I suppose if my sister, Meg, reads this blog entry, she will have her birthday present revealed before she actually sees it in the flesh...err, I mean... fabric.

From time to time, I've bought vintage quilt tops on Ebay and then had them actually quilted and finished.  I have a special attraction to quilt tops made in the 1930s, and this one pictured above is one of them.  I love the peach color and all the fabrics from that time - some are even feedsack cloth.  I bought this especially for Meg, and sent this off to her.  She lives in Tokushima, Japan.  I sent it on the slow route (I imagine barges and old shipmen loading boats.)  Meg is a quilter herself (and a knitter, and an embroiderer, along with many other craft skills...)

Before I get into the movies I watched in February, I have to mention my odd film watching on Sunday.  I've been giggling here and there over the serendipity of life's random events, even when it comes something as mundane as what back-to-back movies one watches.

I wanted to watch all 5 1/2 hours of "Carlos" - a 2010 French film by Olivier Assayas.   It was made for television, and as a full feature film.  I wanted to see this film because, after the Academy Awards, which were so dull and mostly depressing, I was thinking about how wrong the Academy so often is.  I wondered how long we'd be talking and thinking about the movies that won many of the awards in the coming years.  I was also thinking how the National Society of Film Critics is SO MUCH BETTER at giving accurate awards.  So I was tooling around their website, thinking about how they should have a televised show!  I looked at the past awards and was reminded about "Carlos" - it got Best Feature and Best Director in second place for films of 2010 (Second after "The Social Network.")

I got the film.  I should add that I really loved "Summer Hours" the film Assayas made just before "Carlos."  (And which won best Foreign Film for 2009 by the National Society of Film Critiics.)

So - this is a lot of lead up to explain my weird, weird Sunday.  I finished the film on Sunday afternoon, and was sort of thrown into a reverie by it.  I think it's a masterpiece. "Carlos" is about a terrorist - a left wing, PLO (kind of) associated terrorist - he was born in Venezuela and spoke many languages and masterminded several horrific terror plots, including the kidnapping of the entire OPEC conference in 1975 (I have very vague rememberances of that - I was a high school debater then - the topic, "Should OPEC be Abolished?" :)

"Carlos" is incredible, and I recommend it heartily.  But then, Sunday night, Michael and I decided to watch "Game Change."  The Sarah Palin HBO film.  I had extremely low expectations for this film.  But I was surprised at how even handed and accomplished the film was.  The peformances were so good.  I loved that they took the high road, didn't even get into family or anything other than the basic facts.  I liked that they didn't villify or ridiculous-ize Sarah Palin, they made her seem somewhat saner than I thought she was from watching her live on TV.  But how this cumulatively dealt a much darker and subversive blow - how out of control things were and how no one was really responsible and how frightening the outcome was.  In many ways Sarah Palin is a victim.

BUT.  BUT.  BUT.

There were so many unsettling parralels between Carlos and Sarah Palin!  That's what was so wild.  No - Sarah Palin is not a terrorist and didn't murder people.   But I realized that the emotional impact of both films was exactly the same, which is - here is this charismatic person - with these outspoken ideals - who feels there is deep wrong and claims to want to change the world - who's attractive and dynamic. But who - in the end, is basically an empty shell.  There's no true idealism.  There's definitely a desperate need for attention and a deep drive to feel as if they stand for something, but in the end, they stand for nothing.  There's no there there.

Social pathology is so subtle.  Not in these two cases.  These two cases are not subtle at all.  But there is such a huge gray area in people - when is this type of drive and behavior meaningful and accurate and when is it all smoke and mirrors?  God, I love thinking about this.  And I would not have guessed that it was Carlos the Jackal that made me understand better the essential void in the mind of Sarah Palin.

That was quite a Sunday.

Okay, now on to February movie watching....


I have watched these movies during the month of February, 2012

1.)  Iron Lady, 2011, dir. by Phillida Lloyd
2.)  Garden State, 2004, dir. by Zach Braff
3.)  Ordet, 1955, dir. by Carl Dreyer
4.)  A Better Life, 2011, dir. by Chris Weitz
5.)  Hollow Triumph, 1948, dir. by Steve Sekely
6.)  The Bridge on the River Kawai, 1957, dir. by David Lean
7.)  If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front, 2011, dir. by Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman
8.)  Drive, 2011, dir. by Nicolas Winding Refn
9.)  Rango, 2011, dir. by Gore Verbinski
10.)  Pina, 2011, dir. by Win Wenders
11.)  Jane Eyre, 2011, dir. by Cary Fukunaga
12.)  Hell and Back Again, 2011, dir. by Danfung Dennis
13.) Of Time and the City, 2008, dir. by Terrence Davies
14.) Anonymous, 2011, dir. by Roland Emmerich

Looking at this list, here is what is still resonating:  "Ordet."  "Bridge." "Pina."  "Jane" ; and all three docs: "Of Time," "Hell," and "If a Tree."

"Ordet" is something I've wanted to see for some time. I'm a fan of Dreyer's, "The Passion of Joan of Arc" is a film of his that still thrusts it's images into my concious mind from time to time.  But when I saw "Everlasting Moments" and read that the story line and the style was heavily influenced by "Ordet," and knowing that "Everlasting Moments" would be having it's way with my mind for some time, I decided to put "Ordet" in my Netflix queue.  The film was both difficult and difficult not to watch.   It's style is very stilted and can seem almost awkward.  It's point of view is decidedly religious, even though the plot is about bickering religious people.  But the film gave me shivers.  I really recommend it. I might have to watch it again soon.

I did the particpation accounting for "Bridge on the River Kwai" when I was in my twenties, when I worked at Columbia Pictures in their accounting department.  I have wanted to see it since then!  It's an odd film, odder than I thought it would be. Alec Guiness (so young, so handsome!) is an officer who is willing to die as a prisoner of war over this: that officers should not have to do the physical work that the rank and file soldiers - soldiers who are also prisoners of war - are required to do.  I simply could not let go of this insanity.  I felt the point of view of the filmmaker was that we were to see this stance as an indication of his staunch defense of rules, which was a good thing.  Huh?  Or that he was completely mad.  To me, it was just creepy.  The film goes on from there. It's such a good idea for a story - the main plotline, the bridge and the men building it and then it getting destroyed and everyone having such conflicted attitudes.  It's long and I felt trapped with everyone.  The performances are great.  What a wonderful, but odd movie.

Well, now that the Academy Awards have come and gone, I feel happy that I can delve into movies that were not necessarily released this last year. I felt I had a lot of homework.  And when I watched the awards, which was only fun becasue I was following several people on twitter who I think are funny, many of whom are friends too, and it almost felt like we were all together watching.  It was a sort of sad broadcast, and the only truly funny bit was the Wizard of Oz audience testing bit with Fred Willard and everyone else who is hysterical.  That is absolutely the only time I genuinely laughed. On the other hand, I don't need to laugh.  But I do want to feel the awards mean something, and I have to say I began to feel I was losing that sense.

"Pina" is staying with me too.  I don't know a lot about dance, but Wim Wenders caused me to understand how great dance is through this documentary.  I want to see this film again.

Books read in Feb. 2012:

Only two this month, and both by the same astonishing writer.

1.) In Zanesville, by Jo Ann Beard
2.) Boys of My Youth, by Jo Ann Beard

Reading her books, it makes me want to stop even trying to be a writer.  In Zanesville is a lovely romp with a 14 year old girl.  I surrendered to her fiction so deeply, I couldn't pull myself out and had to get to the library to get her earlier book of essays, which is also heart-stoppingly lyrical and breathtaking.  I love this woman.  I want more books from her.

Okay. That's all folks. Back to my own writing slog....

These are my parents, in 1958 just after a wedding shower where my mother had apparently been given an iron.  I love the way my mother has her hand behind her back, my father's hipster glasses, and my mother's somewhat genuine and somewhat fake smile.   Ah...  the smile of marriage.

Get ready to do some ironing!


Okay, allow me to list the movies I watched in January 2012.

1.) Sweet Grass, 2009, directed by Ilisa Barbash and Lucien Castaing-Taylor
2.) Silent Light, 2007, directed by Carlos Reygadas
3.) Casablanca,  1942, directed by Michael Curtiz
4.) Kenny, 2006, directed by Clayton Jacobson
5.) Four Feathers, 1939, directed by Zolton Korda
6.) Deep End, 1970, directed by Jerzy Skolimowski
7.) Carnage, 2011, directed by Roman Polanski
8.) Poetry, 2010, directed by Chang-Dong Lee
9.) The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo, 2011, directed by David Fincher
10.) Once Upon A Time In Anatolia, 2011, directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan
11.) Five Came Back, 1939, directed by John Farrow
12.) A Separation, 2011, directed by Asghar Farhadi
13.) The Artist, 2011, directed by Michel Hazanavicius
14.) Last Year at Marienbad, 1962, directed by Alain Resnais
15.) Ugetsu, 1953, directed by Kenji Mizoguchi


Hands down, the film that had the most effect on me was "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia."  It's a long movie, 2 hours and 40 minutes.  Not only that, it's a very, very, VERY slow movie.  There are long-shots that are long.  Really long.  Almost-to-the-point-of-parody long.   But it's necessary - you begin to feel you're with the characters in real time.  In the middle of the night.  Driving around the countryside of Turkey.  Looking for a dead body.   With little or no information about who it is, how he died, why it's important, and who the hell everyone who's looking for him is, exactly.  And guess what, it turns out that it actually isn't all that important - the who, how, and why.

