The Film Noir Experience

So, I'm reading this book, Discover Your Inner Economist by Tyler Cowen. Chapter four is called "Possess All the Great Art Ever Made. I enjoyed the first three chapters, which talked about things like incentives and how to use them to control the world and, just in general what economists do. Chapter four, among other things, has some great suggestions for how to make museum going experiences more rewarding. (Also, it reminded me a little of How Proust Can Change Your Life, so the rest of the book could be awful, but I'm still going to say that I like it.)

One of Cowen's suggestions include letting go of any pretense you may have about how much you love high culture and how knowledgeable you are about it. This one was pretty easy. I like museum going, and have been known to drag loved ones through galeries of little interest to them but I still know very little about the things at which I like to look. I know that Cher was right in Clueless about Monet paintings up close, the Islamic art wonderfully geometrical, and that even if there is no rope around the sphynx, you are not allowed to touch its marble magnificence.

Another of the suggestions was to plan a robbery, (hypothetically speaking). In this museum game, in each room, you assess each painting and then decide, if you were to take one painting from this room, which one would you take and why. So, you are making sell-centered value judgments, but you are also working on assessing what is good about each painting and what you like. My sister and I decided that we would stroll the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We had a pretty good afternoon.

Some of the our picks were just because they would be challenges (and, also, of course, because they were awesome.) The Sphynx and a column in the Egyptian room would be impossible to pull off. However, this is a good game because of the discussion that generates.

Beth really enjoyed a tapestry depicting Troy in the Medieval rooms. We had a nice chat about the crossbow because of this tapestry. In the 19th-early 20th rooms we had a discussion about how not every painting by a master can be a masterpiece. In that same room, I found a painting by Vuillard that I'm looking for a print of as it would be perfect over my couch. There was a painting in the European room (and, for once, we weren't taking notes) so we can't tell you who its by or even what its name was, of a woman in blue that had a look on her face that said, "Seriously? You're going to paint me now? Seriously."

Some of my favorite pieces were a stained glass column and a bronze statue that I believe was called "The Vine" in the American room. It amazes me how well motion can be captured in bronze. I also enjoyed the papyrus in the Egyptian rooms and the reconstruction of a chariot on the mezzanine of the Roman room.

There is an exhibition on the Model as a muse, which featured music by Nirvana. We had a moment of cognitive disonance, listening to grunge while looking at high fashion. And, we wondered, "Is Kurt Cobain rolling in his grave?"

Currently, there is also a retrospective of Francis Bacon. These rooms were well worth it, if only for comments of the other museum goers. I find it hard to look at a lot of Francis Bacon's work because its creepy. So, the entire room of paintings that were studies after Velasquez was pretty much my limit. Francis Bacon could have set dressed every Nine Inch Nails video made before the Fragile.

After Francis Bacon, we took in some other modern art. It was nice to end with a little Balthus and Mattisse. Although, the creepiness probably ended our Thomas Crown affair. There are no museums on the menu for the rest of the trip, but we will be seeing a taping of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. This is a more-than-acceptable substitute.

Posted by Kate at 10:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

After Thanksgiving, things were a little low key today. (One must take some time to recover from the turkey coma.) We woke up slowly, everyone showered and got dressed. We had tea and coffee (well, those of us who are tea/coffee drinkers had one or the other.) We ate some leftovers. We decided what to do with the day.

Whatever it was, we had to be done with it by 3:30, so that Beth could get to work. It was a gorgeous day, so we came to the conclusion that we should do what you do on gorgeous days if it is an option: go for a long walk in the park. So, we took the subway down to Prospect Park , and strutted around it. The road was blocked off through the park, so cars couldn't get in and this falicitated our meandering. We walked past the little dog beach. Although it didn't have any dogs on it, it was full of ducks. In general we just strolled around and talked about books. It was really lovely. Not all of the trees have lost their leaves yet, so it still quite colorful in the park, which added to the warmth from the sun. Around 2, we decided to head back towards the circle where we'd gotten off the subway because there was a coffee shop there. The shop was called Connecticut Muffin. No one had a muffin, though. We all got drinks and we decided to share a Brooklyn Blackout brownie (which, if you ask me, was a little too sweet.) Then, we took Beth to work. I had a coupon I wanted to use so this suited me just fine. I picked up a copy of The Tale of Desperaux by Kate DiCamillo. It is still a goal of mine to make it through all of the Newbery Award winners and it has been made as a film that will be released soon, so it seemed like a good choice.

Since then, Dad and I have been getting some work done. (I think he may have gotten more work done than I did. Although, he is napping right now.) This evening we are headed back out to have dinner with Beth on her break and then we are going to see the new James Bond film. I'm pretty excited about it. I don't know what the plan is for tomorrow, but I have a feeling it is going to involve writing papers for me. We shall see.

Posted by Kate at 05:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

So, I arrived in Brooklyn last night. Got to my sister's around midnight. Hung out for awhile. Went to bed. She left me a nice little note telling me where I might want to go and what I might want to do, which trains or buses to take. Which is important because when I said that I would come to her house for Thanksgiving and volunteered to cook since she would have to work today and on Friday, I told her not to sweat anything but the turkey. That I would swoop in on Wednesday and take care of the shopping.

