The Boys Are Back

...and so am I. At least occasionally. This is cross-posted from MidLifeBloggers but I don't know who reads that or who, if anyone, reads ByJane.

People who know me know that I'm a real snippy critic when it comes to movies. Much of what the film industry puts out earns Three Snorts from me. So when I tell you I thought a movie was terrific, trust me--it was terrific.

Last night I went to a screening of The Boys Are Back. I didn't expect anything special. Didn't really know much about the film except that it starred Clive Owen and had boys in it. To what end, I wasn't sure--and really, that wasn't the point in my going. It was a screening, for heaven's sake. Shades of Hollywood, for heaven's sake. Not to mention a chance to make myself feel like LA's not that far away. So I met up with Margaret of NannyGoatsInPanties and Alena of LenaLoo's Inner Green Fairy and Larissa of no blog at all, bought myself the popcorn I must have to watch a movie and settled back to see what was what.

What I saw was one of the best films in ages. I hate movie reviews that recount the plot so I won't. Suffice to say, it's a love story between a father and his sons. It's about trying your best and sometimes coming up short, but sometimes not. It's about trying and sometimes failing, but sometimes not. It's about family in all its messy glory when each member is valued as an individual. It's about males without women but not in a way that demeans either gender.

It's about filmmakers not going the quick and dirty route with heavy-handed symbolism and Lessons Learned. No manipulation by music, no cheap Hollywood tricks to create an emotional response. Scott Hicks, the director of Shine and producer of Billy Elliot, directed it, from a screenplay by Allan Cubitt, which was based on the memoir, The Boys Are Back In Town, by Simon Carr. They have created a spot of real life in a movie theatre. Truly, if I hadn't recognized Clive Owen, I would have thought I was watching a documentary. I loved the world they created on the screen and, frankly, I didn't want it to end.

I can't remember the last time I was so touched by a film. Yet, such is the world of movies these days that I don't think I would have seen it if not for the screening. Too many bum deals out there for $10.50 a pop. Too many films where the best thing going was the popcorn. So I have to thank Melissa from Women and Hollywood for getting me on the hallowed screening list. And I have to thank the filmmakers, all those involved, for creating a film that made me remember that moving pictures are indeed an art form and that the best of them reflect who we are and refract our values.

Moleskine -- and Jane's addiction

Jane's addiction--small 'a', people--is my addiction. I love Moleskines. I can't not fondle them wherever they're displayed. I lust after each and every one of them, and I own three, THREE, three of my very own.
The one on the left is a cunning little accordian file, just the right size for--whatever is 3-ish x 5-ish.
I've used it over the years to carry with me whatever stuff I might need, but don't know when. Like a credit card for Robinsons-May, a department store which no longer exists. And my Express card, a reminder of the days when I could wear those clothes. And my Women's Shoe Club benefits card from Bloomingdale's, last used on 4/29/98. As I said, I've used it over the years...

The one on the top is a vertical lined notebook. See.

And the one on the bottom is a sketchbook, in which I--sketch. Until today, I thought I was alone in this addiction. No one else I know even thinks of Moleskines, and if they do, it's probably only to say--what for? But today I was idly browsing my Google reader and came across this post from Communicatrix on getting stuff done. I believe she put it rather more creatively than that, but suffice to say, I'm a sucker for any kind of organizational information. I firmly believe that all that is standing between me and great success at whatever is the correct organizational mode. So I read her post, and then there at the end, she had a photo of a Moleskine. Eureka! I followed the link and learned there's a whole world of Moleskine-lovers out there. Flickr even has a category for them! And oh what riches following that link produced.

I feel as if I've found My People.

The Martian Has Landed: A Post About Nothing & Everything

...earth to Jane, earth to Jane....

I must confess that I have been a less than constant blogpal lately. I went away and then I came back and somehow I just couldn't work up that much interest. And looking at my stats, the feeling must be mutual. Is it me? Is it thee? I dunno. My SOM* is OK, better 'n OK I'd say--and certainly my alliterative, not to mention rhyming powers are intact. So what gives?

For one, there seems to be an awful lot of babble on the net these days. Blog babble is one thing, but Twitter babble--that's just plumb ugly annoying. You know, we have monkey minds, as the Buddhists say. Thoughts, large and small, important and inane, are forever to-ing and fro-ing through the jungle in our heads, leaping and swinging and making incessant noise. Those who practice Mindfulness (hear monks chanting; smell incense burning) work to quiet that Monkey Mind. So what's with the Twitterers who are gleefully sharing each and every leap and swing, burble and belch with those of us who for whatever reason are their Followers (you asked me; you like me; you really like me). They must be practicing Unmindfulness.

I could work myself into a whole rant about this, but then I'd probably insult people, and, jeeze, that's not something I ever want to do. At least not on purpose. Unless one (the ubiquitous One) has pissed me off. Nah, not even then. I have a sharp tongue, but a soft heart. So, I've turned my Twitter phone messages off. That's what we call "taking care of oneself."

It is also called "taking care of oneself" to only read people and posts that interest me. This is a new tack: formerly I read just about everybody I had ever met or wanted to or thought I should. But it was taking me ages every day to work my way through this one and that one's whatever. In fact, some days it became the One Thing I Did: read every blog on my Google Reader. Good girl. Well done. Go fetch. What I'm finding with my new discernment (is there such a word? there is now) is that the blogs I am really attracted to are those where the writing (a) is really really good, and (b) the writer lets me in to their life. Right now these are the blogs I don't like to miss: Thursday Drive, Mad Marriage, A Walkabout's Weblog. Is it any coincidence that they're all writers? Hmmmmmmmmm? I think not.

*state of mind

Odds & Sods

I hate to ruin the pristinicity of my last post, the grandiose interview with the grandiose Akaky, but--hey, it's another day and this is, after all, a blog that's doing Blog365. So--on to other more mundane things.

Like, this photograph of an empty jar of Archer Farms Butter Toffee. I bought it at Target late this afternoon. I ate the premium caramel clusters with almonds & cashews when I got home a short time later. Oh, what, no photo? That's because my cell phone--my SPRINT cell phone--will not do as it's bidden and cough up the picture.

Suffice to say, and more than sufficient to my caloric needs, this stuff is fantastic. Better than fantastic; it's awesome.

Can we talk about that word awesome? As in striking awe in a person. Not, as it is used today, as in hey dude really cool.

S'all for now, boys and girls. Tomorrow at 6:50 sharp, I'm off to catch a train to Stitches West, where I will mingle with ninetymillion other knitters, some of whom I even know. And some not so much.

Ta ra for now...

For Ryan Seacrest, an Ode...

I was going to do this is pentameter with an ABBA CDDE rhyme scheme, but damned if I can remember what all that shit was about.

I used to know it. I used to know not only the common parts of speech, but those uncommon--and therefore kinda cute. A friend told me the other day that her son could use my help because he was studying metaphors and similes. All I could think--it popped into my head like a blinking neon sign--was FOS. Figures of Speech. And then the next blink: Tropes. Which is what FOS actually are. I kept silent, though, because she's a new friend and I didn't want to scare her away.

So I was going to do my encomium to Ryan Seacrest as an ode. But first I had to Google odes and when I saw all the stuff about meter and rhyme schemes, I was like: Oh, yeah, vaguely, I remember that. It was not unlike the time I had to write an article about orgasm during a multi-year dry (um huh) spell. Oh, yeah, I remember that, vaguely.

Thus, my Ode to Ryan Seacrest has died aborning, and this rather pedantic piece of prose will has to suffice.

In all of the huge keffuffle (now there's a word they taught us in grad school) over American Idol, no one ever mentions Ryan. Other than to quibble with his clothing or the closeness of his shave. The focus in AI is always on the contestants and the judges. Who was good, who should be sent home. Or the relative merits of Randy and Paula as judges compared to the great god Simon.

True, all of these people are elements of what makes AI the success that it is. They are the characters in the drama that is played out each week. But a play takes a playwright and since AI is live and unedited, that dramaturge to a great extent is Ryan Seacrest. His script is minimal; timing and segues are probably all he has in front of him. He's got to take each moment of drama or trauma and make it entertaining. Do you know how hard that it to do? How quick-witted he has to be? How aware of all aspects of the show, past, present and future? How verbally apt and psychodynamically able he has to be?

