so yes. i got to see a BATMAN movie last week! pre-show my excitement for the thursday midnight debut was a bit off the charts. it would have been tough to meet or surpass what i was expecting. and it started off great (the opening sequence was especially fantastic), and just as it was getting into full swing… a fire alarm went off.

i’m not kidding. as i turned and said to spencer as we were waiting to see what would happen: this had never happened to me before in an entire lifetime of going to see movies, and it had to happen in the movie i’d basically been waiting my whole life to see? (okay maybe that’s not entirely true; that was probably the first new star wars movie, and that went okay. but this is a close second).

so we waited a few minutes to see if someone would come tell us everything was okay. no one did. we resigned ourselves to exiting the theatre, then as people started filing out, they told us to go back, it was a false alarm, movie should be back on in five minutes. then they came back five minutes later and said ‘there was only a little bit of smoke, five more minutes,’ which really freaked out alex. but i stated plainly that as long as there weren’t open flames in the theatre i was sitting in, they better put fucking batman back on. i could see the emergency exit from my seat; i can handle myself.

it also occurred to me how amazing it would have been if it were all an elaborate setup for midnight moviegoers, in which a costumed joker came in and pulled a fake stickup in the middle of the movie, but alas, it was probably just incompetent use of the popcorn popper.

anyhow, if you care to see it, my extended dark knight review is up at under culture, featuring a nice counterpoint article from spencer. taken together i think you get a pretty well-rounded take on the movie, and no, there are no outright spoilers, if you’re worried.

also, last week i’d posted an article on john darnielle’s 33 1/3 book, his potential as a writer, and how that’s not something all musicians are capable of, in case you missed that and are interested.

i’ve been lucky that in the first month of writing i’ve had so many wonderful things come out recently to write about… it’s a lot easier when you’re so passionate about something going in. i think i have to buckle down and find some topics now that aren’t as obviously matched to my taste to practice coming at something from a non-glowing angle.

no, i’m not dead. that’s got to be the natural reaction to me not posting right away about batman, and naturally so.

there’s a good excuse: i had an extremely lazy weekend during which i mostly played video games. and i wanted to write something substantial for under culture, which is just about ready, and which i will link to here soon.

the good news is jessica is back from another trip, and that makes me a lot happier. it also makes me less lazy about three quarters of the time, because there is a person around to keep me from lapsing into a couch coma. of course, the other quarter, we happily veg out together, and that’s not so bad either.

if it weren’t for her, i might not even realize that project runway had started back up again and that i absolutely hate one of its contestants already. what the fuck is ‘girlicious’ supposed to mean, you stupid douchebag? if that little weiner from last season started a trend where everyone thinks if they have a catchphrase, they will win, i am going to stop watching now.

Least appealing spa day ever.

oh and i almost forgot to mention, there’s a lengthy review of the new girl talk album up over at the new under culture digs that i spent a lot of time on. i’d be curious to hear reactions or have people call bullshit on me if you’ve been digging the album as much as i have.

oh man, did i forget to tell you about our awesome july 4th/jessica’s birthday weekend? it was nonstop coolness. friday we hung at sarah’s folks’ place in the pool, did some barbequeing and beer pong (thanks to my portable table, natch) and even flip cup. then after it all we went and saw wall-e, which was wonderful. best pixar to date. that’s right, i said it (BITE me, toy story!).

saturday was the party for jessica at which we sang karaoke for almost four hours. not jessica and i, that would be exhausting. there were probably 15 or so people, and it was good times even if none of the pictures ever turn out when you’re trying to capture the passion with which your friends valiantly attempt to recreate the 80’s. we had some fantaaaaastic cupcakes from crumbs (the caramel apple one was ‘holy shit’ good), lots of tall bottles of hite, and she loved her gifts ($200 burke williams spa certificate from the gang, AND some nice new diamond earrings from yours truly. god, i’m a good boyfriend).

then we capped it off with a sunday trip out to mei long village for some heavenly dumplings and other chinese deliciousness. i’m not sure if they quite topped the ones we had in new york like jessica claimed they might, but i’ve never met a dumpling i didn’t like, and these were certainly way up there.

this week, just nerdin’ out. she’s off for a work trip (again, sigh), so i went over to spencer’s last night to watch the gotham knight batman anime dvd thing, which had its ups and downs. i think i might head out solo tonight to a reading at book soup with my favorite song-and-now-book writer, mr john ‘mountain goats’ darnielle. there are rumblings that on top of his 33 1/3 book on master of reality, he might be working on an actual novel now… fanboy jitters! if anyone else wants to come along tonight, it’s not too late…

the reason i’ve been slow at posting here lately is because i’ve been working on something new.

