Historical Dollhouse

An old friend of mine from school found out about my love/obsession with dollhouses and very generously gave me an old dollhouse she found in her barn! She's living in an old old house in Indiana and is remodeling it. The house was in pretty bad shape having apparently spent the last 50 years or so in a barn, and I literally spent a full year in paralysized contemplation about whether to put in new wallpaper and floors or just restore as much as possible. The wallpaper inside is so pretty and I'm fairly certain it's a lithography printing. It has a gorgeous art deco trompe l'oeil scene downstairs and a darling flowered print upstairs. A wall swings out to give access to the interior and you can also lift off the roof. After some research, it seems like it's from the Schoenhut dollhouse company (Philadelphia) and was probably made in the 1930s.

 Here's how it looked when I got it

and here it is cleaned up a bit - the pressed cardboard roof is a little shinier now, but otherwise I didn't change anything on the exterior but wipe off the cobwebs.

This is the swinging out door - it had a lot of yellow crayon some child must have applied.

Here's a before an after I really love - a lot more crayon from an interprising child (unpopular opinion:  Dollhouses are not for Children!)

after:

And here's that great art deco scene on the first floor before and...

after!

To my incredible delight, what I thought was torn paper was actually just paper stuck on there!  So with some delicate application of moisture and gentle nudging, I was able to remove all of it!  There is, alas, a tear in the middle of the wall, but an amazing improvement overall.  

I was also able to clean up the floor which also had the most enchanting wood grain you've ever seen...

Here's a sort of before and after that shows the difference.  I cleaned with first a mixture of vinegar and water, then lemon and water, then... dare I say it... Magic Eraser which really did the trick.  Of course you have to be very very careful.  If you clean too much, you'll Magic Erase the whole damn thing.

After all that cleaning, I really didn't want to touch it very much, and since I wasn't able to find the exact house (although similar ones) online, I have to think it's pretty rare.  I offered it back to my friend, and also mentioned we could donate it to a local history museum, and because she's super-cool, she wants to donate it.  I couldn't be more pleased.  

Way up there

I lost a friend recently.  A friend I actually never met in person but nevertheless had a close kinship with.  For a while we really supported each other's writing through our blogs, back in the early aughts when I updated this blog at least once a week instead of every other year.  We both loved crafting and reading and feminism and music.  We traded favorite songs and favorite books and mailed each other little things we made.  She was generous and funny and an enthusiastic friend.  Looking back through my social media she is always there, making my Facebook memories a landmine of reminders and grief.  She was my Online Friend but she was my Friend. She gave good advice and cut through the bullshit.  I think it's clear she shared at least two of my love languages, "Quality Time" and "Words of Affirmation" and she lavished both of those on my online self - on my self.  She had those qualities I cherish in a friend: Steadfastness. Kindness. Generosity of spirit.

Recently I heard a song and knew she would have loved it.  She loved nearly every song I shared with her as she had a welcoming ear and a joy in discovering new music, the same as me.  The song is French and I didn't understand the lyrics very well.  When I looked them up - it seems like this song could have been written about her.  

Au delà des fourbes apparences Derrières nos loups de circonstance Sous nos masque cousus d'espérance Se cachent les fêlures de l'enfance De l'enfance

Beyond deceitful appearances Behind our occasional wolves Under our masks sewn with hope Hidden are the cracks of childhood From childhood

For about the last few years we haven't been as close. I thought it was mainly because I had stepped back from social media a little bit and perhaps she had too.  Honestly during most of the pandemic I had so much stress and anxiety I couldn't deal with anyone's problems but my own.  I saw her make a few cries for help on Facebook and I disregarded them.  I think of how casually we lived/are living with chaos.  How texts to and from my best friends would go something like "I can't go on like this" and "lol SAME".  When I heard she died alone in a hotel room my heart was pierced not only with the sadness of loss but the thought that I should have reached out and didn't.  I learned that she was going through some devastating personal losses, the kinds I can hardly imagine.  

L'air de rien on n'est pas mal tout là haut On goûte aux étoiles tout là haut On oublie nos certitudes On chérit la solitude A faire une escale tout là haut A nourrir le calme tout là haut On ne joue plus d'artifice On sait pourquoi on existe

Like air, we are not bad up there We taste the stars up there We forget our certainties We cherish loneliness To make a stopover up there To feed the calm up there We no longer play tricks We know why we exist

Although she was taken from us too soon and too terribly, I hope she finds peace tout là haut/"up there", away from the fray of this earth. At least for me, I'll think of her whenever I hear certain songs, and probably every time I look at Facebook.

She died on her birthday, a day, I know, she was flooded with messages on Fb from friends and family. On my birthday, I want to say: I'll miss you, my friend, and I'm so sorry. You were loved.

Gift Lists!

Have you ever bought anything off a Gift List?  I love reading them, but they're pretty useless.  I scour Lists for Dads looking for something for my Very Hard to Shop For Dad, but find things like SOCKS?  GRILL-RELATED? SPORTS-RELATED? A $25 Banana Hat from this list? Have they ever even met a dad?  They already have all things, socks, sports, grill, banana.  

The 27 Absolute Best, Wirecutter-Approved White Elephant Gifts Under $25 sounded promising, but held the usual collection of socks and adult coloring books.  I have enough adult coloring books to color every day of the rest of my adult life.  

Mike told me about a list called "56 gifts every woman in your life would love to receive" which included a Menopod Instant Cooling Device." Thank you, husband, for thinking about my menopause needs - although the description "Get near-instant relief from menopausal hot flashes and sweats with this palm-sized, electronic gadget" made me think it zaps you into temporary unconsciousness (yes, please!)

Hey, I could write a pretty good gift guide, is something I thought to myself, even though I prefer to make most of my gifts, and most people are already drowning in a bunch of garbage they don't need.  

Poetry for Neanderthals - $13.  This game looks fun and includes an inflatable club.  What could go wrong?

Set - $8.85.  I love Set because you can play it with people of all ages.   Literally like 3 year olds and 70 year olds.  

Spot It - $27?  That's ridiculous.  Don't pay that much.

Another game you can play with people of all ages.  Spot It also has a lot of variations like Camping Spot It and Sports Spot It and so on.  I have a soft spot for plain old Spot It because it has a few weird symbols that you just have to make up a name for like, "Handface!"and "Orange Guy!"

It's dumb not to have a jade roller and gua sha tool - get one for every woman you know.  Then you get them a small bottle of argan oil or rose oil and you're done.  BOOM. Perfect. Works for dudes too, but not dads.  Not my dad.

A very fancy lipstick.  Get your best gal a fancy pants lipstick that she might not buy for herself.  The finest one I know is this YSL for $38 (ask the salesperson for a shade that looks good on everyone).  People say Tom Ford is a very fine lipstick.  Tom Ford lipstick costs about ... $58.  That's a lot of money for lipstick.  

A fancy doorknob.  Guess what?  Literally everyone likes fancy doorknobs. This might be a good dad gift.  I have no idea.  The best gift my dad ever got, and said so, was a bucket full of stuff to wash his car with because Washing Cars is his Love Language.  Do not ask him about this, he will have no idea what a Love Language is.  

On John Wick II, Language, and Hoosiers

After diligently checking DoesTheDogDie.com, I watched John Wick 2 and was rather amazed at his foreign language abilities (not to mention his ability to get hit by a car, punched a million times, get shot in the actual kidney and still go on to kill like, literally 400 people).  First he meets a Russian gangster and tells him, in Russian, Let's have peace, this feud is over, etc.  Then, an Italian guy shows up in his house, and they converse, in Italian, about having coffee and becoming an assassin again.  THEN, I shit you not, there is a deaf assassin in the movie, and he starts talking to her in ASL.

I finally took an ASL course this year - something I've been wanting to do for many a year.  It was great to finally get started.  Obviously I'm nowhere near fluent but I want to keep practicing (there are some great tutorials online - try these if you're interested).  Speaking of languages, one of the best things I've read this year was The Idiot, a hilarious book about, amongst other things, the connection between language and thought, something that's been occupying my mind a lot recently.  Little did I know that John Wick, of all things, would continue to pique this interest.  Without a word for "assassin", for example, would John Wick have ever become that thing?  Naturally, I wanted to learn all the dirty words in sign language but that is an on-going education.

Here's a funny story:  My parents came to visit this weekend and I mentioned that, God forbid, if anything ever happened to M, I would most likely never love again, with the possible exception of my cheesemonger. "Due to his kind nature or something else?" asks my mom.  "Due to his knowledge of and access to cheese!" I said.

Mom tells me an old family friend loves talking about "Hoosier Go-to" and when asked to explain she said, "Oh, you know, who you would go to if your spouse died."  And I said, "Well, do they have to be a hoosier?" and then there was some confusion until I finally understood that she was not saying "Hoosier go-to" but rather "WHO'S your go-to" to which M shouted out, to general hilarity, "WHO'S EAR?"  A joke, I suppose, only Hoosiers will understand.

Twinsters

We watched this really wonderful documentary on netflix called Twinsters - it's about this American girl who was adopted from Korea as a baby.  She grew up in New Jersey, but now lives in LA and is an actress.  She did a webseries, and some guy in France watched it and thought the girl in the video was his friend, Anaïs,  He shares it with her on Facebook.  Anaïs messages the American (Sam) with her birthday and birth city.  Sam's is the same.

It's through the miracle of social media that these two find each other, despite Sam growing up in New Jersey and Anaïs growing up in France (then college in London), and it's through social media that they build their relationship - they skype right away (first talk=3 hours) they WhatsApp constantly (they even nickname each other "pop" - that little sound of a new message coming in).

It's amazing to me how utterly compatible they are right from the beginning.  It's Sam, the outgoing LA actress and budding filmmaker who has the instinct to record their initial meeting and ultimately make the documentary, so you see the amazing progression of this incredible story, yes, but more importantly you see the beautiful and immediate connection these two very sweet, loving girls form.  And, not only do the two girls fall instantly into sisterhood, but their adopted families immediately love and accept the other girl and her parents.  I just couldn't help but think, if I found my identical twin on the opposite side of the planet, she'd probably hate me and I'd think she was a jerk, and no way would our families get along.  Maybe that's just me because I'm a cynical, cold-hearted person?

The two girls eventually go to Korea together and attempt to find their birth mother.  They do find the women who fostered them for a few weeks before they were adopted out, which is so sweet because Anaïs tearfully says that she never really felt that her life began until she was arrived in France with her adopted parents - but was so overwhelmed to find that she really was loved and cared for as a baby in Korea, and that the woman who fostered her remembered her still.

Although the doc doesn't really get into the politics of international adoption, there's a lot of food for thought there.  It does get a bit into twin studies, as these two are a goldmine as identical twins who were raised apart.  To tell the truth, I'm real "Nurture" person when it comes to the whole Nature v. Nurture development debate but this film really blew apart some of my ideas.

Anyway, if you're looking for something to watch, it's utterly charming and has really given me a lot to think about lately.  As someone who really aches to be physically closer to her sister, I hope those two twins find an opportunity to live closer to each other soon.

old news: The Martian

I saw The Martian when it came out a few weeks ago, and wanted to write about it, but had a hard time putting it into words until I saw this by the great Sarah Mccarry (her blog is The Rejectionist) who writes, "who doesn’t love space, idiots is who, but what was missing from that movie for me was a sense of wonder, of joy, of holy shit guys we’re on Mars, look at the crazy nonsense human beings get up to for absolutely no reason: art, poetry, flying around in spaceships, discovering the secrets of the universe. For a movie in which things are constantly happening there is next to no interiority, so little joy or emotional truth, and so ultimately it’s boring."  Yes.  So much yes.

I liked The Martian but it sort of felt like a morality tale that was basically: When something bad happens, just figure out how to resolve it and get through it, dummy.  Which, whatever, that's fine.  That's a fine lesson for school children but is it a great movie?  Not really.  The whole time I'm wondering, doesn't Matt Damon have a family on Earth?  That he misses or even thinks about occasionally?  He's supposed to be out there alone for 3 years or whatever.  And even if he doesn't have anyone, why does he want to live anyway?  Like, take Gravity, an amazing movie - Sandra Bullock's daughter is dead, all joy is lost from her life, for some reason she goes to space, everything goes to shit, but you see her decide: Actually, I do want to live!  Simple - "emotional truth" that's exciting and beautiful and touching.

Anyway, this guy gets stuck on Mars by himself in a kind of Home Alone situation, and so he's like, I'd better start growing potatoes in my own shit pronto, and at the end of the movie, in case you didn't get it, (spoiler: he makes it) he talks to a group of incoming astronauts and says You Gotta Work the Problem.  And that's the point of the whole movie, I guess?

In other Mars news, many of my friends have been raving about a book called Red Rising, about a miner that lives on Mars.  So far, I really like it, although it was all too obvious the beautiful, passionate, 16 year old wife was not going to make it, and, what a surprise: she gets killed (didn't work the problem).

There's Bears in the Pool

What I love the most about this video is how the underlying subtext of both the Mama in the pool and the Mama in the window is Will You Idiots Give Me Two Seconds of Fucking Peace? Poor Mama Grizzly holds her cub’s head in both her gigantic paws and does that thing bears do where they seem like they’re going to bite your entire face off: Will you! Just. Quit. HANGING on me. Meanwhile Mama in the window’s eye rolls couldn’t be more obvious even though we never see her face. Her toddler is freaking out: There’s BEARS in the POOL! and whining: ONE IS EATING MY CAAAAAR. The dog’s barking, the husband’s disgruntled: Well, that’s it! The pool’s done for the summa. Moma in the window is like: It’s fine. Let them play. Will you! Just.

I thought this was all happening in like, northern Canada, but it turns out it’s fricking NEW JERSEY (I hear it in the Dad’s accent now). I guess it’s true that flora and fauna will quickly take over after we leave this Earth. There’ll only be the rare survivor of the apocalypse to whine about bears swimming in our pools and sleeping in our beds and eating our porridge.

Mama in the window is trying to enjoy the, I mean, really quite astounding visage of another mother relaxing in her pool - just like we do, leaning against the edge, resting her arms on the ledge and chucking out all the extraneous detritus. She just watches as bears ransack her already ransacked yard and dirty her already dirty pool. Her children are crying and whining about their domestic goods, her husband flips out and leaves (where did he go? I mean, WHAT is more interesting than 6 bears frolicking in your own corner of the world?) She only shows the slightest dismay that her expensive floaty is getting ripped to shreds by baby bears. She’s more afraid the Mama Bear will eat the chlorine or electrocute herself. Utterly sure the cubs will be fine - they’ll follow where their mother goes and she will protect them, that much is clear, just as her own cubs are perfectly fine in their suburban home one hour’s drive from Manhattan, separated by a fence from a wilderness full of bears.

Anyway, summer IS over and what a dramatic ending: THERE’S BEARS IN THE POOL! My own realization was no less shocking as I rode my bike to the beach for my last possible weekend day there and stepped into the 50 degree waters of Lake Michigan. It was like looking out my back window and seeing bears swimming in my proverbial pool. Summer IS OVER, y’all. Get out your sweaters, hide your kids, hide your floatie, hide your porridge. There’s bears in the pool.

me, riding my bike to work

Stuff I'm watching

I'm a die-hard Tom Cruise fan from way back.  Nothing shatters my loyalty, not the couch-jumping or the Scientology or anything.  Mission Impossible 5 (or whatever) is a fine addition to the MI movies, not as good as the first one or the last one but certainly not as bad as the second or the third one.  There's this new, beautiful (Impossibly beautiful!?!) actress named Rebecca Ferguson that does this nifty trick where she jumps up around a dude's neck and like, thighs him to death or something.  Jesus Christ if I could do that...

