A little snag

The new Mercury Rev is available for all to purchase today. It's sweeping and gorgeous and lovely and wonderful.

My poor baby snaggletooth doggie is at the vet today. He has been limping since mid-day Sunday. I couldn't see anything wrong and close inspection didn't reveal anything. The doctor thinks its either a sprain or arthritis. He'll get pain meds and a nice bath. Poor love, he hates going to the vet and I hate having to leave him there. At least he gets to come home this afternoon.

I took this picture of my old man while we were waiting for the doctor to see us. Those teeth just kill me. He's such a sweet, cute old baby! (For those of you who may be curious, I have his teeth checked fairly regularly. He doesn't have too many left, he's always had bad teeth and the vet has been forced to pull a bunch of them over the years. The two you see in the photo have been drifting south for several years now. Yes, he eats hard food and he is in pretty great shape for an old man!)

Strange Attraction

All of us are lucky people today. Mercury Rev has released its new instrumental album Strange Attractor today. It's completely free to download, you simply must visit Mercury Rev's official site and sign up for the mailing list. They will send you a link so that you can access the download. The companion album Snowflake Midnight will be released on Yep Roc records tomorrow.

If you like scientifically-minded psychedelic rock freak-outs, then my goodness, this is for you! I'm listening right now and loving every second. Beware: Mercury Rev are the new-age cousins of the Flaming Lips and can come off as really, really hippified. As much as I love metal and punk, there's none to be found here. Mercury Rev is a band I adore because they are complete weirdos who make exactly the sort of music they want to make, always forge their own path and never conform to mainstream expectations. In that respect I suppose they are PUNK AS F#^K!

Also, if you missed the All Things Considered interview yesterday, then click here for info and streaming audio.

Gotta get up on it

The new film Choke was released Friday and I'm desperate to see it. Sam Rockwell, yes thank you! I have had to work all weekend and haven't hit the theatre. I just found out that the movie didn't perform so well at the box office, it opened outside of the top 10. Yikes. Guess I had better hit the theatre one night this week cause I don't want to miss this one. It's moved up to the top of my list, right in front of Burn After Reading.

Bugger it!

I was misinformed, I tell ya!

MISINFORMED!

The Mercury Rev interview will apparently air tomorrow, Sunday Sept 28th at 5:00 pm. Maybe it got bumped because of the debates and Paul Newman (R.I.P.). Still, I've been sitting here with my dumb crappy radio listening intently to good 'Mericans who were interviewed about the debates while they were shopping at Home Depot.

Tomorrow, All Things Considered, Mercury Rev. Fingers crossed.

Mercury Rev on "All Things Considered"

As my clever post title indicates, my musical heroes Mercury Rev will be featured on NPR's "All Things Considered" today, Saturday September 27th. Check your local stations for air time, though the program should be available for streaming online, too.

Local folks can hit up 89.5 WHRV at 5:00 pm for the radio broadcast. I brought my sad little old radio to work so that I can listen since the evil folks over at the city IT department make sure we can't access any streaming media from our city computers.

In delightfully related news, I received an e-mail notifying me that my copy of "Snowflake Midnight" has been shipped! On Tuesday each and every one of us will be able to download the companion album "Strange Attractors" absolutely free! It's a dream come true. I love you, Mercury Rev.

That bunny on the cover of "Snowflake Midnight" is the bunny I dreamt about a month or so ago. I dreamt that I accidentally hurt it, I think I stepped on it and opened up a gash on its chest. It was bleeding and was going to die. I was devastated. I set the rabbit on my chest so that the gash was against my skin. I petted the bunny and calmed it. We laid that way in bed for two weeks, and once the two weeks had past, the bunny was completely healed.

The coolest thing!

I am so excited! Do you recall my posts regarding Wristcutters: A Love Story and the beautiful, enchanting dog Foxie? Foxie is my favorite dog in a movie ever. I finally checked my e-mail and found that Foxie's owner found my blog and sent me a lovely comment. Thank you!

