I got this DVD box quite some time ago. Been meaning to start watching it for ages! It was enjoying Swayze in Dirty Dancing that prompted the purchase! His undeniable charisma coupled with my abiding interest in the ACW meant this was a ‘shoe-in’, whatever that is!
Last night Teresa and I watched the first two episodes. Each of which is a 90 minute self contained movie. We really enjoyed it. Sure, it’s cornball, and very sentimental. But it’s durn good fun watching.
Our handsome heroes at West Point.
Swayze’s Orry, and his buddy Hazard (James Read) make for very likeable pals. And the basic premise, of the clashing of cultures and a friendship tested by the travails of love and war, is a familiar but potent vehicle for good solid drama.
I’m not going to go into any great detail here, this is just a brief note to record that I’m watching and enjoying this old but epic series. I might have more to say about it as I watch more of it.
Ding Dong! A real Southern Belle!
One thing I will note is that Lesley Anne Down is, as we said back in the 1980s, lush! And I rather warmed, bizarrely perhaps, to the villainous Bent (Philip Casnoff), esp’ when we learn that he’s the bastard ‘mistake’ of a powerful senator.
Looking forward to watching some more later today!
I discovered Theo via Vulfpeck, as I’m sure most folk do. His singing, drumming, guitar playing, and other sundry stuff, in that context, are all great. No, make that, superb.
But then I discovered his solo stuff. I’m trying to recall what it was I first heard in that line? Pop Song, perhaps? And from there I just kept digging. And, holy shit… it’s all solid gold!
A fabulous cover, and a truly great album.
I bought Modern Johnny Sings a few months ago, whilst riding a euphoric wave of Katzmania. And it’s stupidly good. But live? Theo and his seriously talented crew take it all to a whole other set of levels. It’s truly astonishing.
For an ageing somewhat jaded ornery duffer like me, having my faith in humanity restored by the righteous soul of these cats is a real tonic.
And to top it all off, the aesthetics are aligned perfectly to my, er… (adopts Alan Partridge voice) I want to say chakras!? … but I don’t go for that nonsense! What I mean to say is Theo is looking super-fly, and the whole package – from fonts to colour schemes (never mind the sounds!) – everything is just TOTALLY AWESOME!!!
Being heartily sick of feeling sick – bloated, lethargic, windy, etc. (and that’s in addition to other stuff!) – after about a week of hemming and hawing, I’ve decided to actually try the FODMAP diet.
I’ve done other exclusion diets in the past, to little or no noticeable effect. And that’s partly why I’ve so long resisted trying this one. Plus FODMAP looks harder than any of the others I’ve tried, and prohibits (at least initially*) lots of stuff I love!
But I need to do something! And FODMAP has been recommended to me before. Plus it’s alleged to be beneficial for people with my congregation of symptoms.
I had been tasked with cooking an old faithful favourite, spaghetti carbonara, tonight. But that’s full of prohibited stuff: pasta, onions, cream… (at least the way we make it!). Bummer!
So instead I’ve grilled some salmon, boiled some ‘taters, and steamed a bit of kale and spinach. No butter or mayo for me, sadly. Just salt, pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice.
Luckily this proves to be both healthy and tasty, albeit that the potatoes really could’ve done with butter or mayo! Mind, I could’ve ‘drizzled’ some olive oil over them? Next time!
* I believe you cut all the ‘bad stuff’ out, carry on for a bit to see if it’s working, and then selectively reintroduce stuff to see what causes adverse reactions. So potentially some of the verboten stuff will turn out to be ok.
I was saying on here, very recently, that in some fundamental way this blog is a kind of modern ‘cyber-journal’. A record of some of things I’ve done or am doing. And very much a way to remind myself that I exist at all!
One of the main ways of doing this we have in our contemporary society is ‘I spend, therefore I am.’ And now, with social media such a large and powerful force, I ‘tweet’ (or whatever), therefore I am. It’s a continual performance. Surely this is a form of unbridled narcissism?
Anyway, leaving such worrying thoughts aside momentarily… it’s Thursday. Thursday is a non-school/non-teaching day. Such days are usually spent on a variety of things: from pure rest (for reasons I go into elsewhere on this blog I’m often utterly exhausted), to working on home/DIY stuff, or my teaching prep and admin, etc.
Earlier today I revisited a drum score – Led Zep’s ‘Good Times Bad Times’ – because whilst teaching from it yesterday I was reminded that it has a number of errors of interpretation in it. I corrected as many of them as I felt able to without spending all day on it, and then emailed the revised score to the pupil who I’m working on it with.
That’s all to the good. And it enabled me to tick off two items on todays ‘to do list’. But that list is pretty massive. I feel little crushed by the oppressive weight of obligations. This feeling isn’t helped by physical issues: I have various headaches, my eyes are streaming, and I have post-nasal drip! Such stuff very rapidly begins to feel like it a form of chronic attritional torture!
It’s hard to be dynamic, energised, pro-active, and all that, when you feel crushed by mountains of stuff to do, and beset by physical issues that drain you of energy and vitality.
As many will know from bitter personal experience, years of anti-NHS Toryism (some of it implemented by the Labour govt’s of Blair/Brown, to their everlasting shame), are slowly but inexorably grinding the NHS to dust. Trying to see one’s GP, where I am, has become an Orwellian dystopian nightmare. And people are literally dying as a result.
I mention this because the anger that this generates is one source of harness-able energy that could motivate me to more action. But before I go down a ranting rabbit hole, back – in proper ‘age of me’ blogging style – to more personal matters!
Numerous visits to the local GP surgery – at 90% of which I see a nurse or ‘clinical practitioner’ (what is that?) – have failed to clearly unpick my numerous ongoing issues. One line of inquiry is to treat me for hay-fever. I’m taking the meds. No signs of improvement yet.
So, having got up pretty late, about 10am, after a very good nights sleep (first time in three or four nights), I did the work on the drum score in Sibelius. Then I took a break for lunch. Made myself a three egg omelette, with onion, mushrooms and cheese, with a weak coffee to wash it all down.
I’m still cogitating over whether I ought to try this FODMAP diet experiment. I think I ought to. But I’m not sure I have the discipline (or even the funds to buy the required alternative groceries!?). But my constant bloatedness and wind argues that I really really should make the effort. I’m 50, fer chrissakes, and still don’t know my body/health like I ought to!
Some other symptoms of less than ideal health are my profuse sweating, IBS style bowel movements, and – especially noticeable overnight – continually dry mouth. Reading about this stuff online, along with stuff I’ve gleaned from the treatment of my psoriasis and arthritis, suggests high blood pressure.
So once again improving diet and increasing exercise are indicated. The only real exercise I get at present is the home/DIY stuff I do. Such, for example, as the earth moving I’ve been doing recently in preparing a base for the shed Ken gave us.
I’ll take a break from this post now, to go back to some of that work!
Haven’t watched this yet. Might be dreadful!? But just before turning in for the night I discovered this, whilst randomly browsing stuff, stumbling upon it I know not how.
Sounded interesting, with a long and troubled production. Never actually really officially finished. Indeed, this video is the work of a fan, who’s attempted to ‘finish the job’ in the style intended by its creator.
In recent years I’ve started to experience what might be IBS: one moment constipated, the next suffering from diarrhoea. Not much fun!
I have a whole range of issues, health wise. The chief of which are psoriasis and psoriatic arthropophy. These are, thankfully, being dealt with by meds I currently take.
But a whole constellation of other issue also plague me, from bouts of depression to total and utter physical exhaustion one moment and insomnia the next. Again, not that much fun!
And in amongst all this, as well as being a bit overweight, I definitely suffer from bloating. A recent trip to the doc’s (re)confirmed this. The guy I saw – a clinical practitioner, not a fully-fledged GP – tapped on my torso: tapping on his cupped hand on my chest produced a dull thud. On my belly? A drum like ‘thock’. ‘You’re full of gas’, he told me. A if I didn’t know!
Over the years and for varying reasons I’ve tried numerous exclusion diets. I was a veggie for many years, on ethical grounds. Having ditched that, I tried other diets to try and address the psoriasis and arthritis. Such as no dairy, avoiding certain food groups, etc.
None of that latter stuff appeared to make any difference whatsoever! Certain regimes I’ve either never ties, or only in a half-arsed way. FODMAP looks scarily hardcore. Loads of our most common foodstuffs are in the avoid category!
But, encouragingly, or at least softening the possible blow, it’s a three step process. Cut all that lovely stuff out for say a month. See if things improve. And if they do, strategically reintroduce stuff, to see what causes a return of bloating.
According to info I found on a a nutritionist’s website, FODMAP is a three step process:
The three steps are:
Elimination – In this first step, you eliminate all FODMAP carbs for several weeks. Your symptoms may improve immediately or over several weeks.
Reintroduction – In this step, you’ll introduce FODMAPs one at a time to identify which foods you can tolerate and in what amount.
Personalization – Finally, you’ll modify your diet to increase variety while adjusting the type and amount of FODMAP carbs you eat, based on what you learned in step 2.
