CleverDonkey.com …Musings, Commentary, Opinions, and Drivel

Oh, man, did this movie suck. Directed and co-written by Jane Campion, it stars Meg Ryan in her birthday suit for the first time on film. We went hoping to see an erotic thriller, and we’re still hoping. Yes, Ms. Ryan does bare it all, but it was completely (to me) un-erotic…in fact, it was de-rotic. And there’s nothing thrilling or mysterious, other than the mystery of how long they can drag out the lame story, or the mystery of how many men that Meg Ryan’s character thinks is a psychotic killer will she be aroused by and sleep with over and over and over and over again. The only “ic” that this movie is is idiotic, and it is that in spades. Here are some examples:

Example #1: At the beginning of the movie Frannie (Meg Ryan’s character), a high school English teacher, meets one of her students at a bar to discuss a paper he’s writing (a bar?). She heads down the dark, dingy back stairs of the seedy bar towards the restroom, and sees a man with a very unique and distinguishing tattoo being…serviced (ahem)…by a young lady with very unique and distinguishing blue fingernails. Later, when the decapitated head of the murder victim, who just happens to be the same young lady with the blue fingernails, is found beneath Frannie’s bedroom window in her garden, the cop who shows up has the same distinguishing tattoo as the guy from the bar. Frannie’s reaction to this? Sleep with him.

Example #2: When Frannie is unsure of her relationship with the cop, she seeks out the advice of her sister. Her sister recommends that she continue sleeping with the cop, which Frannie does. Frannie’s sister’s advice is trustworthy to Frannie, even though in her own personal life the sister is stalking some poor doctor, stealing the doctor’s wife’s clothes from the dry cleaner, and her biggest worry is what to wear to court when they slap her with a restraining order. Oh, and she lives in an apartment directly above a strip club, and appears to be sort of a den-mother to the dancers, running a sort of empowered-naked-women’s day care center, or something like that, where the strippers leave their babies while they go out front and grind for the customers. Heartwarming.

Example #3: The student from the bar, an obviously troubled young man who is writing a paper (in blood) defending notorious serial killer John Wayne Gacy as a misunderstood nice guy who loved his victims, also flirts with Frannie in that street-tough fashion of youth. Later in the story, after Frannie has discovered the body of her violently murdered sister and sat on the floor with her sister’s disembodied head in a plastic shopping bag in her lap until the police show up and pry it from her hands, Frannie promptly goes home, finds her young student waiting for her, and takes him upstairs and proceeds to make out with him. That’s a perfectly normal reaction, wouldn’t you say?

Example #4: At the beginning of the film Frannie relates to her sister the story of how their father proposed to her mother (they’re half-sisters – same father), and it’s a beautiful, romantic, sepia-toned flashback to her father and mother silently skating on a glorious winter’s day, and her father getting down on one knee on the frozen lake to propose. As the film progresses we learn more of this story through intermittent flashbacks, and find out that the father actually came to the lake with a different girl, his fiancé, no less, who is taken aback by how much attention he is paying to Frannie’s future mom. So the fiancé takes off the engagement ring and flings it at him, and he proceeds to pick it up, skate over to Frannie’s mom, and propose to her with the same ring. Of course, in that true, hackneyed cinematic tradition, he ends up slicing her legs off with his razor-sharp skates and spreading blood all over the frozen lake. Quite Kapra-esque.

Example #5: Kevin Bacon plays a former romantic interest of Frannie’s, who just happens to be instantly recognizable as a red herring, because he’s just too loony and stalker-like to actually be the killer….or is he?? Who cares.

The list goes on and on (and on and on). When we got home I double-checked the running time, which is just under two hours. It felt like a lot more. The absolute worst part of the film, however, is the grand finale, where the killer is finally revealed.

READ NO FURTHER UNLESS YOU WANT TO KNOW WHO THE KILLER IS!!!!

So, as we begin wrapping up this circus we find that Frannie is almost positive that the detective is the killer, so she invites him up to her apartment, for some inexplicable reason puts on a sexy, red, night-out-on-the-town dress, provocatively handcuffs him to an exposed pipe with his own handcuffs, has her way with him, then stumbles off blindly into the night (in her provocative red dress), where she runs into the detective’s partner, who thus far has been nothing but a bit character. He takes Frannie to a huge red lighthouse under the George Washington Bridge. The red lighthouse both physically and metaphorically resembles a bloody penis, so given Frannie’s romantic choices thus far I just assumed that she’d start humping it. At this point it is clear to everyone, including the audience and Frannie, that the partner is the killer.

So Frannie does the smart thing and follows on foot as he unlocks the gate and lets her in to the lighthouse grounds, where she seems to be inexplicably trapped by a 7 foot high, easily climbable wrought iron fence, even though she knows (because he tells her) that he’s going to kill her. But first he puts on a little easy-listening music, has a drink, and asks Frannie to marry him, at which point she does the first smart thing she’s done during the entire film and shoots him with the other cop’s gun that coincidentally happens to be in the pocket of his jacket, which she coincidentally decided to bring with her on her run out of her apartment, into the partner’s car, on the long drive through the country, and into the red lighthouse/weiner. Even though she shoots him in the leg (they show it), the overhead shot shows him dead laying on top of her bleeding from a chest wound. Call the Warren Commission, we’ve got another magic bullet.

It’s a shame that the wonderful Meg Ryan chose this piece of dreck as the first film where she bares her assets, as this film is not worthy. Ms. Ryan does a good job with what she’s given, and shows acting chops that make me very interested to see her first (good) serious film. This film, however, does not work on any level. I can’t see that it could be empowering for women (but I await correction on that assumption), it’s not a thriller, it’s not a police procedural, it’s not erotic, it’s not dramatic, it’s not funny, it’s not deep, it has no message, it has no layers, it’s not metaphorical of anything interesting/important/serious enough to care about, and it’s not anything but a complete waste of everyone’s time, effort, and money.

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This is the resurgence of garage rock, hunh? I’m no expert (couldn’t tell a Hive from a Vine if I had a bad case of both), but I have to say, if you’re going to listen to non-groundbreaking musical stylings, I find that straight-up, just-one-shade-above-playing-at-a-local-bar type rock-and-roll ain’t a bad way to go.

So far everything about this CD experience has been nearly straight out of the late 70’s. I bought it low-tech: I heard their song once on the radio, thought it catchy, and went right out to Best Buy to get it without hearing / researching any further (“How retro,” comments engineerboy dryly). The album looks low-tech: I’m convinced the cover art might actually be the “Stillwater” album from Almost Famous. Either that or Jet found the guy who did the cover art for my mom’s album The Best of Bread, circa 1976. The sparse liner notes don’t even contain lyrics and are remarkably free of any shout-outs to their homies. Even the couple photos of these guys are of a taken-on-the-subway-with-a-shaky-35-mm quality. However, later during the day I buy the CD I realize the song I like is one of the tunes on the new iPod for PC commercials… so it’s not all throw-back, I guess.

The rock on this album (we’ll drag that concept out of the dustbin) is straight-up and fun, if not exactly revolutionary. I can name about five bands that might want to consider suing Jet for too closely resembling their sound — they are a remarkable blender combo of AC/DC, Bachman Turner Overdrive, Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Clash, and Golden Earring. Oh, and I think the Bangles might even have a quarrel with the tambourine intro to “Are You Gonna Be My Girl”. (Ok, so maybe I’m missing the point of garage rock, but stiilll, synthesize your own sound at least a liiittle bit). Nitpicking aside, when the songs rock, they rock. The current hit tune is a fun blast, “Rollover DJ” is kicky and exuberant, and “Cold Hard Bitch” (the most AC/DC-esque of the bunch) is excellent. Makes me wanna don my Nascar tank top and head to an ice house. As a matter of fact, if this album had more of its rocking songs on there, I’d give it a higher rating. There are a few too many Beatles-inflected piano intro songs on there… I’d make a joke about the Kiss pioneer power ballad “Beth”, but it’s low-hanging fruit — the last would-be-soulful tune on the CD is called “Timothy”, so the joke’s just too easy.

All in all, though, it’s an enjoyable if uneven ride. I can skip past the slow tunes pretty easily, and the rest is unchallenging and unpretentious. If you think modern music is pretty much crap since, oh, 1983 or so, then this is the album for you. Mynagirl says, “Rock on!”

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Click here to see the review of Kill Bill: Vol 2.

Kill Bill: Vol. 1 is Quentin Tarantino’s fourth film as a director. Well, third-and-a-half would be more appropriate, since this is really the first half of one film, not the first film in a film/sequel progression. So far he’s batting .500 in my book. I *loved* Reservoir Dogs, and still watch it once every year or two, even though it’s a tough, gritty ordeal. I’ve never been able to watch Pulp Fiction all the way through, finding it to be a moronic, but more slickly Hollywood, pale imitation derived from Dogs. I’ve seen enough movies that I believe I can tell the difference between good films that I just don’t happen to like and bad films. Pulp Fiction may not be a bad film, but it’s sure not good, and certainly not great, and I have always struggled to understand its popularity.

My pet theory is that Pulp Fiction was embraced by those who had heard that Tarantino was a great director, but had never bothered to seek out (or endure sitting through the pain of watching) Reservoir Dogs. I’m pretty neutral about Jackie Brown, in that it was mildly enjoyable when I first saw it, but it was quickly forgotten and I’ve never revisited it.

Which brings us to Kill Bill: Vol. 1, which I enjoyed greatly. There is almost zero prelude or character development in this movie, which jumps immediately into a violent revenge story, and only gives us the slightest of glimpses at the back-story of these characters. And even the back-story is an un-detailed, just-the-facts presentation of events, without any explanation of why. In typical Tarantino fashion, the story is not linear, but is told through flashbacks, memories, and even animated sequences. This is all done masterfully, weaving in the bits and pieces of the story at just the right times, without being dumbed down for (Hollywood’s understanding of) the multiplex audience.

The basic storyline is that The Bride (Uma Thurman) and her entire wedding party, including her unborn child, are slaughtered by her fellow assassins on her wedding day in a small, dusty, clapboard chapel in El Paso. Except that The Bride survives, even though Bill (an unseen David Carradine) administers a point-blank, bullet-to-the-head coup de grace. The Bride ends up in a four year coma, and when she wakes up she realizes she has lost everything except a white-hot need to exact revenge on her former boss and colleagues. The rest of the film follows The Bride as she starts hunting down her former teammates one by one.

In an interesting directorial choice, Uma Thurman’s character is never referred to by a given name in this film, with the exception of one scene where it is uttered twice, but purposely beeped out both times. There doesn’t appear to be any reason to keep her name secret, but it does add to her mystery, and the beeping feels right and actually works within the story rather than being distracting.