Best of all, Foxie has her own MySpace page! This is great, go visit and check out pictures of Foxie (even pictures of Tom Waits carrying her around). It appears that Foxie's owner is a beautiful model. The dog's full name is evidently Foxie Reynolds. Wish she could meet Whitey Thomas, they'd be great friends.

Foxie lives in Brooklyn. I'm so disappointed that I didn't get to see her on my visit there last weekend. :( Maybe next time.

I am definitely getting a Cockamo one day.

A Rose is a Rose

The first thing I did in New York was get a cab to Leah's place. The second thing was to hit Chelsea to find the Jonathan Levine Gallery. Contained within until Oct 4th is "Ambien Somnambulants", the new exhibition of recent work from Camille Rose Garcia, one of my favorite artists working today. And oh boy, was it glorious! Garcia's work in print is lovely, but in person its stunning. The details are incredible, touches of black glitter and slight texture only add to the surrealist dreamscapes she creates. I wish that I had about 17,000 extra dollars lying around so that I could have one of my very own to love every day. Instead I picked up a lovely free poster.

In my life I have been very deeply affected by art exhibits, but only rarely. My life changed on a day in November 1998 in London when I stumbled upon the Victoria and Albert's showing of Aubrey Beardsley's work. Now I have 3 tattoos by or inspired by Beardsley! Then my husband and I saw Yayoi Kusama's exhibit of Eternity/Modernity at the Kyoto Museum of Modern Art in January 2005 and it was truly breathtaking. Now I've seen Camille Rose Garcia, and I had some of the same stirrings of emotion and a similar jaw-dropping reaction. Garcia's fusion of the bizarre and disturbing with remarkably lush and beautiful imagery is a wondrous thing to behold. I could write about how her work is influenced by politics and modern society's slow, brutal destruction of our planet and how people medicate themselves to live in a sort of denial-infused fugue state. However, the reality is that I just really think the work is very pretty. Very pretty indeed.

Hola amigos!

I'm back from the insanity of New York City! It was wonderful and crazy and exhausting and a terrific experience.

In the past week, I've been to 1 David Byrne show, 2 Indigo bellydance shows, 2 Yard Dogs Road Shows, 3+ hrs of yoga classes and 4 hrs of dance workshops. I've walked about 150,000 miles. I've slept a total of 13 hrs (it feels that way). It was marvelous and I am just so happy to know that I'm not so old and decrepit that I am incapable of physical activity. I may be tired and sore but I'm not dead!

I have so much to write, but I can't cause I have to catch up on work. So I'll start with a couple of random details.

I had the best fried chicken I've ever tasted at a little Asian fusion restaurant in SoHo. It had a ginger mayo sauce and it was light and crispy and delicious and I wish I knew the name of that ding dang restaurant.

Leah is delightful and she's an excellent yoga instructor. I took two classes with her and they were amazing. One girl who took the class is a big yoga fanatic from San Fransisco who was visiting with a friend. I heard her exclaim as she exited with her friend "Dude! That was so f^c#ing awesome!" And it was really f'ing awesome. Plus, Leah's new man is super nice. I dig him.

The Birchmere in Alexandria is weird. You eat there and watch the show from a weird angle. Most seats are perpendicular to the stage so you have to twist around and it's uncomfortable.

The Yard Dogs Road Show is an extraordinary experience. They tour as a band but each member has some interesting talents. The most amazing was Tobias the Mystic Man, who performed a feat so incredible that I am still reeling from amazement.

I got to go to kidrobot store which was everything I had hoped it would be. I spent way too much money on little plastic toys. The Anna Sui store is still my favorite shop in the whole wide world and I would live there if I could. Seriously, I would move there. I have decorated my second bedroom to resemble that shop and it makes me so happy. It's glorious and I am so happy that I got to go back there and get treasures.

