mike leigh...foucault scholar?!?

i saw "vera drake" on the weekend...it's an older mike leigh film. it was fantastic, mostly because it illustrated the domination of the foucauldean medicalized, governmentalized knowledge-power nexus over the prior paradigm of health. it was actually borderline crazy how well it dovetailed with the two foucault readings i had just done. some of the parallels were so lucid. when vera drake is apprehended by the authorities, they try to make her "confess" and use medical terminology; while she insists that she is merely "helping girls out" the policeman keeps correcting her, by saying, "you mean you give women abortions." i really love when you can read movies as theoretical texts. the last time i felt this was done as eloquently and closely was when i read "being john malkovich" as an examination of lacanian psychoanalytics.

i also finished reading a fantastic young adult novel called "the beckoners". young adult fiction is, in my opinion, some of the best stuff around. i find that the writing is really adventurous, and the subject matters tackled are done with a depth and nuance that's missing from a lot of "adult" fiction. this book deals with girl on girl bullying and clique-mentality in a small, northern b.c. town. it was completely engrossing and scary to read. while i am definitely aware that girls can be quite vicious, i don't think i'm exposed to depictions of girl violence in the same manner that male violence is normalized, so it always carries more of an element of shock and a frisson of danger and instability.

i switched around my work schedule, so that i know have tuesdays off, and picked up a regular saturday afternoon shift. i think i'm going to withdraw my application from that position at tpl. the interview times are all during school days, and it seems silly to miss school for an interview for a job that i probably won't be taking. it's for the best, although i am a little saddened by the lack of monies in my pocket.

last night's dinner was so good! i made my cheddar and onion sammy in the toaster oven at work, and it turned out fantastically. the cheese melted and got really gooey, while the onions maintained just enough of their astringent bite. the lentil soup also went down easy. i felt very virtuous eating it, as i bumped up the antioxidant power by throwing in some kale. on sunday night as an appetizer before our pasta, we came up with a lovely little snack. the roomie bought some fig and olive crackers made by a friend of her sister's in b.c. we topped them with some brie, and a dollop of my strawberry fig jam and then heated them in the oven. the combo of salty-sweet, crispy-melty was aces. tonight for dinner i'm making a spinach, mushroom, and kale pasta with sauteed onions and garlic, with rigatoni, bound together in a gorgonzola cream sauce. friday night my doppelganger made a fantastic gussied up mac'n'cheese and she used devonshire cream in the sauce, so i think i'm going to jack her steeze. it's going to be fatty, but so so good! i'm also going to offset the fattiness by making that radicchio, parsley, fennel and romano bean salad with the lemon vinaigrette.

fin.