Stuff

Follow Sita’s little plane.

Rumsfeld out and a Democrat majority in the House of Representatives. Still doesn’t fill me with hope for a brighter future but it’s a step in the right direction. Here’s Steven Colbert’s take on it.

First off the good news. If you like insanely paced, utterly unbelievable, adolescent male wish-fulfillment films, Crank (2006) will be right up your street. I was feeling slightly sleepy, but it picked me right up. Jason Statham’s heart will explode if his BPM goes below 150 and spends 87 sex, violence, drugs and jumping around-filled minutes trying to kill the baddies before he expires… Excellent stuff. Snappy dialogue too… He’s goes to a hospital to get some Ephedrine, “I’m looking for something beginning with E”… “England?” asks the chemist. Fine editing and SFX. Never a dull moment… 4 Lulus.

Next up The Killers- Sam’s Town (2006)… not so good. As every review will tell you it’s a change in direction from their excellent debut album. I went right off the actual band after reading an interview in Q with the vocalist who came off like an immensely irritating git. Still I’ve never let my feelings about the members of a band change my opinion about the music. However this album is not my cup of tea at all. According to most reviews, they’ve rediscovered Bruce Springsteen as an influence, and that’s definitely apparent. not being a fan of the Boss won’t help you here, but worse still they appear to have rediscovered Meat Loaf too. And that’s unpardonable. 1.5 Lulus

No sos vos, soy yo (2004) was the only option at the cinema on Sunday night. A film about a fairly nasty break-up and the aftermath on one very sensitive young man. It was very tenderly observed and, though predictable, a nice little film. Even though I’m not sure about the redemptive powers of dog owning… Always nice to hear argentine spanish in the cinema though. 3.5 Lulus

They weren’t there again today. Sod it. I’m going to organise my own club, that can be my new year’s resolution. I’ll be 32 next year and if that’s not the age when one should settle down and start thinking about organised Scrabble, when is the right time?

Got my guitar back from “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” workshop downtown. It’s sounding fine again. I bought a high E string in San Juan de Dios and promptly broke it after trying to tune the guitar too high. They gave me another and threw in a polishing for nowt. Took a couple of photos of the shop, which looks the part. I’d not trust them with one of my more expensive guitars, mind…

 

A year ago or so one of the “machine heads” on me guitar fell off, so i’ve been tuning the other strings to that one since I can’t tune it at all. So it’s gradually been getting lower as the months go by, so that when I sing Shakira songs they sound more like Tom Waits. No more! I went to the city center with my guitar over my shoulder like some scruffy gringo mariachi and left it at a tiny little guitar workshop overnight. It’ll cost me 120 pesos (7 quid) but tomorrow should be back to normal as long as I can find the shop again… Actually I should find it cos I have their card “43 years of experience” apparently, and the geezer there didn’t look a day under 97. They’re listed on the card as El Bueno, Salvador, el Malo, Jose and El Feo, Juan… Hope it’s Salvador who does the magic. Even though he looked at my geetar and said ah they don’t make them like this any more, which i’m not conviced of. I got it 7 yrs ago in Seville for 80 quid… Any requests for more YouTube busking?

Also “rented” a bunch of DVDs… Crank (apparently the first 30 minutes is good), Ong-Bak in “El Nuevo Dragon” (chop soggy nonsense from Thailand), The Corpse Bride (this time not dubbed into Spanish, hopefully), Mi Vida sin mi (My life without me?, no idea what it’s all about), Cronica de una Fuga (Uruguayan director, Cannes film winner), Sra. Venganza (from the director of the excellent korean film, Oldboy), and Children of Men (I couldn’t wait for it to come out in the cinemas any longer). So this week I shall be mostly vegging out in front of the telly awaiting young sita’s arrival…

Couldn’t agree more with this bloke (woman?)’s article on corporations trying to be your friend. Travel Money indeed…

Almost as bad as my US bank, Washington Mutual, or WaMu as they now insist on being called… Christ

And a 15 piece Mariachi band has just struck up a rousing rendition of god knows what in front of the house opposite me. I love this country! And there goes song #2, “¡ay, ha, jaiii!”. Seriously, where else does this kind of nonsense happen?

And they’re still playing… I had time to go up on the roof, film a quick 90 secs, upload it to YouTube and post it here… this is costing someone big bucks… pesos grandes even. Maybe they’re getting off-peak rates…

Another fantastic afternoon/ evening/ night yesterday. First up, I went to see Memorias del subdesarrollo (1968) about Cuba’s surprisingly sedate postrevolutionary transition. There’s going to be a whole series of Cuban films on Saturday afternoons at 5 in the CUCSH so that might become a nice weekly event. Afterwards, El Rincon de la Doa for pre-concert drinks then on to the Teatro Diana for the main event. We had great seats and you could practically make out each chord the guitarrist played. Julieta is completely different to young Shakira, mind. She seems altogether shier, but warmed up after a few songs. It can’t be easy playing to a seated audience… I was surprised as I like to bob about while concert going, but actually sitting down made perfect sense and It was a fine spectacle with some nice lighting/projection effects. Excellent musicians too. I might have to seriously reconsider my thoughts on accordianists. All my favourite songs were present and correct. Actually she didn’t play Casa Abandonada, but I can live with that. Let’s see if it’s on YouTube…. Nope, have the final song instead, an audience singalong no less… Andar Conmigo

Then back to El Rincon de la Doa for post-match analysis and banter. Then a last-minute change of plan from going to find taco outlets open at 2 to going to “El rincon de los rumberos” where I looked after handbags and drinks for those who enjoy dancing to live salsa… A fine, fine night all round.

Didn’t get home till very early this morning… however despite the lack of sleep the following ad for French channel, Canal +, made me laugh:

And I also liked this here magic eye stereogram tetris thing. Defocus your eyes and use the cursor keys to steer the falling blocks. Or alternatively just try to not go permanently blind…

A good mate of mine, whose nom de plume is Pinguino Frog, wrote a short story which seems appropriate for the Día de los Muertos. He posted in in Spanish here in his blog. And since it’s all in the present tense and not too tricky I gave it the translation treatment.

Here’s the first paragraph:

They have arrived; I can feel them, their cold, their pain, their solitude. They wake me, brushing against my shoulder. It’s past 12 o’clock they inform me. With some difficulty I open my eyes and see them floating, there, at the side of my bed. They have arrived, they have arrived to give me a message from the other side, they have come to tell me that the dead are worried, that they are worried because I am getting dangerously close to their borders. They talk to me in an unknown language that all the same I understand perfectly. I sit on the edge of my bed to see them better, I rub my eyes to make sure that they aren’t merely some kind of trick. The spectres are completely unknown to me, not even by straining to see them better can I identify them; who they might be. I cannot avoid comparing this apparition with Dickens. I can’t help feeling like a Scrooge, victim of three Christmas spirits, even though, those who visit me number five.

Download the whole 5 page short story here (PDF 97k) . Not for the squeamish…

and therefore shouldn’t vote in the upcoming US elections. “C, You should consider not voting until you update your knowledge on contemporary issues.” Well, that and my green card status…

This is what happens when you get all your US news via the internets, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, and whatever scraps of the Daily Show and Colbert Report they’ve left up on YouTube… I wouldn’t touch US politics with a 10 foot bargepole, mind, it’s gone to hell in a fundamentalist handbasket. Not that recently watching a seasonsworth of BBC 2’s Mock the Week and the latest Radio 4’s News Quiz inspires confidence in how my home country’s being handled neither. And then there’s Oaxaca, jaysis… At least there’ll always be scrabble…

Or will there? After a fairly hefty walk to where it was advertised I found an old abandoned café and nothing going on, so I rang the bloke’s number in the paper and he said ah, now it’s in Café Azteca where I went originally weeks ago. So I started walking then thought “bugger it” and got a taxi there or i’d get there too late. So I arrive and no one’s there and I phone my scrabble contact again and he says he’ll see where Virginia’s got to, who’s the other half of the organisers. She says due to, quote, Force Majeure, unquote, there’s no scrabbling this week but they’d love me to come next Tuesday. So anyway to cut (make, US) a long story short, no scrabble today. If you don’t count the 5 online games and half dozen on my pocket PC…

Sita’s got her tickets for MX today so I’ll be seeing her v. soon. Which is fantastic news. She’s got a nasty cold at the minute so send her an email and wish her well if you have a minute. Although I’m told Atticus is being the perfect nurse and sporting his hallowe’en devil horns. No photos though, I’m afraid…

In or around the Guadalajara area in December, 2006? Fancy learning how to make documentaries in the beautiful environs of Mazamitla with a sound bunch of peeps? Intangible’s new Flash site may just be for you… The mute button’s on the bottom left… and you might have to click on the box to activate it until I get my head round the javascript necassery for IE7 to autoactivate Flash objects…

And now I’m off to hunt down the Tapatian Scrabble Association again…

Click away for another vanity video of me mangling G’n’R’s Patience…

Too busy to post anything much right now, I’m in the middle of translating a document on “The creation of new cinematographic languages or the concept of ‘Filming the ineffable”” and it’s starting to do my head in… Nearly finished though…

Can anyone beat 30 seconds on this game? Almost worth losing for the taunts in French “That’s exactly the same time Paris Hilton got..” *Gallic guffaw*

If I get over 400 points in a two player game of scrabble, I’m happy with meself, but this geezer racked up 365pts with just one word…

As I wex lyrical to my jo, it’s not qua my abilities. Even when armed with my jax and the azo qi is flowing fortuitously through the qats.

