Now I'm not proud to admit the fact that I was watching the Oxygen network over the weekend, but I have an explanation! I needed a break from cleaning and Pride and Prejudice was on, which totally sucked me in, because, well who can say no to Mr. Darcy? Am I right?
Anyway, it turned out to be far more entertaining than I could have imagined, due to the fact that the commercials on Oxygen are a hilarious mess of low-budget film making. Among the (expected) slew of Massengil, FDS and tampon advertisements, there was an endless string of ridiculous infomercials. One had a particularly special effect on me, so much so, that I had to rewind my DVR and actually watch the ad for a second time. For your viewing pleasure:
First of all, I think one reason I fell in love with the Listen Up commercial was that my dad listens to the television so loudly, that the entire house shakes whenever the Law & Order dum-dum sounds, so it kind of gave me the warm and fuzzies.
But I also love the fact that the wife in the commercial is such a nagging bitch. She seems so disgusted with her husband's hearing problem; and the hokey look he shoots her as he shakes his head and turns down the volume on his stereo merits extra points for its high Unintentional Funny Factor.
The best part of the ad however comes in when the sinister applications of the product come to light. BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE! You can spy on your neighbors, and they will assume you're merely listening to your iPod. But I fear the Listen Up's cleverness is also its undoing. After all, how many elderly people do you know walking around listening to mp3 players?
And more importantly, doesn't the Listen Up actually represent a technological retrogression? Why would you get a little box (the size of a credit card!) in order to hear, when you could just put in a far more inconspicuous hearing aid? But perhaps there's something extra special about the Listen Up that has the capability to save the marriage of an exasperated old lady and her increasingly deaf husband. We can only hope...
Monday, March 31, 2008
Strabismus and Me
So I had a follow-up appointment to look into my eye issues. I decided to stay far, far away from the University Eye Center after my dreadful experience there and instead went to Kaiser, which seemed like a bit of a risk as well actually...
But in the end, I sort of lucked out. I had an appointment with a general ophthalmologist and about 2 minutes into our appointment, this little man in a white lab coat came in and said, "ummm....can you help me? I can't log into my computer."
"You need a passcode?" my doctor asked him and he responded with a sheepish nod. "I'm so sorry," she said to me, "you'll have to excuse me for a moment."
I tried to play nice. "Oh sure! Take your time," I assured her, when I was really thinking "OK lady, but make it quick. I already sat for 30 minutes in the waiting room."
When she came back though, I was glad I had been so gracious. "Great news," she told me. "That is our strabismus specialist (which is what you have). He doesn't usually come to the Richmond branch on Tuesdays, but he just happens to be here and said he could squeeze you in." Apparently, if I had left and called to schedule an appointment with him, his next opening would have been at the end of May.
Of course my initial glee to meet with the wee man was soon overshadowed with the diagnosis: if I wanted my eye to stop marching to the beat of its own damn drummer, then I was going to have to tighten up a nerve ending to fix a muscle. And that, my friend, requires surgery.
"EYE surgery?" I croaked, picturing my eyeball out of its socket, resting in the palm of a be-gloved hand.
As it turns out, they don't have to actually remove my eyeball (thank the lord). I know this, because I googled strabismus surgery and found a Wikipedia entry about it.
Did you look at the link? I'm so sorry to do that, but I just HAD to. It is so sickening, that I couldn't possibly look at that image and not share it with someone. I still feel queasy about the whole thing, because I have a bit of a gag reflex when it comes to eyes and sharp instruments (and nail-biters, but that's a whole different blog entry). Whenever I think about it, a strange sensation comes over me that reminds me of my parents' neighbors--when the man of the house had back surgery, his squeamish wife couldn't bare to change the bandages, so she asked her son to do it. But as soon as he saw the incision, he began running around the room in circles screaming, "I've got butterflies in my butt! I've got butterflies in my butt!"
If you are afflicted with a weak stomach, then you know exactly what he means. Of course, it's somewhat related to, but not quite as fun as having "tickles in my belly," which I get when I see pictures of my niece wearing her new Adidas. As you can see, she takes after her aunt's sense of colorful style. Let's just hope she doesn't also inherit my penchant for random maladies:
But in the end, I sort of lucked out. I had an appointment with a general ophthalmologist and about 2 minutes into our appointment, this little man in a white lab coat came in and said, "ummm....can you help me? I can't log into my computer."
"You need a passcode?" my doctor asked him and he responded with a sheepish nod. "I'm so sorry," she said to me, "you'll have to excuse me for a moment."
I tried to play nice. "Oh sure! Take your time," I assured her, when I was really thinking "OK lady, but make it quick. I already sat for 30 minutes in the waiting room."
When she came back though, I was glad I had been so gracious. "Great news," she told me. "That is our strabismus specialist (which is what you have). He doesn't usually come to the Richmond branch on Tuesdays, but he just happens to be here and said he could squeeze you in." Apparently, if I had left and called to schedule an appointment with him, his next opening would have been at the end of May.
Of course my initial glee to meet with the wee man was soon overshadowed with the diagnosis: if I wanted my eye to stop marching to the beat of its own damn drummer, then I was going to have to tighten up a nerve ending to fix a muscle. And that, my friend, requires surgery.
"EYE surgery?" I croaked, picturing my eyeball out of its socket, resting in the palm of a be-gloved hand.
As it turns out, they don't have to actually remove my eyeball (thank the lord). I know this, because I googled strabismus surgery and found a Wikipedia entry about it.
Did you look at the link? I'm so sorry to do that, but I just HAD to. It is so sickening, that I couldn't possibly look at that image and not share it with someone. I still feel queasy about the whole thing, because I have a bit of a gag reflex when it comes to eyes and sharp instruments (and nail-biters, but that's a whole different blog entry). Whenever I think about it, a strange sensation comes over me that reminds me of my parents' neighbors--when the man of the house had back surgery, his squeamish wife couldn't bare to change the bandages, so she asked her son to do it. But as soon as he saw the incision, he began running around the room in circles screaming, "I've got butterflies in my butt! I've got butterflies in my butt!"
If you are afflicted with a weak stomach, then you know exactly what he means. Of course, it's somewhat related to, but not quite as fun as having "tickles in my belly," which I get when I see pictures of my niece wearing her new Adidas. As you can see, she takes after her aunt's sense of colorful style. Let's just hope she doesn't also inherit my penchant for random maladies:
Cesar Chavez, Patron Saint of Vacation Days
When Scooby decided that he wanted to go on a little ski vacation to Colorado, I was definitely excited by the idea, but given that I need to conserve vacation for the endless string of weddings, reunions and bachelorette parties this summer, I wasn't sure I could swing it. But then I remembered Cesar Chavez. Chavez was a migrant worker turned labor leader who improved conditions for farm workers. More importantly, his very existence warrants a vacation day in California. I had never heard of the man before moving here, but he is all over the place. It seems like every third street is named after him, and last Friday was Cesar Chavez Day.
So, since I had never taken Cesar Chavez Day off before, I figured I wouldn't miss it if I decided to work that day and instead take the previous Friday off for Colorado ski fun.
The trip promised to be stellar on multiple levels: we would stay with Scooby's parents, so there would be no lodging expenses; the snow in Colorado is amazing this year; one of my best friends from college was going to be there at the same time. There was just one thing I forgot to account for: I am, apparently, a delicate flower. It's funny, because I don't usually think of myself as a weakling. In fact, I often make fun of other delicate flowers, namely my sister's dog Dexter, because he is so sensitive and easily injured. I mean look at him:
But I'm slowly starting to realize that I may not be able to live up to my sturdy Germanic heritage. Even high altitude makes me sick.
Of course I've been skiing in Colorado before, and I've been to a number high-altitude locales, but for some reason this time around my body refused to tolerate it. As soon as we were driving from Denver up into the mountains, I could feel my head start to pound. I decided to start guzzling water, since I knew that being at 9,000 feet can cause dehydration and then headaches, but the pain persisted. I was so exhausted by the time we arrived, I decided to go straight to bed, but I slept restlessly and was awake for two hours in the middle of the night. By the time the alarm rang in the morning, my head hurt so badly, I could barely open my eyes. I reached for more water thinking it would alleviate some of the pressure in my head, but it only seemed to exacerbate some rumblings in my stomach.
And that's when the puking started.
After an hour and a half of running between the bed and the bathroom, I finally decided to follow my mother's advice and head to the hospital. So I hopped in the car with Scooby, his friend (both dressed and ready for the slopes), his mother and stepdad. And wouldn't you know it? I had to request that Scooby's stepdad pull over the car so I could hop out and vomit on the side of the road. In a word: humiliating.
Scooby's mom stayed with me at the hospital, where I sat in the waiting room with a tiny blue cone that was supposed to be my vomit receptacle, should I get sick again. I couldn't help but think of Garth in Wayne's World saying, "if you're gonna spew, spew into this," and holding up a little Dixie cup. Luckily, I didn't need to use the cone, but I did have to run to the hospital bathroom--again--to dry heave.
Once the doctors saw me, they immediately put me on oxygen and pumped me full of drugs and fluids. The medicine made me feel strange and jerky though, and I was preoccupied with the fact that I was acting strange and erratic in front of my boyfriend's mother. I felt miraculously better in the next couple of hours, but they made me take the oxygen tank with me, which made me look uncannily like my grandmother at 70. On my way out, as I was waiting to pay for my medications, I sneaked a glimpse at a little boy who was in a wheelchair with a broken leg, broken arm, fat lip and a black eye. His mother walked over to him and said, "you okay?" and he just looked up at her without saying a word, his chin starting to quiver. It broke my heart and simultaneously made me miss my mother.
The little boy looked over and caught me staring, so I looked away, but when I looked back he was staring at me, which reminded me that he wasn't the only spectacle in the hospital. I did, after all, have a oxygen tank slung over my shoulder and plastic tubes descending from my nose. How quickly we forget...
In the end, lots o' drugs and pure oxygen perked me right up and I was able to go skiing the following two days and even eat chili on the slopes, but being in the hospital is not exactly the ideal way to spend Cesar Chavez Day (observed).
Plus, I had to come to an empty (except for one person) office building on the real Cesar Chavez Day. I decided to use the luxury of an empty office to call my brother. "It's a holiday, but I'm working," I told him. "Cesar Chavez Day."
"You gotta be kidding me," he practically yelled into the phone. "You get a day off to celebrate that guy?" I wondered for a second (a) how Rob knew who Cesar Chavez was and (b) why he would dislike the migrant worker turned hero.
And then it dawned on me.
"Not Hugo Chavez! CESAR Chavez." I mean Berkeley may have protesters living in trees and people picketing the Marine's office, but we do have some standards.
So, since I had never taken Cesar Chavez Day off before, I figured I wouldn't miss it if I decided to work that day and instead take the previous Friday off for Colorado ski fun.
The trip promised to be stellar on multiple levels: we would stay with Scooby's parents, so there would be no lodging expenses; the snow in Colorado is amazing this year; one of my best friends from college was going to be there at the same time. There was just one thing I forgot to account for: I am, apparently, a delicate flower. It's funny, because I don't usually think of myself as a weakling. In fact, I often make fun of other delicate flowers, namely my sister's dog Dexter, because he is so sensitive and easily injured. I mean look at him:
But I'm slowly starting to realize that I may not be able to live up to my sturdy Germanic heritage. Even high altitude makes me sick.
Of course I've been skiing in Colorado before, and I've been to a number high-altitude locales, but for some reason this time around my body refused to tolerate it. As soon as we were driving from Denver up into the mountains, I could feel my head start to pound. I decided to start guzzling water, since I knew that being at 9,000 feet can cause dehydration and then headaches, but the pain persisted. I was so exhausted by the time we arrived, I decided to go straight to bed, but I slept restlessly and was awake for two hours in the middle of the night. By the time the alarm rang in the morning, my head hurt so badly, I could barely open my eyes. I reached for more water thinking it would alleviate some of the pressure in my head, but it only seemed to exacerbate some rumblings in my stomach.
And that's when the puking started.
After an hour and a half of running between the bed and the bathroom, I finally decided to follow my mother's advice and head to the hospital. So I hopped in the car with Scooby, his friend (both dressed and ready for the slopes), his mother and stepdad. And wouldn't you know it? I had to request that Scooby's stepdad pull over the car so I could hop out and vomit on the side of the road. In a word: humiliating.
Scooby's mom stayed with me at the hospital, where I sat in the waiting room with a tiny blue cone that was supposed to be my vomit receptacle, should I get sick again. I couldn't help but think of Garth in Wayne's World saying, "if you're gonna spew, spew into this," and holding up a little Dixie cup. Luckily, I didn't need to use the cone, but I did have to run to the hospital bathroom--again--to dry heave.
Once the doctors saw me, they immediately put me on oxygen and pumped me full of drugs and fluids. The medicine made me feel strange and jerky though, and I was preoccupied with the fact that I was acting strange and erratic in front of my boyfriend's mother. I felt miraculously better in the next couple of hours, but they made me take the oxygen tank with me, which made me look uncannily like my grandmother at 70. On my way out, as I was waiting to pay for my medications, I sneaked a glimpse at a little boy who was in a wheelchair with a broken leg, broken arm, fat lip and a black eye. His mother walked over to him and said, "you okay?" and he just looked up at her without saying a word, his chin starting to quiver. It broke my heart and simultaneously made me miss my mother.
The little boy looked over and caught me staring, so I looked away, but when I looked back he was staring at me, which reminded me that he wasn't the only spectacle in the hospital. I did, after all, have a oxygen tank slung over my shoulder and plastic tubes descending from my nose. How quickly we forget...
In the end, lots o' drugs and pure oxygen perked me right up and I was able to go skiing the following two days and even eat chili on the slopes, but being in the hospital is not exactly the ideal way to spend Cesar Chavez Day (observed).
Plus, I had to come to an empty (except for one person) office building on the real Cesar Chavez Day. I decided to use the luxury of an empty office to call my brother. "It's a holiday, but I'm working," I told him. "Cesar Chavez Day."
"You gotta be kidding me," he practically yelled into the phone. "You get a day off to celebrate that guy?" I wondered for a second (a) how Rob knew who Cesar Chavez was and (b) why he would dislike the migrant worker turned hero.
And then it dawned on me.
"Not Hugo Chavez! CESAR Chavez." I mean Berkeley may have protesters living in trees and people picketing the Marine's office, but we do have some standards.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Ouch
I was going through my most recent Domino magazine last night and there was an article glorifying the improvements Silda Spitzer made to the governor's mansion to make it more eco-friendly.
Well, you win some, you lose some I guess....
PS is it REQUIRED for wives of politicians/celebrities to stand by their men? You know, the Hillarys and Vanessa Bryants and Silda Spitzers of the world? Even if I knew my husband was soliciting prostitutes (which, by the way, takes a pretty large suspension of disbelief), if he got caught, I think I would say, "well buddy, it's been nice knowin' ya. I don't think I can live with myself if I stick around." And I think he would know better than to ask me to accompany him to a press conference where he planned on discussing his indiscretions.
PPS if men are cuckolds, what are women?
PPPS I love wikipedia: cucquean!
Get out of there Silda! You deserve better!
Well, you win some, you lose some I guess....
PS is it REQUIRED for wives of politicians/celebrities to stand by their men? You know, the Hillarys and Vanessa Bryants and Silda Spitzers of the world? Even if I knew my husband was soliciting prostitutes (which, by the way, takes a pretty large suspension of disbelief), if he got caught, I think I would say, "well buddy, it's been nice knowin' ya. I don't think I can live with myself if I stick around." And I think he would know better than to ask me to accompany him to a press conference where he planned on discussing his indiscretions.
