DELAYED BIRTHDAY REACTION

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO PEABO

Sorry I didn't call. And sorry about the rain on your birthday. I had this whole fan-dancer routine worked out I was going to perform in your yard, but it'll have to wait until a sunnier day.

Whenever I think of your birthday, I think of the time we all went rollerskating, you got kicked in the head with a skate, and we all gave up and watched Conan: The Destroyer at your house. You were seriously jacked up, but we all liked the movie. Leave it to your mom to have Conan on tap for a "plan B". Good lady, that Mrs. Peabo.

Also, one year, we went to Malibu and you totally smoked my sorry self on the track.

We had a lovely weekend.

Saturday we arrived at my folks' place, dropped off Melbotis, discovered my parents' air conditioner had died, got ready and then headed for Erica and Scott's big night.

The location wasn't too far off 288 in South Houston. It was a lovely, outdoor ceremony at dusk. The ceremony went off without a hitch, although I later heard rumors that the bride's mom had somehow disappeared prior to the ceremony and this caused some backstage consternation (no drama, she had just wandered off or something).

The reception was similarly lovely. Erica and I went to high school together, but whereas I showed up for the last three years of high school, Erica had lived in the same area since she was five. Therefore, there were a lot of faces at the wedding that I sorta-recognized, but was unable to put a name with. Aside from one, who, of course, had no recollection of me at all. And in this manner the cosmic wheel doles out justice.

Did some dancing, including some of my patented "Robot". Jamie looked totally foxy, so I got to appear as the guy with the cookie on his arm. Go, me.

Returned to Shannon and Josh's place, chatted a bit, got some sleep, and then got up in the morning yesterday for the post-wedding breakfast (which began at 8:00). The breakfast was obviously thought up by people who didn't plan on hanging near the bar at the wedding. Anyhoo, that was nice, and we got to see the bride and groom looking a little less stunned as they made their morning rounds.

Yesterday was Jamie's birthday, and I think my presents were sort of a dud, but she seemed happy enough. Shannon and Josh were nice enough to drop by for dinner.

I also found out (last, as always) that Julie B., wife of Cousin John, is expecting. Bully news, I say. John and Julie are great folks and will make ace parents, I have no doubt.

Today we dropped off Jamie at dialysis, I had lunch, then hit the road. It's raining like crazy in Austin, which I drove into around Giddings. It was all right. During Heather's recent visit, she'd loaned me a book-on-CD of Stephen King's "Dreamcatcher".

I haven't read any King since, maybe, middle-school. And somehow it's comforting to hear King's paid-by-the-word approach to a novel, with his squarely believable characters who eat the same junk you do, get hung up on the same minutia as your neighbors and are usually written awfully close to the folks you already know. In a way, it's sort of stunning how difficult a task that must be for writers to achieve. the Joe Averages who populate most novels are there specifically to remind you that average people are quirky and bizarre in their own way... But King's books are more interested in putting folks that could be you into some odd situations.

One of my great dis-satisfactions of trolling the New Fiction aisle at Barnes & Noble is that the characters all too often might as well appear in books down in the sci-fi and fantasy book sections for as much relevance as they have to my daily life. The kid winning the spelling bee with seemingly supernatural talent, the lonely widower bee keeper, the Indian kid stuck in a boat with a tiger, the Chinese peasant's family getting the tar kicked out of them for generations, the rich scenester with the tell-all about how they realized life isn't about doing copious amounts of blow, the Addams Family/dysfunctional family yarn... It's exciting to write about exciting people, no doubt. And we've all sat in a class where someone mistook their life for being worthy of novelization. So I'm not sure what the happy medium might be that I'm looking for.

That's not a knock on those books, it's much more of a knock on my own taste and patience. All stories worth telling, but none of which dwell anywhere near anything resembling the life of Bill and Kathy Armswagger in Goober Springs, Alabama. It's an oddity of the legacy of American Fiction that the person who may chronicle this period in the US most accurately might do so with stories of killer cars, rabid dogs and weird clown/ spiders. His characters are not just projections of who King wishes he could be, or cooler people living cooler lives than the author which King actually manages to swing...

That said, King still drives me nuts with his endless parenthetical asides (a crime which should be outlawed in any form of writing. It distracts, is tangential, and never really adds to the narrative at hand). I guess I'm mostly a glutton for narrative economy, possibly a by-product of reading too many comics and reading screenplays where much of the action is shown, not told. And I certainly see the flaws of which I feel guilty on the page in his work. Sometimes you wish he would simply kill his darlings... But what editor is going to tell King how to write at this point in his career?

That said, without the asides, how much of that detail I admire would survive? I'm conflicted, Leaguers.

Listening to it can be taxing, when you just want for him to describe the important action, not some-body's goofy hat.

I got through 3 discs today as I took an extra hour on taking The Admiral and KareBear's official shortcut from Manor to 71, and, I believe, missing a turn at 183. Then getting stuck in the molasses of Austin's traffic, when one adds in rain.

Jeff The Cat is quite happy that someone is home, and in a bit I'll head down to Jason's house to retrieve Lucy, whose been inside all day at Jason's. Tonight will be fun.

Flyin' A's, kidneys, weddings

It's been an okay week. We're headed out tomorrow for the wedding of Erica F., taking place somewhere in the greater Houston area. Erica's an old pal of mine from my days in high school, who wound up as one of Jamie's roommates in college. So, yeah, we go back a piece. Actually, if memory serves, Erica and I were tied for ranking in our high school class.

I've not actually met the husband-to-be as he came into the picture while we were in PHX, but early reports have been extremely positive. The bottom line is that I like a good party, and as long as they keep the ceremony short, who doesn't like a good wedding, too? It gives you a chance to really space out until the "I Do's" and the applause. I am unsure how much dancing I'll be doing at the ceremony, but I suppose I shall have to put in another round of doing The Robot.

I'm returning Monday, but Jamie (and Melbotis) will remain in Houston for most of the week. I have some business to attend to in Austin, but Jamie's getting worked up at Methodist Hospital in order to get back on the kidney recipient list. So, Karebear is taking jamie under wing and will be managing that detail. I feel sort of bad about not being there, but I don't think the procedures are going to be terribly upsetting or invasive. If they are, I guess I'm headed back to Houston.

Depending upon your religious preference, I would ask that all of you GET ON THE ORGAN DONOR'S LIST and then INFORM YOUR RELATIVES AS PER YOUR WISHES. If you die and your organs can be donated, many families refuse to go along with the checked box on the driver's license indicating organ and tissue donation. Understandably, it's an emotional time, and many people going through the grieving process may not wish to think about organ donation at one of the roughest times in their life. SO... make sure you speak up beforehand.

Last night we went to see Hilary and Stuart's band, The Flyin' A's, play at Artz Ribhouse. Turns out they're really very good, which i sort of knew, but it was my first time seeing them live, and they more than confirmed my suspicions. The Flyin' A's play some nice Texas country, but covered some Etta James and Johnny Cash as well. They play all the time, and I don't have a very good excuse as per why we haven't gone out to see them, but that's going to change. Folks in Austin (or other places they play (they go on tour this summer) should check them out. Our San Antonio contingent should know they're playing at Specht's on Saturday evening.

http://www.theflyinas.com/


Hope all is well with all of ya'll.

McNewspeak

When I was in high school, I first came across the term "McJob" in Douglas Coupland's book Generation X.

McJob: (page 5)

A low-pay, low-prestige, low-dignity, low-benefit, no-future job in the service sector. Frequently considered a satisfying career choice by people who have never held one.

And I think that last bit is the sinker.

Anyhow, it appears McDonald's is outraged that the job of burger flipper/ burger warmer is not held in the highest of esteem.

Read about it here.

Apparently unaware of how the English language works, McDonalds has started an effort to convince those they see as the "owners" of language that they've not given the term "McJob" a fair shake and seen the word the way their corporate decision makers would like the world to see the term "McJob". Oddly, these chroniclers of the language seem to go with how billions of English-speaking people use the term. What to do when you're an enormous corporation and you can't buy your way out of your sorry reputation as an employer.

From the article:

The Oxford English Dictionary, considered by many wordsmiths as the gold standard for the English language, is one of those that will be targeted. It defines the noun as "an unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects, esp. one created by the expansion of the service sector."

I get freaked out by Newspeak at the best of times, but when you get the feeling a corporation is considering doing something pretty vile to try to demolish an image that's been somewhat fairly earned... I dunno. Kind of freaky. Rather than cowboy up and address the issue, is it really that much better to publicly take on the Dictionary?

