Current Book Pile

Whoah, I did NOT mean to leave that Charlie Sheen post up as long as I did. Oh well. This mont's book pile, for your consideration. It's a little out of date, but really, all I've added since then is Moby Dick. Just imagine some added heft to the pile.

From Top to Bottom:

Future Reading: The Death of the Heart, Elizabeth Bowen

RIP Elizabeth Taylor Reading: The Driver's Seat, Muriel Spark (she starred in the film adaptation)

Just Finished Reading: The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera

Just Finished Non-Fiction Reading: Gretzky's Tears, Stephen Brunt (mentally subtitled: "Stop it with all the padding, Brunt)

Current Graphic Novel: Shenzhen, Guy Delisle

An Open Letter to North America Regarding The Charlie Sheen Situation

Dear North America,

I'll begin this letter by sharing a personal anecdote. When Charlie Sheen exploded/imploded into media consciousness a few weeks back, my reaction was as follows: hearty chuckle, followed by an "Oh, that Charlie Sheen, he's so wacky", followed by "Actually, no, he has a history of spousal abuse, some serious issues, and is also responsible for the well-being of several children, a task he's clearly ill-prepared for. This isn't wacky. This is fucking SAD."

Evidently, this was not the reaction shared by many of you. You followed him on Twitter, you made his quotes into catchphrases, and you probably continued to watch re-runs of Two And A Half Men, although maybe it was 7pm on a Tuesday, you were tired, and the remote had fallen behind the couch, so I suppose it's justifiable. But mostly, when he took his meltdown on tour, you bought tickets.

And, the result was not good. Sheen was booed during his first show, with most of the audience fleeing and many of them demanding refunds. Let's look at a few quotes from this Associated Press article about Sheen's debacle in Detroit. "'It's kind of like a NASCAR race. You're just tuning in because you're just waiting for the accident to happen,' said Prentice, 37." "Adam Hawke said he bought a ticket for the same reason. 'He might be doing something really crazy,' said Hawke, 47, who works in the construction business and lives in Michigan. 'He's a wreck. That's half the draw.'"

To which I say: NO REFUNDS FOR ANY OF YOU. If you wanted a wreck, an accident, there it is. Sheen didn't let you down, he delivered exactly what you loved weeks ago, except this time there was no protective screen. His physical presence made you confront his humanity- and you realized that what's funny on YouTube isn't necessarily so funny when it's being yelled at you in a bus stop or on stage.

And since you so badly want to see a human being flame out, I'm glad that pleasure has a high price tag: at least $45 dollars, plus two hours in a room with a bitter man in a bowling shirt.

Cordially yours,
Portagitron.

One Paragraph Movie Review: Hobo With a Shotgun

You don't have to be a twelve year-old boy high on Mountain Dew and Hot Rods to like Hobo With a Shotgun, but it's a good place to start. You could also be a twelve-year-old boy in a twenty-three year old woman's body. That worked for me, and it could work for you too. It's a fine export from Nova Scotia, a province finally delivering something besides (shudder) Celtic revival music, and features a Hobo With a Shotgun, his sidekick the Hooker with a Heart of Gold (and Even Better Rack) and a bunch of evil dudes. Supporting credit must also go out to as much red paint/blood as Canadian Tire was probably stocking on film day. Rutger Hauer is the titular hobo, who goes head-to-head with the megalomaniacal Drake and his goony sons in order to clean up Hope City. Naturally, Hope City is less hopeful and more like a Canadian version of RoboCop's Detroit; slightly cleaner and housing George Stroumboulopoulos. But it's Strombo's cameo, as well as those by other Canadian celebrities, that are the only awkward notes in 90 minutes of good, nasty, Troma-inspired fun.

Introducing Cascadia: The Best Place That Doesn't Exist (Yet)

Sorry about the total drought of posting- it can be blamed on a combination of things, from Marmotinis (like a regular Martini, but more endangered and expensive, and found only in the Bengal Lounge of the Empress Hotel, aka The One Place Where the Sun Has Never Set On The British Empire) to woodworking to house sitting.

