I just saw the bombastic video for “Vida La Vida” by Coldplay and must say I am a bit disappointed, because I like the song a great deal and thought it deserved better. In fact, for the past month or so I have been constructing my own video for the song in my head (something I do quite often for a song I really love) and think, well, my version would have been miles better, even if it might have cost a touch more.
Music videos are tricky things. We live in a subtle age, in which art which is subtle seems to be the most valued. How this parses out in music videos is that it is generally uncool to simply represent the exact content of the words, especially in real time with the action immediately mirroring the last sung words (something the Chris Martin does in the new video quite often). Nevertheless, sometimes I think direct representations of some of the words in a song can be quite effective, particularly if these are nested in a story the video is telling.
First, for reference, here are the lyrics to “Viva La Vida:”
___________________
I used to rule the world
Seas would rise when I gave the word
Now in the morning I sleep alone
Sweep the streets I used to own
I used to roll the dice
Feel the fear in my enemy’s eyes
Listen as the crowd would sing:
“Now the old king is dead! Long live the king!”
One minute I held the key
Next the walls were closed on me
And I discovered that my castles stand
Upon pillars of salt, pillars of sand
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can not explain
Once you go there was never, never an honest word
That was when I ruled the world
It was the wicked and wild wind
Blew down the doors to let me in.
Shattered windows and the sound of drums
People could not believe what I’d become
Revolutionaries Wait
For my head on a silver plate
Just a puppet on a lonely string
Oh who would ever want to be king?
I hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can not explain
I know Saint Peter won’t call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world
(Ooooh Oooh Oooh)
Hear Jerusalem bells are ringing
Roman Cavalry choirs are singing
Be my mirror my sword and shield
My missionaries in a foreign field
For some reason I can’t explain
I know Saint Peter will call my name
Never an honest word
But that was when I ruled the world
______________
First, in a nod to the end of the video for “Yellow” (a simply amazing video made more or less accidently) I would begin by having a blazing sun rising out of the sea, and then the camera would pan to the left during the opening music. The scene would be a hot Mediterranean morning with a hazy blue sea, and a dusty, sandy shoreline in the foreground. The shot would pan to a castle on the very edge of a cliff top, surrounded by a dusty, crowded city, but this would be seen from the distance. The camera would circle down to a hovel and shoot Martin in the hovel from the back, in silhouette against the sea, on a balcony, beginning to sing.
I am not sure of the sequence of these flashbacks but I would like these ones included.
Martin in a home with a regal interior with a Mediterranean (Greek, Turkish, or something like) woman. Some initial “in-loveness” scenes might be included, but there would need to be one scene of her trying to stop him from leaving as he dresses and arms himself, obviously on his way to start a revolution.
Somewhere we need a scene of the woman leaving, intercut with Martin becoming very severe and hard.
Then miscellaneous revolutionary, storming the castle scenes with Martin leading soldiers could be scene. Some of the other band mates can be his military cohorts. This might be followed by snippets of his reign of iron.
To depict his reign unraveling, a scene of him being chased through the castle by the band mates as former fellow soldiers, now revolutionaries would end with him being forced to and then off a precipice…you guessed it, into the sea. This could all happen during the Oooh, oooh, ooooh’s perhaps.
The flashback scenes would all be intercut with Martin as a humble cobbler, or whatever he is, wandering around the little hamlet where he lives, generally with obvious relief and joy on his face. Chris Marin can do some of his goofy dancing and gesturing here, but in a tasteful way. These sequences might also have a more serious scene where Martin walks sadly by a dusty church. At this point, perhaps the camera could zoom in on the face of a silent priest with piercing eyes who watches him as he walks by.
The video would end with the woman passing through the village (perhaps in a small entourage) and secretly recognizing him and staring at him and beginning to smile and him returning her gaze with serious/wistful/happy face. Then it would be back to the smile of the woman. You can’t go wrong ending a video with the smile of a beautiful woman. Perhaps she could be in front of the sea with the sun setting behind her (the castle and and city and village could all be on a narrow peninsula so it would make sense that the sun could rise and set in the same place) and we could pan out to the sun in a similar fashion to the way we began.
Well, that is what has been taking up some of my thought processes during my drives this month. The picture below taken in Chicago does not illustrate my video, but also reminded me of this song.
Category Archives: Pure Silliness
We Are Not Pregnant, Part Deux
In the aforementioned conversation about sympathetic male pregnancy, or a similar one at another time, I cannot precisely remember, I came up with an idea, which my friend, H, promised to illustrate. Here, just in time to supplement yesterday’s post, is H’s fine handiwork. Make sure you look at them in order. There is this and then this.
Brilliant. Thanks, H, for that lovely execution.
P.S. Here is the Dassler edit of that last drawing. And remember, gents, if you ever find yourself at the business end of that particular scalpel, don’t try to be macho or cheap out and think you can recover without the aid a of jock (or “athletic supporter,” if you will, which is a funny name isn’t it, because it rather sounds like that would be a member of the booster club or something), because you can’t, and it ain’t pretty. Or so I’ve heard. There’s a reason God let the women have the babies, because we’re pretty much wusses when it comes to pain. Which reminds me of best practical joke that I thought of but didn’t execute. When, er, shall we say, someone close to me had this procedure done, I really wanted to stop by Walmart and bring him a cap gun so that, in the short run, at least he would have something he could get up, and then also he could get used to, you know, only shooting blanks. I did tell about this intended gift, but somehow he didn’t think it very funny.
Apologies for that PG-13 moment on an otherwise PG blog.
t(ie)pology
This page will be updated in batches as I wear them and think to take the pictures. It may take some time (it is a big collection). If the name is blank, it means I have not as yet thought up one. Here, in no particular order, is the Dassler t(ie)pology. Click on the thumnails if you prefer a bigger image.
There is a lot of polyester here, but I like how they look and they are low maintenance. You have to be more gentle with silk ties to get stuff off of them. I do like the feel of the silk though. Oh, and just so you know, just because I do pay a fair amount attention to my tie choices and matching them with shirts, I still must insist that, no, I do not wear outfits.
Oh, and tie tying style? Full Windsor all the way, baby! Love that symmetry. If you are worried about fat knots, keep pulling down as you tie it. As far as I’m concerned, you only need another knot if you are tying a skinny leather tie from the eighties, any skinny tie from the eighties, for that matter.
Cohort I
Name: Razzle Dazzle I
Brand: n/a
Origin: thrift store
Material: polyester
Comment: OK, so its a bit flashy, I know, but with the equally bold shirt, I can manage to pull it off.
Name:
Brand: 615 Collection
Origin: thrift store
Material: polyester
Comment: I really feel bad for this tie, as I do not think it has ever gotten commented upon. Perhaps it is because it is rather somber and serious. But it has a lovely shade of red in it and shiny, navy blue. Perhaps I need to do better by it and wear a shirt that makes its strengths shine.
Name: Red Paisley
Brand: n/a
Origin: gift / thrift store
Material: Ancient Madder, All Silk
Comment: Ah, this was one of my favorites at one point. Alas, it has begun to fray on one side, so it does not get nearly the circulation it deserves anymore. And this is not a fantastic pic of it.
Name: The All-time Favorite / Interview Tie
Brand: Regalon (Wash and Wear)
Origin: gift / thrift store
Material: 100% Polyester
Comment: Oh, I do love this tie, its color and pattern. It matches a lot of the colors I like i.e. the family of brown, which I have been pretty much inhabiting over the past 5 years or so. Oh, and gotta love a wash and wear tie.
Name:
Brand: n/a
Origin: thrift store
Material: 65% Acetate, 35% Rayon (yes, I think that makes it 100 % Polyester as well)
Comment: The patterns on this ties are intricate, yet subtle. You only catch them in good light. These polyester ties are amazingly textured. Not sure how they do that, but I like it
Name: The Power Tie, Slumming with Hipsters
Brand: Jones New York
Origin: thrift store
Material: 100% Silk
Comment: OK, so this tie is a bit out of place here, but the red is of deep and melancholy enough quality and it has a very nice slate stripe, so I let it in. It is amazing the brand names you can buy at a thrift store
Name: Midnight with Chagall Blue
Brand:
Origin: thrift store
Material: n/a but it seems like Polyester again
Comment: OK, so the name is a bit pretentious, but that is what it looks like. This picture doesn’t do it justice.
Name: The New Regalon
Brand: Regalon
Origin: thrift store
Material: 100% Polyester
Comment: This, along with “The Power Tie, Slumming with the Hipsters,” were my most recent purchases. Now I need to get a shirt to do it justice.
Name: Nerve Cells with Stained Nuclei
Brand: n/a
Origin: Gift from Lydia
Material: 100% Polyester
Comment: Lydia was my direct supervisor at SIUE and a bit of a mother to me for a while. This tie is polyester, but it feels like silk
Name: Just Making the Cut
Brand: Polo by Ralph Lauren
Origin: thrift store
Material: Polyester
Comment: I gotta tell you, I am rather ambivalent about this tie, but the burgundy and green in it goes well with a shirt and my only summer suit coat that fits just now.
Tea, Glorious Tea!
See, now when I suggest a cup of tea after, say, house church or a P.L.A.T.E.S(S) lunch or….OK, pretty much after anything…it will be perceived as an imminently healthy suggestion. Of course the article doesn’t address the adverse effects that the sugar and milk might have in a cup of tea the way I like it. Oh, and do you have a favorite tea? Favorite tea ritual?
