WAGON WHEEL WEDNESDAYS 2: ARIZONA

I first visited Arizona's corner at the famous Four Corners. At the time it looked like the other three corners (which would be New York, Florida and Puerto Rico... Right? No! Wrong. Utah, Colorado, New Mexico). I saw some slight differences between the four kissing states but it was all probably in my head. I didn't return for another few years... and now I'm an Arizona junkie. Not quite, but it is a wonderfully scenic place. McCain is the Senator there, and maybe more come November, so that sucks, but if you like you some canyons, Native Indians, cacti and heat, this place is for you. I could probably write several days of entries on Arizona. I've been there three or four times and have seen a good portion of the state by now. I'll lay out the highlights for you.

GRAND CANYON

There are two types of hype. One is what I call the Mona Lisa phenomenon. In this example, you hear about something and then you see it and it's pretty damn unimpressive. Then there's the underrated hype. This is reserved for things that are so beyond the scope of great that words or pictures or sounds can't capture their awesomeness. Therefore, they get praised to death but somehow still end up "underrated." The Beatles. Spaghetti in Italy.... and The Grand Canyon. Sure it's merely a giant hole in the ground, but please don't underestimate the word "giant." If Jupiter had a penis and one day wanted to fuck Earth, this is where he'd go for some action.

My trip to the canyon was even more special because I befriended a trucker and trusted him with my life. Only a week earlier, I had feared truckers, not wanting to stop at certain rest stops because all I could think about was crank and rape in the "clean" bathrooms that these places so prominently advertised. I said "trucker" like it was a slur. But yet here I was, hiking the rim of the grand canyon and chatting it up with him. When he told me he was a trucker, I stood a few inches from the rim. But I knew he wouldn't push me down. It's one thing to fear a group, not right or just but understandable. When you're face to face with someone though, it all breaks down. Groups you praise can have twisted members that change your whole perspective and vise versa. This isn't, "I hate all of them accept this one guy." This isn't a bigoted response. It's saying, sometimes you need to meet a real person to begin to see through your own fucked up prejudices. Daniel told me he had survived a six story fall as a child. He broke his back but lived. Now there's a trucker for you.

If you go to the canyon, you may not meet someone who changes how you view others, but if you do, be open to it. Unless they're wearing a shirt that says "Throw the Stranger Off the Cliff." Then it's okay to be scared.


PETRIFIED FOREST/PAINTED DESERT

When I first saw signs for the petrified forest, I didn't know what "petrified" meant in terms of wood. I expected to see a bunch of tree in the middle of the desert screaming. Afraid of what? I dunno. The snakes, crazy former-POWs, what? Oh how simple I can be. Turns out "petrified" refers to how all this wood basically turned to rock after thousands of years. Good lord, this shit was beautiful. Hundreds of multi-colored logs- red, blue, silver- sitting amongst "rock tepees." There's a good reason that this area of Arizona's called the Painted Desert. This was really the first time in my life I truly felt the power of nature. You see shit like this and it's so far removed from subways or greedy men knocking you over on their way to business meetings. As I saw more parks after this, that feeling would only intensify. Call it spiritual or cosmic or simply just damn cool. However you slice it, sights like the Petrified Forest remind you how small you are.

As I left the park and the sun descended, I noticed tons of signs saying it was a federal crime to remove the wood. I'm sure people remove it anyway. In fact, I found out once I returned home to Philly that my dad had taken three huge sizable chunks from this very forest as a five year old child. Ah, Daddy the Rebel.

We left the park and listened to Neil Young's "Rust Never Sleeps." As the song "Thrashers" played, for a brief moment I thought I could see the prophet Ezekiel.

SAGUARO NATIONAL PARK

There are very few places in America where you can actually see the stereotypical cactus. Sure you can find cacti all over, but there aren't many that look like what you might see in a road runner cartoon. But in the Saguaro Forest National Park (it's actually two parks split in the middle by Tuscon) you'll see hundreds of thousands of these Saguaro cacti. It's quite a sight. Rather creepy actually. Imagine going your whole life never seeing a moose and then seeing a field of 20,000 moose. Kinda fucks with you. When I went it was about 110 degrees and as I hiked, I gave myself a 50/50 shot of coming out alive and unscathed by the venomous monsters that hid in cacti. I had seen a picture of a "elf owl" inside a saguaro cactus and really wanted to see one since I'm a big fan of owls. But none were out that day.

