Then i went up to Bloor Street. Pretty grey weather, but not so cold i couldn't survive in just a tee shirt. I had lunch at Crepes a Go-Go (i had the campagnarde, mozzarella, egg, and tomato, i think).

The movie i went to see was My Blueberry Nights by Wong Kar-wai, his first English language film. The reviews have been mixed, but i really enjoyed it. It's about letting go of the past, at least the painful parts - a woman (Norah Jones), frustrated by the end of a relationship, talking with a cafe owner (Jude Law), and runs away, taking waitressing and bar serving jobs to pay her way. It's pretty light on story, but has some nice character development bits, though Norah Jones isn't the best actor, and Natalie Portman is too young and pretty for her role. Typical for Wong Kar-wai, the movie looks gorgeous - you could see it for just the photography.

"So what's wrong with the Blueberry Pie?
"There's nothing wrong with the Blueberry Pie, just people make other choices. You can't blame the Blueberry Pie, it's just... no one wants it."

"How do you say goodbye to someone you can't imagine living without? I didn't say goodbye... I didn't say anything. I just walked away."

I forgot to mention that on Tuesday, i drove to Waterloo for a Skills Competition. We had two teams competing in an Animation Competition - given the story idea, had to brainstorm, storyboard, make a leica, animate then render (they brought their own characters). Chris had gone up with the students the night before, and i got there mid-competition. The place was crazy-busy. Anyway, after, we ate supper at Golden Griddle, and were going to see Iron Man, but the newspaper screwed up the times - turns out all the movies in Waterloo start at 7:10 or 9:45. I left for home - they had to stay the next moring for the final results. Anyway, one of our teams placed First, so yay!

Saturday night, i went over to Lisa & Russ's, and we watched Enchanted (i missed the start) with the kids, and after they went to bed, Superbad.

Sunday morning i went to the new show at MOCCA, part of the Contact photo festival, Between Memory & History: From the Epic to the Everyday: "...probes relationships that exist between the intimate and the public, between moments of personal significance to events of global resonance that affect each one of us." Pretty vague, i didn't see the connection between all the pieces, it can mean pretty much anything.

by Martin Parr, and Alessandra Sanguinetti

The only photographer i recognized by name was Nan Goldin, and - SURPRISE! - it was photos of her friends being intimate and sexual, including a long slide show. Odd that the most explicit ones were a gay couple. Or maybe not, lol. She needs some lesbian friends.

I miss my Mom.   :'(

I see a lot of movies, and not every one is a Kurosawa or Kieslowski or even a Brad Bird. Not every movie is a coming-of-age film or speaks to the human condition. I can appreciate movies that are just about entertaining, as long as they do it well - could be a comedy like Judd Apatow's, or an action movie, like James Bond. In that spirit i went to see Speed Racer.

The plot was pretty straight forward - evil corporation at first tries to buy Speed Racer, then tries to take him down. I thought they did it fairly well. It's essentially what i'd expect from a Speed Racer movie: good vs evil with a lot of racing and family-oriented fun. Was i expecting intricate character studies, or intense drama? Some reviewers have complained about the non-stop garishly coloured special effects and sensory overload, but to my mind, that's like complaining about the loud music at a dance club or the nudity in a porn flick - what did you think you were going to get? Instead, i embraced it - i went to see it at the IMAX. The Wachowskis created a fantasy world as unique as Sin City, or any fairy tale animation or Miyazaki anime, but one that fits the material: 60s-influenced colour explosions that look like they're on, well, speed - very much a live-action cartoon. They deserve credit for at least trying to create a new visual language. Usually i'm pretty much in agreement with critics, but this weekend, they have it wrong - the ratings from regular customers are much, much higher.

All that being said, it was very odd to experience the visual and auditory calm once the movie ended, lol.

If ever there were a real person who had an anime face...

"You think you can drive a car and change the world? It doesn't work like that!"
"Maybe not, but it's the only thing I know how to do and I gotta do something."

"RAIN!!!!!!!"

Why do i have pics of Trixie, but not Speed? Huh!

I was running late, having blown most of the morning not doing very much. Still, i had enough time to grab a hot dog at Queen & Spadina, buy a couple of shirts at H&M, and look for a manga at Silver Snail. On the way home, i bought my niece's birthday present (gift card for Home Depot - she's moving into her own place).

The week was mainly meetings and polishing off outlines. Had lunch at Shoeless one day, supper (wings) at The Tap. Friday i worked half a day, went to Lick's for lunch, and then to the movies.

I see a lot of movies, and i've sat through some terrible ones (Hollow Man), some painfully long ones (Gerry), some even offensive ones (Fat Girl, but not because of the sexual violence, but because i thought the director undermined the whole story at the end), but David Mamet's Redbelt is the first one i've left midway through. It's not because it was offensive, long or even terrible (in fact, metacritic.com has given it a very positive grade), but because i found it just plain annoying. A tribute to Kurosawa's samurai films? Seriously?