I have a mini-military hobby blog, which I’ve more or less stopped doing. Not a plan! Just an evolution. That one actually had readers. Not many. But some.
Now I’m focused more on this here blog. And I wonder, should I (can I?) bring the other blog – AQOS, or A Question Of Scale – over to sebpalmer.com?
Actually I also had another one, on a musical axis. That’s still out there on ye inter web. But I’ve not posted to that one in even longer than I’ve not posted to the wargaming and modelling one.
And then there are the why bother?/who cares? aspects. But, for the time being at least, I find blogging a sort of therapeutic form of modern journal.
I’d like it if others read it, or found things interesting. But that’s not essential. It fulfils a purpose for me by merely existing. A kind of online notebook for me, as well as some sort of reassurance that I actually exist!
I’ve never been much of an extrovert or performer, to be honest. So in a way I’m quite happy ‘performing’ to the void!
For quite a long time now the soft-top roof on my MX5 has not closed very well. It’s apparently a common issue. There’s a rubber or plastic ‘nipple’ (!?) that wears away, allowing the latch to become floppy and loose.
I recently replaced this part, on both sides, with a new pair. Can’t recall who I ordered them from (I ought to find out; I think they’re Jass parts via BOFIracing?). But I’m pretty miffed that one of them – the dodgy one on my side – failed almost instantly.
I’ve subsequently ordered yet another one, this time as I got an individual one, not a pair. Wound up costing nearly a tenner, for a £1.95 part! Really annoying. But even more annoying. It doesn’t bleedin’ fit!
My ‘only option’, at least via MX5parts.co.uk.
I’ve contacted Autolink, who I got the more recent one from, to let them know (via email). Not had a reply as yet. I’ve also contacted MX5parts.co.uk, and they say there’s no longer a choice of two parts, but just the one:
I know that there used to be, and via some channels – e.g. Autolink – there still are, two different parts that have formerly been sold, that do this job. One is curved, the other is more ‘pointy’ (but still a bit curved).
These are the two types.
So, what do I do? Keep buying these little bits? I can’t actually afford any expenses right now. Even a tiny trickle such as this has become. Or do I modify the metal part of the latch; file it down and make the latch fit?
I might be forced to go the latter route, for purely economic reasons.
I have to confess I binge watched this entire mini-series last night. Not a terrifically wise decision, given I started watching it at about 9-10pm! I’m guessing it must have been about 5am when it finished?
I was hankering for some enjoyable adrenal-gland stimulation, that could be administered lying down. And in that respect, this new show – premiered July 1st – ticked the box.
Author and former SEAL, Jack Carr.
The story is based on a book of the same name by former Navy SEAL turned author, Jack Carr. Rather surprisingly, whilst the TV show has a Wikipedia page, Carr himself does not.
I’m not going to delve too deep into Carr’s real life or military career, nor am I going to synopsise the entire TV series. This is just going to be a fairly basic review/reaction to having just watched the entire show.
The fetishisation of macho violence is total.
I’m giving it three stars, for now. Why? Well, it was entertaining and compelling enough that I stayed up most the night to watch it. But it is also rather troubling – very worrying, frankly – in how it relates to the current rise in neo-Fascist aspects of contemporary American Conservatism, US gun culture and modern ideas of masculinity.
Jaws so square they could chisel granite.
What it highlights for me is the incredibly dangerous intersections of whole constellations of myths and reality in the psyche of the modern American right.
To highlight what I’m talking about, let’s just very lightly unpick one aspect of the story… the private contractors hired to provide security for various characters, large numbers of whom wind up as just so much cannon fodder.
This idea is quite well parodied in one of the Austin Powers movies; at one level these functionaries are really just guys doing a job, feeding their families. But here they’re no more than meat for the grinder of ‘righteous’ hatred!
Fails his family…
The attempt to have Reece as both a loving family man, as well as a war hardened super ninja, is, ultimately, as another reviewer I read elsewhere (I can’t recall where) says, really quite boneheaded.
Offing countless mercenaries to get to his targets, some of whom (the latter esp’) he brutally tortures – he’s more successful as a killer and a sadist than as a family man – just doesn’t square well with ‘nice ordinary guy’. Dude’s a freakin’ psycho!
… but excels as sadistic executioner.
Jack Carr loves his weapons, especially his guns, as you might imagine a Navy SEAL would. He hunts big game at home (mountain lion recently, I read somewhere). And he’s hunted humans too, as a sniper, whilst serving overseas.
