It's been a bit of a busy year -- which says a lot when you consider the fact that it's February.
In the interests of contributing to even more online traffic I've added a TUMBLR site to my semi monthly/weekly upload routine.
You can check it out at lookmariko.tumblr.com
As a bit of trivia, the title "Look Mariko" or "Look, Mariko" is actually a bit of a my-friend-ali-ism (truly, one of many). When we were in NYC several years ago I began randomly starting conversations with the controversial, vaguely intense and often over-dramatic, "LOOK."
As in:
"Look, I'm not saying I'm NOT into having sushi for dinner, I'm saying I want to hear my options."
"Look. Technically, there's nothing wrong with a busy street."
I like "look" as a bit of a u-turn type of conversational element. It's a bit bossy and implies that you are about to say something that is going to
a) put everything that was previously said into some sort of focus
b) rebut (effectively) what was previously said
c) at the very least, cut to the chase.
"Look" seems like something a very efficient and level headed person says, when surrounded by babblers.
Ali dared me to use "look" in an upcoming panel discussion I had to participate in.
And.
I did.
So, there you have it.
In other news I am currently tripless until later in April. STAYING PUT I AM! Kind of exciting.
sumxo
The problem, of course, was that everyone KNEW Roots sweatshirts were cool and so even if you weren't cool you couldn't help but think it would be good to be seen wearing something cool, as opposed to something UNCOOL (like, say, fluffy cords and Northern Reflections sweatshirts). Like, really, why would anyone knowingly wear anything uncool if they could help it? Plus there was always this odd underlying pressure to wear/buy brands like Roots because they were... you know... cool in a larger Toronto type way.
I remember at one point, in grade 6, someone told me there had been a conversation between two very cool people about the fact that I had bought and was wearing a pink Roots sweatshirt (with white and blue lettering). The girls in question were both, I remember, mildly impressed that I somehow knew what Roots was (because I wasn't living under a rock I suppose) BUT also suspect as to whether or not it was OK that I was wearing the sweatshirt that was not unlike the sweatshirts that THEY were wearing. Was I tainting Roots, I guess, was the question.
(Ultimately, yes.)
There are two types of movies about the cool/uncool phenomena described above.
In movie A, the uncool is adopted and made cool by someone who is cool, a process that involves a make over and the adoption of cool clothes by the uncool person (who must then also relinquish her glasses). This makeover is typically based on some sort of bet - where the cool person is dared to hang with the uncool person (and - sometimes - eventually - do something bad to them - Carrie).
See also: Clueless, Mean Girls, She's All That, Can't Buy Me Love.
In movie B, the uncool is paired up with the cool person (for reasons beyond the cool person's control) and then the uncool person STEALS/adopts the cool person's entire persona, including her look. Like a succubus.
See: Single White Female and now, Roommate.
Of course there is typically some sort of jealous girlfriend type vibe to this situation. But no sex. Just the vibe.
Movie B annoys me in much the same way that movies about lesbians where the lesbian in question ends up sleeping with every girl that she meets (see Tipping the Velvet) annoy me. My annoyance, more than anything else, I hope, has to do with a lack of accuracy.
My point, with regard to movie B, is that the phenom where uncool people try to copy cool people typically has less to do with lesbo-psycho succubus type stuff and more to do with a healthy dose of admiration/a desire to be cool. And the idea that the victims, the potential victims, in these pairings are the COOL people is LAUGHABLE to me.
I'm not saying there aren't psycho lesbians out there ready to cop your style, I'm just saying that there aren't a lot of them (and you could probably take them if you had to).
Anyway.
In other news, my new favourite thing is to watch horror movies on Saturday afternoon.
Yesterday c and I watched Case 39, with Rene Zellweger looking a bit puffy, not unlike the look she adopted for the equally kind of badly written White Oleander (2002).
We also watched Duplicity, which, you know, f--- me if I knew what was happening in that movie. It felt like I fell asleep watching Closer and woke up watching a weird hidden bottom half of Closer with more corporate shenanigans.
Am reading Lisa Moore's Alligator, and pretty much loving it.
More later.
Happy Sunday everyone.
sumxo
The book is like one of many books I've read in the past that chronicles the complexity of an artistic scene, which means referencing a lot of names that - if you don't know - kind of just wiz by you like gravel spraying up from a dirt road.
