The Four Things Tag

Eva did this on Coffee, Classics, and Craziness and tagged anyone who enjoys rewatching movies.  I ADORE rewatching movies, as you undoubtedly know, so... I consider myself tagged and am filling this out accordingly (with some asides to narrow down the categories a bit).

Four Jobs I’ve Had

Face-painter
Waitress
Cashier
Columnist

Four Things I Don’t (like to) Eat

Boiled potatoes
Baked potatoes
Mashed potatoes
Stewed potatoes

(My reaction to 'taters.)

Four Places I’ve Lived (since I was an adult)

Minnesota
Wisconsin
Connecticut
Virginia

Four of my Favorite Foods

Chocolate
Peanut butter
Pears
Asparagus

(From Pinterest)

Four Movies I’ve Watched More Than Once (with my best friend)

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
The Lone Ranger (2013)
Slow West (2015)
Hamlet (2011)


Four TV Shows I (am currently) Watch(ing)

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D
Leverage
Castle
F Troop

Four Things I’m Looking Forward to This Year (2018)

Publishing my next book, Dancing and Doughnuts
Visiting the Ark Encounter and Creation Museum (I hope)
Seeing my best friend again (someway, somehow)
Cleaning up the giant mess that my bedroom has become


Four Things I Can’t Live Without (besides the obvious things like water and air and food)(and not counting people or God, cuz they're not things)

Books
Movies
Yarn
Cameras


Four Places I’ve Visited (over and over)

Colonial Williamsburg, VA
Mackinac Island, MI
Charleston, SC
The Wisconsin Dells, WI

(A pic I took in Colonial Williamsburg last year.)

Four Pet Peeves (or things that annoy me, anyway)

The number of people who don't differentiate between an opinion and a fact
Lots of Alan Ladd's movies aren't available on DVD
The phrase "try and" -- it's bad grammar and ought to be "try to"
The way the big toenail on my left foot just won't go back to normal after getting ripped off like 2 years ago


Four Things I Wish I Could Do

Fence (with swords, I mean, not put up fences)
Enjoy housecleaning
Eat as much bacon as I want
Decorate really pretty cakes

(From Pinterest)

Four Subjects I Studied at School College

English
History
Literature
Creative Writing


Four Things Near Me Right Now

My Wolverine coffee mug
The Sons of Katie Elder soundtrack on CD
A box of my daughters' nail polishes
My red camera, Francis

There, I finally finished this tag!  Yay!  I hereby tag anyone who loves bacon :-9

AMA Answers #2: Elanor, Maddy, and Claire

Time for the second set of AMA answers!  Once again, there's a short vlog at the end of this post in which I answer one question from each of these participants.

And again, if you haven't had a chance to ask me questions on my AMA post, I'm accepting questions until the end of the week.

Elanor

What is something that is considered a luxury, but you don’t think you could live without?

A camera.  I mean, obviously I could live without it, but I would be really miserable without a camera to record the big and little and medium-sized moments of life.  I haven't been without a working camera of my own since I was 8 years old.

What is something you do the "old-fashioned" way?

I do a lot of things the old-fashioned way, I think.  I like to bake things from scratch when I have the time.  I crochet and knit.  I sometimes sew.  I write thank-you notes.  I give birth with the assistance of midwives and no pain-relieving drugs.  My bicycle has only one speed.  Do any of those count?

What fictional place would you want to live in?

I'd love to live in Mitford, the fictional town created by Jan Karon.  It's based on a real town: Blowing Rock, North Carolina.  Which happens to be where I spent my honeymoon.

Do you have any hobbies you enjoy? If so, what are they?

I'm definitely a hobbyist.  I crochet, I knit, I sew, I bake, I dabble in photography.  I collect things.  I blog.  I garden.  I learn songs with complicated lyrics and try to sing them really fast.

What is you favorite old (like b&w old) movie?

I can't decide if I'm going to take this to mean the oldest movie I call a favorite, or my favorite black-and-white movie.  Because they've been making color movies since the 1930s.  I'll answer this in the vlog at the end of this post.

Just because I'm curious: Did you like Fantastic Beasts better than Harry Potter? Why/why not?

