Below are the 11 most recent journal entries recorded in Normal is the Watchword's LiveJournal:

Monday, August 10th, 2009
11:28 pm	That's noise. "Rescue Me" - unlike equally intense HBO shows like "The Sopranos" and "Big Love" - does not trace and retrace the situation that is its reason for being. It has a drunker logic to it: laughing when things are at their worst, crying unexpectedly, broadly mocking itself, lashing, brawling, blacking out. Its material, as often as not, circles it like its bed spins: the blazes and the cheating but irrestible women and the loveable jerks at the fire house, and of course, the bodies. Then when the drama stumbles - when Tommy's arbitrary rage destabilizes any kind of straight story of the human heart - Mr. Leary, who created the show with Peter Tolan, takes refuge in a tough first principle: we're Irish. Being Irish here means being capricious, volatile, erratic: at odds, in other words, with lucid emotional narrative. - the New York Times on Rescue Me (Comment on this)
Thursday, July 10th, 2008
10:53 pm	"The reason you haven't felt it is because it doesn't exist. What you call love was invented by guys like me, to sell nylons. You're born alone and you die alone and this world just drops a bunch of rules on top of you to make you forget those facts. But I never forget. I'm living like there's no tomorrow, because there isn't one." - Mad Men, Season One, Episode One (Comment on this)
Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
9:19 pm	It's been a hard year for hearts. It's almost like you had it planned It's like you smiled and shook my hand And said "Hey, I'm about to screw you Over big time" And what was I supposed to do I was stuck in between you In a hard place We won't talk about The hard place But I don't blame you anymore Thats too much pain to store It left me half dead Inside my head And boy, looking back I see I'm not the girl I used to be When I lost my mind It saved my life It's how you wanted it to be It's like you played a joke on me And I lost a friend in the end And I think that I cried for days But now that seems light years away And I'm never going back To who I was 'Cuz I don't blame you anymore Thats too much pain to store It left me half dead Inside my head And boy, looking back I see I'm not the girl I used to be When I lost my mind It saved my life I think I cried for days But now that seems light years away And I'm never going back To who I was 'Cuz I don't blame you anymore Thats too much pain to store It left me half dead Inside my head And boy, looking back I see I'm not the girl I used to be When I lost my mind It saved my life That life seems like Light years away, light years away (Comment on this)
Saturday, February 16th, 2008
11:34 am	the new REM song Everybody here Comes from somewhere If they would just as soon forget A disguise Disguised as they know you made you feel it At the summer camp they volunteered No one saw your face, no one saw your fear You got apparition just appeared Took you up and away from this place and shared Humiliation Of your teenage nation Nobody cares no one remembers or cares If your fantasies are Dressed up in travesties Enjoy yourself with no regrets So if you call out safe then I’ll stop right away When premise explodes and the room starts to shake The details shift And the stories the same You don’t have to explain You don’t have to explain Humiliation Of your teenage nation No one cares If your fantasies are Dressed up in travesties Enjoy yourself with no regrets Everybody here comes from somewhere If they would just as soon forget, disguise So if you call out safe then I’ll stop right away When the premise explodes and the room starts to shake The details shift With the stories the same You don’t have to explain You don’t have to explain Humiliation Of your teenage nation This celebration Of your teenage nation Nobody cares no one remembers and nobody cares (Comment on this)
Friday, January 4th, 2008
11:00 am	My New Years Resolution is to write 500 words a day. (LJ doesn't count.) (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, November 3rd, 2007
11:24 am	And so it begins. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 30th, 2007
8:21 pm	At lunch today, there was mention of outreach visiting Houston elementary school. I used to live by Houston, when I lived in Mt. Airy, but what I most remember about Hudson school was that Mat Johnson went there. Mat Johnson has written two novels - Drop, Hunting in Harlem - and he's been a reader/writer/workshop leader at the Rutgers Summer Writers Conference every time I've participated. Honestly, I haven't thought about Mat Johnson in a long time but when I do, I remember two very specific things. First, when he spoke at a discussion where post 9/11 fiction came up - this was in the summer of 2002 - he said that the best fiction to come out of 9/11 wasn't going to be about 9/11 at all. It was going to be writers taking the emotion that was felt during 9/11 and putting it toward other events like boat accidents or car wrecks. He said that there are three stages of being a writer - 1- you don't write about what you know because you feel that what you know isn't good enough. 2- you write about what you know because you realize you have to write about what you know to be any good at all. 3 - you take the emotions you feel about what you know and put them toward something completely make believe. That advice about writing has stuck with me and shaped my writing life more than anything else I've ever read or heard about writing. I bring it up all the time and in fact, often, I feel like other people recall it back to me. (This happened in Austin, my friend Beth turned to me and said, I think it's you who told me that you take what you know and you use that toward something you are making up.) The other thing I remember about Mat Johnson is that he read this story at one of the Rutger readings and it was one of the most touching, most intense reading experiences I've had. The story was about his mother and it was hilarious but in the middle of it, he broke down and cried. And as an audience, it was such an experience because here we were laughing - which, I'm sure is what he wanted - but it was personal and we felt that along with him. I tried to find the story today online and I couldn't find a text version of it which makes me a little sad however; I did find a podcast version of Mat reading it on his site which is almost better. I suggest listening to it. It's a great story. And he'll never know it but not having anything to do with his novels at all, he's shaped my writing and my writing life more than anyone else. "Why I Hate Alaska" (Comment on this)
