BLOG UPDATE SOLO!!! Bwananabwananabwanana...And in that mighty moment, she let the blogging rip

Dear Those Who Have Shown Justine Timberlake Was Wrong by Acting as Living Proof that Sexy Never Went Anywhere:

I think that everyone should give at least brief life updates, no matter how boring. Even if it's short and along the lines of the Marquis de Sade: "We eat, we shit, we kill, we die."

So, I saw Sin City for the first time last night, and it was wicked good. I was skeptical when it came out, but I was pleasantly surprised. Also, tonight my dad and I went to this new Korean monster flick, The Host. If it's playing near you, it's totally worth seeing. It toes the line between horror movie and dark comedy, and very well. It's like an updated version of Godzilla and Mothra and other movies of the like: the personification of our modern fears as a monster wreaking havoc on a major Asian city with political under- and overtones coming out in the response of the government to this crisis. Where Godzilla reflected fear of being annihilated by an unstoppable force much like the atomic bomb, and Mothra reflected fear of being punished for our all-consuming love of capitalism, the oozy, snake-fish thingy living in a river in Seoul reflects the fear of being killed by a virus (SARS, anyone?) and being swept up in a pandemic while the government panics and the US interferes in its usual here-we-come-to-save-the-day, self-important fashion, doing little good and obscuring the issue. Meanwhile, the everyman who knows what's going on is ignored, and forced to take action with no help. So it's fun both as a movie and as an update of one of my favorite genres.

Also, Stacyann Chin, who was a performer in Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam, came to Yale, and she was awesome. She had these great little haikus that she'd sprinkle in at lightning speed, and she read excerpts from this new book she's working on.

And on the music front, Hanson came to New Haven. How do you like your washed-up boy bands? Blonde-haired, pop-rock brothers with a side of one hit wonder, please! They came to a master's tea (the masters of the twelve residential colleges bring various interesting people, like Art Spiegelman, Dr. Ruth, Meryl Streep, etc. to sit down and talk and drink tea and answer questions with a smallish group of students). The room was packed, and despite their best efforts to steer the conversation to questions about the music industry as a whole and the problems with major record labels, people just sort of nodded, smiled, and then asked about the lyrics to "Mm Mm Bop." It was lots of fun, but unfortunately I wasn't able to go to the concert later that night. It was sold out. Bah!

So I'm on spring break now, and I've been bumming around, catching up on pleasure reading. I just finished The Mists of Avalon (feminist retelling of Arthurian legend), and I'm working my way through the new Dave Eggers novel, What is the What, which is a fictionalized retelling of a man's escape and subsequent life after the genocide in Sudan. Oh, and you should all check out this short story writer, Clarice Lispector. She was a 20th century Brazilian writer, and her stuff is basically one, big, eloquent middle finger aimed at patriarchal society. Even if you're not particularly interested in the feminist element, her stuff is still worth it for the writing.

Finally, my Top Five Ska Songs:
1. Ban the Tube Top - Reel Big Fish
2. The Impression That I Get - The Mighty Mighty Bosstones
3. Keasbey Nights - Catch 22
4. Bumble Bee Tuna - Mephiskapheles
5. The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything - Relient K

Still a jack-of-all-interests, major-in-none,
Meredith