Present Imperfect

Not Crap! | December 31, 2003

Instead of reflecting nostalgically on events of the past year, I'm going to devote part of today's entry to How Scottish Things Are So Awesome!

Would you like a few examples? How about Roddy Frame, Billy Boyd, Belle and Sebastian, delicious buttery shortbread, kilts on guys with really good calves and this So Awesome thing where you can throw digital snowballs at digital windows and be met with digital jeers!

If you're American and you want to be married in Great Britain, you can only do it in Scotland. Awesome. In fact...So Awesome.

My friend Graham is Scottish and he and his wife and two kids and two Labradors are So Awesome. (That reminds me to send him a Happy New Year e-mail while I'm sober, not while I'm drunk and teary-eyed with my usual, alcohol-induced love for humanity that can be either charming or disturbing, depending on the amount of booze consumed.)

In non Scottish-related news, last year I thought I was using the word "awesome" way too much, thereby lessening its impact. But now I embrace "awesome" and want everyone out there to know that when I say something or someone is awesome, I really mean it.

Here are the awesome things I have planned for this evening:
Drinking Kir Royales (This is an awesome drink made of sparkling wine and creme de cassis liqueur.)
Eating steak
Hanging out with my friends
Looking awesome (I hope.)
Listening, at least once, to Love's "Alone Again Or," which is about how people can be pretty awesome (or, "the greatest fun," according to the song)
Not getting really, really drunk, which can occasionally be awesome but sets a bad precedent for the year to come, I think.

On that note, I would like to wish you and yours an Awesome New Year. I would also like to say Happy Birthday to my awesome friend Phil and send a shout-out to all the awesome people in New Zealand, where it is already 2004: Don't tell me what happens, okay?

Yes, Virginia, There Really is a Dysfunctional Family | December 29, 2003

Well, I'm back.

Christmas was weird. Mom, Ian and I opened gifts and watched Oskar, who is now deaf and mostly blind, sniff around. Then we went to Grandma's, where my aunt freaked out because we were 10 minutes late. We ate roast beef, corn, mashed potatoes, stuffing, applesauce and pie, all the while trying to explain to Grandma who we were. Ian made up something about embroidering the tablecloth himself. Grandma believed him. Then we adjourned to the living room to open gifts, and Ian set fire to his jeans in a miscalculated attempt to burn the fuzzies off his socks. Ah, tradition.

Let me make something perfectly clear: I never, ever want to go back to Pennsylvania for Christmas.

You really can't go home again.

2003: The Year in List | December 23, 2003

Alright, then. Here's another list.

Writing a list is way more fun than complaining about airplanes.

Bronwyn's Favorite Stuff of 2003
(in no particular order)
The Return of the King
The Shins' "Chutes Too Narrow"
A black LeSportsac bag with '70s-looking flowers and fruit on it
New Zealand
This cool plastic bracelet that you can put stuff in
Bill Viola's Passions exhibit
Lost in Translation
Red Adidas sneakers with Velcro
The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde
Entrecôte Frites with Roquefort sauce from Figaro Brasserie

Is it "Heightened" or "Elevated?" | December 22, 2003

Yay. We're at threat level Orange AND we had an earthquake today.

God, I don't want to get on an airplane tomorrow night. I'm not particularly worried that Al Qaeda has its sights set on the red-eye from Los Angeles to Pittsburgh, but I just don't want to go anywhere for Christmas. I live HERE. I don't WANT to go home. I AM home. But I don't want my mom to be by herself, either, so I'm taking one for the team.

Still, I feel a little sick to my stomach about the whole thing. Of course, that could be the peanut butter cups and sickly rolling motion of the earthquake, too.

I don't want to die on the red-eye to Pittsburgh! That would piss me right off. I hereby swear that I will violently haunt USAirways corporate headquarters (and its affiliates in cities around the world, you know, so I can travel) if that happens.

Oh, now KCRW is playing "Fairy Tale of New York" by the Pogues and a DEAD Kirsty MacColl. That's it, USAirways. That's your Christmas Carol: "You scumbag, you maggot/You cheap lousy faggot/Happy Christmas your arse/I pray God it's our last." But I'm getting off that jet alive and healthy on December 28th, not cut to shreds by a motor boat propeller in Mexico, you bastards.

