carmina’s blogografia

I have got to stop smoking. In two months I progressed to half a pack a day. But I only smoke in the evenings when I come back from work, so that's like, a lot.  Just a second ago, I reached out for my laptopie and heard my lung wheeze back at me. oh geez, am I addicted? do I have lung cancer? am I dying? How soon.

Also I need to start going to bed earlier. Like before the sun comes up over Amsterdam Avenue.

Happy Protest Against Climate Change Day too. Scratch the happy out, of course.

Tom Stoppard's of course. Rock'n'Roll on Broadway, the English (I Thank your Goodness, Trevor Nunn) staging.

Tears in the end, I  will confess. If I could only wish for such an end that brings tears. Who's imitating who, again?

So, the play has several significant levels that is built on, all of which involve some sort of juxtaposition. In the foreground it is the story of a young man (a goddamn fucking idealist) who abandons his studies at Cambridge and returns to his native country (Czechoslovakia) to save Socialism and who gets quickly disillusioned. Across stands his mentor professor, a goddamn fucking communist who will remain faithful to the dogma, albeit in the not at all communist Britain, disillusioned as well by the emerging Thatcherism and the young people's lack of ideology.

On another level we see the aspirations and struggles of several young people immersed in two different countries/cultures, each with their own ideology, none devoid of it, each with their different courses and conclusions.

Further in the backdrop is the juxtaposition of the music of The Rolling Stones and the Velvet Underground on the one side of the "parapet" and that of the Plastic People of the Universe, a legendary group from Prague that resisted communism and suffered marginalization, censure and persecution.  This is the level also that sets the play's nostalgic soundtrack which spans 22 years and several other bands such as the Grateful Dead, the Doors and the Cure, why not?

All the acting was top notch but I sure do have a crush on Rufus Sewell. I loved both the actor and the role.
I am his Esme.

*****smiles and compliments to the graceful company, too... ;)

Central campus Columbia University

(pic stolen from this page).

In all its glory, the first snowfall is literally upon the city today. I woke up to find my window sills and the fire escape covered with a layer about half an inch thick. I could tell it's snowing because the traffic is light (snow always brings a certain tranquility even in this bustling city) and because I could hear instead little kids giggling, this early on a Sunday morn. I wish my kids were here to enjoy it. Time for cuddles and snuggles and embraces, too bad I can' t have any. I'll indulge otherwise. Now that will cost.

This post has a soundtrack too: George Dalaras and Emma Shapplin in Spente le stelle.

Watermelon moon, winter cold and several glasses of vino chianti make a person happy.

It was girls' night out in West Village and as per Despina's recommendation the Centro Vinoteca. Finger food mostly and wine. Lots of it. To fill in a couple of hours of chatting and serious discussions that ranged from relationships (ah, it never ends) to women in the work force, Greece and what die-hard-NYers we are. Or not.

Kalliopi came too, which was nice because she could update us on the art scene and her thesis progress. One was more interesting than the other, it seems, she recognized sadly.

I had a little time to look at the people around me, mostly single, I guess, or at least unmarried. I don't know, this is not my kind of scene and I am very glad to be out of it. Yes, even I am glad about something, sometimes. I believe I am turning into a grinch, just in time for the holidays, duh. At least on time.

I am rambling. It's the wine. I wish for rhubarb pie and more  wine. And this:

This is why I love NY. I can find anything I want here. Well, almost anything.

Gjetost

And then I saw it:  I ran across this summer's crush: Ekte Gjetost. If you have never had it, you must try it. 100% goat cheese (no wonder I loved it), strong, super sweet  and hard. A slice is enough. I was having it religiously every morning in Bergen and Annette, my Norwegian colleague, was shocked when I confessed it.

A commonly used synonym of Gjetost is Gudbrandsdalsost; the Gudbrand valley being its area of origin. The name derives from the Norwegian for goat - Gjet.

Norway's mountainous landscape, in which only about 3% of the land can be cultivated, made goat's cheese the more common in the past, but now the milk is often mixed with cow's to give a more varied taste. The result is a semi-hard cheese with a fat content lower than most (about 30%). However, it can be made with goat's milk alone, which is known as Ekte or genuine Gjetost.

It is made by boiling the leftover whey of cow's and goat's milk until the lactose caramelises (which gives it it's light brown appearance). The cheese is then poured into rectangular moulds and left to cool. The outer surface is similar to that of a decorated cake.

The taste resembles a slightly sour but sweet caramel cheese with a smooth texture similar to fudge.

It can be shaven into thin slices and eaten with coffee for breakfast. At Christmas it is a favourite with spiced fruit cake. It is also considered ideal as a sweet fondue or a sauce for game. Mariners traditionally took this cheese with them on long voyages.

Yes, I saw Before the devil knows you are dead tonight. It was really down to Sidney Lumet or Brian De Palma at the Lincoln Plaza. A choice I obviously wasted.

