Lotta water under the bridge, lotta other stuff too

I finally got around to watching Scorcese's No Direction Home, and I was not disappointed. Bob Dylan is a fascinating subject. The other great documentary, Pennebaker's Don't Look Back is a favourite of mine. While much of this new documentary understandably revolves around Dylan going electric, the film also traces Dylan's roots: from growing up in the Iron Belt of northen Minnesota, his discovery of country, rock and folk music, his first trip to New York. There are a number of interviews with folk singers, active in the Greenwich Village folk scene, who give their perspectives on the young Bob Dylan. The best thing about Scorcese's film is the scope: the interviews, the performance footage not only of Dylan, but other musicans. You get a real sense of the New York folk movement.

Of course, the footage of Dylan performing is the absolute highlight of the film, especially the much mythologised electric performances at the Newport and England. It is surreal to watch Dylan and what will become "The Band" play classic Bob Dylan songs to a chorus of boos and catcalls (like "Judas") from the audience. The Newport footage is punctuated with interviews with other folk musicians who were there, including Pete Seger, who apparently had an axe and was going to cut the mic cables and later locked himself in a car. So much for peace, love, and harmony, eh Pete?

The Long and Winding Road

Yeah, I'm a terrible, terrible person. I haven't been updating much lately. My bad.

This weekend has turned into a sort of "invesitgation into my ancestry." I've been watching Wagner's Ring cycle on DVD (which takes care of my German side) and, last night, I attended a Burns Dinner (appealing to my Scottish side).

Rachel calls the Wagner "that Star Trek opera," becasue she came home while the giants, who looked a lot like Klingons, were singing in Das Rheingold.

The Burns Dinner was fantastic. One of my Prov colleagues and his wife hosted it, and we followed most of the Burns litany. We toasted the haggis* (and then ate the haggis), we read poems, we used the Selkirk grace. Michael's wife, Kyla, more than out did her herself on the food: I may never have had roast lamb as good as that.

* For those of you who don't know, haggis is made with sheep's 'pluck' (heart, liver and lungs), minced with oatmeal and spices, mixed with stock. It's traditionally boiled in the animal's stomach for an hour. It looks like a big sausage and tastes MUCH better than it sounds.

So let's forget about it

I have just returned for submitting 3 copies of my dissertation to Grad Studies. The process from here? Those copies are distributed to my committee (including the external reader). They submit a form when they've read the dissertation and from there Grad Studies sets up a defense date. If everything goes according to plan, I'll get my PhD three days before my next birthday!!!

In other news: I'm becoming a serious fan of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen. Das Rheingold has been on my iPod all week. Who knew German opera could be so fun?

This is the end, beautiful friend, the end

In less than one week, I shall to submitting my PhD dissertation to Graduate Studies for distribution. They will send the copies out to the members of my committee and sometime in the next few months, I will be defending it before a committee of my peers. My entire time in Winnipeg has been building up to this moment.

And when it is all over, I shall sleep.

Song instead of a kiss

One of my classes started today. I thought I was prepared. After all, it was just an introduction: "Hey, I'm Mike, etc."

Nothing too taxing.

Well, upon my arrival at the school, I tried to photocopy the syllabus. You'd think that the button that says 2->1 means that the photocopier is going to take two separate pieces of paper and doubleside them, right? Well, if you think that you'd be very, very wrong. Apparently that button means that the photocopier will take a 2 SIDED document and reproduce each side on a separate piece of paper. How many people actually use this function?

The long and the short of it: instead of cutting the number of pages of the ayllabus in half, I wound up doubling it. I photocopied a whole blank page for the back side of every piece of paper. I ended up with a stack of papers to rival my longest chapter. There's a bit more photocopy-drama as I try to get everything in order, but nothing too serious. I eventually get all the syllabi together, have lunch, and head off to class. I walked into the room ... and realize there are a lot of students in the room.

My class this semester is 37 students, almost a dozen more than last semester. So, I'm a little surprised by that. I believe started with, "Good afternoon, everyone ... My goodness, there are a lot of you."

I pass out the syllabi, and then the heat hits me. It was like a sauna in that classroom - at least 10 degrees wamrer than the hallway. The air was thick and heavy, like the air in a gym after an aerobics class. I was suddenly very sleepy. I cracked a window, but it didn't help. (Must remember: no sweaters this semester.) I tried to be hardline on a couple of things - due dates, participation, plagarism - but all I wanted to do was curl up and nap. When I finally dismissed them for the day, the collar of my shirt was soaked with sweat. Very attractive, friends.

You will resume your callow ways

Not much to report today, other than some awesome dissertation news. I'm only a few steps from handing the damned thing in. Just got word that my advisor's really happy with the last chapter I submitted (a whopping 62 page chapter on film noir). There are just some minor revisions and another chapter to submit Wednesday. Then just some copy editing, an intro, conclusion and an abstract! WOOO! Once all this craziness is through, there's going to be a party. And some of you are invited!

Oh, and games night the other day was F.U.N. Jenga? Yeah, we kicked its "block-from-the-bottom" butt.

The Ipod's rocking Brandburg Concertos this week. Run out and tell a friend.

A junk yard fool with eyes of gloom

Happy 12th Night, friends! This is it, the twelfth day of Christmas, kiddies. I hope you all get your twelve drummers drumming. I mailed them on Monday.

"The Office" continues to be the best show on American television. The past few episodes (one penned by original Office creators, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant; another directed by Harold Ramis) have been the smartest, funniest of a very funny season. Last night's was no exception. The show is smart, funny, and, most importantly, radically different type of sitcom. The scene of Pam crying in the hall almost killed me, but crystalizes what I love so much about the show. The writers have enough faith in the audience to leave the subtext of the scene as subtext. There was no overt explanation for her crying, no talking head segment "I was sad because..."

I just found out that one of my co-workers at the UM Press has become addicted to the show. In the words of Tommy, "'come to my lair' said the spider to the fly."

Listening to: Beta Band's "Dry the Rain" on repeat. Spray on dust IS the greatest thing.

When you drunk my health in scented jasmine tea

Not much to say today, but given the overwhelming response to my return I figured I'd better post something. Can't disappoint the fans. (That's dripping with sarcasm, BTW)

Okay, what's new? Well, I really want to see Guillermo del Toror's new flick, Pan's Labyrinth. While I never bothered with Hellboy or Blade 2, I loved The Devil's Backbone. Too bad no one in Winnipeg has Pan yet, though I really don't have time to see it right now anyway.

On a darker, more embarassing note, I find myself strangely drawn to "The Facts of Life" season 3 which my wife just bought. Must be strong. I'm sure that it's only the appeal of completely mindless television and the idea of simple answers to difficult questions in a time of great mental exhaustion. Surely, nothing good that way lies.

Currently on the Ipod: Rolling Stone's Let it Bleed.

No one ever said it would be this hard

All right... the blog silence is broken, and another year of inane posting begins. Sorry for the lack of posting. I really did think I'd get a chance to post while I was in Saskatoon, but I never even bothered to check my email.

Saskatoon was nice. A week away from the dissertation was just what the doctor ordered. I didn't even watch any of the "work" movies that I brought along. Although we did see MANY movies, most of which I really, really liked.

1) Little Miss Sunshine Brilliant. Almost peed myself during the dance at the end of the movie.

2) The Good Shepherd De Niro's film about the early days of the CIA. I liked it, but felt it was a little overlong. Good acting throughout, though Matt Damon hardly seemed to age. I was also a little distracted by his son's physical appearance (ie, it was hard to imagine that Damon and Angelina Jolie had a kid so unattractive).

3) Casino Royale Best Bond film ever. A gritty and intelligent turn in a franchise that had turned to the worst of the Moore era with an abundance of ridiculous gadgets and silly names. Daniel Craig was great as a novice Bond.

