Sermon on Sunday
As Israel bombs Gaza, it’s informative to see how the media online is reporting this.
The Huffington Post has had pictures of the carnage. The New York Times has a left lead article “Israel says strikes against Hamas will continue ” The Christian Science Monitor is really outdated with a sentence saying Israel is planning attacks against Hamas. BBC shows a bleeding Palestinian child with an excellent article on the whys behind the bombings. CNN has a long shot of the smoke from an explosion with the headline of “U.N. urges halt......” (The U.S. has told the "Hamas thugs" to stop being bad. Remember, the U.S. hates Hamas and we don’t have a history of tolerating elected governments we don’t like.) The New York Daily News takes the neutral, but right-on headline of “Cycle of Violence” with a picture of the carnage.Al Jazeera has three pictures with articles on the current crisis and the “60 Years of Division.”
And so it goes. Children, the innocent, will die. My country will not be the honest broker here because of the government’s relationship with Israel. And the next government will be no better. Both Obama and Clinton gave their first speeches after the Democratic convention to AIPAC. A first speech to Habitat for Humanity would have been much more promising.
The world does have the United Nations. But we don’t like the United Nations unless it's our United Nations.
I was once asked that, as a pacifist, didn’t I think that World War II had to be fought. And I said that, as a pacifist, I condemn warfare and don’t pick and choose my wars.
It’s the same way with violence. You have to work very hard to keep the world peaceful but it’s worth the good struggle.
I fully understand Arnold’s:
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
But I would rather live by Millay’s:
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Friday, December 26, 2008
Knitting Friday
I’m ready to start my next knitting project, which is spooky since I have so many to finish still. Plus, there’s that sweater which sits almost completed as a vest at this point, but just sits because I have no desire to pick it up and complete the few rows needed. At which point, all that will be left are the sleeves. A bit of a problem since I don’t have US13 double pointed. (In fact, I can’t find large doubled-pointed anywhere. My largest being an ancient plastic set in US10.5.) So I will have to jerryrig (is that spelling right?) something to work.
Later today, I will probably pull out some new wool and work on a variation of a pattern I just finished. I think it’s this sense of new adventure and new learning which spurs a lot of people in crafts. That’s why it’s so satisfying. Perhaps, we, the two-legged animal, are wired for this adventure and change. Have you ever heard a lion say (outside of a Larson cartoon): How about vegetable sushi tonight, dear?
Some of us fulfill this need through travel; some with too, too many knitting projects.
But this has been a very productive week. The variegated yarn shawl is finished. It’s not a favorite shawl. I think I was right about the runs of color in variegated: they must be long to be attractive. This big-box store variegated while 100% wool has the “off-the-rack” look - not that there is anything wrong with that.
The pattern is:
http://mustaavillaa.blogspot.com/2005/12/helleborus.html
My version looks nothing like the original, which is a very pretty shawl, since I used 300 + yards DK weight and US15 to get a 23"x 54" shawl. The designer used US9 for a 12" wide scarf.
But I got what I wanted and also I wet blocked for the first time. This is total immersion of the finished project in water (and soap, if desired) and then blocking the wet, but not dripping, shawl to dimensions. It worked.
The designer said the project got boring. I didn’t find that. It was an easy lace which was obviously not easy enough for me. Even with markers and diligence, I noticed, at blocking, I had become a free spirit in the center of the shawl (of all places) where my pattern veered, for a few rows, in an opposite direction.
My second completed project was from a ball of yarn with a shady past. Shady in the sense I that I have vague recollections that it was unraveled from a 100% wool project. Yardage was a mystery so I knew that I had to make a triangle shawl and a bottom up one since I have not figured out how to top-down this pattern yet. Although, my trusty postal scale would have helped me along if I wanted to make a diagonal rectangle shawl, this was going to be a travel project and I was not going to travel with a postal scale in order to keep track of yardage left.
On US13, I worked the following pattern:
Row 1: K1 *P* K1
Row 2: K1 *K2tog* K1
Row 3: K1 *K1, M1* K1
with a Kfb in the first and last stitch, every other row.
I make this pattern a lot using only Row 2 & 3. However, the Row 1 purl row gave it a nice texture and I want to try one with a Row 1 as knit, not purl. Also, I know that the M1 (make 1 stitch) should be a horizontal bar pick-up between stitches but I used a yarn-over instead for a lacy effect and because I needed every bit of yarn I had for the length.
This is the pattern I want to begin again as the new project mentioned above. This time working the M1 as it should be.
So, I guess the advice I should be giving myself and all fellow knitters: Let’s get knitting.
I’m ready to start my next knitting project, which is spooky since I have so many to finish still. Plus, there’s that sweater which sits almost completed as a vest at this point, but just sits because I have no desire to pick it up and complete the few rows needed. At which point, all that will be left are the sleeves. A bit of a problem since I don’t have US13 double pointed. (In fact, I can’t find large doubled-pointed anywhere. My largest being an ancient plastic set in US10.5.) So I will have to jerryrig (is that spelling right?) something to work.
Later today, I will probably pull out some new wool and work on a variation of a pattern I just finished. I think it’s this sense of new adventure and new learning which spurs a lot of people in crafts. That’s why it’s so satisfying. Perhaps, we, the two-legged animal, are wired for this adventure and change. Have you ever heard a lion say (outside of a Larson cartoon): How about vegetable sushi tonight, dear?
Some of us fulfill this need through travel; some with too, too many knitting projects.
But this has been a very productive week. The variegated yarn shawl is finished. It’s not a favorite shawl. I think I was right about the runs of color in variegated: they must be long to be attractive. This big-box store variegated while 100% wool has the “off-the-rack” look - not that there is anything wrong with that.
The pattern is:
http://mustaavillaa.blogspot.com/2005/12/helleborus.html
My version looks nothing like the original, which is a very pretty shawl, since I used 300 + yards DK weight and US15 to get a 23"x 54" shawl. The designer used US9 for a 12" wide scarf.
But I got what I wanted and also I wet blocked for the first time. This is total immersion of the finished project in water (and soap, if desired) and then blocking the wet, but not dripping, shawl to dimensions. It worked.
The designer said the project got boring. I didn’t find that. It was an easy lace which was obviously not easy enough for me. Even with markers and diligence, I noticed, at blocking, I had become a free spirit in the center of the shawl (of all places) where my pattern veered, for a few rows, in an opposite direction.
My second completed project was from a ball of yarn with a shady past. Shady in the sense I that I have vague recollections that it was unraveled from a 100% wool project. Yardage was a mystery so I knew that I had to make a triangle shawl and a bottom up one since I have not figured out how to top-down this pattern yet. Although, my trusty postal scale would have helped me along if I wanted to make a diagonal rectangle shawl, this was going to be a travel project and I was not going to travel with a postal scale in order to keep track of yardage left.
On US13, I worked the following pattern:
Row 1: K1 *P* K1
Row 2: K1 *K2tog* K1
Row 3: K1 *K1, M1* K1
with a Kfb in the first and last stitch, every other row.
I make this pattern a lot using only Row 2 & 3. However, the Row 1 purl row gave it a nice texture and I want to try one with a Row 1 as knit, not purl. Also, I know that the M1 (make 1 stitch) should be a horizontal bar pick-up between stitches but I used a yarn-over instead for a lacy effect and because I needed every bit of yarn I had for the length.
This is the pattern I want to begin again as the new project mentioned above. This time working the M1 as it should be.
So, I guess the advice I should be giving myself and all fellow knitters: Let’s get knitting.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Website Wednesday
We live in troubling times. Well, I guess the world has always lived in troubling times only some times the times are less troubled and some times not everyone is troubled. (I'm beginning to sound like Bilbo's birthday speech.)
When times get troubled, rumors abound. They abound all the time really, just like troubles, but these times they get believed, and that can be dangerous.
People start to lose jobs and the rumor flies: Oh, that's because (fill in the blank) are buying up all the companies or: That's because they give all the good jobs to (fill in the blank.) Neighbor tells neighbor and ignorance flies through the air. And we all know that the rumor will beat the truth every time.
That why:
http://www.snopes.com/
is so important. Snopes tackles the rumors and the urban myths and gets to the bottom of them.
I knew Snopes when it was just a puppy. It's grown up to be a very nice looking and helpful dog.
Snopes lists categories and subcategories of rumors. Click on a category and you get a listing of rumors. Click on a hyperlink within a rumor and you get a separate page listing the claim (rumor), its status, an example, the origin of the rumor and the date of the page's last update. Now, that’s thorough.
Snopes tackles rumors from the important (“Barack Obama admitted to being a Muslim” - something that might have determined the U.S. election in other times) to the mundane (Archduke Ferdinand’s limo is jinxed).
Check the links across the top of their home page. Included are a free e-mail newsletter (to which I just subscribed) and a message board which, on a cursory glance, looks free of trolls.
Read Snopes for pleasure (I didn’t know that Subway used a fat Statue of Liberty - and she was fat - on their tray liner in Germany in 2004) and read it for truth, something we can never get enough of.
And to all, whether they are celebrating holidays this month or not: Much Joy.
We live in troubling times. Well, I guess the world has always lived in troubling times only some times the times are less troubled and some times not everyone is troubled. (I'm beginning to sound like Bilbo's birthday speech.)
When times get troubled, rumors abound. They abound all the time really, just like troubles, but these times they get believed, and that can be dangerous.
People start to lose jobs and the rumor flies: Oh, that's because (fill in the blank) are buying up all the companies or: That's because they give all the good jobs to (fill in the blank.) Neighbor tells neighbor and ignorance flies through the air. And we all know that the rumor will beat the truth every time.
That why:
http://www.snopes.com/
is so important. Snopes tackles the rumors and the urban myths and gets to the bottom of them.
I knew Snopes when it was just a puppy. It's grown up to be a very nice looking and helpful dog.
Snopes lists categories and subcategories of rumors. Click on a category and you get a listing of rumors. Click on a hyperlink within a rumor and you get a separate page listing the claim (rumor), its status, an example, the origin of the rumor and the date of the page's last update. Now, that’s thorough.
Snopes tackles rumors from the important (“Barack Obama admitted to being a Muslim” - something that might have determined the U.S. election in other times) to the mundane (Archduke Ferdinand’s limo is jinxed).
Check the links across the top of their home page. Included are a free e-mail newsletter (to which I just subscribed) and a message board which, on a cursory glance, looks free of trolls.
Read Snopes for pleasure (I didn’t know that Subway used a fat Statue of Liberty - and she was fat - on their tray liner in Germany in 2004) and read it for truth, something we can never get enough of.
And to all, whether they are celebrating holidays this month or not: Much Joy.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Movie Monday
I’m having the whole place painted. I call it the “whole place” because it’s a loft design of about 1400 square feet so the whole place is open and therefore a “whole place.”
Everything has to come off the walls and all the furniture has to be moved at least 2 feet from the walls. That can be back breaking but we’ve made a good start.
As things get moved and stored, I’m looking at the place with different eyes. When you have a loft design, you can leave it wide open or use “barriers” to create separate areas. I chose the later. A lot of screens and very big flower arrangements. Ok, I know, flowers are the anathema of designers. But they do provide a more natural visual barrier from a window to a bed than a screen.
But with the area looking so bare and open, I’m beginning to wonder if my decorating style, which has worked extremely well in this area for so long, should be changed.
I’m being to have doubts.
Movie Review from Trailer: Doubt
Ok, I know, that was a cheap lead-in. But, in a “What I Expect Before I View The Trailer” thought, I’m thinking that my doubts about room design after many years may be mirrored, in a morally epic sense, by this movie. Let’s see.
The first image is Meryl Streep in old-fashioned nun’s (RC) garb. Her first words to a group of nun’s eating: I want you all to be alert.
I have a feeling she is also warning the audience. We, too, are to be alert.
Next shot: a child being banged on the head. Corporeal punishment existed (does exist?) in Catholic schools but unfortunately, Serevus Snape’s dramatic slap of Ron Weasley’s head has probably doomed that gesture to comedy forever.
We observe fast that Streep’s nun is not to be triffled with, even by other nuns. The priest played by Philip Seymour Hoffman observes: The dragon is hungry. Soon we learn he believes the church has to change. I expect a major clash of wills between him and Streep.
And immediately, things get serious. A young nun is telling Streep that Father Flynn called a student, Donald Muller, to the rectory. From Streep: So, it’s happened.
(Aside: This movie probably set in the late 1950's. Today, of course, we know about the sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic church. Was it recognized back then? Would this be thought of immediately back then if a priest called a male student into the rectory? Or is this only a plot device? Hitchcock’s McGuffin? Used to move things along while the real drama is the clash of wills? Don’t know yet.)
Shot of a lone bell ringer, then Flynn enjoying a meal with others and Streep’s voice over: We are going to have to stop him ourselves. Wow! This nun is pissed. Title appears on the screen: There Is No Evidence.
Next scene: Streep is questioning Hoffman as to what happened in the rectory. When Hoffman says nothing happened, Streep keeps pressing. (Another aside: I know nuns smoked in private [the horror!] butwere they that confrontational with priests back then?)
Title on screen: There Are No Witnesses. And the next shoot is Father Flynn screaming: You haven’t the slightest proof. Things have really taken a turn for the worst, or for the overly dramatic.
The mother of the boy is seen talking to Streep. The young nun is telling Hoffman: You are letting then convict you of something terrible.
We see more evidence of Streep’s extreme dislike of Hoffman. Only the young nun seems able to speak to her reasonably. (Aside: From the first shot, where Streep is running the nun’s dining table with an iron fist in an iron glove, it seems unusual she would listen to a young nun’s concerns. But, does she need the young girl for her plan? That we don’t know.)
By the end of the trailer you know this is going to be a battle to the death.
Streep to boy’s mother: I’ll throw your son out of this school.
Young nun: I don’t think Father Flynn did anything wrong.
Streep: I will do what needs to be done.
What I Expect From The Movie Based On The Trailer:
Knowing modern movies and the U.S. which is adverse to intellectual controversy, I am not expecting the following, but would like to see it: a look at power, change, purity of motives, ego and clashes of wills. I would like real doubt. I don’t want this movie tied up in a box with a neat ribbon at the end. I want to leave the movie thinking. I want the doubt to lead to a good discussion.
As I’m typing this, Absence of Malice is on the TV. I remember that movie brought about a discussion of journalistic ethics when it first came out. I would like this movie to engender similar discussions. I want to leave this movie with doubt.
And, I would pay to see this movie
I’m having the whole place painted. I call it the “whole place” because it’s a loft design of about 1400 square feet so the whole place is open and therefore a “whole place.”
Everything has to come off the walls and all the furniture has to be moved at least 2 feet from the walls. That can be back breaking but we’ve made a good start.
As things get moved and stored, I’m looking at the place with different eyes. When you have a loft design, you can leave it wide open or use “barriers” to create separate areas. I chose the later. A lot of screens and very big flower arrangements. Ok, I know, flowers are the anathema of designers. But they do provide a more natural visual barrier from a window to a bed than a screen.
But with the area looking so bare and open, I’m beginning to wonder if my decorating style, which has worked extremely well in this area for so long, should be changed.
I’m being to have doubts.
Movie Review from Trailer: Doubt
Ok, I know, that was a cheap lead-in. But, in a “What I Expect Before I View The Trailer” thought, I’m thinking that my doubts about room design after many years may be mirrored, in a morally epic sense, by this movie. Let’s see.
The first image is Meryl Streep in old-fashioned nun’s (RC) garb. Her first words to a group of nun’s eating: I want you all to be alert.
I have a feeling she is also warning the audience. We, too, are to be alert.
Next shot: a child being banged on the head. Corporeal punishment existed (does exist?) in Catholic schools but unfortunately, Serevus Snape’s dramatic slap of Ron Weasley’s head has probably doomed that gesture to comedy forever.
We observe fast that Streep’s nun is not to be triffled with, even by other nuns. The priest played by Philip Seymour Hoffman observes: The dragon is hungry. Soon we learn he believes the church has to change. I expect a major clash of wills between him and Streep.
And immediately, things get serious. A young nun is telling Streep that Father Flynn called a student, Donald Muller, to the rectory. From Streep: So, it’s happened.
(Aside: This movie probably set in the late 1950's. Today, of course, we know about the sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic church. Was it recognized back then? Would this be thought of immediately back then if a priest called a male student into the rectory? Or is this only a plot device? Hitchcock’s McGuffin? Used to move things along while the real drama is the clash of wills? Don’t know yet.)
Shot of a lone bell ringer, then Flynn enjoying a meal with others and Streep’s voice over: We are going to have to stop him ourselves. Wow! This nun is pissed. Title appears on the screen: There Is No Evidence.
Next scene: Streep is questioning Hoffman as to what happened in the rectory. When Hoffman says nothing happened, Streep keeps pressing. (Another aside: I know nuns smoked in private [the horror!] butwere they that confrontational with priests back then?)
Title on screen: There Are No Witnesses. And the next shoot is Father Flynn screaming: You haven’t the slightest proof. Things have really taken a turn for the worst, or for the overly dramatic.
The mother of the boy is seen talking to Streep. The young nun is telling Hoffman: You are letting then convict you of something terrible.
We see more evidence of Streep’s extreme dislike of Hoffman. Only the young nun seems able to speak to her reasonably. (Aside: From the first shot, where Streep is running the nun’s dining table with an iron fist in an iron glove, it seems unusual she would listen to a young nun’s concerns. But, does she need the young girl for her plan? That we don’t know.)
By the end of the trailer you know this is going to be a battle to the death.
Streep to boy’s mother: I’ll throw your son out of this school.
Young nun: I don’t think Father Flynn did anything wrong.
