Jennifer Susannah Devore's Blog, page 8

Zoltán Kodály, Zoltán Korda and Cmdr. McBragg: Gesundheit!

- There! The Russian-Hungarian border! Did I ever tell you about the time I ...?

- No, Commander, but I ...

- The year? 1812. I had just defeated the Emperor Napoleon and rescued Empress Marie-Louise from his clammy, froggy clutches, winning her fair heart in the process. It was dawn, the sun had barely risen over the ...

- But, but, Commaaaander ...

- Yes! French cavalry all around me! I, all alone with naught but my bare knuckles! Man-to-man, hand-to-hand I fought off the Emperor!

- Yes, Commander. How riveting, Commander. Do continue. ~sigh~

 

Cheers, kittens! It's me, Hannah Hart! Now, I imagine there's a whole bushel of you numnuts whom have no clue who Commander McBragg is. (Note: "I wasn't born then." is not, I repeat, not an appropriate response. Where you born when Mozart wrote Die Zauberflöte? Were you born when Thomas Jefferson wrote Notes on Virginia? Were you born when Wilbur and Orville Wright lifted off the Outer Banks? No. Now stop using that sad excuse. It makes you sound obtuse, oblivious and uneducated. This goes out especially to the bank teller in San Clemente whom declared proudly, with the look of a dumb turtle, "I Love Lucy? I don't think I've heard of it. I wasn't born then." Idiot.)

Anyhoo, I digress, kids. Our own, kippy San Diego Symphony put on a doozy of a show last week and Yours Truly was there to soak in all the melodic goodness. Like getting Harvey Weinstein stuffed into a wetsuit, the concise one-hour and forty-five minute performance (incl. intermission and its $11 cocktails) was seeping and hissing at the seams with variety.  Whilst shorter than Yours Truly anticipated, it was most likely the perfect duration for a contemporary attention span: longer than a Disney animation, shorter than a Ken Burns documentary. Within these parameters, musical director Jahja Ling prepared for us a healthy feast of the classical.

Amuse-bouche of Haydn, Symphony No. 1 in D Major: light and refreshing like a crisp bit of apple, a little baroque violin and flute is the perfect bite-sized smackerel to whet the appetite.


First Course of Mozart, Oboe Concerto in C Major: always pleasing, never a bad one in the bunch, Mozart perfectly pairs with the incessant chatter of a know-it-all in the row behind you, schooling his friend on all things Mozart. Despite Mr. This was originally written for piccolo., Miss Sarah Skuster trilled her way into my brain with her lilting oboe solo, her elegant, nude silk-crepe and pewter sequined gown glittering and sparkling under the house lights as her form moved melodiously to Mozart.


Intermission: overpriced martinis and a de rigueur, long line for the ladies' room. For once, the line was not an annoyance but a nice indication that live performance and The Arts might not yet be dead. Considering a notable attendance of the college-aged, to boot, perchance the symphony is not merely the realm of the dottering and the wealthy.


Second Course of Martucci, Notturno, Opus 70, No.1:  just as one would expect of a late-19thC. Italian, Giuseppe served up a hearty, family-style serving of boisterous joy. The serving was small, the smallest of the night, but like any good ravioli, all you need is a few bites, and a bit of Prosecco.


Dessert by Zoltán Kodály, Suite from "Háry János": if Gammy Lippenstift -my paternal, Hungarian grandmama- was correct about anything, it was, Nem túl sok vacsoráznak. Helymegtakarítás a desszert! "Don't fill up on dinner. Save room for dessert!" That we did. This was the longest piece of the night and, this is difficult for a Mozartphile to admit, the grandest piece of the night. (Entschuldigung, Wolfy!) Like Gammy Lippenstift's rum-soaked Palacsinta (Hungarian crepes), Kodály and his own Cmdr. McBragg treated us to a rich and heavy, satisfying finale.

Before dessert was served, Navroj "Nuvi" Mehta, San Diego Symphony's pre-concert lecturer and affable M.C., regaled the audience with the plot points, ingredients as it were, of our coming selection. He tells us of the old, Hungarian legend which says a story must be true if preceded by a sneeze. If one pays close attention, one will note the suite begins with one grand, "orchestral sneeze": a great, instant crescendo which then swan dives six octaves throughout the entire orchestra.

Happily, too, for this old dame, he ever so politely offered a suggestion to the wet-smack, half-portions of the audience, likely the same ones whom never heard of I Love Lucy. As Kodály knows how to string together a tune and segue intriguingly from satire to drama and back again, Nuvi urged patrons to "please hold your applause between movements" and save it for the end. Thank you, Nuvi! What is this? Al fresco, Italian opera?! Hold your applause, jelly beans!

With libretto based on János Garay's 1843 epic poem The Old Veteran and Napoleon, Háry János is an Hungarian singspiel -a folk opera, more a country musical than traditional opera- first performed in 1926 at The Royal Hungarian Opera House in Budapest. The S.D. Symphony's offering was a suite of music from this singspiel: a purely instrumental performance of six movements, telling the same tale.

Háry János is an aging veteran of the Austrian Army, a cavalry hussar of the Napoleonic Wars. With little to do in his old age but drink and tell tall tales, he indulges locals with intricately-woven histories of his glory days: foreign foes, Herculean combat and lovelorn ladies left strewn across the land. This night at the smoky bar-tabac, he tells of the time he defeated Napoleon and his entire army, slashing and chopping his way through a thick Frog soup en seul and rescuing the Empress Marie-Louise, whisking her away to glitzy, waltzy Vienna for a life of Austro-Hungarian riches and coffeehouses.

Soon though, the country lad tires of her needy and high-maintenance, City Girl ways, longing for the simple life back in his wee Hungarian village with his childhood sweetheart, Örsze, presumably buxom and beauteous with hay in her blonde braids, an apron filthy with blueberry stains and a devoted herd of goats following her lovingly across the farm.

The saga and its music float seamlessly between the foolish ways of the French and the flighty nature of coquetry, using brass and piccolos to signify silliness and satire and the deep, dark, dramatic patriotism of our Hungarian hero, employing strings, oboes and a cimbalom to elicit feelings of human heartache, true love and national duty. The story ending with what Kodály himself described as "an ironical march of triumph" as the Emperor of Vienna returns to his sycophantic court; Háry János returns to Örsze and the farm.

Now, back to the Cmdr. McBragg discussion. (See, the topic came full-circle.) If you are not aware of Commander McBragg, as chided previously, I can only assume you are equally unaware of Hungarian director Zoltán Korda (b. 1895, d. 1961) and his 1939 film The Four Feathers. If you want to watch it, watch it. Suffice it to say here, it seems pretty clear that C. Aubrey Smith's portrayal of the pompous Gen. Burroughs in the film had to be an inspiration for The World of Commander McBragg. Was Gen. Burroughs inspired by Háry János? Maybe, baby. The timing is certainly correct. Think on that over lunch.

With the current release of DreamWorks' Mr. Peabody & Sherman, you might be aware of Rocky & Bullwinkle. (Please tell me at least you jelly beans know who Rocky & Bullwinkle are. Moose and squirrel?) Along with Underdog, (the canine adventures of Shoeshine Boy and Polly Purebred) Rocky & Bullwinkle aired cartoon shorts within their show, like Fractured Fairy Tales. The World of Commander McBragg was one of these shorts and today, the name McBragg is still synonymous with braggadocio blowhards. Like him or not, he does spin a ripping good yarn! If you see him at a steampunk party, stick close by ... but leave yourself an easy egress.

Interesting story, both Zoltáns, director Korda and composer Kodály, served as Hungarian cavalrymen in their youth ... just like Háry János says he did.

Now, many of you know my pally, authoress Jennifer Susannah Devore. Turns out she's quite the Austro-Hungarian fiddler herself. (Not to mention a bit of a Commandess McBragg. Zip it, once in a while, Betty!) With a few, albeit unsuccessful, symphony auditions under her belt, she can still play a mean Irish jig, a mournful Mother Machree and a very pretty rendition of Little House on the Prairie's theme song. She is also currently teaching herself The Blaggard's Drunken Sailor.

Nevertheless, her German-crafted, Pfretzchner violin awaits patiently in its leather case for her to pick it up seriously, daily, once again. Terrifying memories of stuffed-shirt auditions and creepy college tutors urging her to "run away with me to Paris where we''ll drink champagne and play violin!" still haunt her. (True story. Ick.) Come on, JennyPop! You owe your parents! How many years of expensive lessons? How many custom-made violins? Maybe a few more nights at the symphony will churn you into gear, you orch dork!

Beaded gowns, pricey cocktails, muted smartphones and the questionable tales of a mustachioed braggart? Sounds like many an evening I spent with Clark Gable. (Did you know that man had a 44" chest with a 32" waist? He was so uniquely proportioned only bespoke Brooks Brothers suits could fit that Heavenly physique. Zowie!) An evening of sophisticated, analog entertainment that doesn't take itself too seriously oft makes for an excellent date.

