Golden retrievers
rule! Ally McBeal's micro-minis, month by month. Three hundred
and sixty-five days of Mary Engelbreight. Same shit, different
year. Every autumn, a new crop of wall calendars appears on
bookstore shelves, but you've seen them all before. The millennium,
however, summons more captivating timekeepers. Here, a few
that reflect what is right and wrong about the 20th century.
1. Our Dumb Century: The Onion Year 2000 Calendar
$11.99 at Music Millennium, Powell's, Calendar Club
(700 SW 5th Ave., 450-1357)
"Earth-Quake Marks Least Gay Day in San Francisco History
(1906)." "Bumper Sticker Industry Applauds Roe v. Wade
Decision (1973)." "Hinkley, Foster to Wed (1981)." Ah, thank
God for The
Onion. Since 1988, the Madison, Wisc., satirical
weekly has been skewering politicians and pop culture alike,
with wit and delivery on a par with Chevy Chase's Weekend
Update. If you've seen the book Our Dumb Century,
then you'll know the calendar, but really, can you ever
get enough of The Onion? Each month features a faux
front page representing a different year, recollections
from fictional publisher emeritus T. Herman Zweibel, a farcical
fake ad and themed timelines (religion & ethics, music)
peppered with tidbits such as these: Nov. 2, 1943--Betty
Grable appointed head of U.S. Army Special Masturbation
Fantasy Squadron; Sept. 18, 1954--Ebbets Field bathed
in sepia-tone glow; Sept. 11, 1984--Famine-Wracked
Ethiopia makes desperate plea to U2. Every office should
have one of these.
2. The American Century: Art & Culture 1900-2000
$13.95 at Music Millennium, Powell's
How do you choose 12 artists to represent 100 years of
American art? The Whitney Museum of American Art's epic
exhibit, The American Century: Art & Culture 1900-2000,
features more than 1,200 works by creators who have helped
to define our county's character. Currently on display through
Feb. 13, 2000, at the Whitney is Part II (1950-2000) of
the project, an installation that fills all five floors
of the building. If you can't make it to New York, you can
view bottlecap-sized reproductions on the Web site (www.echonyc.com/
~whitney) or buy this calendar. Mapplethorpe, Basquiat,
Cindy Sherman and Julian Schnabel are not included, but
Edward Hopper's sun-dappled Early Sunday Morning,
Three Flags by Jasper Johns, Mark Rothko's Four
Darks in Red and O'Keefe's Summer Days are, making
for a fine and varied capsule of contemporary canvases.
3. Saturday Night Live: A 25 Year Retrospective
$12.95
at Music Millennium, Calendar Club
Creator Lorne Michaels said it best: Saturday
Night Live is "a show for the generation that grew
up on television." It may not appeal so much to the generation
that's growing up on Quake, Dennis Rodman and Dawson's
Creek, but SNL carries on, peaking and crashing
like the presidential turns it parodies. This calendar profiles
some of the show's most memorable comics, highlighting priceless
personae such as Nick the Lounge Singer, John Belushi's
Samurai and Prymaat Conehead. The dead--Belushi, Gilda Radner,
Chris Farley and Phil Hartman-- are lionized and today's
stars--Molly Shannon, Mike Myers, David Spade--get wall-time,
but Chevy Chase, Eddie Murphy, Martin Short and Kevin Nealon
are woefully absent.
4. Disasters of the 20th Century
$11.99 at Borders
Books and Music, Powell's, Calendar Club
This calendar suffers tiny disasters of its own. There
are misspellings throughout, and the Chernobyl power plant
is identified as being in Russia, not the Ukraine. Devastating
occurrences such as the Hindenberg explosion, Mount
Pinatubo eruption and two San Francisco earthquakes are
represented, but so are less obvious hazards such as the
Denver Tornado of 1988. Don't remember that one? Me neither,
but apparently it caused some airport damage. Please the
fatalist on your list; it's just the thing for someone's
gray cubicle.
5. Monty Python Songs and Other Silly Stuff
$12.99
at Borders Books and Music,Powell's, Calendar Club
While fetching the mail, do you sometimes break into a
silly walk? Do you often find yourself twittering, "Always
look on the bright side of life..."? If you know what I'm
talking about, then this Python
30th (and a bit) Anniversary Edition calendar is a must.
This calendar tracks every imaginable holiday--such as Australia's
Picnic Day (Aug. 7) and Respect the Aged Day in Japan (Sept.
15)--and each month includes a bit of the legendary troupe's
wonderfully saucy couplets. Lucky you to be born in October,
where "Bruce's Philosophers Song" begins thusly: "Immanuel
Kant was a real pissant/Who was very rarely stable/Heidegger,
Heidegger was a boozy beggar/Who could think you under the
table."
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Willamette Week | originally
published November 23,
1999
|