My favorite tea is straight up black (orange pekoe and cut black) tea with milk and sugar, and unless you are in India or Pakistan, the milk should be evaporated milk or half in half to get the real flavor. Oh, and make the tea strong. I also like Moroccan Mint with sugar. Green tea with honey is nice as well. For a change up, I like a cup of Lapsang Souchong, which Jesse says is like drinking a campfire. Plus, it is fun to pronounce. And, though, I do not consider herbal teas to be be tea, a cup of Sweet Dreams takes me, very pleasantly, right back to Cedar Campus where I first drank it.
Favorite tea ritual? Well, I do enjoy a cup of tea on my own on a quiet morning or in the car on the way to work, but the most delightful times are with others. In high school, we would walk to the local village to have tea on a ricketty balcony overlooking a massive valley in the foothills of the Himalayas. Now, a nice shared cup after house church or on a Sunday evening is equally lovely. And then there was (note the past tense) tea time with Jesse, where one or the other of us would make the tea and either sit on the balcony and talk or sit laptop to laptop and work (OK, its probably more often simply playing) and talk. That was until he up and moved away 
Processional
Last night, in a delightful, post-house church, coffee shop gathering, sitting outside in the lovely night, we were playing “Would You Rather,” a game involving someone asking a question such as “Needing to raise money, say, for seminary for example, would you rather spend a year working in the Reptile House at the St. Louis Zoo, cleaning cages, moving reptiles etc. or spend a year constantly making funnel cakes as a carnival worker?” The person who asked the question would then have to go around and guess how each person would answer. Pretty cool game.
Here are a selection of some of the other questions. Sorry, I cannot remember them all just now.
“Would you rather spend a month long vacaation in Italy or Brazil?”
“Would you rather have two children or five?”
“Would you rather take an art class or literature class (either studying each genre or practising it)?”
“Would you rather lose your sight or your hearing for the rest of your life?”
“Would you rather be married in a stone church or outside?”
This final question elicited some wedding ceremony related discussion, ranging from unity candle symbolism (Yes, Dawn, I mentioned my poo poo-ing the floating unity candle 
to what hymn/chorus/song folks might want to include in their wedding ceremonies.
Well, selecting music for my morning commute reminded me of the song I want for a processional…for the guys that is. You gotta love a pair of nationalistic, nerdy looking, Scottish, identical twins who love the blues, sing in their own accents, and engage in religious reflection from time to time.
Oh…funnel cake, Italy, five, literature, lose my sight (though I later changed it to hearing), and stone church (though I wouldn’t be picky).
Long Delayed
Here are two events which I fully intended to blog about, but somehow never managed to get to.
Running with the Devil
Today I managed to get back to running after nearly a two week hiatus. It was quite difficult, as usual, but the endorphins sure do feel good now. I think I burned out for a couple of weeks because: a) I always do after a few days/weeks/months of good effort, and b) I think I was rather pushing myself pretty hard before a 5k I did with friends on March 24th.
I arrived at the 5k site in Tower Grove park, which was not quite as flat as I remembered whilst driving through it (memory of the hills on a route is so subjective depending on whether you are driving a car, riding a bike, or running), to discover the number that I had been assigned was….Well, you can see it in the picture below. I said to the woman rather lightly that that was a rather inauspicious number. She asked if I wanted a different one, but I said that it wasn’t a problem and that I would go ahead and wear the Mark-o-the-Beast.
Now, if you are a brother or a close friend, you may be sniggering right about now because you remember my phobia when I was growing up that I was predestined to grow up be the Anti-Christ and my obessive fear of the number “6.” Oh, go ahead and laugh. It’s funny. Not so much when I was kid though. You can’t be too careful what sort of movies you let your kids see. A combination of obsessive compulsive tendencies (yeah, ask me about it) combined with, I am sure, a well-meant, but terrifying viewing, of The Thief in the Night at boarding school, combined with perhaps some genuine spiritual oppression, and, well, you have one fearful child. But, seriously, if you ever see me amassing large amounts of political power, I think you know what you should do.
Getting back to the race though, evidently the number didn’t help my manners. Here’s me running off-course, past some nice ladies who were walking the course. What can I say, the Devil made me do it. In the background you can just see Claire, of Reason’s Why fame, and to the left Joel Chappeau and Dave Lim.
Dave was not running officially but came to spur us on to love and good works. As for the race, well, having gone out a bit too fast, I had to walk for about twenty yards. Still, I managed what was for me a very respectable time of 29 minutes flat. Yeah, and then dehydration and burnout, but still it was worth it. And while I was gasping across the finish line, the woman who had registered me said:
“And the Devil finishes!”
Nice.
