The Broken Foot Part 2

Summer continues to be hotter than normal, though after the two upcoming steamy days ahead things should return to about average for several days.  Parts of our garden have turned into instant jungle yet again.  We will try to fix that later today.  And Deb has been venturing into the basement over the past week in an effort to get rid of years of junk  In a couple of weeks it should look quite different down there!

 

In medical news I have seen a doctor about my foot and had x-rays done.  Now we wait to hear whether or not there are broken bones (there are).  Then they will tell me to ice the foot and stay off of it as much as possible (I am).  Life goes on, and my limp is becoming quite a part of me.

 

We have contracted for a new back deck.  Work on that project should commence late next week, around the time of full moon.  Not sure how long it will take, but it's a pretty small deck, so perhaps a week or so.  It will be a bit smaller than the old one, and made of composite plastic instead of wood.  It is supposed to last a lifetime and will bring up the house value, too.  Some inside projects are just around the corner, too.   Terribly exciting times around here.

 

In film news, Deb's recent poster for her newest film just won an award for best poster!  Just a Peek has also been entered in several film competitions, mostly European.  Check Deb's website (left margin here) or her Imdb page for the latest.

 

Deb's award winning poster for her most recent film. 

 

In film watching news I have two to report.  Most recently was another Argentinian noir from the 50s.  If I Should Die Before I Wake is from 1952 and is based on a story by Cornell Woolrich.  It's a hard hitting little number about a serial killer of little schoolgirls.  The young male friend of the first girl killed is wracked with terror, as he has promised the girl not to tell anyone that she has been taking candy from a man.  When she turns up dead he nearly goes crazy.  Two years later a similar thing happens to another young female friend of his.  He acts on his own to try and save her, since the adults in his life (parents and teachers) won't even listen to what he wants to say.  A well done film, with a very bizarre fairy tale dream-like opening scene.  Recommended.

 

Now showing on Criterion until July 31st.  The only available print was restored by UCLA film labs.  The original negative was too far gone. 

 

Before that came The Truman Show, a film starring Jim Carrey that is not only watchable, but enjoyable too.  Directed by Peter Weir and from 1998, it chronicles the televised life of Truman Burbank, albeit unbeknownst to him.  As much SF as comedy-thriller, parts of it reminded me of The Prisoner TV series.  Raised in an idyllic small town, Truman works as an insurance salesman.  Since his birth (shown live on TV) all aspects of his life have been televised non-stop 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  By all appearances it's been a pretty boring show up until now.  When happily married Truman meets another woman who tries to warn him of what is going on the film gradually picks up steam.  It seems everyone, even his best friend, is in on the scheme.  A fun film, with many laugh out loud parts.  Carrey's restrained performance is a revelation, and some of his fans hated him in this role.  Recommended.

 

Now showing on Paramount Plus. 

 

A recent sale on Steam has seen my train sim world family grow a lot.  I now have 14 different train systems to run, including two London Overground routes and the full Bakerloo tube line!  Here are a few pics from some of my recent journeys. 

 

Hauling freight on an early morning run across the California desert.

 

Driving a commuter train from downtown LA to distant mountain cities.

 

Trying out some image blurring on the line between Euston and Milton Keynes.

 

This is a new line running from Mainz to Koblenz along the Rhine.  I am driving a tourist train on a Rhine castle tour in winter.

 

Running an express service towards Mainz from Koblenz. 

 

Mapman Mike

 

 

 

  

The Broken Foot, Part 1

I have had two wonderfully clear nights so far this session, and am hoping to score one more.  The first night out was last Sunday.  Sometime in the middle of that session I turned around and kicked my metal chair over.  It was closer than I thought it was.  It seemed to hit a spot on my foot that it really shouldn't have.  Years ago I broke my right foot and remember well what that felt like.  This feels pretty much the same.  It is the left foot, up near and around the big toe.  I've been gimping around on it all week, hoping that it will magically get better.  The last break took six weeks to feel better, and despite x-rays and visits to the doctor, it still took six weeks with no interference.  I will see how things are by Monday before I decide to visit my M.D.  It still hurts when I walk on it, but the non-walking pain has subsided.  Ice is helping, too.  Unfortunately this may seriously interfere with late September travel plans, which have to do with lots of walking.

 

The two astronomy sessions were epic, though the warmest on record for me.  When I began observing Sunday night it was 82 F at 10:30 pm.  When I left at 2:00 am it was 79 F.  A light breeze kept the bugs down.  I returned on Monday night for a similar experience.  It had been so hot during those two days (96 F and 98F) that the humidity had burned away, leaving me with a dry night and good sky transparency.

 

Our current passports have six months remaining, so it is time to renew them.  The process will begin very soon, or sooner.  By the time we travel to Europe there will be less than 3 months remaining on the old ones. Ten years managed to fly past us.

