One of those movies I’m guaranteed to like, what with being very interested in identity formation and young people going out into the world on their own. This is a gorgous tale of V-E Day celebrations and how the crown princess and P2 celebrate. I think my teeth dried out from my smiling so much.
Cost: free due to mom’s Netflix account
Where watched: at mom’s with mom.
poster from: http://www.impawards.com/intl/uk/2015/royal_night_out.html
It’s popping up all over!
The good: my many squash plants produced! I enjoyed having a trombone zucchini and I even got a beet!
The bad: two of My Oregon Sweet Meat squash split, which meant they wouldn’t keep. I cut out the rotted part of one squash and the rest was fine. The other I gave to someone at work. He and his housemates ate it for a long time.
I had saved seed of delicata squash and it didn’t grow true. Perhaps it was a hybrid. A goodly number of my delicata squash look like delicata-shaped acorn squash. Also, of my two trombone zucchini plants, one of them seemed to be more yellow squash than zucchini squash.
Holy schnikies, Batman, I read books in every category this month! That’s unusual, especially the three grownup nonfiction books. Though two of them I had been reading for a while and just happened to finish them in September.
Picture books: Best Frients in the Whole Universe
Middle grade: Full of Beans
Young adult: First & Then (even though was a re-read)
Young nonfiction: Tiny Stitches
Adult fiction: Leave Me
Adult nonfiction: Maud Hart Lovelace’s Deep Valley (admittedly, a niche book)
Smart smut: Say it Louder
Best Frients in the Whole Universe
Antoniette Portis
Read for Librarian Book Group
I giggled through this book and enjoyed its general exuberance.
Coyote Moon
Gianferrari/Ibatoulline
Read for Librarian Book Group
Travel with a mother coyote as she searches for food for her family.
The Sound of Silence
Katrina Goldsaito
Read for Librarian Book Group
Yoshio looks for the sound of silence in Tokyo, Japan.
The Storyteller
Evan Turk
Read for Librarian Book Group
Fantastically illustrated tale about the importance of listening to the storytellers.
Lucy
Randy Cecil
Read for Librarian Book Group
I remember liking this, but I can’t remember why.
Full of Beans
Jennifer Holm
Read for Librarian Book Group
Probably my favorite character voice of the year. It was fun to be transported back to 1930’s Key West, Florida.
The Inn Between
Marina Cohen
Read for Librarian Book Group
Clever book that is slightly too obvious about showing its hand.
First & Then
Emma Mills
Read Aloud with Matt.
I really enjoyed hearing this the second time; the first time through I was enjoying it so much I skimmed. Matt liked it too.
Jackaby
William Ritter
Good historical fiction/fantasy where the young Miss Abigail Rook, having fled her family’s Victorian expectations, arrives in New Fiddleham, New England. There she encounters R.F. Jackaby, a sort of Sherlockian character. Gaining work as his assistant, she helps investigate a serial killer in this fantastical mystery.
Tiny Stitches: The Life of Medical Pioneer Vivian Thomas
Hooks/Bootman
Read for Librarian Book Group
Illuminating nonfiction about the man who developed a procedure to help blue babies survive. It does not shy away from the racism Thomas faced in his quest to be a doctor.
My Brilliant Friend
Elena Ferrante
When friends on Goodreads give books five stars, I notice. So I was very interested to read this book, the first in the Neapolitan Novels I found it rough going. Though I had been warned to power through until the main characters hit 13, I found I had to power through the entire book.
I found the fierce, stark, angry prose too confessional for me. The plot was meandering. This is a good read for those interested in the frenemy relationships between girls, or those who would like to be transported to a poor neighborhood in 1950s Italy. Be warned though, that this book ends abruptly. Almost as if someone needed to make a very long book into two very long books.
Leave Me
Gayle Forman
Can a woman who is a mother leave her children to save her own health? My observations of the current climate say the answer is no. And thus, I’m guessing Gayle Forman will get a lot of aggro about her main character, Maribeth, who suffers a heart attack in her early forties and flees her young twins and husband so she can mend.
I happen to think women have completely overextended themselves trying to fulfill today’s version of “mother” and so I was interested in Maribeth’s journey which involved the city of Pittsburgh, a rouge heart doctor, a search for her birth mother and (my favorite) healing through swimming.
As I have with Forman’s other books I devoured this and enjoyed the way she plays with alternate paths that lead to greater understanding.
Lafayette in the Somewhat United States
Sarah Vowell
I enjoy Sarah Vowell books with a lot of Sarah Vowell in them. When she weaves herself into the story while telling us about the history she’s interested in. This book had a lot of history and not as much Sarah Vowell. Thus, it was slow going.
The Tiredness Cure
Sohere Roked
I was feeling tired and this book offered a range of potential fixes, all from an English naturopath’s perspective.
Maud Hart Lovelace’s Deep Valley
Schrader
For those who want to know the inspirations of Mankato people and locations from Lovelace’s many Deep Valley books. This well-researched book includes photos, biographies and clippings of Mankato/Deep Valley’s people and places. It’s good to read before taking a Betsy/Tacy visit.
