Friday, May 06, 2005

Poem for Friday

Dream Variations
By Langston Hughes


To fling my arms wide
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done.
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark like me --
That is my dream!

To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! Whirl! Whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening...
A tall, slim tree...
Night coming tenderly
Black like me.

--------

I regret that this post will contain limited squee compared to the previous few days, as I had more chores and carpools and things of that nature to deal with today, not to mention dinner out with my parents when we were all already exhausted, the kids were so fried they were hyper, and I got interrogated about Mother's Day when I am not even making the plans in this household as my mother-in-law will be here so my husband has been put in charge of all arrangements (my father will be in New York at a Yankees game with my sister's husband's family). I did have a relatively enjoyable morning and afternoon though it involved organizing and cleaning things...I was dubbing Boiling Point from one videotape to another because the original also had A Walk on the Moon on it, which I have since gotten on DVD, so while it was transferring I had the film on in the living room and half-watched and enjoyed it rather more than the first time, less for Viggo Mortensen than Seymour Cassel and Lolita Davidovich I'm afraid.

In the afternoon older son came home early, as he has to get up VERY early for the state chorus championships in Annapolis and needed homework and runaround time today, so he helped younger son with his complicated lattice multiplication problems that I couldn't figure out while I wrote TrekToday articles, then we all went to younger son's violin lesson so we could go straight from there to meet my parents. Younger son has grown from a 1/4 size violin to a 1/2 size, and we realized that it was much cheaper to buy a $200 violin that he will probably play for three years than to rent one for nearly $30 a month, so today he received his very own violin. He is very pleased and so am I, since he seems committed to sticking with it -- considering that he started these lessons on a whim because of an interview with Russell Crowe about learning to play the instrument for Master and Commander, I feel like I should send Russell Crowe a gift. I know, I'll buy his album off iTunes next week, hee. *g*

Next door to where my son takes lessons is a hobby store where we stopped with older son, and they had Pirates of the Crimson Coast, the follow-up build-your-own-little-ships game to Pirates of the Spanish Main. I got a little French schooner and a very beautiful five-masted French ship with fleurs de lis on the sails, but youngest son was so jealous of this that I traded him for a pretty Spanish schooner, La Bahama, and his big British Spanish Main ship, the HMS Titan. I cannot believe what a geek I am about this game.

To mellow out I watched HBO's First Look documentary on Kingdom of Heaven, which I enjoyed enormously. Not only did I suffer from a very serious case of Death By Orlando Bloom -- ohh that boy is growing up nicely, and if he is faking being genuinely sweet and humble and hardworking, then I don't ever want to know and he can have an Oscar for it -- but I suffered an absolutely fatal case of Death By David Thewlis, whom I wasn't even sure I'd get to see in the documentary because he hasn't featured much in the previews and press. I think he got more interview time than anyone but Orlando (he managed to squee about Ridley Scott without sounding ridiculous) and he speaks so soulfully in the movie and looks sinfully good in those robes. And, I mean, his HANDS, which he waves around when he talks. *dies again* There wasn't a lot of Jeremy Irons, but I always suffer death anyway when I hear him talk -- as is often the case, he was the one assigned to talk about the film's social relevance -- and Liam Neeson was his usual charming dedicated self.

I am absurdly excited about this movie even though I expect it to be rather shallow, Western-centric and overly reminiscent of Gladiator considering that 2/3 of the clips resemble it and if HBO was playing KOH's music, it's got too much wailing female voice. Hey, it's also got Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Marton Csokas and Alexander Siddig in supporting roles. How can I possibly not enjoy myself? Not sure about Eva Green, who looks like the love child of Jennifer Connelly and Nicole Kidman, which could mean I'll love her or I'll hate her...guess I'll find out. In other film news, my good friend in London went to Forbidden Planet to see whether she could buy a fuzzy Marvin from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, because, as she put it, "a little knitted alan rickman robot -- don't we all want one? to take to bed?" However, "for only about the 40th time this week, said the kindly assistant...they haven't released the knitted marvins yet. the assistant sounded pretty marvinish himself, as if he'd had middle-aged ladies approaching him to demand the knitted plush edition all day every day." Hee! I wish they'd make one that vibrates talks in Alan Rickman's voice.

Once again we return from England for neighborhood entertainment, since we had courting doves on the deck and our neighbor had her rabbit out playing in her front yard...


This bunny's name is Daffodil. I'm not entirely sure why, except that she'd probably eat them, as she eats azaleas and juniper...then again she would probably eat almost anything. *g*


Sometimes she looks very cat-like in her expressions...


...but then she remembers that she is a rabbit and hops off to eat more bushes.


Then there are the doves, who have chosen our deck railing and our neighbors' to conduct their courtship.


I find this charming, but it causes Cinnamon to sit in the window chittering in a most perturbed manner.

1 comment:

GreenSidekick said...

cute bunny! love it!