She Still Looks Gorgeous at Fifty

Some movie stars look as radiantly gorgeous at fifty as they did when they first burst upon the scene. Of course, I am talking about Mothra, who made her debut in an eponymous film. Mothra sure is a looker:





Now, that's one fine looking moth. Of course, no post about Mothra would be complete without the Mothra theme song, sung by the ***SPOILER ALERT*** two little pixies who lived in the temple on Mothra's home island:





I had wanted to post a clip from the movie, but embedding was disabled. While the scene doesn't play "creepy", the subject matter is pretty chilling when one considers it- the audience sits, enraptured by the very singing that will bring about their doom. The beautiful pixies which have been enslaved for their entertainment are sending out a call for vengeance, vengeance in the form of a giant moth!!! You are on the way to destruction! Destruction at the hands antennae of a moth... now that's lepidopterror!

The moth-summoning pixies of the movie were played by twin sisters Emi and Yumi Ito, who recorded as The Peanuts. When not bringing the wrath of giant insects down on their oppressors, these ladies were swinging:





Those Ito twins were really something. Of course, other pop acts have taken on the Mothra Song, but there's no substitute for the original. Just imagine, if the ill-conceived, piss-poor American "re-imagining" of Godzilla hadn't been such a flop, thus dissuading American studios from tackling other Toho properties, we may have had a remake of Mothra starring the Olsen twins.

A few years back, I found a cute site called "The Church of Mothra", which was a fan site by a neo-pagan who posited that Mothra, being a nature goddess, would be worthy of worship. That site is now defunct, but there is a current Church of Mothra blog which doesn't seem to be theological in nature.

I Know You Don't Care Much For What I Think...

...but I'd be remiss if I didn't tell you anyway.

Motivated by nostalgia, I searched throughout the t00bz for a bit of (sadly unpopular) pop perfection from my y00t. I remember the legendary WLIR playing the hell out of the eponymous EP by Dancing Hoods, a band fronted by Mark Linkous (who tragically took his own life last year), frontman of the band Sparklehorse- not to be confused with sparkleponies!

With that being said, here's a pure pop confection with some great lyrics- 1984's Reputation by Dancing Hoods:





For a faster, more "aggressive" sound, here's another track from the EP (GOOGLE IT, YOUNGUNS!!! After you get offa mah lawn, that is), Not the Only One... blast this one, folks:





No trip like the nostalgia trip, folks.

UPDATE: I'm writing this post in the four o' clock hour while at work (thank you "Post Options"), so I feel compelled to post an additional song, one which seems to be my theme song these days:

Not Slacking, Honest!

When it seems like I'm slacking off with the posts, it means I'm up to my ass in alligators at work.

This is, as they say, one of those days (weeks... months... years...)- I left the house at 8AM Saturday for my volunteer gig, then had to head off for a long slog at work- 4PM to 9PM at one site, 10PM to 6AM tomorrow at another. Our busy season is drawing to an end, and things get real quiet for a while. I can't wait.

I wanted to embed the video for Belly's lovely Now They'll Sleep (gotta love Tanya Donnelly...), but stupid Warner Brothers won't allow embedding.

Back Off, Missy, That's a Man's Makeup!

Okay, so I'm straying to some interesting corners of the web, and I run across a cover version of Ikenai Rouge Magic done by a... wait for it... wait for it... done by a girl!!!





Jumpin' J-pop on a pogo stick! Everybody knows that the burrow owl lives in a hole in the ground Ikenai Rouge Magic is about men's makeup... it's about makeup machismo, and the glam rock lifestyle. It's not supposed to be sung by a girl! There's nothing macho about the preceding video... the heavily made-up face of badass masculinity looks like this:





What's this world coming to? Everywhere you look, male privilege is toppling like an impotent phallus. Hell, even the He Men Women Haters' Club has female leaders now.

Of course, the title of the post is ripped off from one of my favorite B. Kliban cartoons:





B. Kliban's work was instrumental in the development of my admittedly warped sense of humor- while still in high school, I bought a copy of The Biggest Tongue in Tunisia and never looked back (I wouldn't have seen anything with that tongue in the way). While his pictures of kittehs were at one time ubiquitous, it's his surrealistic works that appeal to me. Here's a good selection of some of his work.

Tradition Should Not Be a Cudgel

I've been thinking about this post for a while now, over four months, in fact. The word "tradition", like the word "family" has been nuked from orbit by right-wing authoritarians.

The American Heritage Dictionary (heritage is another word which has been "nuked from orbit") defines tradition as:


1. The passing down of elements of a culture from generation to generation, especially by oral communication.
2. A mode of thought or behavior followed by a people continuously from generation to generation; a custom or usage.
3. A set of such customs and usages viewed as a coherent body of precedents influencing the present: followed family tradition in dress and manners. See synonyms at heritage.
4. A body of unwritten religious precepts.
5. A time-honored practice or set of such practices.
6. Law. Transfer of property to another.