The Bride’s quest for revenge involves much hand-to-hand combat, knife fights, and sword fights, but does not involve any Weapons of More-serious Destruction, like guns. This, of course, indicates that the film does not take place in the pseudo-reality of movies set in the real world, but instead is set in a mythical place, where all the assassins use guns when attacking The Bride and her wedding party, but then all of the subsequent revenge fighting is lead-free. This movie could have been over in 10 minutes if even one of the hundreds of world-class bad guys who’s butt’s The Bride kicks would have thought to carry a gun.

Fortunately (from my perspective), the mythical world of Kill Bill is not the digitally rendered, video-game like, heartless, soulless, plastic, lame-ass type of world seen in the Matrix “films”. Instead, it is much like the real world, except for the actions of the characters (and a couple of gravity defying fighting moves), none of whom are digital, and all of whom are sort of honorably stylized and/or stylishly honorable, in that they all seem to live (and die) by some unwritten Assassin’s Code.

For those who don’t already know, Tarantino shot this as one film, but it ended up with a ~4 hour running time, which he was reluctant to cut down. So the studio made the decision to release it as two films, the first out now, the second out early next year. I don’t have a big beef with the split, because I understand that any movie showing in a multiplex with a four hour run time is going to be under-viewed. However, I have a *big* problem with the long delay between the release of the halves. In fact, in my opinion, they should have been released on consecutive weekends, which I think would have set up a kind of harmonic vibration of folks going to see both of them, ending up generating more box office dollars than this artificial delay. You see, since this was conceived as a single film, there is no traditional “end” to Vol. 1, just a stopping point. Nothing is settled or decided, no watersheds are reached, nothing. If you look at the list of film/sequel combinations that are actually watchable, they all have one characteristic in common, which is that each film tells a complete story, and that story is part of a larger continuing story. With Kill Bill: Vol. 1, you get half of a well-told story.

And what a half it is. The sparse dialogue is not trite, not Shakespeare, but a perfect fit for this film. There’s an animated sequence that tells the horrifying story of one of the assassins coming-of-age. The sets, locations, and cinematography are beautiful. The violence and gore start out extreme, soon become over-the-top, evolve to comedically ridiculous, and finally blossom into sublime commentary/homage/satire of the violent film genre. Uma is likeable and lethal in her role, David Carradine does a good job as the unseen but seemingly omnipotent Bill, Daryl Hannah and Vivica A. Fox embody their roles with gusto, and Lucy Liu is suitably Oriental in her role as the…Oriental. I don’t think I will be spoiling anything for anyone by telling you that Uma survives this first half, but only some of the rest do.

I deducted a half-star from this rating as penalty for not being to see the whole $%#@$%$# story and thus not knowing if it will actually be good, once the fullness is grokked. However I get the feeling that The Compleat Kill Bill will end up being a four star masterwork, as long as the second half lives up the first half. And it should, since they were shot together and so shouldn’t suffer from any of the creative/artistic mutations that seem to plague the majority of sequels.

So Quentin Tarantino is now 2-2 in my book. Kill Bill is undeniably the work of a director with both a clear artistic vision and the complete command of the medium necessary to tell his story exactly as he envisions it. I’m quite upset that I have to wait until next year to see the rest of the story, but I also think that the anticipation will make the finale all the sweeter.

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Another star is born. Jack Black has slowly been working his way up the movie role food chain, starting with small roles in movies like Waterworld, Bob Roberts, Demolition Man, The Cable Guy, and Mars Attacks, and then moving up to more visible roles in such films as High Fidelity and Shallow Hal. And now, in School of Rock, he has grabbed the mic in his first big, mainstream, successful starring vehicle.

He is starting to be compared with John Belushi and Chris Farley, and I think those comparisons are close to the mark. Black has a unique style, and while he doesn’t appear to trying to emulate either of them (or anyone else), he does have Belushi’s commanding presence and Farley’s endearing earnestness, as well as the comic abilities shared by both. One hopes that Black will be able control the conflagrations of fame to become an enduring fixture, and not a brightly blazing, but too soon extinguished, shooting star.

The film itself is laugh-out-loud funny and charming, and manages to be family-friendly without slipping over into smarmy sweetness. The story follows Dewey Finn (Black’s character), who is a fringe-dweller in his town’s local music scene, as he gets kicked out of the band he helped found (to be replaced by a guy with less talent but better abs, tats, and hair) and finds himself broke and jobless and facing eviction from his apartment by his roommate’s girlfriend if he can’t cough up the back rent. Dewey’s roommate is a substitute teacher, and one day Dewey fields a call from a school looking for an emergency substitute, and ends up taking the position himself (while masquerading as his roommate).

The school turns out to be the finest private prep school in town, and Dewey’s students are all refined, polite, and highly intelligent. He tells the kids that they’re going to have permanent recess in his class, scams some munchies from one of the kids, and promptly does a whole lot of nothing else as he avoids the pinched headmistress (played with tightly-wound conviction by Joan Cusack) and attempts to keep up the charade long enough to get a paycheck without having to actually do anything.

But when his kids head down the hall for music class, Dewey follows them and finds out that they are talented musicians and singers. By the time the kids come back to his class, Dewey has schlepped in all the band instruments from his van and has decided that he and these kids are going to win the upcoming Battle of the Bands, giving him revenge on his former bandmates. The problem is that the kids are schooled in classical music, not rock and roll, but this only inspires Dewey to become, of all things, an impassioned teacher. And his lessons, ostensibly about the history and art of metal rock, are, in true Hollywood fashion, metaphoric life lessons.

And also in true Hollywood fashion, Dewey learns from the experience, too. He has written his one great song, a Zeppelin-esque rock ballad/anthem, complete with deeply mystical lyrics and overblown orchestrations, and he thinks this is the song that will take his new band to victory at the contest. However, one of the students writes his own song, a simpler but ultimately more powerful song based on his own troubled relationship with his success-focused father. Dewey recognizes the superiority of the song, and learns that being a leader means using the best ideas, even if they’re not yours. And the band goes on to overcome tribulations, compete, and while they don’t win, they do triumph, and learn that it’s more important to be true to yourself and your art than to win.

Jack Black shines here as Dewey, imparting the pure joy of his love of music and convincingly portraying his evolution from slacker-loser to deserving shaper of young minds. The kids are played by actual musical prodigies with little or no formal acting experience. This results in performances that, while rough around the edges, are better than anything that could have come from precocious acting veterans, because these kids play their own instruments and sing their own songs, and that more than makes up for the occasional lack of acting polish.

All-in-all, this film is a trifle, but it is a very enjoyable one. It will be interesting to see how Jack Black handles his new movie-star status, and how he balances his own roots in the mock-rock band Tenacious D with the pull of Hollywood and the lure of superstardom. I’m already reading stories where Jack Black talks about his schedule being so hectic that he’s using pills to control his sleep cycle. I don’t know if these quotes are accurate, but they seem eerily familiar. Let’s hope that his rock opera turns out to be heroic, and not tragic.

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So, The Rock has *it*. That may already have been evident to his wrestling fans, and maybe to others after his film debut in The Scorpion King, but I remained undecided. His performance in Scorpion was better than I expected it would be, but it still didn’t convince me that he was destined to blossom into a legitimate movie star.

But The Rundown has made me a believer. The Rock still has a few rough edges, but in Rundown he’s funny, cool, menacing and charismatic. Now, this is an action/buddy/comedy, so he’s not being asked to demonstrate a Method actor’s range, but he does an excellent job with the material at hand.

The film itself is mindlessly/mildly enjoyable, with some good action sequences, beautiful jungle scenery, trite-but-relatively-inoffensive storyline and dialogue, rapacious monkeys, an inexplicable Scotsman, and Christopher Walken doing an excellent impression of Christopher Walken at his most menacingly cruel. It also has Sean William Scott, who may be on his way to replacing Keanu Reeves, in my mind, as the luckiest dope to ever fall ass-backwards into a film career.

The storyline is basically an amalgamation of Romancing the Stone, Midnight Run, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and The Magnificent Seven. The plot is unremarkable, but it also manages not to get in the way of the heart of the film, which is the action, the stunts, and the scenery. Several of the stunts looked real (not CGI) and quite painful, and the fight scenes have some amazing looking moves that, again, do not appear to be computer-generated. There are a couple of places where the trickery is noticeable, but it never devolves into Crouching Angels Reloaded fantasy-fighting. And the mountains of Hawaii are breathtaking as they stand-in for the jungles of Brazil.

So, the best part of this film is The Rock laying the foundation for what appears to be a long and successful career. Pay close attention to the first few minutes of the film to see what appears to be the (deserved) passing of the Action Hero torch from one generation to the next. I hope that The Rock chooses his next few projects wisely, as he is on the verge of superstar status, and many before him have been at this same watershed point, only to take their eye off the ball and end up Van Damm-ed to mediocrity.

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I don’t live in New York, I’m not a member of the literary intelligentsia, I’m not Jewish, I’m not single, and I’m not female. Crossing Delancey tells the story of a single, Jewish woman who lives in New York, and whose work has her rubbing elbows with noted, famous authors. Despite having nothing in common with the main character, Izzy (short for Isabelle), I *love* this movie. I think that it’s because I identify with Sam, the pickle man, who is Izzy’s sporadic suitor.

Izzy is played by Amy Irving, in one of her best, perhaps very best, roles. Izzy is an intelligent, upwardly mobile professional who seems to be making a good life for herself doing something she loves. She has a good, rent-controlled apartment, works at a prestigious old-style bookstore, hobnobs with the upper crust of the New York literary scene, and spends personal time with her life-long girlfriends. Her only remaining connection to her past is her grandmother, Bubbie, who still lives in the old neighborhood in the old way. Izzy is dutiful in visiting her Bubbie and helping her with shopping, etc, but resists her Bubbie’s insistent meddling into her personal life. Bubbie firmly believes that Izzy “…lives alone, like a dog. Only a dog should live alone, not people!” Izzy insists that she has a great life, and doesn’t need a man to feel complete.

Unbeknownst to Izzy, Bubbie retains the services of the local matchmaker to help Izzy find a husband. Izzy doesn’t find out about the setup until the wheels are already in motion, and she is too respectful of her Bubbie to just leave once she finds out. So, she dutifully, but coldly, endures a lunchtime meeting around Bubbie’s kitchen table with the matchmaker and her blind date, Sam. Sam is played by Peter Riegert, in a marvelously understated performance. Sam owns a pickle stand on the lower East side, which he inherited from his father. A pickle man from the old neighborhood is definitely not what Izzy wants in a man, as she tends to get all doe-eyed and mushy over a prattling, Euro-trash author, played with perfect pitch by Jeroen Krabbé.