He goes to gun shows, and gives interviews to people like Soldier of Fortune and The Federalist. The former essentially being ‘Mercernaries Monthly’, the latter a Conservative media organ that has shamelessly spouted anti-vax bollocks, and declared support for Trump’s blatant lies around the whole ‘stolen election’ fraud.
‘Lock and load’ is one thing. ‘Pray and spray’!?
In his SOF interview (read that here) he describes the story, accurately enough, as ‘a story of revenge without constraint.’ His hero Reece goes on the warpath, Stateside, to kill those – on his ‘terminal list’ – who he holds responsible for the deaths of his entire squad (mostly overseas), and his wife and daughter, once back home.
In the same SOF piece Carr expands: Reece kills ‘those involved using the tactics and techniques used by the enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan, so at another level it’s about someone abandoning the rule of law and becoming the terrorist and insurgent he’d been fighting … it’s about a veteran of the War on Terror bringing that war home.’
That sounds quite interesting as an idea. There is a chickens coming home to roost side to the ‘war on terror’ that America seems to fundamentally fail to grasp. But that potentially interesting thread is poorly served here, in the end.
The suits and their spooks, always corrupt.
The plot is further complicated by other strands in the story. I’ll refrain from spoilers. Despite these attempts to be confusingly interesting, however, the over familiar ’conspiracy from within’ trope is rather convoluted, and, frankly, veers towards the silly. But it just about serves its purpose, as a plot driver. Don’t examine anything too closely though. It bears very little scrutiny!
Ultimately this one of those recurring and popular fantasies of older right wing males: über machismo uncorked. And ultimately it’s pretty revolting. The ending being particularly dumb and horrid.
But the untethered ego of the hero survives! So… all is well, is it? Really? If I was Carr’s wife, I’d be pretty worried about his priorities and general mental health.
Black, red,white? Wasn’t there a little Austrian chap that liked this combo’?
Returning to the neo-fascist threads, these are on display everywhere, from the unctuous tattooed bodybuilder villain, to the rites of the US military itself, to Reece, part hillbilly demon, part sensitive beautiful powerful man!
There’s a toxic self-regard at the heart of this macho male military culture, in which everything and everybody else is merely an ancillary appendage to the hero’s ego. Not at all attractive, to me at any rate!
Most real world villains prob’ spend less time in gyms and salons.*
In the end it’s all just a rehash of everything from Clint Eastwood to James Bond to Rambo. The lone hero, against pretty much the entire world. Mean, moody. A hardass mo’fo’, who’ll slit you from gullet to gizzard just as readily as buy you a brew.
Clearly made with a huge budget, and pretty decently acted, albeit in a world of cartoonish simplification, I did enjoy ‘the ride’. But as a film that might have anything to leave the viewer with, after the adrenaline subsides? Pretty bleak!
Reece hangs with his bro’.
* I’m sure real-life super vain super villains like Trump spend plenty of time and money on their appearance. They just clearly do so far less successfully than some of the specimens Hollywood style casting agents clearly prefer.
There was a very faint knock on our door at about 9am this morning. I’m amazed I heard it. As I was busy drilling holes in an upstairs wall, to mount a little shelf for a DVD player, ‘neath our bedroom TV.
DVD shelf brackets up; hardboard shelf is temp’!
On going downstairs I spied a young lad with a lorry, with a crane on’t back, and six rather knackered old looking sleepers on it. It is a shame they’re B grade, in all honesty, as they have ruddy great cracks in them, splintered areas and missing chunks.
Unloading the sleepers.
But we were given them, in exchange for my help with some manual labour. So really we’re lucky to have them at all! Thanks, Ken, for helping us out.
Nearly there.
Two other jobs this morning: the above mentioned little DVD-player shelf in our bedroom, and (re)fixing – I already repaired it once – another knackered old drawer from a set of freebie (Freecycle this time, and ages ago now) chest o’mc-drawers.
The drawer in its broken state.
This set of drawers was full of my clothes till yesterday, as were two others. Leaving Teresa with just one set of drawers, and yet more clothes than me! So now we’ll have two chests each, and I’ll have mended us a drawer each in one of them as well.
The drawer fixed, the glue ‘going off’.
The heat today is ridiculous. I did some of the drawer fixing work out in the back garden. And now I’m back indoors, buck naked and sweating profusely (I think at heart I’m a naturist!). I’m going to hop in the shower and freshen up, and have a brief rest.
Another view. Note missing bits of fancy trim!*
Or should I delay the shower until after moving the sleepers? The latter would require enlisting a strong burly neighbour. I wonder… is Sean in at no. 72?
