Everything I Tell you is Hearsay

magnolia is one of my very favorite movies ever. i unwisely lent my copy to some reprobate neighbor of mine about 5 years ago and thus hadn’t seen it in about that long. but sunday i spent most of the morning in bed watching it. and i remembered anew why i love it so very much.

it isn’t just because it helps me remember a more innocent time when watching tom cruise’s palpable intensity only moved me rather than creeping me out. nor only because jason robards delivers such a touching performance and i always wished he was my grampa ever since seeing “Max Dugan Returns” as a small child. the entire cast of this film moves together in a nuanced and tender way that exposes such loveliness and tragedy all at once.

i somehow forgot how many little tics i picked up from this movie. the scene where the little boy raps to Officer Jim about the identity of the murderer is classic:

i’ll help you solve the case, gotta get paid though, gotta get paid

i say this constantly. and of course, we all know i subscribe to the Seduce and Destroy credo

RESPECT THE COCK! AND TAME THE CUNT!

likewise, when Frank TJ Mackey gets cornered in a lie by the reporter and clams up on her, she asks him what he’s doing, his reply:

i’m quietly judging you

classic scorching derision!!

and not only this, but Magnolia contains what is, for me, the singlemost moving and beautiful scene in any film i have ever watched; each cast member sings a line or two from Aimee Mann’s hauntingly lovely song “Wise Up” and it does not matter if they can, or if they are even conscious but only that they are all bound together in this moment of vulnerability and wonder.

there was some unbridled crying in front of my cohort during this part of the movie. apparently my relentless sentimentality is no secret to anybody.

then i went to breakfast and had spicy potatoes and a screwdriver. it was a very nice sunday indeed.

with the surly people behind the counter at my local convenience stores? i’m accustomed to uppity waitstaff, i mean, i am from here. but this phenomenon is new. i am used to my clerk at the plaid being:

1. drunk, intoxicated, or suffering the long-term effects of previous drunkenness/intoxication
   
2. mentally challenged
3. toothless
4. persistently curious about my personal life/plans for the evening
5. some combination of the above

what i am NOT used to is the not-so-subtly snide mien the handful of cashiers i have encountered lately have adopted.

few weeks back friends lyza, emma, & i wandered over to plaid to obtain milk duds for our popcorn. we were enjoying the fine pre-summer evening with a few cocktails, and we had all confirmed via emma’s snazzy personal breathalyzer unit that none of us should attempt to captain a vehicle of any kind, but we were merely enjoying our time together and the prospect of salty carmely chocolatey popcorny goodness. as we approached the counter, the fellow behind it got this look on his face like he thought our behavior could be favorably compared to dental work sans anesthesia. then, when i attempted to engage him in a little friendly banter to reassure him we were harmless, well…

“can i have one of those scratch its? (aside to e&l) these are really fun. (back to cashier) a friend of mine showed me how to do them. we all take turns. (smile)”

“that’s a riveting story”

WTF?

like, i wasn’t really looking for approval from this guy, but why the snark? we weren’t being unduly rowdy, we were making a sizable purchase, and, if i do say so myself, we are a group of lookers. what the hell?

then today, i go into the 7-11 so i can grab something for lunch. i decide on a clif bar, some trail mix, and a rockstar. my digestions have been a little off kilter of late so i wanted something relatively low key, but cheap and fast. i bring my whatnot to the counter and this guy gives me this look and says

“you know, there’s no FOOD in your food.”

i’m a little taken aback here so i don’t reply immediately. Then:

“well it suits me.”

“why don’t you go get yourself some crackers, or an orange. a sandwich for chrissakes.”

(pause to think of retort, think of one, begin to walk away)

“i will if you promise to shove them up your ass.”

no one saw fit to critique my purchases at freddy’s.

i have been noticing lately that i have a strange reflexive reaction to say, like a litany, certain phrases that i’ve picked up over the course of my life.

they’re embedded in my consciousness. there are a bunch of em. they are lines from movies, commercials, things my friends or lovers have said to me, generally the verbal detritus of life. and they slip past my lips with virtually no active effort or awareness.

par example:

from The End of the World: “but i am le tired”

i say this all the damn time. most net savvy people get it and snicker. my child, on the other hand, just assumes this is how one announces one is done in. when she’s ready to crash, she is always “le tired.” ha.

from Natural Born Killers: “holy shitfire Leroy!”

this is an all purpose expletive. this one comes into play when i am feeling particularly incredulous. i find it comes in handy in an array of situations.

from my former spouse “fuckow my cigarettes”

this one may make less sense, overall. basically, whenever anything went wrong, my ex would say “fuckow my cigarettes.” and for some reason this seemed to sum things up pretty succinctly in most cases. i generally adapt the phrase for more specific purposes; “fuckow my tattoo,” or “fuckow my uterus,” occasionally “fuckow the black toenail of doom”

from The Amazing Cosmic Awareness of Duffy Moon “you can do it Duffy Moon!!”

