Category Archives: Movies

books, Family, Gatherings, History, Media, Movies, TV, Uncategorized

OK!

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Today is the anniversary of the shootout at the OK Corral in Tombstone,  AZ between the Earp brothers  and the Clanton gang.  None of these were real solid citizens, but this “battle” haunts us to this day with cowboy legend. I loved movie westerns growing up.  Having Native friends has tempered this somewhat.  I was surprised to hear that one of Husband’s Native colleagues likes nothing better than to vegetate and watch westerns while lying in bed.

Virgil Earp was supposedly the real hero in this incident but Wyatt got all the credit about it because he wrote a book about it. This seems unfair to me, but I never had any siblings. I wonder what Virgil thought about it?

What is your favorite western movie or novel?    How are things with you and your siblings?

Art, Family, History, Kids, Media, Movies, Music, Uncategorized

On Your Toes

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Today in 1581, the first ballet was performed in Paris. It had been commissioned by Catherine De Medici  and was called “Ballet Comique de la Reine”.  I love ballet, and so do our children. Both studied dance for many years.

The only ballets that  I have seen in live performance were by the Winnipeg Ballet, which is a very fine company.  We saw them perform Giselle and The Firebird.  We sometimes saw dancers from the company wandering the halls of our psychology department as they went to appointments to manage their eating disorders with one of our professors, an unfortunate side effect for some dancers.

What is your favorite ballet? Tell about your experiences with dance.

 

 

Fifty Words, History, Media, Movies, Radio, Uncategorized

Comic Duos

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Today is significant in history for the 1927 release of The Second Hundred Years, the first Laurel and Hardy film in which they appeared as a team, as well as the 1942 debuts on radio of The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet and a weekly show by Abbott and Costello.  It is also the anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire. I suppose Mrs. O’Leary and her cow are a duo, but they are not terribly comic.

Talk about your favorite duo, comic or not.

100 Words, Movies, Uncategorized, work

Work Friends

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Last week was pretty dull for me at work, as two of my favorite floor mates were gone, one to Montana, and one to California.  They are Developmental Disability Case managers, and I have worked with them for 20 years. We tease, laugh, and help each other out. We only see each other at work.  Work is mere drudgery without them. We are all set to retire about the same time, and imagine ourselves waltzing out the door on our last day like Dorothy, the Scare Crow, and the Tin Man.

Tell about your best work buddies. What made them special?

education, Fantasy, History, Movies, Nature, Science, space, Travel, Uncategorized

Aliens Among Us?

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Back to my rant on reactionary headlines. Now I’m seeing news that some videos from quite a few years ago have been leaked from Navy archives, videos that the Navy says are “real”.  They show unidentified objects that have never been explained.  So now aliens exist and are among us according to the headlines.

Personally I’m not willing to say that we are the only life in the universe. As Matthew McConaughey says in the movie, Contact

However, I’m pretty sure that if there is other life in the universe, the human race doesn’t have it within itself to RECOGNIZE that life. I think that our definition of life is too small.  Even our definition of life is based on what we currently believe to be life:  “the condition that distinguishes animals and plants form inorganic matter, including the capacity for growth, reproduction, functional activity and continual change preceding death.”

I’m also pretty sure that any kind of life/civilization that can get to Earth is/will be way more advanced than we can imagine. So I’m not really concerned that the Navy video is really aliens – if aliens are here, they are advanced enough to keep themselves hidden from us.  For all we know, aliens do walk among us and we’ll probably never figure it out?

What place in the universe would you like to visit?

Automotive, Fantasy, Media, Movies, Nature, TV, Uncategorized

Real Life

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In a TV murder mystery I watched over the weekend, the heroine is trailing some bad guy at a hotel. He leaves the hotel and gets into his car right outside.   She comes out and gets into her car which is parked right behind his.  That’s when I realized that Aristotle was wrong about art imitating life.  When, in any movie or TV show does the hero or heroine have to circle the block to find a parking spot?  Or park 3 blocks away and hoof it to where they are going?  Or stop to pay a parking meter?  Never.