Streep: I will do what needs to be done.
What I Expect From The Movie Based On The Trailer:
Knowing modern movies and the U.S. which is adverse to intellectual controversy, I am not expecting the following, but would like to see it: a look at power, change, purity of motives, ego and clashes of wills. I would like real doubt. I don’t want this movie tied up in a box with a neat ribbon at the end. I want to leave the movie thinking. I want the doubt to lead to a good discussion.
As I’m typing this, Absence of Malice is on the TV. I remember that movie brought about a discussion of journalistic ethics when it first came out. I would like this movie to engender similar discussions. I want to leave this movie with doubt.
And, I would pay to see this movie
Friday, December 19, 2008
Knitting Friday
I wait for predicted snow activity which will hit NJ at various levels soon. The web weather says it’s coming tomorrow now. Of course, I could walk 4 feet to the window and do some real checking but it’s Knitting Friday and I’m pretty bummed out about my lack of knitting this week. Not my lack of trying to knit this week. In fact, I did knit, and knit and knit. Then just hours ago, I ripped out two shawls and there went my knitting for the week.
I think I hit some sort of record when I pulled out the variegated yarn shawl for the 10th time; this time after the thing was bound off. Every other time it was a few rows, then a-quarter up, then a-half up.
Humans are such optimists. Each time, I told myself: This is the pattern. What a fool!
But I did learn some things. First, variegated yarn on very large needles does not solve anything. That was my most recent frogging. The finished project looked like an open weave mesh-like shawl on my lap but once it hung from my shoulders it looked like a jumble of short pieces of yarn just hanging with no obvious pattern. Like the kid who spreads his food around on his plate to pretend he’s eaten; some things you just can’t get away with.
Second, I learned that variegated yarns should have long runs of color to make the pattern attractive. You can get away with short runs on dark variegates but on lighter variegates the yarns just looks choppy. Maybe that’s why I’m so attracted to variegates when they are scrunched in a skein but so disappointed in the final project. (My only really successful variegated project - and I’m talking about using big box store variegated, not hand-spun - was a very darkly patterned one.) Note to me: Spend the money on variegated or stick with solids.
However, like Ulysses seeking new worlds: To strive, to seek, to find....., I’m itching to return to my quest for my perfect variegated pattern. It has to be a shawl. It has to be reversible. Preferably, from few stitches to many. Very little garter......It was easier buying a car.
So, for Knitting Friday, I’ll leave you with a shawl search site for you to enjoy:
http://www.stickamera.se/gratismonster.php?gratismonster=gm_sjalar
The language on the top of the page is foreign for me but scroll down for the mother lode of shawl patterns in English. Then click on any of the words on top and you’ll be taken to a new category. For example: Filtar = blankets and Vantar/handskar = gloves.
You can get lost for days here.
Next week: I will have a pattern for my variegated yarn. I know I will. But, if you find one first, please let me know.
I wait for predicted snow activity which will hit NJ at various levels soon. The web weather says it’s coming tomorrow now. Of course, I could walk 4 feet to the window and do some real checking but it’s Knitting Friday and I’m pretty bummed out about my lack of knitting this week. Not my lack of trying to knit this week. In fact, I did knit, and knit and knit. Then just hours ago, I ripped out two shawls and there went my knitting for the week.
I think I hit some sort of record when I pulled out the variegated yarn shawl for the 10th time; this time after the thing was bound off. Every other time it was a few rows, then a-quarter up, then a-half up.
Humans are such optimists. Each time, I told myself: This is the pattern. What a fool!
But I did learn some things. First, variegated yarn on very large needles does not solve anything. That was my most recent frogging. The finished project looked like an open weave mesh-like shawl on my lap but once it hung from my shoulders it looked like a jumble of short pieces of yarn just hanging with no obvious pattern. Like the kid who spreads his food around on his plate to pretend he’s eaten; some things you just can’t get away with.
Second, I learned that variegated yarns should have long runs of color to make the pattern attractive. You can get away with short runs on dark variegates but on lighter variegates the yarns just looks choppy. Maybe that’s why I’m so attracted to variegates when they are scrunched in a skein but so disappointed in the final project. (My only really successful variegated project - and I’m talking about using big box store variegated, not hand-spun - was a very darkly patterned one.) Note to me: Spend the money on variegated or stick with solids.
However, like Ulysses seeking new worlds: To strive, to seek, to find....., I’m itching to return to my quest for my perfect variegated pattern. It has to be a shawl. It has to be reversible. Preferably, from few stitches to many. Very little garter......It was easier buying a car.
So, for Knitting Friday, I’ll leave you with a shawl search site for you to enjoy:
http://www.stickamera.se/gratismonster.php?gratismonster=gm_sjalar
The language on the top of the page is foreign for me but scroll down for the mother lode of shawl patterns in English. Then click on any of the words on top and you’ll be taken to a new category. For example: Filtar = blankets and Vantar/handskar = gloves.
You can get lost for days here.
Next week: I will have a pattern for my variegated yarn. I know I will. But, if you find one first, please let me know.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Website Wednesday
The seasons have a lot of holidays even without holy days. Ancients celebrated the first buds of spring and the harvest which follows.
Probably, some ancestor scratched his head while living in cold climes and, during winter, thought: Another dreary day. We need a festivus.
Whatever the reasoning and spurred on by the rise of capitalism, holidays were born, presents were bought and nerves got frazzled.
So, in this season of frenetic buying in the U.S. (possibly the last before our frenetic depression), I offer a quiet relief in fun and games:
http://www.freeworldgroup.com/
For serious gamers, there are much better sites out there with thousands of gamers who comment and help with the more difficult puzzle, adventure and escape games. However, sometimes I find many of these games exercises in frustration where I, and many others, flounder until someone throws us a lifeline in the form of cheats.
Free World Group offers all types of games. Types of games include: puzzles, strategy, sport, multiplayer, card, adventure, arcade, brain teaser, board.
Each game lists its objectives and controls so you can skip that time-consuming "Instructions" link within the game. Well, you can skip it at your peril, of course.
Under Brain Teaser, I played Entangled where you have to rotate tiles so the random lines on them form closed shapes. No time limit and brain worthy - heaven!
Games are mouse or key controlled, or both. Adventures seems to be key controlled, (who can forget the wickedly difficult Pharaoh's Tomb?) and Word and Puzzle, among others, mouse controlled.
Some of the games only have a certain number of levels before you have to buy to continue. Some of the games look lame pretty fast. But there are enough games for some fast clicking around. You'll find something you like.
An interesting bonus is Travel Stories. These are short stories written about different parts of the world. For example, Ebonyi Tales is written by a man who left banking to teach in Nigeria. That's something you don't find on game sites.
As with almost all Internet site, children should be monitored here.
So give it a try. It will give you some relaxation in this hectic season.
And now, excuse me, it's my turn in Puzzle Freaks II. I can't be sure but I think that my computer opponent is getting all the easy puzzles to solve.
The seasons have a lot of holidays even without holy days. Ancients celebrated the first buds of spring and the harvest which follows.
Probably, some ancestor scratched his head while living in cold climes and, during winter, thought: Another dreary day. We need a festivus.
Whatever the reasoning and spurred on by the rise of capitalism, holidays were born, presents were bought and nerves got frazzled.
So, in this season of frenetic buying in the U.S. (possibly the last before our frenetic depression), I offer a quiet relief in fun and games:
http://www.freeworldgroup.com/
For serious gamers, there are much better sites out there with thousands of gamers who comment and help with the more difficult puzzle, adventure and escape games. However, sometimes I find many of these games exercises in frustration where I, and many others, flounder until someone throws us a lifeline in the form of cheats.
Free World Group offers all types of games. Types of games include: puzzles, strategy, sport, multiplayer, card, adventure, arcade, brain teaser, board.
Each game lists its objectives and controls so you can skip that time-consuming "Instructions" link within the game. Well, you can skip it at your peril, of course.
Under Brain Teaser, I played Entangled where you have to rotate tiles so the random lines on them form closed shapes. No time limit and brain worthy - heaven!
Games are mouse or key controlled, or both. Adventures seems to be key controlled, (who can forget the wickedly difficult Pharaoh's Tomb?) and Word and Puzzle, among others, mouse controlled.
Some of the games only have a certain number of levels before you have to buy to continue. Some of the games look lame pretty fast. But there are enough games for some fast clicking around. You'll find something you like.
An interesting bonus is Travel Stories. These are short stories written about different parts of the world. For example, Ebonyi Tales is written by a man who left banking to teach in Nigeria. That's something you don't find on game sites.
As with almost all Internet site, children should be monitored here.
So give it a try. It will give you some relaxation in this hectic season.
And now, excuse me, it's my turn in Puzzle Freaks II. I can't be sure but I think that my computer opponent is getting all the easy puzzles to solve.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Movie Monday
I saw the original 1951 The Day The Earth Stood Still this weekend. The black and white one where Patricia Neal discovers that Hugh Marlowe really is a schmuck and not marriage material.
