We Are the Music Makers

I've been neglectful again. I blame it on the fact that I had a post in mind for October that never came to fruition and defeated me for November. Now December's almost over and here I am finally posting something. This is also a very busy time at work which leads me to feeling lazier in other areas of my life. Excuses made!

During the holiday season, one of our smaller cinemas shows Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory in "smell-o-vision" and a quote along The Princess Bride. I was basically put in charge of it this year, which means long days of scratch and sniff stickers and rodents of unusual size. While there is a good group of adults that like to come out for the Bride part of the day, the star of the two is definitely Wonka. Not that I have a problem with that, I prefer the Wonka screenings where my only job is to hand out goody bags and turn on a bubble machine at the proper interval. Bride requires someone to dress in a large rodent costume and terrorize the audience, which I always make a minion working with me do. Thankfully, someone is always willing.

Wonka is a strange phenomena to me and one that has become a slight obsession over this winter as I delved into decorating a lobby and picking out candy to sell that would amplify the Wonka experience. I never read Roald Dahl as a child and recall only minor, terrifying moments of the 1971 film. I refused to watch anything starring Gene Wilder well into my adulthood. It wasn't until I watched The Producers in college that I got over my irrational fear of the man. This year, at the ripe age of 31, I finally read the book as a sort of compliment to my education, research if you will. The book, although very simple and easy to read, is still frightening. Kids being squeezed and stretched and chopped back into their correct proportion is just as alarming in the book as it is in the movie. This should come as no surprise since Dahl was of course a double whammy of darkness, being born of Norwegians in Wales. We Scandinavians like our nights long, our drama dark, and our comedy black. It reads very much like a modern Grimm's fairy tale with the Oompa Loompas offering the moral of the story through their musical commentary. The vices condemned range from grand, greed, gluttony, and bad parenting, to oddly specific, gum chewing and television watching - how would Dahl have felt about today's modern miracles?

One thing that struck me this year was the variety of recognizable quotes from the film. I sit in the dark listening to the scene prior to my bubble cue. It's the scene where Violet turns violet...Violet. We have the Oompa Loompas proselytizing about how gum is good because it keeps you from smoking but bad if you chew it all day long. As Violet is rolled out to be juiced, Wonka ponders, "where is fancy bred? In the heart or in the head?" before distastefully suggesting that they "roll along". A simple search will tell you that this quote is in fact from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. And this isn't the only time our well read candy confectionaire quotes the Bard. He does so again near the end of the film when he observes "so shines a good dead in a weary world" (also from The Merchant).  One of the more famous quotes attributed to Wonka is "a little nonsense now and then is relished by the wisest men". This is more illusive to track but is thought to be an 18th century proverb often attributed to Joseph Addison. And let us not forget the big daddy of all Wonka quotes, "we are the music makers and we are the dreamers of dreams", the beginning of the poem "Ode" by Arthur O'Shaughnessy. "Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker" however is pure Wonka.

I don't know why this is so intriguing to me. Maybe it's because Wilder's portrayal of him seems so different from the book. In the book he comes across almost as a sprite-like creature, a happy, bouncing, excitable vision in purple velvet, only a trifle deaf when Mike Teavee speaks. Wilder's Wonka is an educated man, spouting Shakespeare and poetry, giving side winks to parents, with a brazenly sardonic sense of humor. Remember "Help. Police. Murder." when Gloop in drowning in chocolate?  That line is actually shrieked by Mrs. Gloop in the book. He is someone you don't dare brush by, even though there is a river of the most delicious chocolate in front of you, until he allows you to. He's done a 360 for me, from someone who terrified me as a child to someone I would date as an adult. Strange how that works. I'm sure Freud would have an opinion about it.

Appreciation Post: Dylan

Thomas that is. Sorry Michelle Pfeiffer. Random question: was saying Bob Dylan was your favorite poet edgy in the 90s? 60s yes, 90s? ...I think not. But I digress. 

I have gathered quite the collection of poetry readings on my Spotify account.  During my sometimes long commutes to south Seattle in rush hour traffic, this is usually the first playlist I opt to listen to. I take after my father, and perhaps my sister, with my love of poetry.  Modern in particular. And my easy obsession with actors no doubt feeds into this.  Kenneth Branagh reading Shakespeare? Put that in the playlist, please. Julie Harris and the works of Emily Dickinson? Say no more. I have no doubt there are not nearly enough of the dulcet tones of British actors reciting verse in the world. But even with Alan Rickman, Alec Guinness, and Alan Bates; Richard Burton, Ralph Fiennes, and Robert Newton; all the actors whose voices could give you goosebumps and no one comes close to Dylan Thomas. Strange isn't it, that a poet could beat out all of those great actors. But listening to him read Yeats is like listening to music. Try not to get the refrain from "The Three Bushes" stuck in your head like the chorus repeated on the radio. Ah I can hear you say "well he's a poet, he should know best how to read poetry." I beg to differ. Love as I do my favorite poet, T.S. Eliot, what I wouldn't give to have a recording of someone like Leo Genn reciting "The Wasteland" for 25 minutes. Luckily for me, this quality of Thomas' was recognized and recorded. Quite a bit. So take a minute to enjoy my favorite Dylan song:



And I could listen to that one on repeat. 

On Obsession (or an Ode to Robert Newton)

I've had a lot of time to myself lately, which turns into me watching more movies than I normally would.  I get into a cycle at the video store.  I have to return the movies so I might as well rent more, right? So every Tuesday I go to Scarecrow Video here in Seattle and pick up about five films to last me the week.  Much to the annoyance of the guy who has to ring me up every week, I'm sure.  This has become such a regular thing for me that I've even started an Instagram account to log the films I rent from there.  Here's the link, for the interested: scarecrow.is.my.boyfriend

This is how I entertain myself.

When I watch movies, I watch them in waves.  This is no doubt due to my somewhat obsessive nature.  I get in the mood for something in particular and that's all I want to watch.  Everything else falls by the wayside.  Even television gets the boot.  Case in point, I still haven't finished the second season of Peaky Blinders because a mood struck me and it was put on the back burner.  It has been at least 8 months and I still haven't picked it back up.  Not because I don't want to!  It's a great show.  I'm just a slave to my moods.  For a period of time a year or so ago I would only watch Kurosawa films with Toshiro Mifune in them. That's all I could watch and I had to watch them all. That is until I got near the end.  I still haven't watched the first of their collaborations because once I do, that'll be it.  No more new Kurosawa/Mifune to enjoy.

Often my moods will lead to other obsessions, which brings me to my current status.  For reasons found buried in my childhood, summer always inspires in me a mood for the classic live-action Disney films.  Summer was for me, as it is for most people I'm sure, a magical time.  It was a time when we could rent and watch movies during the week!  Yes, I know.  Incredible.  The video store we grew up renting from also had a magical section, the very top row of the children's area.  This row was all live-action Disney films encased in their large, white VHS covers that opened like a book.  So much more magical than those clear plastic covers you had to squeeze and shake to get the video out.  And they had everything!  From The Three Lives of Thomasina to The Cat from Outer Space, from Now You See Him, Now You Don't to No Deposit, No Return, all the Haley Mills you could ask for, Summer Magic, the Moonspinners, That Darn Cat, and of course, the Parent Trap.  They even had the VERY grown up Condorman! (I think we believed it was such a grown up film because of the frightening actor who played the villain, the same man who scarred me for life by playing Bill Sikes in Oliver! and who would become one of the biggest obsessions of my adult life, the amazingly wonderful Oliver Reed).

An example of the videos from my childhood.  It happens to have Oliver Reed on the cover. 

This summer, I decided to rewatch many of them and that led me to see a few that I had missed during my youth.  Most importantly, Treasure Island and Kidnapped.  If this seems like a big, yawning gap in my Disney movie profile, it is.  The only excuse I offer is that I had seen the Muppet's Treasure Island and was unimpressed and not ready to watch any other version of the same.  And wasn't Kidnapped after all the same story?  Jim Hawkins gets kidnapped so logic followed that it was.  Sadly, I was missing out on two great Disney films, on a young introduction to the amazing Peter Finch, and on THE man who established what it means to be a pirate in the world of film, Robert Newton.

Arrrr, that's right Matey!

This brings us up to my current obsession.  As I watched Treasure Island, I was so impressed with the  actor who played Long John Silver and his physicality that I actually brought up my trusty IMDb app to see if he had the use of both his legs in real life.  Lo and behold, I had seen this man in half a dozen other films never connecting them as the same actor. Some were obvious, Bill Sikes in David Lean's Oliver Twist, Lukey, the painter, in Carol Reed's Odd Man Out. Others not so much. In fact, upon seeing that he had been in Hitchcock's Jamaica Inn I automatically assumed that he played the villainous uncle when he in fact played the romantic lead. At this point, I knew that I needed to revisit his films and watch as many unseen ones as possible.  I went through his filmography and made a list of all the movies of his that Scarecrow carries and the last five weeks have been dedicated to watching every single one.

Sikes threatening young Oliver in the most faithful adaptation of Oliver Twist

A friend asked me to explain my obsession with him.  It was surprisingly hard to articulate.  But I really believe that each performance of his is fantastic.  I love his soft voice and eccentric acting.  He has been accused of being a terribly over the top actor, which is unfounded in my opinion.  Every role where he has unashamedly hammed it up have been larger than life characters.  Characters that call for something more.  Long John Silver, Blackbeard, Inspector Fix (Around the World in 80 Days), Ancient Pistol in Henry V, even Lukey, all ridiculous yes, even cartoon like in their characterizations. But tell me honestly, could you watch Around the World in 80 Days, with Shirley MacLaine playing an Indian princess, Cantinflas bull fighting in Spain, and "Rule Britannia" piping on while David Niven drinks tea on the deck of a ship in a storm, and not expect the antagonist with fantastic mustachios not to be played over the top? Or Edward Teach with his many braided black beard, tied up with little red ribbons? And if Shakespeare ever meant anyone to play Pistol as the straight man, he wrote it wrong.

If Ancient Pistol wasn't meant to be ridiculous, I don't know who was. 

For every wide eyed incarnation, there are twice as many subtle ones.  The gentle father in David Lean's This Happy Breed, guilt ridden Bill in Major Barbara,  the reforming headmaster in Tom Brown's Schooldays.  And perhaps more impressively when he, playing the villain, drummed up more sympathy than any of the protagonists could.  I gained more understanding of Javert from his performance in the otherwise dubious film version of Les Miserables.  In Obsession, a fantastic film noir from Britain, I desperately wanted his beleaguered husband to get away with the perfect murder.  Waterfront Women was a hard film to like at all, the main character drastically played to ridiculousness by Avis Scott. A young Richard Burton playing her fiancé and Robert Newton playing her lowlife father were not going to be enough to redeem this movie.  And yet, in the last ten minutes of the film, Newton pulled tears from me.  He even made me feel sorry for Bill Sikes.  Which is pretty much insane.

Bill having a crisis of faith in Major Barbara

For the first time ever, my obsession has not been sated.  I found myself renting the last five movies of his this Tuesday and was strangely depressed by it.  I have always discovered the next object of my obsession before finishing the catalogue of the previous.  But I'm not ready to move on.  So I guess I'll have to cultivate my obsession with Newton the way I've cultivated my love of Oliver Reed. Build up my collection of his films, keep an eye out for any previously unreleased features, hope that Criterion restores the great ones that desperately need it, and have an annual Newton re-watch-a-thon of the best ones.  No doubt before or after my annual Reed re-watch-a-thon.

Yeah, you know you have it figured out.  My favorite reaction shot of Newton's, fittingly from Obsession. 

Message from Osamu

Years ago, or more accurately a year ago, I was encouraged by a friend to write a book review of Lolita.  It was an attempt to encourage me to write more entries for my blog.  The time for reviewing Lolita has come and gone, but books are still being read so here I go with my first attempt.  I have recently fallen into reading Osamu Tezuka, my road to which has been long and winding so I won't go into it here.  I had been reading almost anything of his I could get my hands on and when the only thing I could get my hands on was Message to Adolf, I gave in to my obsessive nature and checked it out from the library.

