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April 29, 2008
Oscar Challenge: You Can't Take It With You
First, I apologize for the complete and utter lack of knitting content. It's just been to darned hot lately to knit, and the only thing I'm actively working on is the FBS, which is unbelievably, stultifyingly boring. Sorry about that.
Anyway, the movie. This should have been a great movie. It's based on one of the best plays ever written, and the casting (can I tell you how much I LOVE Lionel Barrymore?) and sets were fabulous. But I use the words "based on". I don't know what the hell Frank Capra was thinking. I don't know what the hell Kaufman and Hart were thinking.
There was all this ridiculous extra crap written in. WHY? My theory is that Capra wanted to cast Jimmy Stewart as Tony, and he's really a supporting character, so they re-wrote it to make the love story the main plot. The point of Tony as written is that he's of another world, and the play explores all the interesting things that happen when worlds collide. In this story, Tony starts out as an oddball who happens to live in that other world, so there's no journey.
We have to get up in like three hours to go to Disneyland, so I'm not going to rant about this. Just go see even a crappy community theatre production of this lovely play, and rent "It's a Wonderful Life". You'll be way better off.
p.s. I know everyone who's ever been in a play has done this one, but my mom and I both played Penny in high school, and Nathan played Paul.
Posted by Kate at 12:37 AM | Comments (1)April 27, 2008
Oscar Challenge: The Life of Emile Zola
An incompetently run war! Racial profiling! An innocent man sent to some hellhole island! A paranoid and power-hungry government! Fickle public opinion! A hothead shouting "EAT MY SHORTS!"
(Okay, you caught me. Emile Zola said "J'accuse", not "Eat my shorts".)
This was an excellent flick, but it was almost too creepy to watch. You couldn't make a film about the Dreyfus Affair nowadays because nobody would believe it wasn't totally made up. Watching the scenes of Zola's trial was like watching freakin' Condi Rice lie testify before Congress. At least in this story you know the good guys are going to triumph, although if I'd been Alfred Dreyfus I would have told them to stick their apology up their derrieres.
April 24, 2008
in which i crack myself up
This last Christmas, Elizabeth asked me to take a "nice picture" of her family. No problem, I thought. All four of them are extremely attractive and photogenic. I probably took a hundred pictures, and there was not a single one where everyone was looking at the camera and smiling.
Oh well.
April 22, 2008
Oscar Challenge: The Great Ziegfeld
It was three hours long, totally over the top and I loved it. I kept wishing someone would have edited the crap out of it, but that would have been a lousy way to pay homage to Ziegfeld.
Usually those crazy over-produced song and dance numbers with rotating staircases, dancers clad in glitter and feathers, and (I am not making this up) live ponies leave me bored to tears, but somehow this all worked. Maybe it was because William Powell is so much fun to watch. Obviously he's going to be fabulous with Myrna Loy (she was fab, but why didn't Billie Burke play herself?), but I was delighted by the chemistry he had with Frank Morgan (you know, the Great and Powerful Oz), who played Jack Billings, rival/enabler.
Speaking of Frank Morgan and Billie Burke (and Ray Bolger, who did play himself), we're about to hit about ten awesome movies in a row. After we get through The Life of Emile Zola and the massacred script fiasco of You Can't Take It With You, we're going to get a whole bunch of my favorite movies ever. We're going to try to watch as many nominated films as we can going forward, which isn't going to be too tough. In fact, I'm going to go out on a limb and declare an Oscar Challenge Mini-Challenge, which is to watch all the Best Picture nominees for 1939.
Aaaaanyway, this was way, way, way better than I expected. I laughed, I cried, it was better than Cats.
Posted by Kate at 11:45 PM | Comments (1)April 19, 2008
Oscar Challenge: Mutiny on the Bounty
Normally I'm a History Snob and I know too much about a story to enjoy it. Here's what I knew before I saw this flick: There was this dick named Captain Bligh, and he was on this ship called the Bounty, and there was a mutiny and Tahiti and some breadfruit and, tangentially, Sir Joseph Banks (he has a nice rose named after him).
Yeah, that's pretty much it. Timothy Spall Charles Laughton was a total dick, Clark Gable was a shirtless hottie, and the mostly naked chicks in Tahiti all had great hair.
Ignorance is bliss, I guess.
Posted by Kate at 12:22 AM | Comments (1)April 18, 2008
In which I give myself some credit
Boy, I suck at photographing shawls.
