Happy Man Day

Mondays are "man days" around the Power household, when Trevor and Henry hang around, doing various "manly" activities that do not involve me. They make their own sausage and drink beer and burp loudly. Or at least that's what I suspect they do. However, these man days are occasionally thwarted when I'm on a break from school, which I currently am. So this is how Trevor, Henry, and I spent this man day.

Both of us completed the Red Eye crossword puzzle, independently of one another. We then drank coffee and did our own "things" on the couch for about an hour. My "thing" was reading my new (new to me) Patricia Highsmith Tom Ripley novel, The Boy Who Followed Ripley, and Trevor's "thing" was catching up on various art and iPhone blogs on the computer.

After all of this rigorous activity, we had, obviously, worked up quite an appetite. We decided to make and eat soup and sandwiches. This was a great decision, not only because the food was good, but also because we got to use our new dining accoutrement--super cool b & w napkins and placemats--courtesy of my 2009 Secret Power Santa, Angi.

While we digested, we finished watching our Netflix flick, The Limits of Control. It's the most recent film by Jim Jarmusch, and it's an abstract and quiet, though very interesting and oddly likable, movie about a hit man. Well, it's sort of about a hit man. Tilda Swinton, Bill Murray, Gael García Bernal, and John Hurt co-star, and I think that Jarmusch is one of the only filmmakers who can make a movie that, although it's starring a famous and very talented cast, gets no press and you only discover it accidentally through a random indie-film rental trailer or shoved behind Terminator Salvation at the video store--a film like this that, when you watch it, is actually...good. Usually movies like this--with a famous and very talented cast, that gets no press, and is stuck behind Terminator Salvation--are...well, they're just God awful. You know, the ones that when you see the trailer or read the back of the box, you say, "Gee, this is starring all of my favorite actors! Robert DeNiro, William H. Macy, Sigourney Weaver...why haven't I ever heard of it?! Well, I guess since it has such a famous and very talented cast, it must be good. Even though I have never, ever heard of it..." And that so rarely turns out well.

Case in point:

We recently saw Shadowboxer starring Helen Mirren, Cuba Gooding Jr., Mo'Nique (who is getting barrels and buckets full of critical acclaim for her portrayal of an abusive mother in Precious) and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Now, although Shadowboxer stars famous and very talented actors, it is awful. It's that unintentionally funny-kind-of-awful. Lots of slow motion. A really false-looking and strangely present blond wig. A super--SUPER--creepy relationship between Mirren and Gooding's characters. Stephen Dorff, however, is another co-star, and this single casting decision should have been a dead giveaway to its badness. He hasn't made a good movie since Judgment Night. (And that's not an ironic statement. I love Judgment Night.) But this movie is no Judgment Night. In fact, its working title was probably "Check out Cuba Gooding Jr.'s Naked Butt for 30/90 minutes," or "Stephen Dorff Plays Another Heartless Bad Guy in a See-Thru Shirt and Heavy Gold Neck Chain with Ginormous Crucifix," or, "Helen Mirren is a Contract Killer Dying of Cancer and Has a Graphic Sex Scene with CGJr. (so gross) P.S. She Drinks Wild Turkey and Smokes Cigarettes, Which Means She's Super Bad-Ass." See?

Now, a word of warning, because the previous descriptions might have peaked your interest and you're feeling frisky enough to rent Shadowboxer just to test our critical merit. Or to catch a glimpse of naked CGJr. butt. But please, please, don't. Just take our word for it on this one. I beg of you.

Okay, so that turned into a rant I wasn't quite expecting to write. And back to the Jim Jarmusch movie that defied the expectation of badness. If you like Jarmusch and you're in the mood to look at how pretty the cities and countrysides of Spain are, and you don't mind a movie with a lot of plot but little-to-no story (not a bad thing, as it turns out!), then check out The Limits of Control.

And...back to man day:

So, after the movie was over, I broke out more new holiday gear, this kitcheny gift a handmade apron from Paula!

Yes! She seriously made that! She made one for Mom Bork, too, but I like mine better. Obviously, because it's mine! Don't be jealous of my fantastic slippers-'n'-socks look. I pull off tremendous fashion feats while hanging around the house all day. My jeans and tee-shirts looks are infinite...

I donned the awesome apron and got to baking. I had a few browning bananas left over (Trevor will not eat a banana that has any sort of tinge of brown on it, anywhere.), so I decided to make a banana bread. I'm usually not a successful from-scratch baker, but I was very conscientious with my recipe-following and I think I may have done a good job. It smelled good, anyway. Although, they almost always smell good. It's still cooling on the counter, so I'll let you know about its all-important taste tomorrow. But this is how it looked in the oven (and yes, I know that I need to clean the oven):

While the bread was baking and I was starting to blog, Trevor actually got one of his traditional man day activities accomplished: vacuuming.

He's pretty terrific.

And that brings us up to right now. I'm finishing this post, half-way through the laundry, and I'll start dinner after having a few sips of wine. All in all a productive day! Tomorrow I will actually leave the house to get some file folders for the many papers I need to file after my winter cleaning the other day (I forgot to take a "before" picture, so the "after" picture wouldn't have much of an impact. Sorry). So happy man day to all, and have a good man night.