Monday, January 8th, 2007
8:25 am	More beef with the 21 Jumpstreet dvd. I realized what is a good time to have an unexplicable loyalty to finishing 21 Jumpstreet on dvd. It's when you come down with a crazy cold, a fever, a horrific sore throat and don't do anything but sleep and drink tea and grapefruit juice all day. It's especially appreciated when you've just finished watching Munich which you love and which has two of the most attractive men EVER (Bana and Bond) in it but leaves you wanting to watch something that you have to think a bit less while watching. (I realize many people out there - those of you that don't watch mainstream movies or read fiction, hate television, think poorly about those who watch it - who will snub their nose at watching something where you have to "think less". I embrace it. I think too much as it is. Of course, if you are one of those people, you probably shouldn't be reading my livejournal.) Season 3, disc 5. I'm not use to watching tv on dvd thru Netflix so it seems like a really slow process but this disc reminds me of why I wanted to finish watching 21 Jumpstreet to begin with. I wanted to know why Tom Hanson went to jail. We all know why Tom Hanson really went to jail - Johnny Depp wanted off the show - but I wanted to remember the exact way it happened. And so, I was psyched I was also psyched because this disc has another one of the three episodes I covet - "Next Victim". "Next Victim" is the episode where Booker goes undercover as a Howard Stern-like radio personality and Brian Bloom plays the guy trying to stop him. Nothing says late 1980s television more than Brian Bloom. And remember his brother who was on Who's The Boss? Rian Johnson, who wrote and directed Brick (which I also watched this weekend) is making a movie called The Brothers Bloom and I was actually disappointed to find out that it was not about Brian and Scott Bloom but I digress. When I popped in the disc, I was disappointed to find out that the third episode on the dvd was Next Victim and the first two episodes were Loc'd Out Part 1 and Loc'd Out Part 2. I almost considered watching Next Victim first because it was the episode I really wanted to see and in my ill state, I didn't know if I was going to make it for all three episodes. The chances of me falling asleep were high. I didn't know if I could commit but I talked myself out of it because I felt I need to watch them in order and so, I started watching the Loc'd Outs, satisfied once I started because these were obvious the episodes that answered the burning question of why Tom Hanson went to jail. (And the less, but still burning, question of why Ioki got addicted to painkillers.) I didn't watch Next Victim until the next morning. While watching it, I couldn't help but think it strange that the two episodes before it were the ones where Hanson goes to jail and Ioki gets shot and yet, in Next Victim, there is no mention of either. Something seemed off. Didn't the season end with Hanson's trial? Was it possible that Next Victim was out of place? And so back to the internet I had to go while watching 21 Jumpstreet on dvd because once again, something didn't feel right. Well, guess what? Next Victim actually came before the Loc'd Out episodes during the season. THE DVD HAS THE EPISODES IN THE WRONG ORDER. What the fuck? How is that possible? Who do I complain to? That's just wrong. It's not even like it was the disc before where who the hell cares what case comes first, they don't really reference each other. This was the last disc of the season. THE SEASON FINALE ENDS IN A CLIFF HANGER. And they put an episode after it? This really bothers me. (Comment on this)
Monday, January 1st, 2007
8:01 pm	Biggest disappointments you learn while growing up? 1. There is no Santa Claus, Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy. 2. The dog your family had when you were a kid did not in fact sleep with you every night but rather waited until you were asleep and then left your bedroom to sleep somewhere else but came back in the morning before you woke up. (My parents broke that one to me when I was a teenager.) 3. Johnny Depp hated being on 21 Jumpstreet. Yeah, #3 was a bit hard for me to take. I loved 21 Jumpstreet when I was kid. I loved it so much that in 5th grade, I raised my hand in class while we were discussing the Scientific Method and told the teacher you could use the Scientific Method to solve cop cases. In retrospect, I probably just thought Johnny Depp was hot. I remained loyal to the show for a long time and I always kept three episodes (one being the two hour pilot) on VHS tape. When the tv on dvd phenomena hit, I quickly bought seasons one and two only to find out that there are some television shows that shouldn't be brought back because they are just not that good. This was about the same time it became common knowledge that Depp had always been unhappy and had always wanted off the show. I still felt slightly guilty only having watched the first two seasons on dvd and so when I finally joined Netflix, I felt some unexplained loyalty to watch the rest of it, despite the fact it only compares in comparison to today's cop shows. (I also feel loyalty to the show because it was the first one hour drama on Fox - that's right, the first - and one of the other shows closest to my heart, Oz, was the first one hour drama on HBO. Of course, the latter also meant the breakthrough beginning of cable television which was a little more historical.) Since television is apparently one of the only things I can be loyal and committed to, I've been finishing 21 Jumpstreet on dvd, inexplicably. I half watch the episodes but I feel I need to plow through them. This evening, I was actually looking forward to spending time watching an episode, that episode being 'High High', one of my favorite and one that I always had on tape. 