Almost 2011, and a Rap on the Wrap

First of all, I'm still pronouncing "2010" as "Two Thousand Ten," and I think I'll likely pronounce "2011" as "Two Thousand Eleven." What about y'all? For some reason, "Twenty-Ten" and "Twenty-Eleven" sound like marketing copy to me, yet I know it's inconsistent, 'cause I certainly didn't refer to "1999" as "One Thousand Nine Hundred Ninety-Nine or even the slightly less cumbersome "Nineteen Hundred Ninety-Nine." For a helpful look at this issue which is essentially a digression from my main drift today, please listen to Grammar Girl's podcast on the topic. Seems I'm out of the norm on this one, which isn't surprising in the least.

Speaking of norms, it is around this time of year here at Toothpick Labeling that we are all frothing at the mouth, chomping at the bit, ready to jump guns, cross lines in sand, and loads of other appropriate (or not) overused metaphors in hot anticipation of my annual Year-end Wrap. For those of you not in the know, every year for the last seven of 'em, I've written up a summary of how my year has gone, including a fairly detailed collection of reviews of all the culture I've imbibed, films I've seen, books I've read, shows I've attended, yadda yadda. Every year since 2003. Except, I'm afraid to report, for the year 2010.*

Why have I skimped on preparing a Wrap this time? Well, I'll tell ya. In the first half of the year, I had actually planned to continue my tradition of yearly review by setting up a Word document as I normally do with the general categories of the entry all lined up (personal stuff that's happened, books, TV shows, films I've seen in the theater, films I've watched on DVD/online, live shows, music I've acquired, and resolutions for the year). I began filling in those categories as I ticked off events, milestones, and cultural consumption during the first few months of the year. I also set out a new and ambitious plan to begin reviewing stuff in the blog more or less as I finish a book or after I've seen a movie so that my work on the Wrap would be a lot less daunting at the end of the year. I was really happy with that commitment I'd set out for myself.

A collage of images from Wraps-Past. Clockwise from top left: Dorrie the Dog; Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler; some of our friends from Buffy the Vampire Slayer; an ostrich in the Santa Inez Valley; The L-Word dykes; the Van Tussles vs. the Turnblads in John Waters's Hairspray; Gandhi; laughable lotus climax from The Fountain; King Crimson's album In the Court of the Crimson King: an Observation by King Crimson; the cast of Nine to Five.

But then in April, Mom got diagnosed with cancer, and by May she was dead. And, although it seems trivial in comparison, just a few days after Mom died, my apartment got broken into and my laptop was stolen, and along with it, the not-backed-up document containing all my 2010 Wrap info. Added to that, there's been a lot of relationship wrangling and the constant stress of being underemployed and trying to build my therapy practice.

It's hard for me to break with traditions, especially with expectations I set out for myself, but it became clear at length that I would have to ditch the Wrap this time. I've had bigger fish to fry emotionally and energetically this year. I'm sure my readers can understand this breech of protocol, and, to tell you the truth, letting myself off the hook from the exacting task of tracking every freakin' thing I do all year has been liberating in the extreme.

I can't promise I'll get back to doing a Wrap for 2011, but it's possible. It's also possible I'll be focusing my energies on ever-newer, more up-to-the-moment relevant projects that hopefully will feed my soul in different ways. If you're nostalgic for my Wraps of yore, you can check 'em out by clicking any of these handy hyperlinks: 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003

Here's wishing you and yours a happy Thanksgiving, a warm and wonderful holiday season, a fantastic New Year, and the hope that all our energies will continue to be focused on what's important, inspiring, loving, and fruitful. I am, and I trust that we all are, exactly where we need to be.

Peace 'n' love,
Bree


*The author understands if you read that as "Twenty-Ten" and won't like you any less for it.

In pencil, on a paper placemat

This was a list I wrote myself around July of this year. I'm not feeling as unstable as I was then, but it's a meaningful period piece.

Reasons to be kind to myself:

I'm in mourning.
I feel lost and abandoned.
I'm hungry and haven't had time to take care of myself today.
I'm worthy of love.
Astrid loves me.
I'm a good person.
This is temporary.
I'm okay.
I have a family and friends who love me.
I deserve kindness.
I am learning how to be a good therapist, and it's okay not to be perfect.

Wishes, Goals, Bookshelves

Astrid and I are navigating a lot of complexity together. We're doing well, moving through it, communicating our feelings and our needs to each other, and above all, trying to balance the here-and-now with the yet unknown future, or trying to manifest in the here-and-now the kinds of futures we desire for ourselves as individuals and for our lives together. To that end, beyond the verbal processing, the treating each other with extra attention and kindness, the connecting and reconnecting through talk and touch, we are engaged in a goal-setting exercise which we've been refining over the last week or so. We outlined our life values as individuals, listed our wishes. What does each of us want to manifest in our lives, the materialistic and the altruistic, the personal and the professional, the creative and the logistical? Today, we organized our wishes into goals, identified the areas of our lives the goals fit into, and assigned a timeline to each. Mine run the gamut from the microscopic-mundane:

Clear out the bookshelf in the dining room (personal goal). Timeline: immediate

to the long-ranging and grandiose:

Write and publish a nonfiction book (career goal). Timeline: 5 to 10 years.

I'm pleased to say I've already knocked out the bookshelf. It was a catch-all that caught everything from random shoelaces to no less than three bike U-lock mounts (never used) to a baseball mitt (last touched nearly three years ago) to my grad school readers and binders that had been collecting dust since graduation in 2008 to outdated telephone directories (why do they still make those things?) Now it's cleared out, dusted, virtually empty, waiting to be filled with objects that are more relevant to our lives now, useful and in use, a dynamic space rather than a dead one.

'Cause that's the point, really, to occupy the space of our lives with vitality and movement, rather than stagnancy, dust, the dead-end of inattention and the taking for granted that we just move from day to day without sight of our dreams, what we really want from this life: bookshelves of our own and bookshelves to share.

The Wrath of Lacan

I'm very excited to present to you my first attempt at an animated sketch. This dialogue is based on a recent conversation among friends over a few glasses of wine and/or whiskey.

Tech brought to you by xtranormal.com. The URL for this video is at http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/6811497



Shouts out to Nan, DJ, Astrid, and April. Thanks Astrid for editorial feedback.

Mundane tasks, you know, like making life insurance claims...

Today's a pretty typical day for me. Mondays are my days off, and so I often do stuff like walk the dog, do the dishes, pay bills, goof around on Facebook, work on the blogs. But I had a task on my list today that was layered with immense pain, even though I ended up executing it with a reasonable level of business-as-if-it's-usualness. As the title of this post alludes to, the task was to start the process of filing the life insurance claims for the policies my mom left my sisters and me. I took this on as one of the many tasks that the three of us are sharing in the shadow of Mom's death. The phone call was surprisingly easy, even though what it symbolized is not. All we need to provide is the death certificate and some rote forms, and then we've got some money to use to pay off Mom's creditors and make the arrangements to sell her mobile home. Hopefully the house won't suck up too much money, so that there'll be some left over for the three of us to use, but the truth is, mobile homes don't sell quickly, and we have to pay space rent on it every month til it sells. The enormity of the meaning of these perfunctory business transactions is that I will never see my mom again, I will never hear her voice again, I will never have to hear her say, "Why don't you ever call me, you rotten kid?" again, whether she's joking or not.

If you thought April was rough...

...May's been no cake walk either. Most of you who know me in "real life" already know what's been up with me since my last blog post. But those of you just tuning in for the first time, or for my blogospheric friends out there, I have some news to share with you. On May 14, less than a month after her cancer diagnosis, my mom died in San Jose, California. She was 73 years old. This entry might come off as clinical or cold or glib; forgive me, but I'm not in a melancholy mood today, and I'm interested in staying that way. This isn't meant to be a cathartic entry for me (although one doesn't know the outcome until one goes ahead and writes); rather, I'd like simply to let everyone know what's been up, so that I can move on to more nuanced posts if I feel like it, or more trivial posts if I feel that way.

My mom was admitted to the hospital after her very first meeting with the oncologist. The cancer doc called in the bone doc, because he was very concerned about a mass that had spread to her left femur. The orthopedic surgeon and the oncologist agreed that surgery to implant a rod would be the best insurance for my mom's comfort in her last months of life. Her cancer had metastasized, spread to her bones, and she was terminal, but also in danger of shattering her leg. We all agreed it was the best course of action to get her the surgery, but she was terrified. The surgery itself went as planned, and she was healing up on morphine, by turns out of it and cranky. At one point, she told a nurse that she didn't like her voice, that it was grating to her, and then she turned to the other nurse and said, "I'll talk to you instead." Her orneriness was kind of a good sign, though. Unfortunately, the bed rest and immune system weakness led to pneumonia, the pain drugs further weakened her breathing, and on top of that, her chronic pulmonary obstructive disease, from the smoking, also depleted her ability to get enough oxygen into her blood and increased her carbon dioxide output. A particularly know-it-all-like respiratory therapist put it this way: "her lungs are not allowing her to exchange gases properly." He offered this pat description every time we asked him a different question about her condition. After days on a bipap machine, which forced air into her lungs, the fluid wasn't clearing out and her oxygen and carbon levels continued to plummet/spike respectively whenever the mask was taken off. She was verbally unresponsive at this point, basically just sleeping, occasionally grabbing at the mask to take it off. So C. and J. and I made the decision we knew Mom would want us to make. We decided to take her off the bipap machine and wait for her to die.

Imagine that: I'm feeling more emotional than I'd wanted to at the outset of writing this entry. I'll say one more thing. We held the memorial for Mom two days later, at the funeral home and cemetery where my father and my grandparents are interred, and where my cousin is buried. I enjoyed the ceremony, as much as it's possible to enjoy such a thing, and I think Mom would have enjoyed it, too. Several friends she'd known for thirty and forty and more years spoke, and some dear family friends played guitar. I hope she would have liked it. She was well-loved, my mom.

I'm writing this. Does that make it real?

April Overload

April was incredible: more than I asked for, in good ways and pretty terrible ways. Here's a handy-dandy timeline of my life over the last four or five weeks:


April 1: I ran into my ex-girlfriend N. for the first time in nearly four years. It was sweet, and it was bitter, and I don't really know what to say about it.

April 2: Astrid and I took a guy home from a bar together. He was Quebecois, and quoted Baudelaire in bed. Astrid and he had outrageous chemistry, but it was damned fun for me, too!

April 3: Astrid and Montréal Boy had a second glorious date together while I hung out with pals for the evening, then dropped from exhaustion.

April 4: My mom called me in the morning. Her doctor found a mass in her lung. As I adjusted to this news, Astrid and I joined pals for an invigorating hike in the freezing rain on Mount Tam.

April 6: Astrid and I celebrated the fifth annual Orbit Day: the anniversary of our first date!

April 11: A dear friend of astro-b's was in town for the weekend. He's geeky-sweet, just what I like in a boy. I suckered him into bed with me, eventually. I guess April was the month for my latent bisexuality to emerge. Grin.

April 20: We learned that the mass in Mom's lung isn't the only one. She's got "suspicious" masses in or near her liver and kidneys, in her bones, between her shoulder blades. Everywhere. We're still waiting for the biopsy results.

April 29: Evidently my clinical supervisor had an intense April as well. She informed me that due to a personal crisis in her family, she would need to resume seeing clients on Fridays, which has been one of my two full days to use our shared office space. In other words, my internship and my weekly schedule are going to be altered in a major way.

Shit howdy, I'm glad it's May.

Both/(And)

The undulations of my moods lately aren't severe, just ripples riding sometimes higher in anxiety and sometimes lower in listlesness. There are some good days too, to be sure.