Somehow, this generates images in my head of the burger wars from the mostly not-discussed Frank Miller comic "Give Me Liberty" in which the US goes to war to protect fast food cows in the Amazon.

I don't want for anyone to misconstrue this particular rant for some sort of disrespect for the hard working burgermeisters who prepare my fast food. The League has not worked fast food, but... We DID work at Chuck E. Cheese, which is mediocre, slowly produced food delivered in a temple in which all pizza eating worshippers must halt eating and conversation in reverence to a mechanical gigantic mouse in a hat. We swept up pizza crusts, handed out tokens to kids when the machine "ate" their token, oversaw the ball crawl*, and polished the vertical bars on the mini-carousel. I've slung records at the Camelot and pimped Tinkerbell shirts at the Disney Store. There is such a thing as a job where the downers (usually created by inept or negative management) greatly outweigh the $4.75 an hour. In two of these three jobs I was asked to wear an ill-fitting and humiliating uniform (we actually requested silver jumpsuits to wear when I worked at UT. Request denied). And had managers that, on a good day, were indifferent to me at best.

I had no skills, no experience, no future within the organization, and was constantly reminded of as much. If not for school and the promise of becoming a middle-class wage slave, I might have given in to the gripping despair that one can only find when told to keep glass doors clean in a restuarant full of children who've been handling pizza, tokens, tickets, and wiping snot on their own palms. For $4.25 or whatever minimum wage was in 1990.

But I also lived with my parents, and/or was earning supplemental money while in school which my folks generously assisted with. I am not an eighteen year old kid living in Goober Springs, Alabama where options are McDonalds or tending to my Uncle's Used Tire Emporium. So when that kid hears "McJob", I have no idea what he or she must think. But I hope to God that with the power of television and our educational system, Buddy McBarnes from Goober Springs at least knows that there may be more opportunity available than what ends when you pass the Exxon and it's all trees again along the freeway.

Thusly, mad respect for folks in the service industry, but I also know that the bright-eyed promising student is far and few between who says "I want to spend my life earning minimum wage and microwaving McMuffins."

Curiously, the CEO of McDonald's from a few years back was once a burger pimp, himself. Here's an article from when someone died and Bell took over.

Bell began his career with the fast-food chain at age 15 as a part-time crew member at a McDonald's restaurant in Sydney, Australia.

He became the company's youngest store manager in Australia at 19, a vice president at 27 and a member of the McDonald's Australia board of directors by the time was 29 years old.

"This is an absolutely right choice," said S&P's Milton. "Cantalupo relied on Bell a lot for crafting the turnaround. This is someone who has been with the company for a significant period of time."

That's awesome. I bet Bell's staff is made up entirely of the crew he started with at that Australian McDonald's**. What happened to you, Bell? You used to be from the street, dawg! You knew what it was to flip a burger and clean up some kids' barf from the McDonaldland Playscape!*** You sold out, Bell. You sold out.

Minimum wage isn't really the thrust of the phrase "McJob". A McJob is more about the drudgery of many jobs that's cropped up since the Industrial Revolution as people become cogs in an assembly line, whether that be McDonalds employees leaping into action when the frier makes that awful "WHEEEEEEEEEEET! WHEEEEEEEEEEEET!" noise. Or whether that person is wearing a tie, sitting in a cube where they can't be seen, anyway, and calling people to donate to the Austin Policemen's Charity (the tie makes you all professional-like).

There's something far more frightening about the white-collar McJob. It's a job intended to mark time, is mostly insulting to the intelligence, and can usually be identified by how often the manager insists that they are a professional of some sort and how unnecessarily cumbersome the tasks assigned to wage slave actually are. Usually because nobody ever bothered to ask the employees how to improve the processes they do all day, which the executives have never actually performed. But they DO pay well enough, these jobs... and there's not necessarily the same sense of temporary employment that pervades when one is loaned their pants and told they must return them when they quit. And, of course, in the white-collr McJob, you are surrounded by lots of other people all doing the same job, many of whom have been their for years and never once considered a promotion.

What's curious is that McDonalds is going after the dictionary in the same manner they go after our elected officials whenever it's suggested the minimum wage see an increase. As I recall, in order to try to dodge out of some legislation or other that might effect the bottomline, McDonald's attempted to reassign their employees from the food-prep category to some sort of assembly line technician. I can't find it now, but in my commute in PHX, I recall hearing the story on NPR.

