IMBWHT

It Must Be Winter Hibernation Time

2 movies were rented last night.

" Bridesmaids " - its supposed to be good. L says ' a piece of garbage "  M liked it.

" The Last Airbender "  An entertaining job
For a dollar from the Red Box  " Zip.ca " Excellent value.

YSSTO

You Should See This One

" Sky Captain and the World of To-morrow "

Why should you see this movie ? You could be one of the 300 people who saw this one. Including me.

" SC and the Wof T " is an mostly - SG picture revolving around the adventures of  SKY CAPTAIN  ( Jude Law ), call me Joe. An ex-Nazi, ex-person Totenkopf wants to destroy the world and start over. Joe is a mercenary for hire ( I know what a mercenary is - they don't ). The reporter, Polly Perkins ( Gwyneth Paltrow ) who catches the story is the love interest , ex-love interest, aussi .
SC flies a Curtis P - 40 Tomahawk, a Flying Tiger.  The plane can fly anywhere and I mean anywhere, even underwater.
The film resembles a 1940 s serial. In fact, I believe, the original plan was to show the film as a segented piece.
This is not the " Artist " ala Scorcese. You don't get brownie points for watching this one.
Its different. and besides you get to see Angelina Jolie in black leather and giving orders. Angie plays Frankie , commander / pilot / lover in the Royal Navy.

Update 2012 7/15 The producer-director s are bros. Terry and ....... Conran
I appreciate their effort. Obviously, a campish sort of production. But Paltrow and Law shine as does Giovanni Ribisi ( excellent supproting actor )

CotT

"Clash of the Titans " Why you ask ?
Can't help it. Appeared to have action and monsters
swords and noise. Oh boy, a formula for success.
Rating ? Best not to go there.
I'm glad that Perseus ( hero ) gets the girl, Io( spirit / seer, Io dies and then Zeus brings her back ). 
The Kraken ( probably the same one in " Pirates of the Carybean " )
- seems everyone is afraid of the thing even the gods. K does a good job of thrashing about and roaring, all very important monster stuff.
Andromeda is a beautiful princess, kind and sweet despite her grasping and elitist parents. Perseus turns her down on the beach ( obviously no Burt Lancaster clone ) and of course, is rewarded w/ Io whom you could tell liked him from the beginning.
If you are a constant reader of the blog you'll know the quote from Perseus's father , a paean to the gods " I'm tired of being grateful for scraps " has been used before in " 2sents.... ".
Obviously, I've been re-watching " CotT ". " Green Lantern " and " The 300 " ( Spartan flick ala Marvel comics (?) ) have been re-screened as well.
OK. Did I mention " Off the Map " b/c that one is at the cottage and I watched it this week as well. Joan Allen ( from the " Bourne " trilogy ) does an excellent job as wife / mother / hunter / gatherer.
Set against the grandeur of New Mexico, this ex-play meanders through life and the scenery.  the couple, Allen and Sam Elliott
( yep, Cowboy Sam ) live on 5K a year.  They scavenge in the local dump ( only useful things, tho' ) tend the town dentist's fruit trees and sell crafts. Charlie's mantra ( Elliott ) " You haven't got time to learn anything if you work for someone else " dictates their life style.


In researching the body of work for Emily Blunt ( "Adjustment Bureau " w/ Matt Damon ) found a upcoming movie of hers " Salmon Fishing in Yemen ".  co-starring Ewan McGregor ( " Star Wars " ) this title and proposition caught my eye. While watching a film " Descendants " ( w/ George Clooney ) at MoviePlex, one of the trailers was for " SFiY". Kind of cute. So I'll get to see this one.
B/c at the time of the research " SFiY " was not available.

Card playing 101

everyone needs a hobby and mine is fishing. Luckily, I've been able to fish pretty much all my life.  Thanks goodness says M - get him out of the house.
As well, I play poker weekly. in fact on certain times of the month, I get to play three times a week. Last night in the cottage game ( for me, for them its the local game ) I managed to hold off Gary.  Gary scares me. I get the feeling he knows what my cards are. Overall, the cottage guys are conservative and tough to get an edge on. In " Outlaw Josie Wales " Josie says " always helps to have an edge ".  " all kinds of edges " says Lone Wadi. 

Travelling to the cottage, CBC had a piece on a fellow who is offering / building basic machines e.g. tractors and brick making machines by modules. so, for instance, the brick machine uses the hydraulic module from the tractor assembly.
Apparently, this entrepeneur got his idea when he bought a tractor that failed and had repair work that failed  on the tractor.  He realized that the fundemantal machines he needed were costly and unreliable and  occassionally un-repairable as well.
the upshot is that I want to build a tractor ( cost is $ 4 K by module system ). what would I do w/ a tractor ? DUNNO.
however, once built the tractor is a prototype for all other basic machines in the series.
What skills do I have  ? NONE  Skills needed ? Some. helps if you can weld. I'd need to sub-contract that part. We really could use a lift system at the cottage as it is 60 ft to the water from the house. I guess the tractor could be the pulley motor.
Hope someone else up there wants a tractor too !!! Or is as daft as me.

The road to the 16

everyone is waiting to find out  - how is Johns Hopkins doing.

Well, the Js are 2 - 0.  The Black and Blue held off a 18 th ranked Delaware Blue Hens team.  I watched the game last night on a cartoon website called GameTracker and an in-game blog from Laxpower.com.  I used to be able to listen to games from ESPN 1300 but somehow those broadcasts are no longer available here in Canada.

BTW - some history buffs clain that the team name comes from a match where JHU got beat up pretty bad.  The announcer said look at those " black and blue j
s - as in JHU " - aha the birth of a team name.

To be fair to Hop not many teams would want to start the season w/ games against Towson University and U. Delaware. Both teams are well schooled and not push overs.
However, every year, JHU plays a schedule pretty much the same as this year.  Hop plays 6 teams ranked in the top 20 this year.  As well, their schedule includes in-state rivals U.Maryland, Towson, Loyola University and the Naval Academy. these guys are not panty waists either.
So looking ahead which the team should not do, there is a short stretch w/ games against Syracuse, Virginia and North Carolina.
Each year, Hopkins pins its hopes of a place in the sweet 16 of Div 1 lacrosse w/ a Strength of Schedule rating and a winning record.  Hopkins is an independent team and has an enviable ( and to some a fortuitous and bias ) record of 42 straight appearances in the final 16. 
" Bias " b/c each year, there is a selection process overseen by D1 coaches. And each year questions are raised about who makes the cut and who doesn't and why. The most common outcry each year, is the "  bias " favouring teams w/ a long history of  participating and located in the East, specifically, the Baltimore - D.C. area.
Comically, some criticism, sees the bias as all of the East, east of the Mississippi. In fact , I sometimes think these critics include Ohio State and Notre Dame.
I really think that the teams from Upper NY state and Pennsylvania feel they get outed b/c they're not from the traditional base of lacrosse. And poor Duke and North Carolina feel they get rotted b/c they're too far south.  Look out Jacksonville.

RoT

Reflections on Travelling

We're home in T.O. you have read previously of, tooth debacle on the road and Montezuma's revenge. BTW, on this stomach flu front, I just heard a report on the radio of " Norwa " virus and I think they might have meant  " norwalk " . The symptoms are nausea ( not me ) vomitting ( not me ) and diarrhea ( def. me ) This is a February - seasonal event. In the old or health compromised,  the results can be death. Just wondering, if this virus is what I had.

The flight home was bumpy for about three minutes, then I watched " Untold Stories of the ER " and that plus food service, killed the two hours and nineteen min. Hate flying, I'm never really comfortable but it sure beats the 3 day ( for us ) drive to FlaUSA. I'm not a good long distance driver - 6 hours and I'm OK, tired but OK.  Ten hours and zombi-ism starts to arise. M often drives for a bit in the early PM to give a break. Hey,  I'm not even comfortable driving.
Guess we're flying next year too !!!

Why do I want to be home ? Its comfortable. I think its pretty basic human behaviour.  You know, return to the den and gnaw on bones or something. Yes, you can gnaw on bones in FlaUSA but soup making is a little more difficult.
Ok. I'm a homer, shoot me or in the case of Canadians don't shoot me b/c we are ten times less likely to get shot or mutilated at home cf the U.S.

