I’ve posted this video before but every once in a while I need to escape into some music and reset my center. There’s rarely a song that comes out these days that grabs my attention, but this track, released in 2013, nearly moves me to tears. Nostalgia? Perhaps. But it’s also a solid tune with amazing vocals.
Here’s Gary Barlow (from Take That) and Agentha Fältskog (from ABBA) with “I Should Have Followed You Home” from 2013.
Earl and I went to our local “Movie Tavern” over the weekend to see “Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2”. The movie was enjoyable and we are looking forward to the next Guardians of the Galaxy cinematic adventure.
Movie Tavern is one of those newfangled movie theaters where everyone has a BarcaLounger, a full service menu is offered and service staff can come and go at any time during the movie, all by request of a low-lit blue button mounted on the tray on the BarcaLounger. The tickets cost a little more and we often make reservations online so that we know where we are going to sit before we get there. For this particular outing we were in the middle of the theatre, three rows from top. Earl sat to my right.
As we were getting settled into the BarcaLoungers and perusing over the menus, we noticed a family coming in to sit to our right. They were dressed in what I would call “grubby Gypsy” clothes. Mom had a lot of afghans and shawls over her skirt. An older gentleman had a scruffy beard, thick glasses and a very dirty baseball cap to go with his grubby clothes. There were a few others in mismatched attire from the mid 1970s Sears Wishbook. Immediately to Earl’s right was a younger girl with long hair who played on her phone every moment prior to any action on the screen. The aforementioned mother was content knitting.
During the previews Earl moved his cup of soda from the cup holder and put it on my tray. Wild movement caught my eye; it seemed that the woman next to him was whipping her hair all over the place. She wasn’t in time with any sort of music. It took me a few moments to realize that she was having a seizure of some sort.
I asked Earl if she was alright. He answered to the affirmative but then answered to the negative when I asked if he wanted to switch seats. The mother in afghans just continued to knit and the man with the ball cap slurped on his drink. Apparently this young lady’s seizure was no big deal.
The thing is, every time there was a bright flash during the movie she went into another seizure. When you’re watching “Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2”, there’s a few space battle scenes and every time a laser was fired or a torpedo was launched with great cinematic fanfare, this young woman started flailing in a seizure. Her hair whipped back and forth, her hands went in the air and she thrashed about like she was dancing some she-nay-nay. I didn’t feel bad for her as she clearly wanted to be there, but I felt bad for Earl because he was getting whipped with her long hair from time to time. I was worried that she was going to flip the BarcaLounger, or the food on her table and it was going to end up on Earl’s lap or something.
I firmly believe that anyone, regardless of mental, emotional or medical capability, has the right to enjoy the entertainment of their choice as long as it’s not hurting anyone and aside from Earl getting hair in his cup and his “space” from time to time, this young lady wasn’t hurting anyone during her seizures. However, I couldn’t help but wonder why the rest of the family didn’t locate her in the middle of their entourage, for her safety and for the safety of the other patrons around her. What if the intensity of her seizure had increased during the movie? What if she fell out of her chair?
I shared my BarcaLounger tray with Earl and we survived the ordeal. The seizures continued right up until the last space battle scene. When the credits rolled, the customer in question screamed “I am Groot!” every time the words were seen in the credits. Maybe she thought she was Groot.
I guess I was a little stunned by the family’s lack of consideration for others but again, I’ve never been in their shoes so maybe I would have had the same nonchalant attitude that they had.
I know that I wouldn’t have been knitting.
Even though it’s only Monday, I’m exhausted by the news coming out of Washington, D.C. this evening. As a distraction, let’s listen to Alisha sing “Into My Secret” in 1987.
https://youtu.be/2TC-SiAndUs
So Earl and I are avid viewers of “Shark Tank”. I’ve always been partial to episodes that include Barbara Corcoran as one of the sharks (I like the way she thinks, she’s way outside of the box and that’s awesome) and last night we caught up on the season finale off the DVR.
Some of the products pitched on the show get my attention and last night one of the pitches was for Rocketbook, specifically the Rocketbook Wave.