That’s the basic setup of Crossing Delancey, and the rest of the story follows Izzy as she goes through the process of separating what she thinks she wants from what she actually needs. There’s nothing earth-shattering or original about the plot, but the story is imbued with wit, warmth, and humor, and all of the characters feel real, and it’s easy to care very much what happens to them. Amy Irving does an excellent job of portraying Izzy’s angst as she struggles with the forces pulling her between her old and new worlds.

The movie portrays a literary world populated by semi-talented, blathering, self-congratulatory “noted authors”, who are surrounded by fawning, pseudo-intellectual wannabes. I’m actually distilling down to one sentence what is only eventually implied by the movie, and this characterization of the literati is not heavy-handed or comical. But the movie does seem to be telling us that the only difference between the fawn-ers and the fawn-ees is that one group was lucky enough to have sold a few books, and the other group sees that as the highest achievement of mankind.

Izzy is definitely a fawn-ee, with a genuine love of literature, but with a blind spot that seems to have her equating today’s bestselling “serious” authors-du-jour with the classic masters of writing. Given this predisposition, it is impossible for her to notice, much less appreciate, the subtle charms and non-egotistical confidence of a guy who has to soak his hands in milk and vanilla to get rid of the pickle smell. Sam pitches a little woo her way, and she eventually has to acknowledge that he seems like a good guy, but that he’s just not part of her world. Sam takes this news with equanimity, and does not chase her, but events (and meddling yentas) eventually put them back on each other’s radar.

Sam has a lot of characteristics that I admire, and that I strive to nurture in my self. Sam is very centered and has a strong sense of self, and doesn’t look for external validation of his worth. He runs a pickle stand with his brother, he lives in the old neighborhood, he plays handball, he helps the local bubbies with heavy chores, he’s witty and engaging, and through all of these small things he makes the world a better place. He doesn’t need anyone to praise him for what he does, or to tell him that he’s great, because he already knows who he is, and he knows the right things to do, and he does them. It’s very simple, subtle, and non-flashy. Still waters run very deep, indeed.

Anton the Dutch writer (Jeroen Krabbé’s character), on the other hand, is a charming-yet-angsty manipulative-tortured-genius type. The movie explores one of the standard relationship conundrums, which is why are women sometimes unable to see through brash flashiness and pathetic egotism and recognize jerks? (Nice guys everywhere would love to know, since it would sure save everyone a lot of time.)

But that conundrum is the heart of this film, and it makes for a very interesting, funny, charming, and heart-warming story. Of special note is Reizl Bozyk, who plays Bubbie. This was her first, and only, film appearance, after a career on the Yiddish vaudeville stage, and she gives a wonderful performance as the loving grandmother who seems to be doddering and out of touch, while all the time knowing exactly what she’s doing.

As we go through life our beliefs and philosophies continually change. In the end, I think the message of this film is that going back and re-embracing things that were previously discarded is not tantamount to compromise or settling, but instead is something that we should all be open-minded enough to do.

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I’ve decided I’m a vegetabletarian. I might be the first and only. You see, I’ve been in a bind for a couple of years. I am an animal lover, and lately I’ve been feeling flat-out odd about eating them, as I’ve done for all of my life up until now. I’m sure in a post-apocalyptic world I could become hungry enough to kill an animal for food, but as the child of a comfortable and genteel age I am uncomfortable at the thought of a living, breathing creature dying for me to eat its flesh.

But until recently I haven’t seen a practical alternative to being a regular, card-carrying member of normal, meat-eating society. Veganism is, like other religions, a form of deluded zealotry I cannot connect with; even more moderate vegetarians can be a general pain in the ass — the pariah of the group lunch, the impromptu dinner with relatives, the summer bar-b-que, and any other social situation where being an overly vocal picky eater makes the entire event a drag for the normal people who just wanna eat their hot dog.

The other general problem I have with vegetarie-egans is that sometimes they seem to claim that humans aren’t meant to eat meat. Clearly, humans, like many creatures on this planet, evolved to eat meat, and I find it ridiculous to dispute that. For the record, I do, however, revile hunting as the sport of psychopaths and evolutionary retards. I think there is something fundamentally wrong with someone raised in our modern-day society who can consciously cause pain and terror in a living creature for fun. Even if hunters do eat their kill as did our cavemen ancestors, it doesn’t make any difference to me… there are lots of things our ancestors did (raping, stoning an unwanted child, killing a neighbor over a small dispute) that would be illegal or immoral by even the loosest of today’s standards.

But if you look closely at the factory farming industry, I’m not sure they’re much more concerned with animal pain and suffering than the hunting retards (although presumably the guy killing the chicken in the meat factory doesn’t actually enjoy it). Animals, especially the smaller ones, are given such a minimum of space to live that you can’t even imagine it. I read one article that equated the amount of space farmed chickens have to a human living in an elevator with 10 other people for his entire life — doesn’t really seem what nature intended, does it? As a kid, you’re often not really aware of those kind of things; you eat a Happy Meal and you’re happy. But as an adult, I find myself wishing that I could eat the meat my body wants without worrying that my dinner was kept in a cage and force-fed through a tube.

