Day 323: Pondering the Next Dark Knight Villian

Tuesday, August 5

I got up this morning and was on hold until I found out when I needed to go to the label printer for press checks.  I finally got the instructions and headed out to Beaverton.

 

At work, I quickly ate my lunch and worked like crazy to get through my pile of things to do.  I had to leave for the winery for an afternoon media visit, which went well.

 

And when I got home, I had every intention of fitting in a workout before meeting my co-workers for a movie.   I even changed and walked over to the gym, while chatting with my sister on the phone.  The treadmill was actually occupied.  So, I walked back to my apartment and tried to do sit-ups while still talking to my sister. 

We were cracking each other up talking about a cool concert she went to on Sunday night in Chattanooga – it was Journey, Heart and Cheap Trick.  We kept singing Journey and Heart songs over each other, which, I finally had to say sounded awful.  We started to crack up.  Then, I told her it would be funny if we acted like we were in a musical and just communicated through song.  I continued, “gosh, I really had a bad day…  stumbled outta bed, stumbled to the kitchen, poured myself a cup of ambition.” And then we lost it.  We just play off of each other well.  She is my comic relief in this crazy life!

 

My exercise plans foiled, I got dressed again and headed for Bridgeport Village to go see the IMAX version of The Dark Knight.  And Christian Bale reminds me of a guy I dated back in DC several years ago.  I kept saying he’s more like The HOT Knight.  To which I was told to simmer down.

 

Who knew the theater would be packed on a Tuesday night??  We got stuck in the fourth row with our heads cocked up in painful angles.  From this position, I couldn’t really tell what made it IMAX, and wondered why I paid the extra $3 for that.  I kept thinking of one of my favorite classic 80’s movies, Better off Dead – I want my three dollars!!

 

Anyway.  The action scenes were hard to see in this row.  Even still, it was a pretty cool film.  It was very loud.  But very cool.  I mean – Morgan Freeman, Michael Cane, Gary Oldman – priceless.  Then there were the crazy amazing performances – Heath Ledger and Aaron Eckhart.  Their characters were, by far, the most interesting.  I liked the support roles played by Maggie Gyllenhaal and Eric Roberts. 

 

I admit, I was quite distracted by Bale’s huskied voice when in the Batman character/suit.  It was kind of annoying.  Didn’t matter.  Still hot.  Even hotter when he’d jump buildings and fly in his batsuit, drive wicked cool cars and motorcycles fast, wear a two piece suit, wear THE suit, and beat up the bad guys.  My god.  Why can’t a girl find a hot vigilante like the Batman???

 

I am left to wonder which Batman villain we get to see in the making for the sequel to The Dark Knight.   Would it be the Joker, the Penguin – ooh, that could be fun.  An arctic adventure!  Maybe the Penguin was on a fishing boat a la Deadliest Catch, and in a crazy mutation accident, amalgamating into The Penguin a la Jeff Goldblum in The Fly. 

 

Perhaps it’ll be The Riddler.  Or Cat Woman.  There’s already rumor that Jonny Depp could sign to play the Riddler in his early days or Maggie Gyllenhaal could reprise her role as Rachel, the women who supposedly becomes Cat Woman.  That would be cool.

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Day 252: A Rainy Day In, Chores, Writing, TV Movies & Classic Soft Rock

Sunday, May 25

Three day weekends are wonderful but sometimes spin me a little.  Especially when you work on Saturday.  When you’re not used to working 6 days a week, you get a little thrown.  At least, I do.

Of course the one nice day of the weekend was the day I had to work.  I’m a little bitter about that, but such is life, really.  Not to say that life is all disappointments, but, mostly so – the trick is to learn to try to still be glad in the midst of so many disappointments.  Then, when the good moments and things emerge from the pools of disappointments, well, we are supposed to appreciate them all the more.  Still, it sucks that I was stuck indoors on Saturday.

Anyway.  I wasn’t motivated to leave the house today.  I kept my pajamas on all day.  And sometimes you really need days like that.  It was dark, cloudy, rainy and crappy out.  So, I cooked a brown organic egg over easy and placed it over a gluten-free biscuit with a large piece of fresh, organic basil.  I had a glass of organic orange juice. 

I stripped the bed and sorted my laundy, put the first load in, then went back downstairs to make a cup of Elixir Buddha creativity tea.  I lit some candles, put in a Peter Gabriel CD and got to work on some writing.  I was asked by a colleague to write a story about Celiac disease and wine.  I found a couple of reports that suggested glutinous agents are used in the clarification process, and some barrels are hinged with a flour-water paste that contains gluten.  The debate is whether or not the levels of gluten from these processes put those with Celiac disease at risk.  Most of the studies suggest the levels are so low that it wouldn’t impart any real risk.  In general, those suffering from Celiac disease should get in the habit of calling food and beverage producers to ask the important questions.  I, myself, haven’t reacted to wine yet.  But it’s always good to be aware of the potential  cross contaminations.

After I finished writing my first draft, I went upstairs to check the laundry and to make my bed.  I then turned on the television and the movie The Cider House Rules had just started.  It’s a moving adaption of John Irving’s novel about a compassionate young man, Homer Wells (Tobey Maguire), raised in an orphanage and trained to be a doctor there by Dr. Wilbur Larch (Michael Caine), decides to leave to see the world.  Anyway, it’s a wonderful story, Tobey Maguire is delightful and I more than once got teary-eyed.

While I finished folding laundry and getting through all of the loads, I worked on some poetry and organized some other writing.  After some gluten-free lasagna, the 1996 made-for-tv movie In Cold Blood , based on Truman Capote’s incredible narrative non-fiction masterpiece, came on.  It starred Anthony Edwards as Dick Hickock, Erik Roberts as Perry Smith, and Sam Neill as Agent Alvin Dewey.  It didn’t compare to the 1960′s classic original starring Robert Blake.  And, as far as I’m concerned, Capote, which earned Philip Seymour Hoffman an Oscar, is the most riveting take on this historical massacre.

When the movie was over, an infomercial came on for a 1970′s/1980′s classic soft rock collection.  I started making lists of some of the songs I liked and created a new playlist.  Some of the songs were cheesy, some were serious classics, but in general, most of them brought back memories.  Titles included:  Show Me the Way (Peter Frampton); Waiting for a Girl Like You (Foreigner); These Dreams (Heart); Into the Night (Benny Mardones); A Horse with No Name (America); Longer (Dan Fogelberg); How Long (Ace); I Go Crazy (Paul Davis); Somebody’s Baby (Jackson Browne), and so on.  I knew many of the songs but not the artists – go figure!  I made a note to forward this list to my sister and my cousin, Kathryn.  Many of these songs made me think of our childhood together.

It was already after midnight when a PBS progam came on about travelling through Scotland.  I was mesmerized.  It’s now on my list of places to visit.  A highlight was a story about a woman who takes a small paddle boat out to an island on some loch and plays her fiddle for the seals, overjoyed when familiar heads emerge from the water’s surface showing glossy, big eyes and whiskers.  This inspired me – I thought about writing a story about an old widow on the Oregon coast during the 1950′s who lost her husband in the Great War, and played her fiddle for the sealions at Coos Bay.  I’ll have to develop that one.

This quiet weekend in inspired a lot of writing, so, something good emerged from a disappointing day of unpleasant weather.

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