50 Ways I'd Spend My Summer Vacation....

I woke up this afternoon at 3:30pm, the distant and persistent sound ringing in my ears of someone mowing their lawn a few houses down the street. I step into the bathroom and am immediately encased in its icy cool refrigerator stasis, air conditioning pumping more each moment. This is the first idyllic Summer day of 2013, at least atmospherically (technically it's not Summer yet...) And while Summer is far from the most tragic teenage missed connection which occasionally haunts my possible pasts, it'd certainly be one of the easiest to make use of.

See, the thing is, I was depressed for most of my life. No lust for life means no taste for trying things, no interests to tap, and no pleasure even when I tried. Luckily those days are long, long gone, but I ran out of summers long before I learned how to have fun. I can't help imagining all the great things I could have done with a solid season of free time, if just one.

I know how to have fun, now. My real life summers were more about trying to keep my head from falling off, than necessarily having fun. I languished in confusion. I made plans but never had the drive to follow through with them. But today I'm the opposite. I make plans habitually, plan out practically every weekend with special events and unique chances. Now that it's about the destination rather than the mere idea of it, I do exactly the kind of things that would have made a summer really successful and fun. So if I could have one more summer vacation, one more mammoth block of free time, hot sun, and endless possibility, what would I do?

Here are 50 of the things I'd do. In no particular order. Chronologically let's assume I'm still 25 year old me, I just happen to have a few months of guilt-free leisure time for no good reason.

1. Follow Neil Young & Crazy Horse on tour, just for a few shows.
2. Finally learn my way around this neighborhood, completely.
3. Become a regular at the local gay bars.
4. Become a regular at the local library.
5. Read every Julie Anne Peters novel.
6. Buy a region free DVD player, plus Noroi: The Curse and the Sugar Rush TV series.
7. Host an Atmosfear party with my high school friends.
8. Learn how to play the A Song of Ice and Fire themed board game and card game.
9. Write a properly sourced, academic paper about lesbian subtext in iCarly and/or Victorious.
10. Marathon Neon Genesis Evangelion.
11. Reconnect with the people I've lost touch with, from school, from work, from everywhere.
12. Make an effort to meet the people in this area who like good music, TV, movies, and books. Never met 'em but I know they must be out there somewhere.
13. Get completely drunk and regret it immediately.
14. Get a part-time job at a coffee shop.
15. In order to triumph over my general anxiety in this area, force myself to ask out 50 people before the end of summer.
16. Take a walk to somewhere that'll take me all day to walk there.
17. Stay up for a week straight, against all sound judgement.
18. Go see a concert by an artist I don't like, and see if my opinion changes any.
19. Try to find a drama or acting  class to take.
20. At least seriously consider attempting to film a found footage horror movie.
21. Write several strongly worded letters to the School Board encouraging them to put Annie On My Mind in the cirriculum.
22. Greyhound to NYC for a concert.
23. Take photos of the streets at night, it's always so atmospheric and beautfiul with the deserted landscape and the glimmering array of streetlights.
24. Start a podcast.
25. Submit amateur movie reviews to... oh, I don't know, wherever you submit amateur movie reviews to. Probably a lesbian lifestyle magazine.
26. Write a short story and submit it to aforementioned hypothetical lesbian lifestyle magazine.
27. Have an all-night horror marathon once a week, find some people who would be into this (already have a couple in mind)
28. Try to strike up a friendship with someone I meet while walking.
29. Try to strike up a friendship with a customer at work (in this case, at the coffee shop).
30. Try to strike up a friendship with someone at least 30 years older than me, and someone 8 to 10 years younger than me. Apply for Big Brothers/Big Sisters?
31. Watch every single movie in the "Gay & Lesbian Movies" category on Netflix.
32. Start playing guitar again, and learn songs by Ani Difranco and Taylor Swift.
33. Beat Prince of Persia on the Super Nintendo (so hard!)
34. Attend a Libertarian event, it's my political party after all (in name, anyway).
35. Babysit for friend(s) who have kids so that I'll have experience when I eventually have kids.
36. Regularly lift weights (like I used to).
37. Visit the Museum of Natural History, haven't been there since I was a kid.
38. Watch the old Disney Channel shows, see if they stand up to time.
39. See a movie at the theater dressed in an octopus costume. Just to mess with people.
40. Meet one of my favorite authors in person
41. Get a cellphone.
42. Invent a slang word.
43. Go back to ENP and work off the clock for as long as possible until someone kicks me out. 
44. Finish Switched at Birth, Life Unexpected, The Vampire Diaries, and Season 4 of The West Wing. 
45. Start Anyone But Me, Make it or Break it, Enlightened, Lip Service, H20 Just Add Water, Dance Academy, and Teen Wolf.
46. Watch Game of Thrones with someone who hasn't read the books. 
47. Sit out on a candle-lit porch all night just talking and discussing things.
48. Discover a good TV show through pure channel surfing.
49. Toss a Fox Tail around a park somewhere.
50. Admit something really embarassing to someone I think is uber cool.

You may ask.... hey doofus, how come you can't do all these things anyway? What kind of warped little stunted mind would only be capable of doing general leisure activities under the comforting cover of a summer vacation? Well, you could be right. I could be hiding behind a myth in order to alleviate the pressure of having to accomplish such a myriad of things.

But I don't think so. This isn't a bucket list, these aren't things I feel a need to accomplish before I die. These are just ways in which I would have made summer fun. Summer was always so existential for me because I never knew what to do with myself. These are agreeable, exciting activities that would have made for a perfect Summer. The point isn't that these are all things I desperately want to do, the point is how much better equipped to deal with free time I am today than I was back then.  While I still have my job to occupy most of time, it's simply not an issue. But still, maybe there are a few I ought to incorporate to my daily life. ;)

Ani Difranco

Time to tell you a little bit about my latest interest in music...

I've been familiar with Ani since I was a teenager but I never delved all that deeply into her catalogue because, to be perfectly honest, I was afraid of being perceived as a poseur. It was great music but it was tapped into some seriously haunted stuff, I felt like I had no right to empathize with what Ani had apparently been going through. Sure, I had struggled with intense suicidal depression since about the age of 7, but that's grunge pain, Nirvana pain, melancholy, imbalanced chemicals. Ani Difranco's music is like, god... abuse, persecution, what it feels like to be a pariah, the experience of living on your own.

To put it bluntly, I have trouble imagining that Kurt Cobain was ever actually 27 years old. Everything about him makes him seem like a teenager. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Ani feels like she was born 35, her music reeks of experience and the complex maturities inherent to dealing with the adult world. As a naive teenager I felt like listening to Ani might expose me for the mental infant I was, wholly unaware of what the real world was or how to form coherent, consequential responses to it.

Those days now long since obscured by the years, I've been lucky enough to grow up. I'm not that infant anymore, and now I can resonate sincerely and unashamedly with Ani's music. And while it's surely no surprise, I'm pleased to find her legendary status is most assuredly deserved.

Since we've already hit on the conceptual side, we can start into Ani's music from a musical standpoint. First, I want to say, I love acoustic music. But I'm not always fond of stereotypical acoustic music, that lite-rock, crooning stuff. Having a few ballads is bloody fantastic, but I would never listen extensively to an artist like James Taylor, where it's pretty much all ballads. It's just overkill, you need a balance for those things.

Ani's music is almost all acoustic, but it's not at all in the lite-rock crooning category. You can see in her the very best part of Neil Young's acoustic side. Not the "Heart of Gold," Harvest Moon, Comes a Time, Prairie Wind side, no. It's the "Will to Love," "Ambulance Blues," "Broken Arrow," "Last Trip To Tulsa" side, unhinged and biting, personal to an almost embarrassing extent. This is the incredibly unique wavelength Ani surfs on.

Ballads account for less than half of Ani's output, and even when she does ballads, they're not gooey romance tales, they're brooding 8 minute ruminations, psychotic and poignant. Hell, even her hit single, "32 Flavors," is lyrically abstract and 6 minutes long.

And then we get to the other side of the coin, the bulk of what she does, these acoustic songs that don't really fit any mold. First of all, she's a fucking amazing guitarist. The things she plays sound complex as living Hell, like that "Knock on Wood" song by Justin King. All kinds of harmonics flying everywhere and sliding hands and it just sounds like she's a virtuoso without even trying.

And then there's the incredible soulfulness of the grooves. Technical guitar playing tends to lack soul and groove, but Ani has mastered that as well. She controls her melodies almost like a talented metal band does, pulling down the tempo and fleshing out the nuances until it becomes a new melody. Some of her breakdowns would make Pantera jealous.

Basically Ani Difranco is unprecedentedly amazing. It's hard to imagine someone like her could exist all in one, with the acute emotional depth, the virtuosic playing, and even the good sense to control her own career two decades before that mode would become fashionable in the internet age.

Hannah Free

As a general rule I stay away from 'advanced age' romances. I can remember what it was like to be a teenager, and naturally I know what it's like to be an early adult, but I can scarcely imagine what it must be like to be old. Not yet. And besides, what's more powerful than first love? What's more exciting than that tumultuous period of first discovery, right?

I discovered how wrong I was when I watched If These Walls Could Talk 2, HBO's lesbian romance TV anthology film. The first segment was about two older ladies who had spent nearly their entire lives together. It had me wanting to rip my heart out of my chest from the very first moment, first from joy, and then from utter despair when one partner dies and the other is left, without the protections inherent to marriage, to deal with the callous, uncaring in-laws who barely knew the deceased and could not care less about whatever bond the two may have shared.

It was breathtakingly ingenious  one of the greatest and most heartbreaking things I've ever seen. So I immediately scrambled to find more advanced age romance movies and Hannah Free immediately popped up.

Hannah Free is billed as 'the lesbian Brokeback Mountain.' "An empty boast," I immediately told myself. Brokeback Mountain is a staggering achievement in film history, a flawless masterwork of sweeping bittersweet romance. Yet... to my unimaginable delight, Hannah Free may well be as good as Brokeback Mountain after all.

This film tells the story of a woman with the unlikely name of Hannah Free, whose wanderlust is as boundless as her last name entails. But the seasons in the sun are long gone, and now she fritters away in an old folks' home, confined to a hospital bed by injury. By her side always, is the one she loves... not physically, but incorporeal as a hallucination or ghost. It's dually heartwarming and heartbreaking to see her railing at a spirit who may not be there. The bond they share is so viscerally strong.

Hannah Free lacks the epic cinematography, the conceptual grandeur, the succinct directorial flourishes that allow Brokeback Mountain to blow minds and win awards. But the story it tells is every bit as good, if not better. The people and circumstances and dialogue it portrays are every bit as real, every bit as illuminatingly genuine. And this movie had me bawling as much as any movie I've ever seen.

That's certainly not to disparage Brokeback, one of my all-time favorite films. Brokeback Mountain plays with gender mores to lusciously paint an essential and enlightening point about the nature of love. Hannah Free never pushes the envelope, never strikes a chord intended to ring out in the annals of time. But the points it makes are subversive in their own way, and essential as well. It tells us that the Well of Loneliness is not the only end for one who "dares" to love one who is of their same gender. It tells that miracle love knows no gender bounds, and it tells us that love can transverse decades. The portrait it paints of elderly life is as shockingly unglamorous as Brokeback Mountain's tragic arc is shockingly glamorous (in cinematographic terms), and both visions have truth to them.

Admittedly. the soundtrack is generic. Like, I think they borrowed it from The Weather Channel. But in a way I don't mind, because the stark simplicity of the soundtrack sort of forces you to focus on the story. Lacking the powerful force of contemporary music makes the story seem a little more sincere. Despite the incredible melancholy of some of the content, it never feels contrived or maudlin because they're not using the typical tricks employed by the Oscar crowd.

What Hannah Free is, is pure unadulterated romance. It's the Annie On My Mind of films. Even though this and Annie have nothing remotely in common story-wise, they both hit the mark of perfect love. If you're looking for something accusatory, biting, tumultuous, this may not be the film for you. But if you're one who believes real love still exists, one who believes love is as pure and wide and unbreakable as a mountain, Hannah Free will resonate as deeply with you as it has with me.

The unlikely film called Jack & Diane.