So, let’s imagine for a moment that one factory farming company’s owner (the companies are more likely all multi-national conglomerates, but play along here) decides to be a kinder, gentler factory farmer. Animals get a lot more space to move around, conditions are much more humane, the animals are happier and killed quickly with no suffering. The critters have less hormones put into them, so they’re more like their “natural” selves — they aren’t as big, though, so one chicken produces fewer pounds of meat. Mr. Factory Farmer takes his product to market, making sure he’s still competitively priced with the other meat vendors. And he goes out of business. Americans buy with their dollars, and not enough Americans care or know about the conditions of their food before it becomes food. In a normal day, they go about their business with work, money, love life, kids, and other daily concerns. The buy the meat they can afford, or the meat that’s available to them when they need a meal on the go, and that’s about it.

So what alternative do I have available to me if factory-farmed food makes me queasy but I think vegetarians can be a kooky, unrealistic bunch? I have the same daily concerns as the rest of Americans; I can’t quite move out to a farm and produce my own means of subsistence. I work for a living; if I want to look like I’ve dressed for the office, I wear leather shoes. Well, as far as I can work out in my own mind, the answer is vegetabletarianism — my own personal concoction of a lessened reliance on factory farmed meat products without the dogmatism I perceive in today’s vegetarianism. It means that if I can buy meat that’s raised in a manner I can live with, I might eat it, even if it’s at a premium price. It means that I buy eggs at triple price because they’re from free roaming hens.

However, it means that if I’m at my mother-in-law’s and she’s cooked a big meal with brisket, I won’t refuse to sit down with everyone else. I won’t make a big production about fixing a veggie meal just for myself. I won’t excoriate my fellow diners with how they’re eating cruelly farmed meat. In short, I won’t make a pain in the ass of myself. I’ll try to live in the real world — minimizing my reliance on factory-farmed meat but recognizing that I might sometimes be in a situation where I can’t stick to that 100%. Keeping my eye out for places and companies that sell ‘happy’ meat; ordering it when and if I can. The best way in our country to effect change is with the pocketbook. And who knows, maybe there are other people out there who don’t like factory farming but can’t commit to the only alternative they see in society — vegetarianism without compromise. Maybe a practical approach will catch on with others like me, and you’ll start seeing high-priced, cruelty-free ‘vegetabletarian’ products at your local store.

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One of the wonderful things about a friendship and relationship is the glorious dance of discovery and compromise that comes about as you mix and match your preferences, likes, and dislikes with those of your mate. Often, your similar likes are what bring you together in the first place: a shared reverence for the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique album, the ability to quote from The Princess Bride, a fondness for wry humor and a well-turned phrase, a love of technology.

Then, as you get to know each other better, you find that some of your tastes don’t always match up. I remember being a bit taken aback when I first learned Scott found my morning staple of NPR pretentious and tedious, and instead revealed that he had been a Howard Stern listener. I was surprised by his look of pained endurance (much like a faithful hound dog getting a medical procedure) as we watched one of my favorite all-time movies, the Burt Reynolds / Dolly Parton musical The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. In turn, I’m sure he was disappointed when we watched one of his favorite movies, What’s Up, Doc? and I was irritated and impatient with the female character’s nasal voice and intrusive meddling.

However, this experimentation also leads both parties to the wonderful broadening of experience and taste as you are exposed to things your mate likes that you also find delightful. I now love the movies So I Married an Axe Murderer (“We’ve got a piperrr down!!”) and Doctor Strangelove (“I do not avoid women, Mandrake… but I deny them my essence.”). He and I now both watch his favorite show of Seinfeld together constantly, and I even loved Howard Stern’s movie Private Parts. Similarly, Scott now listens to Eminem and Busta Rhymes with me and even enjoyed 8 Mile after we saw it together. He loves the short-lived cartoon show The Critic that I introduced him to and watched The South Park Movie at my urging (loved it).

Over the years of our friendship, relationship, and marriage, Scott has always loved Weird Al Yankovic. God forbid the Coolio song “Gansta’s Paradise” be played, lest Scott feel the need to belt out Weird Al’s parody, “Amish Paradise”:

It’s hard work and sacrifice

Living in an Amish paradise

We sell quilts at discount price

Living in an Amish paradise

That parody annoyed the hell outta me! First of all, I liked Coolio’s song, and the Stevie Wonder song on which it was based. Weird Al’s song spoiled it for me! Because, after enough repetitions of Scott singing or playing the Weird Al version, I would hear the Weird Al lyrics in my head even if I was listening to the Coolio version.

Years ago, when Scott bought the album “Running with Scissors” and played the song “The Saga Begins” (about Episode One of the Star Wars series), I thought the lyrics were mildly clever but I wasn’t a big Star Wars fan, so it didn’t really do much for me (sung to the tune of “American Pie”):

Oh my my this here Anakin guy

May be Vader someday later; now he’s just a small fry

And he left his home and kissed his mommy goodbye

Sayin’ “Soon I’m gonna be a Jedi”

“Soon I’m gonna be a Jedi”

Then he played a song I thought was pretty funny, because it hit me squarely in my mid-20’s demographic: an original zydeco ditty called “My Baby’s In Love With Eddie Vedder”.