The moral of this story? If you used to play an instrument, pick it up again. Don't throw away that hard-earned talent, it's still in there; muscle memory is wild thing. If you have tales to tell, tell them and do it with pizazz! Hold court and gather a crowd! Wear more silk and sequins; at least pretend you care about your appearance. (Good Heavens, you're a schlubby generation!) Get over expensive drinks during a night out; it's still just a ten-spot. Eat more of your grammy's baked goods and always heed Grammy Rosalyn's advice: "A story must be true if preceded by a sneeze." Háry János never started a story without a good one.

Achoo!

Gesundheit!

Ah, yes. Quite.

@JennyPopNet

 

 

Ode to The O.C.: An Excerpt From Jennifer S. Devore's The Darlings of Orange County

Orange County versus L.A.? Well, versus just about everybody? Please. It's a fun game to play; but they started it. Orange County was just sitting there, beachside in her lovely Escada pixie pants, having a Bombay martini, minding her own business and, without provocation, all those other snarky, nasty, jealous little counties started razzing her. La Pauvre! Authoress Jennifer Susannah Devore is one of her most ardent protectors in such silly, verbal contests, most oft set in a grungy bar somewhere other than The O.C. (Psst, we don't call it that.)

Within the pages of her novel, The Darlings of Orange County, she takes the opportunity to give it a direct S/O and, ever so politely, correct the "competition". (Really though, short of Monterey, Carmel and Santa Barbara, Orange County has no competition in California.) Love it or hate it, Orange County counts ... and it doesn't, by a very long stretch.

Enjoy an excerpt from Jennifer S. Devore's The Darlings of Orange County

Orange County? Now, that’s a whole other zone. It counts ... and it doesn't count, by a very long stretch. Orange County is excluded from the spiritual as well as the legal TMZ, and with extreme prejudice.

Orange County is the pretty, privileged, perky cousin you hate, but have no real, valid reason to do so. All you have are some faint memories of childhood and family visits, because you really just don’t visit ever, if you can help it. Still, you're constantly reminded of her success, beauty and casual, happy lifestyle through family gossip, pictures and Facebook posts. She grew up in a bigger house, with nicer parents, received a better education, and had shinier hair, fancier clothes and even her own damn horse. You can't stand the fact that even though you secretly disdain her, she adores you and year after year gives you a better Christmas present than you give her and it's always beautifully wrapped. She's a total bitch because she's not a bitch at all and despite the crap you give her, she still smiles, laughs, drinks her cocktails and enjoys her life and, worst of all, has a kick-ass body that you know you could have if you actually worked on it like she did; but, she actually likes working out and that makes you hate her even more. It makes her feel good and she just couldn’t imagine a day without exercise and that makes you cringe. In short, you are jealous of her and that is why you mock her with the other unhappy people in your life … but you know you would trade places with her in a heartbeat if somebody just dropped it all in your lap.

Now, tonight that little bitch was having a kick-ass party and you were invited. You bitched all the way down the 405 from The Valley, but you showed up anyway and are going to drink all the free champagne you can, aren’t you?

The only folks whom proudly claim to love Orange County, live in Orange County. The rest of the world dismisses it with a flip of the wrist and a catty, convenient label: phony, vapid, unreal, tacky, fake, classless, trash with cash, Mickey's whorehouse, Silicone Valley. Los Angelenos think Orange Countians are stupid and unsophisticated, Inland Empire dwellers think they're phony and plastic, and Northern Californians hate them viscerally and consider them an Aryan race of Republican trust fund brats hell-bent on enslaving the Mexican immigrant community and manicuring the entire state to look like a Mission Viejo cul-de-sac. Amidst all that, the competition within and behind the Orange Curtain is fierce and it's a daily struggle to be the prettiest, perkiest, most privileged cousin on the block. To quote Lynne Curtin from the self-destructive Real Housewives of Orange County, "It's Orange County! It's freaking hard to live in Orange County! It's so hard!"

It is a damn fine place to live, though. Like those outside the main stream enough to build a house into a boulder, and there happens to be one of those on Laguna’s Aliso Beach, some of the Hollywood set have made Orange County their home: if not a primary residence, at least a second home.

From John Wayne, Richard Nixon and Errol Flynn to Dennis Rodman, Barbara Eden and Bette Midler, some have just understood the beauty of Orange County. Some, like Humphrey Bogart, Mae West and James Cagney, were content to keep their yachts moored in Newport Harbor and some, like Charlie Chaplin, Billy Bob Thornton, Britney Spears, Susan Sarandon and Tom Hanks, are happy to use her facilities on occasion: Disneyland, South Coast Plaza, Fashion Island, Monarch Links, The St. Regis. Yep, a lot of the world may talk a lot of smack about the O.C., but, like an appletini or mozzarella sticks, once you've had a taste you know you want some more.

Excerpt from The Darlings of Orange County by Jennifer S. Devore. All rights reserved. Property of KIMedia, LLC. Excerpt may be shared digitally for entertainment,  non-commercial purposes only and may not be reprinted in analog format or sold in any format, digital, analog or otherwise.

 

Follow @JennyPopNet #OrangeCounty

 

Is That Jennifer Aniston on a Mule? Hiking The Grand Canyon in Winter

For those whom recall my original Grand Canyon challenge to Sugar Belle, as well as my brief follow-up post, please enjoy the following, full-length narrative, on the one-year recollection of a most wonderful trek to the depths of the Canyon and, naturally, back to the Rim where a much needed, hour-long, lemongrass shower and subsequent martini awaited.

 

 

The dining hall is virtually empty, with the exception of our small crew and Jude, a kind, slightly bohemian fellow working the Phantom Ranch Canteen. On this ghostly quiet, February afternoon, the Ranch is appropriately named. As there are no other guests to tend, Jude chats with us and asks our story; we return the curiosity, and wonder about his story, working at the very bottom of the Grand Canyon. He brings us some of the best beer any of us will ever imbibe, given its Tao-like actualization, and tells us.

"Working below the Rim is like nothing else, anywhere," Jude claims with a smile that upholds the claim. Even though he hikes in and out on his own time, and his own dime, it's a nature-gig, similar to being a lifeguard or snowboard instructor, well worth the physical effort and light pay. For the mellow dude from Phoenix, just getting to be in the Canyon is enough. It may seem simple, working in a restaurant at a national park, but it's not simple by a long shot. In fact, it's phenomenal. When one realizes that, of all the humans of the planet, only a small, anthropologically-insignificant handful has actually sipped where we did that day.

Eight-hundred years after Havasupai tribes slept in pit houses at the Canyon's lowest point, and well over one-hundred years before Jude regaled us with tales and ales, John Wesley Powell, a grandfather of 19thCentury American West conservation, camped along the waters of what is today Phantom Ranch and Bright Angel Campground. In 1913 Teddy Roosevelt made his way to this same spot via mule and slept in the same camp where the Havasupai, J.W. Powell and our little group all slept. Today, it is difficult to imagine there hasn't always been this oasis of running water, summertime ranger talks, pampered mules and all the seven-dollar postcards, vegetarian chili and four-dollar cans of beer your heart desires.

Near the turn of the 20thCentury, in a time noted by Lesley Poling-Kempes in her book The Harvey Girls: Women Who Opened The West, there were "no ladies west of Dodge City and no women west of Albuquerque". Architect and noted interior designer Mary E.J. Colter was the exception to this sentiment.

Colter worked under the umbrella of hospitality-pioneer Fred Harvey and the Santa Fe Railway, designing a multitude of hotels, train stations and tourist destinations running alongside the railway's Midwest and Southwest routes. The Grand Canyon was socially and financially vital for both the hotelier from London and the Santa Fe Railway. Scores of the prettily-starched, well-mannered, butler-schooled Harvey Girls would make the Canyon their home for months at a time, bringing not only a touch of glamour and finesse to the rugged West, but tourism dollars and word-of-mouth still seen today.

The queen of the Harvey Girls was Colter herself and, in addition to the El Tovar Hotel, Hopi House, Lookout Studio, Hermit’s Rest and the Indian Watchtower, she was commissioned to create cozy lodging on the ancient Canyon floor. Her task was to "fashion a place of food, lodging and comfort against an austere backdrop". Incorporating local materials, the most logical choice, and influenced by local Native American motifs, her signature, architectural style would come to be known as National Park Rustic: a phrasing that immediately evokes Old West comfort and natural relaxation.

Nearly a century later, I sit in one of Colter's many commissions: the Phantom Ranch Canteen. Had we booked earlier, we might have enjoyed one of her small yet comfy cabins. No worries, though. The Canteen is all the indoors we desire this trip. Camping under the stars, on the Canyon floor is an experience not to be underestimated. Who knew there could be so many stars?

