The Travels and Rants Journal

This was really not as weird as it looks. At least, I don’t think so. I remember there was some wine involved…

1. Welcome to “pedestrian-friendly” Charlottesville, where, for the most part, only the cops get to run over people in wheelchairs. (Watch the video). Cops running people over, other cops giving tickets to the run-over instead of the runner-over - too bad there’s a writers’ strike going on - somehow this smells like a bad punchline to a bad joke about job security…

2. Congratulations to Fred Thompson, the one-time savior of the right wing, who came in more than 1400 votes behind the write-ins in the New Hampshire primary.

3. I might finally be over my cold. Still not up to speed, but I manged to run two and a half miles today. Slow and stiff, but I think I scraped some of the rust off my lungs.

4. Music plug: Nathan Moore. Friday. Miller’s. Downtown. I’m outta town, but you should go.

5. Going through old pics. My friend Alyce. October 2005.

The Quiet American: Michael Caine is a great actor, and makes the role of Thomas Fowler his own. This is just a well-crafted, beautiful film. 4/5. *

Neil Young: Heart of Gold: I’ve been a fan of Neil Young forever - and I think he’s one of the best songwriters and performers of his era - but as a film, this just felt lifeless and staged. I loved watching Neil and seeing the interview footage, and some of the older songs had a certain energy to them, but too much of the uncompelling concert footage lacked any kind of spark. 2/5.

The U.S. vs. John Lennon: I found a lot of this obvious and ineloquent (and it’s kinda hard to take seriously any film that chooses to use Geraldo Rivera as a talking head), but if nothing else, it can be recommended for its obvious parallels to present-day abuses of government power, and for our day’s need for a man who can be counted on to stand up for the right thing. 3/5.

Frida: Salma Hayek and Alfred Molina are perfect as Frida and Diego, and the film floats along with a colorful and stylish energy. It’s smart, feeling, beautiful, and emotional. 4/5.

Field of Dreams: Possibly my favorite movie of all time. Don’t get me started… 5/5. *

Taxi Driver: Yeah, it’s a classic, and everyone should see it. De Niro is amazing of course. Still, I was a little surprised how dated it felt. Or if not dated, sort of obvious…? 4/5. *

The Assassination of Richard Nixon: Though this is not for the squeamish, it’s a pretty amazing film, with some amazing performances. Sean Penn is about as good an actor as this day and age gets. Don Cheadle also turns in a nuanced, first-rate performance. 4/5. *

Torn Curtain: In some ways, a very un-Hitchcock Hitchcock movie (Julie Andrews?!), but in some ways, it’s a fun and well-paced thriller. Paul Newman (also un-Hitch) is good, and the film carries the usual elements along at a steady speed. 4/5.

* Highly recommended.

—–

Older picture. Surry County, Virginia. December 2005.

1. This is so wrong on so many levels: One, do you really want a hamburger in the shape of a rodent head; two, is it just me, or does the idea of buying ground beef from Disney sound a little scary?; and three, where the hell are you supposed to get mickey-shaped buns?

Mickey burgers (from Boing Boing)

2. This is getting more and more interesting. BigStrongRogerMan had better have his ducks in a row once he finds himself under oath…

Clemens, McNamee have ‘emotional’ phone talk. (from Newsday)

3. I need to take more more photographs. I wanted to take some this weekend, but still have this awful cold.

4. I think I’ve got seven of the new pieces done and photographed. Look for updates soon.

5. Music to make art to:

Run away to the seashore it doesn’t matter anymore
Doesn’t matter anymore
Words dry up and fly away with the passing of the days
Eventually you just let the stone fall

-Frazey Ford and Samantha Parton (Be Good Tanyas), “Only In The Past”

6. Another ferry picture from NC:

1. I’ve been working at the UVa Art Museum, and I really like it. I’ve been helping with the de-installation of the amazing William Christenberry exhibition. The show had lots of his great little sculptured houses, tons of photographs, drawings, paintings, dolls, etc., all of which have to be carefully crated for shipment to their next exhibition. The exhibition is very special, and it’s a treat and an honor to be so close to the work of someone so gifted. So we’ve been busy with that, plus painting galleries and getting ready for what’s to come.

2. I highly recommend this stunning blog from a talented British photographer. A Funny Time Of Year.

3. And now… A man who built a bowling alley in his garage.

4. Followed by… Cows who fart like kangaroos.

5. I have a cold and feel like shit.

6. From last month. Hanging out on the couch…

Last week, Wanchese, North Carolina:

1. Happy New Year! I hope you had fun doing whatever you were doing to ring in 2008. Did you make any resolutions? I never do. It’s certainly not that I don’t feel the need for self-improvement, I just don’t really buy into the idea that promises made on December 31 have any more merit (or chance of success) than those made any other day.

2. Congrats to our reader Eve, who won the December drawing for a limited edition matted photograph. You could win too - I give away art every month to some lucky commenter - details for the January drawing are here.

3. Congrats also to Charlottesville TV station WCAV for their creative spelling of the last period of a football game. That’s some damn fine journalism there, kids!

Forth Quarter Texas Tech Comeback Stuns Virginia, 31-28

*** Edit: It’s been fixed!  Do you think they’re reading this…? ***

4. If you don’t read Bill Emory’s blog, you should.

5. If you have a few minutes, read the always smart and thoughtful John Hockenberry’s article about his disillusionment with the teevee news biz, “‘You Don’t Understand Our Audience’; What I learned about network television at Dateline NBC”

In the spring of 2005, after working in television news for 12 years, I was jettisoned from NBC News in one of the company’s downsizings. The work that I and others at Dateline NBC had done - to explore how the Internet might create new opportunities for storytelling, new audiences, and exciting new mechanisms for the creation of journalism - had come to naught. After years of timid experiments, NBC News tacitly declared that it wasn’t interested. The culmination of Dateline’s Internet journalism strategy was the highly rated pile of programming debris called To Catch a Predator. The TCAP formula is to post offers of sex with minors on the Internet and see whether anybody responds. Dateline’s notion of New Media was the technological equivalent of etching “For a good time call Sally” on a men’s room stall and waiting with cameras to see if anybody copied down the number.

6. Slumber: