05 June 2002• by

Angela’s Ashes, Part Two

In which I share another favorite passage from Angela’s Ashes.

You can imagine how stunned I was to read this article by Pat Buchanan, a man I quite dislike, and yet agree with nearly every word. This is what I’ve been saying since September 11th. This is what I’ve been arguing about, standing in the office, shouting over Mike (who is shouting over me), explaining that the United States can’t stop terrorism by going to Afghanistan and blowing people up, can’t stop terrorism through a war of rhetoric, can’t stop terrorism at all unless it leaves the Middle East. That’s too simple for most people to understand: the Saudis (and other people in the Middle East) don’t hate us for our politics, our freedom, our wealth (though they don’t like these things), they hate us because of our Imperialistic attitudes, because of our presence on their sovreign soil, on their holy lands.

Pat Buchanan is absolutely right on this particular issue.

(From metafilter, my original source for this Buchanan story, comes this McLaughlin Group transcript which features a quote from Buchanan in which he displays not only his insight on this particular issue, but also his particular brand of charm that makes me hate him so: “I am talking about an interventionist policy in every darn country in the world that is Islamic, where crazies are, so they turn all their attention right to the United States of America. What is there over there that is worth a nuclear weapon in my hometown?”)

As promised, here is another excerpt from Frank McCourt’s Pulitzer Prize winning autobiography, Angela’s Ashes:

The master, Mr. Benson, is very old. He roars and spits all over us every day. The boys in the front row hope he has no diseases for it’s the spit that carries all the diseases and he might be spreading consumption right and left. He tells us we have to know the catechism backwards, forwards and sideways. We have to know the Ten Commandments, the Seven Virtues, Divine and Moral, the Seven Sacraments, the Seven Deadly Sins. We have to know by heart all the prayers, the Hail Mary, the Our Father, the Confiteor, the Apostles’ Creed, the Act of Contrition, the Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary. We have to know them in Irish and English and if we forget an Irish word and use an English he goes into a rage and goes at us with the stick. If he had his way we’d be learning our religion in Latin, the language of the saints who communed intimately with God and His Holy Mother, the language of the early Christians, who huddled in the catacombs and went forth to die on rack and sword, who expired in the foaming jaws of the ravenous lion. Irish is fine for patriots, English for traitors and informers, but it’s the Latin in which the barbarians pulled out their nails and cut their skin off inch by inch. He tells us we’re a disgrace to Ireland and her long sad history, that we’d be better off in Africa praying to bush or tree. He tells us we’re hopeless, the worst class he ever had for First Communion but as sure as God made little apples he’ll make Catholics of us, he’ll beat the idler out of us and the Sanctifying Grace into us.

Brendan Quigley raises his hand. We call him Question Quigley because he’s always asking questions. He can’t help himself. Sir, he says, what’s Sanctifying Grace?

The master rolls his eyes to heaven. He’s going to kill Quigley. Instead he barks at him, Never mind what Sanctifying Grace, Quigley. That’s none of your business. You’re here to learn the catechism and do what you’re told. You’re not here to be asking questions. There are too many people wandering the world asking questions and that’s what has us in the state we’re in and if I find any boy in this class asking questions I won’t be responsible for what happens. Do you hear me, Quigley?

I do.

I do, what?

I do, sir.

He goes on with his speech, There are boys in this class who will never know the Sanctifying Grace. And why? Because of the greed. I have heard them abroad in the schoolyard talking about First Communion day, the happiest day of your life. Are they talking about the body and blood of Our Lord? Oh, no. Those greedy little balguards are talking about the money they’ll get, The Collection. They’ll go from house to house in their little suits like beggars for The Collection. And will they take any of that money and send it to the little black babies in Africa? Will they think of those little pagans doomed forever for lack of baptism and knowledge of the True Faith? Little black babies denied knowledge of the Mystical Body of Christ? Limbo is packed with little black babies flying around and crying for their mothers because they’ll never be admitted to the ineffable presence of Our Lord and the glorious company of saints, martyrs, virgins. Oh, no. It’s off to the cinemas, our First Communion boys run to wallow in the filth spewed across the world by the devil’s henchmen in Hollywood. Isn’t that right, McCourt?

‘Tis, sir.

Question Quigley raises his hand again. There are looks around the room and we wonder if it’s suicide he’s after.

What’s henchmen, sir?

The master’s face goes white, then red. His mouth tightens and opens and spits fire everywhere. He walks to Question and drags him from his seat. He snorts and stutters and his spit flies around the room. He flogs Question across the shoulders, the bottom, the legs. He grabs him by the collar and drags him to the front of the room.

Look at this specimen, he roars.

Question is shaking and crying. I’m sorry, sir.

The master mocks him. I’m sorry, sir. What are you sorry for?

I’m sorry I asked the question. I’ll never ask a question again, sir.

The day you do, Quigley, will be the day you wish God would take you to His bosom. What will you wish, Quigley?

That God will take me to His bosom, sir.

Go back to your seat, you omadhaun, you poltroon, you thing from the dark corner of a bog.

He sits down with the stick before him on the desk. He tells Question to stop whimpering and be a man. If he hears a single boy in this class asking foolish questions or talking about The Collection again he’ll flog that boy till the blood spurts.

What will I do, boys?

Flog the boy, sir.

Till?

Till the blood spurts, sir.

Now, Clohessy, what is the Sixth Commandment?

Thou shalt not commit adultery.

Thou shalt not commit adultery what?

Thou shalt not commit adultery, sir.

And what is adultery, Clohessy?

Impure thoughts, impure words, impure deeds, sir.

Good, Clohessy. You’re a good boy. You may be slow and forgetful in the sir department and you may not have a shoe to your foot but you’re powerful with the Sixth Commandment and that will keep you pure.

My “now reading” box on the right has been lying for the past couple of weeks. I’ve actually been reading William Faulkner’s The Sound and The Fury. I’ve started Angela’s Ashes now, though, and so Faulkner will have to wait because after I finish this book I’m going to reread Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain (fifth or sixth time for that one), then read The Journals of Lewis and Clark (as edited by John Bakeless), and then read Angle of Repose. Only after I’ve finished all of these will I be able to return to Benji and the rest of the messed-up gang in The Sound and the Fury.

I love books.

Comments


On 07 June 2002 (07:20 PM),
Mom said:

I loved Angela’s Ashes and the scene you have included demonstrates the kind of religion I hate. As you may or may not know, I wasn’t brought up being allowed to question and it still doesn’t come easily for me. I’m better at it now than I’ve ever been before in my life. In my opinion, fanatical religion in various forms is the root of many kinds of cruelties and injustices in this world.

I, too, think it’s ironic that you are agreeing with Pat Buchanan. I think that our insistance on making sure we have ready sources of oil rather than finding alternative fuels is a big cause of our continuing strong presence in the Middle East. It is coming back to bite us.

I love books, too. I’m trying to read “A Fine Balance”, an Oprah book club book — can’t remember the author’s name at the moment — and it’s difficult to read because of the graphic way in which it portrays some of the past and present conditions in India. However, it’s probably something that I need to read. I’m in limbo a bit right now on reading material that I really enjoy. I suppose a visit to the bookstore is in order sometime soon.

I hadn’t been to your site to see what you were up to for a while. I hope you don’t mind me putting my 2 cents worth in!

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04 June 2002• by

Angela’s Ashes, Part One

In which I share favorite passages from Angela’s Ashes.

Mac and Pam had checked out the Angela’s Ashes DVD from the public library so I borrowed it the other day. When I started to watch it, however, I was angered by the gloss of the adaptation. The small segment that I saw gave short shrift to the beginning of the story. And stylistically, the film had a sheen, a lack of authenticity, seemed to be portraying the Hollywood version of the poor in 1930s Ireland instead of the poor as they actually existed. (Hell, we poor 1970s Oregonians had worse conditions than the film’s poor 1930s Irish!)

I stopped the film, ripped it to my hard drive for later viewing, and from my bookshelf I took the book upon which the film was based.

This book is a fine piece of work, destined to become a classic. This is only the second time that I’ve read it and I regret that it’s taken me five years to return to it.

Here is the second paragraph (which, by all rights, ought to be the first paragraph), the best-known passage from the book:

When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I survived at all. It was, of course, a miserable childhood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood is the miserable Irish childhood, and worse yet is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood.

That paragraph is an apt summary of the book’s plot, but cannot begin to do justice to the range and degree of poverty that the author, Frank McCourt, experiences during his childhood.

Here is another great passage (and yet another will follow tomorrow):

Paddy Clohessy has no shoe on his foot, his mother shaves his head to keep the lice away, his eyes are red, his nose always snotty. The sores on his kneecaps never heal because he picks the scabs and puts them in his mouth. His clothes are rags he has to share with his six brothers and a sister and when he comes to school with a bloody nose or a black eye you know he had to fight over the clothes that morning. He hates school. He’s seven going on eight, the biggest and oldest boy in the class, and he can’t wait to grow up and join the English army and go to India where it’s nice and warm and he’ll live in a tent with a dark girl with the red dot on her forehead and he’ll be lying there eating figs, that’s what they eat in India, figs, and she’ll cook the curry day and night and plonk on a ukelele and when he has enough money he’ll send for the whole family and they’ll all live in the tent especially his poor father who’s at home coughing up great gobs of blood because of the consumption. When my mother sees Paddy on the street she says, Wisha, look at that poor child. He’s a skeleton with rags and if they were making a film about the famine they’d surely put him in the middle of it.

