Old So What

  Seasons come and go all on their own.   No one cues them; gives them the “all clear.” They just get on with it, and show up at our doors, on our roofs, in our gardens. Summer leaves us with no kicking and screaming, though some of us would do so if it would help. With winter shoved into our lives whether we want it or not.   Which we do not…most decidedly want:   The cold mornings, the expensive heating fuel, the scratchy sweaters, the cold coffee, the gray, bleak days, which seem to last forever.   Just d-r-a-g-g-i-n-g on. Until one morning while taking out the trash, we feel the soft caress, and sweet kiss of spring. Oh, thank goodness, sanity and beauty return!

  You don’t have to burn down the library…to turn the page.

 In the mood for something spooky this fall? Look no further than Repo! The Genetic Opera. This hard rock Opera movie, has songs with great lyrics, blood, and a great premise. A bleak future where people seek perfection through constant surgeries; sound familiar? Only if you miss a payment, they repo back what they operated on. Paul Sorvino is a powerhouse as the head of the company that performs these surgeries. Alexa PenaVaga belts out ballads that will have you rebelling against your own inherited genetics. Anthony Head is tortured Repoman forced to do all the dirty work to protect his family. But my favorite character is the mysterious Graverobber, who wrote the movie. You won't be disappointed with this movie.

  OMG my cat is bleeding to death!! But it was just some blackberry jam from breakfast…

 Is an epic Chinese fantasy drama that is larger that the three realms it inhabits. Friendship, betrayal, family, love; this drama has it all. The female lead is dealt a seemingly insurmountable fate, while the dreamy male lead tries to protect her from all dangers, even from herself. There is humor along the way and even quests. Paired with beautiful backgrounds and fantasy animals, demons and deities, it is like a video game come to life.  Highly recommend for anyone who loves fantasy. Just be prepared for a long emotional journey. I watched this on Amazon prime.

  A perfume with bacon in it: Eau de Ba-CON! It would be a runaway bestseller!

  In 1869, a French chemist named Hippolyte Mège-Mouries created a new “butter,” made from beef fat.   It was supposed to have a longer shelf life than real butter, and be an overall hardier product. So, in 1895, the butter industry, or whatever it was called, banned yellow margarine. This meant that you could only buy white margarine. Segue to the early 1950s… Now, I’ve seen white margarine. It’s not appetizing, but that’s the point. So, you had to mix the yellow coloring with the white margarine glop. They came in a plastic bag, but in two different compartments in the bag that you had to squish together.   I loved to do this.   It was a fun job when you’re five! (I, myself, prefer the taste of butter.)

  Neatness has its place for giving us peace and a sense of order. But you cannot create anything out of neatness. Creativity requires a certain amount of chaos, so the situation can be reordered, rearranged, or reinvented producing/generating something new.

Many, that’s the word for this program:   This is many episodes of many shows, which occur in many languages, and many countries at this point. And, yes, this series has been on for many years. The plot is couples getting to know each other sight unseen, through conversations only, which occur in small isolated rooms known as “pods.” Don’t get your hopes up because the success rate for these couples is very low.   Usually just one couple (out of 5 to 7) makes it to the altar and then beyond, staying together. The reasons are easy to spot:   The couples are often made up of emotionally wounded people, waiting for something else bad to happen to them.   Plus, these are people who don’t know each other well. They are really almost complete strangers, so each stone in the road of their relationship becomes an insurmountable boulder. With little knowledge, with little trust, with no firm foundation to build on, and just the beginning feelings of love and commitment, is it no wonder

  In the 1980s, exhibitions of Titanic material started to tour. (I think they are still touring today in some form.) My husband and I were Titanic junkies at the time. It was an emotional experience going to one of these productions. We went to Memphis, Tennessee; Boston, Massachusetts; and Atlantic City, New Jersey to view the sacred artifacts from the Titanic. And they did feel sacred. All the objects owned, valued or used by so many people who died needlessly in such a tragic way. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about you should come up for air from under that rock.) The Boston exhibit was the most exciting because the “Big Piece” had just been raised on August 10, 1998, from the grips of the ocean. My husband memorialized the event of our touching the large piece of the starboard hull on September 26, 1998, with a kind of a plaque for our stairway wall. It wasn’t just a keyhole that you stuck you finger in, as so many Titanic exhibitions give you for just a touch.