this week's photo friday theme is angles. i'm not sure how i feel about my shots, but here they are nonetheless.

     

this weeks entries seem a bit stronger(or maybe just more interesting to me) than last weeks. i quite like this shot and this shot to name two.

suzanne has voiced something i've been thinking as well, mainly that the picks for notables on the photo friday page rarely match the ones i'd choose myself, and in some cases i'm surprised what gets overlooked. but then not every great photo or semi-great photo can go into the notables section for that theme. plus i'm sure some of the photos i love are not ones others would find appealing.

suzanne has suggested that it would be nice if we could vote on our favourites too. but maybe that would entail too much work for the photo friday people, after all what's going to stop someone from just voting for themselves a bunch of times? still it would be nice, but in the meantime i think i'll just continue to mention a few i like as i post my photo friday entries.

reading paul's blog today i discover katherine hepburn is dead. it's not that surprising, but sad all the same. none of the obituaries i've read mention my favourite(one of many) hepburn films though, stagedoor. it's on my list of films that i wish was available on dvd.

last night peter and i went up to yamingshan to see the night view. to be honest, the view of taipei isn't all that special. but while we were up there, we saw some fireflies. this made me more than happy as i've never seen a firefly before and was starting to think i never would. i'd heard that they no longer existed in the taipei area because of the pollution. but apparently a few still exist up on yamingshan. i've always wanted to see them in real life ever since reading sam and the firefly when i was little.

tonight after work, peter met me in kuanghua and i picked up a few dvds. i got almost famous and blue velvet. i had bought blue velvet before, but had to return it as the disc had some problems. once i got home i checked the scene that had the problem to make sure it was ok, and it seems to be. almost famous i've been wanting for awhile. they show it from time to time on tv here, and nearly everytime i get sucked into watching the whole thing. this is the two disc set. the first thing i did was watch the deleted scenes. i didn't sit through all of the sweetwater concert as i really don't like their music much on it's own. but i like the way it is used in the film(ie not too much).

there's a scene in the film where william's sister gives him a bunch of records and she leaves a note that listening to the who's tommy will set you free. they show him put it on and it does seem to open up worlds for him. and i can relate, as music did the same for me when i was a teen. and it makes me wonder, these kids that listen to britney spears or jennifer lopez - do they have such feelings for that manufactured pop music? does it open up worlds for them - or is it just something more to be consumed and tossed to the side as soon as the next fad hits?

my favourite scene in almost famous is when they are all on the tour bus singing along with elton john's tiny dancer. whenever i see this scene it makes me want to get some old elton john. the part of this scene i really like is where william says i have to go home. and penny lane says back at him you are home.

is it just my cynicism that makes me surprised to hear that the u.s. supreme court knocked down this anti-sodomy law? it's nice to hear some good news for a change. though it's interesting that the cnn article ends with people saying this will be the end of the family. isn't this what they have been saying for ages? anytime there is a change, it's the end of the family. women can't vote - it'll be the end of the family, women can't work - it'll be the end of the family, you can't have sex in that position - it'll be the end of the family. well, if any of those things cause the end of the family, then i'm all for the family ending.

riaa to start suing individual downloaders. i can't say i'm surprised, but i still don't see how suing your customers is going to save your business.

apparently, the people over at photoblogs.org think that taiwan is a province of china. this is horribly offensive to your average taiwanese. i'm not even taiwanese and i find it offensive. are they just ignorant or kow towing to china's whim just like the WHO? and more importantly why would they? they've got no stake in such things as far as i can tell.

to make things even more confusing the one blog listed as from taiwan uses the flag of taiwan(while saying "province of china"), yet chinese delegates have been known to fly into a tizzy upon that flag being displayed. often taiwan delegates to trade shows are pressured to remove their flags. a few years ago, at an international art event, the taiwan table was forbidden from even using the name taiwan. an artist from another country went around asking people for a letter from their country names so that the letters would spell out taiwan. he then put it on the taiwan table and said this is art you cannot remove it.

anyway, i dropped them a line about this. i mean if hk can just be called hk shouldn't taiwan just be taiwan without having province of china added to its name?

there are quite a few films i'd like to see come out on dvd. it seems that a lot of the more obscure films that have come out on videotape, haven't quite made it to dvd, and may never make it there. one of the films i'd really like to see make it to dvd is whatever happened to susan jane?. bascially the story of a suburban housewife that leaves her husbund and goes out to san francisco to look up an old classmate. once in san francisco she ends up hanging out with artists, drag queens and other scenesters. i'm pretty doubtful that it will ever make it to dvd, but there is a small article on the makers of this film here. and a review with a clip of the found footage they used in the film here.

this week photo friday's theme is critters.

i'm not exactly sure if this photo qualifies as a critter, but we'll pretend it does. when i first read about this week's theme, i wasn't that thrilled, as i'm not a big animal person and on intiial perusing through what people had posted i found quite a few just seemed like snapshots of people's pets. interesting if they are your pets, but maybe not that interesting for those of us that do not know the animals. having said that, there are some nice photos that have been posted. i'm especially fond of this one.

