Genre – Mystery
Movie Total Runtime – 5 Hour 53 Minutes
Spoilers – Yes
Growing up, my house had one television. It was a secondhand RCA CRT with no remote. The volume knob was the on switch and the only two other controls on the front were the VHF and UHF tuners. We got five channels on the rabbit ears – ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, and Fox. Later on, some more UHF channels were almost possible to be picked up. But since there was just the one set, peace was maintained through routine. Certain shows would get watched, and specials would have to be negotiated, parental veto applied to anything.
One show that was on pretty much every week was “Murder, She Wrote”. My mother was more into the TV mysteries than my Father, but we all watched as a family. As a result I have seen every broadcast episode of the series. In fact, I own every broadcast episode of the series. And this set. These four made for TV movies were aired after the end of the regular run, and I apparently never saw them. I acquired them with the boxed set of the series, but they were on the shelf.
I doubt anyone here doesn’t know the premise of the show. Jessica Fletcher is a serial killer Mystery Writer from Maine who goes around stumbling onto corpses and getting people to confess to being the ones to make them unliving. One of the running jokes is that she had to start travelling lest her home town run out of people. Well, when your weekly murder mystery show runs for twelve seasons, you’re going to accumulate a lot of corpses. Angela Lansbury is a talented actress whose health was failing over the course of the show’s run, but her definitive performance makes it pretty impossible for anyone else to take over the character. While I initially speculated that the switch to movies was related to those health issues, it was not. They were a consolation prize for the show’s cancellation by the network.
Time to watch them.
The first of these is “South by Southwest” (1997). It plays to the weakness of the series – an espionage plot. They tried touching on espionage a few times in the main run, and it never really worked. But it starts with the guest corpse of the week walking up a staircase, then getting shot by someone who appears from nowhere and disappears between cuts. Quite literally, since there is no one there in the wide shots. We finish out the opening by Kieth David, FBI showing up to take the one witness into protective custody.
We finally meet up with Jessica while she is rushing to board a train while fussing over a giant box she’s brought as luggage. It strained credulity that Amtrak employees would put up with this. It is unambiguously Amtrak, as the name and logo are slapped on the train and all the staff. I am even more incredulous that the train leaves on time. We hit another minor annoyance. I know the title is a play off of the movie “North by Northwest”, but in that movie, they are at least travelling west. Here, the action moves more or less due East. Starting in LA, the Train goes to a fictional town in Arizona, then to El Paso. Its eventual stop is somewhere in Florida, but the movie is over in El Paso.
Back on the plot, Jessica ends up having to share a dining car table with the witness from the opener, her FBI protection nowhere to be seen. Unlike real people who’d at most make small talk, the instant plot friend effect is invoked and we get some exposition. So when the train comes to an emergency stop and the witness vanishes, Jessica activates nosy bint mode and pokes around the witness’ cabin in the sleeper car. There, Random bald dude shows up with a silenced pistol demanding to know where “It” is in cliched fashion until reporter dude clobbers him with a wine bottle and they push bald dude off the train. The train hadn’t started moving again yet, so other than traumatic brain injury from the wine bottle, bald dude is fine. Reporter dude, however, gets shot offscreen and we have our second corpse for the movie.
Snooping through witness’ purse (which had been abandoned at the time of disappearance) Jessica finds a GameBoy and little else of note. After abandoning the train to get a bus and backtrack to where the emergency stop happened, Jessica gives away the GameBoy to a random child, even though it is not her property. In the town nearest the emergency stop, Jessica finds both a ‘secret’ government installation and a cabin containing a photograph of the witness with first dead guy, plus the dead guy’s government keycard. Ignoring logic, reason, and the laws of the land, Jessica decides to bluff her way onto a shuttle to the facility, uses the dead guy’s keycard to enter the facility, then tries to break into a computer. Thankfully, the show indicates her first password guess is wrong. She doesn’t get a second as security catches up with her and she’s brought before the local division director.
Mind you, at this point Jessica has committed several felonies and is still trespassing on a three letter agency site she illegally accessed with a stolen ID card. At this point she would realistically either disappear or be arrested and prosecuted. There is no question of misunderstanding, she knew this was a secure facility she had no permission to be in. Instead, division director provides exposition and lets her go. Apparently, dead guy number one found a security vulnerability in the software some spy sats ran on and was about to leak it to the press because patching it wasn’t being prioritized. I had a whole rant about how this makes no sense – government managers run around with their hair on fire at the words “security vulnerability” and insist it be patched yesterday. But this dumbass downloaded the entire code base and was “just going to show it” to some reporter who wouldn’t know a loop from a conditional.
Inexplicably free Jessica finds the witness at a different cabin indicated by the picture from the first and they drive towards El Paso. Along the way, Jessica Encyclopedia Browns the witness and hits her with an over analysis of Exact Words™, indicating that she was the killer all along. Insert lack of shocked face. We had already heard that first dead guy and witness were going through a less than civil divorce, and the only asset he had of any value was the illegally downloaded code base for the spy sats. The spouse is always the first suspect.
Keith David, FBI reminds us that the code is still out in the wild, but it’s obviously hiding in the GameBoy. Now, I thought it would either be in the game cartridge, or inside the main housing where it couldn’t be accidentally stumbled upon. But no, it was in the battery compartment. Somehow, despite obsessively playing the system, the random child had not managed to drain the batteries and stumbled onto the chip. And it is literally a chip, the prop is a 14-pin DIP with the legs folded out.
Keith David, FBI casually says it’s a 64GB chip, and at first blush, I think nothing of it. I mean today I have 1TB microSD cards that I get for relatively reasonable prices, and 64GB is a normal capacity for small storage media… But this movie came out in 1997. The Deskstar Titan 16GB desktop hard drive came out in 1998. Anway, we find out that the second dead guy was unalived by a couple of background characters I took for simple sneak thieves, roll credits.
South By Southwest did not play to the strengths of the series or the characters and falls flat as a result. Jessica Fletcher is not a spy, stop using her in espionage plots.
Second up is “A Story to Die For” (2000). In a nostalgic change of pace, they returned to the classic TV series opening credits font, even if they didn’t use the exact theme music. What? You’ve never been nostalgic for a font before? While the scene is being set where a bunch of motivational speakers are arriving for some sort of convention, the Russians show up intending to get something from the special Russian guest with a non-Russian accent. I skipped the rant on foreign accents in the last movie where they expected us to accept a Latvian as a Romanian because it wasn’t plot relevant. A Canadian who sounds like a Canadian trying to sound British doesn’t past for a Russian. Since the item the Russians are after appears to be memoirs of the former head of the KGB. I could try to justify the Canukistani accent. But I’m not that charitable.
The suspects are introduced at a dinner where the ex-KGB man antagonizes everyone, making more and more obvious he’s the guest corpse of the week. …aaaand, he’s dead.
Trying to play against formula, Jessica tries to stay away from the investigation while everyone expects and or wants her to jump in. Everyone else at the convention opts to try their hand at investigating, resulting in a bunch of acrimonious confrontations. Bumbling FBI agents ominously wander in and start questioning people. The Russians are still wandering about, looking for the now-missing memoirs.
To be honest, they loaded too many red herrings and characters. I’m usually good at juggling a large cast, but I’m having trouble keeping track of who’s supposed to be suspicious for what reason. I’ve begun to ignore the clues and dissect the narrative to look for who we’re not supposed to be suspicious of. I have pegged someone for that reason, and some of the background dialog has given me the “A-ha! I’m right” moment, but not from the clues being placed for viewer consumption. That is not a good thing for a mystery story. The narrative churns through the obvious red herrings with the extra suspects getting on my nerves. As is the standard issue magical Hollywood silencer which is used on my narrative suspect with Jessica in the next room. My guess is a self-inflicted wound given how minor it is and the ancillary details.
Even after the clues given to the audience confirm my narrative-based suspicions, they continue to work through the “lead the idiot by the nose” steps to eventually get there. The problem is that there are twenty minutes left in the movie. This step only works if done quickly, otherwise it starts to become condescending. There are no valid red herrings, we have all the evidence – wrap it up.
With some judicious editing, you could probably fit this plot into a regular episode, but it was a made for TV movie, so, no surprise there. If the background characters were more likable or interesting, it could have sustained this length, but they annoyed me. If you like the TV formula, you’ll probably be fine with this.
Third up, we have “The Last Free Man” (2001). They once again misplaced the credits font, and don’t have the theme music, not even the motif of it. You don’t need to use the opening typewriter sequence from the TV series, but the font and the music are iconic. I had to pause during the opening credits as we have a sequence where a man is getting chased by trackers with beagles. While research tells me that beagles are a perfectly valid tracking breed, the visual was just so funny I couldn’t help but laugh. Should I be upset that they played against trope and left the bloodhounds at home? Or lament their lack? Old-timey muzzle loader shot, and scene.
Switch to white guilt lecture by mixed-race lecturer talking about the injustice of the opening scene. No, Jessica, you do not have any responsibility for your distant great aunt being a slaveowner, shut up. Of course the main plot is about looking for evidence to clear the dead guy from the opening scene. The guilt-tripper has found two tombstones bearing the name of the dead guy from the opening scene. My first reaction was – “Or it’s a guy with the same name”. Of course, being fiction, this possibility gets ignored. Dead guy has two graves.
My first problem with this plot is – where are the stakes? Everybody involved in long dead, it’s a historical mystery, but nobody is left to be brought to justice. It’s so dead that there’s no reasonable excuse for a modern crime to be committed related to it. Activist lecturer is overly antagonistic and I’m unhappy about her churlishly brusque response to otherwise civil discourse. And I’m a New Yorker, brusque is my first language. Of course, the writers are condescending towards the southerners.
Also, as the movie switches to a period piece, the produces begin the anachronisms. The arrogant officer rival shows up to an antebellum wedding reception in Confederate grays almost a year before the introduction of that unform, and half a year before succession. You could argue it was a militia gray, but I’m going to doubt they did the research. I mean, he has a cavalry coat with an infantry officer’s hat.
At this point I got sick of the ham-fisted writing beating me over the head with The Message™ about how “Slavery is Bad”. No shit, Sherlock.
I did not bother to finish watching this installment.
