New Slang

I have listened to the song "New Slang" by The Shins for the past hour as I've been writing a paper. This song has some haunting, eerily soothing quality about it, and I can't quite understand why I like it so much. I feel like I've heard songs like this one before, yet there is something uniquely captivating about it. I first heard it in commercials for "Garden State," but I didn't know who The Shins were and how to go about finding out who sang that song that goes "oooh oooh oooh." I'm amazed nobody understood what song I was talking about when I wailed that part at them. It was only when I heard someone play some music by The Shins that I recalled that song I liked so much. Now, with it resting firmly in my iTunes player, I can listen to it ad infinitum as I compose my weird writing assignment and read essays by E.B. White.

If anyone knows why it is called "New Slang" please tell me--I'm curious.

What did Ashton Kutcher ever do to you?

I was one of the few kids in my high school to never own a trucker hat. it seemed kind of silly to want to imitate Ashton Kutcher to the point of wearing a "Jesus is my Homeboy" mesh hat. That being said, I like Ashton Kutcher and defend him frequently against people who call him a vapid pretty-boy. For starters, Ashton Kutcher was a biochemical engineering major at the University of Iowa. Now, I don't know what the hell that is, but it sounds complicated and like the kind of thing that requires lab coats and short hair. Secondly, Ashton Kutcher doesn't really come across as a jerk. This is something I find increasingly rare in celebs these days, and while it doesn't bother me too much that spoiled, rich people act like tools, I think we should reward Ashton for not being that way. Finally, I think Punk'd is hilarious. Even when the actual prank is poorly executed, I still laugh at some member of Good Charlotte cursing out a tow-truck driver or something, mostly because I think Good Charlotte sucks and deserve anything negative that happens to them. Overall, Ashton Kutcher doesn't do anything that justifies people thinking he sucks. Or at least that is what I thought before I saw the commericals for "Guess Who?"

"Guess Who?" is a remake of "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?" which is mentioned in the same sentence as words like 'seminal' and 'breakthrough.' I thought it strange that Ashton Kutcher and Bernie Mac were doing an inverted version of the movie. The message isn't problematic, but the movie looks straight up unbearable. Nothing in the preview made me want to see the movie, except to find out if the girl in it is actually African American, or if she is Dominican as I read in some reviews. I can't decide what this movie is trying to say--that race tension still exists in America, but if you look at people as individuals and see past their skin color, you can can meet some truly wonderful people? If this is the case, the movie is completely useless and not funny. Why do studios keep greenlighting these movies? When is somebody going to make an actual engaging, thought provoking movie with good writing and convincing acting? Oh, I forgot; nobody makes those movies anymore. For every 1 movie I see that is even kind of good, I see previews for 5 that are awful.

I think we should hand over all American Film powers to a oligarchical collective controlled by;
Luke and Owen Wilson, Vince Vaughn, Will Ferrell, and others of that ilk. At the very least, I'm assured escapist cinema with lines like, "it's a deep burn...it's so deep."

high fidelity + beautiful girls = $10 for Barnes & Noble

last week, i saw the movie Beautiful Girls, and have been raving about it since then to anyone that will listen. tuesday i was in Barnes & Noble (i so rarely get to use ampersands), and i saw this book. now, i must confess, i buy books like it's my job. not only do i buy books, but i consume them like reuben studdard consumes entire hams. on top of this, i will read books 20 times over if i enjoy them, a feat even the corpulent mr. studdard fails to achieve with his ham.

i bought this book for a few reasons.

1. i had a barnes & noble gift card with me holding a balance that was the exact price of this book. i took this as an omen.
2. i've heard that it has been optioned to turn into a movie that will be a lot like Beautiful Girls, and it is to be produced by brad pitt and jennifer aniston. how could i refuse? everything those two touch turns to gold!
   
3. this book has been described as a mix of High Fidelity and Beautiful Girls, with a bit of Garden State thrown in. this can only spell an enjoyable read.

i have read only a few pages, because i'd had so much to do. but with so little work to do, i can sit back, drink some tea, enjoy a book, and get a hip replacement.

knocking out that whole to-do list in one afternoon.

listening to: Queen "Somebody to Love"
--remind me to talk about how i've become a rabid fan of Queen these past few months. furthermore, remind me to tell you what Nikki Sixx said about Queen. it's pretty hilarious.

matt <3 jack bauer

my roommate matt has a lot of strange quirks, but perhaps the most disturbing is his love of the show 24. now, i've seen 24, and it's a good show. matt doesn't think it is a show--he seems to really believe that jack bauer is an actual federal agent, and he's fighting for america. of course, on some level he knows it isn't real, but that level is frequently ignored for the giddy schoolboy crush matt harbors for jack bauer. not 5 minutes ago, matt described a situation that he has imagined wherein he calls a telephone number established by the show for fans to call in and maybe talk to a star of the show. in this fantasy world, matt gets to talk to kiefer sutherland, becomes friends with him, and matt enters and wins a sweepstakes where he gets to come to the set, and from there the flights of fancy are endless.

i'm sure if it were in any way feasible, matt would marry jack bauer, and live happily ever after.

sweet caroline

today, i caught a movie titled "Beautiful Girls," directed by Ted Demme and starring Timothy Hutton, Matt Dillon, and to a lesser extent Uma Thurman. it is the story of working-class guys in suburban Massachusetts the week of their 10 year high school reunion. Timothy Hutton, who i've always thought is an incredible and underrated actor, comes up from New York City, where he plays the piano and lives with his attractive, sweet and well-to-do lawyer girlfriend. the movie is a funny and poignant evaluation of the way men think about women, committment, life, jobs, and such. Natalie Portman is in the movie, playing the 13 year old neighbor of Timothy Hutton's parents. Portman is intelligent far beyond her years, and seems to get Hutton, and there is a Lolita-esque quality of their relationship, but Hutton just admires how smart and cool this kid is. Nothing sordid happens here, but Portman helps Hutton realize how much he cares for his girlfriend. The camraderie is portrayed honestly, as the 20-something fellas exhibit mannerisms and dialogue that rings true. More than anything else, i'd like to thank this movie for reintroducing me to a songs i'd long forgotten: Neil Diamond's "sweet caroline." Of course, when i say "sweet caroline" you know exactly who it is. This song is so representative of Diamond, but what is so great about it is the chorus. i've described it as "beautifully languid," because it is so cheery and reflects a kind of belonging that everyone wants, and when you have it, you clutch it knowing how precious it is. This is the song you sing with your buddies at a bar, lingerieng a bit too long on the 'caroline.' It is a song that reminds you instantly of friends you'll have forever, of being young and having nothing to be responsible for. It imbues the listener with a longing for the days when your life was so simple it startles you. This song reminds me of people i love, and that i'll have them for a long time. This song, simply put, makes me happier than almost any other.

Sweet Caroline, good times never seemed so good.
I've been inclined to believe it never would.

Tartar

today i went to the dentist. unlike most people, i don't have a pathological aversion to the dentist. i don't particularly enjoy an elder gentleman poking sharp metal instruments into my gums, and then acting bemused when they bleed, but it's not so bad. usually, i am playing some song by Queen in my head, and today it was "killer queen." i derive a disproportionate amount of joy from being praised by my dental hygenist on how well i brush and floss. it's kind of sad and pathetic that i aim to impress a 40 year old woman i see once a year, but by all accounts i am a sad and pathetic person.

continuing along this theme of me differing from most people, i don't see what's so damn great about dogs. dogs are like any other animal, except less interesting and they require you to pick up their feces with your hands. if i wanted to live with a useless ball of hair who slobbered all over the place, made loud and incomprehensible sounds, and forced me to clean up after it, i'd live with anna nicole smith. i can't imagine what dog would add to my life, except shave 3 seconds from my allotted "find my slippers" time, but this doesn't help me because: a) i don't have house slippers and b) i wouldn't immediately wear anything that was just in my dog's mouth. ironically enough, and what would this blog be without irony, i used to beg my father for a dog when i was younger. i thought my canine pal would make suburban life infinitely more interesting, what with all the ball throwing, running about with peals of gay laughter, and endless affection we would share with each other. of course, my father refused, and i was mercifully spared all those late night walks and bags of dog crap.

thanks dad, i owe you big.

you're so vain, you probably think this post is about you

among the billions of things i fail to understand is carly simon's song "you're so vain." my main problem with the song is that carly (i call her carly because we're such good friends) claims that the subject of the song is so vain as to assume that the song is actually about him. the nerve of some people. here is the rub: the song IS about him. that's the object of the song: his vanity. to write a song about someone, and then call them vain for thinking that they are the muse is stupid. it's sort of like shakespeare calling julius caesar vain for thinking "julius caesar" is about him. people should see how pointless the lyrics of this song are, and i should be awarded some sort of cash prize for figuring out how absurd it is. something of the area of $100,000,000 sounds just.

Midterms

As a college student, midterms are an unavoidable part of my life. Since I'm a liberal arts students, my week is composed of exams in Russian History since 1917, and Principles of International Politics. Both these classes are intellectually stimulating, and I really like the professors. My politics class is full of game theory, including Nash Equilibriums and Sub-game Perfect Nash Equilibrium. To someone who is actually interested in non-cooperative game theory, it's very interesting, but people who are interested in non-cooperative game theory typically find calculus puzzles interesting, and I'm thankfully not great at math. The point I was initially making was that my exams are not difficult, and are actually in subjects I like, but I detest them all the same. I thought if I took classes I liked, I wouldn 't dread the exams so much. I then realized that I hate tests more than I hate Celine Dion.

On Wednesday afternoon, I'll be very happy.

New York sitcoms

as someone who now lives in manhattan, i try to find out the image outsiders have of life in new york. i think The Economist has a done a fine job through its analysis of sitcoms based in new york.

“Sex and the City” stars four young career women and is ostensibly about the difficulties of finding a man in New York. It has a point. According to an analysis for The Economist, there are 93 men to every 100 women among single New Yorkers aged 20-44. In the country as a whole, and in most other big cities, there are more young single men than young single women. What the programme mostly shows, though, are the joys of chatting, shopping and going out to glamorous places. The six young friends in “Friends” are poorer and don't have quite the right invitations. They hang out together, discuss who is hanging out with whom, then hang out some more. “Seinfeld” is about a self-satisfied comic who occupies himself by being mildly witty about the trivial frustrations of urban living and his eccentric neighbours.