TUSCON

I don't know why, but I expected more. It wasn't much of a city, which is fine. I expected some sort of "old world charm" that was kind of there, mostly not. Now that I think about it, it's probably because the Beatles mention it in "Back in the USSR." I went to a Spanish Mission that was nice, but overall, typical sprawl ruled the land.

PHOENIX?

You got me. I drove through it on my way up to Vegas. Most people say it's a shitty version of LA with fake water. What's a shitty version of shit? I didn't want to find out.

MONUMENT VALLEY

I'll talk about this one in the Utah post since it crosses both states... Let's just say possibly the most geographically intense place on earth.. Leave it at that for now. It's like a cliffhanger for Week 38 or whenever Utah falls.

Topical Tuesdays Volume 1

And now we complete the cycle of daily posts. Tomorrow will be Wagon Wheel Wednesday again and nothing will be new. Enjoy this breath of fresh air while it lasts.

Today in the news:

Jeremiah Wright Endorses McCain. Shit, he may as well have. I understand ordinary Americans' fears over this guy, but some of what he says is true. I don't want this sight wire tapped by the FEDS, so I'm not going to offer anytyhing particularly controversial here, but I will comment on the AIDS business. Obviously it's a bit of an overstatement. But there was once a time where the AIDS cases in this country could be counted on one hand. It could've been contained and for whatever reason (probably because it seemed to only affect people that weren't in Reagan's Fave 5) it became an epidemic. So it's all semantics really. McDonald's didn't invent the Hamburger, but they spread the Hamburger. We definitely didn't "invent" AIDS, but it's not out of the realm of possibility that we could've done a better job controlling it.

I for one find Jeremiah Wright to be a bit adorable though. He has a beaming smile and possesses an elusive "teddy bear" quality. Sure he's a greedy preacher out for himself first, the Black community second, the white community third and Obama last. But take that same footage, remove the inflammatory statements and replace it all with Teddy Ruxpin-isms, and you'll want your own J. Wright doll in no time.



Another big item is that McCain announced a health plan. I assumed he was finally taking the opportunity to give us his doctors' credentials so we can all put aside our fears about his age. But no, just a bunch of nonsense about OUR health. Worry about your own health first Mr. Speaking of which, these pictures have been floating around that show what the candidates will look like in 4 years. Obama and Hillary look noticeably older. McCain though looks more or less the same. Probably because what they're not telling you is that they predict he'll have a heart attack within a year and this is what the embalmed photo of McCain will look like.

MUSIC MONDAYS: PRINCE ORGASM

Oh my fucking... wow. If anyone has ever met me, you know I love me some Prince. I have two Prince posters, I spent many many high school and college years telling skeptical people that Prince ruled and eventually everyone wised the fuck up.

When Coachella was announced, the only day that jumped out was Saturday. Mainly because Portishead was headlining and I'm big into those guys. Then news came that Prince had been added. Prince. I'd seen him twice before in Philly but faaaaar away. In theory, I could now get super close. I started thinking of plans. I'd get to the main stage at 1 and just wait. I even looked up some portable peeing contraptions. Everything from uncomfortable (Depends) to the painful (a catheter inserted in the pee hole). Eventually, I decided that if I had a big enough bottle, I could sneak it down my pants and pee... When the set times were released and I saw the final three mainstage acts were Kraftwerk, Porishead and Prince, my decision was set.

Turned out a few days before Jen scored me some tickets to Portishead's LA rehearsal, which was un-un-unreal. So seeing them again in a huge setting was just an added bonus.

We walked into the festival at around 1:30. First I went to the mini-Virgin Megastore or maybe Virgin Ministore would be easier for those of you who can't pick up on the subtleties of the oxymoron. Sure enough, they had the new Portishead a few days early. Three days early to be exact. And the album is called Third. SCARY!

Jen and everyone else left me at the store. They know how I get in record stores. Silence, silence. It's like a fucking library for me. If you disturb me, you need to buy me an album. After purchasing the album I checked out a few seconds of Kavinsky. Pretty cool Ed Banger DJ who claims he was killed in a motorcycle accident in 1986 or something like that. I left there for Man Man. I heard they put on a good show and were from Philly, so I had to represent. And shit they didn't disappoint. It was like Tom Waits' crack babies. They were lots of fun. They played tons of instruments and jumped around a bunch. I told Jen how nuts they were. Jen and James came to check them out and promptly declared them the worst band to ever play Coachella.