i’ve been wanting for a while to try my hand at writing some more feature-length, article-type things, but didn’t think this was really the place. if i start filling this page up with multi-page pieces on video games or movies, i might bore the crap out of half of the friends and family that read this. and also if i started doing that, and getting some sort of audience for those things, they might be annoyed when i went back to posting about a fun party i went to or what i ate over my vacation.

so, i built a separate site which i’m going to start filling up as much as i can with honest writing attempts, and keep this one more for diary style thoughts. after several weeks of monkeying with domain names, wordpress, learning some php and css tricks, figuring out layouts and logo styles and all that, i’m finally about ready to let people see it, so here it is if you want the sneak peak:

under culture

obviously there isn’t too much there yet because i was spending all my time building it, not writing articles, but that will change soon. also, the clever and talented spencer has already contributed an article, which is hilarious and smart. he will be back with more soon i hope. if you like the idea, please get in touch, because i would love love love if more of my clever friends signed on to make this a seriously high-quality project.

anyway, thanks for being patient, hope to see all you friends this weekend at pool parties, karaoke birthdays, or what have you.

a very full week, including a beach party, two LA film fest screenings, and an upcoming trip to vegas for the weekend with TEN, count ’em, TEN college buddies. it may get a little unruly.

both of our selections from the fest turned out really well though. monday night we went to see the new chuck palahniuk adaptation, choke. it was cool seeing something that won’t be out until september, and i always love getting to hear a little bit about a movie afterward from a director. plus chuck as a surprise guest, which was a bonus. what a strange man, and an odd movie. good odd though, for sure. i’d say if you like things that are a bit dark and twisted, but funny — closer to rules of attraction than fight club maybe, even though i know i’m mixing controversial authors — you will enjoy this as i did. it’s definitely less stylized than a david fincher movie though, so don’t expect the same level of grittiness.

tuesday was a screening of spaced, the sitcom that birthed the team behind shaun of the dead and hot fuzz. that was just plain old fun and i pre-ordered the box set today so i could see the rest of the episodes now that they’re finally coming to the US.

speaking of pre-ordering, i don’t have to tell anyone anymore how excited i am about the upcoming batman movie. however, what you may not know is that they’re also doing a short anime film collection bridging the gap between the two movies (in the vein of the animatrix, which you may have heard of), called batman: gotham knight, and holy shit, i don’t think anything direct-to-dvd has or ever will made me this jittery with excitement. you KNOW i got the double-disc collector’s version of that shit.

been caught up in a new little project, so a lot of my computer screen time has been spent elsewhere. plus i haven’t had a whole lot of excitement to report. i mean, we did win once again at bar trivia on saturday, but that’s almost expected at this point. i’m fairly confident that of the dozen or so regulars that rotate on or off our team, no matter which five or six show up to play, we will be a force to be reckoned with. and i find the idea that as a whole my friends are smarter than the other people in the neighborhood extremely satisfying.

also caught the latest animation show (now in its fourth volume, to be specific) friday night, which i won’t go on too long about. basically i’m still a huge fan of the idea of showcasing great animated shorts you may never see otherwise, but this year’s batch was slightly disappointing. i got a sense very early on that an unnecessary percentage revolved around slapstick and/or violence, and had to tell myself not to be so cynical and just enjoy it. there were definitely some winners in there, but not their best showing overall.

i don’t usually make posts just to point to articles i read and enjoyed, but this camile paglia article on salon, covering the topics from ‘why not hilary’ to the current state of american feminism was so good i couldn’t resist.

she’s obviously a brilliant woman, and she gets so many things right, i was energized reading it. personally my heart is still with edwards, but i have to admit she’s got a good point with sebelius.

between an end-of-may new york trip and an end-of-june vegas trip coming up, i am going to have to make a concerted effort not to spend too much money. it think it will help that i’m currently very much into watching a bunch of episodes of bleach, and still playing the apparently never-ending GTA IV. with jessica leaving once again for work trips that will leave me home alone, it should be easy to stay in a live on the cheap in the intervening weeks.

of course, there are always things that threaten to come along and foil that. like the pretty much unmissable animation show which is coming to LA this friday (which reminds me… who wants to go? plans need to be made), although that’s just standard movie ticket price. the 12 dollar beers at last weekend’s cubs/dodgers game didn’t help much, and they couldn’t even pull out the win to make it worthwhile, the jerks.

plus i’m very curious about the pending releases of both the new, improved iphone and the hopefully cheaper, if not quite as cool samsung instinct, so i can upgrade from good phone with crappy internet/messaging to better phone with slightly better internet/messaging in the not-to-distant future. hrm. i have this problem where once i decide i want something, i find it really tough to put off going out and getting that thing. we’ll see how long my will can hold out on this issue, and just thank my lucky checkbook that i like my car and haven’t yet started considering upgrading that.