The "tagline" for Message to Adolf is that it is the story of three Adolfs.  I would argue that it is actually the story of two Adolfs and a Toge; Adolf Kamil, Adolf Kaufmann, and Sohei Toge.  The third Adolf would, of course, be Adolf Hitler.  Considering the story begins and ends with Toge, we'll put aside this three Adolfs idea and just admit that Toge is the main character.   He is a former athlete turned reporter, passionate, charming, genial, and must be quite a catch as all the women in the book seem to go mad for him. He is in Germany to follow the Olympics when he finds his brother murdered and that's where our story begins.  The two Adolfs are introduced as children later on.  Kamil is a Jewish-German lad living in Japan while Kaufmann is the child of a German consulate and a Japanese mother.  Kamil protects Kaufmann from school bullies and the two become best friends.  So much for the Wikipedia-esque introduction of the characters!

[Be forewarned, spoilers sighted ahead! But knowing how a story ends, shouldn't keep you from reading a good book. Also keep in mind to read the inserted images from right to left.]

With Toge comes my biggest issue with the book (or books, as you will). He is set up to be the guy I, the reader, am supposed to root for.  I say "supposed to" because of what occurs in the first two chapters. Determined to find who killed his brother, Toge teams up with his brother's former sweetheart, Rosa, the daughter of a prominent member of the gestapo.  In due time, he discovers that Rosa, knowing that Isao Toge was a communist and fearing for his life, told the authorities that he was a red naively believing that they would deport him.  Upon hearing this, Toge locks Rosa in her hotel room, beats her, threatens to kill her, rapes her, makes a snide comment about her still being a virgin, and then leaves her.  After all this, she throws herself from the hotel balcony successfully committing suicide.  Her death appears not to have effected him one iota.  He mentions her in passing once, telling another female character that he knew a girl in Germany, but she's dead.  Even when confronted by her father, who claims Toge murdered his daughter, he ignores the accusation entirely, as if it wasn't even worth refuting.  Needless to say, I could give zero shits about this character after those first two chapters. It may have been possible if, like the other characters, Toge was presented as a deeply flawed individual with warring sides of his personality.  But when I compare the rape scene of Rosa to the rape scene of Elisa later in the story, I can't help but think that Tezuka did not see what happened to Rosa as a violation.  While the rape of Elisa is portrayed by images of her naked body being chewed up by a thousand toothed serpent, Rosa's passes by with no violent imagery whatsoever. And I have a hard time believing that a woman who has just been placed in a choke hold and subsequently beaten would be happy to give herself to this man. I don't know why Toge's character is so poorly developed.  I could guess that there was something of a national pride that wouldn't allow Tezuka to write a Japanese protagonist who was something much more than just weak at times, but I feel like that would be simplifying a great author.  Whatever the reason, Toge remains the weakest point of an otherwise great collection of character stories.  

Kamil, much like Toge, is supposed to be "good".  He is so good, in fact, that nothing much happens in his story throughout the first volume.  Quite a bit does happen to him, mostly surrounding some documents about Hitler's lineage, but nothing out of the normal good-Jewish-boy-living-through-WWII troupe. He helps his parents, his father goes to Germany and disappears, he helps his mother, he meets a Jewish girl, he falls in love with her, his mother dies in an air raid, he marries the girl, etc. Living in an Axis Powers nation was apparently much easier for Jews during the war than I would have thought.  Towards the end of his story however, we glimpse another side of Kamil when he tells his mother that he can't marry his fiancee after she has been raped by another man, or as he damns Americans to burn in hell for bombing Japan following the death of his mother. Long after the war, Kamil has joined the Israelites in their never ending battle against the Palestinians. We are told that he leads troops in the massacre of Arabs, killing women and children, perpetuating the violence done to his people. With Kamil, we get a glimpse of the power that Adolf holds.  Kamil is a deeply flawed individual as I believe, or perhaps more accurately hope, that Tezuka intended for him to be. If only he had been as careful in Toge's character development.

Kaufmann is where the true, tragic brilliance of Adolf lies. His story is that of a drowning man and it is oh, so hard to watch.  At the beginning, he is filled with that innocence and courage that only children possess.  He is determined that the friendship he shares with Kamil will be steadfast. He refuses to sing the Hitler Youth anthem at school, he rails against his father's wishes that he be sent to Germany to join the Youth, he runs away from home when it looks like even his mother will be unable to save him from the inevitable.  This is what makes his story so difficult, to watch him slide down into the abyss of Nazism after fighting so desperately against it.  We watch as he becomes indoctrinated with propaganda, we witness the first time he kills and many of the times after. Every now and again, Tezuka offers Kaufmann a chance at redemption only to snatch it away and cause him to spiral even further down the path of moral degradation, culminating in him raping the Jewess that he had claimed to love, the fiancée of Kamil. Even at his basest, we see Kaufmann floundering to understand his conflicted existence. Tezuka never makes excuses for Kaufmann's actions and if there is a character to labeled an antagonist in this work, it would be he. At times, I'm not entirely sure that the author intended this character to be as sympathetic as he is, if at all.  But if he did intend it, as I assume he did, he has more brilliantly shown me the tragedy of the "other" side then any author I have read has ever been able to do.  And as I read and hoped, more then I had ever hoped through all the myriad of WWII films and books, that Kaufmann would turn back to the courageous child he was at the beginning, I found myself for the first and perhaps only time in my life, desiring redemption for a Nazi.  And that, above all else, should cement Tezuka among the great authors of the 20th century. 

Redemption never comes for Kaufmann. And it's heartbreaking.

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about this book.  And maybe that's the point.  All I know is that there is nothing black and white about this story.  That is the frustratingly wonderful thing about it.  It is entirely too much like the world.  There are no good wars and even good people get caught up in terrible things.  Perhaps there is no such thing as a good person and the idea of a protagonist is inherently flawed.  We are all the bad guy, it just depends on who is telling the story.  

Summer Lovin'

There are many things about summer that I love.  But one of the best is summer reading.  Now that I'm an adult and work all seasons of the year, summers shouldn't really matter anymore.  Alas, old habits die hard, and the magic of summer lingers on.  And the sense that I can actually read for fun and not school remains.  So this summer, my reading takes me back to my favorite genre of all genres, Southern Gothic.  There's nothing quite like reading about a hot summer's day in the south, on a hot summer's day in the PNW (yes it does actually get hot up here).  There is also nothing like finding a copy of a book from the 70's, all marked from the previous readers, and finding the same meaning and insight from the same passages that they marked years, perhaps decades ago.  The passage on love, the lover versus the beloved, was just such a passage for me, and whomever came before me. 

"What sort of thing, then, was this love?

First of all, love is a joint experience between two persons—but the fact that it is a joint experience does not mean that it is a similar experience to the two people involved. There are the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries. Often the beloved is only a stimulus for all the stored-up love which has lain quiet within the lover for a long time hitherto. And somehow every lover knows this. He feels in his soul that his love is a solitary thing. He comes to know a new, strange loneliness, and it is this knowledge which makes him suffer. So there is only one thing for the lover to do. He must house his love within himself as best he can; he must create for himself a whole new inward world—a world intense and strange, complete in himself. Let it be added here that this lover about whom we speak need not necessarily be a young man saving for a wedding ring—this lover can be a man, woman, child, or indeed any human creature on this earth.

Now, the beloved can also be of any description. The most outlandish people can be the stimulus for love. A man may be a doddering great-grandfather and still love only a strange girl he saw in the streets of Cheehaw one afternoon two decades past. The preacher may love a fallen woman. The beloved may be treacherous, greasy-headed, and given to evil habits. Yes, and the lover may see this as clearly as anyone else—but that does not affect the evolution of his love one whit. A most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lilies of the swamp. A good man may be the stimulus for a love both violent and debased, or a jabbering madman may bring about in the soul of someone a tender and simple idyll. Therefore, the value and quality of any love is determined solely by the lover himself.

It is for this reason that most of us would rather love than be loved. Almost everyone wants to be the lover. And the curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being be loved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain."   

