oh, the sarah palin

I'll admit that it took me a few tries to first get into Team America: World Police. I'd psych myself up to watch the Matt Stone and Trey Parker flick, while visions of Basketballs danced in my head, but I'd wind up deflated just minutes in because I couldn't get past the wooden puppets. As absurd as the setting and characters and situations were, I took all the dialogue seriously for whatever reason and the humour was lost on me. I'd turn it off for good, just ten minutes in.

Thankfully, I got over my puppet hang-up and I have enjoyed the movie many times for what it is: an over-the-top, cliche-spoofing satire of American intervention in world affairs (with puppet porn!)

And I think the same thing is starting to happen to me with Sarah Palin.

When this broad first stepped into the national spotlight, I couldn't fathom how anyone could even entertain the notion of taking her seriously. Her stuttered and stunted speeches - and some of the electorate's rapturous reactions to them - made me turn away in disbelief and disgust and I've been doing the same ever since.

But now, after she released this video to show her disapproval with some in the news media who are arguing that vitriolic rhetoric (which does absolutely nothing good for anyone, in my opinion) may have played a part in that demented 22-year-old's killing rampage in Arizona, (not printing the dude's name because that's really all that those people want, isn't it?) I think I'm finally getting the joke. (Editor's Note: Now that's what I call a run-on sentence. Should start calling that a Gump.)

Sarah Palin: "America's Enduring Strength" from Sarah Palin on Vimeo.

Palin is just an over-the-top, mothafuckin aw-shuckin, cliche-spouting satire of a 21st Century politician. (This isn't my original thought either. Thanks to Inflatable Elvis' twitter feed.) She survives through sound bites, she is hardly challenged on her beliefs - or her own thoughts - in public, her image has been crafted and mythologized with some very creative twisting and exaggeration of fact, and everything she says is scripted by someone else operating things behind the controls.

Man, she's actually quite a lot like one of those Team America puppets, right down to the vapid stare, terrible acting, puppet strings and blockish, chiseled face.

to the new strokes

I saw 'Incendies' this weekend. A few quick thoughts:

1) I'm super proud about having understood about 95 percent of the film considering it was in French or with French-subtitles. (It is kind of sad though that I'm still stagnant with my functional French and not even on the cusp of fluency yet.)

2) Man, is that one heavy flick. You don't even know what to say after you walk out of it. I won't give it away in case you check it out, but I'll just say that Freud was really one creepy guy. (And I'm still not sure about the character ages and how they all add up. I was doing the math for a couple hours afterwards and I still don't know if it's all possible...)

...and 3) During a preview for a new Sofia Coppola flick, I heard a melody sung by Julian Casablancas that I could have sworn I'd heard before. The chorus came: "sit me down/shut me up/I'll calm down and I'll get along with you..." and I recognized it from the First Impressions of Earth album, but I had to sing it over and over in my head about 30 times before I could build the song around it and realize it was the album opener, "I'll Try Anything Once." I couldn't focus on the first five or ten minutes of 'Incendies' because of this and the reason it took me so long to recall this track was that the song that appeared in the preview was a stripped-down, soft version with just Julian singing, accompanied by a fuzzy keyboard and not the layered version I was used to.

It's really damn good.

The Laser and I got to talking about the Strokes at a pub a week back after 'Is This It?' came on. We talked about how refreshing those Strokes were back in 2002 - 2004, when that album and Room on Fire were soundtracks to my life. Laser said the same, but added that he hadn't liked the second album as much and hadn't really heard any of the third. I admitted the third felt a little over-produced and that I'd only recently given Julian Casablancas' solo album a listen after my buddy Ska-Ped played me a few tracks this summer. (I have liked a lot of Albert Hammond Jr.'s stuff.)

The thing about the Strokes was that, although their albums do sound meticulously crafted, they didn't ever seem like they were trying hard, but with new each album - and expectations building and critics pleading with them to evolve and fans wanting them to stay the same - it seemed like they were pushing harder and harder to sound as much like themselves as possible. Unfortunately for all of us, they sort of lost what that was and what had made them so great: the effortlessness and the cool.

And so with a new Strokes album scheduled for release this year, here's hoping they sound more like this demo than their latest, glitzy incarnation.

But I'm just one guy, so who gives a fuck.

speak for me, youtube

Youtube is really starting to consume me. Well, maybe not consume, because it's more slo-mo, Spice Girls, 2 Become 1 shit. It's integrating into me.

Not only does it entertain me while I'm at home (example: two hours completely disappeared last night as I jumped from wrestling link to wrestling link to wrestling link) or liven up an evening when conversations get dull with friends, but this year - since I'm still working hard to string together some pennies - I actually sent some friends my favourite clips from 2010 as a Christmas gift. It's the thought that counts, right?

I know I'm definitely not alone in my appreciation for this site, but without realizing it until just now, I think I've started to take this love to a new level: youtube is speaking for me.

A little history (and don't worry, this will soon make sense): My old man is as renown for his clever gift card messages, as he is notorious for the amount of time it takes him to sign said card. He puts a lot of pressure on himself and he feels he has a reputation to uphold each and every time a loved one's birthday or wedding or new bambino comes around. It's a gift and a curse, in his mind. He sits down at the table and stares at the card, looking through the thing, searching and straining for the perfect combination of words. He'll then look skyward and scratch his head. Everyone knows not to talk to him during this time. He'll get up and go dry some dishes and then, suddenly, he'll start back to the card and sit back down with a pen and almost have something, before getting up again to burn off the nervous energy.

I feel somewhat stricken with this handicap: it's not that I am noted for having hilarious notes in cards, but I always strive to come up with something clever whenever the occasion arises. (Note: Look at that, I just backed my way into an excuse for the lack of recent blog posts. When you don't got it, you just don't got it, folks.)

So thank the Spaghetti Monster that my pops doesn't have facebook. You see, the constant barrage of wall posts and messages and photos creates an endless and insatiable demand for clever quips. I'm sure if my dad was ever presented with this possibility, it would drive him crazy(er?).

And that's where I've likely wound up. Call it laziness or craziness, but instead of racking my feeble brain for some funny, tight and succinct one-liners, I've leaned upon my burgeoning catalogue of youtube clips and allowed them to start talking for me. Someone posts a beautiful picture? I'll fire off a link with Keanu Reeves' saying 'WHOA!' The boys won a hockey tournament in Hay River? Well, why not paste in a clip of Canadian fans going apeshit after Crosby scored in Vancouver to show my appreciation?

You see how this works, right?

I can see how this might be viewed as lazy and I can see how some would say that this is further evidence that technology is becoming more embedded in our everyday and that, as it becomes more expressive and complex, we - the users - become less verbose and simpler. I can also see how this kind of linked response could get very tired, very quickly.

But for delusion's sake, I'd argue that I'm just demonstrating the fruits of all my youtube labour. I've put in hours and hours of work watching videos and now I'm just showing off my encyclopedic knowledge of banality. I think I've put in the effort, now I'm watching it pay off.

Do you think I'm full of ess-aich-eye-tee? Do you agree? Let me know... but do it using a youtube clip.

happy thought to start your year

As we start this new year, with new hope and new dreams, here's a little story that I read this morning that puts it all into perspective. The actual CEO wages aren't all that shocking actually, but the story's lead really makes my whole next year feel kind of pathetic:

Canada's top-paid chief executives only have to work until 2:30 p.m. Monday to make the same amount of money the average Canadian will earn for the entire year, a new study suggests.

Now I've been on the "Kill Bankers" tip for a while now - especially after seeing Inside Job - so reading this jives with my surly philosophy that all rich people are greedy and suck. (Although, I suppose they could just have easily replaced 'Canada's top-paid chief executives' with 'Many professional athletes' and I probably would have shrugged.)

The story really does have the ability to get you down, if you live check to check like I am right now. The disparity in wages between these chief swindlers and regular folks are getting out of hand, especially when I try to imagine how much 'real work' these people actually do.

I started to get down, actually, until one thought immediately picked me up. It's January 3, 2011 today. I don't have to work today. And while those CEOs are currently 56 minutes from having made the equivalent of my yearly income, at least I'm still in bed while those working stiffs are stuck at their desks.

Have fun, CEOs, ya big chumps ya. I think I might just have a coffee and Baileys right now... mmm...

