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Date-Based Archive Gangs of New York

I feel now as if I need to write an apologetic review of this film. It seems as if I need to apologize in two areas - firstly in that I am sorry that I liked the film, and secondly, since so many people whom I have talked to did not like the film, I worry that my review may consist largely of excuses, as if I am apologizing for the film's quality.

As I left the theater, I did not feel that I was alone in liking Gangs of New York, nor did I feel that the movie was particularly lacking in quality. Sure, I knew that critics had given the film a luke-warm reception, but my family and I, and the handful of friends who went with us to the theater, agreed that this was a "good" movie which all of us "enjoyed." It was only when I returned to New York that I realized that many of my friends had neither enjoyed the film, nor appreciated the overall quality. Herein I should like to play up the films strong points, and touch upon a few criticisms of my own.

Daniel Day-Lewis. One thing everyone seems to agree on is that Daniel Day-Lewis made this film. His performance was downright stunning, and I'll be damned if he doesn't win an Oscar for the role. Mr. Day-Lewis has created on screen one of the most memorable villains in recent movie history. To me, his portrayal of Bill the Butcher is equivalent to Marlon Brando's role in Apocalypse Now. Yes, he was just that good. (One may wish to note at this point that I have never seen any other movie starring Daniel Day-Lewis from start-to-finish save for A Room With A View.)

There is, unfortunately, a down side to Mr. Day-Lewis's incredible performance in Gangs of New York - he makes all the other actors seem like slack-jawed yokels. Leonardo DiCaprio and Cameron Diaz run around not knowing what they're doing. While I watched the film I reached the conclusion that their characters were rather confused, although now I realize, as others have pointed out to me, the actors simply did not know how to act.

Scorsese-isms. I'm a big fan of Scorsese. He went to NYU back in the day, he's from New York, he's made many terrific film-boy-favorite films, and if you've ever seen him interviewed, he's a terrifically intellectual, as well as a spastic madman. Gangs of New York contained many Scorsese-isms that made me smile.

For example. the film begins with a close-up. This is a rarity in the film world. Most films begin with a wide establishing shot, to give you a sense of where everything is. Scorsese started off as an editor, so he knows this rule of film, and he knows the resonance of breaking such a rule. He opens Gangs of New York with a rather extreme close-up of a man shaving. This is comparable to The Godfather, another close-up opener, which, if you'll recall, starts with a close-up of a cat. Shaving is significant for Scorsese in particular as one of his early short films is The Big Shave.

There are many other terrific Scorsese-isms in the film. The largest, perhaps, is the rampant use of ambiguous morality. Much like in Taxi Driver and Goodfellas Scorsese does not draw a line between good and evil. His heroes are anti-heroes. They are not concerned with differentiating good from bad or right from wrong, and their only moral code is that of honor among thieves. Moral ambiguity appeals to me in a most unhealthy enjoyable way, especially when it comes to cinema. I tend to think that a lot of morality is relative anyway, even though I know that moral relativism is not the soundest philosophical argument.

Also not unlike Goodfellas, the opening of Gangs of New York presents us with gangsters scene through the eyes of a child. In Goodfellas the child narrates to us, "For as long as I can remember, I've wanted to be a gangster..." Leo's character, Amsterdam Vallon, is hardly given any other choice in life except to be a gangster from the very start. He's never been interested in doing anything else.

Violence. Scorsese has given us many wonderfully violent movies in his day. Watching Gangs of New York I realized that I particularly enjoy the way Scorsese portrays violence. In most action movies, both heroes and villains act out violently. In a typical American movie, the audience will expect that the villain's violent actions are unjustified, and that's what makes them the bad guy, whereas the hero's violence is doled out on an only-when-necessary, or merely-in-justifiable-self-defense basis. Since Scorsese's films tend to star villainous anti-heroes anyway, the audience must come to terms with the fact that although some of the protagonist's violent acts are justified, many are not.

Better still, I tend to think that Scorsese shows us more or less realistic violence, and not gratuitous violence. One gets the feeling in Gangs of New York that real gangsters really did rip off each other's ears as trophies, and he's not just showing us that to gross us out (as compared to movies like Meet the Feebles wherein everything is meant just to gross you out). Scorsese is saying, "This is the way it is!" Not, "Look at my cool blood special effects!"

Furthermore, I greatly enjoyed the way the fight in the opening scene was shot. There were jump-cuts to people dying and arteries squirting blood everywhere - it seemed highly realistic in style and substance. I felt like I was there.

The Plot. I have heard some outcry about the plot of Gangs of New York not making enough sense. I can't see why, as it made sense to me. Bill the Butcher kills Amsterdam's (Leo's) father, and Amsterdam wants to avenge his death. He decides the best way to do this is to join the Butcher's gang, and kill him on the anniversary of his father's death, in front of the highest-up members of the Butcher's gang. Amsterdam is afforded some anonymity in the Five Points area, since he's been in jail for the last 18 years. He uses this anonymity to join the Butcher's gang. The Butcher takes a liking to Amsterdam and makes him his favorite apprentice.

