Notes from a happy guy with rest of the week off

Observations, lessons learned, and odd things I've picked up during my week of leisure:

• Daniel Day Lewis is my Best Actor pick in the Oscar pools this year. Hell, any year. The man is terrifyingly good in There Will Be Blood - he starts off obsessively ruthless, then he really loses it. Love or hate the movie, the performance is otherworldly - and so is that soundtrack. Composed by Jonny Greenwood (Radiohead), it provokes an ever-present unsettling sense of dread - you know the poem "The Second Coming" by W.B. Yeats, and how he describes a beast slouching towards Bethlehem to be born? I imagine the noise the beast would make would sound alot like Greenwood's movie score.
• My plans to see U2 in 3D in IMAX were thwarted when someone in programming thought that it made sense to have The Spiderwick Chronicles 3D Experience booked this week. I can understand daytime showings, but who the hell went to see a kid's fantasy film at the 10:15pm showing? You couldn't drop one concert film that appeals to those who can stay up past 10pm?
• Carlin Rule #103: if my dining companion spends more than 3 minutes describing her lingerie, I am legally entitled to see it.
• Remember the 90s band Tripping Daisy? They had that one hit "I've Got A Girl" - I had no idea that they eventually went on to form the choral symphonic rock band The Polyphonic Spree.
• I'm pretty damned happy with my new Sony w810i Walkman phone - i just got it through Rogers Wireless and it is sweet - great music player, clear call quality, sharp design, surprisingly good 2mp camera, and an easy to use interface. My only complaint, minor as it is: I can't seem to access any info in my contacts lists aside from names and phone numbers. I can add and edit the info, but can't view it easily. Otherwise, very happy with the upgrade.
• I am definitely in the market for an indie-music loving girlfriend. Tell your friends.
• That trailer for Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull has me hooked - I'm in. And how excellent is this summer movie season shaping up? Hellboy 2, Iron Man, Batman - The Dark Knight, Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay, even freaking Speed Racer (way to stick to the original material Wachowskis!) all look like they're going to deliver great entertaining films that are faithful to the source material. I can't recall being so optimistically into a slate of movies.
• And finally, just how much ass is the new season of Lost kicking? Four solid episodes that have been delivering exciting revelations, great character moments, and a quick breathless pace.

Scenes From A Weekend

Place: Going away party . The guest of honour is relocating to Vancouver, B.C. He's been asking my advice on every aspect of the transition: how to find work, should he go temp or hold out for full-time, what type of furniture to buy, should he consider a roommate. I could write a book.

SD: Hey Jay, what do you think is going to happen to me out there? How do you think I'll do?

Me (deadpan): I think you're going to get mauled by a bear.

Place: Foggy Dew pub on King Street birthday drinks with The Peterborough Two. A streetcar party/pub crawl comes in and one of the lager louts immediately makes a loud phone call.

Lout: Dude I'm so wasted we've been drinking Jamieson's all night and it's great!!! WHOOOOOO I'm so going to headbutt someone, it won't be me and I'm gonna headbutt someone tonight, some mutha is getting a big old headbutt toniiiiiiight OH YEAH Give me the intersecond (sic) and we'll hook up it's soooo great we're going to headbutt someone tonight YEAAAAHHH!!!! HEADBUTTTT!!!!

(No one was headbutted at the pub, and the pub crawl left for the next stop after 30 minutes. I had hoped to be called on to demonstrate the Scottish martial art of Feckyou, and headbutt him first. That, or walk up behind him and bounce his head off the table (a technique I learned from my friend T.)

Place: Outside Embassy Nightclub, I show up late to go in for a friend's birthday. 3 young guys are in front of me and are trying to get in, and the dress code at the bar is "Smart".

Bouncer: You guys can't get in. We have a dress code and you're not getting in wearing baggy pants and that. (indicates their golf shirts and sneakers)

Guy: So how do we gotta' dress to get in?

Bouncer (looks over, points to me): Like that guy. Come right in sir.

It's bright and cool out. I've got The Fugee's "The Score" playing on the iPod. I have a large hot coffee, and someone has brought a tray of samosas into the office. Coffee and a samosa for breakfast are not bad things at all. And I'm looking forward to work, with a great weekend of food, Fringe Festival, and friends that I haven't been out with in a while.

This will be a good day.

Press your luck

It's one thing to feel like you're on a roll. Whenever I've won a prize or some other piece of good fortune comes my way, my friends are sure to congratulate me, and then accuse me of "having a horseshoe stuck up your ass". Which is a phrase that I'm sure looks nice on a greeting card.

But to openly run around proclaiming your luck boldly, to proudly announce just where that horseshoe is stuck; well my friends, that is what we call "asking for it". You might as well draw that target on your head, just so that other shoe knows where to drop.

I believe in a higher power in the world. It's known by many names: Karma, God, the Universe, Buddha, Mohammad, Fate. Too many events in my life have the precise timing necessary for the maximum comedic effect. It can't possibly be coincidence that many times.

Hubris and gloating about your luck is a quick way to having an anvil drop on your head (metaphorical or literal).

Rick: Do you believe in Fate
Kat: Not me....
Rick: I hate Fate.
Kat: ...but let's not make it angry!

from the show "The Class"

Audio pollution: I need a "The Fray" - Free zone

This isn't a post to say I don't like The Fray. There's a couple of songs I liked on that last album, and they got a lucrative career ahead of them in the booming "Songs To Play Over A Montage on a Medical Show" genre ( I'm confident that section will be in HMV and iTunes shortly, where you'll also find Snow Patrol, Coldplay, and Damien West).

But damn, they just won't stop playing "How to Save A Life" aka The Grey's Anatomy song on the radios in my workplace. Thank God for my headphones, but 4 times daily is just too much Fray. It's like when that one really good song comes out in the summer gets played to death, like "Hey Ya!" by Outkast or "Crazy" by Gnarls Barkley. I recommend re-visiting "Hey Ya!" and slowly re-introduce it into your music rotation. It's a remarkable song with some insane rhythms, and it's been long enough that you don't hear it as often. A little too recent to sit through "Crazy" just yet, maybe next year.

And while we're on the subject, why am I hearing Billy Ocean's "Caribbean Queen" daily now? I thought I left that tune back in the 80s, along with Smurfs and the lawn darts that were actually darts. I know that there's a funny running gag in the show Everybody Hates Chris, which is set in the 80s, with the little sister being a huge Billy Ocean fan while everyone else is into Michael Jackson. And same on Scrubs:

J.D.'s narration: (While listening to Billy Ocean's Caribbean Queen) Ah Billy! After the Arctic and the Pacific, you're my favourite ocean.

Is Billy due for a William Shatner-like resurgence?

Links: YouTube - Billy Ocean - Caribbean Queen

voices in your head

I've been chatting with a friend after she saw the Stranger Than Fiction trailer, and we got to talking about inner monologues.

Tell me about your inner monologue:

• Is it a type of voice, male or female?
  
  
• Does it just go "la-la-la I'm so pretty" all day?
  
  
• Does it have an accent?
  
  
• Does it sound like an actor?
  
  
• Does your voice sound like Samuel L Jackson somedays: "I want these mutha#*@$ing TPS reports off my mutha#*@$ing desk right now! And where's my mutha#*@$ing coffee?"
• If it sounds like Zach Braff, then you probably watch a lot of Scrubs.
  
  
• Does it sound like Marvin the Paranoid Android? (seek help)
  
  
• Does it sound like Carrie Bradshaw from Sex In the City? (seek help and a Cosmo)
  
  
• Does it sound like a musical? (seek funding)
  
  
• Does it encourage you, criticize you?
  
  
• Or do you just hear a song or theme music all day?

My inner monologue sometimes slips outside: I ask whether that was my inside or outside voice. "I can't believe I have to spend time with this idiot .... oh, was that my outside voice?"

I think my inner monologue changes narrators a bit. Someday's it's Tom Waits (eccentric and gravelly). Sometime's it sounds like Ian McKellan, but lately I get a lot of Ian McShane/Al Swearengen from Deadwood. I think I'd go batty if it sounded like Dennis Miller or Ray Romano.

My friend on the other hand has a chatty monologue, who can go from demure to lunatic in a minute, and "curses more than an entire platoon of military boys". Which sounds like Helena Bonham Carter in the movie Fight Club.

Who's in your head?