Category: All (-ish)

Wheel! Of! Fortune!

Mom, Aunt Carol and I got to see a taping of Wheel of Fortune at the Convention Center.  It was great fun.
 

Things you should know about going to a remote taping of Wheel of Fortune:

  • The information emphatically requires no cell phones and no cameras.  If you follow their instructions and do not bring your cell phones and cameras you will be annoyed because the vast majority of people DO bring their cell phones and cameras with no consequences.
  • There is a lot of waiting around.  First there is the waiting around to get in when you are herded, cattle-like, through a switchback of a line.  However, Wheel of Fortune knows their audience and there are chairs in which to sit all along the line, for those who aren’t able to stand the whole time.  
  • For those who can’t really stand long at all, they just get to go to a holding area to wait for the rest of their party.  This brings up unfortunate images of “culling the weak ones” in my mind, but rest assured that your loved one will still be waiting when you get to the front of the line.
  • When you are herded into a seat, you may not really like your seats.  That is okay, as they will be taping multiple shows and there are a lot of people who leave after the first show is done.  Then you can get much better seats.
  • They will want you to clap a lot.  So if you try and keep up with Vanna’s clapping as the Wheel is spinning, your hands will be quite tired by the end of the session.
  • It takes a very long time to tape three 20-minute shows. The taping itself lasted about 2.5 hours and that doesn’t include waiting in line.  So get ready to settle in.

Observations gleaned from my session:

  • Pat Sajak spends very little time on stage.  When they have finished the round he immediately leaves the stage, returning just as the next round is going to begin.  There is very little schmoozing
  • Vanna is the only one on stage who knows the answer to the puzzle.
  • When Vanna walks around answering questions, 30% will be interesting questions to which I want to know the answers, 65% will be the eye-roll inducing and grammatically incorrect “Can I have a hug?” and 5% will be people wanting to take their pictures with her.
  • Vanna does not get to keep the clothing she wears.  Given that she wore three different one-piece outfits that I found a bit ugly, I see this as a blessing.  She does, however, wear her own shoes with her outfits.  She reports that she has a lot of shoes.
  • It takes eight people to move the mini-Wheel used for the final puzzle on and off the stage:  four to push/hold up cables, and four more to place a rotation of press board on the floor for the mini wheel to roll over.
  • I find the TV industry to be incredibly inefficient in the realm of labor.
  • WOF has a “remote crew” out of Florida who do all the remote tapings.  The regular crew stays back in California.
  • There is only one Wheel and it is very heavy.  Watching the crew change the wheel between segments was my favorite part.
  • The reason the contestants tend to yell out their letters in a rather obnoxious fashion is that there are two people employed to make sure the candidates can spin the wheel and they hype them up as much as possible.
  • When Pat Sajak mishears a contestant’s letter choice the stage goes dark, the contestants are ordered to turn around, there is a general murmur of discussion on the stage and then they restart the round with a brand-new puzzle.  Also, Pat Sajak will tell you that it’s the first time it has happened in the history of the show.  Don’t believe him.
  • Because contestants are not allowed to name their actual employers, when a contestant identifies hers as a “local athletic apparel manufacturer” half the audience will lean to the other half of the audience and whisper “Nike.”
  • The “kissing cam” was a hilarious part of the experience, even if I felt dumb the whole time for laughing.  This was where they would show two members of the audience framed in a heart and the couple would laugh in recognition and kiss, to the audience’s approval.  Or, they would lean over a row and down three chairs to kiss their spouse who was not the person in the frame originally, or attempt to hide their eight-year old selves as their older sister attempted to kiss them, or sit uncomfortably as their wife moves in for the kiss.  Good clean fun.
  • When the productions likes us, they give us super cool Wheel of Fortune blinky pins that are very fun to wear at school the next day.

 

 

Requiem: tank top, jewelry box, mirror, bag.

This was a great tank top which I bought at the Junior League Thrift Shop soon after I came to Portland, when that Thrift Shop was located downtown.  It moved (there’s now a vitamin store where it used to be) and eventually closed, much to my horror as it reliably had good stuff.  There was a mattress store occupying the space, but I think that’s turned over too.  I loved the stripy nature of this tank top, but I think my advancing age means I can no longer go without a bra.  And I don’t care to invest in a strapless bra just for one shirt.
 
