midwesterngal's Journal

Relentless.

Last summer in Rome, there was a relentless musquito that hovered around my bed for about 5 weeks. I thought I'd never meet another one with such fierce endurance. Well...it appears that the Motherland has Rome beat where musquitos are concerned. These beasts are fierce. They fear nothing. It seems they're true Stakhanovites. I now have about 40 bites on each arm, and the worst part is that by the time morning rolls around they stop itching and the marks go away, so I can't even fully relish in the process of complaining about them! Sigh.

Went to hear a concert at the Kapella on the Moika Canal. I wonder if it's too much to ask that an orchestra play TOGETHER?!?! Nevertheless, Carmina Burana was great fun to listen to. I had never heard the piece live. The Tchaikovsky Violin concerto was a whole other story. The poor soloist really looked like she was struggling to get to the end. The orchestra couldn't really follow her, and the woodwind & brass sections just proceeded to ruin the evening whenever it was time for a solo...Let me tell you, it wasn't no Gergiev conducting!!!

Watched the Tchaikovsky Competition awards ceremony on TV the other night. I didn't know that Rostropovich was the President of the Jury....sad. I'm decidedly NOT a fan of the Roccoco Variations. can you say BOOOOORRRRING????? ugh. that same theme. over and over and over again...The cellist didn't help much. The winning violinst was stunning. The pianist left me entirely cold.

Took a daytrip out to Tsarskoe Selo, but some Oligarch had booked the palace for a private party, so we couldn't get in. Of course the mere mortals were told that the palace was closed due to "technological problems."

Guess what? Midwesterngal is surviving in the Mutterland without ANY water! As per usual, the hot water went off on July 1, but then yesterday, out of the blue, the COLD water went bust as well!!!!! The charm wore off after about 22 seconds, let me tell you.

Venice of the North

Greetings from die Mutterland. Midwesterngal made it to the Very Northern Metropolis, and her summer peregrinations have begun. I guess she won't be "midwesterngal" until august 2008, unless, of course, you consider Northern Metropolis part of the Midwest.

I always seem to greet the MotherLand with a simultaneous sense of awe and horror. St. Petersburg is gorgeous -- I walk around the city for hours on end, marvelling at every facade -- but I also find it horrifying. There are days I wish I worked on a country I love, like Italy....ah well.

Made it to the Mariinskii 2 nighs ago, and heard Gergiev conduct Mahler's 5th. what a treat! I sat behind the orchestra, just like i had for Mahler's 9th in San Francisco 2.5 years ago. I find watching orchestras magical. It's like being in a movie set. I had forgotten Mahler scored the 5th for 7 horns and a colossal number of trombones! it was amazing. Daddy-o always makes fun of me for liking BIG sound, but I do, there's no way around it. Plebian taste, I suppose....I finally understood where Shostakovich comes from: he's basically Mahler + irony. that's my great discovery. A shame it took 30 + years to realize that:)

More coming soon...stay tuned.

Almost June!
Midwesterngal can't believe it's almost June!

Soundtrack for today: Annie Lennox's DIVA. I heard this for the first time in Providence, RI, spring of 1994, when I thought that Annie Lennox went by the name of Diva. No particular affection for this album, but it still moves me, the way all songs are attached to a particular geography in my mind.

Midwesterngal is reading Olesha's ENVY for the first time (gasp!) and loves it. Why did i wait this long? I highly recommend, in case anybody needs summer reading.

Oh, and I'm also reading Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. Another of those books I should have read about 15 years ago, but somehow had other things to do...tried making my way through Charlotte Delbo's Auschwitz et apres, and realized that I can't handle holocaust narratives right now. So, I put it away in favor of Dillard's Virginia landscapes and sounds of nature. seems like a fair trade for now.

Mandelstam still haunts my days (Periwinkle -- how could you handle a whole dissertation on him? i'm moving on to greener pastures as soon as this is done...he's all-consuming, and utterly frustrating at the same time, because no matter how much i read, i don't have a firm grasp on anything he's doing; and i've never felt the futility of an argument more strongly than when I write about him...)

Movie agenda: Paris, Je T'aime. should be great. After all, the Coen brothers directed one of the 18 shorts, and Alexander Payne did another, so it's bound to be interesting.

