David Garrett / Carmen Phantasie

Thanks to my friend Christina, I have found a new violinist to follow. PBS aired a concert of his last night, and I instantly fell in love with his style that blends Classical violin pieces and modern rock and pop songs. He can play the Classics pure and still rock out with the modern pieces, as well as blend them together. I guess I know which CD I'll be buying next...

epic fail

Yesterday afternoon I went to the new Transformers movie, Revenge of the Fallen. I tried to have an open mind going in, because even though the one review I had seen online was absolutely scathing, many of my facebook acquaintances had loved it. And it's generally okay for there to be a summer movie that's all about explosions, as long as it presents itself well.

But this movie was just bad. And not in a low-budget, slapped-together way that's merely not good. Movies that aren't good come out all the time and make their way quietly to the $5 bin at WalMart about a month after the initial DVD release. Then there those campy movies that poke fun at themselves by being intentionally bad. The Librarian springs to mind. I enjoy a movie like that, as long as it's clear that they aren't taking themselves seriously. And in a class all by themselves are those movies that are totally, monumentally bad in every way and are clearly taking themselves far too seriously the entire time. Transformers 2 is that movie. It's the sort of movie that makes me want to sing the opening song from The Producers as I walk out of the theater:

He's done it again
He's done it again
Max Bialystock has done it again!
We can't believe it
You can't conceive it...

How'd he achieve it?

It's the worst show in town!
We sat there sighing
Groaning and crying
There's no denying
It's the worst show in town!

Oh, we wanted to stand up and hiss...

We've seen shit...

But never like this!

Just substitute Michael Bay for Max Bialystock (ooh, ironic name similarities!) and the sentiment is the same.

If I were to detail to you the entirety of the badness of the movie, it would take all day and I would be giving it more time and publicity than it deserves. And I'm not concerned that everything I'm about to write is a major spoiler--if you haven't seen it yet I urge you not to waste your time or money (although, it could be fun to rent some day when you need a good laugh). So here's a short list of the top several reasons this movie fails:

1. Optimus Prime has the most over-dramatic dialogue of all time, and his final line has nothing to do with the movie.

2. Sam's mother is worse than a caricature--no human being could be that pathetically ridiculous. And making her get high off marijuana brownies when they move Sam to college is just in poor taste, although it did almost make me forget her over-the-top crying breakdown as they were packing to leave.

3. Sam's girlfriend Mikaela embodies every female stereotype I've ever heard of, which really shouldn't be possible, since so many of them are conflicting. She is at the same time flighty and clingy, needy and overly assertive, composed "warrior goddess" who takes on decepticons single-handedly and panicky girl who almost gets them killed by screaming. I realize her only real purpose is to distract the male members of the audience enough between explosions so that they don't realize how ridiculous everything is, but seriously, Bay could have at least picked her lines as carefully as he chose her clothing to allow for the maximum amount of boob jiggling without actually falling out.

4. Gratuitious shots of humping dogs are, by definition, gratuitous, and do absolutely nothing for the story. A miniature Decepticon doing the same thing to Mikaela's leg is even worse.

5. The super-hot robot chick is an impossibility unexplained by anything before or after the scene in which she appears and is subsequently killed. How is it that this one Decepticon can hide not as an automobile, but as a college co-ed? If she was that advanced, she should have been harder to kill. I think the only reason she got to be in the movie was so that the director could call for a shot up her skirt and justify it by using the angle to show her robot tail coming out.

6. The giant Decepticon does not need giant wrecking ball testicles. That just isn't funny.

7. You made Agent Simmons move in with his mother and become the random-ultra nerd-turned-hero? What? He wasn't cool enough in the first movie to get that part now, and the underwear shot that scarred me for life is so beyond unnecessary.

8. Sam's commitment issues are not cute. You may think it's resolved at the end, Michael Bay, but you are so wrong.

9. The Tomb of the Primes is two inches behind a 7th Century (maybe later, but certainly not earlier) Christian fresco in a random desert temple, and no one has found it before now? I don't think so. By the story's timeline, the Primes were there since 7000 BC, and I think whoever built the temple and later decorated it would have been rather more observant than that.

10. All the new Autobots are either completely flat characters or ethnic stereotypes. Not cool.

11. Were they trying to make Sam Witwicky into Harry Potter? They've got the teen angst and general outsider tendencies covered, easily. Add in a scene of him dead and talking with wise, departed ancients before returning to save the day, and all he needs to complete the similarity is glasses, a wand, real friends, a soul, a story that is complex and actually makes sense...