Lastly, we have “The Celtic Riddle” (2003), where we still have neither the music nor the font yet again. Lets see how they mishandle the Irish. While we’re hardly the only Celts around, the series long established that Jessica has partial Irish ancestry. It opens on some storyteller rambling at some hippies. We then move on to some guy’s video will. Of course the greedy members of the family are unhappy, as it includes the servants and family friends. Hippy daughter isn’t too perturbed at her inheritance of nothing, so maybe she does have principles. Her boyfriend is quite angry at the nothing. I’m supposed to care about a treasure hunt concocted in the will, but I suspect the treasure will be “friendship” or some similar hippy drivel. Sounds like the sort of moral the production staff would go for. It would be out of character for it to be cash.
I’m trying not to let my uncharitability from the previous blunt installment color my opinion of this even as the first corpse drops in. Not sure who he is, maybe the storyteller? It wasn’t. The name doesn’t help. No one has really been established to the point where I can remember the names. From later context, he was at the will reading. Greedy widow is upset that new corpse’s portion of the inheritance doesn’t automatically fall to her, since she was bequeathed a specific sum. Perpetually terrified housekeeper goes to Spookychurch and almost gets herself killed for her treasure clue, but reveals she forgot to bring it to the offscreen antagonist. Offscreen antagonist, in trying to break into the desk where three clues are stored clobbers Jessica as she snoops about.
Greedy family finds out the family business is losing money badly. This reinforces my opinion that the ‘treasure’ is not money. While hippy girl drives Jessica to some excuse of an appointment, offscreen antagonist runs the car off the road and into a fence. The vehicle turns up at boyfriend’s garage being worked on. Of course, the keys are kept in an easily accessible spot. Offscreen antagonist stabs yet another clue holder while only Jessica and hippy girl are accounted for. Perpetually terrified housekeeper points the finger at boyfriend.
We get conversational exposition about a bastard child of the original dead guy by the sister of perpetually terrified housekeeper. I suppose the identity is supposed to be a great mystery, but I don’t think it is. Perpetually terrified housekeeper summons Jessica to Spookychurch where she snoops about the graveyard, and fails to find anything, even the housekeeper. The housekeeper is found the next day by joggers, dead.
My engagement in the mystery lulls as they accumulate the plot coupons and close in on the treasure location. My narrative-based analysis picked the right person as the bastard and offscreen antagonist. Last thing – am I right about the treasure? Yes and no. The glurgy sentiment is inscribed on a silver artifact.
On objective reflection, I probably would have enjoyed the Celtic Riddle more had I not just been talked down to by The Last Free Man. They manage the runtime better, fitting the pacing to the format. The cast is more concise, and the information better distributed through the narrative. If you are a fan of the larger series, it’s a no-brainer. If not, I’m probably not going to convince you to watch it.
All in all, the movies are a mixed bag. I do miss the theme music.
C’mon man, there’s an expectation of The Music you guys let down.
I know, I know, they probably didn’t want to pay whoever got royalties whenever the music got used.
Unrelated, I’ve only got 47 unreviewed items after the nine more I’ve already reviewed (PTB, I’ve not uploaded all the written reviewed yet, I’m proofing them). Should I start intentionally looking for new items, or are you guys already sick of this format?
I actually greatly enjoy the format and style, for a few different reasons.
Chief among them: They’re entertaining. My time, well spent. Cheers.
Not sick of it.
Sometimes I learn something new.
A couple of my friends were addicted to Murder She Wrote.
My Mom loved it – I seem to vaguely remember buying her this T-shirt or something like it:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0384/0921/products/framed-murder-she-wrote-t-shirt.master_54c97eef-40ac-4bc2-bee8-718ced351556_1024x1024.jpg?v=1673624580
My mom adored Columbo./shows age
Colombo wasn’t on as often, but it was also on the “always watch” list.
For some reason, when I was a kid, Diagnosis Murder became a show that I would watch regularly. It was the one oddball “grown-up” show that stood out from all the Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network stuff. I think it was on during a time when everything else was infomercials, and it was occasionally funny.
Yup, We watched that one too. It’s eerie how Dick van Dyke and Barry van Dyke have literally the same voice.
Speaking of Columbo…
I was absolutely nostalgic for the original Columbo font. The one they used for the TV movies was terrible.
PS. I had no idea the same creators were behind both shows.
Columbo was a big part of Family Viewings. Parents would fetch me to watch with ’em. Peter Falk delivers one of the greatest characters of all time, one of my favorites.
Theory: There is no Mrs. Columbo. That’s the lieutenant being coy, with tales helping establish his ‘not-serious’ vibe for the perps. I ‘think’ many of the stories are references to his dog, who certainly *is* real, and the pooch’s habits and quirks.
I want to rewatch Murder By the Book by Neil Simon, making fun of all the detective tropes. Falk is in that one as a hard-boiled gumshoe, and Truman Capote has a speaking role in it. Not sure if it holds up, ‘specially since Dad loves it.
*Murder By the Book is the first Columbo episode and Spielberg’s first big project. Also Jack Cassidy.
I’m thinking of Murder by Death.
The one with the sex therapist is on Cozi now – great ep.
Popcorn TV. You know it’s going to follow the formula, but in the end you don’t care.
I’ve never seen a second of it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I wonder if it’s on anywhere; I haven’t come across it on cable. Maybe Pluto?
😧
How?
