Adventures in Burtonland
The first trailer that Betty saw for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland movie was, sad to say, a little underwhelming. Though he has gone to town with the visual lunacy for which he is justly famous, there were distinct hints of lazy Disney remix syndrome going on. With this longer and more revealing trailer, however, Betty begins to feel that there may still be something there. Please, Mr Burton, please let there be something there…
Neopolitan Dreams
This song is one of the things I miss most from my cushy cable-watching job.
Switchfoot, quite frankly, are the bizo
I heard Switchfoot live earlier this year, and they were corking. I plan to hear them again this year, and they will be absolutely super.
Hosanna
We’ve been singing this at the Baptist Tabernacle a lot. I like it.
Katie Melua is most pleasing on the eardrums
This song plays on cable a lot when Betty is at work (this is the job at which Betty sits a lot and watches cable, readers understand). It is reminiscent of C. S. Lewis’s poetry, in the following way: on first hearing, it struck Betty as being cerebral and poncy to the point of awkwardness. This impression was quite wrong. On repeated listenings, just as it is when one repeatedly reads one of Lewis’s poems — “Love’s as Warm as Tears”, let’s say, or the devastatingly lovely “Footnote to All Prayers” — the piece is revealed to be strikingly simple, sufficiently but not ostentatiously complex, beautifully shaped: and integrated, shaped by its own structure, not decorated or embellished. The best words in the best order, as another poet used to say, and he was right.
Jellyfish
On Takapuna beach the other day, the boy person friend and I came across this rather massive jellyfish.
Which was exciting. It was bigger than a breadbin. But check this out, tiny children: it was still alive.
You’re welcome.
