How was your paddle?

The weather in Seattle all week has been just spectacular (outside of a brief thunderstorm on Tuesday.) And unfortunately I was sitting in my office all week. This made me pretty frustrated. Today I couldn't take it anymore and skipped out early.

I had my life jacket in the car, and while I didn't have quite the right clothing for kayaking - I didn't really care. I just drove across the lake (traffic was already ugly at 3:00) and went to the kayak club. They were nice to me and gave me one of their best boats; a super fast and nimble Synergy kayak. And I was off. I didn't really have a plan, but I knew I wanted to get a close up look at the starting of the opening day of boat season celebrations (more info here and here.) It was a really cool sight, a half mile of boats lined up next to each other, everyone hanging out, drinking, partying. It reminded me of beach city at Wildflower, but on water (for those Cal Poly people that know what I'm talking about.)

That area was also not very natural though, with all the motor boats putting around. Lots of exhaust and fuel fumes. So I cruised out into the middle of the lake and just spent some time sitting there with my hands in the water. I really wish there had been some kind of platform out there I could have saddled up to and swam off of, since you can't really exit a sea kayak in open water and expect to get back in. That's ok, I expect to find somewhere to swim tomorrow (one of my complaints about Seattle is there is tons of water here, but not so many good swim spots.)

It means I'll have to do some work over the weekend to catch back up, but this was one of the best ideas I've had in a long time.

Yes, at Blue Sky Outfitters Safety is Number 1

That was a quote during some questionable transportation when I was up rafting yesterday. It was my first trip this year, and I had a wonderful time. Although I forgot how much you have to paddle with rookie guides. Soon enough they'll be better, but my arms are sore today from all the extra paddle strokes.

Ooh child, things are gonna get easier
Ooh child, things'll be brighter

At the risk of sounding like a broken record I'm going to talk about Everwood again. I was struck once more by the excellent music in last night's episode (Kate was too!) The site Everwood Music has been a great help for me, allowing me to track down the music I hear on the show.

Two weeks ago it was Alexi Murdoch, who's Four Songs EP is wonderful (if short, with only four songs.) This week the song that stood out was "Ooh Child" by Beth Orton. It can only be found on the Hope Benefit CD, which I just ordered used from some guy through Amazon. I look forward to listening to it, even though I already listened to most of the songs on their website.

The WB has really stepped up the quality of their shows. I watch three hour-long drama's a week there (Everwood, Gilmore Girls and Smallville - The WB gets more of my time then any other network.) And as I think back they've traditionally had great music. It was a Smallville episode two years ago that first pointed me to Eva Cassidy, an artist that I recommend to friends and family all the time. (Random trivia - The episode was "Crush" in the first season and guest starred Adam Brody from The OC, who got his start on the WB on this episode then later on Gilmore Girls.) It's a mark of truly great music when I hear about 15-30 seconds of it in a TV show and immediately recognize that I want to hear much more. It doesn't happen much, but the WB has been on a roll recently.

Women call this the silent treatment. We let them think we don't like it.

There was one thing I forgot about Kill Bill Volume 2, the camera movement and framing were just spectacular. Tarantino uses to whole screen, and to great effect. The most obvious were the quick sooms on Pai Mei, but there were lots of great movements that were a bit more subtle.

It would be a travesty to watch this film in full screen mode. I would applaud greatly if Miramax didn't even bother with a pan and scan cut - just go widescreen ratio everywhere.

This woman, she deserves her revenge. And we deserve to die.

If you didn't think Quentin Tarantino was at least a little screwed up, Kill Bill Volume 2 will convince you. The most striking thing about it was how incredibly different it was from Volume 1. Where Volume 1 was fast paced, high energy, and full of bright style, Volume 2 is slower, dialog heavy, and has a wonderful dark style.

But it does manage to twist genre's like the first. Most of the film is a classic Tarantino movie, but it has this cheesy Kung Fu movie stuck in the middle. Once again, if you'd told me this concept on paper I would have cringed, but it works beautifully.

With more dialog of course comes more humor (since it's Tarantino.) So we get to laugh more, which takes the edge off the gory scenes. But beware, this isn't for the feint hearted. Two scenes in particular are very gruesome, including one that may be the most horrifying I've ever seen - and is only tolerable because we know Uma survives it.

If you're a Tarantino fan, you can't miss this one.

He's getting wierder.
I didn't think that was possible.

I'm getting really tired of the incessant drama factory that is Marissa on The OC. For an ensemble show everything has been rotating around her for a long time. Seth/Summer, Sandy/Kiersten, and Haley/Jimmy are much more interesting then the crap that hovers around Marissa. Ug, time for a new story arc.

I'm going to ask questions. If you don't give me information I'm going to start cutting things off, and I promise you they will be things that you will miss.

I really have no idea how I never saw Kill Bill Volume 1 in the theaters. Seriously, I knew I would love it, I really wanted to see it, I just never made it to the theater. In my defense it was during that time in the fall where I saw very few movies in the theaters.