See:
Yoshihiro Tatsumi's A Drifting Life
Factory Made: Warhol and the Sixties
A Different Kind of Intimacy by Karen Findley
Beyond that, Smith's chronicle really feels like a sort of remembering, especially the way she drifts in and out of scenes. She'll do a pretty extensive build up to what feels like a kind of important event and then kind of just look the other way and fall into another place and another time, which I kind of liked.
One thing I thought, as I was reading, is that IF I had been around back then, you know, all amazing and hanging out in the back room of Max's, I don't think I would have liked Patti Smith very much. Even though I connected to her intense symbolism, and I think we would have been able to compare notes of all the stuff we were hoarding and why (magical objects galore), I can't imagine having a conversation with someone that intensely into their own poetic self and process.
Not that I'm thinking Patti Smith is missing out, you understand.
I just sort of pictured her in the corner of these vibrant rooms full of the amazing queers, the Jackie Curtis's and so on, in her little black outfits, pinning for French monuments and books I'll never read.
Again, I'm sure that's way cooler than what I'd be doing at Max's (like trying to steal Jackie Curtis).
Just saying, I guess.
I'd love to hear what other people thought of this book, actually. Which made me super sad as I finished it, and thumbed through these haunting black and white photos while my plane skittered down onto the runway and the woman next to me finished watching GOING THE DISTANCE for the second time.
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Like, if you were to ask me about what's influencing me NOW it would be less "literary greats" and more a mix of 16 and Pregnant and The West Wing.
Don't get me wrong, I READ, okay? But I certainly don't read enough.
So my resolution for NOW, and for as long as I can remember to maintain it, is to read at least one book a month. You know, obviously, more if it comes up/happens.
So this month I started with Emma Donoghue's ROOM, which has been nominated for a zillion awards (shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Hughes & Hughes Irish Novel of the Year and the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize (for best Canadian novel). It has also been a finalist for International Author of the Year (Galaxy National Book Awards) and the Governor General’s Award.). Actually, if you go to Emma Donoghue's site, there's a ton of stuff about the book, Donoghue's research, and the list of awards noms I just copied and pasted.
I have to say, I was not thrilled by this book for the first few chapters. I was kind of... annoyed by it. I think my initial take on that was that I didn't like being stuck in this little five year old boy's styilized narrative. After a few pages it felt like being stuck in a room with the Teletubbies and a bunch of moms and kids watching kids tv. Although, later a friend of mine picked up the book and she noted that you're kind of immediately immersed into it, like immediately your put right into the middle of the situation Jack and his Ma are in. And as I kept reading it felt like a very effective approach to pulling the reader into this place, this ROOM.
I got frustrated with this kid, kind of hated this kid at times, but I was also pretty hooked by the middle of the book.
And, hey, symbolically, possibly an odd choice for the beginning of the year but ultimately a really good book I thought.
Next I have:
Just Kids by Patti Smith
Player One by Douglas Coupland
and
FAT VAMPIRE by Adam Rex.
So a bit of a mixed bag.
I'm off to Montreal to hang with the Scandelles while they're in Montreal - come see Neon Nightz at the Centaur if you're around.
sumxo
Including (and in order of watching):
SALT
Devil
The American
Bourne Identity
The Other Guys
Lessons learned are as follows:
1) Spies/assassins make crappy life partners.
You really cannot just date a spy. It's deadly. Even though spies are well equipped to look after you, they've got that whole "being hunted down" thing going. Safe, with a spy, is always safe for now.
2) As a result, spies/assassins are lonely.
Movies that focus on said lonliness are terribly boring. Sorry Clooney. But what's the deal? Your movies are either zany or spit drying on wall slow.
3) M. Night Shyamalan's movies are awesome.
Devil is probably the few of his movies that you can actually write about without giving away the cool ending. Needless to say, it is always nice to see a movie that some put thought into the beginning, middle and end and how these all make sense TOGETHER.
4) Will Ferrell's movies are the Naked Guns of today.
It is so hard to say if The Other Guys is actually funny. I think it is, but, that said, I only really laughed out loud once for this line:
Allen Gamble: I was so drunk, I thought a tube of toothpaste was astronaut food.
Terry Hoitz: What is this?
Allen Gamble: Its my car, Its a Prius.
Terry Hoitz: I feel like we're literally driving around in a vagina.
I had no idea Prius' were so mocked.
5) People dye their hair black when they want to go under cover.