I am not sure, to be honest.  I love so many of the characters and the world-building in Harry Potter.  I doubt I will ever love a character in Fantastic Beasts like I love Sirius Black.  But I like the more mature story-telling that she's got going on in Beasts.  I'm excited to see where the next movie goes.

Maddy

If you could have written any novel, which one would it have been and why?

Intriguing question!  Um, well, hmmm.  I... am not really sure!  I don't think I've ever read a novel and thought, "Wow, I wish I'd written that."  I mean, maybe I have, and I just don't remember doing that.  I know there are books that I've read and thought, "Well, I could have done a better job writing that."  Not a lot, but a few.

Okay, here's one, but it's not a novel.  I wish I'd written John Gielgud Directs Richard Burton in "Hamlet" instead of Richard L. Sterne because that would mean that I had gotten to experience being in the theater every day while they rehearsed, getting to bask in the presence of two actors I very much admire as they delved deeply into my favorite play.  That would have been amazing.

What are some of your favorite classic era films?

I'll answer this in the vlog at the bottom of the post :-)

Which is your personal favorite post that you have written here over the years?

I kind of answered this question yesterday, so today I'll say my post about the "realization and revelation" that helped me understand what makes me like and dislike stories.


Claire

You are at Elizabeth Chambers' Bird Bakery. What do you order? (And more importantly, which Armie Hammer movie do you watch afterwards? ;-)) I grew up right by Bird Bakery and have been missing it dearly lately, hence the question. :-)

I... I... I have no idea!  Bird Bakery is on my bucket list of places I want to visit one day.  I would order something chocolatey.  Unless, you know, Armie Hammer was there.  Then I'd just cower in the corner and try to keep breathing.

And then after, I'd either watch The Lone Ranger (2013) or The Man from UNCLE (2015), or possibly both.  Because I adore both of them.

What classic novel have you been putting off reading?

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy.  Cowboy read it in college, but I haven't.  Yet.

What movie has taken you by surprise and become an unexpected favorite?

Slow West (2015).  I mean, I knew it was a western, and that it had Michael Fassbender in it, but I was unprepared for the way it would creep into my brain and heart.

What is your favorite Rufus Sewell film/role?

Film would be A Knight's Tale (2001), which I have loved since I saw it in the theaters.  I had a poster of Heath Ledger from it on my dorm room wall for the rest of college.  But my favorite role of his is Autolycus in Hercules (2014).  Man, he just kills it in that film.

What is your favorite Christmastime recipe?

Answer is in the vlog below!

What's on the top of your "dream vacation" list?

Alaska.  Also New Zealand and all the LOTR film stuff there -- that's a close second.

You have just been put in charge of creating a new adaptation of Persuasion. Who do you cast?

Ioan Gruffudd as Captain Frederick Wentworth and Louise Brealy as Anne Elliot.  I really want this to happen, so if anybody knows any Hollywood producers, put a bug in their ear about it, okay?  Thanks!

What is your favorite television show episode of all time?

"The Walking Wounded" from Combat!, which I blogged about here.

What's the best movie you've seen so far this year?

I would say Logan (2017).  It's not necessarily my favorite movie of the ones I've seen this year, but it is probably just the all-around best.

THE VLOG

That's all for now!  More answers in a day or two :-)

Container Garden Update

Just a quick update to show off how my container garden is coming along.  Actually, these photos are from almost 2 weeks ago -- just didn't have a chance to take them off my camera until now.  Click here to see what it looked like in May, if you want to compare.

Everything came up except the pansies, although only a few straggly chives came up, but oh well.  I replaced the pansies with a flower I'd never seen before called purslane.  I picked the purslane up at Walmart on a whim, and it's a short-but-rangy plant with very bright flowers.

The leaves and stems are almost rubbery, so I'm guessing it comes from arid places and handles heat and drought well.  Considering the heat index here is supposed to be over 100 today and for the next 4 days, I'm glad to have something that will survive!

Here's how big my lavender is getting:

And look at my lemon basil!  I used some of it for the first time the other night, with some fish I baked for supper.

Here's that center pot with lantana and calibrachoas.  This is before it got hot last week -- I'm so glad I took pictures when I did, because this may well have been the most glorious the calibrachoas will get.  They've gotten pretty bedraggled the last few days, and I'm sure the continual heat will not improve them.  But the lantana is going strong still!

My dad unexpectedly gave me a really nice camera last month, and I tried out some of the fun features on it for the first time the other day.  Like this one, which lets you turn everything black-and-white except for one color:

Not sure how it happened, it being a new camera and all, but my picture size got switched to square for a while, until I noticed and switched it back.  That's why a bunch of these are square, not rectangular.  I named my new camera Diego because I was reading The Mark of Zorro when my dad gave the camera to me.  It's black, Zorro wears a lot of black, and I really love the name Diego, so it fit nicely.  But don't worry, I'm not abandoning Francis!  I still love my pocket-sized red camera too, and use it more still, to tell the truth.  Diego gets used when I have time to play and experiment a little, or want to take super-good photos.  But Francis is perfect to grab and take along to a museum or playground, or just snap a quick shot of the kids being cute.

Anyway, one more shot of the whole container garden from a different angle:

Some of the nasturtiums have started flowering since I took these, and I just saw my first marigold opening yesterday, all of which add more color and variety.

And, because I was playing with Diego's zoom lens (okay, that sounded wrong), here's a shot I took of one of our little bunny visitors:

We see these almost every day throughout the spring and summer.  This is one of the adults, but on Sunday we saw a teensy baby hop out from under our deck and nibble some clover oh-so-close to our house.  It was so small I could have held it in one hand -- just adorable!  I've read that bunnies like to roll in lavender, so if I can get mine going really well, I'll find somewhere in the yard to plant it so I can share it with them.  And then we'll have lavender-scented wild rabbits!  What's not to love?

Francis, Daffodils, and The Garden

So... I've named my new camera Francis.  After Bruce Willis' character in Red.  Yeah.  Hee.

Anyway, I got it earlier this week, and have been having a blast trying out all the new settings!  I'm so happy that my daffodils bloomed later than everyone else's, because they're still lovely and I got to take all kinds of pictures of them.  They're my first daffodils of my very own, which is so exciting to me because they're my favorite flower.  So here are a few of the photos I've taken of them this week, using some of Francis' settings:

See the nifty effects I get to play with?  That one with the shadows in the corners is called "toy camera," and so far it's my favorite.  This last photo shows where the daffodils are in relation to the front of the house.  This fall, I plan to plant more so they totally encircle that tree instead of just being around the front half.

Here's what else we've been doing outside:  building a garden!

We decided to try a Square Foot Garden this year, since it uses all new dirt.  Last year, our  garden failed abysmally.  Cowboy planted a peach tree in the middle of our old garden, and clover all around it:

There you can see how the tree and garden are up on the hill behind our house.  We planted clover around the peach tree because the two are supposed to grow well together, and because bunnies like clover and we have bunnies.  They and the deer are why we have the fence around our garden.  Cowboy just finished putting up the fence today, and I'll be planting peas later this week.  He built our box a couple weeks ago, and filled it with dirt earlier this month.  Doesn't it look like it'll be fun to plant in?

So anyway, I have lots more photos of flowers on our property, but I'll post them some other time.  For now, I'll just say that so far, there's only one thing Francis isn't very good at taking clear pictures of:  little boys riding big-wheels :-D

A Loss

My camera died :-(  The one I named Haldir, that I got from Deborah Koren back when Dano was still in utero.  It's almost six years old, seen a great deal of use, and taken thousands upon thousands of pictures, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  Just sad.  He died right in the middle of a trip to DC with some visiting family members, and already I've missed a bunch of photo-taking opportunities, though I've been trying to capture things on my video camera (Yakima) than usual to make up for the lack.  I'm almost tempted to pull out one of my 35mm cameras (Gabriel, Marlowe, and my trusty Kodak) just to fill in the void, and may end up doing so.  Been a long time since I took one of them on an adventure, and I really want to get some shots of my daffodils that are blooming for the first time!