She says the way he grinds his molars is really sexy

She thinks he’s so darn dysfunctional and Generation X-ey

…

Now, every time I see him, well, he looks so grim

I guess it really must suck to be a rock star like him

What a pain in the butt to have so much success

Spending all his time moping and avoiding the press

But my girl can’t get enough of his sullen demeanor

Like he’s some big tortured genius and I’m some kinda wiener

I have to say, I found that one to be pretty hilarious. He pretty much nails Eddie Vedder right on (only Weird Al would think to describe him as having a “walleyed stare”) and aptly makes fun of how hilarious it was that Pearl Jam was so popular and fiscally successful as they seemingly eschewed material things and boycotted the music “machine” of MTV and Ticketmaster. And I thought that the song “Jerry Springer,” a rapid-fire parody of the song “One Week” by the Barenaked Ladies, was sorta funny.

So, at this point, I thought Weird Al could be funny in a hit-or-miss kinda way. Some of the songs were amusing but goofy — clever, but not genius.

Then… I heard… “All About the Pentiums”. It was a hard-rocking parody of a Puff Daddy song I’d never heard of called “All About the Benjamins”. “All About the Pentiums” is about technology, and I found it hilarious! To wit:

Hey fella, I bet you’re still livin’ in your parents’ cellar

Downloadin’ pictures of Sarah Michelle Gellar

And postin’ “Me too!” like some brain-dead AOL-er

I should do the world a favor and cap you like Old Yeller

You’re just about as useless as Jpegs to Hellen Keller

It’s tacky and crude, but completely funny! The song is laced with references I would categorize as “true computer geek” talk, the kinda stuff you can’t just sit down and write about unless you truly are a computer and Internet person:

Got a flat-screen monitor forty inches wide

I believe that yours says “Etch-A-Sketch” on the side

In a 32-bit world, you’re a 2-bit user

You’ve got your own newsgroup: alt.total.loser

So, “All About the Pentiums” became one of my favorite songs. I even put it on my Flash card for going running — it’s got a pretty good fast beat! Then, Scott bought Weird Al’s most recent album, Poodle Hat, and I realized that Weird Al is truly a genius.

The song, “Ebay” (parodying a Back Street Boys tune, or so my embarassed stepdaughter informs me), again nailed me right in the demographics. I’m a pretty regular Ebay shopper and seller, and the song made pretty clear that Weird Al had done his homework about Ebay:

I am the type who is liable to snipe you

With two seconds left to go, whoa

Got Paypal or Visa, what ever’ll please

As long as I’ve got the dough

And then… I heard the song “Bob”, an original Weird Al composition in the style of Bob Dylan. I chuckled as we listened to the nonsensical lyrics in the style of “Subterranean Homesick Blues”. The the last line of the song played, and Annalisa sputtered from the back seat, “that line, that’s one of … those… things!!!!” We listened to the words again:

Ah, Satan sees Natasha

No devil lived on

Lonely Tylenol

Not a banana baton

No “x” in “Nixon”

O, stone, be not so

O Geronimo, no minor ego

“Naomi,” I moan

“A Toyota’s a Toyota”

A dog, a panic in a pagoda

Yep, that’s right. Not only was the song a dead-on homage to Bob Dylan with its harmonica and strange crooning style, but every single lyric in the entire song is a palindrome. And so is the song’s title, ‘Bob’. I felt a series of synaptic explosions as the sheer genius of the song really struck me. And I was officially converted to being a full-time Weird Al fan.

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Da Marco
1520 Westheimer Rd
Houston, TX
(713) 807-8857

It’s easy to miss Da Marco: the small converted house is set off the street right at the most harrowing narrow-laned portion of the Westheimer curve; the sign is well-lit but competes for eye attention with the nearby tattoo and body piercing joints. Those eclectic surroundings, sprinkled with top-notch food choices is, of course, a major part of the appeal to this section of Houston. This gracious Italian eatery fits right in.

Last night was our first trip to Da Marco; we wanted an upscale (but not outrageous) dinner treat before heading over to the SkyBar. The entrance to the restaurant leads you into a tiny 3′ curtained area, and from there the hostess escorts you another three feet to the small bar. Jacketed waiters efficiently weave through the small non-smoking dining room — the feeling is intimate but not overly cramped. The place was very well candle-lit, although a bit too warm in the bar area because of the open wood-burning bread oven just behind the well-roasted bartender. The families and couples dining there on this visit (a Friday night) were a comfortably mixed bunch: everything from middle aged couples in jeans and tennies, to younger couples in suits and evening dresses, to at least two very authentic-looking garrulous Italian families.

Our white-linened table was nicely placed near a back wall and our waiter was affable and knowledgeable. The wine list was all Italian, with only a few selections available by the glass. The menu was structured in a traditional three-course format: antipasti, pasta, and entrée. The off-menu selections were presented via a chalkboard and included an oxtail pasta selection as well as main courses of rabbit and in-house aged angus beef. Our meal for two included:

antipasto Frisée with pears, candied walnuts, and some type of wonderfully soft ripe cheese	antipasto Giant sea scallops with orange segments (two bites into which Scott proclaims, “this might be my new favorite restaurant”)
pasta An unbelievably good sweet corn ravioli with huge bits of fresh lobster meat	pasta Mouth-watering porcini risotto with fresh hunks of ripe parmesan
entrée Very tender pork tenderloin with figs in a sweet balsamic reduction, accompanied by a very tasty cheese polenta	entrée Fabulously tender duck in a sweet glaze, accompanied by mashed sweet potatoes and wonderfully grilled brussel sprouts