Meanwhile, my puritanical Scrabble for my pocket PC refuses to accept “poo”.

Matando Cabos (2004). Hilarious, one of the best comedies I’ve seen in ages. Sort of like “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” but infinitely funnier and with better acting all round. Some nice lucha libre moments too… 4.5 Lulus…

Erm, what else? I’ve been busy translating corporate documents for a chain of car dealerships and putting the finishing touches to this here lycra sports clothing shop. I’ve got to do a fair amount of work on Intangible’s site before tomorrow evening, and there’s rumours of a party being held here on Friday with Javier and a load of his students from England… I’m also off to buy tix for Julieta Venegas which is on the 4th, so keeping busy as ever.

Sita asked me what to dress up Atticus as for Hallowe’en. This page has a few ideas: http://mfrost.typepad.com/cute_overload/2006/10/lets_just_get_t.html though he’s more Princess Leia than Darth Vader… Being a schipperke, or Belgian boat dog, he’s be a good Hercules Poirot…

I’m liking FireFox 2.0, by the way definitely worth installing. Mind you, if IE had extensions IE7 would be up there with it. There’s a new TotalPodCastrophe out, Desmond 22 so I’ll be giving that a play on my next round of errands…

Erm that’s it. Have a photo of some taco ingredients that i’ll almost certainly not be trying anytime soon. Tacos de Trompa (snout)

The Tacos al Pastor come highly recommended though. Mexico City style…

but prompted to post after being put on hold for 3 minutes and force fed an orchestral/muzak rendition of Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall Pt II”. I’d have stayed on longer to see if Nine Inch Nail’s “Hurt” or maybe M.A.S.H. theme, “Suicide is Painless”, was going to be next, but cell phone calls cost a fortune round this way… TelMex have the Beatles catalog when you’re put on hold. I wonder if they’re paying the royalties. Shall have to ask them next time my bill has more anomolies…

Last night I went cantina hopping with Jose, his sister and a couple of other peeps, it was grand to be out of the house again after what seems like an age. La Fuente first, which was packed. It’s going through a fair few changes. It’s one of Guadalajara’s oldest cantinas but recently it’s been refurbished, expanded and now features art exhibitions and several plasma flatscreen TVs which really don’t help the ambience. There’s a bike above the bar that someone left in 1947 or thereabouts saying they could keep it until he came back to pay his tab. Needless to say he never returned. Anyroad, it was missing last night with a plaque saying it’s been leant to an exhibition on collectibles in the Casa de Cultura. Once they replace the live musicians with a video jukebox we’ll know it’s all over… Anyroad, after there on to El Rincón de la Doa in Calle Heroes, not far from the Coliseo (The lucha libre arena). Much more sedate… We were there till around 1:30 then headed to Los Famosos Equipales where I got involved in a very strange argument about bullfighting.

Strange because I completely agreed with the bloke arguing with me. My every other word was, “exactly”, or “I completely agree”, or “you’re totally right” but it seemed like after years of arguing bullfighting ethics with foreigners he didn’t believe anyone who wasn’t Spanish or Mexican could possibly be in favour of it. I’ve never been to a corrido de toros which is pretty odd considering my lifelong obsession with all things hispano. When I was vegetarian for 3 years I was passionately against it but once you’re an omnivorous, leather-wearing, animal-tested-medicine-taking co-conspirator you’ve not got a leg to stand on. It’s all about using animals for non-essential human ends, and in for a penny, in for a pound reckons I. Bullfight bulls certainly have a better quality of life than your average dairy cow or battery hen. And on their last day alive at least they have a chance to get even in front of a paying audience rather than being transported across the county in a small box, shot up with antibiotics, shuffling into an abbatoir and having a bolt put through their brain…

Today if all goes according to plan, off to the Tianguis Cultural downtown, then watching native Guadalajaran, Guillermo del Toro (coincidentally enough)’s new film El Laberinto del Fauno (Pan’s Labyrinth) which has been getting impressive reviews.