Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board

So I finally broke down over the weekend and cleaned out my closet.

This does not sound like the start of a good story, but trust me, it gets better. (For ethical reasons, I feel obliged to inform you that it does not, in fact, get better.)

See, I'd been putting this off for roughly 8 months. Any time something broke (like a dining room chair, a computer monitor, or a plastic bobblehead dog) rather than repair it or throw it away, I would just store it in the closet for later. Then when I got my new king-size bed, I decided to retain the old full sized mattress and box spring for tactical purposes (also I am lazy and didn't want to have to carry it farther than 5 feet anywhere) so it went in there as well. AND THEN when I got my new TV, I didn't want to carry the giant box that it came in out to the dumpster (which would almost literally be like carrying a sign that says "Please Rob Me" around my not-so-nice neighborhood), so into the closet it went.

Considering the pre-existing boxes of clothes, bedding, Christmas trees, unopened blenders, books that are either ugly or don't fit into my shelves, garbage bags full of stuffed animal beavers that I have stashed away in the hopes that people forget about that period of my life, etc. that already littered the place, we sort of hit a critical mass in there about 4 months ago. And yet I did nothing.

"But Jason," you say. "A closet is for keeping clothes. How do you live life with no access to your wardrobe?"

To that, I say "Bah!"

I can adapt to anything. While yes, technically there was roughly 10 feet of hanging space in the closet that I could not access, I could still reach the 18 inches directly in front of the closet door. Which is just enough space to cram every dress shirt and pair of slacks I own, as long as I pushed really hard. And while I could no longer reach the shelves where my folded clothes should go, I was able to clear off two tiny spaces on the wire rack that stood directly beside the closet door, on which I was able to precariously stack every other piece of laundry I owned. So not only did I work it out, I never technically had to enter the closet after that point, to defend against the off chance that it might consume me entirely.

This setup lasted until this weekend when I had to retrieve a blanket for a house guest and nearly lost my life when I got stuck between the box spring, my space heater, and a lamp, and almost had to call the fire department to come in to rescue me with the jaws of life.

Thus, on Sunday I steeled myself and started yanking things out. You know at the circus, when the clowns come out of the tiny car? Imagine instead that the tiny car is actually a giant SUV, and yet still a proportionate number of clowns come out of it. Like, instead of 10 clowns out of a VW, imagine a million clowns coming out of a Hummer. (Lets all stop and wonder in horror at the idea of a million clowns. Move on when you stop shuddering.)

This imagination adventure was necessary because my closet is only moderately sized, and yet I managed to pull enough stuff out of there to fill my entire bedroom, my bathroom, and part of the hallway. It defied the laws of space, time, and physics. I found things in there I'm pretty sure I hadn't seen since I left the metaphorical closet back in 2001 - up to and including my high school graduation cap, a broken saxophone, a computer from 1994, and what I can only assume was once a mattress pad, before the ravages of time turned it into a synthetic pile of foamy dust.

Once suitably cleared out, I set about empirically deciding which items could effectively be thrown out without one day possibly missing them. Which by my insane qualifications meant tossing 2 things: the (assumed) mattress pad lump and the box that the giant TV came in. Because you never do know when you're going to need a desktop computer from 1994, or a stack of outdated video cards from 1999-2003.

I realize that I may have some packratting issues.

But in any case, I attempt then to carry said giant TV box from my bedroom to the dumpster across the apartment complex. You would think this would not be a difficult thing, but only if you haven't met me. The box is open on either end, but is both too wide to carry lengthwise and too long to stand on its end and still be carryable. Since I am by myself, I compromise and just half-carry it by holding one of the short ends and prop the rest against my body at an angle upwards. Sort of like I'm about to do a pole vault, only instead of a pole I've got a long and wide empty cardboard box. Since I'm fighting both gravity and my own weakness, I have to book it pretty quickly across the parking lot, lest the whole thing crash down to earth and I end up in a sobbing heap on the (really, really hot) asphalt.

I still maintain that this plan was solid, and totally would have worked, had it not been windy that afternoon. But alas. Halfway across the parking lot, a huge gust of wind picks up and hits the box broadside. I am bodily picked up by the force of it and spun 90 degrees, so that instead of half running towards a dumpster, I am now half running directly at several parked cars.

I attempt to course correct for this by shifting my left arm and part of my body to the backside of the box and pushing with all my might. I am half successful in this attempt, insofar as I regain my original heading without killing myself or falling over my own feet. This success lasts approximately 2 seconds before the second gust of wind hits. This time I am already braced against the backside of the box, so you'd think that would be enough to compensate.