I think that's great! I mean, as long as you're making a revenge killing anyway, why not make it as painful for the victim as possible by becoming his heir and best friend and then turning on him? That's downright Shakespearean! (And it is supposed to be Shakespearean, as there's even a line in the film to that effect.) Amsterdam is in serious trouble when he finds himself taking a bullet meant for the Butcher when someone else tries to assassinate him. This stirs up a lot of conflict for poor, confused Amsterdam/Leo. Maybe he really likes the Butcher after all and doesn't want to kill him!

The movie gets weird after Amsterdam finally takes a decent stab at the Butcher. The film really should have ended fairly soon after that point, but instead it does not, and we learn that Cameron Diaz has been saving up money to move to California, and the Draft is becoming a serious problem in the city. Finally there are some massive Draft Riots, which, even though they were established very early on as a plot element, still seem very strange in the film, as if they don't quite belong there.

New York. To wrap up my praise of the film, I should like to add that I am very interested in the history of New York, especially since the first two years I lived here, I lived in the old part of the city, below Fulton Street. You can't live there without wondering what the place was like when it was just wooden shacks and not glittering skyscrapers. Scorsese very kindly points out, throughout the film, exact intersections and street names, which is useful and highly interesting to New Yorkers watching the film, as the streets are still there.

And now on to my own complaints about the film:

Embarrassing Love Scenes. I saw this film with my parents. It's always kind of weird for me to watch anything having to do with sex with my parents, since in our family we have a don't-ask-don't-tell policy. I don't want to think about my parents having sex, and they don't want to think about me having sex. So when we're both watching Cameron Diaz lick Leo's scars on a 12-foot tall silver screen, it makes me kind of uncomfortable. Even if I weren't watching the movie with my parents, I still think that the love scenes in particular were poorly acted out. Those who have seen it may wish to cringe as they recall the wussy slap-fight scene.

John Woo Style Flashbacks. The main reason I don't like John Woo films are the flashbacks. His so-called best movie, The Killer contains the best example of this phenomenon I usually cite: As the Killer opens, there is a big shoot-out wherein a woman is blinded. After the opening credits, we are told that ten years have passed. The blind woman meets a man from the shoot-out. John Woo then gives us no small number of flashbacks to the opening scene. I could see where this might be necessary if, say, an hour had past between the opening scene and the flashbacks. However, in real time, it has only been about 2 minutes since the opening credits. Does the director have no confidence that I'll remember anything I saw 3 minutes ago, or is he anticipating late-comers into the theater? This is a constant problem with John Woo movies.

To me, flashbacks make sense in movies only under two conditions: 1. Scenes being flashed back to happened before the movie began (as in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon) or 2. Scenes being flashed back to shed new light on something we the viewers may have missed (consider the Beck video "Devil's Haircut") or give us a new perspective on what happened, for example, another character is giving us his or her take on the situation (as in Rashomon). These rules do not apply to television episodes containing flashbacks to older episodes which I may or may not have seen.

98% of all John Woo movies break my two simple rules, and frankly, I find this insulting. Films are only 2 hours long. Unless there was a flashframe I missed, I can usually remember everything I've seen in the past two hours. Signs is a big offender here - yes, the clues all fell together in the end, no, I did not require a flashback to figure it out.

Scorsese, as far as I can tell, is not flashback-crazy like John Woo. However, Gangs of New Yorkcontained quite a few totally unnecessary flashbacks to the opening fight. Yes, thank you, I remember that Dead Rabbit's face. Even if I didn't, Leo's persistent staring at the guy would clue me in on the fact that this is a person from his past.

So there you have it. That's my take on the film. I thought it was flawed, but overall enjoyable and worth watching, no apologies needed.

It is also worth mentioning that three kids sitting in front of me for the first 45 minutes of the movie were causing trouble and I was still able to enjoy the film. Eventually the troublemakers got bored with the movie and left. Only to come back for 5 minutes and leave again. It's a good thing they took off. The violent acts in the movie made me feel compelled to do violent things to them. I have never actively fantasized about kicking anyone in the head before. But then again, this is the first pair of steel-toed boots I've ever owned.

Posted by erin at 11:34 PM | Comments (40)

Date-Based Archive Merry Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

Posted by erin at 07:49 PM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive Jerksquad Happiness; Lackluster Gifts

I am sooooo happy that Jerksquad is up and running! Some of it so far is extremely funny. Much thanks go to Maggie, and many hugs, and so forth!