But it came out yesterday on DVD and I promptly bought it and watched it last night. It was fantastic. I'm not really sure what to say about it though. How do you recommend a movie like this. I guess the best way is to say it was a great movie in it's genre. But that brings a new problem, it's sort of it's own genre.

It's classic Tarantino, it's a homage to martial arts movies, it exists purely in the realm of style. There really isn't any content at all - just wonderous style. Perhaps the best way to describe it is live action anime; a concept which would cause me to shudder had I not just seen a wonderful implementation. I can think of no other film maker then Tarantino who could have pulled this movie off.

Ebert and Roeper both said Volume 2 will be on their ten best lists at the end of the year. Rotten Tomatoes has it at 91%. I won't make the mistake I did with Volume 1 and will be eagerly sitting in a theater Friday night.

No, I could never do the friend thing with you.

I know I just talked about it a few weeks ago, but more and more I think Everwood is the best show on TV right now. Sure it's sappy and moralistic. But it's also smart and remarkably real for something in this genre. Tonight's episode was a little bland until the end scene with Ephram and Madison - spectacular. They replay on Sunday evenings so turn in if you're not watching. Plus last week's episode pointed me to a spectacular singer: Alexi Murdoch. I'm tracking down his albumn now.

Side notes:

I went to New York City last week and it was fantastic. I think I did about two weeks worth of visiting in four days. But fortunately I took notes (seriously, I did...) and I'll write something up about the whole experience this week.

Over the weekend Ebert & Roeper completely panned The Girl Next Door which I actually liked. When I saw it I remember thinking I needed to see it again to really be sure, and watching their review just reinforced this. I typically don't disagree with them this much.

That concludes round 10. We have two spellers remaining. We will now move to the championship words subsection.
"Opsimath"

Spellbound is a phenomenal film. This movie dives into the spelling bee subculture. It follows eight teenagers who compete in the national competition bee. We see their families and home lives and get a glimpse into how they study. Some of them are more crazy then others (the kid from Orange County was nuts, Matt and I likened him to the Yankees.) But all of them have worked hard to get to the Nationals, where 249 kids are whittled down to one in two days. It's brutal, there's all these super talented kids who are thrown into the deep end of the pool. Where just one mistake and you're done.

I ended up rooting for all the kids, and felt for them when they were eliminated. But watching the kids isn't the best part. It's the parents who are the best. It made me think about how hard it must be for these kids, with their parents wrapped up in this competition as a success measure. And it's a brutal success measure too - only one of them can be the winner, and everyone else makes a mistake. To give you an idea the movie starts off by saying 249 kids go to the spelling bee, 248 will spend just one word wrong.

This is fabulous documentary. And as much as I like Michael Moore, Bowling For Columbine was more of a political piece then a documentary. Spellbound ended up losing the Academy Award to Bowling For Columbine, but if I'd been a voter I would have voted for Spellbound without a second thought.

Note: My spell checker doesn't know the word "Opsimath"

The higher caliber I was referring to, Sir, is hers.

Minor Spoilers - but this plot is so formulaic you really can't spoil it.

I went to see The Prince and Me with some friends, which really ended up being much less painful then I thought it would be. It turns out this movie has a lot of wit and good charm between the leads. I found myself laughing quite a bit, and I even bought in for the first two thirds or so.

But then for the last third when the movie stops being witty and just pumps the formula it lost me. I'm thinking the big turning point was the tour of the crown jewels. Although it just could have been all the gasps from the girls (and I mean girls, not women) in the audience that pulled me out of the movie. Either way I leaned over to my friend and said "This is like porn for young girls."

Though, I have to give the writers some credit for burying a girl power message in here. Not only does it show a smart, ambitious girl getting picked up by the prince (instead of a bimbo) but then later she ends up taking a stand for the things she believs in. The rediculous ending even has her able to keep the life she wants and the man, no hard choices required. That may be a bit unrealistic (there would certainly be hard choices involved in a similar real-life situation) but at least it's a positive message.

Even with the charm of the lovebirds, by far the best character in this on is the Prince's companion: Soren. He was great. I'd like to see a DVD feature with a quick in character feature about him - showing parts of the movie from his perspective. That'd be great.

Whether you're a pessimist, underachiever or a chronic failure, I personally offer my unconditional* guarantee that Demotivators® will truly inspire you to new lows!

The cynic and satirist in me absolutely loves the Demotivators line from Despair, Inc. I buy their calendar every year and always have it up in my office. Part of it is they are genuinely funny, but a bigger part is how ridiculous those motivation posters seem. And as always whenever I see something ridiculous I hunger for a way to make fun of it through satire (this is why I love The Daily Show and South Park.)

I thought of this all today because this month's demotivator, Potential, is my favorite of the 2004 collection. If you haven't seen them before go and browse. I highly recommend Persistence (2004), Goals (2003), Irresponsibility (2002), Consulting (2002), Doubt (2000), Failure (Classic), Mediocrity (Classic) and Procrastination (Classic).

PS: Happy Birthday Bubba, can't imagine a better birthday for you then April Fools Day...

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