After watching Rosminah do it several times, I finally decided to do the Master Cleanse. You may have heard of it–seven to 10 days of nothing but diluted maple syrup and lemon juice, while the body detoxes itself.
I guess at some point I decided my body needed some cleaning out. I’m pretty healthy anyway, but could I do with some extra intestinal housekeeping? Some things were promised: lost weight, a heightened sense of smell, watching weird stuff come out of your body, a general euphoric feeling. I’ll try anything once, right?
So on a Tuesday night I had my last food and drink. I went out with a Zombie and an appetizer plate of potstickers. This wasn’t by design, just how things played out.
DAY 1: This was the only day I really felt hungry. It was more a mental thing. I kept getting up to “grab a snack” and then sitting back down. While I was teaching I started thinking about what i was going to have for dinner. And then realizing…Nope! The mix itself of lemon juice (2 tbsp) and maple syrup (grade b, 2 tbsp) with water (about 1-1/4 liquid cups) and 1/10 tsp of cayenne pepper wasn’t bad. And you do get to have a cup of tea at night: Yogi brand herbal laxative tea.
Month: February 2010
Moving on, Moving out — ’35 Shots of Rum’ demands a close watch
Viewers have to figure out a lot of these relationships themselves and become like the characters in the film, closely examining body language and eyes. Denis makes us work more than other filmmakers, and a lot of “35 Shots of Rum” is like being at a party for new friends and trying to figure out how everybody is related.
All Aboard the Xprez — Half-animation, half-performance piece brings the weird to CAF Thursday
Photo courtesy of Hooliganship
Half animation revue, half performance, all weird, Cartune Xprez (its name a nod to USA Network’s own animation show) grew out of the minds of Burr and his co-conspirator Christopher Doulgeris.
THE MING DYNASTY’S ‘ZOMBIE’
Ming Dynasty has been huddled away in the Kmart shopping center in Goleta for a good quarter-century, serving up everything from orange chicken and dim sum to fresh Mongolian barbecue. But it’s also had a small bar hidden inside, a reminder that Chinese food and cocktails used to go hand in hand.
Take a look at the cocktail menu and you’re back in mid-century America, when tropical drinks took over the national consciousness.
This Benson doesn’t hedge : Brendan Benson, part of the raucous group The Raconteurs with Jack White, delivered clean-burning power pop at Velvet Jones on Friday
CARA ROBBINS/BROOKS INSTITUTE
On his latest record, Mr. Benson wraps himself in all sorts of lush arrangements, with a wide palette of instruments at his disposal. Live, with Mr. Benson backed up by three smokin’ hot musicians, the songs get returned to their post-punk roots, less Wings and more This Year’s Model.
Climb Every Mountain — Popular Banff documentary film festival returns to UCSB for two days
The festival has been coming to UCSB on tour since 1992. The festival originally started as a community event in Banff, Canada. It was a way, Fest coordinator Seana Strain says, of bridging the gap between the summer and winter recreational seasons. It gained such popularity that the festival was taken on the road. The first tour went across Canada only, but the word of mouth spread. Today, the tour hits 30 cities worldwide, and even includes a few shows in the Antarctic, making this viewable in all seven continents.
Benson’s Back — Power popster Brendan Benson, who gigs at Velvet Jones tonight, has returned to solo work since a stint with The Raconteurs
Fans of power pop have been watching Brendan Benson’s career since he arrived with a perfect gem of a debut in 1996 with “One Mississippi.” In a perfect world, fans say, Benson would have had a string of pop hits and by now taken his seat as the new Paul McCartney. After his disillusionment with his major label he continued to put out albums, but with a lower profile. It was his partnership with friend Jack White in The Raconteurs that brought Benson back to the national stage. And now he has returned with one of his strongest solo albums, “My Old, Familiar Friend,” packed with melodic invention, sing-along choruses, clever songs structures and a retro-’70s feel from producer Gil Norton that nods to Wings, ELO, and Todd Rundgren.
A Night with the Opera — Portland’s Vagabond Opera comes to SOhO
What is it about Portland that has made it such an incubator of great music? The scene is thriving, not just on a national stage (The Shins, Pink Martini) but on a local one, with a live scene that makes Santa Barbara’s look like an elementary school talent show and jumble sale. One reason, suggests Eric Stern, leader of the Vagabond Opera: money and time.
“Things are cheap,” he says. “Unlike California, the people have a lot of time to sit around and play music and play together. Portland is a great crossroads for that, it’s a musical laboratory.” Stern adds that the community is small — he attends school functions for his kid and runs into members of The Decemberists.
At Last, Shorts Weather — 10 films nominated for the Oscars come to the Arlington in two screenings
“French Roast,” above, is among the shorts nominated for an Academy Award and being screened this week at the Arlington Theatre. Below is a scene from “Logorama,” the story of a psychotic bankrobber loose in the streets of Los Angeles, in a world made entirely out of corporate logos.
Metropolitan Theatres has finally secured the rights to bring the touring program of Oscar-nominated shorts to Santa Barbara, showing at the Arlington starting today and running through the rest of the month. Two programs will be offered: A live-action selection and an animated selection, topping out at 90 minutes. Because the nominated shorts are a shorter total runtime, three additional films that did not make the Academy cut will be added (including a Pixar short).
A SINGLE-MINDED MAN : Colin Firth receives Outstanding Performance Award at SBIFF
ROBBY BARTHELMESS / NEWS-PRESS
Finola Dwyer is pictured on the red carpet.