Given the fact that I like alliteration, I'd define tradition as "the sum of the practices, preferences, and prejudices that are passed down from generation to generation in any given culture." Some traditions, like eating sfingi on St Joseph's Day are great. Other traditions, like working to deny human rights to certain members of the population, are awful. Being multi-ethnic, I've always had the benefit of approaching tradition in "buffet" style- I can pick and choose which aspects of my heritage to play up at any given time. My advice is to embrace the aspects of one's culture that affirm life and liberty and to expunge those aspects which impinge on the ability of oneself and others to life a free and fulfilling life. In other words, "Inhale Einstein, Exhale Hitler"... eat the lefse, shun the lutefisk... leave the gun, take the cannoli... You get the picture, there are good and bad traditions. If Tevye had been singing about hating on the gays, would this song be a beloved classic of the musical theater?





Be wary of anyone who claims to be a traditionalist, a whole lot of stupid, bigoted nonsense is likely to follow such a proclamation. Of course, New Traditionalists are an entirely different matter.

Sitting Shiva

I was going to do a post on All Souls Day or El Dia de los Muertos, but a sad recent development caused me to change my focus.

Over the weekend, the father of a dear friend of mine died peacefully in his sleep after being ill for a few months. Dr Dave was a gracious, kindly man with a gentle, generous spirit. He was intelligent, cultured, funny, and charming. I have fond memories of going to the home he shared with his lovely wife Elaine to celebrate Hanukkah with their family.

I learned about the funeral after it had taken place, having spent much of the weekend in my workplace without electricity. In Jewish tradition burial takes place as soon as possible after death and the ritual washing of the decedent. The funeral took place on Monday, and the traditional mourning period shiva began.

Last night, I headed over to my friend's childhood home to pay my respects. When I arrived, I met my friend outside the house, walking to dog before the house was filled with mourners. After offering my condolences to her, her mother, and her brother, I helped her husband, also a great and good friend of mine, set up a couple of platters of food on the kitchen table (he's known me for a long, long time, and knew that I'd worked in a delicatessen in olden times, when I had hair). There are two general rules I adhere to when visiting friends' houses- first of all, make your way to the kitchen as soon as possible (it's the center of the home) and when in doubt, help out (this was the first time I'd ever sat Shiva, although I did a bit of reading on what to expect during lulls at work).

The house soon filled up with friends and neighbors, many of whom were members of the good doctor's synagogue. The mourners' Kaddish was going to be led by the female cantor of my friend's synagogue, a less conservative congregation. The cantor (cantrix?) explained to the assembled mourners that hers was a Reform synagogue, and that the form of the Kaddish would be slightly different from the Kaddish recited at a more Orthodox Shiva, and handed out booklets with the entire Kaddish text. One of the older men handed out yarmulkes for the men to don while reciting the Kaddish. I donned mine, and tried to follow along with the English text of the Hebrew prayers. The prayers were sung a capella, and after the Kaddish was over, the assembled mourners sang some of Dr. Dave's favorite traditional songs, including a lovely rendition of the love song Tumbalalaika:





Being among the people celebrating the life and mourning the death of a wonderful human being, I was struck with the thought, "While I may not be a member of the tribe, I am a member of the family, which is more important." As I have written before, tribe is important to me, but it's always, always, always trumped by family.

Saints and Divinities

This being All Saints' Day, I figured I'd do a quick rundown on some pagan divinities and heroes who have snuck in under the theological "velvet rope" and entered the Communion of Saints. Traditional Roman Catholicism is a blend of European philosophical and pagan religious folkways with Levantine monotheism. Much of the work of St Thomas Aquinas was rooted in the philosophy of Aristotle, and the writings of the Greek philosophers exert almost as much of an influence on Catholic theology as the Bible itself.

On a more basic level, the expanding Church incorporated local beliefs into its monotheistic model, and a veneer of sanctity was applied to pagan figures.

St Christopher is often depicted as carrying the Christ child across a river, much like the Greek hero Jason carried the goddess Hera across a raging river. While St Christopher has been quietly removed from the liturgical calendar, devotional medals and emblems are often worn or displayed on car dashboards to invoke protection for travelers.

The Irish goddess Brigid, a patroness of arts and trades, akin to the Greek Athena, has been subsumed by St Bridget of Kildare (also known as Bridey. The feast of St Bridget falls upon the old pagan feast day of Imbolc.

St George, often depicted as a dragon-slayer, shares qualities with a legion of monster slayers.

Even Jesus' mom can't escape association with paganry- the Virgin of Guadalupe is often conflated with the Aztec goddess Tonantzin.

Yeah, even saints sometimes have skeletons in their closets, such as a wild, pagan youth (sometimes, even a youth spent as a god or goddess). Of course, St Adiposa, who sought martyrdom through overeating, doesn't have a pagan connection, but I don't see her listed on the liturgical calendar. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd say that her feast day falls on Thanksgiving.

Mentioning St Adiposa reminds me, I never did review the non Face in the Frost parts of John Bellairs' Magic Mirrors... who's the patron saint of unfinished business?

At least I know who the patron saints of the stranded are: