Screwball melodrama

In "An Intimate Interview with Pedro Almodóvar" -- one of the extras on the DVD of All About My Mother (Todo sobre mi madre, 1999) -- Almodóvar uses the phrase "screwball drama" to describe the movies in his latest, more serious phase, which began with The Flower of My Secret (La flor de mi secreto, 1995). That's a great phrase, but I like "screwball melodrama" even better, because it gets at the artificiality and extremity of the stories. These are soap operas with all their atrocious coincidences and flamboyant, glamorous suffering grounded in an enormous earthy compassion and loving satire. This is soap opera played for hilarious laughs, except you're still crying simultaneously. Unlikely trauma is piled on top of unimaginable loss on top of unbearable (and perversely funny) humiliation, and the emotional effect is so dizzying that you just have to give yourself up to it. Laughing and crying, it's all release, and afterward you feel like maybe you don't have it so bad after all.

Maybe "screwball soap opera" is an even better phrase.

Si usted no tiene electricidad

Has anybody else seen today's Seattle Times? Top of the fold on the first page is a warning in six different languages for people who still don't have electricity in their homes. The warning? In English: "Do not burn charcoal or use gasoline generators indoors, including in the garage. Never use gas ovens to heat your home. Do not use gas or kerosene heaters in closed rooms. These things produce deadly carbon monoxide, which has killed several people since Thursday's storm. For more information, call 1-800-222-1222."

The other languages? Vietnamese, Russian, Chinese, Somali, and Spanish.

Meanwhile, another storm is expected tonight, although it's isn't expected to be as strong as last week's. Nonetheless, that tree that I saw leaning on power lines yesterday could well be a problem if there's more strong wind. Stay safe out there, y'all!