First was the incredibly clumsy accidental shooting scene: why did the cop take the gun out of the holster he'd just put it into? so it could accidentally knocked over by the woman who entered the martial arts studio, and just happens to recoil to someone's touch - why did they not listen to her when she came in and keep telling her to calm down? so she could freak out and hit the gun.

I found the dialogue to be stiff, arch, repetitive, and unnatural, as each "character" spoke his "character's lines", rather than have conversations with each other. On the rare occasion one character asks another a question (rather than just making statements at each other), the character's respond as if it were a different question.

The only thing keeping me in the theatre was Chiwetel Ejiofor, who is an engaging actor. He played the villain in Serenity, and the transvestite in Kinky Boots. Here he plays the pacifist owner or a martial arts school, and in Hollywood, pacifists almost always take up violence in the name of renouncing violence.

But it wasn't enough - it got to the point where i couldn't stand it anymore, so i left, and saw Iron Man again. Iron Man isn't perfect, it has its flaws (like why does Stark need Pepper to go to the office to hack into their computers, Stark couldn't do that from home?, and how can Stane operate his suit so readily on the first try when it took Stark weeks of practice?) but it was entertaining.

"This is Tim Allen! I could kill you right now and no one would know..."

The Friday Five for May 9th, 2008

1. If you knew that you had only one day left to live, what would you do for the 24 hours?
Realistically, probably cry.
2. Do you think that life has meaning?
No, not really. Hence, existentialism.
3. What was your favourite childhood toy/object, or some of your favourites?
(Remember childhood according to the United Nations is anywhere from 0-18 years, so this is a fairly broad span of time).
My stuffed animals (Ginger, Rosemary, Brutus, Sylvester, Rascal, Raquel, Flossie, Hoppity).
4. When you clasp your hands, do you put your right thumb over your left thumb, or your left thumb over your right thumb?
Right over left.
5. If you had to teach the most ignorant person on earth the most difficult thing you have ever learned, how would you go about doing it?
With a hammer, again and again.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

"A spam fritter is a slice of Spam fried in batter. Commonly eaten with chips and mushy peas, spam fritters are served in Fish and Chip shops in English northern industrial towns. They were first introduced during World War II due to fish being unavailable[1]. So closely is the spam fritter associated with the war that in 1995 a government memo relating to the commemoration of the 50-year anniversary of the war ending recommended "spam-fritter frying to get into the wartime spirit"[2].

"In 2006 the makers of Spam, Hormel Foods, announced the return of the spam fritter in pre-packaged form[3].

"Spam fritter is a rhyming slang term for the anus.[4]"

Did another tour of the Royal Botanical Gardens, this time during tulip season. The tulips were at the RGB's Rock Garden, and there were also forsythia, azalea, even some left over daffodils, and blossoming cherry trees outside the Rock Garden itself.

( Many, many, many more photos... )

( Many, many, many more photos... )

Yesterday morning we had interviews - generally pretty awful! And three no-shows, what's up with that? We (four of us) missed the big Faculty meeting, but we made it to the Mandarin lunch paid for by the Dean/School (which only annoyed the other teachers who had to go). We had a couple more interviews after lunch (an average 8 year old could do better). We had our 'open house' later in the day.

After John and i snuck dinner in at Kelsey's (both had the clubhouse), and then went to see Iron Man. I was only vaguely familiar with the character, but the movie was pretty impressive. Robert Downey Jr made the movie.

"Burning people alive, ha ha!"

"Is it better to be feared or respected? And I'd say is it too much to ask for both?"

This morning was reading, laundry and such. I left mid-afternoon for a bit of shopping, then went to the Irish pub, where i got a couple of Strongbows (what, no Magners?), had supper (amazing burger, and caesar), and finished reading Style Deficit Disorder: Harajuku Street Fashion, which was difficult, as the text is small, often on a dark background, and it tends to be dark in the pub.

After, i saw Iron Man again. I was fairly drunk when got to the theatre (it's about 50 feet away from the pub), so snoozed a bit through the cave sequence. I could see it again.

I like Antonia Zerbisias. I edited down her article a bit here, and added some relevant photos:

"Frankly, I think Miley Cyrus looks a lot better – and certainly more age appropriate – in that now controversial Annie Leibowitz photo for the June issue of Vanity Fair than she has in her last dozen or so red carpet appearances. Unlike so many other recent images of Cyrus, as well as those of other young women who grow up in the celebrity spotlight, she is stripped bare of the art and the artifice of music videos and glossy magazines. Her gaze is direct, somewhat flirtatious, but not at all the stuff of the come-hither looks she has lately flashed at the camera. This photo is as natural as we have ever seen her... with her looking as if she might have just climbed out of the bath and into a sheet, is reminiscent of a Titian painting perhaps, or some other classic nude. It shows a beautiful young woman poised on the springboard to adulthood.

"Consider her hair, makeup and outfits on the recent CMT Awards, for which she was a presenter. Apparently braless in two deeply cleaved gowns, teetering on peekaboo pumps, her makeup applied with a trowel, her eyebrows painted on as always...