I was 18 and off to college.  My family dropped me off at my school, but before they did we stopped to visit Aunt Fran and Uncle Stacy.  At some point in the visit, Aunt Fran offered me this jewelery box.  “I thought you might want to have some place to put your jewelry,” she told me.  I hadn’t thought of that, and I didn’t really have much jewelry, but I liked the idea and happily accepted.
 
It’s been a good jewelry box and served me well. Now it’s time for someone else to use it.
 
I can’t remember when I bought this mirror, but it was pretty significant for a stage of my life.  It might have been the stage with roommates, when you can’t spent forever in the bathroom, so some of the grooming migrates to your room.  It’s a great mirror, with standard and magnifying options.
 
I find it strange how I get attached to the oddest things.  I’ve had this bag from the Gap for over ten years.  I can even remember the two pair of jeans that the bag transported home for me.  For years, this bag has held a leotard, tights and ballet slippers.  I’ve decided to let all of the objects go.  Thanks Gap bag, for being a plastic bag in my drawer for so many years.
 

Books read in March 2012

Only three YA books of seven this month?  Not bad, not bad.  Book of note:  even if you aren’t interested in Biosphere 2, Dreaming the Biosphere is a great piece of nonfiction.  I hope to read more by Reider.

Read
Catching Fire
Suzanne Collins
Matt and I read aloud.
More great manipulation coming from every direction.  It was nice read it over a period of weeks, rather than days.
Graceling
Kristen Cashore
It took about 150 pages for me to really like it, but then WHAMMO! I was all in and various daily chores were put off.  There were a lot of similarities between the main character Katsa and a certain Katniss Everdeen from the Hunger Games, and a bit of research shows that both books were published within a month of each other in 2008.  The idea of Gracelings were quite interesting and Katsa’s struggle for freedom was meaningful.

I rarely read Goodreads reviews of a book until after I’ve written my own, but this was an exception.  I was quite surprised at the number of people who disliked the book for its purported “message.”  According to several reviewers, this book existed to warn women away from marriage, as the main character is quite adamant she will not marry, due to the fact that she does not want a man to control her.  Many women expressed they they don’t feel oppressed by their marriage and they didn’t like the author pushing the opposite of marriage upon them.  This was interesting to me, as I find people who apply their own feelings to characters in fantasy settings are kind of missing the point of fantasy novels, and, at the same time, from the view of marriage and owning women, they disregard most of human history.  They may be lucky enough to not feel oppressed in their marriages, but I’m not sure women even 40 years ago could say the same.

Galileo’s Daughter
Dava Sobel
Read for Kenton Book Club.
This book had an interesting premise (letters written to Galileo from his illegitimate daughter who became a nun) and I thought the scientist-to-nun ratio was exactly opposite of what it should be.  I was much more interested in the life of a cloistered nun, but the author has a scientific bent and not a social historian’s bent and thus, we disagreed as to what is most interesting. The politics of science and the Cathloc church were interesting and many people in book group liked this book, but I was not one of them.
Dreaming the Biosphere: The Theater of All Possiblities
Rebeccca Reider
Biosphere II loomed large in my young adulthood wonderings.  For some reason, I was fascinated by the idea of living in a completely closed space for two years with seven other people.  When the mission ended, I read that all of the participants had pledged to not share what went on while inside the Biosphere and I was disappointed I would never find out.

But “nevers” have a way of wandering off as time passes and I’ve since discovered that there are books about the Biosphere II mission written by the insiders.  This, however, is written by an outsider and tells the tale of the creation of the Biosphere, which is as fascinating a story as the Biosphere II story itself.  Recommended.

