I walk face first through the sex, drugs, and church with Wild Things that make Maurice Sendak question his early works.
Aesop Rock - Babies With Guns

In my continuing effort to see some films from the "edge of culture", I wrote down a list of specific director's movies that I constantly hear about, but never get a chance to see in the theater, or movies that always intrigued me in the videostore, but I wasn't sure if they were any good. I went through a short phase in college where I saw numerous David Lynch movies, but after that I returned to watching fairly mainstream films. A few weeks ago I watched A History of Violence, a David Cronenberg film, which seemed like a nice, gentle re-introduction back into the more seedy areas of film. Next, I wanted to see a Terry Gilliam movie because I had already seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Lost in La Mancha, and Twelve Monkeys.

The movie I ended up renting was Tideland, which I had seen on the shelves for some time and it always looked intriguing. However, the rating on the back mentioned something about "gruesome situations involving a child" -- not something I am particularly excited about viewing. Add onto that the always supurb commentary at IMDB (uh, right) about how disturbing the movie is, and it made me think twice about actually picking it up.

Note that the following paragraph has spoilers, so skip a paragraph if you want. Well, I am glad I did pick the movie up. It is defiantly not a mainstream movie, but it was not as over the top as expected. It seems that the most disturbing part of the movie is that the main character (a nine year-old child) goes through a series of events which would leave most adults hysterical (her mother and father die of a drug overdose, she moves to a new place and basically fends for herself, her neighbors are somewhat disturbed), and the child uses her imagination to get through this troubling time in her life. The overall theme of the movie, "child are a lot more resilient than adults realize or give them credit for", reminded me of my college graduation commemcement talk given by Maurice Sendak, where at one point or another, he related the following story:

A child was talking to her parents about the 9/11 bombings the day or so after they happened and the parents said, "Don't worry honey, those were just birds flying out of of the building as it was falling so they could escape." To which the child replied, "I know those weren't birds."

Not only does the child have greater perception than adults might assume, they can also handle more "disturbing" events aptly (and maybe better so than adults).

Along with the trip to the orchard last weekend, Lynn and I participated in the first ever, annual, Guy Pearce Saturday double-header movie extravaganza. Which is all just a long way to say that we watched Memento, followed directly by Factory Girl. Both movies gave me a greater appreciation for his acting ability, which is a rare comment because I pretty much think that all actors are equally okay. Plus, Memento is always fun to watch the movie puzzles fall into place.

Then, I was looking through his filmography and I noticed that he was also in Ravenous, a delightful movie with a skippy 8/12 orchestral score (I mean, really, the soundtrack makes the movie).

Adam and I had a great weekend in Philadelphia! On Friday night we went to the Mann Center to see Neko Case & Rufus Wainwright. It was probably the best concert I have ever been to. Rufus had the most fantastic encore; see it here on youtube. Now I can't wait for his Judy Garland CD/DVD to come out!

On Saturday morning we went to the Dinosaur show, and it was pretty spectacular.









The photos didn't come out so well because it was dark and we were a little far away, but the website has some great videos.

As for the rest of the weekend, it was nice and laid back, and the weather was just beautiful. It almost feels like fall is coming!

It seems when I wake up early on the weekends, I always get more stuff done. Yesterday, Lynn and I went to the Farmer's Market early in the morning to pick up some fresh fruits and vegetables. We also milled around for a bit staring at old trunks and fresh baked bread, inhaling the scent of basil that permeated the city square.

Afterwards, we got free BBQ at my company-sponsored summer picnic down by the waterfront. It was lots of fun, primarily because of the free BBQ :). And also, we passed by one of the plethora of dog-related businesses in Old Town and they were having an adoption day with the cutest puppies in the world in a little pen. This was especially prescient because just the other day Lynn was mentioning that she wanted to have a business where the other thing it would have is a pen full of rumbling, tumbling puppies. I concured, if only because then I would get to work at said rumbling, tumbling business. So, now our new own-your-own business dream includes: a coffee shop/bookstore/used CD store/puppy pen. I think it just might work.

Later in the day, we got had planned to go into the city because we had stumbled on Restaurant Week reservations at The Oval Room downtown. Since there are few times that we will want to plunk down $200 for dinner, we jumped at a chance to get some decently priced food from a Modern (read: fancy) restaurant. So, we decided to head in early and catch a movie at the lovely Landmark theater on E street. And since there is a movie with Parker Posie playing (Broken English), that got first billing, so to speak.