I suppose, logistically, bleaching would take a lot longer and a complete bleach job would be hard to accomplish in the tiny crappy hotel room sinks these jobs are done in. That said, the average girl does appear to be able to pull off a nice looking shaggy bob with just a pair of dull scissors and a dream. Still I have to wonder, in terms of identity/feature changing abilities, does the black dye job really work? Does it work when you're Angelina Jolie and your lips take up half your face? Seriously. Even if AJ shaved her head people would still just have to look south of her nose to know who they were looking at.
That's it for tonight folks.
Tomorrow I'm going to hunt down some more M. Night action.
Happy first day (now second) of 2011.
sumxo
C and I spent quite a bit of time leaning forward to check out the workings of the fancy Princess of Wales stage, which included a moving conveyor belt bit, a lot of things coming from the air, and a bus with lots of fancy lights. Pretty much the entire production is fancy and glittery and sparkly in the way you would imagine it to be. It all feels a bit like a very gay version of the Honest Eds sign at Bloor and Bathurst, which is, of course, entirely fitting. The costumes are as inspiring as they were in the film version, lots of feathers, baubles, corsets and ripped pectoral muscles and drag queen eyes.
Most of the parts I liked were the dance numbers, where the showgirl met the drag queen in a very muppet fashion and it was easy to just sit back and be entertained by the whole thing. There's a point in musicals where the production uses the lyrics of a song to take the place of dialogue in a play, to sing a story instead of telling a story. Priscilla, for the most part, avoids that pitfall, which was kind of a relief. I have this horror memory from the ABBA musical, Mamma Mia, where the song Chiquitita is spoken/sung as an exchange between two characters.
"Chiquitita, tell me what's wrong..."
CRINGE!!
I wasn't super jazzed about the play part of the play, if only because it seemed like such a simplified version of the movie. There's a lot more of the kid/dad stuff in this version, which, while amazing in spirit, ends up reading like some sort of Disney film, like "Somewhere out there." I'm not sure if the people gasping at the plot turns, incidentally, had seen the movie.
As a final point, reading through some reviews, I noticed a review that suggested, amongst other praises for the production, that the final message of PQOTD is "not one about gayness, or cross-dressing, or any garden variety of sexuality." The same review also suggested that the play is ultimately about "a trio of individuals who have been cheated of love in this world and need to find it desperately." (Toronto Star)
While I think it's true that the characters in this musical are all searching for love, it feels a bit strange to me to say that this is not a play where gayness is front and centre, or where the final message is divorced from said gayness. Priscilla is totally gay, and yes, it's about love and all that, but it's message about love immersed within a queer context. I don't think that fact puts the show in danger of being a drag, even if the pun is funny.
The trio of individuals in this play have the phrase "fuck you faggots" painted on their tour bus. They know what it means to be objects of adoration, the life of the party in a small town bar in Australia, and objects of hate in the morning, when drag looks less magical and more like excessive make up over stubble. The characters in this musical are trying to find love within that. You know? I'm not saying gays are the only people who deal with that dichotomy, I'm saying that this particular divide is largely what this musical is about.
Or that's my take anyway.
Go see it if you have the chance. It's leaving TO on January 2nd.
sumxo
Go to Paris, buy fancy boots
2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Never resolve, only do
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
My sister in law
4. Did anyone close to you die?
No one very close, but definitely a lot of loss this year.
5. What countries did you visit?U.S., France, Holland, Belgium, Germany
6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
The ability to keep track of my parking tickets
7. What date from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and what for?
Wow. What remains etched in my memory these days? Not much. Pride was pretty awesome.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Keeping my Job.
90 days of P90X
Finishing my novel
9. What was your biggest failure?
The parking ticket thing.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Not that I know of.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
My Paris Purse and our Wii.
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
My friend Abi Slone cuz she got a kick ass job.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Basically every time I see someone talk about twitter on TV now, I hate them.
14. Where did most of your money go?
My cat's intestines, the car.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Going to Europe. Writing.
16. What song(s) will always remind you of 2010?
The Suburbs, Arcade Fire
Get Outta My Way, Kylie Minogue
Heavy, Florence + The Machine
Pumpkin Soup, Kate Nash
Monster, Kanye West et al
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder?
Happier I think.
ii. richer or poorer?
same
iii. thinner or fatter?
thinner I think
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Reading
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Wasting time on Facebook
20. How will you be spending the holidays?
Pretending like they're any other days
22. Did you fall in love in 2010?
I rediscovered in 2010. Nuff said.