Spoiler Notification: This review describes the film in very broad strokes and doesn't betray any specific plot details or conclusions. But in some senses it could be considered to spoil the overall content of the film (e.g. by detailing what percentage of the film is dedicated to one concept, and which percentage to the other). I wouldn't consider it spoilers, but depending on how "fresh" you intend to come into your movie viewing, your perspective my differ. The film is available for free on Netflix and Amazon Prime so you may as well watch it first if you are inclined.


When I heard this movie existed, I immediately had to watch it; although the inconsistent tone was obvious even just from the synopsis blurb. A lesbian romance werewolf film? Where are they going with this?

The cheesy intro scene paints Jack & Diane as a dimestore werewolf b-movie. But 90% of the film seems to ignore the werewolf subplot entirely, and what we have is just a tender and tumultuous romance story about two teenage lesbians not unlike ones you've seen before.

As a romance film it is exceptional, with shades of all the greats like Fucking Amal and My Summer of Love, though it doesn't reach those heights. It's a little on the impressionistic side, which I don't favor, but the romance and storyline are real enough to sustain it. There were moments of genuine poignancy. The characters weren't quite as fleshed out as they could have been, but the important aspects shine through and by the end I found myself believing in both these people, and feeling for their struggle. At its best there were definite tidbits in which the uncomfortable, emphatic, mind-boggling experience of young love is fully invoked, coaxed from the ether.

As a horror film, on the other hand, well if that's all you're watching it for you'll be disappointed, but it's competent enough at sewing horror when it tries to be. Jack & Diane may not have 1/10th the balance of rich horror/romance tones cultivated by critical favorite Let the Right One In, but I found the 'scary' moments in J&D a dozen times more effective than any in LTRO. The imbalance actually serves to make the little shards of horror all the more unexpected and jarring.

And then there's by far the most horrific scene in the film, which has nothing to do with werewolves. This movie takes one peculiar, unforeseeable foray into cinema verite rape, defying all convention and (possibly) good story telling. Admittedly the scene does have genuine plot repercussions, even though it involves neither of our main characters. However, the sheer length of it was definitely unnecessary, and there are dozens of other viable ways the necessary plot function could have been reasonably achieved, so I do find myself questioning the wisdom of creating this scene. Mind you this isn't some graphic I Spit On Your Grave type segment, but the "found footage" Point-of-View makes it rather harrowing all the same. Maybe the film's creators wanted to remind the audience that this is, in fact, a horror movie, even if only 10% of the time.

The rape scene threw me off completely and I did have trouble getting back into the film afterward... but eventually I managed to come back into it with about 89% of the enthusiasm I had before that point. I was especially won over by the hilariously awkward privates-shaving scene, the perfect kind of coming of age fodder to show the unnerving newness of being young and in love.

All in all I found Jack & Diane genuinely shocking and when it took its turns to horror, I sincerely couldn't guess what the outcome would be. Is one of them going to end up dead? Both of them? Is it imaginary/symbolic or real? I'm sure the point of the werewolf was some thinly veiled Ginger Snapsian subtext, but I've yet to quite work out the theme as yet. No doubt repeated viewings will illuminate the mystery.

Overall I was very satisfied with Jack & Diane. Given the uncanny mix of content matter, it could have been an all-time favorite film for me -- with some heavy editing. But as is, it's still one of my favorite romance dramas (number 5 or 6 at the moment) and I can't fault a great film for being (merely) great. The soundtrack was also good. Very hip as well as varied.

I've long felt that horror and romance are destined to combine into some amazing, all-time favorite film for me. I thought that film would be Let the Right One In, until I actually watched Let the Right One In. Jack & Diane isn't quite there either, but we're getting closer. Funny that I've never really cared for werewolves and still don't, but between this and the impeccable Ginger Snaps 2, werewolves are starting to takeover my list of favorite films.

Fun With Aliens

Unsealed has opened me up to all kinds of great documentary content that I had overlooked or forgotten about. Right now I'm watching an episode of Discovery Channel's Curiosity, in which scientists and military strategists try to envision what would really happen if aliens attacked Planet Earth.

Just for fun I was imagining what it'd be like if one morning I wake up as usual, a normal average day. Then I go down stairs, and someone's watching the news, as they often are. And on the news there's a man standing next to a podium, and at the podium itself, there's a grey alien, in flesh and blood. How would I feel, what would I do?