The movie was okay; romantic comedies usually aren't a favorite of mine. Broken English at least had a tinge of melancholy that tempered the inevitable pseudo-happy ending. However, I think what ruined the movie for me were the actual movie-goers inside the theater. The lack of common respect for keeping quiet and just, what seems to me, common theater-going etiquette always baffles me every time it happens. If I could afford a huge widescreen TV, and a decent sound set-up, the idea of going to the movies would seem quaint and unnecessary.

After the movie we hustled to The Oval Room and enjoyed a very good dinner. The waiter was a tad pushy (I am assuming that during Restaurant Week they make most of their money on alcohol, although one review I read said that the service is pushy during normal serving times, as well). It is fun to go out to "fancy" restaurants once in a while, even if sometimes the servers seem to speak down to us. However, trying new combinations of foods is always exciting. It just obliterates our food budget every time we do it.

We walked to Georgetown afterwards, which was maybe a mistake. By the time we got there I was hot and Lynn's feet were sore from her shoes. We made our customary stop at Barnes and Nobles to hit up the restroom and then ventured into Urban Outfitters for a quick look around before heading home.

Last Wednesday Lynn and I were talking about wanting to take more road trips this summer, and then decided to try to go this weekend somewhere. Then we remembered that Lynn's highschool friend Damien was going to be here for the weekend, so I cashed in all of my work favors to get Friday off (and by "cashing in my favors" I really mean that I asked my manager and he shrugged and said, "Sure."). We decided to go to Richmond, VA, which is about 2 hours from DC because Lynn had an article in the feminist magazine Bust that detailed the hipster hangouts in the area.

We got up early and drove down I-95 to get some vegetarian breakfast at Cafe 821 on Cary St. Before that though, we saw the Landmark Theater, which we incorrectly assumed was a huge Sephardic temple (I later found out it was built by the Shriners which used a lot of Islamic influences when they built it -- it was originally called "The Mosque").

After a huge breakfast, we decided to drive up to the Jewish cemetery in the northern portion of the city, which also contained a small Holocaust memorial. Unfortunately, the cemetery was somewhat of a let-down because it was neither sufficiently old or creepy, which are the two qualifications I have for a good cemetery visit. So, we decided to drive down to the Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, which has numerous US and Confederate presidents. This cemetery was pretty awesome because a lot of the gravestones were from the Civil War era and there were numerous angels and religious artifacts.

By this time, we were ready to spend some time in some air conditioning to escape the oppressive heat, so we made out way over to the Science Museum of Virginia. The museum would probably be a big hit if I was 10, but it was a little underwhelming as an adult. A lot of the exhibits just plain didn't work, and the others were pretty uneventful. The building it was housed in (the old train station) was pretty impressive, though, with a huge domed lobby.

We drove downtown looking for some lunch, stumbled upon a weird Tex-Mex joint with surprisingly weak margaritas, but decent food and then drove to the Edgar Allen Poe Museum a little south of downtown. This was the third Poe museum (Philadelphia and Baltimore were the other two) that I have to with Lynn -- even though I probably couldn't get through one of his stories (I have little patience for flowery prose), Poe is an impressive figure. It definitely doesn't hurt that his life story is pretty tragic and bizarre, either. Lynn got sick of the tour guide, but she gave us a lot more information and context on Poe's family then I have heard from guides before, so I liked all of the detail.

I was getting tired by this point (it was early afternoon), but one of the main reasons we came was for Carytown (or at least, one of the main reasons I wanted to come to Richmond was Carytown -- it was all in my master plan to visit as many independent record shops as possible wherever I am). It is a section of Richmond which is the definition of hipsterness with numerous vintage stores, record shops, and boutique clothes shops. So, we dragged ourselves there and spent a good amount of time perusing the funky independent retailers that lined Cary street. The music shop, Plan 9, was okay. I think I was too tired and hot to be impressed -- the prices weren't anything to write home about and the used CD section was underwhelming as well. It is hard to compete with the incomparable Soundgarden in Baltimore, MD, but I feel a compulsion to try to find a store that compares favorably. Sweaty and achey, we piled into the car and decided to conclude our mini-roadtrip and get on home.