"Monuments Men" (2014) -- Initial Thoughts

I didn't know they made movies like this anymore!  Seriously, this could have been made in the '60s, back when they were making The Guns of Navaronne and The Dirty Dozen and Where Eagles Dare.  Like those classic WWII movies, Monuments Men is unabashedly heroic.  There's none of the moral uncertainty or post-modernist hand-wringing that plagues many recent war movies.  And I think perhaps that's why this movie was not beloved of the critics.  It does not feel like a modern war movie.  In fact, it's something of an anachronism -- a quiet, gentle movie in many ways, but still a war movie too.  No wonder the critics disliked it -- it's not exactly like every other movie being made right now!

And the characters.  So many nice people, these characters!  I liked them all, definitely want to be friends with most of them :-)  Also, some of them reminded me a lot of characters from Combat!, which definitely added to my enjoyment.  Frank Stokes (George Clooney) had that debonair officer thing going on, just like Lt. Hanley (Rick Jason).  Jean Claude Clermont (Jean Dujardin) was the jaunty, charming, French-speaking outsider, quite like Caje (Pierre Jalbert).  Walter Garfield (John Goodman) was the round guy who likes to cheer others up, rather like Braddock (Shecky Greene).  In fact, the movie as a whole would have worked pretty well as a Combat! episode, a two-parter like "The Long Way Home."  In fact, I was reminded several times of one C! ep in particular, "Heritage," which guest-starred Charles Bronson and involved the squad finding a bunch of stolen artwork hidden in a cave.  I'm guessing that ep was inspired by the events this movie portrays.

Because this is based on a true story, you know, of soldiers trying to rescue artwork from the Nazis.  The movie poses the question of whether or not a "priceless" painting or statue is worth a person's life, and it kind of leaves it up to the viewer to decide, though it's pretty plain what the filmmakers think.

Damon as Granger

My favorite character was absolutely James Granger, and not just cuz he was played by Matt Damon, though that did factor in a great deal :-)  He's kind, sensible, helpful, nice -- exactly what I like in a character.  (SPOILER!) Granger is a married man, and he gets to know this French woman, Claire (Cate Blanchett), and she makes it plain she'd like to sleep with him without saying it in so many words, and he turns her down, remaining very gentlemanly but firm.  (END SPOILER)

Is this movie family friendly?  More than most modern movies!  There's a fair amount of cussing, on par with a late-60s-or-early-70s war movie, and a woman very obliquely asks a man to sleep with her, but it's all implied, nothing stated in so many words.

I Made Jam! Maybe.

I've never made jam before.  Ever.  I've never canned anything by myself either, though I helped my mom can things when I was a kid.  But this is fridge canning, not "actual" canning, so this kinda doesn't count, I don't think.  But I did make jam.  At least, I hope it's jam.

Okay, let me back up.  Our first spring here at Tir Asleen, we discovered that the tree right in front of our house is magnificent.  It's a cherry-plum tree, which means it produces gorgeous flowers.

And then it produces fruit which are technically plums, but they're the size of cherries.  And very tart.  I like tart things.  So that first spring, I said, "I will make jam from these some day!"  But I had a little baby at the time, and couldn't find the time to even harvest the cherry-plums.

The next spring, which was last spring, we didn't get much rain, and our tree didn't flower a lot.  Didn't produce much fruit either.  So again, no harvesting.  I began to despair of ever enjoying more than the occasional tart morsel from that tree.

But this year, we got lots of blossoms, lots of fruit!  So the kids and I picked cherry-plums for a couple of hours one morning, and I would guesstimate we picked about 12 cups of them.  Maybe closer to 14.  We filled a whole gallon Ziploc bag and then started in on another.  And finally, finally my dream of jam could become a reality!

I found this recipe and set off on my jam-making adventure.  It took me two hours of steady work, plus the help of one small mouse who helped me remove stems before cooking, but I turned those cherry-plums above into the seven jars of jam below.

They're still cooling, and then I'll have to put them in the fridge until they're thoroughly cold, but it looks like jam to me!  Woo!

Also, I made Cherry-Plum and Blackberry Cobbler yesterday.  You can find the recipe here on my recipe blog.

Cobbler?  More like Gobbler, the way my kids attacked it.

Happy (belated) Birthday, John Wayne!

I missed posting about his birthday yesterday!  How could I?  (Okay, sure, I'd just gotten home from 2 weeks at my parents' house, I was madly unpacking and doing laundry and taking kids to swimming lessons... but that's no excuse.)

So, happy birthday one day late to my favorite actor of all time, not to mention a personal hero of mine.

This kind of sums up my attitude today.

And if punching you doesn't work, I'll hit you with this pool cue!

Or maybe I'll just fix your hat for you.  (That's Ricky Nelson, in case you didn't know.)

2014 Container Garden

Here it is!  My container garden for the year.  I thought I'd posted about this last year too, but I guess not.  I love growing things, but the soil around here is so poor you can't just plant things in the ground and expect them to grow.  You have to enrich the soil and stuff.  I miss the Midwest!  No wonder all the pioneers were in such raptures when they got Iowa.  Such wonderful, instantly-ready-to-grow-things dirt.  But anyway, we've solved the issue by building a raised bed garden for our veggies, and putting a container garden on our deck so I can grow flowers.  Actually, I have daffodils and hyacinths and other things growing in the ground too, but annuals and veggies don't seem to thrive without a lot of crazy stuff done to the soil first.

I actually planted this a couple weeks ago, but just didn't get a chance to post about it until now.  These pics were taken the day I planted everything, hence all the dirt and water everywhere.  In the leftmost pot, I have lavender.  I've tried growing lavender from seeds for two years and failed miserably, so this year I bought a plant and we'll see if that works better.

This is a closeup of the lavender pot.  It's just a terra cotta pot that I painted with these wonderful "patio paints" I found at the craft store.  They dry quickly and don't wash off!  Very fun. 

I got these amazing stackable pots new this spring!  They were originally $60 for a set of three layers like this, which I thought was a bit exorbitant, but I got one set 50% off, and the other 60% off a week later!  Very pleased.  This set by the lavender has lemon basil on top, then chives in the middle, and dill on the bottom.  I've been growing a mint plant in a container for a couple years, and decided to try some more herbs.  We'll see what happens!

In the two pots to the right of this, I planted seeds for marigolds and nasturtiums and pansies.  Those are all edible flowers!  Going to be interesting experimenting with that this summer.

The center pot has flowers I bought from the store too -- I like to start out with some color already there in my containers so I don't have to wait all spring for things to sprout and grow and bloom.  So I put yellow lantanas and a pretty yellow-and-white striped calibrachoa hybrid in that pot.  They're so cheerful!  My lantana last year got enormous, and I'm hoping this year's does too.  The calibrachoas should spread out and drape down the sides of the container, a look I just love.

Calibrachoa "superbells" hybrid

Lantana

The two off-white containers to the right of the center are the same things as the ones to the left.  And then the brown three-layered pot on the right is totally planted with verbena seeds I harvest myself from plants I had last summer.  I've never tried harvesting my own seeds before, so I'm really excited to see how these do.

I also harvested nasturtium seeds last fall, which got planted in these three pots.  My three kids each got to paint a pot too, and I put them on this nifty little plant stand to add some levels and interest to my garden.  The six-year-old's is the highest, then the four-year-old's, then the two-year-old's.  Isn't it fun seeing the progression of painting abilities?

Last year I only had those middle five pots.  And that was wonderful -- I got such joy from the beautiful flowers that grew there all summer and into the fall.  This year, I'm really excited for all the additions!  This section of my deck is all filled up now, so I don't think my little container garden will be getting any bigger for a few years, but that's absolutely fine with me.  I'll try to post an update when plants are up and getting pretty!

Happy Birthday, Dearest Bobby!

Happy birthday to my beloved Bobby Darin!  I'm not at home right now, where my wall calendar would remind me of birthdays and such.  I thought several times today that May 14 seemed like it was important for some reason, but it wasn't until I'd crawled into bed at 11:30 that it hit me.  Bobby's birthday!  I'm sorry I almost forgot, Bobby.  I'll listen to lots of your music tomorrow to make up for it.

Playing "Happy Birthday" for himself because I forgot to.

Giving me that come-listen-to-my-music-because-I'm-going-to-melt-your-heart look.

A still from his appearance on Wagon Train, which I haven't seen yet.  But I can't resist him in a cowboy hat.  

Bobby would have been 78 today.  Sigh.

Winner! Winner!

Three cheers for Clayton, winner of the DVD giveaway!  Clayton, I've just emailed you, so as soon as I get your mailing address, I'll be sending off your copy of A Sun Also Rises.  I hope you enjoy it!

Everyone else, better luck next time :-)  I'm kind of addicted to giveaways, so I'm sure I'll hold another one before long!

My Natasha "Black Widow" Romanoff Hair