I mean, they make you PAY for their disgusting food. What the fuck?!

Gimli Ate My Junior Mints | December 18, 2003

Oops...so long without a blog entry, so very few people disappointed.

I was going to copy a passage from Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things and a passage from Lord of the Rings for a little "hmmm, though they are from disparate sources, those are oddly similar" moment, but I generally write blog entries at work and the actual book items are at home. If I can be bothered later, I will do it. No, really, I will. And again, who cares?

Anyhoo, Tuesday I took the day off work to indulge my not-so-inner-geek with the 12-hour "Trilogy Tuesday" presentation of all three LOTR movies in a row. Some memorable moments? Sure:

1. As we were waiting to enter the Cineramadome, we took note of a sign advising us to "leave all bulky packages in your car." This precipitated penis jokes from Bill and Jeremy. "I guess we can't go in!" Later, we began referring to Bill as "Bill the Pony."

2. I saw my college friend Jessica outside before the movies began. I called out (like you do) "Jessica!" She looked bewildered and then acknowledged me by explaining that "Jessica" is no longer her name. We exchanged numbers, but that was dumb, because I feel fairly certain that neither of us will call the other. I was happy to see her, but every time I saw her after that (concession stand, line, lobby, etc.), I was unable to call out to her because it took my brain too long to register that the person who looked just like Jessica was not "Jessica." Oh well. It's been 10 years. I probably won't see her again until the next epic fantasy film premieres at the ArcLight. The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, anyone? Incidentally, she is called Finn now.

3. I saw an Boromir and two Arwens eating hot pretzels smothered in mustard after the second film. Way to stay in character and preserve the mystery, folks. It makes you long for a good RenFair where people are at least forced to drink mead and eat giant turkey legs.

4. There were lots of news cameras around. Los Angeles has the bestest news! It's a good thing small droplets of water weren't falling mysteriously from the sky, or that would have led the hour, displacing the otherwise red-hot "people waiting in a line to see a movie" story.

5. Sala Baker, the Dark Lord Sauron, was there. That was cool. That Bruce Vilanch-looking guy with the glasses and the Hawaiian shirt was there. That was not cool. Who is that guy?

6. Spontaneous applause for (BEWARE, SPOILERS! Oooh, that was exciting!):

the New Line logo (?), the "Lord of the Rings" title and the individual film title in all three films

the forming of the Fellowship in FOTR

Aragorn chopping off Lurtz's head FOTR

Gandalf's first appearance as Gandalf the White in TTT

Legolas getting on the horse in TTT

The elves arriving at Helm's Deep in TTT

Gandalf's arrival on Shadowfax at Helm's Deep in TTT

Aragorn unsheathing Anduril for the first time (no "bulky package" jokes, please) in ROTK

Theoden telling Aragorn that "Rohan will answer" to Gondor's beacon fires in ROTK

Gandalf knocking Denethor upside the head with his staff in ROTK

Pippin killing an orc in ROTK

Eowyn and Merry dispatching a mumakil in ROTK

Legolas spectacularly dispatching a mumakil in ROTK

Eowyn's "I am no man!" revelation in ROTK

Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas (and friends) arriving by boat in ROTK

Practically every appearance of Sam in ROTK. The highlight reel includes: Sam and Shelob, Sam carrying Frodo, Sam making a move on Rosie Cotton, Sam simply walking through a doorway. He's just that good.

Nougat and Caramel | December 02, 2003

Well, well, well...we're back from our annual Turkeyday adventure in San Francisco. Of course, the only thing that separates Thanksgiving in San Francisco from any other visit to San Francisco is the actual presence of turkey. Otherwise, just about every jaunt up north results in our eating way too much and spending way too much money. The turkey, incidentally, was delicious.

Also, we watched all the Pulp videos on DVD multiple times and Dana and I came to the unanimous (forgone, really) conclusion that Jarvis Cocker is, as the kids say, "hot." I posited that roughly three-quarters of all Pulp songs are about getting it on, so it stands to reason that the performance of said on-getting songs would result in an overall hotness in the lead singer component.