i like them and i am one. being drunk in the afternoon is like being high in highschool. a pleasant feeling. gah. i have adopted a dog. his name is Sir Guy Altamont III. He’s a darling. Hahaha, now I need a truck and a job. I am on my way to greatness people!
I wasn’t aware of Italy’s animal cruelty laws until reading an article about lobsters. WHAT?! Yes, I am afraid it’s true. It seems that Italy has some of the toughest animal cruelty laws around. I am all for walking a dog three times a day (though being fined for not doing it seems a little outrageous), I’m even ok with the prevention of using dogs to beg. Where it goes a little too far is banning round goldfish bowls (oh yeah they need regular sized aquariums) and in this case putting live lobsters on ice. It seems that in Rome an Italian restaurant was fined 688 euros (around 850 bucks) for a display that they had in 2002 where the lobsters were displayed on ice which in turn causes the lobsters a slow suffocating death.
Excuse me?! I guess getting dipped into a boiling pot of water is a more “humane” way to kill lobsters. I’m sure that as a crustacean it feels awesome to have your insides boiled to death. Hmmmm insides being boiled or suffocating to death. I pick suffocation. Though it is said that lobsters don’t feel a thing while being boiled. It’s also true that most lobsters are shipped to Italy packed in ice. I guess while they’re at it they should just stop eating lobster all together. They’ll have to settle for that funny fake crab meat made out of surimi, a fish that is then heavily processed. But that’s only if they’re kept in regular aquariums right?
On a little bit of a tangent: It’s a good thing (for horror fans) that these laws weren’t in place during the 70’s or I don’t think they would have made Zombie or Cannibal Holocaust. Italian film makers during this time were drugging sharks and eating sea turtles, which actually banned Cannibal Holocaust in it’s native land (and 60 other countries). I’ll take the sea turtle lobster ravioli please.
Tags:
Lobster
Italy
Animal Rights
I pick Hemingway because out of any author his sentences were the most easily constructed and may be emulated in bird speech by Starlings. It’s been discovered, by scientist Tim Gentner, that these songbirds can be trained to
This kind of experiment has failed before when using monkeys, but then again it was administered in a different way. It is also possible that Starlings are more apt for this kind of experiment. They do use vocals to communicate more than non-human primates seem to. I like to think that apes and monkeys communicate more through facial expressions and gestures rather then vocally. Starlings sing. One thing (a little disappointing) that Gentner failed to do was record the Starlings’ response to the recordings he was using to train them. It would have been interesting to see if a pattern developed. Whatever the case this study has prompted a new and interesting debate in linguistics.
Tags:
Linguistics
What did I do all day? Well other then look for a job, I went to this really cool art gallery near the coffee shop I frequent. It inspired me to create a shadow box based on my father. The best thing about living across the street from Alanna and Breanne is that I can go over there and use all of their art materials even when they aren’t home. Which they weren’t.
I had two pictures of my father that I discretely took from a drawer in a side table inside my parents’ house. One is of him playing around with what is presumably a cap gun. The other is him with his mother (who died when he was 15, and I regrettably never met) on Halloween. I used a PH neutral glue to attach the pictures to a cardboard material used in book binding so that the pictures wouldn’t be eaten away slowly by some acidic glue. I also attached different clippings from magazines that remind me of my father to the same material. The paper on the back was something Bre had laying around (thankfully). Everything within the box means something special to me and it’s a fabulous way to remember and preserve my father. I also seem to be extremely good at creating shadow boxes. It’s a really good creative outlet for me. If anyone wants one I would be more then happy to make one for you or If anyone would like to know more about how to make one I would be happy to explain. Hot glue guns and a non acidic glue are key.
I got this yesterday at Fine Line. Max did it and he is awesome.
Over the weekend, or last night rather, I went to a cabin in the mountains of New Mexico. Don’t ask me which ones because I don’t know. It was Shelby’s coming of age that we were there for, though I am not sure that she has really become a woman. It was very cleansing. Writing things on paper and burning those pieces of paper is such a simple thing to do, yet such a relieving thing to do. Just another form of prayer. We lit candles, gave gifts, told stories, and just generally shared an experience together. Just the ladies doing our thing. I have posted pictures on flickr.
Inside the cabin was decorated circa 1971. Nothing in it was new and it was comforting. It is also a great location for a horror film. Alanna and I discussed it and we were thinking about involving some Native American myths/folklore. I haven’t seen a good movie about that almost ever. Not in recent memory anyway. The film would be a simple ghost/monster type story. I envision it opening with a bunch of kids going on this trip. They get to our cabin and have a campfire and exchange ghost stories, thoroughly freaking each other out. And go from there. I have been a flood with ideas lately. I hope no big shots are reading my blog and stealing my ideas. Errrrrr.
Concepts I wish Had Been Revealed:
Things I Wish I was told:
Life is change
Do not fear but
Understand.
If not change
Then static boredom.
There are reasons
Even if masked in
rANdOmnEsS
Learn, Observe, groW
Through Self awareness.
Beware Self consciousness.
Perceive perspectives;
Everyone one has different
Eyes.