My first thought might be that it's fake. Even the CNN or Fox News banner wouldn't necessarily rule out some sort of spoof, gimmick, or movie clip. After all, in the last 15 years we've seen paranormal-themed cinema verite, found footage and faux-documentaries not just in the movie theater but on learning channels like Animal Planet and The Discovery Channel. Taking the deceit to the 24-hour news networks wouldn't be much of a leap, if they haven't done it already.

So in all seriousness I might at this point be thinking "fucking awesome, the effects on this are GREAT. It looks so real!" But out of due diligence I'm obligated to check other news stations, competing news stations, cable stations, network stations, ABC, CBS, to see if they have the same story.

When I find out that this is broadcast across the board, each network with their own *unique* footage, it becomes clear that this is real. When it becomes clear that this is real, I start screaming uncontrolalbly. Screaming bloody terror and clawing my eyes out. Not screaming for the unbearable implications that an intelligent race that can transverse galaxies will almost certainly eliminate or enslave us as advanced civilizations have always done to simple savages like us, nor screaming for the terrifying fact that if real flesh and blood aliens look just like greys... all those brutal tales of alien abduction are most likely true as well. No, I'd just be screaming because greys are fucking CREEPY.

I've long hoped that during my lifetime we would discover alien life, and make contact with extraterrestrial beings. I don't believe that they've been here, I don't believe in government cover-ups or hidden encounters. But even in the utmost mainstream of science, it's becoming clearer and clearer that life is most likely not a unique occurence. Rare perhaps, or perhaps not. The leading theory is that Mars itself has liquid water and primitive life. If life can strike twice in our mere solar system, most scientists agree that in the grand scheme of the universe, the likelihood of life beyond our own is near-insurmountable.

Intelligence is perhaps a different scenario. We're yet to be clear on quite what has made human beings develop intelligence to begin with. Some scientists speculate that intelligence may not be an evolutionary advantage in the wide scope, compared to a bacteria or fungus which retains no risk of self-inflicted extinction. So could it be that we're the only life? It could. But with the probability that life itself is so prevalent  the likelihood of intelligent life somewhere in the vast universe seems like a good bet, to me.

The fun thing about extraterrestrial life is that, it requires no step-ladder for aliens to reach us. We don't have to go to Mars, go past our solar system, terraform other planets in order for intelligent beings to find *us*. It would make it more likely, no doubt, the more presence we have in the universe. But there's nothing stopping intelligent beings from another world from landing on your doorstep five minutes from now.

Yes, an alien race would almost certainly spell our doom. Thus far the progress of civilization has made us less overtly barbaric but no less cruel or destructive in truth, and it has made us even more brutal to lesser beings. Look at how KFC treats their chickens, this is likely the same regard a galaxy-traversing alien species would have for us.

So yes, it's a disturbing notion. But I care little for that... I just want to see an alien being. I want that worldwide fervor when humanity finally knows something beyond our scope exists. Hopefully the actual invasion force would be millenia from reaching us. It's not implausible that a rogue ship, thrown far off course, could end up on our planet without the technology necessary to get home or communicate with his brethren. Something like Roswell or District 9. That way we get to meet an extraterrestrial being, but with no threat in the near future of being enslaved or destroyed.

Ooh and Falling Skies is free on Amazon Prime. Perfect segway from this doc.

Bunheads: Will It Survive?

This week ABC Family's quaint dramedy Bunheads aired what may well be its series finale, if the show doesn't get renewed for a second season. In case you don't know, Bunheads is the latest brainchild of Amy Sherman Palladino, the spiritual sequel to her breakout hit Gilmore Girls.
Borrowing the small town setting, cutesy mannerisms, fast-paced pop culture dialogue, and several of the actors from Palladino's prior show, the parallels to Gilmore Girls are overwhelmingly inescapable. And yet, Bunheads manages to carve out its own slab of granite.

Before we go further, I have to admit I'm furious at the show for not being gay. There are so many unambiguous hints for each of the girls that they could be gay, for them not to address this by the finale is a downright tragedy. Don't they realize this may well have been their last chance?