I think Paddy likes me because of the raisin and I feel a bit guilty because I wasn’t that generous in the first place. The master, Mr. Benson, said the government was going to give us the free lunch so we wouldn’t be going home in the freezing weather. He led us down to a cold room in the dungeons of Leamy’s School where the charwoman, Nellie Ahearn, was handing out the half pint of milk and the raisin bun. The milk was frozen in the bottles and we had to melt it between our thighs. The boys joked and said the bottles would freeze our things off and the master roared, Any more of that talk and I’ll warm the bottles on the backs of yeer heads. We all searched our raisin buns for a raisin but Nellie said they must have forgotten to put them in and she’d inquire form the man who delivered. We searched again every day till at last I found a raisin in my bun and held it up. The boys started grousing and said they wanted a raisin and Nellie said it wasn’t her fault. She’d ask the man again. Now the boys were begging me for the raisin and offering me everything, a slug of their milk, a pencil, a comic book. Toby Mackey said I could have his sister and Mr. Benson heard him and took him out to the hallway and knocked him around till he howled. I wanted the raisin for myself but I saw Paddy Clohessy standing in the corner with no shoes and the room was freezing and he was shivering like a dog that had been kicked and I always felt sad over kicked dogs so I walked over and gave Paddy the raisin because I didn’t know what else to do and all the boys yelled that I was a fool and a feckin’ eejit and I’d regret the day and after I handed the raisin to Paddy I longed for it but it was too late now because he pushed it right into his mouth and gulped it and looked at me and said nothing and I said in my head what kind of an eejit are you to be giving away your raisin.

Mr. Benson gave me a look and said nothing and Nellie Ahearn said, You’re a great oul’ Yankee, Frankie.

Great stuff.

Comments


On 18 January 2005 (05:46 AM),
emily clohessy said:

hi this is emily clohessy

do you know paddie clohessy he helped write angelas ashes



On 15 April 2005 (05:40 AM),
emily clohessy said:

hi this is emily again guess what paddie clohessy is my grandad and , heather clohessy is my mum and issable clohessy is my granma isn’t that great well send me a message back just click on post a message and type your name in and your message if you want to contact me just call 079703716326


On 15 April 2005 (05:42 AM),
gemma tregellas said:

HELLO GEMMA HERE WATS EVERYONE DOING IM BORED AT SCHOOL HELP ME



On 18 April 2005 (02:57 AM),
emily clohessy said:

is anyone going to reply xxxxxxx



On 20 September 2005 (12:55 AM),
Jane Foster said:

Hi Emily, I am Paddy Clohessy’s niece, it would be lovely to hear, send me a post. I am his sister Nancy’s daughter. I met Frank Mccourt in Sydney for the premiere of the movie in 2000. Regards Jane.

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21 May 2002• by

Star Wars Generation

In which I remember how important Star Wars was to me in my youth.

Lest my review of Attack of the Clones lead anyone to believe that I am anti-Star Wars, let me assure you that I am most certainly a member of the Star Wars Generation. My personal history is deeply intertwined with the Star Wars mythos. In the tradition of Wil Wheaton‘s “The Trade” and fray.com‘s “Star Wars Memories“, here are my recollections of being a part of the Star Wars Generation.

I was born on 25 March 1969. Star Wars was released on 25 May 1977. I was eight years, two months old.

My father took us to see Star Wars a few of weeks after it was released. The Sunday Oregonian had been running an ad for the film and the ad’s artwork was mesmerizing: a young man in a robe holding a torch over his head, a young woman wrapped around his waist, sleek airplanes flying through space, robots on a mountain, and behind it all some mysterious helmeted figure.

According to my brother Jeff, we were at my grandparents’ house when Mom and Dad came and told us that we were going to see Star Wars. Jeff remembers not being aware of Star Wars until�

We entered the theater late, after the opening fanfare, after the title scroll, after the opening battle sequence. When we sat down, a shiny gold robot was walking across the desert and a little round blue robot was being zapped by strange midget aliens in capes. I loved this movie from the start. It was like my favorite TV show, Star Trek (shown every Sunday at 4 p.m. in reruns on KPTV channel 12 the entire time I was growing up), only better, faster paced, with laser swords and creepy aliens.

As the summer of 1977 progressed we were able to see the movie several more times, with family and with friends. Sometimes the lines to see the film were huge. I’d never seen anyone line up for a movie before. Each time we saw the film we noticed something new, we memorized more of the dialogue.

A year after its release, we were still going to see Star Wars in the theater. How many films stay in theatrical release for a year now? The Fellowship of the Ring has been around almost six months, but that’s atypical.

At school Star Wars fever had gripped all of the boys. We bought Star Wars cards and Star Wars action figures and Star Wars comic books. We had Star Wars bed sheets and Star Wars underwear and every boy had the same Star Wars t-shirt, our heroes with blasters at the ready. We orderd Dynamite! magazine from the school book service because the cover featured the Star Wars gang. We marveled at the holographic Princess Leia (“Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope!”). We were disgusted by the blue milk. We dreamed of light-sabers and X-Wings and Princess Leia. We acted our favorite scenes over and over and over again.

For three years, Star Wars cards were our prized possessions. We coveted them: the blue cards, the red cards, the green cards, the yellow cards, the orange cards. Each pack of cards ($0.15/pack) also contained a Star Wars sticker and stick of hard, pink bubble gum. We put these stickers all over everything. We chewed the gum with gusto.

Star Wars cards were used for currency at school. If I wanted a classmate’s toy or book or comic, I’d offer to trade him Star Wars cards. I remember coveting The Star Wars Storybook, a glossy paperback filled with a plot summary and stills from the film as well as information about the sources of George Lucas’ inspiration to make Star Wars. (Specifically, the book traced his inspiration to Saturday morning serials from forty years earlier, and to pulp science fiction — this was actually my introduction to the idea of pulp science fiction.)

We also played with the Star Wars action figures, which were sold everywhere. We bought many of our figures from the local Coast-to-Coast hardware store ($2.50/each). When Dad went in for vegetable seeds or nails or anything else, we stood entranced before the display of Greedos and Hammerheads and Walrus Men.

We conducted many spectacular battles on the harvest gold shag carpet in the living room of our trailer house. We developed clever games that required switching the capes on the various figures, swapping the lightsabers from one Jedi to another. As The Empire Strikes Back approached, we sent in for the Boba Fett figure. (I believe to this day that the primary reason for Boba Fett’s popularity is that his figure was the first one from Empire to be released — thousands of young boys saved proofs of purchase in order to send away for this figure.) (Here’s a link to a guy in Wisonsin who kept all of his action figures…)

When we didn’t have our Star Wars merchandise with us, we would improvise. When Mom or Dad drove us places we’d fight for the chance to sit in the front seat. We wanted access to the dashboard which would be transformed into the controls for our X-Wing fighter.

We’d flip the tuning knob on the radio: “This is Red Five, I’m going in.” We’d press the buttons to change the preset stations in order to fire our turbolasers. We’d open and close the vents to change the configuration of our wings. We’d scout for TIE Fighters in the mirrors.

Those confined to the back seat would sulk while the lucky bastard in the front seat single-handedly held off Darth Vader and his evil minions.

The Star Wars comic books ($0.35/each) were another source of adventure. The stories were imaginative and seemed like natural extensions of the film. The over-arching plot line related the Rebel Alliance’s quest for a new base. This search required our heroes to visit new, exotic locales: water worlds, giant space stations filled with gladiatorial arenas, industrial planets, etc. The humor and the adventure of the movie were always present.

Once we tried to dramatize the issues in which Luke and company encounter a civil war on the water world, Drexel. This was more difficult than we had anticipated (what we could have done with a modern PC!), so we abandoned the project after only half an issue.

My parents gave us the Star Wars soundtrack for Christmas. We listened to it constantly, all four sides. We loved every track from the opening title sequence to the cantina band to Princess Leia’s Theme to the End Celebration. We wore that vinyl out.

In the fall of 1978 my father purchased an Apple II computer. The machine came with two games on cassette tape: Star Wars and Star Trek. In the Star Wars game, two players using game paddles co-operated to target and destroy TIE Fighters. The toughest TIE Fighters to destroy were the curved-wing “Darth Vader” TIE Fighters. We loved this game.

When VCRs came to prominence in the late-70s and early-80s, the first film we watched on tape was Star Wars.

The Oregonian carried the Star Wars comic strip. The daily strips and the Sunday strips tracked separate stories, both of which were exciting. The strip eventually became Sunday-only and the stories took on a sort of Flash Gordon feel, especially the stylish art from Al Williamson.

