On my way to stay with my parents for a few days to help Dad with some work in the garden (digging out and replacing soil in the veg plot). Looking forward to some home comforts but feeling slightly apprehensive about not being in control of my own time
This morning in the park
I knew there would be a day when all the beer bottle tops I’ve collected over the years would come in handy. It’s poker night and we’ve got chips coming out of our ears
📺 Finished watching Kaleidoscope (2023)
I really enjoyed this series. I watched it in the order suggested by Netflix but I’m really interested to see how it plays out watching the episodes either chronologically or in a different non-chronological order.
Cooking tea tonight was a relay; I started and my wife finished. Somewhere along the way we got our wires crossed and ended up eating both tonight’s meal and tomorrow’s lunch as one dish 😆
It was super windy here last night (80+ km/hr). Saw this on my walk this morning. The sign reads “High Winds. Mixed medium. Artist: Mother Nature (Temporary Installation)”
Went to Whitby to play hockey. We lost. Beaten by a better team on the day. Fish and chips and a pint as a consolation prize
Finished reading: Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency by Olivia Laing 📚
As with every other book I’ve read by Olivia Laing I’ve come away with a list of artists and authors, and their work, to follow up on.
The Farewell, 2019 - ★★★
The central relationship between grandma and granddaughter was enough to keep me engaged in this story. And I found myself on a similar journey to Billi, learning to appreciate the differences in familial, and particularly intergenerational, relationships between eastern and western cultures.
I’m a little bemused by references to the film as a comedy-drama. There’s humour in it for sure, but it’s bittersweet and I think to call it comedy is a stretch.
TIL about the role of a Chief Evangelist. Sounds a bit icky to me.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, 2022 - ★★★
Ridiculous and entertaining. I think I marginally preferred this second outing for Benoit Blanc to his debut.
There were moments however where I was pulled out of the story and reminded these "disruptors" with their endless pots of money and huge egos are out there causing havoc in the real world.
Finished reading: The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern 📚
Woah 🤯 The perfect holiday read, I’ve devoured this over the past few days.
Question about importing feeds (eg Letterboxd) to microblog; will it pull in existing entries or just those published after the feed is added?
A walk at the coast was a great way to start the day (and year)
Wedding Season, 2022 - ★★
A friend recently introduced me to the concept of “fake date” films and this one certainly fits the bill. One of the better films I watched in my pre-Christmas, cold induced rom-com binge.
Falling for Christmas, 2022 - ★★
There should be a special star rating system for Christmas films. This one was actually better than I expected.
Beauty, 2022 - ★★
I liked the style of this film, including the decision not to let us hear Beauty sing. Ultimately it’s a tragedy and felt reminiscent of what I know about Whitney Houston’s life, which left me wondering whether the character of Beauty was based on her.
Overall, I felt the filmmaker was trying a bit too hard and failed to create any connection for me with either the characters or story.
