Twilight. April 17, 2008

Another lazy day, and as I am student, I of course have fuck-all to do. If I was taking a major in ’sitting on my arse all day with interludes of strolling through the city, engaging in light physical activity and food gathering at the local supermarket’, I would graduate magna cum laude. And still, I pass all of my exams with mostly very good grades. I baffle myself sometimes.
So what do I do? Read, listen to music, watch films, write, be out and about. I always have the intention to do something productive, but then I get distracted and I am left watching half a season of Scrubs. Somehow I think I cannot keep affording the luxury of doing fuck-all. Meh. I will worry about that later. When it is too late.

While honing my skills in ‘fuck-allery’, I stumbled onto a goldmine of Twilight icons on ONTD. Trust them to make me say things like ‘lmao, omg! lolz!’ out loud.
And as the interwebs is made for sharing, I shall share with thee icons! And pictures! And giggles!
Somehow, I love doing these Twilight-related posts – any excuse will do to post some more Rpattz, am I right?

       

     

 

The best for last:

Flipping dazzling.

Sunshine. April 11, 2008

After a grey, dreary, miserable winter that wasn’t much like winter at all, and that had been dragging on into spring long enough to cause mass depression, yesterday felt like the first real day of spring. Cloudless sky, seemingly neverending sunlight…I had almost forgotten that it would get dark and cold around nine-ish again.
I cycled to work, making my way through the city as slow as possible. Not on purpose, but because everyone else was slow, strangely bordering on languid. The feel of warm, dry, comforting air and bright sunshine was utterly soporific – it made you want to plop down on the nearest patch of grass, close your eyes and slowly drift to sleep, the breeze as your blanket.
City sounds weren’t aggressive or startling but more like a subdued din, almost not a din at all. Life felt very carefree; I cruised through the swarms of tourists, over the cobbles, past cars and buses, across bridges and around corners, completely relaxed, moving but not really realizing it. I seemed to be making no progress at all, but looking at the belfry to keep an eye on the time, I was still as fast as always – I just didn’t feel like I was hurrying along.

Best place to be on a sunny day.

And then, somewhere in the haze that was mid-Thursday morning, I had to go all philosophical on myself. I had been thinking about Spanish, and wondered about ser and estar. As a general rule, you use the first for permanent situations and the latter for things that are temporary. But when someone is married, frick, even dead, you use estar. How temporary does death sound to you? Not very. 
Sounds like marriage is only fleeting, that it will pass; like you would say estoy enferma, I am sick, but don’t worry, a cold doesn’t last that long – some honey to soothe the throat and you will live through it. Then again, you also use estar for being divorced or widowed. So life goes on, no permanency in anything.
Saying uncle John está muerto, is dead, is a little different. Not like he would rise from the grave bright and chipper after a good night’s sleep, but rather like it isn’t over, really. Estar fits perfectly if you think there is something after having six feet of earth chucked on top of you. Being locked in a box under the ground is pretty permanent. So is never breathing again. And still, you ‘only’ estás muerto. Comforting for those left behind, no?
Good thing a friend sitting on a bridge I had just crossed shouted ‘hey!’ before my mind wandered off into further dissecting the Spanish language – took me ten metres to register that friend was supposed to be going into work with me, so I stopped semi-daydreaming, made a middle-of-the-road u-turn and reminded my colleague to go get his bike.
I made it to work in time.

To be a Calidore. April 5, 2008

Yesterday a very good friend was spinning a yarn about how she saw her future, starting with who she would be ending up with. She is very fantastical, I wouldn’t be wrong in saying she would fit perfectly in Wuthering Heights – a Byronic hero in the vein of Heathcliff would suit her to a tee. Sadly, she might be a century or two mistaken.

Quintessential Byron.

Naturally, I was forced to give my tuppence worth in the veriest of Brontë styles. I don’t know if it was the mood or the general topic discussed, but we wandered off and ended up with the following highly-demanding description of my Heathcliff, mostly conjured up by her. I suppose, judging from this, she has a better view of my subconscious than I have myself (this should be accompanied by a bit of Keats, for sheer romantic drama):

“Incredibly attractive, friendly but slightly cocky with an (unexpected) outgoing edge, almost incomprehensibly intelligent and ambitious, stuck-up and self-aware but nonetheless very self-deprecating and unselfish, with an upper-middle class education, a whiff of pretency and a slight aristocratic feel; debonair and eager to please, confident but not on a pedestal, thoughtful and considering, open-minded and not afraid to express his opinion. Similar to me what arrogancy, wackiness, awareness of others and helpfulness is considered, with an ability to balance out my unintended hypocrisy, plethora of ideas and passion for travel, but supporting me in all my undertakings as I would be supportive of him. A strong rock in exchange for a safe haven. A counterweight to my surprisingly dominant character. And highly preferably British.”

I suppose this narrows it down to a Harrodian or other private school alumn, Surrey or an alike region-inhabitating, musically or otherwise talented, probably equestrian or generally sports-loving and incredibly charming. I would be moving up in the world, indeed!
Should anyone like this exist, please direct yourself to the nearest location of myself and make your enquiry.

Frostbite. April 4, 2008

Dad’s camera is infinitely superior to mine, judging from these pictures I took during the Christmas holidays:

 

One day, I will have my own Olympus.

Writing playlist. April 3, 2008

I had to do some writing for some thing or other today, and I made myself this playlist, titled ‘not quite the ubiquitous requisite fifty’
(somehow I found that sounds really nice, doesn’t matter if it actually makes sense or not):

Some pretty mushy songs in there, huh. Michael Bublé? Robbie Williams? John Mayer? What was I thinking.
I am sticking with all the other choices, though. Number 21 always knocks the air out of my lungs a bit.
Number 39 is one of my all-time favourites, and the next one is just hauntingly beautiful.
And for those of you who have never listened to ‘The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill’: check it out sometime. Be sure to listen to the MTV Unplugged one, too - pretty amazing.
Yael Naim I also love: brilliant songs, and she sings in Hebrew as well; best way to learn and so much more fun than studying lists of vocabulary – those lists make me shudder involuntarily.
Basically, just give the songs you don’t know a listen, there might be a few you actually like. Number 2 is really popular now; I saw Adele featured on a BBC2 show called ‘Sound’ quite a while back performing Hometown Glory, and wow, does she know how to carry a tune.
By the way, number 35 is just breathtaking.

Twilight moms. Run. April 2, 2008

ETA: ONTD post: you will laugh until you cry. I know I did. (loads of Twilight mom stuff, including set pictures, in here)

Ugh, two posts in one day, both dedicated to the spawn of Stephenie Meyer’s mind. I must be going a little loopy. Or it must be the pretty bad mood. I don’t even know why I get so worked up about this whole Twilight thing. Maybe because I get worked up about just about everything. Maybe I need some counselling; but for now, I am happy being my peeved-off self. It is so much fun!

I just couldn’t contain myself when I heard about the Twilight moms. I am sure they are very respectable, loving, caring women who are the best their family could ever wish for. This doesn’t mean I can’t rip on them.
It is pretty disconcerting and disturbing that there are grown women who spend their days snapping pictures, interviewing and generally hanging around on the Twilight film set. Most of their attention seems to go toward the men involved – a very strange kind of flattery I should imagine.
They have websites on which they post their photos and experiences of a day filled with pleasurable stalking. Say wut.
I am ok with teenagers running after smokingly hot actors (sandwich with Edward and Jasper, y/y?), but I do not see why adult women should spend every day trying to get a ‘hello’ out of the actors. Oh, I know; how very unfair of me to say this. Well, let me say that I don’t give a shit about how they love the books and all that – everyone is allowed to like whatever they want. I don’t mind the obsession at all, I do mind how you handle it. Hell, it does bring on the laughs when you read stories of them creeping around on the film set. I suppose it makes them feel young, and who isn’t entitled to a bit of fun? Who doesn’t crush on characters in books and films (I think by now it is clear I am living proof of that)? Just keep it separate from real life. I will call the CPA on you.