"It's not as if her wholesome Hannah Montana brand – worth a billion this year, at least according to The New York Times – hasn't already been tainted.

"In fact, the rest of the Vanity Fair layout is what should be attracting their ire. Not only does she wear a cut-to-whoops and hiked-to-OMG Balmain dress, there is a particularly creeptacular photo of Cyrus lounging up against her father, the one-hit country music wonder Billy Ray. He denies being on set when the girl-in-a-sheet shot was taken – although other minders were present – but he makes no apology for posing like a dirty uncle with her. Which he does all the time. But then, Cyrus's trashy parents – who have spawned a number of children through various adulterous relationships – do the God talk thing a lot, which seems to give them a pass in the more conservative quarters of the U.S. of A.

"As for the Disney company's statement that 'a situation was created to deliberately manipulate a 15-year-old in order to sell magazines,' it is to laugh. Its Hannah Montana juggernaut not only manipulates a 15-year-old – who has reportedly now been told to lay low – it exploits the three million girls aged 6 to 14 who watch the show, buy the records, pay for concert tickets and want the clothes. That parents who are now protesting Cyrus's pose have not been concerned about what she has been projecting and promoting to date – rampant consumerism through the idea that girls should be all about their looks and clothes – is what is really disturbing."

The Oni Press forum is now totally defunct. Other than James Lucas Jones posting promo links, and me posting the new comics list, there's virtually no activity. I posted a question a coupe of weeks ago about any new Blue Monday, and got no reply. It's kind of sad.

I was chatting online with a now-graduating student, and he told me that until we had dinner at Boston Pizza on Friday, they had assumed i was gay, or maybe bi. Apparently, it was because in one of our first classes together almost three years ago, i wrote my name on the whiteboard, and missed the R in Gary (if it was cursive, the r and y do tend to merge) - apparently i also corrected it right away, but rather than taking this as a sign i was making sure it said my name and not 'gay', they took it as an unwritten message that i was gay. I'm not sure why they thought i felt i should have to tell them, let alone in such a roundabout way.

Apparently, also my fashion sense was seen as a sign (okay, i do use a lot of colour, ha ha). I chatted with another student who suggested part of it was because last year the grads whom i tended to hang around with were female, which to my mind says, "That doesn't make sense."

They aren't really paying attention, because if you see my Facebook (and the vast majority of them are Facebook friends), i've uploaded a lot of pics of attractive females, some i've taken, like girls in bikinis or girls in cosplay at Animecons, or downloaded pics of classic poster babes, and so on. Nor have they seen me turning my head for female students (not ones in the programs i teach, lol). Any evidence of heterosexuality was either ignored, or allowed that i was possibly bi.

What's funny is that it's turned into a tradition, lol. Last year at our End-Of-Year party, two of the female grads yelled out they had thought i was gay (ironically, the pair i'd hung around with, lol). I'm not sure how it even fit into the conversation. And two girls from the year before said they had thought i was gay. One said she didn't know i was straight until she'd seen my Myspace page (this was a year after graduation, lol), though the other one had said she had realized i wasn't because of some comment i'd made. Apparently they thought i was gay because i'd never mentioned a wife or girlfriend in class (which the other teachers had done). Actually, it hadn't occurred to me that my private life was a fitting classroom topic, lol.

Anyway, on Friday, one of the students made a paper rose out of a napkin, and she gave it to me. I stuck it in one ear (on one ear?), and then took it off and wondered out loud, "Which is the gay ear and which is the straight ear?" I said, the left was the straight ear for earrings (which it was at least way back in the 80s, and is the one i have an earring in), and put the rose on that one. Then we saw saw the movies, and i went with them to a party, so it wasn't until i left them 7 hours later that they had a discussion along the lines of "Oh, i guess he's not gay after all."

I was invited to go over for an impromptu party on Monday night, after i was told about all this. We were playing a game of Kings, and when i got an Ace, i made a rule that everytime they drank they had to praise my manliness, lol.

I don't really mind either way - apparently it endeared me to the girls in class, lol, though to be honest i would prefer that the girls thought i was a hottie, though perhaps for keeping my job, it's been safer this way, ha ha.

The Friday Five for May 2nd, 2008

1. What's one of the nicest things a friend has ever done for you?
Well, one friend helped me get my current job, and made sure i was decently high on the pay scale. Also, when i was dirt poor, and Lisa and Russ were visiting from Australia (before they moved back), they paid for everything the whole time.
2. What's one of the nicest things a stranger has ever done for you?
My car broke down on the highway one time, and though i called CAA, they never came. A woman stopped on the busy expressway, and gave me a ride to my house 40 minutes away. She and her son were on the way to their cottage for the weekend.
3. What is a trait in another person that you instantly admire, and that draws you to them?
Sense of humour.
4. What is a trait in another person that instantly repels you, and prevents you from forming a close relationship with them?
Arrogance.
5. Time to vent: tell us about something rotten someone has done to you?
Well, my only two real friends in high school dumped me as a friend between grade 11 and 12, without at least telling me, because i was uncool. Apparently they were making fun of me behind my back too. Grade 12 was a tough year - thankfully, we had a grade 13 back then, and things got better.

