The World

Spent the last week on vacation.  Cleaning house.  Getting things ready for a move.  Shyam and I will be moving in together.  Consolidating households is daunting.  Consolidating libraries?  That's mindwrecking.

I've stayed off social media as much as I could.  Trying to wean myself from that Facebooke teat.  It's an addiction, and not a good one.

Lot of anger out there.  Lot of frustration, and a lot of fear.  I think I tend to soak that up.  What used to be a few minutes on Ye Olde Facebooke seeing what people are doing and thinking ends up making me tense.

Life is tense enough without everybody looking to be the smartest person in the room.

Life is tense enough without getting shouted down.

What bothers me is the people that I consider friends who are angry.

It's not all the time.  But since all I see of theirs is what they post online?  It paints them.

I try to keep it light.  Post what I'm reading.  Post an interesting article.

And I appreciate people who do the same.

But the anger is overwhelming.

So, if I should drop out of the Facebooking world unexpectedly, don't fret.  I'm still out here.  Probably here.....

Silence

I took advantage of the afternoon off one day this past week to go see the flick Silence.

I've taken a while to digest it.  It's a beautiful flick.  Brutal, but beautiful.

My initial reaction was negative.

It's a little long.  I'll say that.  Scorsese has had a pacing problem for a while.  Bringing out the Dead and The Departed are aberrations in that regard, over his work for the past 25 years or so.

Also: I did not enjoy Andrew Garfield's performance.  At all.  I've tried with Garfield.  There's something in his performances that I can't get past.  I wish I could place a finger on it.  I just do not enjoy his work.

The movie's stuck with me, though.  I want to watch the movie again, though.

Alone.

Here's why:

I was the first in the theater.  I thought, for a second, that it'd be one of those glorious experiences where I had the theater to myself.  It wasn't to be, though.  A couple walked in a couple minutes later.  And a fourth person walked in minutes after that.

Then, the lights went down, and the trailers started (I'm really, really curious about A Cure for Wellness, by the way).  And during the trailers, a group walks in.  A group of maybe 20 folks.  All older.  A couple of them use walkers, and take seats near the entrance hall.

It quickly becomes apparent that the Jesuit priests have a cheering section.  The retirees down front.

For those unfamiliar with the story, Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver play priests sent to track down a mentor and missionary in Japan, who has been rumored to have abandoned his faith.

The priests are in hiding, as the persecution of Christians is the law of the land.

There are moments, though, when the priests find those of Faith in the land.  Much to the elation of the retirement set down front.  There are outbursts.

Yes!

Praise God!

And most often:  Amen.

There is one point in the movie, where Andrew Garfield's Rodrigues is in a tense exchange with Japanese authorities.  He makes an analogy about not being able to grow trees on poison ground, but is hesitant to use the word "poisoned."

There is a climactic pause, before he says the word.

At which point one among the set down front cries out "Say it!"

Here's the thing.  The movie isn't a rah! rah! rah! flick.  At least, I didn't take it as such.  These outbursts are annoying, to the point of distraction.

Apparently for one of the folks who came in just after me, as he gets up, and goes to the gentleman who cried out.  I can't hear the exchange--they're six or seven rows up.  I can see gestures.  I do hear the older gentleman's reply "I am watching the movie."

But, the talk was effective.  There are fewer outbursts.  A couple of Amens.  A hallelujah.

The movie ends.  The 32 ounce bottle of water I'd rented needed to be deposited.  I wandered down the steps to note a couple members of the large group wiping tears away.

Like I said.  I want to watch the movie again.

So that the Silence won't be broken.....

Flagg

Man, it's hard to watch the end of the 1994 mini series adaptation of The Stand, with the Vegas crowd chewing on Flagg's every word, and not be reminded of Trump and the MAGA legion that follows him.

Additionally, there is part of me that wishes somebody like HBO, or AMC, or Netflix, or somebody, would pick up the Stand and run with it for several episodes with some 2017 money behind it.  I hate to say so, but it would actually make me buy a channel if they adapted it again.

Just don't turd it up like CBS did with Under the Dome.

Think more along the lines of 11.22.63 from Hulu.

Also, think less along the lines of The Man in the High Castle, which had an intriguing first season, but with which I've had a booger of a time even making it through the first episode of the second season.

Snuka

Here's a blurry picture of me with Jimmy "Superfly" Snuka.

It was taken the Monday morning after Wrestlemania XXIII in Detroit.  We were in the airport getting ready to fly back to Nashville.  We passed Jimmy Snuka drinking a Jack and Coke in the airport bar.  I didn't want to bother him.  Because I know how much I hate being bothered if I'm drinking at an airport bar at 9 in the morning.  Still, he didn't seem to mind when I asked if we could get a picture.

He was pretty incoherent, but I did catch it when he said "Thanks brutha."

This was all before I knew he might have killed his girlfriend back in 1983.

He did an interview with Opie and Anthony a few years back, that I caught when I still had XM.  It was actually a troubling interview.  He seemed lucid, and candid.  And his story seemed like complete bullshit.

He was declared incompetent to stand trial.  The interview I heard was three or four years before that (I think...time's funny out here....).

He died yesterday.

Snow Thoughts

Tired is pretty much my default position.

We did 3 holidays in the space of 14 days.

Christmas.

New Year's Eve.

Snow Rush.

I actually got off the worst of the Snow Rush.  I expected to have to work.  I rushed Thursday to get all my chores down, so that I wouldn't be left hanging if I had to run Friday.  I actually got to stay in and watch season one of Shameless on Netflix.  Really digging that one, by the way.

I did have have to work the aftermath though.  You know, the part where you have to convince people that it's alright to drive on a road with an inch of snow.  It's always an interesting paradox, where your customers have no trouble getting in but it's much too difficult for the workers to drive in.....

Actually, I get it.  I'm from McMinn County.  If you're rural, on a hilly shaded road, you don't want to get out.  I'm heading out to visit my parents who live on such a road in a few minutes.  I lived on that road.  I get it.  I'm not giving you a hard time.

But, if you live in a city where they've treated the roads (to excess, if the solid salt shell on my car is any indication), you need to come to work.  It's an inch of snow.  Snow.  Not lava.  Not man-eating sharks.  Not ninja throwing stars.  It's snow.  Suck it up.  And try not to complain to the guy who drove 30 miles before dawn in it.

Grownups don't get snow days.

Sorry.