year ending

 

Tuesday night our team was ready and waiting when the quiz started.  We made good progress, including getting a perfect score on three of the eight rounds, finishing with a respectable 84 points.  Alas, our rivals at the next table came in with a score of 85 points!   So near and yet so far.   
Oh well, there's another couple of weeks until the Christmas break, so watch this space.
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Wednesday the last of three days of ferrying stuff to K's place.  I am glad for his sake that we got it done, but I'm grateful that there isn't any more stuff to shift.  Always happy to help a friend in need, but there are limits.  Checked my road map to remind me how to get to Royal Yacht Club for Mission Group's Christmas lunch tomorrow.
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Lunch at Wrest Point on Friday to celebrate Helena and Julie joint-birthday.  Half a dozen of us dined in the Boardwalk room, then sat outside enjoying the sunny afternoon, admiring the view of the river and talking.  A pleasant time to meet up with old friends and discuss old times.
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Friday night I finished writing up the quiz questions for the next day.  Saturday lunch time we all gathered at the Croquet Club and enjoyed a two-course lunch in the open-air with the annual Christmas quiz at half-time.  I kept it fairly simple, just 12 true-or-false questions about the Christmas season.  And I advised players "If you don't know the answer, have a guess. You've got a 50% chance  of being right."
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BATTLE OF THE WORLDS [1961]  available on You Tube.
A stray planet, on a collision course with Earth, instead slows and takes orbit around our blue marble. After careful examination - and a few near-fatal accidents in space - what seems like a dead planet suddenly launches a fleet of flying attack saucers. Professor Benson and his team, along with the space fleet, must figure out how to destroy the invaders. In the end, the frustrated professor is forced to weigh the sacrifices that are required to save the citizens of Earth from certain doom.  
These Italian space opera movies always look stylish, though the scripts sometimes don't hang together too well.  Claude Rains, as Professor Benson, seems to be channeling the character he played in THE LOST WORLD, Professor Challenger.  Indeed, I have seen the American trailer and it even (ahem) declares "See Claude Rains in his most challenging role" !
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I didn't check my e-mails on Saturday night, so I missed an update from the church office.   I thought I was reading from the book of Matthew, but when the minister introduced me, he said I'd be reading from chapter 9 of Isaiah.  I looked calm as I walked up to the lectern, but inwardly I was anxious to open my Bible and see what I was about to do a "cold read" from. I opened the Bible and scanned the passage while I announced the passage I'd be reading, then launched into reading aloud from the Old Testament.    I was lucky - there were almost no complicated names on that page and I got through without any visible problems.
A friend nodded to me afterwards and said "Good reading this morning."   I responded with "You have no idea!"
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Watched the "mockbuster" movie BATTLE OF LOS ANGELES, made by Asylum studios to cash in on the release of the Columbia movie BATTLE: LOS ANGELES.  Lots of running and shooting doesn't compensate for the confusing plot.  Strange to see Nia Peeples as a Xena-style swordswoman who comes to the aid of the heroes.
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Monday and Wednesday I spent the days relaxing, with no calls on my time to make me leave the house. Tuesday I got in one game of croquet at lunchtime,  then out to the final quiz night of the year. We shared a good dinner, paid for by the prize money from the last twelve months,  then ended up being narrowly nudged into second place by the people at the next table who won by a single point.

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Thursday I was having a quiet day at home, watching the weather to see if we could fit in our last game of Bocce for the season.  Unfortunately friends descended on me and quizzed me about how my feet were going.  When I finally showed them, they were very concerned and insisted on calling a friend who runs a "foot nurse" service. There went my chances of getting to Bocce but I did finish the day with a nice pedicure.
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I must remember to check these things before I sit down and tune in a movie on You Tube.   Tonight I started watching the movie THE EYE CREATURES thinking it was the American title for the well-regarded British movie THE TROLLENBERG TERROR.  Alas it's not;  I was thinking of THE CRAWLING EYE.   This one was a really dire flick about a couple who run over an alien invader on their way back from Lover's Lane and (surprise) nobody believes them.   I don't think I've ever said this before, but there's not a single thing of interest in the whole movie.
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A columnist in the WASHINGTON POST mused on Richard Whateley’s satirical pamphlet, published in 1819, “Historic Doubts Relative to Napoleon Buonaparte.” In it, this future archbishop proves that there’s no way to be absolutely sure that Napoleon, who was then still alive, wasn’t actually a myth. Whately’s intent was subtly religious: He wanted to mock those who questioned the evidence for Christ’s existence.  
[Today we'd probably call this a work of "alternative history"!]
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They have some dumb things on-line trying to get you interested in watching You Tube videos.  One trumpeted "Lucille Ball's grand-daughter looks just like her!"  -  what a surprise.  Another asked "Why was the coffin closed at JFK's funeral?"  -  well, it could be something to do with him being shot in the head.
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Have never seen any Mexican horror T, though I know there are some, so WORLD OF THE VAMPIRES (1960) was something new to me.   Filmed in black and white, it used the old plot of the vampire count who seeks revenge on the family whose ancestors wiped out his family.  The twist is that the family have a guest, a music expert who has just returned from Transylvania, where he discovered which musical notes repel vampires.   This is actually quite an interesting little movie.
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The Light Programme radio show has now moved to https://www.mixcloud.com/The_Light_Programme/
I'd been wondering what had happened to them, since their website seemed up to date.