Okay, these are harsh words. I never entirely dislike a movie. I usually carefully pick what I will go see. Long gone are the days I would just show up in a movie theater, to watch something. Time constraints and the good fortune of living in a place like NYC (where I can do a lot of other things, although I do usually do nothing...) result in maybe two or three cinema-goings a month.

Anyway, still, the movie was not what I would expect from Sidney Lumet. My main problem was the script. The script, oh my my. So many inconsistencies, loose points, unnecessary information... It seems, part of the reason is Kelly Masterson's previous engagement as a playwright; the scenario is too fragmented for film. The characters in a play have more freedom to be deviating because the space/time constraints as well as the "live" presence allow the audience to fill in the blanks. I think this might be one major difference between a play and movie. But I don't want to go deeper into that now (although it is an great idea to ponder, hmm).

Anyway again, I thought the directing was good (not great) but good. I am a big fan of Lumet's style of jump cuts in mixed chronological order. I think it emphasizes the psychological factor and in some cases it is a practical yet elegant way to go back and explain points in the plot. But here is another shortcoming of Masterson's script: it failed to adhere/support the cinematic style.

Acting was great from Philip Seymour Hoffman (who is one damn great actor everywhere I've seen him play) and Ethan Hawke who redeemed himself (in my humble eyes) after the flop in Stoppard's Coast of Utopia last year. I guess he was shooting this movie at the same time he was playing that role, eh? I wonder if it's been really documented how actors with such tight schedules of filming/acting may confuse the characters. Hawke was definitely playing "Hank Hanson" instead of "Mikhail Bakunin" last year. Ah ha! QED.

Albert Finey was painful to watch, much like your grandpa staggering down the stairs. Marisa Tomei is very beautiful, even when dressed (oh gee, I am not a sexist!) but her character was weak. A high maintenance trophy wife? Fucking the loser brother? Ah, I dunno. Okay I am done bashing Ms Masterson for tonight. But I wonder how Redacted would have been...

"Sunset over the Palisades on the Hudson", by Sanford R. Gifford, oil on canvas, 1879, private coll

Palisades

Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory - IRI

LDEO hosts a series of other Institutions and Departments as well most notably, Seismology and Tectonophysics and Marine Geophysics and Ocean Physics. Their "Deepsea-core Samples Repository" is one of the best in the world and is used internationally for research of paleo-climate changes on Earth. As I was walking through the dry-rack library I couldn't help but feel awed at the daunting amount of information stored in this place. I kept thinking that I was trotting Earths's history of not hundreds or thousands but of millions of years, each breath a hundred years, each step a millenium. I could go back and forth, and pause, and run. Yes, I am silly.

Michael Studinger: A pictorial view of the subglacial Lake Vostok system.

The Lamont library of deep-sea cores has been used for many kinds of studies. In the 1950s, cores we

No, there is no snow today in NYC, unfortunately. What there is (was, really) is a Snow Party, at work. One of those gatherings you always go, mostly out of camaraderie and despite your unparty mood. In lieu of my insufficient words, this is how it went:

Marco Polo

Poem by Carolyn J. Paurowski.

The dry wind, you hear it and your skin crinkles and you want to wet your lips. Right there, in the theater.

The heavy breathing, there is no music queuing you into turning points in the plot. It is the breathing. And the sound of cowboy boots on the ground. You feel the breathing down your spine.

This is the Coen brothers new movie, No country for old men.

I have not read the book, so I cannot really know how far/close the movie stays to it, but there is a wholesomeness visually-contextually-acoustically that is a Coen trademark already.  If someone can make a flick better than any book, it's them. The movie is violent, very, but there is an implicit/unconfessed limit to it, apparently. None of the main characters dies in our view. We gather they did, or we see their dead bodies but not the actual killing. I have got to think about it a bit, maybe see the movie again. There is a bloodshed of others that we witness, but it seems to me that characters we are attached with, die ... discreetly (like the guy in the bathtub, even). But, really it cannot be a coincidence. I wonder how exactly it's in the book. I want it to be a Coens' nudge to the audience, like a gesture of appease.

Stellar performances, Josh Brolin, who was in American Gangster also, gave a memorable performance as the rugged by-chance opportunist (huh?) But the true gem is Javier Bardem who becomes the epitome of the deranged, the crazy and the scary in the movies, for me at least. What a radical change from his previous roles and truly another proof of the Coens' brilliance who brought it about. In fact, Bardem's character (Anton Chigurh in the movie) is just an oddity. He must be a reference to something I cannot grasp, but he isn't a typical bad character you encounter in westerns/drug dealing bloodfiestas.  Almost out of place, totally one-dimensional, no hints for his past or his future, with his dark colors/orderly looks/stylized hairdo and his absolute lack of anything even remotely human, he is just a supervillain. I love him*. And I am afraid of him.

* No, I do not love him. I love the character, the way it is built and portrayed. I do not like psychos.