To attain this reward, the stars and bar at the bottom of the Canyon, is no simple journey. A 7.3-mile hike of 5,000 vertical feet is physically, psychologically and spiritually demanding. Of course, as with any journey, it all begins with the first step; and that first step better be in good shoes. Under the care of my Ralph Lauren hiking shoes, my feet emerged from the Canyon after a total of six days and nearly eighteen miles over rocky, muddy, snowy, steep terrain.

Once the soles are well-protected, one must prepare the soul, best as one can. This is where a naturally cheerful spirit comes in handy. If you're inclined to grouse about the little things in life, the task of hiking the canyon might not fit your temperament. Then again, you might need the Canyon more than most.

Words like magnificent, breathtaking, awesome, surreal and inspiring are bandied about ad nauseam in description of the Grand Canyon, and with good reason. Be warned, even the mightiest of men are brought to a quiver when sitting atop Ooh Ahh Point and peering to the depths below, or viewing the Colorado River for the first time from a switchback on the Kaibab Trail. Being February, the trail transitions without warning, from crunchy snow to gooey mud to dusty clay and back again. If your toes, thighs and lower back can handle a full day of forward pitch and decline, you will be rewarded by nightfall.

Along the way, the legendary Grand Canyon mules are a very special reward. You will bump into the dark-eyed darlings on occasion, maybe even literally if you're laughing with your pal and not paying attention and don’t hear the lead wrangler call out, Mules. Mules. Mules! As chill as Woody Harrelson sitting on a beach in Cabo and sipping a Dos Equis, these grade-A mules do not spook easily. If you're an animal lover, be prepared to squeal each time you see one and earn yourself an eye-roll or two from a wrangler, but not a startle or a peep from the mules. They react to seemingly nothing, move at their own pace and at their own, oft stubborn will. There's plenty of room to hug a cliff as they pass, but keep in mind and watch your behind, the mules only travel one way: up the South Kaibab, down the Bright Angel. Don't get caught getting goosed by a mule.

If you're lucky, as the mules pass, one might pause and nudge you with his muzzle. You'll freeze, afraid of what to do and certain you'll be the cause of the Canyon's next environmental tragedy. Fret not. The wrangler will simply, curtly instruct, "Pet him. He wants a pet." Do so and he'll be on his way. If you're extra lucky, one of those wranglers will be a dead ringer for Jennifer Aniston and you'll do a double-take, wondering, "So this what she does between gigs?" Sadly, by the time you think all this, she's already around a switchback and you can't tell for sure. You'll never be sure and think what a great rumor to start, about her being a mule wrangler at the Grand Canyon.

As the day wanes and the mules and Jennifer Aniston have long passed you by, it becomes necessary to start the mind games and get yourself to your campground. You still have a few miles to go, dark is setting in, the trail is thin of fellow travelers and you're beginning to wonder what it would be like if you had not checked out of the Bright Angel Lodge this morning. You'd still have that great Rim view, but you'd be eating spinach enchiladas and sipping green tea at the restaurant right now, and looking forward to sleeping in your little cabin, in the bed. Like the mules, however, you must trudge forth. As one in our group said, "I'm just walking on the ground. That's what I'm doing today, walking." So we are.

Focus. One foot in front of the other. Focus. Correct walking stick placement, forming a three-point stance on the ground at all times. Think of Gen. George Washington and French Commander Rochambeau. They marched their troops from New York to Virginia 1781. White Plains to Yorktown in shoes of the wrong size, shoes of no size or maybe even no shoes at all, just pieces of leather and cotton tied loosely with rope to the bottom of bare feet. If they could do that, I can do this. Think about the Havasupai walking this trail in bare feet altogether, in the height of summer no less and without any REI water packs. Think of the Trader Joe's Block Red Shiraz at the bottom of your backpack: a box of wine equal to four bottles! (Ah, yes, that's stirring something!) Think of the Starbucks Via packets in your backpack, which will bring your everyday cup of morning brew new meaning when sipping it alongside Bright Angel Creek at sunrise. (Yes, yes! It's working!)

Toward the end of the South Kaibab Trail, just when we were feeling pretty chipper and excited about campground wine and the resting of the bones, the last two miles set in and did their best to break our spirits. This was no longer a walking path; this was a jumping path. Do not let the last two miles win.

Do not think of your knees or your bruised toenails as each jolting, nine-inch step down the final mile, wood-railed steps dug into the trail for the mules, makes you want to toss every piece of hardware you're carrying directly over the next ledge. Do not think about the mountain goat eyeballing you. Do not think about the mountain goat now trotting down the slope directly toward you. Do not think. Run! Do not turn your back on him, Step away from the ledge. Brace yourself! Phew, he turned. He just wanted a different view. So do I. Think about the wine, the coffee, Washington, the Havasupai, the mules and what Jennifer Aniston's next gig might be and eventually, you shall arrive. You have to. There is nowhere else to go.

Think about the silence, the river, the ravens, the deer, the glorious lack of electronic media and the fact that you are one of a mere handful of bipeds fortunate enough to ever experience the pit of the Grand Canyon, a hole on the Earth, half the age of the Earth itself. Think on that, not the screaming pain in the balls of your feet. Also, if you're afraid of heights, do not think about the Kaibab Suspension Bridge coming up, swaying some 65 feet above the Colorado River, depending on the river's changing level. You have to cross the river somehow; this is the only way tonight.

Finally stumbling in on nothing but thankfulness to be alive, we reached Bright Angel Campground well after dark. The downside to arriving at a campground at night is this; it is dark. One cannot see anything, least of all the best site to choose. We blindly fumbled down the campground path until we found an open spot and threw down our packs like they had fleas. Despite trail promises, we were too tired to savor our wine. Granted, it was a wonderful treat, but merely a tasty sleep elixir. By morning though, the sunrise cup of Starbucks Via Italian Roast kept its trail promise to be simply astounding.

After coffee, we saw the crucial error of our late-night ways. We chose a campsite decidedly not on the creek. Powered by Starbucks, we hauled our tents and gear to an open site directly on Bright Angel Creek. It might not seem much difference, those few yards, but it is indeed world of difference. It is like living at the beach, just across the road from the sand. It's Heavenly, but there's still a row of houses across that road, directly on the sand. That's where you really want to be, but who can pay the taxes?

Once the camp was reestablished, it was time: Phantom Ranch Canteen-time. The canteen is a short walk through the ranch, including a stop on a small bridge to check for fish in the creek and another stop to read a National Register of Historic Places plaque: Trans-Canyon Telephone Line Built in 1935. If anyone deserved a cold can of beer, it was those early Mountain Bell workers. Of course, since they weren't there, we were the next most-deserving.

Grand Canyon Brewery White Water Wheat was the brew of the day. True, my inclination tends toward Guinness and, as a rule, do not generally drink anything from can. Had I known it was an option, I would have preferred the Brewery's Starry Night Stout. Still, at this moment, the light wheat ale is pure perfection. Elsewhere in the canteen sit shelves of board games, Dominoes and cards, waiting patiently for the analog gamer; shelves of books, for purchasing or borrowing, also lie in wait. Even a surprisingly well-stocked sewing kit, in an old, Danish cookie tin, rests dusty and unused on a lower shelf. This proved helpful after purchasing a Phantom Ranch patch, available only at the Canteen. That night, by headlamp-light in my tent, I sewed it onto my ritual, camping, Boy Scouts shirt.

Even better entertainment than an old chess board is the complete lack of entertainment. There are no televisions in the Canteen. There is no electronic gaming. There are no smartphones, laptops or tablets below the Rim; at least there's no use for them. Signals are few to none and batteries die instantly, as if there's a ghost nearby feeding on your power supply. Sure, you could try to check the weather on your device, but it won't change your plans. You could try to check the news, but you don't care. You could try to check your email, but why did you come here in the first place?

I made the grave mistake of bringing a Kindle, thinking I would read loads of Mark Twain. Nope. By the time I plopped onto my sleeping bag at night, I had just enough energy to flip through my analog, Simpsons comic books. Thank goodness for pack-out mule service available at the Canteen. My pink Kindle and twenty-eight more pounds of unnecessary gear made its way back up the canyon walls, via mule, and waited for us topside across from Bright Angel Lodge at the Grand Canyon National Park Mule Barn.

Looming over our serenity, is the niggling realization that we still have to get out of here somehow. Because it's nearly ten miles and 4,500ft up and out, egress is best broken into two days, with an overnight at Indian Gardens. Thinking the first day would be the easier of the two proved wrong. Though it was just under five miles, it was primarily steep, punishing switchbacks. Moreover, on this rare February day, it was bright, sunny and hot. The overnight respite at Indian Gardens proffered little help. Cold and uncomfortable, it was nothing like Bright Angel: no trickling creek, no deer sipping in the streams, no ravens conversing in the trees and certainly no canteen. Indian Gardens is just a place to hang your pack, some hard dirt to sleep upon and fresh water to get you going in the morning. Worse yet, the Rim overhangs your campsite and mocks your every nighttime movement and effort to sleep, reminding you of what awaits you tomorrow.