Take the other night, for example (no, you take it, no you--). I think it happened when Jordin finished singing. Randy has done his "Yo" thing and Paula had clapped her pitty pitty hands when Simon, in full roar, absolutely eviserated Jordin. Not that what he was saying wasn't true. Not that Jordan didn't already know it. But for some reason--and who knows with Simon--he felt the need to grind it in. Take his thumb and really pulverize to a paste.

It was, to say the least, an awkward moment. And that is one of Ryan's tasks--to smooth over the awkward moment. To save the contestant, to make the audience feel comfortable with the tension. He did it this time by making some comment about Simon, that tangentially maybe sortof could be assumed to allude to his girl friend. And Simon smacked back.

He took, as the Brits say, "the hump" and got all "pissy" (as they also say). I'm not going to answer your question, he told Ryan, because you were just rude about my girlfriend. I want you to apologize for insulting her. They got into a bit of a pissing contest what with the no I didn't yes you dids flying back and forth for what seemed like forever. Would Ryan apologize? Would Simon back off? No, and yes.

The easiest thing for Ryan to do would have been to apologize. Everyone could have gone back to breathing and nothing would have been lost. Except for Ryan's ability to control Simon, which is mandatory to the success of the show. Ryan has to humanize Simon for the audience, and he has to do it while not alienating Simon himself. It's a tricky tightrope wire he walks there, and he does it admirably.

Thus, my non-ode. Ryan earns his money, and probably more. The show, without him, would not be AI, as is true, of course, of Simon as well. The contestants will come and go, Paula and Randy may fade away, but Ryan and Simon: without them, AI would be just another amateur hour. Simon gets the accolades for this all the time. Ryan doesn't. So I wanted to say so.

I am soooo soooo mature.....

I could watch this over and over again, if I didn't have to keep running to the bathroom so I don't pee in my pants.

With thanks to Dooce.

Say Hello to Butare, Rwanda

I don't know if you can see it, but I've got a button on my blog that links to some mega-switchboard in the sky (or the depths, since I do know that the salient wires are buried deep). It gives me reports about Traffic and such, most of which I'm still unblissfully ignorant of.

My favorite report, though, is the one called "Location". That tells me the city and state and country, if you will, of each visitor to my site. Mostly, it's got Elk Groves or Sacramento or Philadelphia. But sometimes my reading public comes from far afield.

I get so excited when I see that. I want to yell "Hello Taipei--whassup?" And "Hey Singapore, how'd you get here?" Or just plain--"Hi Butare, Rwanda. Who are you and will you be back?"

Hi hi hi, world out there. Am I incredibly uncool for getting excited about this????? Does anybody else think it's a wonder, this blogging thing?

Happy Half-Birthday to Me......

I do this every year, don't I. Announce my half birthday and expect felicitations. Oh gawd, so immature, you're thinking. When will she ever grow up? I think the safe bet is on: never.

I am rereading one of my favorite books, Daddy Long Legs by Jean Webster. I first loved this book when I found it among the lot of second-hand books my mother bought at a used bookstore. All the books were circa the teens and 20s, illustrated, hard-cover girl's novels. What would be called Young Adult today. The paper on some of them had achieved parchment state and as I was often sent to sit in the bathroom with a book, I had a fondness for crunching off the corners of pages and dropping them between my legs into the toilet. Talk about an early form of dog-earred.

Daddy Long Legs is what we in the lit biz call an epistolary novel. That is, it consists of a series of letters, rather than straightforward exposition. This was, class, the first genre of novel to exist and was a particular favorite of women writers. The story is rags-to-riches, in some way. Jerusha Abbott is plucked from the orphanage in which she had grown up by a rich man to be sent all expenses paid to college. All she must do in return is write regular letters to him reporting her progress. What ensues over the next four years is a blend of coming of age, love story, feminist tract, and sociological exploration that is funny and tender and touching and maddening and eternal. It has been made, not very well in my opinion, into a movie twice. In my screenwriter days, I once pitched it to Ron Samuels and he actually showed some interest, but as was my wont, I never got off my ass to do more than talk about it. I still think it would be a fantastic film today, and I'd love to do the script for it, and still have my notes hanging around somewhere, if anyone is interested...

I am not reading my original copy. No, I'm much too much a today's chick (although I don't believe that vernacular is quite as au courant as I would like) for that. I'm getting it on-line. Sent to me in my email, a letter at a time by Daily Lit, who have lots of other books in their library. I know there are people who swear the internet has killed the novel. But how can that be when the internet is bringing me a book written way back in the early 20th century? Isn't that just widening the group of possible readers? And isn't that a good thing for publishing and writers and readers. Okay, it's bad for typesetters and paper manufacturers. But good for trees.

ANTM, or I wish I could tell you...

...that I doing something wild and wonderful yesterday. However, I got caught up in the second season of America's Next Top Model Marathon. God knows when it started, but I checked in at about 2-ish, just intending to keep myself company while I finished wrapping gifts. At 11 p.m., after Yalonna won, we turned the TV off. Yes, we. D, too, was mesmerized. There is something about that show that sucks you in.

First, I love Tyra. Yes, I know. I'm so horribly out of it, but I think she's doing wonderful things in the world; sort of a junior Oprah (who, incidentally, is beginning to annoy and bore me--is it just me, or has she gotten too thin? and too Lady Bountiful? Hubris, O, hubris). And the producers on ANTM have a terrific sense of story. In all the seasons it has been on, there are few times that it's been predictable.

Unlike other reality shows I could mention. As in The Apprentice, which I will not be watching. Or Survivor, which has become my multi-tasking option. And even American Idol has gotten woefully predictable.

I watched a couple of Britain's Next Top Model the other night, and it wasn't the same as ANTM. For one, the production values on BNTM suck, as is the wont of the Brits. I mean, the judges sat at a long table covered with a cloth in front of a hanging cloth and that was the extent of the Judging set. Tacky tacky. The competitions and shows were also much meaner. And the girls, ah, the gels--I spent too long in England I suppose, and my ear is still finely honed to accent differentiations, but the contestants for the most part sounded stupid. Dumb. Like they belonged back at Boots stocking shelves. The equivalent contestant in ANTM's season two was Shandi, who somehow got plucked from behind a Walgreen's counter and make it to the final three. It was fun watching her evolve from homely geek to sorta-confident sorta-model, and she did it with such humility.

Perhaps I needed that day-long fix of ANTM because I was so unbearably, excruciatingly disappointed with the finale of this latest season. I know Caridee was America's Sweetheart, but even the judges in the last test said she didn't hold a candle to Melrose. So how come Melrose didn't win? We wuz robbed!!!!!!!!!!

My Name Is Jane and I'm Addicted to Magazines

Yes, I confess. I am a magazine junkie. I love them. Can't get enough of them. The smell of a new magazine, the glossy (or not so glossy or even matt) paper excites me. I want to touch them. Fondle them. Flip quickly through their pages and then slowly, slowly go back over each one.

I see magazines as repositories of everything I might ever want or need to know; the cover lines say so. How to deal with my belly fat. What the newest tech toys are. Why Hilary may not be running in '06. I believe what they tell me. Even though when I was writing for magazines, I know how I could work with words to make them seem to say far more than they actually did.

A room is never painted. There's no prep or primer that goes into it. You "merely use your roller to apply a coat or two." A perp never says something. He alleges, which inserts that element of doubt, reminds you that we're talking about legal matters, which are never, after all, totally true.

Here are the magazines that are in my house every month or, god help me, week: Allure, Cooking Light, Eating Well, Hadassah, InStyle, Los Angeles, Money, Men's Best Life, More, Newsweek, O, People, Rolling Stone, Sacramento, Time, Vanity Fair, Vogue, Wired. And those are just the ones I have subscriptions to.

And I've just found a new one, which prompted this post: sactown. I got the premier issue yesterday. It's lovely. The cover stock is heavy and dull, sort of like brushed metal. The fonts are varied, as is the way today, but still comprehensible (as is not the way for some mags I could name). I've only done my first flip through, so I can't offer a full J-school analysis, but I will say this: it's the first time in years that my journalists' buttons got pushed, and I started thinking story ideas. Perhaps I'll write them a love letter....