I'll try getting a picture of it actually in use this weekend. None of the pictures I took of the thing draped picturesquely over the porch railings or the beam in the inglenook came out very well.
This was absolutely the most difficult thing I've ever knitted. I cast it on in January of 2007, and it went on two very long Time Outs. It almost didn't get finished, but I'm so glad I persevered because it is absolutely flipping gorgeous, if I do say so myself.
Dorothy Siemens, the designer of this pattern, did one heckova job. It's a beautifully written pattern with thoughtfully laid-out charts. She deserves a huge amount of credit for this shawl, but I'm going to go out on a limb and pat myself on the back for executing this sucker all by myself.
Yeah, there are mistakes in it. If you know exactly where to look, you can see where I fixed that dropped stitch, and evidence of the snag of doom is still there. The join in the middle is not very clean, and there's a really crappily woven-in end in the middle of a row where I'd had a knot in the yarn. But I like to keep in mind the weavers of Persian rugs, who believe that only Allah is perfect, therefore it's arrogant to try to make a perfect rug.
I know this shawl is far from perfect, but I love it and am very proud of it.
Posted by Kate at 2:13 PM | Comments (8)April 17, 2008
adrift
The Paisley Shawl of Doom is done, so are the orange Acero socks.
Now what? I've cast on a pair of emergency socks, but I'm feeling a little unfulfilled. My options:
1. the Forbes Forest scarf - I don't really feel like it.
2. One of Cookie's new socks - I have the patterns, but none of my stash is leaping out at me.
3. Gretel - I have the pattern and the perfect yarn and the needles. I just don't feel like making a hat.
4. I could actually, you know, like, PHOTOGRAPH the purple shawl and blog about it, since it kicks some serious ass.
5. The old FBS could come out of exile.
Bleah. Maybe I'll just go do the laundry.
Posted by Kate at 11:21 AM
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April 12, 2008
SERENITY NOW!
So Margaret and George are in town and we went in to the City today to chill with them. We started out at the Ferry Plaza and had lunch at Taylor's (yay), then we schlepped across town to the park and the Conservatory of Flowers. It was fabulous, but it was a freakin' sauna in there. We still needed more flowery goodness, so we walked over to the Japanese Tea Garden. I TRIED to be tranquil and shit, but I couldn't do it. (I was successfully tranquilized somewhat later by several Hendricks and Tonics at the Thirsty Bear.)
The pictures are on Smugmug. I'm going to put Nathan's pictures up, too. It's really cool how we took totally different pictures of the same plants. Mine are mostly close up and weird, and Nathan's pictures show the plants in context with their surroundings.
Anyway, it was a swell day. I'm a little sunburned and a lot tired, but my unstylish new sneakers from L.L. Bean didn't give me blisters. Woohoo!
Posted by Kate at 10:33 PM | Comments (2)April 10, 2008
in which I am dubious of a shawl
Is this EVER going to be done? There are only about three rows of the last paisley chart left, then there are the hexagons, then some spacer rows, so I suppose I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Sigh. I just want it done.
Also, I'm very, very concerned that my gauge now is looser than when I started. I've been trying to knit tighter, but I don't think it's helping. (This is where Grace tells me it will all block out.)
I know, I know, get back to work. It's not going to knit itself.
Posted by Kate at 3:44 PM | Comments (3)April 7, 2008
thing 2
O hai, the Paisley Shawl is being haunted by Karl Rove.
Example 1: HOLYFUCKINGSHIT, there's a snag in it. Let me just say that it's WAY too far away to fix by dropping down to it. I don't know what to do. I've poked and prodded at it and have determined that it's not a live stitch, so if I do nothing it's not going to get worse unless it catches on something. It's not long enough to weave in, and I am loath to tie a knot in it. Any ideas? (Click on the picture - the bigger photo shows the loop really clearly.)
Example 2: Last night I was plugging away on the last bloody chart repeat of the Boteh Chart and noticed that in one of the middle sections, I had seven stitches instead of eight. I poked and prodded and couldn't find where I'd screwed up, so I said "screw it" and strategically eliminated a k2tog.
About six rows later, I decided to put on my dorktastic Petzl headlamp. I was knitting along and right there in plain sight, about six rows back, was a dropped stitch. Just hanging there. I nearly had a heart attack. Strangely, instead of panicking, I hallooed for Nathan and asked him to bring me a sock needle (How cute is it that he knew what I wanted and where I keep them?) and then a Manhattan.
Anyway, the spirit of Elizabeth Zimmerman must have been watching over me. The bit where I picked up the dropped stitch isn't gorgeous, but there's no way anyone will ever see it unless they've got a microscope.
