Pageant

MissTexas
Originally uploaded by nojam75. [Image stolen from TriPro.org. Kevin Cook as Miss Texas in Triangle Productions' Pageant.]

On Friday night, Scott and I joined his co-workers at Triangle Productions!'s comedy musical Pageant at the tiny Firehouse Theatre. We were all there to see Scott's co-worker, Kevin (aka Poison Waters), perform as Miss Texas, a semi-finalist in the fictional Miss Glamouresse pageant.

The show was hilarious! The show's small venue required audience participation including five audience members posing as pageant judges. In fact, one blond judge/audience member almost stole the show with her banter with the pageant's MC. There was also a drunk audience member who was too enthusiastic about the show. However, the MC did a great job of improv and wrangling the audience.

The show was a great way to end the week. I'm always amazed how a relatively small show (compared to a blockbuster movie or big stage production) can be so entertaining. I really should go to more local performances.

Portland/Seattle sight-seeing

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Scott's sister, Lacey, visited us this weekend. She has visited Portland before when Scott first moved to town, so we decided to go to Seattle. I haven't entertained very many people from out of town before, so I'm not quite sure what is really interesting or worthwhile for people to see. Also, the weather has been rainy, so that kills many of the outdoorsy sighting seeing like the Columbia Gorge. However, I think we had a good time. Here are some of the highlights:

• McMenamins St Johns Theater & Pub: (see prior post)
• Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame, Seattle: We started our weekend in Seattle at Paul Allen's Sci-Fi museum inside the hideous Frank Gehry building at the Seattle Center. Outside of Star Trek and maybe Star Wars, I know very little about science fiction, so much of the museum seems obscure. Although Scott and Lacey were excited to see the alien from Aliens. While not as interesting as Star Trek: The Experience in Vegas, it was neat to see Captain Kirk's original captain's chair. They also had the scale model of the original series sets that were used for planning the production.
• Space Needle: This was a great time of year to do the touristy Space Needle. There were no lines like when we visited last summer.
• Monorail: A ridiculously short transportation system, the monorail is still a fun excuse to ride the short distance downtown.
• Pike Place Market: We were too late to see any fish throwing, but we did spend some time at a comic book store and did see the original Starbucks store. The line was too long at the original Starbucks store, but we did manager to visit two other Starbucks earlier that day.
• Dilettante Chocolates: In the Capital Hill neighborhood, we made sure Lacey experienced our favorite tiramis. Soooo gooood.
• Elliott Bay Book Co.: On Sunday morning while we waited for the aquarium to open, we had coffee at the Elliott Bay Book Co.'s cafe which is supposedly the inspiration for the coffee shop on Frasier. However, I don't think they promote this association.
• Seattle Aquarium: The aquarium fed the octopuses chicken drumsticks while we were there. We noticed that all the kids would scream "Dory!" whenever they saw the familiar blue fish.
• Sungari Pearl: Back in Portland, we ordered Chinese take-out which allowed Lacey more chopstick practice.
• Portland Art Museum: Scott and Lacey saw the ancient Egypt exhibit at the art museum.

The Illusionist: Grade D

illusionist
Originally uploaded by nojam75. [Image stolen from theillusionist.com.]

Scott and I wanted to show his sister, Lacey, one of Portland's pub/theaters. We took her to The Illusionist at McMenamins' St Johns Theater & Pub on Friday. The 1905 Lewis & Clark Exposition building matched the film's turn of the last century setting.

For some reason, there are two turn-of-the-century magician movies out this year with promising big name stars. The other movie, The Prestige, starring Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, and Michael Cain, I have not seen, but I understand that it is about competing magicians. The Illusionist stars Edward Norton, Paul Giamatti, Jessica Biel and is a love story about a poor boy who returns to his home town as a traveling magician and reunites with his higher-class first love. The movie was filmed in the style of an early motion picture with a dim and flickering image, bland cinematography and an obvious plot. I hate trying to guess how a film will end, but this film's storyline was so basic and obvious that I could not help but know how the film was going to end. The movie is 1 hour 50 minutes long, but felt like it dragged on for three hours.

Edward Norton came close to making his magician character, Eisenheim, interesting, but his performance confuses being mysterious with being aloof. In the end, I didn't really care about Eisenheim or his love interest. Giamatti's Chief Inspector character helped salvage the film and steals the climax of the film.

Overall, I would have rather spent my evening watching a different film. Illusion is not a very interesting or mysterious subject since we all know the filmmakers cheated through the use of visual effects. Had the filmmakers made some sort of commitment to viewers to use only believable, turn-of-the-century illusionist tricks, I think the film would have been a little more interesting and compelling.

hate crime in Vantucky?

Yesterday, I saw a KGW report [clip] about a Vancouver, WA, restaurant that was vandalized with anti-Arab hate graffiti and set on fire. The mediterranean restaurant, Galilee Cafe, is owned by a man from Israel.