1Q84
Haruki Murakami
I’ve not read Murakami before and this was a fabulous introduction.  I loved the writing and this was one of those books that I just kept reading until I was done, which was unfortunate as it is a very long book.  It came in handy for days spent in airports, though.  I loved every minute of the story.  Until I was done.  Upon finishing the 925th and final page, I felt a bit cheated.  “I just read almost one thousand pages for that story?” I wondered to myself.  Still, the great prose made this a good experience, even if the I felt sold short by the ending. Also, there’s a lot of sex.  A lot.  I find this interesting as most novels just briefly describe the encounter or sort of brush by it in the style of movies from the 1950s.  Do all his novels have so much sex in them?  Either way, I’ll read more by Murakami.  Who has recommendations for what to read next?
Make the Bread, Buy the Butter
Jennifer Reese
I have never referred to a cookbook as “hilarious” before, but this was that.  I think I found the book funny because Reese seems to have a very familiar style of cooking, that is, getting a bit overwhelmed in her projects.  So if you lean in that direction, you might enjoy this book just for reading.  There was also a great essay about her mother’s dislike of cooking that pulled a few heartstrings. Also, aside from good reading, I loved the recipes.  The book came from the library and I started to mark recipes to copy before returning.  After about the first five I realized I should just buy the book.  So I did.  I’ve already made: bread, bagels(!) cream cheese, almond butter, yogurt and ginger ale.
Fire
Kristin Cashore
Officially called a “companion book” to Graceling this went in an entirely different direction much to my relief as the person who I thought was the main character tortured animals and that is one of the few things I cannot read about in books.  Happily, after an introductory paragraph he was not seen again until the end of the book.  Here we have another strong woman character, lots of battles, intrigue and perhaps a bit of romance?  Sounds good to me.  I will be interested to see if the next book ties the two companion books together.

Note:  I just checked out some reviews and again with the hating on Cashore’s “anti-marriage, pro-casual-sex views.”  Who ARE these people?  Not everyone’s so into marriage and most people I know are pro-casual-sex.  Neither position means the other one is bad. Also, is it just being called casual sex because the characters are not married?  They are in exclusive relationships.  Is this book such a threat because it’s written for teenage girls?  I’m beginning to wonder if this author popped up on some list: “Read this anti-marriage, pro-casual-sex author and say bad things about her.”

Requiem: 3 shirts

A coworker at Bread and Circus gave this to me for my birthday one year.  At the time, I was wearing army pants with inserts of plaid down the side seams (it was the late 90s.) She thought this shirt would go nicely with those pants.  I disagreed (too much army in one place for an unenlisted person) but I wore the heck out of this shirt. It’s pretty threadbare.  I also used to often wear it without a bra.  (See above about late 90s)
 
When I lived in Somerville, a thrift store opened and I found this shirt there.  I loved it because the 1984 games were the first Olympics I remembered.  I probably would have had memories of the 1980 games, but there was that pesky boycott.  I think the thrift store was supporting a charity that turned out not to be so charitable and that’s why I can’t find the thrift store in the quick internet search I did.  I used to exercise in this, pairing it with men’s boxer briefs.  Again, it was the late 90s.
 
I believe this was my first eBay purchase.  At the time, I was really interested in bicycle touring and I bought this shirt for something like $4.00.  It was a great deal and a great biking shirt.  However, I haven’t worn it in years.  So it’s off to the Goodwill to make someone else happy.  Knowing the Goodwill’s pricing structure, the happy recipient will most likely pay more than $4.00.
 

Three sentence movie reviews: Tom, Dick and Harry

A “zany comedy” recommended by the library’s blog, this was a bit slow (as befitting a movie made 70 years ago) and I enjoyed Ginger Roger’s slightly dingy main character.  Having only seen her with Fred Astaire, I was intrigued to see her on her own.  I wasn’t happy with the ending, but a movie that is about three generations out of my own expereince isn’t probably going to have the same idea of “happy ending” as I do.

p.s.  Warner Archive.  It’s nice that you’ve re-released this and all, but could you at the very least fix the wild fluctuation in sound?  And maybe those of our hearing-impaired friends would like the movie. If only there was some closed captioning.  How much would that have cost, really?

