Really cold now. I wonder what it would be like to live in a warmer, sunnier climate.
Saw three decent movies: A REAL PAIN, WICKED and ALL WE IMAGINE AS LIGHT. The third one I slept through mostly, a shame because I think it was the best of the lot. Three women slept while the man took notes for us.
We celebrated Kevin's 18th. And then they took off for Chicago. So nice that he is still happy to go places with his parents. He is excited to be seeing SECOND CITY.
Enjoying LATER DATERS on Netflix as well as this and that. Also COLIN FROM ACCOUNTS (Paramount).
Still working my way though ALL FOURS (Miranda July, which is so very odd. Also a novel about a woman involved in solving polio. WOMAN WITH THE CURE.
What about you? Had enough turkey?
32 comments:
Happy birthday to Kevin! It's hard to imagine he's pretty much grown up.
The good news is that we survived Albuquerque, although the car drive there nearly did us in -- 14 hours the first day and 9 hours the second. We styed at a Quality Inn in Denton, Texas; all I have to say about that is that the motel had better think seriously about changing its name. In Albuquerque we stayed at a Hampton Inn, which was significantly better (although no great shakes, just better). Two things really stood out about the drive: Dallas during rush hour is a hellscape, and there was a sign at the edge of a small Texas town informing us that "Hitchhikers may be Escaping Prisoners" (which made us wonder how many escaping prisoners do they have that would warrant the expense of putting up a sign, and wouldn't that money have been better spent increasing security?). We found a faster route home which shaved 2 and 1/2 hours of driving time but which increased our awareness of how boring the interstate highway system is.
We found Mark's apartment building and dropped off his furniture and his three snakes. He had been sleeping on a folding camping cot and using a camp chair until then. We met his new snake, Storm, who is a small (I want to say Vietnamese something-or-other) with beautiful dark gray coloring and a feisty attitude. Storm kept biting at Mark while he was showing us the snake, but its head was so small its teeth could not puncture so it only felt like someone tapping your arm lightly with their finger. We left early because Mark was scheduled for elephant watch duty from 4 a.m. to 8 a.m, when his official work day began. But then...
Mark's car was stolen! He had gone out to his car at 3:35, unlocked it, retrieved his water bottle, and went back into the apartment to fill it. When he came back at 3:40 the car was gone -- stolen within that five-minute timeframe. It turns out stolen cars are quite the thing in Albuquerque, often it's kids joyriding, but sometimes not. (The second person Mark told at the zoo that morning said, "Oh, yeah. My car was stolen two months ago,") Kias and Hyundais are the most often stolen because of their ignition systems -- Mark had a Hyundai. Because Mark is an innocent, he had his credit card, debit card, driver's license, and the keys to the zoo in his glove compartment (**sigh**). He put a hold on his bank cards in case the car was found in the next few days; it wasn't, so he reported them stolen to the bank this weekend. He's basically cashless and carless for now. Because Walt recently go a new truck, he had been planning to sell his Jetta, but now Christina and Walt will be driving the Jetta out to Mark over Christmas.
So the week started off with excitement. Christina drove Mark to and from week (and elephant watch) this week, while a public transportation plan was being worked out. (Mark's work week is Friday to Tuesday, with Wednesdays and Thursdays off.)
Monday we went to Old Town Albuquerque with its many great shops, where Christina and Erin both spent the equivalent of the national debt. Tuesday, Christina, Erin, and Jack went hiking and enjoyed the natural vistas. (I opted out, having done something to my back, which kept seizing up and threatening to drop me.) Wednesday, Mark gave us a tour of the zoo (or "Biopark," as it terms itself). the weather Wednesday turned bitter cold and windy, so many of the animals were not on display but the zoo itself and its displays were wonderful. Mark gave us an insider's tour of the penguin exhibit where he normally works. There are thirty-four penguins -- Macaronis, Gentoos, and Kings -- there, each sharing a single brain cell, although each penguin has an individual personality. Newt, a Gentoo penguin, waddled to a back room so Mark could hand feed him fish. Mark gave us an overview of the records that had to be kept on each bird, as well as a tour of the hatchery and incubator rooms. We also got to meet Ike, Mark's favorite Penguin -- also a Gentoo.
I'd like to see Wicked (haven't yet), Patti. I'm glad you thought it was a good 'un.
Mark really likes working in the bird department and he is now being trained to work with macaws and other birds. But his true passion is reptiles, and there is a slot opening up in the reptile department and the people there are urging Mark to apply for it, so we'll see what happens.