Happily, the second day out was almost as exhilarating as the day at the Canteen. Marked by two rest houses (1.5-mile and 3-mile), the last leg is nicely split up into psychologically manageable treks. To boot, because it is a common day hike from the South Rim there are far more hikers on the road, offering safety-in-numbers peace-of-mind. Further, knowing we would not only survive, but that hot showers with lemongrass body wash awaited us at the Kachina Lodge and martinis at the El Tovar, we kicked up our paces like a herd of horses headed back to the stables. It's also the day Jennifer Aniston smiled at me on the trail, wrangling mules, which is apparently what she does in between gigs.

Eventually, we made that final mile, which is steep, brutal and exhausting. Shuffling past friendly Austrian and Japanese tourists at the trailhead, we crossed under the final arch at the South Rim and reached Kolb Studio: former home, studio and business of adventure-photography pioneers and brothers, Emery and Ellsworth. It's a Grand Canyon fixture since 1904 and today serves as a gallery and bookstore. It also serves as a world-famous, scenic lookout, perched precariously on the Rim and with a mind-blowing backdrop. Needless to say, the path at this point is clustered with cameras.

We politely squeezed past large groups of large tourists getting their pictures taken and, once past them, crossed into The Village: a shopping and dining compound encompassed by the park hotels and bordered by the Rim itself. In an instant, we are surrounded by more humans than we have seen in a week. Our noodle-legged shuffles morph into strong struts. There are not suitable words to describe the pride of accomplishment, walking through The Village at that moment amidst the day-trippers, shoppers and shutterbugs. With the satisfied look of the overconfident, unwashed, underfed and the freshly-spewed from the mouth of the Earth, we march toward our rooms, showers and, eventually, El Tovar martinis.

Before heading into the lodge, we stand at the Rim for one last look, that day anyway. Walking sticks in hand, 35lb-packs now seemingly weightless, we silently take it all in together. Being part-human, a few stinging tears tried to breach. Being in public, I fought them down successfully. In the truest sense of the word, it is stunning. If I just did that, if I just went down there and clawed my way back up, I can do anything. Really.

At the turn of the 20thC., the Harvey Girls were already legends in their own time. Floating effortlessly and elegantly through the Grand Canyon hotels and restaurants, their stark-white aprons, headbands and bows starched to perfection, the Harvey Girls greeted and cared for guests, top to bottom. That included the bottom of the Canyon. With their fresh smiles, brightly rested eyes and manicured nails, even Phantom Ranch was a respite of rustic luxury amidst the harsh elements. Today, sadly, the Harvey Girls are no more and travel reviews will offer the spectrum of great-to-rude Xanterra service experiences. For our part, Jude was our Harvey Girl of the Phantom Ranch Canteen.

Jude the kindly bohemian lacked only the starched apron. His manner was professional yet affable, like Mark Twain filling in for a friend working Morton's Steakhouse. He could sense when we wanted a ripping good yarn and when we wished to be left to ourselves. The fare was first-rate, with prices to match and beer was cold, which is just what one wants, even in February. Overall, the experience was exactly what one wants on the way to Middle Earth.

In 1903, U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt stood at the Rim and grandly stated the following:

I hope you will not have a building of any kind, not a summer cottage, a hotel, or anything else, to mar the wonderful grandeur, the sublimity, the great loneliness and beauty of the canyon. Leave it as it is. You cannot improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it.

There are a number of buildings now, a lot of summer cottages, a few hotels and more. To boot, I am pretty certain, Jennifer Aniston is an off-season mule wrangler. I wonder what T.R. might think? In the end, I wish I could sum up my winter expedition better than Lawrence Kasdan in his 1991 film Grand Canyon. I cannot. So, I charge Simon (Danny Glover) to do it for me:

When you sit on the edge of that thing, you realize what a joke we people really are, what big heads we have thinking that what we do is gonna matter all that much, thinking that our time here means didly to those rocks. Just a split second we have been here, the whole lot of us. That's a piece of time so small to even get a name. Those rocks are laughing at me right now, me and my worries. Yeah, it's real humorous, that Grand Canyon. It's laughing at me right now.

 

Follow @JennyPopNet #grandcanyon #travel #arizona #hiking

Beer, Donuts and a Wine Tree: Love, Funster-Style

As Valentine's Day looms on 30 Rock's "Anna Howard Shaw Day" (S4, e13), Liz Lemon schedules dental-surgery to shun the greeting card-holiday she so loathes, and, most importantly, to avoid the clear and present abundance of "nobody" in her life. When she cannot arrange the necessary ride home after said-surgery because, as Virginia singer-songwriter Stephen Christoff once wrote, "everyone is in love, except for you", TGS writer Frank Rossitano, resident Italian, porn-addicted, Momma's boy, sums it up for Liz: "You are no different. You just want to know someone cares about you. Only your case is worse, because that tooth infection could spread to your brain and kill you."

We do want to know someone cares and Lady Fortuna has spun her wheel raw-ther kindly for me; happily, there exists a plethora of folks, friends and fam, upon whom I am certain I could rely for a ride home, drooling and slurring from a day at the dentist and too much nitrous oxide, or a night at an Irish pub and too much Guinness. To wit, each and every one of us must count one more person amongst our beloveds, one we may not even know. Or, maybe we do know of them, but are unaware of their affections. Secret admirers come in myriad form and format. Mine is a transplanted, Canadian-Maritime chick now living deep in the heart of Texas, and the not-so-secret admiration is mutual. She's bonkers and witty, speaks French and loves animals and vintage porcelain. I imagine, were we to live closer, we'd spend many a day at cafés, museums and antique shops. Such days would end enjoying wine in her wine tree, or on my beach, with our supportive, patient, long-suffering husbands. She is Jannie Funster.

Jannie sings for beer and donuts, is a damn fine Mommy of a wee gymnast/artist/musician, gives affection and a luxurious home to a "crap-ton of pets", had a wedgie on her wedding day and lives for five o'clock in her wine-drinking tree (a tree for drinking wine, not a tree which guzzles wine itself), weather permitting, which it almost always is in Texas. From her lushly gardened, poshly situated neighborhood in an Austin suburb, Jannie composes melodies and divines lyrics in her home studio, keeps fit via SPAM yoga, sells goodies once ina while on eBay (I got a gorgeous pair of red, suede Via Spigas) and scribes poems, non sequitur musings and intimate posts for her blog: categories range from "Ass Kicking" and "Bra Flinging", to "Nova Scotia" and "Rooftop Yodeling". Her words ever proffer selfless support, love, admiration and kindness for anyone whom cares to claim it. With the soprano lilt of a Disney bluebird, similar to the springtime café stylings of former-first lady of France, Carla Bruni or 1990s beauteous, dream-pop hippie Hope Sandoval of Mazzy Star, Jannie's lyrics and poetry tell you oh-so-sweetly to stop whining and live your life: recall fondly your past, relish your present and grow excited about your future. To boot, if you thought Jewel was the only pretty, blonde yodeler who could milk a cow and write about wedgies, you've not yet met The Funster!

"Kissing 39 Goodbye" (track 3) blows out the candles and wishes for 30 again: Another year disappeared so fast, fading forever like fireworks flashing / I'm kissing 39 goodbye again / All those pretty ladies on the covers of magazines / Those picture perfect babies, some still seventeen

"Rosie's Song" (track 9) pines for a sister, parted by silly distance: I've got a picture of you in my heart, it helps me try to be strong / Because I haven't seen you in so long / I miss you, I miss you, I miss you now / Hey, little sister, I never dreamed I'd live in Texas someday / Here I am and there you are, half a world away

"I Need a Man" (track 4) is quite apropos for some this Valentine's Day: I need a man with a chainsaw, I need a man with an axe / A guy who's good in the garden, to give my weeds a whack / I need a man to trim my hedges / I need a man who can cut my grass

Love is out there, life is out there and, best of all, wine is out there: go get some! Who's stopping you? She drinks wine in her tree in Texas, I drink mine on my beach in California. Where is your wine tree? No matter who you are, how far your loved ones are or where your wine tree grows, I Need A Man will cheer you, make you weep and make you spit out your wine. Even sans CD, The Funster will cheer you. Even if you are truly alone (and I do hate to think that anyone is in such a way), you shall ne'er be alone again when The Funster spreads her zen! Follow her blog; you shan't be sorry, ever! She and Fox Mulder tell us, "We are not alone" and "The truth is out there". Similarly, Jannie Funster is out there ... waaay out there sometimes, but then again, so am I. I'm willing to bet you are, too.

Jannie is currently recording her second CD, where you will find the long-awaited, "Banana Seat Bicycles": a charming, lilting tune of summer days, that awesome bike you had back in junior-high and endless, childhood friendships.

