Weekend's End

Word of the day: abrogate : to nullify, cancel

Gabriel had a great birthday party yesterday. It was fun to see family. Gabriel took a good two hours to warm up (a.k.a. the entire length of the party), but eventually he did and ran himself ragged, making me chase him so much that, in a moment of extreme clownishness, I slipped and fell directly on my elbow. Yow!

On today's agenda: a long nap, a game of Wii Jeopardy vs. my formidable wife, leftover pizza, errands, a good attempt at finishing the book I'm reading, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest on Netflix, lasagna, and the SAG Awards. I was planning on picking back up with my writing, but I 'm not sure I feel like it.

Jules and I finished The Other Guys last night. It was an entertaining, hit-or-miss affair with some hysterical bits, action scenes that were a bit belabored, some unusual chemisty between leads Will Ferrell (playing it affectedly buttoned-up and straight) and Mark Wahlberg (not the nimblest of comedians, for sure, but earning laughs regardless because he performs with such straightfaced intensity), a funny supporting turn by Michael Keaton as the two's TLC-referencing boss, and the usual try-anything approach to raunchy, splattery humor. It's an odd hybrid, but it works well at times.

Frederic Edwin Church was of the second generation of the Hudson River School of painters, the uniquely American movement in which artists drew the rugged outdoor landscapes of the Hudson River, the Adirondacks, and New Hampshire's White Mountains, among other regional scenery and vistas. He travelled extensively (South America, Jamaica, Greenland, an Old World pilgrimmage through Palestine), studied under the famous Hudson River artist Thomas Cole, and eventually settled with his wife along the Hudson in a Persian-inspired castle, Olana, which can still be visited by the public today.

His The Heart of the Andes, the second image at the top of the page, made him nationally famous and was the most popular American painting during the Civil War period. It was created following expeditions to Ecuador and Colombia in the mid-1850s. His most famous work was, arguably, Niagara, the top image, painted from the Canadian side of the falls. The artists of the Hudson River School expressed a great reverence for nature, a sort of transcendental optimism in the face of such natural wonder, using big canvasses to portray luminous contemplation of the insignificance of man. His works can be seen in museums throughout the country, including Cincinnati and Cleveland.

"Cough, Cough"

Word of the day: opsimath : one who comes to learning late in life

I'm calling in "sick" to work today so that I can spend the morning with Gabriel and so that Julia and I can take him to COSI (the Children's Science Museum) this afternoon, along with a few other spots to celebrate his Birthday Eve.

I hate my job, but what other place could I be working at right now that would allow me to play hooky once a month and get paid for it? I've done this once a month for over four years now. For you math majors out there, that's about fifty imaginary illnesses.

I think on Sunday that I'm going to get back to work on my novel. I started it last August and spent a few months on it, before I got distracted and wanted to take some time off from it. I had just finished my fifth young adult novel (in fifteen months) and I was a little burnt out and more than a little depressed that I couldn't find any agency representation for them. It's time to get back, though, to my novel. It's a story about a couple's marriage through the years, parceled out in short anecdotes. I want to finish it, though, and to keep writing screenplays, novels, TV pilots, plays... even as I try to figure out what I want to do with my life once we move to Georgia.

If you haven't noticed by now, I transition randomly and abruptly on here with a conscious, off-the-cuff brusqueness, so I'll do it again. I've been reading a lot lately, and here is a list of some of the best books I've read over the last four years.

2010:

- Freedom, Jonathan Franzen

- The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins

- True Grit, Charles Portis

- Indignation, Philip Roth

- Nemesis, Philip Roth

- Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys

- Hypothermia, Arnaldur Indridason

- Disturbing the Peace, Richard Yates

- The Human Stain, Philip Roth (sensing a pattern here?)

- The Call of the Wild and White Fang, Jack London

- Christine Falls, Benjamin Black

- Native Son, Richard Wright

- A Handful of Dust, Evelyn Waugh

- Sophie's Choice, William Styron

- The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro

2009

- A Dog's Ransom, Patricia Highsmith

- Disgrace, J.M. Coetze

- The Family Man, Elinor Lipman

- Animals Make Us Human, Temple Grandin

- The World According to Garp, John Irving

- Trouble, Jesse Kellerman

- 1984, George Orwell

2008

- Anything For Billy, Larry McMurtry

- In the Woods, Tana French

- On Chesil Beach, Ian McEwan

- The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck

- Little Tiny Teeth, Aaron Elkins

- Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry

- The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Sherman Alexie

- The Chemistry of Death, Simon Beckett

- Life Class, Pat Barker

- The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson

- Last Night at the Lobster, Stewart O'Nan

- Bridge of Sighs, Richard Russo

- World Without End, Ken Follett

2007

- Revolutionary Road, Richard Yates

- Straight Man, Richard Russo

- Eye of the Needle, Ken Follett

- Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett

- Red Leaves, Thomas Cook

- The Tin Roof Blowdown, James Lee Burke

- The Water's Lovely, Ruth Rendell

- Shadow of the Wind, Carlos Ruiz Zafon

- Shutter Island, Dennis Lehane

- Crazy in Alabama, Mark Childress

- Empire Falls, Richard Russo

- The Post Birthday World, Lionel Shriver

- The Road, Cormac McCarthy

- The Emperor's Children, Claire Messud

We're all looking forward to an exciting weekend. Julia has plenty of work to do for her classes and dissertation, and I'll watch Gabriel, do a little work, maybe watch a movie. I plan on resuming working out again soon - that is, if I can get focused.

Another feature of the blog will be a "fun" fact about something in history, usually art history. While reading Steve Martin's An Object of Beauty, I got to thinking about John Singleton Copley, the leading painter of colonial America, most famous for his portraits of the elite figures of his day (in America and England) and his 1782 painting Watson and the Shark.

Two interesting facts about Copley:

1) He was a pioneer in the orchestration of private exhibitions, and one of the first contemporary history painters, a genre more appreciated at the time in London, where he eventually resettled before the Revolutionary War (Copley was a Loyalist, supporting King George), than in his native Massachusetts.

2) The figures in his paintings were often holding telltale objects, portraits d'apparat. The largest collection of these paintings, indeed the most expansive of Copley's ouevre, can be seen at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

Above is Paul Revere (1768-1770).

First Post

Welcome!

This is my initial post on my second blog. I abandoned my first blog a few years ago. I'm looking forward to starting anew, writing, as always, about pop culture (films, books, TV), art, life, travel, writing, or whatever else entrances my fancy.

So how to start this thing off? Well, about me: I'm thirty, married to a brilliant woman, father to an adorably great two-year old, living in Columbus, Ohio for a few more months. Currently, I work at a bookstore, but I'm thankful that I won't be making a career of it.

We're moving to Georgia in July, to Statesboro, as Julia got a job at Georgia Southern University teaching art history. We're all looking forward to the move.

My brain's a bit rusty at the moment, and I can't think of too much more to say as far as introducing myself.

What's new today? Well, the Oscar nominations are out. I won't list the Oscar nominees for you since there are numerous websites where such information can be found - and I'm sure anyone who's interested in the Oscars already knows who has been nominated.

Best Picture: No surprises here, although of course there were gripes (as ever) about what films were left out in the cold, such as Ben Affleck's The Town, Shutter Island, The Ghost Writer, among others.

I think The Social Network is going to win this one, due to its popularity, its complete, utter domination of every single critics circle, and the fact that it's David Fincher's finest film. It's timely, it's of-the-moment, gorgeously written, impeccably acted, masterfully scored, exciting, tense, smart.

The King's Speech, which I haven't seen, could be primed to de-throne the Facebook crowd, but I think that will win in at least one other category...

Best Actor: I think this is Colin Firth's year, guys. He's won all the crucial awards so far and his part hits all the Academy's beloved tropes: a real-life historical figure, a royal figure no less, with a disability, during a war...

I don't think Jeff Bridges or Javier Bardem have much of a shot, nor does James Franco, although his rich performance was a revelation. That leaves Jesse Eisenberg as the probable bridesmaid. He's ruthlessly, magnetically unsympathetic, but he's up against Colin Firth. Incidentally, Eisenberg's good movie/bad movie ratio at this point in his career is remarakably high (The Squid and the Whale, Zombieland, The Emperor's Club, Adventureland, Roger Dodger, The Hunting Party...)

Best Actress:

This really is Natalie Portman's to win. Her no-holds-barred performance in Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan is a high-wire act, both overwrought and nimble.

Annette Bening's masterful turn in The Kids are Alright is really superb, deserving of the win, and she's Portman's stiffest competition. Nicole Kidman (Rabbit Hole) earned her third career nomination, but she has no chance, since hardly anyone's seen the film. Jennifer Lawrence might be a dark horse candidate for Winter's Bone, but she's too much of an unknown, and her steady, raw portrayal struck too much amateurish notes (for me, anyway).

Other predictions:

Supporting Actor: Christian Bale, The Fighter

Supporting Actress: Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit

Director: David Fincher, The Social Network

Original Screenplay: Lisa Cholodenko, Stuart Blomberg, The Kids Are Alright

Adapted Screenplay: Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network

In other news, it's Gabriel's second birthday this Saturday. Happy birthday, big boy. On Friday, he'll be going to COSI, the bakery, the toy store, and then he'll feast on some pizza. Saturday, he'll be in Cincinnati for a birthday party.

What I've finished reading: Ken Follett's Fall of Giants, a big, juicy epic (part 1 of a trilogy) that features dozens of characters loving and fighting through World War 1. Follet's style has an easy, accessible malleability. He's melodramatic, for sure, but that's the fun of it, and he has a suave, assured way with history, both barreling through all the moments most of us have forgotten from history (the Russian Revolution, the defining years of the Labour Party, the Battle of Somme, the suffrage movement) and explaining it lucidly and entertainingly.

Our first word of the day: hebetude : stupidity, dull-wittedness

Stay in touch, guys. I'll be back every couple days for more opinions, goings-on, words and facts of the day, recommendations, tidbits...