Lots of the money stress, still. Still. Some relationship ennui has come and gone, the way it does with long standing love. Dr. Mario has been brought out of its 1 1/2 year slumber in order to nurse Astrid and I through our collective anxiety about not accomplishing real things. My private practice is finally turning a "profit" if that's what you call around $400 per month. This is truly a good, good thing. But with just one tiny bookkeeping gig in addition to the therapy work, I'm still making just enough to pay rent and that's absolutely it. I've blogged enough about all this before, so I should get on to other things. Like that I'm hungry, and I should probably eat some lunch.

xo
Bree

Hot Tub Time Machine (2010) **½

There were certainly some laugh-out-loud gags, and fun cameo/supporting cast choices (particularly the meta choice of Crispin Glover as a bitter bell hop), but for the most part: tired plot, tired homophobic and sexist humor and characterizations, and an utter lack of creativity in utilizing the time travel premise. And the most cloyingly conventional and predictable resolution ever. This movie gives us one gift: a prominent role for Clark Duke, who plays 20 year-old straight man to a bunch of sad-sack 40-somethings. I'll look forward to seeing his career develop.

Don't Hang Noodles On My Ears

Here are some English idiomatic expressions and what I believe to be their Russian equivalents. At least, these are my guesses. I'll have the real answers, if they differ from mine, in a bit. Venture your own guesses at Dave's blog.

Super-Quick White Bean & Tomato Veggie Soup

Have to share this recipe from last night's dinner. Astrid and I had a long day at Fort Funston with the dog and were too exhausted to cook something elaborate, but are also too broke to treat ourselves out right now. We stopped by Arizmendi to get some yummy bread for sandwiches, but ended up with a crunchy, crusty sourdough loaf instead. Astrid said it'd be good with soup, and thought of the combination of white beans and tomato. This was the inspiration for the following totally ad-hoc recipe, full of shortcuts (canned beans, canned tomato, bouillon cubes). We had delicious soup in about an hour.

Ingredients:

1-2 T oil (olive, canola, whatever)
1 yellow onion, chopped
2-3 stalks of celery, chopped
1/2 a red bell pepper, chopped
2 garlic cloves, smashed and minced
8-10 mushrooms, coarsely sliced
1 turnip, diced
2 veggie bouillon cubes dissolved into about 6-7 cups hot/boiling water
small handful of fresh marjoram or other herbs (about a tablespoon dried)
2 cans butter beans or cannellini beans, drained
1 large can of whole peeled tomatoes, coarsely chopped, with juice
fresh parsley for garnish*
fresh-milled black pepper to taste

* (This is a totally Throw-All-the-Old-Veggies-You've-Got-Into-the-Soup situation. I think the onions, garlic, and celery are essential, but otherwise anything goes. Zucchini or dark leafy greens would be fantastic.)

Method:

In a large pot, heat a glug of oil on medium flame. Throw in the onions and move them around while they cook to milky/translucent. Add the garlic, celery, red bell, mushrooms, turnips or other veggies. Sautée all.

While veggies are sautéeing, boil water separately for the bouillon. I used the kettle - it's a quicker boil than a pot. Place the bouillon cubes in a large glass bowl or measuring cup that won't crack from the hot water. Add the water to the cubes and mix around to dissolve, then pour the broth over the veggies in the pot.*

Add the herbs, drained beans, and tomatoes with juice. Turn the heat up to high and boil. Then turn down to simmer for as long as you want. At least a half hour.

Garnish with some fresh parsley and dunk some crusty bread! I didn't add any additional salt besides the bouillon cubes. Salt to your liking - it'll depend on how much water you add. The flavor of this soup is very similar to minestrone. If you wanna go that extra mile, add some cooked pasta and some grated Parmesan, then mangiare!

*If I'm not making a veggie stock from scratch, I prefer to use a good bouillon cube or paste than one of those ready-made liquid stocks in the aseptic-pack cartons. Three reasons: 1. cheaper; 2. less packaging waste; 3. I find that a bouillon imparts a clearer, more pure stock flavor than those thicker liquid stocks. Most of the vegetarian ones are high in carrot flavor, which provides more sweetness than I like.

Avenue Q

Avenue Q at the San Jose Center for the Performing Arts, January 16, 2010 ****

My whole family went to see this performance together. Our section of the audience ranged in age from 72 (my mom) to 24 (my youngest nephew Zach) with cultural tastes as divergent as Sinatra and Sigur Rós. Everyone got something out of the show, though unfortunately the acoustics and sound weren't great, so mom had trouble hearing it.

It's always something of a thrill to partake in a cultural production that captures some kind of essence of what I consider to be "my sensibilities." Having been born in a particular time and place, 1972 in the United States, I straddle the fence between Gen X and Gen Y, not old enough to remember the Vietnam War, but a student marcher against George Bush, Sr.'s invasion of Iraq. Old enough to have written real, paper letters to my friends through high school and college, but also an avid blogger, chatter, texter.



Avenue Q gave me the same sense of, "Yes, that's it, exactly!" as did Douglas Coupland's Generation X, Richard Linklater's Slacker, Roche Troche's Go Fish. These works made me bask in recognition, "This is me, these are my friends, this is my specific experience!" Avenue Q, with its broken fourth wall (floor?) puppeteering, takes on issues both timely and timeless (racism, queerness, internet porn, being unemployed with a humanities degree, finding life's purpose). It eagerly inhabits stereotypes while smashing them at the same time. My only critique is that the major narrative thread (boy meets girl, boy and girl fuck, boy hurts girl, boy tentatively wins girl back), a structure that may hold all the outrageous action in place, is still maddeningly conventional for such an iconoclastic production.