The Kings of Spring

Starting about now, I follow NCAA lacrosse.  I wear a Johns Hopkins lacrosse jacket etc.  Go Jays !
The beginnings go back to 1965 or so when Sports Illustrated represented the way I got sports news. JHU was in the process of dominating or had dominated lax for some time.  story line reads " small liberal arts / science school goes up against the big bad schools of the east. " I was hooked.  followed JHU in the news when I could.
 Then around 2003, I was looking for an outlet as I retired and decided , finally, I could go watch the Jays play at Homewood Field in the spring ( once ). Well, my record is 13 - 3 when seeing the Jays live.  I witnessed losses to Princeton ( ugly )  Syracuse (we got man handled ) and Navy ( real ugly ).  however, that is a pretty good record. Except JHU wins in the late season April - May and their coach Petriemala has a solid record himself.
Of course , the year I drove twice to Baltimore to watch the Jays play at Homewood, was the first NCAA title since 1987. I was treated to a dominating defensive team with good speed but great lacrosse skills - I was mesmerized and still am.
To-night, in their home opener at Homewood, the Js beat in town rivals Towson w/ their new coach Shawn Nadelen.
So, another three months of suspense and more suspense - the Jays never do it the easy way.

Oh, " the Kings of Spring " was an advertising slogan for NCAA lacrosse, must have been thought up at Anheuser Busch or something.

Tony "wonka" and the chocolate factory

Will Rogers, noted humourist,  did a stage show where the content of his monologue came from the newspaper.  Will used to say " I'm not making this up ".
In this vein, the average Norte Americano eats 12lb of chocolate a year.  To me this means that some dude or dudette is eating some 23 lb of chocolate b/c I don't think that I even come close to 1 lb.
BTW,the average Swiss persona eats 22 lb of chocolate a year. These tidbits came from " How Do They Make It " on the History Channel.  

Antonio Benedetti (Tony Bennett ) in honouring the passing of Whitney Houston went on some age related bizarro rant and suggested every person in his audience should support legalizing and regulating drugs. The media interpretation was that he means illegal drugs as defined presently. Methinks Tony-o didn't quite know what he was saying either. 
OMG, give guy a platform and he'll hang himself - such as a blog too ?

On traveller's stomach, its almost over but this is open to interpretation. I'm pretending that all is well.

Medical reviews

Traveller's stomach or Montezuma's revenge.
OK. got the runs while on the road. I've tried to be normal diet et c but Cuban veal and les mets chinois ( Chinese food ) probably weren't the optimal food choices it seems.
I'm slowly returning to a state of functional plumbing and not constantly replenishing water loss.
Overall, I'm fortunate - someone here developed shingles, yick.

Update 2012 7/14 We were still in Fla. The shingles person left Fla wtill suffering from Shingles

BS AND MOUTH GUARDS

Watched a Bruce Springsteen music video - from when     a) he was a young rocker and b)  Courtney Cox comes out of the audience to dance w/ the Boss

Whoa, just noticed I haven't made a posting for days.  Perhaps you needed a break from the relentless onslaught.

So, the plastic crown is doing well.  I cut down my mouthguard that I use for sleeping b/c the mg hit the new crown and I guess the whole area was tender. Then as the area healed the cut down mouth guard started to hurt the fourth tooth from the back ( its a little pointy ). Went out and bought a new mouthguard ( yellow - sanctioned by the NFL or something ). The yellow mg is single density and fits beautifully in my mouth ( very small - though you'd never guess , as it gets used a lot ). 
I've tried mg s that are custom made ( $ 180 and a real loser ) , one that was Dr. Sleepgood's or some such barely could keep it in my mouth ( it hurt and cost $ 40 ) . And about six others w/ varying degrees of success. The cost for these hockey ? mg s is usually 4 - 6 $.
Here it comes the last two - one is no name and the other NFL approved both were $ 1.47 at Wallymart. What have I been doing ????

To be fair, the others probably     a ) fit most people  b) protect your teeth etc from humongous blows as you play a sport.  Thankfully, the only blows that my mg needs to w/stand is M giving me a poke at night so that , I'll roll-over and not snore.  Whoops, forgot to tell you that I chatter and grind my teeth which is the problem.

Let me guess - way too much info                 Well, thnx for listening

not a polar cap

Drilled and filled.  went for a permanent crown on the road

Mon- try the vodka rinse treatment and tooth went ballistic , the coleslaw touched the tooth - woohooo

A little cute plastic cap is in place, and the porcelein one comes in 8 days