barry man - and i use that term loosely - ilow has cancelled his appearance on the "the view" because he's afraid of the somewhat conservative co-hostess, elisabeth hasselbeck. apparently man - and i still use that term loosely - ilow said that ms. hasselbeck is, and i'm quoting here, "dangerous."
smockmomma: September 2007 Archives
"vision without execution is hallucination." ~ joe calloway
help! i'm seeing the word irregardless -- oh, that word is like a fingernail scraping across a chalkboard -- used by journalists! the word used to be confined to the likes of sportscasters and mouth-readers, but now even so-called educated people are using it. why, I even heard it used on *gasp* npr just the other day. the word is regardless, people, re-gard-less. see the -less in there? newsflash: using the ir- prefix and -less suffix in a single word is not only redundant, it’s stupid. i will admit that at times i have horrible grammar and my spelling is abysmal, but at least i’m butchering the correct words. please. stop the madness!
smockdaddy and i saw the brave one last night. two words: uber intense.
jodie won her first academy award playing a victim who, after being bashed from her chrysalis, is reborn into a braver self in the accused. and while thrillers aren't usually the academy's style (oops! did i mention jodie's oscar for silence of the lambs?), my jodie gives an amazing performance of enormous complexity that deserves many awards.
in the brave one, jodie's erica bain, after being beaten nearly to death with her fiancé who doesn't survive the attack, has to emerge from the womb of her fear by reluctantly reinventing herself. it is very evident that erica does not want to become the vigilante she is branded. terrence howard (whom i am growing incresingly fond of with each movie he makes) plays detective mercer who struggles with the moral dilemma of identifying with this magnetic and pitiful nemesis ... she even asks herself if she is looking for the iniquity or if the iniquity is finding her.
this is probably the most symbolic film i've seen in a great while. the scenes of erica's struggle through the hallway of her apartment building as she tries to emerge from the safehaven of her apartment are incredibly "birthlike." detective mercer sounds an awful lot like mercy. and bain is french for bathing -- is erica trying to cleanse herself as she bathes the streets of "the safest big city in the world" of it's grotesque filth? the list goes on and on, but i won’t spoil it all for you here – but i cannot wait to get mamaT to this film this week to see it again and have a lengthy discussion which i’m sure will ensue.
the irony of this morality piece is palpable. more than once erica refers to her hometown as "the safest big city in the world" -- as a viewer you tell yourself, if this is "the safest big city in the world" then our world is very unsafe. the extreme intensity of the brave one stems from the blatant dichotomy at play -- this tale is somehow both visceral and reasonable at the same time. at first erica reacts only when her own life is in danger -- and even when she seeks out a predator, you cannot help but feel she is irrefutably justified.
there were surprisingly few moments when i questioned my own reaction to the violence of the film, but as a catholic you cannot help but struggle with the moral ramifications. i will admit however that while watching the movie it was a small struggle to shrug off my religion. at one point i turned to smockdaddy and commented that "maybe this is how God works through people?" during one scene in particular there was for me absolutely no dilemma -- i was in no way ambivalent about the ... vindication. it is only now, the next day, that i am laboring through the complexity of the subject. which I’m sure was the writers’ intent.
director neil jordan is careful to play both sides of vigilantism, but from the clapping and hoots from last night's audience -- the smock included -- you know the verdict: a reckoning by any other name would smell as sweet.
i shouldn't think it's so amusing, but i can't help but feel vindicated. i've had one too many peers who have snickered down their noses at me for not "educating" my smocklings at terribly early ages with under-studied but over-hyped baby einstein and the like. i've always maintained that a fool and her money are soon parted when it comes to so-called educational videos for babies. and guess what! according to the latest research, babies basically zone out while watching these videos (not unlike their older siblings who stand agog in front of the television).
well, believe it or not, as researcher frederick zimmerman told science, these videos are little more than "empty calories for the mind." it has also been found that for every daily hour a baby spent watching baby einstein, the child understood an average of seven fewer words than babies who didn't watch the videos. imagine the chagrin of the countless alpha mommies who've dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into the "brainy baby" biz.
but, as the attachment parenting professionals have been telling us for decades, babies and toddlers learn from interacting with people. i wouldn't go so far as to agree with zimmerman that it's likely better for a child to watch american idol on a parent's lap than to be parked alone in front of a video that claims to be teaching baby timmy mathematics ... well, maybe if they were watching re-runs of frasier...
there's more at this time article: "baby einsteins: not so smart after all"
the smocklings favorite flick right now is roald dahl's matilda. i absolutely love ms. agatha trunchbull, perfectly portrayed by pam ferris -- whom danny devito chose to employ in another summa mama guilty pleasure [which we do not recommend] entitled death to smoochy.
i love ms. trunchbull because she has such a deliciously bad attitude -- "i cannot for the life of me understand why small children take so long to grow up. i think they do it deliberately, just to annoy me!" -- and really great insults "she's a wart. a carbuncle. a festering pool of ooze." she throws around wonderful words like "putrescent" and "pissworm" and, heaven help me, it just makes me giggle.
of course, this from a momma who a few years back, in order to curb her potty mouth, resolved to curse using only bard worthy barbs (read: elizabethan english). it was actually quite fun while it lasted and i'm even considering taking up the resolution again since i found this awesome little jewel: the shakespearean insulter. enjoy!
thanks for sharing, mamaT!
| You are Slingback Sandals |
 You dress to the nines wherever you go Even if it's in your couture sweats! |
this is listed as "ready to wear" fashion. ready to wear where, i ask you, where?
something i didn't mention on the last cell phone rant because, well frankly i didn't think of it until today when it actually happened ... to me!
have you ever noticed that when you're chatting via cell phone that if another call comes in and the person puts you on hold, what you're really doing is waiting to see if you are call worthy? i mean, if whomever you're chatting with comes back and says, "hey, let me call you back" aren't they really just telling you um, sorry hon, but you aren't as important to me as this other caller? it's like being back in middle school and being told you can't sit next to the cool kids during lunch. even if your friend says something like "i really need to take this call" in an attempt to at least make the other call appear urgent, you're still getting the brush off. . .and losing the popularity contest all in one call. bummer.