Perhaps if McDonalds paid a bit better, perhaps if the drudgery of the position wasn't punctuted only with being shouted at by furious managers and customers... McDonalds might be able to actually convince those of us who've used the term "McJob" without blinking for fifteen years to drop the term if their employees did not always look miserable and their turnover wasn't well known as one of the highest turnover positions in any industry. (As someone who has managed part time employees, turn over is a huge time killer and makes managers grumpy.)









*some new parents read this blog. I beseech of thee, if you care at all for your health or the health and safety of your children... do not let your child enter a public ball crawl. New parents don't want to think about this, but little kids are germ factories. Not only are they perpetually ill, they also have no concept of hygiene, and will wipe their nose with their hands and then leap into the ball crawl. It is IMPOSSIBLE to clean the balls in the ball crawl. And dozens and dozens of kids pass through a ball crawl each day, leaving their trail of germs on everything.

Also, while your child may be an angel, other kids are irresponsible horrors with no respect for their safety or that of anyone else. So expect for your kid to get a shin to the back of the head.

And last, but not least... and i can't believe I have to share this, but I speak from experience... Ball crawls are not a good place for infants. Do not toss your infant into the ball crawl in the high hopes that the disgruntled 16 year old watching the crawl will watch your kid while you pound back a cool Coors 16 oz'er. The ball crawl is about 3 feet deep. Your infant could easily disappear and not be found again until the semi-annual ball-crawl vaccuuming. Also, the note about the shin to the back of the head? Kids like to jump off the walls, pretending to be their favorite luchador, often in the direction of your infant's still unfused skull.

When considering the ball crawl, just.... don't.

**I know they eat beef in Australia, but what else is on the menu? Filet 'o Platypus? Koala Nuggets? Ah, it's funny to make fun of Australians. FACT: They're all reprehensible savages****.

***Why is it that really low-paying jobs often require the removal of vomit? I do recall that one of the reasons I was not liked (and I hadn't thought about this in a while) at the Disney Store was that when I was informed that some kid had tossed her cookies in the store, on carpet, I declared "I am not paid enough to clean up barf. At least not without that pink, granular stuff." Apparently not wanting to clean up barf makes you "not a team player". But, you know what... they weren't paying for benefits or nuthin'. I was supposed to shift from fixing the stuffed anaimal arrangements to scooping up vomit.
Other people's barf is super gross, and I don't think it's unreasonable to expect some sort of special compensation for cleaning it up. If we all worked together and refused to clean up barf for minimum wage, just imagine the utopia we'd all be living in.

****This is not an actual fact. I've met a few Australians, and while I get tired of hearing about how they find my slection of knife completely substandard, our friends from down under couldn't be a more decent people. In fact, if you'd like to point to anyone as an utter savage, it's Canadians, who, FACT: eat babies*****.

*****It is mostly not-true that Candians eat babies. At least not Canadian babies, or there would be no actual Canadians. I suspect some Canadians of cannibalism, but can prove nothing. They probably clean up barf for a shiny dime, too.******

******I feel sort of bad about that. That may have gone too far.

King of Hobos/ PROJECT: H.A.R.M.S.

So last night Steven and I had dinner and he showed me some work he'd been doing lately for the Mellies. Steven is working on an application that will allow Loyal Leaguers to enter a UI and fill in their responses to the queries. This doesn't particularly help you, but it sure as heck helps me.

And, because Steven is King of the Hobos, he has decided to live his life on The Rails. he's trying to learn the technology, and I'm trying to get free help. In this way, my lamprey-like life continues. I'm a bit fascinated with what he's doing, and when he wraps up, we'll have a chat about what this is doing that a JAVA/ Cold Fusion interface wouldn't have done, or what else might have been a competing option. I can feel my work brain kicking in again after too many months of dormancy. Plus, it's a new technology, and while I may never learn to write for it, I can certainly learn about the features.

(I am thinking we need BLOCKS for the users to fill in rather than scrolling lines).

Anyway, Project: H.A.R.M.S. is saving the day.

But what does H.A.R.M.S. stand for?

You decide...

Humanoid
Android
Robotic
Man-Like
Synthoid
?

Fudge

So I was working on this sort of pointless, mid-week filler post for Comic Fodder regarding the value of Power Girl in the DCU, even when artists are complete morons.


Cover to JLA #10, which defies logic and gravity

There's nothing like a Michael Turner cover to suddenly make you embarassed for buying a comic. This is the JL-freaking-A, not Juggs Magazine. I, along with 80,000 readers, was going to buy this comic if the cover was blank and made of butcher paper. But, Turner went and ruined it.

Anyway, the point was that this sort of nonsense detracts from a character, especially one that is already treated like the class joke by a lot of creators who still giggle like a thirteen year old when they think of boobies. There was a dicier portion of the post for which i needed quotes, links and whatnot as I disagreed with a blogger's statements I'd read elsewhere. I just couldn't remember where I'd seen the post.

I looked and looked.

I'm currently using the latest Explorer, which is not unlike Firefox in that it provides me with tabs. Over at Comic Fodder, I try to behave as a bit more of a journalista, citing sources, lots of linking, etc... the tabs help me stay organized as I jump from pane to pane, looking for material.

All i really needed to do was find that last link and I could start wrapping the thing up. I'd looked at more than a dozen likely sites, and hit a site which was clearly NOT my site, and which didn't want to load...

And then IE went all IE on me, and shut down my unsaved post, the page I was looking at, and a few other references I had in pocket. I was utterly shocked, but felt like I'd learned an important MS IE lesson. I don't know what sites I'll hit, so I need to start saving more often and consider going back to just using multiple windows.

Maybe it's for the best. That post won't see the light of day, and I can maybe think about it a little harder and do my proper legwork before writing. Still, that was a particularly large amount of documentation for that particular column.

That was like 1.5 hours gone poof on me.

Darn you IE.

Congrats to Jeff and Keora

I sort of quickly mentioned it the other day, but congrats to Jeff Shoemaker and his new bride, Keora.

They were married Friday at the Travis County Courthouse with family in attendance. I've known Jeff since 1993 where we shared a community bathroom in Jester. Keora I did not meet until this Fall when we returned to Austin.

You see a lot of couples that you don't have a whole lot of faith in, and you see other couples that, together, might drive you a bit nuts. Not so these two. Together they provide a united fighting front that's really going to clean up crime in Star City.

A Bit of Difference

As I recall, Leaguer Randy once opined something along the lines of "Why does The League obsess about Austin? Stop living in the past, dude."



The past week or so has proven to me in no small degree that our return to Waterloo was a well-conceived plan, if you don't take my current jobless situation into account.

1) Last Friday, my former roommate and eternal pal was here for SXSW hi-jinks. I was able to see the guy and dine out with he and other friends. This led to running into old pal, Amy C. No longer same-city e-mail pals, we got to catch up.
2) The parents were able to come for a nice weekend March Birthday celebration last weekend.
3) Monday night, Nathan C. (no relation to Amy C) was in town for SXSW. Got to catch up with one heck of a guy and once-again expectant father.
4) Not much going on Tuesday aside from Crack fun.
5) Wednesday, outdoors in the rain, got to see some fun music and rock out. Also allowed to participate in said rocking.
6) Wagner arrives for the rocking.
7) Wednesday night was "booze night".
8) Thursday mostly uneventful, but Wagner continues to linger.
9) Thursday night prioved difficult to find a place to eat as SXSW is everywhere. Jamie grumpy, but, honestly, I was just happy we had options. Just not something we had in AZ.
10) Friday braved the crowds and hit certain shops in pursuit of Jason's birthday present.
11) Friday night somewhat tame as I miss the FREE Public Enemy Show, then proceed to miss a birthday party as I just couldn't bear the thought of going into town during SXSW.
12) Saturday hit Curra's for Jason's b-day lunch. (Finally re-locate Texicalli... which is next door to Curra's).
13) Saturday night is Jason's B-Day party at his place. I hang green streamers and almost deafen the birthday boy when "popper" is actually very loud and does not just shoot confetti as I believed.
14) Spend some time with Jason's quality friends, including catching a rare glimpse of the elusive Meredith Shaw. Although the evening's highlight may have come with Ellie's gigantic Hulk hand beer holder.
15) Nearing midnight head to Pat's where I see The My for the first time since 2000, meet his wife, and am also able to celebrate wedding of pal Jeff Shoemaker (formerly a Loyal Leaguer) who had a small civil ceremony on Friday.
16) Sunday, some folks from Saturday late party drop by, we all wind up having a late dinner at Trudy's.