23. How many one night stands?
"One night stand" is such a weird phrase, yes?
24. What was your favorite TV program?
Every HBO Documentary I saw this year blew me away.
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate last year?
Yes. Wow. Yes I do.
26. What was the best book you read?
Chuck Klosterman's Eating the Dinosaur, Brecht Evans The Wrong Place, Art Spiegelman Maus, John Hodgins Master of Happy Endings, Objects of Worship by Claude Lalumière.
27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Florence + The Machine
28. What did you want and get?
New watch
29. What did you want and not get?
yet
30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Public Speaking, Every Little Step, Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World
31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Turned 35. Dinner with my favourite people.
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Money and focus
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
Skirts
34. What kept you sane?
Music
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Helen Mirren
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
More shaken than stirred
37. Who did you miss?
bits of my past
38. Who was the best new person you met?
Lindsay Anne Black! Fish mistress.
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010:
Look, Mariko.
40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
Oh. Hmm. Not really.
I've always been a pretty big fan of Fran Lebowitz, although not in any die hard way. I'm generally a fan of people the media describes as
a) accerbic
b) sarcastic
c) witty
Mostly a).
As it turns out, it was pretty awesome. It's basically a biography that forgoes the background bits and goes straight to the red meat of what makes Fran Lebowitz really interesting, specifically, what she has to say about what she thinks about everything.
Which was a RELIEF because really my least favourite thing about any documentary is the part where OTHER PEOPLE talk about the subject of the biography. My VERY LEAST favourite thing is where random pop culture/entertainment news reporters are brought in to talk about celebrities as though those celebrities were close childhood friends.
Like. "You know, as much as Kate Moss really loved modeling, in the back of her mind she always had doubts about the ethics of that particular industry."
Yeah. Because, as a reporter reading reports about said person, you would know that.
RIGHT.
All this has made me think that what I really need for Christmas, aside from one of those Tossimo coffee maker things, is the collected works of Fran Lebowitz.
So. Let's see if we can make that happen, shall we?
In other news, Happy Birthday Frances Stacey Ayuso!
sumxo
2. Helen Mirren, machine gun
3. Colour me excited
4. A very rare movie date for c and me
5. Only tickets available are for big mammoth AVX movie theatre
6. $15.75 a piece for tickets
7. What the hell, you only live once and the other tickets are, like, what? $14.
I'm not exactly sure why it was I left the movie theatre feeling so deflated. I think I'm getting a little sick of being disappointed by movies, especially movies where I walk in with the expectation that I'm about to be thuroughly entertained, by something on a screen that is very nearly LARGER THAN LIFE.
The movie itself was not necessarily bad but it certainly wasn't very interesting. It felt like a play that a bunch of people had planned, bought costumes for, scheduled explosions for, hired actors for, but hadn't really WRITTEN with any extensive care. Which I was kind of shocked by because, well, it's based on a comic book, yes? So the plot and all that is there. Watchmen, case in point, was pretty well written and thought out I thought and that is probably largely in part because, a) someone put great care into writing the comic and b) someone directed/created a movie that paid attention to that original.
I wiki'd RED and it turns out the original comic and the storyline of the film are - according to wiki - pretty different so?
So.
I don't know. Just, UGH, COME ON GUYS!! It's a great premise! Cool characters! It's the COCCOON of our time, where the oldies break bone instead of partying in the pool and then jumping ship. Where was the zing?
Malkovich was pretty funny...
My reception of said film was probably also tempered by the fact that the couple sitting next to us brought their little kid - maybe 4 - who was clearly NOT an ideal audience member for RED. He spent the entire movie asking what was happening and squirming in his seat. C says I gave them one too many dirty looks.
What, like 10.
It was a long movie.
Kid asked A LOT of questions.
Anyway.
Go see LET ME IN. Or rent LET THE RIGHT ONE IN.
That's all for now folks.
sumxo
(Thanks to Miss EPW who had this idea first) Don't take too long to think about it. 20 books you've read that will always stick with you. List the first 20 you can recall in no more than 20 minutes. Tag 20 friends, including me, because I'm interested in seeing what books my friends choose. (To do this, go to your Notes tab on your profile page, paste rules in a new note, cast your 20 picks, and tag people in the note.) Do yours before you read anyone else's....