Total meal cost: $140 before gratuity

Alas, we skipped any dessert / coffee course, as we were full and ready to move onto the remainder of our evening’s entertainment. But Da Marco’s definitely delivered what we were looking for. The food was unbelievably good, the waitstaff attentive (the steady stream of fresh bread and ripe olive oil was quite evil), and the ambiance and people-watching were perfect: not too clattery, nicely candle-lit, and a fun mix of patrons. And, as a big bonus for us, it was all smoke-free. There was a separate dining room completely enclosed by French doors — it could be that’s a smoking dining room; I meant to ask but was too busy eating and enjoying myself. Regardless, the bar and main dining room were wonderfully free of even a trace of smoke, and it made the entire experience enjoyable and relaxing.

Da Marco definitely delivers for its cost. If you’re looking for excellent food, an Italian wine list, and an intimate and attentive dining experience, then this is one of the best choices in this part of Houston.

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We purchased the NordicTrack CX 995 Elliptical Trainer (aka CX995 or NTE1392) recently, directly from the NordicTrack website. The online experience was smooth, and the product was delivered within the promised time frame. Here are our impressions of the unit, so far:

If I Were Already Hercules, I Wouldn’t Need This Thing!

Please note that their delivery company only delivers curb-side, and will not bring the unit inside. They clearly state this in the shipping section, but the full impact does not hit home until the delivery guy leaves you with a 260 lb. cardboard box, secured with straps, sitting on a wooden pallet in your garage. You can take about ¼ of the weight out of the box by schlepping in the smaller bits and pieces, but the main unit, with the attached elliptical ramps, is all in one piece. In our case we were installing the unit in our upstairs bedroom, and getting it upstairs was quite a challenging chore. Be sure you have two strong, competent, affable people to wrangle the thing, because it’s pretty frustrating.

Some Assembly Required, Some More Assembly Required, More and More Assembly Required…!

Assembly is also a bit of a chore, but if you’ve ever bought a complicated piece of furniture from IKEA or some other put-it-together-yourself place, you can probably handle it. Keep in mind that assembly is definitely a two-person activity, as there are several cases where things have to be held in place and aligned, while other things are assembled/inserted/etc. Again, the directions clearly state that two people are needed, so believe it. It took us about 90 minutes to get the thing together.

Oh Baby, That’s Smooth

Once assembled, the first ride was very positive. The machine is extremely solidly built, and the movements are quiet and sure as you ellipse. The machine also comes with a wireless chest pulse sensor, that you wear around your torso, and you can track your heart rate on the console as you work out. There are also heart-rate monitors built into the handgrips if you don’t want to use the wireless one. The handgrip sensors will also measure your body fat percentage (damn them).

The footpads on this model are spaced apart such that the movement feels very natural. We had tried some of the other NordicTrack ellipticals in various sporting goods stores, and the foot pedals were widely spaced, meaning that you were doing a weird sort of bowlegged shuffle instead of a normal-feeling running motion.

The incline of the ramp adjusts electronically, so as you go through your exercise program the unit will hum and you will suddenly be “running” uphill. The motion on this unit is very smooth, and it feels very natural, like running but without the pounding.

This Unit Are Smart

The console provides around 20 different workout programs. They offer such things as hilly terrain, where the slope changes as you run, fat burning, strength training, etc. My favorites are the ones that let you target your heart rate and then the unit automatically varies the workout (and prompts you to speed up/slow down) to keep you near your target heart rate. There’s also a fan in the center of the console, which you can turn on and have it blow on your torso or face, as it is adjustable. One minor complaint is that if you tilt the fan down far enough to blow on your body, it will slowly scooch it’s way back to the point where it’s blowing on your face. In other words, it doesn’t stay where you point it.

The Fatal Flaw

OK, we really do love this machine. It is solidly built, has lots of very useful features, and works like a dream. When you use it you can feel how well engineered it is, and you can tell that the designers went to great lengths to make it smooth and quiet. It being quiet is very important to us, because we use this in our bedroom, and often one is using it while the other is sleeping. The unit is quiet enough for that, except for one thing.

YOU CANNOT CONTROL THE BEEPING OF THE CONSOLE!!! It can’t be muted or even turned down. All of the exercise programs emit periodic beeps to tell you about your progress or alert you to various things that are happening in your program. There are places where it will beep every minute…and not just one beep, but a series of beeps, counting down. BEEP BEEP BEEP.

I contacted NordicTrack and they told me that was the way it was, and there was nothing to be done. Eventually, if we don’t become immune to it, I’ll probably end up disassembling the console and snipping the speaker wires. But I don’t want to ruin the unit, or void the warranty just yet. Still, this issue seems like an incredibly stupid oversight by the folks at NordicTrack. Can you imagine being one of the engineers, who worked and slaved to shave off every decibel of noise that you possibly could, and then having some electronics geek stupidly put an incessantly beeping console on your beautiful machine? As a geek-engineer myself, it breaks my heart to see the near-perfection of this unit ruined by something so pedestrian as yet-another-annoying-beeping-electronic-device.

But We Still Recommend It

All that being said, the unit’s positives outweigh that one glaring negative. If you’re looking for a solid, feature-rich, sub-$1,000 elliptical, take a good look at this one. If you can live with the beeping, it will probably fit the bill.

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