About Stinkin’ Time!
Friday, April 28, 2006
Ok…I’m going to take the easy way out and claim that the news of Zy’s impending arrival has taken up my time and thereby prevented this update. Truth is, well – yeah lots of time has been allocated to preparing the house for the new arrival. So, in the time-honored tradition of married couples everywhere, I realized that sometime in the past year or so “we” and “our” have become synonymous with “you” and “yours”. How? Well, our guest room / office / storage room used to have a lot of stuff in it. Stuff. Like, well, my drum set (the one that had never gotten assembled since the apartment turned a wee bit smaller than it looked when it was empty) and my hockey gear (you know, the stuff that I keep meaning to use when I start playing again) along with books and clothes and stuff. The detritus of projects past, lives past and days gone by.
Mostly mine. Yep. “We have to get rid of some of our stuff” really means “you gotta get rid of some of your crap, Al”. Amazing how the smallest rental space available actually holds a LOT of stuff. The possibility of a baby room is quickly becoming the reality of one. Wow.
Since we’re on the whole “wow” subject, my buddy Barry and I had a wow-esque time on March 13 at Laguna Seca. Why? Well we attended the second level of the Keith Code California Superbike School. After zipping down to Salinas (much closer than Willow Springs, I gotta say) on Sunday and hitting Cannery Row for dinner we adjourned to the track early on Monday morning. Even a cold, damp and cloudy Laguna Seca handily beats an office meeting to start a week, but it was pretty damn crisp out there. The thought of hitting the track in low 40-degree temperatures and wet pavement from the never-ending winter rains was more than a bit intimidating…but our luck held and the sun came out and decided to hang around for much of the day.
As before, the school was split into 5 sessions of track riding and classroom sessions. This time around the focus was on visual skills. Spotting and using reference points, keeping a broad perspective on the environment and realizing that the entire track (even the curbing) makes for a good riding surface. Taking laps around Laguna, the same track used for the US MotoGP races, was mind blowing. This 11-turn course includes the famous “corkscrew” – a quick left / right chicane with a vertical drop. Essentially you come up to the top of a hill and have to turn into what seems like…nothing. It’s quite an experience the first, second and twentieth time around. Wow. While I was nowhere even vaguely close to racer lap times, my bike indicated a 2:04 on one lap – about :40 seconds slower than the fast guys do it, but plenty fast for me. Barry had a lowside crash in turn 3 just as we started the post-lunch session, but thankfully he was not hurt and the bike only slightly damaged. What a day.
I’m pretty sure our kid will enjoy riding. Even this protective Daddy to be knows that someday I, like my Dad before me, will have to let go of the bike despite the risk. That’s how we discover what we love and what we’re capable of.
As promised, the movie reviews continue:
• Walk the Line:
Wow. While you can’t help but wonder if Joaquin Phoenix would have established himself as strongly if his brother River had lived, he is an amazing talent. His depiction of Johnny Cash was great, as was Reese Witherspoon as June – both managing to sing well without the camp factor
• Short Cuts:
Robert Altman’s ensemble cast, complex script and story lines and fast editing combine in a story of L.A. lives intersecting in shocking and unexpected ways. Good? Yeah, but it runs long and tends to bog down in times. Any movie that has Lyle Lovett and Lily Tomlin and features Jennifer Jason Leigh in a riotously funny role as a phone-sex actress taking dirty while changing a diaper merits watching.
• Brokeback Mountain:
“I wish I could quit you”…sure, if “you” means the hype about this movie. The expectations generated by the Oscar buzz, the press coverage and the contrived scandalous nature of the script all overwhelmed the reality of a touching and well-acted movie about love. The fact that the lovers are two male cowboys should be incidental – the force bringing them together despite the world around them was a powerful commentary on how emotions aren’t easily forced societal norms.
• Memoirs of a Geisha:
An amazing novel, but one so full of character development and descriptions of 1940’s Japanese culture that translating it into a movie was essentially impossible. They tried and at times succeeded – but overall it was like Karate Kid goes Geisha. The diamond in the rough becoming a stunning Geisha in about 30 minutes of celluloid. Yeah. Oh, and cast two Chinese actresses as leads in a story about war-era Japan – clever.
• The Corporation:
A documentary about the corporate culture produced by people trying WAY too hard to show off their editing software in lieu of a cohesive storyline and a muddled approach. Quick cuts and heavy-handed graphical illustrations got annoying VERY fast. Once paused, we never hit Play again. Not worth renting.
• Capote:
Historically inaccurate and while I love Philip Seymour Hoffman, his nasal-toned portrayal of Truman Capote was grating and almost impossible to understand. It was actually very well written and acted, but when you’re wishing for subtitles and reaching for the mute button when the lead character is onscreen you know something didn’t quite hit the mark. I won’t go as far as saying the victims of the In Cold Blood murders suffered less – but let’s just say Kansas didn’t look half bad during a couple of scenes.
Well, Mabel and I are headed for an overnight trip to Yosemite. I’ll post up if we meet Yogi and Boo-boo.