Okay, I suppose it's a bit existential.  In fact, I wasn't really all that into this movie until after the two hour mark.  I was a little confused by it's tone, it's lack of forward movement, but I was also enjoying surrendering to the film.  Then suddenly: BAM.  Okay, oh dear, oh yes, oh no, oh wow.  This movie is like wading in water near the shore - with it's calm little waves, rhythmically lapping at your feet.  And just when you start to decide to maybe get out - a monster waves hits you from behind.  But even this analogy is misleading - it's not that anything particularly startling happens, it just suddenly has this cumulative effect.

I cannot stop thinking about this movie.

In fact, I invited a couple of friends over this Friday to see it again.  This time I'll be able to savor those fleeting moments that in retrospect mean so much.  Ceylan lets these moments occur like they would in real life: maybe not important, maybe completely important.   This is the best movie I saw out of the 2011 crop, maybe the most personally impactful movie I've seen in years.  I have Ceylan's previous films in my Netflix queue.  I'm suddenly a big fan.   To me, just from this one film, he's the filmmaker equivilent of the Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk.  There's something so distinctly Turkish about their work, and I barely know what that means.  It's just... Turkish.  If I had to label the feeling it would be: hope with surrender, fatalistic, traditional, yearning, dissapointment, quiet promise.

I felt that way about "Deep End" as well.  This movie was shot in England, but by a Polish director - Jerzy Skolimowsky.  (And starring Jane Asher, Paul McCartney's former gal pal!)  It's in english, but it's a completely Polish movie.  And there's something so Polish - so distinctive. I cannot eloquently explain it, I just can feel it.  Let me try, Polish movies are: thick, saturated, inevitable, darkly comic, a dirge with a tinge of the oblivious.

Which brings me to "Carnage."  Wow.  I really love Polanski.  I can even see why he responded to the play "God of Carnage."  I think he thought it was really funny.  I think there's something about how broad and silly and ridiculous that play is that, through Polish eyes, IS funny.  But I must say it: not funny.  A weird marriage of sensibilities.  I think the actors were having fun.  I wish I was having as much fun watching it as they looked like they were having playing these completely cartoonish characters.  Sadly, I think the premise is brilliant.  But ugh.  It made me glad I didn't see the play.  It wasn't for me.

But I want to concentrate on what I loved watching.

Last month I had the pleasure and honor of hosting three of my dearest friends from Seattle.  Jim Emerson, Kathleen Murphy, and Richard T. Jameson are all close close friends who I've known for over thirty years.  They're all film critics. Last year they also came for a few days in January, and we had a mini film festival in my basement.  We did it again this year, and added an extra day - five days in all -  of film watching.  Such a treat!   Many of the films I watched last month I got to watch along with them. There is just about no greater delight in my opinion.  I didn't offer a film for my contribution, I just made them all sit and watch all seven episodes of "Episodes" - which is a masterpiece of comedy!

Other notes on films from January:  I saw "Casablanca" in downtown Chicago, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's playing the score.  I forgot how wonderful that movie is, how well written it is.  It was a little distracting, to be honest, having the orchestra there.  But still, a good experience and worth the effort.

"Silent Light" was another movie that has stayed with me a long time after seeing it, like "Once Upon a Time in Anatolia." It's a Mexican film, but about German speaking Mennonites in Mexico.  The entire movie is made in their dialect with non-professional actors from the community.  I had no idea these people existed.  The film is slow and unwinds at it's own pace, but it's beautiful and haunting.  Since I read it was a remake of Dreyer's "Ordet" (at least partially) - I ordered that movie from Netflix and watched it this month (Feb.)   I actually like "Silent Light" better.  Well - they're really so different.  Both were good experiences.

I did not expect to like "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" as I've never  read the book(s) or seen the original movie.  In fact, I felt I had to go see it (my friends wanted to go) and I considered it homework.  To my surprise, I love, LOVED it.  Rooney Mara is enigmatic, disturbing, and you can't take your eyes off her.   The film was quick and yet expertly paced.  I was completely engrossed, actually riveted.  I hope there'll be sequels.

Dare I say it: I think "The Artist" is overrated.  I did like it.  In fact, I liked it very, very much.  But it seems thin.  Also, I got tired of how depressed the main character got.  (The actor George Valentin, played by the actor Jean Dujardin)  It was too much.  And it was also too much, the girl (The actress Peppy Miller played by the actress Berenice Bejo) saving him over and over and OVER again.  (Spoiler Alert)  I wanted to yell at her - stop trying to save this guy - he needs to save himself!  He tries to kill himself too many times.   By the time he was putting a gun in his mouth I wanted him to just go ahead with it.  This film started to feel too much like a male show biz executive's fantasy.   Let's take a moment and think of a comparison: What is the reverse-sex version of this story?  Well, it's "Sunset Blvd."  Imagine Joe Gillis trying to save dear sweet Norma Desmond's life over and over and OVER again.  And the movie ending with a delightful career-saving tap dance?  HA.  All I'm saying is.... Well, I dunno.  I guess I'm saying that men in that situation often get saved by young women, and women in that situation aren't saved at all.  There's my feminist rant on "The Artist."  But okay - this kind of thing does happen for many men.  So all right.   The film is beautiful - and some of the images - one of which I see is being used in advertising - when Peppy puts her hand through George's jacket and then puts her own arm (as his) around herself - god that was GREAT!  And it was shot all over L.A. and that part made me miss Los Angeles so much it hurt.

I wholeheartedly recommend "Poetry."  It's a Korean movie about an older woman who's a little silly and very sweet and genuine.  She has a lot of bad things happening in her life and she's overwhelmed.  For example, she  has a horrible teenage grandson who lives with her.   She takes a poetry class and it's just heartbreaking and transcendant and whole-life -justifying all at the same time.

Oh, and "Kenny."  What a delight.  And a surprise.   I'm not even exactly sure how I came upon this film.  It's an Australian comedy - very improvisational - about a port-a-potty salesman.  At first I thought it was going to just be scatalogical jokes about, well, about shit.  And yes, it is that. But it has a lot more to it - lots of good performances.  I laughed a lot.

I laughed a lot during "Last Year at Marienbad" too.  It's really the epitome of an experimental art film. It doesn't make much sense as a narrative film.  I think I was laughing at the movie, not with it.  But I would hope that when the Renais and Alain Robbe Grillet (the novelist and the man who wrote the script) got over themselves (or actually maybe this is what they intended)  they would laugh too.  I both hated and liked the film.  And yet I felt no quandries about feeling that way.  I get how stylistic it is. I see the composition, the beauty, and even it's oddness.  But it's also ridiculous.  There's some great extras on the Critereon DVD, I especially loved the interview with film scholar Ginette Vincendeau - she goes into the history of the film and it's influences.  In fact, you could skip the movie and just watch her.

Now, let's move to books.

I read these books in January 2012:

1.) 2666, volume 1. Published in  Written by Roberto Bolano.
2.) The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home  Published in 1989.  Written by Arlie Hochschild (with Anne Machung)
3.) Marriage Shock: The Transformation of Women into Wives  Published in 1999.  Written by Dalma Heyn.

I've been wanting to read 2666 for a long time.  For the first half of the this first volume (which is in three books, which are sold all together) I was happily in love with this book. The characters and the set up is delightful - four academics in four different european countries who all study the same mysterious author.  But by the end of the first volume, I felt I'd lost it. I had this same feeling I had reading Orhan Pamuk's "The Museum of Innocence."  I started to seriously think the author had lost it, not just his characters.  I began to feel the author losing himself in his own book, and not in a good way.   As in losing perspective.  And I was willing to go there with Pamuk.  But I don't know. I don't know if I'm in for the other volumes of 2666.

I've been meaning to read The Second Shift for a very long time.  I have read references to it for twenty years!  But I never had any overriding reason to read it.  I knew the basic idea: in families where both partners work, it's still the women who do the "second shift" at home - 80% of the domestic work of child caretaking, cleaning, laundry, cooking, etc.   And yes, that Is the premise in a nutshell.  And I'm sure it's as true today as it was 20 years ago.  But I was unprepared for how compelling and well written and gut-level astonishing - I would even say astounding -  the book was.  I recognized myself, I recognized my marriage, I saw what I was doing to perpetuate inequitable patterns.  I read this for my own book I'm writing - I have a chapter on housecleaners and housekeeping and I just wanted to cover my bases.  Oh Lordy!  I saw that an updated edition was issued on Jan. 31, 2012!  I must get that to see what's different.  I won't go into it all here, I'm trying to write something deeper for my book.  But god - anyone who's in a situation like this - two working parents - should read it.    It was both embarrassing and enlightening for me to read it.

Marriage Shock - that was pretty good as well.  Her basic idea is: women become demure after they get married. They edit their pasts, they don't act as aggressively, or as ambitiously, and they assume the mantle of purity and love.  They do this but they sublimate their resentment at doing this.  It pops out.  And I can see that this is true.  But Heyn only concentrates on marriage, and not on marriage with children.  Possibly this is because she herself doesn't have children.   In any case, I kept thinking that the book only pertained to a small percentage of women and that group didn't include me.  On the other hand, she is one hell of a writer.  God, some of her paragraphs literally took my breath away.  Again, I plan to write a bit about this in my book, so I'll leave this topic for now...

Arden, my dog, continues to live and love.