12. Optimus' final battle against the Fallen is over in 2 seconds. Really? The fallen is a Prime and can only be defeated by a Prime (hence the waiting on his diabolical plan until Optimus is out of the way), so shouldn't they be evenly matched enough to make a good battle sequence? All Optimus needs to defeat his fallen brother is a resurrection and some rocket boosters? After all the buildup, I expected more. For shame, Michael Bay, wasting a perfectly good opportunity to add more violence to a film that already involved more death, destruction and explosions than I would expect from 2012 (a new movie about the end of the world--the preview was before Transformers).

13. The overly dramatic chopper flyover with muted choir in the midst of battle as Sam "dies" was so overdone I almost burst out laughing. Clearly the director thinks this is a serious action movie with deep philosophical gems buried so deep only explosions of the highest magnitude can bring them forth.

I will admit that Sam's roommate was fun--Leo the conspiracy theory website guy was a good call and made me smile.

But the best part of the whole experience was probably seeing the new Harry Potter trailer. Now that's a movie that should not disappoint!

-Kim

story time

My friends from writing group have been published! Dale and Caleb have both had short stories published in web magazines recently. They received very little money, but it's a start. As writing credits like these build up, more prominent publishers start to take notice. And it's a good sign for the writers group, showing that our efforts to make each other better writers are paying off. You can read their stories online here:

8 Minutes - Caleb Jordan Schulz

Program Orange - Dale Carothers

I'm proud of them for getting their names out and making real progress on getting larger works published and moving toward the elusive goal of someday actually being paid to write. It gives me hope that I will someday be able to do the same. But it also sparks another emotion: guilt.

I haven't really been writing this summer. First, I was decompressing after the semester and wanted some time off before diving into it. Then my excuse became the fact that I was working 2 jobs. Granted, they do keep me running around, but it's not actually any worse than I've had before. So I really have no excuse for my lack of progress.

I've been trying to be better about this lately. I've been blogging more in an effort to at least put some thoughts in writing on a regular basis, even if it isn't very creative or even interesting. And I've been doing a lot of thinking, which is how my writing process always starts. But I think it's time to move beyond the thinking stage and leap into a project again. I'm not ready to go back to the bear story, because I have a few more things to sort out there. Also, I have 2 sequels in my head for that world and keep having trouble concentrating on only one.

So what will I write? I'm going to try a short story again, something I haven't done for a while. I usually don't bother with shorter pieces because I have a tendency to make stories far too complicated. But that's why trying something short could be a good exercise for me--give me a chance to do something different since I'm stalled out on the more traditional project. And it has the added bonus of finishing sooner--the novel will take months, while a short story should only take days (at least, to get a semi-coherent draft to work with). The idea, which I won't expound upon here--in order to keep you all in suspense--was sparked last night at Bible study, and I spent my first free hour at the library jotting down notes and planning out a timeline. I have the last sentence, but not the first (although, since I'm not dictating this piece to a stenographer, that's no excuse for not starting).

The most difficult part of this project will probably be keeping myself focused and motivated, even if it gets difficult to keep things short and moving. And actually starting! Don't think of this post as a delay tactic--read it as me psyching myself up to start. And now you, my dear readers, can all hold me accountable to actually get this done.

Wish me luck!

-Kim

romance and zombies

I've been reading a lot of "girly" books lately. Not that this should be any big surprise, as I have already read the entire Austen canon and loved them all, but usually I read them interspersed with fantasy novels or Sci-Fi, which tends to be written with a more masculine audience in mind. At the moment, however, I am reading both Jane Eyre and Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South (It was suggested by Katie while I was home, and yesterday it appeared in the book return at work, so I picked it up.). I'm usually a one book at a time person, but the inability to care about or finish People of the Book (in spite of my best efforts) has sparked a bad habit of reading only a few chapters at a time and then moving on to something else. I may have to find something new to read that is so good I can't put it down, just to get back on track with my reading.

The last book that drew me in that way was the first in the current series of girlie books, but with an unusual twist. It was Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Much of the text is Austen's original romance, but Seth Grahame-Smith has added hordes or the living dead and made the Bennet sisters warriors of the highest skill. It's amazing how well he has managed to bring in death and mayhem without actually making any major changes in the story line. Of course, this means that while newcomers will still enjoy the gruesome descriptions and illustrations, only a true Austen fan who knows the original will realize the true cleverness of their integration or catch all the jokes.