Herein I will shamelessly plug Jerksquad and tell any of my regular readers who don't read other blogs to check out the site, and please please please ask lots and lots of questions.

I went to an extended-family Christmas thing yesterday and got gifts more pathetic than usual. My grandma got my brother and I laptop cases, nice ones, that were on sale. She never bothered to ask if either of us have laptops - which, of course, we don't. My aunt and uncle gave me some useful things, a pair of gloves, a pop-up netted clothes hamper thing - but they also gave me insence, complete with a burner, and a little silver box. Are they trying to tell me that I smell? Or do they just think I'm a huge stoner?

Insence is just not a very good gift, unless you know the person you're giving it to really likes it.

Posted by erin at 10:07 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Chichiri!

This site had inane quiz questions, but focused on series I'd actually seen.

quiz by xonegirlarmyx

Posted by erin at 01:24 AM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Blogging from Home

I'm in Michigan now, at my parents' home. It is cold here... 32 degrees, with one inch of snow stuck on the ground. It's not much snow, but enough for my Christmas-liking.

I just saw The Two Towers again, with my mom, who had not seen it yet, and my dad, who failed to be adequately impressed for my liking. He said there were some slow parts, but overall he thought it was good.

But it's better than good. It's jumping-up-and-down-in-the-parking-lot good. It's clapping-during-the-movie-good. My mom appreciated it a lot more, having read the books long, long ago, and besides, she's a pretty big dork. She thought it was just as good as the first one, which is the correct review.

Then I went home and watched Inu-Yasha on cartoon network. I hadn't seen it before, due to its Saturday night time slot. It's actually not as bad as the commercials make it seem. In fact, it might be quite good gamer-style anime. Inu-Yasha is a half demon, and in the episode I saw he was fighting a possessed forest spirit-creature. The creature was coughing up 3-eyed demon wolves periodically, as well as making other kinds of attacks. It's a good thing Inu-Yasha is so high leveled, or else he would have died, what with being badly injured from the last episode. I.Y.'s clerics helped him out of the battle. It was pretty exciting.

Hal: Please do not, in the future, make us fight monsters that vomit dozens of wolves at us every few minutes.

Posted by erin at 01:57 AM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive The Solution to Out D & D Problems

Sorry to all my non-dork readers... (but no apology to Rick - in your face, Rick!)

Maggie is leaving, but plans to return once a month to play D&D with us. This creates a problem in that we should like to play more than once a month. Fortunately, there is a simple solution - since our party is already split into two groups, all we need to do is get both of Maggie's characters in one group, then rotate our playing schedule to coordinate with Ms. Magdelana's visits.

All we would need is some sort of teleportation scroll, or some bit of creativity on Hal's part to pull it off.

This would be, of course, only a temporary solution to our gaming needs, as Mr. Halifax may be departing for Japan in May.

I'm cc:ing this to Dan, since I know he doesn't read my blog...

Posted by erin at 10:32 AM | Comments (1)

Date-Based Archive Tattoo? My Mom?

My mom writes:

Do you guys want to go with me, laura and Marcie to get my tattoo? I think I'm going for a water dragon. I'll forward you some pictures for your input.

!!!!!

Since when has my mom wanted a tattoo? Maybe she's just pulling my leg. I'll send updates when I know for sure.

Posted by erin at 02:08 PM | Comments (14)

Date-Based Archive I guess I won't see you for a while.

Oops, I forgot to mention last night, I'm not going to see most of you for a while! I'm flying out on Friday night and I'll be back Sunday, December 29th, late at night. So I really should have said some goodbyes and whatnot, but whatever, we're in touch through blogs, aren't we?

Is anyone planning on having a New Years Party? Because if not, I'll totally throw one, either at my apartment, or uh, N.'s apartment if his roommates aren't there. I get out of work early on the 31st and have New Years Day off. I want to have a New Years Day Best Anime You've Never Seen Marathon. You know, for anyone who's interested in that sort of thing.

Posted by erin at 10:39 AM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Wheeeeeee!!

Every once in a while a gift comes along that's so good, even your own parents couldn't have been more thoughtful. To date, I have received two such gifts. One was the Simpson's chess set an ex-boyfriend's parents got me (before he was my ex, obviously). I was bowled over, as not only did I not know I'd be getting a gift from them, but it was a better gift than anything my grandparents had given me in years.

The second such gift is the wonderful Eva robot toy Sam got me in the gift exchange! Thanks Sam!!! She also got me the first tape in the series. Wheeeeeee!!!!!

More exclamation points to follow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted by erin at 09:30 AM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive I'd like to buy a vowel

Sp_c__l th_nks t_ th_ f_gh_g wh_ s_t _n fr_nt _f m_ _t L_TR f_r sh_r_ng y__r p_pc_rn, _v_n _ft_r _l_x c_ll_d y__ _ c_nt.

