POLARITY 167
this entry brought to you by medeski, martin, and wood, "chubb sub"
THE GOOD
My two-year anniversary last Monday A friend of mine had asked me a week before the anniversary how long we'd been married, and I said it had been 1 year. It has actually been two. Now, this sounds bad. But really, it's not. Which would you rather someone say if you were married to them? "It's just been a year... What, it's been 2? Wow, where did the time go?" or "It's been 3 years... 3... long... years... Wait, it's only been 2? Oh, lord..." Me, personally, I'd rather have the former.
Supersize Me I was thoroughly engrossed by this documentary . A few people have pointed out a few flaws in the movie, but most of them are illegitimate to me because Spurlock never claimed that this was a scientific study, but that it was a personal study. And, as such, it's a total eye opener. We all know that fast food is bad for us. It's not a secret. But it's a shock to see what a drastic change he goes through from beginning to end. He says at the film's conclusion that your response to his experiment is probably "No shit you messed up your body! You ate nothing but McDonald's!" But he answers with this: some people eat fast food nearly every single day. As much as I am ashamed to admit it... I was one of them. Five times a week for a year and a half, Jack in the Box during my lunch break. Why? Because our lunch was at 8 in the morning and nothing else was open, and spending 2 bucks on two Jumbo Jacks was cheaper than pretty much anything in the world, and it was guaranteed to be filling... If I were to bring my lunch, it would cost considerably more than 2 dollars per meal to fill me up. So Jack in the Box every day. And as I watched Supersize Me, I just felt fat. Fat, fat, fat.
Wine Yes, I will admit it: It was the movie Sideways that finally did it, but honestly, I was always a little interested. Michelle and I have casually gotten into drinking wine. We've bought four or five bottles of wine since the 23rd of the month, ranging in prices from 8 to 17 dollars. Nothing too expensive. We're not trying to be connosieurs, just trying to have a new hobby and learn new, interesting things. I have to admit a certain childish guilt whenever I'm in the liquor section, but I am an adult, so why not? Anyway, so far it's been a lot of fun, and we've learned Sideways was right: a good, solid, thorough smell first really brings out the flavor once you drink it. I have to admit, so far I don't have much of a pallette for this sort of thing. I have yet to pinpoint any specific flavors, whereas Michelle will say "I think I taste coconut... Yeah, definitely coconut," and the bottle will say "just a hint of coconut"-- we always read the label after we drink, to see how close we were-- but I only detect descriptive words like "woodsy" or "crystalline and glassy" or "bold and thick".
Soul Caliber 3 I usually don't mention video games here on Polarity, but I've been so into Soul Caliber 3 it would be wrong of me not to mention it-- if you couldn't care less about video games, just skip this. The game itself is basically the same as the previous Soul Caliber's, lovingly tweaked further to perfection. But I thought I would specifically bring up player creation mode. Before I bought the game I'd seen some screenshots of the characterr creation mode, and the characters looked terribly generic. I was afraid once I got the game I would be really bored with the character creation stuff; yet, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. And when you play the game, some of the preset characters are, in fact, generic. But once you start unlocking stuff for the mode, and granted, this may take a while, it becomes feverishly addictive and generally satisfying. Basically, it works like this: Namco created 12 new characters, and you get to change how they look based on tons of items. You can't control the character's body other than skin tone and face texture (it would be great if you could control body type and size too), but believe me when I say you're going to probably spend a lot of time tweaking a character to perfection to unleash it on your friends. Too bad there's no on-line mode, though....
This little kitty-cat flash cartoon This amused me for a couple minutes. Give it a click.