Photo from monstersandcritics.com
The Rocketbook Wave is a notebook designed to be reusable. Using a Pilot Flexion pen, you take notes like you would in any regular notebook. Using a free app on your iPhone, you can then instantly transfer those notes to the cloud service of your choice. It’s a “system” and it’s a well thought out system at that. When you’re done, you then microwave the notebook and all of the pages are erased. You can then use the notebook over again.
That’s pretty nifty.
Here’s a video explaining it.
I am always torn between writing my notes in a notebook, because writing things down by hand helps me remember things and keeping all of my notes digitally. I don’t like wasting paper and I don’t like having to refer back to notebooks. I’ve tried writing notes by hand on my iPad Pro using an Apple Pencil, but it doesn’t feel natural to me and this “artificial pen and paper” distracts from the task of writing something down to remember it. So naturally I went ahead and ordered a Rocketbook Wave directly from their website.
If you use this link to get to their website, you’ll get a special deal.
I’m looking forward to my Rocketbook Wave and pen set arriving in the next few days. I’ll be posting a follow-up blog entry to let you know how successful I am with this note taking system that is ecologically friendly.
Now, my only question is, where do I get Jake’s sunglasses? They are very Pretinama.
In 1957 or 58 my grandfather moved his family out of their farm house and into the first floor of one of the three barns on their property. The floor had been renovated so that it was a decent living space. He then ripped the old farm house down and built a new home. The new house was designed by a man that owed the family business money. The custom design, which underwent one revision when my grandmother provided input on the kitchen, came to fruition and I believe my grandparents moved the family out of the barn and into the new house in 1959. The house was decidedly what we call “Mid Century Modern” today, with pocket doors, a judicious use of slate and brick on the interior and a large basement that had its own fireplace and large windows.
My fascination with Mid Century Modern began with this four bedroom, three and a half bath house that my grandparents called home for nearly 50 years. I struggle with seeing it in the somewhat run down state it’s in today; the guy that purchased the home from my grandfather’s estate using it as a camp of sorts.
I like to remember it in all its glory.
More of us should be like Samantha Bee. Speak out, don’t mince words and call the farce and chaos for what it is.
As a Mac boy I’m always looking for exciting ways to trick out my macOS experience and be super geeky. Quinn Nelson @SnazzyQ (Twitter), who produces excellent, information tech videos, has some super cool tricks for macOS in his latest video.
Have fun!
This is Rexie. I’ve never met Rexie in person, but he seems like a good sort and he’s famous on the Internet. Looking at pictures of Rexie today kept me fairly grounded.
Tonight Earl and I also visited the local PetSmart store just to see the cats looking for a home. There were a few there and they seemed content. It was nap time for many.
My day was a whirlwind: the progress on the condo in Chicago came to a screeching halt due to some issues on the seller’s behalf and we were notified that there is going to be some budget belt-tightening at work. These two nuggets of news hit within a half hour of each other.
So I looked at a picture or two of Rexie and pictures of cats that have shared their lives with us over the years.
Purrfect.
Well this made my night.
Earl and I thoroughly enjoyed the latest episode of “Madam Secretary”, entitled “The Seventh Floor”. The tempo of this episode was different than previous episodes in that the focus was on Secretary McCord (Téa Leoni) and her staff. There was a great deal of character development of the staff and the entire episode had a “The West Wing” feel to it. The show has always done well with character development but the focus has been on the McCord family. Nothing wrong with that, but it was awesome to see the fleshing out of the supporting characters in Secretary McCord’s office.
This show is worth watching. It’s intelligent, it’s thoughtful and it “feels like real life”. If you haven’t seen “Madam Secretary” yet, please look it up on your favorite streaming service. It’s well worth it.
Oh, and I freely admit that I have a little straight crush on Téa Leoni.
Just a guy with a husband. We’ve been together 28 years and he still makes me see fireworks on a daily basis. Hiker. Storm Chaser. Private Pilot. Tech Guy. Hackerish.
Weird? Eccentric!