I had to look it up… it started in 1984. Well, in 84/85 I was living in Germany. After my return I was crazy busy with high school, and then college drinking and drugging limited my time for TV even more.
Me either, in my case it was because my mom loved it and that made me avoid it like the plague.
Roku has an entire Murder, She Wrote channel.
A quick search shows the channel is on Pluto, too.
Couldn’t find Equity bloodhounds maybe?
What would those be?
Actors’ union dogs.
I support scab labor.
/former Union Steward.
Admittedly obscure reference
I didn’t get it.
Care to elaborate.
Well, I just now realized that a reference to Actors Equity is to the entirely wrong union, as it’s for live theater. Should’ve been to the Screen Actors Guild. Maybe there’s a Screen Animal Actors Guild.
A SAAGy Dog story?
👏😆
Still can’t remember who prefers good puns or bad puns, or hates puns.
A SAAGy Dog story?
Once upon a time there was a dog. He lived in the alley behind an Indian restaurant. One day the chef ran out of goat meat for his signature dish based on stewed spinach. The dog was never heard from again.
That’s ruff. 😞
A Lap Dance is So Much Better When the Unionist Cries
In one episode of Murder She Wrote, I picked out the killer before the killing even took place.
Which episode?
All I remember is the “clue” that would solve the case.
This was the era of big earrings. At the start of the show, some important woman was called to the phone. She unclipped an earring, set it on the table, the put the phone to her ear. This is the kind of thing that happens in real, that would never show up in a movie or TV show unless it was relevant to the story.
And it was. The clip on earring was at the murder scene and proved the woman did the crime. I have no memory of any other part of the show. But I pissed off my family members by blurting out she was the killer as soon as she took off the earring at the start of the show.
You know, I know exactly which episode you’re talking about. The earrings were a corporate anniversay gift for long serving female employees, of the handful of employees who got them, there are like two, one with pierced ears versus unpierced.
Yes, that is the episode.
It was a time when pierced ears were still not totally ubiquitous. Lot’s of women still wore clipon earrings.
Hah! My mom didn’t get her ears pierced until I was about five (’76) and she wore big clip-ons in the eighties.
I remember that episode.
Wait, is that the one with Steve Martin and Martin Short?
Yeah, I picked the killer out as soon as they showed.
No one has posted this yet?
https://printerval.com/jessica-fletcher-i-killed-them-i-killed-them-all-vintage-t-shirt-p42127159?spid=3420181097&tr=&adgroupid=&campaignid=21333123562&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=21322947111&gbraid=0AAAAA9xz-1S7tA6zIepZf1kS6-ePE-tCE&gclid=CjwKCAjwz5nGBhBBEiwA-W6XRPvzdveo3zDRmk2ZzSsk2pL5jSSnkNoHPmBJDcFPR5zNNionjwx7nBoC3WkQAvD_BwE
She’s too canny to confess.
A memoir written from a tropical resort with no extradition treaty.
All amateur detectives are serial killers. Any rando who turns up on the site of dozens or hundreds of murders and inserts themself into the investigation is almost certainly the killer.
Maybe there’s a Screen Animal Actors Guild.
I got on a samurai movie kick at one point. It seemed like they all had white cats in them. At first I thought there might be some cultural significance to white cats in Japan. But then I thought maybe it’s just the same cat. The cat samurai movie superstar who gets all the best gigs. The Toshiro Mifune of cats.
That cat is no Samurai, it’s a Ninja Kitty. 🐱👤
I have the blu-ray of Yojimbo and Sanjuro – I’ll have to look out for white cats next time I watch them. I’m usually too distracted by the man whose systolic blood pressure must be in the thousands (spoiler alert).
I love that a FX technical error a) made it to the final cut and b) became a trope.
Based on my extensive knowledge of Japan (98% wrong 2% trite) arrived at by intensive study (watching cartoons) I can conclusively state that that cat is either a God, a Demon, or a Witch in animal form and probably instigated the bad guy in his badness.
(((Jarflax gets it.
Bakeneko
Or a merchant, of course.
Maneki-neko
Huh, I thought this show was a lot older than it is. It entered my vocabulary, however, specifically cuz of a Simpsons line, back when they were good, briefly showing Lansbury walking over hot coals, with Troy McClure shouting “Excitement, she wrote!”
Using it as my own exclamation, I’ll substitute “Excitement” with “Curiosity,” Suspense,” “Confusion,” etc, depending on the personal or observational situation I find myself commenting on, and certainly with a theatrical voice. It tends to land well, but probably on the delivery, rather than them understanding the reference.
It ran from 1984-1996 for the primary broadcast run, these made for TV movies are more recent.
I remember it being on Sunday nights, but I don’t remember ever paying much attention to it. I’ll be darned if I can think of what I might have watched during that time slot instead. I seriously doubt I had access to cable during most (if not all) of those years. 🤔
lol Starting in 1987 it was on at the same time as Married… With Children.
I have a strong suspicion that Mom was watching Jessica in the living room while I was watching the Bundys in my room while doing my homework.
MSW, Matlock, and the like were definitely right up Mom’s alley.
Just got to the (216) so Im catching up.
The issues with the Jeep (2019 Cherokee, Trailhawk package) are due to the owner’s (Jugsy) and deferred maintenance.
