dr. who

so i watched the first two episodes of the new season of dr. who. now when i was a little tyke, i used to watch it with my dad and jim. i loved the long scarf, the tardis, and of course, the daleks. but when i watched the new season it seemed too dr. who. the most exciting part of the show was when they played the theme song. man i love that theme song. the most disappointing part was the monsters. they were marginally better than the ones that i saw in the late 80's, but still not as good as i expected to see. this is the 21st century--i need good monsters. and for that matter, a good, edgy plot. unfortunately, it was the doctor, running around, hiding and saving people from the same plastic (literally) monsters.

it's like when hook used to be my favorite movie. then, i watched in college. it was awful. my advice is to stay away from anything you enjoyed as a child. don't ruin those precious memories.

further instructions

lost is a pretty rediculous show. i dig the crazy sci-fi stuff that happens, and i think the format, with character-specific flashbacks, is a great idea. the new season is good--the division of storylines agrees with me quite well.

but what is making me write now is the great vision that locke has in episode 3, "further instructions." without giving anything away, the setting is perfect, the parallels it sets up are right on, and it has a bit of a creep-out factor that any good hallucinogenic vision quest should have. A+, lost.

a buddhist parable

once upon a time, a woman had the idea to test a buddhist monk's vows of abstaining from killing, sex, and intoxicants. she invited a monk to her house under false pretenses, and locked the door behind him. she told him she would not give him the key unless he did one of three things: kill a goat tied up in the back yard, have sex with her, or drink a flask of wine.

while the killing and the sex affected others' lives, the drinking of the wine affected only the monk's own, so he decided he would drink the flask.

the next morning, while nursing a nasty hangover (a little interpretation there) the monk realized that while he was drunk he killed the goat and ate it, and afterwards made love to the woman.

this parable demonstrates why clouding your mind can be so detrimental. while it may seem like a small, insignificant act, the loss of control that can follow may prove to be more damaging.

freak show

david cross has been a hero of mine ever since i watched mr. show the first time. the way they linked the skits together was genius, and if you have ever seen the drugachussetts episode, you know what i mean.

his new project is called freak show. it is about a crack team of freaks who go missions given to them by the parking attendant at the white house. even though i'm a big fan of david cross, i'm not a huge fan of freak show. there are a few barbs pointed at our society, government, etc, but it doesn't push it over the hump for me. perhaps if i was in an altered state, i'd feel differently.

i am neither a fan of aqua teen hunger force, and they seem to have that audience in mind. it is the same type of animation, the same type of bizarre setups, and many of the same voices, as well.

it's just not david cross enough.

world trade center

wow. not what i was expecting. i need a nick cage who is going to save the day not...whoops...spoiler alert....

be trapped in a pile of rubble for the whole movie. i mean, oliver stone nailed the tone i think, and i teared up a few times, but on the whole i was expecting something much different. Perhaps my expectations lost it for me, as expectations often will.

or perhaps it was the shitty bootleg i was watching. first it was in german till we switched the audio. then the cameraman in the theatre kept rubbing the mike against his jacket or something. in the dark scenes in the rubble it was too dark, and there was no detail--it added a gritty feel to it, but watching nick cage's eye glints for a whole hour is a bit much. then it switched back into german for another fifteen minutes, no matter which language it was in, and finally it cut out the best part of the movie when the crazy vet finds the cops.

so it could be either expectations or bad bootlegging. i say a little from column a, a little from column b.

but i think that stone made an honorable tribute to such an awful event. i still don't know what to make of the vet...i guess it was stone's little piece of commentary in an otherwise tame movie. well shot, well acted, just maybe not what i was looking for.

more haikus

at the risk of this becoming a haiku based blog, in my sparetime waiting for buses to travel to the cultural revolution museum, i wrote a few more.

escaping chicken
many ways to be free, now
nope, back in the bag

chinese funnel in
buses pull out constantly
will it ever stop?

blue sky, sun shadows,
breathing air you cannot see
an anomaly

dirty-ass kid squats
dad supports his endeavor
peeing in public

(his ass was actually dusty, that's not a figure of speech.)

taxis vie for place
safety is not a concern
speed above all else

mao in porcelain
cultural revolution
history in plates

meditation wonderfulness

quiet sitting now
rain falls, flute sings, life is good
china, my haven

me and my shadow

as i meditated tonight, i did so (inadvertently) with my reading light on, instead of my overhead light. therefore as i sat, i looked at my shadow. now the main idea behind sitting is to put yourself in the moment, and let go of your ego. it was great, because as my eyes became soft, my shadow would lose focus, and eventually disappear into the wall onto which it was cast. it seemed to me a great metaphor for my practice. i'm not sure it is good for my sitting, however.