Tuesday morning, when i left for work (around 8:30), i could see there was a fire downtown, fairly near to where my sister and brother-in-law's business is. When i got home around 6, they were still fighting it - the area had been shut down all day. The next morning i took a few photos on the way to work.

There's not much behind the facades.

Wednesday i left work a little early, picked up Lisa, and we went to the National Ballet's HQ on Queen's Quay for "Member's Night", which meant a tour. I did it last year, but it was good doing again, especially with Lisa. We saw where they made the costumes, stored and cleaned the costumes (the current ones - there are thousands and thousands, as much as 30 years old, most stored elsewhere), repaired the costumes, made and repaired the wigs, the shoe storage (a dancer can go through two pairs in a performance), saw the scale models for the sets (again, most stored elsewhere), saw about 15 minutes of ballet rehearsal in a studio, and went to the cookies, tarts and coffee reception.

After, i drove to MOCCA for the opening of the new show, only to realize the show was Thursday not Wednesday, lol. We went to Jules for supper. I had the prix fixe (sauteed chicken in bacon cream sauce, caesar salad, frites, creme brulee for dessert), while Lis had a la carte (onion quiche, frites, salad greens, with a creme brulee about double the size). While she had wine, i just had ginger ale because i was driving. We went to check out H&M but it was closed, but stopped at a bookstore on the way home for a look-see.

Tuesday and today were just working on school stuff - taking a long time, it seems.

I took some photos around the house the past few days.

The backyard from the bathroom window again. You can see the trees and bushes are beginning to bud, and the forsythia is in bloom.

Sunday my friend Lisa was performing with her choir - a large no-audition community choir that is 90% women, and probably 90% over 50. Anyway, it was pretty good - they sang Gershwin, and had a get jazz vocalist who alternated with the choir.

The light was awful, and if the bassist wasn't blocking my view, it was another singer with her music. Lis didn't need her music - she knew the words (that's her mother to our left).

They invited me to come over for dinner. It was salmon steak (again), mashed potato, corn, salad, and ice cream for dessert. After Lis and i went to the bookstore (actually, the local one was closed, so we went to the next closest) because she had to get a gift for her newest nephew.

Monday we decided to meet in the city (since a chunk of us live there, tho' not me), at Matt's place, which is right on the harbour. It was kind of lame, because we had to leave after the morning rush hour, and leave before, so we got only about three hours of work done. The meeting itself was good, but we didn't get to enjoy being at Matt's - i'd brought my bathing suit. And the weather changed from essentially summer last week to more like November. Chris got a call when we were finishing lunch, and an hour after he got home, his wife had their second baby (a girl) at home.

The Friday Five for April 25th, 2008

1. What's harder to live without, chocolate or alcohol?
Neither are tough to live without. Chocolate has been making me feeling sick when eating it past couple of years, so no biggie. And i only drink for fun, and not much at that.
2. Does the colour yellow remind you of anything?
Yellow-coloured things? Pee-pee?
3. Who most annoyed you last week?
Creepy student.
4. Do you have a cutesy romantic nickname for your partner (or previous partners)?
Figment of my imagination?
5. What is your favourite Stephen King movie?
Ugh.

Afterwards, we saw Deception, the thriller with Hugh Jackman and Ewan McGregor. It starts off well, with the mystery man and the sex club cell phone - i think there's a good story if they went with that. But it switches to a basic extortion plot, and switches we aren't supposed to know are switches but are pretty obvious. I'm curious how the story would have gone if the accountant was more of a stereotypical middle-aged balding man instead of a ridiculously nerdy Ewan McGregor. Written by someone who's never transferred money online i think. And wouldn't be easy to schedule an automatic transfer of funds a day or two later? A corporate auditor should be fairly well paid, by the way.

"Are you free tonight?"

After the movies, we went back to their (Mo and Kate's) house for card games and such. Didn't quite work for me, as i was drinking juice, but it was still fun. One bit had them having to compliment me with every drink, or moaning, or doing a little dance. I left around 1, and didn't get to sleep until after 2, so i am pretty tired.

Thursday we had our formal marks meeting with the Dean, which is pointless, because all we do is recite marks about people he doesn't know. After, we had a sushi lunch meeting and planned out our spring workload.

Friday i went in to finish up marks (inputting them), and organizing for our meeting on Monday. I got frustrated because the document Chris gave us was Excel, and it didn't let me make paragraphs, so copying from Word was a pain in the ass. My garbage can took the brunt of my upset.

I met a bunch of students (the Muffins, and some part of a wider gang) at Boston Pizza for early supper. I had 3 glasses of wine(! - mostly they are now grads). I made sure i was sitting in the centre!

Then we went to the cinema to see a couple(!) of movies.

First up was Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay, which was decently funny, though maybe not as much as i'd been hoping for. I was a little surpised at the explicitness of the 'Bottomless' Party. It's more than just a stoner buddy movie - it's more satirical, and it's notable for bringing up issues of race. How many other other mainstream movies do you know where the main characters aren't white, or even black?