But anyway, thanks to a generous birthday gift from my dad, I've ordered a new camera.  It should look like this:

It's the Canon PowerShot A3400, and I don't know about you, but given the color and the fact that it has an A in its model number, I'm thinking it needs a very Asgardian name.  But I'll wait to decide until I actually get it :-)

I got another new camera :-D This could become an addiction. Who am I kidding -- it's already an addiction. Anyway, this one is a Canon Powershot SD1000. My very first digital camera! If you don't count the DVD camera we got on vacation, but I haven't taken still photos with that, just movies.

Anyway, this camera is a gift from DKoren so I can keep her supplied with pics of Gumdrop once he arrives. I'm sure his grandparents will appreciate that as well :-)

I haven't actually gotten to play with my new camera yet, because I'm really tired these days -- I tend to nap or sleep in before I go to work, and then when I get home in the mornings I'm so wiped I just lie on the couch until Cowboy has supper finished (yes, he is the bestest husband ever!). But I'm off work tonight and tomorrow, so I plan to spend some significant time playing with the camera now.

I haven't actually named it yet -- I can't decide between 'Elrond,' 'Haldir,' and 'Glorfindel.' You see, this camera is a Digital ELPH, and those are my three favorite elves from The Lord of the Rings. Elrond is by far the coolest elf ever (IMHO), but I'm really fond of Haldir in the movies. Glorfindel is highly awesome in the books and I wish he hadn't been cut out of the movies. So I can't decide -- anyone have any thoughts or advice?

Oh, and I haven't named the dvd camera yet either, though I'm kind of thinking about 'Yakima,' after Yakima Canutt, who was a dear friend of John Wayne, an innovative stunt man, and assistant director/second unit director of some of my favorite movies ever (Ben-Hur, The Swiss Family Robinson, Where Eagles Dare, etc).

So yeah, now I have two 35mm SLRs, one 35mm point-and-shoot, one DVD camera, and one digital point-and-shoot. Holy camera collection, Batman, huh? :-D

I've had about sixteen ideas for blog posts in the past three or four days. I can't remember a single one of them. Obviously they weren't very interesting after all.

So I think I'll write about the reasons I don't have a digital camera.

First of all, I am occasionally a tightwad, and when I have 3 perfectly good (okay, 2 perfectly good and 1 that died, mysteriously ressurected itself, and cannot be trusted not to die again) cameras already, why would I buy another one? Yes, it might be cool to upload pictures onto my computer and send them to family and friends instantly. But I don't have kids yet, so I'd be sending them pictures of what? Cowboy and myself cooking supper? Woooo, that's exciting.

Second, I like not knowing instantly if a picture I took will turn out or not. There's that tinge of mystery, the suspense of wondering if I've gotten a brilliant shot of that old ramshackle barn. The anticipation when I drop the film off at my one-hour photo developer, and have to wait to pick them up. Or, back when I was actually the one working in the photo lab, the joy of feeding little cartridges of rolled-up secrets into the developer and having them come out as long curly strips of memories, then sliding them into the printer and watching them turn into tangible images.

Also, taking pictures with a digital camera takes away some of the magic, some of the art and spontenaity. How often haven't people I know taken a picture with their digital camera, looked at it, then said, "Uh-oh, we need to reshoot that, so-and-so blinked." And they end up taking nineteen more shots, by which point most non-camera-lovers want to strangle them. With real film, you take two shots, and pray one of them turns out.

Third, I love the noises my 35mm cameras make. It's like my attachment to my old computer keyboard. I have this ancient keyboard that came with my parents' first computer, a 386 or something. It makes lots of noise. When I type, it clicks, kind of like a typewriter actually (I remind myself of "that nut that's in love with his typewriter" from You've Got Mail sometimes). This keyboard doesn't make the swanky swooshy noises of modern keyboards...it clacks and clicks and taps. If I type fast enough, it almost sounds like percussive music. It's so old I had to get an adapter to hook it up to my newer computers, but I refuse to replace it until it dies. Anyway...back to cameras....

