Grrr. If you watched any television yesterday you were probably forced to cry at least a little. It was like sweeps week, except instead of being after ratings those urchins were after tears. Am i being impossibly cynical? I don’t know. It was all moving because the stories are moving, but i don’t trust any of the well-coifed news anchors to care about the actual well-being of people past the moments when their eyeballs are stuck to the TV.
I have probably watched the least amount of television coverage of anyone, having been abroad with no TV set for 8 of the last 12 months, but i’m still at the i-can’t-take-anymore stage. I only saw the video footage that everyone here knows by heart last May. I watched the actual event in a tiny window on a french webcast at work in paris. Then i nervously chain-smoked cigarettes with the other American outside the office. I was sitting on the hood of a little car and it was a crisp fall day. In later months i would feel horribly disconnected from everything New York and everything Paris. I wished i could either be back in New York, or wipe the place out of my mind, but i didn’t do either. Mostly i just smoked.
~~~
I saw Woody Allen’s Manhattan yesterday at free show at BAM. Manhattan has never looked more beautiful, she is the real star. As a love story though, the film is pretty depressing since everyone in it is kind of a jerk (and i find myself relating to all of them). And the couple in front of me was being so cuddly i kept imagining how easy it would be to step on their heads, repeatedly. But like Mr Allen, i also fall in love with Diane Keaton whenever she’s in one of his movies. That hussy!
Before it started, like a scene out of a Woody Allen movie the slightly dorky guy sitting next to me started talking to me about obscure French directors who’s names he couldn’t remember. I wasn’t biting. I’m only impressed these days by guys with absolutely nothing to prove. Guys who are basically indifferent to me. And even then i’m skeptical. I need a date desperately but i don’t trust anyone in pants. It’s a quandary. And it’s interesting that no one i encountered yesterday said a word about the anniversary, yet it was the only thing on the lips of our media. Was it simple over-saturation, or was not talking about it for just one day the best way? I don’t know. Nobody knows, least of all Fox News Team coverage.
New Angeles Monthly, June 2008
Weekend America, March 30, 2008
Los Angeles Times, March 13, 2008
Los Angeles Times, March 6, 2008
Nil by Mouth is written by Neille Ilel. Neille is a writer, reporter and user interface specialist in Los Angeles. If you think that's a lot, she's also got a host of meandering sidelines including improv comedy, tennis, cooking, drawing and thinking about learning to play the guitar.
Nil is her given name. It's a long story.
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