I also happened upon Earwax records in Brooklyn. I think I've ended up there each and every time I've been to New York. Every time I find something cool and unexpected, like the amazing new album by the Tindersticks that I'm listening to as I type this.

The Spieglworld Spiegeltent is truly an wondrous place.

The Indigo bellydancers are my heroes, particularly the beautiful Mardi Love who I had the pleasure of taking a workshop with on Sunday.

Best of all, I am so happy to be home to my dog and kitties and husband.
More soon on the Yard Dogs Road Show and more!

Check this

I was just reviewing items acceptable for carry on luggage for flights. Did you know that you CAN INDEED check the following items:
meat cleavers, cattle prods, starter pistols, spear guns, ice picks, swords & sabers

They can't be carried onto the plane, but you can check your cattle prod so that it will be waiting for you in your destination city!

Good to know.

David Byrne was excellent. More on that later, but must pack for my journey.

Another new obsession

I just watched the pilot episode (titled "Pie-lette") of the television show "Pushing Daisies" at it was marvelous. It's just about the cutest thing ever. I'm in love (again, yes, I know, I'm in love every week with something random and new). I can't wait to watch more! However, I'm exhausted and it's night-night time now.

I love Pushing Daisies. I love it so much!

Here he comes

Here comes Speed Racer!

The Wachowski Brothers' box office disappointment, Speed Racer, is available today on DVD & Blu-Ray. I think I need this one on Blu-Ray! If you are okay with a non-existent plot, then I highly recommend this candy-colored cartoon dream. It requires no brain activity on the viewer's part and it's lovely to look at. It's like entering a very pretty colorful world for two hours. I recommend having a very sweet, sugary snack to munch on while viewing to complete your Speed Racer experience. Warning: this film could induce a diabetic coma from visual overstimulation!

More Cure stuff is out today. It was raining outside but it has stopped for now. I can't tell if my boss is in a good mood or a bad mood (I get the feeling that the slightest bit of bad news could put him over the edge and into a foul mood).

Three random tidbits

This weekend, the following occurred:

1. My boss made me do a 300-piece mailing on Saturday morning and it made for a horrible workday. Saturday workdays almost always stink, so I shouldn't have been surprised.

2. Watched Underworld and Underworld: Evolution back-to-back Saturday night. Lovely mindless entertainment.

3. Went into a store yesterday and because I heard The Cure coming from inside. Walked away $50 lighter and with a slightly larger wardrobe, which I didn't need at all. Then I proceeded to go buy all the new Cure singles that I had sort of forgotten about. The Cure is back to sounding pretty good again.

I *heart* NYC

Thanks to Benders Books & Comics (!!!), I received a pass for two to a sneak preview of the new film Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist this past Tuesday. I'm not sure why, but I was all of a sudden very excited to see the movie. I decided that Matt and I had to attend the sneak preview cause there was no way that I could possibly wait until the release date of Oct 3rd to see it.

The movie started off rather bland and the characters were a bit grating. About 15 minutes into the movie, things get rolling and I started to fall in love a little. The premise of the film is a bit contrived and predictable. Nick's shallow, superficial girlfriend has just broken up with him and he's reeling and licking his wounds by making sentimental mix CDs for her. He and his bandmates hit the town looking for a secret gig by their favorite band, Where's Fluffy?. Meanwhile, Norah and her inebriated best friend are also hitting the town searching for Fluffy. Paths cross, hearts flutter. The drunken best friend goes missing so Nick, Norah and the Nick's gay bandmates hit the streets of New York to find her (and Fluffy) while trying to dodge sketchy ex-boyfriends & ex-girlfriends. The shots of New York City are so lush that it made even more excited (if that's even possible!) for my trip next week.

Filled with some great music (Richard Hawley, no less!) and some rather cool cameos (indie band Bishop Allen shows up, as does cult folk hero Devendra Banhart), Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist is hokey yet somehow believable and sweet. Nick is played by Michael Cera of Juno and Superbad fame. He plays THE EXACT SAME GUY as he played in those other movies, which is just fine by me. He's got that character nailed, so he might as well milk it while he can. Kat Dennings (Catherine Keener's daughter in The 40 Year Old Virgin) is lovely as Norah. Though corny and a little formulaic, this is a great date movie and a more intelligent alternative to so many romantic comedies, especially one targeted towards a young audience. The gay characters are treated respectfully and casually, without any "messages" or stigma attached to them. Best of all, teenage drinking is not glamorized in any way and the straight-edge kids are our heroes. For half a second, I actually felt a little bit cool.

Get yer ya yas

My husband got lots of ya yas last night. NO! Not that kind of ya ya, you perverts. He bought a real deal Ms. Pac-Man arcade game cocktail table, the kind you see occasionally in restaurants. He's so excited, he says he's fulfilled a childhood dream. I'm glad he fulfilled his dream. Now I can go to New York and fulfill my dream of spending silly money on stupid junk I don't need in the most reckless manner possible.

For good times, go visit the Film Drunk website. The elitist movie snobs over there make me laugh so hard I cry at least once a week. It's my favorite work time waster other than posting to this blog.

Lastly, ToggleSwitch sent me a link today. This is an article about one of my favorite bands, Mercury Rev, and their quest for music via science. Check it out: http://tinyurl.com/65xlgh . They're so wonderful and close to my heart. They're also perhaps the best live band I've seen. I need to post a list of my top 5 favorite live shows ever, though now that I'm getting old all the specific dates have long since left my addled brain. Mercury Rev definitely makes the top 5. Reminder, new album on the 30th!

Random stuff from the weekend

Tropical storm Hanna showed up and they cancelled crappy Bay Days. Yay! Suck it, Hornsby!

It rained a little but we never lost power. An extremely large tree branch snapped and miraculously fell right in between our hedges and our house. Six inches in either direction and we might have had a crisis.

Matt and I got to snuggle up and watch tons of movies. Dark City on Blu-Ray was pretty luscious. Tropic Thunder at the theatre was pretty hilarious. Eagle vs. Shark has Jemaine Clement from Flight of the Conchords. It was sort of New Zealand's answer to Napoleon Dynamite and it was much better than I expected. I want to get a copy of Penelope and now also one of Eagle vs. Shark.

I learned how to play Yahtzee and I walloped poor Matt again and again.

Finally, I watched the new Criterion edition of Night on Earth that I got for my birthday. It was Matt's first time seeing it and he loved it. I adored it, I always will love it. That film started my love affair with independent cinema. My grandmother took me to the Kimball Theatre in Williamsburg to see it in early 1992 when I had just turned 14. I wanted to see it because I read that Winona Ryder was in it (remember back in 1992 when Winona Ryder was still the coolest girl on the planet?). I got a lot more than I bargained for, of course. The film was amazing, plus I heard the voice of Tom Waits for the first time and I was hooked. My grandmother bought me the soundtrack on cassette not longer after and it's still one of my most beloved treasures. Now here we are, 16 years later and Night on Earth is still just as wonderful and funny and heartbreaking as it was when it was first released.

Nothing

I just ate a nothing sandwich. That's two pieces of plain white bread held together with nothing in between. It was pretty good.

I want this

It's Junko Mizuno's creation for KidRobot's new Dunny5 series. Yum yum! It's rare so I'll probably have to hit up ebay. Still, wish me luck cause it might be in one of the blind boxes I just ordered! Oh, it's so cute I can't stand it.

Always...

Always expect and prepare for the worst and therefore you will never be disappointed. This is my life philosophy and it has rarely let me down. Today tickets for all single events for our upcoming season went on sale. I prepared for a ticket sales nightmare. Instead, things were busy but manageable and everything has gone very smoothly. I am so relieved, especially after this past weekend's magic show hell. I know that there must be a special place in hell for me, and it probably concerns me working endless "family fun" shows for all eternity.