 Then there's the weird fact that Tom Cruise did that whole HANGING OFF A PLANE BIT FOR REALZ.  So what if he had a couple of safety harnesses OMG?????

I'm also watching True Detective which I really love but can hardly understand AT ALL.  I'm currently reading recaps to figure it out but if anyone knows WTF is going on, please let me know.

So many movies!

I've seen a lot of movies this spring, most of them good!  I will try to briefly recap...

Last week we saw Inside Out - what a beautiful, funny movie.  I wish so hard I had seen this when I was 11.  Really applaud Pixar for making a film about emotional intelligence.  Genious.  Here's me in last 10 minutes:

Also saw Jurassic World, which was a fun, big-screen movie with the always charming Chris Pratt who is just a joy to watch and inspired zoo-keepers everywhere to create his scene with the velociraptors and provided a nice opportunity to revive all those classic Jeff Goldblum lines.  Life, uh, finds a way.  The only thing is, the movie was soooooooo unrealistic.  I mean, Bryce Howard wears heels through the ENTIRE thing?  Come on.  

Oh dear god, I also saw Magic Mike XXL which I thought was going to be a hilarious romp with a handful of girlfriends, but was more like a constant barrage of crotches shaking in faces.  For reasons I don't quite understand, the movie is getting excellent reviews.  Although I did appreciate the diversity - including women of color, women of size, and even a scene where all these straight dude strippers stood around respectfully clapping and smiling at the mad skills of these other dudes at a gay bar.  So, there's that.  

Let's see... we also saw Spy with Melissa McCarthy.  It was a fun movie that thankfully was made up of more substantial material than.... hey look at this goofy fat lady jokes.  It was smart and pro-woman and also very funny.  Mad Max Fury Road was totes amaze.  Was like, literally gripping the arms of my seat through entire movie and it was just like a pure, big-screen experience that was everything I love about going TO the movies.  Not for the faint of heart.  

I saw the Chicago premier of Me and Earl and the Dying Girl at the Music Box with the director in attendance.  We all had to physically turn off our cellphones while entering the theatre as a draconian usher observed.  It was like The Fault in Our Stars only not saccharine or manipulative.  So, if you like movies about young people dying of cancer, this one's for you! 

Cinderella

When I was in LA, I went to see Cinderella with my sister and nephew.  I love going to the movies with my sister and I love going to the movies in LA. Cinderella is a beautiful movie to look at, but, unfortunately there's nothing new about the story - it's pretty faithful to the 1950 cartoon.  A major theme is that you should "have courage and be kind." I don't have much beef with the advice to "have courage" but "be kind" is pretty rotten advice to give a girl.  By being "kind", Cinderella allows herself to become a slave to her step-mother and sisters and only gets out of it by being overheard singing sweetly in her attic prison.  Telling girls, especially, to smile through their pain and suffering lest they make someone else uncomfortable is a 1950's attitude and frankly, a horrid message to put out there in friggin' 2015.

I guess one minor improvement was that the prince actually recognizes her at the end of the movie without going through the humiliation of trying on a shoe to prove her identity.  That always bothered me.  I mean, NO OTHER WOMAN IN THE VILLAGE WORE A FUCKING SIZE 8.5?  Also, does anyone else think the act of Cinderella putting on the shoe is a kind of a gross expression of hetero-normative behavior?

I do.  Perfect fit, etc.? An example of Cinderella's purity and virginity? Whereby the phallic symbol slides into the glistening precious vessel thus proving ultimate ownership?  

Anywho, the aside from the just awful representations of gendered behavior, etc, the movie was pretty much straight up Costume Porn, which, I'll admit, I like very much.  There's this very strange bit, however, when Cinderella's homely yet lovingly made dress is discarded/morphed into her gown.  In the 1950's version, it looks like this:

In Branagh's version, the fairy godmother sends her into what my sister aptly called a "dress-gasm" whereby she spun and spun and spun and ooh, she's still spinning because that dress just feels sooo good.