when i was in middle school we were forced to watch this bizarre after-school special style commentary on self-esteem. our hero Duffy Moon is confronted with no end of difficulty in his daily life, and he suffers the concomitant self-doubt. every time he begins to question himself a chorus of high-pitched celestial voices chime in and say: “you can do it Duffy Moon!” and he is thus reassured. so, more than a decade later, i relentlessly hear this same chorus of voices whenever self-doubt rears its head. but knowing Duffy Moon can do it doesn’t really tend to make me feel better about myself, somehow…

from Super Troopers: “(holy) mother-of-god”

ok, to be fair, i kinda got this from my friend steph, who said it way before, but as i suspect people may be more culturally aware of super troopers than of, well, steph, i’ll give them the credit. as a fairly irreligious person it always seems to stun people when they hear this one come out. however, as a person who customarily curses like a drunken belligerent sailor with an angry rash, i find sometimes it behooves me to express my consternation/anger/shock/pain/etc in some way that is unlikely to cause mothers to cast foul glances in my direction. the “holy” is optional, when added emphasis seems appropriate. it often does.

i know for a certainty there are more of these rattling around in my head, but i can’t bring any more to mind at this moment. this one is likely to turn into a series… as they come up, i’ll be adding them to the roster.

and you? what’s snuck into your vernacular?

so, after 4 fine years at MLC hodie will be going transferring to our neighborhood school Bridlemile in the fall. we decided this for a host of reasons, and we’re pretty excited about it, although i must admit i’ll sort of miss the bragging rights associated with being the parent of an MLC childling.

turns out though, that the academtic rating on this neighborhood school is actually better than MLC (which is a magnet) and more than one of the parents i met today had actually pulled their kid out of montessori/private school and applied for transfer into Bridlemile since it’s such a good school. sweet!

so, sacrificing nothing in terms of quality of education, we are gaining the following:

1) neighborhood kids & activities. the nature of the magnet is that the kids come from all quadrants of the town and usually don’t live near one another. nice for a varied demographic, not nice for playdates.

2) more “authentic” school experience. as much as i loved the touchy feel-y child centered education model for her when she was a kindergartener, the older she gets, the more structure i think she needs. not to mention the concept of grades (which they don’t do at MLC) and a less insular social model. moreover they are getting ready to stick her class into 2 years of split grade, which we did not love the last time we did it.

3) SCHOOL BUS! WOOT! i have been driving her back and forth to school for 4 years. i’m tired.

so, on the whole, we’re happy! and today was the open house for the school so they could come over and meet their new teacher. i thought after being so used to MLC, the least i could do was let hodie have one day to look around the new school and meet her new teacher so it wasn’t completely overwhelming come fall.

and so i sat in my sub-adult sized chair in the library while she went off to meet her new teacher. i spoke with a whole new set of highly-entitled snarky parents (not leaving them behind apparently), and waited for her to come back and give me her impressions.

they had the whole experience set up to try and ease the kids into the transition. one step in this process was each of the outgoing 4th graders from Miss Good’s class wrote a letter to an incoming member. you know, give them a little inside scoop, some insight into the 4th grade experience. well, what follows was the letter for hodie. (spelling and tense errors are those of the author and reproduced faithfully)

June 6th, 2008

Dear New 4th grader,

HI! My name is (not actually going to post the name). I’m 10 years olf and I was in Miss Good’s class. I don’t know how I did it but all I now is that it was torchure with Miss Good.

When I found out I was in Miss Good’s class I was freaking out!!! I didn’t kno what it would be like. I heard so much thinks about her like “she is the worst teacher ever!” or “She is SO Mean!!” And alot more.

Just to be nice I’m going to give you some tips on how to survive Miss Good’s class. One is do NOT I repet do NOT turn in eney thing late!! She hats that. The second one is if you arnt paying attention she will get MAD!!! And the last one is never LIE!! If you do sometimes she knows it. Thank you for reading this note.

Sincerely, (not actually going to post the name)

bwahahahahahahaha. ahem. not exactly the most reassuring note. one must consider the source i suppose, but hodie is now totally paranoid that her new teacher is a tyrant with a lie detector embedded in her head. so, that’s awesome.

can’t wait til fall!!

so, after 4 fine years at MLC hodie will be going transferring to our neighborhood school Bridlemile in the fall. we decided this for a host of reasons, and we’re pretty excited about it, although i must admit i’ll sort of miss the bragging rights associated with being the parent of an MLC childling.

turns out though, that the academtic rating on this neighborhood school is actually better than MLC (which is a magnet) and more than one of the parents i met today had actually pulled their kid out of montessori/private school and applied for transfer into Bridlemile since it’s such a good school. sweet!

so, sacrificing nothing in terms of quality of education, we are gaining the following:

1) neighborhood kids & activities. the nature of the magnet is that the kids come from all quadrants of the town and usually don’t live near one another. nice for a varied demographic, not nice for playdates.

2) more “authentic” school experience. as much as i loved the touchy feel-y child centered education model for her when she was a kindergartener, the older she gets, the more structure i think she needs. not to mention the concept of grades (which they don’t do at MLC) and a less insular social model. moreover they are getting ready to stick her class into 2 years of split grade, which we did not love the last time we did it.

