Robert Manners

Unutterably Banal

I really don't have anything to say today, but I don't like not saying anything for too long. There is this nonblogging epidemic afoot, where people aren't posting very regularly or are taking blog-breaks or are discontinuing their blogs altogether. A substantial chunk of the links in my Daily Reads column are dead or dormant. And I, like my mother and much of the rest of my family, feel compelled to fill in the silence with inane babbling.



Actually, I am working out something that I did want to talk about, but I'm having too much difficulty arranging my thoughts... one of the nice features of Blogger Pro is that you can mark something as a draft and store it away for future use. So I can jot down my thoughts now, and then when I have the afflatus to actually finish the article, it will be available to me no matter where I am. One of the difficulties of working from two different computers is that one doesn't always have all the same files on each one. I'll often email things to myself so that I can get to them from either computer, and every once in a while will copy all of my newer files onto disks and take them from one to the other, but in general it's difficult to keep track.



So while I'm waiting for my brain to kick in on the draft topic, I will take up space with a lot of drivelling frivoling nonsense.



I am so in love with Travis Fimmel right now. Just thought I'd let you know.



I am also quite in love with my new computer game, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. It is so cool! I was up late last night playing it, and was late to work this morning because I was playing it (searching the greenhouse and gardens complex for a sheaf of boomslang skin... I finished that level about half an hour after I was supposed to be at work, and I wasn't even dressed yet). The environments are so beautifully rendered, I could just spend the whole time wandering around the halls of Hogwarts Castle; the challenges are really challenging, but not difficult at all... you have to think, but you don't have to act fast (and since I am great at puzzles but my hand-eye coordination sucks, this is good); and in this game, unlike its predecessor or any other RPG computer games I've played, the characters' faces move, their eyebrows go up and down and their mouths open and close and their eyes blink. It's a little disturbing at first, as they look like ventriloquist's dummies (one of my many phobias), but it's really pretty cool once you get used to it.



The only drawback is that the rendering is a little much for my computer, so it takes a long time to load scenes and cut-screens and what-have-you. That, and the fact that it's so involving and interesting that I have a hard time stepping away from the game. But I'll finish it and/or get bored with it soon enough. I mean, I haven't touched my Sims in ages, and there was a time when I used to rush home from the office or kaffee-klatsches just so I could play (looking up links just now, I am reminded that both of these games are from the same company, Electronic Arts... hmmmm).



My other Great Love of the Moment is the Chicago soundtrack. I bought it a few weeks ago, on a lark, and rather enjoyed it. It seemed so much better-produced than the most recent B'way version I have (starring Bebe Neuwirth), more tuneful and lush. But then on Monday I went and saw the film, which was so unspeakably fabulous that I could barely believe it. I plan to see it again while it's still in the theatres and will be rooting for it at the Oscars. I've been listening to the soundtrack over and over since then, especially my favorite piece, "Roxie"... I liked the song to begin with, but when I saw it done on screen I was floored. That bit with the mirrors, and the walking on the chorus-boys' hands... WOW!



It's interesting how having a fabulous visual to imagine somehow makes the music seem richer and more interesting. I was terribly impressed with the film, and now every time I listen to the soundtrack I can relive that exciting camera-work and fabulous choreography in my mind's eye.



I was also amused, at the end of the film, to see avowals in the credits that the three principles, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Richard Gere and Renée Zellweger, did all their own singing and dancing... "Miss Zellweger's songs and dances performed by Renée Zellweger" and so on and so forth. As if we were actually sitting there reading the credits (so few people do that, myself being one of them) worried that someone had dubbed them and body-doubled them... I would have expected much better performances if they'd been dubbed and body-doubled, you know? Still, they all did fairly good jobs of the vocals and dancing, considering that none of them are known for their musical talents. Certainly better than I could have done.



Well, I guess I've yammered on long enough. I'm going to go back to that odd Italian website and browse for a while (I can't quite figure out what the purpose of the site is... there're lots of pictures, but my Italian isn't quite sophisticated enough to make much sense of the text)... or maybe I'll just go home (the office is eerily silent, the phone hasn't rung in hours) and play Harry Potter some more.



In parting, here is my favorite picture gleaned from the Travis Fimmel page of the Italian website... I'm not really into bondage, but there's something ever so compelling about a hot man incapactitated into submission: