It’s been a long time, I know. I’m not sure what happened, but I guess an increase in non-online activities (aka a social life!) resulted in a significant decrease in online activities (aka blogging). And yes, the non-online activities include work, leading to the use of “significant decrease” and other such language that can be classified as “science-talk” in everyday speech. Geeky, I know, but I like it. Anyways, what prompted this entry was the fact that (1) I miss blogging! and (2) there have been many blog-worthy events that I have just been itching to write about.

Books
First, I’ve “significantly” increased the frequency/number of books that I am reading. We have a mini-book club going on here (in the real world), and we actually held a book club meeting (which was very successful, and included eating Taco Bell during the discussion). The last book we read was The God of Small Things – my new favourite book. I’m not very good at expressing myself in words, but that’s partly why I enjoyed this novel so much. In this book everything held meaning: the way words were written (phonetically vs. the correct spelling), sentence structure, paragraphs…I loved it all. To me, it was a great piece of writing because it approached writing as something beyond “getting the message across”. It was art, it had depth.

The next book we read was “Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures”, by Vincent Lam (of TGH, in Toronto). This book was really hyped up in Toronto since it was written by a fellow member of the medical profession – I always hear people talking about it in elevators in the hospital and such places. Despite all the hype, I was pretty disappointed. Especially following “The God of Small Things”, this book had no chance to compete. Each chapter was a different story, however there was no cohesion, nothing came together in the end (Disappointment #1). Maybe there was an underlying theme that I missed completely, but other than a review of different aspects of the medical profession, I didn’t get much out of it. I was particularly disappointed in the ending (Disappointment #2). It didn’t feel like it had to be there, like there was a purpose. It didn’t conclude anything. Anyways, as I said I’m not very good at expressing myself, so I will stop my ranting here. There were a few good parts to the book, but overall it wouldn’t recommend it.

Book #3: “A History of Love”. Written by Nicole Krauss, the wife of the Jonathan Safran Foer (the author of “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” – another one of my favourite books!). I’m currently on page 10 (or something equally unimpressive) so I am in no position to comment on this book, but from what I’ve heard it should be better than the last.

Films

The advent of non-online activities has included an increase in the number of movies we have been going to watch. Okay, I have to admit that this also includes Hollywood-type movies (such as Knocked Up. It was pretty funny, although some parts were a little bit too “male-humour” oriented for me). The prompt for this blog entry was actually a movie I saw last night: Paris Je T’aime. I visited Paris with my family twelve years ago, so I don’t remember much other than visiting the Louvre and how expensive MacDonalds was. And the insane driving skills. And eating a baguette with cheese for lunch. Also, that we had to specifically request cheese on our pizza, or else it wouldn’t come with cheese. And the big crowd in front of Mona Lisa. And how the elevators were SO small. I’m guessing these are things that an 11 year old is more or less preoccupied with.

This film was great for so many reasons. Personally, I’m a big sap and I love movies about love and beauty and truth (a la Moulin Rouge / la Boheme) – films that leave you with a feeling that the world is not a horrible, selfish place and that things like love do exist. Cheese, I know. Some would call it inspirational. Okay I’ll start with the film itself. It was a compilation of short films by (I think..) 18 different directors. I’m guessing that they decided on a unifying theme of love, set in the city Paris, and then sent the directors on their own way, free to their own interpretation. This movie had depth. When it first began, I found myself wishing that they had instead focused on a few stories and then gave the viewer more detail about how the story continued. But as the movie went on, I came to really enjoy it. It was art, it was interpretation. Some directors made political or social statements in their little 5-10 minute clips, and it was effective. It was funny at parts, and tragic at others. It had character. The film ended by bringing together all the seperate, seemingly unrelated stories. Giving the viewer a sense of all that takes place to “create” the city. Finishing with the feeling that love and compassion do exist. Who knows if the whole “Paris” part really mattered – I think it could have taken place in any large, metropolitan city that is made up of so many fundamentally different people. But for this movie, it worked.