Arden was diagnosed with an extremely large tumor last June. The tumor is growing between his lungs and heart.  The vet suggested I alert my daughter (who was away at camp at the time) and let her know that Arden may not be alive by the time she got home.  I took Arden to a specialist and after a better X-ray they told me that, indeed, there was a massive tumor.  There was nothing that could be done about it.  He'd probably have a heart attack, or suffocate to death as the tumor got larger and larger.  I was told to expect him to possibly faint, or I could possibly wake up one morning and find him dead, having perished in the night.  It was suggested that he could not go on walks, or rather, on only very short walks.  I was given a medication for him to take to reduce his coughing.

Well, now it's late January.  Arden and I still go on our 2.4 mile walk almost daily (down from our old 3 mile-r) and he's feeling pretty good.  He seems happy and relaxed.  He must've had that tumor for a very long time and it must be very, very slow growing.  He is having problems here and there - every once in a while a limb seems to get numb.  His breathing is weirdly erratic from time to time.  He's a lot more subdued.  A LOT.  But overall, he's in good shape.  I think he'll live for quite some time.

Even though all those above-mentioned possibilities still loom like a dark sky.

I'm very late posting my December lists, and I do feel guilty about that.  I'm promising myself that my January lists will get written up more promptly.  I'm not exactly sure why posting these lists causes me to feel so organized and in control.  But somehow it does.  And so, without further adieu...

Here are the movies that I watched in December:

1.)    Stage Coach, dir. John Ford, 1939
2.)    J. Edgar, dir. Clint Eastwood, 2011
3.)    Young Adult, dir. Jason Reitman, 2011
4.)    The Help, dir. Tate Taylor, 2011
5.)    A Dangerous Method, dir. David Cronenberg, 2011
6.)    The Descendants, dir. Alexander Payne, 2011
7.)    War Horse, dir. Steven Spielberg, 2011
8.)    Moonstruck, dir. Norman Jewison, 1987
9.)    Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, dir. Stephen Daldry, 2011
10.)  Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, dir. Tomas Alfredson, 2011
11.)  Uncle Bonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2010
12.)  The Shop Around The Corner, dir. Ernst Lubitch, 1940
13.)  Days of Heaven, dir. Terrence Malick, 1978
14.)  Tree of Life, dir. Terrence Malick, 2011
15.)  Blossoms of Fire, dir. Maureen Gosling & Ellen Osborne, 2001
16.)  Contagion, dir. Steven Soderbergh, 2011
17.)  How The Grinch Stole Christmas, dir. Chuck Jones & Ben Washam


It was a big month for movies, many which I loved, and others which I not only didn't enjoy, I would go as far as to say I detested them.  So, among this list, of these particular movies which were released in 2011, I would give my best movie award to: Tinker, Tailor.   Second best is a tie between Contagion and The Descendants.

Even though I mostly had no idea what was going on in Tinker, Tailor, I was still enthralled and filled with a deep happy wonder at the unfolding story.   The look of the film, how the scenes built on each other, the performances, the subject - I drank it all up - as if I'd been thirsty for this drink, this taste precisely.  And yet, I hadn't known I was so thirsty for it! I want to see the film again, especially now that I know what the basic story is.  Gary Oldman must be nominated for an Oscar.  Sadly, I wonder if he will be.

There are movies that are impossible to fully experience the first time around. I think Tinker, Tailor might be one of them.  I have no idea why everyone is ignoring it for awards - so far anyway.

I felt The Descendants has been slightly over rated by critics, but only slightly. It definitely grew on me.  The movie got better in the week after I saw it, frankly - as I reflected and turned scenes up and back in my mind.  I appreciated how Hawaii was presented, as a real place where real people really live.  I think Contagion is very good too, why isn't it being nominated so far?  I don't get it.

The worst movies (of the 2011 releases) that I saw in December are:  Worst of all:  Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.  Tie for second worse is between: War Horse and J. Edgar.    Now, as far as Extremely Loud goes - frankly I have such deep contempt for that movie,  I feel to explain why gives it more attention than anyone should ever give to this film.  The kid was so annoying, kids like that are not endearing to me, they're just oblivious jerks.  I know he was supposed to have Aspberger's Syndrome, but then he also showed startling emotional intelligence and insightfulness which is not a characteristic of Asberger's and I felt this was in the film just to cheat, to make the audience like him.  I also did not buy Tom Hank's character and wondered why he thought up absurd mysteries for his son to solve when there would be such joy in investigating things that were real - and when I say real, I just mean that make logical sense and adhere to actual physical rules instead of the gobbeldygook that we were to watch and I guess, admire.

Incredibly Loud: Award for Most Manipulative.

Well, wait.


I take it back.


War Horse gets the award for MOST openly and clunkily manipulative.  And from a director who knows better.  This is the same guy who made Munich? (My personal favorite Spielberg movie.)  I felt the play was also overly sentimental and manipulative, but it was also haunting and beautiful and complexly sad.  The film was not.

Here's an example: In the play the boy's father is an erratic alcoholic who, for mostly egoistic and impulsive reasons buys a horse he cannot really afford, nor take care of.  His son does.  Bad things happen.

But in the movie, we are treated to "why" the father's an alcoholic. He was hurt in a war.  He's wounded.  In fact, he was a hero!  Who has medals hidden away!  So now we're supposed to understand why he drinks.

To me this greatly diminshes the impact of the boy taking over the care of the horse.  He's not giving the horse guidance and protection that he was not given himself, he's now a boy who just doesn't get that his father really is a good guy.  Plus, Spielberg left out the mournful, lone Gaelic singing (which was in the play) and I feel that was a mistake.


J. Edgar missed by a mile for me too.  I kept thinking of the movie that could have been made.  It was excruciating to watch as well. Oh where is that wonderful director of Unforgiven hiding?

I have to say, "The Help" is not worth even considering amongst the list of terrible movies.

Wow.  I'm cranky about movies today.   Cranky and a bit inarticulate.

Fantastic.

Okay, I didn't hate "A Dangerous Method."  But I didn't love it either.  Many of my friends, friends who mostly have a similar film sensibility as myself, just loved it.  I dunno.  Maybe it was the time I watched.  I may need to give that film another go.

Also, not a fan of "Young Adult." Even though I think Patton was fantastic and should be nominated for an Academy Award.  And Charlize Theron was great too.  But, I don't think I'm ultimately a fan of Diablo Cody.  I want to be!  There's so much about her spunk and drive and insightfulness that I really enjoy.  But I feel she took the easy way out with this script by making the Theron character so completely unsympathetic.  I felt she was just trying to shock people with her brutal honesty  and unforgiving candid eye, but truthfully - in the end she just wrote about an underdeveloped, unlikable character that somehow we're supposed to...

wait...

to what?

I'm not in any way averse to unsympathetic characters.  In fact, I like them.  I just felt that there was so much more she could have mined.  I felt she hadn't done her homework.  Here's an example: in the final scene where Patton's character's sister gives her this speech about how small town life is so dumb and boring and Theron's character's life is so wonderful and great - why couldn't it have been more realistic and insightful?  Why didn't the sister character say something like: "You don't get to have it all.  You got a life that's exciting in many ways that life here is not."   But instead Cody's written a speech that makes everyone in the small town seem like rubes.  And Theron, although unlikable, is still cool and hip and successful.  To me that was the take-away from Young Adult.  Cody is telling us: "I have a great career that doesn't require that much effort.  So fuck you all in small towns everywhere.  I may be depressed and mean, but I'm really cool while I do it!"

This is too much time in the negative, let's go positive.

Let's turn to some movies that have - by any standard - stood the test of time.  First of all "Stage Coach" is a masterpiece. In fact, my daughter Mulan is home from school today, sick, and I just may insist that we watch "Stage Coach."  I think that's the finest movie, overall, that I watched all month.

Well, "The Shop Around The Corner" is a perfect movie too.  Yes, it's perfect.  We watched it on Christmas day with my mother (who was visiting) and my dearest friend Gino who also spent the day with us.  For me, to watch The Shop Around The Corner on Christmas Day is a great Christmas Day.  In fact, I think it's required Christmas viewing.   For the record, I've never seen "You've Got Mail."  I'm just too afraid that my beloved movie has been mangled.

I wasn't enthralled with "The Tree of Life."  But there were parts I did love, many many parts.  Jessica Chastain is great - along with Brad Pitt.  But the film is a confusing mess to me.  I felt that the point of view of the director was: "We are all part of a plan, a plan we don't understand but naturally yearn for."  I think it would've been much more powerful and poignant if I got the sense that the film's creator felt this slightly (okay greatly) tweaked and different way:   "Evidence shows that the world has no plan, and it's a tragedy of human existence that we keep yearning and seeking a plan, or reasons, or meaning when there ultimately may not be any."

I still think you could have kept most of the movie the same!   Lose the ending with dead people in heaven walking on a beach.  The dinosaur scene were I guess we are supposed to witness the beginnings of compassion was weird and wrong.  In fact, in keeping with Malick's theme, he could have done a scene with the beginnings of love in humans - motherly love! That truly is the alpha and omega of love. We're bonded because we give birth to completely helpless beings who get their evolutionary advantage through culture which is transmitted by doting and caring parents, most of whom are the mothers of those helpless beings.  That would've still been in the theme of his film!  Oh!

Why don't directors like Malick consult with me before they begin shooting? Honestly!

:)

I will say that watching "Days of Heaven" I expected to love it - I loved it when it came out.  But really - that movie is truly a masterpiece.  That is a perfect film.  Not one frame, not one word is off, in my not-exactly-humble-I-admit opinion.  Days of Heaven is sublime.  Much better than I remembered, and I have such happy memories of that film.  I saw it when I was in college.  I sat in the movie theater for some time afterwards, just absorbing what I saw.  And yet, the film was even better than I could have understood at the time.  (Come to think of it, Day's of Heaven's directorial theme is the one I articulated above, the one I wished Malick still held.)

I suppose that makes three perfect movies for last month: Stage Coach, The Shop, and Days.

Now on to books, and finally I'll write a word or two about Victoria Jackson.

I only read three books last month.

1.) A Mother'sWork: How Feminism, The Market, and Policy Shape Family Life, written by Neil Gilbert
2.) Shockaholic, by Carrie Fisher
3.) The Sexual Paradox, by Susan Pinker

I enjoyed all these books tremendously.  Fisher's chapter on spending Michael Jackson's last Christmas with his family was riveting and insightful and hilarious as only she can be.  Gilbert's "A Mother's Work" was enlightening. I have such a different view of how our culture should be helping frame the idea of motherhood in our society than I ever did before and much of it is in alignment with Gilbert's views.  But I won't go into this here, because I'm putting this in my book.   The Sexual Paradox is full of good information as well.  But, again, I won't get into that here.  

Now, onto Victoria Jackson.  Many people, more than I would have ever expected, have written me to ask me if Victoria Jackson is for real.  The way she appears, the views she espouses, and how she espouses them, is very confusing.

It's true. I've felt this way from the beginning.  Imagine if Steven Colbert were actually the character he plays: Steven Colbert of "The Colbert Report."  Would that not be highly confusing?  We enjoy Steven Colbert because we see there is a genius inside him that can see all the hypocrisy and inanity of our political system as well as the media, and he's so focused, smart and funny that he plays with it all - he's like Mozart playing tunes from notes out of our deeply dysfunctional system of government and media.  But Victoria.  Victoria.

So, to answer the question that many have asked me.... Yes.  She is for real. She really does believe all the things she says. To my knowledge, there will not be a day when she says: the jig is up.  It was all a performance piece.

What bothers me is that she wants to have it both ways at once. She wants to get the laughs that are there for characters who are kooky and dimwitted, but then she also wants to use this persona to make real points and arguments.  Points and arguments that are not ironic, they are completely naked and honest and forthright.  But she'll take the laughs.  I don't know why those on the right let her be part of their media-pushes.  To me it would be like, like if there was a "comedian" who's character was a Marxist-Leninist. He wears a beard and small round glasses and all black and he says things like:  The Government should own all the land!  People should not be allowed to own any money!  Free Enterprise should be stopped!

And then he has a soap box that he carries around with him, and he puts it out there - and it even says "Soap Box" on it, and he gets on top of it and yells and gesticulates like a cartoon of communism.

And he's on talk shows and everyone laughs at how nutty he is.

Only he really believes what he's saying.  He may be somewhat confused about why people are laughing.  But he doesn't care enough to analyze it, he really just wants the laughs.  He hears the laughs, and he'll happily take the laughs.

Now, wouldn't you have a certain contempt for this person?  Wouldn't you think: if they know people are laughing at them, doesn't that reduce their credibility?  Doesn't it make it seem as if the point of view they have is being compromised by the very laughs they're receiving?

I suppose it comes down to a demarcation in comedy.  You are laughed at, or you are laughed with.  Most comedians dabble in both ways of getting laughs.  In fact, it's a good exercise.  The next time you watch a comedian, just say out loud, as they get the laugh - "at"  "at"  "with" with."  It's very educational.

But you expect that when a comedian is getting an "at" laugh, that they know they're getting it.  More specifically, they know WHY they're getting it.  They are the wiser.  Their act is planned out in this way.

This is the thing: I don't think Victoria's act is planned out that way.  It's for real.

She's not Andy Kaufman (as many emailers have asked me.)   The "there" you think is "there" is not "there."

As far as I know.

I had someone forward me a song that Victoria has recorded and is up on You Tube, about - well, I suppose it's about me. It's about a fellow cast member who's an "atheist" (I personally prefer the term: non-believer)  and she wrote a song about it.  Here's her complaint with me: I talk about it all the time.  There's a chorus where she sings, "And she goes blah blah blah about it ALL DAY LONG."

That's a very weak argument.  This is an argument that my own mother might've used.  Did use, come to think of it.  "Why do you have to talk about it?"

Seriously, what kind of argument is that?  That's not an argument.   You may as well say, "She's a non-believer and she wears poorly constructed shoes."  What do the shoes have to do with anything?

But, really, what is that argument?

This is the argument of shut up.  The argument of be quiet.  The argument of why-are-you-talking-about-something-that-makes-me-uncomfortable.

Personally I don't think I talk too much about religion. In fact, I seriously think I talk about it too little. But my talking more or less about it is not an argument in favor of, or against the quality of my arguments.

I mean, duh.

I am now feeling like I over ranted over this topic that is not consuming very many people. In fact, it may be extremely few people.  But still, since some people had written and asked, I figured I'd explain a bit.

Or something like that.

Ha.

Okay, that's all I have to say on this subject for now.....

The sourpuss in the middle of this picture is me, 1970, at Christmas time.  I'm 11 years old.

Okay.  Now, let's start with the movie list.

Movies watched in November 2011:

1.) The Parent Trap, dir. David Swift, 1961
2.) Phantom Lady, dir. Robert Siodmak, 1944
3.) Louis Sullivan: The Struggle for American Architecture, dir. Mark Richard Smith, 2010
4.) I Am Love, dir. Luca Guadagnino, 2009
5.) West Side Story, dir. Ernest Lehman, 1961
6.) The River, dir. Jean Renoir, 1951
7.) The Goddess, dir. John Cromwell, 1958
8.) Bridesmaids, dir. by Paul Feig, 2011
9.) Hugo, dir. Martin Scorcese, 2011
10.) The Assasination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, dir. Andrew Dominik, 2007
11.) The Spiral Staircase, dir. Robert Siodmak, 1945
12.) Moneyball, dir. Bennett Miller, 2011

It was a glorious month for movies.  I would say the highlight was "The River" by Jean Renoir.  I've been wanting to see this movie for a very long time, and my mother-in-law gave it to Mulan for her 12th birthday.  We all watched it together as a family, and then we watched all the wonderous extras on the DVD.  Then, on Thanksgiving, we all watched it again along with our dinner guests.  Our friends also have a 12 year-old daughter and I think this film was just the perfect after-dinner experience.  One of the all-time great coming-of-age movies.  It's like watching an epic poem.

I'ld say the next standout movie of the month, for me, was "Bridesmaids." I'm embarrassed I hadn't seen it before.  I know so many of the people in that movie - not really well, but I know them from the comedy world - and specifically through the Groundlings.  I had no idea it was so good.  Kristin Wiig is a master - funny, painfully poignantly funny.  She's the female Bill Murray of our time.  The script was so precise and loose at the same time - just the right combination for maximum laughs.  And the actors - the actors!   This film is my top favorite of all those Apatow-annointed comedies.   This film and "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" are my favorites.  (Well, and "Forty Year Old Virgin.")  It's so satisfying to see a comedy hit a home run.  I think it's the hardest thing in the world to do.  Great script, hilarious women, really damn funny.  I was so astounded - just blown away - that I watched it again immediately!  Maya Rudolph was so good too, and Melissa McCarthy is so versitile and her timing is impeccable.

I loved "Hugo." I cried for fully the last half of the movie.  I'm so happy Scorcese made this movie.  It's absolutely in my top ten of the year.  The best use of 3D that I've ever seen, maybe with the exception (or inclusion) of Zemeckis  "A Christmas Carol" (2009.)

What else really grabbed me???  Oh, oh, oh! "I Am Love" was soooo great. That's another one I watched twice. I also watched all the extras on the DVD.  Lots of great interviews with the entire cast.  Tilda Swinton is such an astonishingly good actress.  It's a fantastic part for her.

"The Goddess" I'd seen a long, long time ago.  I forgot what an amazing actress Kim Stanley was.  A really haunting movie about Hollywood actresses.  Some fantastic performances...

Now, on to books.  I've been reading many motherhood oriented books while I write my book about motherhood. It's been very enjoyable and enlightening.

Books read in November 2011

1.)  Blue Nights, written by Joan Didion.
2.)  Mother Nature: Maternal Instincts and How They Shape the Human Species, written by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy
3.) Mothers and Others: The Evolutionary Origins of Mutual Understanding, written by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy
4.) The Price of Motherhood: Why the Most Important Job in the World is the Least Valued, written by Ann Crittenden.
5.)  Cool, Calm and Contentious, written by Merrill Markoe.

I've obviously been concentrating on books under the theme of "mother" since I'm finishing up writing my book.  I loved the Blaffer Hrdy books - both of them are very good.  But the book which really rocked my world was The Price of Motherhood.  That book had a great and deep impact, along the lines of when I read Robert Wright's "The Moral Animal."  This book yanked me out of my world and my cynical and uninformed views of motherhood.  Ha - I know, big statement, but seriously, it did.  It's hard to paraphrase the ideas in this book without using cliches and hacky sound bites.   In fact, one of the reasons that parenting - mothering in particular - is so discounted in our culture is because it is over-the-top elevated with platitudes and pandering.  For example, I want to write that after reading this book I realized that raising a child is the most important job in the world, but that sounds like we've heard it a million times and now we're supposed to look over to that sweatered, mild, sweetly smiling woman in the corner and gaze at her admirably for just long enough to feel good about ourselves before we rush off to do some "real" work that actually means something, earns something, and gets some respect.