It seems that their (middle-aged) lust for Edward Cullen is transposed to Robert Pattinson. Fine. I am not saying they cannot crush on him, or any of the actors for that matter, but maybe it would be a better idea to just do it at home, within a safe distance from Rpattz (as he has been dubbed by the teen in me). This also goes for the teenagers, by the way, but I understand it coming from them. Hell, I have only just outgrown that stage myself – I remember how absolutely amazing it was to go to that BSB concert when I was twelve. Kevin touched my hand. I nearly died.
What annoys me most, is that these Twilight moms find the teens insane. “Like, omg, they were so standing in the way when I was trying to get to Robert, but he was, like, so cool about it, you know.” The moms deride these kids and find their (the moms’) behaviour perfectly normal. Like the teens are annoying the actors more. I do not agree. Teenyboppers are like that. I find it utterly absurd these mothers should think infatuated young girls silly, stalker-y and obsessive while finding themselves so very much above that. That is working with double standards; it is ok for you because you are so much more mature, damnit, you even have children? I don’t think so. You can be as obsessed as you want – just admit to it and don’t mock those so much younger than you for it.

Also, I am going to claim my territory here a little what Pattinson is concerned: he is a twenty-one-year old male. My age bracket. You are not Samantha from Sex and the City.
You see, I find this whole Edward Cullen craze pretty funny and I have to admit, were I fourteen, I would be up there with my fricking camera. Thankfully for the poor Twilight cast, I am long past waiting outside in the rain to catch a glimpse of that wonderful red hair Pattinson sports. What I mean is: would I hit on Pattinson? Damn straight, girl. Would I wait outside his trailer on set with a fansign and a camera to cause him major trauma? Hell to the no, bitch.

Sure, it’s all good – everyone has a right to do whatever he wants as long as it is not illegal, right? I just want to say that I am not very down with it. Discussing it on forums and all that – go ahead, but I would feel pretty uncomfortable bumping into Twilight moms while walking from set to trailer.
And I don’t want to hear your orgasmic sounds when I will be watching Twilight in a couple of months. Leave me to enjoy my popcorn, I will leave you to stalk the living daylights out of the cast. Don’t give me stick for bursting your bubble, ladies, but you are something out of the ordinary. Not always in a good way.

 

It’s Cullen, bbs. April 2, 2008

As some of you might know, they are making the Stephenie MeyerTwilight series into a film franchise. Right now they are filming the first one out of currently three (but I believe there is a fourth book on the way), much to the delight of teenyboppers and middle-aged women (I am thinking of devoting a whole rant to Twilight moms – they are beyond crazy).
Of course, I had to know what all the buzz was about, but I wasn’t really prepared to go out andbuy these books – no, that did not imply I went to filch them at Borders. I don’t want “stealing ofTwilight, New Moon and Eclipse” on my record. Too embarrassing.
I had heard the books were absolutely shite. So now I really had to read them – I couldn’t pass on this junkfest that none other than Cedric Diggory signed up for! That is right, Robert Pattinson is playing one of the main characters, Edward Cullen. Pictures of the actors on set started to appear everywhere (and by everywhere I mean ONTD – ilu bbs!), ’dazzling’ blingees and ‘omfg, Twilight moms, pervs!’ comments abound.
Then I stumbled upon the e-books - yay! I needed to know what was up with all the ‘glittering like rainbows’ shit. Stephenie Meyer seems like a very intelligent, nice, sociable, happy person. I like her. I would like to fully praise her books, but I am afraid I just can’t. I wish I would have been fourteen when reading this series, I might have enjoyed it for what it is, not constantly pointing out what I think it should have been.
I suppose I am very disappointed in the books, I am frustrated because I really expected Meyer to bring me a certain level of compelling story-telling. All she did was capture my attention by focusing on my oestrogen, on which I do have to compliment her. I like the book cover, though:

All in all, even taking into account all my whining about how crap the books are, they are so bad it makes them so very good again. I will definitely be reading the fourth book. And the one about Edward.
Conclusion: no matter how much bile you will hear me spitting, I still love the craptasticness of it all.