Happy New Year

belated merry government mandated pre-new years days off...

or Christmas, as it's called in some sacred circles.

why i love craigslist

Marty Jannetty, is that you?

cold feet reality

It kind of all hit me for real while I was having a beer at a show at Cagibi. It wasn't anything sung in a song that made me take notice and it certainly wasn't an alcoholic epiphany that opened up this suppressed railway of thought either. Funny enough, it was a set of cold feet that made me realize that I've come back to the worries of yore: the anxiety and restlessness that possessed me on my move out of Yellowknife and down here.

Cold feet.

I'd kind of slept-walked through the day: got up late, saw a flick, ate a burger. My buddy Chocolate T told me I didn't seem myself - I'd heard that from a handful of people the past month or so. I was tired and feeling reclusive. I went off to the show, even though I wasn't really up for it. I kind of wished that I had a giant beard, like Pacino did at the end of Serpico, so my eyes could poke out of the fur like a periscope and I could watch what was happening without being detected. I would have fit right in at the Ground Zero of Montreal Hipsterdom too.

Before this starts to sound like an emo song, it's not that I didn't want to talk to anybody, it's just that I didn't feel like I had anything to say. I moved into my own place about a month and a half ago and that means a lot of time by one's self. A friend wrote me and said you are confronted by your demons in a live-alone state because it means you have a lot of time to think. That's really the last thing I need.

I have had a lot of time to think about what has gone wrong in the past few months. For one, my two best friends in Montreal - my two former roommates - had a spat and the house was disbanded as a result. Being who I am and trying, in my own way, to do right by both of them - or maybe to avoid conflict - I played Switzerland and kept my distance. I went home to sleep that last month and that was pretty much it.

Now, I don't really see much of either of them and when I do, some resentments seem to crop up or linger behind the scenes. That's mostly my fault because I find that I don't want to deal with any of this and that's maybe because Montreal has really been a fantasyland since I arrived just over a year ago, with only a backpack full of clothes and books and a sleeping bag purchased in Iceland.

I hit the ground running and saw and did something new every day. Everything in the city was new too and so close and fascinating. Saw a ton of shows. Ate amazing food. Went to some great - and some ridiculous - parties. Hung out in parks and on rooftops and skating rinks. And met new people all the time. I had the same story: just moved here on a whim, looking for work, etc. I fell into a great group in nearly the exact apartment I'd dreamt about living in, while pondering life pessimistically in Yellowknife.

Life was grand. It was new and challenging. It was starting from scratch.

But like the Roots best album, Things fall Apart. People started to leave. I found a job. Money got tight, as I started to live on my income and not my Visa. Free time shrunk. Energy got zapped. Fought with friends. Stress. Got sick of my job. Wanted something else. Got static. Had weekend rut - and hangover gut rut. Lost creativity. Pay Check. Broke. Pay Check. Broke.

Cold Feet.

Back to the cold feet. Like I said I realized, for the first time at that show, that my feet were cold and that they shouldn't be cold. I'm wearing some black Pumas that aren't equipped for winter. (I'm sure they'll somehow rust, with the amount of salt the city unloads on the sidewalks and streets.)

But the point is, I was discomforted by my cold feet. A year earlier, I wouldn't have noticed them - or if I did, I would have shrugged and sucked it up, because I was in no position to do anything about ameliorating the situation. "I need a job! Feet, you're going to have to wait until later."

Is it possible to feel worse knowing that you can better your condition? I'm less happy the more comfortable I am. Is that weird? I enjoyed living unsustainably, trying to pull myself up onto the ledge. It was exhilarating. Everything I worried about was legit. There was no time or room for idle anxiety. Now I'm on that ledge and I'm twiddling my thumbs about what ledge I should move on to. I've found a job, I've got a roof over my head, I've made friends, but now I hate my job and I'm living by myself and I have had some friend drama and so as much as I tried to fight it, it looks like real life - REAL life - has finally infiltrated Montreal. I'm back to stressing about a satisfying job, finding a spark and I'm spinning my tires about how to go about doing all that.

I want to be dependent and I'm getting there, but it doesn't feel like I'm gaining maturity. Is maturity really about knuckling down, planning, getting real and doing something about something? Am I confusing it with something? Why should deciding on a future be accompanied by so much negativity?

Or am I just thinking too much?

Note: I wrote this at a Second Cup beside a chick who was griping about THE EXACT SAME SHIT with her friend. I found her totally annoying and self-obsessed and enthralled with the sound of her own voice. Heh heh heh.... errr... self-FAIL!