Posted by erin at 09:25 AM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive Drumline

Last night after an excessive number of previews and commercials, I saw Drumline. I bring up the trailers, as each one was sillier and worse than the last, culminating with a trailer for Cradle 2 the Grave starring Jet Li and rap star DMX. It's hilarious trailer can be seen here. I encourage you to watch this trailer. It certainly changed my life forever.

It is, perhaps, that trailer which inspired me to approach this review from the angle: Would this movie make Hal throw up?

For those of you unfamiliar with Hal, movies that nearly made him vomit include Moulin Rouge and Romeo + Juliet. Hal's other viewing habits include keeping top ten lists of movies by year dating back to 1920. Additionally, he strives to watch 365 movies per year, renting primarily from the library. One movie Hal really likes is the Japanese film Battle Royale. One movie that you'll be surprised didn't make Hal vomit was the loathsome film Peal Harbor. He actually enjoyed it.

I think Hal might like Drumline, whereas the Cradle 2 the Grave trailer might make him spew. ET might want to see the latter film for cheesy kung fu goodness.

Drumline has some of the worst TV spots I have ever seen. Although the movie is about a marching band, the television commercials highlight the cheerleader-esque dancers and "booty shaking" parties that take up less than 5% of the screentime of the actual film. I saw right through these poorly made commercials, and knew that it would be a film about band nerds.

I was right. Sort of. There are no real "nerds" in the film outside of the token white guy (self-proclaimed "Mr. Affirmative Action") and perhaps the band director himself. This is unfortunate, in a way, since the viewer misses out on getting to see some real band nerd action. However, the act of watching the film, and enjoying it, is the action of a band nerd.

I was a band nerd in high school, so I know whereof I speak. I played French horn for 8 years. My high school band was very small, so everyone had to be in marching band, concert band, and pep band. Twice I had the good fortune of going to a recruiting event that the University of Michigan Marching Band held. The U of M drumline was (is) AWESOME. Until you have seen someone do a somersault with crash cymbals, you'll have no idea what I'm talking about.

U of M's drumline was much better than the Atlanta A & T drumline that was used in the movie. Although A & T's drumming was very good, and they did have a few good tricks, they were not nearly as impressive as the drumline I had seen live.

Nevertheless, there was a lot of good marching band footage in the film. ...And that's about it, because the subplots were largely cheesy and predictable. However, without said plots, it would be a documentary. A marching band documentary may not have been as cool.

The plot predictably surrounds Devon, an African-American youth from Harlem, who's superior high school drumming skills have gotten him a full ride scholarship to Atlanta A & T. Devon is so cocky and full of himself that he immediately gets in trouble with the drum section leader, even before tryouts. The friction between the two makes up much of the tension in the film. Devon finds a love interest before moving into his dorm room - Laila, who, as it predictably turns out, is the leader of the dancers who dance with the band. When it turns out that Devon can't actually read music (gasp!!!) and has just been memorizing his parts the whole time, he gets suspended from the band (temporarily) and sort of stops seeing Laila. Then Devon starts a fistfight with the rival band's drumline during homecoming, and gets kicked out of band (more or less) permanently.

But who cares about those plots! The second best thing this film has going for it (after the actual marching band footage) is the rivalry between the A & T band director (Orlando Jones) and the band director at the opposing school. The taunts they throw back and forth are priceless! I cannot convey to you the hilarity of rival band directors, except, perhaps by comparing it to the Far Side strip with the "evil" butterfly catchers. I'm not sure I'd want to watch a feature length film about rival directors, but it couldn't be too much cheesier than Devon's story.

The film concludes with some kind of competition between marching bands, not unlike the big cheerleader competition at the end of Bring It On. I won't "spoil" it for you by telling you which band wins, but I will say that at least Bring It On had more restraint with its super-predictable ending.

I think many parts of Drumline would make Hal laugh, and/or otherwise enjoy himself, although there were definitely several scenes and choice lines that would cause Hal to pull at his hat and grit his teeth the way he sometimes does. Overall, although the film won't make Hal's ton ten list for the year, I'm fairly sure it wouldn't make him spew chunks, either. In fact, if Drumline is Hal's Worst Movie of 2002, it would still be a pretty good year for movies.

Posted by erin at 04:12 PM | Comments (2)

Date-Based Archive No Blood

Posted by erin at 12:07 AM | Comments (11)

Date-Based Archive baaaaaaaaarf

Jason thinks I should go see the new Star Trek movie. I made a strip illustrating my feelings on the issue. He has also been so kind as to ask me, "why is your hair all like, messy today" and when I complained that his question was too rude, he responded, "how is that mean? i'm just showing concern."

Gah!

