Dryope

Who the hell is Jayne Cobb?

<p>Oh my god, this is hilarious.&nbsp; Some guy posted this comment to the Jayne hat pattern:</p><blockquote dir="ltr" style="MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px"><p>Who the hell is Janye Cobb?&nbsp; She doesn't sound Peruvian which is where this hat comes from.&nbsp; Call it a chullo and respect my culture please.</p></blockquote><p dir="ltr">He calls himself &quot;Peru Guy&quot;.</p> <p dir="ltr">Boy, this Jayne guy has a lot to answer for to the country of Peru, doesn't he?</p> <p dir="ltr">Anyway, so apparently we are all mistaken.&nbsp; Everyone in Latin America (excepting Peru, of course) and all of Europe stole this pattern from Peru.&nbsp; Go Peru!</p> <p dir="ltr">And this means that the entire country of Peru is inherently cunning.&nbsp; And possibly evil.&nbsp; But only in the Joss-verse.&nbsp; </p> <p dir="ltr">I wonder if Jayne's mother was Peruvian?&nbsp; Maybe he came from a planet called Peru IV or something...</p>

Carb Encounter of the Third Kind

A woman in line at the cafeteria felt it necessary to comment to me about what I was scooping onto my plate.  It was potatoes—$ 1.30 of potatoes, in fact.  I was hungry and I didn’t feel like a helping of greasy pancakes or pork or some sort of clever bagel imitation.  If there’s one thing that’s consistently edible for breakfast no matter who’s cooking, it’s potatoes. 

The woman sidled up to me with her friend, waiting for me to finish.  I can only assume the she was suffering from one of the many stages of carbohydrate deficiency—she certainly wasn’t fat.  Out of the blue—with no eye contact between us at all—she came out with: “Someone of your build shouldn’t be able to eat so many carbs.”  And then laughed, as if that’s a perfectly normal thing to declare to a stranger.  It’s cute—a compliment with biting commentary, including a little tinge of jealousy.

Honestly.  I’ve been reading Stephen King’s book On Writing and he gives several examples of bad dialogue.  All day yesterday I was thinking, “Wow.  Dialogue is really hard.”  (Okay, I knew this already.)  “I should listen more to how people really talk.”  Well, forget it.  Apparently plenty of real people open their mouths with readymade bad dialogue.  I suspect it comes from reading too many quack health books that try to convince you biochemistry is fun (no, Erin, you’re wrong).

So I just looked at her quizzically, stalling for time as I finished up with my scooping.  Several choice things to reply with came to my mind, all of them somewhat cruel.  Hey, she set herself up here. 

Of course, she just went on, digging herself in deeper.

I know it’s the fashion to make chiding comments to strangers about their personal habits and expect a good-natured comeback.  But come on.  This is me we’re talking about.  I don’t dish it out because I just can’t take it.

So I didn't know which to do: give her a lecture about manners, or better--healthy eating habits (oh, let's just cut out an ENTIRE FOOD GROUP and starve ourselves to death because people on TV do it) or just run like hell. 

So I said what any crusading thin girl with confrontation issues would to an obviously deluded (and normal weighing) woman.  I looked her in the eye and said “Carbs are life.” Firmly.

And then ran like hell.

Kigali Zombies

So I finally saw “Hotel Rwanda”.  I’d put it off, since I couldn’t find anyone to go with me, and when I finally dragged myself to the theater alone on a holiday, I felt like I was putting on a hairshirt to do penance for what part my country had in permitting the atrocities.  You know, the old “it’s a great film about a horrible tragedy that will make you cry the whole way through and feel wretched after you leave” thing.  I mean, I take this stuff literally.  I saw “Butcher Boy” in college (because it featured Sinead O’Connor as a swearing vision of the Virgin Mary) and ended up feeling disturbed and disconnected from society for an entire weekend.  So I didn’t go to “Hotel Rwanda” lightly, nor did I go eagerly. 

In the end, it was a six-hankie movie, but it was a non-disturbing six-hankie movie.  It focused on good people doing brave things in terrible circumstances, which helps you cope with the body count.  Plus, it’s not like the genocide isn’t a surprise to the audience.  But it was, you know, fantastically acted and written, and I’m really glad I saw it.  I wouldn’t mind even seeing it again.

No, “Hotel Rwanda” didn’t disturb me.  “Shaun of the Dead” disturbed me.

“Shaun of the Dead” is a quirky, black-humor British movie that spoofs the zombie flick genre, especially, you know, that movie with the similar title.  I thought it was going to be funny, and well, it was (once you got used to the actors doing that British fast-talking mumble thing) to a point, but it was also a zombie movie with the usual gore and heartbreak of having to kill your now-zombified friends.  Still, though, that wasn’t the disturbing part.

No, the disturbing part was when I realized that “Shaun of the Dead” and “Hotel Rwanda” are pretty much the same movie.  Ordinary people in the heroes’ town suddenly (with slight warnings that they ignore) go crazy and start massacring all the non-zombies they can find. The heroes--

Oh, wait. Hold on a second.  Here, read this:

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Beware!

