Girl Detective

From Kate Beaton, “The Greatest Hamlet of Our Time.” Link from Blog of a Bookslut.

Also see Party Time with Richard III

Found by my husband G. Grod, the Hamlet weblog.

Zot!: The Complete Black-and-White Stories: 1987-1991, by Scott McCloud, is a great collection of a great series. I was happy to reread its 36 issues, and sad all over again when I got to the end of Zot, Jenny, and everyone else’s story. This collection stands alone, but is a follow up to the out-of-print Zot! Book 1. Zot! is a great YA series, with heroes and villains, but also romance and problems for everyday, interesting, engaging characters. It has a hopeful outlook, which stands in pleasant contrast to bleaker views that have predominated in the comics landscape since Moore’s Watchmen and Miller’s Dark Knight Returns, in the 80’s.

McCloud’s brief commentary is enlightening. It places the comics in historical perspective, as well as on the continuum of McCloud’s work. He followed Zot! with the highly regarded, influential Understanding Comics. He also includes entertaining anecdotes, like the one where his wife went into labor with their second child during a dinner party. She gave birth hours later, while Neil Gaiman sang songs from Sweeney Todd to the elder daughter in the waiting room.

I’ve heard a lot of non-love out there for the current season, 5, of Project Runway. I’m having fun watching, though. I think this is an interesting crop of designers, and that the final three, and the winner, aren’t as obvious as they were last season. Project Rungay continues to be the best, and most entertaining commentary on the show.

A few thoughts: Blayne is playing to the camera, and trying to be Christian with his catchphrases. He’s only still on because his designs are more bizarre than plain bad. Stella became much more entertaining as the series progressed, and I’m sad to see her gone. I’d been thinking Terri was a shoo-in till Jerell made his fabulously bitchy comment that she’s got two faces and four patterns. Rowrr!

The Drag Queen challenge was one of my favorite episodes. I loved how the designers referred without exception to their clients using the feminine pronoun, since their clients’ gender was female. I loved how the drag queens came in decked out, then au naturel, and then a combination before the runway show. I thought Joe deserved the win. As Michael Kors loves to say, “He put the right girl, in the right outfit, styled the right way.”

Saturnalia: I was surprised first by Korto’s woven seat belts, since bags of that have been around for ages. But the end result was so beautiful and intricately done that she deserved her second-place finish. I’m also thrilled to see Leanne finally win, with her crazy, futuristic, perfectly executed, and bogglingly not-unflattering design.

DVF: Kenley continues to crusade for most annoying, though as long as Blayne’s around, she’ll lose. But her meltdown was entertaining, and her dress was beautiful. I’d wear it in a second. I own 2 DVF dresses, and they’re among my favorite clothing items, so Diane von Furstenberg as both challenge and guest? LOVING! Leanne wins again, and Korto is in the top. Joe is delusional, and it appears Terri is, too. Delusion usually signals an imminent auf’ing, as with Mormon Keith.

I’m a terrible prognosticator, but I think Korto and Leanne are going to be in the final three. Whether the third will be Terri or Kenley I’m not sure. Jerrell could be a wild card, but I think (and hope) Blayne and Joe are next to go.

In the short story “A Night at the Fair,” Fitzgerald described over eighty years ago what so many people still experience today at the Minnesota State Fair. I was surprised and delighted to find that much about the fair hasn’t changed.

The Magnificent Fair

The two cities were separated only by a thin well-bridged river; their tails curling over the banks met and mingled, and at the juncture, under the jealous eye of each, lay, every fall, the State Fair. Because of this advantageous position, and because of the agricultural eminence of the state, the fair was one of the most magnificent in America. There were immense exhibits of grain, livestock and farming machinery…a grand exhibition of fireworks…took place in the Grand Concourse every night.

Boys at the Fair

At the late afternoon of a hot September day two boys of fifteen, somewhat replete with food and pop, and fatigued by eight hours of constant motion, issued from the Penny Arcade.

Sensations of the Fair

The first lights of the evening were springing into pale existence; the afternoon crowd had thinned a little, and the lanes, empty of people, were heavy with the rich various smells of pop corn and peanuts, molasses and dust and cooking Wienerwurst and a not- unpleasant overtone of animals and hay. The Ferris wheel, pricked out now in lights, revolved leisurely through the dusk; a few empty cars of the roller coaster rattled overhead. The heat had blown off and there was the crisp stimulating excitement of Northern autumn in the air.

Night at the Fair

Once again the fair–but differing from the fair of the afternoon as a girl in the daytime differs from her radiant presentation of herself at night. The substance of the cardboard booths and plaster palaces was gone, the forms remained. Outlined in lights, these forms suggested things more mysterious and entrancing than themselves, and the people strolling along the network of little Broadways shared this quality, as their pale faces singly and in clusters broke the half darkness.

Yes, many things have changed. There are no aeroplanes, horse races or hoochie-coochie shows. And the wienerwurst has been replaced by the Pronto Pup (from Minnesota), the corn dog (an Iowa import), and the absolutely delicious pork-chop-on-a-stick. But the sights, the smells, and the fair as an event–all these abide.

After I saw the new black-and-white Zot! collection at Big Brain Comics, I went back to my shelf for the out-of-print Zot! Book 1, which collected the first ten issues of Zot! by Scott McCloud. The issues were in color, and published by dear, departed Kitchen Sink. McCloud has gone on from his 80’s series to push the boundaries of comics production, and write books about the history and future of comics: Understanding Comics, Reinventing Comics, and the new Making Comics.

In his introduction, McCloud makes it clear that the first ten issues of Zot! were his training ground. He acknowledges, but doesn’t apologize (much) for the simple story and evolving visual style. Nonetheless, this collection still delights. It came out around the same time as Alan Moore’s Watchmen and Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns, and is a refreshing, hopeful, counterbalance to those dystopic visions–a comic sorbet, if you will. Zot is Zachary Paleozogt, a blond teen superhero from an alternate Earth. When he crashes into ours, literally, he meets Jenny Weaver and her brother Butch, and wacky hijinks ensue in the pursuit of a golden key to the door at the end of the universe.

Butch, to Zot: What do you know about being a superhero, anyway? What’re your powers? A Gun?? Boot jets?? Feh! Y’gotta be mnore aggressive, kid! Get mean. Kill a few people! And stop grinning so much!!

Zot: ?

Butch: All the good heroes act like they big problems all the time…

Zot: But, what if I don’t have any big problems?

Butch: That’s OK, neither do they! They just act like they do! C’mon, get serious! Give it a try!

Zot: Uh, all right. [Glares, then bursts into laughter.] I can’t do it!

Butch: Hopeless…

Zot! is a sweet book with substance, great for young adults and jaded older ones, too.

I took 2 1/2 weeks to read the Arden 2nd Series Hamlet, edited by Harold Jenkins. I read the introduction, play, footnotes and long notes at the end, and the effort was well spent. I’m going to follow the reading with at least one dvd production. It’s in print as a book, but was intended to be experienced in a theater.

Is this the second greatest story ever told?

More on Hamlet as I’m able. So many passages to quote–perhaps you should just read it again, too. I highly recommend it!

What? It’s not Christmas? Well, maybe that’s the most wonderful time for you, but for me, it’s the Minnesota State Fair.

It’s opening day, and I’m going with the boys and our babysitter. I’m going to have to clean up my food plan from past years and be more conscious when I’m with the kids. (This year’s food map, here.)

Idea: 1. Big, strong food, e.g., wild rice dog or Sausage Sisters, 2. Snack food, e.g., cheese curds or french fries, 3. Treat, e.g., mini donuts or Sweet Martha cookies.

Why, yes, I _do_ have a talent for rationalization. I think it’s all those years studying and working in marketing.

