I watched The Electric Life of Louis Bain on TV, which was oddest movie of all. Louis Bain was the world's most popular artist of cats. Benedict Cumberbatch was excellent in the role but it was sooooooooo weird. Filmed in a strange way and about a family of eccentric people.
I signed on for Acorn to get the new Dalgliesh series which seems good based on the first two episodes.
I talked to a friend today in the hospital with a stroke but she also caught Covid despite being vaccinated. The nurses in her section were told to go into patient rooms as little as possible so she had horrible care. I am so sad that the people not getting shots have brought this sort of treatment about. I wonder if they know or care what they have wrought.
Have no attention for reading novels right now. Didn't even finish the Krueger one which seemed like it was dragging out the plot for far too long. First time I noticed that with him so it was probably me. I have the new Jonathan Frantzen here so maybe I will try that.
How about you?
21 comments:
Sorry you didn't like Last Night in Soho. I didn't find it particularly dark but than I seem to have a high tolerance for dark. I didn't see the French Dispatch yet. I have mixed feelings about Wes Anderson. I like Royal Tennenbaums, Fantastic Mr Fox and Moonrise Kingdom best. I didn't see any movies in the theater this week. Rewatched Mona Lisa. Great movie. And Crash (the Cronenberg) which I found dull. Binged Post Mortem on Netflix which I liked. Also the Netflix Movie The Harder They Fall which I did not like despite good performances by Idris Elba, Regina King and Delroy Lindo. The other female performances were awful.
Saw Elvis Costello in Ann Arbor. Great show.
Read A Line to Kill by Anthony Horowitz which I liked a lot. Also Leave the Gun, Tanke the Cannoli the story of the making of The Godfather which was also quite good. Started Five Decembers by James Kestral.
Couldn't get through The Corrections bhy Jonathan Franzen so I have avoided him since. Listed to him once on NPR and found him to be quite full of himself.
I'm glad you're getting out, Patti, even if the movies didn't quite gel for you. It's been a long time since I've been in movie theater. Too expensive, too crowded, too noisy, perhaps too Covid-y, and most movies now are not that good, IMHO. I don't know if I'll ever go to a movie theater again.
Turned seventy-five this week. I woke up that morning feeling like a twenty-five year old but I couldn't find one. (insert rim shot here; I've got a million of them, folks, and I'll be here all week.)
Had my biopsy Friday. No probs. I see the doctor next week although if they find anything catastrophic I'm sure I'll hear earlier. Even minor procedures tend to knock the blip out of me and I find myself sleeping a lot -- not much fun for my wife. Soon all this will pass and I'll be able to get back to blogging on a daily basis.
Saturday Jack got another hat trick in soccer. This is his fourth one this season. For a nine-year-old, he's pretty good.
Th girls and the grands came over on Saturday for an afternoon of crafting, something they try do once a month. This time they were decoupaging napkins on mason jars. I think. It was hard to tell through all the laughter.
I read Stephen King's BILLY SUMMERS. Marketing as thriller, it was really just a 500-page character study. It drew me in but it was a pretty diffuse book. I think King was trying to do too much. There were several spooky references to the haunted Overlook Hotel from THE SHINING; other than that he steered clear of the supernatural. I also read a (?) graphic novel/ collection of cartoons by Rachael Smith about how she dealt with the Covid quarantine in England, QUARANTINE COMIX. Rachael has a flatmate and is missing her boyfriend who is quarantined at his place. She has a cat who talks to her. She also has two imaginary dogs -- a large black one that represents her despair and depression and a smaller white on the represents hope. The white on is often seen following the black one. The book is a daily compilation of her ups and downs of dealing with the Quarantine. The more I think about the book, the more impressed I am.
In between naps and reading, I watched a lot of old, forgettable black and white movies from the Thirties. I also started watching THE CHESTNUT MAN, a Danish thriller series; I'll finish that one up sometime today.
Enjoy your week, Patti.
So sorry to hear about your friend, Patti! You're right that people not getting vaccinated are playing a big part in these sorts of tragedies.
On a completely different note, I'm glad you got Acorn, and I hope you'll enjoy it. I like the service a lot.
Patti, you're right. They don't care about anything or anyone but themselves. And there is nothing you can say that will change their mind, because as Deb says, once they drink the MAGA Kool-Aid, they are gone.
But on a happier note; after reading the Ron (and Clint) Howard memoir, we watched APOLLO 13 again over the weekend. (It was On Demand on one of the pay channels.) It held up pretty well. A lot of familiar faces who have gone on to other shows and movies, and all looked so much younger (and, mostly, thinner) 25 years ago (!). Of course, once they hired Tom Hanks for the lead role of Jim Lovell (still alive at 92), they were on the right track. Ed Harris, Kevin Bacon, the late Bill Paxton, Gary Sinise (aas the guy bumped from the flight who helped get them home), Kathleen Quinlan, etc.
Saturday night is our British TV night, and since we finished MIDSOMER MURDERS and McDONALD & DODDS we needed new shows. On Acorn and Britbox we watched: MANHUNT (series 2). A low key police series (based on real cases) with Martin Clunes as Ch. Insp. Colin Sutton, brought in in the first series after a French girl is murdered. Two years later, the second series as about a serial rapist who has been active over a long period (1992-2009), with Sutton brought in to go over what has gone on, and to see if he can find a new way to solve the case, I like it that the first series was only 3 episodes and the second only 4. It might be a little too low key if you want to the usual LINE OF DUTY action, as it is probably more like real police work, but Clunes does a nice job.
THE LONG CALL. This is the latest series based on an Ann Cleeves series of books (after VERA and SHETLAND). Matthew Venn is openly gay Chi. Insp. Matthew Venn in picturesque North Devon, living with his artist husband. He grew up in one of these cultlike religious communities, but was expelled (at his mother's insistence) when he announced that he no longer believed. Now he returns when his father dies, though his mother (Juliet Stevenson) is quite hostile. But the head of the group (Martin Shaw, who has played both Gently and Dalgliesh in the past) is quite welcoming. Meanwhile there is a body that washed ashore, and it is tied to the artists' commune Matthew's husband runs.
Third was the one Patti mentioned, the new Dalgliesh starring Bertie Carvel, who played to awful headmistress Miss Trunchbull in MATILDA: The Musical in London and on Broadway. The first two parter is SHROUD FOR A NIGHTINGALE, with a student nurse murdered during a demonstration. It is set in 1975, a short time after Dalgleish's wife's death. His assigned Sergeant is a real piece of work, and not in a good way. There are two more done, A TASTE FOR DEATH and THE BLACK TOWER. All were previously done with Roy Marsden in the '80s.
Totally agree on Wes Anderson. I liked MOONRISE KINGDOM but intensely disliked THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL.
We finished the last two episodes of MAID last night. You want to shake her at times, but after 10 episodes she finally gets her act together. Juicy role for her real life Mom Andie McDowell as her bipolar mother. Also finished AMERICAN RUST and my opinion didn't change. Good acting but a total downer and I didn't like it at all.
We're up to season three of SEINFELD. A few of these episodes are totally unfamiliar to me, though I probably saw them at least once. Coming up on the first great one, "The Pen."
Still reading a lot of short stories - Patricia Highsmith, Marly Swick (after Patti's review), Otto Penzler's collection of ghost stories. Also read the new Longmire by Craig Johnson and the terrific thriller by Gregg Hurwitz, ORPHAN X, the first in a series.
We're supposed to be back in the 60s most of the week which will be nice.
Sorry, meant to say that Ben Aldridge plays Matthew Venn in the Cleeves series.
Western NY's roller-coaster weather will deliver much warmer temperatures this week: 60s instead of the normal 50s. Diane and I got our Moderna Booster shots last week. Several of our friends are dealing with "breakthrough" infections.
I donated six boxes of books to SUNY at Buffalo's Special Collections Library. I have more books ready to go, but SUNY at Buffalo is not accepting any more donations until June 2022 because they just don't have the staff to process the books. Everyone is short on staff!
Diane is busy planning our trip to New York City to spend Thanksgiving with Patrick and Katie (and hopefully the Meyersons). Patrick's POD from California arrives today with all of the stuff he packed it with in California. Patrick hired movers so if things go well, he'll have all his "stuff" in his new apartment today. Of course, "settling" his apartment might take some time.
Saw ETERNALS....ho, hum. I am not a Wes Anderson fan. Stay safe!
