Syberia 3, Teotihuacan, and Fred and Ginger

First, the rain.  Since Thursday afternoon, we had 4" of rain through Sunday night.  That's a lot of rain, especially for an area already suffering from record high water levels in the surrounding lakes and rivers.  More is expected tomorrow, and possibly Wednesday.  What to do with it all.

For the past several weeks I have been playing Syberia 3, a game for PC, off and on in the evenings.  It's a rather tedious game, and not very special.  I am playing it only out of loyalty to the first two games in the series.  Anyway, as per usual, when I turned on the game to play, Steam downloaded an update.  Then, when the game finally loaded, all my progress was erased.  No saved games, no nothing.  Weeks and weeks of work down the tube, with no desire to start all over again.  I downloaded some saved games from the web, but so far they refuse to load.  Harrumph (and under my breath, many more worse words).

We finally sat down and played a mostly full round of our newest board game, called Teotihuacan.  It is certainly one of the better board games we now own.  It is an evening's commitment to set up the board and play, but it is a lot of fun, and as the game board changes with each new game, no sure fire strategy will help you win the next game.  And you get to build a pyramid, and decorate it.  How cool is that?  I think Tokaido Road and this game are our two favourites.  Now that the basement had been reassembled, I have room to store and display all of our board games.  Some have never been played yet.

Deb's weekend movie pick was Swing Time, starring Fred and Ginger.  From 1936, and directed by George Stevens, this b & w classic has some superb dancing and some memorable songs, including "The Way You Look Tonight," and "A Fine Romance," written by Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields.  Great dance numbers (and music) include "Never Gonna Dance," and Fred's black face tribute to Bill "Bojangle" Robinson.  Some great hoofin'.  The plot, of course, is virtually non-existent. 

 Showing on the Criterion Channel until the end of August. 

And now we return to our regular programming, featuring another fine landscape painting from the Detroit Institute of Arts.

Bernardo Bellotto

View of the Tiber in Rome with the Castel Sant'Angelo, 1743 or 1744

oil on canvas, 34" x 48", unframed. 

The museum did a complete reorganization several years ago, something which I think destroyed the overall layout and made finding any specific painting much more difficult.  One of the newer spaces is called The Grand Tour," and purports to show how Italy was on everyone's grand tour in the 18th Century, and the artists who did souvenir type works of art.  Canaletto, Guardi, Panini, robert, and Bellotto are some of these artists, and thanks to them we have some rather good impressions of Rome, Venice, and other cities because of their painstaking renditions for rich tourists to carry home.  This particular painting has always been a favourite of mine, and it is large enough to get in close and observe all of the wonderful details of the time.

Detail of the bridge.

 Detail of far left side.

Detail of St. Peter's dome.

Detail of the Castel, which once served as Hadrian's tomb.

Castel, further detail.

Paintings like this hang in every great museum of the world, and are always worth stopping to look at more closely.  This one has an evening twilight colour that cannot be captured in a photo, but is magical and difficult to describe in person.

I had my first piano lesson this afternoon with Philip Adamson, bringing him my newest program.  We got to work on the Bach Prelude and Fugue, and the Schubert Impromptu in C Minor.  Very helpful.  I will return in a few weeks for help with the Haydn Sonata and the Bartok Allegro Barbaro.  I will not likely make my August memorization goals.  For every three notes I stick into my head, two of them pop out the other side.  I'll get there, but it will take more time.

Mapman Mike