ATL - 8/25/08 - IKEA & Bday

Indoor leeks
Grandpa's 69 Birthday!
A-one-a and a-two-a and ... IKEA!
Bake me a cake... as fast as you can...spoons...even better, spoons & beer!

MOVIE/ART/LOCAL/U.S./FRENCH/WEB NEWS

MOVIE NEWS - Babylon A.D. - Is it just since that jump-the-shark baby-vs-the-big-bad-government-agent movie he made that Vin Diesel movies have to sneak into theaters? I haven't heard a thing about this one and only barely caught the trailer; it looks like "2 Fast 2 Escape 2 New York".

8/27 - Plaza Theater, 7:30 - "Breakfast at Tiffany's" (Benefit for Multiple Sclerosis!)

8/28 - Fox Theater, 7:30 - "Mama Mia" ('nuff said)

8/30 - Fox Theater, 2:00 - "Wall-E" (I really, really, really like this movie. Really.)

ART NEWS - 8/29 - Fernbank, 5:30 - ?? - Martini's and IMAX w/ Kayla Taylor Jazz, including KENYON!

8/29 & 30 - Plaza Theater - An Evening with Crispin Glover. What is it? I have no clue...just the weirdest guy in film...on stage.

LOCAL NEWS -8/30 Dragon Con Parade @ 10:00, leaving from Woodruff Park. Still my favorite parade in Atlanta! -2007-

8/23-30 - Midtown Restaurant Week. Dine-out for $25.

Good news re: Panhandling in ajc.com? "Atlanta police say a mini-crackdown on aggressive panhandling in the city’s Peachtree Corridor has yielded 40 arrests in the past 20 days..." Wow..."mini" is 40? How many panhandlers are there on Peachtree?

OVERHEARD IN C'VILLE - "Have you done that invoice?"

"Well, we generated it; if you haven't got it, it must be lost in lingo."

(Truer words never spoken.)

U.S. NEWS - Some damn convention. I know there are important events inspired (or spawned) by these political rah-rahs - William Jennings Bryant's "Cross of Gold" speech in 1896, the "Wets" vs. "Drys" debates during the Prohibition-era 1924 convention, Chicago's Vietnam War protests in 1968 , the actual announcement of the Vice-Presidential nominee during the convention for the last time in 1976, Obama's 2004 keynote speech, but for me, the DNC will forever be associated with 1988's convention in Atlanta, where Rob Lowe met an under-aged girl at Club Rio and filmed himself in-flagrante with her in a hotel room. Why is this significant? The first celebrity video-scandal? Impetous for undercover bed louse investigations? Radical restructuring of DNC convention rules? Nope, it was because immediately following, Club Rio got too popular for its own good and we had to start going to "Velvet".

FRENCH NEWS - There is plenty of local news in France this week - 8 climbers killed in a Mont Blanc avalanche, the debate over the increasing popularity of "bottelones" (youth-organized, open air, out-of-control, BYOB parties), an impressive Olympic medal count (40)...

...but the headliner event was something I thought I could at least escape by reading a foreign newspaper...but was wrong. Page One of lemonde...the start of the Democratic National Convention. Lemonde points out that the event isn't yet one of unity...in spite of "L'obamania".

WEB NEWS - I can't get enough of his wonderful stuff -shag-