Things worth checking out

The I Crush Your Head group on Flickr. I only made it through the pool of pictures, viewing them on slideshow... but there is so much goodness... so many reasons to laugh. I am definitely going to take some crushing your head pictures soon. Watch out world! My fingers are coming for ya!

Home Made Macros - Rancor

Home Made Macros - Rancor
Originally uploaded by Chambo25.

One of our favorite childhood toys is just laying on his back looking pathetic these days... I took a bunch of pictures trying to get the right one, and I like this one... might try for even better next time I'm home.

Okay... maybe you're right, he doesn't look completely pathetic... he's still kinda fierce, but if you find the Rancor entry on Wikipedia, the photo there is crazy! Wow, it brought me back to how much that scene scared the crap out of my as a little kid.

Alright, random photoblogging... done.

Bush won't negotiate... with Democrats.

Here's yet another example of bipartisanship Bushie style:

From the AP:

"In essence, Bush invited the Democratic leaders of Congress to come hear the stance he has offered for weeks.

He again accused them of shirking their responsibilities."

... when substitute Whitehouse Spokesperson Dana Perino was questioned about the point of this meeting, reason why Democrats should attend a conversation that the administration has described explicitly as not a negotiation, she had the following to say:

"Perino said Democrats could benefit by accepting Bush's invitation. "Maybe they need to hear again from the president about why he thinks it is foolish to set arbitrary timetables for withdrawal," she said."

Hey, anybody seen sanity? Clearly it's lost on these folks. UGH!

WJLC Charts

Okay... so I've been wanting to do this for awhile. I'm indulging the metaphor that I've got my own radio station since I have started cramming tons of music into an ipod over the past few months. I'm up to over 2,000 songs at this point, and I like having a reason to talk about music, so periodically (maybe weekly if I can get my act together) I'm going to release something I used to compile for my college radio station, the charts. This week the charts are starting out with a pretty simple format... who's getting the most spins, and what are five relatively recent things added into rotation (either ripped from ye olde CD collection or newly discovered). Enjoy!

Top 10 (Heavy Rotation): listings show artist - album (single or singles)
1. The Shins Bluegrass Tribute - The Shins Bluegrass Tribute (New Slang, Know Your Onion!)
2. Ween - Shinola Vol. 1 (Gabrielle)
3. The Mountain Goats - The Sunset Tree (This Year, Dance Music)
4. Josh Ritter - The Animal Years (Good Man, Lillian Egypt)
5. A.C. Newman - The Slow Wonder (On the Table)
6. Chris Mills - Wall to Wall Sessions (Escape from New York)
7. Spoon - Gimme Fiction (I Summon You, I Turn My Camera On)
8. The New Pornographers - Twin Cinema (Sing me Spanish Techno)
9. Johnny Cash - At Folsom Prison (Folsom Prison Blues, 25 Minutes to Go, Jackson)
10. Old Crow Medicine Show - OCMS, Big Iron World (Wagon Wheel, James River Blues)

New Adds:
1. Modest Mouse - We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank (Dashboard, Steam Engenius)
2. Withdrawal - The Perfectionist Blacklist (Decompression, Nova Breeze)
3. Iggy Pop - Lust for Life (The Passenger, Lust for Life, Neighborhood Threat)
4. Gillian Welch - Soul Journey (Wrecking Ball, No One Knows My Name)
5. Loretta Lynn - Van Lear Rose (Mrs. Leroy Brown, Portland Oregon)

Quick Sloppy Writing

So, I've looked a bit at my last post, and it was very poorly written. Everybody in the movies I was talking about did, "a great job" or was really neat or cool. Granted, I was trying to get out the door, writing the post was an afterthought, and I really mostly wanted to say, "hey world... I just saw these cool movies and you should check them out too."

That all said, I thought it was worth elaborating a bit. I think that Children of Men is remarkable in a visual sense, both because of the choices to make the movie with many long takes, and lots of beautifully captured moving, fluid scenes. The whole thing feels very well composed, and the performances of Clive Owen and others are part of that composition. They fill this bleak landscape with a weariness that is pierced with hope, and that quality is something I found very powerful throughout the movie. Some scenes and events are remarkably awful, but the whole thing doesn't feel overwhelmingly doom & gloom.

As for Mother Night, again, there's an interesting mix of the comic and the tragic. Alan Arkin and Nick Nolte are truly great throughout, and John Goodman's normal schtick works remarkably well. I've seen some pretty blah (breakfast of champions) translations of Vonnegut's work for screen, and I think this one is pretty remarkably well done in keeping his odd, but enjoyable, light but world-weary narrative quality.