Basic plot spoilers below that will ruin BOTH MOVIES and YOUR LIFE if you continue reading.  Alligators may possibly emerge from the screen to eat you if you read what follows. 

Doom. 

Doooooommm!

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Still with me?  Okay, now that that’s out of the way:

The heroes, caught off guard, rescue those they can and hole up in what they think is a safe place to ride it out.  But they don’t have weapons or protection worth speaking of, and eventually they give up, expecting to die.  Then they are miraculously rescued and reunited with people they had thought were dead, their lives and their societies changed forever.

So, bottom line: Rwanda was a real-life zombie movie.  That’s pretty horrifying.  I mean, vampires are used as metaphors for drug abuse (among other vices), which is much more scary in real life—compare “Lost Boys” to “Sid and Nancy” for sheer horror value.  Gozilla and Frankenstein’s monster (and a billion other cult horror classics) represent the dangers of tampering with science, but honestly, which is scarier, a guy in a rubber suit or shadows of atomized people in Hiroshima?  Some monsters deal with the potential for evil within human psychology, but just reading the newspaper scares me a lot more than a werewolf movie or reading Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.   

Maybe I’m just a sucker for zombies (“Resident Evil” gave me nightmares) but explaining genocide through the evil dead just somehow brings it home so much more than the other monster analogies. I don’t think it’s a metaphor that any zombie movie writer intended (though the Cranberries sure thought of it), but thinking of the Rwandan atrocities in this way was, to me, more horrific than “Hotel Rwanda”.  It’s probably something to do with the power of the imagination coupled with our initial response (like, oh…in 1994) to disbelieve what we hear and see on TV.  A million civilians killed in a few weeks with clubs and machetes by their neighbors in Africa—you think, well, that’s Africa.  Why send troops?  They’ll just start killing people for some stupid tribal- or colonial-inspired reason somewhere else tomorrow.  And the numbers are probably inflated. 

But crazed zombiemen running through the streets and forcing themselves into houses, hacking a million people to death and forcing others to convert to their side or die—in effect, turning others into zombies against their will—the monster analogy brings it home and dispels all reticence to help. How could you stand by while a whole country was ransacked with zombies?  It’s just inhuman.

If we had known the full truth, how could we have stood by?  And even now, how can we understand the full horror of what happened? 

I don’t know about you, but “zombies” pretty much does it for me.

Reaver Origin?

<p>I came across this article at BBC News the other day--it says that there was a group called the <strong>&quot;reivers&quot;</strong> who were &quot;cross border families...who lived by stealing cattle, rape and pillage&quot; in 16th century England.&nbsp; A quick google search proves that, like, everyone in England knows about this group--so it's likely Joss's heard about them. ;)&nbsp; </p> <p>So my revised theory is that Firefly's bad guys come from <a href="http://dryope.typepad.com/superfly/2004/02/disney_legend.html">Disney </a>and the dark ages.</p> <p>Anyway, here's the full article--it's pretty neat:</p> <p><strong>City is 'cursed' by ancient stone </strong></p> <p><a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/cumbria/4311611.stm">http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/cumbria/4311611.stm</a><br /> <br />The stone is inscribed with a 16th Century curse<br />A stone commissioned to mark the millennium may be destroyed after being blamed for bringing misfortunes of &quot;biblical proportions&quot; to a city. </p> <p>Since the Cursing Stone was placed in Carlisle, the city has suffered floods, foot-and-mouth disease, job losses and a goal famine for the football team. </p> <p>The 14-tonne granite artwork is carved with a 1,069-word 16th Century curse. </p> <p>Now city councillor Jim Tootle wants the stone destroyed and has tabled a motion to discuss it on 8 March. </p> <p>The stone, which stands between the castle and the museum, is inscribed with a curse first invoked by the Archbishop of Glasgow in 1525 against cross border families, known as the &quot;reivers&quot;, who lived by stealing cattle, rape and pillage. </p> <p>Blessing included </p> <p>It was designed by artist Gordon Young whose own family was one of the &quot;reivers&quot;. </p> <p>Mr Tootle said: &quot;Various Christian groups have approached me, and they opposed it at the time and there was a petition saying, please don't bring the stone here and put the curse back on us. </p> <p>&quot;We have had floods, pestilence, a great big fire in the city - it is of biblical proportions.&quot; </p> <p>Council leader Mike Mitchelson said: &quot;We're obliged to address his comments, but estimate that it will cost the council several thousands of pounds to remove the stone. </p> <p>&quot;The council will need to look at whether the removal of the stone is a financial priority for the local area.&quot; </p> <p>The city council also said local Christian groups, including the Bishop of Carlisle, were consulted and were in agreement with the Cursing Stone and a blessing was included within the artwork.</p>

The Man of the Minute

Today I saw the president's hand.

Ooh.  And part of his head.  Just, like, the very top.  It might have just been some hair.

It's so exciting living here in DC.  And I had just popped out of work for ice cream.  Boy, am I glad the president's meet-and-greet was there to make me take a longer detour.