Memories
Can be W A
A L
R T
P E
E R
D, E
D.
{Higher Power} Judgement sits at
The side of a {see above}
Do what you enjoy
Not what others tell
You what they think
You’d excel at
Be careful where you
LEND
Your love.
Remember it’s yours
And it’s easily
B r
o k
En.
If things seem
U N KN OW N
Then ask. Always ask.
Cowards do not.
Bravery is essential to
Survival.
this looks better in word.
About 4 years ago I worked two jobs. One was the morning shift at the Circle Shell station. I would arise at 5 in the morning a make the dark and cold journey to the shell station, opening and then waiting for Al to come in with my coffee. Afterwards I would come home at 2pm and have a few hours to clean the gasoline from my body and lounge around the shitty house that i was pretty much squatting in. During this time i would usually lay on my mattress and listen to two radio hosts that were obscene, yet hilarious. 
Their names were Opie and Anthony but fans call them O&A for short. I would listen to their program while i got ready for my other job at Flemington Family restaurant. They lightened my otherwise grueling day. They had bits where one (i can’t remember which) guessed the age of a person by their taint, or the 50 gallon drum challenge in which contestants were confined to said drums and have awful things thrown in (often CD’s of awful comedians and snakes). It was mindless entertainment, but that’s what my brain needed at that precise moment of the day. Then in 2002 Infinity Broadcasting kicked my beloved hosts off the air. The reason being an act of sex that was aired live. Listeners participating in a contest where put on the air having sex in New York’s St. Patrick’s Cathedral. An era in live entertainment was over. In 2004 O&A were picked up and syndicated on XM radio. A girl who pretty much steals her internet doesn’t have the money to pay for XM so alas I didn’t get to hear those silly shock jocks.
Things, however, are looking up. It seems that David Lee Roth has been canned and they (CBS radio) are replacing him with O&A. XM has agreed to syndicate their show to 6 markets (not including Albuquerque, but i bet i can listen online) and keep an exclusive two hours for their listeners. I may not be able to get the whole show, but at least I may be able to listen to some of it occasionally. The coolest part of the whole deal is that O&A have finally taken Howard Stern’s coveted morning slot, something they have deserved for a long time.
Tags:
Opie and Anthony
O&A
Radio
Breakfast on Pluto (Out on DVD) follows the life of a transvestite named Patrick (aka Kitten) during the 70’s and 60’s in Ireland/London. The film is a little over two hours and overthetop Cillian Murphy stars as Kitten. We open with a scene in which the adult Kitten is getting catcalled by construction workers and wheeling around a baby.
Cut to a title screen that indicates a chapter and a title; something like: 1 In which I was abandoned. The reason for the title screens is that the film was based off of a book by Patrick McCabe, an author that Neil Jordan (INTERVEIW WITH THE VAMPIRE) seems to like working with (THE BUTCHER BOY). No mind. Title screens like that are lazy and insulting. If I want to know what’s going on in the film I will watch it, not lazily look at the screen and then think “Gee that’s what’s going to happen”. The only thing worse than title screens are ones that don’t even really accomplish their goal. You would think that they would bring some semblance to the film, but the vignettes are rudely hinged together. It was all over the place with bad transitions and poor explanations for certain events that take place in the film. There were times when I was confused and a title screen certainly didn’t help with my confusion. There are some fantasy sequences that are highly entertaining but in order to get to them you have to watch the rest of the movie.
People may also tell you (and if you read any synopsis) that this film is about a crossdressing cabaret singer. Not really. It’s about a transvestite who lives in a different reality and therefore can’t seem to keep herself out of trouble. There’s not much singing or acting (on stage anyway). Cillian Murphy (BATMAN BEGINS, RED EYE) is doing his impression of a crossdresser and it’s pretty good. I love Cillian Murphy because he’s such a bad actor. Every role I’ve seen him in has been exaggerated almost to the point of vaudvillian. It works in this film though because Kitten herself is such a bad actress. Liam Neeson (also in BATMAN with Cillian) plays a priest who watches after Kitten. He does his best at feeling guilty and awkward. I don’t really like Neeson so I have a bit of a bias. He does do a pretty excellent job in this film though.
Yet how many times can I watch the same movie (albeit slightly altered)? If you’ve seen Hedwig and the Angry Inch or Velvet Goldmine and you want to revisit them in a film that’s not even as good, or if you’re really dying to watch a film about war torn Ireland from a crossdresser’s perspective then be my guest. Even the performances couldn’t save this disjointed, somewhat sloppy, and looooong film, which I wouldn’t have watched based on content alone unless it was with someone that did (curses Alana!).
I went to Immaculate Conception Parish today. I wasn’t really even meaning to go during a service. Just to light some candles and send some prayers out. I walked in on a Spanish service though. It was pretty beautiful. There was some nice singing and guitar music. The church itself was pulchritudinous (ooo new word). Gold everywhere. I lit a candle. I stood when everyone else did but I did not kneel. I just sat. I didn’t take communion either. It didn’t seem right. I felt very good, but now I am sleepy and I need the pillow.
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