Books

Trimalchio of West Egg

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I don’t remember exactly when I first read The Great Gatsby, but I do remember that I didn’t think much of it. My memories of it consisted of “over-hyped, not very interesting, short, some girl gets run over.” I couldn’t have told you two things about the titular character, including his first name. I could tell you even less about Fitzgerald’s writing.

How is that possible? I didn’t read Gatsby in high school, when words pass through a brain still mostly mush (because of which I forgive myself for forgetting everything about another Fitzgerald book, Tender is the Night, on which I did my junior theme).

Family

The Few(er), the Proud

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Few children get to celebrate their parents 50th wedding anniversary, because not many parents get to their 50th wedding anniversary. Even fewer children can say that they were present for all 50 years. I am one of the fewer.

Dad married Mother after a whirlwind three month courtship, when I was three-and-three-fourths. (Hey, when you’re three, the three-fourths counts!) It was quite a leap of faith for a 21-year-old to take on, a wife and a (I believe precocious would be the polite word) child, but he thought he was up to the task. He adopted me a few years later (my birth father had flown the coop a few months before Dad met my mom, never to be seen again, within four decimal places of “never”), and as it turns out, he was up to the task.

Books / Spiritual Journey

Reruns

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Tivo has a wonderful thing called a Season Pass. You can record every instance of a show without having to worry about what time it is, what night it’s on, etc. When you set up a season pass for a show, you can decide whether you want only first run shows, first runs and reruns, or all shows. I always choose the first option — who wants to watch reruns?

And yet, I will re-read a good book over and over. I’ve read Les Misérables a half-dozen times, Into Thin Air at least as many, and LOTR too many to count.

Movies / Spiritual Journey

It’s still just once a year, isn’t it?

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It’s February 2nd, Groundhog Day, the day when we have a rodent predicting our weather instead of the usual … well, fill in your own joke here. For the last 20 years, it’s also the day when we watch the movie of the same name. I’ve loved Bill Murray since his original stint on Saturday Night Live (the upgrade from Chevy Chase to Murray was like getting rid of your Kia and buying a Porsche), and Groundhog Day finds Murray at the top of his Murrayness.

What if there was no tomorrow?; there wasn’t one today!

It is a deceptive movie.

Movies

It was the best of times, it was …

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What do you do if you’re in charge of a franchise loved by tens of millions of people around the world and you’re about to bring it to the silver screen once again after a long absence?

You create a script of wooden dialog, direct actors to horrifically wooden performances, and create perhaps the most (validly) maligned CGI character in history, of course.

But let’s talk about Les Misérables, instead. (I know, two Les Mis posts in a row. As the saying goes, write what you know.)

Even people not paying attention (and that’s most of you) know I’m a Les Mis geek.

Spiritual Journey

Does he or doesn’t he?

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My wife and I went to see Les Misérables today, the musical adapted from Victor Hugo’s 19th century novel. It was a new staging, created for the show’s 25th anniversary. The new staging was quite a bit different, in a good way, than the other four times we’ve seen it (I know; I also own five soundtracks). And even if it hadn’t been, as has been said about other things, a bad day at Les Mis is better than a good day anywhere else.

The characters were starker and less “pretty.” Valjean actually looked like a convict who’d been in prison for 20 years.