Brakes- I hadnt driven the thing for a couple months, and one day when we’re going to breakfast I had to ask her “so for how long now has the jeep made a noise like keys being cut when the pedal is depressed?” My guy showed me the pads- down to the backing plate. And of course the rotors were toasted. The added expense came from the electric parking brake caliper being extended to the point it wouldnt return.
Battery- its a 3 year old AGM. Likely just a cell is bad, but wont crank the engine. Que sera, sera.
Struts-Just last weekend she wanted me to drive it because at highway speeds “it feels funny”. Sure enough, at 70 mph you could feel it in the column. Back to my dude. OEM struts? $500 each. Job pays 4 hours.
Tires? When she brought that thing home 2 years ago they were shot. We made a trip to Northern Ky yesterday and i was driving. Hoping it would go out on me when I was there. Nope. Waited until this morning when I was 50 miles away having breakfast with Tres 2.0.
So its all stuff that could have been avoided. The struts would have been just as expensive but at 92K Im sure they were shot anyhow.
https://store.mopar.com/oem-parts/mopar-suspension-shock-absorber-kit-68443139aa?
OEM retail is $222. Even with a parts markup that seems excessive. Labor hours seem more realistic as it’s likely going to need an alignment.
Yes. Alignment too.
Which it will need again when I buy a new set of tires. Of course.
Those are rear shocks. Front struts are probably more, especially if it’s a quick strut assembly.
Good point Doc! For some reason I was reading $500 a corner.
Murder She Wrote
Hah! Glad I’m not the only one whose mind went there.
Ugh. As an 80’s baby I found few television programs more tedious than fucking Murder She Wrote. It was basically Colombo without the charm or wit. Many were the days when I was being watched over by my paternal grandparents over the summers between school years and I distinctly remember being bored to tears over my grandparents’ instance on watching shit like MSW, Matlock, and Hee-Haw.
Yeah, my grandparents liked Hee-Haw. Watching it was doom, despair, and agony oh me.
That was on in my house every week, ugh.
Laugh-In for rednecks.
Never saw Hee-Haw or Laugh-in, but how dare you malign the other shows!
😡
Hee Haw, Carol Burnette, Laverne & Shirley. I remember hating MASH as a kid, then growing to love it later.
I’ve always found Alan Alda’s personality come across as “smug, condescending, insufferable lefty prick”. Even as. kid he just rubbed me the wrong way so I never gave MASH much of chance. I’ve seen dozens of episodes but it never hit home.
There was the one gal what wore the shirt that looked like a picnic table cover that always caught my attention.
LuLu Roman gave me an appreciation for the larger ladies.
I am less of a fan of MASH now than I was when I was little. But I still watch it sometimes.
I wish Carol Burnett was on more – it was on one of the old-people channels a couple years ago, maybe one that I don’t get now. MeTV? That show is a classic.
The Roku Channel has an entire channel of The Carol Burnett Show.
I am not familiar with the Roku Channel. Is it something like Pluto, where I can just add it to my teevee?
Never mind, I found it.
lol Murder She Wrote is “trending”. 🫤
If you’ve got a Roku box (I think the cheap models are still $30 or so), you can load apps like Pluto or Tubi or the pay streaming services to it the same way you can to a smart TV. Roku’s FAST service calls itself “The Roku Channel”, which is unfortunate since as with Tubi or Pluto “channel” is usually thought of as each of the individual channels.
I went with Roku boxes when Dad and I moved because at the time our most recent TV was from before Mom died in 2015, so even if the TVs had been smart when we bought them, they weren’t smart any longer.
My grandparents watched Lawrence Welk.
Lies, nobody watched Lawrence Welk.
Yes, now that was torture. There’s a meme floating around mimicking a law firm commercial: “If you were forced to watch Lawrence Welk you may be entitled to compensation”
When I bought an accordion, my Dad asked me “Whaddaya gonna do, become the next Lawrence Welk?”
I looked up Lawrence Welk just to see who he was. It was rather… Boring. Not bad musicianship, just rather uninteresting. Albert Vossen is better.
My grandparents watched it. Was a tough one to slog through. That was the one show that I would hope for even the news to come on instead.
To be fair, the grandparents also watched Benny Hill.
Wow! You all are like looking at my TV Guide with my faves underlines but no Laurence Welk . Too local
My kids were young, they loved those programs. The VN relatives got their first taste of Americana as well.
Welk and He-ha at my fathers house, PBS as moms.
Flipped to ESPN to watch the Yankees at Boston. Well, that game has begun, but the network is still playing the NY v Phoenix WNBA game in OT. (Oh! It *is* their playoffs!)
Biggest baseball rivalry, and arguably the biggest in US sports, sidelined by the NBAs tax write-off. I suppose the execs don’t care how their bread is buttered, or likely, it’s being spread by other partners I’m unaware of, most certainly with a legal edge to it. It must be contractual for the networks to play the full game, even if it goes into OT or extras, just like how the Big Four sports do. Still. Uh. Were I trying to make money, I’d certainly prioritize NY v Boston, because I happen to *like* making money. I prefer making it as easy as possible.
“Let me get this straight. You took all the money you made from the Klown Kollege and bet *against* the Harlem Globetrotters?!”