To quote Liz Lemon, "Happy Valentine's Day, nobody!"

Tracks on I Need A Man

Hearts and Bones

Motorcycle Cop

Kissing 39 Goodbye

I Need A (Chainsaw) Man

Hurricane Jane

Bones

What'll I Do With Me

Sugar Lady

Rosie's Song

Bob's Coffee Shop

Mystery Tune

Wedgie Wedding

Smallest Songwriter (Music, lyrics by Kelly, age 5)

All music and lyrics, except Smallest Songwriter, by Jannie Funster, ASCAP
Copyright 2009, all rights reserved by Jannie Funster and Roski-Otto Records
Recorded, mixed and mastered by George Coyne, Parrot Tracks Studio, Manchaca, TX

 

Buy I Need A Man! Can't make it to Austin to see Jannie live? Fret not, Jannie records some performances for you!

Where is your wine tree? Tell us @JannieFunster & @JennyPopNet

A Dog, A Rabbit and A Stinkbug Walk Into A Strip: Mel Henze's Gentle Creatures

It’s ritual. Almost involuntary, like whatever it is my spleen does when I’m not looking. Wake up, turn on news, make espresso, read funnies. I’m still Old School enough to prefer my funnies in the dry, gritty, analog, format of newspaper. Of course, I am no Luddite either and, as is the most convenient today, and cleaner for manicured hands, I take my funnies online via GoComics.com.

The ease and access is beautiful: funnies on my phone, funnies on my tablet, funnies on my laptop. It’s never been easier to chase friends and family around the room urging, “OMG! You have to read this one!”, almost always answered with a patient smile, a single eyebrow-lift and an obligatory, “That’s funny.” Is it? Then laugh.

The traditional comic strip, a linear set of panels delivering a quick, wry joke, une blague, as the French call it and which I find a much funnier word than “joke”, seems to be holding its own nicely in our contempo, digital world. Stretching as far back as the Bayeux Tapestry, I would argue, the linear storytelling model feeds man’s need for a brief, pithy respite of humour (not that the Norman Invasion was all that funny), whether on his way to a clan war in the Scottish highlands, a revolution in Yorktown or a pitch meeting on the Loews Santa Monica patio bar.

 

First published in a Sunday supplement to William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal in 1897, The Katzenjammer Kids, created by Rudolph Dirks and drawn today by Hy Eisman, remains America’s longest-running comic strip, still appearing in over fifty newspapers and magazines across the globe, distributed by King Features.

 

Like any commercial art, cartooning is a tough and tight-knit crew. Becoming an internationally syndicated cartoonist is harder than figuring out WTF happened on the final season of LOST. However, if you have tenacity, an innate sense of humour, drawing skills and a cocktail napkin, you might have a shot at the Big Time. Mel Henze had all that and now look at him. Of course, “all that” minus the drawing skills. Even he admits, “As far as the drawing goes, it’s a struggle at times. I need lessons and/or books.”

Mel Henze, a jovial, approachable chap who could sumo wrestle Ron Howard for the title of Mr. Nice Guy, lives the beauteous life on a quiet, wooded beach somewhere in British Columbia. He seems impervious to criticism, indeed values it, and, like any good artist, flays himself mercilessly before others can do the job. He is open to comments and questions and happy to chat with his readers; it is merited to this failing that he fell into my trap and was kind enough to allow me a brief interview about his newest strip, Gentle Creatures. Rumoured to be actually written by a chain-smoking, ex-circus clown, my due diligence has not turned up any hard evidence to this fact and it appears Henze is indeed the real creator and artist. Here’s the story he’s selling. (Caveat emptor.)

Gentle Creatures is the story of a fat-headed bunny named Radish Cheeseweed, his good natured but dim witted dog Jingles and their pal Cecil, an opinionated stink bug. While it may be true that the bunny-dog-stink bug combination is an age-old classic, Gentle Creatures breathes new life into the union in a way that has been seen only a few dozen times before.

A truism since we crawled out of the primordial stew and up onto Canadian beaches, the bunny-dog-stinkbug combo is timeless. In the case of GC, Radish Cheeseweed, his dog Jingles and the snarky Cecil work well together, Radish’s general beef with the universe being the swizzle stick that stirs the Singapore Sling.

Animals-as-people is also an age-old classic. Be it Snoopy, Garfield, The Far Side dinosaurs in cat-lady glasses or Get Fuzzy‘s Bucky and Satchel, anthropomorphized animals make the best friends, and comic characters. I asked Mel why we love them so.

I remember being drawn to Richard Scarry books as a kid. I'd spend what seemed like hours looking at how all the different animals were drawn and all the funny things they were doing. For me, it's just something I've always identified with. It also makes sense from a cartooning perspective. Cranky bunny, lovable innocent dog... one is easily distinguishable from the other, even at a glance.  And they're often easier to draw... another bonus.

If you follow the philosophical teachings of animators, Seth MacFarlane and Walt Disney have both said that the eyes, especially where animal characters are concerned, are vital to a character’s connection with the audience. Jingles’ eyes are beckoning and innocent; one wants to protect him, mostly from Radish. Academically, Mel knows this, yet is horrified to realize he has failed here, miserably.

Cecil has no eyes. Well, no pupils really. Wait, now that you mention it, none of the regular characters have pupils. I think [MacFarlane and Disney] might be on to something…

Not to worry, fair reader. Cecil the stinkbug might have no eyes and Jingles no pupils, but there exist other features cartoon creatures can possess, which draw them happily into our hearts and souls.

In terms of other features, Radish has angry eyebrows and a fat head, both of which contribute to his immediate and recognisable dislikability.

Gentle Creatures is not Henze's first cat rodeo, although the initial, now infamous, cocktail napkin submission to GoComics, and subsequent, rough draft-feedback, suggests otherwise.

Hubert and Abby is, in fact, Henze’s first comic strip. Before that, he was drawing single-panel cartoons and was very fortunate, via one his very first panels, to be picked up, and syndicated in the U.S. and internationally, by legendary distributor King Features (Betty & Veronica, Mother Goose & Grimm, Mutts), a unit of Hearst Corporation. Once in the club, Henze was encouraged by editors to “create a comic strip as an alternative to the somewhat flooded panel market.” Henze listened and, “a few iterations later, Hubert and Abby was born”. The lure of the panel still calls like a fat mermaid-siren in the night though, and to quell this lust, Henze occasionally designs greeting cards for Oatmeal Studios.

Henry David Thoreau suggested one write what one knows. One wonders then, like many an artist, is Henze embodied in any of his creations? Is the cranky Radish Cheeseweed an alter ego of sorts? Does Henze/Cheeseweed find daily irritation with what the inimitable writer Hunter S. Thompson called “the inchworms” of the world; or do Canadians love everybody? Might Henze be Jingles, the contented and kindly pup; or is Henze the personification of Cecil, the obdurate stinkbug? It seems Thoreau’s influence made its way into a previous, Hubert and Abby strip. (Makes sense. Most artists living in tents on secluded beaches or in lean-tos in the woods tend to appreciate Thoreau to a fault.)

Turtle quoted Thoreau in Hubert and Abby as having said "I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion". Hubert tested the theory with the nearest reasonable facsimile...a can of pumpkin pie filling. Like Turtle, I'm more of a pumpkin-guy myself, though I'd have to say there's a bit of me in each of my characters. Minus the crankiness of course.

So, back to the cocktail napkin: readers want to know … is that real? Did a famous, multi-strip, syndicated cartoonist from Canada really submit an idea in this manner? Do we blame Canada? The story goes that the muck-stained napkin was submitted to GoComics editors and the following, visceral response ensued.

“There was something about it that I liked,” claimed Editor Joe. “I’m not sure if it was the kind and peaceful nature of the characters themselves, or the gentle way the interacted. I know it wasn’t the art … I mean, really.”

Was it the cranky rabbit, or did Hubert and Abby help get Henze’s lucky rabbit foot in the door? Moreover, what is the ring on said-napkin? Is it espresso, drip coffee (if so, what brew?), bean soup or maybe even a chocolate martini? Well, kids, in this GoodToBeAGeek exclusive, Mel tells all.

The napkin sketch wasn’t part of the original submission, unfortunately, but the idea of a submission drawn in five seconds on a (used) napkin struck me as funny. It’s also a jab at my own inability to put a decent proposal together, though it may have come across differently. I created it specifically for the GoComics launch and the stain is “simulated” coffee, thanks to photo-editing software.  I also experimented with bacon grease and tape, both of which didn’t make the final cut.

Interesting. Now that we all feel like fools, having Huzzah!ed the little guy and Fie!ed the “mean and unfair syndicate monsters” the world over who wish only to use artists’ hard-fought work for nothing more than fish-wrap, we can step back and read Gentle Creatures for what it really is: a truly funny, giggle-invoking, daily dash of happy.

How does a mere Canadian, any artist for that matter, make it amongst the ranks of Charles Schulz and Bill Watterson? Can-do, I say! I asked Henze and, naturally, he had an answer.

Gentle Creatures, like Hubert and Abby, started on the GoComics Sherpa site, which for me, is a great place to develop a strip.  It gave me the opportunity to work to a deadline while getting valuable feedback from other cartoonists and readers.  The GoComics editors also keep an eye on strips on the Sherpa side … sometimes you’ll hear from the pros on the GoComics side.  The very talented Ed Power, My Cage and Santa vs. Dracula [both GoComics-strips illustrated by Melissa DeJesus], was an early supporter and provided a much appreciated boost early on and continues to get the word out about Gentle Creatures.

As the convention season in SoCal starts its early rumblings, this SoCal geek girl wondered if Henze and his creatures would feature at either WonderCon or the god of all cons, San Diego Comic-Con? SDCC badges and press passes are harder to garner than a birthday party invitation from Hillary Clinton to Ted Nugent. Yet, if GoComics sponsored a Henze appearance, stinkbugs and cranky rabbits from all over the Southland would file in to get a glimpse. Henze himself is open to it all.

With any luck, these will be something I can attend in the future. By all accounts, they’re pretty amazing events, and a great place to meet and connect with people, and possibly introduce them to a cranky bunny, a lovable dog, and an opinionated stink bug.

Besides stinkbugs and small mammals, Comic-Con is also crawling with cartoonists and animators of all strains and species. Henze has a bit of golden advice for the funny-page wannabes, as well as an open email box for anyone whom wishes to pick his brain.

If you have an idea, submit it on a napkin.  It's funny. I really enjoy hearing from people who want to talk about their strip or mine, or cartooning in general, and welcome comments (good or bad!) to the email on my GoComics page. Happy Cartooning!

As Radish Cheeseweed’s recent hospital stay proved, no one is indispensable. Kermit the Frog and Tom Cruise, I have on good authority, are on permanent standby, just in case Cheeseweed meets an untimely end; and keeping it all in The Muppets family, Pepe the King Prawn could serve well as a Cecil stand-in. Jingles, for this reader’s worth, is absolutely indispensable. Jingles has quickly moved up my ranks to join prestigious company with Fox Trot‘s Jason and Quincy, Get Fuzzy‘s Satchel and Peanuts‘ Sally Brown. Jingles makes a sweet first-impression. Moreover, it is rumoured Jingles fancies a parasol on sunny days, much like Yours Truly. Who doesn’t love a wee dog with a pink parasol? Will Henze play God with his characters? Probably.

I hope Jingles is indispensable. As much as cartoonists describe their characters as their children, I've found after a few years, they're like adult children living in your basement. You hope that someday they can stand on their own and eke out a living. Henze added, I love Pepe the King Prawn! Maybe a future cameo?!

Henze’s strip makes me scroll to the bottom of my personalized GoComicsPro page each morning. I am excited to learn what hay is being made in the dew-dappled meadow amidst the burbling, gurgling creek which runs through the smallish hills. (Note, GC is not at the bottom of my page as a ranking judgment; but simply because it is one of the newest I’ve added.) Calvin and Hobbes and Peanuts top my list, of course. Gentle Creatures sits nicely snuggled in between Sarah’s Scribbles and Wizard of Id.

Gentle Creatures is exactly what a comic strip should be. Comic strips should make you guffaw, laugh out loud embarrassingly in public, leaving those around you at Starbucks to wonder if you’re actually reading something funny, or if they should have 9-1-1 at the ready. The funnies should make you excited to open the new strip every day. They should make you get up from your seat and force everyone else in the house to read it, too, whilst you stand there, dorky smile plastered on your face, waiting in giddy anticipation and watching their face for signs of the coming laugh, the same creeping smile and chortle the strip elicited from you. Often, this is not the case and we must retreat to our davenports (That’s what they call it in Canada, right?), tails between our legs and resume reading our beloved and misunderstood, under-appreciated comics with quieter chuckles and titters. (That’s a funny word, too. Right, Jingles?) Gentle Creatures accomplishes this, indeed.

Find Gentle Creatures at GoComics.com, a division of Universal Uclick, an Andrews-McMeel Universal company. Email Mel Henze at gentlecreaturescomic@gmail.com! To boot, a very special thank you to @Gene Willis @GoComics for the introduction and, especiall,y to Mel Henze for his time, his humour, his art and, most of all, my panel!

See you in the Sunday funnies, kids!

Follow @JennyPopNet #GentleCreatures #comics

 

So Many Monkeys: SyFy Original Series "Helix"

No monkeys here. Too many monkeys here. Is that a monkey? Frozen monkey field. Look, we've been at this over an hour and still no monkeys.

Helix, SyFy's newest original series, is an experiment in extremes: viral containment, climate, human isolation and monkeys. Set in a cutting-edge research facility in the Arctic, Helix could easily be a next-generation, X-Files spin-off, picking up after any one of the Black Oil Mythology episodes, or even Scully and Mulder's Alaskan exploits in "Ice" (S1e7).

It is safe to say, should you be an X-Phile, you will once again enjoy the glacial-blue light of Friday night, sci-fi-thriller TV. So, grab some snacks, zip up your Snuggy and leave a hand free; you'll need it for your chocolate-covered frozen bananas and a handily-placed stun baton. It's Helix time.

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It makes sense. Steven Maeda (X-Files, Lost) serves as Helix executive producer alongside Ronald D. Moore (Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek: TNG ) and Lynda Obst (Contact, The Fisher King), as well as Jeffrey Reiner (Friday Night Lights, Trauma) and Brad Turner (24, Hawaii Five-O), both of whom direct episodes: "Pilot" (S1e1) and "Vector" (S1e2), respectively. "274" (S1e3) is directed by Steven A. Adelson (Haven, Sanctuary).

Psychologists suggest the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour. Naturally, Helix is bound to exhibit influence from so many involved, experienced and august, above-the-line raconteurs; Maeda's past simply shines through the brightest, at least thus far in the series. SyFy tenderfoot and Helix creator/writer/co-executive producer Cameron Porsandeh finds himself very fortunate in his professional company.

Like many a thriller, our secretive, U.S. government provides unwitting and reluctant heroes plucked from deep within federal cubicle farms. This time, it's the CDC and the protags, de rigueur, have a bevy of personal and interpersonal issues compiling their newly assumed duties. All this makes working in a lockdown facility full of sharp, shiny, metal instruments, and possibly run amok with infected monkeys, situated on an merciless, frozen tundra, if one could escape, extra fun.

Shot on-location in Montréal, Québec, including on a sound stage dubbed "The Freezer", Helix effectively presents viable, unsettling, virtual feelings of claustrophobia and agoraphobia. Add what Maeda calls "an invisible villain", and you've got fear and panic factory-sealed in an icy gift box.

"You can't touch it. You can't taste it. But it's there," Maeda added in a SyFy press call with Helix actress Kyra Zagorsky (Smallville, Soldiers of the Apocalypse) who plays the emotionally severe yet painfully professional Dr. Julia Walker.

Zagorsky concurred about the fictional virus:

This virus ... it’s something that they’ve never seen and that, in itself, is quite frightening in a story because this is something that happens all the time, a real life epidemic scare, you know. I mean, I think there was just a couple reported cases this last week in Vancouver of some deaths of people passed away with H1N1. You know, it’s something that’s really out there for people.

At the Ilaria Corporation high-tech research facility, Arctic Biosystems, the true menace is neither simian nor even meteorological in form; although the agoraphobic nature of nothing but white death for leagues and leagues does present itself as its own, haranguing character.

Banking on mankind's truest fears, like recurrences of the Black Death, Spanish Flu, Chernobyl and even the still-worrisome Fukushima Daiichi fallout, Helix' writers, and actors, understand they are straddling a very fine line between fiction and reality. Audiences like to be scared by the likes of Paranormal Activity and Fire in the Sky because it feeds some primal need for adrenaline in our luxurious, SUV seat-heater, caramel double-latte, fingerless cashmere iPad-gloves, modern world. Audiences know ghosts and aliens won't actually harm them, mostly. Yet, a mysterious illness, emerging out of nowhere, killing indiscriminately and painfully at a near 100% mortality rate whilst fueling its autonomous need to propagate? That's not just terrifying, it's possible.

Interviewing Helix actors Catherine Lemieux (Blue Violin, White House Down), who plays Dr. Doreen Boyle with a hard realism, and Mark Ghanimé (Soldiers of the Apocalypse, Emily Owens, M.D.), who brings a confident approachability to the role of Major Sergio Balleseros, I was afforded an opportunity to chat with them about the story devices of fear and hope, human nature and dealing with mankind's paramount fear of the unknown.

Catherine Lemieux:   Wow. Wow. I think that that's just a reflection of life really like life is a balance of those two things in a sense of fear and hope through that and of conquering the fears that we get. So I think that's kind of like a true reflection, the show kind of reflects the balance of life that we all try to achieve. And we all have fears and we all have to face them in that sense. So it's a very, very human experience in that. It also being a Sci-fi experience and having this disease be completely unknown and completely from out of this world maybe, who knows.


Mark Ghanimé:    Exactly what Catherine says, and also the fact that if you look at some of the characters as we develop the story in the season some of the infected - the people that get infected in the base there is - there is the fear and the hope that these people from the CDC can help them. And, I mean, that kind of - it's a very important story line on the secondary and the guest star characters in the show. A lot of times you don't see too too much of the fear and the hope on the surface of the hero characters. But, we have that support from the guest stars on our show. You really get to see what the true feelings are of these people in the space. And I think, yeah, it is exactly human nature.

Does Helix face a difficulty down the line, putting a fictive slant on such a sobering subject, I wondered? Mark Ghanimé espoused the following:

We've echoed this a lot on our previous interviews. The fact that what we're doing in this show is not fantastical, is not supernatural, is not beyond the reach of the real world I think that in itself lends a built-in fear in that it can happen. You look outside your door and those things can occur. And I think that itself is enough to put the fear of God into people. Yeah, for lack of a better term.

Catherine continued with the idea of character-identification, linking that sympathetic emotion of fear between actor and viewer.

The possibility, I think, of it - the possibility of any situation that's on television or on film or what have you is definitely the link with the audience in that sense. If an audience member can identify and see themselves in this problem that these characters are having then you really do have a connection.

"The primary goal," directs the CDC's head of Special Pathogens, Dr. Alan Farragut, played sternly by Billy Campbell (The O.C., The 4400) "identify the pathogen." Narvik is the mystery pathogen. Narvik is its name, killier black goo is its game. Whether you get strain-A or -B is when the game comes afoot and that is up to fate, and the writers: Cameron Porsandeh (Helix), Misha Green (Heroes, Sons of Anarchy), Keith Huff (House of Cards, Mad Men) and Ronald D. Moore (Caprica, Star Trek: First Contact). To boot, climate conditions at Arctic Biosystems are so heinous they wreak havoc on helicopter mechanisms, making it futile to depend on, or even hope for, outside help, thus adding desperation and panic to fundamental fear and those oh-so-gelled, previous feelings of claustrophobia and agoraphobia everyone is experiencing, including the pathos-brimming rats and monkeys.

Fair warning to the squeamish and the animal-empathetic. Animal lovers might spend a good deal of each show watching through closed hands. Lab rats and monkeys make regular appearances in various stages of distress and infection. SFX, MUA, CGI and robotics they might be; still, the visuals are disturbing and one wonders how much animal suffering some viewers will stomach before switching over to a much-needed dose of happy and silly via Archer or Bob's Burgers on Netflix? It would be funny if the animal testing was conducted at Springfield's "Screaming Monkey Medical Research Facility", as seen on The Simpsons episode "HOMR" (S12e9). Alas, it is not. Still, Catherine Lemieux assuaged the concern about the animals on-set, assuring viewers everyone is well-cared for, without a doubt.

I just wanted to point out that we also had a vet on set. And she was great. She's somebody that I could use a total resource. Her name was (Ev) and I don't know her last name. but I considered that such a gift from production to be able to speak to somebody who actually is a veterinarian and who deals with that on a day to day basis. So that was really, really a great help.

At the end of the interview, I asked both Lemieux and Ghanimé about an ad for Ilaria's Infinity contact lenses. How does it link to the untenable situation at Arctic Biosystems. The query was originally posited by, of all people, a Chair of Ophthalmology at U.C. Davis. The good doctor and I wondered if it could have something to do with the inhuman, silver eyes of Dr. Hatake (played astringently by Hiroyuki Sanada). The question was responded to with an immediate aaahhs and hmmms; one could almost hear them shifting in their seats as they pondered my question. All to no effect, though; Ghanimé's answer was curt.

I have a huge answer. It's a juicy one. Are you ready for this? No comment. We cannot talk about that ... said with all humor of course.

New episodes of Helix air on SyFy, Fridays @10p/9c

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Jen in Pen ... and Ink! Thank You, Mel Henze!

Honours come in many a form and fancy. Some strive for awards and trophies, some for honorary mentions and notice. Mine, like many a dyed-in-the-wool geek is to be a cartoon character ... and not via those cheesy, "Turn yourself into a superhero!" ads: the product being little more than a selfie morphed by mildly impressive Photoshopping. No, a truly organic, artistic character is what I crave and not necessarily a Marvel-style superheroine (although, a metal bustier, Manson boots and coal-black locks, tipped with poisonous scorpions, à la Blackbeard and his legendary, gunpowder-dipped curls, with which to sting my villains ... hmmm). An honest to goodness Sunday funnies, cartoon character suits me raw-ther nicely. Well, my Fairy Godmother waved her wand and Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo! Unexpected and a true honour, this drawing was a thank-you from syndicated cartoonist Mel Henze, of GoComics new comic strip, Gentle Creatures. Weirdly, he nailed me with surprising accuracy! The parasol, the red shoes, the hat, sunglasses and flower! (Not the boobs, so much; but I love The Far Side approach to anatomy!)

I oft describe myself as Ken Burns, minus the funding. When something strikes my fancy, I write about it: Disneyland, Nordstrom, The Simpsons, Comic-Con, Colonial Williamsburg, Orange County, etc. Gentle Creatures struck my fancy and I wanted to write about it, where I scribe so often on geek culture, comics and animation: GoodToBeAGeek.com

Fortunate enough to interview Mr. Henze, I learned a great deal about his process, the maze and diligence that can lead to U.S. and international syndication and something called "panel-heaviness". I met a wonderful little doggy named Jingles, a curious stinkbug named Cecil, learned not all rabbits are cute and cuddly and The Muppets' King Prawn Pepe is on possible standby ... for what, I'm not sure. Check back very soon for my full interview with Mr. Henze and his Gentle Creatures!

 

Thank you, Mr. Henze! Thank you for the introduction, to boot, Mr. Gene Willis @GoComics!

Queen Guinevere Momentarily Dethroned By Princess Brooklynn, Two Ns

Hazel, Gladys, Dessie, Melvin, Ira and Edgar: all names most notably evoking an elderly relative, correct? What about Madison, Britney, Ashley, Declan, Wyatt and Cody? Too hip, too 2010s zeitgeist? Okay, then how about Nancy, Michele, Shannon, Gregory, Mark and Michael? Like it or not, the hipper your name, the surer its generational adhesion and popular decline; as you age, so will your chic and contempo cognomen. Did Mom & Dad name you in a trend? Enter your name into BabyNameWizard.com's to check; if you see a Matterhorn-spike, you're a trend, or at least were.

Apropos to Moi, a Jennifer, a on Huffington Post highlights the Matterhorn-spike that was my name. It's my website, my name, so I get to write about me. Hello, Narcissus.

Between 1965 and 1985, everyone named their daughter Jennifer, and now, no one does. So Jennifer was officially a Name Fad. What this means for all the Jennifers of the world is that while they've enjoyed spending most of their life so far with a cute, hip, young girl name, they are on their way to having a Your Mom's Friend's Name. A few decades after that, Jennifer can look forward to having an Old Lady Name, which happens when a name belongs to lots of old ladies, but no one under 75.

For you, gentle reader, the name Jennifer evokes whom? Aniston, Lawrence, Hudson, Garner, Saunders, Tilly, Grey, Jason Leigh, Devore? In fact, one of the very first, famous Jennifers was Queen Guinevere, the beauteous yet cuckolding wife of King Arthur. Legendary meanings of the pre-Jennifer sobriquets float from "white fairy" to "fair beauty" and "white ghost" (my fave). Today's more popular "Jennifer", a Franco-Norman derivation, finds its classic origins in the Celtic-Cornish language with "Gwenhwyfar"; this eventually morphed into Guinevere. Already considered old-fashioned and Mumsy by the dawn of the 20thC., the name Guinevere itself was dethroned and gave way in popularity to Jennifer, in the 1930s, and remained one of the top girl's names for the lion's share of the past century. Since then, we fair Gwennys have been riding high and happy the wave of Jennidom ... until now.

Fads ebb and flow, but your name is always yours. The test of how much you love your name, like your wedding ring? Do you still love it? Indeed, do you love it more so, as time goes by? Would you change it? Are you embarrassed by its passing fancy? Or, do you flaunt it proudly, happy to share it with the world, regardless of how thoroughly modern or ghetto-fabulous others' may be?

Yours Truly was almost Amy Clementine, Clemmy for short, Mom tells me. I also recall being pea-green with envy, at the age of five, of a school chum named Chandelier. Happily, like my curls,  I have grown into my name and would not change any of it for the world.