My favorite part, which had me laughing out loud in the Chicago airport on my way home a few weeks ago, was the scene in which Elizabeth Bennet is first visiting Lady Catherine (known now for her famous skill in the deadly arts and zombie-slaying abilities) and is questioned on her upbringing and training. Instead of asking about whether the governess has left them, she asks if their ninjas have left, and cannot comprehend the idea that five girls could have been brought up without ninjas to defend them in the early years of their training. Ninjas!

Of course, the changes also include a crass joke about Darcy's "most English parts" and gratuitous vomiting, but on the whole it is a good, fun read for anyone who loves Victorian romance and zombies. And if you were afraid it can no longer be taken as serious literature, Seth Grahame-Smith included discussion questions in the back of the book, including what Austen might have been trying to symbolize with the plague of undead spreading across England and, my personal favorite: "Does Mrs. Bennet have any redeeming qualities?"

As ridiculous as the concept may seem at first, the integration of original text and supernatural happenings is so well done that it makes me want to try it myself. Of course, zombies are out at this point, because it wouldn't work just to copy this one. I wonder what I could try instead?

-Kim

Two shifts as a tour guide are now behind me. Friday wasn't too busy, and I was only there in the afternoon, but still got to talk to several people and answer questions. I even met a mother and daughter from Marshall, MN and got to connect about our Midwestern roots--the mom apparently attended SDSU.

On Saturday the highlight of my day didn't come from interacting directly with an individual but simply observing one. One of our visitors was cartoon mouse Speedy Gonzales in human form, right down to the hat. He mustache was even waxed to stick out to the sides, which completed the effect.

Another great part of Saturday was free ice cream on the Common, which I picked up during my lunch break. There was some sort of charity festival going on, and Ben & Jerry's was giving away free samples of their newest ice ream creation--Flipped Out ice cream bowls. After we closed up shop for the day I went to Haymarket (where I intended to buy vegetables, but the fruit was so much more appealing) with Esther, the tour guide team leader and PK. First, though, we had to stop at the parsonage, which I didn't realize was where we were headed until suddenly I was standing in Dr. Hugenberger's living room. Apparently the head pastor and his family are given an apartment at the top of 3 Park Street, one of the several connected buildings in the church complex.

I ended the night with some much needed relaxation, painting my nails green (a personal spring/summer tradition) and watching a favorite movie, Alex and Emma, which I finally realized is set in Boston. The location just didn't matter to me in any of my previous viewings, but now I recognize every place the characters visit on their day out--the Public Garden, a Duck Boat tour at the Museum of Science, and of course the T. Pair that with the fact that it's also a ridiculous comedy about the writing process, and it's a perfect good time for me.

On Sunday I had to be at church insanely early because I was playing the prelude for both morning services with three other string players. I really enjoyed getting to play in a group again, and can't wait until the next opportunity, even if it does mean getting up at 6am on a Sunday.

-Kim

training days

This week has been busy, to say the least. I spent the last three days training with the Park Street Church Freedom Trail tour guide team to prepare to meet the tourists today. Training was actually rather haphazard--our team leader spent the school year in France and is slowly adapting back to speaking English all the time and remembering how the trail worked last year.

Part of the training involved meeting with members of the ministerial staff to discuss how we should answer theological questions and what the church's official stance is on some sensitive issues. It's great to know that the ministers are so supportive of us, and they were constantly reminding us that not only is this a service job, it is community outreach and an opportunity for evangelism, with the right circumstances. I'm still rather nervous to begin, but I think I can handle it.

Also as part of our training, the team walked the Freedom Trail together. Well, most of it. We got the official, costumed guided tour from the visitor's center to Faniuel Hall, and then went on our own to Old North Church (we skipped the sites across the river because we were tired and hungry). The guide was entertaining, but we got to hear firsthand how little they actually say about the history of Park Street Church and the inaccuracies in the speech. It will be good to explain to visitors what it means to be a Congregational church and that the sails of Old Ironsides were not sewn in the church, but in the building previously on the spot, as well as just giving a more full picture of the broad history of the church and the many organizations it began.