“I thought The Generals were *due!* <– Also not me. See? I make great decisions, all of them inspired.
I am reminded that broadcast and cable television show more women’s soccer than men’s these days.
I chuckled many a times over this Summer while skimming channels for sporting events and mostly finding women’s sports being featured. Women’s soccer in particular. Call me misogynistic if you must but watching a group of world class women athletes play a game I don’t really care about while knowing that the best local highschool boys team would mop the floor with said world class women athletes kinda takes the thrill out of watching. Yet the networks still try to make me care. Emphatically so.
I hope this link works. “The Most Karen Woman in the World.”
https://x.com/IndianaGPA/status/1965399412005544163
That, right there, was both hilarious and very well made. I suspect AI got the Liz Warren lookalike doing all those things rather than an actress. The facial expressions and physicality are quite believable. (It could also be a real lookalike doing a good job, but I highly, highly doubt it. Awfully speedily produced, eh? Seems unlikely, but what do I know?)
Writers and actors, hit hardest by AI takeover. (Minorities, women and children, hardest hit of all.)
I wonder when we’re going to see full-length movies made with AI. If someone can make that skit about the Baseball Karen, they could probably make a 90 minute movie; it would just take one person a couple days to give the prompts until the scene comes out as desired.
Many, many years ago, I was perusing some interview with a movie director. They were talking about the “new” technology of CGI and ability to edit an actor’s performance after it’s filmed, like subtly changing facial expressions or erasing unwanted lines of dialogue and the accompanying mouth movement…
Interviewer: When will you say that this technology has gone too far?
Director: When they can make movies without any interaction between the actors and the director.
Welp, we’re about there, I think.
Even worse, we’re about to reach the point where no video or photograph you see can be trusted ever again.
I don’t think the poobahs have given that any serious thought.
We are about there, but the movies will suck as much as all the superhero films combined.
The central issue with AI is that it has no moral sense, and due to that it will never create good art. There will be no Apocalypse Now, no Fitzcarraldo, no Birth of a Nation, because all of those films are not action, but moral fables, playing out a persons dreams and fears. And without those dreams and fears, the movies will have no emotional stakes.
The movies that AI will make will make Dick and Jane seem emotionally charged.
We got five channels on the rabbit ears – ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, and Fox.
Showing your youth privilege here. Lots of us remember a time when there was no Fox network. (I think Albany only had four channels at the time, no independents.)
[ Fourscore enters the chat to tell us he remembers a time with no TV ]
We got WUHF (independent, I guess Fox now) when I was 10 years old and it was most amazing thing that had ever happened up to that point in my life.
When I lived in Montana in the mid-90s, no Fox. So, X-Files was run on a Friday night on one of the other local network affiliates.
We had the big 3, PBS and KMSP, an independent in the Twin Cities.
We had a ton of independent stations in DFW. It was a blessing. Otherwise it was the Big Three and PBS.
We didn’t have TV when I left home, I’d never really experienced it. Fourscores were too poor but once I cleared the front door things got better for my folks and they got TV with a tall mast and a rotor when fine tuning between Fargo and Duluth.
In ’59, in NJ, my room mate and I got a hand-me-down TV, we could watch ball games on Saturday. Most of the other times we were studying.
My brother (yes, there are two of us) got a dead a Sears black and white TV from a neighbor’s trash for pickup. He determined it just needed to be wrapped in a towel for the tubes to get warm enough to work. So we watched Doctor Who, midnight matinee, all the good stuff.
The big three and PBS.
I had KCBS, KNBC, KTLA, KABC, KCAL, KTTV, KCOP, and UHF channels.
My first problem with this plot is – where are the stakes?
Sean’s first problem with the plot is — where are the steaks?
Hee Haw could be pretty damn funny at times.
Agreed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6T2nRAazrY
Yeah I poke fun at it but it wasn’t half bad.
And Roy Clark was an awesome guitarist.
And he shares my birthday so is therefore awesome.
Informal survey: Do you watch actual TV channels anymore or just streaming/YouTube?
I never got cable when I moved out on my own (2006) and watch almost entirely YouTube. The things I watch are usually cooking shows, woodworking shows, and geography/travel content. I’ve found a few channels in each of those categories where they are pretty dense on interesting and useful information. Whenever I see network TV shows at somebody’s house, they always seem over-produced and padded out to fill up the required programming block.
I watch MeTV almost daily, it is over-the-air. And channel 8 for weather news. I do watch a lot of streaming channels and I do not have cable.
I have to pay for a higher tier to get MeTV, pisses me off. I’m not paying 250 a month for cable/internet any more (75 after I moved to my current building) so the trade off is worth it I guess.
Only television. It’s just background noise while I do real stuff on my computer. Youtube requires paying attention which interferes with the real stuff I’d rather be doing.
I actually digitally record both broadcast and cable. Historically it was easier than streaming and we can watch on any device – TV or phone or tablet.
If we moved I’m not sure I’d bother with cable TV, but being able to receive and record live TV is really nice. Naturally the broadcasters want none of that the ATSC 3.0
https://www.tvrev.com/news/broadcasters-want-to-kill-atsc-10-but-at-what-cost-to-viewers
https://www.tvtechnology.com/news/silicondust-urges-fcc-to-do-away-with-drm-rules-for-atsc-3-0-programming
I’m set in my ways, sonny. Not fooling around with stuff I don’t already do.