In the summer of 1980 we went to a rummage sale at Eccles School in Canby. David Carlson and his brother Paul were there. Paul found a copy of Star Wars #35, an issue that I didn’t have yet. He went to ask his mother for money, and I promised to watch the comic for him, but while he was gone I bought it for myself.

The Star Wars comic book was the first periodical to which I ever subscribed. I saved my money until I could afford to go to the post office for a money order, which I mailed to New York. A few weeks later the first issue of my subscription arrived: Star Wars #39, the first part of the Empire Strikes Back adaptation. I was a subscriber for six years, until the title ceased publication.

The Empire Strikes Back was released when I was eleven. My family went opening weekend, stood in line, sat in a crowded theater. When Luke, sitting on his Tauntaun, lifted his goggles, the crowd cheered. We watched, amazed, at the Battle of Hoth, the attack of the Imperial Walkers. The chase through the asteroid field was like a ride on a roller coaster. The cloud city of Bespin, though clearly derived from the Star Trek episode “The Cloud Miners“, was beautiful to behold. Boba Fett captured our imagination. And — horrors! — Darth Vader revealed that he was Luke’s father!?!

The Brown twins, Sean and Cory, were lucky enough to receive The Empire Strikes Back game cartridge for their Atari 2600 one Christmas. What a fantastic game! Here were Imperial Walkers live on our television screens.

Though the Empire Strikes Back cards weren’t as cool as the original Star Wars cards, we collected them. We also bought the action figures, though these too had lost some of their charm. My Yoda figure was awesome, with its little fabric cloak and little plastic stick. I kept that thing through high school.

The week before Return of the Jedi was released, the fledgling USA Today revealed several important plot points. The most shocking revelation was that Luke and Leia were siblings. Blasphemy! It was also my first experience with a “spoiler”, advance information about a movie.

Later that week, in gym class, when I revealed that Luke and Leia were related, and that I knew this because I had read it in the newspaper, nobody beleived me. Except one little guy who taunted me and said I only knew this because I had already seen the movie.This caused me great offense. I hadn’t seen the film already, I told him, but had read about it in the paper. He told me I was a liar.

We were in the locker room, eighth-graders standing around in jockstraps, and this kid just kept pestering me. I threw him up against the lockers and told him to shut up, that I hadn’t seen the movie, and that if he didn’t leave me alone, I’d beat the crap out of him. It was the first and only time in my life that I ever threatened anyone. And it was because of Star Wars.

The Saturday that Jedi opened, Darren Misner’s mother drove us to the Westgate theater at 6 a.m. She sat in line with us for five hours, a saint of a woman if ever there was one. Darren and I were eager with anticipation. I had brought my father’s microcassette recorder. (My obsession with microcassette recorders started a long time ago.) One of the young men in line had brought a boom box (these were still novel in 1983); he played his Duran Duran tape repeatedly. We listened to “Is There Something I Should Know” a dozen times that moring.

The first half of the movie was thrilling, if contrived, but something happened midway through. Luke and Leia were in an exciting speeder chase through a dense forest and Leia fell off her vehicle. Miraculously she survived.

And then it happened: the turning point in the history of Star Wars.

As Leia came to, she encountered the Marketing Tool. Darren and I, only fourteen, were not impressed. And worse, the Marketing Tools (there turned out to be an entire village of Marketing Tools) somehow managed to defeat the mighty Imprerial Stormtroopers and their advanced weaponry. The Rebel Alliance had been crushed by these Imperials in the Battle of Hoth, but somehow a group of primitive teddy bear-like Marketing Tools were able to do what an organized rebellion could not.

There were other problems with the film, too (much of it felt contrived, strung together in order to get from Point A to Point B without any care for the logic of the actual path), but none compared to the presence of the Marketing Tools.

My enthusiasm for the Star Wars universe has never faded. Throughout high school and college, I watched the films regularly. (I’ll admit that near the end of my college career I sold my comic book collection for money, including all of my Star Wars comic books (of which I had multiple copies of most issues). Where were my priorities?!? I’ve spent the past several years piecing together a nearly complete run of the series again.)

During the nineties I read various Star Wars novels, most notably the almost-good series from Timothy Zahn. I continued to buy various Star Wars comic books, including the Dark Empire series from Dark Horse. I bought the only issue of “Star Wars Generation”, a quality fanzine.

When I purchased my new Apple Macintosh 640CD-DOS compatible personal computer in the fall of 1995, the first game I got for the machine was Star Wars: Dark Forces. I played it through three times. Soon after Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight was released, I bought a PC. (In no small part because of that game.) Dave and I spent one memorable Saturday at his office hacking each other apart with light sabers. More recently, I spent last month under the spell of Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast.

During the past five years I’ve pieced together a nearly-complete run of Marvel’s Star Wars comics (thanks largely to Excalibur Comics’ semi-regular 50% off sales). They’re great reading. (I look forward to the impending Dark Horse trade paperback collections with will gather these stories into more easily accessible volumes).

On 31 January 1997, Star Wars was re-realeased with fancy new effects and added scenes. Kris and I took time off work that day to see the show. We watched it twice. It was fantastic.

As Phantom Menace neared release, I downloaded both trailers and brought them to work. We watched them over and over, awestruck. This new movie was going to be better than all three of the previous Star Wars films combined! When Phantom Menace action figures began to trickle onto the market in March of 1999, Kris and I bought one for Paul Jolstead as a birthday present. Custom Box Service bought a bagful. We put together little Star Wars packages which Tony took around to our best customers. When the movie was released, we bought tickets for one of our clients.

Kris and I bought tickets for the 12:01 a.m. showing. We stood in a rowdy line at the Hilltop Theater in Oregon City, we cheered as the scroll crawled across the screen. Then we sat in a muddled mixture of terror and amazement as the story unfolded. The next day I took time off work to go see the movie twice more. I could barely sit through the third showing. This film worse than could have been imagined, worse than Jedi, far worse than the trailers had led us to believe. This was a black mark on the Star Wars universe. The ending was inconceivably bad. Sure, the pod race was fun and Ewan McGregor did a fine job, but the rest of the movie was a failure.

I thought Attack of the Clones had to be better, but the trailers revealed that this wasn’t likely to be the case. And then I saw the film…

Star Wars has been a defining force (heh heh) in my life for the past twenty-five years. It galls me to see it reduced to a mere shadow of what it once was.

Comments

On 21 May 2002 (05:17 AM),
Dagny said:

Well, JD – it galls me that you were responsible for such pain in Paul Carlson’s life. He probably needed therapy over that, you know.

On 21 May 2002 (05:29 AM),
Dagny said:

Oh yeah – I almost forgot. If you want to see vintage Star Wars wall paper, give Mike Groff a call and arrange a tour of his parents’ house. The upstairs bedroom that used to be Dave’s is still resplendent in heroes.

On 18 June 2005 (05:50 PM),
Rich Handley said:

The Star Wars strip never became Sunday-only. It ran seven days a week from the beginning to the end. It’s possible the paper you read them in only carried the strip on Sundays, but it ran every day of the week until the last week of the series.

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18 May 2002• by

Attack of the Clones

In which Star Wars episode II: Attack of the Clones stinks to high heaven.

First impression: this film stinks.

Second impression: the core of a good film is in there somewhere.

Third impression: this film stinks.

I hadn’t planned to see Attack of the Clones so soon; however when Mac asked if we wanted to see the film last night after book group, I was happy to say yes. (We haven’t done much with Mac and Pam lately, and I miss that.)

Before the show started, the crowd was a bit rowdy. Certainly not as rowdy as the crowd had been at the midnight showing of The Phantom Menace, but a bit rowdy nonetheless. At the end of the show, the crowd was silent. Not a good sign.

The movie was dull at the start and remained dull nearly throughout. Kris’ succinct review highlights one of this film’s root problems: “It wasn’t engaging, there were no characters that were engaging.” (Her one-word review was also apt: “Lame.”)

Many reviews have stated that Clones is better than Menace. This isn’t really the case. It seems to me the two films are equally bad, just bad in different ways.

