Lots of clouds and rain in Michigan. I am losing the sense that it's summer. Some of it is, no doubt, due to the fires. Although I remember a cloudy summer in 1972. I had two babies and couldn't seem to get a nice day to push them in their stroller.
Saw NO HARD FEELINGS, which I liked more than expected. Jennifer Lawrence brings a lot of charm to her role and the actor who plays the teenager was great too. Dragged three women to see SPIDERMAN and I might be shot. Although the animation and art was good, the moral was good, the wit was good, it was still a kids' movie and waaay too long. And I forgot to warn them there was a "to be continued" at the end.
Went to Megan's book signing in Northville, which seemed successful. She is good at it by now and the crowd was enthusiastic even if the B & N didn't seem very experienced at such an event. Too bad the Agnews could not have run things. (The Agnews ran Aunt Agatha's for years)
Watching THE BEAR (A+), SILO, HIJACK, ENDEAVOR. Finished JOE PICKETT, which I liked best as a family drama. Half the scenes were filmed so darkly, I couldn't make them out though. Is that intentional or do I need to adjust. I think I have raised this issue before,
Reading THE SOUVENIR (Patricia Carlon) and DAUGHTER OF TIME (Tey).
What about you?
15 comments:
Oh, I'll be interested to know what you think of The Daughter of Time, Patti. I'm glad you liked No Hard Feelings better than you expected. It's not my sort of film, but I do like Jennifer Lawrence. Hm...
We are in the midst of a heat dome here but it isn't as bad as in Texas and elsewhere. We have not lost power, so the grid appears to be maintaining itself. Thank goodness for air conditioning.
Have spent much of last week and will be spending this week finalizing Kitty's memorial service. So many details and so much confusion and so many people not returning our calls... Because the airline changed its schedule, we now have to fly into Newark next Sunday (instead of Boston) and rent a car there. We'll be spending two days at Kitty's family place on Cape Cod while Jessie and the girls visit with her in-laws a couple of towns over. On Wednesday, we'll head to Gloucester for a whale watch before heading off to meet with the minister and finalize everything. She will be interred in a small ceremony on Friday, and the memorial service will be held the next day, followed by a reception/gathering. Then we leave at 4:00 am Sunday to drive back to Newark for the flight home. Blogging will be very light this week and probably none-existent next week.
Amy was accidently clocked on the head by another worker at the shelter and had to be taken to urgent care, which sent her to the emergeny room. After three hours she will never get back the doctor released her after not seeing her. She went back to urgent care the next morning and they told her, yes, she had suffered a concussion, by golly. (Jessie was not happy with all of this and was especially ticked off at the snarky and unhelpful emergency room staff at Ascension Sacred Heart Hospital; she's urging everyone to avoid that place.) Amy is fine now, although still sore and a little battered.
Jack went in for his regularly scheduled sedated MRI. He has had a borderline chiari malformation since birth and it has been monitored ever since. The MRI staff decided he did not need to be sedated, which freaked him out at first but he came through it like a trooper. A milkshake and a Mexican lunch were his rewards. He'll turn 11 on the day we fly back from Newark, so we're planning something both before and after his birthday.
The free kids' movie at the theater this week was THE LEAGUE OF SUPERPETS. Both Christina and I were surprised that we enjoyed it. On television, I watched the French flick ASTERIX & OBELIX: THE MIDDLE KINGDOM, which was just as zany and enjoyable as the books by Goscinny and Uderzo. I'm still withholding judgement on SECRET INVASION.
Read two BEST SF STORIES OF THE YEAR anthologies edited by Lester del Rey (the Second and the Third), and finished two Murray Leinster science fiction collections, ADVENTURES IN THE FIFTH DIMENSION and PLANETS OF ADVENTURE. ELLERY QUEEN'S INTERNATIONAL CASEBOOK, written by Manfred Lee as EQ, comtained 20 stories supposedly told to Ellery as he travelled around the world -- all short, slight, and ironical. Novels read were T. H. White's THE SWORD IN THE STONE (I'll get to the the other three books in THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING later this month), APACHE LAW #1: THE LONELY GUN by "Luke Adams" (probably Bill Crider), and Martin Edward's first Harry Devlin novel ALL THE LONELY PEOPLE (very good, but I prefer his Lake District mysteries). I'm currently reading and enjoying Megan's latest.
I did something kinky to my back, so I have been walking like a crab for three days. Bah!
Have a fantastic week, Patti. Stay safe.
We spent a week in smoky heat with the Canadian wild fires still out of control. We finally got some rain this weekend that washed some of the smoke away.
Diane shares her birthday, July 13, with Harrison Ford so we had to go see the final Indy movie: INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY. It was okay.
The audience for the animated SPIDER-MAN movie is teenagers. It is outperforming expectations while THE FLASH and Indy are putting up disappointing Box Office numbers. I'm going to pick up the AMC tickets for next week's MISSION IMPOSSIBLE movie today.
Stay safe!
The memorial for Kitty sounds complicated. I hope it's not too taxing on you. So lovely that you are honoring her life this way.
Josh said the same thing about DOD. It was good enough but his theater was pretty empty.