But mostly, I blame Seattle. After nine months of being apart from my beloved ex-roommate Ivy McDougalhopper, we finally made plans to be in the same city. She lives in Minnesota, I live in BC, and so we ended up meeting, if not quite in the middle, then at least on her side of the border.

Seattle, of course, was lovely. Any city that offers honey-lavender and balsamic-strawberry ice cream (at Molly Moon's, in Capitol Hill) must be amazing. But it also felt strangely familiar. There were people in GoreTex, bicyclists, rainy weather, piers, fairly liberal politics... OH MY GOD, I had actually taken the wrong seaplane and ended up back in VANCOUVER.

Oh wait, no, the money is still uniformly and confusingly green. So many one dollar bills! I can't count them all! I must still be in Seattle. But it did feel a fair bit like BC. Then my coworker explained my confusion by introducing me to the fake country of Cascadia.

The Douglas Fir Flag, emblem of Cascadia. Likely to be pine-scented as well.

Cascadia is the union of Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia into an independent nation. One assumes its main exports would be lumber, agricultural products, and flannel-wearing men. And, for a fake country, it has an awful lot of real support. It's shown up in a bunch of Sci-Fi books, but more endearingly the Cascadia Cup is contested between the city's respective soccer teams (the Whitecaps, Sounders and Timbers) and three breweries put the flag on their product.

Between the soccer and the local brew, it's clearly a movement with a particular audience. I imagine the ideal Cascadian citizen being Grant Lawrence, the scruffy Cowichan sweater fan and CBC broadcaster. His favourite beer is already Phillips Blue Buck, which comes emblazoned with the Doug flag, and I'm sure Cascadian Public Radio would find a place in its heart for this man.

And I'm just in love with this idea too. From now on, I'm a dual Canadian/Cascadian citizen. Rule, Cascadia! Cascadia, rule the coast!

Comic Strips!

A few months ago on this blog, I was complaining about "Straight White Guys Buying Milk" comics, my term for indie comics that revolve around the purchasing habits and general sadness of some scruffy, beleaguered cartoonist. Then I made up a joke script, which I finally got around to illustrating in my own awkward drawing style (I call it: Canadian Primitive. Canada Council Grant, please!)

But then I started to wonder- I am white, straight-ish, and the occasional purchaser of beverages. Just because I am a girl, would that make my navel-gazing comic strips any more insightful? So, I drew one (of a true story that happened to me just a few weeks ago) to find out. And the answer? No. Which should be a surprise to no one, although I certainly put more effort into drawing it.

You can judge for yourself which side of the indie comics coin is the best, below. Click on the strips to make them bigger. Then, vote in the poll to the right. I'll only cry a little bit if you choose A.

Book Covers I Have Loved: Sleepless by Jo Anne Metsch

This cover might not be particularly powerful on its own, but consider the fact that it's a mystery. Then consider what that fact would shelve it next to: a whole lot of dark, busy covers. You know, blood splatters, shattered fonts and "The Next Steig Larsson" taglines. I know when I saw this on a table of mysteries in a bookstore, bright, crisp and very white, I wanted to read it- even if I could barely make out the title.

The copyright page says the book designer is Jo Anne Metsch, so I'll assume she was responsible for the cover as well.

Sticking to Paper and Ink

The results of the poll I ran a few weeks ago were definite- the majority of my readers have Print 4 Life tattooed over their hearts. And, I would assume, inked in that curlicue script so beloved of hip hop artists everywhere.

I'll be skipping the tattoo, but I agree with my friends. There will be no ereader for me in the near future. First of all, there's the matter of cost. I just can't justify spending over $100 on a piece of equipment when I'm still paying off student loans, trying to keep my credit card bill reasonable, and tipping a firm 20% on all my drinks.

