Since everyone else is talking about R. Kelly, I will too.

He. Is. Everywhere. Has anyone considered the idea that R-Kells and the publicity surrounding the second installment of Trapped in the Closet might be taking over the planet? On Wednesday night we all filed down to the gallery to watch it projected on the big screen. Two admissions must, at this point, be made: ONE: I was SO EAGERLY ANTICIPATING the second installment of Trapped episodes. TWO: I liked it, but not so much as I liked the first segment.

Now hold on there all y’all who haven’t seen it yet. Don’t avoid seeking out R. Kelly’s latest film fiasco on my account. Really, it has its high points, especially R. Kelly recording fifty tracks of his own voice for the choir scene (”You can do it, Pimp Lucius!”), which somehow finds its strange way into some awesome, gospel-influenced grooves. The second installment strongly broke away from the rigid musical structure of the first twelve episodes. It was intense and fast-paced, even difficult to follow at points, but allowed, in my opinion, the opportunity for more intricate and developed rhythms, lyrics and lines.

But I found myself missing a lot of what intrigued me about the first twelve episodes. I especially missed hearing Kelly sing his own bleeps and frankly felt like the narrative slowed down way too much during this second part. The recaps, as well as the dream sequence, seemed like fluffy filler in comparison to the overly-dramatic, plot-based juggernaut that defined the first installment of episodes. More than anything though, I was disappointed in the appearance of overly-intentional comedy in this new bit; there were jokes - actual one-character-tells-the-other-character JOKES - that ended up falling flat for me. The “genius,” if you will allow my use of that term, of the first installment of Trapped was that, whether the comedy of these episodes was actually intentional or not, it FELT like unintentional comedy - like R. Kelly had no idea what he was actually doing. I think much of that brilliance dissolved significantly in the second installment, but that’s just me.

So, is everybody else excited about this? Because you should be.

How does Wes Anderson make films so quickly?

In other news, I’m reading, still. This week its been the collected essays of Virginia Woolf, the poetry of Donald Hall and Jorie Graham, The Habit of Being (Collected Letters of Flannery O’Connor), David Foster Wallace’s book of essays Consider the Lobster and John Gardner’s The Art of Fiction. Phew. For listening it’s been tons of Bob Dylan and Nina Simone, a bit of Elvis Perkins and (that’s right) Blondie. Also, I received my first copies of the inaugural issue of Oleander Review, which includes my non-fiction piece The Silence of Objects. You can order a copy here. Also, a few of my poems are out in the online version of Spork Press‘ final issue. Check it out.

And it FINALLY RAINED. During my evening run today I actually got caught in a downpour! Thunder, lightning! It was wonderful.