really glad

That this happened. Really glad they included the important getting cool/dressed montage and in particular the close up of Ozone's earring. I was so into that earring. This just reminds me of a specific time in my life that was generally full of rubbish but which I remember very fondly. Also, my fascination with a palette I can weakly describe as 'fluoro-pastel' can be quite clearly traced back to the sequel to this film, Breakin' 2 - Electric Boogaloo. Look out for an incredibly enthusiastic black lycra clad JCVD in the beach scene...

nostalgia

I think most children of divorced parents find it incredibly bittersweet to look at photos of their childhood. I know I certainly do. I feel this pulling in my chest when I see photos of us all together. That's not to say it makes me feel terribly sad, but there is an indefinable tugging sensation. I think that when my parents separated, my heart was broken for the first time, and looking at those photos makes it ache a little.

One thing I love about my parents is that even though they are separated now, they were together for a long time before they had children.

At around my age they were married and travelling the world together. When they left New Zealand, my Dad had to hide on the other side of the ship so my Mum's very strict Croatian parents would not know they were going away together. They even worked on a kibbutz in Israel (Mum didn't like it and Dad had to spent a lot of time keeping the other men away from her. Did I mention my Mum is really, really pretty?)

When they returned to New Zealand they lived in a dank little flat in Wellington and my Aunty remembers them dancing in the kitchen together while making pumpkin soup. We've found photos they took of themselves, cheek to cheek, holding the camera at arms length. It makes me feel hopeful, knowing that they were that in love, for that long a time.

I found this picture of my dad with either me or my older sister at the beach. I think its quite lovely. xx

what i desire is man's red fire

I developed a new habit recently, it usually manifests when I've had a bit (or a lot) to drink, and am either in my backyard by myself, or somewhere else with one or two other people. I've become addicted to watching clips from old Disney movies on YouTube.

More specifically, I have been watching:
The Monkey Song from the Jungle Book
Bear Necessities from the Jungle Book
I Just Can't Wait to be King from the Lion King
The Circle of Life from the Lion King
and one time, Under the Sea from the Little Mermaid.*

I think maybe everyone in my generation has secret hopes of doing this with our future (unfortunate) babies.

A few points to note: the 3G reception in my backyard is somewhat lacking and can cause these to take quite a while to load, but I persevere. The quality of most of these is low. They aren't actually music videos, and often you have to wait through a few minutes of boring (to drunk me) dialogue to get to 'the good bits'.

Anyway, all of this got a bit embarassing when I got my phone bill** and so to remedy this I have recently aquired the beginnings of what will eventually be a collection of every Disney film ever made.

I had these toys, from a happy meal probably, when I was little

Now, we all know the female characters tended to be over-sexualised, distorted images of femininity while the males were huge, muscular oafs, often with teeny tiny lower halfs. It was weird. I'm using the past tense because I'm not thinking about any Disney movie made since I was 12, though I'm sure their CG heroines were equally wasp-waisted and the good guys equally broad shouldered.

This and all the thinly veiled racist anthropomorphism aside, I loved these movies to death and am really, really excited about watching them again. Particularly those which I've been watching clips from lately, and Beauty and the Beast which was the first movie I saw in theatres ever. That may or may not be a true fact but it's certainly the first I remember.

Wap bop a loo bop, a wap bam boom. Or something to that effect.

I personally intend to watch these films, enjoy their dewey eyes and musical interludes, and possibly engage in some intellectual and/or drunk discussion about Latinos being portrayed as hot blooded and criminally minded chihuahuas on Lady and the Tramp, African Americans as jive talking, scat singing monkeys and crows in the Jungle Book and Dumbo, and French men as CANDLESTICKS and CLOCKS in Beauty and the Beast. Or maybe I'll leave that to other people and just sing along.

Here and here are two other links you should click on.

*I just want you all to know that I watched/listened to these again, as I looked them up for the links, and as I type this am involuntarily nodding my head and tapping my feet along to Bare Necessities yet I am not drunk. It is that good.
*This isn't entirely true, it didn't cost me anything extra on my phone bill, but at some point did become embarassing. Hence why I'm sharing it with everyone on the internet.