not-cheese-brained-mother

Today I met a mother I actually like. (see my entry: mothers, brains and cheese to understand the problem.)

When we first saw each other we both looked at the other completely astounded, and then started blurting exactly the same: „Your are fairheaded!… you are young!“ (and, jeez, you speak a decent language)

Golly, how I like people who walk-talk-look-think like me. 

me and professor Snape

Today K. was fussing around in this teenager-no-authority-mode which is really unnerving. So I got in my angry-god-mode and hissed at him: „, You want to fool me? What do you take me for, a stupid junior-high-teacher?“ (German: „… ein dummer Gymnasiallehrer“)… you know, I’m good at this relaxed-but-with-enough-cruelty-in-voice-stuff. 

It resulted in an amazing silence and then in happy grinning teenagers everywhere around: She just said stupid junior-high-teacher. 

Plan DX 17

Dinge, die ich in den nächsten 3 Jahren machen möchte und die eine ganz fiese Tendenz haben, einander auszuschließen

 schwarzer Gürtel in Taekwondo

2. Kind

Magisterarbeit

Doktorarbeit

mein Youth-movement gründen

Weltherrschaft  

Und das sind nicht die einzigen Pläne (das Richteramt anstreben, ein Buch veröffentlichen, das Konzept der Hochsteckfrisur perfektionieren etc.)… irgendwelche Koordinationsideen, die keinen time-turner involvieren wären sehr willkommen. 

„… Ich bin zurückgekehrt“, sagte er, „Ich habe mich intensiv mit mir selbst auseinandergesetzt.“

„Und?“

„Ich bin ein prima Kerl. Nur die Umstände, sie sind widrig, machen mich bitter und hastig.“

„Höre“, erwiderte ihm sein junger Vorgesetzter mit blaukalten Augen, „Die Mitglieder der Gilde sind niemals Opfer der Umstände. Sie formen die Umstände.“

 (Aus der Trilogie des Instituts, Part II: Die Gilde)

„Someone could have come along and eased the boy’s pain. But nobobdy did. Because nobody does.“

At the moment I am double-checking the grammar, logic etc. in my thesis according to Kalafudra’s corrections, the word-spell-check  and my own twisted mind as I want to send the next 50 pages to my professor. Usually I am in bed at such late night-time as Baby wakes me at sunrise… therefore, maybe it can be forgiven that I sat there and thought „Why is the word-spell-checker underlining verunglimpflichendes Lebens-und Charakterbild, this can’t be anything but perfectly alright „. … I can’t stop thinking about malakhov-pie. Or springrolls with hot-sweet chili sauce.  

1. Maat: Eisberg voraus! 

Kapitän: —- 

1. Maat: Eisberg voraus! 

Kapitän: —- 

*CRASH* 

1. Maat: Gehen wir jetzt unter? 

Kapitän: Nein, der Eisberg. 

mothers, brains and cheese

Alice Schwarzer  once wrote something about women’s brains getting all muddy after giving birth and women staying stupid for their whole life if they stay at home with their kid.I of course heartily disagree for my part but I really think that maybe she was right after all when I see, listen and talk to the other mothers at the playground. It is a real catastrophe. How can they all be that stupid? They talk about whole-wheat muffins and how the Braun kitchen aid would improve their lives and then suddenly without finishing their sentences, they start „da-da-da“ with their baby-kid as if they were learning the baby’s language and not the other way round. Brrr! I mean, they are all around 35,40 years old late-mothers, and of course they are very happy to finally have their kiddy-dream come true – but, after all, I do know very cool 40-agers, too. Why can’t some of them have kids?  Why I’m not indulging with the younger mothers?… well, the younger mothers sit together in dark-haired groups I don’t feel very welcome to as they speak languages I don’t understand and every now and then start whacking one of their 2 year old girls. Call it cultural difference but I don’t think it is very nice to beat such little kids. So, back to these 40-year old infant-brained mothers…  I sometimes think maybe they were that stupid before having kids and now talking to toddlers 24/7 does not really improve their brains, either. The fathers I get to know are all (well, most) of normal intelligence and some even cool to talk to, they are fun, they are interested in cool stuff, they even play cooler games with the kids.  They are also more interested in talking to me than the mothers, so far I had around 20 fathers asking me when we’ll come around again or to exchange phone-numbers and exactly 1 mother doing so…. Concerning people without kids I know about the same amount of cool women and men (slightly more women). But concerning people with kids – I know many nice men but very few women who seem even of average intelligence. Men somehow stay more the same, I guess. Maybe it really has to do with keeping on working and talking to people who already can read and write… But when I reached that conclusion I found myself confronted with the question: Do I seem like an imbecille-mother to other people, too? 

Another Country

See young Rupert Everett and young Colin Firth in one of the finest movies ever made!

The story is about Guy Benett (a character loosely based on Guy Burgess, a key figure of the Cambridge Spy ring) , an openly gay boy who attends Eton and is not willing to conform. He abandons his class, betrays his country and  becomes a spy for the Soviet Union. 

 

The story starts with the suicide of Martineau, an Eton student who got caught with another boy and facing expulsion  and shame eventually commits suicide.The prefects fear a scandal and do their best to cover it. Their hypocricy and class-conciousness becomes more and more clear and the power struggle between them never ceases. With a world-war going on and a scandal to cover they all have very little liking for openly gay Guy Benett and his communist friend Thommy Judd. 

The film mainly shows the public school system of the 30ies and how Guy Benett who desperately wants to be a god (which is superior in rank to a prefect) fits in – or rather does not. 

His best friend Thommy Judd is a communist with a sense of clever repartee; his lover James Harcourt is a boy from another house. Consequently Guy is always in trouble. See these wonderful buildings and gardens, see uniforms and decadent prefects and, most importantly, see Rupert Everett’s young unspoilt face and his boyish blond lover  (Cary Elwes at his sweetest), enjoy Colin Firth as Thommy Judd. Soundtrack is good, too. 

It is a very sweet love story, and also a good picture of repression and decadent classes, about internal power struggles and friendship… well, just go and see it. 

 

See Rupert Everett and Cary Elwes dating on a boat…  

 

 

unfortunately I only own the film on video-tape (but don’t own a TV)- if someone wants to borrow it, just ask. 

 

Announcement

This is the new „Culture“-project I’m starting on this blog. I am going to  introduce you, my blog-readers, to books, films, songs etc. which are barely known but deserve much better. Do give them a try, they are worth the effort! I’m also very much interested in your secret-favorites – don’t hesistate to post them here, I’ll have a look for sure. Starting with: Another Country. (Film) (see next posting)