Ridiculous surfeit of new material, or varying degrees of recycled material, on the "premium" cable stations Sunday night...the end, as Jeff notes, of the first season of AMERICAN RUST (I still like it better than he does, but I wonder if all the characters in the novel its based on also make the stupidest choices they possibly can at nearly every opportunity, as well) along with the DEXTER continuation (not bad if unnecessary; amusing that Dexter's new native-Am cop womanfriend looks a bit like Jennifer Carpenter/Deb, which takes on some relevance), and the season-end of THE CIRCUS (a series wherein the reporters can't quite bring themselves to ask the serious questions, but, then, Alex Wagner chooses to paint Biden as a cuddly teddy bear of a president, which, sadly, is not the result of keen insight); the upcoming We Women Survivors of a Plane Crash Did Terrible Things Before We Were Rescued, YELLOWJACKETS, looks terrible by strength of Showtime's ads.
First two episodes of the second season of CONDOR on Epix (good, and finding a way of keeping it engaging and even a bit surprising), CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM and LAST WEEK TONIGHT on HBO (SUCCESSION is indeed repetitious, as you noted, Patti, and the first run-through of the insults and broad performances weren't engaging to me...not sure why this one is praised to the skies)...I still think I need to watch earlier seasons of INSECURE to see if I'm going to get the most from the current, final (till someone decides otherwise) season. Am a little tired of John Oliver's notion that him professing lust for male actors is hilarious in and of itself. And another impressive episode of HIGHTOWN on Starz.
Most things seem to be settling...mostly glad to read that most things for folks here are on the uptick (sorry about your friend...atop all else, the nursing staff in her place were almost certainly underpopulated and overworked even if they hadn't been told to limit contact).
I think one does have to be receptive to not caring about others to take on the notion that one need not worry about This "Overblown" Disease.
Hope all is progressing OK for you, healthwise...sorry about the distractions...is there real value to Franzen? His smugness seems to me to permeate his fiction as well as his personal version of Owning the Libs nonfiction.
I have seen every episode of Seinfeld at least five times but have the feeling I will watch Schitt's Creek even more because the characters are nicer by the end.
Is it me or is Larry David getting nicer on CURB. He seems to own his annoyingness now.
I don't have any of the cable channels anymore-just the streaming ones. I did save some money but it probably isn't worth it when I keep adding more of them.
My surgery is Nov 18th. Once the incision recovers (2-3 wks) I do three weeks of radiation five times a week and then take an estrogen-blocking pill. That should lower my chances of a recurrence to 2% providing they find nothing in the lymph nodes. They look clear but with my luck....
I can't find anyone who wants Phil's books on presidents. I have to get rid of them and hate to just toss them. Some are only a few years old.
Jack seems to be a future soccer star.
Really? I loved that Krueger, and raced through it, was sorry when it ended. Maybe you were expecting something else. Yes, the anti-vac people have a lot to answer for and sadly, they won't, because no one is willing to use common sense or take responsibility. When a medical facility doesn't properly treat patients, they should not be paid.
Reading some short stories, I'll have a post up Wednesday mid-morning. Watched some TV, news and sports but no movies. We had some rain, which we needed, and it has been very windy so the leaves have mostly all blown off. Too bad, the Fall color was good.
Patti, thanks for sharing that information about your surgery.
This weekend we watched Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, my favorite because it has Sean Connery. And Beetlejuice. Two fun movies. Our regular rotation right now is Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, Star Trek Next Generation, and Brooklyn 99. And Midsomer Murders occasionally; we will be watching one tonight. The current TV shows we are watching now are NCIS, NCIS: Hawaii, CSI: Vegas and Bull. We are watching them via Paramount Plus so that we can watch them earlier in the evening, but we did not go for the level with no commercials. The commercials are not as bad as on TV. And I forgot that we have been watch Leverage: Redemption on IMDB TV.
I am reading novellas this month for Novellas in November. I have been happy with all the books I have read. Which are:
Carte Blanche by Carlo Lucarelli (crime fiction, Italian)
The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes
Montalbano’s First Case by Andrea Camilleri (crime fiction, Italian)
Train Dreams by Denis Johnson
As far as Covid is concerned, and the reactions in the U.S. to it, I think I’ll probably be in isolation and mask & distance mode for the rest of my life. I blame right-wing social media and it’s false narratives by people like Tucker Carlson, and the GOP big lie believers. I know you and almost everyone want to get out and about, and get back to normal, but I’m afraid to.
I’m donating books to Goodwill. There was a time when I was proud to have a wall of filled bookshelves, but now I just think of the burden for Barbara when I’m gone.