A quiet May it's been.

Nature of the beast.
The problem with teaching literature is that I sometimes forget how to read for pleasure. Or, rather, reading for pleasure brings me very little pleasure. That's when I fear my job the most -- like it's robbing me of what I love most. But, I guess that's what summers are for (and research leaves, woohoo!). The neverending semester came to a close. We finished off wtih Chekhov's Cherry Orchard (what better way to end?) -- brought the Reaslit tradition to a monumental close. My students didn't get it AT ALL -- they were annoyed by Russians who just talk and talk and talk (and drink and talk and talk) and then I had them perform some scenes in class, and suddenly it CLICKED! it was an AHA moment I hadn't even expected -- they suddenly GOT Chekhov, GOT his comedy -- the way everyone speaks past each other, the absurd treading on the tragic constantly, and focing you to laugh in spite of yourself. And it all ended on a great note.

I'm always shocked at how the semester suddenly bleeds into summer, with no advance warning. Things just come to a HALT, and then it all picks up again in September. It's strange that I won't be teaching for a whole year. Good, but strange.

Anyhow, I succumbed to Spiderman 3, even though I knew it wouldn't be as great as Spidey 1 or 2. and let me tell you, it SUCKED. bigtime! I was actually bored stiff for part of the movie -- can you believe being bored by cute little Tobey Maguire? well, it happened. Don't waste your precious pennies on that one.

Watched THE WAITRESS a couple days ago, and was really touched by it. Made me want to bake pies! Hey TwoSheep -- you got some good pie recipes? Would love to try one:) The director, Adrienne Shelly, was tragically murdered right after her film got accepted at Sundance. I wasn't sure about the ending though -- seemed like a cop out to me. I didn't see much future for any of the women and was sort of annoyed that the movie presented it as a viable sort of path... but great, overall.

I've been reading Croatian contemporary fiction -- Dubravka Ugresic is the writer's name. I highly recommend Museum of Unconditional Surrender and Ministry of Pain. Nostalgia, emigre reality, living between languages, between worlds. Midwesterngal's kinda thing.

On the same note, just read Nancy Huston's Nord perdu and absolutely loved it. Gets at the same questions as Ugresic, but from a voluntary ex-pat's perspective. Living a bilingual existence, she wonders who she is, what is her identity, how can she possibly determine it, and what language can she use to figure it out? It was one of those rare books where i could relate to every single sentence. She's married to Tsvetan Todorov (my friend and yours); i'm always shocked to find out he's still alive.

Oh, and the BIG news: I FINALLY (finally, finally!) saw the BIG LEBOWSKI. WOW. i'm still speechless, and wonder why on earth I waited 10 years to watch that! The Coen Brothers are geniuses. it's official. And so is John Turturro:)

Rostropovich...
Ack! Rostropovich died today. I wonder what i fell in love with first: the cello or Rostropovich playing the cello. The events seem to have occurred simultaneously. I remember hearing him play the Saint Saens cello concerto in Vienna in early September 1995, the night before I took the night train to Paris for my junior year abroad. I remember hearing him play the Rococo Variations at the Theatre des Champs Elysees in November of that same year, the same day I discovered Le Corbusier, and raced to the concert hall, all the way from Villa Savoie on the last stop of the RER A. I remember hearing him play the Dvorak concerto at the Orpheum in Vancouver in 1984. I remember listening to him play the Glazunov concerto over and over (and over and over) again during the spring of 1996, because it was the only CD I had with me. I remember discovering Bach cello suites in 1990, the year I read Catcher in the Rye and watched the ducks (or was it geese?) in Central Park, pretending I was Holden Caulfield -- that weekend in June when my grandfather died. I remember hearing the Brahms Double Concerto for the first time in Spring of 1996, or that season we called spring, since it was really an endless parisian winter in an apartment with no heat. And I remember thinking how sad it was to have finally heard the Brahms Double, because I'd never be able to hear it for the first time again.

