Month: October 2019

Joker

A scene from Joker

I went to see the movie Joker in a small theater in a small town with my daughter on a beautiful October afternoon. I had read reviews that mentioned the right, the left, incels, mass shootings, dangerous movies, on and on. What I ended up viewing I have to admit left me a little dazed at the end, not quite sure what exactly I had just experienced. It reminded me of my reactions to Apocalypse Now, The Deer Hunter and, yes, certain Scorsese movies. Like those earlier films Joker is not an uplifting or inspirational film. No character is happy, content, or even just okay. Most everyone is miserable, which sets the overall mood of the movie. There is trash everywhere on the streets (due to a strike) and grime and dirt and darkness. Arthur Fleck lives in this hopeless world. His dreams continually fall through, every day he is humiliated, he fails at whatever he tries, and finally he decides to fight back after being assaulted yet again. Empowered by a handgun, he shoots first some harassers on the subway. His medication and therapy ended because of budget cuts, he begins to expand his killing fields to include almost everyone he knows. It is a transformation that one watches with gathering gloom and horror. Arthur becomes a killing machine, evolving from a depressed, lonely nobody into the dancing, homicidal maniac the Joker, one of the greatest comic book bad guys of all. Since show business loves handing out awards Joaquin Phoenix should be at the top of the list to receive something for his intense portrayal of Arthur/Joker. The movie is a stew of mental illness, desperation, violence, hopelessness, pathos, arrogance, faint hope, lost dreams, misery and more violence…with just a dash of humor. It is not a fun movie, but a fascinating one.

The Roundup

Yardlight By David Jacobi

GRIT “offers practical advice, product reviews, livestock guides, gardening, cooking and other do-it-yourself information, humor and the inspirational stories of folks who moved to the country and love it. Each issue covers topics related to country living, land management, wildlife, gardening, livestock or pets, skills and techniques, seasonal food, community, machinery or tools, and lifestyle events.”

Use GoWatchIt “to discover where the movies you want to see are available on the services you care about. Keep track of your movies and receive alerts when they become available. You can also see what your friends are watching, and plan a movie night. GoWatchIt brings you the movies of your choice the way you want to watch, whether in Theaters, on DVD or Blu-ray, Online or On Demand.”

The Black Vault is “the largest privately run online repository of declassified government documents anywhere in the world. With more than 2 MILLION pages of documents to read, on nearly every government secret imaginable, The Black Vault is known worldwide for getting down to the truth… and nothing but. Every document in this archive was obtained through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Begun in 1996, at the age of 15, John Greenewald, Jr., began hammering the U.S. Government with FOIA requests to obtain information. The Black Vault is the result of that more than two decade effort.”

FreeWill “is an award-winning social venture founded by graduate students at Stanford University in 2016, with the help and support of many of the world’s leading experts in law, design, and philanthropy.” Use the site to create your last will and testament for free.

The Harvest

The field to our east

The brisk fall winds have begun blowing and the first hard freeze of the season settled on us a week ago. We picked all of the bell peppers and the red and green tomatoes from the garden the day before the freeze. As I was picking them I noticed dozens of little yellow flowers on the tomato branches. If not for the weather change those plants could have gone on indefinitely. The day after the freeze the plants had obviously been killed, their branches drooping and leaves curled up. The tomatoes have been stored in the garage on a long table to ripen, if they will. We have talked about what to do with this huge bounty, and I think there will be plenty of fried green tomatoes, chili, spaghetti, goulash, homemade V8, roasted tomatoes, and anything else we can think of while they either ripen or rot. The freezer is already full, so the only other alternatives are canning or eating them. We have shared with family, neighbors and coworkers as well. Our first garden here on the acreage produced more tomatoes than we ever experienced in the city, and only seven plants were involved. The field crop harvest has finally started, but slowly. It has been a wet fall and the farmers must wait for the fields to dry out or to freeze. There have only been a few advantageous days so far when the fields become busy with harvesters, but otherwise the rain has kept them away. The sun is setting earlier at each days dusk, and the high temperatures are declining, giving a daily reminder of what is to come.

Website Review: Brain Pickings

Brain Pickings

Brain Pickings was created and is written by Maria Popova. From her About page she writes “I am a reader and writer, and I write about what I read here on Brain Pickings — my one-woman labor of love. It is an inquiry into what it means to live a decent, substantive, rewarding life, and a record of my own becoming as a person — intellectually, creatively, spiritually — drawn from my extended marginalia on the search for meaning across literature, science, art, philosophy, and the various other tentacles of human thought and feeling.” I have been a subscriber to her newsletter for several years now, and it is a weekly highlight to read. Some articles focus on a single theme in depth, while other post’s can meander and skim on multiple subjects. Well worth checking out.