camp records. an underground record label that specialized in gay themed records. the odd thing is that rodney dangerfield appears on some of these records. it'd be great if someone interviewed rodney and asked him how he got involved in this project or anything he knows about the label since very little seems to be known. the site has most of the catalogue available to listen to. they also have a catalogue from the 60s that had an ad for camp records release in it, as well as nudie magazines, and books that seem to range from gay pulp novels to literature. fascinating. via 365 days.

i stayed up way too late last night reading this online comic cat and girl. how many comics mention joseph beuys repeatedly, and even feature a joseph beuys zombie? or talk about hipsters' merit badges? via yip yop.

this morning when i woke up i was in the mood for record shopping. i don't mean cd shopping but in the mood to go somewhere and thumb through used vinyl and see what treasures present themselves. it's not something i've done in a long time, as i really don't have the option to, and usually when i go to a cd shop here i have something in mind i want to buy. i'm sure this feeling can mainly be attributed to the fact that george and i have been discussing the joys of vinyl in recent emails. well, tonight after work i met up with a friend of mine to give him the cds i'd ordered for him, and after doing that we decided to hit this used shop that neither of us had been too since they'd moved over a year ago. i ended up being bad and getting the following:

• rita reys sings burt bacharach


• mark hollis by mark hollis


• pressure points by anne clark


• hopeless cases by anne clark


• best of sammy davis jr. and the mike curb congregation

so i guess i sort of satisfied that record shopping desire this morning by hitting this cd shop. i have no idea who rita rey is, i bought it merely because she's doing burt bacharach songs. i hope i'm not too disappointed. the mark hollis cd i've been wanting for a long time, but whenever i went to buy it something else would demand to be bought instead. well, by waiting so long at least i got the cheap price. anne clark is an old favourite from the 80s and she even has ties to french and saunders if you go back far enough. i don't have any sammy davis jr. so i figured this would be a good place to start. looks like it has some classics like candy man, singing in the rain, and movin' on up. hmm, movin' on up?! i wonder if that is the theme to the jeffersons?

a virtual tour of the simpsons house. it's the beta version, but still pretty cool to wander around their house, though a bit odd to be wandering around with none of the family home. via j-walk.

need a manican? the manicans of children are frightening, the men are just ugly, and the women don't fare much better, but at least they have wacky hair so they don't seem quite as ugly. reminds me of this scary manican sporting bad 80s hair and fashion that has been popping up in cd shops here to advertise some japanese pop group. via geisha asobi.

my friend paul has brought this scary article to my attention about a politician that wants to develop a way to destroy the computers of people who download music illegally. hmm, how well are they going to be able to tell if something is legal or not and what happens when they destroy someone's computer who is downloading mp3s legally? at least for now this seems like a pipe dream, but if it was to happen, it'd make me want to download music even more.

well, i managed to get my butt in gear and here is my entry for the photo friday theme multiples.

the top one reflects what this building looked like in real life. the bottom one is what happens when you run it through auto colour in photoshop. which do you prefer?

i've finally started work on a photoblog. it's still in the preliminary stage, as the permalinks aren't working and i may have to start over from scratch to see if i can get them to work. but for now you can take a quick peak here if you so desire.

today, my latest order from strange fortune arrived. whenever i want things like current 93, coil, or nurse with wound i usually order from strange fortune as the prices are good and more importantly the postage is reasonable. for taiwan it's 7 bucks for the first item, and a buck for everything after that. what i got this time are as follows:

• all the king's horses - legendary pink dots
  
• coil presents black light district a thousand lights in a darkened room
  
• man with the woman face - nurse with wound
  
• textures of illumina - edward kaspel

i also picked up two split cds. one is a cd edition of a single with antony and the johnsons and current 93, and the other is a live ep thing once again with current 93 and antony and the johnsons. i'd heard about antony and the johnsons for awhile, and even downloaded some samples which didn't do much for me. but then one day i got curious again, and now i don't know why i was so unimpressed the first time. i want their full length, and i know one shop here had it but they moved location and i haven't been to the new place yet. strange fortune didn't have it or i would of ordered it with this stuff.

i have two things on backorder. the new current 93 release, and brown book by death in june. i've been wanting to hear that again.

photo friday:

Each week Photo Friday posts a photo assignment. Your mission is the creative interpretation of the week's theme. When you're done, post the picture you took to your website and submit your link to Photo Friday.

Photo Friday is about challenging our participants to be original and creative within the constraints of the week's theme. It's not a competition. Anyone with a camera and a place on the internet to post pictures can participate.

i really like this idea, and if i can get my butt in gear i'll be participating.

lob-a-job. use a sling shot to fling your prospective clients into an office building to get them a job. via geisha asobi.

taiwan recently passed a new copyright law, bowing to international pressure to strengthen it's prosecution of violators. a few years ago, some students were arrested for downloading mp3s. well, now it seems ammendments to this new law make it only illegal to download or copy things if you make a profit or sell them, but for personal use is ok. this is surpisingly good news. the ifpi is not happy though. will this speed up the demise of the major labels? some are boycotting any artist that belongs to the riaa, i haven't gone that far but at this point i'm refusing to buy any cd that has copy protection incorporated into it. i'm seeing them pop up more and more here though.

gregory peck has passed away. this makes me wonder, of the old classic hollywood stars who is left? it seems that most of them are gone now. are there any stars today that could be described as having a quiet dignity? or people we could describe that way? are such ideas just a thing of the past?

tv cream, a site devoted to uk tv shows and other bits of pop culture. they've got a nice selection of tv theme mp3s to download as well. i finally was able to hear what the original theme song for magpie sounds like compared to the death by chocolate cover. i think i like the death by chocolate cover a bit more though.

a gas station not far from my house. i'm quite fond of the little guy standing on top of the gas station. when you fill up your tank here, they'll give you a free bottle of water or a box of tissues. when i first came to taiwan, i saw lots of scooters, but it was months before i saw an actual gas station. there are plenty of convenience stores here, but gas stations do not seem to be as plentiful as you'd see in the states or canada.

apparently the 5 original members of duran duran have reformed and are touring again. the tour is starting in japan, and tickets sold out in 1 hour, and it's the first time they've been in japan in 18 years. i'm starting to feel old.

peter's mom is moving house, so the other night he brought home all these tapes, mainly of the first english songs he listened to. things like bonnie tyler, duran duran, wham!, basically some pretty scary stuff. he told me that if you mispronounce duran duran in taiwanese it sounds like poke the penis, so of course everyone would mispronounce it. i've been told it's easier to insult someone in taiwanese, as the language contains more colourful phrases than madarin does.

among his tapes was one of movie music, which contains a track called three loins in the fountain, hmm, a porno theme perhaps?

i've never liked pearl jam, and never really considered them much part of the whole grunge scene either as they always seemed a bit too commercial for that. but this article about them leaving their label is interesting, especially if it means the further demise of the control major labels have over bands. though i wonder, are pearl jam really the most popular and important American rock band of the '90s? most popular maybe, but most important? i'd seriously doubt that. sounds like the writer is overreaching there a bit.

oddly enough, the writer of the article is one of the editors for blogcritics. there's been a lot of discussion about blogging being the new journalism. personally, any blog that resembles journalism, i tend to dislike. if what you write reads like a magazine, why don't you just publish an online magazine, instead of a blog? or are blogs for some people just a step into legitimate journalism? via j-walk.

korea food banner on the side of a building not too far from my house. i think that's pucca advertising the food too. i thought that character was japanese, until one of my students told me she's korean. i wondered why i had seen her everywhere when i was in korea.

the 80s tarot. yes, that is grace jones above as the devil and madness as the seven of cups. the site has even more 80s icons: pee wee herman, robert smith, paul king,... but still i think i may prefer the playschool tarot or the peanuts tarot to this. sadly it looks like the peanuts set was forced to be taken down. sheesh, some people have no sense of fun do they? via six different ways.

alphadrome, a site that i just know is going to make me want to go out and buy more toy robots. via solipsistic.

the art of richard borge. it looks like he's done some of the artwork for meat beat manifesto and you can even buy prints of his work for $100, which doesn't seem that unreasonable considering how much some people would charge for such things. via everlasting bort.

i've gotten a lot of hits recently from filepile. but what is it? and why are these people coming here? their page says they are closed for sign ups and without being a member i can't read their faq. anyone know what this is? or what led them to robot action boy?

i'd heard that a large portion of the cast from the bewitched television series were gay, but not until chancing on this link in the comments on scrubbles did i find out exactly who. it's been a long time since i've seen the show, but i suspect those reading queer themes into the fact samantha is forced to live a lie and pretend she is a mortal, are reading a bit too much into it. the queer themes in the x-men on the otherhand are much more apparent.

today is dragon boat festival. peter and i went to bi tan to see the dragon boat races, only to find there were no races there this year. i'm starting to wonder if they only hold races there every two years, since we saw the races last year, but this year no races, and two years ago there were no races as well.*

since there were no races we just walked around bi tan a little and then came home. peter's brother had bought time crisis 2 for ps2, so we spent the afternoon randomly shooting people.


*i've since learned the races in the greater taipei area were cancelled due to sars, but still took place on other parts of the island.

quite often people will ask me about the singer grace ge lan chang. she was quite famous in the 50s and 60s for her music as well as for starring in various films. her music was used in the taiwanese film the hole, which introduced her to a new audience. it seems that i read somewhere that she was the first chinese to have an album released in the states, but i'm not sure if that is true or not. and now one of her early films, mambo girl, has been released on dvd with english subtitles. this is definately on the top of my list of dvds to order next. via the exoticalist.

26 things. the international photographic scavenger hunt. this sounds really cool, and at this point i'm planning on participating. from thier website:

on tuesday july 1st 2003, 26 things to hunt for will be posted on this website and you
are free to complete the project on or before thursday july 31st 2003.
come back friday august 1st to submit your 26 things website.

sounds good to me. now to remember that date...via indigoblog.

35togo. a very nice photoblog of various sites in taiwan and other places in asia. there's even a quicktime movie of the adventure of buying betel nuts from a betel nut beauty and trying some. a braver soul than i, but then the appeal of chewing a cancerous substance that will turn your mouth a bloody red is lost on me.