Rather odd.
Midwesterngal just witnessed something strange. The music librarian at Universidad del Hamleto has a toupee (sp?). This morning, when I came in to get a recording of the Kreutzer Sonata to play for my students, I witnessed him combing and styling his toupee. It was a strange sight. Do those things really need to be combed? Don't they just have a life of their own? Is it really necessary to infuse that mop with hairspray? I was nearly asphyxiated. Between the hairspray and his pungent perfume, I thought I was going to pass out.

More trials and tribulations in the Hamlet.

Went on my first bike ride of the season. 25 miles felt longer than they've ever felt. But the (itty bitty) hills were beautiful, and we caught a really cool pre-storm sunset on the way back to the car.

I'm a little scared to see the Namesake, mainly because I loved Lahiri's book so much. But I suppose I'll confront my fears and see it this weekend anyhow!

learning...
If you happen to own a Mountain HardWear fushia zip-up Fleece, boy does Midwesterngal have advice for you: don't stand too close to the stove when you're boiling water for an afternoon cup of tea! Fleeces are flamable! I didn't set myself on fire, but almost. It heated up pretty quickly and smelled funny.

The Lives of Others (Das Leben den Anderen) is a work of genius. I highly recommend it! The actor who played the lead role was extraordinary. I never knew one could do so much with hardly any dialogue!

I'm in need of good "ethnic" pop tunes. Maroussia, I've almost OD'd on DDT -- what are those Israeli tunes you've been listening to?!

Ack. not much of an entry, I realize, but it's week 14 of the semester and I'm about to embark on yet another grading marathon. I recently got to play Emergency Thesis Doctor for about 3 hours straight. the only problem is that after these help-sessions, I start thinking in thesis statements. Could be worse, I guess. Currently, I'm waging FULL FLEDGED WAR on sweeping generalizations. It's a fun war to wage, but not one that I ever seem to win. Sigh. Will keep you updated on my trials and tribulations.

In other news, made it to Big City Orchestra last week, and heard Bartok's CANTATA PROFANA. WOW. and it was all in magyarul! I've never heard Hungarian sung before! i understood about half the words! Woohoo!

Circumstance.
HAPPY BUNNY DAY!!!!! I love Easter. I wish there were Jewish holidays with cute little pastel colored bunnies! Boy, would I be a Happy Midwesterngal!

If colleague X hadn't gone on leave this year, and I hadn't weaseled my way into the huge-window office, I might never have rediscovered Bergman. Strange how these things happen. Colleague X teaches film, and so there are tons of vhs tapes all over the office, and at some point in October, a hot-pink video box caught my eye (yep, Friendly Greek, it's all about pink...), and it turned out to be the case for Persona. I kept telling myself I should muster up the courage and watch it. And then at some point this semester, I bit the bullet and went on a BergmanBinge. Just watched Autumn Sonata and I'm stunned. With every Bergman movie I see, I think it's impossible to reach a higher state of cinematic perfection. but here it is. Mother-Daughter relations laid bare. completely. It's raw. I am speechless. I didn't think cinema could convey such emotion, both haunting and profoundly intimate. I've never seen music used with such precision before. I don't think I'll ever listen to Chopin's second prelude the same way again (I actually [re]-learned it after watching the movie...). Was amazing to see Ingrid Bergman speak Swedish! Liv Ullman is stunning. Parts of the movie looked like a 17th century renaissance painting (Sven Nyqvist is the best cinematographer on planet earth -- no doubt in my mind!!). I'm still in shock. 92 minutes of perfection. Everything is stripped down to the bare essentials, not an extra word or movement.

Good thing I saw Blades of Glory last night; memories of the hilariously absurd (and great!!) latest Will Farrell flick kept me from getting too depressed by Bergman. I highly recommend Blades....anybody who grew up watching skating championships on TV will just die of laughter watching this. I'm beginning to think Will Farrell is a genius in his own right. wow. what a performance:) Beware the Iron Lotus!

Went to the farmer's market yesterday! Bought some stellar arugula, and other exciting greens. YUM. the moment i had been waiting for since last November! Just made millet. Interesting. Never a favorite grain of mine, but I'm warming up to it. Twosheep -- you got any millet recipes?!

seems every year, Midwesterngal has a pot-burning ritual cause she forgets it on the stove! Just last week, I was thinking to myself that I hadn't burned a pot in a long long time....Well...guess what?! Today was my lucky day! Right after having some millet, i left the pot on the stove:) oops. There goes another one. pretty much burned to a crisp. Ah well, small casualties, I guess...It was time to go to Target anyhow!