My Kodak PaS (Point and Shoot) makes a particular winding noise that is like an old friend clearing their throat when they just wake up in the morning. I've had that camera since I was about 11--it's just a cheap thing my parents got me for Christmas, to replace an earlier even-more-elcheapo camera that went kaput (sometime I'll tell you about the related Sault Ste. Marie Camera Tragedy). I've dropped it, sat on it, taken it to Ukraine where it got fogged upon...I don't even remember how it got the scar on its lens cover. But this little junky Kodak PaS takes lovely photos with really devine colors. And I can load it with my eyes closed. And it makes that winding noise.

Gabriel, my first SLR (Single Lens Reflex), is the one that died back when I first started this blog. Then when we moved here, he magically came back to life. He makes cool noises too, especially when he focuses for me--it's a zeeeeeet zeeeeeeeet sound, and then he chirps when he's satisfied with the focus. When the shutter closes, it makes a satisfying chuh-chuh-chkkkkk.

But the coolest-sounding camera I have is Marlowe, my Chinon SLR I picked up at a pawn shop when I thought Gabriel was no more. He's fully manual, which means I have to do all the focusing myself, and also that its easier to control his aperture and shutter speed, at least for me. He makes that fantastic loud chk-CHK noise that I always associate with "real" photographers. Also, he smells like old mechanical things.

Digital cameras are too sleek for me, too stylized. They're an accessory, not a tool. It's like stilletto heels versus sneakers. The mystery and enchantment of wondering what that shot you just took will really look like--that's gone. And it's too simple to manipulate digital photos. Sure, you can center things, crop out unwanted intruders, fix red demon eyes...and what else? Fix your hair? Shed a few photo pounds? Whiten your smile? The possibility to lose truth is just too great for me.

This is not meant as a slam on any of my friends or family members who own digital cameras. I love the pictures I get of my neice and nephew, of my friends's kids, etc. This is just an explanation of why I do not personally at this time own a digital camera. Who knows? I may get one in the future. I've been known to change my mind, after all...

Well, after an absence of...I don't want to think how long it's been since I blogged. I actually didn't think this thing would still be around. But my friend MB set up her own online journal recently (http://maribel.easyjournal.com), and suddenly I've gotten the urge to resume blogging.

I have three sad things to say.

My darling dog Westley is dead.
They canceled Angel.
Creed has disbanded.

It has been kind of a depressing year, now and then. Other than the above 3 horrid occurances, life has been good though. We're in WI now, not MN. We live near my Cowboy's family, so that's kinda cool, we get to hang with them a lot. Good thing we all get along fairly well, eh?

I have a lot more to say, and I hope I'll get around to saying it. Oh, I named my new camera 'Marlowe' after Raymond Chandler's gumshoe Philip Marlowe. That's really old news, but it fits with the last post I left oh so long ago...

:-( :-( :-( Gabriel is dead. His DC converter and winding mechanism both broke, and would need to be replaced to the tune of $127. I love Gabriel, but I only paid $200 for him in the first place, so I told them to just ship the body home. I hope they got that roll of film out.

But I got a new camera :-) It's by some non-big-name-brand company, but it's fully manual, which I like because I get to mess with more stuff. It looks about 10 years old, and I picked it up at a pawn shop this weekend for $75. It's in nice condition, no lense scratches or anything. I can't wait to try it out! You won't believe how often I wanted to shoot stuff while I was good-camera-less...

So yes, I mourn Gabriel's demise. But now I get to name my new camera. I haven't decided on anything for sure yet. Clark? Edward? Liam? Hmmmm...

Feel free to laugh at me.

For the last couple weeks my sinuses have been acting up, as they usually do in the fall. But this year I experienced something that doesn't usually accompany my allergies: a peculiar ringing in my ears. My ears rang most of the time, just a little, but enough to be annoying, for about three days. And then they would pretty much only ring while I was at work. And this second ringing was a very intermittent, high-pitched ringing that would last for 2-20 seconds, and then go away for a minute or so, only to start up again. And today I figured out what it was: the new printer that sits about 10 feet away from me. Every time it prints (and that is quite often in a paper-oriented place like this), it makes this high-pitched electronic whistle, that when muffled by the headphones I usually wear, sounds like a ringing in my ears.

At least I know I'm not going either deaf or mad.

