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The Genius of Memory

Automobiles are free of egotism, passion, prejudice and stupid ideas about where to have dinner. They are, literally, selfless. A world designed for automobiles instead of people would have wider streets, larger dining rooms, fewer stairs to climb and no smelly, dangerous subway stations.
-- P. J. O'Rourke

Wednesday, May 28, 1997

New resolve: write my journal before going online and reading other people, collecting email, reading newsgroups, etc. Not that writing is a chore, but these other things always take longer than I think!

So as I was driving off to work today, I came to the realisation that the symptoms my car had been showing could no longer be ignored. I limped to my local Texaco station (I support Texaco because of their Metropolitan Opera sponsorship. I love opera!) and left my car for them to diagnose.

Good thing I picked up my bus pass for the next year yesterday! This is a benefit that MS provides to ameliorate the traffic and parking problems we have. I hopped a bus downtown and made a stop at the bill-paying office of Seattle City Light (another instance of my procrastination vice! arrgh!), then managed to catch the express bus to Microsoft right outside the building.

The Texaco guy called me at work and gave me the bad news: transmission rebuild. I kind of knew that this was the problem, so I was prepared. Luckily I have the cash for it, and I'd rather not get another car, which is the alternative. A---, my festival buddy, suggested I should regard this as a birthday present to myself, so I'll take the opportunity to get a few other things done at the same time, like replace a broken window. I'm so good to me!

By taking the very first bus in the afternoon, I was able to get to the festival in time for the five o'clock show. But if there were bad traffic this might present a problem.

The Long Way Home
Very good documentary on the immediate post-WWII period and what to do with those pesky displaced persons. Some great personal testimony, and effective use of diaries, letters and memoirs of the period. This didn't move me to tears, but did hold my attention. Maybe I was distancing myself from some of the most horrific stuff, the footage of the people who died from disease after the liberation. Produced by Moriah Films which is connected to the Weisenthal Center, and directed by Mark Jonathan Harris.

One Summer in La Goulette
Very nice comedy with some dramatic undertones, from Tunisian director Ferid Boughedir, who did Halfaouine, Boy of the Terrace a few years back. I really liked this portrayal of a seaside town in Tunis, in 1967 just before the seven-day war. The neighborhood is mixed, with Christians speaking Italian, Jews speaking French, and Muslims speaking Arabic [?]. My favorite sequence was when all the inhabitants of a small apartment building were sending each other dishes from their dinner. Beautiful images, good cast, good script. Boughedir is a master of the elegiac tone, portraying an idealized past.

My birthday is coming up, on the real Memorial Day. I really liked my birthday being a holiday when I was growing up, so I have never completely gotten over them moving MD to make a three-day weekend. We had a high percentage of holiday birthdays in my family: my mother was born on St. Patrick's Day, my sister on July 4, and me on Memorial Day.

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