500 Days of Summer

500 Days of Summer (2009) **½
I recently sat down with Astrid, Calisto, and Dave to watch the much-acclaimed 2009 indie romantic comedy 500 Days of Summer, staring Zooey Deshanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Knowing that I already liked the casting and the concept (the story of a doomed Gen-Y relationship told, Memento style, chrono-illogical) I set my expectations-meter to about medium, figuring that I'd enjoy it, but it wouldn't quite live up to all the hype. I'm sad to report that the hype is indeed way wrong. What it's got going for it: engaging performances by both leads and a story predicated on the self-determination of a free-spirited woman, at least, until she loses her self-determination. What it's got against it is cliché-heavy dialogue and a plot that succumbs to rom-com conventionality where it ought to have broken with tradition in order to convey any shred of emotional truth in the end. The fairy-tale conclusion fits in with the film's pretty set design and cinematography, producing a contemporary Los Angeles so white and white-washed it looks like Harvard Square in the '50s.

What's that star rating mean, anyway?

Super Bowl 2010 Commercial Wrap-Up

This year the theme of the Super Bowl commercial spots seemed to be: "Men need to reinscribe our dudeliness because women are threatening our masculinity."

Example 1: A Dodge Charger commercial in which a blank-expressioned (almost lifeless) man lists off the ways in which he compromises himself (presumably for his woman), i.e. "I will take off my socks before bed, I will clean the sink after I shave, I will listen to your opinions of my friends, I will listen to your friends' opinions of my friends, I will put the seat down," etc. as long as this allows him to (animated, forceful language) "drive the car I want to drive!"

Example 2: A FloTV commercial tag line: "Change out of that skirt, Jason" after suggesting that his girlfriend has "removed his spine" !!

Example 3: In the Dockers commercial, a huge group of men are wandering around in their underwear proclaiming, in unison, "I wear no pants!" Then the ad copy and announcer command men to "Wear the pants" again. This was a very tame version of the revolting print ad component of this campaign, which implores men to "step away from the salad bars" and from their lattés, blaming our "genderless society" for the broken state of our civilization. (Click the ad for a larger image.)

The most politically incindiary of the bunch, of course, was the much-publicized spot from the right-wing Christian advocacy group Focus on the Family featuring NFL player Tim Tebow and his mother sweetly recounting the difficulty she had in pregnancy and the "miracle" of his birth, insideously reinforcing the organization's anti-choice stance.




Unfortunately, Planned Parenthood's response to the Tebow ad wasn't funded enough to air during the big game, but it's nicely done, and you can check it out right here, all you miracle children!



What alarms me most about the Tebow ad, and also about the counter ad by Planned Parenthood, is that the word "abortion" is never mentioned. It reminds me of the confusingly tame ads against Prop 8 that didn't discuss the concept of "gay marriage" or "same-sex marriage," only referred vaguely to "equality." The American public needs to be challenged to talk honestly about issues. We don't need to be fucking spoon-fed euphemistic pablum. This is the same sort of short-sighted politicking that allows the "debate" about health care to be hijacked by people who liken a nationalized health plan to Nazism.

PS - I hope Tim Tebow comes out.

2009 Wrap

Before taking a bite out of my seventh annual Wrap, why not try some nicely aged appetizers?

2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003

The Stuff that Occurred in 2009:

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* Block-rockin' New Year's party * Pacific Grove with the family for the ~Eighth Annual Asilomar weekend. * Heart-to-heart with my mom about keeping in touch more. * Got a Facebook message from Bianca. It was kind of amazing. * Astrid and I made a major domestic commitment: after living together for close to two years, we finally combined our bookshelves. * I got laid off of my bookkeeping gig at CompuTrap. * Astrid and I celebrated our 2-year Shack-Up-Iversary.* Looked for jobs. * DJ moved back to San Diego. Suck. * Visited with Callie and Jacket, in town for the Lesbian Health Summit. * Zombie pub crawl for Dax's birthday * Mustache-and-unibrow pub crawl for Carol * Lovely birthday dinner for Minoba. * The Bewilder reading/writing group commenced and still goes strong! * The Proust reading group failed. (Sorry Nan and Amie!) * Continued looking for jobs. * Luxuriate Day commenced! * Minoba and I dated, then broke it off, then started back up, then broke it off again. Sigh. * Turned 37! Had another fantastic birthday at Zeitgeist. * Attended a meditation group for the first time ever! * Bought panniers for my bike. * Saw Magna graduate from med school! * Got a couple small bookkeeping gigs. * Began preparations for my private practice psychotherapy internship! Holy shit!! * Saw a bunch of dear friends at a 20th reunion gathering for my Jewish youth group. Thanks again, Facebook. * Saw my niece Halina and her beau M. get married in one of the sweetest ceremonies ever. * My mom's husband got diagnosed with terminal liver cancer at the beginning of the year and died in July. R.I.P. Phil.* Almost my entire immediate family moved into a condo complex together. * Finished my two-year internship at the LGBTQ clinic. * Started my private practice! * Had another fantastic visit with Callie! * Took a vacation to Washington, D.C. and North Carolina with the astrobarry to visit dear old pals. * Astrid and I made another major domestic commitment: we got a dog! * Continued looking for jobs while the private practice slowly, slowly grew. * Can't I have a year without someone fucking with my bike? My back wheel was stolen outside of Safeway, from under the nose of a security guard. *

The Year's Culture Consumption in Review:

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My foolproof two-pronged rating system, copyright 2003 (with slight modifications), is still in effect, and is to be interpreted as follows:

Prong #1: The Star System, wherein:

Prong #2: Ranked-order:

In each category, I will rank from top to bottom the book or film or show, etc., that I enjoyed most to least. So if there were a list of department stores like this one:

Mervyn's *** (RIP)
Macy's ****
Nordstrom *****
Gottschalk's **½ (RIP)

…I could justify ranking my favorite department store (Mervyn's) above higher-end stores like Macy's or Nordstrom based not on quality of products or on consistency of customer service, but on my own idiosyncratic enjoyment, nostalgia, and satisfaction. Capische? Onward. (Some spoilers ahead!)

* * *

Books: Non-fiction (or: "Three Books about Nonmonogamy Plus Two Others.")