At this point it was probably 3:30 or so. I decided the time had come to go to the mainstage. I arrived in the middle of Minus the Bear and got very good position when people left. I sat down and whipped out a book. Cold War Kids came on and I remained seated. Sorry fans, I can't stand for twelve hours like I did for Neil at Willie Nelson's 4th of July Picnic. That was fun and all but my heart rate got really high at one point and scared me. If I can sit, I will sit. So I sat. The Cold War Kids weren't as bad as I expected. Some of the songs were pretty good actually. In the middle of the set Jen said I should get some food and save it for later. I didn't want to lose position, but I figured it was early enough that I could go. Good idea that I did. I got right back to my place, maybe even a bit closer and now had nourishment. I picked up a few more waters for the road and I was set.

Ten minutes later Cafe Tecuba started. I thought they were called Cafe Tacvba but folks informed me that was a typo on the poster. They seemed cool enough. The show itself was an interesting experience. The crowd was almost 100% Latin. If you asked me the day before if I thought I'd feel uncomfortable in a situation like this, I'd say of course not. It's like people wondering if I'm ever uncomfortable around large groups of Black people. I've spent most of my life around large groups of Black people, so I rarely feel "out of place" or whatever in those situations... But I haven't spent most of my life around Mexican people. Sure enough, I did feel very WHITE. Folks were really into it and that was awesome, but as people formed a giant circle and started dancing, I felt so so so HONKY. So positively CRACKER! It didn't matter that as a Jew, I'm so familiar with dancing in circles. Didn't matter at all. But I enjoyed myself regardless. It was nice to feel out of place actually. A welcome change.

After Tacuba ended, I got much closer. By this point I was about 10 or so people back. Death Cab came on and bored me. Ben Gibbard made "jokes" about Prince arriving in a purple helicopter. It seemed very clear that he had an insane jealousy of Prince. As if Prince's presence reminded him that indie divinity is really not that huge on an a major scale. After all, as Prince says himself, he's an "international lover." Pretty intimidating stuff. After Death Cab, I got a wee bit closer yet. At that point it became clear that there would be no more huge openings after bands ended. Where I stood was pretty much my final place for Prince. I was completely okay with that. I could see everything. Who cares if I wasn't leaning on the front barrier. I was five people behind that. If this had been Madison Square Garden, that's like a 2000 buck ticket still.

While I waited for Kraftwerk (a band I finally actually wanted to see) I took note of the people around me. On one side were about eight teenagers. They didn't really want to see Prince, but they knew it was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Most of them hadn't even heard any Prince songs. Great. I can't believe they were taking spots from real fans out there, but I couldn't complain. If they were willing to stand for six more hours, they deserved it... On the left side you had the other extreme. SUPERFANS. They immediately let out the Prince "love call" to see if any other fans were around. I don't know the fucking love call. I'm a forgetful person. I know the albums, the songs, etc., but I'm bad with little things. Just on the car ride over I called "Jack You Off" "Jack Me Off." If the fact that I'm a really spacey dude who is still suffering from years of weed clouds makes me less of a Prince fan, then shit, I hope you find a Prince symbol shaped dildo to please you for the rest of your life, you can have that.

Kraftwerk came on and had a great light/projection type show, the pinnacle of which was this moment where light blinded the audience for two minutes. When they finally dimmed, the four guys in Kraftwerk had been replaced by robot versions of themselevs performing the song "Robots." After they left, Portishead set a great mood. Not as special as the other night when I saw them, but for people who hadn't scored the hookup, I'm sure this ruled just as much. Portishead went off around 10:20... The time approached!! (more on the time approaching later)

I managed to squeeze myself another few people forward and move over so I was dead center. I'd say there were maybe three-five people that had a better view in the whole place. As the various roadies came on, the superfans exhibited just how lame they were by talking about all the roadies by name, culminating in a short biographical summary of Prince's long blonde haired guitar technician. Around this time, three drunken/tripping/rolling/who the hell knows fuckamos started shouting such pithy things as "show your tits," "lick my knob" and "penis penis penis." I closed my eyes, went into a zen place and ignored all else for the next forty-five minutes until the sound folks determined the space was ready and the show could begin.