Ok, I know there was more to it than that, but you almost always learn that the boyfriend is no-good in a certain type of science fiction movie.
This one is considered a classic. But if you tell your dog he’s beautiful often enough, even he’ll believe it.
Patricia Neal was pretty hammy in the scene where she goes to deliver Klaatu’s message to Gort. Running from Gort, falling over those folding chairs, breathlessly looking up at him in terror was more reminiscent of an impending rape scene than a “message to Garcia” one.
And talking about that message. She repeats it once in the taxi and then remembers it perfectly. That’s a gift, unless your first language is “outer space.” Note to me: when you join the army to fight the space invaders, don’t apply to the messenger corp.
But since I saw the original, I had to review the re-make which has joined that pantheon of movie wonders by getting roasted by the critics yet taking the weekend box-office.
Movie Trailer Movie Review: The Day The Earth Stood Still
This stuff, whatever it is, is going to be world-wide. We are told that there are spheres all over the world. That's never good.
You get an early shot of the Egyptian pyramids in the trailer and that’s always used to tell you this stuff is big. After all, those pyramids are one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Now, I don’t know their place in an Entertainment Weekly’s Survey so if they don’t come in as #1 maybe we have some wiggle room.
Apparently not. Keanu Reeves is saying (and he’s not human though he looks like one): If the human race dies, the earth survives. That is not good news for my species. Well, a matter of fact, not for any species. But we’re the only ones who can write this crap so we really matter.
And eureka comes for Kathy Bates when she asks him in the most monotone line delivery for an Oscar winning actress: Why have you come to our planet? Answer: Your planet?
Oh cripes, we’ve been renting all this time.
Then Armageddon begins. We get those typical macho, throw-away lines from the military: Hey, guys, let wipe this thing up, as they’re getting their collective asses kicked.
Planes fly. Explosion abound. CGIs reign.
The end doesn’t look good. Woman: You can stop it. Reeves: I don’t know.
There are times when you need more than an existential hero. But then the screen flashes: Nothing can prepare you. So, perhaps existential is the operative word here.
In the midst of the carnage, Reeves, in human form, reaches to the skies as Gort, in robot form reaches down to him. Well, at least, some life form may be saved.
And then it looks like a football stadium blows up and I know this is my movie. I bet the subliminal message is: Stop with the sports. Maybe that’s what aliens have been trying to tell us all along.
Everything turns whirlwind gray and the title appears.
What I Expect From The Trailer:
Well, I sort of know what to expect from the original movie. This one probably follows that plot with a lot more explosions.
There was the creepiness in the original which only good black and white can give you. Not that the original didn’t have its slow and hokey moments. This one has them also but without the slow.
I am beginning to realize that I can rate movies on the musical crescendos in the trailers. This one is filled with them. They used to say you could always tell a bad western if the beginning titles were accompanied by a song. (Not music but a singer.)
Crescendo music races the “savage breast.” It’s the heralder announcing what you are seeing/about to see rises beyond the mundane into the sphere of worthwhile.
I guess I should expect a lot of worthwhile stuff in this movie.
I saw the original 1951 The Day The Earth Stood Still this weekend. The black and white one where Patricia Neal discovers that Hugh Marlowe really is a schmuck and not marriage material.
Ok, I know there was more to it than that, but you almost always learn that the boyfriend is no-good in a certain type of science fiction movie.
This one is considered a classic. But if you tell your dog he’s beautiful often enough, even he’ll believe it.
Patricia Neal was pretty hammy in the scene where she goes to deliver Klaatu’s message to Gort. Running from Gort, falling over those folding chairs, breathlessly looking up at him in terror was more reminiscent of an impending rape scene than a “message to Garcia” one.
And talking about that message. She repeats it once in the taxi and then remembers it perfectly. That’s a gift, unless your first language is “outer space.” Note to me: when you join the army to fight the space invaders, don’t apply to the messenger corp.
But since I saw the original, I had to review the re-make which has joined that pantheon of movie wonders by getting roasted by the critics yet taking the weekend box-office.
Movie Trailer Movie Review: The Day The Earth Stood Still
This stuff, whatever it is, is going to be world-wide. We are told that there are spheres all over the world. That's never good.
You get an early shot of the Egyptian pyramids in the trailer and that’s always used to tell you this stuff is big. After all, those pyramids are one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Now, I don’t know their place in an Entertainment Weekly’s Survey so if they don’t come in as #1 maybe we have some wiggle room.
Apparently not. Keanu Reeves is saying (and he’s not human though he looks like one): If the human race dies, the earth survives. That is not good news for my species. Well, a matter of fact, not for any species. But we’re the only ones who can write this crap so we really matter.
And eureka comes for Kathy Bates when she asks him in the most monotone line delivery for an Oscar winning actress: Why have you come to our planet? Answer: Your planet?
Oh cripes, we’ve been renting all this time.
Then Armageddon begins. We get those typical macho, throw-away lines from the military: Hey, guys, let wipe this thing up, as they’re getting their collective asses kicked.
Planes fly. Explosion abound. CGIs reign.
The end doesn’t look good. Woman: You can stop it. Reeves: I don’t know.
There are times when you need more than an existential hero. But then the screen flashes: Nothing can prepare you. So, perhaps existential is the operative word here.
In the midst of the carnage, Reeves, in human form, reaches to the skies as Gort, in robot form reaches down to him. Well, at least, some life form may be saved.
And then it looks like a football stadium blows up and I know this is my movie. I bet the subliminal message is: Stop with the sports. Maybe that’s what aliens have been trying to tell us all along.
Everything turns whirlwind gray and the title appears.
What I Expect From The Trailer:
Well, I sort of know what to expect from the original movie. This one probably follows that plot with a lot more explosions.
There was the creepiness in the original which only good black and white can give you. Not that the original didn’t have its slow and hokey moments. This one has them also but without the slow.
I am beginning to realize that I can rate movies on the musical crescendos in the trailers. This one is filled with them. They used to say you could always tell a bad western if the beginning titles were accompanied by a song. (Not music but a singer.)
Crescendo music races the “savage breast.” It’s the heralder announcing what you are seeing/about to see rises beyond the mundane into the sphere of worthwhile.
I guess I should expect a lot of worthwhile stuff in this movie.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Knitting Friday
What a depressing knitting week. But I did learn some things about myself.
First, I spent the week pulling out lace shawls.
Elann has a new one:
http://www.elann.com/ShowFreePattern.asp?Id=308024
It’s lace but it’s easy lace. That is, if you’re not knitting, reading a blog and watching a movie on the computer at the same time. (The movie was The Southerner with Zachary Scott and directed by Jean Renoir. I blame the move for my problems because it was one you had to watch, unlike my usual fare like the spooky Fog Island.)
In spite of these extra activities, which are no-nos for lace knitting, I was moving right along until Row 29 when I slipped a stitch. (The irony being that just after Row 29 the pattern begins repeating and finally becomes a simple four row lace pattern.)
Now, anyone who knits lace knows that if you don’t use lifelines you deserve all your troubles. Guess who didn’t use a lifeline? I was able to pick up the stitch immediately, but lace is yarn overs and I must have missed at least one, so by the end of the row, I was off count. I did try to find the problem but it was useless and the frog pond got another visitor.
Next, I started a shawl from Shawls On the Go!, Volume 2. It’s the one where you yarn over twice for each stitch and then do four K and P 2 together on every four stitches for an easy and attractive crossover stitch shawl.
I started so successfully. It was boring with wrapping the yarn twice around for each stitch but the “look” of the shawl came fast. Then, I put it down, went to work, and returned and started again with the wrong stitch. Somehow, I got to the end of the row and I had two extra stitches. I knew the pull-out was not going to be easy on this one. So, rip-it, rip-it.
Finally, I made up my own variation on the *yo, k2tog* shawl. I only had 300 yards of double knitting weight (I consider this weight one up from sports, if that helps) so I started at a point and increased each side every other row until the first ball of yarn was used. Then I decreased each side every other row for the second ball.
That’s when I looked at the project. I was connecting two Vs. What a great shape to wear. A point at your waist and a point at your neck. Move over, Marc Jacobs. Plus, 300 yards knitted this way, even on US 13 needles, was giving me a big, weirdly-shaped scarf and not enough width for shawl warmth. Another trip to the frog pond.
So, you ask, what did you learn this week in knitting? I think I learned that except for special projects or gifts, I like fast knitting. I’ve made the beautiful lace shawl, the complicated Aran style sweaters and afghans, the entrelac sweaters, etc. Give me the simple knitting. Life really is too short.
And now for a simple pattern which I learned this week is a good answer to: "What can I make when I have no idea how much yarn this is?" (I’ll discuss postal scales another time - I love mine.)
The "I Don’t Know My Yardage" Shawl
Find a triangular shawl pattern which gives you the stitch number (for example: pattern is 4 sts + 2 for selvage.) Preferably a yarn over pattern and not a twisted stitch one - unless your unknown yardage looks like a lot.