THE BAD
UNKLE, Never, Never Land I own the first UNKLE CD, Psyence Fiction. It's a classic, eclectic trip- hop excursion from the late 90's starring DJ Shadow and James Lavelle, along with a gaggle of collaborators including Tom Yorke of Radiohead in "Rabbit in Your Headlights" (a song sure to send shivers up your spine), Richard Ashcroft of The Verve on "Lonely Souls", and Badly Drawn Boy on "Nursery Rhyme" (an awesome, lone rock song). Well, DJ Shadow, who was really the whole point of the record, left, leaving Levelle to replace him with Richard File. Unfortunately, what's left isn't really UNKLE anymore. It's just a so-so, darkish dance record that's perfectly okay if it didn't have to live up to its excellent pedigree. The guest artists, which were a highlight of the record, have been pulled back and seem incidental. There's no intricate DJ scratching. No rock song. Hell, it's not even trip-hop. This would've been an okay moody dance record with anyone else's name on it, but as a follow-up to Psyence Fiction, it's terrible.
Meet Prussian Blue, teeny pop for racists When I first saw this, I wanted to think it was a joke. I really wanted to think it was a joke.
Radio DJs talking over songs I still don't listen to the radio often, but when I do, I never budge from 103.9, the local "indie" station. I've listened to it exclusively... well, basically since I got here to Arizona. I still have yet to turn it on in the house on my personal time, but I used to turn it on at work when I ran out of CDs, and it's always on in the car. But you know, occasionally I'll be forced to listen to a different station for one reason or another, maybe I'm on hold or something, and I swear to god, as if God is showing me why I hate radio, no matter how little time I spend on another radio station, the DJ will talk over the beginnings and endings of sounds! And because I live in my little non-corporate radio bubble of bliss, I forget how much I fucking hate that. There's no fucking excuse for it! At all!
Jessica Simpson You want to know what annoys me about her? No, it's not how hideous she is, how stupid she is, or how she should never be allowed to apply make up to herself, it's that there are people who are obsessed with her-- and she's not a real celebrity! She is a C-grade singer, below Britney and Christina, and doesn't have the acting ability or career smarts of Mandy Moore. The only thing she's known for is a shitty reality show which wasn't even remarkable besides how stupid she was. So why do shitty celebrity magazines treat her as if she's A-List, or, in fact, anyone that's worth our time and attention?
Katie Holmes pregnant Someone's sure going to regret this in a few months. And it'll be Tom Cruise, when he learns the child he seduces and fell head over heels for him won't accept that he's left her.
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with love from CRS @ 3:32 PM
Monday, October 31, 2005
THE GOOD
My two-year anniversary last Monday A friend of mine had asked me a week before the anniversary how long we'd been married, and I said it had been 1 year. It has actually been two. Now, this sounds bad. But really, it's not. Which would you rather someone say if you were married to them? "It's just been a year... What, it's been 2? Wow, where did the time go?" or "It's been 3 years... 3... long... years... Wait, it's only been 2? Oh, lord..." Me, personally, I'd rather have the former.
Supersize Me I was thoroughly engrossed by this documentary . A few people have pointed out a few flaws in the movie, but most of them are illegitimate to me because Spurlock never claimed that this was a scientific study, but that it was a personal study. And, as such, it's a total eye opener. We all know that fast food is bad for us. It's not a secret. But it's a shock to see what a drastic change he goes through from beginning to end. He says at the film's conclusion that your response to his experiment is probably "No shit you messed up your body! You ate nothing but McDonald's!" But he answers with this: some people eat fast food nearly every single day. As much as I am ashamed to admit it... I was one of them. Five times a week for a year and a half, Jack in the Box during my lunch break. Why? Because our lunch was at 8 in the morning and nothing else was open, and spending 2 bucks on two Jumbo Jacks was cheaper than pretty much anything in the world, and it was guaranteed to be filling... If I were to bring my lunch, it would cost considerably more than 2 dollars per meal to fill me up. So Jack in the Box every day. And as I watched Supersize Me, I just felt fat. Fat, fat, fat.
Wine Yes, I will admit it: It was the movie Sideways that finally did it, but honestly, I was always a little interested. Michelle and I have casually gotten into drinking wine. We've bought four or five bottles of wine since the 23rd of the month, ranging in prices from 8 to 17 dollars. Nothing too expensive. We're not trying to be connosieurs, just trying to have a new hobby and learn new, interesting things. I have to admit a certain childish guilt whenever I'm in the liquor section, but I am an adult, so why not? Anyway, so far it's been a lot of fun, and we've learned Sideways was right: a good, solid, thorough smell first really brings out the flavor once you drink it. I have to admit, so far I don't have much of a pallette for this sort of thing. I have yet to pinpoint any specific flavors, whereas Michelle will say "I think I taste coconut... Yeah, definitely coconut," and the bottle will say "just a hint of coconut"-- we always read the label after we drink, to see how close we were-- but I only detect descriptive words like "woodsy" or "crystalline and glassy" or "bold and thick".
Soul Caliber 3 I usually don't mention video games here on Polarity, but I've been so into Soul Caliber 3 it would be wrong of me not to mention it-- if you couldn't care less about video games, just skip this. The game itself is basically the same as the previous Soul Caliber's, lovingly tweaked further to perfection. But I thought I would specifically bring up player creation mode. Before I bought the game I'd seen some screenshots of the characterr creation mode, and the characters looked terribly generic. I was afraid once I got the game I would be really bored with the character creation stuff; yet, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it. And when you play the game, some of the preset characters are, in fact, generic. But once you start unlocking stuff for the mode, and granted, this may take a while, it becomes feverishly addictive and generally satisfying. Basically, it works like this: Namco created 12 new characters, and you get to change how they look based on tons of items. You can't control the character's body other than skin tone and face texture (it would be great if you could control body type and size too), but believe me when I say you're going to probably spend a lot of time tweaking a character to perfection to unleash it on your friends. Too bad there's no on-line mode, though....
This little kitty-cat flash cartoon This amused me for a couple minutes. Give it a click.
THE BAD
UNKLE, Never, Never Land I own the first UNKLE CD, Psyence Fiction. It's a classic, eclectic trip- hop excursion from the late 90's starring DJ Shadow and James Lavelle, along with a gaggle of collaborators including Tom Yorke of Radiohead in "Rabbit in Your Headlights" (a song sure to send shivers up your spine), Richard Ashcroft of The Verve on "Lonely Souls", and Badly Drawn Boy on "Nursery Rhyme" (an awesome, lone rock song). Well, DJ Shadow, who was really the whole point of the record, left, leaving Levelle to replace him with Richard File. Unfortunately, what's left isn't really UNKLE anymore. It's just a so-so, darkish dance record that's perfectly okay if it didn't have to live up to its excellent pedigree. The guest artists, which were a highlight of the record, have been pulled back and seem incidental. There's no intricate DJ scratching. No rock song. Hell, it's not even trip-hop. This would've been an okay moody dance record with anyone else's name on it, but as a follow-up to Psyence Fiction, it's terrible.
Meet Prussian Blue, teeny pop for racists When I first saw this, I wanted to think it was a joke. I really wanted to think it was a joke.
Radio DJs talking over songs I still don't listen to the radio often, but when I do, I never budge from 103.9, the local "indie" station. I've listened to it exclusively... well, basically since I got here to Arizona. I still have yet to turn it on in the house on my personal time, but I used to turn it on at work when I ran out of CDs, and it's always on in the car. But you know, occasionally I'll be forced to listen to a different station for one reason or another, maybe I'm on hold or something, and I swear to god, as if God is showing me why I hate radio, no matter how little time I spend on another radio station, the DJ will talk over the beginnings and endings of sounds! And because I live in my little non-corporate radio bubble of bliss, I forget how much I fucking hate that. There's no fucking excuse for it! At all!
Jessica Simpson You want to know what annoys me about her? No, it's not how hideous she is, how stupid she is, or how she should never be allowed to apply make up to herself, it's that there are people who are obsessed with her-- and she's not a real celebrity! She is a C-grade singer, below Britney and Christina, and doesn't have the acting ability or career smarts of Mandy Moore. The only thing she's known for is a shitty reality show which wasn't even remarkable besides how stupid she was. So why do shitty celebrity magazines treat her as if she's A-List, or, in fact, anyone that's worth our time and attention?
Katie Holmes pregnant Someone's sure going to regret this in a few months. And it'll be Tom Cruise, when he learns the child he seduces and fell head over heels for him won't accept that he's left her.
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