An open thread where you can, at your weekend leisure, discuss whatever you like.
42 Responses to “Saturday Salon”
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I know this has been done already here but I’ve only just managed to get a copy of “Illinoise” (from a nice bloke named Gary Hunn at Revolver in Townsville - if you’re ever in the far north, they’re in an arcade off the Flinders Mall - give him some business), and I’ve got to say it out loud - it’s a masterpiece. Kate’s right about “Gacy”, but “Casimir Pulaski Day” is as moving as anything I’ve ever heard anywhere. I’m flummoxed by this sort of talent - where does it come from. Damn, it’s good.
From the sublime to the ridiculous, I also bought Brakes’ “Give Blood”. Jackhammer guitars, gurgled lyrics, 10 second songs (and not much over 2 minutes) - bloody tremendous fun.
Mmmm, talk about anything you want.
Politics blogging in Australia is dominated by blokes.
Please discuss.
Blogging may be (dunno really, though, never done a count). I suspect commenting hereabouts is running closer to 50/50.
Women’s blogs are largely dominated by women.
Darlene, if you’re looking some related reading, try this.
Two of LP’s favourite topics, together at last.
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops reviews Dylan doco No Direction Home
There are some passing instances of profanity and rough and crude language, so this is probably best for older adolescents and adults.
I dunno. After the dismay of last Sunday, the first day of the cricket season, ready to turn out in 7th grade, and I do a hamstring last night. Cursed I tell you! Cursed!
Anyone seen Serenity yet?
Kate has.
My friends went to see it Thursday night and report that nerds singing theme songs spontaneously while waiting for the cinema door to open and wearing t-shirts saying “Joss Whedon rocks my world” is an interesting experience. I’ve heard it’s brilliant though.
Keep far far away from the Tropical flavoured version of Pepsi. It is disgusting.
I don’t think Joss Whedon is anywhere near a ‘God’ as some people seem to think. I’ve watched Buffy, Angel and Firefly and they were nothing to write home about IMHO but even watching the trailer for Serenity? You would think they would at the LEAST try to ensure that the promo doesn’t have corny and wooden dialogue.
However, Joss has been giving press to a good show called Veronica Mars. The second season just has started in the US and we should be getting the series this summer.
All the posts are linked to this one so you can’t get to the comments on the others.
One post to rule them all!
You got it, EP. Having read Mark’s emails, I’ll opt for the banned status he’s threatened me with, and say farewell, folks.
Keep safe.
You can reach the other posts from the LP front page - but not the sidebar.
Never say die, Rob.
If you liked Toy Story you like Joss Whedon.
As far as I can tell Firefly is a Libertarian story - though I’ve only seen a few eps.
Buffy was just a girl in high school.
Angel however, had depth, but you couldn’t just watch one self-contained episode. You had to watch a series. Actually I’m doing Buffy a disfavour there - the latter series of Buffy had depth.
I’m not sure what Serenity will be like.
Anyhow as this is a largely QLD blog - get out there and support North Queensland.
I just hope the Wests Tigers can give it to you. For the New South Welshmen - don a NSW Blues mentality and support the Tigers.
Yes, the sidebar is definitely broken.
Oh easy for you to say Vee. I’m wearing my Parra jersey to the barbie tomorrow. We are contesting in the Jersey Flegg and Premier Grade GFs prior to first grade. Blue and Gold forever. Yes, I’m over it.
And btw, Buffy had depth from go to whoah. It did the high school to adult progression better than any other TV show. Though Angel really hit its stride in latter seasons. And it wasn’t just that Whedon was a good writer (he is) but that the gathered other good writers as well.
And Whedon fans will always remember Numfar and his dance of joy.
Plus Faith was teh hawtness.
I noticed that you can now buy all the key Faith eps of Buffy on one dvd - as you can with Fred eps from Angel etc - interesting marketing.
Rob
If you feel I overreacted I apologise and I ought not to use language like that, so I’m sorry.
1. Irony is sometimes hard to read in text. Given constant annoyance from the spam thing and various other problems, not to mention the Tim Lambert vs anti-Tim Lambert stuff last weekend it was hard to read your comment in any other way than literally, particularly when it came on top of claims you made previously (and as recently as Friday) that your comments were being moderated and that you were being singled out.
I don’t take kindly to being accused of manipulating discourse or being partial in allowing comments. You might recall that J F Beck made similar statements over the course of the week. All this has a cumulative effect, and irony or humour or otherwise, you should be aware of how you’re contributing to it.
2. I don’t quite know how to take your various somewhat qualified apologies except to accept them.
League - well the NRL grand final is a tough one… If you want to sit on the fence in a bizarre way try this (a friend of mine recommends this):
she’s barracking for Wests, but putting money on the Cowboys.
(Go figure?!)
Nice play, Mark. As a keen observa of irony, I can vouchsafe for Rob’s credentials in this instance. I suggest it’s all put down to a bad hair week.
I liked Fred though a good mate and I did have an perpetual argument re was Fred teh hawtness. I thought not but we did agree of Faith so the friendship wasn’t threatened. And Elizabeth Rohm who played Kate Lockley in Angel.
