Darcy vs. Zombie vs. Predator

Elizabeth Bennet is having a hot year.

And remember when we found out in American history that two dudes had invented the modern sewing machine simultaneously? Well, wait for it, Mr. Darcy is The Predator.



It's like I fell into an alternate dimension where everything is tailored to my specifications.

New Music Tuesday

I am that girl who gets into ruts, musically. I dig myself in until I am comfortable, and then I stay there. Some of my favorite musical holes are filled with early Belle & Sebastian and Otis Redding singles.

To allay your fears, I am a naturally curious person, and I like new sounds, different sounds, but I am also very lazy. Listening to a new record is such a process. You have to hear it several times before you can make any worthwhile points. Gut reflex hardly constitutes a review.

Today, as a project, I am going to listen to a recently released album by an artist who is new to me, and I will update periodically as I make my way through it.

Step 1, picking a new album. So, I turn to the usual sources- friends, pretentious reviews, and the more light-hearted music blogs. Looking things over, I realize a few things. First, there's a new Clem Snide release! Second, Metric! And third, I need to stop just listening to the artists I listened to in college.

Eventually, after consulting the interwebs and examining my mood, I settle on The Bird and The Bee's sophomore release, Ray Guns Are Not Just the Future.


Oh, I hear you clamoring, "It only got a 5.4 on Pitchfork! This does not strike me as a particularly challenging choice." And it's not. I have two meetings on the docket today, kids, and this last line on the album from the AV Club review sells me on The Bird and The Bee, "the underlying skill and craft... make this fluffy-sounding collection of songs cheerily frivolous, but not disposable." That sounds ideal.

Step 2, laying my hands on the album. This is hardly even a step.

Step 3, first time through. Goofy, jazzy, fizzy. I can't tell if I like it, but I can certainly nod along.

Step 4, a couple listenings past. Ok, so it's ever so catchy and charming. Inara George has a faultless voice for this mod, synthy, jazz-influenced indie pop. My favorite track at this point is definitely, "My Love," with its effervescent love song from a Jetsons style future sound, "Hey boy, won't you take me out tonight?/ I get excited when I think of crawling into your arms," the chorus rings out over xylophone and a clap track.

Step 5, a few lyrics memorized. I finished up my first day of listening to this record a little sick of it. I would put two of the songs on mix cds, and the rest are largely forgettable. As my housemate would say, the record is pleasant. It is cohesive, and flawlessly produced, but it is never surprising.

Here I go, singing low.

In that whole consumption post, I forgot to mention Darren Aronofsky's masterful film, The Wrestler, which made me cry a little.


The thing about The Wrestler is the thing about Mickey Rourke, and I've always been a sucker for haunted characters. The ones with the ghosts of their pasts at their shoulders, in their eyes. Randy "The Ram" Robinson is a former pro-wrestling champ, an ex-star. He drives a van with his own action figure sitting on the dash, an effigy on an alter.

Decline inevitably follows peak, and the crest of the Ram's career was two decades ago. We are introduced to a middle aged, scar-faced man in a duct taped winter coat, struggling to make rent on his mobile home. In one early scene, he returns from a match only to find that his landlord has locked him out. Forced to sleep in his van, he swallows a few pain pills, fashions a pillow out of a towel, and balls his large, hurting body up against the winter cold.

For all that his body is breaking down, it is Randy's livelihood. He could have worked construction, it's true, or some other job. But he is an athlete, and an entertainer, and he will not quit until he is too broken to go on. Rourke succeeds in making this desire one I understood for all I found it unreasonable, and this is his great triumph in the role. On the wrestling circuit, no longer a hot commodity, The Ram must try increasingly reckless tricks to keep the audience's attention. That is what makes the film hard to watch. In one scene, after pulling staples and broken glass out of his back, Randy collapses into a pool of his own vomit. Sitting in the comfortable warm of the Midtown Art Cinema, watching him pitch forward, I shed two tears, because he was so bent on suffering, and I understood that his life outside the ring was not worth a damn. Turns out the pony only had one trick.