Awfully Big Adventures (part 1)

I disappeared again.  But for a good reason!  Adventures have been had.  Not huge adventures, but enjoyable nonetheless.  What adventures, you ask?  Well, I'll tell you.  I have finally taken advantage of my sister's living in Illinois and went out to visit her in mid March.  We met in Chicago for the first four days of the trip and then headed down to Carbondale for the remainder.  Let me just get a couple things out of the way before I begin.  Yes, we went to Chicago in the wintertime.  Technically.  Even though there was snow on the ground, it was in the 40's while we were there.  Quite bearable, especially considering that there weren't too many tourists yet.  And no, we had no idea what we were going to do there.  Frankly, I didn't really know what there was to do in Chicago.  Maybe I don't know enough people who have been there, but I've never heard the Chicago equivalent of "Oh are you going to the Golden Gate Bridge/Alcatraz/Pier 39, etc. when you visit San Francisco?".  Except for deep dish pizza, no one really knew what I should experience in Chicago.  Thankfully, I've recently gotten to know a couple gentlemen who lived in Chicago for some time.  So armed with very little knowledge and too many recommendations, I headed out to the Second City.

Looks just like a large, snowy quilt.

A view of Chicago from Millennium Park, near the Pavilion 

 The first day I arrived in the late afternoon and met my sister at our hotel.  The cab ride in showed me the largest McDonald's I have ever seen!  I initially took the two giant, golden arches to be some sort of public art exhibit.  That's how big this McD's is.  Our hotel was on the Loop and thus, perfectly placed for metro travel.  We donned our winter coats and scarves and set out to check out the hood, namely Millennium Park.  I'm sure the park is much more stunning in the springtime, but it was good enough to get to see Frank Gehry's Jay Pritzker Pavilion and the Cloud Gate, aka the Bean.  We ogled architecture, oohed at the lake in the distance, awed at the massive, non-working fountain that we had to cross a plain of snow to get to, and stumbled upon the Art Institute, where we made the misguided decision to visit it on our last day in Chicago.  We finished up our evening eating at the Good Stuff Eatery, where I had a Sunnyside Up burger and Seanse had an Obama burger.

Worth it crossing the snow to get to

This is the city for art nouveau!

Andersonville 

The next day, we took the L out to Andersonville, the Swedish neighborhood in Chicago.  Or it used to be.  Much like Ballard here in Seattle, very little of the Swedish roots remain.  Antique stores apparently took the place over.  But what antiques!  Pictures of gorgeous mid-century furniture probably took up more space on my phone than pictures of Andersonville itself.  We were visiting on a Sunday and sadly were too late to the one Swedish restaurant, so we opted for an Irish pub.  If you can't get Grandma's food, might as well get Grandpa's.

Just one of the many awesome antique stores in Andersonville.  This one clearly wanted to be Canadian

A little home in Chicago!

The L making its rounds, behind it the gleaming Trump tower

Monday we took some of the recommendations of my native Chicagoan and went out to Wicker Park to visit a couple of bookstores.  This was probably a bad decision on my part.  One, because the last thing I need is to buy more books, and two, when you live a mere 3 hours away from Powell's City of Books, all other bookstores just pale in comparison.  Bookstores are, of course, always magical, but as I now know, not necessary on short trips.  We headed back to the Loop to take a better peek at the amazing buildings, the Trump Tower, the Chicago Tribune, and the Corn Cobs.  We tried to follow the river down to the lake, but that would just be too easy, now wouldn't it?  That evening we went out to Lincoln Park to get the best deep dish pizza in Chicago at Pequod's.  Miguel, my Chicagoan in Seattle, tried to relate what this experience would be like for me.  I didn't fully understand until I tried it myself.  The "caramelized" crust is what made it.  I could try and explain it here, but I know words would fail.

More amazing architecture, again, looming Trump tower

The Corn Cobs!

The Bean!  Or Cloud Gate.  Whatever.  

This is a city Target.  Yes, this is a Target.

A monkey and a puppy in Seurat's Sunday in the Park 

Our final day in Chicago we went to the Art Institute as planned, thinking a mere 3 hours would be enough time to see it all.  Fools!  After exploring the miniatures in the basements and the world art on the first floor, we felt like we were making good time.  The second floor however, is home to the largest collection of Impressionist paintings outside of France.  Needless to say, we didn't make it to the third floor.  Opting not to rush, we enjoyed looking through all the pre-Modern art and decided we would make another trip, starting next time from the top.  Picasso was just put on hold for a bit.

With our Chicago adventures at an end, Seanse and I headed to the train that would take us south, where more adventures awaited!  Stay tuned...

The Saga of a Sedentary Life

I know, I know.  I've been remiss in my blogging duties of late.  I blame...well, I was going to blame the holidays, but it's a little late for that.   I blame my general need to sleep so much.  I think it must be unnatural.  I think I also need to blame this bloody golden age of television.  When did shows just get so damn good?  Even the bad ones.  And with the beginning of a new year, new seasons dawn.  I'm in the midst of the new Downton Abbey season, Game of Thrones approaches in April, the second season of Broadchurch should be available soon, and sometime in the next year or five, the new Sherlock.  I'm in the midst of watching the second season of Peaky Blinders, and the second season of the Fall.  Then my brother decided I should start watching the Blacklist, one of those it's-not-that-good-but-it's-so-great kind of shows.

In the midst of all this, I've started renting movies again, from the oh so awesome Scarecrow Video.  If you are unfamiliar with this magical place, it's a film addict's dream with roughly 110,000 titles.  If it exists on any format, they most likely have it.  Last Monday, I went in for my weekly hour-long perusal of the shelves and decided to rent an anime I've been curious about, Naoki Urasawa's Monster.  Thinking it was only 15 episodes long, I figured I could knock it out in a week and have another series under my belt.  I started it and all other viewing ceased.  I would actually anxiously look forward to getting home from work, so I could watch a couple more episodes.  Imagine my delight when I found out that this show isn't merely 15 episodes, but 74!  What joy!  In true serial fashion, episode 15 left me with a cliffhanger.  I trekked happily back to Scarecrow today to check out the next set, but it wasn't there.  Surely someone checked it out.  I look at the database, nothing.  I recalled reading that it was streaming somewhere.  I check my roku at home.  I'll explain this if you don't have a roku.  It houses all the available streaming channels so you can watch them on your TV.  It has almost everything, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, PBS, Funimation, etc.  You can search on your main roku page, and it will look for the movie or show on all the channels and give you a list of options to watch it on.  So I searched.  None of the channels had it.  After some interweb digging, I find out that the company that released it, only released those first 15.  *imagine me, on my knees, screaming to the heavens "WHY?!"*

I have no legal means of watching the rest of this show.  And I felt the need to share my despair with the empty void of the internet-verse.  Now I will scour the globe for the rest of it, or resort to reading the books.  Only time and my patience will reveal which path I take.

Rant: over!  

Going Downton

Ah, another season of Downton Abbey!

Another season of Mary being a royal bitch to Edith.
Another season of Lord G being vaguely insufferable.
Another season of Thomas trying to be evil sans O'Brien.  
The drama, the looks, the quips from Dame Maggie.

I really don't know how I've lasted so long with this show.

Oh.  Right.

Page One

And with very little effort, the new year begins.

I saw a post on Instagram that said, "Page 1 of 365."  It's not a new concept, having chapters in your book of life, but for some reason the thought of each day being a page made me think.  I mean, 365 pages isn't just a chapter, that's an entire book.  Maybe not a massive, in depth book, but an Agatha Christie at least.  Maybe even a Jane Austen!  Each year of your life is a book.  That's a concept I can get behind.  It makes a year feel more important to the overall tome of your life.

So my hopes for the new book.  Last year's book was not the happiest, so let's make this book a bit happier.  Let's draw more, and read more, and internet less, and appreciate the fact that I have a job I don't hate.  Let's try to maintain the healthier weight a certain parasite helped us get to.  Let's go to Chicago.  Let's find affordable housing.  Let's pay off debts.  And let's not be too hard on ourselves when we fail at everything we hoped we'd do in 2015.

Happy New Book!

For auld lang syne!