Folks, it has been a terrible week. A terrible month, in fact. This move is going wrong at every possible moment, and it is draining in every way. All I want to do is sit in the dark and watch Star Trek: Voyager and eat this entire party-sized bag of Skittles.

Instead, I’d like to share with your a little something that will always bring me joy: Ace of Base. Or, more specifically, bands that I adore doing Ace of Base covers.

Firstly, the leader of the fanclub and one of my favorite musicians for his sheer literary prowess, The Mountain Goats (John Darnielle) with “I Saw the Sign”. Now, there are a ton of different versions floating around YouTube, but my very favorite is the six-minute audio-only version I got from a friend. So, here you go:

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I promise you, it’s worth the whole six(ish) minutes. And if you’ve never before listened to The Mountain Goats, give them a go. I’d recommend Tallahassee, The Sunset Tree, Heretic Pride and We Shall Al Be Healed as good albums to start with. In no particular order.

Did I mention he was prolific?

Maybe I should post a good compilation list. There’s a lot, a lot, a lot of Mountain Goats stuff to sift through. A lot of it is dark, a lot of it is lo-fi, but it really is a brilliant collection of work.

Jukebox the Ghost is a band that I had the pleasure of seeing when they opened for Ben Folds in April of 2009. I’m almost afraid to admit it, as much as I like Ben Folds, but I think I enjoyed Jukebox’s set more that night. Their album lived in my player for months, it was on constant repeat on my MP3 player, and I definitely gave at least one person that album for Christmas. They’re brilliant and catchy, they sing about the apocalypse, and they’re bringing piano rock back with a vengeance.

Imagine my delight when, while strolling through the iTunes store, I noticed they were on a compilation album. Of cover songs. Doing “It’s a Beautiful Life”.

Some YouTube-age for you, since they’re pretty silly dudes.

And, as a little extra, a video of their single “Empire” from the album due out in September. They are both absolutely worth the 99 cents I spent on them.

For those of you playing along at home, you’ll notice that there hasn’t been an update in over a month. I’d like to apologize to both of you.

Never fear - I’m still reading lots of interesting books and watching entirely too much television - Community, anyone? - but I’ve been purposefully putting off an update for two exciting reasons. One, I’m moving over a thousand miles away to start grad school in the fall. The plan was to move this very weekend, but that has fallen apart in spectacular fashion, so I’ve moved my focus on to Reason Two For Lack Of Updates. Being, of course, YAMCast. Now that my mad-dash to organize my life into hundreds of cardboard cartons has slowed to a leisurely crawl, I can get the tech set up to bring my YA yammer straight to your earholes.

Expect that in mid-June. For now, I’d like to leave you with the following movie trailer. This is decidedly the worst premise for a romantic comedy that I have ever seen:

We’re living in a green age, people. True, it’s a slow and painful process, and there are plenty of people who still don’t see a need to take care of our planet, but America is getting greener every day.

Making the choice for more energy-efficient products and organic foodstuffs is becoming more popular, and therefore more available. That’s not to say the problem is anywhere close to being solved, but the need for green solutions has entered the public conscious. And by that I mean it’s all over the mainstream media.

In 2008 there was the increasingly popular documentary Food, Inc. that told us all about the wastefulness and uncleanliness of our nation’s food industry. Then there was the No Impact Man documentary in 2009 that let us follow the lives of a New York family as they tried to leave no negative impact on the planet, environmentally speaking. They went to extremes, certainly, but it was (and is) an experiment in just how much wastefulness we can do without. And, I admit I haven’t watched it yet, Food Revolution is this season’s TV newcomer, but it’s in the same ballpark.

It seems that as a nation we’re somewhat open to a change in our diets, provided it isn’t too pricey, but there’s something that still scares the begeezus out of us - germs.

Quick! Everyone break out your miniature disposable bottle of hand sanitizer - the GERMS are here! We may all get swine flu if we so much as look at a child with the sniffles! I think someone three blocks away just had a coughing fit - excuse me while I break out my SARS mask. (Or rather, buy a brand new one. Can’t be too safe, you know?)

When it comes to germs, our newfound green sensibilities seem to fly straight out the window. We still opt for the cleaners with bleaches in them. We use rolls of paper towels instead of reusable rags. Disposable paper products - toilet paper, tissues, diapers, feminine products - are a huge percentage of our country’s waste. We break out the antibacterial hand sanitizer at every opportunity.

Kleenex knows this. They anticipate and welcome our fears and know these fears overpower our thinking. And so, they have concocted a new, shiny product for us to buy, which they advertise like so:

A clean, fresh towel every time.

Every time.

According to Kleenex’s own website, “People in the U.S. dry their hands on cloth bathroom towels approximately 200 billion times a year.” So, in perfect Kleenex World, 200 billion of these disposable paper towels will end up in our landfills every year. What?