This thing is going to be the death of me.
Posted by Kate at 12:18 PM | Comments (5)thing 1
O hai, I mostly finished the chalk bag. It still wants the grommets, but Nathan's jonesin' to use it tonight. I think it'll be fine without them for an evening.
The pattern was a breeze, but there were some math mistakes in it. I wound up making up my own decreases on the bottom. Now that I know what I'm doing, I'll be able to make Nathan his Rebel Alliance logo bag. I dunno about the matching hat.
Posted by Kate at 12:10 PM
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April 6, 2008
Oscar Challenge: It Happened One Night
We were talking the other night about what makes a "Best Picture". One of the strongest criteria for me is "Will people still enjoy this movie in 70 years?" Dude, It Happened One Night has got that NAILED.
It's got an unfair advantage for me because I grew up with this movie and I've seen it about a jillion times. But it's SO DAMNED GOOD. The story line is simple but classic, the dialogue is smart and witty, and jesusmaryandjoseph, Claudette Colbert and Clark Gable are SO DAMNED GOOD.
None of the movies we've watched in our Challenge have had a believable love story. There's been infantile infatuation (Wings), insane love-at-first-sight (Grand Hotel), codependence verging on abuse (ugh, Cimarron), but no believable love. Gable and Colbert's Peter and Ellie fall in love with each other quickly but gradually, and when Ellie's father asks Peter if he loves her, Peter barks as he storms out, "But don't hold that against me, I'm a little screwy myself! " She makes him nuts, he makes her nuts, but they're a perfect match.
To have them not wind up together would be a crime, but never fear, it's Frank Capra, not Shakespeare.
Posted by Kate at 12:02 PM
| Comments (2)
April 4, 2008
FRACKIN' A!
You know you're excited about the new Battlestar Galactica when you put your unfelted chalk bag on your head instead of a hat.
Posted by Kate at 12:23 PM
| Comments (5)
April 3, 2008
ow, my arm
Why does my left arm hurt so much? I figure it's a combination of these things:
- Too much knitting. I have finished Flicker and the second Jaywalker (Isn't it cool how the second foot didn't pool?), I've got the second Acero sock started, and I'm working on a felted chalk bag. Ow, ow, ow.
- I climbed a gigantic 5.9 at the gym on Monday.
- I got a tetanus shot.
- Karl Rove
April 1, 2008
no foolin'
Hey, we knit in public today. It was awesome. I successfully galvanized three other knitters (and one seamstress) who live in V'jo to come out and do needlework in public.
Downtown Vallejo, as my landlord puts it, looks like a neutron bomb hit it. It's got all these fabulous old storefronts, but there are no people. Baci, next to the newly remodeled Empress Theater, is allegedly one of if not the best restaurants in town. They obligingly have a nice coffee shop attached to the bar of their restaurant. I feel a little like a chump for not noticing it before.
It's really an ideal place for a Stitch-n-Bitch. There are couches, plenty of tables, great espresso, and a FULL BAR. And they didn't get mad when Stef spilled wine on the wall. The bar was surprisingly hoppin' for a Tuesday night, and every single customer who stuck his or her head into the cafe reacted very positively to our presence. Some people just gave us a thumbs up, but a couple of people came in and were STUNNED that there was organized knitting going on and wanted to know how often we met.
It'd be interesting to see just how many knitters there are here.
Nathan stopped by on his way home and took some pictures. The light was low and the flash was off, but here's Stef, me, Kelly, Robin, and the back of Marnie's and Fiona's heads. Martin also stopped by, but I think it was because he heard it was a Sew-n-Blow.
Posted by Kate at 11:36 PM
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Oscar Challenge: Cavalcade
These pre-WWII war movies are creeping me out. In the beginning of Cavalcade (filmed in 1933), our heroine worries about her husband going off to fight the Boer War. She objects strenuously about the pointlessness of this particular war. She has two young sons, so you know this scene will be repeated when WWI breaks out.
When WWI does break out, the younger son (now 18 or so) goes to the roof of a theatre with his sweetheart during an air raid. They watch the bombing of London by a slow, lumbering zeppelin. Watching this scene and knowing what would happen to London in six more years made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Anyway, this was a great flick. I think this is my favorite of the Best Picture films we've seen so far. (AQOTWF was better, but I liked this more.) The costumes were outstanding, the acting was lovely, and, of course, Noel Coward's words always make me want to swim in a vat of Champagne.