Welcome to the first weekend of fall. I know a lot of people enjoy this time of year, but I hate it. Seasonal depression will do that to a person. Nevertheless, since my last post was at the start of summer, I thought it was a good time for an update.
Currently Reading:
Totally Folked by Penny Reid: A fun, fast read. I might actually be able to finish this book in a weekend!
Your Money or Life by Vicki Robin: Am I going to calculate every cent I've made in my entire life? No. No way.
Recent Memorable Reads:
The Cellist by Daniel Silva: Another excellent and super-relevant read from Silva.
The Drops of God, Vols. 1-44 by Tadashi Agi: Getting through this manga was my summer project. The last few volumes were MUCHO depressing and then they didn't even find the drops of god by the end!
Movies:
Such a dad movie. In fact, my dad actually watched it with me. An excellent, well-made film well worth the cost of a rental.
If you liked Ford v Ferrari, why not watch the legendary Steve McQ in action at Le Mans?! This is the type of movie where no one speaks for the first 20 minutes and the rest of the movie is basically just race cars going around and around. Plus the '70s hair is doing McQueen no favors. But it was cool to see the actual Le Mans in action.
Not a fan. There was absolutely no effort to make this movie cinematic. Just film it on a stage and be done with it.
Highly recommend this movie! Nicole Kidman is the headmistress of a girl's school in the south during the Civil War. When her students discover a Union soldier on the edge of death, she agrees to take him in and nurse him back to health. The soldier thinks he's a rooster who's landed in a hen house, but he's in for an unpleasant awakening in that regard.
Proposed alternate title: Life's a Beach and Then You Die
I think this movie scarred my parents for life. It's based on a twitter thread about a stripper who goes down to FL with another stripper she's just met to make a few bucks pole dancing. She quickly realizes her traveling companions are not the greatest.
The twitter thread is better.
This movie takes itself WAY too seriously. The costumes are gorge, though. Does anyone know where I can get a scarf with bells on it?
This is another movie that would have probably scarred my parents for life, if they had seen it. It's about a teenager - we're talking like 14, 15 - who's lured into joining a group of traveling magazine salespeople and then proceeds to get into one dicey situation after another. It sounds like it might be a downer, or preachy, but it's neither. I wouldn't call it uplifting, but it is well worth the watch.
An excellent film that reminded me of a young person's Nomadland.
Normally Cinderella stories are my jam, but this one's BAD. BAAAAD BAD BAAAAAAAAAAD. The worst Cinderella film I've ever seen by far.
Terrible title, surprisingly decent movie! In the 1960s, Jennifer Stirling finds a letter from a lover she can't remember, because amnesia. Who was he and what happened to him?! In modern tymes, Ellie Haworth is researching her magazine's first female editor and comes across the same letter, and has the same questions. The script and storytelling were excellent, with a lot of narrative tension. The ending was little on the lame side, but eh.
Another surprisingly decent movie. I spent most of it worrying about the dog.
These weeks in heidenkindom:
Lots of things are changing in the wake of COVID-19. People are moving, breaking up, quitting jobs. In my department at the university, we're staffed at 60% and two people are going on maternity leave in November. 😬 But on the plus side, we've finally filled my old position that's been vacant since June of 2020, so that takes some of the pressure off.
My brother also moved to another state. But before he left, we went on a mini-road trip together to Chaco Canyon, one of the least-visited National Parks in the US. That's because it's a pain to get to! It's the center of an ancient pueblo culture that existed throughout the Four Corners area, and it's a place I've wanted to visit for years. I was pretty excited!
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| Chaco Canyon from a distance. |
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| Hungo Pavi |
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| Pueblo Bonito, the largest of the "houses" |
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| Windows like this shine light in specific alcoves to mark the movement of the sun. |
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| The "road." |
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| Pueblo del Arroyo |
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| It's hard to see, but there's a rock outcropping on the mesa in the distance that casts a shadow in the points of a spiral below during solstices. |
So that was pretty cool! Chaco Canyon would be an awesome place to camp, if I was into that sort of thing. But I'm not.
Other than that, not much has been going on. The fam has been happy and healthy and we're hanging in there.
What's been going on in your neck of the woods?