To be clear, not an exhaustive list. Obviously.
1. Generation X - Douglas Copeland
Probably the first book I ever loved that I felt was "mine," in some way. Like it was a book that was written in my time and for my people. Still love the way DC writes about groups of friends, little tribes of people interacting and connecting/disconnecting. Lovely.
2. Not Wanted on the Voyage - Timothy Findley
Read this in grade 10. Started me on a huge TF kick, which ultimately brought me to...
3. Headhunter - Timothy Findley
Amazing. Incredible weaving together of different stories, realities. Poetic. Intense.
4. Housekeeping - Marilynne Robinson
Probably the first book I read as a highschooler that wasn't primarily about boys or men. I just remember getting lost in this book, and loving Ruth and her aunt Sylvie.
5. Geek Love - Katherine Dunn
Do all goths love Geek Love? I would think they should. I can't believe this isn't a movie yet. Magical.
6. Music for Torching - A.M. Holmes
I love almost everything that A.M. Holmes has ever written, but this book left me shaking. I've never had a book do that to me before. My brain was static for hours after I finished the final page.
7. Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris
This book saved me from Chapters. I read the first story and burst into hysterics in the stock room. I love the personal essay (I might love it the most) and no one does it better (in my opinion) than Sedaris.
8. The New Kings of Non Fiction - Edited by Ira Glass
Bar none, my number one book recommend. I'm waiting a requisite 2 years before I read it again so I'll enjoy it as much as the first time. This book is the argument for the literaryness of non fiction. Such an incredibly diverse range of writing. Love Bill Buford's Among the Thugs and Susan Orlean's piece.
9. Choke - Chuck Palahniuk
I read this again recently and it wasn't as amazing as I remembered, but I'm putting it on here because no one writes fight, puke, fist, self-pity, fucked up, punch like Chuck.
10. Saints of Big Harbour/Mean Boy - Lynn Coady
Some of my favourite characters in fiction come from Lynn Coady's brain.
11. Written on the Body - Jeanette Winterson
What can I say? It's a stereotype but it's a great book. My first lesbian love story. Like a feathery punch to the gut.
12. Virgin Suicides - Jeffery Eugenides
This was his DEBUT novel. Amazing. One of those chest achy books for me.
13. Scott Pilgrim - Bryan Lee O'Malley
It's occured to me that this series is not only the first comic series I've ever fallen in love with, it's also a really reconnection back to my love of Copeland, his humour and his amazing mix of pop mediums/references.
14. Cat's Eye - Margaret Atwood
Yeah I've spent this whole list trying to decide which MA to include here. I think this was the first book I read of hers that I really connected with, possibly because of the subject matter(amongst other things, bullying), which at the time I read it (high school) was a little closer to home.
15. Flowers in the Attic - V.C. Andrews
I spent at least two summers obsessing over V.C.A. I dreamed of attics and suspected older brothers for YEARS because of her. Gotta include it here somewhere.
16. It was on Fire When I Lay Down on It - Robert Fulgum
Does anyone else remember Robert Fulgum? It's probably a salient detail to include here that my obsession with Fulgum coincided with a nervous breakdown. I think at the time I was reading I thought of this stuff as, like, essays, not self-help. Although I did write him a letter later telling him about my woes and his secretary sent a really nice letter back....
17. Stone Angel - Margaret Laurence
Another grade 13 read. I loved this book. It was also the first Toronto theatre play I ever saw, I think, which was pretty inspiring at the time.
18. Who Do You Think You Are? - Alice Munro
Lives of Girls and Women is a book I'll mostly remember because we had to have this big talk about the masturbation scene afterwards, but WDYTYA was my fav.
19. The Acme Novelty Library - Chris Ware
It's hard to know what comics to include here, especially since comics, while certainly books that have stuck with me, are still a pretty new thing (like within the last 5 years). I'm continually drawn to Chris Ware's work, both the intensely detailed style of it and the sad little stories he creates. So. Yeah. There should be a separate section here for comics to include works by: Charles Burns, Adrian Tomine, Hope Larson, Kate Beaton, Jillian Tamaki, Alison Bechdel, Phoebe Gloeckner, Julie Doucet, and Lynda Barry - to name a few...
20. Etc - Malcolm Gladwell
Pretty much everything this guy writes, sticks with me and becomes a desperate topic of conversation. Thanks.
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