Now, I’m not one to advocate a completely paperless home existence, but I do think there’s a line, and Kleenex is crossing it. Sure, dispose of your toilet paper. We’ve figured that one out. Reusable cleaning rags instead of paper towels. Easy. Facial tissues are great, but try to use one up completely before you chuck it. Allergies anymore make it almost as wasteful to be machine-washing little loads of handkerchiefs every day. Diapers are a problem that need addressing, and I’m not saying you need to craft your own tampons but there are less wasteful alternatives. (A post for another day, assuredly!)

These disposable hand towels are wasteful and unnecessary. And thankfully, other people (David and Shea) find it a real kick in the teeth that they’re advertising this garbage (literally - ha!) right around Earth Day. Honestly, I thought it was a joke at first. Not to mention the fact that all this germophobia in recent years is leading to new, stronger germs, as well as children who have been so insulated from them that their immune systems can’t do their job. Kleenex’s own beloved CDC has expressed concern over these antibacterial products, and Anne Marie at About.com gives it to you short and sweet.

At any rate, I’m going to keep using my disgusting hand towel. My parents let me get sick as a kid, so I’m pretty sure my immune system is up for the challenge.

The City of Ember (2003)

Sometime in 2004 I picked up Jeanne DuPrau’s The City of Ember. It must have coincided with one of my collegiate re-readings of The Giver, because I remember the similarities standing out in a glaring way. I shelved The City of Ember with disgust, and forgot it existed. Until, that is, I saw the previews in 2008 for the film adaptation. I remember groaning aloud in the theater, explaining to friends that it was a terrible book.

I had an English professor in college with whom I took many, many classes. One thing she taught us was that reading is not a passive experience. You don’t read something, tuck it away, and that’s that. You enter the reading with your whole life’s accumulation of experiences. You interact with the book and it changes you. Your relationship with a book when you read it at 18 will be vastly different than when you read it at 40. Never has this been clearer to me than with this book.

Last week I ordered the film The City of Ember through Netflix. I settled in for an evening of masochistic glee, only to find that I was genuinely sorry I had to pause the movie to meet some friends. I thought about it while I was away, and I was glad to come home and finish it. Was the movie really so much better than the book? Had they changed it so much? I didn’t think they had, but I couldn’t remember. Six years is a while. So I pulled it out again (I can’t get rid of books) and sat down to read.

The film is visually incredible. Granted, there are great sections at the end that scream COMPUTER GENERATED in very loud, contrasty tones, but I mean before that. Perhaps it was the charm of post-apocalyptic self-contained societies, but the shabby clutter of electrical Ember was thrilling to look at and explore. The premise being that the town was stocked to survive for 200 years, but we’re about forty years past that, so everything is patched and re-purposed and very in right now.

Doon Harrow (Harry Treadaway) and Lina Mayfleet (Saoirse Ronan) in City of Ember (2008)

I found it was nice to have these visuals with me when I read the book again. I usually prefer my own imaginings, but I think in the case of The City of Ember, I had been at a loss six years ago to come up with a very compelling image of the city. The movie does it beautifully. I particularly liked the costume for Lina Mayfleet, and the exteriors of the city as she ran through delivering her messages.

I also noticed the similarities to The Giver less. Or maybe there just weren’t as many as I though. Man-made post-apocalyptic village? Okay, yeah, that’s not just Lois Lowry. I think she’s got the monopoly when it comes to YA lit though. Then there’s Assignment Day for all the twelve year-olds. This is when they’re given theit jobs within the community. The process is different, but the base concept is the same. Hey, maybe that’s what the end of the world calls for? You get to be a kid until you’re twelve, and then you better pull your weight. Maybe they’re tuned in to something the rest of us aren’t privy to. But aside from the job of Messenger (which DuPrau beat Lowry to, clearly), and keeping the villagers purposefully ignorant, I can’t find anything. And all that’s fairly coincidental, if not unavoidable. Rage dismissed. I was wrong.

City of Ember (2008)

The plots between the book and film stay in line almost perfectly until the end. In both cases we are given the background up front - Ember had been built underground to save the last of humanity. Their eventual escape, however, is made much more theatrical for the film. (Strangely enough.) Lots of automated and impressive machinery. I admit, I found it thrilling. After reading the escape in the novel again, I don’t think it would have been quite as climactic. Good choice.

The book does attempt to give us some background on the actual building of Ember. It started with a base of 200 people (100 infants, 100 elderly) who are assigned into family units (oh hey, more Giver) and the elders are supposed to say nothing of their lives before Ember. The new generations will grow up in ignorance until, 200 years later, the instructions for their departure are revealed. Except that doesn’t happen. The movie doesn’t even touch on this. I realize I’m getting awfully niticky about an allegory, but these are the things I want to know. How long would it take, really, to build an underground city that will sustain about 200 people, give or take, for 200 years? All the supplies they had to fill the storerooms with? Do you build extra homes so people can move out when they’re older? How do people repair the generator without understanding it? What government even funds this?

