Sweet Dreams

Yeah, I missed yesterday's entry. In my defence, I was sitting on the couch with Atti snuggled up to one side, and Benj lying across my lap. Then when I woke Benj up and got him to move, I fell asleep.

All was good until about 3am when Atti woke me up looking for some Num. So I'm lying there with him lying on top of me, when I realise that the TV is showing some programme about entity attacks. In the light of day I might have found it kind of amusing, or even been interested in it. Also, in the light of day, I would've been able to just turn it over. But instead I was stuck in the dark, flat on my back, a small person firmly attached to me. And I got scared. I was terrified to turn and look at the TV. In fact I was terrified to turn at all, in case some evil old hag was waiting to fuck me up.

When they started playing what they claimed were voice recordings of a man while an attack was happening, I had to shout to get Benj to turn it off for me. So now I have another thing to be scared of. That along with malicious aliens*, the Movie-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named, the invisible people who amuse Atti so and seem to be standing just behind me, and Gunther von Hagens.

* Don't wish to bloviate, but I once told Benj of my fear of opening the toilet door after flushing, in case there was an alien standing there waiting for me. In order to allay my fear, my lovely husband just said, "Don't be silly. If an alien wanted to get you, and you were on the toilet, he'd just open the door and come in." Fucker.

Chim Chim Cheree

So I saw an advert on TV for Blood Diamond. Ages ago I saw the trailer while we were at the movies and had decided not to go watch it, seeing as it looked like a big pile of crap. After seeing the TV ad & looking into it further through my friend YouTube, the big pile of crap opinion has been strongly reinforced. But I've also decided that I'll probably want to see it.

Yup, I'm willing to sit through 2 hours of excruciating, nonsensical bullshit just so I can watch as Leonardo DiCaprio joins the ranks of actors who have tried (and failed) to produce a credible South African accent.



Although, to be fair to Leo, he's nowhere near as bad as Nicole Kidman was in The Interpreter. When I watched that movie, I had no idea what the story was about, so spent the first 20 minutes thinking Nicole was trying to sound like she was from Italy, not Zimbabwe. (Sorry, I mean Matobo, that completely made up African country that bears no resemblance to Zimbabwe at all, just as its despised tyrannical leader, who totally gets pwned by Nicole, is in no way similar to Mugabe).



Forgive me while I bloviate, but I think that the worst thing about watching such linguistic cockery is that you can just tell that the actor in question thinks that they're doing Just Fine.

I understand that some people just don't have an ear for accents. I live with one. So I get why people are spewing mangled bollocks all over movie sets. What I don't get, however, is why nobody else tells them how bad they are. Don't these people have dialect coaches? And don't these dialect coaches ever say, "Sorry, Nic, you're just shite. There's nothing I can do for you'? Failing that, how come the directors, camera crew, cast members, editors and catering staff apparently never feel that they're able to speak up and tell the star it's just not working?

But no, instead of being gently corrected (which could, in fact, improve their acting abilities), actors all over the world are left marvelling at their own leet accent skillz.

I hate bad accents. I hate, hate, hate them. I'm of the belief that, if a certain actor can't produce one to a reasonably realistic standard, then the director should either a) get a different actor in to play that part, or b) tell the actor not to bother with the accent at all.*

And this applies to even good actors. Those who are at least adequately skilled in other areas of performance aren't necessarily also able to put on a convincing accent. Allow me to demonstrate:

I actually wanted to put two other people in that list, but I couldn't think of anything postive to say about them.

An annoying Dick playing an irritating mockney wanker.

What the fuck? I mean, seriously, What. The. Fuck?

Intensely bad Australian accents abound on Lost, but Emilie de Ravin is deserving of unbridled scorn because she is actually an Australian. She's from fucking Mount Eliza.

I think I'm either going to start a charity to provide dialect coaches to needy thespians, or lobby for legislation banning dodgy accents. I'd be doing the world a favour.

*Or c) indulge your actor, then post-production get in another actor to dub over the first's monumentally terrible dialogue.

In Which Samantha Is Pissed Off

This is such fucking bullshit. Fate has decreed that not only is it going to piss me off, but it's then going to rub coarse salty salt into my gaping axe-wound. Fuck you fate. And fuck you Shane.

Last year, when Benj and I were moving up here, it happened that we'd be passing by Sydney on the same day that Muse was playing there. Muse being on my (rather short) list of bands I'd really, really like to see live, I wanted to go. But we'd decided to drive up to Lismore the inland route, so it turned out we wouldn't be spending the night in Sydney. And we probably couldn't really afford it at that time. And it turned out for the best because I was actually in the early stages of incubating The Tadpole.

So, I recently find out that Muse is touring again. Brisbane being only a 3 hour drive, I quickly envisaged a lovely night out followed by a sleep in a lovely hotel, followed by a lovely visit to Ikea. But no. Apparently, even though the other shows are all-ages events, the Brisbane one is not. But it's not 18+, either. It's open only to people above the age of 6. Yep, six years old.

What the fuck? When is 6 ever an arbitrary cut-off for anything else? Other than, perhaps, school attendance. And, thinking about it, probably for the free tickets to events that you get as an infant. Is that it, I wonder? Perhaps the Brisbane venue allows children under 6 free admission and Muse are a big fat bunch of tight cuntwads. Who knows?

All I know is that I don't get to see Muse again. But Shane does. Shane, a man who (I have on very good authority) wore a dress to Kryal Castle recently. A man who, I'm sure, will very much enjoy the Musey goodness and come back to bloviate about how great the experience was. Shane, I hope that the acoustics are terrible, you get stuck next to drunken bogans with some kind of plastic trumpet, and when you go to the bathroom a huge, tattooed Maori man called Crusher pisses on your shoes.

The Challenge

So Benj and I are sad, lame bastards. To save me from the need to bloviate, the summary is here. Get set to read a whole lot of crap.

It's supposed to be an entry each every day, but I've been let off the hook for yesterday due to a particularly needy little boy. That said, I have to make up for it today by posting two entries.

In a completely unrelated note, today I heard the following: "Uranus is a giant gas planet." I would've made a great teenaged boy.

Ten Points from Gryffindor

Last December I cut my hair.

I've done this quite a few times before and it usually works out okay. But this time I decided to cut a fringe.

It sucked balls.

So I cut it shorter.

If balls had balls, the shorter fringe would have sucked those balls' balls.

Fast forward to August, almost a full 8 months later, and my fringe has almost grown long enough to be tucked fully behind my ears. Almost. For the sake of my sanity, I decided something had to be done. So I cut my hair shorter and dyed it black.

Without the poxy growing-out fringe this would look fine.

With the poxy growing-out fringe?

Just call me Severus.