Start the pattern as instructed but when you get to your desired width (I like 20"), start working straight. Right now, you will have one end done as a V and the shawl will knitting up as a rectangle. Continue on to your desired length.
For the ending, if you have enough yarn left at your length, reverse your pattern to decrease to another V. Or, just bind off straight. Your ends will be different, but so what? If you have a bit of yarn left over, work crochet loops on the straight end or put a tassel (or a big button) on the V end.
I’m making one now in the simple *yo, K2tog* pattern on large needles. I don’t know yet whether the second end will be straight or a V.
I’ll let you know.
What a depressing knitting week. But I did learn some things about myself.
First, I spent the week pulling out lace shawls.
Elann has a new one:
http://www.elann.com/ShowFreePattern.asp?Id=308024
It’s lace but it’s easy lace. That is, if you’re not knitting, reading a blog and watching a movie on the computer at the same time. (The movie was The Southerner with Zachary Scott and directed by Jean Renoir. I blame the move for my problems because it was one you had to watch, unlike my usual fare like the spooky Fog Island.)
In spite of these extra activities, which are no-nos for lace knitting, I was moving right along until Row 29 when I slipped a stitch. (The irony being that just after Row 29 the pattern begins repeating and finally becomes a simple four row lace pattern.)
Now, anyone who knits lace knows that if you don’t use lifelines you deserve all your troubles. Guess who didn’t use a lifeline? I was able to pick up the stitch immediately, but lace is yarn overs and I must have missed at least one, so by the end of the row, I was off count. I did try to find the problem but it was useless and the frog pond got another visitor.
Next, I started a shawl from Shawls On the Go!, Volume 2. It’s the one where you yarn over twice for each stitch and then do four K and P 2 together on every four stitches for an easy and attractive crossover stitch shawl.
I started so successfully. It was boring with wrapping the yarn twice around for each stitch but the “look” of the shawl came fast. Then, I put it down, went to work, and returned and started again with the wrong stitch. Somehow, I got to the end of the row and I had two extra stitches. I knew the pull-out was not going to be easy on this one. So, rip-it, rip-it.
Finally, I made up my own variation on the *yo, k2tog* shawl. I only had 300 yards of double knitting weight (I consider this weight one up from sports, if that helps) so I started at a point and increased each side every other row until the first ball of yarn was used. Then I decreased each side every other row for the second ball.
That’s when I looked at the project. I was connecting two Vs. What a great shape to wear. A point at your waist and a point at your neck. Move over, Marc Jacobs. Plus, 300 yards knitted this way, even on US 13 needles, was giving me a big, weirdly-shaped scarf and not enough width for shawl warmth. Another trip to the frog pond.
So, you ask, what did you learn this week in knitting? I think I learned that except for special projects or gifts, I like fast knitting. I’ve made the beautiful lace shawl, the complicated Aran style sweaters and afghans, the entrelac sweaters, etc. Give me the simple knitting. Life really is too short.
And now for a simple pattern which I learned this week is a good answer to: "What can I make when I have no idea how much yarn this is?" (I’ll discuss postal scales another time - I love mine.)
The "I Don’t Know My Yardage" Shawl
Find a triangular shawl pattern which gives you the stitch number (for example: pattern is 4 sts + 2 for selvage.) Preferably a yarn over pattern and not a twisted stitch one - unless your unknown yardage looks like a lot.
Start the pattern as instructed but when you get to your desired width (I like 20"), start working straight. Right now, you will have one end done as a V and the shawl will knitting up as a rectangle. Continue on to your desired length.
For the ending, if you have enough yarn left at your length, reverse your pattern to decrease to another V. Or, just bind off straight. Your ends will be different, but so what? If you have a bit of yarn left over, work crochet loops on the straight end or put a tassel (or a big button) on the V end.
I’m making one now in the simple *yo, K2tog* pattern on large needles. I don’t know yet whether the second end will be straight or a V.
I’ll let you know.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Website Wednesday
For last Wednesday, I was going to list a website which promised to keep you writing.
It was only a fairly large writing pane. You were to write in it and not stop for any length of time - or else.
Well, I don’t send out websites without trying them, so I typed in a sentence and sat back. Within minutes, the screen surrounding the writing pane went from white, to yellow, to pink, to bright red.
And I waited. Finally, remembering Theoden’s famous line at the beginning of the Helms Deep battle: Is this all you have to offer, Saruman?, I went on to other things.
Every day, I check Internet Archives for any new public domain movies and I saw that they had Ivan the Terrible. So I put on the speakers and that’s when I went searching for the howling cats.
Now, I’m probably slow on the uptake and you’ve probably figured this out already, but I clicked off site after site and still the cats were chasing me. It was seconds after I shut down Firefox that it hit me: that sound was the “or else” promised on the writing site.
But today, my website is just sweetness and light; no howling cats.
http://oldpoetry.com
This site has thousands of poems and I’m a sucker for poems - especially now that I have become such an expert in metaphor.
The poems are old and new and surprising.
I didn’t know that Hemingway wrote poetry and he wrote it just like his novels. Terse. And, I didn’t know that Edgar Wallace, famous for his novels of mystery and suspense, wrote poetry dealing with the Boer War, one of which, War, is here.
You can search by poet, by poem, by geographical area. Each poet has a short biography and many have notes and comments. Comments range from simple remarks to esoteric analysis.
There are essays and forums. There are poems of the day.
Membership is needed to comment but as a guest you can navigate all the sections.
Even if poetry is not your favorite literary form, take a look at this site. If just for The Age Demanded by Hemingway, which begins:
The age demanded that we sing
And cut away our tongue.
and ends three brief stanzas later with:
And in the end the age was handed
The sort of shit that it demanded.
For last Wednesday, I was going to list a website which promised to keep you writing.
It was only a fairly large writing pane. You were to write in it and not stop for any length of time - or else.
Well, I don’t send out websites without trying them, so I typed in a sentence and sat back. Within minutes, the screen surrounding the writing pane went from white, to yellow, to pink, to bright red.
And I waited. Finally, remembering Theoden’s famous line at the beginning of the Helms Deep battle: Is this all you have to offer, Saruman?, I went on to other things.
Every day, I check Internet Archives for any new public domain movies and I saw that they had Ivan the Terrible. So I put on the speakers and that’s when I went searching for the howling cats.
Now, I’m probably slow on the uptake and you’ve probably figured this out already, but I clicked off site after site and still the cats were chasing me. It was seconds after I shut down Firefox that it hit me: that sound was the “or else” promised on the writing site.
But today, my website is just sweetness and light; no howling cats.
http://oldpoetry.com
This site has thousands of poems and I’m a sucker for poems - especially now that I have become such an expert in metaphor.
The poems are old and new and surprising.
I didn’t know that Hemingway wrote poetry and he wrote it just like his novels. Terse. And, I didn’t know that Edgar Wallace, famous for his novels of mystery and suspense, wrote poetry dealing with the Boer War, one of which, War, is here.
You can search by poet, by poem, by geographical area. Each poet has a short biography and many have notes and comments. Comments range from simple remarks to esoteric analysis.
There are essays and forums. There are poems of the day.
Membership is needed to comment but as a guest you can navigate all the sections.
Even if poetry is not your favorite literary form, take a look at this site. If just for The Age Demanded by Hemingway, which begins:
The age demanded that we sing
And cut away our tongue.
and ends three brief stanzas later with:
And in the end the age was handed
The sort of shit that it demanded.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Movie Monday
I was watching an Italian movie - just the beginning. The protagonist was an efficiency expert at a factory. You knew that quickly because he was kindly explaining to a worker that’s he was going too fast (not good for the machines.) Then he’s getting ready to leave, reaches his car, hears his name called, goes back to the boss’ office, talks to the boss about his upcoming leave (that’s why he was leaving so fast) and where he’s going and is given a valuable present from the boss to deliver to someone in his hometown.
That’s all I saw. It probably took me longer to write it than watch it. But why did I watch it? I know I would have been half paying attention if the dialogue was in English.
And, that may be the allure of the foreign film. Film is a visual medium. It had to be one completely before sound. But with sound, you no longer have to watch the screen. Your eyes and your brain can be distracted from the picture. You can multi-task.
Except in foreign language films. There you must concentrate on the screen. And, if the subtitles fly by quickly as so many of them do, you must concentrate firmly.
I got hooked on CSI while doing a complicated lace project just because I didn’t want to watch the screen all the time and CSI is probably some of the best “I must look away” TV out there.
So maybe foreign films are not as great as I think. It’s just that I have to invest a lot more brain energy in them. My concentration makes them great.
Which brings me to my foreign film review today: Australia.
I know, it’s in English and I know all the words to Waltzing Mathilda, but it is foreign.
I’m looking at this film because I saw a short clip from it on a cable channel devoted to promoting new films. I don’t think there is one film they feature which they don’t like so this is usually a channel I pass. However, cruising by, I saw a shot of Nicole Kidman inside a tent, clutching the flaps around her so only her head was out, looking at a waist-up naked Hugh Jackman pouring a bucket of water over him (an Australian bath?)
It was not the scene which stopped me, but the look on Kidman’s face. It was an exact duplicate of the hammy pout she used in Moulin Rouge. Now that musical, which I liked, was over the top. Romantic farce with some tear-jerking songs. Hamminess (though there was too much of it on her part) fit into Moulin Rouge. What was she doing repeating it in Australia? I know this movie has been called a modern Gone With The Wind, and I know that Vivien Leigh did have a few pouts.
Was Kidman a one-note actress or was she trying to duplicate Leigh? I had to find out.
Movie Trailer Review of Australia
Wow! I just saw it and I want to enlist! In what, I have no idea but I’m so hopped up. Kidman just told me: We can’t let them win. (Well, actually she told Hugh Jackman) And he said: We won’t. and Kidman told the cute aboriginal girl: Whatever I takes, I’ll find you. So I feel really good and ready to enlist and get my head blown off.
Oh well, back to earth. But that’s what propaganda does to you as so beautifully portrayed in All’s Quiet on the Western Front when the professor fuels up all his students to enlist in glory only to have them return in caskets.
The trailer starts with a shot worthy of Vogue: an extremely well dressed Nicole Kidman. What a hat! It belongs in a museum. Then we see a rugged Hugh Jackman on a ship. Get it? Civilization meets barbarian. Mark my words, sex is coming.
An early shot has him fighting; she protesting (probably the fighting), still precisely coiffured, with palm outstretched and mouthing “No.”
He greets her sweating, breathless, gritty: Welcome to Australia. What, we thought this was Versailles?
Then both are riding a truck in the desert with a dog. She in face netting (she, Nicole, not the dog) and Jackman saying: You’d be more comfortable if you changed into something less constricting.
Shades of Stewart Granger and Deborah Kerr in King Solomon’s Mine.
Then the tent scene. Not the hammy part this time, just she emerging from the tent, he naked from the waist up. Flash to screen: From the director of Romeo and Juliet....... Oh, thank you so much, I had been expecting a submarine movie.
Fast forward and we’re in the time warp of Grease where Olivia Newton John becomes a greaser at the end.
Kidman can ride. Jackman is impressed. Kidman looks gritty on the horse. And, she can belt down a few also.
Whoa! Now, they’re skinny dipping. That was fast.
Faster still is our introduction to waltzing in Australian high society; a cute aboriginal girl; and (I assume) good, old Australian prejudice. Kidman: Just because it is, doesn’t mean it should be. Are we going deep here?
We're told: Their love defied destiny. Good to know; I’ll stop looking for submarines.
And not a minute too soon because here come the planes. Kidman hears them sitting in a great looking bedroom. Bombs drop. We see reactions from Jackman and the cute, aboriginal girl.
We’re at war. Talk about a plot twist to keep this from being one long roll in the hay movie.
For the sake of truth in trailers, I should admit there looked like some sort of local Australian shooting trouble before this war starts involving Kidman, Jackman and others.
But war is like the eight card in Crazy Eights. It changes everything.
What Do I Expect From the Trailer:
I’m going to see this movie, though I’m not going to pay for it, except through my cable provider. It looks well-done, hokey, formulaic but there’s a place for that in life.
It can’t all be Aristotle’s Poetics. I bet there were times when Mrs. Aristotle would call out: Ari, enough with the thinking, get the chariot, we’re going to Bingo Night.
I was watching an Italian movie - just the beginning. The protagonist was an efficiency expert at a factory. You knew that quickly because he was kindly explaining to a worker that’s he was going too fast (not good for the machines.) Then he’s getting ready to leave, reaches his car, hears his name called, goes back to the boss’ office, talks to the boss about his upcoming leave (that’s why he was leaving so fast) and where he’s going and is given a valuable present from the boss to deliver to someone in his hometown.
That’s all I saw. It probably took me longer to write it than watch it. But why did I watch it? I know I would have been half paying attention if the dialogue was in English.
And, that may be the allure of the foreign film. Film is a visual medium. It had to be one completely before sound. But with sound, you no longer have to watch the screen. Your eyes and your brain can be distracted from the picture. You can multi-task.
Except in foreign language films. There you must concentrate on the screen. And, if the subtitles fly by quickly as so many of them do, you must concentrate firmly.
I got hooked on CSI while doing a complicated lace project just because I didn’t want to watch the screen all the time and CSI is probably some of the best “I must look away” TV out there.
So maybe foreign films are not as great as I think. It’s just that I have to invest a lot more brain energy in them. My concentration makes them great.
Which brings me to my foreign film review today: Australia.
I know, it’s in English and I know all the words to Waltzing Mathilda, but it is foreign.
I’m looking at this film because I saw a short clip from it on a cable channel devoted to promoting new films. I don’t think there is one film they feature which they don’t like so this is usually a channel I pass. However, cruising by, I saw a shot of Nicole Kidman inside a tent, clutching the flaps around her so only her head was out, looking at a waist-up naked Hugh Jackman pouring a bucket of water over him (an Australian bath?)
It was not the scene which stopped me, but the look on Kidman’s face. It was an exact duplicate of the hammy pout she used in Moulin Rouge. Now that musical, which I liked, was over the top. Romantic farce with some tear-jerking songs. Hamminess (though there was too much of it on her part) fit into Moulin Rouge. What was she doing repeating it in Australia? I know this movie has been called a modern Gone With The Wind, and I know that Vivien Leigh did have a few pouts.
Was Kidman a one-note actress or was she trying to duplicate Leigh? I had to find out.
Movie Trailer Review of Australia
Wow! I just saw it and I want to enlist! In what, I have no idea but I’m so hopped up. Kidman just told me: We can’t let them win. (Well, actually she told Hugh Jackman) And he said: We won’t. and Kidman told the cute aboriginal girl: Whatever I takes, I’ll find you. So I feel really good and ready to enlist and get my head blown off.
Oh well, back to earth. But that’s what propaganda does to you as so beautifully portrayed in All’s Quiet on the Western Front when the professor fuels up all his students to enlist in glory only to have them return in caskets.
The trailer starts with a shot worthy of Vogue: an extremely well dressed Nicole Kidman. What a hat! It belongs in a museum. Then we see a rugged Hugh Jackman on a ship. Get it? Civilization meets barbarian. Mark my words, sex is coming.
An early shot has him fighting; she protesting (probably the fighting), still precisely coiffured, with palm outstretched and mouthing “No.”
He greets her sweating, breathless, gritty: Welcome to Australia. What, we thought this was Versailles?
Then both are riding a truck in the desert with a dog. She in face netting (she, Nicole, not the dog) and Jackman saying: You’d be more comfortable if you changed into something less constricting.
Shades of Stewart Granger and Deborah Kerr in King Solomon’s Mine.
Then the tent scene. Not the hammy part this time, just she emerging from the tent, he naked from the waist up. Flash to screen: From the director of Romeo and Juliet....... Oh, thank you so much, I had been expecting a submarine movie.
Fast forward and we’re in the time warp of Grease where Olivia Newton John becomes a greaser at the end.
Kidman can ride. Jackman is impressed. Kidman looks gritty on the horse. And, she can belt down a few also.
Whoa! Now, they’re skinny dipping. That was fast.
Faster still is our introduction to waltzing in Australian high society; a cute aboriginal girl; and (I assume) good, old Australian prejudice. Kidman: Just because it is, doesn’t mean it should be. Are we going deep here?
We're told: Their love defied destiny. Good to know; I’ll stop looking for submarines.
And not a minute too soon because here come the planes. Kidman hears them sitting in a great looking bedroom. Bombs drop. We see reactions from Jackman and the cute, aboriginal girl.
We’re at war. Talk about a plot twist to keep this from being one long roll in the hay movie.
For the sake of truth in trailers, I should admit there looked like some sort of local Australian shooting trouble before this war starts involving Kidman, Jackman and others.
But war is like the eight card in Crazy Eights. It changes everything.
What Do I Expect From the Trailer:
I’m going to see this movie, though I’m not going to pay for it, except through my cable provider. It looks well-done, hokey, formulaic but there’s a place for that in life.
It can’t all be Aristotle’s Poetics. I bet there were times when Mrs. Aristotle would call out: Ari, enough with the thinking, get the chariot, we’re going to Bingo Night.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Knitting Friday
Somehow I wound up asleep last night under my crocheted leftover yarn blanket which I had mentioned in my 10/31 blog as being so warm. Well, that’s the truth. 2 a.m. when I awoke, I was toasty warm.
The question as I see it: do I make more of the same. I have about four, two large and two small. They are such "go to" blankets but they are no works of arts. I guess I could make them such by using expensive yarn and coordinating colors. But this is supposed to be a leftover project. Like, after Thanksgiving, you throw all the leftovers together and make a meal that no one likes or eats but that’s leftovers.