"It's going to be exactly like Eurotrip except it's not going to suck."

Neil Patrick Harris is totally bizarre.

Sunday was another local movie, this time The Forbidden Kingdom, a cheesy martial arts epic starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li and the kid from Sky High, based on folk and pop culture characters. It was fun despite its weaknesses.

"Monkey King" (Goku!)

After i went to Lisa & Russ's for dinner. We had wine, salmon (the girls had chicken), mashed potato, cauliflower and corn, and blueberry pie with cookie ice cream.

Saturday was a light day. Did laundry, read stuff and such. No travelling to the city. I did see a movie, locally, Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It was pretty funny, and it actually gave the cheating girlfriend a platform.

"When life gives you lemons... just say 'Fuck the lemons and let's go!' "

"I wonder if her carpet matches her pubes?"

"Oh, no... I was gonna listen to that, but then, um, I just carried on living my life."

Sex-ed on the beach.

Last week was both busy and unbusy. I cancelled third year classes, because the third years were having their interviews. Because of the interview times, in order to do them, i cancelled first year Games and one of the first year Animation classes, and also cancelled the other one to be fair. That left me with just one class to teach, the poor embattled second year Animation students, to whom i gave a test, and reviewed it after.

I had a TON of marking to do.

The reviews went reasonably well. Only two people failed, one, a real sweet heart, who just wasn't ready 9luckily, i didn't have to do that). Somehow she got derailed, probably by interpersonal dramas. The other one, in my group, just didn't show up for his interview. He's failing or marginal in other classes, so it's not unexpected.

Thursday evening we had our dinner with the first year Games class at The Mandarin. They're pretty amazing bunch - some are as good as third years, and certainly harder working and more mature than second year Games students. After, i went with a couple of our teachers to some teacher's house, which was kind of lame. I left when they all decided to go drinking at a pub - some probably shouldn't have driven.

Friday was our End Of Year Screening. We had trouble booking a proper space with central scheduling - not even our dean could manage it. I mentioned it to our person in Admissions, and she got it done. Ha! Anyway, we'd gotten each year to make a mini-reel, so we showed them for each group: First Year Animation, First Year Games, Second Year Games, Second Year Animation, and then the final demo reels of Third Year Animation (class of 2008). Less muss and fuss than previous screenings.

After, we went to Shoeless Joe's, and while in previous years, we tried to make it for the graduating group only, essentially everyone came (except First Year Games for some reason). The place was PACKED. We call ahead to make sure they'd have enough staff. It was a little weird drinking with the callow First Years, looking too young to drink, too stupid to study for classes, some of whom are failing. We were also being cornered, one at a time, by a creepy drunk Second Year.

After, some of us went to a house some of the Third Years are living in, to socialize and what not. It was perfectly fine, until again, some First Years showed up (to whom the idea of party conversation consists of "Parrrrr-deeee!", and "To drink-in' "), and again creepy drunk Second Year. Anyway, i left just after 2, Matt havng left earlier. Chris left after the cops showed up (they were being noisy, but the cops didn't go into the house), and crazy Miah was there until 6:30.

Wednesday was my most recent physiotherapy. I guess i'm close to done - i got a new tension bands. I'm going back in three weeks.

The Friday Five for April 18th, 2008

Fact or Fiction?

1. Love at First Sight: Fact or Fiction?
Fiction. Physical attraction, infatuation, but not love.
2. Fortune Telling: Fact or Fiction?
Fiction. Remembering that even random guesses will be right some of the time.
3. Other Life: Fact or Fiction?
Uhhh? 'Other'?! Life on other planets? Undoubtedly. Remembering 100% of the star systems we've explored has life, and there billions of billions others. Visiting this planet? Less likely, and even less likely that they'd be interested in anal probing hicks. Previous life? See next.
4. Afterlife: Fact or Fiction?
Fiction. Sadly.
5. Bigfoot: Fact or Fiction?
Fiction. Probably fiction. Only one ape has ever made it to the Americas, and that's with clothing. The yeti is more plausible, although apes are tropical species, so it's pretty unlikely.

I just finished reading an interesting book, How Jesus Became Christian: St. Paul, the Early Church and the Jesus Cover-up. Essentially, its thesis is, if you read the Bible, it shows evidence that:

1. By his own words (esp. in Matthew), Jesus was a practicing Jew, that he clearly thought following Jewish Law was important, and that he never thought of himself as anything other than a normal human (no virgin birth, no divine nature). Possibly he saw himself as the Messiah (some of his later Jewish followers certainly did), but in a Jewish sense, as the descendent of David who would re-establish a Jewish state, which would be an earthly beacon for all nations, and whose death is unnecessary to achieve the Kingdom of God (indeed, makes it near impossible). After Jesus death, his movement was led by his (true, biological) brother James - they were true followers of Jesus and his teachings. When Jesus cries out, "Why hast thou forsaken me?", it's the words of an ordinary human.