Trials and Tribulations
It happened again. While in the Northern Metropolis, Midwesterngal had a vision of the perfect haircut she wanted. I managed to convey the vision to RockStarSister, who understood exactly what I meant. She recommended her snazzy "sytlist," so off I went. But somehow when I was trying to relate the intricacies of my overarching vision, something must have been lost on snazzy stylist, cause I walked out of the hair appointment looking pretty much the same as when I walked in! She added a few layers, but it was nothing like I had imagined! I still wonder what got lost in translation. hm...perhaps I was too wishy-washy (layered, but not ridiculously layered, i remember saying -- was that too subtle? was that asking her to imagine too much?) and my language lacked precision (fluffy but not poofy [sp??]). hm...ack.

And then, about 10 minutes ago, a student walked into my office to talk about her paper, and as we were working through a thesis statement, I looked at her and gasped! SHE HAD THE HAIRDO I'VE BEEN SEARCHING FOR!!!! It exists! I don't remember how (or whether!) we fixed her thesis, because i spent the rest of the time trying to supress my fascination with her hair. Hm...what to do?! Do I ask the student who cut her hair? Do i ask her how she communicates with her hairdresser? Do I ask her to "describe" her hairdo in ordinary hair-dresser-accessible language? Do I just give her an A and ask her to go to the hairdresser WITH ME?!?!?! HELP. Yes, those were the exact things running through my mind as we discussed Alyosha Karamazov's religious crisis. Sorry Dostoevsky. Sometimes I'm under the impression that wrestling with language in the hairdresser's chair is a spiritual crisis. of sorts.

Finally got to see Radiant City; it was worth it. Makes me never want to set foot in suburbia again. The Lives of Others opens next week. That's next on my list (after Blades of Glory, of course:)

In the Northern Metropolis
I have a theory about C major. there's something ethereal about it, and it was confirmed yesterday, when I went to hear Northern Metropolis University Orchestra and Choir play Bruckner's TE DEUM. I don't have much of an ear (at all), but i knew that piece had to be in C major just listening to it...ok. not much of a theory yet, but i'm working on it:) After Bruckner, they played Mahler 1 (TITAN). can i just saw WOW? I know the symphony backwards and forwards (ok, maybe just forwards) but had never heard it live -- I love it when the 7 horns STAND in the last movement! The third movement -- the folkloric dance/country melody movement -- is amazing; parts of it sound like klezmer music! Watching the symphony felt like reading a mystery novel. i was on the edge of my seat the entire time.

I love the Northern Metropolis. I hadn't realized it's such a great city to bike in! Now that the Rocket has hiked up prices, i just cruise around on my bike...

"Radiant City" -- the one doc I missed in Hamleto a couple weeks back -- just opened here yesterday, so i'm going to see it as soon as I finish the mountain of grading on my desk. Ahhhhh, rewards.

Made it out to see SHOOTER. Marky Mark is wondrous. Dreamy, actually. He's a future Jack Nicholson, I tell you. Mark my words!

Learning.
The things I learn, here in the Hamlet: my pilates teacher used to be a drill sergeant. No joke. She used to be in the army! Now her teaching method (ah, the abdominal crunches!) makes perfect sense to me. It took a while to put 2 and 2 together.

Saw one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Trust the Man (Julianne Moore & David Duchovny). It was horrific. Such a great cast and all for NAUGHT. Parts of it felt like a home-video. Yes, it was that bad. One of those movies that tries so hard it's painful to watch. And this is coming from someone who worships Julianne Moore. In fact, Midwesterngal aspires to be Julianne Moore (once I hit that certain age, of course). Anyhow, the movie was, quite literally, a waste of 106 minutes of my life. Not that it hasn't happened before, but... Ah well, could have been worse, I suppose. I'm going to make up for it by watching Bergman's Shame tonight. Ah, Max von Sydow....how i've missed thee.

