It Takes All Kinds.

It takes all kinds.

I mean: you think your own blog is just your own sad little rantings.

Yet you harbor the notion that there is some wider appeal.

Then you spot someone's web site, and it's so specific and peculiar that you just think: what the heck?

One fellow--I'm assuming here--has a web site consisting of nothing but images of a woman (usually unconscious) being carried by a male figure--yes, it can be a robot.

That's it.

Mummies carrying ladies.

Vampires carrying victims.

Guys in ape suits carrying B-movie actresses.

Christian Slater carrying Marisa Tomei. (But now I'm repeating myself.)

Could I make this up?

I mean it almost rises to the level of cultural analysis--which is, by the way, rigorously eschewed.

But panel after panel of four frames from a movie, each one bearing the same basic image. (Here's just one such page.)

Well, it's kind of amazing.

It's a cultural trope.

Hat's off to obsessive nerds everywhere--turning our little fixations into websites.

--E. R. O'Neill

P.S. His pal in Grosse Pointe, MI has a similar fetish--but the guy seems to film women in passed-out states. Wow.

Listening to Regine Crespin.

The great French soprano died recently--at the age of 80, of liver cancer.

So I'm listening to her tonight, as the fog creeps in over San Francisco.

I put my LP of her sublime Rosenkavalier on mp3 for myself. And I have CD's of her--live "sur scene" (onstage) in Mozart and other things, and also, of course, her famous epoch-making recording of Berlioz and Ravel.

(Someone did a nice fan site that has lots of audio, too.)

God, first Bubbles and now this.

Sills did commentary for a simulcast of I Puritani this winter. She just had to open her mouth to crack everyone up. She was just so fresh and real and direct, no matter what she did or said.

And apparently Regine's memoir is very, um, frank, too.

And don't we love diva's with potty mouths? I do.

Sirius is playing their live version of Sills' (and Verret's) sublime Rossini nonsense. I'll listen to it every time, too. The Rossini is not far from just scales, and the story--well, serious Rossini is really over-the-top, but the vocalism is unbelievable.

Rest in peace, my dear dead wondergirls.

--E. R. O'Neill

Kitties, Headbangers, Whatever.

And if you get tired of pictures of cute kitties saying funny/nonsensical web memes, then you can move on to headbangers.

--E. R. O'Neill

What's Wrong, Li'l Hipster?

Yes, it's good coffee.

But why does everyone who hangs out there have to look so fucking miserable? Oh, what's wrong little hipster? Is it hard being cool? It makes you unhappy? Are you cranky because you're starving yourself to fit into those skinny jeans? Are you mad because you spilled coffee on your favorite black hoodie? Did you just find out that your roommate's been stealing your black eyeliner? Did somebody hurt your feelings by telling you that the real hipsters are in Williamsburg? Your friends got tickets to Silversun Pickups and you didn't? Boo fucking hoo.

--Review of Ritual Coffee, 1026 Valencia St., San Francisco
found on yelp.com
http://www.yelp.com/biz/VOoHZDC-dgDUzTSsmgESOQ
written by "Suge K."