What makes the high heat of summer in this part of Texas bearable, even something to look forward to, is the abundance of swimming spots in natural cool spring-fed creeks, often lined with tall Cypress trees for shade. We've just discovered a place about 2 miles from our house, on Onion Creek, that is really nice. We had be going for much longer drives before we found this spot.

Victor is a very enthusiastic swimmer. He's taken to doing short dips under the surface lately, again the Lab in him showing through. Found this site honoring Umbra, a competitive swimmer dog.

  posted by John : 9:46 AM

 


More shenanigans from the fine folks over at the Alamo Drafthouse. If you've got the time, and can come up with the gas money - here's something fun to do for 2 weeks at the end of August... Rolling Roadshow Tour.

  posted by John : 6:55 PM

 
Touching the Void
Last night I watched the film Touching the Void. Its a documentary re-creation, based on the events that took place in 1985 when mountaineers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates attempted to climb an icy, vertical, snow covered, twenty one thousand foot high peak in Peru. To put it mildy, things go a bit awry for these two English blokes.

I recommend the film, especially if your spouse, significant other or movie-watching-buddy has both a fear of heights and a close relative who climbs icy peaks, and the last thing they want to see are ice-climbers in perilous situations. And that spouse, S.O. or buddy is out of town. Sharon is away this week at a retreat in Michigan, and when I'm going to watch a movie without her I try to think of one that she has already seen, or like Touching the Void, one she would rather not watch anyway. Actually, the survival on icy peaks genre is where I look first when trying to pick out such a film. A couple of years ago when Sharon was away I rented, and thoroughly enjoyed Alive, a film recreation of the true story of a soccer team from Uruguay who spend an unplanned week on an icy peak when the plane taking them to Chile crashes in the Andes.

Without spoiling the film, I can say that what was most interesting to me about Touching the Void (directed by Kevin MacDonald, who also made One Day in September), was the spiritual aspect of the journey. The Void is the characters' view of what death is like. That is, its like nothing. You die, and everything that was you, stops. And we have a built in desire to avoid it if at all possible.

  posted by John : 2:07 PM

 
This just in on a My Yahoo Telecommunications News feed... Twin Cities Rocked by 8.5 Richter Scale Quake. Then it went away. I guess someone spotted that it more appropriately belongs in the breaking handbag-news section.

  posted by John : 9:22 AM

 
Last week we watched Sideways - a film that came across to me as one sponsored by the tourist board of Santa Barbara county. We're planning to stay a couple of nights in the area where the story takes place on our SF to LA drive next month, so I thought we should see the movie, since it appeared to pop up alot on local business websites - "as featured in the film Sideways", etc. Oddly, none of these establishments mentioned "home of Michael Jackson", though its also home to his fantasy ranch.

Thinking of other films that would be interesting to watch for the context of where we'll be visiting, I realized that I'd never seen East of Eden - the film version of the John Steinbeck novel, starring James Dean. So I flagged it as one to watch. Then I saw that it was playing today at the Paramount theater in Austin - synchronicity. The Paramount is the grand old turn-of-the century theatre in Austin, and they have a summer series. So I went to a matinee featuring the restored print for the 50th anniversary of the movie. They played the original lead music for about 5 mins beforehand, giving time for our eyes and thoughts to adjust before starting the film They pulled back the curtains, like they used to do, and began the cinemascope feature, opening on the seashore of Monterey in 1917, and describing the geography of Steinbeck country. This was James Dean's first film, and he was great throughout. It seemed to me that the other actors were there to provide framing only for his performance. And it was a good film to watch for father's day, being at least parlty about not being able to break free of a father's bonds. Now I'd like to read the book, as I'm sure this was just a sliver of the original story.



  posted by John : 5:50 PM

 
Strange Brewery
I had to plug back in to find tonight's entertainment. Perfect. Have to get a cape for Victor.

  posted by John : 11:45 AM

 
Summertime
I gotta start getting up earlier. That's the only way for me to enjoy the outdoors here at this time of year. Or at least that's what I think, because I can't stand being in the direct sun for long - and I've been spending too much time in air-conditioning. The days of 95F everyday have begun. Here the heat builds and builds throughout the day, as the limestone absorbs the suns rays, to the hottest temp about an hour before sunset. That leaves a decent morning, and very excellent early morning and evenings. What I'd like to do is get my internal clock calibrated to enjoy those early mornings. But at the rate I've been going, working late every night, its more likely that I'm just starting to get some good sleep then. But there's room for that to change now. The nine month long project I've been working on, after a gruelling two month stretch to the finish with barely any time off, has finally gone into production. I'm left now doing post-production support, but that's a breeze in comparison to the stress we had been enduring. I've been glued to the computer. The fact that I'm writing this here this morning is evidence of that -- I should have it unplugged and enjoy the weekend.