4) For Your Consideration Christopher Guest's take on Hollywood lacks the sparkle of his previous films. While there are some wonderful scenes (Fred Willard's hair deserved its own credit), the film failed to build to anything. It just sort of ended.

5) An Inconvenient Truth This Al Gore documentary should be required viewing. I think if Gore had shown this much passion and personality during his Presidential campaign, the world would look a little different today.

6) Charade Yes, Cary Grant was far too old to be romantically linked with Audrey Hepburn, but who cares? This is one of the smartest, most enjoyable non-Hitchcock caper films.

7) Love Actually My in-laws asked us to bring this along, thinking they'd not seen it before. They realized almost immediately that they had, but we all watched it anyway.

8) Once Upon a Time in the West How does Sergio Leone make the perennially likable Henry Fonda so evil? Magic. Claudia Cardinale may be one of the great screen beauties of all time.

Flew home yesterday to discover that Winnipeg had been hit with 30 cm of snow. Spent a good portion of New Year's morning shovelling my car out. Stupid snow.

Now that the holidays have come to an abrupt end, I'm back at work, type, type typing away.

Let nothing you afright

Well, it's 2:00 in the afternoon on the 22nd of December. I have a busy couple of days coming up (dissertation editing, Christmas-y stuff), so I don't know when I'll be able to get on here again. Of course, saying that, I'll now manage to post a record number of entries in the next couple of days.

My bestest friend, Jaimie, sent me a link to a site that reported Santa's been cleared to fly on the 24th. Good stuff. I was worried. His health can't be good.

Anyway, I wanna wish all my readers and all my lurkers... a very Merry Christmas. Stay safe, eats lots, and watch a holiday classic with someone you love (even if that someone is yourself).

Pax

M~

PS - If you want to know what I'd like for Christmas: 10'000 hits by the New Year. Any chance you all could help me with that?

Hangin' my stockin' I can hear you knockin': Zat you, Santa Claus

After doing this blog for four years, it's hard to remember what I have and haven't written about. I'm pretty sure that in Christmases past I've listed my favourite Christmas songs; last year, I detailed Christmas in the Netherlands with St. Nicholas and Black Peter...but I don' think I've ever listed some of my favourite holiday movies. So that's what I'm going to do this year. These are, in no particular order films I try to watch every holiday season. Some will be the classics that appear on everyone's list, some will be hidden treasure that you've never heard of before.

1) Miracle of Morgan's Creek (1944) I love Preston Sturges movies and The Lady Eve might just be the best comedy ever made. Miracle is a great holiday movie because it's so wonderfully, shockingly subversive! It's about a girl, Trudy Kockenlocker (how did that name get by the censors?), who goes to a GI dance with her friend, Norval Jones. Well, Trudy has such a good time that she winds up married and pregnant... but has no idea who the father might be. Norval steps up and tries to do the right thing. It all comes to a head at Christmas ... a fitting time for a young girl who's been unexpectedly knocked up to deliver her "miracle" child.

2) It's a Wonderful Life (1946) This classic film deserves every iota of praise. A truly inspired reinterpretation of Dickens' A Christmas Carol with George Bailey, a good and honest man who has placed the interests of others ahead of himself, believing that his life has been misspent. This film reveals the fragility of life - suggesting that one person could make the difference between a whole community's happiness/success and misery. This is my advisor's favourite movie of all time, and the fact that he lost a job at a prestigious American university because he unrelentingly defended this film when someone's wife dismissed it as sentimental nonsense makes me proud.

3) Scrooge (aka A Christmas Carol) (1951) Many versions of Dickens' ghost story of Yuletide redemption have been made over the years, but this is the definitive. Anyone who tells you otherwise is an absolute moron. I feel as deeply and passionately about this film as any other. I usually watch it three or four times a year and can recite most of the dialogue from memory. One of the great joys and proudest moments of my dissertation has been working this film into a highly praised chapter on Dickens adaptations.

4 & 5) About a Boy (2002) and Love Actually (2003) I can't imagine there are many other people with two Hugh Grant films on their must-see holiday lists, but both of these films are great Christmas movies. In About a Boy Grant's character is haunted by his father's very popular, but ultimately innocuous Christmas song, "Santa's Super Sleigh". All but rejecting the holiday, he holes himself up in his apartment watching Frankenstein until he learns that family can be about a community you choose. In Love Actually Grant is one of a dozen or so actors whose intertwined stories portray the highs and lows of the holiday season.

6) Santa Claus (1954) I'm pretty sure I could only ever sit through the "Mystery Science Theatre 3000" version of this piece of Mexican yule-poo (that's for you, Kyler). I recently inflicted this on some friends... and I'm not sure they'll ever forgive me. Basic premise: Santa and his multinational child labourers battle the devil, Pitch, who tries to convince children to steal, vandalize and be naughty. You read that right. Santa fights the devil. I'm sure it's going for "quaint," but it hits "creepy" nearly every single time. Particularly disturbing are the giant toy reindeer that pull Santa's sleigh, Pitch's Busby Berkleyesque dancing, and most of Santa's facial expressions.

Wassail! wassail! all over the town

At about four thirty this morning, my eyes opened. I was wide awake, and there was nothing I could do to get back to sleep. After trying and trying, I decided, at about five o'clock, to give up and go downstairs.

I flipped on the television and scrolled through the guide to see what was on. I'm hardly ever up at five o'clock in the morning any more and was disappointed to find only cable access quality religious programming, infomercials and a rerun of "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air". I reluctantly chose to spend my early morning with Will Smith.

It was one I'd seen before: Vanessa Williams guest starred as a very pregnant sports reporter who takes Will to see the Lakers. In the limo in the gridlock of traffic, Williams goes into labour and delivers her baby while Will freaks out around her.

The episode, though, was fascinating, not as a result of the plot or the actors. It was the same old sitcom formula, with lots of pratfalls and mugging for the camera. What was fascinating was what episodes like this have done to me and what fears these types of plots have instilled in me.
I am terrified of being around pregnant women, because television has taught me that they will go off at any moment. Television has programmed me to believe that 99% of all births occur in elevators, buses, cars (often taxi cabs) and other enclosed spaces. And, more often than not, these infants are delivered by untrained, panicky men who just happened to get in the same elevator or the same car.

There's a woman at Booth who's very pregnant. She's very nice, but from now on I'm going to avoid her just in case.

Although, if I do happen to wind up in the same small space with her while she's giving birth, I should rest assure: sitcoms have also taught me a few other things about the wonderful miracle of birth.

1) "water breaking" is something women feel with no
external signs to indicate something is happening- in other words,
there isn't actually any "water"
2) children are born looking about 4-5 months old and are very clean; also,
umbilical cords are a myth, as is the placenta
and 3) while women scream a lot (and it's very funny), birth is
a relatively quick and messless process which virtually anyone can
coach a woman through it.

The Boys of the NYPD choir were singing Galway Bay

I turned in my grades for one course and have started marking the exams that my students wrote yesterday. Those will be the final grading of 2006. I wasn't planning on doing any marking last night, but decided I should at least get started. I marked five or six legible exams. There are a few more legible exams to go, then the pile of "My-goodness-did-you-write-this-with-the-pen-in-you-mouth?" exams.

It's best to save those to the end.

But ya' gotta shout and ya gotta swing out

The Swing and Big Band Christmas album I was listening to in the car today might be the toe-tappin'est Christmas Album I own. While "Fairytale of New York" is the greatest Christmas song ever written, the version of "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" might be the most fun.

Just thought I'd share that. Don't really have much more to say on the subject.

