(1) Intended to go see Accuracy of Death at the Japan Society, but it was sold out so I went to see the Slants with
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littlebutfierce and
phredd. The two acts that went on before them were not especially good, but the Slants rocked the place out. Their music is a bit reminiscent of some of the recent classic-rock-throwback bands like the Killers, with lots of loud crunchy guitars, but also cool synth beats. I overcame my inhibitions enough to actually dance, and it was very dancey music. And I geeked out when the keyboardist played "Sakura sakura." Also I ordered a weak rum & coke, but it wasn't so weak - I could barely taste the coke. I continue to be dismayed by my low tolerance for alcohol but I don't intend to stop drinking completely, so I can either continue to drink occasionally and have bad reactions or try to drink more often and build up some tolerance...
(2) Broke down and bought the digital piano that I wanted, because I got my stimulus check and it was on sale. I really don't like Guitar Center - I'm going to avoid them in the future, not least because they always make me check my bag. No one ever is available to help me, and even though I barely talked to the salesman he lied to me ("It isn't heavy." Whatever. I got it home to Brooklyn somehow, but my arms are not happy today.)
(3) Hung out at Meaghan's place playing Rock Band, where I learned that Jesse Helms had died.
Let me make this clear: I don't think it's good for me to hate people, or take pleasure in their deaths. The whole "do not ask for whom the bell tolls" thing, I get it.
But I will make an exception for this guy.
I lived in NC from the time I was 12 to the time I was 18. Jesse Helms was one of our senators for that entire period of time. I watched the 1996 race with great interest and just about cried when he beat Harvey Gantt. There was actually a book published of ignorant, bigoted, racist things that Helms had said - he had said enough terrible things to fill a book.
I can only think he lived this long because God didn't want to deal with him.
(4) Went to see Wall-E with Meaghan and Marshall. Liked it a great deal, though with mixed feelings especially about the treatment of gender. I'm increasingly disappointed with Pixar for making these movies that are meticulous and carefully thought-out in every respect... except that they thought it was totally unproblematic to reduce the female-gendered robot to a baby-plant-incubator. I actually thought at one point, "Is this movie just Children of Men remade with adorable robots?"
(5) Went to see Yasukuni today. The reviews all said that it was long and boring, and the reviews were right, and yet I liked the movie and am glad that I saw it. It was a movie that was trying to do things other than being entertaining. I wonder if the filmmaker was actually trying to actively take an anti-entertaining approach - as if any attempt to impose a stronger narrative arc on the movie would have threatened the movie's own fragmentary internal logic. I mean, it's certainly not the case that the filmmaker didn't know what he was doing, so I have to assume there was something purposeful about the boredom.nd