We Jennifers, according to HuffPo, are Your Mom's Friend. To boot, as everybody's Mom, Mother Nature, dictates, we will also be Old Ladies one day. Speaking pour Moi, I am my name and whether I am 8, 22, 37 or beyond, life is Camelot, minus the cuckolding, of course; and as the eternal white ghost, I plan to flit through my days, now and into infinitum with a Jennifer name plate on my Sadie Schwinn and Happy Birthday, Jennifer! painted on my cake with pink icing and pink roses.

Take note, Aubrey, Lindsay, Chelsea and Brooklynn with two Ns; be your name, embrace it and love it, no matter what they say when you hit 80. Not only will you be a Your Mom's Friend one day, you will also be an Old Lady. You, too, Ryder, Ryker, Kyler and Axel. Dig it and don't let the kids laugh at you when you're a professor emeritus at UC Santa Barbara or the oldest bartender in Dublin. See you one day in The Summerland, kittens!

 

Are you a #Jennifer? Share via @JennyPopNet

 

Christmas Eve Gnomes, Trolls and Elves: A Holiday Villanelle

They Mostly Come at Night

by Jennifer Susannah Devore

 

Holiday elves and gnomes, turning Christmas Eve so ghostly

Scampering hither and thither, skittering creepily through the house

They mostly come at night, mostly

 

Crafting chaos, making mischief so grossly

Frightened back to their beds, all the family pets: the cats, the pup and even the mouse

Holiday elves and gnomes, turning Christmas Eve so ghostly

 

 

Keeping eye from the widow's walk, lookout gnomes watch closely

Searching the inky skies for the mystical deer and the one known as Klaus

They mostly come at night, mostly

 

Down in the parlour, amidst the tree and its finery so costly

Trolls now join the midnight fête, some all alone, some with a spouse

Holiday elves and gnomes, turning Christmas Eve so ghostly

 

Dancing in the hall of the Mountain King, even fairies now flit and frolic so boastly

Cavorting and carousing to the crystal clinks of Mozart, Gaga, Bing and Strauss

They mostly come at night, mostly

 

In an instant he alights, the man with cheeks so rosy

Pressies left under the tree, cookies washed down with milk in a great douse

Holiday elves and gnomes, turning Christmas Eve so ghostly

They mostly come at night, mostly

 

@JennyPopNet

 

Star Wars, Steampunk and Smattering: San Diego Mini Maker Faire

Kittens, if the chilly, San Diego rain wasn’t a prompt to play indoors this December, the siren of invention, engineering,  technology and design was enough to lure a capacity-crowd of the curious to the first San Diego Mini Maker Faire. Ringing its knell from the warm beauty of the Spanish Mission-styled Del Mar Fairgrounds, this newest stop for the San Diego geek train proved bustling, hectic and promising. Besides, it’s Del Mar, kids! Even a permanent guest at the Hotel del Coronado needs a change of scenery once in a bit and this girl needs only an eighth of a reason to pop over “Where the Surf Meets the Turf”!

Billed as The Greatest Show (and Tell) on Earth, Maker Faire is a congress of the imaginative and a place to share, and sell, ideas and wares. Known as the Maker Movement, this creative-following is gaining steam worldwide, with Faires staged from the Bay Area to New York, from Dublin to Rome, from Tokyo to Sydney. December 2K13 was San Diego’s initiation with its first ever, and hopefully annual, Mini Maker Faire. (Why Mini? Based on New York’s version, there is much room to grow.)

An all-ages gathering of tech enthusiasts, crafters, educators, tinkerers, hobbyists, engineers, science clubs, authors, artists, students, and commercial exhibitors, Maker Faire worldwide is a cerebral wonderland for anyone with an imagination and the temerity to do something with it. Like a geeky cocktail party, minus the good booze (although some form of vile, domestic, beerwater was available at John Dillinger prices), the gathering is, as Maker Faire claims, a family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness … part science fair, part county fair, and part something entirely new.

Waiting in a very long, very slow, very wet line to enter San Diego’s first Faire, a talkative and cheerful USD student spoke authoritatively about the Bay Area venue, claiming it to be, with just a dash of good-natured condescension, “much bigger, way better and lots of actual symposia and lectures”. Fretting about the $12 entrance fee, wishing she had purchased the cheaper, $10 ticket online, she hoped San Diego’s effort would be worth it. Sizing up the hall’s exterior from under her fur-trimmed parka-hood, she sneered a bit and said with a twisted smile, “Kinda doubt it.”

Whilst the entry fee, plus $15 parking was relatively steep (Consider the Grand Dame of geek fests, San Diego Comic-Con, runs $12-$42/day) and the line was agonizingly slow (only two ticket windows), the cerebral and visual stimuli inside Bing Crosby Hall assuaged the lighter wallet and damp boots. Awaiting the rain- and line-weary crowds was a bevy of crafting booths, science experiments and technological demos, including a proverbial explosion in the popularity of 3-D printing: Yoda heads, TARDIS and Millennium Falcons proving the most popular products of the 3-D craze. The most inspiring, fascinating and useful of the 3-D buzz? Robohands: building appendages for those with hand anomalies, in mere hours! Don’t have $80K for a prosthetic? No worries. A set of blueprints and a 3-D printer (approx. $2K to purchase; a pittance to rent; maybe even one exists in your office) and you’ve got a hand by day’s end.

If one’s avocation, vocation or profession tends toward technology, real science, science-fiction or even steampunk, one would be pleased in the tightly-packed confines of the Faire. To boot, Comic-Con and WonderCon regulars would note some friendly faces on the periphery: San Diego Star Wars Society and San Diego R2-D2 Builders Club, to name a couple.

San Diego Star Wars Society and San Diego R2-D2 Builders Club shared a space and, as one would expect of them, brought a fan’s enthusiasm to the franchises. SDSWS is like AA, for Star Wars geeks. If they put out a calendar, Tina Fey-as-Liz Lemon-as-Princess Leia-as-hologram would be their centerfold. Meet-ups are a way for fellow San Diego Star wars freaks to gather and geek out over any and all things SW. From movie marathons to cosplay-and-props workshops, from collecting and gaming to convention field trips and even charitable events (notably Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation: Fighting Childhood Cancer, One Cup at a Time), the simple goal of this SoCal space sodality is to have a good time with like-minded dorks.

If Thomas, a kindly Swiss San Diegan manning the booth, is any indication of the folk you’ll meet at SDSWS, this coterie of Chewbacca connoisseurs would indeed be a pleasant diversion from the leagues of snarky, snippy, Star-savants out there, of both Wars and Trek. Welcoming, informative and inclusive, Thomas was anathema to so many Star Wars experts blitzing about the planet, propelled by their own hot air.  Smiling and eager to chat, hopeful to bring anyone into the fold, even the wholly uninitiated, Thomas offered no snorts of derision or condescending blinks when fielding even the simplest questions from children and adults alike. Enthusiastically, and with the slightest Teutonic accent, he shared the simple mission of SDSWS: “Come and join us to talk about Star Wars and have a good time!”

If the future isn’t your gig, but futuristic is, Gears & Roebuck: Rusty Junk Emporium and The San Diego Steampunk Community (including the Adventures of Drake & McTrowell: Perils in a Postulated Past) were on-hand, in very wee numbers, it should be noted, to hawk a few antique wares, tell some tall tales and share the collective mission of steampunkers worldwide: “We fight with invention, we fight with ingenuity. Full steam ahead! All aboard!” Our own Dr. Lucy, naturally was in Heaven; the gears in her own noggin whirring and ticking as she flitted between the two booths, trying on air-conditioned pith helmets and mechanized corsets, and testing the efficacy of thermometer-regulated moon backpacks and giant, sterling silver spoons for feeding her pet octopus Onslow, back at our Hotel Del.

Generally a well-read, sartorially-intense and whimsical crew, the Victorian votaries are tinkerers extraordinaire, taking cues from the likes of  Jules Verne to Bill Gates. Steampunk inspiration reaches back to Sir Charles Wheatstone and his stereoscopic imaging (predecessor to today’s 3-D imaging) and forward to Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. If you’ve yet to explore the world of steampunk, do acquaint yourself. If you’re already in the know, and living in San Diego, the San Diego Steampunk Community just might have the perfect, Phileas Foggesque, space-age tool to scratch that ruddy itch.

Will the Maker Faire make it to San Diego again next year? The Maker Movement is gaining traction in metropoli everywhere.  Judging by the Mars-level heat generated in this sardine-packed venue, it seems plumb stupid to not capitalize again on the funky, inventive and creative nature of San Diego folk. However, like Kim Kardashian’s jeans, the Bing Crosby Exhibition Hall was packed to the seams and ready to burst if anyone took a deep breath. My recommendation, promoters? Bigger jeans and maybe some air-conditioned pith helmets.

Full steam ahead! Ahoy! Abyssinia and Merrie Christmas!

 

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