It made me think about other things that never happen on screen. Nobody ever scoops poop when walking their dogs, nobody ever seems to put groceries away (although every now and then there is actually time spent in a grocery store) and nobody EVER stops to worry about birth control.

I think it would be nice to have a world in which I could always find a convenient parking spot and have my groceries put away magically.

What daily task would you love to have disappear from your life?

Business, holidays, home, Movies, Nature, Seasons, TV, Uncategorized, Weather

Too Hot to Shop?

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Wowser! Over lunch I decided to run a couple of errands so I wouldn’t have to do them after work.  (I hate doing errands on a Friday after work – I just want to get home!)  And, of course, the heat and humidity is in the “you’ve got to be kidding me” range.   As I walked through the doors at Joann’s, the first big display is all about fall.  Pumpkins, dried vine wreaths, autumn wall hangings, the works.  Nothing specific to Halloween that I saw, but I was making a beeline to the fabric section.  I’m guessing that if I’d wandered past the initial display I would have seen stuff for little ghosts and ghouls.  It was so incongruous to me that they are selling items for the fall when it’s mid-July and 94° outside.  If I weren’t already overheated from Mother Nature, it would make my temperature go up!

I’m not sure why this drives me so crazy, but when retail jumps the gun on holidays and seasons, I just dig in a little more. I just want to celebrate the season I’m in, thank you very much- no need to start stocking up on pumpkin-themed items just yet.  And of course I’ve ranted here before about the Hallmark Channel running Christmas movies for weeks at a time during the summer months.  I adore holiday movies (well maybe not all the Hallmark ones) but they definitely have their place in my world.  And that place begins the day after Thanksgiving and not before.

So I guess I’ll just have to stubbornly keep ignoring the fall displays and the holiday movies until I’m ready. Sorry retail America.

What gets your temperature heated up?  What do you do to cool off?

History, Media, Movies, Music, Uncategorized

RIP Doris Day

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I’ve just seen that Doris Day has passed away at the age of 97. Born in 1922, she got into show business at the age of 17 as a big band singer and her first film was “Romance on the High Seas”.  The first part of her film career was top heavy with musical comedy but she broke out of that mold in 1955 with “Love Me or Leave Me” which she always said was her best performance.

Her later life was filled with music and her deep care for animal rights. The Doris Day Animal Foundation is a very active presence and supports all kind of animal initiatives.  She released her last album “My Heart” in 2011 and all the proceeds went to the Foundation.

Doris Day certainly wasn’t my favorite actress of all time, but I did admire her and thought she lived a full and meaningful life. The world is slightly less buoyant today for her loss.

Tell me your favorite and your least favorite Doris Day films?

 

 

Art, books, Fantasy, Media, Movies, TV, Uncategorized

Hero Cult?

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In this world of super heroes and avengers, it seems as if everyone needs to get on the band wagon. I see in the news that an actor has been named for a re-make of “He-Man”.  I didn’t realize there had even been an original movie, although I do remember the original tv cartoon series.

Apparently the first movie was a flop (or as they say in Hollywood “a commercial failure”) which leads me to wonder why anyone feels the need to try again. But then I see that the latest Avengers movie completed Sherman-tanked its way over box office records last weekend, so who am I to say that people don’t want more super hero movies.

I guess in a anxiety-filled world, imagining that there are super beings who can control a little more of their destiny is somehow comforting?

Tell me about the worst film you’ve ever seen. (Or worst book you’ve ever read.)

100 Words, Family, Fantasy, home, Movies, pets, Stories, Travel, Uncategorized

The Bad Dream

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I had a nightmare last night. Don’t need to go into it but it combined two things I’m not crazy about and I even know what I’ve seen/thought recently that most likely triggered it.  However at 3:25 in the morning, you just want to go back to sleep.  I turned on the TV and pulled up Laura with Gene Tierney, Dana Andrews and Clifton Webb.  I know the first 10 minutes by heart because that’s about how long it takes me to fall back to sleep with it playing.  I didn’t make it 10 minutes in this time.

How to you deal with bad dreams?