She took me at her word. Around 9 this morning, I had her last cereal bar and a diet coke. The diet coke, by the way, was pretty much the only thing she had in her fridge. So, she literally took me at my word. Sadly, I didn't really get her much in the way of staples or useful things. I'm not even sure I got everything that I needed. But, we're going to go with it.

Of course, the first thing I do is get on the wrong train. I followed Beth's instructions and get off at the stop she said I should. And, it didn't look anything like she described. No shopping center. No Buffalo Wild Wings. No Target. Fuck. But, there was a gourmet deli. So, I thought, what the hell, I'm in Brooklyn, lets see if they have rubens.

Oh, did they ever. Thin-sliced corned beef. Sauerkraut. Rye. Amazing. Also, directions that included the sentence, "Go back the way you came." Brilliant.

Shopping the day before Thanksgiving is a little like playing a game of dodge ball whilst in a bumper car hunting easter eggs. Loads of fun. We're having pie, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, rolls, brussel sprouts, stuffing and magical butter-bacon turkey. At least, that is what I now have the ingridients to make. Also, I bought some cheese to go with some crackers for before dinner. It is the way forward. And, some breakfast food.

Now, I have to go back out because Beth gets off work soon and then we are going to see Twilight. TWILIGHT! I'm so very, very excited.

Happy Thanksgiving E'en, everyone!

Posted by Kate at 02:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

So, I live near the The Niagara Wine Trail. I know this because I've driven past the "Niagara Wine Trail Begins Here" sign at least one hundred times since Monday.

I figured, I should see what its all about. Apparently, you can purchase their "vino visa passport" and with it you get a wine tasting at all of the vineyards on the trail.

I went to the first one today. The Warm Lake Estate Vineyard and Winery was Wine Spectator's highest rated Pinot Noir in New York State in 2007. The wine tasting consisted of five wines all made from the pinot grape. The two Estate wines (which were nice and smooth and a little sweet and a little spicy. I'm thinking the bottle I bought needs to be served with a lovely steak.), one I think was called "Mountain Road", (I should have taken better notes.) This one I didn't like as much, it had a huge black peppery kick at the end which I didn't care for. And, then the last two were their Glacé Noir. The first one was way too sweet for me. Although, apparently it is fantastic when mixed with pomegranate juice and chocolate martini mix. The last one was a mistake. It was meant to be the Glacé Noir, but instead ended up being more like a pinot brandy. It was fantastic.

From there I did a little exploring. I got lost for a minute on the way to where I planned to have lunch. I finally gave up looking for it and decided to go to the next place where food was served (that wasn't a fast food chain.) The next place I drove past was a bar and grill next to a take out sub place. I didn't feel like eating in my car, so I walked into the bar and grill.

Let me rephrase that. I walked into the BAR and grill. At this point, I just had to go with it. Yup, I had lunch down the bar from the two guys who had decided that Happy Hour started at 2 pm.

Then, I found Lake Ontario. Which isn't hard because it is huge.

But that's not where the excitement started. The excitement started after I breezed past the second vineyard I was planning on visiting. Looking for a place to turn around I found Russell's U Pick Blueberries. Russell gave me a bucket and let me wander through his twelve acres of blueberries.

When I first arrived here in Buffalo, we went to the grocery store and the first thing I saw was a huge flat of blueberries (that I had to be talked out of.) And, for the past week I've been thinking about going back to the store and buying blueberries and doing a lot of baking. Right now, I have four and quarter pounds of blueberries chilling in my fridge. Tomorrow, I'm going to make a pie from scratch. And, then maybe some blueberry buckle. Goodness, I couldn't be happier.

After that, I stopped at a fruit farm and bought some super cheap fresh veg (and a pint of apricots!). And, I drove past some orchards that I'm hoping are "U Pick" apple orchards once apples are in season. I think Western New York and I are going to be very good friends.

Posted by Kate at 12:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

To get to Chicago, I first had to fly through Dublin. Aer Lingus had the cheapest flight. It was a nice little flight. Its only about 55 minutes. I got to sit in the exit row and stretch my legs. They still have the flight attendants doing the safety speech instead of having a video. No turbulence, no problems.

When we got to the airport, the captain came on and said, "Welcome to Dublin. Just to let you know, we are using the stairs instead of the jetway because Dublin is having a power shortage."

I thought, "shortage" meaning that they didn't have enough for everything. They meant "shortage" as in "electrical shortage" as in the power was out. So, we were waved straight through immigration and told to go upstairs where we joined the people milling about waiting to check in and the ever growing queue of people who had been waved through immigration and already had their boarding cards and were just waiting to get a connecting flight. The power wasn't out that long, only about half an hour. (At least, I was only present for about half an hour of the shortage.) After that, they got lights and x-ray machines and computers back. They didn't have the monitors back that told you which gate you should be heading to. So, you had to go through security and then wait patiently in a crowd of people while someone in a yellow safety vest looked up each flight on a list and told everyone where to go. This only the delayed the flight for about half an hour, but I think its the best reason I've ever heard for a flight delay.

Posted by Kate at 11:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)