'High High' is the one where they go to the creative arts high school and as soon as the show started, I found myself knowing the dialogue before it even came out of the actors' mouths. I'm not proud of it but I seriously have watched this episode hundreds of times. And one of my favorite parts of it was the music. I remember 'On Broadway' opening up the show and the song that was played while Johnny Depp was playing the guitar in class and everyone was taking drugs in other classes. Something was off, tonight. 'On Broadway' never played and I didn't think anything about it except that it wasn't there - I figured it must play at the end and I got it wrong. Even if I knew I hadn't got it wrong. And then, that song with the guitar was different. I tried to ignore it but then, it really started bugging me. Could it be even possible that the music on the dvd in this episode is different? No, that's ridiculous. But eventually, I couldn't deal with it anymore. I tried going through my old tapes to find the episode and compare the songs but that seemed like a lot of work and so, I did a google search for "high high" 21 Jumpstreet music change dvd. A ton of stuff came up including the Wikipedia definition that actually states The criticism on the DVD release has been the substitution of soundtrack music from that used on the original episodes, as that the music originally used was often notably linked to the themes of each episode. How crazy is that? I wonder if it's like that on almost every episode but this was the one that I knew most and so I noticed. I've been looking for a new job recently and I've been pretty down on myself for not having "a skill". I would do anything to have a skill or trade - to be an electrician or a computer geek or an investment banker or a lawyer. I've been pissed off at myself for having two utterly useless degrees and a bunch of student loans to pay off in return for them. There's got to be something out there for me, right? If I can notice that they changed the music on an episode of 21 Jumpstreet, that has to mean something. I have to be good at something, right? (I should also point out that another issue I have with watching 21 Jumpstreet is that the characters are only like 22, 23 and 24 in the show and when I first watched it, back in the day, they seemed so . . . old. Like real grown ups. And now, I watch it and I'm so much older than them. This really freaked me out when I first started watching it on dvd. In fact, I think I actually watched the pilot and then couldn't deal with it and put it away for awhile. I had to talk myself back into watching it because it blew my mind so much.) (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, December 29th, 2006
10:46 am	Is there a general consensus about which is better - The Outsiders, The Complete Novel or the original The Outsiders? The Outsiders is on the list of top five books* which changed my life. The Outsiders is actually the reason for the list. I don't remember when I first read it - grade school? middle school? high school? - and to be honest, I don't remember if I read the book first or saw the movie first. I just know that I've always known that first line When I stepped out into the bright sunlight. . . , that it made me always want brothers, that I loved Dal Winston even know that I shouldn't, that it appealed to my yet developed interest in blue collar sentimentality. It's the only book that I read at least once a year and still get into it and still find something new about it. When I took my first film class in grad school, I was just starting to get into film, just realizing that my interest in it could be more than just a hobby, and I was also just starting to get back into YA, this time as an adult. I wrote my final paper on Coppola's screen adaptations of YA books and I read and watched both The Outsiders and Rumblefish over and over again. It was definitely the place I was in my life that makes it such an important memory. And SE Hinton is somewhat of the ideal success story for me - she wrote novels, she got to be on set and assist Coppola. Because I studied the film so intensely as an adaptation, I have a lot of thoughts about the adaptation aspect of it. I think the original film is the perfect film adaptation of a novel which probably makes it just an okay film. Lately, I've been going back and forth between the original and the restored version. They say the original cut was too long for theaters and would potentially upset fans of the book. I actually think I like the 90 minute version better even though I feel I should like the longer, restored film. One of the hypes of the new cut is the music and while music is really important to me (in book and film) and usually something I'm very into, I'm not so into it. I like the Stevie Wonder song and that's it. I don't know if it's because I'm too comfortable with the original or what, which is why I wonder if there's a general vote on which is better. * Also: Sati by Christopher Pike, Girl by Blake Nelson, Before Night Falls by Reynaldo Arenas (Comment on this)
Monday, September 11th, 2006
7:40 am	"That's how he felt on that plane, and all we were doing was landing in a different city. Imagine how the people must have felt on those planes, or in those buildings in those last moments when they saw the planes coming. That's what's terrible. Not that they died; because everybody dies. The terrible part is knowing that it's coming for such an awful reason and you can't do anything to stop it. Those people who died in those planes are gone, but the cloud of horror and dread that came pouring off those people in their final moments... that very real, almost pornographic awareness that we live in a world almost completely beyond our control... that's still here. It's everywhere, everywhere I've been today I've felt it. I feel it here right now. That's the terrible part, because where does that energy go, where does that human dread go as it comes pouring off of those doomed souls? It goes into us . It settles slowly down across the land like a menacing fog and it goes into us . And that's why Andrew feels the way he feels, I think. And I think that's why you feel the way you feel. Because you're both too daunted by the horrible facts of the situation to claim your own freedom to do something in response. But that kind of abdication is a lie. We're all as free today as we've ever been. We're perfectly and absolutely free." - Craig Wright, Recent Tragic Events (Comment on this)