Went to see Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants tonight because 1. I loved the book and 2. we got free tickets at work. It wasn't as good as the book, shocker I know, but I was really happy to see it as they actually filmed part of it in Santorini!

As many of you know, I have obsessed about Santorini for years, finally got to go 3 summers ago, and fell head over heals in love with the place. I plan to spend a good portion of my remaining life there as soon as I actually grow up enough to start a savings plan and buy a small house/flat there. It was so nice to see it again, especially for free, to see the restaurants Kim and I went to, the views, I got all misty just looking at it.

Doesn't do it justice, but if you're curious go here and here

A million thanks to K.Lo!

They're all good, but you must scroll down to the winning phallus

I was having a conversation with Migrant P about North Americans not having been trained to take responsibility for their own actions and how Eastern (sorry, Central!) Europe had been kinda nice in that dumb people were forced to deal with their own dumb actions, though granted taking responsibility often meant coming up with the cash to bribe officials into forgetting about your actions.

Pickle and I used to talk about this a lot, with the specific example always being my friend Binman's going away party. Honza got the public waste people to get us a garbage (or bin) truck so that Binman could go pick up some garbage. Now after we did this, we managed to get the garbage (or bin) men to drive along the highway to the restaurant we were going to (where Binman stuck his cock in the mouth of a roasted pig, but that's another story). Binman wanted to ride on the truck hanging off the back of it, which we often see garbage men doing as they drive down the side streets picking up trash, but as it was on the highway with no speed limit, the truck was going considerably faster. But the guys let Binman do it.

That would never happen here because the workers would be too paranoid that Binman would fall off and sue them. In the Czech Republic, if Binman had gone into a court and said "I wanted to hang on to the back of a truck doing 100 klicks and these two guys let me do it so they should be punished," he would have been laughed out of court. It was his own damn decision and if he's so dumb that he doesn't understand the consequences of this action then so be it, it's not the workers fault. There aren't as many laws telling you what you have to do because you're expected to be smart enough to do the right thing without the law there.

Anyhoo, my impression of Europe (especially the rockin' Netherlands) being this wonderful place where people are forced to take responsibility for themselves has now been shattered by the new legislation being considered in the UK. The UK has been considering legislation to control the consumption of junk food and alcohol, as well as putting in ID cards (yes, the same as the US, it's supposedly in order to fight against terrorism) but now they're going a bit too far: legislation against the wearing of hoodies is now being considered. Apparently there was some incident in a mall with some hooded hoodlums and so now they're being considered "identity hiders." It seems many people in the UK think this is ridiculous, and I'm quite glad, but the fact that this is even on the table is disappointing.

Besides which, I'm a wee bit concerned as I head to Scotland in September and everybody knows my entire wardrobe consists of hoodies and jeans so what the fuck am I going to wear over there?

Hmm...actually the idea of not having clothes and being around a bunch of scotsmen in kilts...perhaps not so bad.

I know all the "real" Star Wars people have already posted their reviews, but here I go, late as usual. I promised myself I was not going to see the new Star Wars as I had been so deeply offended by the previous two episodes (Gotta love the Buffy where Andrew says "I'm bored. Episode 1 bored"). However I kept hearing how this last installment was much better so I decided to break my promise to myself (which was obviously broken along with the "I will spend less time watching Buffy" promise). So here's my take on what was hopefully last movie that Lucas will ever direct.

Star Wars: Episode III

- I could, in all honesty and without my usual tendency towards hyperbole, crap better dialogue.

- The special effects were nifty - fun to watch.

- I was not quite as offended by the characterization of Yoda as I was during the other two movies.

- It does wrap up the series nicely and fills the info gaps we had about the first trilogy.