I showed my students Love and Death. Pure genius. I really think Woody Allen is underappreciated. Not only is it a phenomenal spoof on Russian literature, but also an exquisite Bergman collage (I saw references to Seventh Seal, Persona and Cries & Whispers -- i'm sure i'm missing other!). I need to watch Interiors again.

Amazing biking weather yesterday! The trail is finally back! All ice has been cleared. 15 miles felt like nothing. beautiful!

More updates on the documentary film festival coming soon.

"To Air is Human, to Air Guitar is Divine!"
Hamletissimo is hopping! The documentary film festival has hit town & boy are things exciting!

I saw "Souvenirs" by Shahar Cohen last night. An israeli roadtrip movie: father & son hop in the car and drive from Israel up to Holland to find potential step-siblings, which the father refers to as "souvenirs". The father was in the Jewish Brigades in WWII, ended up in Holland had a few girlfriends, and thinks he may have left some "souvenirs" behind. The pacing of the movie was nice, parts were hilarious, the relationship between father & son is tender, but it doesn't quite add up in the end. At least not the way Doug Block's film about father-son relationships did. But I laughed. And the director sat next to me, and he was chatty and friendly.

Saw "Falling Man" last night as well. That was one stunning film. A memorial to all the people who jumped out of the twin towers on 9/11. Inspired by a photo taken by AP journalist Richard Drew, of a man falling to his death, head first, suspended in mid-air, the movie chronicles the photo's reception -- as it appeared in all major newspapers, then was virtually censored. Then the film takes a fascinating turn and basically turns into a detective story in hopes of figuring out the falling man's identity. A fascinating meditation on visual imagery, memory, the horror of 9/11, our relationship to history. Extremely moving, startling, a real jolt to the senses. What was most frightening to me was realizing the extent to which I had become desencitized to 9/11 imagery. The movie brought it all back. In a sense it reminded me of Akhmatova's Requiem, which mourns the forgotten women of Russia in the 40s. "Falling Man" attempts to remember the people who fell & jumped (willingly?) to their deaths on 9/11, the people the media refused to talk about, claiming that America wasn't "ready" for such images & stories, the people whose strories are lost. It's a reclaiming of history, and a powerful one. British director Henry Singer is one to look out for.

And then tonight, as a diversion, I saw "Air Guitar Nation". A fantastically hilarious documentary about the Air Guitar World Championship! Alexandra Lipsitz did a wonderful job chronicling this absurdly bizarre competition. I found myself growing attached to the contenders, especially Korean-American David Jung, who went by the name of C-Diddy and competed in a Hello Kitty breast plate! I laughed so hard I cried at one point. I'll let you in on one of Midwesterngal's secrets: I've always wanted to be a rock star or, at the very least, a juke box. So, watching these folks play air guitar, and taking it so seriously, was entirely riveting! Total catharsis! Movie opens in New York and LA later this month. oh, and in case you were wondering -- the title of this post is a direct quote from the movie:)

More on the agenda for tomorrow & Sunday. Stay tuned.

We tell ourselves stories in order to live.
I picked up Joan Didion's White Album, read the first line and was hooked. I don't like everything I read, but there's an energy that carries me. And I keep coming back to that first line, which grabbed hold of me without my asking, without my permission almost. And so, when I should be reading some big fat monster of a Russian novel (my students call them monsters, and I find that touching, somehow...they are monsters, isn't that part of the attraction? the indescribably beauty of the novelistic universes?), I'm flipping through Didion's essays instead. Transported back to 1969-early 70s California. it makes me realize that it's healthy to travel between worlds: between the 19th century realist novel universe, the hopelessly unhappy families I have plunged my poor students into, and the equally strangely uncomfortable California universe. Bizarre, this juxtaposition.

Saw a stunning documentary: 51 Birch Street, by Doug Block. It was astonishing: Block's investigation of his parents' 54 year marriage which, as he learns, was less than picture perfect. The movie was shot with tremendous compassion, honesty. It was touching to watch him develop a relationship with his father, after all these years, and we were just as surprised as Block was to see the thing unfurl. The movie's pacing was perfect: things unfolded before your very eyes, seamlessly. And I could recognize my own family in his, bits of my own past, conversations rung so true. And like in the greatest of all novelistic universes, you felt sympathy for every single character. Look out for Doug Block. total genius. My favorite moment in the movie was a non-moment: he's at home filming his wife, asking her a question and points the camera at her face. Her response is an acerbic glance from under her glasses and she mumbles "ugh, this again?" That moment was so real, so true, so unescapably prosaic. And that's just what this movie was: real life. Unadorned, raw, and yet perfectly cadenced. Since moving to Hamleto, I've been thinking more seriously about documentary, but it took Doug Block's film to make it feel like true art.

