Star Wars (but not those kind)

Except for sentimental reasons and with one or two exceptions I've never really managed to get into Wilco. But news of a (surprise) new album still made me grin because this cat is everything.

The problem with Gambit

For a period in my teens I bought X-Men and Uncanny X-Men comics religiously. For some reason I have a very clear memory of walking half hour into town to buy the latest edition from the general store when my family holidayed down south. (Yeah that was a great general store - terrific magazine and comic selection). It also inspired me to write/draw my own terrible comic (thankfully unseen by anyone but myself I hope and pray) featuring thinly disguised versions of my favourite characters. To call it an homage would be... generous. Terrible fan-fic is closer to the mark.

The reason I was so into the series at that stage was the reason I think a lot of people, by which I mean women and girls in particular, were into the comics at that stage - the sweet-arse love story that was Gambit and Rogue. I won't bother going into the ups and downs of those two crazy kids but, yeah, it was a romantic story line that really worked. As a hormonal teenager I ate it up with a spoon and thought Gambit was the shit.

Which is why I'm so super bummed Channing Tatum will be playing Gambit in the planned film, even as I feel bad for being down on it. I like Tatum - he's funny, charismatic and seems like kind of a sweetheart. I think he's great onscreen and I am usually interested to see him in things. But dude is not hot. I'm sorry but he is not. There is too much muscle, too much... ears. Too much... chin? I don't know but dude is TOO MUCH. The Gambit I remember was drawn thin and kinda rangy, always slouching around in his too-big trenchcoat and looking undernourished and faintly in need of a bath. Tatum will wear that trenchcoat like a second skin.

I shouldn't complain. I mean, I'll always have the beautiful romantic pairing of a young Professor X and Magneto in the current crop of X-Men films - a charming development I did not see coming. If Fassbender makes a cameo in the Gambit film wearing that white-tshirt and pants combo he wore for historic Nazi hunting in the first flashback film you will not hear me complain about C-Tate's melon of a head. Not once.

Sleep well, sweet prince

I don't know why I laughed quite so much because dead racoon = sad but this little tale did make me laugh. Especially the last image, which I haven't posted here to avoid spoiling it for ya'll.

Things I learned from reading back issues of Gourmet Traveller in a waiting room today

There is an appliance called a tortilla press and I probably need one.

Ghosts

Why is it that everyone is suddenly talking about ghosting? And why does it bum me out so much? I guess there's not really anything new in it, except for the fact that technology makes it that much more obvious when one is being ghosted (ie: you can't tell yourself someone has probably died or at least been temporarily hospitalised and unable to reach a phone when you can see them posting photos of their Sunday brunch on Instagram). But it strikes me as incredibly cruel. I've lost a couple friends, one of whom meant a lot to me, when they eventually just... failed to respond to my texts/emails and that was brutal enough even though in each case the writing was very much on the wall.

I mean if the New York Times can be believed people are actually doing this - 

In a less dramatic but similarly confounding fashion, Aaron Leth, 29, a fashion editor, found his texts unanswered when a man he had been dating for a month disappeared after he and Mr. Leth had bought the ingredients for a dinner they planned to cook later that evening. “He went home to take a nap and said, ‘I’ll call you,’ ” Mr. Leth said. “I’m still waiting, two years later.”

Okay, sure, the way it was written made me laugh. But still, dude: that's coooold.

Songs I would play at my own private Hot Dub Time Machine

Not because they're fun to dance to, obviously, but because they remind me of very specific times in my life. The downside being that the songs and albums and bands I remember most are probably those that were instrumental in getting me through some tough ol' times, hence they lean towards the maudlin and sometimes downright depressing. It would be kind of a shit party, I guess.


Belle and Sebastian, "We Rule the School"
Back in the day I would spend hours on Napster (I know) seeking out B&S' back catalogue. But this was the first song off the first album I ever heard of theirs and I only sought it out because (of course) some dude I had a crush on recommended them. The first band I ever remember being entirely obsessed with and a band I can't imagine ever not listening to.


Phoenix, "If I Ever Feel Better"
I couldn't tell you how many times I've listened to this song and yet still - STILL - after so many years it's my go-to song to get me in the mood when I can't be arsed leaving the house.


From The Piano, "The Heart Asks Pleasure First"
I was obsessed with this movie and in particular its music for oooh a period in the late 1990s. Not sure what that was about really but I would hang out in my bedroom listening to the soundtrack over and over again. My lucky parents.


The Smiths, Half a Person
Most of my favourite bands have come via cute boys and The Smiths are no exception. I still recall feigning a familiarity with them I did not have in order to bond with my ex-boyfriend Michael when he was still just my friendly co-worker, then racing home for some essential research.


Noah and the Whale, "I Have Nothing"
Downer Country, population: me.


Real Estate, "It's Real"
The flipside of Noah and the Whale in that this one just reminds me of a very dreamy, mostly happy albeit messy period of my life.

One for Harry Potter nerds only

sorting hat quizzes be like

essentiallyjesus:

How do you brush your teeth?

a) bravely

b) while making a sandwich

c) while reading a book

d) I’m a snake

(Via show me dem kitties) 

Life lesson #13

Do not fall asleep listening to an audiobook involving sweet adolescent romance because you will have sweet adolescenty romantic dreams and when you wake up to realise you're -

a) 32
b) married
c) sleeping in a tent

- you may feel a little sad for awhile.

Read it

I'm officially on holidays for a week from today, which means I have time to actually read a lot more journalism, particularly long-form, than I usually do when I'm paging through papers or scrolling through websites for just long enough to be sure I have a vague idea of what's going on everywhere without letting anything sink too far into my brain.

My break is getting off to a great start because so far I've read two terrific reads on two subjects I didn't think I cared about: Roger Federer and, um, I guess... America?

Brian Phillips doesn't mention the debt he owes to David Foster Wallace in his own version for Grantland but to me it's hard to avoid comparisons between Phillips' very good read and DFW'a wonderfully titled and by-now classic essay "Roger Federer as Religious Experience". I don't know though, maybe it's just because I don't read a lot about Federer and there's no comparison to be made.

Either way Phillips has some gorgeous prose and it's well worth reading the whole thing. If this opening doesn't hook you in it's probably not for you:

"Early on in Adam Roberts’s 2014 meta-sci-fi submarine-disaster novel, Twenty Trillion Leagues Under the Sea, a French nuclear sub called the Plongeur begins to sink in the North Atlantic. The startled crew tries to regain command of the vessel, but nothing works. The controls don’t respond. The diver who’s sent out to reconnoiter the exterior of the ship with a flashlight doesn’t come back. The Plongeur is built to withstand pressure to a depth of a thousand meters or so. Beyond that, it will be crushed. And even if it isn’t, even if it somehow holds together against what Roberts calls “the unspeakable pressures of the profound deep,” it will build up so much speed as it falls that it will shatter when it hits the ocean floor."

Then there's Gary Younge's "Farewell to America" for The Guardian. This one shocked me because I wasn't sure there was anything new to read on this topic. Whether Younge's saying something new or saying something old, just beautifully, I'm not sure. It's a tremendous piece of writing though - get into it:

For the past couple of years the summers, like hurricanes, have had names. Not single names like Katrina or Floyd – but full names like Trayvon Martin or Michael Brown. Like hurricanes, their arrival was both predictable and predicted, and yet somehow, when they landed, the effect was still shocking.
We do not yet know the name that will be attached to this particular season. He is still out there, playing Call of Duty, finding a way to feed his family or working to pay off his student loans. He (and it probably will be a he) has no idea that his days are numbered; and we have no idea what the number of those days will be.

Hail Robots

I for one welcome our new robot overlords.

Signs the rebooted Total Recall is not a great movie

1. Jessica Biel.
2. Kate Beckinsale.
3. Mark Bomback.
4. I love Philip K Dick short stories, have loved Colin Farrell in some things and have a certain nostalgic fondness for the original, yet I haaaaaaated it.

N.B: I couldn't quite bear to post a screenshot from this shitty movie so enjoy a slice of Farrell being cute in the lovely movie, In Bruges. I maybe need to see that movie again.

Things I wanted to say to the women having breakfast on the table next to me this morning:

1. You're so right: Mariah Carey and James Packer makes sense, somehow.

2. Jamie Dornan was underrated in 50 Shades of Grey. No, I also will (probably) not be reading Grey.

3. Can we be friends?

Word

"Apparently every Disney woman is a clone/direct descendant of some primordial creature with huge round cheeks and a disturbingly small nose, because there is no other explanation (yes there is(it’s lazy sexism)) for the incredible lack of diversity among these female faces."

(Read the whole thing here)

Because otherwise I would need to have a long lie down

I choose to believe the "Manscriminate" campaign is a parody.

As ever

The Guardian's Hadley Freedman is a delight.

A few weeks ago I read about a fashion advert that has been banned by the ASA. But what confuses me is why the advert existed in the first place. It seems to show a very ill girl lying on the floor – why would that sell clothes?Patrick, by emailAh, Patrick, Patrick, Patrick. I do not know what you do in life, Patrick, as your email was tantalisingly succinct, but I do know that you have – unwittingly, I suspect – taken on the role of truth-teller in this instance. Not for nothing does the tale of The Emperor’s New Clothes use fashion as a metaphor and you, Patrick, are the young boy pointing your finger at the king’s nudity.

(You can and should read the whole thing here)

The Three Switches: a puzzle

Downstairs in a house are three identical on-off switches. One of them controls the lamp in the attic. The puzzle is to work out which switch controls the lamp.The rules are as follows. You are allowed to manipulate the switches all you like, and then you are allowed only one trip to the attic. How do you do it?

I don't know what's more tragic: that I didn't solve it or that I didn't solve it, despite having heard it once before.

(Via The Guardian)

"...white spiders..." (Hee!)

A semi-broke homebody's guide to turning that frown upside down after a rough day:

1. Make a big pot of dhaal makhani.

2. Taste-test elderly open bottle of wine.

3. Decide wine is okay.

4. Drink wine.

5. Eat a sensibly-portioned bowl of dhaal.

6. Eat a little more dhaal.

7. Soooo much more dhaal.

8. Lie on couch to watch Silicon Valley.

Overheard in the office

"Honestly any kind of rare disease is really okay with me."

Now I think about it "Pratt Train" sounds like a euphemism for... something.

I'm not sure when I got onboard the Chris Pratt train but apparently that happened. It's not even like I really want to do to him the things I want to do to, say, Tom Hardy. It's more like I'd like to be friends and hang out, maybe see a movie some time. Or go full Misery and tie him to the bed: EITHER WAY.

Questions and answers via Extreme Fan Club.