Added later, post trip: I was brave and didn’t take the stroller for 5yo Drake and 2.5yo Guppy. We used the park-n-ride on 6th Street at the U of M. But as the boys got tired they got slower and fussier, so the trip to the parking lot felt endless. We ate a Twisted Sister from Sausage Sisters, a pickle on a Stick, Mouth Trap cheese curds, drank a green apple soda, had cider freezies and a lemonade for the road.

Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings are playing, for free!, at the bandshell tonight, so I may go back if G. Grod is up for putting the kids to bed. I think the fair trip will have sufficiently tired them out.

My husband G. Grod and I were visiting family near Philadelphia. G. flew home on his own so I could stay for a longer visit with 4yo Drake an 2yo Guppy. As he went through security, G. was stopped for a search of his bag.

“What’s this?” asked the guard, holding up a brick-sized, foil-wrapped item in a Ziploc bag.

G., appreciating how suspicious this looked: “It’s a pound of scrapple. My mom froze it so I could take a loaf home.”

“OK,” the guard shrugged, replacing the package in G’s bag, as if that were the most reasonable thing he’d heard all day. Next he pulled out a heavy, paper-wrapped cylinder. “What’s this, then?”

“It’s an Eagles beer stein,” G said. “I took my son up to training camp at Lehigh.”

The guard then asked who they’d seen, and how the Birds had looked. He waved G. through the checkpoint.

Only in Philly, G. thought, would a loaf of scrapple not raise an eyebrow, and a heavy beer glass spark a conversation among fans. It’s good to see some things don’t change.

Empire has a good, if hard to navigate, list of the 50 greatest comic book characters. Now, lists are inherently flawed and best as discussion starters. Nonetheless, there are a lot of great characters on here from my favorite comics. (Link from Bookslut)

I’m kinda bummed Nexus and Zot didn’t make the cut. Oh, and Carrie Stetko (coming soon to the movies) and Tara Chace, too. And Batgirl and Supergirl. Perhaps I should stop thinking on this.

Others?

A few geeky tidbits gleaned from reading Titus Andronicus.

For Battlestar Galactica fans:

Goths: As he saith, so say we all with him (5.1.17)

For Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans:

Cocytus’ misty mouth (2.3.237): While Cocytus refers to a a river in the classical underworld of Hades, the phrase Cocytus’ misty mouth may suggest the hellmouth, or entrance into hell, that was a stage property in Christian cycle drama still performed in the sixteenth century in England.

Hamlet, on Facebook. (Link from Morning News and ALoTT5MA)

Guess what? White people love Facebook (link from my friend lxbean), which I recently joined. I’m discouraged by how many things I like that White People like–81 out of 106, right now. I don’t delude myself that I’m unique, but it’s a humbling reminder of how herd-like my supposedly independent thinking is.

At the Literary Review, Philip Davis argues that reading Shakespeare changes our brains in the moment, not by discussing it after the fact. (Link from Arts & Letters Daily)

Shakespeare is stretching us, making us more alive, at a level of neural excitement never fully exorcised by later conceptualisation; he is opening up the possibility of further peaks, new potential pathways or developments.

He offers early studies of brain activity to back up his theory. I’ll be interested to see if these experiments are sound and stand up to scrutiny. I’d also be interested to learn if there’s a difference in the brain’s response to reading Shakespeare versus hearing/seeing Shakespeare performed, as it was intended.

At the Guardian, Alice Wignall uses the opening of the “Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging” film to muse about “the power of teenage literary passions.” (Link from Bookslut)

The truth is that you never love books the way you do as a young reader. My generation consumed with fanatical zeal the works of Judy Blume and Paula Danziger and the far less wholesome American series, Sweet Valley High. And contemporary teenagers are just as likely to be found with their heads stuck in a book.

I am one of about two people in the universe who didn’t like the Angus book, but I can see why so many do, because it reminded me strongly of two books that I LOVE, Pride and Prejudice and Bridget Jones’ Diary.