PPS if men are cuckolds, what are women?
PPPS I love wikipedia: cucquean!
Get out of there Silda! You deserve better!
The beauty of shorts
No, I'm not thinking wistfully of what I will wear once the weather heats up; in fact I pretty much refuse to wear shorts unless I'm at the gym. When it comes to movies however, I think shorts are amazing, no matter the season.
I'm not sure what it is about them that appeals to me so much. An acute case of ADD? It's possible. But more than anything, I think shorts are to feature-length films what poetry is to the novel. And everyone knows how much I love poetry (though admittedly, it's not for everyone, and arguably, it's for very few). When poetry works, it's because it manages to accomplish a lot with so little. Every word must be carefully chosen, every syllable must pack a punch. Poetry and shorts are for masters of economy.
So of course, I happily anticipate when the Oscars roll around, because it's the perfect opportunity to watch "good" shorts. A number of theaters in Berkeley showed the nominees, back to back.
It's been a while since Scooby, Marcus and I saw the nominees, but I feel like some of them have stuck with me much more than a lot of feature films I've seen recently. While none of the movies are on YouTube, all of them are available on iTunes, so anyone can see them for $1.99 a pop.
And now, in order from least enjoyable to most....the 2008 Oscar-nominated shorts:
At Night
At Night is a Danish film about three young women in a cancer ward just before New Year's Eve. The movie employs what my father calls "the old cancer trick" in order to squeeze a few tears out of the audience. It didn't really work for me though, primarily because the movie didn't effectively develop its characters. With such a limited amount of time, a short must rely on telling scenes to show character motives or flaws or desires. Instead we get hit over the head with what the characters represent, which is essentially stereotypes: the hardened (and somewhat unlikable) one; the strong silent type; the girl with a heart of gold. I didn't buy a minute of it. And I think the fact that I didn't get choked up at all (and I cry at EVERYthing) speaks volumes.
The Substitute
This Italian film revolves around an oddball substitute teacher and the bizarre things he requests that the teen-aged students in his class do for good grades (impersonate an ass-kisser or various animals, read a diary). Things get particularly interesting about halfway through when the principal arrives to see what all the commotion is about.
This film had me alternating between laughter and incredulity as the sub appeared to be completely off his rocker, but overall it was wholly enjoyable. The fact that this falls so close to the bottom of the list is a testament to the high caliber of the shorts.
Mozart of Pickpockets
This little ditty tells the story of two idiotic ne'er-do-well thieves who can't seem to do anything (read: steal) right. Their luck changes however when a mute boy, apparently an orphan, appears with no intention of leaving their sides. The comedy in this short, unlike the Substitute, had a very light touch. Although the film verges on preciousness, the comical stupidity of the pickpockets rescues it. I was a bit surprised that this won the Oscar, but I can say that it is easily worth the $1.99 to view it.
Tonto Woman
This film employs one of Tarantino's favorite techniques of starting at the end, where we see a wounded man confessing his sins to a priest. We are then whisked back in time to see how exactly this man reached his current state. The story revolves around the character's relationship with a woman whose face is tattooed, the result of being held captive by Indians for 11 years. After her wealthy husband rescues her, he keeps her secluded at a small house in the desert to live out her years alone. When the husband finds out someone has been visiting his wife, things get a bit complicated.
From what I've read, most people find the premise too weird to be enjoyable. But in addition to being a sucker for westerns, I found the story enthralling. The way the story unfolds, the landscape and the amazing cinematography (reminiscent of another Oscar favorite, No Country for Old Men) make this strange tale truly beautiful.
Tanghi Argentini
Man falls in love with woman in internet chat room and lies about being a tango expert; man sets date to meet said woman in two weeks time; man must convince coworker to give him a crash course in tango.
The opportunities for comedy are somewhat predictable: the two middle-aged men dancing together, funny tango-related exchanges at the office, one man telling the other to "move like a panther." But the timing of the comedy, as well as the (seeming) earnestness of the student make the movie completely beguiling, especially after the ending, which moves from comedic to heart-warming.
"Chin up! Move like a panther!"
I'm not sure what it is about them that appeals to me so much. An acute case of ADD? It's possible. But more than anything, I think shorts are to feature-length films what poetry is to the novel. And everyone knows how much I love poetry (though admittedly, it's not for everyone, and arguably, it's for very few). When poetry works, it's because it manages to accomplish a lot with so little. Every word must be carefully chosen, every syllable must pack a punch. Poetry and shorts are for masters of economy.
So of course, I happily anticipate when the Oscars roll around, because it's the perfect opportunity to watch "good" shorts. A number of theaters in Berkeley showed the nominees, back to back.
It's been a while since Scooby, Marcus and I saw the nominees, but I feel like some of them have stuck with me much more than a lot of feature films I've seen recently. While none of the movies are on YouTube, all of them are available on iTunes, so anyone can see them for $1.99 a pop.
And now, in order from least enjoyable to most....the 2008 Oscar-nominated shorts:
At Night
At Night is a Danish film about three young women in a cancer ward just before New Year's Eve. The movie employs what my father calls "the old cancer trick" in order to squeeze a few tears out of the audience. It didn't really work for me though, primarily because the movie didn't effectively develop its characters. With such a limited amount of time, a short must rely on telling scenes to show character motives or flaws or desires. Instead we get hit over the head with what the characters represent, which is essentially stereotypes: the hardened (and somewhat unlikable) one; the strong silent type; the girl with a heart of gold. I didn't buy a minute of it. And I think the fact that I didn't get choked up at all (and I cry at EVERYthing) speaks volumes.
The Substitute
This Italian film revolves around an oddball substitute teacher and the bizarre things he requests that the teen-aged students in his class do for good grades (impersonate an ass-kisser or various animals, read a diary). Things get particularly interesting about halfway through when the principal arrives to see what all the commotion is about.
This film had me alternating between laughter and incredulity as the sub appeared to be completely off his rocker, but overall it was wholly enjoyable. The fact that this falls so close to the bottom of the list is a testament to the high caliber of the shorts.
Mozart of Pickpockets
This little ditty tells the story of two idiotic ne'er-do-well thieves who can't seem to do anything (read: steal) right. Their luck changes however when a mute boy, apparently an orphan, appears with no intention of leaving their sides. The comedy in this short, unlike the Substitute, had a very light touch. Although the film verges on preciousness, the comical stupidity of the pickpockets rescues it. I was a bit surprised that this won the Oscar, but I can say that it is easily worth the $1.99 to view it.
Tonto Woman
This film employs one of Tarantino's favorite techniques of starting at the end, where we see a wounded man confessing his sins to a priest. We are then whisked back in time to see how exactly this man reached his current state. The story revolves around the character's relationship with a woman whose face is tattooed, the result of being held captive by Indians for 11 years. After her wealthy husband rescues her, he keeps her secluded at a small house in the desert to live out her years alone. When the husband finds out someone has been visiting his wife, things get a bit complicated.
From what I've read, most people find the premise too weird to be enjoyable. But in addition to being a sucker for westerns, I found the story enthralling. The way the story unfolds, the landscape and the amazing cinematography (reminiscent of another Oscar favorite, No Country for Old Men) make this strange tale truly beautiful.
Tanghi Argentini
Man falls in love with woman in internet chat room and lies about being a tango expert; man sets date to meet said woman in two weeks time; man must convince coworker to give him a crash course in tango.
The opportunities for comedy are somewhat predictable: the two middle-aged men dancing together, funny tango-related exchanges at the office, one man telling the other to "move like a panther." But the timing of the comedy, as well as the (seeming) earnestness of the student make the movie completely beguiling, especially after the ending, which moves from comedic to heart-warming.
"Chin up! Move like a panther!"
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