2. Paul's 'Vision' had nothing to do with the historical Jesus, and instead relied on Paul's beliefs. While Paul occasionally refers to the 'Old Testament' (when Paul was around there was no New Testament), it's very selective (sometimes misleading), and tends to ignore most of its teachings. Paul develops the idea of the Divine Christ, the eternal Son Of God, yet Saviour-through-Sacrifice - though 'Christ' and 'Messiah' are literal translations of each other, their real meanings are very different. Paul's Christ has more in common with pagan mystery religions, like those of Dionysus, Osiris and Mithras, than with Jesus' teachings and Judaism. Paul never uses Jesus' words to settle issues. Paul specifically rejects Jewish law, including dietary restrictions, and 'eternal covenant' of circumcision. Interestingly, Paul's writings (as much of those which are considered authentic) are the earliest of what's now called the New Testament.

The creeds of followers of Paul (including modern Christians) say nothing about the teachings of Jesus or following God's laws, but demanding only belief in Christ (and later the Trinity)

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds (æons), Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; by whom all things were made; who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, and was made man; he was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered, and was buried, and the third day he rose again, according to the Scriptures, and ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of the Father; from thence he shall come again, with glory, to judge the quick and the dead; whose kingdom shall have no end.

And in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceedeth from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified, who spake by the prophets.

In one holy catholic and apostolic Church; we acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins; we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.

Amen.

Interestingly, it still refers to the Father as being the one God.

3. Later, there were a variety of 'Christian' sects which differed in how (or if) to reconcile Jewish Jesus and Pauline Christianity. Some created tortuous allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament as leading towards Christ, and that Christianity superseded Judaism. Some (Marcionites) simply rejected all Jewish writings, and edited out any Jewish-flavoured bits of the Gospels and Letters. Some (Ebionites) continued to see Jesus as a Jewish Messiah and followed Jewish law. Some (Nazarenes) followed Jewish law, but thought Jesus was divine. [Actually, there's no doubt these sects all existed.] The author of Acts ("Luke") tried make a compromise, that Jewish Christians (to whom James ministered) should continue to follow the Law, while Gentiles (to whom Paul ministered) didn't have to - except this is something Paul in his Letters actually rejected. It's the author's belief that the Christians needed the pedigree of an religion to help sell their faith in the Greco-Roman world (it is odd that many Christians clung to the Old Testament when so much of it conflicts with Christian thought).

A large part of the book is a discussion of the origins of anti-Semitism, which i find less interesting than the historical questions themselves. There's also an interesting quote from the Bible about Mary Magdalene and other women being Jesus' financial backers (highly unlikely if you consider Mary Magdalene to be the harlot).

It makes an interesting comparison with The Pagan Christ, which makes a similar comparison between Paul's beliefs and the mystery cults - that author contended that that was the point, and the underlying truth of all religion. In fact, Harpur even doubts historical existence of Jesus (which really does have little hard evidence), or contends the existence of a Jewish rabbi named Yeshua (a pretty common name) was barely relevant. He thinks the historical existence of Christ was revisionism by later Church leaders, distorting Paul's message, turning allegorical messages of achieving unity with the divine spark within into 'history'.

I wasted much of last night surfing on the interweb tubes.

I got up early this morning, cuz my movie started early. Traffic is nice at 8 am Sunday morning, lemme tell ya.

The movie i saw was part of the Sprockets International Film Festival For Children. It was an animated film, called The Three Robbers (Die Drei Räuber), although the main character is a little girl. She's just been orphaned at the beginning of the story, and is on her way to an orphanage (which turns out to be a nasty workhouse, of course) when her coach is stopped by three notorious highway robbers. Abandoned by her driver, she spins a story about a wealthy father to whom they could send a ransom note. What a fun movie! What it lacked in the design elegance and dreamy magic of Nocturna, it made up in goofy charm. The story itself is swet, in a children's story way. But it's full of little sight gags, odd little owls, bats and such - my favourite was a bird crashing into the moon as if it were a backdrop. European sensibilities are different than the Hollywood ones i'm used to. There's a constable arresting forest animals for offences, such as snails speeding. But at one point he was making an arrest for indecency, and then we see a shot of two rabbits engaged! One character made a joke about 'ass cream', then corrected it to 'ice cream'. A character committed suicide - in a cartoony, fairy tale way, but still. I wish it were available on DVD.

Breakfast was an egg mcmuffin (minus the meat), lunch a ribeye sandwich at Licks. I checked out Indigo, but didn't buy anything.

The Toronto Star
Apr 10, 2008 04:30 AM
David Olive

Say this for the economic-policy trappings of John McCain: he travels light.

Unlike fellow United States presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, the Republicans' all-but-official presidential nominee does not offer an anti-poverty program or a universal-health plan to cover the 47 million Americans who are uninsured.

The Arizona senator has no proposal for arresting the growth in America's national debt, much of it owed to China and other foreign creditors, which has nearly doubled under President George W. Bush, to almost $9 trillion (U.S.).

