I have been immersed in all things Islam lately. Well, literarally, anyway. I just finished reading Naguib Mahfouz's Palace Walk, the first book in the Cairo Trilogy. Reading this book sent me into culture shock, just sitting on my couch. I got so sucked into the story, the characters, and the strangeness of the traditional Islamic culture, that I would look up and forget that I was allowed to leave the house, despite being a woman.

Palace Walk was written in 1956, and maybe it's just the translation, but the formality of the prose really contributes to the sense of antiquity, of stepping backward into another world, one I could not imagine being part of. It made me wonder, over and over, whether life in places like Iran, or Afghanistan, is still as stifled, as repressive, as the life depicted by Mahfouz in Cairo at the turn of the century.

To follow up on my foray into Islamic studies, I started Reading Lolita in Tehran, by Azar Nafisi. I've been looking foward to reading this book for months, and thus far, it's living up to all my expectations. Nafisi relates what is was like living in Iran during the revolution, contextualizing her memories in her story about a clandestine reading group she led in the early 1990s. It's fascinating.

All I ever hear about Islam, though, are these stories about fundamentalism, about its repressive side, its traditional side. I want a broader picture. I want to see the side that would make a Western woman, someone I've known since childhood, convert. I want to see the good things. I'm sure they exist.

Why is this what election campaigns are all about? Why the the Bush administration the biggest lyingest liars in the history of liars? Why isn't everyone as terrified of them as I am? Why hasn't Bush been impeached? What is wrong with this country!?!?!?

I love this picture. I love the idea of little old ladies as "hellraisers." Yeah!

Making the world safe for democracy...

I just watched A Decade Under the Influence, a documentary about the cinematic revolutions of the 1970s. Aside from capturing a very exciting period in film history, in a decidedly non-stuffy boring documentary way, it made me think about a similar period in more recent film history: the "independent revolution" of the early 90s.

There was the same realization, catalyzed by one film ("Easy Rider" in the 70s, "Pulp Fiction" in the 90s), that the big studio system was failing, unable to produce movies people wanted to see. There was suddenly something new and different and fresh, and thus are revoutions born.

However, revolutions also die. After the mind-opening films of the 70s came "Weekend at Bernie's" and "The Big Chill." After Richard Linklater and Tarantino came "Titanic."

My question: are we going to come soon upon another revolution in filmmaking? Or did the big studios finally co-opt revolutionary cinema when Disney bought Miramax and Fox opened their own "independent" imprint? Can we reclaim the real meaning of independent, instead of mistakenly linking it to anything that doesn't star Kate and Ashley Olsen?

Whatever. I'm still excited for "Harry Potter." Whoot whoot!

Mmm. Stepford Wives and tuna casserole last night. What more could a girl ask for? Since hearing about the soon-to-be-released Stepford Wives remake, I've become obsessed with the film, so we had a little screening last night.

The first thing I thought was how much it reminded me of Rosemary's Baby. It has the same themes: paranoia, the war between the sexes, and a husband who has (inexplicably) turned against his wife for his own selfish reasons. Well, duh. They are both based on novels by Ira Levin.

A stellar film, and I have a new cinematic hero: Paula Prentiss, who plays the feisty best friend, Bobby. Not only is she super saucy, she's fashionable to boot (in a hot, hot pants kind of way). How can you not admire a character who says, "Two things I always carry with me: Tampax and Ring Dings." Awww yeah.

So. I'm officially gainfully employed. After a year and a half, I finally got the job I moved to this weather-challenged city to find. I will start my new position as Editorial Assistant for Pearson Custom Publishing in 3 days. I am simulateously thrilled and terrified. I had a panic attack about twenty minutes after accepting the job.

My whole life is going to change. Admittedly, this is what I have been praying for for the past few weeks. Things at the Bella Luna have become...um...a bit unbearable. But I've never been so good with change. And the very structure of my life will be entirely different. The people I see, the places I inhabit, the times I wake up and go to bed, the nights I go out and don't go out (and I'm sure I will be going out much less frequently, which is probably a good thing). Everything will change.

In other news, California was spectacular. I am now tan. My brother's graduation was amusing and entertaining. Seeing my family was interesting, as always (we are all crazy). The drive up the coast was stunning, making me ponder again and again why I'm in Massachusetts.

The real killer, though, was being in San Francisco again. I probably had more fun in the day we spent there last week than I did in all the countless weekends I spent there in the past. I fell in love with San Francisco all over again, and actually accepted the possibility that I might, just might, want to move back there someday. If only for Amoeba Records...

What I'm reading: Rides of the Midway by Lee Durkee, On Love by Alain de Botton, Waiting: the True Confessions of a Waitress by Debra Ginsberg.

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.

Against my will, the job search appears to have been restarted. I have an interview on Friday morning. Suddenly, I am forced to start considering all these factors again, these things I decided I didn't want to consider anymore: money, responsibility, the point at which I have to grow up and decide that having fun can't be the predominant element of my career.

I just want to get out of Boston for awhile. May 14 can't come soon enough.

Things have been super hectic, and I haven't had time to sit down, much less think of anything interesting to say. I hate to use this site to give updates about my boring life, but I feel the need to write something, and I don't have time to come up with something interesting. I'm still not reading the news...

My cousin has been in town for a week, and we've been having super fun. I suppose it's not that crazy that we get along so well, and are so much alike, seeing as we've known each other for 20 years. She's like my sister.

We went to Montreal this weekend. It sounds stupid, but I didn't expect it to feel so foreign. Montreal was very...strange. I was instantly obsessed with the frenchness, and wanted to move there the minute we drove across the border and saw signs that said "Bienvenue a Quebec." Yes, I'm a ridiculous francophile, especially regarding la langue. I loved it. Too bad I could barely speak it. Everytime we went somewhere, I would said "Bonjour, un cafe s'il vous plait." Then they would say something to me in very fast, unintelligible French, and I would get a blank, pained look on my face. Then they would smile, and say, "ahh, English." Yes, dammit. English.

We decided to spend our one night in Montreal on a Rue St. Denis pub crawl. The bars were very strange. When I have more time, I will write a more detailed account of the Official Montreal Pub Crawl. But I'll leave you with this tidbit: we ended the night in a hooker bar, where we watched a 25-year-old woman leave with an 80-year-old man, who had a frightening "I'm going to get laid" grin on his face. Ewww.

I'm going to California next week, and buddha knows I need the freakin' vacation. Screw Boston.

What I'm reading: Nalda Said by Stuart David. The Uses of Literature by Italo Calvino. Found Magazine.

Bow Wow Wow are touring this summer. Could things get any better?

The only writing I've been doing lately is in my journal. Maybe I've been reading too much Anais Nin.

It's 80 degrees in Boston today. I can't even begin to express how wonderful this is.

Dancing at the MW tonight. Could things be any better? I guess I only feel this way because I haven't been reading the news lately.

An interesting twist.

Alright, record job growth is a good thing. Employment statistics, though, always seem so oddly calculated, and I often wonder what statements like "308,000 jobs created in March" mean. If the vast majority of those jobs created are low-paying jobs in retail, new job creation means crap to me. If the unemployment rate drops because people stop actively seeking work, well, that also means crap to me.

See, technically, I am gainfully employed. I work an average of 33 hours a week--full time. I bring home a regular (albeit wimpy) paycheck. And despite monthly struggles to pay rent, I actually live above the poverty line. But I didn't move to Boston intending to be a waitress. This isn't a career. I don't feel gainfully employed. In fact, I have spent the past year looking for a job, and only recently decided that it was too demoralizing to continue.

There are too many people in my position. People with years of education, people who have had careers, people with families to feed and clothe and shelter and whatnot. You can't take a job making minimum wage and expect to successfully support your family. Sometimes you can't even expect to successfully support yourself. Yet, taking the minimum wage job that doesn't even feel like a job automatically increases the number of gainfully employed citizens in the statistical ranks, and decreases the unemployment rate.

So I was curious, reading about these 308,000 new jobs, what exactly those jobs entailed. This website answered that question quite well. And while retail-oriented service jobs were not the vast majority of new jobs created, I am still feeling bewildered and frustrated by how these statistics are created and manipulated in the electoral political process.

Sigh. At least I live above the poverty line.

Hm. So, can I have her job? I think this would be my dream come true...

Well this is awfully exciting, or at least it will be at noon today. Or at least it might be awfully exciting. I heart Al Franken, so at least there's that.

I am too ridiculously tired this morning. But--wait! There were no 6.30 am jackhammers!!! Jesus obviously loves me.

This is pretty interesting. The explication can feel a little long-winded if you're already well-versed in the viscissitudes of political opinion. But it's cool nonetheless.

Apparently, I fall pretty far to the liberal-economic and libertarian-social policy side of things. Not surprising at all.

If this kind of thing were happening in the U.S., I might be more convinced that we were doing something significant to fight terrorism. I doubt that the reason we're not seeing these kinds of arrests is the absence of U.S.-based terrorists. We are focusing our fight on "terror" internationally, rather than trying to protect ourselves at home.

We are doing nothing right.

I can't decide whether Bush's apparent sense of humour irks me or pleases me. That's all I have to say about that.

This lady, however, definitely pleases me.

I'm obviously not at peak performance this morning. Yeah, I got nothin.'

No time to write anything witty or even halfway interesting. But I sure love this picture. I'm not sure why.