Because I Can

Synecdoche: New York

I just watched it, not expecting much, expecting it to be messy, expecting it to be what I had read it was about. It isn't. It's the best American film I've seen since Angels In America, which was made for HBO and relied entirely on writing.
Turns out, so does SNY. Charlie Kaufman's writing to be exact. If I had remembered that about the film, I probably would have watched it in theaters, but it doesn't matter.
Roger Ebert, who has improved immensely in recent years, named it the best film of the decade, meaning 2000-2009.
Here's the rest of his list, in case you'd like to experiment.

It's An Electrical Problem

Discalculia, the problem I didn't know had a name, means being not only indifferent to but wildly unhappy about math.
And there's a therapy, if not a cure.
Just a little gentle electrical stimulation.
Still too new to know how it will help my algebra.
Calculus? Don't get me started!

Eat The Rich Dept.

Whose idea was it anyway? Or, at least, what famous ancient American, revered as only a handful are, thought the rich ought to pay for everyone's else's government services?
(Hint: It was no James Madison. Hint #2: It was not George Washington.)

Best Song About A Washington State Place

And just down the road, too.


Quite a story. Linda Perhacs only made one album, in 1970, but it's sort of an underground iconic thing for music people. Psychedelic folk, they call it.
MeFi found if for me. In an interview I listened to, turns out she and her husband at the time built a home in Chimacum back in the day. Guess she's in California now. And old. Like me.

Comment O' Teh Day

There is balm in Youtube,
To make the wounded whole ;
There's power enough in Animal vids,
To cure a world-sick soul.

MeFier codacarola

For this

Nobody Knows, Nobody Cares

About the deficit, about the "process."
Krugman tells the President he is wrong, wrong, wrong.
And Krugman's right.

Jon Ham Is Some Actor, Eh What? Plus, Smoking!

I would just like to point out that Peggy is not actually inhaling nicotine in her shots.

Henry's Brain...And You

I haven't read the whole thing yet because I found the cool quote below, but Andrew Sullivan says it's worth it and I'm going right back.

Henry's life never really progressed beyond the day in 1953 when Dr. Scoville, my grandfather, removed some small but important pieces of Henry's brain.