Things are icky here today at work, but all next week I get to go home!! Yay! No work! All I have to do is lay around my parents house and accept gifts and food offerings. It'll be great. I will probably answer jerksquad questions non-stop, also, ask them, just for practice and to get a forum going. The site is really coming along.

Over the weekend Lauren and Troy from back home visited. The visit went OK, but fell into the recent trend of my guests leaving weirdly early. They were also visiting Troy's-long-lost-brother, so they spent a lot of time with him instead of me. Which was unexpected, but I should have anticipated it, I suppose. Nevertheless, I took my friends out for sushi, Belgian fries, and Japanese candy before the night devolved into drinking games. Then we went to Yaffa. Another word on food - Lauren recently visited Japan and swore this one kind of lemon candy, like a super-classy Smartie, was her favorite. She also made us try these weird space ice cream-type candies, that were in real miniature sugar cones. Space ice cream is not exactly accurate... but nevertheless, they were weird and good.

Japan has great snack food. It makes sense now why Miaka, when returning from ancient China to the modern times in Fushigi Yugi would pick up a backpack full of snack foods to take back in time with her, and nothing else. I mean, I assume she also picked up some clean underwear, but who knows? If given the choice between packing more underwear and more Pocky, Miaka's choice would be obvious.

Posted by erin at 02:55 PM | Comments (8)

Date-Based Archive Fun Game

I'm playing a new fun game called "F*cking with my template."

OK, so it's not new, fun, or even a game.

Posted by erin at 05:49 PM | Comments (12)

Date-Based Archive My Mom's Favorite Movies

Many of you have met my mother. She's a great person and a great mom. She's super-nice, and always listens to what you're saying (well, maybe not 100% of what I'm saying, I think I'm just easy to tune out sometimes...) and she never judges what you have to say. For example, my mom could politely hold a conversation with Rick, even if Rick was talking about politics.

That said, my mom has strange tastes in movies. But that's not quite it, it's more like, the way she watches movies differs from the way most people watch movies. And it's not the way she watches all movies, I mean, she goes to the theater on weekends like the rest of us, but the way she watches her favorite movies is kind of strange.

Here is a list of some of my mom's favorite movies:

1. Stewart Smally Saves His Family
2. To Wong Fu, Thanks for Everything Julie Newmar
3. White Christmas
4. Home Alone
5. Star Wars Trilogy**
6. Back to the Future Trilogy**
7. Mallrats
8. Doc Hollywood
9. Clueless
10. The Music Man

With the exception of Star Wars and Back to the Future, once my mom has deemed a movie as a "favorite" she will watch it an excessive number of times - but she doesn't just sit down and watch the movie from beginning to end. Instead, she starts the movie. Then if there's a phone call, or she falls asleep, or what-not, she doesn't bother to stop the tape, instead she just leaves it running. When she finally gets off the phone, she doesn't rewind the tape to where she left off - oh no, she just keeps the movie going. Next, provided she isn't going to bed, and if she's missed large enough chunks of the film, she'll rewind it, and start over again from the beginning.

I had the misfortune of being ill one Christmas break when my mom was re-finishing furniture and cooking a big dinner after starting to watch Home Alone. I watched the whole thing (I like it enough) - and then she rewound the tape to start over! I had to leave the room and do something elsewhere. She went on to watch it at least 4 times that week!

Maybe if my mom was watching really good movies, or at least actually watching the entire movie, it wouldn't bother me. But she's not watching good movies, she's watching Stewart-freaking-Smally! (Not the one about the mouse, that's Stewart Little, this is the straight-to-video SNL film about that positive affirmation guy, "Because you're good enough, you're smart enough, and doggone it, people like you.")

It's not just OCD, my mom has reasoning behind this. Some films are very emotionally demanding of viewers - you know, putting you on the edge of your seat, making you worry about the main character, and so forth. That's way too much "stress" for my mom. She'll read the last page of a mystery book first, just to avoid the suspense. Her favorite movies are therefore "stress-free." Mallrats, for example, is not terribly demanding of the viewer. You know, even never having seen the film, right from the start; antics are going to happen and the couples will all get back together in the end.

When my parents saw Scream in the theaters I refused to tell my mom which characters would live and who done it. When the movie got too tense part way through, my mom went out for a popcorn refill and had the ushers tell her the ending.

I suppose there's nothing terribly wrong with the way my mom watches movies. It's valid. And seeing how often she falls asleep in her chair, I can see how rewinding is somewhat impractical. But the movies she likes are generally so cheesy, I worry whenever she starts watching a movie I liked ( the Fifth Element)...

** When it comes to the trilogies on the list my mom takes a slightly different approach - if one of the three films air on television, she'll dig out the tape of that movie and watch it, to avoid commercials. Then, within one week's time, she MUST watch the other two films in the trilogy, in any order. My brother does the same thing, although not with my mom, he'll watch them upstairs.

