In more than words I tried to tell you; the more I tried I failed
You know, eventually I'll post about something important, like politics or activism or stuff.
Right now I'll just ramble on about television (insert *gasp* here) and the fannish butterfly effect and stuff.
Most times I find what I love by tripping and falling headlong into it.
For instance, I discovered Melissa Etheridge's music by picking up a tape in a record store (what did they even call record stores in the post-vinyl, pre-CD days?)and asking, "is this any good"? I was told it was, and so I bought her second album, Brave and Crazy (on cassette!) without hearing it. This was years before she became famous, and later I got her first for a dollar in a discount bin. I got to see her in concert at PPAC (which is teenytiny) right before she really started skyrocketing.
I had a sort of similar experience with Morrissey's Late Night, Maudlin Street, except the song was already playing on the loudspeaker when I walked in. I was basically all OMG musthavegimmeegimmee, so I bought the album with the song on it. And, of course, snailmailed a handwritten copy of the lyrics (just the lyrics, mind you, with no title or explanation whatsoever) to songdog, who was all, wtf? She did come to like the song quite a bit, though. :)
And okay, the coolest, bestest example ever: Way back in 1994 (when I watched a lot more commercial, being-made-right-this-minute television than the oh, NONE I watch now), I saw a trailer for The Stand miniseries. Hmm, said I, this looks interesting. Think I'll watch it, but OMG, it's on in just a couple of weeks and of course it was a book first and of course I have to read the book first. And of course, I'd never read the book because eww, it was Stephen King and I never even dreamed of reading Stephen King, because, well, I just didn't read all that horror stuff (Now I lecture people who say they "don't like Stephen King" without reading a word he wrote). Give me a multi-book Arthurianesque fantasy series over that stuff, any day (a short pause here for retroactive facepalming, please). But I decided to read The Stand anyway because I wanted to see the series and my purism won out.
So I did--I read it at the stove, in the car, in the bathroom, at my mother's house, my friend's house, the fecking Newport Folk Festival, because I just couldn't put the damn thing down. It was like a hundreds-of-pages-long jawdrop. And I was gone, completely captivated by the story and SK's writing style. When I finished, I did what I always do when I find a new author (Stephen King as a New Author pretty much illustrates my knack for Finding Things Late)--obsessively hunted for anything else he'd written that I could get my hands on. What I got my hands on first was this, which started my epic love affair with Roland's story (which, surprise! Is a multi-book fantasy series with connections to Arthur) and also gave me a love for dark fantasy that I still have today. And yay, I did see the miniseries, in which there was much scary goodness and a great soundtrack. And unto us was given Gary Sinise. And lo, it was good:
I'm very much a six degrees kind of person. After I saw Ewan McGregor in The Phantom Menace, I hurt my back and was out of work for two weeks. The upside was that I couldn't do much but stay home and watch movies. Consequently I ended up watching most of the rest of Ewan's film repertoire (and seeing how his talent was totally wasted in TPM, say sorry, sai Lucas), which was where I discovered Velvet Goldmine, which became my favourite film of all time, ever. Six degrees of TPM also introduced me to a lot of Liam Neeson's films. Michael Collins was one of them, and because of it, I renewed my interest in Irish history. So yeah, six degrees is a good way to stumble into things.
But that's not what I wanted to talk about.
I wanted to talk about the draft Slings & Arrows.
I still maintain that it's all moonlight69's fault, because she's the one who brought due South from somewhere in the middle of my Things to Watch When I Get Around To It list right up to the top of my OMG, How Could I Ever Have Lived Without This? list. She gave me a Round Tuit, as it were, so in my usual obsessive focussed way I saw all four seasons in, I dunno, maybe two weeks? Something like that, and I'm forever in her debt for it. moonlight69 also provided one of my Very Favourite Moments in Fandom: Not two minutes into RayK's first scene ever, she said, deadpan, and I quote: "Okay, he's hot."
I admit to sporfling wildly at this. Because of course, he is:
Anyway, um. I'm not going to go on and on about how much I love dS because I do that all the time and I probably will again. Suffice it to say that if you haven't seen it, you should. As in you simply must, this is an order, full stop.