I will only mention that the glass slippers appear to have no less than a four inch heel and then I will slowly shake my head.

My favorite costumes were worn by the great Cate Blanchett and the two stepsisters, hilariously played by Sophie McShera (Downton Abbey) and Holliday Grainger (The Borgias).  

 The fabric in the sister's dresses is slightly sheer.  Blanchett's hat and skirt... I can't even.

I wish we had seen more of these dresses in the movie - they were so crazy fabulous. The scene below was quite funny - the sisters in these bonkers cages and undergarments fighting over lavalieres.

This is the wedding dress, which you just get a glimpse of in the movie.  It's sort of ridiculous and old fashioned but also I can't stop looking at it?  I love it and hate it just like Angelina's wedding dress.

And, finally, this is what Cinderella wore to the ... premiere.  Those pockets!  I mean, you can't put anything in there but your hands, but!

California!

I had a fantastic trip to California last weekend.  Struggling to get through the tail-end of this winter, I really needed some sunshine and warm air.  I nearly wept just to feel the sun on my bare arms (and not wear socks! or a down jacket! or boots! or gloves!)  Not to mention I got to see my beloved sister and nephew!  Aside from just sitting on my sister's balcony rueing the day I ever left California for the god-forsaken hinterland that is Chicago.  I love California and would really like to move there again, although I also spend a fair amount of time imagining an apocalyptic future where I valiantly cross the country to "save" my sister, only to find her happily nestled in my friend L's backyard in a tent with pit latrine at an appropriate distance.  Supposedly the people who survive "The Big One" will be the ones who know how to dig their own toilets.  Doesn't help that I recently read The Parable of the Sower about just such an apocalyptic future with people painstakingly meandering up the 101 toward the promised land that is, of course: Canada.

I digress.  One day we went on a lovely hike not far from my sister's house where there was that wonderful diversion:  A Rope Swing Over a Gentle Brook.  Beloved Nephew made many valiant efforts and I made one supremely pathetic one.

On The Fall and Smirking

I finished up season 2 of The Fall which was half-good and half-terrible.  What a stink of an ending, which I won't disclose here except to say it stunk, and I was really grossed out by all the smirking going on by the murderer.  Gillian Anderson was radiant, and I'm filled with a strange desire to rewatch the entirety of the X Files.  So, I didn't realize that that guy the played the serial murderer in The Fall is also the dude who will play whatshisname in 50 Shades of Grey (here's my post on the same).  So, imagine if you were really into The Fall and 50 Shades (which I am not, btw) - wouldn't your mind get all confused between sexy serial killer and sexy s&m guy?  I bet you ANYTHING he smirks through the whole damn thing!

I saw The Fault in Our Stars on a plane, and, yes, even though I wept hot tears of shame throughout the whole entire movie, I was so grossed out that what passed for romance between two cancer-ridden teenagers was - you guessed it!  Smirking!

My friend, MZ, and I had a hilarious chat about how much smirking at women goes on in the movies, as if all a girl wants is someone to look at her with nothing but bald-faced irony to cover any true feelings of love that might linger under their smirking exteriors.  She figures Harrison Ford started it, which sounds about right to me.  

It's actually hard to find a picture of Harrison Ford where he isn't smirking.

Here's Edward Cullin on his own damn wedding day, smirking as his bride walks down the aisle!

Other over-smirkers include George Clooney (and the entire cast of Ocean's 11), Sean Connery, of course James Tiberius Kirk in all his incarnations, basically anyone who plays a vampire (see especially: True Blood), any and all super-villians, and Robert Downey Jr (all he does is smirk).