I was surprised that there was relatively little coverage of the possible hate crime. However, the Oregonian reports that the one of the suspects told the police that the fire was set for "monetary gain". It seems unfair that to let a comment from a suspected arsonist undermine a possible hate crime victim, but it seems the media reports are handling this case carefully.

Fresh Air: Gay in the Middle East

Fresh Air had an interesting pair of interviews today about being gay in the Middle East. It really puts the gay debate here in perspective. Fortunately, there is some hope the burgeoning GLBT communities in Tel Aviv and Beirut.

back to the gym

Just for the record: I've returned to the gym. I've never been a fitness fanatic or considered myself athletic, but the guilt and embarrassment was really weighing me down (figuratively and literally).

I stopped going for all of the typical reasons (lazy, unmotivated, work, relationship, etc.). The reality is that I didn't make the gym a priority. Anyways, a few weeks ago a co-worker admitted that he was in the same boat. He stopped going when his gym partner had to stop going. So, last week I bit the bullet and offered to go to be his gym partner.

So far, we've gone Monday and Tuesday night. Fortunately, the good people at 24 Hour Fitness were kind enough to continue debiting my checking account for the many, many months I avoided the gym so I didn't have to worry about re-joining. What's more embarrassing to admit is that I actually forgot where the gym was and took the wrong street (yes, it's been that long).

Anyways, I'm really sore today, but I feel good that I'm getting back into the routine. We may go Friday, otherwise, I promise to go this weekend.

Jimmy Carter is great

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Originally uploaded by nojam75.

Today, I've been hearing (NPR's Fresh Air) and seeing (CNN's Larry King Live) Jimmy Carter's interviews about his controversial new book, Palestine Peace Not Apartheid. He admits that the title is purposely controversial.

Admittedly, I know nothing about the Middle East/Israel/Palestine dispute. However, it's always troubled me that the U.S. gives so much monetary, military, and political support to a country that seems to discriminate based on race and religion. The rationalization is that Israel is still better than many of the neighboring countries in the regions.

While I was watching the interview's closed captioning at the gym, a caller to Larry King asked about why not a single-state solution in which Palestinians were recognized as citizens and allowed to vote. Carter's recognized that Israelis would never agree to such a situation because, obviously, the Palestinians would vastly outnumber the non-Palestinian Israelis and take over, but I love that the question was asked and considered.

Contrary to the inept way his presidency is often portray by right-wingers, Carter strongly defends accomplishments and Clinton's Mid East peace accomplishments. It's reassuring to know that after almost six years of Bush, Jr., incompetence, there are still people who believe Mid East peace is possible.

Also, in one of the interviews Carter distinguishes the Bush presidencies as "Bush Senior" and "Bush Junior". I have never heard any other political figure use the senior/junior language. I always assumed there was some kind of unspoken rule against using this language, but Carter seems to use it.

Seattle trip

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Scott and I took our semi-annual Seattle day trip today. We spent too much time and money at IKEA. Then we hung-out in Seattle. Scott took numerous pictures of Smith Tower.

We got back this evening. It was nice getting out and seeing another city for the day.

Christmas tree lighting

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Scott, Paula, and I went to the Christmas tree lighting "ceremony" at Pioneer Courthouse Square last night. The first 45 minutes we had to listen to the "legendary" Linda Hornbuckle(sp?). While I'm sure she is a great musician -- we didn't really care for her selection of music. Then the has-been group, the Bare Naked Ladies, came up and played two Christmas songs.

After the tree was lit, we got the heck out of there and went to a nearby Starbucks. Ta-da! Christmas has been celebrated.

Michael Richards' apology

A seemingly unedited version of Michael Richards' unpolished and rambling apology on the Letterman show is on YouTube (The abridged version CBS posted doesn't make any sense). Richards' statement seems so...so pathetic and unrehearsed that it seems genuine. He even used the outdated "Afro-American" term. Defamer.com recounts a Richards sighting after the apology in which he is overheard admitting that he doesn't have a PR person to handle the disaster: "I don't have anyone handling this. If I did, I wouldn't have gotten into trouble in the first place." (Obviously this is a rumored remark, so who knows how accurate it is.)

I have to admit that as a long-time Seinfeld show fan, I really did want to believe Richards was genuine and sincere, but Richards offensive remarks seem to go way overboard. During the statement, he momentarily lost my sympathy when he tried to phrase his behavior in the context of the nation's race relations and Katrina, but he steered himself back to his awkward apology. It would be adviseable for Richards to check-in into drug/alcohol or even psychiatric treatment -- even if he doesn't have a diagnosed problem -- because I can't imagine how else he can explain away his remarks.

On a side note, this has to be one of the most awkward television moments ever. Jerry Seinfeld even scolds Letterman's live audience ("Stop laughing. It's not funny.") who were obviously not following the unexpected transition from comedy show to serious interview. Undermining the Letterman segment is that Michael Richards and Jerry Seinfeld are so closely connected to their self-centered Seinfeld characters who were never sincere or serious about anything. Although I intellectually know Richards and Seinfeld are real people seperate from their characters, it was impossible not to see their characters in the Letterman segment.