Three sentence movie reviews: The Incredible Hulk

I liked Edward Norton as Bruce Banner, it worked for me though I know others were not so happy with his performance.  I can never decide if Liv Tyler is a good actress or if I just like her so much I’m happy to watch her no matter her acting ability.  Overall, not a bad way to spend an evening.

Nice poster.

Essay: When the USPS works faster than the internet or the phone.

On Saturday morning, I tried to stop my paper before I went on vacation.  An hour later, I was furiously typing the letter below.
Dear Oregonian Reader Services,
I am going away for a few days and would like to stop my paper. This used to be a matter of dialing the number in the paper, talking to a very nice person and telling them the dates I wished to stop my newspaper subscription. Then it became an automated voice, which was not as pleasant, but got the job done. Recently, I received information of how to set up my account online and I did so. I chose a password according to your incredibly labyrinthine—and unnecessary—specifications and then I emailed myself the password so I would not forget.
Today I remembered I needed to stop the paper. I dialed the phone number listed in the paper and found the line was busy. The automated lady nicely offered to keep dialing for only 75 cents, but I figured since the easiest avenue was closed to me, I would log on and use the online service I had already prepped for.
When I entered my email and password, I was told that they did not match. I chalked it up to my error—after all, I may have noted it incorrectly. I then used the “forgot password” link. The email that was sent DID NOT INCLUDE A PASSWORD. Instead, it prompted me to log on and then I could change my password. However, since there was no password forthcoming, I was unable to do that. I tried the phone number a few more times, but the line continued to be busy.
I then used the password again and this time the email contained a password. I copied and pasted it into the password field, only to find that your system, the one who just sent me the new password, told me that the username and password DID NOT MATCH. I enclose a copy of the emails for your perusal. I then searched the site for a way to email my request, but was stopped by the same email and password conundrum.
I feel I have made a good faith effort to put a vacation stop on my paper. Seeing as my paper will be delivered despite my efforts, I request 1) a refund for the papers delivered Sunday March 25 through Tuesday, March 27. 2)Some sort of confirmation that you will do this, contact information below. 3)Either an upgrade of your web service so it works, or an increase in the number of phone lines your company uses.
Sincerely,
Patricia Collins
[email address was here] (note that there is no complex log on procedure necessary to contact me)
[phone number was here]
When I arrived home on Tuesday night, I found a paper was delivered on Sunday and another on Monday.  There was no paper on Tuesday and none arrived on Wednesday.  I called on Wednesday and was able to get through.  The nice man who helped me helpfully told me that a complaint had been lodged, but that there was no hold on my paper and he wasn’t sure why it had not come for two days.  He promised to give me a credit (which, come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve received) and he would get my paper started.  
I enjoy that I explicitly stated my needs in my letter (even handily numbered) and the company was not able to meet any of them.  This is where I would love to cancel my subscription, but I need the paper, so I must put up with their shenanigans.  But it’s times like these that I wonder if this  is the type of efficient company “the government” is supposed to model itself after.

Three sentence movie reviews: The Prince and the Showgirl

I rented (meaning I got it from the library) this because the movie My Week with Marilyn is based on the experience of one of the crew of this production.  While I found My Week with Marilyn a bit trying, I greatly enjoyed this frippery of a tale.  Monroe’s comedic talents were on display and I liked how smart the “dumb blonde” was.

Note that there is no red dress in the movie. She wears the same white one for the entire film.

Mini Time Machine Museum

This museum in Tuscon was a great find. It’s chock full of doll houses, shadow boxes and other miniatures that transport you to different times. (Hence the “time-machine” in the title)  I was delighted to wander through.

This man who built this house was killed in a carriage accident.  Supposedly, the devil riding the bicycle (you can see the enlargement of the figurine in the information to the left of the house) was placed there to commemorate the craftsman’s untimely death.  The horseless carriage (lower right corner) was also put there for the same reasons.

An example of the “time machine” quality:
An 18th century German Kitchen
And a late 19th century German Kitchen.
The details on the houses were amazing.

I bought a calendar in the gift shop and it came with a tiny mini-calendar which causes most who see it to break out into various versions of “oh my goodness it’s so cute!!!” Myself included.