I don’t think I do love books I read now, as an adult, as ardently or so well as I did those when I was young. That’s why reading Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Dodie Smith’s I Captured the Castle and Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice for the first time as an adult was bittersweet; I wished I’d been re-reading them since girlhood.

I read Blume and Danziger (The Solid Gold Kid was a favorite), but missed the Sweet Valley High phenomenon by a few years. I was reading Anne of Green Gables, Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden and the Hardy Boys right up till I started sneaking more salacious fare, like Blume’s Forever and Wifey, Judith Krantz’s Scruples, Princess Daisy and Mistral’s Daughter, Mary Stewart’s The Crystal Cave, Lace by Shirley Conran, Judith McNaught and Kathleen E. Woodiwiss’s bodice rippers, Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern series, and those truly dreadful V.C. Andrews books. Of these, I might have one Pern book still on my shelf. All the rest have been duly and rightfully purged. And yet, I didn’t just love them, I LOVED! them, and I feel affection for them for that, if nothing else.

Wignall’s essay suggests that boys aren’t nearly as impressed by what they read as are girls. I question this, though. Tolkien, Harry Potter? Superman, Batman, X-Men, et al? Where would these be without their fervent boy-reader followings?

How about you–do you love certain books with the same fervor as when you were young?

If you enjoyed the viral dance video, “Where in the Hell is Matt?” you’ll probably enjoy this new video featuring the same vocalist, Palbasha Siddique. If you still haven’t watched Matt dancing, please do so immediately. MinnPost’s Michael Metzgar sums it up well:

The “Matt” video features American video game designer Matt Harding doing a goofy little dance in spectacular settings around the world, often accompanied by the indigenous people of the 42 countries he visited. It struck a chord somehow, linking the world in silly, unabashed happiness. (emphasis mine)

I first found the Matt video through a link on a national news site. So I was pretty surprised to find that the vocalist for Matt’s video lives IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD. She’s visiting family in Bangladesh right now, competing in an American-Idol-esque competition.

The popularity of the Matt video spurred her to make “Maa”, about longing for home, with her band, Melange. The song is similar to, and the video reminiscent, of Matt’s. It’s set in and around downtown Minneapolis, so it has a lot of pleasant associations for me. In one shot, you can see the building G. Grod and I lived in when 4yo Drake was born.

If you squint and use your imagination, this looks kinda like superhero versions of G. Grod and me.

Dead End Kids is the fourth collection of Runaways, the young adult superhero series created by acclaimed comics writer Brian K. Vaughan (Y the Last Man, Ex Machina, and more.) (Reviews of volumes 1, 2 and 3, here.) Buffy creator Joss Whedon takes over the writing reins for another story about a group of misfit kids from LA whose parents were supervillains. They’re trying, and succeeding about as often as they fail, to do good, unlike their parents.

Their LA hideout was busted, so they seek the help of their parents’ former colleague, the Kingpin. They think they can manipulate him for a place to stay, but soon end up on the wrong side of the Punisher and a LOT of ninjas. They get away, but strand themselves in 1907, surrounded by warring factions of “Wonders,” as the super-powered people of that time were called.

Like much of Whedon’s work, the story has a girl whose power alienates her from others, and both she and others have to make tremendous personal sacrifices. Some endings are happy, but not all. This is a good read, for fans of the ongoing series and for fans of Whedon.

Alex Robinson’s Too Cool to Be Forgotten is a great graphic novel for young adults and older ones, too. With all the graphic novels out there for teen girls, it was nice to read one about a teen boy. It rather reminded me of Judy Blume’s Then Again, Maybe I Won’t, because it’s a boy book in a girl market. Yet it’s for just about anyone, really. Robinson has a great sense of humor and humanity, and a wonderful way of capturing the indignities of everyday life. He’s got a confident, accessible art style that helps to bring his characters to life.

Forty-ish Andy Wicks tries hypnosis to kick his smoking habit. But things don’t go as he expected–instead he’s transported back to 1985, his sophomore year in high school. The adult-in-a-teenage-body story has been done many times, but rarely with so much skill and sympathy. Yes, Andy asks out the girl he was too afraid to the first time around, but as the story progresses, we see more and more how things are connected from Andy’s past to his present.

The book itself is a lovely little hardcover; publisher Top Shelf delivers a typically high-quality production again. Funny, sad and sweet, Too Cool to Be Forgotten is great for anyone (all of us?) who have ever wondered what we would do if we could do things over again.

I highly recommend the Hellboy graphic novel collections. They’re high quality, with author commentary, passionate introductions by famous fans, and generous extra stories and material. Hellboy: Strange Places, though, was darker and more murky than the previous volumes. Creator Mike Mignola writes that he was influenced by 9/11, and that there were several stops and starts to the main story. Certainly it’s much less humorous than the preceding books, but it still has its moments, like a pig-demon intent on revenge, and Hellboy’s commentary on the odd and scary creatures he has to deal with:

Hey, giant fish-lady! Let’s get this show on the road!

If you’re new to the Hellboy graphic novels, Strange Places is not a good place to start–for that I recommend the beginning, Seed of Destruction. But the art is stunning, and the hints about Hellboy’s past and future continue to tantalize.

FYI, if you have seen the movie(s), there are some differences from the books, which have no romance with Liz, and a smarter, more sympathetic and nuanced Hellboy. But the books and movies are each great on their own merits.

Normally, I’m anti-gadget. They clutter the house, they break, they create more work than they save. Yet I’ve been very happy with three recent purchases:

Cherry pitter: 2yo Guppy doesn’t have to negotiate the pits, and both he and 4yo Drake love to use it–it’s a new favorite reward for good behavior. We eat Door County cherries straight, or use them in homemade vanilla ice cream (like this recipe from Baking Beauties) with Potion 9 chocolate on top. Mmm.

Mandoline: A $10 purchase at Target, this made-in-China one is flimsy, but it’s getting lots of use in spite of that. The thin slicer attachment does great work on radishes (for eating with sweet butter on fresh bakery bread), cucumbers, and carrots for salads. When it breaks, I think I’m likely to spring for a better-made one.

Lemon/Lime juicer: I’ve used a stainless juicer with basin, a Robocop-lookin’ thing, and a reamer over a sieve over a bowl. But this thing gets maximum juice and maximum flavor from both lemons and limes. I think it’s strong enough to get out some of the oil from the rind. Great for guacamole:

Guacamole (from a recipe from Cooks Illustrated)

Makes about 1 1/2 cups
2 small avocados , ripe, (preferably Haas)
1 tablespoon minced red onion or scallion
1 small clove garlic , minced or pressed through garlic press
1/2 small jalapeño chile , minced (about 1 1/2 teaspoons), ribs and seeds removed to temper heat
2 tablespoons minced fresh cilantro or Italian parsley leaves
Table salt
1 tablespoon lime juice from 1 lime

1. Halve 1 avocado, remove pit, and scoop flesh into medium bowl. Using fork, mash lightly with onion, garlic, jalapeño, cilantro, and 1/8 teaspoon salt until just combined.

2. Halve and pit remaining avocado. Using a dinner knife, carefully make 1/2-inch cross-hatch incisions in flesh, cutting down to but not through skin, (see illustrations below). Using a soupspoon, gently scoop flesh from skin; transfer to bowl with mashed avocado mixture. Sprinkle lime juice over and mix lightly with fork until combined but still chunky. Adjust seasoning with salt, if necessary, and serve. (Can be covered with plastic wrap, pressed directly onto surface of mixture, and refrigerated up to 1 day. Return guacamole to room temperature, removing plastic wrap just before serving.)

I love the films of Baz Luhrmann. When I saw the trailer for his upcoming Australia, and heard the accompanying music, from one of my favorite films, Branagh’s Henry V, I got pretty excited. I know the music won’t necessarily be in the film, but the trailer + the music was quite stirring.