Life in Hamletissimo is about to get mega-exciting! Documentary film festival hits town on Thursday! I'm volunteering, which means I get in for free! woohoo! The line-up is stellar, so mega-blogging will ensue. Stay Tuned!! you too will become a Doc-fan by the end of next week!

In other news, I watched Divorzio all'Italiana the other night, and Marcello Mastroianni was delicious. Might have to test out some Fellini movies next! I laughed pretty hard the whole way through. I remember watching an amazing documentary about Mastroianni's life Mi ricordo, si, io mi ricordo back when i lived on the west coast, and what struck me in the film was how much FUN he had while acting! I thought of that watching Divorzio, cause it shows. He said acting was a game for him, an endless passionate game. Everything comes naturally to him, nothing is forced, it's like Stiva Oblonsky's smile in Anna Karenina, which Tolstoy tells, is as smooth as almond butter. When I read that with my students, and forced them to analyze that image to death, I realized Tolstoy is a true genius.

It's pouring rain in Hamleto. I started reading Mann's Buddenbrooks, but wonder how far into it I'll actually get. Soundtrack today (Maroussia, you'll like this one): DDT. Anybody looking for good Russian 80s pop, check out DDT. nothing quite like it!

Beehives and Spirits
If you're in the mood to be stunned, run to the video store and rent EL ESPIRITU DE LA COLMENA (spirit of the beehive), Spanish movie, 1973. A perfectly crafted movie about the power of texts (films, stories, what have you) to shape your existence. It's a beautiful meditation on crafting meaning from narratives, on childhood fantasies, loss, understanding. The little girl, Ana, is breathtaking. The scenes where the two young sisters lie in bed whispering late into the night, or having a pillow fight are gripping, natural, perfect. The haunting atmosphere doesn't let up, and perfectly captures the minute-to-minute childhood excitement. (Maroussia -- you gotta see this one!!!) The castillian plains remind me of biking through Midwestern country roads (endless, gorgeous, miraculous). Watch it!

Just when I think life can't get any stranger, it does. I took a drive out to BIG CITY yesterday morning to hear the symphony. It was an all Russian program: Rachmaninov Piano Concerto #1 (sounds like movie-music:), Rimsky's Coq d'or suite (amazing!!) and Scriabin's Poeme de l'ecstase (am I getting too old to be moved by symbolism the way I used to ?! not sure. loved it, but not as much as I worshipped the piece when I first heard it...). Little did I know, but the concert was sponsored by Krispy Kreme donuts! I walked into the hall and saw hundreds -- probably thousands! -- of dounts all over the place! The senior citizens crowd even got a little wild, grabbing at those donuts like there was no tomorrow! I had ONE (remember? Midwesterngal has a predilection for Dunkin...). Later, TwoSheep's sister, violinist extraordinaire in Big City orchestra, told me that the musicians all had a couple donuts each before going on stage and things were a bit hyper:)

What an odd sight to be at the Symphony and to see DONUTS everywhere you look! Could you imagine this happening in NYC or in Northern Metropolis?

Anyhow, the concert was excellent. I realized that i'm not a fan of Stephen Hough though. I mean he's a machine! Nice that he can play in tempo and gets every single note right in the Rachmaninov, but i felt like i was watching a robot play! TwoSheep's sis was right when she said it was the angriest rachmaninov she'd ever heard!

Then, of course, I went on a pilgrimage to Trader Joe's! YUM!! Got some more anti-oxidant dried cherries:) And some amazing dates. TJ's makes me smile. Supersmile. Like the kind of smile that makes your face hurt!

I watched Cries and Whispers last night, and am taking a break from Bergman. It's official now. I can't watch Shame just yet (even though it has sexy MvS in it! -- will have to wait till next week). I had thought that Almodovar was doing something superoriginal in Volver, with his women-only universe, but now i realize it comes straight out of Cries and Whispers. What a terrifying film. The swedes are bizarre folk. Anyhow, if you're in the mood for a "family reunion gone awry" type of movie, deal well with incommunicative Swedes with repressed emotions, death, aren't put off by a self-mutilation scene thrown in for good measure (but far far from gratuitous), I recommend it highly. Actually, I recommend it most highly even if you can't deal with any of the above. If only for the way Bergman uses Bach's cello suites. If only for that amazing scene of sisterly intimacy. If only for the color scheme. If only for the cinematography. If only for the fact that each scene is constructed like a painting, a work of art. If only...

Oh, just rent it!

I Heart Valentine's Day!
No really, I do! Let's see: chocolate, cute little hearts all over the place, the color red -- what more could Midwesterngal wish for?

Preparing.
I have a secret love of mushy food! In preparation for the day all my teeth will fall out, I made rice pudding tonight. There will come a time, when this will be all I'll be able to eat. Some people save up for retirement. Others prepare themselves by fashioning a diet that contains much mush. YUM. Mark Bittman (aka: GOD) has a great & easy recipe! And poof, voila, the rice pudding melts in your mough. No chewing involved. Strange to imagine what eating will feel like oh about 55 years from now. hm...fun fun times ahead!!

Anyhow, it's the perfect comfort food to get me through an evening of grading. Ack! is it so hard to realize that a boring thesis statement will invariably lead to a painfully boring paper???? I tell students this, and they don't believe me. I tell them that if their argument puts them to sleep, chances are I too will be lulled to sleep by its banality and start snoring before I hit the bottom of page 2. And then chances are their paper would get something in the C range. And that's Midwesterngal being Charitable. But they don't listen....

I've switched the CD from Mozart Dissonant Quartet & Haffner symphony to Bach concerti for piano (or pianoforte, or some sort of Klavier they played circa 1735 -- help me out here docbroc!!). The second movements of these concerti kill me. Woody Allen used one in Hannah & her sisters, when Elliot kissed Lee. That was possibly the most romantic scene for me in all of cinema. And guess what? Straight out of good old Ingmar. There's an intensity, a vivacity to Bach that I can't get enough of.

For the record, I'm a total Collard Greens convert:) Always new I had a thing for them, but never really did much about it. Anyhow, they were on sale last week & I decided it was time to shift gears from fantasy to reality. I made chicken & collard greens stirfry and it ROCKED (thanks Mark B, geez, you really DO know how to cook everything!). Nutricious AND delicious. Yum.

Back to grading...

Two weeks & a day!
Until the Oscars!!!

January 29 issue of the New Yorker has a fascinating article on contemporary Russia, and the mess its in, and the problematic role of the media. I had no idea that 13 journalists have been killed since Putin came to power. I had no idea that Putin decides who will be mayor of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Ha, so much for moving toward any sort of viable democracy. Anyhow, read it:)

Saw Bergman's Passion of Anna -- I'm a total Max von Sydow convert now! But makes me think that his role in Hannah and her Sisters was just MvS playing a Bergman character. The movie is chilling -- I highly recommend it. I wonder if the director of Little Children saw it, cause it seems like the frames are similar: LC has a pedophile roaming around their warped suburban town & passion of Anna is framed by some freak who runs around killing sheep & leaving their carcasses lying around the island MvS inhabits. Hm....I would like to know more (much more) about film. Hope to teach a class on it one of these days!!!! Also realizing that Woody Allen got his Bach obsession from Bergman, and his wonderful closeups (i'm thinking of Hannah & Sisters in particular, probably Interiors as well, which is, literally, a hommage to Bergman)...

Also saw Persona. Quite liked it, but it left me disturbed. I know there's much I didn't get in the movie, but I love the mood Bergman sets up. Not quite sure how to describe it...hm...will ponder further.

Needed a bit of a Bergman break, so I saw Groundhog Day (thanks, Friendly Greek, for the rec!!). Beautiful. Mind-candy. Sweet. Watch it if you missed it back in 93 like I did:)

Anyhow, weather in Hamleto is gorgeous today, but the trail is still wayyyyyyy to icy to even contemplate walking on! And the roads aren't really safe to bike yet, and well, even with my northern constitution, let's face it, it's DAMN COLD.