McCain offers no plan for financing the $3 trillion in costs for the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which will further increase in a McCain presidency, because he pledges to continue those conflicts indefinitely.

McCain has no interest in overhauling the regulation of a grossly undersupervised Wall Street, the recklessness of which triggered the current global credit crisis. He has no program for rescuing the two million to five million Americans threatened by the loss of their homes by foreclosure. (Headline in the liberal Nation: "McCain to home owners: Drop dead.")

Why is that, when America is sliding into recession and concerns about job losses and declining personal incomes will probably dominate the U.S. general election this fall?

Partly it's that McCain, by his own admission, is an economics dunce. As McCain confessed to The Wall Street Journal in a 2005 interview, "I'm going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues. I still need to be educated."

More recently, McCain allowed in December that "The issue of economics is not something I've understood as well as I should ... (but) I've got Greenspan's book."

That was a reference to the memoir of Ayn Rand acolyte Alan Greenspan, a McCain mentor and the most overrated chair in the history of the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Partly it's the company McCain keeps. The public face of McCain's economic brain trust is Carly Fiorina, a champion of unrestrained capitalism who made such a botch of Hewlett-Packard Co.'s $19 billion takeover of Compaq Computer Corp. that H-P ousted her as chief executive officer in 2005.

The intellectual flywheel of McCainonomics, former U.S. senator Phil Gramm of Texas, spearheaded the ill-conceived deregulation of Wall Street in the late 1990s. And as vice-chair of UBS AG, Gramm pleads he was "totally unaware" of the $37 billion worth of soured U.S. subprime loans the Swiss banking giant has written off so far. Last year, Gramm helped resuscitate a presidential campaign that McCain had mismanaged into the ground.

Gramm is an "advocate of every predatory and rapacious element that the financial sector has," James K. Galbraith, an economist at the University of Texas, told the Washington Post last week.

And partly it's ideological. McCain remains captive to the shamanistic "supply side" economics of the Ronald Reagan era. McCain wants to make permanent Bush's fiscally ruinous tax cuts skewed to the affluent, and pledges still more tax cuts, under the mistaken impression they alone stimulate the economy. With McCain's undisguised insensitivity to Main Street, he would seem to have a November-election death wish.

Noting Herbert Hoover's programs for curtailing home foreclosures, Susan Dunn, co-author of The Three Roosevelts, wrote in a March letter to The New York Times that "It is a remarkable feat for a politician running for president to be even more out of touch and indifferent to the economic distress of Americans than President Hoover."

McCain is to be lauded for honesty in confessing his ignorance on economics.

Logically, his next step should be removing his name from the ballot.

Actually, Battlestar Galactica is a not-boring part of Friday night at home. I also read while having a relaxing bath.

I woke up around 7 this morning, grabbed some apple juice and a banana, and read three days worth of newspapers. Sent a couple of emails. What is pr0n?

It was good i checked the movie listings thoroughly, so i saw the movie i wanted to see was a little closer, at Kennedy Commons. Still, i was a little late leaving, so i picked up a Licks burger and snuck it into the theatre with me, which actually saved me from being tempted to order popcorn. The movie i saw was Bella, a very-likeable story about a couple of people whose lives have taken bad turns. Nina gets fired from her waitressing job for repeated lateness (due to, as we find out, her unexpected and unwanted pregnancy). Nina's tragedy is a lack of family, no siblings, her father having died when she was 12. Jose, the chef (and the brother of the hard-assed owner), runs out to follow Nina, not out of romantic interest, as we find out, and makes her day much better than it could have been. Jose was a pro soccer player with a promising career, when an accident broke him and put him in jail, and he's still suffering. The movie is mostly Nina talking about her current situation, and Jose talking about his past, but i thought it was pretty heart-felt.

My grandmother used to say, "You want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans."

On Thursday, we let the class out early to go to the city for an event we planned (we meaning Chris the coordinator). I drove John and Miah. We went to the Queen Mother for a 'quick bite' and a drink (Strongbow for me). We should've told our server we were in a little hurry, because they were actually serving other people earlier who were going to the opera. Anyway, we had barely ten minutes to eat - and Miah ordered ribs. He had to inhale that meat (ha ha, he got teased). I had the pad thai, which was quick and easy.

Anyway, the event was to showcase our graduating class's demo reels to members of the local studios, and the reaction was very good. We didn't bore them with a full-day event (like some other school) - took less than an hour, and they appreciated that we ddin't waste their time. They thought even the weakest of them was at least level with other schools. Unfortunately, the projector sucked (even though it was new, and at the National Film Board), so some of the stuff got burnt out or washed out. The students learned a good lesson in not making things too bright or dark. Anyway, the studio people know the score, and they came away impressed with our students' work.

After, we walked down to the Loose Moose to socialize with the students. A good time was had by all.

Yesterday, my last class with the third years (class B - class A was Tuesday). We also did our final interviews with the three who are already working. Uh, they passed.

