My Week in Media

Oh dear, I’ve been tagged for a meme by Meg, who got it from Neil, who got it from James. It’s been a while. It’s 3AM as I notice this. I must brood on it over the weekend.

Alright, I’m done brooding.

What I read
I haven’t read a book in ages. I still buy them, though not as often as before, but they sit on my shelves unread. I canceled my subscription to NRC Next because I no longer have a commute, at least not one long enough to read anything, my tram ride lasts about five minutes. The only magazine I currently subscribe to is The Word, formerly known as Word. I never read them when they arrive, but I keep them for when I travel or when I finally get tired of the internet. Is it me, or is Word slowly becoming more like Q magazine? It doesn’t seem as decidedly different from the mainstream music mags as it used to do. Over the Christmas holiday I did spend some time reading an issue on the couch and promptly fell asleep. At work, I try to start the day reading our own newspaper, DAG, but there’s usually some other pressing matter concerning our tv guide to attend to.

What I watched
I watch so many tv shows I hardly ever get round to films. But as my favourite shows are either on strike or suspended over the Christmas break, I caught up on some films. I checked the Times Online’s 100 best films of 2007 and picked The Last King of Scotland, Atonement, For Your Consideration, Bridge to Terabithia and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. All of which I enjoyed to varying degrees, but none of them blew me away as much as my favourite film of the year, Babel, which I would have liked to see again. It’s on my iPod, lacking essential subtitles. I watch quite a bit of video on my iPod in bed, over the last couple of weeks I have been falling asleep watching entire seasons of Battlestar Galactica. (Gaeta is so the fifth remaining Cylon.)

I wish I’d seen all of The History Boys on the BBC, I had planned on watching it, but forgot and only caught the second half. I liked it, but half expected the boys to break into song, it had that kind of stagey rhythm to it. Talking about singing… When Joseph met Maria was a lot less engaging than Lord Webber’s actual competition was and it just reminded me that the blandest candidates won. Bland… yeah, I’ve never liked Tom Hanks much and he didn’t do anything to impress me in the awful The Terminal, which I also managed to see half of.

I also caught Catherine Tate’s Christmas show – and was a little taken aback by her ‘Northern Irish Christmas’ sketch, but George Michael made up for it with his scarily effective Shane McGowan impresssion. I also saw the Extras Christmas special, which I thought was just a rehash of one of the regular episodes. I caught bits and pieces of Dara Ó Briain’s stand up gig on the Beeb. I can’s stand him when he’s on panel shows like Have I Got News For You, but didn’t mind him that much on his own.

I almost forgot the Doctor Who Christmas Special. Maybe that’s because I didn’t find it too memorable. Kylie and Tennant worked well off each other, but the story was a little is that all there is. I hope the much hyped start of Torchwood’s second season (January 16) will be more exciting.

What I listened to
I don’t listen to the radio, haven’t really since college. Since I got the iPod a few weeks back, I have set up an elaborate playlist which ensures I won’t hear a track twice. I’m doing this because there are way too many songs in my collection that I’ve never listened to, because I tended to put favourites on repeat before. I’ve exported my playlist from Christmas Eve to New Year’s Eve for your perusal: listened.txt

Other than that, I spent many hours transferring some of my own old DAT and MD bootlegs to hard disk, splicing them up in tracks and uploading the full shows to a private tracker. I made a handful of people very happy and I enjoyed reliving the memories that go with the concerts and the friends I went with. Precious moments.

As for albums, that dying breed of a format, the new Einstuerzende Neubauten ‘Alles Wieder Offen’ is really, really good. If you’re the kind of person who dismisses them for being German, or ancient, or just… ‘weird’, now’s the time to actually listen to their new work. It may surprise you. Or, you know, confirm your suspicions. If the single Weil, weil, weil puts you off, give Nagorny Karabach a go.

What I surfed
My usual haunts. Television Without Pity for my daily portion of undiluted snark. Our own Whedonesque, of course – things got rather heated over Christmas. I still visit Metafilter though not as often as I used to. I checked out Derek Powazek’s new magazine blog Magazineer.com. I also spent time on various tapers related forums like taperssection.com, looking for information on the hardware I use to record, or to find out the best ways to reduce hiss and remove pops and clicks. Most of the time, though, I was probably reading what folks were up to on Twitter.  

What I played
Meg added this one to the list of questions. I’d really love to have more opportunities to play board games, like we used to in college. On New Year’s Eve I played one round of Trivial Pursuit which I enjoyed a lot. It’s probably the only game I have some chance of winning as I’m useless at all tactical games like Risk.

Who I tag
Please feel free to join in, or not: Derek Powazek, Hydragenic, maybe I can wake Reluctant Nomad from his slumber and I know it’s not going to happen, but I’d love to read what Stephen Fry’d make of this meme. Last but not least I’m going to try to infect the Dutch blogosphere (oh god no, I’m using the b word) and that’s why I tag Erwin Blom, who doesn’t visit here I’m sure, but if you all click on the link a few times he might get the idea.

Who’s your favourite Desperate Housewife?

Mine’s Lynette.

I’m asking, because ‘everybody’ hates Lynette, especially after the lastest episode. Bree seems ‘everybody’s favourite. She comes second with me. (Susan, Gabrielle, Edie are next.)

People hate Lynette mainly because she can’t cope with / doesn’t like her kids and regrets having had to give up her career in favour of motherhood. Same reason why I think she’s fabulous. She’s the only person on the show who is ‘real’. If I were a housewife, and desperate, I’d be Lynette and I’d be putting those horrible boys up for adoption. So there.

Continue reading

VD: fat, naked, dangerous

vd_button.gif

I think back longingly to the time when this ‘Valentine’s Day’ madness hadn’t yet reached our European shores. When it was something odd you read about in Peanuts comic strips. That was back in the day when we thought sky scrapers meant ‘progress’ and you’d have to order baseball caps and linnen All-Stars from rich relatives who travelled on aeroplanes.

At least we’ve got (the-soon-to-be-married-but-probably-not-smug) Meg’s VD cards now.

Katy encounters teenage middle America

Katy encounters teenage middle America – something that’s scared the fuck out of me ever after I joined my first ‘fan’ mailing list back in ’93.

Tom envies Mark for having ‘done Europe’ before his 15th. I did Europe with my parents and grandparents when I was 4. Still have lots of cute photos from them days… 1967. But then I never got to America until my 30s. Indonesia at 11. Canada and then South Africa at 12. Twice. Brasil, Senegal before I was 16… France every bloody year. I didn’t have a particularly pleasant adolescence. (Does anyone?) However, travel we did. No shortage there.

But I always wanted to see Ireland.

Had to wait till my early 20s. But god, did I make up for loss of time.

Incidently, while we’re linkslutting away, Meg starts off a ‘top 5 list’ meme inspired by High Fidelity. And I’d follow suit if it weren’t half past 1 in the morning again… more tomorrow.