Not by Bread Alone
So, first a little background. On Sunday afternoons, oh about ever other week, a group of us from church gather for a potluck. Our group is called The Flying P.L.A.T.E.S(S) People Living Apart Together Eating Something (Sundays). I know, I know, but just go with it, OK? Actually, it is a wonderful time where we have good food and good conversations, which are interrupted with an official ice-breaker type question for everyone to answer, so that people will talk to one another. Go figure. Actually, the questions are fun and instructive too.
At any rate, I send out an Evite for each event and sometimes come up with the theme. The theme for April 1st was a barbecue, and since the meat was being provided, people were to bring sides, salads, desserts, etc. etc. Well, the aforementioned day arrived, and I hurriedly got to the house where we were eating and lit the fire and got things going, running in and out of the house like some type of Martha, of Bethany or Stewart fame, it doesn’t matter. And people kept showing up with bread. And, I, totally obllivious, kept having them put it on the table. People were amused that everyone had brought bread and joked about it a bit. I did too (ha, ha) but inwardly was getting rather nervous at our carb-loaded and boring lunch. Here is the pile pointed out by none other than the author of Flakjammit.
Now, you think I would have realized. But, no. I ran in and out, outwardly laughing, inwardly getting a little flustered, whilst the schemers sat outside enjoying the lovely day and their devious little plan.
In my prayer, I even humorously thanked God for all the bread and then reminded myself to be thankful for all our blessings in any case. It was not until just as everyone lined up to eat and I stood host-and-Martha-like at the end of the table that they revealed their prank. Honestly, it took them telling me a couple of times to understand what had just happened, as folks went out to get their real dishes.
Nicely done.
And, then, if that were not enough, they knew just how to push my buttons further. I asked for ideas for a question from the table and some suggested, “Let’s go around and each tell what is our favorite body part is on the opposite sex.” And true to form, just as those who know my prudish and dictator-like (benign not malignant) tendencies had predicted, I interjected something like, “No, I don’t think we should do that one.” Joke part two. I heard that in the planning stages for the ruse, at a party the night before, there were some even spicier suggestions than this. But I will leave that to the co-conspirators to mention in their comments if they wish.
Groan. I am gullible. And here I thought I was so aware and sophisticated.
red
handed ::: headed (well, kind of)
Addendum
Upon seeing one of my latest pictures in Catapult, my boss insists that he sees a ram in the rock behind it, adding significance to the paschal theme of the picture. I am not seeing a ram, maybe a donkey or a horse or big horn sheep, kind of, but not a ram. Do you see anything? Because if you do, I am thinking dollar signs.
Other co-workers, too, sort of saw the ram, while one accused me of placing the leaf for dramatic effect. Ah, the temerity! I am hurt. If truth be known, though, I am so NOT beyond doing that, but this one was au naturale.
Mmm…Jelabis!
Sadly, the need to pay bribes is rampant in all of the Indian sub-continent, in both India and Pakistan. I am not entirely sure why. Low salaries are probably a major reason, but I suspect that there are also other underlying cultural reasons for it, ala Darrow Miller’s analysis. Grind your teeth, if you must (you know who ya’ll are .
No, the point of this post was not to begin a heady debate, though that of course is not precluded, as our little blog community does a better than average job of both going deep and keeping it civil. No, this post is to celebrate the fact that at least the next time you are getting shaken down in India, it may indeed be a more pleasant experience. Well, in Gujarat at least.
And, also, to help solve one of the problems mentioned in the article, the officers may want to lay off the jalebis and chai. OK, not the the chai. That would be cruel and unusual.
It Occurred to Me Whilst Driving Home…
…that I am going to have to recast my relationship with my camera. If he is Caspian, then no longer will the metaphor of spouse, permiscuous or otherwise, really work. I don’t really want to be the Trumpkin to his Caspian, but I could stand to be a Drinian, a best friend who helps navigate Caspian’s ship to distant lands and far off seas to search for wonder. For those interested in the next Narnia movie, you may be please to know that Peter Dinklage of The Station Agent fame has signed on to play Trumpkin. This is cool, even if I think they should not have made Prince Caspian and just gone onto The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
And, now, my first picture with the camera is going to have to be completely reworked. I was going to do either an American Gothic sort of pose when Lucy came or some nonsense involving dressing up and a formal pose. Now it will have to be something completely different. I know you wait with baited breath.
So, does anyone else spend as much time planning entries for their blog. I don’t actually do concerted planning, but occassionally ideas occur to me and I will spend a fair amount of mental energy fleshing them out. And in at least one case, the thing that was supposed to happen for a blog entry to work never did. I and I was very glad. I was just waiting for the St. Louis Cardinals to crash out of the postseason, and then do a blog entry called “And the cardinal hits the window,” which is taken from Sufjan’s Steven’s Casimir Pulaski Day.