Here are some thoughts on specific aspects of the film, the positive first:

  • Hayden Christensen, as Anakin, isn’t as bad as I had feared. Some of his line readings are worthy of wincing, but mostly he does a passable job. The real problem is the script, not the acting. Star Wars has traditionally had some relatively wooden performances, but it’s difficult to overcome poor dialogue.
  • Amidala is great in the last half of the film (essentially the entire time she’s in her white outfit). I’m not saying this simply because the outfit is snug and form-fitting. No, her character is well-written at this point: decisive, resourceful, engaging. Unfortunately, her character is pretty dull during the first half of the film.
  • Kenobi as secret-agent-Jedi works well. Very well. This is the “core of a good film” to which I earlier alluded. His story is interwoven with the Anakin/Amdidala love story — a story with dialogue so painful as to inspire laughter from the audience — and it is this story alone that is compelling in the film. The rain-drenched ocean world of Kamino, with its tall and graceful cloners, with the mysterious Jango Fett and his son, Boba, is an intriguing place. The film would have been more satisfying if this had been its central focus. (Ewan McGregor does a fine job as Kenobi. He gives the film’s best performance.)
  • I liked most of the Anakin/Amidala story-line from the point they leave Tatooine until the point the Jedi arrive to save them in the gladitorial arena. For maybe twenty minutes, this plot thread is handled well, in the tradition of the earlier Star Wars movies. I didn’t care for the video-game-esque foundry sequence, but found the “execution” scene great fun. Well done.
  • Many of the visuals were stunning. Some of them were too flat and cartoony for my taste, but the animations of the ships and structures were fantastic, especially those on Coruscant. The art-deco styled buses and freightliners and buildings are a strange addition to the Star Wars universe (we’ve seen nothing before or since to suggest their presence), but I like them. When Amidala’s ship came sailing through the clouds to settle at the landing bay in the opening sequence of the film, I was awed.
  • I also liked two borrowed elements: the Jedi library on Coruscant (with its lack of information about Kamino) was eerily similar to a scene in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation and Empire in which our heroes are searching the University library on the planet Trantor, the former seat of the galactic empire, for information about a hidden planet. Also, the choral music near the end of the film is a straight lift from Ralph Vaughan Williams‘ Symphony #7 ‘Sinfonia Antarctica‘ (A beautiful, haunting piece of work. This performance by the London Symphony (conducted by Andre Previn) is superb, with Sir Ralph Richardson reading each movement’s introduction aloud.) Simply awesome stuff and well worth borrowing.

And some thoughts on the negatives:

  • Yes, Lucas reduced Jar-Jar’s role in this film. Severely. But that doesn’t matter becuase C3PO is the new Jar-Jar, but even less funny and more annoying.
  • As has been reported elsewhere, the dialogue in this film is bad, it’s not nearly as bad as the overall story, a story which makes no sense. Characters’ motivations seem completely arbitrary, as do their resultant actions. We never understand why any group is on this side or that side of the galactic struggle.
  • Why is Anakin so damn concerned with his mother now? Where has he been for the past ten years? Wouldn’t his first thought after the events The Phantom Menace have been to return to purchase her freedom from Watto? Why is he only concerned about her now? This plot point is ludicrous. And Shmi’s death scene is awful, too, producing scattered snickers throughout the theater. Anakin finds her tied to a beam. She looks weak. She moans, “Oh, is that my Ani? My how you’ve grown. Gugh.” And she dies. Terrible, terrible writing. Merely a plot device so that he can go berserk and taste the dark side.
  • Lucas has apparently come to the conclusion that more of anything, even a bad thing, makes that thing better. So we’re “treated” to incomprehensible battle scenes with thousands of combatants, yet we care about none of these people. Our heroes are off chasing the bad guys. Why do we need five minutes of animated battle scenes that give no service to the plot? The Battle of Hoth from The Empire Strikes Back was perfect: the audience understood that this was a battle on a grand scale with high-tech vehicles and weapons, yet we had characters we cared about. We understood the motivation of each side in the conflict. We could follow the action. There were dozens of things on screen at once instead of thousands. And I don’t care how fake the models looked, I prefer them to the animation in the newer films.
  • If R2D2 can fly, why haven’t we seen him do it before?
  • If Yoda can hop around like Kermit the Frog on meth, cutting a mighty path with his light-saber, why does he hobble around on that stinking stick?
  • Other than the Antarctic-inspired section, the music was generally dull. Worse, it was omnipresent. Not every scene needs to be scored, but every scene in this film has been. Ugh.
  • Many of the events in later episodes now don’t make much sense. For example, when Owen Lars buys C3PO and R2D2, why isn’t there a glimmer of recognition in any of the three parties? Whoops. That doesn’t really makes sense now, huh?

As we left the theater Pam wondered aloud if George Lucas had even watched the first three films before making the last two. He seems to have forgotten what Star Wars was about. Or perhaps changed his mind.

The original films were effective for a variety of reasons, but one of the key factors was the feeling that our heroes were but small players in a galactic conflict. Luke Skywalker was a lowly moisture-farmer from a backwater planet who inadvertently becomes entangled in events far greater than himself.

The various stories written after the first film retained this sense of “small fish in a big pond”. The novels, such as Alan Dean Foster’s Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, and the comic books (including the still-magnificent Marvel run of issues #11-38, soon to be reprinted in trade paperback by Dark Horse Comics) and the newspaper comic strips all managed to convey a sense of the grand sweep of the galactic civilization and the smallness of our heroes.

Now it has been revealed that our main characters are all part a small band of individuals that shape the course of this galactic civilization, that all of the events for forty years featured the intertwined fates of just a few individuals, or just one individual: Anakin/Darth Vader. The characters are revealed to be “big fish in a big pond”, and this causes them to become less iconic, to lose much of their appeal.

Further, the levels of co-incidence that Lucas is willing to introduce into these stories defies belief. Yes, the original films were fantastic, presenting alien civilizations, technological marvels, and epic battles. But through all of it, the audience was able to accept what they were seeing on the screen, believe that it might possibly exist. It had a sense of realness.

No more.

Now we’re simply overwhelmed with implausible co-incidences and battle scenes with thousands of combatants but no rhyme or reason. Characters act with no plausible motivation, simply to serve the needs of the plot, a plot strung together on the most tenuous of threads.

Am I disappointed?

Hell, yes. I had hoped that The Phantom Menace was an anomaly, but it appears instead to have been an omen.

Some people will read this review and think that I should lighten up because it’s only a movie, as if this somehow excuses it from the realm of quality. Action-adventure movies don’t need to be bad. In fact, we’ve been treated to two good Star Wars films in the past: A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. The recently released Spider-Man is an action film, too, but one that isn’t afraid to be smart and sensible and accessible (my review).

Other people will read this review and think that my expectations of the film influenced my opinion of it. This may be true to an extent, but it’s unlikely to have had much of an effect. I went into The Fellowship of the Ring with low expectations and, though I did not love the film, it surprised me with the quality of its production. I went into Spider-Man with very low expectations and was delighted to be proven wrong. Clones, however, met my lowest expectations and then sank beneath them.

It’s not the worst film I’ve ever seen, but it will probably be the worst film that I see this year.

The best part of the night was the trailer for Minority Report. Now that looks like a good science fiction movie…

Comments

On 18 May 2002 (12:40 PM),
tim said:

well put. i think i agree with 98% of what you said.

On 18 May 2002 (03:01 PM),
Jason said:

Whoa… scathing.

And considering Rotten Tomatoes tallies the score at 55%, I’ve come to the conclusion that the Star Wars legacy is doomed.

What a shame.

On 20 May 2002 (04:52 AM),
Dagny said:

As usual, JD, I agree with some of what you’ve said… the most disturbing element to me was Yoda. If he can avert disaster by heaving a multi-ton stone column with his mind, why in hell does he need to jack around with a light saber? He could have put Dooku down with a raised eyebrow. But that doesn’t make much of a fight scene… no, wait! It did in LOTR. Kinda gives Yoda a bum rap when he has to resort to physical weaponry.

Also ~ when the movie was done, Dane asked me “What do you think?”

I said, “I think that too many people have VCRs and don’t know how to behave themselves in public.”

Dane clarified. “No, about the movie.”

Dagny: “Well, it wasn’t torture. Except for the others in the theatre… they were torture.”

On 20 May 2002 (07:36 AM),
Kal said:

What do you guys usually do after ‘book group’?

On 20 May 2002 (09:21 AM),
Dave said:

Being fully advised by JD’s rant and other, similar expositions of the film’s merits (or lack thereof), I felt that I was fully prepared about what to expect from Attack of the Clones, but boy was I wrong.

First, the good parts:

Yes, I think Natalie Portman looked great in a backless gown.

Karen said that Mr. McGregor looked hot too, and why was Amadala looking at the stupid Anakin guy with Obi-wan around. (and I thought that Mr. McGregor’s acting was the best in the film, recognizing that this doesn’t say much).

The premise of the story was really quite clever.

Oh, and did I mention that I thought Natalie Portman looked really good in the skin tight white outfit? (Although I apparently missed the scene where she leaves the arena, puts it into the washer/dryer, shrinks the hell out of the middle section, puts it back on and returns to the arena. Not that I’m looking a gift bare midriff in the belly button.)

The special effects were usually quite good.

Seeing Yoda bouncing around like a muppet on meth was cool.

Well, ok. That’s about it for the good side. Karen wanted to know where George Lucas got the cigar store indian to play the main character and why he couldn’t have at least painted a convincing expression on him. I wanted to know why a whole bunch of Jedi are going to dump themselves into a hopeless battle when they could have just as easily done the vast majority of the destruction via airstrikes. And lets put on red shirts and fight a huge number of machines in an vast pit where there are no natural terrain features to take advantage of and where we’re going to be picked off like fish in a barrel.

The fact that Anakin can apparently float lends further credence to the supposition that he’s a witch and thus made out of wood.

Even Natalie Portman can’t look good in a stupid head handerchief.

I was praying that Count D. would just run Anakin through and save us all from having to see ST III. Ah, but no luck. Now he’s just got a dorky mechanical hand, OH MY GOD, JUST LIKE LUKE!!!! Isn’t the parallel remarkable?

