Goats

Hey hey! The Mountain Goats are coming to Wellington. Thursday 8 Sept at Bodega. Gonna be there. Woohoo.

nostalgia

A night of red wine and an old friend = nostalgia.

First the music. We remember the two records (vinyl, of course) that SOD and I had in common when we got together (1997). The Fall, I Am Curious Oranj and the 12" of New Order's Blue Monday. Actually not that inidicative of our musical tastes, but an interesting cross-section nonetheless.

We are right now listening to our pick of the bunch, and presently we are listening to one of my Cilla Black records (whom I adore). Paul has fixed our turntable connection. Listening to What the World Needs Now (Bacharach). Romantic childhood music.

Have also been trawling through some old digital snaps. Bought my first digital camera in December 2001 just before heading off to East Timor on a three-month contract for the UN.

Going to Timor was pretty mind blowing. The only time I had been overseas before this was going to Brisbane, Australia with my Nana at age 13. Doesn't really count, eh? So heading off to war-torn East Timor was a bit of a shock. Here are some pics. Beautiful country. Beautiful people. I met some people I will never forget.. Viva Timor Lorosae!

Here's some pics. Maubisse at dawn (the most magnificent view I've seen in my life - the pic doesn't do it justice).



Timorese family at Maubisse.




Grave sites at Maubisse. There are many pre-1999 grave sites. Casualties during the Indonesian occupation were large.




I really want to go back to Timor one day. I know I haven't travelled much, so don't have much to go by. But hey, they is one beautiful country.

Indoctrination at an early age

Listening to: Autechre, Draft



If you're going to indoctrinate your kids you've got to start at 'em early. So say these lovely folk who have put out such a useful book. If you vote don't like paying taxes to look after the poor and disadvantaged then here's the book to convince your kids in a really simplistic way that being greedy and self-centred is not just okay, but admirable. "Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed combines an ingenious story with hilarious illustrations to teach kids about the value of hard work and the threat that taxes pose to the American Dream." – Grover Norquist, president, Americans for Tax Reform.

It just wrong!

tripping around in the red rover

Had a nice afternoon up the coast today. I had organised a photo shoot up in Otaki so most of the afternoon was spent kicking around on the sand. Warm and sunny and made me want summer to hurry the fuck up. Heres' a photo of the beach. Otaki Beach.



Headed over the big hill to Masterton in the weekend. It was so sunny over there - not like cloudy old Wellington. Shiny sun. Kids in the car. Off to see their dad. Caught up with Ben and Ang on the way home and checked out their kitchen-supreme and newly painted Persimmon Lounge. They are my DIY heros. Did the usual buy-up of fresh veg and some yummy manuka honey. Blah blah, boring incidentals.

It's nice to get out of Welly - just don't do it often enough. I love to drive the red rover. Can't wait for my trip down south in a couple of weeks. vroom vroom go red rover.

Kicking around home tonight. Should be doing some work - I'm such a slavedriver of a boss to myself. Always making myself work weekends and evenings. I'm a crap boss. Although I did just let myself lay around on the couch watching John Safran vs God on DVD. The final episode devoted to his exorcism was creepy. John was making some scary demon noises. John, I didn't think you were that kind of boy. Anyway, it was a great series. I just hope the next series he makes isn't him teaming up with that freaking exorcist roaming around Australia casting out the devil. But really, he did seem to be taking the casting-out-satan thing a bit seriously. And so did the camera guys.

Okay, on to the work now. Sadly so.

My Big Fat Film List

Okay, I said I was gonna do it, so here it is: all the movies I saw at this year's film festival. No links - feeling lazy. Some ratings added where I can remember if I really liked the film or really hated it.

9 Songs (yep, it was okay really)
Hidden
Cinévardaphoto (excellent)
Délamu
Le Pont des Arts (gorgeous)
Decasia (excellent)
Little Sky
Little Bits of Light (yay, so good)
The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse
The Future of Food
It's All Gone Pete Tong (good for a laugh)
World Mirror Cinema (made me fall asleep - and I like slow films...)
Tony Takitani (stylish and beautiful)
3-Iron
Pin Boy
Mysterious Skin
Late Bloomer (one of the very best)
Fiction Artists (up there with Decasia for experimental film)
Bombón - El Perro
2046 (over-rated - I never really got In The Mood for Love either)
Godzilla Final Wars (crazy and fun)
A Decent Factory
Grizzly Man (excellent)
In the Realms of the Unreal
Yes
Sorceress of the New Piano
The White Diamond (excellent)
The Devil and Daniel Johnston (excellent)
Forty Shades of Blue
Kings and Queen
The Wayward Cloud (I did not enjoy this much at all, but can't say it's a bad film - I just found it disturbing)
Czech Dream (excellent)
Kekexili: Mountain Patrol (excellent)
Occupation: Dreamland (great)
Rize (woohoo! loved it so much)
Bill Morrison Short Films (very cool)
Inside\Out (great)
Broken Flowers (not Jarmucsh's best, but good)
Duck Season (beautiful and funny)
Dig! (good music doco)
The Edukators (great)
Look Both Ways
Darwin's Nightmare (great but frightening doco)
Monster Road
Tarnation (great! but a little morally repugnant in a way)

taking the piss out of art

Got sent links to some extremely funny piss-take songs by The Histrionics.

Check out:

From their album Never Mind the Pollocks (I just love that title)
Hip to Paint Squares
Me and My Third Hand

From their album The Histrionics
Tracey (as in Tracey Emin)
I Shot Andy Warhol (I imagined this was going to be to the tune of I Shot the Sheriff, but no, it's to I Love Rock'n'Roll)

Thanks for the links Ben and Ange!

masochistic tendencies

Not only did I join WeightWatchers today, I also joined the fricking gym. I already had the idea of joining the gym but it became a little more obvious that I needed it when I did the weigh-in at WeightWatchers - I hadn't weighed myself in ages and it was a little alarming. Soooo, I'm off to the gym tomorrow for the first time. Need to get some of those silly gym clothes. I don't have any of that kind of stuff cos I'm just not that kind of person. I think my body is in for a rude shock. I'm not going to divulge my weight here, but I will update the blog on how much I lose.

I wonder how many hits I'll get for people searching for "masochistic tendencies". Well they won't find much of interest here unless they have a strange fetish for weight loss and excercise...

blogger block

Listening to: Elliot Smith from a basement on the hill

Haven't blogged for a while and all my most recent blogs have been about films. Seeing shitloads of films all in one go does something weird to my brain. I still haven't quite recovered. It's like my brain got all filled up with images and ideas from the films and my grey matter is still sorting and deciphering on the fly and there isn't any room for anything else yet. I get mental images from the films every now and then jumping into other thoughts. Sometimes when I try to think about some of the films they get jumbled up with other ones. I'm thinking that something about the way my brain works now is not as sharp as it used to be. I used to have a real sharp brain (I like to think) but at times I go to pluck for a word from my brain and I get a blank. Like, I don't even smoke weed so I can't used that as an excuse, so I guess I have to put it down to being over 40 now. It all sucks. And then there's the effect of ageing on my body which I don't want to think about at all. I noticed the other day that I have the beginnings of an "old lady neck" where gravity is starting to do it's nasty nasty work and there's no holding it back. Fuck I hate it. I don't feel at all like a 41-year-old but I'm sure starting to look it. The old metabolism is slowing down and I'm even sending myself off to Weightwatchers next week. Yuck yuck yuck! It makes me feel shabby and it's such a boring thing to be doing. I have way better things to do with my time.

Anyway, cheered myself up with some music purchases. First a big bunch of stuff at Real Groovy along with some new CD shelves to replace the big messy piles of CDs that my office usually full of. Which made me realise how few CDs I actually have - they looked a lot more impressive in their wonky piles, but a bit hard to sift through. So of course I had to buy more so I went off to the Big Smoke sale at Smoke CDs. Was served my lovely friend Jules which was very nice. My favourite buy was Venetian Snares.

I'm really procrastinating right now cos I'm meant to be doing stinky old work. I have a couple of deadlines at the moment. Also, I can't invoice these jobs till they are done and I need the money rolling in. SOD and I are off to the South Island for a short road trip. Taking the little Red Rover rather than flying. Will be down in Christchurch for the opening of Mr Couper's show so hanging with Matt and Jo that night will be sweet. BUT we are going to miss Ben's show at Aratoi in Masterton. Most annoyed, but just didn't check the goddamn dates before organising our trip.

Okay gotta do some stinky work.

I'm pooped

It's all over. I saw 43 films this year. Yay! Will post a list soon. But for now, it catching-up-on-work time. Boo hiss.