What part of "Blarg" don't you understand? (Updated)

Ok, good news/bad news time.

The good, or roughly equivalent: consumerism and going home for a bit. The book of Irish Dances I ordered (musically, that is, notes and so forth) finally came, and boy, is it chock full of awesome stuff. I recognized a good amount of the tunes, and low and behold, I found an interesting dichotomy. Now, there is a fairly well used Reel called "Sleepy Maggie" or "Drowsy Maggie," I had originally thought they were just two different names for the same thing, but it turns out I was wrong. I found two different reels under each name. The cool thing was this: the majority of recordings of Sleepy Maggie I'd heard were Reel called such in my new book. Drowsy Maggie, however, was also in a recording (and sounding rather similar): The Chieftans did a rendition of it, calling it "The Reel with the Beryl" following another tune called "The Wind that Shakes the Barley" (also found in the new book). This illustrated the commonality of the same song sharing different names. No-one ever bothered to catalogue old fiddle tunes, so sound-alikes are common.

And speaking of commonality, good news/bad news in a little dose for the book. I had been looking for some sheet music for "O'Sullivan's March" and found the book I now own. Yet, when I finally opened up to it and started playing, it sounded like NOTHING I'd ever heard. I wasn't disappointed, I could easily play the version I've heard by ear. On the positive note, I FINALLY found the version of "Ms. McCloud's Reel" that I have a recording for. The funny thing was, every other place I've found "the dots" for that particular Reel had it as another tune from what I had originally heard (The one done by Gaelic Storm in "Whup Jamboree/Ms. McCloud's Reel"). Huzzah for notes that match the music!

On other media consumption, I picked up the Soundtrack to Star Wars Episode III (with its kick ass bonus DVD) and House of Flying Daggers. The "music videos" on the SW DVD are pretty neat, not what I'd call 5 star material, but cool enough. The music itself is usual Williams, which is a good thing, but can get rather similar with too much listening. I'm always amazed at how ol' Johnny can sound so different, yet so the same. Now, given how prolific the guy is, I can forgive him for using what works. The only opportunity for laze here is that whole "Bridge to the first movie of the original trilogy" thing. I'm starting to hear some startlingly familiar phrases here and there. Nothing too bad overall, but I'm getting the feeling this guy is resting on his laurels a tad.

Wow, I'd forgotten how much I liked the fight scenes in House of Flying Daggers. The story is enh, but I really like the swordplay. The first one in the Peony House highlights the major reason, it's not frantic. Regular people can follow it without being confronted by this wall of lightning-fast moves, and as such appreciate it more. With things like "Hero" and "The Matrix," we see all this amazingly fast and intricate work, too fast for us to really follow, and can only take it in as a whole with general amazement. "Wow, look at those guys go!" In this movie, you're like "Wow, not only are those moves cool, but I can actually follow it! It's no longer this impressive flurry of fury, but something I can handle bit by bit. Awesome!" The cinematography for the fights are cool too, because of the use of fast frame rate/slow frame rate/fast frame rate/slow frame rate. Instead of feeling like a bullet time Matrix-ripoff, it's like pauses in the overall rhythm, to let the audience catch its breath and then continue on. Neat stuff!

The only complaint I have about the DVD is the documentary, in which all the clips from the movie are hopelessly washed out color-wise. It's also a documentary made for and by the easterners. The translation and subs are spot on, but the narration clearly is geared for the Asian culture: Slavish praise for too long at odd times and a decidedly stingy narration. After being spoilt, I suppose, by the western-style documentary for "Hero" I find it hard to draw pleasure from this one. All in all, not bad though.

I get to go home for a bit tomorrow. Woo!

Ok, for the annoying/bad news. First, the easy one, I've got to work on my Anthro project. Wahhh wahhh wahhh. Ok, that's done.

Second, and for the second time, Toes has stood me up. Maybe that's too harsh, but that's what it feels like. It has been something like this: (Tuesday at lunch or fencing)

Me:"Hey, Toes! Wanna watch a Movie Friday Evening?"
Toes:"Oh yeah! Friday works."
Me:"Right on! I'll contact you Friday afternoon for the specifics."
Toes:"Sure, sure."

A few days pass, Friday comes along, evening arrives, and I contact Toes.

Me:"Toes, lemme know when you're ready for the movie."
Toes:"Movie?"
Me:"Yeah, you agreed to watching a movie on Friday, remember?"
Toes:"Hmmm, I don't remember...."
Me: "Dude!..."
Toes:"Yeah, Sorry, I'm already doing something...."

And then I, annoyed and hurt, putter around and eventually fall asleep. This is annoying. Granted, the first time, we still got together and watched movies, but relocated to fit the other agreement Toes had made. It was fine, because it turns out it was another fencer, so it was all cool. This time, I have no freaking clue what the other thing he was doing was. I was too disgusted to ask anything else.

So my problem is this, I don't know if Toes is just a flake (Which I wish he's isn't, but may be the case) or he's trying to tell me something. I don't know if I just need to be in contact with him more to remind him, or if he has other pressing matters to do on Friday evenings. I'm guessing it's not the latter, because I've watched movies on Fridays with him before. I don't want to have to confront him with it, because I don't like calling someone out on being flaky, and if it happens to be the other case, boy, that'll be a hard pill to swallow. I want to be his friend, because we do cool stuff and I enjoy his company, but.....well, I just don't know.

I know, it's not like seeing a movie is a dire matter, but I feel hurt. He agreed to something, and then went right ahead and planned something over it. It makes me feel unimportant, and to this day I haven't had a friend who forgets an agreed time. I suppose there's a time for everything. I'd feel better knowing that it was just him being forgetful and flaky and that it wasn't me. But until I find out, I'll continue to feel bleh.

UPDATE:

Ahh, good. Toes was just busy and forgetful. I got a flurry of apologies on my cell/net/AIM etc. when I got back from home. We ended up watching AvP and it was all good. I'm now chatting with My Lady and she's fretting over how she's gonna get to a friends B-day party today (it being midnight, Sunday morning). I bid her good luck and am gonna go rest my weary head. Oh, and if you want to see a good movie, go see Kingdom of Heaven. You probably won't be blown away, but you won't regret it either.

Enough. More Later.
- James