Say it Louder
Heidi Joy Trethaway
Finally we have Book Four in the Tattoo Thief Series. I’ve waited a long time to see what happens with drummer Dave, who has just discovered how terrible his longtime girlfriend is. In kicking her to the curb (a kick that was quite well-deserved) he finds himself interested in Willa, a scruffy tattoo artist by day and graffiti artist by night. Can Dave, with his not-quite-professional drumming skills–keep himself in the band and convince Willa to trust him? Many complexities ensue, and the path is laid for a fifth book (hooray!) in the Tattoo Thief series. Bring on the babysitter drummer!
(six movies watched)
The Magnificent Seven
Classic for a reason
Bad Moms
I’m surprised it’s here too. But it made me laugh a lot.
I walk by the Free People clothing store regularly and look at their displays with a kind of anthropological interest. These are not clothes designed for me, nor am I meant to wear them. I find some of them kind of cute (the dress on the left, the skirt on the right) and most of them puzzling.
But today I saw the Van Halen 1984 shirt and stopped short. Why are they marketing a shirt for a band consisting of members who are too old to be this demographic’s fathers? Is there some Van Halen resurgence among the young set I don’t know about? (Possibly.) I suspect they just thought the logo looked cool and made it into a shirt.
AWOLNATION “Woman, Woman”
This is one of those songs that gets a lot of radio play and I don’t switch the station. I could never decide if he was saying, “You made me a natural woman,” or “You may be a natural woman.” (It was the latter, as that is the lyric that makes the most sense. The former is the lyric that’s more fun.) I also liked the reputation of “woman woman”.
But I’ve just watched the video and I feel very conflicted.
The use of attractive women recalls Robert Plant’s [by which I mean Robert Palmer] “Simply Irresistible” and “Addicted to Love.” And they’re naked. I get it. “Natural woman” in the AWOLNATION world equals “naked woman.” I watched the entire video cringing. Yes, it looks like they are all having great fun pretending to play (or perhaps actually playing–they could be musicians) and singing this song. Googling “AWOLNATION Woman Woman commentary” gets me this link which says the video is “a hymn to celebrate all females in their natural glory.” Which is a nice sentiment, though to me the video seems to celebrate “women of a specific age (their 20s) who are mostly of the properly accepted weight aesthetic and are nicely diverse in race/ethnicity.”
This is one of those things that purports to celebrate women, while exploiting them. A group of naked women who look like they are having fun is actually a specifically chosen–probably by a man–group of women who are paid to take off their clothes and look like they are having fun, mostly so a certain population can watch the video and think, “boobs!”
That the whole thing is carried off without an internet peep (googling “AWOLNATION Woman Woman controversy” got me nothing) shows me just how far from gender equality we are. I want girls to grow up in a world where they think they can make music, not be the people paid to take off their clothes and pretend to make music. I want boys to grow up in a world where girls are not just something to look at, but are people who can start bands, conceive and direct videos, and do more than be objects.
(I just wanted to download a song and write a quick bit about why I like it. Thanks AWOLNATION, for complicating my blogging time.)
When I moved to Kenton in 2007, this lot at the corner of N. Lombard and N. Fenwick was a KFC with a drive-through and a parking lot. The KFC closed a few years later. The building was taken down and the lot has been empty for some time. I recall a fluttering of plans for something, but those did not come to pass. But now we have what looks like a six-unit complex that has been built on the lot. And it looks like there will be another six-unit complex arriving soon. This is located a block away from the Lombard Transit center, so hopefully many people without cars will rent these places. However, if they do have a car, they will be parking the neighborhood. It’s past time for the Portland City Council to start figuring out a parking system for the city. Big, compact cities have parking enforcement throughout.
Interestingly, the Google Map of the corner has not erased the presence of the KFC, or the parking lot. While I don’t think it should instantaneously show a new building, the building it is showing hasn’t existed for years.
This is the corner of 10th and Davis, soon to be another tall building. Kush Handmade Rugs has the corner. They are moving to a new location. The storefront on Davis was a print shop that has moved. Aztech Sign and Graphics is on 10th. I’m not sure what will happen to them. Next in line is Jimmy Mak’s, Portland’s Legendary Jazz Club. They were going to move across the street, but the owner’s cancer came back, so he decided to close at the end of the year. Their final night will be New Year’s Eve. (Note from the future: Jimmy Makarounis died on New Year’s Day.)
Another free admission, thanks to my hotel stay at the Olympic Club, and another film I would not have watched otherwise, despite my love for Kristen Bell. However, the theater was filled with–judging from their chortles of glee–a lot of moms, and when you discard all trappings of “but, that isn’t realistic because…” then this film is very funny and all three main actresses are fun to watch, especially Kathryn Hahn. While it was great to see so many actresses having fun, I do find myself questioning as to why the two men who wrote and directed this movie did not include any actual females in the creative process.*
Cost: free due to hotel package
Where watched: McMenamins Olympic Club
poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2016/bad_moms.html
*What would a movie about bad moms written and directed by women (or even actual moms) be like? Maybe Hollywood should get on that?
