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I just finished watching the 1927 film Metropolis and I wasn’t that impressed considering that this movie was so highly rated on the top 250 movies of all time. I’m sure it was very poignant at the time with communism vs capitalism, proletariat vs bourgeois being such a big deal, but it did’t do that much for me. It’s interesting in terms of what was possible with big budget films at the time, and it’s historical significance probably can’t be underestimated, but it seemed drawn out for it’s message. I haven’t seen a lot of silent films either, so I suppose I could be biased based on that. See it for it’s historical significance, but don’t expect to be entertained in this day and age.

I only went to one day of Bumbershoot this year. (more…)

Jason Webley’s concerts are always a blast. (more…)

Tonight I went to the Tractor Tavern in Ballard to see Erin McKeown and Kris Delmhorst, two very talented female singer-songwriters, perform.

I had never heard of Kris Delmhorst before but I’m glad that I have now. I don’t usually like female vocalists, but something about Kris’s voice sounded right to me. Her songs seemed very tender but not sappy. The crowd was great too. We got to sit on the floor and enjoy the mellow music. It’s been awhile since I’ve really enjoyed the vibe of a crowd so much.

Erin is much more rock n’ roll than last time we saw her. She has a band with drums and keyboard, and the guitar parts are louder and don’t seem as unique. I liked it, but I missed hearing some of her other solo songs. I think she’ll probably appeal to a wider audience with this new style and that’s a good thing. She’s really got a stage presence for such a little girl.

Kim and I went to see Auggie Smith at the Comedy Underground. Very funny show. He rants and raves in a very amusing way, kinda spastic and shouting. At first I thought he was drunk, but I think that’s just his style. It comes off as very unrehearsed and quick-witted. There were some other comedians too. A guy from Coeur d’Alene was pretty funny, but his set was really short.

Cinderella Man is a good movie even if it does follow the plot of almost every other sports underdog plot, complete with getting in shape music montage (set to Irish music this time). (more…)

Kim and I went to see the Violent Femmes play at the zoo! (more…)

Kim and I went to Volunteer Park this Saturday to see some plays. We saw the Three Musketeers first. Fun sword fights. Then we stuck around for The Tempest. It was a really fun interpretation of a Shakespeare play. The weather was great too.

A little of everything seemed to take place this weekend. Kim babysat on Friday night for some rich people on Queen Anne. Bridgid moved on Saturday morning after a hectic week of buying a car and getting ready to start her job on the peninsula. We took her out to happy hour at the pink door downtown on Thursday and Brian came too. While Bridgid was moving out Kim was checking out culinary schools since she’s considering going back to school to study cooking.

It was Laura’s birthday and she came down from Bellingham, and after a little sitting around the house waiting for people to call use back and tell us what they were doing, we just took off for downtown to go to the cheese festival at Pike Place. There were a ton of cheese samples. Kim met us down there, but as usual, the parking was horrendous and we only stayed for a little while. Then April met all of us and we took off to go climbing at exit 38.

April had never climbed before and Laura has only climbed a little bit, but they both did really well. I was really excited and impressed that Kim led the first few climbs of the day with no fear. She kicked butt. I led the last climb of the day, a slightly wet 5.9.

Kim and I had plans to go to a modern dance show, so we dropped Laura and April off, got some food from Thai Tom’s and hurriedly got ready to go to the show. The show was called Relatively Real, and the dancing was amazing, but I definitely didn’t ‘get’ it. The dancing just looked cool, but I didn’t see how it tied in with the themes that were presented during interludes to the dancing.

After the dance show Kim and I stopped by Jesse’s to see how the Risk game was going. Jesse was the first one to be knocked out. When we left Travis was fighting to survive, Jacob was only doing slightly better, and Deborah and Waleska were duking it out for world domination.

Today was thankfully less eventful. Kim went to get her bridesmaid dress hemmed by Waleska’s mom, and I washed windows and did yard work. A house is quite a bit of work, but so far the novelty hasn’t worn off so I don’t mind yet. When Kim got back we went to Brook’s first birthday party. Brook is the little girl that Kim nanny’s for. I’m constantly amazed that human beings can survive as well as we do considering how helpless babies are for the first MANY years of their lives.

Now we just got word that the person we thought was going to be moving in is flaking out on us, so we’re back to the drawing board for finding a roommate. Oh well, with both sets of parents visiting in the next week it will probably prove to be better to have the room open.