April 8, 2002

I'll Not Be Juggled With!

Overheard between Diane, an attractive New Yorker who is about my mother's age, and Mike, who has (unintentionally) crashed Diane's dinner party:

Mike: Come on now, Diane, I'm sure you have young men wandering through your house all the time.

Diane: Well, not with their clothes on.

So basically I had a great weekend, all things considered. No, really. A party on Friday and on Saturday. And then a reading of Hamlet on Sunday afternoon, where I read the part of Laertes. In my considered opinion, Laertes is basically the man. His first line is to the evil Claudius, "My dread lord..." and it just gets better from there.

His first real speech is to his little sister Ophelia, where he lectures her to be good and not to fool around with boys. (Meanwhile he's off to France to drink, fight, and wench.) I love this guy already! A man after my own heart. (You paying attention, Sarah...?)

Then Laertes heads off to France, and there's a lot of boring stuff with Hamlet. Blah blah blah father, blah blah blah woe is me, blah blah blah oops! I stabbed Polonius, by the way mom you're a shameless hussy, blah blah blah. Fortunately Bill cut a lot of that nonsense out. Stanford doesn't just pick their professors out of a hat, folks.

Then in Act IV, Laertes is back. He wants answers about his father and he wants them now. "How came he dead? I'll not be juggled with! To hell allegiance, vows to the blackest devil, conscience and grace to the profoundest pit!" Damn straight.

Well, you all know how it ends. Hamlet leaps into Ophelia's grave, like the snivelling copy-cat that he is. ("I prithee, take thy fingers from my throat..." -- wimp.) They duel, Laertes stabs Hamlet, Hamlet stabs Laertes, they both die. Exeunt.

There were only two bad parts. First, Laertes agrees to Claudius's plan to use a poisoned blade. I mean, that was just dumb. Laertes is fencing champion of France. He could have wiped the floor with Hamlet if he hadn't been told to put on a show. Second, Laertes begs Hamlet for forgiveness right before he dies. I mean, c'mon. I can only chalk this up to the potent neurotoxin that was ravaging his acetylcholine receptors, causing him to twitch uncontrollably and blurt out, "Exchange forgiveness with me, noble Hamlet," in some kind of last-second Tourette's-like spasm.

Like I said, a good weekend. Also, I taught Nancy HTML (see, kid, that wasn't so hard) and watched the first two episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on DVD. Not a bad pilot -- although it sure has gotten a lot better. Not that I would know, this season. I have no working TV, and besides, Tuesday is Poker Night. I think the guys thought I was a little off when I insisted that we watch the "Buffy: The Musical" episode, and I'm afraid to expend any more political capital on this issue... assuming I have any left.