But I did not factor in the part where I am weaker than the plot of Transformers 2. The wind overpowers my counteractive push to the point where I am literally forced backwards 5 feet and am bodily slammed into the back of a parked car. Who's alarm of course immediately starts going off, seemingly loud enough to cause permanent ear damage and alerting every single person within a 1 mile radius to come out and witness my humiliation.

This is how I meet my new neighbors now, apparently. Wedged up against their car, beaten into submission by a cardboard box that weighs approximately 10 pounds. And of course by the time they come around, there is no wind at all to speak of, so the neighbor's wife is able to easily pick up the box without aid.

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So what lesson did we learn?

Never throw anything out.

OR

Just stop going out in public at all.

Both are good.

Music Review Monday - Spektor, Jonas, et al

Been in a music buying frenzy lately, and thought I'd do a public service announcement on what to buy and what to ignore. Because I definitely know what I'm talking about when it comes to music. (Please note: I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I do like to type a lot.)

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Far, Regina Spektor - I cannot give an unbiased review of this album. It includes the songs "One More Time With Feeling" (my old favorite Regina song) and "Dance Anthem of the 80's" (the song that I heard live back in '06 which started my terrifying fan obsession), so I have no objectivity.

That said, even attempting to pretend impartiality, I think it's a very, very good album. It opens brilliantly with the catchy songs "The Calculation" and "Eet" (which I think are the two standout songs on the record). It get you hooked before you know it and the album slides on with a nice pace, alternating the slower, deeper songs with the more upbeat ones, making a nice layering effect to the thematic idea of the album. The only thing I find out of place is "The Wallet," which is a great song and one of my favorite things she sings live, but it feels jarringly trifling at the end of such a strong album.

As with Begin to Hope, I think the same unfair criticism will be leveled at Far - it's more commercially viable (read: mainstream), more produced, resulting in less original flavor Regina. I agree with the viability and the production, but if anything, this album has more personality Begin to Hope and a couple of the songs rival what we saw on Soviet Kitch. Undoubtedly there are more mainstream things here: "Laughing With" is generic enough for radio play, I sincerely believe "Eet" will end up as the "Better" of this album, and "The Calculation" and "Dance Anthem" both scream commercial to me.

But right at the same time you've got "Folding Chair," which is the quintessential Regina quirk song (there are dolphin noises involved), and "Blue Lips", which is insanely lyrically dense. Basically, I can never figure out what people are on about, but I assume it's cool hate on the popular and say you knew them when, and it was so much better, and lalala. Whatever, it's good stuff.

(Note: As much as I prefer buying music from Amazon over iTunes, get it off iTunes if possible, since the bonus tracks are amazing. While it's short, "Riot Gear" is my favorite song on the whole album.)

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Lines, Vines, and Trying Times, The Jonas Brothers - I don't even know what to say to this album. It's so varied - the theme is obviously the Trying Times part of the title - but musically it's all over the map; you've got country, rock, pop, even a little rap. Despite many of the songs not being my cup of musical tea ("What Did I Do To Your Heart" sounds like a 90's Shania Twain reject, and "Don't Charge Me For The Crime" is gangsta-rap-ultra-lite) I think it's a good album, but it's nothing that you need to go out of your way to hear.

I was shocked how much I liked their last album - it was slickly produced and unbelievably catchy without being too Disney Teen Bop, or only a little bit so (plus some of the songs were just plain good). This album continues that theme in some ways for the better - this is a more mature sounding and better produced album in almost every regard, and it actually has some real-world playable music on it (as long as you never reveal that to anyone that it is the Jonas Brothers who are singing).

Some of it is a little juvenile, though: after listening to "Fly With Me", I sincerely wonder if they've forgotten that Peter Pan sort of doesn't have a happy ending (which seemingly negates the message of the song). And while I enjoy a good Taylor Swift smackdown as much as the next person, I really could have done without the eternally lame "Much Better" ("I'm done with superstars/and all the tears on her guitar, I'm not bitter") Uh, yeah, good luck with that.

On the whole, it's around 6.5 out of 10. Maybe more, depending on how long this "Paranoid" single remains lodged in my brain (seriously, it's really good).

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Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future, The Bird and The Bee - Such a nice album. I've become sort of an electro-pop glutton lately (Bitter:Sweet, Animal Collective, Lykke Li, Imogen Heap...) so I like to think that I'm starting to be able to tell the difference between something that's just catchy and something that's genuinely good, as electronica goes. This is a really great mixture of the two - standout catchy tunes like "My Love" and "Polite Dance Party," and then some songs that some measure of real interest hiding in them like "Meteor" and "Love Letter to Japan."

Not world-breaking, but a delight nonetheless.