I got rid of TV years ago. Somewhere several years prior to 2016, as I ditched it well before buying my house. I also ditched Streaming, since it made me pay for crap I didn’t want, and had terrible discoverability of what it actually had.
Just give me a filterable index.
Anyway both times I realized I was paying for a product I didn’t really use.
Yea, I don’t personally pay for any streaming services; the wife and stepdaughter watch a lot of Netflix and Disney+ though which I watch with them sometimes, but there’s nothing there that I would really watch on my own.
I always hear that Netflix shows are extremely shitty and really just background noise for people who are distracted by a cell phone. But they’re still paying the monthly fee whether they pay attention to the shows or not, so the business model works. My brief glimpses of Netflix series supports the theory that they suck.
But I will say, Netflix did make “The Highwaymen” movie about the Texas Rangers who hunted down Bonnie & Clyde, and that was actually really good.
I should clarify I don’t pay for subscription streaming. There are way too many good free streaming channels. PLUTO has a good cross section.
My wife pays for Netflix. I try to look away.
In my own places, I’ve never had a TV. Just a tablet and YouTube or whatever for background entertainment. I really don’t sit and watch things well. I definitely had MLB.tv to watch the Cubs, and my own Seinfeld, Top Gear or good Simpsons episodes.
We have cable and I always have the TV on, but only really watch baseball or hockey. I actually enjoy Hardcore Pawn and American Pickers, though the former’s characters are especially grating. The concept for both shows is brilliant and is sometimes very well done. But I don’t watch watch. Old eps of Law & Order are great distraction/ memory background, and that show, one channel or another (w 90% being unwatchable) is *always* on.
We have Prime and Netflix, and I use them along with YouTube to find something to occupy my small room’s otherwise silence. Silence is just creepy. I want the noise to help mute extraneous thoughts my brain will bounce around just to fill the vacancy. )See also: Sleep time rain /etc sounds.)
I haven’t watched television in about a decade, and even then it was mostly things like Big Bang Theory re-runs.
I am almost 100% YouTube now, except for baseball playoffs and the very occasional special event. Since I Ethernet cable went bad (it connected my router to an OTA streaming box) I I haven’t watched TV at all.
Streaming and YouTube.
We dvr some stuff from network tv. Mostly live sports and the occasional movie or show. We have the free streamers (Plex, Pluto, Tubi, etc), but mostly watch what I’ve recorded and scanned on off of DVDs and blu rays over the years. We have a few hundred movies and maybe 70 Tv series.
I figured out the twist in The Sixth Sense about 15 minutes into the movie, possibly because I learned how to anticipate such things from watching The Twilight Zone.
My family got cable when I was about 12 and from then on, I watched a lot of Comedy Central, SyFy, and History Channel.
Having read all the Sherlock Holmes stories, I’m pretty good at figuring out mysteries.
It started because I went to a crime solving exhibit at a museum in elementary school and was disappointed that I didn’t notice enough clues.
https://www.oklahoman.com/story/entertainment/arts/2009/12/01/a-real-whodunit-at-science-museum-oklahoma/61320631007/
I learned a lot from this too:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hdT8PgT19w
***
Frances Glessner Lee (March 25, 1878 – January 27, 1962) was an American forensic scientist. She was influential in developing the science of forensics in the United States.[1] To this end, she created the Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, twenty true crime scene dioramas recreated in minute detail at dollhouse scale, used for training homicide investigators. Eighteen of the Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death are still in use for teaching purposes by the Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, and the dioramas are also now considered works of art.[2] Glessner Lee also helped to establish the Department of Legal Medicine at Harvard University, and endowed the Magrath Library of Legal Medicine there.[3] She became the first female police captain in the United States, and is known as the “mother of forensic science”.[4][5]
***
Not many smiles this week.
https://hotair.com/david-strom/2025/09/14/sunday-smiles-n3806785
The Dems are beyond help at this point. If anything was proven this week it’s that the whole “both sides do awful shit” meme is only a convenient fiction.
Aimed right at Yusef
😂🤣
I thought eel pies were a joke from The Simpsons, and I was wrong.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogfyJICT9aI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jellied_eels
***
Eels were historically a cheap, nutritious and readily available food source for the people of London; European eels were once so common in the Thames that nets were set as far upriver as London itself, and eels became a staple for London’s poor. The earliest known eel, pie and mash houses opened in London in the 18th century, and the oldest surviving shop, M.Manze, has been open since 1902.[1] At the end of the Second World War, there were around 100 eel, pie and mash houses in London.[2] In 1995, there were 87.[3]
In the present day, there are relatively few eel, pie and mash shops, although jellied eels are sold in some of the capital’s delicatessens and supermarkets. The water quality of the Thames, having improved greatly since the 1960s,[citation needed] has since become suitable once again for eels.[4] The Environment Agency supports a Thames fishery, allowing nets as far upriver as Tower Bridge.[5] However, the European eel is critically endangered.[6]
***
I like unagi.
I don’t mind eels.
Except as meals.
And the way they feels.
-Ogden Nash (who else?)