Thursday was Thanksgiving and Mark and Erin went on a two-mile mountain hike. A lot of restaurants were closed on Thanksgiving and those that were open needed reservations. We found a small (only six tables), family-owned, authentic Mexican restaurant, where I gave thanks for spending the holiday with four of my favorite people. For the first time my life I had mole, and found it to be very good. Also that week we ate at Chinese, Irish, what I call "corporate" Mexican, and burger restaurants -- all pretty good.
Friday, we headed back home, happy that Mark is doing well, enjoying his life, and is navigating through the entire stolen car business. I rode with Erin (who had her Taylor Swift playlist going, but I did not complain --verbally -- because she was driving and, as such, was in control of the music). We hit Dallas pre-dawn -- much better and less of a hellscape. We also managed to avoid a five-mile traffic jam by briefly taking Route 66 to avoid is. (Yay, us!) We made it home by 5:30 ion Saturday, totally exhausted.
We had spent a week without television, computers, or newspapers and it felt great. I am a little fearful to learn what hellacious things the incoming administration had been up to during that week. I also came back to a non-functioning computer keyboard but was finally able to get it working late Sunday evening.
While we were in Albuquerque, Jessie and Amy were on a Bahama cruise with Jessie's two sisters-in-law and four of their adult children. They came back to port in Baltimore yesterday noontime and will have many tales of their adventures when they get home.
I read two more John Creaseys: GO AWAY DEATH (a Department Z/Gordon Craigie thriller) and TWO MEET TROUBLE ( a standalone originally published as by "Michael Halliday"). I packed a bunch of Hard Case Crime novels for the trip and read NOBODY'S ANGEL by Jack Clark, STOP THIS MAN! by Peter Rabe, THE MURDERER VINE by Sheldon Rifkin, STRAIGHT CUT by Madison Smartt Bell, PLUNDER OF THE SUN by David Dodge, THE DEAD MAN'S BROTHER by Roger Zelazny, and THE NICE GUYS by Charles Ardai -- all great reads, as expected, Currently reading EASY DEATH by 'Daniel Boyd" (Dan Stumpf).
Have a great week, Patti, and do your best to stay off Santa's Naughty List this month.
Never enough turkey, or - especially - stuffing.
My prejudice, probably, since he has been in some good things (ZOMBIELAND), but in general, Jesse Eisenberg rubs me the wrong way. Maybe it's the hair.
We thought the last couple of episodes of the first series of COLIN FROM ACCOUNTS were pretty terrible. Not sure if we'll watch series two. We watched the first episode (Paramount+/Showtime) of THE AGENCY last night, and enjoyed it a lot, despite the back & forth plotting. Michael Fassbender, RIchard Gere, Jeffrey Wright, Alex Jennings (playing American). A MAN ON THE INSIDE (Netflix) is nothing exciting (it's no GOOD PLACE), but it is light and enjoyable, with a nice cast of older actors.
We finished ISKANDER II (MHz/Topic), but didn't think the second (6 episode) series was as good as the first (4 episode) series. The first was set in Guiana, the second in Saint Pierre and Miquelon (considered a part of France) and nearby Newfoundland. It is often confusing and hard to follow and hard to keep the different characters straight.
We watched the first episode of GET MILLIE BLACK (HBO), and frankly, didn't care for it much. Dark and sleazy, despite the Jamaica setting, and very hard to care about the characters. We'll give it another try tonight. Jackie is watching another dark, mostly black show, CROSS (Prime, I think), which she seems to mostly like, other than fast forwarding the serial killer's torture scenes.
SANDHAMN MURDERS (Sweden) and DEADLY TROPICS (French, set on Martinique) have new series on, on MHz.
Current Saturday night Brit Night viewing: FAT FRIENDS, WHITSTABLE PEARL, SILENT WITNESS (each is a two part, 2 hour show), and MI-5 (SPOOKS). Now that Amanda Burton is gone, we're enjoying SILENT WITNESS quite a bit more.
Thanksgiving was quiet here. We ended up getting a huge $5 Costco chicken on Tuesday, and had it two days, with store-bought turkey breast (cut from a roast turkey) the third day, with stuffing, roasted potatoes, corn, and cranberry jello mold, plus sugar-free chocolate pudding pie and whipped cream. Yum.
Plenty of reading. Thanks to how short most of Lydia Davis's short stories are, I set a record for me of 165 short stories read in November. I have one more of her collections on hand, but I am also read two of Martin Edwards's edited British Library collections, one in Scotland, one in Wales, as well as Tom Mead's (somewhat disappointing) locked room/impossible crime collection from Crippen & Landru. And I have more on hand.
Also read Marie Brenner's book (THE DESPERATE HOURS) about the Covid pandemic, centered on the New York-Presbyterian Hospital system. One thing you can say unequivocally: Trump, Cuomo and De Blasio all did a HORRIBLE job in the beginning, undoubtedly causing many, many more deaths than needed to happen.
It is very cold here too, Patti, but at least it is mostly dry, though we did get enough rain last week to kill the wildfire/brush fire threat.
Yikes. That's awful,, Jerry. Jackie was appalled (as I'm sure you were) that he left his credit card (!) in the car! (Not to mention the rest of the stuff, of course.)
It does sound like a tough road trip. Perhaps the sign could have meant that the hitchhikers were trying to escape FROM prisoners? I've actually seen a similar sign driving down to Florida.
Not read - "reading" the Brenner. 200 pages in so far.
Any turkey for me would be too much, and my thought that vegetarian "turkey" would be on clearance last night while picking up some meat for the cats, and chips and pineapple for Alice, meant I'd forgotten they keep it stocked through Xmas. Some of those packages verge on the tasty. Glad you're getting some social interaction, Patti, even if it comes at the cost of sleeping through interesting movies in teams.
I'm just finishing up a historical drama, the 8-part HBO Asia production of GRISSE, based on native and Asian-diasporic resistance to the Dutch and English imperialism in what's now Indonesia and Malaysia...the talented and striking Indonesian actor Adinia Wirasti is the star...much of it is necessarily grim, few if any characters are portrayed without dangerous foolishness or self-service clouding judgment or worse, and particularly the young bro culture that helped saddle us with the kleptocratic incoming national admin has its centuries-ago correspondence marked. Good, rather than superb, but worth seeing.
Sorry about the drives and the stolen car , Jerry, but otherwise things sound like fun... A San Francisco "Quality Inn" that had been rec'd by TV GUIDE's travel office turned out to be a repurposed brothel (the wall-paper gave it away) with no A/C (much needed) in the rooms, when we were in town some years back for a wedding...mostly good reading, Jeff, it seems.
Our two cats would mew greetings, particularly if you like cats and coddle and/or play with them.
Both my children were home for thanksgiving and we had no visitors. My wife and children set-up and decorated the house and tree.
I finished Max Brooks's audio of DEVOLUTION, about a volcanic eruption in the Pacific Northwest that isolates a small, idealistic, tech-dependent community. The natural disaster also drives a clan of hungry sasquatch to the town. Narrated by Judy Greer and I enjoyed the thriller.
Illinois won their football game and should be invited to a decent bowl game and are now ranked #21. I've not watched the rankings this season and was surprised that SMU is in the top ten at #8. I had a cousin who played there for 1-2 seasons before the 1987 death penalty. Also surprised that Indiana is #9.
Last Thanksgiving I had chest pains that wouldn't go away and ended up making an emergency room visit. After a few hours I was told I did not have a heart attack and the event was marked up to stress and exertion. Much of that stress was probably induced by a clogged waste water pipe that, when I finally cleared it, ended up covering the basement and me in a fountain of kitchen sink remains. Glad to say that did not happen this year. My wife mentioned that any leafy material went in the garbage rather than the sink disposal.
That is a lot of movie watching. We did watch movies Thursday and Friday, but old favorites: STAR TREK: THE WRATH OF KHAN, BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA (Kurt Russell, Kim Catrall, James Hong and Victor Wong), and BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY. Bohemian Rhapsody isn't that old but I love the music.
Other than that we are watching the same shows as usual. Getting near to the end of NORTHERN EXPOSURE. All of the later seasons are weird but the 6th one is weirder. It is fun watching NUMB3RS and comparing Rob Morrow in both.
I actually finished a nonfiction book, TUDORS by Peter Ackroyd. I now know much more about the reign of the Tudors than I did, and about life at that time, especially the religious issues.
I am now reading ELEGY FOR APRIL by Benjamin Black (John Banville). This is the third book in the Quirke series and I read the 2nd book, THE SILVER SWAN, earlier this year. I am enjoying the author's writing style very much now that I am used to it.
Glen is reading THE POWER AND THE GLORY by Adrian Tinniswood. The subtitle is "The Country House Before the Great War". It was just published in October of this year and he hasn't read much of it yet.
And he will soon start reading HAUNTERS AT THE HEARTH: Eerie tales for Christmas Nights. From The British Library Tales of the Weird series.
Gerard, I am glad to hear you enjoyed DEVOLUTION by Max Brooks. I have had a copy of that for about a year, I should get to reading it soon.
Jerry, that was an exciting trip you had to Albuquerque. What an adventure! The Zoo / Biopark tour sounds great, to see all that stuff up close and personal. And I hope all of Mark's vehicle / transportation problems are resolved eventually.
And you still got all that reading done. Amazing.
Jeff-Can I watch that if I have Paramount but not SHOWTIME. Otherwise I am dumping Paramount. That is my new life subscribing than dumping channels.
I long for the day when I had Northern Exposure to watch. I remember seeing BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA in Canada years ago.
Funny bit in ALL FOURS, where she rents a motel room and spends a fortune redecorating it so she will have a nice place to stay. Although the book is not funny enough for some strange passages.
Just attended my senior reading group where we talked about our favorite books of the years. They are a really smart group of women (one man) and had some good ideas. Their joint pick was JAMES, which I voted for too.
I didn't realize you were a vegetarian, Todd.
So much stress in our lives, Gerard. And last Christmas you did not even have Trump II to worry you.
Ah, the joys of home plumbing and heating, Gerard! In the last week, we've had to purge our steam heat boiler of water twice, after the pro cleaning, and I've had to change a toilet seat (made the mistake of buying a pressed wood item which lasted about five years last time), along with we'll need to get our dishwasher replaced week after next and our in-sink garbage disposal fixed (well down our list at the moment, as well as eventually have the lead water pipes from the main replaced at our expense, thanks locality! We distill our own water for several reasons, including Alice's C-PAP).
Patti, I've been a lacto-ovo (or "lazy") veg since 1989...eat less and less egg product as time goes by.
And I hope Kevin and his parents enjoyed the birthday SECOND CITY show!
Tracy, BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA is my second all-time favorite movie, just behind PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK.
Yes, if you have Paramount+ it is supposed to be on there. Jackie's hairdresser told her on Sunday that she had watched more than one episode. I didn't check yet if all or only one of the episodes is available. (Will check in a minute as soon as Jackie finishes the last episode of CROSS.) Showtime had the first episode Sunday.
Just found out there is a new series of 3 DALGLEISH stories starting tonight on Acorn, based on three of the P.D. James books.
Not sure how it works, but you can watch it now - the first two episodes - on Paramount+. I guess they add one a week after that.
I'm a fan of BIG TROUBLE as well.
A Greer fan of long standing, I might have to check that recording.
They used Morrow more effectively in NUMB3RS, I think, but his problem with women did lead to some cast turnover, I gather.
UPDATE: Mark's car has been found. Evidently it was used in the commission of a crime because it now residing at the police forensics laboratory. Not known if there was any damage to the car or, if so, how extensive. Due to the circumstances Enterprise is waiving the age requirement of 25 to rent a car (Mark is 24 and 7 months), so he will be able to get back and forth to work. Mark's new driver's license came in the mail Saturday. There is theft coverage on the car so he out only a small deductible for repairs, if needed. If the car is not totaled, that saves Christina and Walt a trip to Albuquerque this month with a replacement.
Why is life so full of things like this. Was it always like this? So sorry, Jerry.
I have looked into distilling my own water and it seems pretty difficult on a half gallon water needs a day.
well my roku just stopped working. Not a day goes by....
I think I have to upgrade to Paramount Plus with Showtime for $12 What a racket.
Morning..... That Quality Inn in Denton has issues. Last year, it was housing students from the nearby University of North Texas which had more than full residence halls. Soon, kids, and some of their parents were on the local news here in Dallas/Fort Worth with horror stories. The University was soon moving them, apologizing, and other wise spinning hard on damage control.
Signs warning about potential escaped prisoners are required by both federal and state law.
Back to deep lurk mode....
Milwaukee has had a lot of trouble with Hyundai and Kia thefts. I chatted with a woman from there who had her car stolen 2-3 times. There is a relatively inexpensive and quick fix to prevent the thefts. But, I was told the parts and service appointments are scarce. Also, the part replacement is not visible, so thieves will still break into the car to try and steal it and still make a mess or break things. Still better than having your car disappear, I suppose.
That is good news.
My wife takes care of the different streaming services. She just subscribed with a $20-a-year special for Peacock. Most of TV is on my tablet or when I plug the phone into the basement TV. I only have about 3 services on the phone and never watch the others.
Well, given that we have to be 25 to rent a car, 21 to drink alcohol, and yet our authorities seek to try 12yos as adults (when, clearly, 25yos aren't actually adults), I'd have to say, yes. The Drumpfs of this world, and their poorer cousins, have always been with us. Apparently the reason my parents and I lived in Oklahoma City in summer of 1969, while my father was getting FAA training in Lawton (a long commute), was that Lawton was Not the kind of town you wanted to be in after dark...thank goodness the Feds had training centers there.
The initial investment in a small distiller isn't too great, but be warned that if you get one like ours, it will definitely heat up a room for the five hours or so it takes to distill a gallon.
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