Last year at this time we were getting rained out of the Ostrich Fest.

Sure, this week was crazy. It was nutty crazy. And next weekend we have a wedding in Houston (Bug's wedding)). The following weekend the lovely La La is marrying this Mike fellow.

The League likes a busy calendar. We enjoy having stuff to do and peopel to do it with. Somehow this tops the weekend trip to Target being our only journey out of the house from Friday to Monday.

Yes, it's been a good week.

Now, if only I had a job.

CRACK! (plus intern)

Born on a Monday

Saturday will mark Jason's 34th birthday. Let's all give the boy a big round of applause.


The birthday boy goes out in search of cake...

Rock and Roll in the Rain

Your League is a little bit tired.

Yesterday was the show at art shop/ Gallery Bella Blue down on S. 1st, just North of Oltorf. Bella Blue's performace area is an outdoor stage, and with 36 hours of rain preceding the show, I was curious to know if the thing would go off. After all, I did not want to see anyone rock out in a shower of sparks.

Eventually it was decided the rain was merely misting, and with a tent set up to protect the electronic components and the drum kit, Crack took the stage and faced down an unprepared audience. I was lucky enough to sit in for a song with Crack ("Mr. Pinchy's Lament"), but otherwise just got to enjoy the fine, fine work of Crack from the audience. I think it's safe to say that Crack rocked the audience's socks off.

Mono Ensemble followed with a really good, tight set. I think they played seven songs or so, including two covers. It was, truth to be told, the best I can recall the Mono E sounding in the many times I've heard them. I don't know if the possibility of imminent electrocution at playing guitars and standing in puddles added extra urgency to their playing, or if the rock gods merely loaned them extra powers of rock... but it was a good set.

And, of course, the one band not featuring Jason, Kosmodrome, impressed me with their post-Autechre electronic aural assault. Good stuff. Can't go wrong with Kosmodrome.

For some photos of the show, here you go.

Afterward, I picked up my weekly comics, then headed home for a much needed shower. As much as I enjoy standing in the rain for hours on end, I've looked better.

Jamie had a Sleep Study last night, which meant that she had to go to the hospital and have all manner of diodes and electrodes glued to her skin while she caught some shut-eye. Normally, this would mean I was left to my own devices, but Jamie tag-teamed with long-time pal H. Wagner. Wagner is on Spring Break from her Masters program in Lubbock and has come to crash for a few days in Austin.

Long story short, Wagner and I hung out til way too late over the firepit and some chit-chatting (and some drinks. Hey, she's on Spring Break).

So, after such a long day, I finally got to bed. Very, very late.

Jamie's car has a flat tire, so I have to fix that today. We're all sort of tired and cranky as, apparenly, Jamie's sleep study more or less kept her from getting a good night's sleep. And I can't say I slept terribly well, either.

Watchmen Movie

The guy who directed 300 currently has the rights to "Watchmen". With a $70 million opening weekend, it's my guess that he's going to make whatever movie he wants next.

Just prior to 300 opening, it was leaked that Snyder had sneaked a frame of his Watchmen test footage into the 300 trailer.

Hurm.

I'm still of a mind that there's too much to Watchmen for a two hour movie. Snyder obviously has no problem sicking to the source material. Make it a mini-series.

Marvel Awesomeness

I hate to steal from Occasional Superheroine two days in a row, but you can't fight awesomeness...



It's like they didn't even try. And I heart them for it.

The torch is passed...

Colbert receives Cap's shield

workday time killer

Here's a page to look at and kill some time today.

Totally rad Halloween costumes.

And

All you ever wanted to know about Kobra Kai Dojo and Sweeping the Leg (and more).

Oh, Retrocrush... I heart you.



And here is Randy and a bunch of ladies.

MONO E AND CRACK: ONE NIGHT ONLY

From my brother:

Just a reminder that two of Austin's most legendary garage bands will be hitting the stage at Bella Blue art boutique on Wednesday afternoon (Bella Blue is an art shop, but they have an entertainment area behind the shop that has a stage and plenty of room for our rock and roll audience). Crack will kick off the festivities at 3:00 with our unique take on savante garde melody making (or noise rock, depending on your point of view). The Mono Ensemble will follow at 4:00 with their own brand of folk-prog-western-jazz-funk-rock, and Kosmodrome will round out the day at 5:00 with experimental electronic fanfare smuggled deep out of the heart of mother Russia. The whole thing is part of the garage band showcase portion of SXS1st (the South 1st Street part of SXSW).