The Wrestler isn't exclusively about making you ache with pity. There are glorious, poignant little light-hearted moments, featuring the Ram's beauty regimen (tanning beds and peroxide) and fire fighter fetishists. Marissa Tomei does superior work portraying a stripper past her prime, and Evan Rachel Wood gives a fine performance as Randy's daughter. But Mickey Rourke's Ram owns the show, because it is so much his story.

In what is the saddest, truest scene in the movie, the Ram attends a small convention of former wrestlers, hocking his own merchandise behind a folding table. He has some VHS tapes and a few posters. As he surveys the room he becomes aware of his peers, with their canes, wheel chairs, and colostomy bags. His face shows recognition, but in a subtle move, Randy curls his fists, defiant, unwilling to surrender.

The Wrestler is an incredible, wrenching, and heartbroken piledriver of a movie. Rourke deserves to win the Oscar, and I hope he does.

A darling of the trenches.

Since I've been remiss in my duties as a blogger, I'm going to offer you:


things I have consumed - by justasweetyoungthing on Polyvore.com

1. Monster Trucks
I went to see large trucks roll over cars and jump hills at the so-called "Monster Jam" at the Georgia Dome. You guys, Monster Truck is poetry. It is mesmerizing and loud and perfect. I may have been a little tipsy, but everything about watching Maximum Destruction flip over and careen into Backdraft was gorgeous. I think I was dazzled by scale, I'm not ashamed to admit. Everything was just so damned big.

2. Twin Peaks
Of course, you may roll your eyes at this one. My love of a good pie, a magically real setting and plot, a square-jawed hero, and a good whodunnit are all wrapped up in a tidy, Lynchian package here. Critically, I'll tell you that the story sags after the first few episodes of the second season. Between that climax and the series finale, Twin Peaks becomes difficult to watch, a series of torturous, directionless scenes featuring beloved characters that used to have animus.

3. Låt den rätte komma in
Sometimes called the Swedish vampire movie, it's more than it sounds. It was a completely magical movie experiences simply by virtue of being itself, which is to say a truly unique perspective on adolescence, vampires and bullying. It's pale and beautiful too, all shades of snow and ice. In truth, it's my favorite movie made in the last year. If you don't trust me to be objective about vampires, you're right, but this movie is still incredible, and you should at least netflix it if you have the chance.

4. Top Flr and La Tavola
I've been working on eating my way through Atlanta, and both these restaurants are worthy. Top Flr has the kind of eclectic, sleek elegance you sometimes crave in a date restaurant, but La Tavola's long second floor porch is magnificent. In terms of food, they represent opposite ends of the modern spectrum, but I think I liked the small plates of minimalist New American fare at Top Flr more than the creative Italian Tavola offered.

5. Fenders
These are the best investment of any of these reviews, and they protect me from puddles and gravel and everything else on the ground, they also look cute and appropriate on my girly, girly bike. I got a basket too, which also succeeds in being practical and charming to look at. That is, of course, my general life goal.

6. Tights
I wear them in shades of black, gray, and brown most everyday. I am so happy they are in style, because my shins are always, always bruised, and these keep my legs looking ladylike. They also hide my pallor, always a plus. I am particularly fond of all the patterns of sweater tights available from Target. A good pair, like these, is warm and comfortable for my bike ride to work and back each day.

7. Necklaces
Let's be honest. I tend to think of jewelry as something I should expect to lose, but I've gotten two necklaces recently that I hope I can hold on to. The first was a thrift store find, and cost me all of $15 dollars, well, actually my mom picked up the tab on that one. The second comes from Hotcakes design in San Francisco, and is a handcarved resin number that cost a little more, but I think I will wear often enough to make up for it. Is it weird that these things make me feel more adult, when really they are basically an extension of my dress-up instincts?

*As in spent money on. Much as I love the idea of eating monster trucks, it is not something I am physically capable of doing.