I think I lazily fell into a typical mindset of feeling two opposite things: that women who stay home with their children can't "do" anything really,  and that women who work don't "care enough" to stay home with their children.  Of course, now that I've written that down I am mortified - and I protest, I didn't think that!  Okay, maybe a little bit.  But after reading this book I have such compassion for all women out there - in the trenches.  Also, I realize that my desire to be at home with my kid as well has have a thriving career is what pretty much every woman wants. Idealizing women who stay home with their kids while at the same time allowing our government to discount, overtax, and fail to help support our children is ridiculous at best and sinister at worst.  I found a great website that is active in promoting laws that help mothers and children called: www.momsrising.org

I'm still digesting everything I've read in all three of these mother books, so I won't go on here.  More in the book!

Now, I read Joan Didion's book, "Blue Nights" and it is extremely well written, and interesting.  But I have to admit that Joan often leaves me impressed, but... cold.  I felt compassion for her situation, and I learned a lot about her daughter, but I have to say, there's no -- well.... not "no there there" but god, I hate to write this but... "no heart there."  Sorta. Kinda.  God, I feel guilty writing that.  Let me concentrate on what I did like - beautiful prose, sparse and elaborate at the same time.  Astonishing writer, Didion.

I have included a book I just finished, so that's cheating, but I have to!  I loved this book so much.  Merrill Markoe wrote another hilarious book, "Cool, Calm and Contentious."  There are so many great essays in this book.  One has the name "Jack Kerouac" in the title and I laughed so hard the book flew out of my hands and my family made faces at me because I was disrupting our reading time.  The stuff about her mother is chilling and funny and insightful.  The chapter called "Bobby" about her relationship with David Letterman - or rather, about what she's had to go through after her relationship and partnership with Dave Letterman, is so funny and awful and gets her point across without being harsh or mean.  That is a difficult line to walk, and she does it.  Did I mention it's funny.  It's fucking hilarious.  Luckily Merrill is a friend of mine so I could tell her all these things.  Some of the essays are so funny they should be in collections of the funniest essays of all.  Merrill should be writing for the New Yorker. GET THIS BOOK.

Okay.  I have to go.  I'm writing away.  I have my last workshop this Saturday and it's going to be a "Best of" so I'm psyched about it.  Then the holidays will engulf me.  I probably won't have read five books in December, in fact, I'll probably be lucky to get through one!

Happy Holidays....

Anton Walbrook and Glynis Johns in "The 49th Parallel," directed by Michael Powell.

Well, I've been writing more and watching and reading less, overall.  But I suppose, with the glorious Anton Walbrook looming over my blog entry, I will jump straight to films.

Films watched in October 2011:

1.) The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, 1943, dir. by Michael Powell
2.) The 49th Parallel, 1941, dir. by Michael Powell
3.) Remorques, aka Stormy Waters, 1941, dir. by Jean Gremillon
4.) The Trail of the Lonesome Pine, 1936, dir. by Henry Hathaway
5.) The Age of Innocence, 1993, dir. by Martin Scorcese
6.) The Last King of Scotland, 2006, dir. by Kevin Macdonald
7.) Meek's Cutoff, 2010, dir. by Kelly Riechardt
8.) The Fly, 1986, dir. by David Cronenberg
9.) Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, 2008, dir. by Jon Hurwitz & Hayden Schlossberg
10.) The Conspiritor, 2010, dir. by Robert Redford
11.) Good Hair, 2009, dir. by Jeff Stillson
12.) Three Strangers, 1946, dir. by Jean Negulesco
13.) Big Fan, 2009, dir. by Robert D. Siegel

So many great movies this month.  I don't know if it's possible to choose a favorite.  The one that got into  my dreams - well four of them did: "Colonel Blimp," "49th Parallel," "Meek's Cutoff" and "The Last King of Scotland."  I am so absolutely in love with Michael Powell's films.  And I have recently watched "The Red Shoes" and realized how brilliant Anton Walbrook is, well... was.  Sadly he died prematurely.  But, what a presence.  He plays such an against-type character in "49th" too, he's an Amish farmer in Canada.  Still, when he is onscreen, hardly anyone else is.

"Meek's Cutoff": I've been waiting to see this movie for so long. I'm a fan of Kelly Riechardt - I loved "Wendy and Lucy" and "Old Joy."  When I heard about the topic for Meek's I got very excited.  I think every western ever filmed (and I am a western fan, and there's been plenty of great ones) should be redone through a woman's eyes.  This is what made me curious and excited to see "Meek's."  Reichardt, you have to hand it to her, she does not pander to a mainstream audience.  This film is slow, hypnotic, and doesn't tell you how to react.  I think my favorite moment was when Michelle Williams loads a gun - it's realistic, takes an absurd amount of time, and barely has any authority over anyone once it's loaded.  I actually let out a big laugh at the end - not because it was funny, but because Reichardt has such guts!  Jesus!  I am a huge fan of this woman.  I cannot wait for her next movie, "Night Moves" which is in pre-production.

I really loved "The Last King of Scotland," too.  James McAvoy is so good, he should have been nominated for an oscar too, along with Forest Whitaker.

I was so happy to see "The Fly" again.  When I saw it the first time,  I was so moved by it, I could not stop crying at the end.  I wanted to see if I still felt that way.  Wow, it was even better!  God, Jeff Goldblum is so sexy, so funny, and so perfect in this role.  And Geena Davis is great.  I had a laughing, cringing, crying good time seeing it again.  The extras on the DVD are pretty good too.  Lots of interviews with people recently about their memories of making this film.

I'd been wanting to see Chris Rock's documentary, "Good Hair," for a long time.  It was directed by a fellow Spokane, Washington native: Jeff Stillson.  It was really good - Rock is great at making a topic funny and serious at the same time.  I learned a lot too.

I felt "The Conspirator" (about the plotters to kill Lincoln) was so underrated when it came out. Why wasn't it nominated for tons of awards?  Redford directing, a great historic epic, fantastic acting (James McAvoy again!  It's my James McAvoy month!)   I was surprised I hadn't seen it before or read more about it.  Robin Wright was so good in her part as Mary Surratt.  Why wasn't she nominated for an oscar? The part was really demanding and difficult and she pulled it off well.

I was glad to finally see "Big Fan." I'm a huge fan (and glad to say friend) of Patton Oswalt's and yet I ahd never seen this film.

Books read in October 2011.  Only one. Yes, only one.

"A Visit From The Good Squad," by Jennifer Egan.   It was brilliant.

But before that, I have to confess: I got off the book treadmill.  Wait, that's not the right way to put it. I imposed these restricitons on my reading about two years ago and it's had the most fantastic results. Unfortunately it requires some discipline.  My self-imposed reading rule was: only one book at a time.  Take the book with you everywhere, christen it - it's the book you are currently reading.  Stick with it until the end.  Read at least an hour a day, then and only then can you move onto magazines and other reading material.  This might sound sort of silly, these self-imposed rules, but it had dramatic results. You see, I was really lazy and promiscuous about my book reading. I would read a third of this book, lose it in the house, and then move onto a third of another book. It never added up to anything and I wasn't finishing anything.  It all gave me this unfinished feeling that I did not like.  There were tradeoffs, mostly in terms of The New Yorker.  I wasn't reading it as much. I wasn't reading the paper as much.  Nor the New Scientist, or Mother Jones, or any of the other magazines I like and subscribe to. But it felt good overall. I was reading the way I enjoy reading, the whole book, diving in and seeing it through.  But then, this month, I lost a book I started, and then I grabbed another and lost it somewhere and then I bout "Goon Squad" and began it and I have to say it really took some force to get me to read it all the way through.

Partly this is because the book is non-linear. It's a set of linked stories that draw you closer to a big set of characters.  The chapters jump around in time and fling themselves into far-off characters you don't expect to know.  It's really good - God the writing is astonishingly good, but the book itself has the feeling to it that I usually get from my haphazard reading style of yesteryear - a chapter here and there.  So it was difficult to see it through. The book almost wants you to put it down. Except I didn't because I was laughing and gasping and digging into these people.  It was a really good book.

I'm doing a bit better now, but more on that in November's entry...

In the meantime, I am not travelling, I'm hunkering down, and writing my "Mother" book.  I've been doing the workshops on Saturdays.  It's helped me, the workshops. I can see where I get stuck in the same old themes.  But it's also excrutiating and I often wonder why I'm doing it.  This week I'm going to read something I'm working on for The Guardian and a piece about nanny's.

My new assistant Pam (oh how I love saying that) lent me a couple of DVDs, it's of a series on Showtime that I've not watched before: "Episodes."  There are seven esisodes of "Episodes."  I've watched four.  They're so damn funny. I acutally woke up last night thinking about them.  If you can watch get hold of them, please watch them. Matt LeBlanc stars.  It's hilarious.  So funny and well written.  I think I'll watch the final three today.

It looks like it's going to snow today.  Here we go....

Michael took this picture when we visited the Chicago Botanical Garden a week or so ago.

It's raining right now.  It's getting colder.  And I say hurrah.

We've had ten days of startlingly perfect weather.  A mid-western Indian summer, warm dry days and cool nights.

And yet, a small voice inside me has been yearning for cold and wet.  I think the outdoors (in which I walk for at least an hour a day) is a place simultaneously stimulating, invigorating, and then, possibly, overwhelming.

I've read that Catholics distrust nature, and maybe a bit of that seeped into me.

However, when it's cold and wet, suddenly, the inside of my house is much, much cozier.  There's a reason to stay inside.  There's a reason to go to the basement and watch a movie, or read a book by a fire in the living room.  When thinking of wet, cold, or snowy weather, my instant physical sensation is: relief.

Maybe part of it is that to brave inclement weather, a greater effort is required.   Walking my dog, Arden (still alive, coughing incessantly, but active and tail-waggingly-enthusiastic for each day) in rain and snow is simultaneously more of a chore and more enjoyable.  When I come in the door I feel I've accomplished something. And it's something not everyone would do!  Ha.   So, you see, my need to feel superior is massaged by an arduous walk.

My husband might note that the dominant force is more accurately an overly-active martyr complex. Hmmm... touche.  Yes, and that's perhaps another vestige of my Catholicism.

What is true: martyr complexes emulsify nicely with a feeling of superiority.

On to other things:

I am grudgingly and yet hopefully back to my usual support of Obama.  I think I might have been too hard on him last month.  I like the jobs bill.  I wonder if our government is too broken for anything substantive to get passed given this Senate and House.  I am watching the Occupy Movement with a thrill.  If I weren't so damn happy to stay inside, I would be there.  It's very exciting.

But let's get to the books and movies of Sept. 2011, shall we?

Movies first!

1. Daisy Kenyon, 1947, dir by Otto Preminger  saw it twice
2. 3 Godfathers, 1948, dir by John Ford
3. The Invention of Lying, 2009, dir by Ricky Gervais & Mathew Robinson
4. Marely & Me, 2008, dir by David Frankel
5. Shine A Light, 2008, dir by Martin Scorcese
6. Cyrus, 2010, dir by Jay & Mark Duplass
7. She Wore A Yellow Ribbon, 1949, dir by John Ford
8. Seeing Other People, 2004, dir by Wallace Wolodarsky
9. Gates of Heaven, 1978, dir by Errol Morris
10. Out of Africa, 1985, dir by Sydney Pollack
11. Rope, 1948, dir by Alfred Hitchcock
12. Harold & Kumar go to Whitecastle, 2004, dir by Danny Leiner
13. The Secret Garden, 1993, dir by Agnieszka Holland
14. Dr. Zhivago, 1965, dir by David Lean
15. Fiddler On The Roof, 1971, dir by Norman Jewison
16. Wagon Master, 1950, dir by John Ford
17. Heat Lightning, 1934, dir by Mervyn LeRoy
18. The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara, 2003, dir. by Errol Morris
19. The Tom Lehrer Collection, various dates, TV footage

Wow. I saw more movies in September than I thought.  Here, already halfway through October, I can predict I won't get the time for as many.  Poop.

September was a great month for movies.

Top of the list: She Wore a Yellow Ribbon and Wagon Master.  I am an uneducated fan of John Ford, and my friend Richard T. Jameson (RTJ) keeps sending me DVDs to watch, and this month I was completely knocked out.  Yes, I did appreciate and enjoy 3 Godfathers, but I was so deeply moved by She Wore - I actually cried - and then seeing Wagon Master - my mind was blown.   Wagon Master is so much like a Coen Bros. movie - very existential. The movie wanders with the characters who are all wandering!  It's simultaneously focused and unfocused.   And it really works: hallucinatory and riveting.

Daisy Kenyon was another surprise.  It was another movie RTJ sent me.  This film so easily could've been a superficial soap-opera, and it wasn't AT ALL.  Henry Fonda, and Joan Crawford in a great role, and Dana Andrews, all three wonderful actors in a romantic triangle.   I loved it so much, that a couple of weeks later, when I had some friends over for dinner, I suggested we watch it.  They all thought it was great.   I highly recommend it.

I really enjoyed hypnotic Shine a Light - the Rolling Stones concert doc by Scorcese.  Wowza, it's really been a Rolling Stones year for me.  And ohmygod, Harold & Kumar!  I laughed so hard - really really hard.  So hard that I think Michael became slightly disturbed by how funny I thought that movie was.  I have Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanomo from Netflix and will watch it this month some time.

Seeing Other People was another lovely, surprising movie.  It stars Jay Mohr and Julianne Nicholson and they play a very funny couple, they give very realistic, nuanced performances that are also highly comedic.  I thought it would be too broad for me but it was not too broad, it was delightful, ahead of it's time in my opinion. I wish Mohr and Nicholson would get together again and play a couple, they are perfect together.  Some of the reviews, which I try to read only after I see a film, claimed it was too sit-com-y.  I dunno, I laughed a lot. 

Didn't like Dr. Zhivago at all.  I'd seen it a million years ago.  Thought it was all style and no substance, but of course Omar Sharif is always sweet to look at.

I thought Cyrus was a perfect movie.  Pitch perfect. Yes, I did.  I loved every frame of that film.  I loved the tone, especially.  I was constantly surprised and I felt people behaved just like people do.   And yet the story had great suspense and movement and best of all the film was delightfully ambiguous.  I felt it was up there with An Education for me in my personal hierarchy of great films that I think I could possibly try to emulate in my own writing. Anyway, Cyrus, I really tickled by that film.  Jonah Hill was great - in fact the whole cast was exactly right.

Rope is a failure, but still great to watch. The interview with Arthur Laurentz - which is on the extras on the DVD - is very insightful.  It caused me to buy two of Laurentz's memoirs, which I hope to get to this month or next.  Laurentz mentions that the dream casting had been James Mason in the Jimmy Stewart role, and Montgomery Clift in the John Dall role.  I thought Dall was perfect - and was hankering to see Rope ever since I watched Gun Crazy.  On the other hand, Rope REALLY would have been a much better movie if it had had Mason and Clift and if Hitchcock had not insisted on basically stunt shooting the thing in long takes, which I could see deeply constrained the performances and the sense of movement.  Laurentz says Stewart is sexless, like a dopey oblivious uncle, and not the character he had envisioned for the professor.  Once he said this I realized immediately how right he was and how far the film had fallen by casting Stewart in the part - who apparently was completely unaware of the gay themes in the film.

Errol Morris is such a genius. I really loved Fog of War - very disturbing, that film.  We go to war for the such silly reasons which are sold by only a few people, people who are usually acquiescing to some paranoid fear raging inside of a couple of other people.   And it's going to happen again.   It's happening now.   OOOOkay....   Not going there.   Oh, I loved Gates of Heaven too.  Michael and Mulan and I visited a pet cemetery (the film is all about a pet cemetery in California) in San Francisco this past summer.  A pet cemetery is simultaneously poignant and ridiculous.  Morris got that combination of feelings perfectly, I thought.


Books read in Sept. 2011

1. The Myth of Free Will, Revised and Expanded Edition, written by Cris Evatt
2. The Givers & the Takers, written by Cris Evatt
3. The Wizard of Lies, written by Diana B. Henriques
4. One Good Turn: A Novel, written by Kate Atkinson
5. When God is Gone, Everything is Holy, written by Chet Raymo

Well, where to begin...  The Myth of Free Will was pretty good. I am just beginning my deeper reading on the subject of free will.  I guess I'm convinced that we don't have it, but I'm unsure - so far - how this acceptance effects my behavior and judgement. It's a tricky thing.  How do you parent when you don't believe in free will?  Surprisingly, it makes me much more compassionate.  Also, it makes me more accepting of my own attempts to shape my child.  This is what I keep thinking: new information is an event, like any other event.  It has effects, like weather, war and strokes of great luck and serendipitous random occurrences.  Therefore understanding that I have no free will is also an event. I guess what I'm saying is that I realize my own actions, driven unconsciously by forces I have no control over, still - obviously - have an effect on the world around me.  Those effects also drive unconscious forces in other people who will respond whatever way or however way they are going to respond.  It's simultaneously empowering and dis-empowering.  Okay, I'm not explaining this properly - partly because I have only a limited grasp of the concepts myself and how I digest them into my own psyche.  So, I will stop for now, but this is an ongoing idea that I continually turn over in my thoughts.  Evatt's book is a breezy, and dare I say light?, a summary of the leading thoughts on the subject of free will.  I read another one of her books too, The Givers & The Takers, which divides the people of the world into one or the other.   It's over-simplifying things, to be sure, but there were some good take-aways from it.  For example, "Give to givers and take from takers."  I've kept that in mind and it's been helpful.

I enjoy Kate Atkinson's books.  There are three books in this mystery series, and One Good Turn is the second in the series.  She's such a delightful, funny, surprising writer.  I'm in love with her protagonist, Jackson Brodie - an ex-cop, ex-detective, divorced-dad who is so endearing and hapless and intelligent.  I often laugh out loud while reading Atkinson.

Now, I must say the Bernie Madoff book, The Wizard of Lies, was FANTASTIC.  Ohmygod, you must read this book.  Diana Henriques is a fair and exacting writer.  I never really understood exactly what was going on with the Madoff case. I mean, I understood it was a big ponzi scheme, but I didn't pay close attention to the details.  It's heartbreaking.  I want to see the movie. I want Aaron Sorkin to write the script.  The whole story is mind-boggingly compelling.  I drove Michael crazy, after every page I had to tell him what was happening.

Lastly, and I feel bad that I'm running out of gas here because I have so much feeling for these books - I love Chet Raymo.  I want to meet this man.  We are so similar - Catholic, appreciative of the culture - or at least parts of the culture, but ultimately non-believers.  When God is Gone, Everything is Holy was like a meal I'd been waiting to devour.  The book is mostly chapters musing on this and that.  My criticism is that the book should have added up to more, but it's meant to be written in a non-linear and wandering fashion.  On the other hand, I agreed with almost everything he wrote and felt so similarly.  I love this guy. I really appreciated this book. I want to read his other books, now.

