Recent media consumption

I don't think I live within convenient driving distance of a real movie theater anymore. You know, one that has stadium seating and first-run movies. That limits what I'm actually seeing, since I now have the time and freedom to catch the occasional film.

Instead, I have been checking out movies and shows from the library like mad! They have the largest selection I have ever seen (or imagined) at a public library. Incredibly well curated too. The librarian that managed the collection must have been a mad, mad genius.

So far...

Serenity (film)

Yes, I know. I have seen it four times now, but it never fails to hurt when Wash...Oh, don't make me get weepy now. I'm a little embarrassed by how much dialog and expression from the ,movie and show have worked their way into my everyday built-in vocabulary. For goram shame!

Deadwood (film)

I'm midway through season three and the language stills gets me. My ex-partner talked just like that. Otherwise, Ian McShane is absolutely amazing to watch. The man has talent and range like-whoa. For reasons best left to the imagination, I'm watching the show with subtitles. It's an interesting experience. Try it some time.

Ready Player One (audio book)

I just started this last week and am loving it! I think it will eventually end up on my recommended-reads list. My current library has it shelved in young adult; my former posting, adult fiction. Anyway, I'm only on disc two, but I am enthralled by the gaming culture, technology, social problems, and the nostalgia for the late 1980s.

Eve by Anna Carey (book)

This was on my to-read list forever. I'm just over half finished with it and am largely unimpressed. But a good ending could still save it!

I've also read some rightist political stuff in the last couple months on the recommendation of a dear friend. I'm not inclined to review it, but I must admit that the tenor of certain parts of that wing is becoming easier to stomach as they discover that you get more flies with honey than with vinegar.

I'll talk about my own politics later, but I still daydream of geritocracy. I promise.

To come:

I hope to see The Mazerunner and to reread the Bhagavad Gita soon.

Media Consumption Post

I had the opportunity to see the movie Captain Phillips Tuesday night. Slow starter, no mistake there, but the ending was some of the best acting I've seen in recent memory. Seriously, it's a movie worth seeing. I know Tom Hanks won't win an Academy Award for it because the competition is so tough this year, but...you know? I think I'll pick him on my Oscar ballot anyway.

Moving on...

I'm listening to Lord of the Rings on audio in my car, courtesy of Amazon and Audible. I read the books possibly twenty times in high school and college and when I die, I hope my afterlife is reliving the years of the ring war...forever. Not that I believe in an afterlife, but for me, nice thought.

Anyway, the reason I started the listen was because it's been a few years and I missed the characters and also because I feel a relentless tug urging me to have an adventure (or something like one). I have to say, this helps...a lot.

After being away so long, I find myself noticing things that I never noticed before.

Like how weird the distances are. I sort of wonder if coming from a smallish island warped Tolkien's sense of proportion and distance a bit. Everything is...closer together than in more modern knock-offs of the genre he created.

Also, my dislike of Aragorn has faded a bit since my younger days and my deep-sucking-chest-wound for Boromir and his fate are not as keen. Well...no one is thirteen forever, right? Still, in my fantasy afterlife, I think I would expend considerable energy trying to save his unworthy ass.

I find myself gravitating more toward Gimli the dwarf than the human characters.

I myself am now and shall always be a hobbit.