Anyway (Apparently I say "anyway" a lot. Cry your pardon), in the short time I've been 6-degree-ing around the dS oeuvre, I've discovered a lot of very cool stuff, like Wilby Wonderful (which anyone who has a heart should see) and Hard Core Logo (which, besides all the grit and angst and intensity and OMGBilly, I love simply because HCL was my virtual introduction to the indescribably talented Hugh Dillon, poet.), and also Falling Angels which I need to see again soon because it's character-driven and so well-done and I love a good dark comedy so very much, and this one's darkdark.
*ahem* So anyway, yes. Slings & Arrows.
I think I've found my new Favourite Thing, television-wise. And miracle of miracles, it hasn't been off the air for a million years! It's not even finished airing yet. And woah, it's actually quality television. The characters are 3-D and believable: I actually care about them and what happens to them, even the non-sympathetic ones. I love character-driven stories that rest on storytelling and characterisation instead of trendy hairdos and bad jokes and laugh tracks. I've only seen up to episode 2.01, but I can't imagine it doing anything but getting even better. I'm a big fan of behind-the-scenes stories and intelligent humour, and this series has both. Witty and smart, S&A is good television. Rare, that.
And yay for good acting! The cast oozes talent out of their collective pores. I think the weakest of the cast talentwise is Rachel McAdams' Kate, which is a little ironic since she's actually a Rising Star, at least here in America. Her character's kind of boring to me, so maybe that's why I'm all mneh about her. But really, they all work ensemble so well, she's carried just fine, and she's not in the other seasons. At least I don't think so. And the rest of the cast is just lovely--vain, damaged Ellen and Dead!Oliver and rational, nervous, underhanded but ultimately sweet Richard. And AmericanMovieStar!Jack with his nervous stomach and w00bieness and gorgeous parallels and soliloquys that make my breath catch. I want to bake him cookies and cuddle him. *sigh* When this show is finished I'll miss all of them almost as if I'd known them. Which means it must be good because the whole point of storytelling is to make the tale come alive and the characters real. Lovely, completely lovely.
And oh, my, Geoffrey Tennant. Holy shit.
I could spend days writing fecking sonnets to this unstable, damaged, broken, beautiful man whose craziness and instability and angst make him the sanest character in the story. How could I do anything except fall completely in love with him? I've added him to my list (I have way too many mental lists) of Favourite Characters Ever. Granted I haven't seen a huge amount of Paul Gross' work, but I don't know how anything can be better than this. He's very, very good --I literally can't take my eyes off him (and no, it's not just because he has, without exception, the loveliest mouth on the planet):
No, really, it's his presence onscreen that draws me, the way he fills every available inch of space with it. A lot of times that kind of screen/stage/ presence doesn't work in ensemble, but here it does because Geoffrey is supposed to be commanding and intense and just that much more there than everyone else. It's especially true in the scenes shot on stage. Geoffrey Tennant could recite soliloquys to me every day and I'd be very happy, so I would.
If you haven't seen S&A, you definitely should, and if you don't know where to go to find it, I could probably help you. :) Because y'all should see it, and not just for the pretty:
Pretty, pretty man. Pretty, pretty mouth. Sonnets, hell, I could write sestinas to that mouth. (Hmm. I remember saying somewhere that I wasn't going to fall prey to Paul Gross Hysteria. *shrugs* Oh, well. Things change, people change. Erm.)
But really. See above paragraph. It's about more than objectification here, kids.
Okay, I'll really stop blithering now. I'm sure you've all enjoyed hearing me go on and on. Yeah, right. Um.
In other news, here's a picture of moonlight69's cat Tenchi. He's a cat, and also a doorstop:
And here's a picture of my new tat, taken the day I got it (it's all peeled and looks better now):
If you're ever in Eugene, Oregon and want a quality tattoo in a nice clean space, go to Sacred Space Tattoo. They have a bunch of specials, which is nice, too. Wulff is the owner and he did mine, The coolest thing is that he actually knew the source of my drawing. It was ka, obviously. :)
That's all. For your patience, here's a song I first heard while stuck in heavy traffic driving through Boston. Another example of stumbling into something I love.
Tom Waits - The Piano Has Been Drinking.
I obviously do not shut up well. Doing it now, for real. The rest, as it were, is silence.
Right now I'll just ramble on about television (insert *gasp* here) and the fannish butterfly effect and stuff.
Most times I find what I love by tripping and falling headlong into it.
For instance, I discovered Melissa Etheridge's music by picking up a tape in a record store (what did they even call record stores in the post-vinyl, pre-CD days?)and asking, "is this any good"? I was told it was, and so I bought her second album, Brave and Crazy (on cassette!) without hearing it. This was years before she became famous, and later I got her first for a dollar in a discount bin. I got to see her in concert at PPAC (which is teenytiny) right before she really started skyrocketing.
I had a sort of similar experience with Morrissey's Late Night, Maudlin Street, except the song was already playing on the loudspeaker when I walked in. I was basically all OMG musthavegimmeegimmee, so I bought the album with the song on it. And, of course, snailmailed a handwritten copy of the lyrics (just the lyrics, mind you, with no title or explanation whatsoever) to songdog, who was all, wtf? She did come to like the song quite a bit, though. :)
And okay, the coolest, bestest example ever: Way back in 1994 (when I watched a lot more commercial, being-made-right-this-minute television than the oh, NONE I watch now), I saw a trailer for The Stand miniseries. Hmm, said I, this looks interesting. Think I'll watch it, but OMG, it's on in just a couple of weeks and of course it was a book first and of course I have to read the book first. And of course, I'd never read the book because eww, it was Stephen King and I never even dreamed of reading Stephen King, because, well, I just didn't read all that horror stuff (Now I lecture people who say they "don't like Stephen King" without reading a word he wrote). Give me a multi-book Arthurianesque fantasy series over that stuff, any day (a short pause here for retroactive facepalming, please). But I decided to read The Stand anyway because I wanted to see the series and my purism won out.
So I did--I read it at the stove, in the car, in the bathroom, at my mother's house, my friend's house, the fecking Newport Folk Festival, because I just couldn't put the damn thing down. It was like a hundreds-of-pages-long jawdrop. And I was gone, completely captivated by the story and SK's writing style. When I finished, I did what I always do when I find a new author (Stephen King as a New Author pretty much illustrates my knack for Finding Things Late)--obsessively hunted for anything else he'd written that I could get my hands on. What I got my hands on first was this, which started my epic love affair with Roland's story (which, surprise! Is a multi-book fantasy series with connections to Arthur) and also gave me a love for dark fantasy that I still have today. And yay, I did see the miniseries, in which there was much scary goodness and a great soundtrack. And unto us was given Gary Sinise. And lo, it was good:
I'm very much a six degrees kind of person. After I saw Ewan McGregor in The Phantom Menace, I hurt my back and was out of work for two weeks. The upside was that I couldn't do much but stay home and watch movies. Consequently I ended up watching most of the rest of Ewan's film repertoire (and seeing how his talent was totally wasted in TPM, say sorry, sai Lucas), which was where I discovered Velvet Goldmine, which became my favourite film of all time, ever. Six degrees of TPM also introduced me to a lot of Liam Neeson's films. Michael Collins was one of them, and because of it, I renewed my interest in Irish history. So yeah, six degrees is a good way to stumble into things.
But that's not what I wanted to talk about.
I wanted to talk about the draft Slings & Arrows.
I still maintain that it's all moonlight69's fault, because she's the one who brought due South from somewhere in the middle of my Things to Watch When I Get Around To It list right up to the top of my OMG, How Could I Ever Have Lived Without This? list. She gave me a Round Tuit, as it were, so in my usual obsessive focussed way I saw all four seasons in, I dunno, maybe two weeks? Something like that, and I'm forever in her debt for it. moonlight69 also provided one of my Very Favourite Moments in Fandom: Not two minutes into RayK's first scene ever, she said, deadpan, and I quote: "Okay, he's hot."
I admit to sporfling wildly at this. Because of course, he is:
Anyway, um. I'm not going to go on and on about how much I love dS because I do that all the time and I probably will again. Suffice it to say that if you haven't seen it, you should. As in you simply must, this is an order, full stop.
