Small Mysteries Endure

I always find graffiti interesting. What was so important that someone broke the law to say it?

Another reason I find graffiti intriguing is that I can't always understand it. Take this, for instance, which I saw last night on a brick wall near the former Theatre de la Jeune Lune in the Warehouse District.

Does it pertain to a marriage proposal?  This book about the Columbine massacre? Some sort of dramatic, fatal agreement?

Your guess is as good as mine.

"Young Adult"

I saw "Young Adult" last night. My impression is that it was a good, but not completely satisfying, movie.

"Young Adult" is the story of Mavis Gary, a Minneapolis-based author (please don't call her a writer) of "Sweet Valley High"-type novels. Upon her receipt of a mass e-mail announcing the birth of her high school boyfriend's daughter, Mavis' already disorderly life goes into a tailspin. Heedless of the fact that he seems happily married, she takes it upon herself to "save" him from what she perceives to be a dull and humdrum life and returns to the small Minnesota town where she was raised to win him back.

First, Charlize Theron's performance as Mavis was excellent. Mavis is rude, childish, self-centered and an alcoholic. In short, she is completely unlovable. But thanks to Theron, she's also entirely watchable and lifelike. Theron seems to have no ego and goes about depicting Mavis at her worst with gusto.

I also liked that this movie had the courage to present the sort of average existence most of us live as something worth having. Mavis' world of  catty gossip, Marc Jacobs dresses and long nights at bars that turn into bleary-eyed mornings is clearly shown to be empty and unfulfilling, while the unglamorous world of raising a child in a small town with only the occasional outing at Buffalo Wild Wings is presented as a comfortable and satisfying way to live. "Young Adult" doesn't preach as to which way of living is preferable, but it's nice to see a movie that doesn't deride everyday life as boring and unsatisfying.

My problem with this movie is with a few of its gaps. The boyfriend Mavis has made up her mind to win back (played by Patrick Wilson) is not enough of a character. We know Mavis has an infantile and self-centered view of the world, but why has she picked him as her most recent target? He's nice and attractive, but it isn't quite clear why he is worthy of her fixation. And while it's obvious that Mavis has never really moved on since high school and is emotionally stunted, something about where the story of "Young Adult" picks up and, ultimately, drops off the story of her life felt incomplete.

All in all, though, those complaints are things that could be said about most movies. Thanks to an interesting take on an interesting person, "Young Adult" felt like an interesting and out-of-the-ordinary movie.

In Praise of Vocabulary Lessons

For some reason, I was thinking about vocabulary lessons today. From second until eleventh grade, we did vocabulary lessons every week and that many weeks of learning new words year after year after year did wonders for my ability to express myself.

Thanks to Mrs. Anderson, my second-grade teacher, I know how to use "inclined" in the sense of being likely or willing to do something. It's because of Mrs. Ferguson, who taught tenth-grade English, that I know "bucolic" means gentle, scenic and pastoral. It was not until I had Mr. Jones as a junior in high school that I knew how to spell "highfalutin."

I know the glamorous thing to do in education these days is to let kids fingerpaint their feelings with organic, plant-based pigments and then nap as mellow Joan Baez tunes waft through the room, but there is something to be said for vocabulary lessons and other old-school learning techniques. Do I use words like "efflorescence" in everyday speech? Of course not. But when a situation arises in which "efflorescence" is the perfect word, I know how to use it. 

That, in my opinion, is a real skill.

Postscript: A note to Mrs. Wendling, my fifth-grade math teacher - despite your daily Mental Math quiz, I am still terrible at doing even basic addition and subtraction in my head. Sorry about that. I know you tried.

New-To-Me Music Update

I feel like today is a good day for a music update.

Because it's Tuesday, that's why.

• "My Girls" by Animal Collective: Nothing about this song is particularly cheerful, but it cheers me up, for some reason. To me, it sounds like MGMT's first album. I wonder if these two bands would ever have a street fight over that.
• "I Don't Want To Go To Sleep, Either" by FM Belfast: This one came into my life courtesy of Brother #1. The sound effects in the chorus sounds kind of like the entire contents of a Toys 'R Us went berserk.
• "Midnight City:" by M83: It's kind of hard to tell which I enjoy more - the song or the creep-tastic music video. 
• "Born to Die" by Lana Del Rey: Lana Del Rey isn't a 1960s pop chanteuse or a bohemian hipster. She's actually from a wealthy family in upstate New York and has admitted that the stage name "Lana Del Rey" was invented by her marketing team. I think the reason that bugs me so much is that I really like this song and am mad that it's kind of inauthentic.

Cold Is Good For Fashion

It is very cold these days here in the City of Lakes, and as we all know, cold is extremely good for your fashion sense.

Actually, if you live anywhere where temperatures don't regularly dip below the minimum threshold necessary to sustain life, then you maybe don't know. 

If that's the case, let me detail for you just how cold weather really keeps you glamorous:

• Thanks to constant wind and unfathomably dry air, the only way to keep your lips from feeling like they've been freshly sandpapered is to slather them with obscene amounts of lip balm and keep them that way at all times. Seriously, gob it on there - with a spackle knife, if necessary. Sure, this approach will always make you feel like your lips are drowning in an oil spill, but if you don't look like Melanie Griffith every single second of every single day from November to about mid-May, then you aren't doing it right.
• Flannel underwear is necessary, especially if you're a guy (don't pretend you don't know why). But flannel underwear is bulky, so if you are going for that slim-fit, tailored look -- good luck. You will have lumps and bulges were there should be no such thing. So, you can either wear ill-fitting pants that conceal your choice of undergarment or you can look like you're wearing a diaper. Your choice.
• There is really no end to the wonders freezing temperatures and moisture-less air can do for your tresses. My hair is currently defying the laws of physics with its inexhaustible ability to attract/store/generate static electricity and stand on end. "Crispy" and "brittle" are laughable understatements for whatever sad, keratin-based substance is now on top of my head. I still comb it in the morning, but I don't know why. It has just decided it is going to be a wispy mop until we are about halfway into 2012.
• Most people know a chill in the air adds a flush to your cheeks. That can be appealing, because it makes you look healthy and vibrant. But sustained exposure to windchills makes your entire face look like it has been scalded. The effect is rather demonic, and "demonic" is definitely a bold and fashion-forward move to make.

Snow-Filled Mornings

I am going to forego the type of post I usually write when it snows for the first time (which is usually along the lines of "OMG! SNOW! I AM FILLED WITH A CHILD-LIKE SENSE OF WONDER!") and instead am going to talk about how snow makes the very first part of my morning much better.

These days, it's dark in the morning when I wake up. I like standing in my kitchen with the lights off, brewing coffee. The snow has this effect of muffling noise from outside, so everything seems soft and quiet. This is a real boon because I live near the main post office and also on a major bus route, so anything that subdues the sound of the unbelievably loud gear-grinding of trucks and buses is a wonderful thing. I also think snow on the ground has a way of changing the light as the sun comes up. That's probably just because it's a different time of year and the sun is at a different angle and blah blah blah boring physics explanation. I still say it's the snow.

All in all, snow makes for a gentler and somehow more civilized way to start my day.