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Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships by Tristan Taormino (2008) **** A much-needed update and complement to 1997's long hailed "poly bible" The Ethical Slut.
Taormino's book adds to the literature on nonmonogamous relationships by surveying more than 100 respondents and giving examples about the many ways in which people do open relationships. Of course, the book contains working definitions of nonmonogamy, polyamory, swinging, intimate networks, etc., but more importantly, this well-organized and thorough volume offers practical wisdom about creating sustainable relationships and "opening up" to the deeply transformative experiences that these relationships present.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers (2000) **** I found the much-hyped, lauded in some quarters/maligned in others, highly self-conscious and conscious of its self-consciousness Eggers memoir to be highly worth reading, appendices and all.

Open: Love, Sex, and Life in an Open Marriage by Jenny Block (2008) ***½ Another great addition to the lit on polyamory. Block's memoir is an easy and lively read chronicling the development of her own uncompromising brand of sexual and romantic expression, from her days as a horny, curious teenager, to her conventional marriage to a man that withstood the transformation to a polyamorous marriage. More radical poly readers might not gel with Block's life choices, like living in upscale suburbia and her relative secrecy on the poly topic around her child, but these are reflections of the author's authentic self, and presented as just one bi-woman's journey toward realizing her relationship potential in her specific social and cultural context.

Staring at the Sun: Overcoming the Terror of Death by Irvin Yalom (2008?) ***½ Yalom's latest book examines the value of confronting death anxiety in order to maximize our time while alive. Full of invaluable insight from a psychotherapist decades into his career and gracefully navigating the path toward his own inevitable death.

The Myth of Monogamy by David P. Barash, PhD, and Judith Eve Lipton, MD. (2001) *** After reading this book, I now know more about sperm competition and copulatory plugs than I'd ever dreamed of knowing (which is still not much, but hell if I don't flaunt that 'copulatory plug' term). This survey of studies across a vast array of species provides ample evidence for evolutionary nonmonogamy in animals as divergent as fruit flies, cliff swallows, and humans. It is readable and informative to the layperson, and for the most part nonsexist in its language, though the geek-humorous prose rambles at times. I was also disappointed by the last chapter of the book, in which the authors go moralistic and negate the importance of multiple partners in humans by declaring that

"…although 'what comes naturally' is…easy to do, this doesn't mean that it is right. The crowning glory of Homo sapiens is its huge brain. This remarkable organ gives people the ability, perhaps unique in the living world, to reflect on their inclinations and decide, if they choose, to act contrary to them."

And while a discussion of free will, choice, and social impact is relevant in the dialogue about nonmonogamy, it seems sorely out of place in a book debunking biological myths about the dominant relationship paradigm.

Books: Fiction

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The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami (1997) ***** Murakami blends a spare writing style with rich magical elements to create this engrossing story about an unemployed man who loses his cat, then his wife, in an entangled series of events that span WWII battles in Mongolia to contemporary Tokyo.

Where I'm Calling From by Raymond Carver (1988) **** A compilation of Carver's deft minimalist prose, concerning (mostly) male protagonists dealing with intimacy issues and alcoholism. Best of the bunch, the title story (1983) and What We Talk about When We Talk about Love (1981), a story touted to me by my awesome junior college fiction writing teacher back in 1991 that I finally got around to reading in 2009. Shouts out to Barbara Loren, wherever you are, and sorry I dallied so.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season Eight Comics (2007…) *** Normally I don't enter a continuing series in the Wrap until I'm done with it, but "Season Eight" of Buffy, in comic form, started in '07 and just keeps going, so I wanted to mention I've been reading it religiously. The comic series picks up where the Scoobies left off in the TV series, in a world full of slayers and serious Big Baddies. The artwork is top notch, and many of the narrative arcs are compelling and true to the Buffyverse as we know it. It's a fun fantasy ride for fans jonesing for the old days. And the letters section at the end of each issue is worth the $3.00 alone.


Hotel World by Ali Smith (2001) *** A story of the accidental death of a young woman, a hotel chambermaid, told from the perspective of five different women whose lives intersect around this event in transient and profound ways.


Life After God by Douglas Coupland (1994) **½ Short story collection by the Generation X author and visual artist. A few passages offer some transcendence; I was particularly moved by a story in which dead narrators describe their last moments on Earth as The Bomb hits. Overall, I found the writing to be wan and lacking in depth.


Films in the Theater:
(I was too broke this year to see many films out.)
*Edit 1/29: I forgot to include Star Trek in my film reviews. Sticking it in there now.

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Mein Freund Aus Faro (To Faro)(2008) *** Satisfying story about a German woman in her twenties who, through a case of willful mistaken identity, passes as a young Portuguese man. While it's not a technically brilliant film, and the story relies on some well-worn narrative tropes, it's a welcome addition to the growing list of films dealing honestly and sweetly with genderqueer experience. Screened at Frameline 33.

The Wrestler (2008) ***½ This movie prompted a heated discussion among the gang (it was a gathering for DJ's birthday back in January). Some of us loved it and thought it was brilliant (DJ), some of us absolutely hated it (Calisto & Dave). I fell just short of loving it, but I give it a strong recommendation. Mickey Rourke's Golden Globe-winning performance was pitch-perfect, and the emotional resonance of the story felt all too real. I take some points off for a clichéd depiction of the relationship between Rourke's burned out absent father and his bitter daughter (Evan Rachel Wood).

Up (2009) ***½ Sweetly compelling, and often delightfully funny meditation on life, death, and the importance of making intimate connections. As with last year's Wall-E, family-oriented films which offer emotional and/or philosophical sophistication can be satisfying on an archetypal level that can sometimes transcend "adult" live-action narratives. And like Wall-E, this film packs most of its punch in the first 30 minutes before devolving into the kid-pleasing slapsticky schtick.