On Serial

I started listening to the podcast Serial last weekend - I listened to the first 8 on a road trip to Indiana and got hooked, just like everyone else, on the way Sarah Koenig is telling the story of this decade old murder.  It's so compelling and, yes, entertaining that about every 30 minutes I get really depressed about how entertained I am by the murder of a 16-year-old girl.  A child.  About whom, aside from being murdered, we learn very little.  So, there's that.  It's gross how so much of our popular culture surrounds the violent death of women.

Also I'm getting more and more disturbed, as I listen, whether Koenig is practicing responsible journalism.  I mean, seriously, IS she?  Because she clearly believes Adnan, right?  And she wants to believe in Adnan, and therefore, who doesn't she trust?  Jay.  So, she paints Jay as a liar and a possible murderer and now half of America thinks Jay's a murderer.  Which I guess wouldn't be so bad if Jay weren't a real person, trying to live his life.  Like, Hae's dead, nothing worse can happen to her, unless post-life-mortification is a thing from having your diary read out loud to strangers, the defense attorney is dead, Adnan's in jail, but Jay, who we learned, works long hours at a menial job only to be surprised on his doorstep by two reporters who are most likely ruining his life.  But, I don't know... say Jay was the murderer, then... it's all ok?

I'll admit that I couldn't stop listening to 1-8, but I think I'm done now.  And, since 8 and 9 pretty much went no-where, it feels like the story might be finished too.  I suspect there won't be a satisfying ending to this story where we learn why a 16-year-old girl was murdered and half-buried in the dirt.  There couldn't be a satisfying answer for that.

Edge of Tomorrow

Over the weekend we saw The Edge of Tomorrow, starring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt.  It was So. Good.  I highly recommend it.  It's one of those movies that's kind of better if you don't know that much about it, so I will not summarize.  It turns out it's based on a Japanese novella called All You Need is Kill.  What a title.  M doesn't like Tom Cruise but my love for him is eternal and everlasting.  I got so excited about Tom Cruise I watched Mission Impossible III on Sunday, pausing half-way through to browse the internet for pictures of Tom Cruise and Suri.  Then for a bizarre 20 minutes or so I fantasized I was Suri and Tom Cruise was my dad and he held me in his strong, powerful arms and protected me from the glare of the paparazzi.   I'm not proud of that.  Then I put Far and Away in my netflix queue - another fact of which I am not proud.

On Sunday night M and I watched Her, which I also thought was wonderful.  It really got me to thinking about consciousness and the body and I suppose I need to read some Alan Watts to follow up on all of that.

Right now I'm in Utah at a conference and I can't quite seem to get over the exhaustion of travel.  I am So. Tired.  Also it's really cold here.  But, it's awfully pretty.

Maleficent

This past weekend we went to Indiana to visit our families, particularly M's Gran, who isn't doing very well.  I find a good solution for high anxiety is the alluring, mind-numbing power of tv and movies, so my moms and I went to see Maleficent.

I'm not a big Angelina Jolie fan, but, I have to tell you, this is one of the greatest movies I've ever seen her in and certainly one of the top movies I've seen this year.  I thought it was super-fun to watch, I loved the visuals and the story and everything!  It really does for Sleeping Beauty what Wicked did for The Wizard of Oz (OMG, will there be a musical in a few years?  I wouldn't be surprised...).  It makes you think about the story in a completely new light, considering the entire tale from the point of view of the soi-disant "evil queen".

Without giving too much of the story, I'll say that the story begins in a magical land (near a norm-core land) where all types of fairies and magical beings live, and Maleficent is a young, winged girl who's inquisitive and kind and helpful and strong, etc.  And she meets this human guy from nearby who eventually fucks with her.  If there's one person in the entire world you shouldn't fuck with, it's Angelina Jolie, right?

If there's one thing I didn't like about the movie, it was the lipstick on Maleficent - it was kind of like Barbara Streisand's fingernails in The Prince of Tides... (yeah, I just made an uber-cool reference to a 13 year old movie nobody's seen) too distracting.  The whole time you're thinking, like, Does she have a tube of lipstick in her cape?  Where does she go to get more lipstick?  Sephora on the Glen?  But, otherwise I thought her look was totally amazing and a nod to the glamour of the queen in the 1959 Disney movie.