I have never heard anyone say: Oh, look at all the lovely yarn I bought for my leftover project. There is some lovely yarn in these blankets and I do try to color coordinate but these blankets are pieces of my knitting history and that very seldom matched.
So, I really can't consider them in any way in league with all the beautiful quilts out there; many of which began their lives as leftovers from other projects. But there is a gift of artistry in them. Just their names alone: Double Wedding Ring, Windmills, Flower Basket, Jacob's Ladder, or Eight Hands Round make you want to learn their history.
My blankets, scraps of yarn, even color coordinated just don't cut it. But on a cold winter night……...
WEB - Warmest Ever Blanket (Pattern from memory so it may need some tweaking)
It’s such a simple pattern: First arrange your yarns and join your scraps especially if weaving in ends doesn't appeal to you. Even with joining, there are going to be two yarn tails for every square only one of which you can work in as you go.
Use a hook to match the thickness of the yarn. You don’t want a large hook on thin yarn. You’re going to crocheting in the round but make squares. You’ll be using single crochets, not double crochets, which makes for the warmth.
Set-Up: Chain (ch) 4, join. Ch 1. Make 12 single crochets (sc) in loop.(You can hide your beginning yarn tail as you go in the 12 sc.)
Slip stitch (sl st) the 12th sc to the first. Mark this join with yarn and move the yarn up to the next round each time you come back to what is your first three-sc corner.
Round 1: Chain 1 then work the following 4xs: * three sc in the same sc for corner, one sc in each of the next 2 sc.* You are now back at your first three-sc corner and the marker yarn. Join with sl st in the first sc (where the marker yarn is) of the first three-sc corner.
Round 2: Chain 1 (replace marker yarn in this st) then work the following 4xs: * three sc in the middle sc of three-3 corner, one sc in each of the next 4 sc.* You are now back at your first three-sc corner and the marker yarn. Join with sl st in the first sc of the first three-sc corner.
Continue working as Round 2 but this time making 6 sc in the single crochets between the three-sc corners. Each time you reach a three-sc corner, work 3 sc in the middle sc.
Your number of sc between the three-sc corners will go from 2 to 4 to 6 to 8. See the pattern; it’s an increase of 2 sc between the three-sc corners each round.
(I found the only tricky part is the last group of sc between the third three-sc corner and the first. My count would go off here. I think because I got to using the slip stitch joining the round as a stitch to be crocheted into.
So I would have 8 sc on three sides and 9 sc on the last side. But crocheting is forgiving. You can fudge a fix easily in crochet. Just be sure every side has the same number of sc before the three-sc corners.)
Continue increasing the square and cut the yarn when it’s big enough.
The cumbersome part of this project is joining the squares. Make large squares and there will be less joining, but there will be joining.
I usually assemble the squares on a bed and arrange the colors as I want them. Then from the wrong side and using the slip stitch I join them in a long stripe. Once the vertical stripes are done, I start the long horizontal joins. Note: if you join with a single crochet, you can “bury” the yarn tails as you go.
Tedious it is, but you get the warmest blanket you could wish for.
Somehow I wound up asleep last night under my crocheted leftover yarn blanket which I had mentioned in my 10/31 blog as being so warm. Well, that’s the truth. 2 a.m. when I awoke, I was toasty warm.
The question as I see it: do I make more of the same. I have about four, two large and two small. They are such "go to" blankets but they are no works of arts. I guess I could make them such by using expensive yarn and coordinating colors. But this is supposed to be a leftover project. Like, after Thanksgiving, you throw all the leftovers together and make a meal that no one likes or eats but that’s leftovers.
I have never heard anyone say: Oh, look at all the lovely yarn I bought for my leftover project. There is some lovely yarn in these blankets and I do try to color coordinate but these blankets are pieces of my knitting history and that very seldom matched.
So, I really can't consider them in any way in league with all the beautiful quilts out there; many of which began their lives as leftovers from other projects. But there is a gift of artistry in them. Just their names alone: Double Wedding Ring, Windmills, Flower Basket, Jacob's Ladder, or Eight Hands Round make you want to learn their history.
My blankets, scraps of yarn, even color coordinated just don't cut it. But on a cold winter night……...
WEB - Warmest Ever Blanket (Pattern from memory so it may need some tweaking)
It’s such a simple pattern: First arrange your yarns and join your scraps especially if weaving in ends doesn't appeal to you. Even with joining, there are going to be two yarn tails for every square only one of which you can work in as you go.
Use a hook to match the thickness of the yarn. You don’t want a large hook on thin yarn. You’re going to crocheting in the round but make squares. You’ll be using single crochets, not double crochets, which makes for the warmth.
Set-Up: Chain (ch) 4, join. Ch 1. Make 12 single crochets (sc) in loop.(You can hide your beginning yarn tail as you go in the 12 sc.)
Slip stitch (sl st) the 12th sc to the first. Mark this join with yarn and move the yarn up to the next round each time you come back to what is your first three-sc corner.
Round 1: Chain 1 then work the following 4xs: * three sc in the same sc for corner, one sc in each of the next 2 sc.* You are now back at your first three-sc corner and the marker yarn. Join with sl st in the first sc (where the marker yarn is) of the first three-sc corner.
Round 2: Chain 1 (replace marker yarn in this st) then work the following 4xs: * three sc in the middle sc of three-3 corner, one sc in each of the next 4 sc.* You are now back at your first three-sc corner and the marker yarn. Join with sl st in the first sc of the first three-sc corner.
Continue working as Round 2 but this time making 6 sc in the single crochets between the three-sc corners. Each time you reach a three-sc corner, work 3 sc in the middle sc.
Your number of sc between the three-sc corners will go from 2 to 4 to 6 to 8. See the pattern; it’s an increase of 2 sc between the three-sc corners each round.
(I found the only tricky part is the last group of sc between the third three-sc corner and the first. My count would go off here. I think because I got to using the slip stitch joining the round as a stitch to be crocheted into.
So I would have 8 sc on three sides and 9 sc on the last side. But crocheting is forgiving. You can fudge a fix easily in crochet. Just be sure every side has the same number of sc before the three-sc corners.)
Continue increasing the square and cut the yarn when it’s big enough.
The cumbersome part of this project is joining the squares. Make large squares and there will be less joining, but there will be joining.
I usually assemble the squares on a bed and arrange the colors as I want them. Then from the wrong side and using the slip stitch I join them in a long stripe. Once the vertical stripes are done, I start the long horizontal joins. Note: if you join with a single crochet, you can “bury” the yarn tails as you go.
Tedious it is, but you get the warmest blanket you could wish for.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Website Wednesday
I read today that college may become financially out of reach for most Americans.(NYT) That's pretty shocking. But then we could look at colleges and universities as any retail institution trying to sell its products at the highest prices. It's just that they, unlike the auto industry, are supposedly "selling" knowledge.
I'm a great believer of Internet higher learning. It opens up a college degree to so many dedicated and harried people who would never have had the time for the traditional four-year trek to a bricks and mortar knowledge factory.
Thinking back to my college years with the 20-20 vision of hindsight, what I most remember is a professor I loathed: He couldn't teach; I didn't get it; I was so picked upon. Waaah!
And yet today, every day I spend time on writing (and that's about every day) I use the rules he taught me. Every major word I write, every major word I change, I think of his wise counsel. (Boy, have I matured.)
There is not one English class I teach where I do not use his word-for-word substitution of a famous document. (Try it some time: take the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance and do a word-for-word substitution without changing the meaning of the original words. It's not easy.)
Also, the best advice I ever got for handling children was from the college professor who taught in the college's on-site middle/high school, which it was mandatory for us to observe throughout our four years.
The advice given to us, students, after he had a tough time with one student and the class was dismissed: Never back a kid into a corner. Meaning: No matter what the situation always leave them with their dignity.
And remember, this advice was before the recent findings that children/teen brains operate differently from adults in the moral/ethical area.
So I did learn a lot in college. But I missed a lot too - like metaphor.
I just never could understand metaphors. They drove me nuts. My brain could not wrap around the concept that they were not just similes missing the "as" or "like." Not a good lack of understanding for an English major to have.
And then, sometime after college, I got it. It was divine revelation. The seas parted. I love metaphors now. And, I get them.
So much tells me that learning (and I mean strict learning like science, math or a language) is a lifetime process. There is a luxury of getting a head start with college when you're young but the love of knowledge should fill your entire life and be available to you for all that time.
Saying that, I have two websites related to learning today:
http://www.munseys.com/site/home
Munseys looks like a slicker Project Gutenberg. Scroll down to “Browse by Category” to click a favorite. You can’t see it on the home page but other pages list the number of books in each category.
Three things I like: in HTML, the font looks like Times Roman and not Gutenberg’s Courier. Second, some of the books have colored pictures of their original covers which is historically interesting. Also, some of the books have short reviews which are always fun to read.