- The main problem with the movies that I identified from the beginning was still there: Lucas had the opportunity to make a great tragedy, a tragedy of Shakespearean and Greek proportions: the fall of a hero. It would have rendered these episodes as classic and as essential as the previous trilogy of the epic battle between good and evil. Lucas had the opportunity to yet again use a genre film to explore huge and mythic issues. However, in order for a tragedy to actually be a tragedy, you have to care what happens to the hero, you have to feel for him, you have to be upset by his fall into darkness. Because of the way this movie was written and directed, no one gives a shit about Anakin - you care a small amount about what his fall does to his wife (but not much because the dialogue between the two is always just laughable) and somewhat more about what it does to Yoda and Obi Wan, but no one gives a shit about Anakin, he's a totally unsympathetic character. The whole baby scene, it was dark, but people were upset by it because the thought of the action itself was disturbing and not so much by the fact that it was beloved Anakin doing it.

Should you pay theatre money to see it? I guess so, as it's still (like the other two) pretty much just a special effects movie and has no real depth to it, so the big screen is the only way you'll be able to see past the worst dialogue in the world and the poorly directed acting. And despite my ranting - which occurs because I cared so much about what he did with this - it's actually a fun movie to see, unlike the other two, so in that sense it is an improvement.

Yes, I know it's insane, two posts in one day!

But you see, when one's seasonal depression has been suddenly lifted by good news, one gets a little excited and needs to share! Over the last few years I've discovered that spring kicks my ass, which is odd as it is when the birdies come out the play and nature comes back into bloom, but nonetheless March and April, and usually some of May tend to find me cranky and sleepy and listless, which bugs me more this year given that I spent much of the fall (my productive season) moping around because of dumb boy. But May will no longer find me amongst the downtrodden! Thank you Highness.

May is National Masturbation Month!

How will you celebrate? Plenty of online events are designed to raise funds, among other things. Commentary by Regina Lynn.

Just do It

I'm back up to 10 hours of belly dancing classes a week and I'm performing twice a month at different events around the city and I'm extremely pleased by these developements. I'm not sure if it's what I really, really want yet,(see Kanga's blog)but it's certainly something that makes me happy.

However, belly dancing fitness is not quite the same as cycling fitness. I now have a two classes back to back on Thursday nights which take place in two different studios. I bike from one place to the other and so does another funky belly girl. She wanted to go there together, which prompted me to try and explain to her why this might be a problem: there is a difference between biking and cycling. I bike and she cycles.

I bike everywhere in the city, not because I love the biking necessarily but because I'm too broke to afford a bus pass every month. I equate biking with walking. I go at a reasonably quick pace, down side streets, stopping now and then to smell a flower, laugh at a cute kitten, jump in a puddle or two.

I equate cycling with jogging. 'Nuff said.

So we set off and, of course, her regular pace is driving me into cardiac arrest. The bike ride is only about 15 minutes long, however by the time we got to the other studio I was wee bit winded. In other words, my face was purple, I was wheezing, and I had to spend a few minutes in the washroom splashing water on my face and wiping the huge amounts of sweat off my back and chest.

It will most definitely help when I get my bike tuned up as it won't shift gears at all right now - but I sense it's still going to be a long couple of months of Tania the Purple Faced Girl. What was that my father always used to say? Right, it builds character.

Here are two quotes about sex with academics from novels that make me think twice about pursuing my phd.

"He was still wrestling with this quaint moral dilemma several hours later in her apartment, when Lilith announced that she wanted to investigate with him the interpenetration of power, sexuality, and the pleasures of the text. In practice this meant taking turns tying each other to her futon with an Ace bandage and declaiming "transgressive things" to each other like porn stars."

-The Lecturer's Tale

"There was sex, of course, but although both of them were extremely interested in sex, and enjoyed nothing better than discussing it, neither of them, if the truth be told, was quite so interested in having it very frequently. ...Sexual desire was a play of signifiers, an infinite deferment and displacement of anticipated pleasure which brute coupling of the signifieds temporarily interrupted. Charles...seemed to approach sex as a form of research, favouring techniques of foreplay so subtle and prolonged that Robyn occasionally dozed off in the middle of them, and wourld wake with a guilty start to find him still crouched studiously over her body, fingering it like a box of index cards."

- Nice Work

Come on people, does this really sound like the type of world I should be involved in?