along and make use of them, and at the same time she wonders if she really doesn’t have anything better to do than wonder about such things, what silliness, she thinks, and then she remembered that she doesn’t have anything better to do….

Probably, she thinks, the sentences all get overtaken sooner or later and are spoken by someone or other, somewhere or other….”

-from Visitation, by Jenny Erpenbeck (translated by Susan Bernofsky)

À la Nick Hornby, books in/books out for January.

Posted on by
Reply

Bought:

  • Hunger, by Jackie Morse Kessler
  • The Sentry, a Joe Pike novel, by Robert Crais (iphone/kindle)
  • Across the Universe, by Beth Revis

Read:
  • Hunger, by Jackie Morse Kessler
  • The Sentry, a Joe Pike novel, by Robert Crais (iphone/kindle)
  • What the Librarian Did, by Karina Bliss (borrowed from the laundry room)
  • The Old Devils, by Kingsley Amis (library)

Big Screen: Blue Valentine

Posted on by
Reply

Small, quiet, kinda painful (emotionally).

I feel mixed on this one. You are seeing, at the same time, the very beginning of the relationship and the very end. So you have to sorta take it on faith that the middle was…better? worthwhile? not just loving (beginning) or fighting (ending)?

There’s a small secret there, spun out very slowly, that has an almost Memento-like effect of changing how you feel about things that happened earlier…

Shot really small and intimately, the sex scenes were kinda hard to watch: I felt like I was intruding on them! As if I had just walked into the room.

I also felt like this had a lot of (unintended) similarities to Wendy & Lucy. You could almost picture this as being the same character, a few years later (or, in the flashbacks, from around the same time).

I liked it and I’m glad I saw it, but…I didn’t completely fall in love with it.

Big Screen: The King’s Speech

Posted on by
Reply

Pretty fantastic filmmaking. Helena Bonham Carter was just lovely and understated, Geoffrey Rush was compassionate and perceptive, Colin Firth had much less patience than usual and it worked so well. The costumes, the settings, the subterfuge in arriving at appointments… I liked it all alot.

I didn’t quite love the film as much as others do, though. I know it was a big moment THEN, the King’s Speech and the committing to a World War AGAIN, and the fact that all those others (particularly Wallis Simpson and the abdicator) were so enamored of Hitler, is really powerful stuff. But I just kept thinking about today, and how little a king’s speech would impact or mean to almost anyone, and how we are right now in World War III even if no one wants to ever acknowledge it or even discuss the fact that we are still at war, these many years post 9/11. I couldn’t quite keep my mind focused on seeing this as the subtle big moment that it was and kept thinking on the small moment it seems NOW.

That said, I did really enjoy it, I did need kleenex at the end, and they are all certainly Oscar-worthy performances.

DadReaction chimed in to say he’s never liked Geoffrey Rush as much as he did in this movie. Such a calm, powerful performance.

Big Screen: The Fighter

Posted on by
Reply

Great performances. Christian Bale really steals the show (as that character would wish to), he’s practically unrecognizable. Wahlberg is obviously a good fit for the working class boxer boy, Adams is believable, the mom and dad were great, the sisters are just perfect, especially their reactions when they’re all crowded together in a space that would normally seat maybe 2 or 3 people.

And if you just want to see a pretty predictable but very well acted boxing movie, this will fit the bill.

But I thought it felt a little tired, a little “yup I’ve seen this before”. Not worth the hype.