Well, today I'm heading over to Space, to do the first of eight workshop performances for the book I'm writing: If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mother. I'm going to read three chapters I've written, and riff on three story ideas I may write up.  I'm going to tell stories I could not tell in my book, and it's going to be very casual and I hope fun.  I also hope there are a few people there.  This is what I did when I began the process of writing Letting Go of God.  I went to the Knitting Factory (a club in L.A. that was supposed to be like the one in NYC) on a late afternoon every week for several weeks and just plowed through what I was working on at the moment.  It was extremely helpful.

I have a new assistant and she just started this week.  I haven't had a helper in a long, long time.  Her name is Pam.  I'm looking forward to working with her, we are really clicking.  She'll be there today at the show.

Well, for this month (sadly, two weeks overdue) that's all folks! 

Mulan sings along with "Oklahoma!" in the basement home theater. 

It was a hot, happy, and somewhat harried August.

Here are the movies I watched in August 2011:

1. Pitfall, Andre DeToth
2. To Kill A Mockingbird (twice), Robert Mulligan
3. They Won't Forget, Mervyn LeRoy
4. Young Mr. Lincoln, John Ford
5. It's Always Fair Weather, Gene Kelly & Stanley Donan
6. The Edge of the World, Michael Powell
7. Vera Drake, Mike Leigh
8. Gun Crazy (twice), Joseph H. Lewis
9. Sweet Land, Ali Selim
10. A Canterbury Tale, Michael Powell & Emeric Pressberger
11. Contraband, AKA Blackout, Michael Powell
12. Ballerina, Bertrand Normand
13. Oklahoma!, Fred Zinnermann
14. Bleak Moments, Mike Leigh
15. A Passage to India, David Lean

It was a very enjoyable film-watching month.  I actually happily appreciated every single movie, well - perhaps with the exception of "Sweet Land."  That film was just glaringly underdeveloped, in my humble opinion.  Oh, and also - surprisingly, "A Passage to India."  I'm sure the book was better, but jeez.  Yeash.  I wanted to yell at the screen: When characters behave in unbelievable ways, it does not make them complicated!  It just makes them unbelievable!!!!!!  How could Mrs. Moore have left India?   Maybe the book makes it clear, I dunno...

The highlights, if I had to parse them out, would be seeing "Gun Crazy" for the first time ever - and then, after almost losing my mind over how great this film is, I forced Michael to watch it with me.  In a period of six hours I'd seen it twice.  The long tracking shot in the car while they start their bank robbing spree - the parking lot, the feeling of claustrophobia and fear and titilation are incomparable.  I liked it better than Bonnie and Clyde (heresy!)   The scene where they meet each other - at the carnival, c'mon.  Very hot.   Funny, and actually steamy too.  Fantastic.  God, you just have to see it!  I was laughing out loud from sheer delight and excitement!

I got "Gun Crazy" from Netflix, but I didn't listen to the commentary, so I think I might send for it again.

We watched "To Kill a Mockingbird."  Mulan promptly announced that was the best movie she'd ever seen.  I was surprised, since I hadn't seen the film since I was a kid  - at not only how great it was - but how iconic its been for me my whole life, and without me being completely aware of this.  Boo Radley is such a potent character, one I've been inspired by in my own screenwriting.  Of course Atticus and Scout and Jem and Dill - the whole world of it.  It was so good, we (Michael, me and Mulan)  were all three crying by the end.   The image that arrested me most surprisingly was the scene when Atticus sits on the top of the jail house steps (with the standing, crook-necked lamp next to his wooden lawyer's chair) and quietly reads, attempting to protect Tom Robinson who's inside.  Just the sight of Atticus sitting there - before the crowd of angry men arrive, and then the children - just that single image of Atticus so alone, so calm, and so clearly doing the right thing, made me get a lump in my throat.  I didn't realize that this image has always been with me, I see it when I read certain stories in the paper, when I see decency and courage and quiet all wrapped up in some person.  That lamp and that chair have unknowingly become for me a symbolic screen-shot of justice and protection.

I didn't realize that when I first came to know about Obama, I had that image in my mind too.  I think I must have thought he was a kind of modern Atticus Finch - his careful speech and deliberate manners.  I guess we are all hoodwinked by our fantasies.  I used to think that conservative Republicans who didn't care for Obama must have thought he was conjured up magically, the perfect Democrat in every way.  I've tried hard to look the other way in poor choice, and sad unnecessary compromise again and again, thinking there was some master plan that I just didn't know about.  I thought I really knew and trusted Obama, especially after reading "Dreams from My Father."

But now, after so many disappointments - the capitulation on the debt ceiling and the latest scrapping of the proposed EPA regulations on smog and oil drilling - those two things being just a couple in a long list of bad moves.  I know he's being strangled by an inept and clearly stupid Congress, but I think he can do a lot more.  I don't think he has to give in constantly even before the fighting starts.  I just don't get it.  Seriously I'm baffled.  I have lost the sense that Obama personally cares about doing the right thing, even if it's impossible to accomplish.

I'm really finding it hard to see the difference in Obama's policies and Bush's, and now I'm wondering if Obama isn't just a magical conjured person dreamed up by Republicans!  Okay, I'll say it:   I think I'm ready to jump ship.  I don't feel I'm capable of supporting him.  It would require blind faith and I have run the gas out on blind faith in Obama.  No, I don't want Rick Perry (or Mitt?) to scare me into voting for Obama.  But I have to admit that I'm completely depressed and disillusioned by this current administration.  I could go on - I won't for now, but it's very very sad to me and causes me a lot of distress.  (I'm beginning to not-secretly wish that Bernie Sanders would run for president.)

Frankly, I'm still livid over the fact that Bin Laden was not captured and tried in a court of law.  And I guess I bring this up here because seeing "To Kill a Mockingbird" again, after so many years... well, I see how far we've come when even our Democratic president abandons the process of law.   I remember when I was a kid and saying to my Dad something about some hateful dictator - I said, "Why don't we just go and kill him?" And my dad said, "That's against the law.  Because that is wrong.  There are international laws in place, and even the most heinous person must be allowed to defend himself in a court of law."  I really felt that the world - the United States - had made that leap into civilization.

God, what a joke that is now.   Jeez.  The truth is we did just what Bin Laden was wishing we would do, (which he blatantly said, in recorded audio release again and again and again) and draw the U.S. Military into countless Middle East wars and bring our nation to bankruptcy.  

Enough.  Breathe.  Slowly now...

I need to take a walk around the block.

I'm back.

Okay.  So...

At the end of August, my mother and my two aunts (my mother's two sisters) came for a long weekend visit.  There was really only time for one movie.  Mulan insisted we watch "To Kill a Mockingbird" again.   The extras on the DVD are excellent - very good interviews with all the main players and a making-of doc that's well done.  When I read later that when Gregory Peck died, Brock Peters (who played Tom Robinson) gave the eulogy at the funeral - well, that gave me tingles.

What other film highlights?  "Pitfall" is a long-neglected film noir that is very well done and hard to see now.   "Young Mr. Lincoln - of course I had seen that before but a long time ago.  I remembered liking it a lot.  But this time, I realized it was even better than I recalled.  Henry Fonda is soooo good.  This movie shows that in the hands of a master like John Ford, even a straight flattering bio-pic can have style and punch and substance, even leave you with a sense of having watched something profound.

"Oklahoma!" was fun, and Mulan is now constantly singing all it's songs.  In the last two weeks, I often hear her singing "Oh What a Beautiful Morning" in the kitchen while she's making her breakfast.  God, that is so funny to me.

After watching "Vera Drake" I was up all night, going over this scene and that one.  I'm on a Mike Leigh jag and want to see everything he's ever directed.  Leigh's good.  There is just nothing like his films.  Long improvisation and character development with actors pays off.

"It's Always Fair Weather" is my favorite musical.  It has a real adult, complex story and fantastic singing and dancing.  Should we just say, categorically, that Cyd Charisse has the best body ever on film?  Maybe ever in the history of women?  I think so.  I think she's the best dancer too.

I'm also trying to catch up on all the Powell-Pressberger movies.  "The Edge of the World" was made before their partnership was cemented - by Powell, but it really haunted me.  It takes place on some Scottish Islands - or are they Irish?  I don't remember, but it feels like a book I read - it has that kind of feeling that gets under your skin. You feel you've lived it.  Oh! And "A Canterbury Tale" - the Archers collaboration - so good.  Incredibly odd plot and yet uncanny in it's deceptively meaningful story.  I read that there's a yearly hike along the route of the film in England. I want to make that some year.

 Books read in August, 2011:

1.) Anthill, by E.O. Wilson.   Jeeezhus.  Is there nothing this man can do?  I guess I had low literary expectations, but he's not only a great scientist, he's a good writer too.  It's a compelling and well-written story.  And I learned a lot about ants.  The Ant Chronicles are the main characters master's thesis and they comprise about a third of the middle part of the book.  Really funny and scary and good.  I agree - we have no free will.

2.) The Devil in the White City, by Erik Larsen.  I still have about a quarter of the book left.  Larsen is a terrific writer.  I know that the Architecture Foundation here in Chicago has a tour of the sites from the book.  I think I'll go this weekend.  The book's about the 1893 Columbian Exhibition and a serial killer named H. H. Holmes.  It's so sad, bone-chillingly creepy, shocking, and then - with Burnham, the architect and leader of the exposition - he is really human and deeply inspiring.  And Olmstead!  God what a great character come to life.  I've surrendered my mind to this book.

Two Architecture Tours Twice in August:  Went on the Chicago River Architecture tour twice with two sets of guests, then did it all again as we did a Sunday bus tour of Highlights of Chicago.  I could go on both of those tours a few more times before I'd be tired of it.  Great tour guides.  I'm going to start trying to go on two architecture tours a month now.  This month my goal is: Calvary Cemetery Tour (where my great grandmother and grandfather are buried along with several other relatives) and the Devil in the White City tour.   I am feeling so lucky to be living here right now.

I went to New York City for four days in August, and I took Mulan with me.  We went to two Broadway shows together:  War Horse, which was very schmaltzy but very enjoyable.  Mulan loved, loved, LOVED it.   I guess Spielberg is making the film.   The stage craft is very good.  We also saw the Book of Mormon.  I think it's genius.  I bought the soundtrack.  I love the songs, they're still in my head all the time.  I could tell that "The Invention of Lying" and Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life" were big influences.  But it was great.  Funny and it got better as I thought about it.  Really top-notch.  Mulan didn't like it!  But she knows nothing about religion. She kept tugging my sleeve and asking things like, "What is a baptism?"  Lots of explaining.  Wow, my kid has no religious knowledge whatsoever.

Monarch Caterpillars Pupating

We planted two different kinds of milkweed in our backyard to attempt to attract Monarch butterflies.   It worked.  Now Michael has transformed the dining room into a Monarch nursery and has begun taking lots of pictures and making little films.  The video is of two Monarch caterpillars becoming pupae.  The pupae are so beautiful, a light green with a golden rim and highlights in a deeper gold.  They would make fabulous earrings.

On to the movies watched in July 2011:

1. Cimarron, Anthony Mann
2. You and Me and Everyone We Know, Miranda July
3. White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Steven Okazaki
4. Helvetica, Gary Hustwit
5. 2 O'Clock Courage, Anthony Mann
6. Pick Up on South Street, Sam Fuller
7. Burden of Dreams, Les Blank
8. Topsy Turvy, Mike Leigh
9. Another Year, Mike Leigh
10. The Searchers, John Ford
11. Whip It, Drew Barrymore
12. E.T., Steven Speilberg
13. Spartacus, Stanley Kubrick, Anthony Mann (uncredited)
14. Laurence of Arabia, David Lean
15. The Lincoln Lawyer, Brad Furman


This was quite a delightful movie-watching month.

The clear highlight was three days watching two epics, absolutely stoned.

Well, on Benadryl.

Mulan came back from camp and told us how everyone had gotten sick, just before the end.  She proudly announced that she did not feel sick.  I immediately did feel sick.  I don't know if that's how I got it, but that's the story that makes sense. In any case, I got a terrible cold in the middle of a horrid heat wave.  I was delirious and had trouble sleeping and had trouble not sleeping.  I was in a daze.  I took a lot of Benadryl and drank a lot of tea.  Somehow it seemed right the right moment to watch "Spartacus," which I had never seen, and "Lawrence of Arabia,"which I had seen so long ago that I only had a dim memory of it.

I loved "Spartacus" so much, it moved right to the top of my list of epics made about Rome.  Kirk Douglas was so good, I forgave him for his shameless appearance on the most recent Academy Awards.  (Actually I blame others, it felt like a creepy form of elder-abuse.) In any case, here Douglas was, in his glory, at his height of physical beauty and a damn good actor in a movie he really made happen from the start to finish.

Then, on to "Lawrence of Arabia," which I watched over two days, and then on the third day watched all the making-of extras on the DVD.  I also spent my time, while not watching the actual movie, googling the history of this time, and the man on which the story is based, and reading all about the production.  I loved this movie too - so hypnotic.  I appreciated that we have a home theater in the basement like never before.  I don't know how you'd watch "Lawrence of Arabia" on a television set and get any sense of it's grandeur.  It was so dark in the basement, and the desert was so big and all- encompassing.  I felt like I had been on another planet afterwards.

I think - seriously - that watching those two movies in that state of mind and body were one of my life's greatest movie watching extravaganzas and experiences.   See, getting sick can pay off.

Another great epic I watched during July was "The Searchers." I have probably seen this movie five to eight times before, but as I get older, I just appreciate it even more.  Also, just having read, in June, the book about Cynthia Parker's abduction, (Empire of the Summer Moon) on which the story for the film is based, my appreciation for "The Searchers" was enhanced.  Even though it doesn't matter if the story is true or not - it just works.  I wonder if there is a more perfect film.  Seriously, I do.

Other wonderful film experiences included "Pick Up on South Street" - another movie I've seen a few times, but probably over twenty years ago.  My god, it is terrific. Better than I remembered.  Richard Widmark and Jean Peters are so good. There are extras on the DVD which are fabulous, including an interview with Richard Widmark about doing the film.

On the documentary side of things, Okazaki's "Bright Light, Black Rain" stays with me still, the images of people who survived the atomic bombs.  Let me just say, you think you know what happened, but really you probably don't.  This film takes you a long way towards understanding the real effect those bombs had on people who survived.  Chilling. And really well made.

I loved both Mike Leigh films, especially "Topsy Turvy."

On the sad side of things, I felt "Cimarron" was nearly unwatchable.  It was so terrible.  I felt for Anthony Mann.  I read he walked off the film when it was nearly over because of disputes with the studio.  It's so awful.  I was embarrassed for him to have his name on that movie.

Now, books read during July 2011:

1.) The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris by David McCullough.  I read this book slowly. Savoring each chapter.  Allowing myself the time to look up this painter and that, this doctor and that, this politician and that.  There are pictures in this book, but they are limited.  I was enthralled with the story of Samuel Morse, inventor of the telegraph and the Morse Code.   My imagination was ignited by John Singer Sargent, and I had to look up this portrait and that online, over and over again.   In fact, I was into Sargent, that the next book I read was an art book, but with very good text.

2.) John Singer Sargent, by Carter Ratcliff. I read every word, like it was a novel.  Sargent's life is a feast of the imagination.  He was the child of middle income, American, but European smitten parents who never lived in one place too long.  He had the kind of childhood I think most of us wish we'd had - no formal schooling, tutors in Italy, England, Spain, etc.  A mother taking him to museums and hiring art teachers.  Friends who were equally loose-footed.  He lived the best life, although he was never concerned with the poverty on the edges of his life.  Never stirred by the politics which raged with extremity during his time in Europe.  Great book with a great overview.

3.) The Stein's Collect: Matisse, Picasso, and the French Avant-Garde by Janet Bishop, Cecile Debray, Rebecca A. Rabinow, Emily Braun, Gary Tinterow, Martha Lucy, Claudine Grammont, Carrie Pilto, Helene Klein, Isabel Alfandary, Edward M. Burns, and McD Robert Parker.    Whilst in San Francisco... (I've just read Russell Brand's fabulous commentary on the London riots in The Guardian and can't get "whilst" out of my vocabulary, read it for yourself at: UK riots: Big Brother isn't watching you | UK news | The Guardian)

Anyhoo - whilst in San Francisco, I went to a really wonderful exhibit on the Stein family, including Gertrude - and their art collections. The exhibit was at the SFMOMA.  I was so overwhelmed by the delightful nature of this exhibit that I couldn't take it all in in one visit.  Even though I was only in San Francisco for four days, I had to go again.  It was even better the second time.  The exhibit moves from San Francisco to New York, (to the MET,)  and then to Paris.  If you have a chance to go, I recommend it.  I fell into the Stein world and couldn't get myself out.  The book that goes along with the exhibition is very good.  I got it at SFMOMA, but I see it is on Amazon for half the price I paid.  No matter, it is a great book that I'm already very happy to own.  Included in the exhibition are not only the story of this remarkable family and their collections, but pieces of furniture that were in their homes.  I wouldn't have guessed that this would make me so happy - to see old desks and dressers, but it did.  It felt like you could touch history.  My biggest surprise: realizing that I probably would  have preferred the company of Michael and Sarah Stein to Gertrude and Alice. And realizing that I preferred the Matisses to the Picassos.  Great art book, in my humble opinion.

4.)   A Planet of Viruses, by Carl Zimmer.  I love Carl Zimmer so much.  I devoured Parasite Rex, and Evolution: the Triumph of an Idea.  I hope Carl Zimmer lives a long, long time so we can get more and more books from him.  Viruses; they are scary, it's debatable whether they are truly alive or if they could be defined as an animal, they are terrifying and will take over the planet in bad ways - surely they will - even while we are just acknowledging how they participated mightily in the instigation of life itself and that viruses, partly, made human beings human beings.  It's a short read - under 100 pages, but intense and well explained.

Now I have started E.O. Wilson's "Anthill." his only book of fiction.  It's good. But I'm not done yet.  More on it next month.

This last month I really got derailed, the trip to San Francisco, then got sick, then we went camping in Door County, Wisconsin (want to go again, it was so beautiful - Cape Cod right in the mid-west!) and then house guests and then a short trip to New York - but now I'm getting into August.  So, I will wait and post again at the end of the month, properly - and not two weeks late.  Thanks of the comments on last month's post.  I really appreciated them.

As for Arden, thanks for those who expressed concern over him (my dog, who has a tumor, who has an unspecified amount of time to live.)  He seems pretty much okay! He still goes on his long 3 mile walk, he still chases rabbits and squirrels.  The truth is, that tumor (which is between his lungs and heart) could have been there, growing very slowly, for a long time.  On the other hand, he has a weird and getting-weirder cough.  It's odd to spend so much time around a being who is terminally ill and has no idea.  For now,  his morning walks are moving to a first place on my daily to-do list.  And I'm letting him stop on our walks, and smell the pee for a longer amount of time.  Also, where we walk: down this block or that, crossing this way and that - well, I give him more say, it's more serendipitous all around.

I shoulda been that way a lot earlier with him.