And begin it did... With Morris Day! (ha get that Time reference now?). He did the Bird and Jungle Love. Prince was there playing some rhythm guitar in the background. I could hear the groans from the newbies. Why wasn't Prince doing more!? What's wrong with him? For any real Prince fan, you know this is part of the show. Sheila E came on next and percussed the desert for Prince's true unveiling, which came in the form of a blistering 1999. I'm sure germs were running into my mouth left and right since by this point my jaw was firmly dropped to the filthy ground. Prince ran through a bunch of wonderful takes on old hits, new hits, shockingly great covers (CREEP!!! ahhhhhhhhhh... i knew it from the opening bars... wow). No he didn't play "Ballad of Dorothy Parker" or "If I Was Your Girlfriend" but who cares, his guitar was on fire and I didn't have to watch him on a screen. Speaking of the jumbo screen, I got a text message from Jen and others that they could see me several times dancing and looking absurd on the jumbo screen.... that's just how good my placement was.

And you know what else is great? I never had to pee in the bottle. I did test the whole system to make sure it could work without detection. And with the assistance of a jacket and darkness, it worked great... I did have a nightmare that it would slip out of the bottle and I'd end up peeing on some girl's leg, so I decided to just hold it.

All and all, for Alex Pudlin, best Coachella ever. I have no pictures for you since Jen had the camera and my little phone couldn't capture much. I hope my words suffice.

Friendly Fridays!!

Yes we have another themed post. Friendly Fridays! For those of you who know me, you know I'm a gigantic kid. Some would even say a gigantic baby. Not a cry baby. I hold strong when I stub my toe, I swear. But I love cute things. I love adorable stuffed animals. Not lame shit though. You won't find me with an ugly as Mickey Mouse or some shit like that. I'm a fucking connoisseur.

Friday is the day you will hear stories about my many animal friends. You'll also hear some musings on Goomba (you all probably remember my short lived Goomba blog), funny creatures I see on the street and various cartoon characters.

Our debut topic concerns cute examples of uncute creatures. I want to show everyone just how dedicated I am to THE ADORABLE. Ha, I like that phrase. We always hear about "the" this and "the" that. "The Other" for instance. I think adorable deserves a The distinction. The Adorable. If I ever have a band again, I think that's what I'll name it. The Adorable.

Back to earth... here's how it went down. I set out on a google scavenger hunt to find cute spiders, rats, bats and snakes. Of course there are plenty of people who are into all these animals, Platonic and even I bet sexually. I'm not one of these people. I don't fear any of them but if I were locked in a closet with even one rat, I'd probably attempt to choke myself to death. Or maybe I'd just jump on the rat. Sorry PETA. I'd never stomp a dog though. That's gotta be worth something right? (Although I do have to admit that yesterday I was watching my bosses dog and contemplating whether or not I'd actually be able to eat the dog if I had to. I don't think I could eat the whole dog, but maybe his foot. If I really really had to... Now that I think about it seems so gross but looking at the actual dog yesterday, I decided I could do it).

Back to earth again... here's the best I could find.

Spider

Let's pretend for a minute that this guy doesn't have four eyes. He's furry. He's got a wonderful smile. All and all not bad. Cuteness rating? I'd say a solid 7.




Rat

Incredible. Sure, they are pet rats not burrito sized Washington DC rats. But come on. Did you ever ever think you'd see such a cute rat? Let alone two? It helps that the big guy's tail isn't shown. That really hurts rats a lot. It's like the beautiful person who has a mole that covers half his/her face. Some things are hard to look past. Cuteness rating? Easy 10.




Bat

Now of these four, I think bats are my least favorite. They get caught in your hair and scratch and bite and give you rabies. I didn't think there was a chance in hell that I'd find a cute bat. But look what we got! It's like a little winged monkey. Cuteness rating? 9




Snake

I don't really mind snakes that much. One time I was out hiking and I thought I heard a rattle snake... oh wait, that never happened. I've thought "shit, I hope I don't hear a rattle snake." and once I heard a mountain lion. But never a rattler...This little guy is great. He's small and looks kinda like Lowly worm, who's a classic friendly character. Cuteness rating? 8




All in all, I think we did pretty well. If any of you have cuter examples of uncute animals, send them in! You can never have enough cute.

Thoughtful Thursdays: Part 1

Welcome to Thursday!

Every Thursday, I'll say something thoughtful. This won't be a day where I go out and do something thoughtful although I really should. The fact that I'm not helping anybody in my life is starting to get to me. So much so though that I'm seriously looking at social work as a possible career path as I continue to write. But that's a separate HUGE topic... No no no, "Thoughtful Thursdays" will be Alex's ramblings on something. Okay I can hear the chatter already. Isn't this blog all your ramblings? Yes. Yes. Yes. But Thoughtful Thursdays will be more focused. Opinions about specific items, food dishes, social phenomena. It won't focus on topical items though (Topical Tuesdays is where you'll find that kinda thing).