Posted by erin at 03:38 PM | Comments (5)

Date-Based Archive AAAAUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!

So I move out of Ann Arbor, and suddenly the friendly little neighborhood anime store EXPANDS RIDICULOUSLY:

http://www.wizzywig.com/

GODDAMNIT!!! YOU CAN RENT ANIME FROM THERE!!! WHY ISN'T THERE ONE IN NEW YORK, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHY?!?!

Posted by erin at 09:13 PM | Comments (11)

Date-Based Archive Hey Jason

Hey Jason, maybe you shouldn't keep this page as your homepage in IE. And how come you never comment? What are you, some kind of troller? Maybe this should be the Jason-insult page until you change your homepage.

Anyway, in other news they announced the dates of Otakon 2003! August 8, 9, and 10! Otakon is the BEST.

I realized today that if I got paid $7 an hour, even if I lived in a cheaper apartment, I probably wouldn't be able to survive. So much for that hentai-watching internship...

Also... I feel really mean today. Or at least just now. Maybe it's the rain, or the fact that my umbrella just broke, or the way I had to go to the postoffice because I'll be goddamned if the post office could actually leave something at my apartment for once. I feel like a junk-yard dog.

Posted by erin at 11:22 AM | Comments (1)

Date-Based Archive FAO Sucks - Union Square Rocks

I began Christmas shopping this weekend, an endeavor that occurred the was it always occurs - I bought the easiest, most "fun" gifts first, I still haven't bought gifts for the more difficult relatives on my list, and I ended up spending a ton of money on myself.

You may not have noticed, but I got a new coat (N.'s gift to me) and some new boots. They look almost identically to my old coat and old boots, which I had been happy with up until multiple buttons started popping off my coat, the lining had wore out, and one sleeve was beginning to detach. My podiatrist brought to my attention that the tread had worn off my boots long ago, making them not unlike bald tires. I was perfectly happy to ignore this, until it snowed last Thursday. As I laid sprawled out on a particularly icy patch of St. Mark's Place, I realized that I would have to get new boots, and soon, if I was to survive the winter spine-in-tact.

My new boots have wonderful, tractor-like tread. I can walk through the iciest of ice. My new coat is a little longer, and has a nice inner-pocket for my wallet.

As per the title of this post - I visited FAO Swhartz on Sunday. This was a horrifying experience. Not only was the place insanely crowded with breeder suburbanites, their hell-spawn in-tow, but all the toys sucks. Every display had some movie or book or TV show tie-in. Why is there so much "Madeline" merchandise, for god's sake? I also ran into a coworker, which has NEVER happened to me ever in the city, seeing as how I work in Jersey and my coworkers tend to live far-and-away upstate.

After the FAO Schwatz claustrophobia-suck experience I stopped by Union Square to check out the holiday market thing going on there. It was great! There were twice as many booths as last year, and all of them had wonderful, original artsy stuff, much like one might find at the Ann Arbor Art Fair. There was even a booth with Unemployed Philosopher's Guild merchandise! I love that company!

These shot glasses of great writer/drinkers are definitely on my wishlist!!

Posted by erin at 05:11 PM | Comments (9)

Date-Based Archive I May Have Forgot to Mention

I have done many things worth blogging about lately and failed to mention most of them. For example, last Wednesday I saw the Daily Show taping with N and his roommate. The guest was Colin Quinn, who you might remember from his brief but hideous newscast on Saturday Night Live. He was much, much funnier in real life, not unlike how Norm McDonald is much funnier doing stand-up than the news.

Jen and her boyfriend Josh visited. They drove in earlier than expected, so I didn't have time to clean my apartment - then they left a day or two ahead of schedule, citing that their one-year anniversary was coming up and each of them was planning something that would take time to prepare. So they drove in on Saturday afternoon and left late Sunday night. Jen had visited the city before, Josh had not. I took them to the Met, then we went on a blitzkrieg tour of Times Square, Battery Park, Wall Street (where Jen climbed up on the Merrill Lynch bull, as per my insistence) and the WTC site (much to my dismay).

Currently, there is an Attila the Hun exhibit at the Met, although we were running out of time and the exhibit was crowded, so it was kind of disappointing. I don't know if they do it every year or what - but there was a giant Christmas tree on display in a prominent part of the museum. At the base of the tree was a gorgeous ceramic nativity scene, and the tree itself was decorated with a host of beautifully detailed ceramic angels. The lights were hidden in the tree and only illuminated the angels, so it was very tastefully done. Recordings of a church choir singing religious Christmas songs played quietly all around, and the hall was decorated like a church, with stained glass and columns and whatnot, completing the effect. It really was a beautiful display.

We also saw the usual Vermeers, Rembrants and Picassos.