By the time we were done watching the film, I was fairly convinced that the Jedi deserved to be wiped out because they’re stupid and incredibly short sighted. Just start from scratch and get it over with.

Anakin + Amadala = blech blech blech. “Oh we can’t, Yes, we can, No, we can’t, yes, we can! Ok, but only if you wear this stupid doylie on your head. OK” For crying out loud, just do it and get on with it! Every time they started the romance thing I had my head in my hands wondering how Karen was ever going to forgive me for dragging her into this load of crap. (I’m sure she’ll devise some suitable punishment. She did mention “chick flick” somewhere in her irritated diatribe.)

Watching the Anakin character go through his “personal agony” over everything in the universe was quite annoying. It really reminded me of a scene from BlackAdder III where Pitt the Younger is talking to BlackAdder about the feelings that he’s developing and the poem he’s written “Why do girls hate me”. Fortunately, that scene made no pretense about being anything other than a comedy.

And to answer JD’s question about Yoda, I’m sure that it’s for the same reason that Jedi take the stairs instead of simply force-jumping to the top.

Yes, death to C3PO and now we have an even bigger reason to hate Jar-Jar since he brought the emperor to power. Of course, since I’m now rooting for Palpatine and want him to kill the Jedi, especially Anakin, that’s ok, isn’t it…

On the whole, I have to agree with JD’s review as well. There is a good story (or two) in this film, but it is severely hampered by crappy dialog (yes, I know that the line you just spoke was spoken by someone in one of the first three movies, but does that mean that Lucas is attempting to be ironic or is he just running out of dialog and decided that the dialog in the first three was sooooo good that we’ll just recycle it?), wooden acting (I killed them all. Not just the men, boo hoo hoo … & such memorable scenes as “We should go after Obi-wan”, “No!!” “Why not”, “He is like a father to me” !?!?!?!???), and implausible individual circumstances (hmmmm, lets keep the audience interested by having Ms. Portman show her midriff. We’ll try to justify this as damage to her clothing from the nasty beast attacking her, which, when it tears clothing will in fact create a new seam and make sure that everything is even.) (Ok, that bit worked for me, but hey, I’m shallow, alright) & “I know you just got tossed out of a fast moving aircraft and you appear to be unconscious, laying there in the sun burning your belly button, but are you OK?” “Oh, well, I was unconscious, but Yes, I feel great now, thank you Mr. StormTrooper prototype, let’s go run across the sand until we can find another transport, take it to the place where the bad guys are at and try to kick some butt, ok?.”

Unless STIII involves Palpatine turning Amadala into his concubine, killing Anakin and basically looks like a remake of Caligula (set in space), I’m thinking that STIII is going to be a video only experience for me because I can’t continue to suffer like this. At least on video we can fast forward to the lightsaber duels and get the crap out of the way.

On 21 May 2002 (05:26 AM),
Dagny said:

Hi Dave. =)

Re: Karen’s “irritated diatribe”

Is there any other kind of diatribe?

On 21 May 2002 (04:15 PM),
Dave said:

Dagny-

Obviously you’re not married. Otherwise you’d know that there are a multiplicity of diatribes. There’s the irritated diatribe (I’m upset with something/one else), the annoyed diatribe (I’m upset with you), the hormonal diatribe (I’m upset with everyone/thing) and the righteous indignation diatribe (I’m really upset with myself, but I’m taking it out on you).

These are just the basic diatribes, each of which have various subcatagories and subclassifications. I’ve no doubt I’ll have the opportunity to expound upon those at some later point in time.

On 23 May 2002 (07:40 AM),
Paul said:

JD,
Why do you continue to consume the mass marketed pablum passed off as entertainment? Your expectations are high because you think. This is not a commie plot to overthrow the dominant paradigm. If you would cast your dollar votes for “good” movies and did not cast your dollar votes for films like Attack of the Snot Clones,then eventually the market produces “good” films to meet demand. Supple and Demand is not a commie plot nor anti-establishment. You don’t buy and read books marketed at the check out counters because you know they are shit. Is Spider Man a gem in the rough? Jim Jarmusch has produced thought provoking movies over the years that certainly are “mainstream”, but do not stoop to the lowest common denominator. For gods sake JD, stop going to “bad” films, you are killing yourself!!! (is that too melodramatic?)

Read More →

08 May 2002• by

Cheese

In which I like cheese.

I like cheese.

I’ve liked nearly every cheese I’ve ever tasted.

My current favorite cheese is feta (also here).

At the moment I’m eating fresh-grated parmesan.

I like cheese.

Some cheesy links:

  • cheese.com: “the number one resource for cheese!”
  • ilovecheese.com: “ahh, the power of cheese” — this is the official cheese site for the American Dairy Association (how long til they muscle in on cheese.com?)
  • CheeseNet: “the Internet’s cheese information resource since 1995”
  • The American Cheese Society: so good they don’t even need a catchy slogan!

Have a cheesy day!

Comments


On 14 May 2002 (09:33 AM),
Amy Jo said:

Have you tried Rambol? My cheese of choice.



On 08 May 2003 (02:54 PM),
J.D. said:

It’s a year later, and I still love cheese, and I still have not tried Rambol, Amy Jo’s cheese of choice. I’ll have to make that a goal for the coming year…

Read More →

07 May 2002• by

Scrabble

In which all of Custom Box Service is hooked on Scrabout, a Scrabble clone.

It’s a slow time of year for Custom Box Service. To kill time, Tony started playing Scrabout, a computerized Scrabble clone. Then Nick started to play it, then Jeff. Now I’m playing it too.

Here’s a screenshot from my best game (click to enlarge):

[J.D.'s best game of Scrabble]

During my first ten games today (against the computer on its highest difficulty level) I won three and lost seven. I averaged 295 points to the computer’s 325 points. During my second ten games today I won four and lost six. I averaged 313 points to the computer’s 332. Overall, I won seven and lost thirteen, averaging 304 points to the computer’s 329 points.

I’ve had a good two-day break. Tomorrow I’ll get back to databases.

All of the papers are touting Spider-Man’s $115 million opening as the “biggest weekend ever” for a film. It always bugs me when they do this. Of course it’s the biggest weekend ever: the damn film just opened on 3615 screens charging around $8.00 a seat. Adjust the figures for inflation! Tell me how many tickets were sold in comparison to past films! Tell me the per theater average adjusted for inflation. That would be a real telling figure. (I managed to google the top 100 films of all time after adjusting for inflation.)

Also: The president of Fantasyland: Bush vs. Science.

(The last two links are courtesy of crookdimwit.com.)

Comments


On 05 January 2003 (02:29 PM),
Kmhoup said:

I agree Scrabout is the best game ever. Unfortunately I just got a new computer and cannot find this game to download. Can you help me? If so please email me. Thanks a bunch!



On 03 February 2003 (03:34 PM),
Maxine said:

I need to download the Scrabout game and cannot find out how to do it. where do I find it> Thanks



On 09 February 2003 (12:54 PM),
J.D. said:

I can’t post a link to Scrabout or tell you where to find it. Trust me, though: it’s out there if you search hard enough. Use google to find a copy (it may take some work), or try your favorite file-swapping program. I have a copy, but I’m not about to incur the wrath of a giant corporation by distributing it.



On 25 May 2003 (07:13 AM),
Vina said:

Scrabout is the best game I ever played in a computer. I was able to play this game in a internet shop. I’d like to download one in my computer.. I cannot find this game to download from the net. I hope you can you help me? Please email me. Thanks so so much.



On 01 June 2003 (12:20 PM),
Paula said:

the best game i have love it !!!!! to find go to 100% freeware games and find the link goodluck



On 01 June 2003 (12:39 PM),
Paula said:

can anyone help me with import export????? keeps telling me ‘not in dic’ &%^* its frustrating



On 11 September 2003 (03:57 AM),
analiza said:

this game is the best!!



On 11 September 2003 (07:30 AM),
dowingba said:

Oh God. That picture is more emotional than you think. Windows 98! How I miss you!!



On 11 September 2003 (08:34 AM),
tammy said:

I’m still using windows 98!



On 11 September 2003 (08:37 AM),
dowingba said:

I wish I was. When I unwittingly switched to windows XP, I wanted nothing better than to format and get back to my happy Windows 98 life. But it’s been like a year or two and I realise that switching back to 98 would be folly. Sadly, windows 98 is becoming obsolete. XP sucks big time, though…



On 11 September 2003 (08:40 AM),
dowingba said:

It’s strange, JD, how it seems you are hooked up to two networks in that photo. Don’t workplace computers usually hook to one network and then the server hooks to the internet? How do you even use two networks? Is one of those a dial-up connection? I need answers!!



On 16 September 2003 (05:58 AM),
Mystiqik said:

hmm…interesting…scrabout and networdz…



On 21 October 2003 (11:31 PM),
Sanpaku said:

Scrabout/Networdz…..same format, same functions, etc
www.scrabbleon.org/get.htm

Cya there!



On 27 December 2003 (04:04 PM),
Dan said:

Can anyone help me in getting Scrabout back please? I have lost it and I have no idea where to find it again.
Thank you, Dan



On 09 December 2004 (01:22 AM),
newton kamchetere said:

i need srabout on my desk top so i can play it



On 18 January 2005 (04:10 AM),
C. said:

Hello:

I agree that Scrabout is an excellent game. After some searching around I finally found a copy of this download using dogpile.com (when google doesn’t find what you are looking for try this search engine). Anyway, this is a fully functional download guys. Enjoy!!!

http://www.thepixiepit.co.uk/scrabble/download.html



On 21 January 2005 (09:48 AM),
Yaw Fosu said:

I just want to download the scrabble



On 04 March 2005 (07:27 AM),
evzone said:

help! i can’t install scrabout! the game’s cannot run in winxp, i think.



On 19 June 2005 (05:26 PM),
Aaron said:

Here’s a copy of the imported dictionary files for scrabout, given a subset of the enable1 list generated with:

$ egrep “^[a-z]{2,12}b” enable1.txt >enable1max12.txt

If I include 13-letter words, the import fails.

http://216.231.49.82/share/scrabout-enable1-max12-dict.zip



On 04 July 2005 (02:39 AM),
Grace Aruta said:

hi! i am interested in dowloading and having a copy of SCRABOUT. I want my kids to learn from this educational board game.
I hope you can help me out how to have a copy of it



On 07 September 2005 (07:11 AM),
christine said:

want for my computer



On 07 September 2005 (07:11 AM),
christine said:

want for my computer



On 14 September 2005 (07:48 AM),
mathias sarauta said:

ardent player of the game. don’t know where to download.



On 07 October 2005 (12:44 PM),
christine said:

where can i get a free download of scrabout

Read More →

04 May 2002• by

Spider-Man

In which Mac, Kris, and I go see the new Spider-Man film and it’s better than I expect.

The mornings are still chill here in Oregon’s Willamette Valley, but the days are warm and the evenings pleasant. Everything’s gone green.

I drove to Hubbard yesterday afternoon and the green was all around. The grass is lush, the trees are gaudy with leaves. The Barlow area is a verdant sea. The beginning of May is a wonderful time to be alive.

I’m not generally a fan of big summer event movies; I prefer the small, thoughtful independent Oscar-worthy stuff that’s released at the end of the year. Mac stayed over last night, though, and he and I both had the same idea: go see Spider-Man.

Spider-Man is not a film to which I’ve been looking forward (despite the presence of Tobey Macguire, a fine actor). Superhero films usually disappoint me (the weak Unbreakable, the abysmal X-Men movie): they’re tedious and nonsensical. The only superhero films I can remember liking are Superman II and the first Batman movie. These films were based on DC heroes, though, and they’re not what I grew up enjoying. I was a fan of Marvel comics (though I didn’t often read Spider-Man).

I wasn’t looking forward to Spider-man, but thought it would be a fun Friday night diversion.

I’m pleased to report that it exceeded my expectations.

The one thing that sets Spider-Man apart from other films in the genre is its writing. The writing, by David Koepp (of Jurassic Park, Mission: Impossible, and Panic Room) is fantastic. It’s not academy award worthy but it indicates an adept hand. The dialogue is sharp (very witty at times) and the story makes sense (for the most part). The directing is good, too: the film’s pacing is flawless and the action sequences move well. No scene lingers too long, a sin most superhero movies commit at various points. There are a couple of scenes in which Peter Parker learns to use his powers, but they’re just enough to give us a feel for what he’s experiencing — they don’t go on and on and on. He slams into one wall and we get the idea that he’s a just a kid learning to cope with newfound powers. No season-long Greatest Amercian Hero bumbling here.

To be sure, there are elements of the film that don’t work for me. The Green Goblin is the Aquaman of super-villains. He’s lame lame lame. The movie doesn’t make him any less lame. In fact, his costume is just about the dumbest costume I’ve ever seen in a superhero film. What’s up with the rigid body suit and mask?

In all, Spider-Man is the best superhero film I’ve seen to date.

The latest issue of Entertainment Weekly has an article on the resurgence of superhero films, a genre that’s never been a mainstay of American cinema.

The success of the X-Men movie helped revive the flagging Marvel Comics empire, and spurred Marvel to begin production on a host of films based on its characters. Ang Lee (Sense and Sensibility, The Ice Storm and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) is making The Hulk (a film that would ordinarily leave me cold, but which I’ll see because of Lee). Ben Afleck is starring in an adaptation of Daredevil, one of my favorite superheroes. Another X-Men movie is in production, but I’ll skip that. Two Alan Moore properties are also on the drawing board: Watchmen is actually in production, and The League of Extra-Ordinary Gentelmen (with Sean Connery rumored to be interested) is in the formative stages. These movies, if done well, could be exciting.

It was difficult to rise this morning; we didn’t get to sleep until one o’clock last night.

Pam came over at 8 a.m. to join us for the annual Master Gardeners Show at the Clackamas County Fairgrounds (Mac went to his class room to do some work). The women and I braved the teeming masses, hunting for particular plants and making some impulse purchases. I bought five Thai basil plants, three Thai peppers, and a catnip. Kris, to apologize for her short temper earlier in the day, bought me a flower that I had admired, a daisy-ish white flower with purple central cone. I forgot to bring my new microcassette recorder, though, and regretted it; large crowds are a great opportunity to record conversations, a writer’s exercise.

When we returned home, Kris gave Pam the nickel garden tour. While they roamed the back yard, I lay on the grass, spread-eagled, eyes closed, and soaked in the sun. I listened to the birds (there are many of them now that May has come), to the little girl crying next door, to Kris and Pam talking about the plants. The sun was warm. A breeze rose and fell. I could smell the basil from my hands. Toto and Satchell came out to play, climbing on the raised beds, racing across the lawn.

Life is good.

Comments


On 05 May 2003 (01:24 PM),
Joelah said:

Hard to believe a year has past since this post. Some similarities include the Canby MGS, the continued abundance of super-heroes in our imaginative lives, and the presence of the sun. (Changes include photography, injury, and Kris’ employment-shakeup. And so we mark our lives.) For obsessive readers of this ‘blog who might go browsing back, I’d like you to know that J.D. did indeed go see the X-Men sequel, and that he felt it was improved in some aspects. Dividing his mind, as he so often does, into Critic and Consumer, he told me that as a comic book fan, X-2 was very good. As a cineast, it sucked hind tit.



On 14 May 2003 (07:22 PM),
Hans said:

hei i also liked spider man. but one should not expect so much from the x-men. because as we all know there isn’t always enough time to show the real story of the x-men. for one thing jean grey wasn’t suppose to change into phoenix the way that xmen2 has shown. movies doesn’t always follow the real story in the comics but the movie xmen 1 and 2 as itself is good enough just dont try to compare it with the comics. sucks ryt?



On 14 May 2003 (07:44 PM),
Azrael said:

xmen 2 n spiderman sucks!!!!! bwahahahaha joke only! well all i can say is that both x-men 1n2, are great. its just that the selection of xmen characters is a bit off. just 4 example: hugh jackman as wolverine, n nightcrawler. Y iz wolverine tall in that movie, n y iz it nightcrawlers eyes have circular yellow pupils? wolverine iz suppose 2 be small right; around 5’3, n nightcrawlers eyes suppose 2 be all white no pupils. but anyway d’ actors chosen 2 act as logan n bruce wagner is good enough, n hugh jackmans face is somewhat similar 2 logan. its just d height that i’m really bothered of about, n as of 2 nightcrawler d effects are superb.

while on d otherhand pyro really sucks!!!!!!!



On 14 May 2003 (07:45 PM),
Azrael said:

xmen 2 n spiderman sucks!!!!! bwahahahaha joke only! well all i can say is that both x-men 1n2, are great. its just that the selection of xmen characters is a bit off. just 4 example: hugh jackman as wolverine, n nightcrawler. Y iz wolverine tall in that movie, n y iz it nightcrawlers eyes have circular yellow pupils? wolverine iz suppose 2 be small right; around 5’3, n nightcrawlers eyes suppose 2 be all white no pupils. but anyway d’ actors chosen 2 act as logan n bruce wagner is good enough, n hugh jackmans face is somewhat similar 2 logan. its just d height that i’m really bothered of about, n as of 2 nightcrawler d effects are superb.

while on d otherhand pyro really sucks!!!!!!!

Read More →

28 April 2002• by

Heresy

In which I enjoy my new wireless network; in which I rave about a computer game; in which I have many bad things to say about religion.

O thrill of Geekdom!

I’m sitting on the patio on a glorious April evening, typing on my laptop. To test the range of my wireless network I walked the extent our property. (Which isn’t difficult to do on a 7500 s.f. lot.) The reception is great no matter where I am. In fact, the worst reception is in the television room, which is blocked from the computer room by several walls.

I can imagine few things more pleasant than being able to work on the computer while sitting outside, watching the cats, listening to the birds, smelling the neighbor’s barbeque. Maria and Escar are raking their yard. The boy next door is playing basketball. He must have a new ball; he’s been dribbling it up-and-down the sidewalk all day. Occasionally a small plane drones overhead. All the while I’m able to keep up with the Mariners game over the Internet while listening to mp3s from my desktop machine.

