November 2006 Archives

On warm days, I tell Heidi, "This is the last warm day of the year, I guarantee it." Yet every time I say it, another balmy day is just around the corner. I walked outside today and it felt like Florida. What's up with messing with our minds, Boston? It snowed in Chattanooga already; it hasn't snowed here (although I think we expect the first "flurry" on Tuesday). As far as I know, it hasn't really frosted yet.

It's not technically winter, but in Boston, as you well know, winter usually begins earlier. I have not yet worn coat, hat, gloves, and scarf all at once.

I will eat my words this weekend when the temperature plummets about 30 degrees and will likely stay that way for a while. But then again, if this mild fall is any evidence, there's no telling. I think we may be experiencing a reversal of the hemispheres. Or just global warming.

My attempt at a 2-part week update turned out to ambitious, not at all unrelated to the unfortunate event of a broken backlight in my iBook. Sad. I can no longer see what I'm reading or writing. What makes it worse is that the 1-year Apple Care warranty is up, so right now my beloved G4 is sitting in a "third-party" shop, waiting to be fixed at half the price those Apple folks offered. I had to race to a Newbury Street computer/Internet shop last night in order to save my paper that was due today, as I don't have an adapter and other stores were not still open. I recovered everything and have learned two important lessons: 1) never, ever spill water on your screen and 2) never, ever delay saving your documents onto gmail, especially if you don't have a jumpdrive.

Our experience at the tech store spawned Heidi's idea for "a list of generalizations,' which I'm sure she'll share in her next entry.

Heidi did a nice job of recapping Thanksgiving week, although she forgot to mention that we went to Birmingham to visit our beloved Keri. We reverted to our old selves, gorging on candy and watching Arrested Development. And we talked and laughed and made big plans for the future- plans that seem to exclude the possibility of marriage. :)

I will echo Heidi's sentiment and say that golfing could be my next obsession, albeit an expensive one. If anyone is wrestling over what to give me for Christmas, a gift certificate to a golf and country club could win my heart (do they sell gift certificates? I don't even know). I'm proud that my first golfing experience involved icy snow, six deer on the fairway, and my brothers ridiculing me for running to hit my next ball. My justification is, why walk when running gets you there faster? In the 35 degree weather, I didn't feel too silly.

Thanksgiving was fun as always, and it was good to hang with Ana Maria and to defeat the guys in Trivial Pursuit. We've rarely played the game girls vs. guys, and when we have, the guys have always won handily- but this year, with secret weapons Aunt Collyn and Andrea, the tides turned. The answer to the final question was Edward Gorey. I'm grateful to have friends like Linnea and Courtney so that I can answer the winning question in Trivial Pursuit. Thanks, guys.

Brief bits from this past week. Each day satisfied in a unique way:

Thursday night: Heidi and I stayed overnight in Atlanta, a result of a delayed flight and a Chattanooga shuttle that stops running at midnight. Blech. There were no vacancies in the area motels. Blech again. A 45-year old conspiracy theorist bothered us for about an hour as we languished on the hard terminal north chairs. 6AM finally arrived; and we were soon home on Lookout Mountain, where our nephews energetically greeted us in the middle of watching ESPN and Max made us some eggs before he left for school.

This weekend is the wedding of Jon and Mary Catherine. I'm looking forward to impromptu musical performances, quality cousin conversation, the Michigan/Ohio State game, and "light fare and dancing." It's rare to have dancing at a Belz wedding. Time to live it up, Jewish-style.

I'm also working on my Arabic words for family and extended family. Did you know that, for all the emphasis Arabs place on family, there is no official word for "cousin"? You have to combine words, like "the son of my paternal uncle" (ibn aeimee) or "the daughter of my maternal aunt" (bint khalee) That's another headache, specifying which side of the family everyone is on. But at least the words for immediate family and extended family are different, so you don't have to explain who you're talking about like we do in English. A-quaarib is the word for relatives.

Did you also know that there's an Arabic Baptist Church in Boston?

Maa salaama, isdaquaa (friends).

"Who in his right mind, when faced with the choice between pancakes and living, chooses pancakes?" -Will Ferrell character
"It depends on the quality of life and the quality of the pancakes." Dustin Hoffman character

"Yeah, dramatic irony, it'll f--- with you every time." Dustin Hoffman

"So...are you a frequenter of the Metropolitan Transit Authority, too?" Will Ferrell's attempt to flirt.

Good movie. I'd recommend it any day over Borat. Ferrell pulls off the boring-yet-interesting character convincingly; he arouses deep pathos (for me, at least) in his depiction of loneliness and monotony. And of course Maggie Gyllenhaal and Hoffman are superb. There's much I could say, particularly about the caricatures and literary aspects, but I, modeling Harold Crick, will refrain.

Next up: Christopher Guest's For Your Consideration. Will be the third movie I've seen in three weeks, and most likely the last for a while.

Saw Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan on Saturday with the rest of Boston. My take - it was good, but it could have been better. In fact, it had the potential to be really hilarious, but instead it was just funny.

I admire Sacha Baron Cohen's fearlessness when it comes to stereotype and prejudice. No one is left untouched - the unfriendly New Yorkers, the manly feminists, the 'hood dwellers, the old-money Southerners, the all-Muslims-are-terrorists Texans, the charismatic Christians, the hospitable Jews, the lush frat boys on a road trip, and so on - all alike fall prey to many a Borat cultural faux pas. (Come to think of it, I don't remember any Hispanic jabs. Perhaps I'm forgetting.) All of these interactions are uniformly awkward and funny, and they certainly bring out latent prejudices that exist among Americans in several categories. They aren't exaggerated too much to seem real. The most telling and brilliant part of the movie happens when Borat sings the Kazakh national anthem to the tune of the Star-Spangled Banner (it's not the real national anthem, but rather Borat's jumbled, proud version) at a rodeo. Before he sings, however, he introduces himself and proceeds with warlike chants about how we will kill everyone in Iraq and Bush will drink the blood of every Iraqi citizen, and the crowd cheers and applauds without hesitation, until Borat gets extreme, and then they are only reticent in their applause. Still, they applaud. It's difficult to explain the scene, but it comes off not as explicitly anti-war, but rather as an assault on American thoughtlessness.

I also love Borat's turns of phrases. However, too often they revert to stupid and sexual humor. I don't mind this humor every now and then, but in Borat it's over the top. Some of it made me feel very self-conscious, which was the point, I suppose, and I didn't mind that, but a good bit of it wasn't all that funny. Overall, the movie could have been funnier if Sacha Baron Cohen had focused more on stereotypes and Kazakh phraseology than on his libido. I guess that's what people like, and it's earning him some serious dough. But the greatest comedy of all time? I think not.