On another happy note (so many for a Monday!), I took Gabriel to the camera shop down the hill this weekend, and for $20 they'll have an answer and an estimate for me in 10-14 days. Hooray! So superb compared to the $120, 6-8 weeks offer from the place in the mall!

So I was looking forward to taking Friday off even though L&B aren't having their wedding this weekend after all. I'd requested the day off and gotten in approved, and figured I'd just have a day off all to myself. Hah! I just did the math and realized that with those 8 hours gone, the overtime I've been doing this week wouldn't be overtime at all, and all in all taking Friday off would cost us $75. Like we can afford that! Especially since we're getting health insurance now, and Gabriel is sick (although Dad offered to help with the cost of fixing him), and we have to start paying back my student loans in November. So no special day off for me.

On the bright side, my friends and I are going shopping on Saturday to a Christmas store and other random places, so that should be fun. Even though I don't plan to spend much (I've got a twenty I'll take along, and when that's gone, no more spending for me), I do want to get some Christmas decorations for our first Christmas together (well, first Christmas as a married couple, we've spent 2 other Christmases together with our families). I love Christmas! My husband laughs at me, but I do! I can't help being in a Christmas mood already! I started shopping for it in May! And I'm almost done with the presents I'm making for 4 of my best friends.

And in really groovy news, I wrote to The Homeless Guy and told him how much I appreciate the things he's saying with his blog (thehomelessguy.blogspot.com), and he wrote me back!

Poor Gabriel. Took him to the camera place in the mall yesterday, and they said I'd have to pay $120 to get him sent off to a repair shop. So I guess I'll have to try the place down the hill. I wish I just knew what's wrong with him, but so far no one has been able to tell me.

And Angel was depressing last night.

And it's a very Monday-ish Monday. We have 20+ new people here at work that all got trained over the weekend. It's their first day on the job, and they're all confused, making work very hectic for the rest of us.

Lots of reasons to brood.

At least the sugar cookies I made last night were good. And I got material yesterday--2 yards at $3 each--to make myself a new sarong.

"Another wet day, another wet town." --Kirby, in some random episode of Combat! (possibly "The Little Jewel" or "The Party"?).

This morning, instead of being greeted by friendly snow, I was treated to a dribbly rain. October is confusing.

Today my Dad sent me this message, which beautifully puts into words what I have been trying to explain to my husband about cameras:

> I am extremely saddened to hear about your camera.
> Being a camera man
> myself, I know how important a camera is.
> Pictures are irreplaceable and
> so are the moments they catch. Few people realize
> this, but those of us
> who do must stick together, lest we be tempted to
> not take pictures.

I have this great urge to preserve things. This is why I journal and blog: to preserve the memories of what my life has been. This is also why I take photos. I know that my mental memories fade, but when I look at a photo of some occasion, the memories revive and I can remember my past better. The same happens when I read back over some of my old journals. I remember how I'd been feeling, what I'd been thinking, what little trials and joys I was experiencing at the time. And then one day I can pass all that down to future generations. Because I love learning about the past, I feel I must preserve the present.

Maybe this can somehow help explain why I'm so upset about my darling camera Gabriel being sick. I'm not just some fluffy, airheaded moron who is sad because she has a broken toy, you know.

Gosh, my very own blog. A spot for me to randomly rant about any and all subjects at any and all hours of the day or night. Kinda scary to think that other people might be reading this. Probably they will be, because I'm sure I'll end up giving people my address. So if you're a friend of mine, Hi! If you're a random stranger, Hi! to you too.

Gabriel is sick. I'm quite worried about him. Especially since I don't think my sales receipt for him exists anymore. (Gabriel is my pet camera). I paid too much for him to just let him sit in his case and rot the way I did to the stupid $80 Minolta. Why is it that my trusty old Kodak works even after being lugged around and dropped and sat on and heaven knows what else for 10 years, and when I get a really great camera, it kaputs in 14 months? Ugh. Really, I'm too depressed to write any more. To think of my darling Gabriel sitting lifeless in his little nylon nest when I should be capturing all sorts of things with him...not to mention retrieving the 20 pictures from that graveyard photo shoot...

Technology depresses me.

I need more caffeine.