lightning strikes twice

Fantastical and whimsical Japanese translated prose.  Very quirky, but towards the end, its the sort of book you have to keep reading.  The protagonist is a not particularly ambitious, but stubborn, man with a small copy agency.  Some VERY weird things happen to him after designing a newsletter with an odd image of a sheep, and he spends several weeks with his equally strange girlfriend on a “wild sheep chase”, including encountering a man who dresses as a sheep.

Like The Kite Runner, A Thousand Splendid Suns is solid story-telling, compelling, but not brilliant.  This story gives insight into the lives of Afghani women, and the trials of living in a society that has historically been ruled by men.  Mariam and Laila are years apart, but through various routes both become married to a much older traditional man who provides stability in a country not helpful to single women, but nothing else.  The descriptions of their life, their escape to Kashmir and their return show how deep cultural and patriotic ties run in those parts of the world.  Here in Australia, where we’re so young and so lucky, a book like this is truly mind opening.

by Dave Eggers

A fantastic and moving book about the tragedies of Sudan (not just Darfour, which gets all the publicity).  In particular it follows one young boy, and the trials and experiences of his life.  These include not just escaping from marauding northerners while walking thousands of kilometres with other “Lost Boys, but also the difficulty of living as a refugee, and trying to assimilate into North American life, all while being looked on as a leader.  Dave Eggers has done a brilliant job of not mangling this story.

• Charlie Wilson’s War – A suprisingly very good story about how a not too special Congressman with a penchant for “jail bait” made a big mark by effectively finding the finance for Afghanistan people in their war with the Russians during the 80s.  I knew that I like Philip Seymour Hoffman, but didn’t think I’d like Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks, but while Julia was a bit of a non-event, Tom Hanks did a fine job as Charlie Wilson.  And it was just the right length, just the right complexity, and just the right tone.  A very good piece of film making in my opinion. 8/10
• The Wendell Baker Story – Sly and wry, silly fun.  Quite entertaining movie with Owen and Luke Wilson being their goofy selves.
• Rendition - starring Jake G, Reese Witherspoon.  Good movie about the CIA stealing away a target to be interrogated in Egypt.
• The Notorious Bettie Page - a pretty good film about a southern girl who has some problems with men, moves to NYC, begins modelling, including in some highly controversial and provocative images, before turning her life to God.

This morning we tackled the Bay Run, a 7km run around the bay bordered by Drummoyne, Lilyfield and the Iron Cove bridge.  I had new shoes, determination, and a hope of getting under 35 minutes, but it wasn’t to be — my time was 36m07s.  Dan hit it good, with a time of 29m35s.  The winning time was a blazing 22m03s.  Inez, being pregnant, just walked it with Trina.

Beautiful morning for a run with a good 1200 other people, but my legs are suffering a little now.  Not so sure about the City2Surf this year, could be just a bit too far for me.  I’ll be back for the Bay Run next year though.

NBA star Josh Childress has signed with a Greek team, which is noteworthy here, since it could be the beginning of a trickle of decent players to Europe, especially while the US dollar is so poor.  I’d like to think I’ll look back on this post in a few years, and it will be common for elite US players to play in Europe or elsewhere, signalling that basketball really is a global sport.

Heading overseas allows Childress to make more money than he could have as a restricted free agent in the United States. The Hawks had the right to match an offer from another NBA team, but not from an international club.

Hawks’ Childress signs with Greek club – NBA – Yahoo! Sports.

Lisbeth Constance Trickett has two favourite sayings. Her first: “They never said it would be easy, they just said it would be worth it.” Her second: “Peace. It does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, hard work or stress. It means to be amidst all those things and still be calm in your heart.”

Good as Gould – Beijing2008 – Sport – smh.com.au.

So, after being registered at Last.fm for a couple of years, but really only getting into it over the last few weeks (even paying up as a subscriber), they’ve thrown a curveball and changed the layout and functionality:

Last.fm – the Blog · Last.fm: The Next Generation.

Clearly, it will take a bit of getting used to, and I did like some specific things on the old layout (such as the recent visitors box), but overall this will probably be a good move for them — I suspect there are many things behind the scenes that have been improved.  Interesting that there’s already a lot of noise on the post linked to above about preferring the old layout… wonder if it’ll have any effect.

Anyway, good work Last.fm, hopefully all the wrinkles are ironed out soon.  Check out my recent listens in the Last.fm box to the right.

Last night we went to a special preview of the new Batman flick (I think called Dark Knight?) at Sydney’s IMAX, apparently the largest cinema screen in the world.  I thought it would be relatively quiet, but it was super busy, there was a massive queue, and when I walked in, it looked like the “stadium seating” sat a couple of thousand (I found out this morning it was only 500… oops).

Anyway, the film moved seamlessly between IMAX size screen and normal letterbox format, but the half dozen IMAX scenes were definitely shot with a super-size screen in mind:  some of the tall building scenes were breath-taking and definitely gave one a feeling of being up amongst the skyscrapers. 

The film itself was pretty good.  Some parts were a little patch or hard to follow, but possibly its because I was so overwhelmed by the visual aspects that I just didn’t follow the story line all that closely.  Whatever, I had a great time.  Highly recommended to see it on the BIG screen.

• Death Proof – A Quentin Tarantino film with his usual touches – lengthy drawn out dialogue, original music and obscene gore.  I don’t know the full story, but this “extended version” was probably longer by a good twenty minutes (?) just because it wasn’t in the “Grindcore” package.  Anyway, definitely memorable, great car chase scene and some interesting setups (whatever happened to the cheerleader and the hillbilly?) 8/10
• I’m Not There – The Bob Dylan movie, with Cate Blanchett, Heath Ledger, Christian Bale and more.  I didn’t read the DVD cover, so it took me quite a while to realise that each character was a fictitious persona of Dylan.  Anyway, it felt a little all over the shop, and I ended up falling asleep so only really saw half the film.  It just didn’t grab me unfortunately.
• Flags Of Our Fathers - Clint Eastwood is a great director, and this film is certainly a continuation of his strong form.  We’ve all seen enough war films that the graphic battle scenes are familiar, but they’re still shocking reality checks.  In some ways, the plot and characters are all expected, but this doesn’t diminish the strength of the film.  Really looking forward to seeing Letters From Iwo Jima, which tells the Japanese side of the same story, I suspect that will be a much ‘newer’ experience.