I saw the Jennifer Lawrence movie because it was the only thing an older friend of mine would enjoy. So few movies are made to appeal to woman over 70.
Spend yesterday at Josh's, which was very nice until the subject of the SCOTUS decisions came up. We didn't all agree on them. In my mind, it is to society's betterment if there is no underclass based on race. Twenty year olds shouldn't be saddled with huge debt even if we were. And bogus cases should not be presented to the court to persecute the gay/trans community. If your business serves the public it serves the entire public.
All my best to Jerry on the upcoming memorial. My family have still not held anything for my father who died 2.5 years ago. I'm glad you're able to put something together.
I read AND THERE HE LEFT HER by Joshua Moehling. A mystery thriller set in rural Minnesota. I enjoyed the story quite a bit. Currently listening to BLACK RABBIT HALL by Eve Chase. BLACK RABBIT is okay and I hope the final reveal is worth the wait.
I finally got around to trying to replace a half-broken shower curtain rod. I've been putting it off because I was dreading what extra work may need to be done with the drywall. Sure enough, there was not a wooden frame to drill into and I now have to patch holes from the damned drywall anchors.
These stories always make me glad I am in an apartment now. Although there are other issues.
I've got a long list of things to fix or update. My current plan is to do an inventory of projects and make a list of needed supplies. I'll then try and schedule the work. I have enough vacation days every year that I am thinking of setting a few vacation days as housekeeping days.
Speaking of which, I finished listening to HOUSEKEEPING by Marilyn Robinson. Not sure why this was a Pulitzer finalist. There was a lot of literary blathering. Maybe I'll look up any related discussion questions just to find out what themes or plot lines I missed.
I'm late to the party today. Looks like little overlap in our television watching this week. We finished SPIRAL, which had a satisfactory - and mostly satisfying -end after 8 series and 15 years (2005-2020). Two of the main stars also starred in A FRENCH VILLAGE, set in a village occupied by the Nazis during WWII, and we've started watching this on MHz. This one ran 7 series and nearly 9 years (2009-2017), overlapping the other. Apparently it was the first French show to deal with collaborators.
We haven't been watching a lot on Netflix lately (though Jackie watches some during the afternoons), but we've started several - SLEEPING DOG (or DOGS) (German), about a former cop who quit the force and his family (though he talks to his teenage daughter), after he seems to have amnesia, possibly from a trauma. The interesting VORTEX (French) is not for those who object to time travel-type stories. It stars the Israeli-French Tomer Sisley, who stars as the title character in BALTHAZAR. Here he is a cop in 1998, with an infant daughter, whose wife is found dead, seemingly by accident (though, of course, we assume from the start it was murder). Twenty-seven years later he is still on the force and has another wife with a young son when he is called to a murder on the same beach where his wife was found. Through a glitch in the Virtual Reality glasses, he suddenly finds himself seeing - and then talking to - his wife, 27 years in the past. Sisley also starred in MESSIAH, which we haven't watched yet, so he is really flavor of the month since 2018, when BALTHAZAR started. Then there is TRANSATLANTIC, a fact-based series about the group led by Varian Fry who managed to smuggle out thousands of Jews and others - including artists, writers, etc. - from under the nose of the Gestapo and the Vichy in Marseilles starting in 1940. We thought the first episode was pretty well done.
Nothing major here this past week, but we do have another show this Saturday - Alex Edelman's one man show JUST FOR US. And next Monday we og to Connecticut to meet my cousins, and go with them Tuesday to Maine for the rest of the week.
I have been reading, but mostly short stories (R.A. Lafferty, John Lutz, Helen Ellis, Lauren Groff), essays (Ellis again), the Jane Smiley book on the novel, plus books by T, J. Newman and Chris Offutt.
The weather is getting hot and very humid, not unusual for this time of year.
Still watching the usual things - POIROT, FOYLE'S WAR, CANDICE RENOIR, etc.
There really are very few water cooler shows anymore. I started TRANSLATLANTIC but found it too similar to the Anne Frank series so decided to come back to it. Maybe now.
My book group loved GUERNSEY. I had forgotten all about it. And we too knew so little about that area.
I thought HOUSEKEEPING was very good. But I read a lot of novels like that.
When we were in Paris about a decade ago, they broadcast her talk onto the street because there were so many who wanted to hear her.
GUERNSEY was a good book. The movie version was OK but the book was better.
Now HOUSEKEEPING was a good movie.
Yes. Perfect casting.
Watched the first VORTEX and I'm hooked although I am not sure it will ever make complete sense.
Cats not enjoying 3 July fireworks. And most cats wouldn't enjoy a "thundershirt" as a corrective, as a dog might.
New cat slept against my leg for an hour for extra comfort. Another night at least.
The racing cars are louder than the fireworks here. So a good place for animals.
I was glad to see that Megan's book signing turned out well.
Still reading All the Sinners Bleed by S. A. Cosby. For some reason I've been reading slowly of late.
Saw Asteroid City last week. Didn't care much for it. Will probably see the new Indiana Jones this week.
Had a couple days Where I stayed inside due to the smoke in the air. Today seemed better. Just a lot of fireworks and cars revving their engines all day.
Posted a bit late this week. I got all screwed up over which day was which.
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