Review: Rescue Dawn

This is a surprising movie in a lot of ways. A Hollywood-type movie directed by German weirdo/genius Werner Herzog, for one. A great, nuanced performance by Christian Bale playing not an action hero but a regular guy who probably believes that he is an action hero. Another great performance by Steve Zahn, one of my favorite character actors, playing counter to his normal comic sidekick role. An incredible, based-on-a-true story tale of survival and hardship. This movie is only marred by a coda that is, if representative of what really happened, staged in such a way that it comes off as supremely cheesy, betraying a lot of the feelings the viewer had developed for the main character.

Worth a watch if you like: POW movies, survival against the wilderness movies, Christian Bale, Steve Zahn, or Werner Herzog.

Darryl at the Plaid

Just got back from a beer stroll to the Plaid where I ran into my next door neighbor Darryl. Why am I not friends with this guy? He's a drummer in a band, he's got a ten-month-old child, he's huge and blond like my oldest friend Roo, and his wife's name rhymes with his own! He's cool.

Fact is, they reached out first, by crashing a Christmas party of ours two years ago (or was it three?!) and Barb and I never reciprocated. Not for not wanting to, but just because we were busy and we're shy and you can easily let two (or was it three?!) years slip by when you are constantly putting things off one week, and then another...

I resolve in 2008 to have Darryl and Jarryl over for dinner, or at least drinks. And to learn how to spell Jarryl's name.

Sites

Instead of whining about my hangover (damn you William and your fancy bourbon!), I'll list the sites I visit on an almost daily basis. It's not very long. I am sometimes bemused by the fact that for me the internet is tiny, a local neighborhood of websites. I take a look at ActionTrip, CHUD, Cool Tools, Ebert, and the New York Times. Like everyone else, I use Google, YouTube, Wikipedia, and IMDb, but really my era of exploration with the internet seems to be over. I've settled down.

Words

Words of today: ogive, ogee, inculpate, abnegate, abrogate, arrogate, and transhumance.

Abnegate, abrogate, and arrogate, obviously, are pretty easily confused words. And because they have more common synonyms, they're even easier to neglect, and therefore confuse, and possibly misuse. Ogive I was looking up because of Keegan's A History of Warfare (he uses "ogival" to describe the shape of the compound bow with which the horse people of the steppes conquered the known world over and over), and ran into ogee as a synonym.

I like collecting words, but if one doesn't use them regularly, they are tough to commit to memory. And if one uses abnegate and inculpate in a sentence instead of renounce and incriminate, one is likely to get a confused stare or a punch in the head.

Sick Day

Took my first true sick day in over a year today. Other uses of sick leave have been for family medical issues. After some needed errands in the morning Barb and I crawled into bed (her with her knitting, me with book and laptop) and we've been here ever since.

We both have colds, and it seemed best to spend a day at rest trying to recover, rather than tough it out and consequently prolong the illness -- and potentially inflict our disease on co-workers. Plus, it's really nice to spend a day of forced idleness once in a while. Which wasn't easy! We both had to remind ourselves to slow down, relax, not try to use this "free" time to be productive (the Christmas season being a time of high productivity -- thus Barb's knitting).

One of the morning errands we couldn't put off was an appointment with our obstetrician, Dr. Lin. It was my first time meeting her and it went well. Barb has had some reservations about her, but I got a good first impression. Plus, we learned that Providence Milwaukie, where Barb should be delivering Elizabeth in March, has a laboring-Jacuzzi, which knowledge made Barb glow with the light of a thousand suns. We are trying to really prepare ourselves for a drug-free delivery, and every option for relieving the pain and stress of contractions is welcome. (Dr. Lin had a chart on the wall showing just how big 10 centimeters is -- yikes!)

Consumerism, Car Culture,& Gift Cards

Just got back from our annual trip to Michael's (the crafts store) in Clackamas on 82nd. Every year we go and every year the strip is clogged with cars, brake lights glowing like the bulbs on Satan's Christmas tree; my blood pressure shoots up; I sweat the reliability of my jalopy; I swear I won't do it next year.

After 82nd we stopped at beloved Powell's on Hawthorne and what a difference! Found a parking spot a few blocks off Hawthorne and walked in the light rain to the bookstore (which was clogged with people, but that's a helluva lot better than cars), did our shopping, stopped at another shop to pick up fresh noodles for dinner... It was still hectic and overpacked, but on a human scale. Point being I think America can successfully survive the death (or crippling, at least) of the car without giving up it's love of consumerism -- a love I happily admit to sharing.

Except for gift cards.

One of the reasons we went to Michael's this year was to get a gift card for Barb's sister. I have decided I hate gift cards. If you want to give a gift card to someone, cut out the middle-man, save a piece of plastic from the landfill, and send a goddamn check. What is the difference, really? The big difference is that every penny of the amount on your check will be used.

We got a Visa gift card (basically a debit with our money on it) for my brother and there was a $5.95 service fee. I would have sent a check, except my brother can't easily cash one for reasons we don't have time to go into here.

First!

Testing. Testing. Is this thing on?