Here's a link to the Bella Blue flyer. Bella Blue is at 2213 South First Street, on the east side of the street, about a block north of Oltorf (next to End of An Ear Records, who I believe may be co-sponsoring the event).

So take part of the day off and come see some local, live music the way SXSW was originally intended!!!!!

Hope to see you all there!!!!!!

hugs,

jason steans



And, yes... I sit in on bass for one of the Crack tunes.

Comic Fodder Catch Up

Hey, Leaguers...

Finally got out Part 2 of Masters in DC Universe

and reviews of last week's DC Comics

300 - the League sees a movie

Readers of LoM may have noticed I was cautiously optimistic about the recently released film "300". The movie promised to blend visual effects, historical inaccuracies, Frank Miller and a legendary tale together into a sort of big 'ol blockbuster. Whether the movie would make sense to mainstream America remained to be seen.

I have to say that it's gratifying in my old age to see the works of people I've genuinely respected for decades receiving star billing on multi-million dollar movies. Leaguers like Jason and JimD know the pain of too many hokey comic-to-movie adaptations that we all grew up with. But as our own generation takes the reigns in Hollywood, the generation which grew up on Dark Knight Returns and too many X-Men comics, filmmakers no longer seem embarrased by their own product, and are willing to take chances to bring some of the visual components of the comic panel to the screen.

And that is why 300 is a visually arresting, technically remarkable movie. However, that slavish devotion may also be why 300 isn't a very good movie.

300 is a slim volume and reads in a relatively quick time frame (your mileage may vary). I'd intentionally avoided re-reading the book since I'd heard the movie was in production, but I did recall that the story was slight and seemed more an opportunity for Miller to stretch his wings as artist. His dialogue is spare and his exposition non-existent as he cuts to the chase and got Persians and Spartans stabbing one another as quickly as possible.


THIS MOVIE HAS LOTS OF SHOUTING!!!!

As many might now know, Miller based the comic upon the real-life battle for Thermopylae, where, legend has it, 300 Spartans and some allies faced down thousands of troops from the Persian army. I'm a history major, but I spent too little time on Greek history to relate much other than what I've read online and seen in TV documentaries. What I can tell you is that history is a mix of myth, legend, fact and fiction. But if you want to believe the histories, Leonidas did, in fact, lead the sort of charge which is shown in the film, resulting in the eventual victory of the allied Greek armies (although the Spartans would fall within a generation or two).

And, as BS brutal as the movie depicts the life of the young king, there's signifcant historical evidence suggesting that the Spartans did send their children into the wild to learn to become fighters before apprenticing as soldiers, that Spartans were much of what was represented in film and more.

In some ways, with our comfy couches, TV's and relative security, the culture of the world 2500 years ago is completely alien. Most city-states were in a perpetual cycle of war with far off lands and with one another. The value of soldiers wasn't marked with magnetic ribbons on the back of an SUV, but in hoping that they didn't lose and that you and your family weren't taken as slaves. So when I see reviews from the NYTimes having a good chuckle at this seemingly jingoistic talk of freedom from tyranny and mysticism, I can appreciate the cynicism in a modern context, but can also appreciate what I believe the filmmakers were attempting to achieve.

I'll leave it to other arm chair quarterbacks to decide if director Zach Snyder was trying to create commentary upon the world's current political status, or if it's not telling that Miller's take on the material is a decade old and remains largely unaltered. There's a lesson in there somewhere if folks want to draw allusions to a 2500 year old story.

Unfortunately, as grand in scope and detail as Snyder would like the movie to be, the film plays more like a series of bombastic set-pieces strung together rather than as a coherent narrative. Where Miller's work moves from panel to panel, Snyder has the challenge of compressing time, of working with scenes rather than tableaus. And, for reasons that become eventually apparent in the end, he inserts the seemingly most unnecessary voice over since Harrison Ford's voice over in the original cut of Blade Runner. The much commented upon violence is brutal, if often lyrical in its blood-cult presentation. No doubt the sort of thing that will have fourteen year old boys secretly practicing spear maneuvers when they believe nobody is watching. That said, the movie does show some respect for the realities of hand to hand fighting with thousands of soldiers crashing into one another and the value of a good strategy.

But that's pretty much all viewers are going to find as far as anything fantastic.

I can't help but think that had someone expanded the scope of Miller's story, had someone else directed the actors in the scenes which do not require a lot of stabbing, the end product would have been more than a sure-fire addition to the average 18-24 tear old's DVD collection. We might have got something great.

as far as the visuals... A friend of mine said he thought the compositing looked amateurish. I think he was more or less looking for something to complain about (he hadn't seen the movie). If the movie has anything going for it, it's visuals.

And, on that note... Action directors who've gone to the "up close" and lots of cuts to disguise the action (Batman Begins comes to mind)could certainly take a page or two from 300's handbook.

When the movie ended at the Westgate, we had loud applause from our mostly 18-24 year old audience. In addition, some dude was shouting "Yeeeaaahh! Yeaaahhhh!" And, a little high school girl immediately got on her phone to tell her friend "I just saw 300. It's really violent and stuff, but it's @#$%ing awesome!"

So someone's liking this movie.

Just not me as much as I'd hoped.

Further Signs of Clinical Depression

My workspace at home.

Too Many Leaguers to Mention, Plus Esther's Follies

The next week or so is going to be interesting.

Friday night my former roommate, KB, returned to town for a brief SXSW visit. It's funny how, even when you haven't seen someone in a long, long time, you pick up right where you left off. I don't believe I've seen KB since either shortly before Jamie and I hitched up, or shortly thereafter. I just recall it was that while I was living off 45th street.

At any rate, we sat down to dinner and fell right back to where we were with the same crowd from 1993-1999ish, a spouse here, a significant other there... and it was the Roaring 90's all over again.

We wrapped up the evening at Pat's where I was finally initiated into the world of Wii. Leaguers who know how I kill time know that gaming systems are not my thing. To The League, there's just not that much enjoyable about pressing buttons in a first person shooter that's just the 567th iteration on Doom. Especially when I think it's easier to use the keyboard than the controllers provided by most systems. But the Wii...

I will own a Wii. Oh, yes. I will.

The control is 100% intuitive, and the games don't feel nearly as anti-social. First-person shooters require you to either sit alone and solve the game or enter an arena where you shoot your pals (with a wide variety of highly unintuitive controls). With the Wii, we bowled, played some baseball, competed in a hammer-throw, raced some monkeys, etc... That's just good stuff.

Saturday morning my folks arrived for the joint KareBear/Jason birthday extravaganza. Did some dining out (at Freddie's), went and looked at some potential places my folks are considering, and wound up at Esther's Follies for the 10:00 show.

For folks who've not been: Esther's Follies is an Austin tradition. It's roughly "sketch comedy", vaudeville, magic, music and drinking. The show is roughly two hours with dozens of skits, some of which are more a part of the show out of tradition than anything else. I may have seen the Patsy Cline sketch 5 or 6 times, but it still kills. I'm also a huge fan of magician Ray Anderson who performs amazing illusions, especially in such an intimate environment.

Most sketches work, some don't. They change material every few months, so if you go two or three times a year, you get a different show. Sure, some of the comedy is Austin-centric, but folks seem to enjoy the show, even from out of town.

The whole thing is performed on a stage with it's back to 6th Street, and with windows open to 6th street, so the mostly inebriated happenings of 6th street are often incorporated directly into the show. It's a unique sort of thing to see as the folks on the street can see in and occasionally attempt to participate.

6th Street is always colorful, and it's always a bit dodgy taking the Karebear and Admiral down to Austin's entertainment district as, really, you never know what to expect. We got a bit of Leslie, who hasn't aged a day, and a very, very drunk young woman getting arrested and shouting "AUSTIN, TEXAS!" over and over. Not sure what that was about.

Time change this morning. The time change always stinks, and it's our first leap forward since 2002. Arizona doesn't observe daylight savings, so we never dealt with the time change. My clock is all kinds of off, and I predict an early evening for myself.

Saw "300" today after the folks left. More on that later.

Now I'm winding down/ catching up.

Tomorrow evening Nathan C. rolls into town. I think I'm due at Austin Books during the day with KB. Wednesday Wagner is making an appearance, and next weekend is the birthday of Steanso. And next weekend, The My rolls into town.

God help us all.

Hope all Loyal Leaguers are having a good one.