Star Trek (2009) ***1/2 Somehow the Star Trek origin story with the shiny new cast didn't make it into my Wrap notes! I guess it didn't leave that much of an impression on me. I liked it, for the most part, but I wasn't a fan of the Kirk childhood scenes set to the Beastie Boys. I also thought the future-Spock mind-meld narration about two-thirds the way into the film was completely unnecessary. Otherwise, a compelling story and visually awesome.

Getting Off and Le Tour de Pants at the Dirt and Desire program at Frameline 33 *** Rude queer raunch-fest! A good time was had by all. [Full disclosure: I know the filmmaker and co-stars of Getting Off].

District 9 (2009) *** People raved about this movie, but I was left feeling emotionally flat afterward. Never mind the constant blood shed and brain splattering throughout (I was prepared for that), the so-called rich metaphor for Apartheid and dehumanizing racial stratification was as blaringly obvious as an enormous spacecraft hovering over Johannesburg. I applaud Neill Blomkamp for mounting an engaging and socially relevant action film on a shoestring budget and bringing attention to the dynamics of race and poverty in South Africa. But I would have liked to see the film set in present day, rather than in the Eighties during the Apartheid era: racial stratification and abject poverty still exist. This is a story that could play out in 2009 East Oakland, Hunter's Point, New Orleans, Cleveland, not just in the shantytowns of Jo'burg.

War Games (rerun, 1982) ***1/2 and Red Dawn (year) ** Double-feature revival at the Castro. I'd never seen Red Dawn before, and apart from the fun in seeing the young '80s celeb cast and the cheesetasticness of the plot, it's really just a jingoistic, racist hodgepodge of violence. I still have an abiding love for War Games, but I have to say for the record that Ally Sheedy's character, Jennifer Mack, was written to be such a fucking airhead that it's maddening to hear her lines. She's stuck in as a proxy for explaining terminology to the audience that doesn't even need to be explained, as in:

Jennifer: What are those?
Falkan: Those are launch codes.
Jennifer: What are they for?
Me: Really?

The Muppet Movie (1979, rerun) ***½ Revival at the Clay. Fun stuff, and cameos galore by every '70s celeb you can think of.

Films on DVD/Download:

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Synecdoche, New York (2008) **** Had to watch it two nights in a row. Can't remember the last time I did that. Charlie Kaufman's latest, and his first directorial effort is not a perfect film. It rambles almost uncontrollably (like the non-narrative of life). It's morbidly self-fascinated, like I find myself more often than I publicly admit. Sometimes it's just too weird. But then there is the awesomeness of philosophical accomplishment, of the structure of the universe Kaufman has created. It's such a difficult film, it demands so much of the viewer, and fuck's sake, I want to see more movies like that.

Happy Go Lucky (2008) **** Truly great performances by Sally Hawkins as a bright and cheery school teacher and Eddie Marsan as a mentally unstable driving instructor. Subtly wrought scripting and direction by Mike Leigh, as always.

Adventureland (2009) *** Jesse Eisenberg continues to be adorably nerdy, Kristen Stewart proves she can act convincingly, the supporting cast is fantastic, and Greg Mottola manages to add sophistication to his superbad oeuvre. If the resolution of the film had been less sugary, I'd have bestowed another half star.

Burn After Reading (2008) ***½ I've never felt so disturbed after watching a film that is primarily a comedy. The Cohen Brothers mix genres again (see Fargo; The Big Lebowski) to deliver a tale of espionage carried out by dimwits which results in ever-devolving consequences.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) *** What I enjoyed: the cinematography, Penélope Cruz's fantastically batty performance, and a more nonjudgmental attitude toward nonmonogamous relationships than we typically see in film. There were some flaws, though: the film-length narration detracted from a story that didn't need further clarification, and went some lengths, in Ms. Astrid's astute observation, to erase Cristina's character, portrayed in Scarlett Johannsson's usual bland timbre.

Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple (2006) **** Gripping documentary about the community that cult leader Jim Jones built first in Northern California, then in San Francisco, and finally in Guyana, South America. Vividly rendered, disturbing, and rich with complexity about the lives changed and shattered at Jonestown.

Coraline (2009) *** I enjoyed it but felt like it was derivative of any standard fairly tale you've already heard. I did not, however, read the Neil Gaiman book from which the film was adapted. Here is a guest review by Ms. Astrid, who knows better:

"I think the best thing about the movie was the titular song by They Might Be Giants. Go read the book. It's short; you have no excuses."

Muriel's Wedding (1994, rerun) ***½ Always a pleasure to re-watch the ol' gang from Porpoise Spit.

The Double Life of Véronique (1991) *** I love Krzysztof Kieslowski. See the Three Colors trilogy for some absolutely amazing filmmaking, visual direction, symbolism, and compelling women characters. This film, I feel, sacrifices some depth for accessibility.

High Art (1998, rerun) ***½ Still holding steady as my favorite dyke flick of all time.

Colma: The Musical (2007) *** A lot of fun for an extremely low-budget coming-of-age film. Three kids try to bust out of the (almost literally) dead suburb of Colma, California and confront real after-high school life, homophobic parents, love triangle drama, and their own volatile temperaments.

Once (2007, rerun) *** On second viewing, I'm nixing a half star. I'd still say the movie's success is a triumph for indie film, and the ending is a rare example of cinematic restraint in staying true to the narrative instead of handing us a commercially-friendly happy ending. But I have to say that the film relies too much on the music to pull it along and that it lacks sufficient focus on Markéta Irglová's character.

Bandits (1997) **½ A rock band from a German women's prison bust out and become a national phenomenon on the lam. See a deeper review of this shallow but sometimes enjoyable film here.

Midnight Cowboy (1969, rerun) **** Still a piece of master screenwriting and filmmaking, but it's hard to imagine a film being made today with such a torrent of homophobic portrayals, even as it can be coded in some ways as a gay love story.

Sherry Baby (2006) **½ An emotionally flat script that spoon-feeds us every plot point in the narrative detracts from Maggie Gyllenhaal's strong performance as an ex-con addict trying to rebuild her relationship with her young daughter.

