The Finns do it again

It's amazing the random crap you'll find on wikipedia.

Today, for instance, I was trying to figure out if there actually was a difference between a "choir" and a "chorus". The answer: not really. But on wikipedia's page about choirs, there was a subsection entitled "Shouting Choirs". What's a shouting choir, you might ask? Well, this, apparently.

You owe it to yourself to listen to their rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner. It's just ... there are no words, really. Just listen. And if you speak Finnish (or whatever the hell those people speak), do let me know the director says at the end that's so funny. I like to think it's a witty remark about the Bush administration.

And speaking of teeth...

This has got to be the silliest story on CNN today. Long story short, prosecutors wanted to confiscate the blingified prosthetic teeth the defendants had installed, not knowing they were bonded on to their real teeth.

The two silliest parts:

1) Quoth one dude interviewed,"It sounds like Nazi Germany when they were removing the gold teeth from the bodies, but at least then they waited until they were dead" Yeah, he compared this to the Nazis.

2) The article repeatedly refers to the teeth as "grills". Look, CNN, I know you're trying to be hip, but you sound like the lame White guy trying to impress his Black friends.

Fo' shizzle.

I'll rim your rockrow, baby...

I have a concert this Sunday. And I have a confession to make -- a couple of the songs we're singing make no sense. The fact that they're in English doesn't help.

As an example, we're singing a setting of a poem by Robert Browning called "A Grammarian's Funeral". I've spent a lot of time trying to figure this one out, and I give up. So it's your turn now.

Right away, the title gives you trouble, because what the hell is a grammarian? Well, it's just what it sounds like, actually -- a teacher (i.e., of grammar, I guess). So, having worked that out, here are the first couple of lines:

Let us begin and carry up this corpse,
Singing together.
Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar thorpes
Each in its tether
Sleeping safe on the bosom of the plain,
Cared-for till cock-crow:

So far so good, right? They're leaving their farms and junk to carry the dude's corpse to the burial. Now here's where it gets crazy:

Look out if yonder be not day again
Rimming the rock-row!
That's the appropriate country; there, man's thought,
Rarer, intenser,
Self-gathered for an outbreak, as it ought,
Chafes in the censer.

"Rimming the rock-row"? What the fuck does that mean? And why does it have that exclamation point? It sounds like some kind of slang for gay sex. There's no punctuation between the first two lines... are they supposed to be one sentence? "Look out if yonder be not day again rimming the rock-row!"? That makes even less sense. And what's this crap about man's thought breaking out and chafing in a censer? That's the little smoking ball-thing Catholic priests swing around,* right? What the hell's going on here?

Leave we the unlettered plain its herd and crop;
Seek we sepulture
On a tall mountain, citied to the top,
Crowded with culture!
All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels;
Clouds overcome it;

Ok, back to making sense, more or less. Bury the dude on top of a mountain. Although I'm not 100% sure what it means for a mountain to be "citied" or to be "crowded with culture", or why he feels the need to throw another exclamation point in there, but I've got enough of an idea to let that slide. And apparently, there's a really tall peak with clouds on it. Fine.

No! yonder sparkle is the citadel´s
Circling its summit.
Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights:
Wait ye the warning?
Our low life was the level's and the night's;
He's for the morning.

And we descend into madness again. What's with the "No!"? He was wrong in the last line? Clouds actually don't overcome it? And now there's a castle floating around the top of the mountain? Is the speaker on acid? And then he asks a question ... which doesn't get answered. What the hell does it even mean? Wait me what warning? And I guess the last couple of lines are supposed to be saying something about how this teacher was so awesome that our (i.e., those of us carrying his corpse) lives seem low and dark compared to his awesomeness. And, you know, morning/mourning. Cute.

Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head,
'Ware the beholders!
This is our master, famous, calm and dead,
Borne on our shoulders.

Ok, this line actually makes more sense if you realize that "'ware" isn't actually a contraction for "beware" but instead "we are". Although it seems like the apostrophe should go after the W. And, you know, he could've just said "we're" instead. And again with the fucking exclamation points -- have you ever read that crappy comic strip "Mark Trail"? Everything the characters say either ends with an ellipsis or an exclamation point. This poem reminds me of that.

So, ideas? Comments? Help?

*Insert your own joke about Catholic priests and smoking ball-things.

I was due

I went to the dentist today. First time in quite a while, I'm sorry to say. The good news is my teeth are all still there. And my gums are, on a scale from 1 - 12 where 1 is healthy and 12 is "oh-my-god-that's-gross", apparently a 3.5. The bad news is I have two "small" cavities. One apparently so small that it can be filled without anaesthetic.

Now, I've never had a cavity before, so I'm not quite sure what to expect from this whole "filling" process. That's where they use the drill, right? Wait, maybe I should just look this up on Wikipedia...

Hm, yep, drilling, anaesthetic...sounds fun.

Let that be a lesson, kids -- go to the dentist every 6 months like your mom told you.

Art imitating life

I can't decide if this is one of the worst ideas for a movie ever or the worst idea for a movie ever. How the hell did this get made? And who's going to see it? It's just a bit too voyeuristic to be comfortable.

Actually, I imagine a fair amount of people are going to see it.

...Who struts and frets his hour upon the stage...

I saw a production of King Lear this weekend. And since I'm about to rip it apart, I won't say who did it.

Now, let me start by saying that Lear is my most favorite of Shakespeare's plays. It's got all kinds of good stuff in it -- sword fightin', pun makin', eye pluckin', and, of course, Lear, who is, in my not so humble opinion, one of the best Shakespearian characters evar. Plus, the ending is so goddam tragic (my favorite line: "Howl! Howl! Howl! Howl!") that if you're not crying when you leave the theatre, you are men of stone (as Lear would say) or the production sucked.

I wasn't crying as I left the theatre. I think if I had to choose one word to sum up this production, it would be "distracting".

First of all, the actor who played the Duke of Burgundy/Oswald was distractingly awkward. It's like he was reading his lines from a teleprompter -- he didn't even attempt to actually, y'know, act. Those aren't huge parts, but he made me wince every time he was on stage. Plus, he looked and sounded like he was stoned. Eyes half-closed, slumped over, moving slowly...it was just weird.

Second, the director's eighth-grade kid and some other kid got a bit part playing the recorder. You know, for fanfares and such (because nothing announces a nobleman's entrance like a fanfare played on the recorder). This would have been fine ... except that the two kids played in different keys. Now, I'm all for the liberation of dissonance, but this was just bad. And to make it worse, they actually played over the beginning of that awesome and heart-wrenching scene when Lear is reunited with Cordelia. It was supposed to sound soft and soothing, I guess. It sounded instead like someone strangling a nightingale.

And then there was the actress playing Edgar.

Okay, I have no problem with females playing male parts or vice versa. I mean, Shakespeare's male actors had to play female parts all the time, so why not do the opposite now? The actress who played Kent in this production actually did a pretty good job. But if you're a woman playing a role like Edgar -- who is not, as far as I know, flamboyantly homosexual -- try to be a bit more masculine. That means lower your voice a bit and try to, you know, move like a man would. I swear for the first couple of Edgar's scenes, I thought the director was trying to imply that Edgar had a thing for Edmund. Which is an interesting interpretation, but perhaps not what Willy had in mind. According to her bio in the program, this actress had like a decade of experience working with physical theatre and voice training, so you'd think she'd know that kind of stuff. But apparently, she got this role because the director liked how she played Edgar-as-crazy-Tom. This actress interpreted "crazy beggar" as meaning pulling off some Bob Fossee moves and writhing around on the ground while shifting among various angular poses. Now, if this were not Shakespeare's King Lear, but instead a new one-man show titled "Lear!", that kind of stuff might've actually worked. Instead, it was just weird.

But, you know, besides all that, it was good.

Dancing at Google

I was visiting Google's HQ. They had just hired a whole bunch of people (as they are wont to do, according to my subconscious) who were going through some kind of orientation. Wizard-of-Oz style, everyone I knew was there. The usual cast of characters from high school, yes, but also random people I went to college with. People from my a capella group and my choir. They all seemed really excited and happy. I wondered why I couldn't join them. When I asked the big bouncer-type guy who seemed to be simultaneously guarding them and keeping the riff-raff (i.e., me) away, he responded, "Well, what can you do?"

Let me clarify the emphasis on that question. It was actually, "Well, what can you do?"

I told him about my experence working with 401k plans. He wasn't impressed. Turns out there's a whole course of study all these other folks had pursued that I missed out on, somehow (the "oh no, I forgot to study for my final and put on my pants" dream). The group moved inside, and I followed.

They were taken to a separate room to begin their orientation. I couldn't follow, but I was allowed to wait in the ante room. It was very nicely furnished -- very bright colors, big mirror, comfortable sofa. There was a fancy tea set that I used (I don't actually like tea, but this tasted really good for some reason).

Afterwards, the group moved outside. Again, I wasn't allowed to join them, but I could sort of watch from behind the electrified fence. There was some kind of rock concert going on. Lots of dancing. Again I wondered why I couldn't join them.

My alarm went off. I notice funny things when I'm half conscious. Like how the nine minutes the snooze button provides seems both a lot longer and a lot shorter than I'd expect (this seems really poetic to me at the time). Like how the sunlight coming through my blinds creates a prison-bar shadow on the floor.

I vow again to go to the gym more. Fitter happier more productive.