The best part of the tour we took was visiting Old North Church. Our team leader was asking questions of one of the guides there, and when she told him who we were, he told us that our status as guides meant we got to have a "special tour." He immediately grabbed a key on a huge ring and led us to through a door in the entryway and up several flights of stairs. Our destination: the steeple. The first level up was a storage room, but then we entered a more attic-esque area of old wooden steps and dust. In all, we went up at least six full sets of twisty, wooden stairs, and numerous short turnings to move upward through the ever-narrowing space. Crys is afraid of heights, so she didn't make it all the way up, but the view from the top was amazing. I can see why this steeple was chosen to give the lantern signal over the river--you can see for miles, and in the days before skyscrapers, it would have been seen for miles as well. We didn't get to stay long, but I made sure to look down on the roof of David and Josiah's apartment below. If only I had brought my camera... (the plan had been to walk the trail on Thurs, but after looking at the weather Esther decided on Wed morning that we should do it that day instead) Old North was also a good stop just to hear how other sites do their tours. Their script is very short, so that gave us a sense of relief about how much we would have to memorize. And really, most of the time we will be answering questions rather than doing scripted tours, which should give us opportunity to remember all the different aspects of the history that might be forgotten in a single recitation.

I also got to poke around in the archive to set up the displays in the welcome center and sanctuary. The archive is rather small, since most of the materials are actually housed at the Congregational Library, around the corner. The archive is located in the basement of 3 Park Street, which used to be a commercial building. The basement has two bank vaults, one of which has been converted into the archive. I can't even describe how exciting it is to see a bank vault door on an archive. It's not locked (the door to the basement is instead), but that's beside the point.

This afternoon, after my shift at the library, I'll be headed back to church for the umpteenth time this week to finally start meeting the tourists. I'm still nervous, but also excited. I think this is going to be a good summer job for me.

-Kim

Beauty of the Ordinary

On my last full day in South Dakota, I woke up in Sioux Falls. On Tuesday I drove down to hang out with a few friends, had a good time, and ended up sleeping at Audrey's place rather than drive back to Brookings in the the middle of the night. Audrey and her family had to get up early and go to work, but she assured me that I could sleep as long as I wanted, so when I got up the house was empty and silent. (Well, not quite, since Adam was still asleep on the basement floor and Audrey's dad was in the shop in the garage, but the point here is the mood.)

I was ready to head out before 9:00am (to get back to Brookings for a shower and a lunch date with Katie), which in the city would be rush hour, but in the country is still a peaceful time.

When I stepped out the front door onto the front porch of the house, I was blindsided by the beauty of a misty country morning. The sky was solid cloud, so the light coming through felt more like early morning than mid-morning. There were no car sounds from the nearby roads, and the house is too far out of town for any of the Sioux Falls background bustle to reach the ears. Instead, all I could hear was the wind in the trees, the leaves dancing, the long grass swaying, morning birds chirping quietly. Such stillness that a small breeze could compose such a symphony.

My breath caught in my throat at the beauty of the moment and my feet froze on the porch, unable to move forward. It was an effort even to walk to the car, though I went slowly. My first instinct, which I had to ignore, was to make tea or cocoa and sit on the porch just to absorb the sound, smell and sight of the South Dakota countryside and store it up for the long months of city life ahead.

A moment like this is impossible in a city, even one so green and open as Boston. The noise never stops. And the sky is so much smaller.

The prairie may not seem as majestic as the mountains or the ocean or as picturesque as sheer cliff faces or giant glaciers to those who have never called it home, but it has a beauty I could never fully describe, and which my mother begins to capture in her amazing work. It is an unassuming beauty that seeps into the soul gradually and takes you over before you realize the scent of dirt has become a perfume. Am I biased because these open skies and seas of grass and grain have always been my home? Perhaps. But I will continue to proclaim their beauty.

As wonderful as my time in Boston has been, and no matter where I end up going from here, I think my heart will always belong to the ordinary beauty of the prairie.

-Kim

Grandma Elsie

Today we drive to Minot, ND to join the rest of the extended family in celebrating grandma Elsie's 90th birthday last month. As part of a group gift to her, we all made pages for a memory book. The photo below is one of the ones I included, and what follows is the text I added to the page.


Grandma,

You’ve always covered me with love. First it was a quilt with nursery characters to delight a young child. Then, when I graduated from high school, you made me a quilt sewn out of memories to take with me as I left home. Now you send me notes and scraps of news from the fabric of your life so I can have something in my mailbox and feel like I’m not so far from home after all. Thank you for your love and all the reminders of it.

Love,

Kim