Natural progression of this thread is debating the best Dr Who companions after digressing through various versions of Star Trek. Babylon 5 is excluded because Ivanova wins hand down.
Well, restraint and judiciousness are not always my best suit at 3am.
On the Fred the Hotness debate, count me among the affirmative votes.
Best dr who companion - Leila.
Thanks again Mark, and sympathetic William.
BTW, a multi-disc set of the Val Lewton ‘horror’ films, including ‘I Walked With a Zombie’ - apparently the titles were pre-agreed) is available from 4 Oct.
I mean, geeeeetttt it!
Not that I’m spruiking.
I though you’d be on the Fred side, Mark.
And it is Leela. Geek credentials have taken a hit for you good sir.
And Leela is may favourite though recently been watching the repeats and I do like Nyssa. And then…then there is Peri
Nabs, how the hell do you post after a few drinks. Even with a spellcheck me speling has gong oot the window.
Mark,
I don’t take kindly to being accused of manipulating discourse or being partial in allowing comments. You might recall that J F Beck made similar statements over the course of the week.
Did I?
I admit that I dont make much sense at the best of times,but neither do you lot.
I tried to watch Firefly the other night but man, it blows chunks. Space Westerns are not a highly original idea and the whole thing reeks of a big adventure in space - my least favorite type of science fiction.
Shaun: forget about premier league. Easts are going back to back.
I was listening to “Seance” by The Church the other day, thinking what a good album it is (Fly, One Day, Electric Lash, It’s No Reason, Disappear? - just love those jingle-jangle guitars), but how it was marred by what I’ve come to know as “the 80’s drum sound” - that horrible “whack whack” that sounds like someone hitting a big cardboard box, which I’ve always (rightly or wrongly) ascribed to the first electronic drums that were such a feature (along with mullets & makeup) of mid-80’s music.
But I see it’s been remastered & rereleased in 2002 - anyone heard the new version and have the drums been corrected?
Can’t we all just get along?
The sidebar has been fixed. Russell Degnan identified the “Brian’s Latest Comments” plugin as a potential cause of the slow loading times, and kindly rewrote the code so that it should be faster now. I uploaded it and went out to a barbecue; when I came home there was a new version in my inbox which has now been installed.
I am also going to try running the Staticize Reloaded plugin, which will reduce the number of requests made to the mySQL database that stores the posts and comments and such. Hopefully that will result in faster loading times for everyone.
Keep your fingers crossed.
Finally, and this is related to the discussion above, we’ve been facing a wave of spam this last couple of weeks. Some of you might have noticed it slipping through the filters occasionally. In response, we’ve added some words to the spam filter, which has helped, but it’s also catching more legitimate comments, which sucks. I’ll probably try a few different anti-spam measures in the next few days, and if there are any hassles can you please contact me directly — Mark just passes them on to me, anyway!
Thanks for putting up with the recent hassles, and please don’t let the current technical difficulties interfere with the usual comradeship.
I guess you just have bad taste, Rex
Surely you at least like Battlestar?
“Brian‚Äôs Latest Comments” plugin is news to me. Whatever it is, I get moderated too quite often.
The grand final was a terrific game. I was rooting for the Cowboys, but the Tigers’ defence and steady yardage was always going to make the difference.
I hope they pick Scott Prince for the test team. Never should have dropped him for Thurston, amazing though he can be, for the Qld State of Origin team.
The ABC’s The National Interest site is sadly not up to date, but if you are near a radio tomorrow at 1pm it is well worth listening to.
Terry Lane has a terrific interview with Hugh Stretton about certain themes from his latest book Australia Fair. Stretton understands better than most the optimum balance between government and private enterprise, and the potential value of active intervention on the part of government.
I didn’t catch the name of the second interviewee but he too was excellent value. It was an academic who has recently joined UNSW and is a full bottle on what the Irish are doing to keep their nation in front of the pack economically.
Brian: the latest comments plugin is what provides the listing of recent comments over on the right-hand side. It doesn’t affect moderation.
I suspect the moderation problem is caused by some “normal” words sneaking into the spam words list. I’ll see if I can weed some of them out.
I’m old enough to remember the original Buffy movie. With Paul Reubens as the head bad guy. “KIll him a lot.’
Sheesh! You don’t have to be that old to remember the Buffy movie, Nabs!
Ps - sign me up for the Fred hotness fan club too…
An interesting phenomenon about anti-spam plugins is that they often give the big Roman thumbs-down to the word ‘Socialism’ because it includes the name of a popular and oft-spammed medicine.
It’s a frickin’ conspiracy I tell youse. Next thing you know we’ll all have inboxes full of emails spruiking ‘pr013tar14n d1c7a70r51p’, ‘R3v01u710n’ and ‘C0/\/\un15m’.
ATT: Phil Gomes. Was that you I ran into, almost litrally, in the bread aisle at Marrickville Woolies yestreday arvo? Last time I saw you at Grogblogging you had these funky glasses on. You without your glasses and me without my blood alcohol reading of that night, left me all at sea in the positive recognition stakes.
PS, yes it’s a little lame not to have established it at the time in person and instead to do so later via blog but whatareyagunnado. Nobody tell Daniel Donahoo!