Lessing and more
12:29 am | Blog, Video | Places, Reading | 0
The weather in Houston has been exceptionally agreeable of late. It took the Labor Day clue and is now transitioning into fall. I know it’s a cruel joke because Texas summers last well into October, sometimes November and December and January. Texas can’t fool me, but it can get my hopes up.
It is fall in Europe though, and this will be the first time I’ve been to Europe this time of year. Previous trips have always been April-May-July. This will be the first time I’ve gone to Germany. I am super excited about that, although most of what I know about Berlin comes from books like Voluptous Panic, which probably ain’t realistic these days. I am excited to be greeted by my husband in the airport and to spend the next three weeks showing him all the places I visited when I was in school.
I keep thinking it’s been a long time since my last trip to Europe but it was only two years ago. It has been almost a decade since I was last in Paris or London, not counting the airports. I turned 20 in London during a time when I was poorer than I’ve ever been in my life and celebrated with half-price tickets to see “The Graduate” starring a naked, husky-voiced, hot Kathleen Turner.
I am re-learning my French accent with handy pod-classes. I am packing light, bringing a small bag, not nearly enough space for three weeks of travel. I’ve been looking for the perfect book, one book, that will satisfy me over during the trip. In May of 2007 I was staying at a tiny deserted resort in El Nido, Philippines, when I picked up a book called Incognito Street: How Travel Made Me A Writer in the resort’s meager hodge-podge library
I think travel guides and writing guides are kinda hokey, but Incognito Street was a pleasant surprise. The book was far better than it’s genre implied, and I was consumed with author Barbara Sjoholm’s burgeoning feminism and her growing identity as a writer. By the end of the trip I had amassed a pretty long, scribbled list of the numerous references she makes throughout the book to novels, movies, writers, feminists and other influences.
One of the books that moved her most was “The Golden Notebook.” So several months later, while plumbing the shelves at the largest used English-language bookstore in Korea, I was pleased to find a copy of Doris Lessing’s most famous work. I recognized the name immediately from the list I’d made before, and immediately bought the copy, in spite of the fact that it was pretty worn.
I haven’t read it yet but it seems like the perfect book to take on this trip, taking into account current events and travel themes. Plus it’s nice and thick.
Only a few months after my purchase, Lessing was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. This movie is older than dirt but I’m posting it anyway because of her adorably cranky acceptance speech.
I’m leaving my computer at home and won’t be online much while I’m away. Tomorrow morning before boarding the plane I’m gonna do a little dance to keep Ike away from Houston. Trip pictures and anecdotes will be posted sometime after the 30th. Later, gators.
Ladies’ choice
9:15 am | Video | Watching | 0
Devastatingly handsome, and he has moves.
Soul Weekenders
9:14 am | Video | Listening, Watching | 1
Northern Soul in the UK.
Summertime
Summertime from Brittanie on Vimeo.
John McCain is a misogynist
2:25 pm | Internerd, Video | Girly, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? | 0
There are a million reasons* not to vote for John McCain but here are two that have my blood boiling lately.
First, McCain calls his wife a make-up smeared cunt ** and then he offers her up to a pack of bikers in an event that equals little more than a debaucherous wet t-shirt contest.
Other ways in which McCain shows little to no regard for women: he wants to overturn Roe v. Wade, limit access to contraception and and doesn’t believe in fair pay.***
* Next time I get a blanket email from my grandmother about how Obama is the Muslim antichrist I’m going to reply with this video.
** Here is an interesting follow-up to that story.
*** I know most of these videos and links are old news but I still think they’re important.
Indulging myself in narcicism
2:38 am | Blog, Video | Girly, Places, Two Wheels | 7
Here’s the video from Chattanooga Channel 12. That’s me in the first montage, kick-starting my scooter in one shot and then revving the throttle a few shots later. That’s also me at the end of the video, rambling about helmet hair. For the record, I don’t know what the fuck I’m talking about when I say I can ride “for weeks” on one tank. For those thinking of buying a scooter, that’s not true. She just asked me a mindless question and I responded in kind.
The current *spin* on scooter stories is about how people sick of high gas prices are turning to two wheels to ease their economic woes. It’s the only way the news can come up with to relate to the scooterist community. But I’ve been riding scooters for 5+ years, way before gas prices reached unreasonable levels, and even before then I was raised by a father who raced and was obsessed with moto-cycling. There are so many people out there now who have bought their first 2-wheeled vehicle and who have no idea on how to ride safely (flip-flops? no helmet? tank tops? lane sharing?) and in my opinion they are not the bulk of the scooterist community, nor are they representative of what AmeriVespa is about. I mean, my bike is a greasy 30-year-old 2-stroke highly-pollutive inefficient engine. If I was in it for gas prices, surely I’d be driving a hyrbid. I’m in it for the scooters themselves.
Okay. End rant. Enjoy the video. Sunday Punchers REPRESENT!
Needing your lovin’
4:57 pm | Video | Listening | 1
Johnny “Secret Agent Man” Rivers is playing in Stafford, TX the night before C goes offshore again. You better believe I already have my tickets, and my outfit picked out. I’m working on the dance.
While we’re on the topic of music, I’ve started (another) list — Shows I Have Seen, 2008.
(Crossposted at Houstonist, where I’m now a contributor.)
Waiting for the War on Bastille Day
1:31 pm | Video | Listening | 0
French late 70s glam-psych rock band Soggy, via Beware of the Blog, who has more delicious info.
Gonzo
10:48 pm | Video | Watching | 1
I saw this movie last week. Serendipitously, as I didn’t know it was coming out until the day before it opened and I am currently finishing “Hell’s Angels.” Overall the movie is pretty good, although plagued by “Unsolved Mysteries”-style dramatic re-enactments. There are a lot of video interviews and photographs with Thompson and the best part is the last half hour during which they touch on the author’s suicide and self-planned memorial service, which looked pretty great. If you’ve read all of his books you won’t learn anything new but the value of the movie is hearing from Thompson the author as opposed to Thompson the character (Raoul Duke).
Make You Say Wow
3:39 pm | Video | Listening | 0
Bob Log III is playing tonight at Rudyard’s. I’m going. You should too.
There is more video awesomeness here.