I love this poem

I Remember

By the first of August
the invisible beetles began
to snore and the grass was
as tough as hemp and was
no color—no more than
the sand was a color and
we had worn our bare feet
bare since the twentieth
of June and there were times
we forgot to wind up your
alarm clock and some nights
we took our gin warm and neat
from old jelly glasses while
the sun blew out of sight
like a red picture hat and
one day I tied my hair back
with a ribbon and you said
that I looked almost like
a puritan lady and what
I remember best is that
the door to your room was
the door to mine. 

Anne Sexton

Grand Budapest Hotel

M & I saw The Grand Budapest Hotel after it came out - I thought it was perfectly marvelous and would like to watch it again and again. I thought practically every scene was a visual treat and I loved loved loved watching Ralph Fiennes in his role as Monsieur Gustave. I haven't enjoyed Fiennes so much since The English Patient, which I have seen precisely 274 times. I particularly liked the scenes that took place in small settings, like the elevator or the train car or a jail cell (spoiler?). Those reminded me of sets from The Darjeeling Limited, one of my favorite Wes Anderson movies.

Exterior shots of the hotel were very charming - like this one of the hotel sitting at the top of this craggy mountain.  The movie also brings the opportunity to use, in common parlance, the word "funicular", which one otherwise has rare occasion to do.  I had similar feelings about the movie Noah, which brought about a wave (GET IT?) of reviewers utilizing the wonderful word "antediluvian."  

So, I read that Anderson "more or less" plagiarized Austrian writer Stefan Zweig.  I'd never heard of Zweig - apparently he's quite popular in Europe - so I checked out a couple of books from the library. I checked them out with great happiness because the books were small and charming and I thought I was on the verge of a great discovery.  Zweig is a bit of a tragic character - he managed to get out of Austria in 1934 but near the end of WWII he and his wife committed double-suicide in Brazil.  Anyway, I start reading what I think it going to be a charming set of short stories, but, the three that I read ended in suicide and were depressing as hell, as you might imagine.  

He does do this thing which is sort of old-fashioned in literature now which is to tell the story through a third party, like, I met this person on a boat and they told me this story about this other guy they knew that went like this... I could probably write more intelligently about this if I had gotten a worthless literature degree instead of a worthless art history degree. In any event, Anderson certainly captures that quality in the movie by framing it in several layers.  It gives it a very fairy tale quality.

Noah!

I can't believe there's a movie about Noah with Russell Crowe and Hermione in it.  Part of me wants to see it, even though I think it will be really stupid.  To me, one of the most interesting parts of the whole Noah story happens after the flood's over and isn't generally covered in Bible School.  What happens is, Noah builds a vineyard, and one day he gets really drunk and gets naked for some reason.  Then, one of his sons, Ham, comes in and laughs at him.  This painting is by Giovanni Bellini, I think it's pretty funny because you can see Ham (in the middle) laughing like a little bitch.  

Ham goes and gets his two brothers to show them, but they do this weird business where they back into the room and cover him, and then back out again.

James Tissot "lalala we don't see anything"

Then Noah wakes up, gets mad, and curses Ham's son, for some reason.

Gustave Dore - Overreact much?

I learned this whole story when I studied art history - The Drunkenness of Noah has been a popular subject for artists.  Some scholars (and artists) assumed that some improprieties took place while Noah was passed out drunk, which seems fairly likely, as drunkenness and nakedness goes.

What I find interesting is that, while this appendix to the story of Noah is mostly unknown today, it was a very popular subject through the ages.  Here's a scene on a panel from the famous bronze doors of the Florence Baptistry, by Ghiberti:

And here it is by Michelangelo on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel: 

This last one is not famous, but I love the look on everyone's faces.  Ham's like, "Isn't this great?  Dad's drunk and naked!" and the brothers are all, "Oh, for Chrissake, pull yourself together."

Luini Bernadino

 I wonder if all this will be in the movie?