After school, i went to the cinema to see a movie, Smart People, which was decent, if not great. The main characters were widowed assholish professor Dennis Quaid, his new love interest and former student (turned off literature by Quaid) Sarah Jessica Parker, his Young Republican snob daughter Ellen Page, and his more fun, people-smart, deadbeat brother Thomas Haden Church (the last two steal the show) - there's also a son, but he's so alienated he's barely part of the story.

These children haven't been properly parented in many years. They're practically feral. That's why I was brought in.

Lunch was a hot dog and popcorn. I had a Moviewatcher coupon, so the movie (oddly called Shutter when i bought it), pop and popcorn were free.

The evening i spent at home. BORING!

The Friday Five for April 11th, 2008

Theme: Change

1. If you had the ability to legally change your name, would you? To what?
No, i'm okay with my name. Maybe i would've preferred my Mom's maiden name for a last name, but oh well.
2. What do you with with change that you receive from banks/purchases/find on the ground?
Put it back in my wallet! With 1 and 2 dollar coins, that serious money.
3. If you could travel back in time to change the course of one historical event, what event would it be?
I dunno... screwing with history can be dangerous. Maybe change it so most Canadian spoke French?
4. Would you rather live a safe, stable, moderately interesting life or one where every day was dangerous, volatile, and different?
You mean, would i rather live in Canada, or, say, Iraq?
5. What do you think you'll be remembered for when you die and, if you could, would you change it to something else?
Probably nothing. Yes, it would be nice to be remembered for something.

Sunday, i went into the city to see (finally) the Chinese Design Exhibit at the Design Exchange. I took some photos.

Lunch was a hot dog was on Front Street in front of the Union Station - it was full of people walking from the train station to the baseball game. Someone's beret is too tight.
( Pics )

Just before i went in, i got a call from L saying the birthday party for A&M had been moved to 1 (ten minutesfrom then). Anyway, i still went to the exhibit - otherwise i would've gone downtown for a very expensive hot dog.

Monday, i didn't go into work - i was caught up with marking, had no meetings. I went into the city to meet my friend Angela for lunch. I'd decided to take the train - when i got to the station, i realized i didn't have my wallet - D'OH! I had to drive back home, which meant i had to drive into the city. Also, i'd left my glasses at home when i picked up my wallet, and driving without sunglasses drove me nuts. So i had to buy new glasses at H&M while waiting for Ange.

We ate at Le Select Bistro, which is conveniently near to where she works (Globe & Mail). I had a Strongbow (what, no French cider?), the 'salade d'endive au bénédictin' (Belgian endives, walnuts, and a Quebec artisan blue cheese Bénédictin, with a cider dressing), the 'rumsteck maître d'hôtel' (top sirloin, served with frites and herb butter), and for dessert, i had the 'baba au rhum', first time i've had a baba! Ange had the mussels. I think it was the most expensive lunch we've had together.

Yesterday and today was work, last class for the 3rd and 1st years, but otherwise uninteresting.

Today was another physio session, the 12th, first in three weeks (ast one March 19th), as the therapist had flu. It's generally been okay, although a muscle had been hurting the other day, so he was easy on it - did some electro-stimulus, massage and acupuncture. It's not 100%, but we may be done soon.

After some gift and stationery shopping, i went into the city again Saturday. I wanted Mini-Market but it was closed until 6, so i went to I Feel Like A Crêpe once again. This time i got a glass of zinfandel, the 'pizza' crêpe (ham, cheese, tomato sauce, oregano), and a dessert crêpe, strawberries, whipped cream and ice cream. I like the conceit of the savoury crêpes having men's names, the sweet women's. Forget the men's, but dessert was Sévérine. The weather was very nice, the best in a long time - i barely needed my coat, and the streets were alive with people.

The movie i saw, again a part of Cinefranco, was J'aurais Voulu être Un Danseur, 'i had wanted to be a dancer', called Gone for a Dance in English, a time-jumping story of 4 generations of men enthralled by Gene Kelly dancing in the rain, to the exclusion even of love and family. It starts off in 2030, with a professor giving a lecture on suppressed memories, then jumps to a suicide in 1949, then a robbery in 1996, then the opening of a garage in 1973. It's rough on the women in their lives, though we do end up laughing as the men abandon their families. It's mostly comedy, but the moment when father and son meet was incredibly emotional.

When i got out, it was still light out, though close to sunset. I like that time of day, buildings sunlit on their sides, the lights of the street beginning to glow, driving home in twilight.

Friday was the final life drawing session for the term. I enjoyed it, certainly produced a lot.

After, i went home to watch Battlestar Galactica (finally returning), and chatted online with students until way too late.

Friday afternoon i went to see Leatherheads, which is okay, light fun. George Clooney played his charmingly smarmy character, Renée Zellweger played a smart-mouthed liberated reporter (it's set in the 1920s).

"I didn’t come here to get insulted."
"Oh no? Where do you usually go?"

Wednesday my physio got cancelled again. Boo!

Thursday i snuck out of school a touch early to see a movie part of Cinefranco in the ci