Jen's visit, for the most part, went smoothly and without incident. At one point, however, she did argue with me a bit about something ridiculous that really made me think that she either no longer knew me at all, or had never known me very well in the first place. I found that disconcerting - seeing as how we were best friends for seven years.

Two of my other friends are visiting this weekend - Lauren and Troy. I think Lauren reads this blog, but since she never comments I'm not too sure. I'm really psyched about their visit, because I know they'll really like the East Village.

Posted by erin at 01:31 PM | Comments (1)

Date-Based Archive Of Course I'll Do That

When I was in community college I didn't have to get up until about 8:30am. My brother was still in high school, and he had to get up sometime before 7am to catch the bus at 7:15. Although I had used an alarm clock since 3rd grade, my brother, being an avid skipper-of-school, relied on my parents to wake him up.

This meant that every morning at about 6:30 my mom would yell up the stairs for Matt to wake up. Matt would respond: "I'm up!"

This was, of course, a lie.

Matt was not up. My mom would yell again at about 6:45. "Are you up? Are you out of bed yet?"

"Yes, I'm up," Matt would respond from the coziness of his bed.

And again, at 7am. "You'd better be out of bed! You're going to miss the bus!"

"I'm up! I'm up!"

At 7:10: "Don't play this game with me, mister! You better be ready for school!"

"I'm up!"

And at 7:15: "You've missed the bus. I'll drive you to school. You're not skipping school again!"

"OK, I'm up! I'm up!"

After that it would degenerate into an ugly argument about how many days Matt had been absent that semester already, the school's sick day policy, how my mom was "not going to put up with this anymore," and then it would wrap up with a coda about failing school.

This was the most annoying thing EVER. Not so much because I was trying to sleep, but because Matt was so blatently lying. As a kid he learned that if you say "No" to a request from a parent, you get in trouble. If you say "yes" and then don't actually follow through, you get in considerably less trouble.

When I was in Junior High I was depressed, so I skipped school fairly often. I would wake up at the correct time, fake some kind of illness, and then go back to bed. Since I didn't skip school excessively, I didn't get in trouble with my parents.

It really, really bothered me that my brother would be the kind of person who would say "yes" to something and then not actually do it. I hate that! I despise the kind of person who does that! I hated that my parents would trust his lies! How could they be so foolish?

In the end, what it comes down to is that people are like water. Given the option, people will always take the easiest path, just like water, flowing down a hill. It was easier to believe Matt's lie than to force him out of bed. It was easier to argue than to force him to go to school every day. It was easier for Matt to say yes than no.

But why does it still bother me so much?!

Posted by erin at 05:30 PM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive Surnames

How common is your surname in America? Find out:

http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2001/thesweetestsound/popularityindex.html

Lee ranks surprisingly high. I blame the flood of Korean immigrants, frankly. Johnson is number 2 after Smith. Surprisingly, Bong is on the list. My grandmother's family, Rumler, is not. Nor is N's last name.

OK, so the rest of this post was going to be about this cool story I heard once on NPR about some country (like Sweden or some such place) that had too many residents with the same surname. An entire apartment building, for example, could be unrelated people with the last name Johanson or something like that. In this country there were also laws that your business could not have same name as an existing business...

Anyway, the country printed out a phonebook length list of new, computer-generated names that would sound like regular Swedish names but were original. Individuals could then pick a new last name, or name their child with a name found in the book. Then the name would not be used again, once they (presumably) registered it or something. The names eventually ran out, and the government had to put together a second book.

The trouble is, I can't remember what country this was, and I can't, for the life of me, find any useful information on it. The closest sites I could find were more npr stories about similar things:

like Mongolian names

or German names

What I'm really interested in is the book of computer generated names... and all I can find are crappy links to US genealogy nonsense!

Posted by erin at 03:48 PM | Comments (9)

Date-Based Archive Closing Early

WHEEEEEEEEEE I get out early today!! Closing at 2pm ! Yes!!

Which would be good, IF MY APARTMENT HAD ANY HEAT!!! The heat and hot water have been going out lately. I mean, it's happened 4 times in good weather, and 3 more times this week (Sunday morning and Monday night). I complained to my landlord a couple of times, and thanks to a flyer another tenant put up, I registered a complaint with the city.

The flyer pointed out that it's illegal in New York to have no heat, no hot water, and no super for the building. That's right - no super. We're just supposed to call the landlord, and expect that the contractors who are re-modeling the building during the day will be able to fix stuff.

Fortunately, is't not so cold that I'm going to die, or anything, but it's not warm either. I guess I'll have to shower at the gym.

Fuck.

Posted by erin at 01:20 PM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive Make your own strip

Lookee! You can make comic strips here:

http://www.stripcreator.com/make.php

Posted by erin at 11:41 AM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Time passes

OH MY GOD IS IT LUNCHTIME YET?!!