I'm rereading Sergei Aksakov's Family Chronicle, and parts of it are beautiful. It really is Frontier Literature! Makes me want to hop in my Honda and go West to Utah or something.

If you're looking for something to read, have a look at Tolstoy's CHILDOOD. It's delicious prose. Not quite as striking to me as Turgenev's First Love, but it's also a joy to read. There's something so wonderfully satisfying about the Russian Gentry Child tale...life in a protected idyll....Hm...things to ponder. Childhood was fun to teach & at the end of class my students said they could tell i really LOVE tolstoy. Which is funny, because I have problems with him when I read him in large doses, and especially creepy Tolstoy @ the end of his life, but I guess I make a point of loving whatever I'm teaching. And after rereading a text and preparing class, I can't NOT love it. Don't know if this is the most critically sound approach to literature, but it's the only one that works for me right now.

Alignment
On my way back from Big City airport, my car felt a little off. Like it was out of alignment or something. I drove carefully, and then upon coming back to the Hamlet, promptly forgot about my car woes and decided that I had been imagining things. On Monday, after work, after locating my car in the garage (ha! only took me 5 minutes this time!) I noticed that the front left tire was completely FLAT! whoah. a wonder I made it home!!

15 dollars and a few smiles later, the tire was pumped and ready to go. The fellows at Big Tires were missing about 3 teeth each, but they seemed to be kind souls indeed. Fixed my tire in about 5 minutes, and off I drove, into the MidWestern Sunset.

well...not quite. To the grocery store, but with a newly aligned 97 Honda Hatchback Civic DX (navy, slightly dented, sweetsweetcar), it felt as good as driving into the sunset!

Small thrills in el Hamleto:)

Movie update: watched a great documentary Rivers and Tides (or is it Tides and Rivers?) about ephemeral nature-art. Loved it. Same director who did that stunning doc about Evelyn Glennie, Touch the Sound. While in the land of Sun and Alligators, I saw Children of Men with the Friendly Greek. I surprised myself by really enjoying it! Too much violence at the end (for my dainty taste), but I was on the edge of my seat the entire time. Michael Caine is a genius, I've decided. Clive Owen is a cutie, and I really really want to look like Julianne Moore when I too reach a certain age. [ah, the profound things i think while watching movies!]

Oscar Countdown!
It's on. 4 weeks from Sunday (last sunday, bread-making Sunday), I'll be watching Oscars! Woohoo! My favorite time of year. Not because I like awards all that much (the the ceremony, codes of behavior and enterprise is fascinating in and of itself, speaking of which, check out Jim English's awesome Economy of Prestige for more on that topic!) and certainly NOT because I believe that getting an oscar guarantees a good movie, but i just love the idea of taking time to celebrate movies. It's my kind of event. My second favorite weekend in Hamleto will be March 1-4, when the documentary film festival hits town! woohoo!

But back to the Oscars. I was delighted to see that Ryan Gosling, of Half-Nelson is nominated for best actor. His performance was one of the most riveting ones i've seen all year. Hm....maybe it's cause i'm a sucker for movies shot in and around the classroom...and the word dialectics comes up! watch it. NOW. The other nominations are fairly predictable, though I'm stunned that Babel has hit so many. Should finally bite the bullet and watch that one. I'm just afraid i'll come aways with a "so what?" feeling. Kind of how I felt after watching Wong Kar Wai's 2046. like HUH? mega-HUH...

Guess I should go see Letters from Iwo Jima too...

Rented Roads to Koktebel (yes, Midwesterngal bit the bullet and tried Netflix...) the other night, and it was excellent. Ok, you have to be in the mood for SLOW, and DEPRESSING RUSSIAN flick, but it was beautifully shot. A little low on dialogue for my taste, but the movie made up for it in drawn out shots of endless Russian steppe...I'm loving roadtrip movies these days. It's a Russian version of Transamerica, minus the transsexual and the great dialogue and the good music. Yeah, lacked some, but worth it anyhow...Verdict: rent it if you're in the mood for something slow, meditative and depressing.

Advertisement