Homemade Cheesecake

Strawberry Cheesecake

We celebrated a birthday this weekend and my wife Shelly made a cheesecake as one of the desserts. Here she shares the recipe.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. For the crust use 1 ¾ c crushed graham crackers, 1/3 c melted butter, ¼ c sugar and ¼ tsp salt. Mix altogether and press into your springform pan. Bake for 10 min.

Cheesecake: 4 8oz pkg cream cheese room temp, 3 eggs room temp, 2 tsp vanilla, ½ c sour cream and 1 c sugar. Mix altogether but do not over mix. Pour on top of the graham cracker crust. Bake for 60-70 minutes until cheesecake is slightly browned and some cracks have formed. You can shut off the oven and let it cool.

My family’s favorite is to then add strawberry topping. I have used canned pie filling as well.

This time I used an 11 x 13 baking dish instead of the springform pan. This way I usually only bake for 55 min.

Enjoy!

Robert Frost

Robert Frost as a young man

He died a couple of years before I was born, but it seemed like Robert Frost was alive and talking to me when I was introduced to him in elementary school. There were a few other poets that were offered to us youngsters, but Frost was the one I latched onto. Such a formal name, not Bob, but Robert. His last name struck me because it evoked the winter season that is the background of many of his poems. His poems were easy to read, but understanding them was more difficult. I liked the layers and added complexities, to a point. When a teacher discussed how good fences made good neighbors, I saw the want to be left alone. I could also understand how they were a barrier to knowing the folks next door. But doors and gates could be opened as needed. There were several ways to think about it. From pondering the end of the world to contemplating an abandoned cord of wood he finds during a walk in the woods, he seemed to find meaning or symbolism in everything he observed and wrote down. When he pauses his horse in the middle of the woods on a snowy night you are there watching with them, feeling the snow drift down on your shoulders and hearing it fall to the ground around you. Robert Frost (1874 – 1963) received four Pulitzer Prizes for his work and remains one of the premier poets of all time. If you haven’t read him in a while, or not at all, this site is a good place to start.

The Roundup

Ready For Harvest

The National Center for Home Food Preservation “is your source for current research-based recommendations for most methods of home food preservation. The Center was established with funding from the Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture (CSREES-USDA) to address food safety concerns for those who practice and teach home food preservation and processing methods.”

PoemHunter.Com “aims to spread the effects of poems in the social and individual life of people, where a continuous change is undergoing with the Internet. PoemHunter.Com without a pause, continues its activities with the active participation of thousands of members around the globe.”

Curious Cosmos is a “paranormal research community for those with a severe passion for the absurd, strange, and outlandish. We’re about IDEAS and DIALOGUE, doing battle in the realm of logic and wit to get to whatever kernel of truth lies at the bottom of the fringe. We love discussing weird, crazy, and impossible things, but those unwilling to have their ideas challenged should turn back now.”

Founded in 2007, MakeUseOf is “an online publication that issues tips and guides on how to make the most of the internet, computer software, and mobile apps. Our mission is to help users understand and navigate modern trends in consumer technology.”

To Build A Fire

One of many fires in our Coleman outdoor hearth

My first intention for this post was to actually detail how to build a fire. But as I wrote about dead limbs and twigs, bark, leaves, grasses, weeds, anything dry and thin and small for kindling, I came to a stopping point. Do I emphasize my preference for log cabin construction over tee-pee techniques? Then it struck me that if an adult does not know how to build a fire, well, so be it. One should know how to do almost anything today, because there is an internet video showing how. Or thousands. So, I began pondering why to build a fire in the first place. Originally used for warmth, safety and cooking, all three of those reasons have been supplanted by modern means, including home furnaces and water heaters, electric lights and stoves. So why build a fire today? First, it is a social event in which everyone present can participate, whether it is adding wood, adjusting the structure as it burns down, or roasting weenies and marshmallows. Second, it can stimulate conversations you might not have in everyday situations. Talking about work and politics and sports might begin the evening, but once the fire gets to burning and creating a coal bed the topics will eventually move on. Dreams and aspirations, remembering loved ones who have passed, reminiscing over good times and bad, discussing current and past relationships, all pour out as the night continues. What is it that makes one open up and talk about so many things normally kept hidden away? The magic is you are all absorbed with looking at the fire, not at each other. You give a glance at the others occasionally while making a point, or for emphasis here and there, but the flames are working their enchantment by now. By using the fire as a sort of mediator, you talk to it as much as to the folks around you. A kind of trance can set in, and you are now saying what you really want to, as does everyone else present. You have been transported to a way of conversation with others that has existed for thousands of years, but is almost forgotten in the modern world. As the evening winds down, the flames burn out and everyone goes their separate way a tranquil feeling lingers. All this is why you will build another fire, the sooner the better.