This is taking forever!!! I came to work early today so I could leave at 4 and watch a Daily Show taping. Yaaaaaarrrrrrrgggggg... I waited and waited and waited and it was only 11:00. I also came to work early yesterday, so I am feeling more than a little sleep deprived.

Like a small child, I am cranky and need a nap.

I am also irritated because I won't be able to go to the gym tonight, as I am supposed to go to N's after the show. Nor will I be able to go to the gym tomorrow, thanks to dork trivia, and desperate, last minute button-making (I hope). I wasn't able to go to the gym last weekend because my friends from out-of-town were visiting, and took up all my time. So although I was up to 4 gym-visits per week for a few weeks, now I am back down to 3. I WAS starting to lose weight, but I guess I can forget about that, what with the holidays and such.

grumble grumble

Posted by erin at 12:12 PM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive Which Eva Character are you?

OK... so I might have not taken the quiz in any kind of honest way.

What Neon Genesis Evangelion character are you?

Posted by erin at 08:25 AM | Comments (2)

Date-Based Archive sweeeeeeeet

SWeEEEEEEEEEET

None of my coworkers are here today. My boss is gone, the woman I usually work with is gone, Shuffle-uffagus is gone, and Herb's not here yet. That really only leaves Tabatha.

I can just do stupid crap all day! Wait, that's what I do every day.

Wait a minute... that means if anything breaks I'll have to test it myself. That's actually MORE work.

Damn!

Posted by erin at 08:17 AM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive Food, Folks, and Fun

What I really need is an entire week off - maybe two weeks. My job is starting to get to me. I think what I will do is continue to work at ISO up through next July or so - the idea being that I will finish another screenplay in that time. Then I will begin in earnest to search for a new job. My mom's advice is to find a new job before quitting this one.

Another deciding factor in my 2003 plan is Maggie's moving or not moving to Seattle. If Maggie moves out, I will probably move out when the lease runs out at the end of July. If Maggie stays, I could consider staying in my current apartment for another year or so.

Anyway, Thanksgiving went something like this:

The Sunday before last my friend Lauren and her buddies threw a party deep in Astoria celebrating Thanksgiving and making everyone dress up as if it were the 1950's for some reason. N and I went to great lengths to wear the proper clothes, as the invitations specified. I'm not sure the effort "paid off" per say, but I think our attempts at costuming were appreciated. I'm still not sure why Lauren insisted on such a mode of dress, but I think it has something to do with her favorite book, Franny and Zoey.

The evening went well, with lots of delicious amateur-level traditional Thanksgiving dishes. At one point, Lauren busted out her all-hot-pink Hello Kitty kareoke machine, but the kareoke stopped after only three songs when the guests we didn't know very well gave Lauren death-like stares.

Andrea, who interns at CPM, told me about her dorky co-workers playing HeroClix, which turned out to be an odd sort of foreshadowing of Thanksgiving Day. You see, Adan had already purchased the game...

For those of you, who, like me, don't follow links, Heroclix involves these tiny plastic figures of super-heroes (Marvel or DC) and on the base is a little dial with hit points, weapons abilities, and superpower stats. As your characters get hit you turn the dial and the stats change. Each character is worth a certain number of points, and when you kill the character you get the points. If any of your characters live, you get those points.

In the first game, I picked She-Hulk as one of my characters. She-Hulk turns out to have exceptional strength. Adan and N saw that this was a problem, and quickly made up a house rule that I call, The House Rule Made Up Specifically to Beat Erin. For those of you still interested, the rule was this: You see, in order for She-Hulk to take any damage during her first click or two in the game, any characters attacking her must do at least three clicks of damage in order for one click to register, as she is invincible for up to two clicks. Most characters can only do one or two clicks of damage in a given attack, making She-Hulk essentially invincible. So N and Adan decided the clicks of damage to She-Hulk were cumulative in a round. Then they ganged up on me and killed all my characters before killing each other.

In the next game I played a Sentinel, which was really cool. Unlike the other characters in the game, the Sentinel's objective is not to kill the other players, but rather, to capture as many players as possible. A capture is worth double the points of a kill, and capturing an arch-enemy is worth triple points. Adan and N were playing Sabertooth and Wolverine, among other heroes, and somehow, they just let their key players fall into my hands. I won by several hundred points, and Maggie, whom they had ignored as a non-lethal threat, killed the Sentinel with one blow, putting her into second place. N was defeated by Plasticman, which he found humiliating.

In the third game, Adan was bitter from losing to my Sentinel, and specifically went after all my players, beating me into the ground. I lost with zero points. Adan went on to win by defeating Sam and Maggie.

Anyway, Thanksgiving dinner at Maggie's house had much delicious food.

The End.

Posted by erin at 12:04 PM | Comments (16)