I read the first three lines ofTwilight, realized that this would be some of the most ludicrously crappy writing I would ever indulge in, and dived straight into a bound to be not-much-depth-at-all story. I read through the whole pdf-file in one go,Twilight isn’t exactly difficult reading.
Now I get the attraction to the books: Edward freakin’ Cullen. Omfg yes. A friend of mine once said that romantic chick books are a woman’s literary porn, and he was right. One line out of Cullen and you don’t want to stop reading. This is about all the books have got going for them, though. Yes, I have read them all. I am weak. But no Cullen, no story, as New Moon deftly proves.
It is a poorly-construed, seemingly not very thought-out assembly of all kinds of events, one more incomprehensible than the other. I mean to say that the actions do not seem to go with the characters. The characters aren’t very consistent, either. For example, Bella is insightful whenever it comes in handy for the story, but at the same time she is the slowest person to catch on when it benefits the next turn in the book. Make up your mind, Meyer. People change, but not every single one is fickle. Yes, Bella is supposed to be indecisive, which doesn’t have to mean her brain, understanding and EQ should shrink to the size of a shrivelled raisin all the time.
I understand the story revolves around Bella and Edward (and Jacob) constantly misunderstanding each other, but come the fuck on. You can only draw out a story for so long before it becomes ridiculous. Building the tension by keeping off the changing of Bella into a flipping vampire is all right, but at least give us something to work with here. The teenager in me is agonized at the lack of sex in the book, Meyer. It is called compensating. I am sure you know Edward Cullen draws in readers like kids to a Happy Meal, so make the most of it.

Also, we cannot expect the series to be fully realistic, but you are construing real characters and they should have some degree of depth. Of course, theTwilight series is not about psychologically stunning its readers, but at least make it more insightful than a fifteen-year old’s Bon Jovi fan fiction. That said, I am willing to concede all the mindless action and entertainment, but maybe it would be nice to stop rehashing the conversations – it is tiring having to read through yet another anguished ‘omfg what should we do, I don’t know, it’s all my fault, I want you but I am somehow too stupid to just get the fuck on with it already because of Jacob and should I become a vampire, oh I am so determined but my actions show otherwise’ conversation/train of thoughts/whole fucking chapter.
At one point reading New Moon I thought that if I would not stumble upon the icy lips of Edward Cullen in twenty pages or so, I would give up. Good thing I read the last couple of pages first before stopping. I just can’t be patient enough when a book doesn’t hold any interest at all for the entire length of the story. It shouldn’t be that hard – people like Umberto Eco are allowed to make it hard, because you know there will be an enlightening pot of gold at the end of it. I will be contented if the pot of gold in the Twilight series would be Bella turning into a vampire already and just for the sake of appeasing just about everyone, having them getting it on.

And for fuck’s sake, Cullen fucking glitters. He dazzles. He sparkles. And this is what identifies him: icy, adonis, crooked smile, topaz, butterscotch, marble, livid. How the fuck can you come up with all that shit and make it work? Dazzling. I love it. That is another thing: don’t keep using the same words and sentences over and over and over again. Growl. Dang, you want to annoy me? Well, you are doing a good job. You seem to have made my temper flare at more than one occasion, Meyer, kudos on you. I am just holding on for this, in all my superficiality (kudos on him, too, for putting up with all this crazy Twilight mom shit. I would scream frickin’ rape.):

Oh, you fox.

The more I read the books, the more I think of Edward as Mr. Bingley from the film Pride & Prejudice. Not the correct image in my opinion, but Edward goes from beautifully dangerous and edgy while being perfectly right, to making some decisions that should never ever come from Edward. He turns into some eighteenth-century dandy at times. I understand he would mollify and all that, but come the fuck on. I am only reading this series because if Cullen were a real person, I would dearly like to do him.

The end.