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Godzilla is back and he’s not alone
Three years ago, thanks to the Wexner Center, I witnessed something that few people in this country have had a chance to see: the original 1954 version of Godzilla. Unlike the Americanized edition that was released in the U.S., it had no Raymond Burr reporting on the mayhem for the folks back home. There were only thousands of scared Japanese citizens trying to avoid being crushed by a prehistoric creature that nuclear weapons had brought back to life.
It was a startlingly grim experience.
Now a special-effects veteran and relatively unknown director named Gareth Edwards (2010’s Monsters) has revived Japan’s favorite beastie. Though the overall tone is quite different, this Godzilla also has its share of grimness.
May is International Masturbation Month
“If you want something done right, do it yourself.”
Beginning in 1995, the sex toy store Good Vibrations began a celebration of self-love as a protest against the firing of the Surgeon General, Joycelyn Elders. After a speech at the 1994 UN World AIDS Day conference, Dr. Elders was asked about masturbation as a way to discourage youth from engaging in partnered sex to avoid the AIDS virus. She responded, “I think it is something that is part of human sexuality and a part of something that perhaps should be taught.” She was forced to resign from working for the government.
Acknowledgment of masturbation as a sexual practice is essential to having a healthy sex life, especially if you are your only partner. It’s safe, free, healthy and can be fulfilling and rewarding.
I'm on a mission of love here y'all. I swear that I am. But every time I see a Facebook post crying to the heavens about the end of net neutrality, all I feel is seething rage. So many people so upset over something they know nothing about. What's worse is that I see it coming from progressives, even self-described radicals. I see these people talking about how this new government decision has ruined the open Internet, and how hard it will make it for innovators, with seemingly no awareness as to how they've been parroting the talking points Republicans have been using since before Reagan.
In many ways I shouldn't be surprised. It's not their fault. Silicon Valley be straight killin' it at the snake-oil-selling game. Almost all of the terms we use to understand the technological/capitalist developments in the past 35 years, “Web 2.0”, “open-source”, the “sharing economy”, hell even “the Internet”, the concept of a “technology industry”, and yes “net neutrality” are disingenuous constructions that serve an ideological purpose.
I saw Milwaukee Rapper Juiceboxxx perform last year as an opener for Jeff the Brotherhood. He was wearing a denim jacket, and walked this line between Kid Rock and James Chance in terms of a rap-metal presentation that was somewhat grotesque but obviously literate in the cooler aspects of proto-punk rock and good Hip Hop. Almost in a manner that you either want to tell him to go take a piss, or go be his friend because you know you can completely relate to him.
At his merch table Juiceboxxx was selling his own energy drink called “Thunderzone.” I thought the idea of selling DIY energy drink next to 7inches and other merch was a clever artistic statement in some capacity. Energy drinks sponsor so many things in music that it was almost saying, ‘if energy drinks drive an underground economy; why not make your own.’
Theatre Roulette has always stuck to the same template: It consists of three collections of short plays, and each collection is rotated to a different day each week, thus giving the annual festival its name.
Beyond that, MadLab has been steadily honing the Roulette format. The shows once tended to be endurance contests, slowed down by lengthy scene changes and long-winded previews of the other nights’ offerings. Recently, though, MadLab has worked to streamline the product.
Open Book, the collection that launched this year’s festival, may be the most streamlined yet. Efficiently and competently directed by Jim Azelvandre, it wraps up its seven plays in a mere 70 minutes.
Are the plays worth the modest investment in time and money? It all depends on your taste and temperament.
Those who eschew (rather than chew) animal products may not be amused by Alex Dremann’s Agnes and the Vegan Burrito, about a man (Chad Hewitt) who suspects his friend (Andy Batt) is having marital difficulties. Others will likely enjoy the wry piece, which asks whether blissful home life is possible when spouses don’t share dietary philosophies.
For those of you who don’t know it, aftermath means: result, consequences, outcome, upshot, repercussion, and the after effects of an event or action. In other words…what happens after a thing occurs.
The aftermath of electing a Black President in America should come as no surprise to anyone. At least not to those who haven’t been wearing blinders to the fact that racism is and has been alive and well in America regardless of the outward appearances to the outside world and even they aren’t fooled.
The rise in the number of different hate groups in America has risen so much that, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, in 2012 the KKK chapters dropped from 221 to 152 in one year. Did you know that the Ohio-based Brotherhood of Klans was the second-largest Klan association in the country, with 38 chapters? And to think President Obama won Ohio electoral votes both times.
Dear Tom:*
I am writing you this letter on behalf of not just myself, but on behalf of several present and former bandmates and the many people within the local music scene who like and respect you. After a good deal of hint dropping and argumentative banter, we have determined that this letter is the only remaining vehicle by which we can communicate our concerns about a serious problem: to wit, your continued use of the Boss DS-1 Distortion pedal.
Initially, we all think you are a damn fine Guitar Player. Sometimes we actually go out to see a band you are playing in just to see you play guitar. Put aside the false modesty and accept this as truth – knowledgeable individuals actually will take an evening of their life and cough up $5.00 just to see you play guitar. Let that sink in. OK, now hopefully you are ready for more truth…..
President Barack Obama has suddenly concluded that the Republicans don’t really like democracy. (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/12/us/politics/criticizing-gop-obama-says-the-right-to-vote-is-threatened.html?_r=0)
The GOP, he says, is doing all it can to deny the vote to women, the poor, people of color, young people and millions more in the 99%: “Across the country, the Republicans have made it harder, not easier, to vote.”
Welcome to the twilight of American elections.
Such shenanigans have been with us since the 1790s heydays of Elbridge Gerry, father of gerrymandering (so named because the districts he drew looked like salamanders).
But a whole new level of bought, rigged and stolen elections has re-defined American politics since 2000, when George W. Bush stole the big one from Al Gore, and 2004 when he did it again to John Kerry.
Let us count some of the ways:
1) Stripping Voter Registration:
