a single burst of glorious criminality

"... her career ended in a single burst of glorious criminality. You can't keep a lady waiting forever, and there came an afternoon when she decided that she'd waited long enough."

  - Orson Welles

Not the first but certainly the most notorious of matadoras, renowned bullfighter Conchita Cintron passed away a few weeks ago.

Women were forbidden to fight on foot in Spain (lest they be gored and exposed in some unseemly and immodest fashion) and in Europe Cintron fought primarily as a rejoneadora from horseback. 

In one of her final fights on Spanish soil, Cintron ignored the order to leave the arena and let a male fighter dispatch the bull. She dismounted, drew her sword and muleta cape, and faced the bull.

The bull charged. Cintron swept her cape aside, let her sword fall to the ground, and reached out with her bare fingers to caress the shoulder of the charging bull. 

She left the arena amidst a shower of thunderous applause and red carnations and was promptly arrested. 

Sunday Night at the Supermarket

Dear Lady, 

I very much admire your courageous choice to eschew traditional groceries in favor of a box of wine, a birthday cake, and a carton of menthol cigarettes. 

Missing you already,

Joshua

Mozart of Madras

Who is A.R. Rahman?

According to his very modestly designed and unpretentious official website, he "is the pride of the Indian nation and a role model for millions around the world." Further perusal of the biography section (which is accessed through a flash-animated marble-arched doorway and flanked by Pegasi and seagulls) also reveals that he is a prolific film composer with scores of Bollywood and western studio films to his credit.

Most recently, he did the music for Danny Boyle's thrilling and awesomely sentimental Slumdog Millionaire.

Here's one of his older and more popular songs, "Chaiyya Chaiyya," (I believe Spike Lee appropriated it for Inside Man) from the film Dil Se:

I shall pet you now

you don't love me yet

In case you were wondering, the best sentence (fragment) in Jonathan Lethem's otherwise forgettable novel You Don't Love Me Yet is:

"Just tongue and a smudge of her hips and goodbye."

Vampire Romance

I think this looks creepy/lovely.

Scenes from a Prison Dream

*Recent dream recreated from notes and memory and punctuated for narrative effect. Any resemblance to real people or actual events is purely coincidental*

I was sent to prison on a technicality. Apparently the now defunct college I was working for last winter was involved in some dubious financial practices and when it folded, all of us former employees were convicted of insider trading. Ouch.

I bore my incarceration as stoically as possible. Taking a page out of the Avon Barksdale book, I resolved only to count the first day and the last day; no use worrying about what you can't change. Prison wasn't so bad. I seemed to spend most of my time wandering around the common areas (cafeteria, exercise yard, etc...) and trying to avoid any confrontations with my fellow inmates.

The food was terrible. At one point an inmate who bore a striking resemblance to this kid Matt I had 10th grade gym with offered to make me a sandwich out of some substance he called "yurt." I was grateful and offered to supply my own bread. He looked annoyed and made me a sandwich using his own bread.

Dream yurt tasted just like tuna fish. I don't eat tuna fish and ended up throwing the sandwich out. I rummaged through a refrigerator looking for something else. I couldn't find anything, so I picked the yurtwich out the trash and ate the soggy bread. Being a vegetarian in prison is hard.

At some point I was raped by a short, unshaven man with long, greasy hair. It wasn't so bad, just another unpleasant but inevitable part of life inside - the prison equivalent of paying taxes or getting a cavity filled.

I think the rape even broke the ice with the other prisoners. I heard a rumor that the greasy guy was planning to rape me again. I went to his cell to get it over with and he was face down on his bunk with a shiv in his back. I had friends, apparently.

I stood watching some inmates steal a basketball from the juvenile inmates we shared recreation space with.

"That's terrible," I said to my friend, who looked like Portland Trailblazers center Greg Oden, only with beaded cornrows.

"Hey, man, you know you'd do the same damn thing if you was out there," dream-Oden replied.

"Half those kids are bigger than me," I gestured at my skinny, suddenly shirtless chest for emphasis, "If I was out there, I'd be the one getting robbed."

"Hehe, you right, boy, you right," dream-Oden chuckled, "Fuckers'd be ON you."

Inside, I smiled. His approval meant a lot to me.

sweet Virginia; punctuation princess

Depending on your feelings towards the semicolon (and freindirekterede), the first pages of Mrs. Dalloway are either willfully wonderful or indulgently insipid.

Happiness

If I could go back in time - or anywhere in time - I would want to go to a place where I could feel like one of the children at this puppet show: unselfconsciously wonderful.

From Les Quatre Cents Coups by Francois Truffaut


This clip never fails to make me smile, then feel a little sad.

Had To Cry Today

It is not often that I am moved to tears by a song, but I was today in Dunkin Donuts over an everything bagel with cream cheese. The song I am referring to is, of course, the fourth track on Scott Walker's solo debut, Scott, which is a cover of the sub-2:00 masterpiece penned by Tim Hardin, "Lady Came From Baltimore":

C G F C
The lady came from Baltimore, all she wore was lace
F C G
She didn't know that I was poor, she never saw my place
Am G F C
I was there to steal her money, to take her rings and run
F C G C
And then I fell in love with the lady and got away with none

C G F C
The lady's name was Susan Moore, her daddy read the law
F C G
She didn't know that I was poor and lived outside the law
C G F C
Her daddy said I was a thief and didn't marry her for love
F C G C
But I was Susan's true belief and married her for love
Am G F C
I was there to steal her money, to take her rings and run
F C G C
And then I fell in love with the lady and got away with none

C G F C
The house she lived in had a wall to keep the robbers out
F C G
She never stopped to think at all that that's what I'm about
Am G F C
I was there to steal her money, to take her rings and run
F C G F C
And then I fell in love with the lady and got away with none.

Eclipsing the Hardin version released the same year by a great deal, Walker's performance is nothing short of breathtaking. Highly recommended listening.