Sharon left yesterday for a 9 day retreat in Michigan, unwinding. Then when she comes back we'll spend a few days to pack our stuff, and her unwound self into the car and head for Toronto. The timing of this project ending couldn't have been better. I'm envisioning taking six weeks or more off. Though that could change - could be less time, could be more. I'm looking forward to not knowing what to do with myself for awhile. Walk, swim, get back into the yoga class I was in there last year, or just look at the outside world ?

Mid July we're going to take that California trip -- starting with a long overdue and much anticipated visit to see GG and family in San Francisco. Did you drove n did you flew? We had originally conceived of driving there from Austin, then up the coast to BC, then on to Toronto - camping along the way. But the miles and logistics involved felt quite heavy, so we're going for the CA-lite tour instead. After a weekend in SF, we'll take our time driving down the coast staying in some neat spots along the way. A weekend in LA, then back to SF for a few nights by the bay. Oooh, that rhymes nicely, doesn't it? I hope to get VERY unplugged on the trip -- even though we'll be visiting the most wired cities on earth.

I will unplug from here now. Going to enjoy Saturday. Victor and I need to go find a shady stream and take a swim.

  posted by John : 9:01 AM

 
Inspired by the news of how well the American Idol runner-up has taken the loss, I wrote this little country chorus:


Copyright, Slow News Day Music - 2005.

  posted by John : 7:08 AM

 
Victor in a red sauce
The evenings outside here at home are perfect right now. We have dinner on the deck and sit and drink wine until dark. The crickets and other bugs have begun to get quite loud on these warm nights.

Last night we might have stayed out just a little too long. Sometime there between twilight and dusk, I looked out in the yard and saw Victor snap up a creature on the dam over the creek, and shake it very vigorously -- the ratter in him coming to life full force. I knew what it was - and it was only a few minutes before the smell wafted toward us. I went out and stood at the bottom of the steps, about fifty yards from where Victor was looking over his catch and looking at me. I called him very sternly and after a few moments he came, and lied right down beside me - every fibre of his body trembling in super-hightened instinct. I told him to stay and walked out to take a look. It looked liked a fairly young skunk, and it was quite dead now. As unpleasant as it was to have happened, it was also interesting to observe the hunting ritual that Victor seemed to know. It seemed to me that terrier in him did the killing, and it was the retriever in him that was waiting patiently as I walked back.

The of our evening, previously planned as an early night to bed, quickly changed into us squeezing lemons all over Victor's face and neck, where the smell was the strongest, then washing him down with a baking soda solution Sharon whipped together. Both things she read about in a handy dandy guide she happened to have for what to do in just such a situation. After repeated rinsing, the smell was not overpowering, but still enough that Victor got to spend the night outside.

Today we got out the tomato juice. Actually we used tomato sauce, as that's all we had. They say the acidity of tomatoes neutralizes the skunk-smell chemical. I couldn't help but think that some parmesean would go well too, but Sharon didn't quite agree. After a couple of applications, then a shampooing, Victor nows only smells a tiny bit if you put your nose right up to his fur, and so is allowed inside. Which is a good thing for him since he's become so acclimated to air-conditioning.

photo

  posted by John : 7:37 PM

 
Last night we went to a new outdoor East Austin music venue to hear Miss Lavelle White sing the blues. Maybe 60 people among scattered lawn chairs set out in a vacant lot next to the Victory Grill in what is a historical center of the "black" side of town. Though there's not much there today, the stage is some plywood on cinder blocks -- the idea of the venue is a bit of an experiment to get something happening. Austin is so obviously divided geographically and culturally by the interstate that slices on North/South axis just east of downtown. I often tell Sharon that I'd like to live in East Austin, but so far she isn't having it and much prefer's our place in the country. We did live there years ago, when the flight path to the old Austin airport was right over our roof. What draws me to the neighborhood is that there are lots of people, young and old, spending time outside - not necessarily rushing to go somewhere. There's a homegrown feeling. Not a Starbucks in sight. Many old houses don't have air conditioning, so people slow down in the summer months. Get you a chair on the porch with the shade tree and plug in a fan.

After the sun went down over the roof of the Victory Grill building, people started arriving to hear the music and support the venue. Miss Lavelle White was in fine form.

Being Thursday I had picked up a copy of the Austin Chroncicle and saw that the original 1954 version of Godzilla which I have wanted to see was playing that night at the Paramount theatre. It was about a 3 minute drive away (another thing I would love about living in East Austin). Thinking we were late we walked in to find what was on the screen was actually a very long trailer for a 1950's Batman movie (memorable quote, when the mad scientist declared, "he's in a state of animated suspension!"). Then Godzilla came on. Very different from the version we've all known as the original film. No Raymond Burr, no English spoken. The early special effects were really fun to watch. Frequent use of the low budget technique of showing a person pointing and screaming instead of actually showing the horrible thing coming at them. I can't remember how the original ends now. ** Spoiler ** : In this one a scientist deploys an Oxygen Destroyer device to the depths of the ocean in a suicide bomb mission to destroy Godzilla (and everything else in the underwater vicinity).

Now this morning, sitting out on the deck to enjoy breakfast we heard the sounds of a strange creature echoing over the trees. Time to head to the underground laboratory.

  posted by John : 7:20 AM

 
Killed my first chicken this morning. One of the sources of attrition of our neighbor's hens is that their little Jack Russell terriers can somehow manage to jump the backyard fence and go after them. A teenager from down the street is looking after the place while they're away on vacation. She called us this morning to say that a dog had gotten to one of the 3 chickens and it was in rough shape, and she'd like some help. I went over. Now they have 2 chickens. Yuck.

  posted by John : 7:51 AM

 


Today's amazing revelation... Wing, the Chinese woman who sings Abba songs on South Park, is for real. Listen to a clip of her sublime rendition of Dancing Queen. A voice as delicious as an order of City Shrimp.

  posted by John : 9:37 PM

 
So Google is now the largest media company - based on value of its stock. Bigger than any news or entertainment company. Bigger than many countries. Big enough to launch the Iraq war. Yes, it is a very slick search engine, which we all use. And I guess that's the point - Google has us all tuned in to their channel, so the value must be on the potential of exploiting that. It will be interesting to see what they decide to show us with that $80 billion.

I did like the Frank Lloyd Wright image they have today...


  posted by John : 9:30 PM

 
Netflix
Earlier this year I heard this review of the film Mikey and Nicky on NPR. It had just been released on DVD. The critic, John Powers, calls it one of the best films of the past 40 years. Anyway, it was enough of a tickler for me to want to see it. We live a good ways from town, and its been ages since we'd rented a movie. Instead we'd been watching films recorded from satellite for some time. So rather than searching for this release, wanting to see it spurred me on to signing up for a Netflix account.

The film, directed by Elaine May, and starring John Cassavettes and Peter Falk, was excellent. According to the DVD extras, it had the record of the most footage shot for a feature film - I think one million feet. Which is a testament to the experimental nature in which the film was made, with many very long takes and many retakes. And it was shot night-for-night, instead of day-for-night, which looks really good.

Here's a NY Times review of the film, which probably helped turn the audiences away in 1976.

Netflix is pretty cool -- a fine semi-low-tech solution to the whole movies-on-demand concept. Better than searching through program guides to see what might be offerred. Instead we get what we want (if Netflix has it of course). It works well for us vs recording movies, or buying DVDs, since I never really want to watch a movie twice anyway. Except maybe right away which is what we did with this film. Favourite films I'll wait years until I can see it again on a big screen. And how much selection do you need on a given night anyway?

So today I finally took a bit of time to get Netflix RSS feeds working on this site. A download here, a cut and paste of some php code into the template there, a bit of fiddling, and voila! See the sidebar list of what we've watched lately and what's in our queue.

  posted by John : 2:23 PM