Okay, yes, now I’m getting too serious. But some of the questions are valid. I picked up the first sequel a few months ago at a used bookstore. I saw that there are others - another sequel, and a prequel. I really hope some of my issues are addressed. I think the plot would be too childish if some of the logistics weren’t made clear. If anything, I’d like to know why the town was made in the first place. I’ll just have to read it and find out.

Bottom line, I really, really enjoyed my second encounter with The City of Ember. I’d recommend it, both the book and the movie.

Podcast!

On an unrelated note, I read Going Bovine a few weeks back. I found that the entry I was writing about it was entirely too long, and I still had so much I wanted to say about it. So, the first episode of YAMCast is going to be about Libba Bray’s Going Bovine, the graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley Lost at Sea, and the teenage existential crisis. Hopefully I’ll be discussing it with a friend of mine, but I’ll totally talk to myself about it. If anyone out there is the weebiverse has some thoughts or opinions and wants to join us, hit me up and we’ll include you one way or another.

Over the last few months Dreamworks has been pouring a huge amount of effort into the promotion of How to Train Your Dragon, assuring the masses that it’s their best flick since Shrek. Personally, I was hooked from trailer one – no critics’ reviews necessary. It’s impossible to see the duo of Hiccup and Toothless onscreen and not be intrigued by their sarcasm and cuteness.

How to Traib Your Dragon (2003)

To my shame, I did not know at first that this film was based on a book series. It wasn’t until I started reading up on it over on Wikipedia that I heard of the books’ existence. Naturally, I had to go to my local bookstore before movie time and grab a copy. I didn’t finish it before seeing the film, but I have finished them both now and let me just say, they are dramatically different.

And, in a stance I rarely take, I must say that I liked the movie a lot more.

Firstly, Novel Hiccup is just over ten years old whereas the film hiccup seems to be in his mid-teens. Novel Hiccup and the other boys of his village are undergoing their initiation into the tribe wherein they have to capture a baby dragon and train it to the satisfaction of their elders. Their dragons are equivalent in size and use to hunting dogs, Hiccup’s ends up being the smallest and most common-bred of them all, despite the fact that he’s the chief’s son and should have a “worthier” dragon. On the other hand, Film Hiccup is thrown into initiation as a last resort wherein he must kill dragons. He captures a rare Night Fury by accident and their relationship grows from there.

Without getting too spoilery, Novel Hiccup and his class face being banned from their tribe but are presented with a last-minute chance to redeem themselves by saving the island. The same applies to Film Hiccup, but the circumstances vary. Cleverness wins out over brute strength and dorky kids everywhere find hope in Hiccup being accepted by his very Viking clan. Even the cantankerous Toothless (who talks throughout the books but does not, thankfully, do so in the films) finds a heart and comes to Hiccups aid, therefore redeeming himself in the end.

How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

The film, however, adds an element that I’d like to draw attention to. When Hiccup first comes across the fallen Toothless, the dragon has crashed into the forest – thanks to Hiccup’s bola-firing contraption. After some half-hearted attempts to slay the dragon, Hiccup sets him free only to discover that Toothless has an injured tail and can no longer fly, Through the ever-helpful use montage we see the clever and mechanical minded Hiccup craft a device that augments Toothless’ broken tail. The previously disabled dragon now has the power of flight restored to him by the same person that (inadvertently) took it away.

Here’s the really spoilery bit. After the climactic final battle, it’s revealed that Hiccup has lost a leg. A crude prosthetic has been crafted for him, though it is still very difficult for Hiccup to walk. Toothless props him up as he walks, and later Hiccup climbs aboard – his mechanical leg fitting perfectly into Toothless’ flight-control mechanism. Separately they have very limited mobility, but together they can fly.

All in all, I loved the film. This little addition is the only sticky wicket for me, as I’m not quite sure what it’s saying about disabilities. I don’t think it’s trying to send any kind of message on purpose, but I think the feel-goodness intended didn’t quite come across. Toothless could have suffered some more temporary type of debilitation and still made a bond with Hiccup, and we could have come out of this film happily-ever-after. As it is, our heroes are both crippled for life and must depend on each other to survive. And it’s clearly Hiccup’s fault.

Do the ends justify the means? Possibly. The entire village is now at peace with, and working harmoniously with, their neighboring dragons. Hiccup may have injured Toothless, but he got his karmic retribution and now everybody is safe. Clearly he’s got the girl as well, and Toothless is a pretty big deal himself. So, in a way, it is happily-ever-after. You make do with what you’ve got, and they’ve got quite a lot going for them.

Frankly, I don’t think kids are going to care. It’s a spectacular movie, and one I’d feel good about recommending to children and adults alike. It really is one of Dreamworks’ best offerings to date. The book is a great read as well, and I intend to pick up some of the sequels in the future. They may be full of crude (yet hilarious) drawings, but they aren’t written in a condescending way. They’re definitely on the strange side, but I can’t say I have a problem with that.