 

In more local news, we have had 5 days of 90 F+ so far this summer (which is one week old).  That has come with enough humidity and rain to keep everything green and jungle like, including here at the Homestead.  Here is a recent photo of our front yard day lilies (there are many in the back yard as well).

 

Our front garden day lilies seem happy enough. 

 

In movie news there are three to report.  We just finished watching a very old favourite of ours.  We sat down and turned on the live TV stream of Criterion.  We caught the last half hour of an early Renoir film.  We decided just to see what was coming on next (commercial free of course), and ended up sitting through a two hour movie.  It was Peter Weir's The Last Wave.  The more times we see this film the more we are able to pull out of it.  It is a masterpiece of cross cultural contact, as well as being carefully thought out and brilliantly executed.  It remains one of our top favourite films.

 

Showing on Criterion. 

 

 Vicky Christina Barcelona is a film written and directed by Woody Allen from 2008.  The film uses the backdrop of Barcelona for romantic comedy that seems to gloss the surface of relationships rather than try to delve into them.  It also glosses the surface of art and of the city of Barcelona itself.  In fact it is difficult to say what this film is about.  Two young woman, one of whom is recently engaged, come under the spell of a handsome Spanish painter.  One of the women ends up living with him for a time, while the other has sex with him once, despite feeling guilty about her engagement.  While clever dialogue and some half decent acting helps thing along, overall the film is a bit of a mess, as it barely skims of the surface of what a relationship is.  Of course it means something different to each person in the story, but none of this is really explored very deeply.  It is romantic, and it does have humour, but it doesn't seem to have much spark to it.  It is certainly a film I would not wish to see again.

 

Leaving Criterion June 30th. 

 

Finally came Rene Clair's 1928 silent film The Italian Straw Hat.  With a running time of nearly two hours, this is an overlong romantic adventure film.  Though often very funny, it just seems to go on and on with the same joke.  For instance, the marriage ceremony is presided over by a windbag of a marriage officiant.  As he drones on and on various parts of the plot continue elsewhere, while we are also entertained by the relatives sitting through it all.  The concept is quite good and often really funny, but it carries on and on until you never want to see another marriage ceremony as long as you live.  The married woman whose hat was half eaten by a horse and her military man lover are not very good characters, and they are given way too much screen time.  Cut the film by 25-30 minutes and it might have been a masterpiece.  As it is it requires far too much patience from the viewer to sit through.

 

Showing on Criterion as part of a Rene Clair retrospective. 

 

Coming soon: June books reading summary.  See you then.

 

Mapman Mike 

 

 

New Windows

 Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday (today) are about as cold as it ever gets down here. Tuesday morning I headed to Windsor for the first piano performance group meeting.  There are currently three of us: Alde, Nadia, and myself.  Both are teachers and piano performance majors.  The program I am working on has 7 pieces by Bach in the first half.  I played four of them on Alde's grand piano.  Next, Nadia performed a set of Beethoven variations, followed by Alde's reading of the first movement of the Waldstein Sonata, also by Beethoven.  The meeting spurred each of us to bigger and better things.  Alde wants to take a piano exam that he never took (A.R.C.T., the top exam of the Royal Conservatory); Nadia wants to get a whole program together; I have increased my practice time from about 12 hours per week to about 17 hours per week.  All of us are looking forward to our second meeting, here at the Homestead in February.  Because of the harpsichord, it could night turn into a Bach event.

The next cold day was Wednesday.  I didn't have to go out, but two new windows were installed.  We have used Centennial Windows and Doors throughout the upstairs of the house.  They are the best there is, pure and simple.  Very expensive, but one gets one's money's worth.  Their guarantee is a real guarantee.  They will even come and replace the draft stoppers beneath their doors when they wear out.  At 9:30 am, when the workers arrived, it was about 11 F outside, with a nice breeze blowing.  By the time they left at around 2 pm, it was 16 F.  Since the front door was going to be opened up so many times with the two workers coming and going, and since the furnace thermostat would be influenced by this, I shut off the boiler and turned on the wood pellet stove.  

 

The kitchen window replacement came first.  The space was wide open for less than half an hour before they plopped the new window in.  Because we kept the original wood frame, that was a much faster job than the next window.  With the wood stove chugging happily along, the downstairs was kept pretty toasty (67 F)!  Upstairs, unheated with no furnace on, we had a small electric space heater running, which kept the temp up there above 60 F.  

 

Next came the bathroom window, which was glass brick.  What a job taking that out!  It took about an hour to smash their way through it all.  Then they had to build a frame from scratch, then finally install the new window.  That bathroom got mighty chilly!  But we now have soundproof and air leakproof windows installed in 85% of the house, along with the two new doors.  Only two windows left to replace!  Once the bathroom window was in place, the wood stove was turned off and the furnace turned back on.  I was worried about the piano going out of tune, but it held up really well!  End of home improvement segment, except for a few photos.

 

The old kitchen window, showing frost buildup whenever it got cold.  Noise and air came through as well.

 

The installer at work in the kitchen.  The other guy was outside.

 

The new kitchen window.  Air tight, no frost, and almost totally soundproof. 

 

The old glass brick did not allow for any ventilation, so we had a moisture problem in the bathroom.  It also leaked cold air quite badly.

 

New bathroom window, which can open by lifting from the bottom, but it also pulls out at a slant, too, to allow for cleaning.  We can now vent the area after a hot shower.  The frame is new, too.  Airtight and soundproof.  Thank you Centennial!!

 

On to my two movie pics for the week.  First up was our fifth or sixth viewing of Peter Weir's The Last Wave, from 1977 and showing on Criterion.  There is also a ten minute short with the director talking about the film, which we had never seen before.  The film is one of the best fantasy films ever made, and though it has flaws, it also has greatness.  The plot concerns an urban tribe of Aboriginals living in Sydney and practicing tribal ritual and tribal law.  One of the tribe breaks a law, and is killed by the others.  Richard Chamberlain, a tax lawyer, ends up defending the native men against the charge of manslaughter.  But he is more than he seems; he has the power to dream of events that will happen.  The plot is great, the music is great, the photography is great, the acting is great, and the opening scene in a rural school yard is by now a classic.  Highly recommended, even if you have seen it more than once.  It's always great!

 

Now showing on Criterion. 

 

My leaving Feb. 28th choice was called Patang (Kite), an Indian film from 2012.  A minor family drama is an excuse to show the city of Ahmedabad during its annual kite festival.  With the colourful city and thousands of kites as backdrop, the plot matters little, and is pretty inconsequential.  A man and his daughter visit the city from Delhi, where his sister-in-law lives along with his mother, and his nephew.  The latter blames his uncle for the death of his father.  The young daughter has a little fling with a local boy during their two-day visit.  The nephew befriends some street urchins and tries to look after their welfare as much as he can.  The uncle, whose brother died after he left to set up business in Delhi, has purchased a new condo for the family, but they don't want it.  That's it for the plot, except for a lot of kite flying.  An easy film to watch, there are many striking city scenes.  There seems to be a lot of people in India. 

Showing on Criterion until Feb. 28th. 

 

Back with more news as it happens. 

 

Mapman Mike

 

A Frigid Wonderland

Our intense cold spell has gotten more intense.  Yesterday and today are the coldest days so far.  It was 9 F when I went out to feed the birds at 10:30 am, though sunny and not windy.  Yesterday I went to Kingsville with Deb, in need of more bird seed.  We have been going through a lot of the stuff of late, including for several ducks who stop by after sunset each night.  I went to Lakeside Park to read.  It was so warm in the car just from sunlight that I had to open windows.  I went for a ten minute stroll and took some photos, too.  You lucky readers will get to see them in a moment.  We went out a second time last night for groceries.  We have been shopping the local stores at 8 pm lately, along with only three or four other customers.  It's a great time to go pick up food.

Lake Erie from the bluff overlooking Lakeside Park, Kingsville.  There is still open water a ways out there, by the shoreline areas are solidly frozen.  There is still some shipping going on, but always accompanied now by a coast guard ice breaker. 

 

Critter footprints on Lake Erie.

More footprints in the snow.

 

A small stream (what New Mexicans would call a river) winds through the park before emptying into Lake Erie.

Open water is becoming scarce.

 

A very chilly babbling brook.  Lakeside Park, Kingsville. 

 

In movie news, there are two films to report.  Peter Weir's Year Of Living Dangerously (1982) doesn't seem to have much of a punch anymore.  The world seems to be coming under right wing dictatorship more and more, and the leaders seem to get more and more cruel.  Taking place in the mid 1960s in Java, Mel Gibson is helped to get a big story by Billy, brilliantly played by Linda Hunt (who won an Oscar for her role).  Gibson falls in love with (a seemingly anorexic) Sigourney Weaver, and the plot thickens.  It is a good movie, and it does try to highlight the problem of starvation in a country run by a dictator.  However, it just seems to be lacking something essential.  It's aim is good, the target is worthwhile, so maybe it's lacking something in plot and execution.  Not having read the novel perhaps doesn't help my judgement.

Showing on Criterion until Jan. 31st. 

 

We also watched a creaky 1960s b & w Sherlock Holmes film starring Christopher Lee.  Filmed in Berlin and dubbed, it's still a pretty good entry, and Lee isn't bad as Holmes.  Moriarty steals an Egyptian necklace said to once have belonged to Cleopatra, and Holmes must put a stop to this nonsense.  Sherlock Holmes and The Deadly Necklace was directed by Terrance Fisher, of Hammer fame.   From 1962, it's worth catching if you can.  We found it on the Roku TV channel, which now has about 7 billion things on it I would love to watch.  With a decent Watson, a good Moriarty, and some atmospheric settings, it was worth seeing.

 

We found this 1962 feature on the Roku TV channel. 

 

Mapman Mike