17 Again (2009) **½ The big-box video store reeled me in with their shiny promo poster, and I'm a sucker for body-switch and/or I'm young again! comedies (see the original Freaky Friday from 1976 for the best of the bunch). This one has a lot going against it: Zac Ephron and Matthew Perry look nothing alike; we've seen dozens of better films, both comedy and drama, about living a life of regret, and the writing and acting are, on the whole, as broad as you'd expect. But there were some genuinely amusing moments, particularly when supporting characters Ned and the high school principal (Reno 911!'s Thomas Lennon and Melora Hardin) were involved, playing a pair of Star(Wars)-crossed lovers.

La Confusion des Genres (Confusion of Genders) (2003) **½ A bi man is attracted to everyone in his life and ambivalates equally about all. Genders aren't confused in this film so much as the narrative is. The sex scenes are pretty hot, though.

Not Another Teen Movie (2001) **½ Pretty much what you'd expect from a teen-angst genre parody: broad humor, losing your virginity subplots, and some nostalgic references. A satisfying cameo from Molly Ringwald, but you have to endure the movie til the end to see it.

Team America: World Police (2004, rerun) *** Clever, often truly funny, and intentionally offensive spoof on U.S. militarism in the wake of the so-called "war on terror." I appreciate and understand the South Park guys' artistic choice to skewer everyone, left or right, but my own sensibilities are strained by this equal-opportunity bashing. Just as with any extreme relativism, be it political or cultural, if all sides are played equally, any meaning is effectively negated. I'm sure the filmmakers intended the movie to stand alone as a comedy, in which case any "meaning" read into the work can be rendered irrelevant. But the film would be stronger as a political satire, necessitating the choosing of sides, however ambiguous or ineffable that task. Another ding to the film is that much of the humor is derived from racist stereotyping. Whether "self-aware" or not, it's still too offensive at times for my blood.

Choke (2008) ** The tone of this movie is glib, but it takes itself too seriously as a "finding the self" narrative that never finds itself. And for a movie with a lot of sex, it's about as sexy as cold lunchmeat. Sure to be a disappointment after David Fincher's brilliant adaptation of Chuck Palahaniuk's earlier novel, Fight Club.

Lost Highway (1997) * Sorry, Mr. Lynch. I just didn't get this one. Can anyone out there vouch for it or offer interpretations?

TV Shows and Web Series on DVD/download (and one show in real-time):

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Battlestar Galactica, Reimagined Seasons 1 through 4.5 (2003-2009) ***½ I would have rated it a solid 4 stars overall, except that the series finale was so disappointing that it detracts from the appeal of the entire venture. If you're a fan of the series and don't mind plenty of spoilers, check out this detailed analysis of the finale from a similarly disappointed (and far more serious) fan. I still recommend the series highly. Every episode is visually compelling, full of complexly flawed (and sexy!) characters, and dramatically tense as hell.

Dollhouse Season One (2009) **½; Season Two (2009/2010) ***½ Joss Whedon's now cancelled show is high on concept but often low on execution, and I'm one among many fans who is disappointed but not shocked that the show got axed. The premise is ambitious: a secretive corporation employs/(enslaves?) humans by wiping out their personalities with neurotech, imprinting them with desirable personalities (and sometimes mad skills!) and using them as operatives to service the wealthy. And because this is a Joss Whedon project, there are lots of moments of real complexity, profound moral questions, and compelling explorations into character arcs. The premise, however, quickly outpaced both the writing (often hammy and convoluted) and the acting (primary foul committed by lead player Eliza Dushku as Echo, unconvincing in any incarnation if it didn't involve ass-kicking). Many supporting players, however, were fantastic, with special props to Olivia Williams as Dollhouse Chief Adelle DeWitt, and Enver Gjokaj as Dollhouse active Victor.

Note: The second season of Dollhouse is wrapped and the final episode airs January 29, 2010. I'm cheating by reviewing both seasons in the 2009 Wrap. Oh well.

Mad Men, Season One (2007) ****, Season Two (2008) **** It took me a few episodes to adjust to the tone of Mad Men. The overt sexism and racism, inherent in the show's early '60s upper middle class white milieu, were hard to swallow until I grasped its subversive message. Now that I'm hooked, there's no turning back on one of the slickest and smartest shows on TV. Well, DVD, in my case.

Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog (2008) ***½ Buzz-generating web musical from Team Whedon. A brilliant self-produced diversion from the WGA writers' strike in '08. Worthy of the hype.

Arrested Development Season One (2003, no rating) A lot of people in my life absolutely love this show. After seeing the first season, I'm still a bit ambivalent. There are moments of absolute comic brilliance (Gob's Final Countdown; Buster and Liza Minnelli, Tobias) but the pacing is so fast and the snark factor so high that I think I would have to watch it through twice to appreciate it fully and give it a fair rating.

Tipping the Velvet (2002) *** and Fingersmith (2005) *** British TV serials based on the Sarah Waters books. Really fun, if campy, Victorian era teleplays with lesbionic themes.

The L Word, Season Six (2009) ** The final season was infuriating, where it could have been campy and self-aware. It tried to be both those things, really tried, and flailed. Jenny is killed off in the first episode, and the rest of the short season is an extended flashback to fill us in on the three months before the deed is done: three months of vapid, pointless subplots that made me hate characters I'd actually come to enjoy over the course of the series. Jennifer Beals's Bette was the only saving grace of the season, acting sane in the narrative chaos.

The Playlist
(The old and newish music I acquired this year.)

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Fleetwood Mac - Rumours (1977) ***** Pure pop bliss, even if when the songs are rooted in heartbreak.

The Breeders - Mountain Battles (2008) *** Best Breeders album since Last Splash, though not as monumental. Solid post-punk pop like only the Deal sisters know how.

Buzzcocks - Singles Going Steady (1979/1992) **** The libidinal punk explosion of Pete Shelley and the boys sounds as crisp in the Aughts as it did in the late '70s, and only benefits from its compilation-concentration of catchy tracks.

Robyn Hitchcock - (several albums) ***½ Part singer-songwriter, part post-proto-punk ("post-proto-punk" - did I just coin a really redundant term?), always odd and enigmatic. If you like early Bowie, or Marshall Crenshaw, give Mr. Hitchcock a spin.

This Mortal Coil - It'll End in Tears (1984) ***½ One of those old 4AD acts that I'd always wanted to try out, but had never given a listen to. Moody to the nth. Essential listening for your inner clove-smoking, poetry-writing goth kid.

Radiohead - Hail to the Thief (2003) ***½ Another great return to un-form for the band of many incarnations.

Three Dollar Bill - Getting to Know You (1998) **½ Underground queer pop-punk from Chicago. Check it out if you like homopolitik with your poprock. [Full disclosure: I'm friends with a band member, and got this CD for free. I'm sure the new FCC rules don't apply to this situation, but, you know, just in case. I'm clean.] Post-punk, pop, indie.

Sunset Rubdown - Random Spirit Lover (2007) *** A small handful of excellent tracks, but disappointing held next to the band's earlier, magnificent records. Sonic swirl, surreal lyrics bordering on cutesy.

Live Shows
(Again, way too broke for shows this year. Sadness.)

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Mount Vicious at the Hemlock Tavern, SF, May, '09 *** Hooky hard rock that incites political outrage. Beware, you'll be holding up lead singer Conan Neutron for like ten stage dives per show. [Full disclosure: I know Conan.] MV-->

Loop!Station at Café du Nord, SF **** - Lush layers of melodic cello overlaid with equally lush vocals. Thanks to K & M for taking me to the show!

~~Fin~~

Hollow Chocolate Bunnies

Here's my first book review of 2010!

The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse by Robert Rankin (2002) * * *

Jack, a thirteen year-old country boy and Eddie, a sawdust-filled teddy bear prone to drunken benders, embark on a (literally) hard-boiled detective case: Humpty Dumpty has been murdered, boiled alive in his own swimming pool. The case takes them to the chocolatey power center of the corrupt metropolis of Toy City, as one by one, the well-known nursery rhyme celebrities in town (otherwise known as Pre-Adolescent Poetic Personalities) drop in the most macabre ways possible. Rankin's prose is at times too gimicky, and unfortunately blemished with several instances of fatphobia trying to pass as humor. It's also hard to buy that Jack, with his proper English diction and mad detective skills, is actually thirteen. Nevertheless, the convoluted title of the book is confidently redeemed by the end as the formula-aware crime novel unfolds in a clockwork cascade of predictable unpredictability.

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What does that star rating mean?

Star Ratings

As promised, I'm going to be devoting discrete entries to the review of the culture and popculture I consume throughout the year, in an effort to blog more frequently and to stem the tide of writing I tend to do at the end of every year in preparation for posting my annual Year-End Wrap. In reviews, I will supply a star rating of one to five stars, and a key to my ratings system is as follows:



Yours in anality,
Bree

Malaise

I really wish it'd stop raining. I don't mind it when I can stay inside and sip a hot beverage, but I gotta get out there in the world. I gotta go to work (what little of it I have) and walk the doggie, who is, for her part, in a seemingly similar malaise. She hates the rain; she's so skittish, poking her nose out the door, looking up at me with those puppy eyes. She's resigned to spread out in front of the heater and sleep the day away, though I know she'd rather be out at the dog park wrestling and running around.

Money just keeps sucking and sucking, and it's sucked about as much as possible at this point. Astrid and I are both maxed out on our credit cards. I really don't know where the rent is gonna come from next month, short of asking my family for it, which I so very dearly do not want to do. I recognize that I have the privilege of having a family that loves me and a few members of the family who can help me at times like these, but the asking is still awful. I'm 37. I should be making a living for myself. External factors (the economy, just starting out in private practice, the paucity of therapy internships that pay) aside, I just feel so ineffectual and weak. I am getting new clients, and I'm projecting that I will actually net some money next month for the first time, which is wonderful. It's hard to hold the positive feelings, though, when "netting" will mean bringing home a few hundred dollars in February. It's not enough.

Bloggage

I love social networking, and I use it to good effect, I think. But I hate that Facebook and Twitter have pulled some of the life out of my blogging here at Toothpick Labeling. It's true, FB and Twitter are tools that I've used to build and promote my more recent blog, a blog that I can't link here because it's attached to my "real" identity (for those who haven't caught on, "Bree" ain't my real name). In order to keep personal subjects somewhat anonymous, at least to all you readers who don't know me in the flesh, I've sacrificed some serious cross-marketing potential for my other blog by not promoting it here. If you're curious about the contents of said blog (they're of a subjective-popculty-music oriented nature), and would like to know the URL, feel free to drop me a line and introduce yourself, and I'll float it your way (if you're nice!). I'm reachable at bree_zip@yahoo.com.

So I think this entry really is somewhat of a 2010 resolution: I'd like to get back into blogging more at TLab. Reflections on daily life, emotional states, health issues, political gripes, cultural and philosohical obsessions, love life updates, the process of becoming a shrink, vintage anecdotes, and the ilk, have been neglected far too long. I'd like to expand on some of the spontaneous ideas that I jot down so noncommitally in my FB updates, and, by gum, this is the forum for it.

Many of you, I know, are also anxiously awaiting the behemoth entry we've all come to know and love as the Year-End Wrap, and writing here more frequently is part of my master plan to make that project a bit less of a behemoth. Example: for the last couple years, I've been saying to myself, "Well if you just take a few minutes to review a movie right after you see it, you'll save yourself the deadline scramble come January. Sheesh!" To that end, look for more entries of brevity about daily goings on and cultural consumption that will ultimately be linked back to in the next Wrap. This is the concept, anyway. We'll see about the follow-through.

As always, thanks for being out there, y'all.

xo
The one who calls herself Bree.