Busy Busy !

 

Oct 28
Friday agenda:
1. inject 5 micrograms of exenatide subcutaneously
2. visit favorite coffee shop - eggs benedict
3. Pharmacist
4. Salvo store and City Mission shop
5. Newsagent
6. Supermarket
7. return home and rest before dinner
8. can't be bothered with TV, listen to old radio series before bed.
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I filled a new prescription for my diabetes medication and the pharmacist ran through possible side effects and told me to take it an hour before meals.  For a couple of days, that's just what I did.  Then something started niggling in the back of my mind and I did a Google search.  Sure enough, it told me to take the drug  "2 times a day at any time within the 60–minute period before the morning and evening meals (or before the 2 main meals of the day, about 6 hours or more apart)".  So I did not need to wait sixty minutes till I could eat breakfast in the morning.
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I went to the meeting at the church hall today and everyone laughed at me.   I don't know who thought of having a comedy segment in the middle of the monthly meeting, but it must have seemed like a good idea to somebody.  (I don't recall hearing of any other Presbyterian stand-up comics;  would it be better for my career if I converted to Judaism?)
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What a week.  You know there are things you do every week, things you do once a fortnight, monthly things, quarterly things and once-a-year things?  Well, by some freak of the calendar they all coincided in the same week!  I had appointments, meetings, dinners and lunches every day.  By the time I got to the end of the week I didn't know if I was coming or going.  I felt like a Christmas tree salesman on December 24th.
Friday I had hoped to rest up for a bit,  only to receive a note on my door saying the RSPCA wanted to talk to me about my goat.  I phoned them and left a message asking them to ring me back, then waited apprehensively.  When they did ring back, they said they'd had a complaint my goat was looking thin.  Fortunately we were able to resolve the matter with no trouble after I sent them some recent pictures of the goat I had on my phone!
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Nov 11th
After hearing this morning's radio interview with the Director of Public Health, I made sure to buy a new packet of masks before going to do the weekend shopping.  Cooler, with showers.  Stores beginning to clog up with Christmas stuff.  Puzzled by the reindeer around the Christmas tree in Coles;  when did reindeer grow manes like a lion?
Went home and had afternoon tea while listening to a 1944 episode of The Lone Ranger.
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Nov12th
Saturday Keith and I went out to the South Hobart tip shop.  Keith happy because he found a book he'd  been looking  for since I-don't-know-when.
Watched a movie on You Tube after dinner.  What a difference nine years makes.  In 2013 when 500mph STORM was made, it was just another disaster movie. Looking at it now, the scenes of storms, floods and fires are uncomfortably like last week's news broadcasts.
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A friend commented "I like your new glasses. They must have been expensive."  No, I explained, because I sold so much of their product when I was in the hotel business, one of the big breweries said they'd chip in for the cost of them.  "You mean...."    Yes, it was a Foster Grant.
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Set out for church early but traffic was light and despite light rain I was there early.  Read from Matthew chapter 20 at the Communion Service without difficulty (aside from a tickle in my throat in the last paragraph).  Drove out to what used to be Animal Tucker Box;  the new owners started by repainting the outside, now they've re-organized the inside.  Home for lunch and debated whether or not to take a nap until it was too late to do so.  More light rain.
Served up dinner and watched another You Tube movie The Deadly Mantis from 1957;  not bad at all, with a semi-documentary opening reel about North America's radar network which is attacked by ... well, you can probably guess.
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Here's a thought provoking quote:
"A movie is a novel turned inside out. A novel directly describes the invisible inner motives and emotions of characters and leaves [the reader] to formulate a mental picture of the physical world. A movie...depicts the visible and implies the unseen. Adapting a book to a screenplay thereby calls for a very difficult inversion: The explicit must be made implicit, and the invisible visible."
~101 Things I Learned in Film School. Neil Landau w/Matthew Frederick
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Thursday I kept busy.  Downloaded some stuff from the Internet before lunch, then went out and  stocked up on my prescription drugs.  Spent two  hours clearing up the front porch so the electricity company can install a new power board tomorrow, then went out and played Bocce for two hours.  By the time I got home and ate dinner, I was ready for bed.
Friday was a madhouse on the roads.  Was there something going on I didn't know about?  If I hadn't known better, I would have thought it was Christmas Eve out there or that the Rolling Stones were performing in the next suburb.  I helped Keith move some stuff to his house and managed to fight my way through the traffic and got home eventually.  Saw OTR guru Ian Grieve in passing at favorite coffee shop. Our friendly neighborhood goatherd dropped in to see Mr Snuggles and share a cup of tea.    No sign of the electricians;  not that surprised - at least I hadn't been at home waiting for them.
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29 Nov :  Spent nearly all day Tuesday out in the sun driving Keith around.  He's finishing up at the place he's been working for years and there was a lot of stuff to be moved.  We made two trips today, and two more tomorrow should finish it off.  I feel a little guilty that all I can do is the driving;  carrying stuff up and down stairs is beyond me these days but I do what I can.  Got home at 5 o'clock and drank a can of watermelon & pineapple energy drink.