A blue jay flits down into tulip bed, finds something interesting to eat. Toto is beside herself. She cackles that “I’m-a-cat-and-I-see-a-bird” cackle, scrunches down. She’s on the patio, though, thirty feet from the bird. The range is too great for an effective attack.

The jay hops around and Toto is a bunch of nerves. Satchel is watching Toto.

The blue jay flies away.

Toto consoles herself by finding a spider on the leg of the patio table. She torments that to death instead. Such is the life of a cat: sometimes the bird is in sight yet you must settle for a spider.

I finally finished the first V.S. Naipaul book and am now ready to start Beyond Belief: Islamic Excursions Among the Converted Peoples. I’m curious to read about the changes between 1979 and 1995 in the Islamic nations that Naipaul visited.

Islam is fascinating.

It’s a religion, sure, but it’s one foreign to the Judeo-Christian ethic in which I was raised. Islam is all-consuming; it’s not just a religion, it’s a political system, a code of personal ethics, a complete way of life. No other religion can compare to it.

And the Big Picture I’m beginning to see (from reading the Koran, books on Islam, and post September 11th media accounts (alternative and mainstream)) is that of all the major world religions, Islam has the greatest chance of becoming a global unifying belief, an unstoppable force that achieves world domination. Not any time soon, mind you, eventually. It’s come far in 1400 years. So long as the Western mind is unable to grasp the Islamic mind, the West is not going to be able cope with it.

(I should mention here that I’m neither pro-Islam or anti-Islam, just as I’m neither pro-Christianity or anti-Christianity. Members of both religions would think otherwise. I’m an atheist, and think most (all?) religion is, on the balance, harmful to individuals and communities. There are positive aspects to religion, but they’re nothing that cannot exist apart from the religion.

Christianity is derived from ancient myths and rules, codified into the contradictory mass of stories we call the Bible. Islam is derived from the self-serving “visions” of the self-proclaimed prophet Mohammed, as codified in the Koran. I have no problem when beleivers keep to themselves and win converts through example. When an adherent to a particular faith begins to prosletyze, or to beleive that his (or her) religious beliefs can and should be forced upon others, then I get upset.

Life your life, leave me alone.

If there’s a hell (and there isn’t), I’ll burn in it and you’ll be up on your white fluffy cloud or in your chamber with seventy-two virgins. Don’t subject me to an Earthly hell just because you’ve found religion.)

I managed to get the lawn mowed today. I also started playing the games for my APBA baseball league. (In away games, played by other owners, my record is 2-17! Amazing. I’ve never owned a team so pathetic.)

Most of my day was spent playing Star Wars Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast, though. I finished the single-player game yesterday; it merits perhaps a B or B- due to some very glaring problems. (A more detailed review, by a more forgiving player than myself (though he still notes problems) can be found at Game Basement.) This morning, on a whim, I decided to play some multi-player over the internet.

Bad move.

For six hours I ran and jumped and fought my way through multi-player capture the flag. Outstanding! This is great fun.

The maps are well designed, and large, so that each player can concentrate on what he likes the most. Most people run around with light-sabers all the time and use Force Grip. (Need a list of Force Powers?)

Me? I have no lightsaber skills at all (and thus no lightsaber), but have maxed out Force Speed and Force Jump and Force Push (to fight Force Grip). My little Jedi runs swiftly and jumps high and is a master of stealth. I’m always the highest scoring player on my team. Assuming moderately skilled teammates, my team usually wins.

I need to loan this game to Mac ASAP so that it doesn’t take up all of my free time…

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14 April 2002• by

De-Fenceless

In which the wind blows over our fence, which means I’ll have to exercise my non-existent handyman genes.

Northwest Oregon had a mild windstorm last night. It can’t have been too bad because there’s no mention of it in the news. Yet it was strong enough to wake both me and Kris. The wind chimes rang throughout the night. Worst of all, it was enough to blow over a section of our fence.

If I could find my digital camera, I’d post a picture of the damage here. It’s not severe — Kris is most upset about the damage to her plants, including a rhododendron that may be a complete loss — but it’s puzzling. This section of our fence was erected two or three years ago and had seemed structurally sound. It showed no signs of sagging, yet last night’s wind was enough to topple it.

It appears that four of the 4×4 fence posts simply snapped at their bases. Did they rot? We don’t know yet. Both of us remember using pressure-treated wood for the posts, and using Quickcrete to hold them in place. Are we both imagining this? Perhaps we did use Quickcrete but did not use pressure-treated wood. This seems unlikely. I suspect we’re just victims of misfortune.

In any event, I’ll be exercising my non-existent handyman genes over the next several days in an effort to repair the fence. I’m not sure how to do it, actually. This ought to be fun.

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22 March 2002• by

U2: A Love Story

In which I loved U2. (Loved, not love.)

I entered high school in the fall of 1983. My sixth period class, the last class of the day, was Speech Communications taught by Wilma Hicks. Mrs. Hicks had led Canby Union High School‘s speech team to glory for a quarter of a century, but I had no illusions of greatness. I just wanted to fulfill a requirement.

A few days into the year, Mrs. Hicks was diagnosed with cancer. She took an extended leave of absence, but was dead within a weeks. Meanwhile, Mr. Stegmeier served as our substitute teacher. I, and every other kid in the Canby school district, had known Mr. Stegmeier for years; he was a substitute teacher at all levels. He was a nice guy, but he didn�t act so much as a teacher he acted as a babysitter. Mr. Stegmeier was a pastor at a local church, and he spent his classtime preparing sermons.

(Throughout my high school career, Mr. Stegmeier called me “Jonathan”, which he knew bugged me. I don’t care what people call me. Except for “Jonathan”. My name isn’t “Jonathan”. In retaliation, I never called him Mr. Stegmeier, I called him “Willy”. Disrespectful, yes, but good-natured. We called each other �Jonathan� and �Willy� for four years, in speech and geometry and choir and chemistry and English and health and every other class but PE.)

While Mr. Stegmeier babysat our speech class, we lounged around the cavernous speech room in Lower B, which was part of a 75-year-old structure that made up a large portion of the school. B Wing was beautiful (though we didn’t appreciate it then), built of rich, dark hardwoods, with towering ceilings and wide corridors. It comprised two levels — Upper B and Lower B — and an ancient auditorium. The home-ec classes were held at one end of Lower B, the journalism and speech classes at the other end. Upper B housed English classes and various special ed and administrative areas.

My favorite part of B Wing was the “secret” rooms. These rooms weren’t really secret, just rarely visited. There were many doors throughout the hall, only some of which led to classrooms. Others led to a teachers’ lounge, the school store (which rarely operated), to the boiler room, to the theater’s control room, etc.

The best door led to the text book storage area, a hot, tight, dark room filled with aging textbooks. In my memory, there was only a single light-bulb, activated by a pull-chain, to light the entire room. It was musty. The boiler room was nearby, and the book room could become very hot. (It’s amazing the books never caught fire!) There were makeshift shelves along the walls, and spanning the center of the room. The school’s spare textbooks were kept here, and to a young bibliophile (yes, I loved books even at the age of fifteen) this room was like a candy store.

(B-Wing was torn down a decade ago and a new main wing was erected in its place. The new structure is a labyrinth of sterile corridors with cookie-cutter rooms and a fluorescent soaked library. It’s impersonal, lacks character, has no charm. B-Wing had its shortcomings (it was a fire trap), but it was a beautiful old building. It had personality.)

While Mr. Stegmeier babysat our speech communications class, the students lounged around the cavernous room in Lower B, earning a required credit just for taking up space. Most of the students were upperclassmen. One of them, Angela Something-Or-Other, became my first high school girlfriend, and was the reason that another upperclassmen beat the shit out of me one day (a story for another time). Another of the upperclassmen in the room was a guy that had just moved to Canby from Colorado. (I have no idea what his name was.)

One day this guy brought in a tape by a band I’d never heard of: U2. “Ha. What a funny name,” I told him. “Yeah,” he said, “but they’re really good.” He asked Mr. Stegmeier for a tape player. Mr. Stegmeier complied and we listened to an album called Under a Blood Red Sky.

I didn�t know whether to like the music or not. At the time I was listening to some Styx and Journey, but was most fond of the New Wave music that had recently swept the country. This band, U2, was straightforward rock-and-roll: drums and guitars and a lead singer with a distinctive voice. We listened to the album a couple of times over the course of a week. I decided I liked it.

That winter, KSKD began to play a song by U2 called “New Year’s Day”. I loved this song the moment I heard it. (But wait! you’re saying. Isn’t “New Year’s Day” on Under a Blood Red Sky? Why, yes it is. But I hadn’t noticed the song during speech class.) The next time we were at the Oregon City Fred Meyer (the source for all of our music in those days), I bought U2�s album War, which contained “New Year’s Day”. Jeff and I listened to this album for weeks on end. The music was fantastic. Rock-and-roll, yes, but rock-and-roll with a passion, with a unique style, with lyrics that resonated in our tiny teenaged hearts. War was the perfect album for a long winter: bleak and aching, with
promises of hope.

Sometime during this year, my friendship with Dave crumbled and Paul became my new best friend. He was also a U2 fan. Between Paul, Jeff, and myself, we soon owned every U2 album (which wasn’t difficult since there were only four of them).

In the fall of 1984, U2 released The Unforgettable Fire. Jeff and I bought the album at the Oregon City Fred Meyer again, this time on tape instead of vinyl. We listened to it constantly, as did Paul. It had a different style than the previous albums, ethereal and moody. “A Sort of Homecoming” is a typical song � full of hope and the expectation of things to come. (The whole album now reminds me of West Side Story’s “Something’s Coming”.) Paul and I listened to The Unforgettable Fire at soccer practice that fall: sun blazing, sweaty bodies, U2 playing at the edge of the field.

In the summer of 1985, U2 performed at Live Aid. I spent all day lying on the couch in the living room of the trailer house, sweating, watching the show. When U2 stepped onto the stage, I turned up the volume. They began to play and I was transported. Their unending version of “Bad” (Live Aid version here) was beautiful, moving, haunting. Bono pulled a young woman on-stage and danced with her. It was magical.

Paul and I began to acquire U2 obscuria. We bought biographies of the band (difficult to find in the mid-eighties) and early 45s, we tacked posters to our walls.

The Joshua Tree was released in mid-March 1987. Before the album was released, KGON played preview tracks. We taped them. My favorite was the dark and brooding “Exit”. “With or Without You” became the first single from the album and was played all over the radio. The previous U2 singles had all but been largely ignored, but this song was climbing the charts.

On the day of The Joshua Tree�s release, Paul approached me and asked me if I wanted to skip school to buy it. I was reluctant — I had only skipped one day prior to this — but agreed. Tower Records in Eastport Plaza had become our source for music (Fred Meyer didn’t carry the obscure New Wave and techno stuff that we’d grown to love), so we drove to Portland and bought the album on both vinyl and cassette. I also bought the “With or Without You” single, the first single that I had ever seen on cassette tape instead of on a 45. We left after break (10:00ish) and were back by lunch.

The Joshua Tree was my soundtrack for the Summer of 1987. In the fall I went to college, and still played the album constantly. There were many U2 fans in the dorm, people who had liked the band even longer than I had. One time I got into a conversation about U2 with a gorgeous young woman visiting from some other school. We played “Sweetest Thing�, a B-Side to “With or Without You”, and we sat in my room laughing. She left that evening and I never saw her again.

During my sophomore year at Willamette I was a DJ at KWU, the campus radio station. I didn�t really want to be a DJ, but I knew that the station got album releases before the stores. Further, I knew that U2 was releasing an album in October. My devious plan worked. When the station received its copy of Rattle and Hum, I was able to “borrow” it to tape it weeks before I could have bought the album.

That was the fall that I pledged Kappa Sigma. One evening a group of us pledges were sitting around being cool, smoking cigars and pipes and clove cigarettes at the fraternity house, when somebody noted that the film of Rattle and Hum was playing near the campus. We threw on jackets and tromped across the wet quad, smoking our cigars and our pipes and our clove cigarettes. We were the only people in the theater (which was good, because we were surrounded by an offensive miasma that could have killed stout livestock), and the sound was poor, but we loved the movie. Afterwards, we sloughed back to campus (smoking our cigars and our pipes and our clove cigarettes) and crowded into somebody’s room to listen to old U2 albums.

In the fall of 1991 I got a job selling Combined Insurance. (This, too, is a story for another time.) The highlight of my insurance selling career was the release of U2’s new album, Achtung Baby, in November. We were canvassing in Hood River at the time, and I had trouble locating a store that sold the album. When I did find it, I sat and listened to it in my brand-new Geo Storm, a quart of chocolate milk between my knees and a box of old-fashioned cake donuts by my side (I was in the process of ballooning from 160 pounds to 190 pounds). I didn’t know what to think. I listened to the album almost constantly for a week, but still didn’t know whether I liked it or not. The sound was new and different.

I grew to like Achtung Baby with time but for the rest of the decade U2’s music left me cold. Bono became a victim of his own hype, of his own smugness, of his own self-satisfaction. He was a parody of himself, an exact image of all that he claimed to despise. The band seemed to lose its focus. U2 became more of political organization than a rock-and-roll band.

Jeff gave me All That You Can’t Leave Behind for Christmas in 2000, and while I admit “Beautiful Day” is a great song in the old-style U2 tradition, I can’t embrace most of the album. It does herald a return to their old sound, but many of the lyrics are terrible. I’m anxious to see what they produce next.

Paul continued to collect their stuff and now has a substantial collection of U2 material. In fact, when I think of U2, I think of Paul. He follows them, always knows what their next project is. He’s a U2 encyclopedia.

Which U2 album was the turning point in the band’s career, the album that spurred them to fame and glory?

For my money, it’s the live Under a Blood Red Sky. This was the album that introduced many of us to U2, the album that caused us to become U2 evangelists. Without Under a Blood Red Sky, I think U2 would be just another Midnight Oil, a rock band with modest success and a cult following but without a fan base to support megapopularity. The live performance at Red Rocks was outstanding; it helped to build a cadre of loyal fans that spread the word about the band.

And the pivotal moment in their career? Without a doubt, it’s their performance at Live Aid. This was the first time U2 had wide exposure, and the band took advantage by staging the performance of a lifetime. Synnergy. Serendipity. Whatever. Their performance brought them to the attention of casual music-buyers that might have otherwise ignored them. From that moment on, they were superstars.

“There’s been a lot of talk about this next song, maybe too much talk. This song is not a rebel song. This song is ‘Sunday Blood Sunday.'”

Comments


On 22 March 2002 (12:57 PM),
Paul said:

JD,
I thought we saw Rattle and Hum together. I know I saw it twice the day of its release. Once in Eugene and the second in Salem.

My favorite is Wide Awake in America. Though it is not a full length ep, it captures the heart of The Unforgettable Fire ep with studio and live recordings. The singles from these releases extends their offering of the sound that they produced during this period of recording.

One of their strongest singles in my opinion is PLEASE. It is a diamond in an a caucophony of different sounds from their “electronic” recording period. It is this period that you believe that ego warps U2, but I believe it is their attempt at staying current and progressive that caused a misdirection of their sound. PLEASE reconfirmed their ability to stay relevant and construct a sound that is emotional and unique.

Your story is not a just a love of U2, but also a story of JD.



On 22 March 2002 (02:04 PM),
jdroth said:

You know, you were there for the Rattle and Hum viewing. It was always great to have you visit Willamette.

I’d love to hear more singles from your collection, actually. I borrowed a pile of them a couple of years ago, but mainly just took the stuff from the early nineties. Maybe their recent stuff will sound better to me now that I’m older.

Also, you’re right: Wide Awake in America is a fantastic piece of work, even though it comprises only four songs. The Live Aid version of “Bad” isn’t commercially available (is it?), but the live recording on Wide Awake is a suitable substitute.



On 26 March 2002 (01:24 PM),
Dagny said:

Ah B wing. That *did* have character, didn’t it? I always liked it too, for what it’s worth… more than anything I miss the womb of Lower B, the speech back room. I didn’t exactly “come of age” there in the sense that’s usually meant, but I felt at home. Plus I learned the word {carrion} from the bold assertion written in permanent black marker: JODI CARGILL IS CARRION. To this day, I don’t know who had such a vendetta against Jodi Cargill, but she must have done *something* to tick someone off.

Mega-props out to Mr. Stegmeier too.

It’s like a walk down amnesia lane.



On 24 May 2002 (06:15 PM),
wicket said:

I just wanted to let you know the tradition of bieng cool in front of k sig with the cigars and cloves lives on….
aekdb



On 01 April 2003 (07:17 PM),
Tiffany said:

This is off the subject and I am not all that into U2, but I just wanted to say that I am a memeber of the church the “Mr. Stegmeier” is pastor of although I refer to him as Bro. Stegmeier. He is a wonderful man, one of the kindest most giving people I have ever met in my life.



On 28 August 2003 (12:48 PM),
amy said:

I don’t know a single thing about U2, but I do have a few ‘B’ wing stories myself. Had my locker in lower B the year I got my driver’s license and dated David M. I sewed a large satin M & M in that home ec. department. Also learned how to make biscuits–my home ec teacher didn’t like me–I think because I was cuter than her… 🙂 Anyway, I graduated from CUHS in 1984, the year you were a freshman. Mrs. Hicks was a legend at that school. And Mr. Stegmeier? Never saw him write a sermon during class, but do know that he was a kind man who loved the Lord. Thanks for the stroll down memory lane.



On 05 March 2004 (04:09 PM),
Lynn said:

Mr. Stegmeier…what a neat guy. He called all the boys “Jonathon” and all the girls “Sally.”



On 24 March 2004 (01:58 PM),
Peter Stathakos said:

Two years later, I found this blog entry and it sparks a memory with me. I blog about it here.

Thanks J.D.

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