Our Debut Thought: Food Abbreviations

We all use them. Some people seem to derive great pleasure from using them, getting cute with them, writing them on menus in goofball fonts and all. They range from the inoffensive (Veggie for Vegetable) to the make me wanna shoot a puppy (Guac for Guacamole). In general, I don't use ANY abbreviations. I don't even say Veggie. I never say Mac N' Cheese (although sometimes I make the whole phrase longer and more confusing by saying 'Macaroni and Bees Please!'). Fine, I admit I do say Mayo, but I don't care about disrespecting the sanctity of MAYONNAISE because I hate that shit.

Let's imagine for a second that the abbreviations really went overboard. It could all get a little confusing. Mozza for Mozzarella. Yum some Manischewitz Matzo Sticks. Or what about Pea Butt for Peanut Butter? Or Fuck for Focaccia. Or Lezzie for Lasagna. Why not just really take shit down and abbreviate the whole menu. It's all about rebuses in 2008. You know, if we abbreviate the abbreviations, the whole food thing is super Hip-Hop. Macaroni and Cheese becomes MC. Guacamole becomes G. Veggie becomes VG. Not really hip-hop on that one but VG is a rating system for records and Disc Jockeys use records. (FYI...VG as a record condition rating stands for Very Good. But that's rather confusing because as all the vinyl lovers out there know, a VG record is actually not in amazing condition. It's more like OK or Good at best. And G, which stands for Good, generally means Awful. We'll take up this kind of thing during Music Mondays though).

Abbreviations are convenient sure. I can totally understand abbreviating antidisestablishmentarianism to ADT. But is it really that hard to say "Macaroni?" It's a joyous word. It's fun to say. Try it sometime!

My hatred of abbreviations extends to most things. Jen loves abbreviations. Food abbreviations, life abbreviations, anything that can be shorter, she's into. "We're outta TP," "Lemme change into my PJs." That kinda thing. I don't knock her. To each her own...Although, Pajama is easily a top 5 English language word. Why oh why abbreviate it? I think tonight I'll begin abbreviating things that have never before been abbreviated and confuse the hell out of her. I'll say TP, but I'll mean Toothpaste. I'll say PJ but I'll mean Portugal in June. She'll be confused, she may even cry, but at the end of the day, we'll hug and make up. We have a very very powerful relationship.

Wagonwheel Wednesdays Volume 1: Alabama

In a new feature that I'm calling Wagonwheel Wednesdays (in honor of the wagon wheel so prevalent in Oregon Trail), I will profile every single state I've been to. For some who know me well, they remember a period of time when I didn't fly. I HATE flying, and eventually I said "ENOUGH!" During that time I drove everywhere. In fact, I can happily say that my feet have been in all 48 of the continental states. My car has been in nearly all 48 of the continental state. I've never been to Alaska or Hawaii and I don't plan to go unless I can drive. Driving to Alaska is doable on a long lonely icy road through British Columbia. If I still smoked weed, it would be a great trip since BC is a pothead's playground, but I don't...Then there's Hawaii, to which you're probably saying: "how can you drive on water? You're not Jesus." To which I say: "I'll drive onto a ferry and then drive off the ferry once I arrive in Hawaii."

But we're getting off subject. This isn't a post about what states I will go to in the future, but a post about where I've actually been. The goal is that in 48 weeks (the time it'll take to complete all Wagonwheel Wednesday posts) I'll have been to Hawaii or Alaska by car, but it's doubtful. In the meantime, you'll have to settle for the older states. The vintage, classic, throwback, retro states. Cool? Good... And one more thing, I'm only going to talk about what I did in the state. I'm not going to mention wild animals that I didn't see or concerts I didn't go to or the raging nightlife of cities I haven't been to. If all I did in a state was drive and piss at a gas station, then that's what you'll hear. At the very least, I tried to get a lotto ticket in every state that had lotto. To prove that I had spent some time in the state...

In fact we begin with a state that I've spent almost no time in! Alabama!!



My boss is actually from Alabama, so I've heard plenty of stories, and I'm a bit embarrassed that I haven't even been to his hometown. Not that I need to take some tour of his childhood, but it would be nice if we could connect over the best pulled pork joints or whatever.

I spent my entire time in Alabama on a single road going from New Orleans to Atlanta: I-59. Along the way, I saw only two things of note.