If they were planning on making us wait 5 seasons for Melanie and Ginny to date, like they made us wait for Luke and Lorelai, it was quite a miscalculation on their part. Having a couple of gay characters could have been just the injection of relevant vitality needed to lift Bunheads up from its nostalgia-wrought cradle and into this decade. Teenagers, many of whom were probably too young to even care much for Gilmore Girls when it was on, aren't going to tune in for something that feels like it should have aired ten years ago.

And yet, as much as I want to yell and scream and condemn the show for its hubris, I just can't. Because it's such a goddamn good show! I eat up every minute of it, it's fabulous. It's unflinchingly idiosyncratic, with a loose appreciation for plot and absolutely gorgeous dance numbers.

Most surprising it actually presents what seems like a calm, calculated improvement on the Gilmore Girls gameplan: replacing the 'vanilla' predictability of Rory & Lorelai with a much more varied and volatile ensemble. 18 episodes can't wash away 7 glorious seasons of GG, but if Bunheads were to continue and maintain quality, it will easily outshine Gilmore Girls in a couple of years.

Given more seasons, this program could very easily rise up among my all-time favorite TV shows. I'll always resent it if they don't explore the overwhelming homosexual potential in these characters, but even so, I can't argue with results... and Bunheads is just so fantastically entertaining. Amazing characters, hilarious storylines, and a light, airy mood that resonates with easy warmth. It has a bit of magic that is impossible to describe, but easy to experience.

Unfortunately, Bunheads hasn't been doing great in the ratings. If the gods are good, it'll run for another five years. But I hope the Bunheads crew has made their peace, because the gods are rarely good.

VHS Reborn

When I was, oh, ten or eleven years old, DVD first begun gaining prominence. But it was a long way off from total domination, and I still remember how wary I was of the new technology. Sure enough, I eventually became endeared to the format, and for the following 13 years I scarcely touched a VHS tape.

That all changed tonight. I picked up a 3 pack of blank VHs at the corner store (yes, they still have them there. Probably 'cause I live in an old people neighborhood). And I'm in the middle of 2 & 1/2 hours of VHS recording right now.

Two things inspired me to get back in the VHS game, each on opposite ends of the TV specturm: one on the lowest level of local public access, and the other on a unique high-end cable channel (which we just happen to randomly get, conveniently enough).

The first is Unsealed: Alien Files, a show that airs, flanked by infomercials, on the local network that took over years ago when the WB ceased to exist (The CW occupying UPN's slot at #22). It's not just the best and creepeist alien show currently airing, it's the only top-notch paranormal doc show that's been on in half a decade or more. It's beyond obvious a show like this will never be out on DVD or iTunes. And since I missed my chance so many years ago to capture the previous paranormal classics like Beyond Bizarre and Real Scary Stories, for future Halloween viewings I need to have Unsealed in my video repetoire.

The other is Palladia, a video music channel better than MTV or VH1 ever has been, even when they were great in the 1990s. A Viacom network (like VH1 and MTV), it reairs great music content from its sister stations like MTV Unplugged and VH1 Storytellers (often full versions *not* shown on their original networks!), but it also airs literally dozens of concerts you can't legally acquire anywhere else. It plays all the biggest festivals (Bonnaroo, Isle of Wight, Download, etc. etc.) and an almost ironically ideal mix of my two favorite genres, pretty much everything the channel plays is either classic rock or modern pop!

It's a fucking amazing station and I couldn't let it sit idly by any longer. After catching a badass Tom Petty set at some festival or another, and discovering that it isn't and will never, ever be released on DVD, I knew I had to get some tapes and record some of this amazing material. Sure enough, right after Unsealed tonight (conveniently not playing at the same time), Palladia is airing highlights from a festival from 2009 featuring... Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, and TAYLOR SWIFT. What a stroke of luck that I even have this channel.

Long story short, I'll probably have to go out and buy more VHS tapes in a couple of days. Three isn't going to last very long. And if I was so inclined, I could even record the movies from On Demand. The current stock includes such excellent films as Liam Neeson's 1998 non-musical Les Miserables, Mammoth featuring Michelle Williams and written/directed by Lukas Moodysson of Fucking Amal, and the much acclaimed horror-romance Let Me In featuring Chloe Moretz.