Category: Writing

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Sang Froid

Viewer frenzy. Season 3 Game of Thrones, too gruesome grotesque. Did they see Season 1? Brutal porn. Beheadings, heart-eating, animal skinnings. Season 2 starts with baby-cide. Hard to believe it could get gorier. Usually eschew blood & guts. But, characters are compelling, acting good. Soldiering on.

MadMen. More Megan foreshadow. Sharon Tate-esque bandana this week. Real-life murderers. MadManson like MadKing Joffrey. And 5th anniversary of Jodi Arias’ fatal attraction throat-slicing frenzy. Froid. Sang. RFK. Hmmm.

Weather too perfect for this. Out to the garden. Red roses poised to pop.

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Mad Cap

Betty is back. So is the show. She’s lookin’ good again, and Don falls for her during a nostalgic night at Bobby’s summer camp. But, Betty has learned that Don punishes women who love him. She smartly stays happy with Henry.

Don tries to reconnect with Megan, but she’s also figured him out. At work, Joan is in charge and gives Roger the heave-ho. Her young white knight is spreading kindness wherever he goes. We get another glimmer of Pete’s heart. Peggy is petulantly uncreative. Ted thinks so. Don knows her best. Everybody seems more true to character, though. Just in time for the season’s bow.

Rainy TV~ PBS: The Bletchley Circle. Based on true story of four women who cracked a code in WWII England. Suspend disbelief as they become sleuths. Dirk Gently. Quirky detectives. Laugh out loud with a jaundiced view. CNN: Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown. Remote world food with soul.

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Brothers Karamaz Off

A tale of brothers struggling with morality, religion, ideology? Or, one brother whose psychology emanated from an unbalanced family dynamic influenced the other? I believe the latter. Russia, Chechnya, Islam are peripheral to this story. Elder son coddled by an obsessed mother, who seems a bit off. Her shoplifting conviction a case in point. As her first born began to behave like an angry bully, she tried to steer him away from evil booze and drugs. He dragged his young brother into an ideological excuse for escalating a violent nature into an act.

It could have been just guns, like other recent mass murders. But, the Boston Marathon Massacre had the added firepower of bombs. Yet, it was still a plot born of psychology and not ideology. Apologies to Dostoyevsky.

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Daffo Dilly

Daffodils up. Finally. Welcome distraction from bombs, cowardice, guns. Explosions, more blood. Ted Cruz gets scarier every day. Turning off the tube to take long-awaited refuge on the porch. Until Sunday night.

Lured back to MadMen. Once more, Creamer nails it. His hero is Ted Chaough, the real Ad Man. Ruthless, shrewd, but not morally corrupt in his personal life. Peggy has escaped to an agency where boundaries are defined by the office door. Not sullied by unseemly relationship spillover. SCDP the whorehouse, with no clear pimp. Hard-drinking, bad-living aging johns in an ever decaying brothel. Still want to see more triumphant Joan for a modicum of redemption.

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PrinTemps

Springtime weekend. Masters class. Tiger, Sergio, Phil navigating azaleas and pine straw. A fourteen-year old phenom from China. Lindsey Vonn wearing a Megan hat. Speaking of whom, Matt Creamer’s MadMen premiere recap is here. Agree, death is the theme, but not enough emphasis on the juxtaposition of Vietnam doom and gloom against tacky Hawaiian tourist escape. More ad biz, less location shots. And, am I the only person who missed the Sylvia Rosen tryst?

Check out this great Brooklyn via Northampton folk-rock band. The Sun Parade. A musical Girls-esque video. Great strings, production. Beautiful young talent.

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Side Bar

Talk to the judge. Every time she says “approach” we go to commercial break. Sidebar obsession. Jodi Arias’s court show has consumed my brain. O.J. trial was tame by comparison. Or, I’m just hallucinating, anesthetized by a polyurethane haze. Fumes aloft are feeding my stupor. When Dr.Husband gets “19th Century Authors” answer in Final Jeopardy and I don’t, synapses are not connecting. Hope it’s a temporary phase. But, hardwood floors do look better.

Sister JeanJean came to my rescue and dragged me into the fresh air at Chesterfield Gorge  yesterday. Gorge-ous early Spring glistening white water flow. So, can’t even blame stop at a real bar for this butt post.

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Mad Men 6

The return of Don. He’s still with Megan. I want my story. The one where Don does Megan’s betrayed friend. Weiner & Co. are still on vacation in Hawaii. What did that have to do with anything? It’s as if last season didn’t happen. No transitions. Fast-forward to somewhere boring. A disjointed, erratic script.

Megan as  soap actress, wanting more scenes with Victor. Must be Y&R. Joan looked like a bloated clown in her purple outfit. The long sideburns on the men were revolting, if authentic of the day. Peggy has become silly strident. Betty has morphed into her mother-in-law, capped by the black hair. What was with the St. Mark’s Place sojourn and Sandy? Random. Not cleverly so. Don has disappeared into himself. Hope they wake up from their sunburns and next week is better.

No offense, MadMen. It was 2 hours of ads and very little show.

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Shelburne Falls Movie Set

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Another film to be set in SideTrekFalls, our favorite tableau. The Judge, starring Robert Downey, Jr., Robert Duvall, Vera Farmiga, is rumored to start production in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts this summer. A drama/comedy.

Still haven’t seen Labor Day come to the screen yet. Jason Reitman’s movie set, starring Josh Brolin and Kate Winslet. Based on J.D. Salinger’s paramour’s book.

Dr.Husband’s Shelburne Falls header photo above.

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Waste Land

It’s almost porch reading season. Help! Good books wanted. Best Sellers. Either, I’ve read most of them a year ago. Or, they are 50 shades of insipid romance. And, I don’t follow Patterson or any other mystery serials. Any ideas? Donna Tartt’s third book in 30 years, Goldfinch, doesn’t come out until October.

Passover-Easter. Second week of Spring break continues. If you don’t like basketball, you are screwed. Sweet 16. Still have 3. FGCSU. Who? Golf delayed. Johnny Miller livid, a Tiger Sunday gone with the wind. Golf Channel today.

Too cold to take Sugar Shack Side Treks. Maybe next week.

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Tango Papa che

Italiano-Argentino. Buena suerte, Francisco, che. Los desaparecidos notwithstanding. Gay marriage, birth control? More of the same? Sí and No. First Jesuit Pope. Traditional though. Worse than Benedetto? Espero que no. Taking the throne on Feast of St. Joe. May the blood of Malbec be with you.

Anderson Cooper found dos Argentinos guapos in the Vatican crowd. Chris Cuomo clueless. Shut up and let’s hear the bells, prayers, Latin. Por favor!