1.The American Mercedes plant. Pretty fitting that Mercedes- a one time Nazi affiliated company- would have its American plant in KKK country, right?

2. Tyson Chicken Truck Anyone who tells you that getting chicken from a fast food place is "healthier" clearly has never seen a chicken truck. It'll give you nightmares. Since my brain always clings to the social implications of everything, the chickens really internalized the horrors of the slave trade. Why? Shit I was in Alabama! In case you didn't hear, people were enslaved there. In fact part of the reason I didn't spend more time there was my paranoid delusions that what happened to three civil rights workers in the 60s would happen to me... Even though that was Mississippi...You get idea... So slavery was already on my mind and then I see these chickens that were packed into the truck like it was a slave ship of sorts. So crowded and in such obvious pain and discomfort. Awful. Truly truly awful... Eventually I got my mind off slavery long enough to look at the chickens closely. And holy hell. They were filthy, probably diseased, nasty chickens. People groan and cringe whenever I ask them if they'd eat a pigeon, but honestly these things were just as dirty as any pigeon I've ever seen. Freaky shit.

Halfway through the state I stopped at a Wal-Mart. I made it a rule that a state can't count in my tally unless I physically walked on the ground in a place other than an airport. So my ground at Alabama was Wal-Mart. Nothing special or sinister about the Wal-Mart. No racks of "The Racism Times" or "White People Weekly." Maybe I had been a bit paranoid. Maybe I should've spent a night at a motel in Selma. Maybe next time.

NEW BLOG

So my Goomba's mad at me. My pet Goomba that is. Really furious. Why? Cause I used to have a Goomba blog but after a couple weeks stopped. There were hundreds of reasons for this. Thousands even. But you can read over my old posts (which you'll see up here in a second) to get more info. Now I'm back with a blog about all sorts of things that interest or bore the world. Goomba will be around. He'll be back. But there will be more. Bigger, better, stronger. Or whatever they say. Whenever I hear that phrase I think of penis size. Not sure why.

I think my inaugural post will be about the panda. We all know this creature well. To some it's a study in the power of integration- Black and White creature from China captures the world's heart. That kind of thing. I see that point, sure. But the panda is more than that. It's a walking teddy bear that has regular bear teeth but chooses to eat only bamboo. Incredible.

Back when I lived in DC, I lived a few blocks from the zoo and since it was free, I treated the pandas like my own pets. Pets that I couldn't walk or feed, sure. But pets all the same. One day it snowed and seeing these bears frolic in the snow gave me so much joy that I almost forgot that I resided in the absolute crack-scarred shithole that is Washington DC. I also bought a panda documentary, which is really two panda documentaries in one. The first is about the panda and other creatures that live in the bamboo forests (like the red panda and the bamboo rat... speaking of which, the red panda and the giant panda aren't even related. They thought they were when rumors swirled that the giant panda was actually a raccoon. Then science caught up to the myth and it was proven once and for all that the giant panda is a real actual bear- unlike the koala bear or the teddy bear- and the red panda is a raccoon) and the second is about the baby born at the San Diego zoo. That one's narrated by Matthew McConaughey or maybe it's Matt Dillon or Matthew Modine or Matthew Broderick... or maybe it's Gary Matthews or the disciple Matthew. I forget. Whichever Matthew does a great job though.

Anyway, these documentaries are incredible. I've probably watched the bamboo forest one 10 times. I told my panda loving girlfriend Jen about it when I first met her and she didn't believe I had a panda documentary. It's funny that we've been dating two years now and we haven't watched it together yet. We should. It's great... There's this one horribly sad part though. It talks about how the panda eats bamboo at one elevation on the mountain and then the bamboo dies so they go to a lower elevation and eat the bamboo there. But due to climate cycles, every several years, the bamboo dies at the same time at both elevations so the panda starves. They have a shot of the panda eating dead bamboo and the narrator (not Matthew, that's the other documentary.. some Brit) says "this panda is wasting precious energy eating dead bamboo that will give him absolutely no nutrition." Perfect. It's so devastating.

Anyway, on a happier note, check out this adorable video!



UPDATE:

What the hell man? Why did they remove this? I'm so sad. This was amazing. They were carrying around pandas and shit... oh which reminds me, I have a bamboo tree outside my new apartment and I wanted to put a panda in it. If anyone has the inside track on pet pandas, let me know. If not I guess I'll put a stuffed panda in the tree. Or maybe Jen's R2D2. He's kind of like a robot version of a panda.