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Beautiful Lie, Ed Harcourt - Get your music snob on. UK release from 2006 that got a US distribution in 2008 to little recognition. This album and Matt Alber's Hide Nothing are my go-to joys for obscure but amazing male singer/songwriters this year. To steal a line, this album is hauntingly beautiful. Goes a little too far on a couple of tracks, particularly "You Only Call Me When You're Drunk" which starts brilliant but then keeps spiraling upwards to a messy and terrible crash, but mostly it's a stunning achievement and kind of makes my heart hurt at times.

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Transmitter Failure, Jenny Owen Youngs -Another one of those biased reviews. Her last album, Batten the Hatches, is my favorite thing that came out of 2007 and I have an irrational love for the way she writes her songs. There's a cynical but reasoned edge to almost every song on that album that really speaks to me.

The new album is a little more driving and a little happier, but the edge is still definitely in place. Her uptempo stuff is just brilliant, with "Last Person" and "Clean Break" as my standout favorites. I'm less in love with a couple of the fragile songs ("Here is a Heart" is a little too cloying and "Nighty Night," while catchy, is off-putting to me), but that's just because I compare them to things like "Woodcut" or "Voice on Tape" from the last album and see missed potential. Make no mistake, it's a wonderful album, maybe my favorite of the whole year so far.

Transformers - Robots in Disg-THE WORST THING IN THE WORLD

My review of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, which was so bad that my hate-review spilled over the character limit on the sidebar.


Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - I told myself as I was walking out of the theater that I wouldn't write up this review for at least a couple of days. "The pain will be too fresh in your mind, and you will say things that you regret."

But you know what? Screw it - This was the worst movie I have ever paid money to go see. And I went to both the remake of Prom Night last year, and I saw The Fog on its opening weekend. Terrible in every way imaginable, and then terrible again in ways that you couldn't even guess. Boring, long, insulting, misogynistic, borderline racist, loud, overly long, annoying, poorly acted, unforgivably dumb, confusing, way too long, illogical, ugly, vaguely nauseating, and (oh did I mention) TOO DAMN LONG. One of my friends complained that when he went to see it, someone pulled the fire alarm at the 2 hour mark and they had to evacuate the theater and he missed the end. Rather than complain, I would have gladly given whoever pulled the fire alarm a hug and maybe a kiss on the mouth. Another friend said she would have had more fun sleeping than watching the movie - I said I would have had more fun hitting myself on the hand with a large, sharp rock for TWO AND ONE HALF HOURS.

The plot is nonsensical to the point that you wonder why they even decided they needed a script at all - just give in to inertia and just go from set-action-piece to set-action-piece without any explanation if your rationalizations are going to be that lame. (Which they did at one point, I might mention. They literally had the cast gather in a circle in the middle of a field outside of the Smithsonian and then magically teleported themselves to a desert in Egypt.)

And then even the action sequences are so poorly shot (or rendered in most cases) that you don't even know what's going on. There are two formulas available:
#1:

• Two large collections of bits of metal go flying at each other from opposite sides of the screen
  
• There is a terribly loud screeching noise and some little bits fly off
  
• The camera then spins around the metal mass about 5 times
  
• Sometimes then one of the robots will "die," sometimes they won't. Sometimes there is a terrible robot-related quip by the victorious robot.

Your only hope of working out any of the action is to look for red bits of colored metal (meaning Optimus Prime) or yellow bits (meaning it's the comedy relief robot). Everyone else is indistinguishable from a stainless steel appliance mangled by a garbage disposal.

#2:

• An airplane fires a missile at a robot
  OR
• An airplane drops a bomb on a robot
  
  (Note: Neither of these things will have any effect on the robot, but explosions = cool, apparently)
  

Those are your options. Choose wisely. (Hint: The only way to win is not to play.)

I will credit the movie for making me laugh on three separate occasions (Rainn Wilson, I absolve you for being in this movie) but that doesn't make up for the damage done to my soul. We were trapped in that theater for 150 minutes of my life. Just a terrible, terrible, horrible, unconscionably bad movie.

And I haven't even talked about that part at the end where (SPOILER FOR THE ENDING OF WORST MOVIE IN THE WORLD) the boy dies and goes to Transformers Limbo where he is praised by the spirits of dead robots and is turned into Keanu Reeves from The Matrix except even more lame (because of his robot loyalty he's now The One? After he only started trying to save a robot because he felt guilty for abandoning him earlier and causing said robot's death?). But then he comes back to life because of the power of either Megan Fox's love, or a magically reassembling tiara. Had I been holding anything in my hands at the time, I might very well have chunked it at the screen. I mean, I can enjoy mindless comedy or I can enjoy mindless action, but this was neither. It was just loud, nonsensical, boring and hate Hate HATE HATEHATEHATEHA--- Okay, I'm out.

Jesus.