The second site is one for teachers but applicable for anyone with children:
http://www.ilovethatteachingidea.com
The categories list the learning disciplines and tell the teacher how to use an idea in a classroom setting. However, you can adapt most of them for home use.
Just two I found interesting:
1- Give children a bag of alphabet cereal and have them make as many words as they can. Then, they eat their words.
2- Give children pipe cleaners and file cards with the names of different geometric forms. Have them make the forms out of the pipe cleaners.
Enjoy these sites. Learning should be lifelong and fun.
I read today that college may become financially out of reach for most Americans.(NYT) That's pretty shocking. But then we could look at colleges and universities as any retail institution trying to sell its products at the highest prices. It's just that they, unlike the auto industry, are supposedly "selling" knowledge.
I'm a great believer of Internet higher learning. It opens up a college degree to so many dedicated and harried people who would never have had the time for the traditional four-year trek to a bricks and mortar knowledge factory.
Thinking back to my college years with the 20-20 vision of hindsight, what I most remember is a professor I loathed: He couldn't teach; I didn't get it; I was so picked upon. Waaah!
And yet today, every day I spend time on writing (and that's about every day) I use the rules he taught me. Every major word I write, every major word I change, I think of his wise counsel. (Boy, have I matured.)
There is not one English class I teach where I do not use his word-for-word substitution of a famous document. (Try it some time: take the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance and do a word-for-word substitution without changing the meaning of the original words. It's not easy.)
Also, the best advice I ever got for handling children was from the college professor who taught in the college's on-site middle/high school, which it was mandatory for us to observe throughout our four years.
The advice given to us, students, after he had a tough time with one student and the class was dismissed: Never back a kid into a corner. Meaning: No matter what the situation always leave them with their dignity.
And remember, this advice was before the recent findings that children/teen brains operate differently from adults in the moral/ethical area.
So I did learn a lot in college. But I missed a lot too - like metaphor.
I just never could understand metaphors. They drove me nuts. My brain could not wrap around the concept that they were not just similes missing the "as" or "like." Not a good lack of understanding for an English major to have.
And then, sometime after college, I got it. It was divine revelation. The seas parted. I love metaphors now. And, I get them.
So much tells me that learning (and I mean strict learning like science, math or a language) is a lifetime process. There is a luxury of getting a head start with college when you're young but the love of knowledge should fill your entire life and be available to you for all that time.
Saying that, I have two websites related to learning today:
http://www.munseys.com/site/home
Munseys looks like a slicker Project Gutenberg. Scroll down to “Browse by Category” to click a favorite. You can’t see it on the home page but other pages list the number of books in each category.
Three things I like: in HTML, the font looks like Times Roman and not Gutenberg’s Courier. Second, some of the books have colored pictures of their original covers which is historically interesting. Also, some of the books have short reviews which are always fun to read.
The second site is one for teachers but applicable for anyone with children:
http://www.ilovethatteachingidea.com
The categories list the learning disciplines and tell the teacher how to use an idea in a classroom setting. However, you can adapt most of them for home use.
Just two I found interesting:
1- Give children a bag of alphabet cereal and have them make as many words as they can. Then, they eat their words.
2- Give children pipe cleaners and file cards with the names of different geometric forms. Have them make the forms out of the pipe cleaners.
Enjoy these sites. Learning should be lifelong and fun.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Movie Monday
This is going to be a little different today because on Thanksgiving I saw FBI’s Most Wanted, Part 1. Ok, don’t go looking in IMDb. It’s an amateur production. Though this year we did have a script and a director.
Every summer, two young children and I produce a movie which is shown to the family later. We do have adults as cameraman and editor (this year, our editor reformatted his computer and lost his editing program so movie release was almost delayed) but this is basically a kids’ production as you can tell from our past titles: The Broken Bone and The Lost Trains.
Until Thanksgiving, I didn’t know what was in the movie since my role as the spy (FBI’s Most Wanted) was to sit on the couch while the FBI (the kids) searched behind me for secret plans.
I was very impressed to see the kids’ acting. They were so natural and poised, nothing stagey about them. I, on the other hand, stunk! Really bad! I can’t act. I can’t even talk. It all comes out so high and shrill. Even my second role as the unseen, but heard, FBI Director was so phony as my lowered voice sounded like my lips were trying to meet my chin.
I remember reading an analysis of Norma Shearer’s acting and it said, at her worst, she would use hand gestures or vocal mannerisms to clue you into what she was feeling. (Back of hand to forehead: anguish.) She had the excuse that she came from the silents. I have no excuse: I’m just a bad actor.
But since it was family, watching it was a hoot and we’re planning next summer’s production already.
This brings me to the business of movies. Or rather, the business of acting in movies.
I once read in a very funny, but sadly defunct blog, You Can’t Make This Up, that after the blogger was an extra in a movie she could never look at movies the same way.
And then, just the other night, Elvis Mitchell interviewed Richard Gere about acting. Gere said you spend so much time preparing for the scene but the take is about 2 minutes long and you (the actor) have to be completely “on” during that short time.
The good actors are. But it’s all so phony. Like the poignant scene at the end of The Return of the King (which was on last night) where Frodo is saying farewell to the other hobbits. Peter Jackson has said that this final scene was shot very early in production before the hobbit actors had a chance to bond. Additionally, the scene had to be shot three times due to film and continuity problems. Yet, watching that sad farewell as it is finally captured makes the audience feel their sorrow.
But it's only actors working their craft, and working it well. And except for emotionally draining scenes when the actor may need time to re-compose, actors can and must turn these emotions on and off in an instant.
We’re taught to be real and not to be phony. Yet we shed tears, race our pulses, cringe in horror as we watch images on the screen, concentrated on that small area the camera sees, while a wide pan would reveal the everyday working movie world which closely surrounds a powerful screen shot. (As the picture in a LOTR book of Aragon fighting Sauron with two men in modern clothes within a yard of Aragon watching and drinking coffee.)
I know all this. Yet tonight, I will be watching some movie, suspending belief, caught in the moment of the drama. Is it like the protagonist figured out in Sullivan’s Travels: even in the worst conditions movies can truly transport you from your troubles, if only for a while.
This is going to be a little different today because on Thanksgiving I saw FBI’s Most Wanted, Part 1. Ok, don’t go looking in IMDb. It’s an amateur production. Though this year we did have a script and a director.
Every summer, two young children and I produce a movie which is shown to the family later. We do have adults as cameraman and editor (this year, our editor reformatted his computer and lost his editing program so movie release was almost delayed) but this is basically a kids’ production as you can tell from our past titles: The Broken Bone and The Lost Trains.
Until Thanksgiving, I didn’t know what was in the movie since my role as the spy (FBI’s Most Wanted) was to sit on the couch while the FBI (the kids) searched behind me for secret plans.
I was very impressed to see the kids’ acting. They were so natural and poised, nothing stagey about them. I, on the other hand, stunk! Really bad! I can’t act. I can’t even talk. It all comes out so high and shrill. Even my second role as the unseen, but heard, FBI Director was so phony as my lowered voice sounded like my lips were trying to meet my chin.
I remember reading an analysis of Norma Shearer’s acting and it said, at her worst, she would use hand gestures or vocal mannerisms to clue you into what she was feeling. (Back of hand to forehead: anguish.) She had the excuse that she came from the silents. I have no excuse: I’m just a bad actor.
But since it was family, watching it was a hoot and we’re planning next summer’s production already.
This brings me to the business of movies. Or rather, the business of acting in movies.
I once read in a very funny, but sadly defunct blog, You Can’t Make This Up, that after the blogger was an extra in a movie she could never look at movies the same way.
And then, just the other night, Elvis Mitchell interviewed Richard Gere about acting. Gere said you spend so much time preparing for the scene but the take is about 2 minutes long and you (the actor) have to be completely “on” during that short time.
The good actors are. But it’s all so phony. Like the poignant scene at the end of The Return of the King (which was on last night) where Frodo is saying farewell to the other hobbits. Peter Jackson has said that this final scene was shot very early in production before the hobbit actors had a chance to bond. Additionally, the scene had to be shot three times due to film and continuity problems. Yet, watching that sad farewell as it is finally captured makes the audience feel their sorrow.
But it's only actors working their craft, and working it well. And except for emotionally draining scenes when the actor may need time to re-compose, actors can and must turn these emotions on and off in an instant.
We’re taught to be real and not to be phony. Yet we shed tears, race our pulses, cringe in horror as we watch images on the screen, concentrated on that small area the camera sees, while a wide pan would reveal the everyday working movie world which closely surrounds a powerful screen shot. (As the picture in a LOTR book of Aragon fighting Sauron with two men in modern clothes within a yard of Aragon watching and drinking coffee.)
I know all this. Yet tonight, I will be watching some movie, suspending belief, caught in the moment of the drama. Is it like the protagonist figured out in Sullivan’s Travels: even in the worst conditions movies can truly transport you from your troubles, if only for a while.
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