Where everything flows

Last month conceptual artist Rutherford Chang sadly passed away. This was brought to my attention via the music world because he spent many years collecting the numbered editions of The Beatles White Album and sometimes displaying them as a form of art. In addition to collecting the albums, he also listened to it every day, which is an impressive feat. I bought a non-numbered White Album in the mid 70's and played it a lot, trying to like it more than I could. While there are many good songs on there, let's face it, there are also some clunkers. Where his collection IMO gets really interesting is when previous owners decided to create their own cover art or just doodled on it. I confess to having little to no imagination and am not very artistic as this never occurred to me to do. Some of the albums he obtained now have wonderful cover art. I hope this labor of love he worked on has or will be kept together and continued. 

Hanging on in quiet desperation

 Movie: Here. Reuniting Tom Hanks and Robin Wright after all these years. Based on a 2014 graphic novel by Richard McGuire, the film stays on one piece of land (eventually house) throughout until the very end. That they used an AI technology called Metaphysic Live to digitally de-age the actors is disappointing but the alternative of using other actors who could not match the excellence of Hanks and Wright would never have worked. The plots proved mundane, but that is a huge part of real life and perhaps what they intended to show. We're born and we have dreams that are squashed in favor of hard work, a little love and in the end, we lose it all. So, yeah, a little depressing but I stayed awake and did appreciate the acting.

Not ready for prime time

 Movie: Saturday Night. Details the moments leading up to the first episode of the now 50 year and still running sketch comedy show SNL. Before there was the phrase water cooler talk, this was the show us kids at school in 1975 asked our friends first thing Monday morning if they had seen. It was new, edgy and hysterically funny. The movie about it isn't those things, but it is insightful. The cinematography makes you feel like you were there, experiencing the nerves, worries and uncertainty that the show would ever air, much less be one that would end up so iconic and long-lasting. I didn't recognize any of the actors. They did a good job, especially with the voices. I wish the three girls had more air time. (Kudos to Curtain and Newman for bringing Radner's photograph to the 50th anniversary show on Saturday.) Recommended to any SNL fan. While there have been so many great comedians on that show, the originals stole our hearts and stay there forever. 

And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

I happened to stumble upon the live stream of Punxsutawney Phil's prediction on Sunday morning just as he was being encouraged out of his hibernating hole. Not surprisingly, Pennsylvania's favorite groundhog says there will be six more weeks on winter. Well, this is not really a disappointment. We here in the north should be so lucky to have only six more weeks. And if you look at the calendar, six weeks from February 2 is March 16. The first official day of Spring this year is March 20. So, according to Phil, we will have spring 4 days early. Sounds good.

I started to wonder why on earth anyone would think a groundhog could predict spring. From Wikipedia, I learned that way back when (year not stated) in Germany, if a hedgehog saw its shadow on February 2, it meant six more weeks of cold, wintry weather. German immigrants in Pennsylvania brought their tradition or superstition with them, transferring the power of weather prediction from hedgehogs to groundhogs. The really strange part of the current festivities is not the top hats and tuxedos. It's the head of the "Inner Circle" who supposedly receives Phil's message in something called "groundhogese." So it has nothing to do with seeing a shadow. It has more to do with one guy's whims? Feel free to correct me if I've misunderstood this.

 

Third time's a charm

 Movie: Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice. Okay, I'm going to sound like an old person here because I am one. But I find this in so many action films with special effects and CGI: it's too dark and too fast. Maybe everything that's happening on the screen finds its way into my mind but I have old and slow eyes with vision that was never good since second grade. So for me, the speed of the action is annoying because I would like to notice everything that's going on. And I want to repeat, this isn't just a dis of this movie. It's all action movies. You need to watch them about twenty times, and possibly in slow motion, to catch half of what you're shown. And maybe that's the plan. That said, this was a very entertaining sequel. Keaton picks up right where he left off, and he's even older than me! O'Hara is always charmingly off-kilter and fun. Ryder: perfect. I don't know much about Ortega, but she was there too. My favorites were DaFoe as Wolf Jackson, head of the Afterlife Crimes Unit. Spot on. He could easily have his own spin-off. And Bob, of course. Gotta love Bob.

Words about winter

This morning the temperatures are in the negatives, somewhere between minus eleven and eighteen, depending on where one resides, with wind chills subtracting another 10 degrees on top of that. When a coworker this morning said she was out at 3 a.m. running her car to make sure it would start four hours later, it made me think of the video bloggers Matt and Julia who travel around the world and end up in exotic places, one of which is Siberia. They stayed there at one point when the temps were negative 80. So how do they cope with cars, especially if they don't have garages, under such extreme weather?

• Leave the engine running all the time. Another coworker whose husband once lived in the Yukon says they did this too. Seems expensive.
  
• Some cars have special gauges to monitor the temperature. If it falls below a certain point, the engine is triggered to start and run for a little while.
• Cover the car with a blanket (see photo.)
• Take the batteries inside and charge them overnight.
• Winter grade antifreeze. And also probably a whole lot of other mechanical things that I know nothing about. Sometimes a blow torch is involved. That's a whole new level of extreme!

The more you share, the more your bowl will be plentiful.

 Which character from The Expanse are you? Apparently, I am Anderson Dawes. Ernest, practical and dependable.

You and Anderson Dawes have similar personalities because tenacity is a keyword in your life. You won't give up no matter the adversity, nor will you belittle or feel sorry for yourself. On the contrary, you will show strong resilience, break your chains, and keep moving forward.