3) SCHOOL BUS! WOOT! i have been driving her back and forth to school for 4 years. i’m tired.

so, on the whole, we’re happy! and today was the open house for the school so they could come over and meet their new teacher. i thought after being so used to MLC, the least i could do was let hodie have one day to look around the new school and meet her new teacher so it wasn’t completely overwhelming come fall.

and so i sat in my sub-adult sized chair in the library while she went off to meet her new teacher. i spoke with a whole new set of highly-entitled snarky parents (not leaving them behind apparently), and waited for her to come back and give me her impressions.

they had the whole experience set up to try and ease the kids into the transition. one step in this process was each of the outgoing 4th graders from Miss Good’s class wrote a letter to an incoming member. you know, give them a little inside scoop, some insight into the 4th grade experience. well, what follows was the letter for hodie. (spelling and tense errors are those of the author and reproduced faithfully)

June 6th, 2008

Dear New 4th grader,

HI! My name is (not actually going to post the name). I’m 10 years olf and I was in Miss Good’s class. I don’t know how I did it but all I now is that it was torchure with Miss Good.

When I found out I was in Miss Good’s class I was freaking out!!! I didn’t kno what it would be like. I heard so much thinks about her like “she is the worst teacher ever!” or “She is SO Mean!!” And alot more.

Just to be nice I’m going to give you some tips on how to survive Miss Good’s class. One is do NOT I repet do NOT turn in eney thing late!! She hats that. The second one is if you arnt paying attention she will get MAD!!! And the last one is never LIE!! If you do sometimes she knows it. Thank you for reading this note.

Sincerely, (not actually going to post the name)

bwahahahahahahaha. ahem. not exactly the most reassuring note. one must consider the source i suppose, but hodie is now totally paranoid that her new teacher is a tyrant with a lie detector embedded in her head. so, that’s awesome.

can’t wait til fall!!

has actually, until recently, been a hate/loathe relationship. stumptown is primarily responsible for making me believe that java isn’t necessarily the foulest substance in the known universe, but i’m hardly a fan.

however, i have come to accept, that in it’s time and place, coffee can be a wonderful wonderful thing. or, perhaps more particularly, stimulants can be a wonderful wonderful thing.

usually, i’m pretty careful about when i attempt to harness this power for evil. cause as a person who can taste caffeine (not yummy) i tend to avoid things that contain it. as such, i’m pretty sensitive to it. so, when i have a cuppa at 7pm it is going to keep me cranking all night. and sometimes, when there is homework, or unavoidable chores, i simply must submit myself to this consequence for the sake of the greater good.

that being said, nothing needs to be coffee flavored as far as i can tell. because (with the exception of aforementioned stumptown, plus also haagen daas ice cream bars) all things coffee flavored taste like wretchedness. and so the lesson here i suppose is for me to realize that not all people feel this way, and that assuming that the protein shake is chocolate just because its brown is faulty reasoning. so.

i can effect a variety of maintenance and repair operations on my own car.

i know. it’s shocking.

i mean, it must be, since the sight of me in front of a car with its hood up, though in no apparent distress, causes men of all ages and stripes to be magnetically attracted to my person and thence required somehow to offer me advice about what i might want to do differently than whatever it is i am already doing, even if what i am doing happens to be the correct thing.

**

i replaced a headlamp bulb on Klaus today. it’s really an extremely simple process. i can, and have, also replaced: brakes, plugs and wires, batteries, tires, dashboard components, various fluids, a gearshift, and even jimmy-rigged an undetectable plexi-glas replacement window. i think it is important to be able to manage these relatively simple mechanical tasks for oneself so as to be extra tough and cool in the eyes of sweaty men-beasts. oh, no wait, actually because people should just be able to handle basic maintenance for themselves no matter what their gender.

yet, no one wanted to leave me in peace to make this repair. at least none of the random dudes at the NAPA on 82nd anyway…

** i am aware this is not a photo of me working on my current car, but you get my point…

Sweeney Todd. Loved it.

Wasn’t exactly what I expected, but still quite good. It was songier than I thought it would be. I suppose its genesis as an opera should have clued me in that there wouldn’t be much dialogue. The vocals were all much better than I anticipated. And in typical Burton style, the darkness didn’t preclude a grim humor of which I am singly fond.

So, though I would not recommend it unstintingly as I have some other films recently, I do think its worthwhile.

No Country For Old Men the latest offering from the estimable Cohen Bros.

I went and saw this film two weekends ago and I am still feeling the creepy-crawlies about it. This is the first time I can recall having literally squirmed out of my seat with the intensity created on screen.

The subtle psychological violence was far more powerful than a typically overblown graphic thriller-gore. The stoicism of the inexorable antagonist more distressing for the veracity of his detachment. The eerie lack of a score far more immediate than any orchestrated tell.

I cannot recommend this film in terms strong enough. So, go see it man.