But it's more than just finances. Since I polled my readers, I have poked at a Kobo while avoiding overeager Chapters employees, and tooled around on somebody's Kindle 2. And I've realized that one thing really bothers me. Most ereaders are about the size of a trade paperback, but the screen is only a part of that. The Kindle 2 felt particularly miserly, maybe equalling half of an average printed page. I can only imagine Kindle users with poor eyesight getting carpal tunnel syndrome of the thumb working their way through Freedom. Just. 6,000. More. Clicks. Of the Next Page. Button.

It's completely irrational, but I'm so used to the average presentation of a page that only seeing half that would feel as if I was getting half of the information. Clearly, there are many people out there who don't share my issues- Kindle downloads outsell paperbacks on Amazon.

And, should anyone find it in their hearts and wallets to gift me an iPad, I'm sure I would change my mind as well. They would have to pry that bit of shininess out of my cramped, desperately tapping, hands.

In No Particular Order, a Few Things I Miss About Quebec

I think I've almost acclimatized myself to British Columbia. But in spite of its good halibut and suspiciously fresh air, I do find myself missing Montreal every now and then. And some of the things I miss about that fair city aren't the usual suspects either (poutine.)

-Really stupid "controversies" over language. Does that disco movie, Funkytown, have too much English in it? Surely, somebody thinks so and will write a column about it.

-Lebanese places that stay open late so you can shovel garlic sauce into your gullet while drunk.

-Francophone men, the kind of guys you strongly suspect have more scarf than personality, but you don't mind because they really know how to drape that scarf.

-The days when the brewery near my house would make the whole air smell sweet, probably because they were brewing some kind of Honey Brown Ale.

-A metro system

-Meu Meu, the ice cream place with hibiscus, honey, salted chocolate flavours and more

-Monastiraki, and Billy, the delightful man who runs it.

-The cheap pitchers at Verres Stérilisés

-The sense of unearned victory you feel when you speak French to someone and- glory be- they reply in French!

-Simons, the store where you can lust after some 1,000$ designer skirt, and then actually purchase the 19$ store brand knockoff they're also carrying downstairs.

-Ms. C and Mr. Will, two wonderful friends

-The murals in the train station

That's all I can think of, for now. I would try and come up with a list for Guelph, but fear it would be a rather short one.

Book Covers I Have Loved: The Information, Cover by Peter Mendelsund

I thought this cover was a little dull at first. White space, serif type and two columns? Lucky they didn't put three on there, that would have really angered up the blood. But I kept on returning to this, even though it was on a shelf with more superficially interesting covers. And that's when its cleverness started to grow on me. Although the title, the author and one of his other credits are highlighted in red, the subtitle is not. The only thing that makes the words "A History, A Theory, A Flood" stand out is their singularity, so my brain was scanning and sorting information, even before I could start reading a book about the same.

Correction of the Correction: I thought I found the credit for the designer on the author's blog, then I thought I hadn't, but now it seems like it really is Peter Mendelsund's work. Oh God, the information!! It's too much for me!

Mystery Train: A Paragraph Review

You should watch Mystery Train if you like the music of Elvis Presley. You should watch Mystery Train if you prefer the music of Carl Perkins. And you should watch Mystery Train if you know anything about Stax Records. In short, you should probably just watch Mystery Train. It's a Jim Jarmusch movie, with the expected interweaving stories and elliptical conversations. What makes it awesome though is the chemistry between Cinqué Lee (yep- Spike's brother) and, of all people, Screaming Jay Hawkins. Lee is the bellhop and Hawkins the desk clerk in a rundown Memphis motel, and it's hard to describe how amazing they are without repeating their scenes verbatim. But they're not nearly as amusing if you can't also hear Hawkins rumbling, Voice of God tones, so let's just say that they create the funniest scene involving a Japanese plum since The Simpsons. And if you're a right-thinking person, that's all you need to know about the validity of this film.