Anytown Graffiti - Pela - Anytown Graffiti - 2007

Every once in a while my REALLY nerdy side rears its ugly head and I'll watch a really bad sword and sandalls kind of movie. And I have to say, I watched an atrotiously bad one earlier this week that reminded me of what a broad spectrum of nerds there are in this world.

Keep in mind the Venn diagram of nerddom that was required to produce a film specifically geared towards the intersection of fans of the Roman Empire, specifically Britain during the Roman occupation and the attempts to find some historicity in the Arthurian Legend during this period. Throw in an absurdly large laddle fall of rabid anglophilia, Ben Kingsley as a proto-Merlin with an absolutely hack Welsh accent, Colin Firth looking in no way embarrassed, a hot indian chick inexplicably kicking everone's ass, and some of those great moments where a telling line of dialouge is followed by a pregnant pause so that the brain dead audience can get the inference (for instance, Colin Firth lays dying on a battle field and the 10 year old exiled emperor of Rome approaches him to tell him he fought "like a dragon", Colin Firth then says "And you fought like the son of a dragon"...que pregnant pause so that the audience, who is nerdy enough to know that Pendragon means "Son of the Dragon" can absorb the fact that he has just been christened and will one day be Arthur's father...just first rate shit).

Anyway, it was a really bad movie...and there are probably people who loved it.

Much like this song...actually this song isn't that bad, it's just kind of bland...and there are probably people that love it.

Ancient History - The Cribs - Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever - 2007

The Cribs work well enough for me. Like a lot of people I can get bored of the guitar-bass-drum set up...I can feel like there is nothing left to do with that format, but the fact of the matter is there is still little better for converying certain emotions than that set up. And rather than another hushed acoustic balladeer or pysch-folk collective, it's almost a refreshing change of pace to find a "turn it up to 11" guitar band out there.

As for ancient history...certain recent situations in my life have caused me to think a lot about the Roman Empire...no scratch that, I ALWAYS think about the Roman Empire, but the recent situation has caused me to think about the conquest of the Greeks in particular. The Romans were crafty and strong...essientially they were the first people to break through Greek defence by figuring out the brilliant strategy of "when they throw their spears, we should get out of the way". But all in all the Greeks were the smarter (unless you go with the "if they were so smart they wouldn't have been conquered" theory). They understood more about math and engineering and art and culture...all of these things.

So I think about how it must have been for the Greeks, having overlords that they knew they were smarter and more refined than. Being asked to teach secrets and knowledge that would allow Rome to grow into the big white marble Empire we all know and love, and knowing all the while that it's your knowledge that they will be remembered for. Wonder why I was thinking about that...