My new favourite expression? "Oh, kitten." I can't thankmy new favourite colleague, Kara, enough for bringing it to my attention. I can't remember who uses it, but I'm taking it over. It's to be employed when someone says something stunningly naive or innocent or fabrication and you (don't) want to crush their little bubble of reality. Ideally, you'd also pat/pet the person's head while saying it. For example, a student told me today that writing my exam was "a lot of fun." On the outside, I smiled and nodded. On the inside? "Oh, kitten."

When ya' first took my hand on that cold Christmas eve, ya promised me Broadway was waitin' for me

So, I'm on the bus this morning. Good stories always take place on the bus. Where else are you going to find such a varied sampling of the ol' gene pool? Anywho, this guy, maybe 18 years old, gets on. We'll call him, "Frank." That's probably not his name, but FRANK-ly he looked rather silly, so Frank it is.

First of all, he's wearing spike bracelets. Now I know some people here (and I'm looking at you jpunk5) wear spike bracelets and look cool. You wear them with t-shirts with bands no one's ever heard of and jeans. Frank did not look cool. At all. In fact, I'd say he looked the opposite of cool....Wait, that's warm, isn't it? That's not right either.

It's winter and Frank's wearing a jacket, which is smart. It's cool out there. It's a nice enough jacket, looks like one of those high school jackets with the leather arms. You know, the kind people I hung out with in highs school would have never bought. Except he has one sleeve rolled up to the elbow. He's wearing one spike bracelet around his wrist (all right), and another around the top of his forearm holding his sleeve up (not all right at all). And they were serious spikes too, with various sizes and pointy-nesses. Frank completed his look with grey twill pants and puffy winter boots. He was so shockingly average, but with these horrible spikes on his exposed arm. I don't want to speculate too much, but he might have been coming to or from a Dungeons and Dragons party. D&D is definitely in this boy's future.

knew of two sisters whose name it was Christmas

It's quiet here today. Rachel had a speaking engagement this morning, and I've spent the morning puttering around -marking papers, watching the telly.

The fridge adventures continue, as it seems we're getting a new stove as well. Well, a new-to-us stove. The old stove matched the old fridge (a colour called Golden Rod); the new fridge, though, is white. So our wonderful landlords are switiching our stove with their almost new, white stove at their cottage sometime this week. So the house is still in a state of chaos, but the end is in sight.

Do you hear what I hear?

This is my first post with the new Beta-blogger. I'm usually terrified of change. I also have several YEARS of old posts I'm not willing to get rid of (not that I figure anyone reads them). Still, needs must. I have switched over and everything seems to have transfered.

I have to take a little break from marking to relate the wond'rous story of our new fridge.

I mentioned a little while ago that our old fridge was dying. We've spent the last week using up all perishable food items and ordering food in, because you know how swans are supposed to sing when they're about to die? Well, fridges do too, apparently. This one was singing and could have stopped at any moment. Anyway, our landlords went out that Monday to buy us a new fridge, which couldn't be delivered until yesterday. Not a problem. A couple of days eating take out? Sounds good to me. We didn't even have to be there when it was delivered as the landlords were home!

Now you have to remember that we live on the second and third story of a house, an old Wolseley house with a narrow staircase with a couple of landings. This fridge had to come up this staircase. So Thursday night Rachel and I moved everything to could hinder/get broken by people moving a large, heavy appliance: pictures came off walls, our coats and winter accessories were relocated to the study, boots and shoes moved to the basement. We also moved our kitchen table and chairs, as well as the rug we have under that table, into the living room so that there was nothing in the way in the kitchen.

When I got home yesterday I was pleased to see the old fridge in the backyard. New fridge! I thought to myself. My landlord was there to greet me as I opened the door.

"I have a story for you," she said. Uh-oh, that's never good. "The new fridge came. It's a brand-new one from Sears." So far so good. We were expecting/would have been happy with a refurbed one. "They got it up stairs and plugged it in, we signed for it and it wasn't until they left..." Wait for it, wait for it. "that we realized it's the wrong fridge."

Apparently, they'd purchased a Kenmore and the store delivered a Maytag. Anyway, the gist was this: Sears was going to get back to them about possibly exchanging it. We could use it, but shouldn't take the tape off the shelves/drawers just in case. This was 5:30. I phoned Rachel, hoping she hadn't gone to pick up a whole mess o' groceries.

We decided to move the table back into the kitchen so we could watch television, but left everything else. If they were going to come back Friday or Saturday there was no point putting everything back only to move it again. So, the large rug is folded up, the kitchen chairs are in the living room, the various hallway items are scattered around the house.

Got a call from the landlords this morning: we're keeping the Maytag. WHOOOOO!!!

What's the sense of hurtin' my pride?

Well, classes are over for another year. I have a mountain of marking, an exam to write, give and mark, and then I can enjoy the holiday season. To that end, Rachel put up one of our Christmas trees.

I say "one," because we actually have two. We have a traditional tree that's a little too big for our current apartment; we also have Tinsely. Tinsely was put up this year for the very first time.

I'm generally not crazy about aluminium Christmas trees (nightmares of the over-commerialized tree lot Charlie Brown visits), but Tinselly has sort of grown on me. This past week Rachel and I have spent the evenings watching Christmas specials on DVD and basking in Tinsely's Christmas magic. It's certainly better than no Christmas tree (which was what we decided last year).

In other news: we've also spent the last week basking in the death throes of our fridge. On Sunday the fridge started making strange noises, sometimes sounding like a whimpering puppy, other times like a car trying to turn over. Since Monday the sounds been pretty consistently on par with a kettle whistling. But tomorrow a new fridge is on its way. The benefits of renting? Broken fridge: not our problem! The landlords went out Monday and bought us a new fridge.

Finally, there's been a minor development in the plagarist story. As it's an on going thing, I'm not comfortable giving details, but I will say this: "pathetic excuse" has been re-defined. Seriously, in all the cases of this I've had in my career, I have yet to hear a convincing excuse: "I handed in the wrong paper," "I forgot a works cited," "My friend helped me, it must have been her!" How stupid do people think their professors are? I would be more willing to cut slack to someone who came to see and said something like "I screwed up. I tried to take a shortcut and got caught. I'm very sorry." Lame excuses make it so much worse. Not only did they think they duped me by passing in someone else's work, but when I call them on it they try to dupe me again.

They can't take that away from me

I think I need a new name. Mike is just so boring. I was walking past an HMV the other day and saw all kinds of new and exciting names, names like Lil Chingy, MF Doom and Todd. I don't think I'm cool enough to pull off one of those awesome names, but I thnk I could handle something more adventurous than Mike.

Put some records on while I pour

Our nine year old houseguest gave us an excellent excuse for enjoying some "young at heart" activites this weekend. On Friday night we braved the blowing snow and cold to drive through the Winter Wonderland at the Red River Ex grounds. Rachel and I have been going to these things with her family each Christmas season, but this is the first time we checked out Winnipeg's version. It was hands down the best one (better than something from Saskatchewan!?!) - it had way more light displays, a skating rink, a horse drawn sleigh and mini-doughnuts, which are what I imagine crack is like.

After a morning spent watching cartoons that I couldn't quite follow (I just didn't udnerstand what Danny Phantom was supposed to be), we headed off to the theatre to watch Flushed Away. Again, I was pretty impressed. I love the Wallace and Gromit claymation stuff and was a little skeptical about a CGI version of that style. A few lackluster reviews had moved this from a title I woulnd't mind seeing to "renter," but I really liked this film. I could have done without half the "guy gets crotched" jokes (which still would have featured as many groinings as an episode of "America's Funniest Home Videos"), but the story was enjoyable and the attention to detail was excellent.

In other news: A florist on Portage Ave has a sign on the street advertising "Bokays". It took a couple of reads to figure out what they were trying to say.