I wish I could afford all those extra channels that everyone else has. Alas, I have what $200 a month basic cable provides, which includes over a hundred channels we never watch.
I’ve decided to reread A TALE OF TWO CITIES by Dickens. I read it in high school. I wonder how it will hold up for me.
My book group toys with reading that or Great Expectations all the time. A lot of the streaming channels are only $6 a month. Netflix is more expensive though.
loved A Sense of an Ending. Although not everyone in my book group did.
Jackie keeps adding more channels, but somehow we aren't paying more. Don't ask me how. We have HBO and Showtime and Starz/Encore. Also Netflix, Amazon Prime/Acorn/Britbox, PBS Passport, MHz Choice, and now Hulu. None of the "+" channels (Apple, Disney, Paramount).
We can certainly afford them, but there is no way we have enough time to watch everything. We did finish SQUID GAME (I partly guessed the end) and series 4 of SCHITT'S CREEK. Also series 3 (finally) of GAME OF THRONES. Also watching the original UPSTAIRS, DOWNSTAIRS and THE GOOD LIFE (just finished the latest run through it) and now ONE FOOT IN THE GRAVE.
Jackie knows how to work more systems...
Morning all..... while I read every week, I often do not say anything as nobody needs to hear me complain about stuff. I am speaking up this morning as I have some more postive things to say.
Thank you for the update on the surgery plan, Patti. Fingers crossed and all that.
We saw Scott's neurologist last Thursday and he was cleared to be weaned off the anti seizure drug, Keepra. He is now taking one a day and then this Friday we start breaking pills so that he can take a half a pill a day for a week. Assuming no setbacks he then will be off the drug. Middle of next month they will do another hour plus brain wave study to see how things look unmedicated. Assuming no problems, we see his doc early January. After that, there may be follow-up monitoring or something, but it sounds like he might be cleared to resume driver ed and various other things.
While I still am not writing and have not since the summer of 2017 with the move back to my childhood home and Sandi and all that, for the first time in twenty years, I read at an event. Sunday evening I read at NOIR AT THE BAR: Dallas along with Harry Hunsicker, Jim Nesbitt, Graham Powell, Eryk Pruitt, and a host of other folks. I read three flash pieces which all seemed to go over well with the audience. Johnny Wesner shot cell phone video of my portion and you can see that on my Facebook page. If I can figure out how to make it work so I can get it up on my blog, I will.
Going to get boosted but getting it done is a bit problematic here with the way things are set up. Only about five of us wore masks--out of about fifty folks-- at the reading event that was outside, but everyone was packed together tight. At least it was outside and we did have a light breeze.
Anyway, will shut up now and go back to lurking. Thanks for listening/reading and being here.
KRT
Glad to hear that you read, Kevin. Not easy to get up and do with all that has happened. Fingers crossed for Scott. We are both in need of some good luck.
Kevin, thanks for all that news and especially the good news about Scott.
I just made appointments for booster shots for my husband and I and the earliest I could get were Dec. 2. That does not worry me too much because we are not getting out that much, and everyone around here does wear masks indoors at businesses.
That we do, Patti.
It was very hard to read. I had not done that for twenty years. Scott was not even born yet. Sandi had pushed me then to do it and I did for her. Hoping that somehow, someway, she knew I did it again.
Thanks, Tracy. I need to get us set up for boosters, but the crappy system here is even worse now. Mask compliance was always an issue, but it has gotten way worse now. I think there were five out of about 40 people at the reading that were masked. It was outdoors but we all were basically shoulder to shoulder.
Booster shots were not a problem here (Michigan). I just walked into the drugstore and got it.
Glad to hear the various health issues are looking better or have solid plans. I received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine and had early eligibility for the Moderna. Booked the booster appointment at Walgreen's.
My family went to Minneapolis over the weekend to visit Boy #1. We didn't do too much but we did track down some winter boots for him. We ate at a Mexican restaurant on Saturday evening that was the best restaurant meal I have had in a long time. Most places I eat at are quick, or just restaurant-average.
Re: Jerry's reference to graphic novel of quarantine. I have the regular black dog of depression plus the real black dog of horrible, awful breath. I need to brush her teeth, but keep putting it off.
I listened to Stuart Turton's THE DEVIL AND THE DARK WATER and enjoyed it quite a bit. Set on a Dutch East India Company cargo ship handing back to Holland. With murders, locked-room mystery, a possible demon/devil, awful rich people, desperate and dangerous crewmen.
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