Anyway (Apparently I say "anyway" a lot. Cry your pardon), in the short time I've been 6-degree-ing around the dS oeuvre, I've discovered a lot of very cool stuff, like Wilby Wonderful (which anyone who has a heart should see) and Hard Core Logo (which, besides all the grit and angst and intensity and OMGBilly, I love simply because HCL was my virtual introduction to the indescribably talented Hugh Dillon, poet.), and also Falling Angels which I need to see again soon because it's character-driven and so well-done and I love a good dark comedy so very much, and this one's darkdark.
*ahem* So anyway, yes. Slings & Arrows.
I think I've found my new Favourite Thing, television-wise. And miracle of miracles, it hasn't been off the air for a million years! It's not even finished airing yet. And woah, it's actually quality television. The characters are 3-D and believable: I actually care about them and what happens to them, even the non-sympathetic ones. I love character-driven stories that rest on storytelling and characterisation instead of trendy hairdos and bad jokes and laugh tracks. I've only seen up to episode 2.01, but I can't imagine it doing anything but getting even better. I'm a big fan of behind-the-scenes stories and intelligent humour, and this series has both. Witty and smart, S&A is good television. Rare, that.
And yay for good acting! The cast oozes talent out of their collective pores. I think the weakest of the cast talentwise is Rachel McAdams' Kate, which is a little ironic since she's actually a Rising Star, at least here in America. Her character's kind of boring to me, so maybe that's why I'm all mneh about her. But really, they all work ensemble so well, she's carried just fine, and she's not in the other seasons. At least I don't think so. And the rest of the cast is just lovely--vain, damaged Ellen and Dead!Oliver and rational, nervous, underhanded but ultimately sweet Richard. And AmericanMovieStar!Jack with his nervous stomach and w00bieness and gorgeous parallels and soliloquys that make my breath catch. I want to bake him cookies and cuddle him. *sigh* When this show is finished I'll miss all of them almost as if I'd known them. Which means it must be good because the whole point of storytelling is to make the tale come alive and the characters real. Lovely, completely lovely.
And oh, my, Geoffrey Tennant. Holy shit.
I could spend days writing fecking sonnets to this unstable, damaged, broken, beautiful man whose craziness and instability and angst make him the sanest character in the story. How could I do anything except fall completely in love with him? I've added him to my list (I have way too many mental lists) of Favourite Characters Ever. Granted I haven't seen a huge amount of Paul Gross' work, but I don't know how anything can be better than this. He's very, very good --I literally can't take my eyes off him (and no, it's not just because he has, without exception, the loveliest mouth on the planet):
No, really, it's his presence onscreen that draws me, the way he fills every available inch of space with it. A lot of times that kind of screen/stage/ presence doesn't work in ensemble, but here it does because Geoffrey is supposed to be commanding and intense and just that much more there than everyone else. It's especially true in the scenes shot on stage. Geoffrey Tennant could recite soliloquys to me every day and I'd be very happy, so I would.
If you haven't seen S&A, you definitely should, and if you don't know where to go to find it, I could probably help you. :) Because y'all should see it, and not just for the pretty:
Pretty, pretty man. Pretty, pretty mouth. Sonnets, hell, I could write sestinas to that mouth. (Hmm. I remember saying somewhere that I wasn't going to fall prey to Paul Gross Hysteria. *shrugs* Oh, well. Things change, people change. Erm.)
But really. See above paragraph. It's about more than objectification here, kids.
Okay, I'll really stop blithering now. I'm sure you've all enjoyed hearing me go on and on. Yeah, right. Um.
In other news, here's a picture of moonlight69's cat Tenchi. He's a cat, and also a doorstop:
And here's a picture of my new tat, taken the day I got it (it's all peeled and looks better now):
If you're ever in Eugene, Oregon and want a quality tattoo in a nice clean space, go to Sacred Space Tattoo. They have a bunch of specials, which is nice, too. Wulff is the owner and he did mine, The coolest thing is that he actually knew the source of my drawing. It was ka, obviously. :)
That's all. For your patience, here's a song I first heard while stuck in heavy traffic driving through Boston. Another example of stumbling into something I love.
Tom Waits - The Piano Has Been Drinking.
I obviously do not shut up well. Doing it now, for real. The rest, as it were, is silence.