Once at a Japanese restaurant, I made the waitstaff and other customers laugh by raising my hand dramatically and saying with an imperious voice “bring me the broiled eel!”
“Unagi? Hai!”
Sometimes I’ll catch a rerun of a 60s show while on my stationary bike. Today the scripts seem retarded, even by today’s standards. Damn, couldn’t they imply Andy and Barney were humping the socks off Helen and Thelma Lou down by Myers Lake? Or have babes like Donna Stone and Mary Richards slept in separate beds from hubbies and hadn’t bumped uglies since the last kid was conceived?
The volume knob was the on switch and the only two other controls on the front were the VHF and UHF tuners. We got five channels on the rabbit ears – ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, and Fox.
Earliest memory of TV is a black and white, long before Fox arose to challenge the tri-opoly of NBC, ABC and CBS. We got two PBS stations, 34 out of Columbus (WOSU) and if the weather was right, 20 out of Athens (WOUB).
Ours was a console TV, color but low resolution. Three channels and PBS.
When FOX hit it was life altering.
I had one of those in my basement bedroom in the early 80s – my mom found it at a garage sale I guess. No idea how I got it. That thing was parked right next to the octopus furnace that kept everything toasty warm in the winter.
I remember taping the theme song from Hart to Hart off it lol
console tv with built in radio and record player
We didn’t get color tv until the late 80’s. I grew up watching Doctor Who (and everything else) in B&W.
The moment Charlie Kirk was killed, uncensored
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6L47dzO4KgQ&rco=1
My guess is the scumbag was trying to do a headshot.
The guy who shot Trump was probably going for a headshot too.
Aim small, miss small
(if you aim at a small target, you’ll miss a small target)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v33AAmKxHC0
/WV raised and Army “pizza box” marksman
Hard pass.
Right there with you. I’m trying to keep what’s left of my soul.
Would you kindly not.
You write of violence, play violent video games, etc, but don’t want to see the real thing? I find that odd. It’s like meeting someone who likes porn but not sex.
It’s understandable that most people don’t want to see death and destruction, just as most people don’t want to work in slaughterhouses. Soldiers and suchlike have a different mindset.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkDYrCCmUIA
Why would you find it odd.
Most people know the difference between make believe and reality.
Derp, I knew a guy that liked porn and thought sex was gross.
Violence is natural, in fact I believe that our culture sanitizes death far too much. I’ve been to war, I’ve seen people die from car crashes, I’ve watched plenty of Russian and Uke tanks and men get droned.
I stoped watching those videos over a year ago. Enough was enough.
You implying that soldiers want to continually watch snuff films?! Jesus this event has even shown some weird cracks in this place too.
Ownbest, watching war is a thing. People went to Gettysburg with picknicks.
Gun camera footage has been a thing for over 80 years.
Most of it was distant and out of focus. You saw the buildings blown up or the train boiler blow.
Now it’s a high rez drone cam hitting some poor sum h in the face. No reason to watch them.
OK, finding fantasy more enjoyable than reality is understandable up to a point.
It’s like someone who eats veggie “meat” but never the real thing because…?
If you find fantasy violence entertaining, you should watch the real thing once in a while to stay sane.
I’ve seen and experienced enough real violence that I don’t seek it out, though I am desensitized to it. Being psychologically bulletproof is handy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmL6N-xDalk
At my 5-year Peace Corps reunion, we had a video watching party, and so I showed this scene of Africans killing an elephant with spears.
https://youtu.be/_Fm464VmtPc?si=y1NqnofHrsh6gXMe&t=2556
Some guy complained “no one wants to see an elephant killed with spears”. Well, sorry creampuff. They’ve done it that way over there for thousands of years.
Some poor schmuck.
Bad autocorrect.
I don’t seek it out
Kirk footage just appeared in your browser?
OK, I watch real violence often. Too often maybe. It keeps me from doing it myself.
Catharsis is a thing.
Hell’s Angels was the name of WW2 bomber. Some of the crew of it and others took up riding motorcycles to replace the lost excitement in their lives.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell%27s_Angels_(aircraft)
***
Hell’s Angels was a Boeing B-17F Flying Fortress used during the Second World War. It was one of the first B-17s in the 8th Air Force to complete 25 credited combat missions in the European Theater. Ultimately, Hell’s Angels would go on to complete 48 missions without any crewman injured or being forced to turn back.[2][3]
***
I read somewhere that IDF and US soldiers watched Daniel Pearl’s beheading to prepare themselves for war.
In the months before I joined the Army, I watched a lot of ISIS videos to prepare myself.
https://www.mojevideo.sk/video/26640/for_the_sake_of_allah_is_nasheed_sk_titulky.html
I didn’t want to freeze up in combat, so I needed habituation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habituation
***
Habituation is a form of non-associative learning in which an organism’s non-reinforced response to an inconsequential stimulus decreases after repeated or prolonged presentations of that stimulus.[1] For example, organisms may habituate to repeated sudden loud noises when they learn that these have no consequences.[2]
***
To each their own Derp really. Some will click your link and that is fine and I think those of us who are passing aren’t putting you down for it, but just more a community check. Do we need that here? A lot have that shock from past times, with many being in the sandbox. Some may have more personal connections to it.
Do we really need to show an in-depth analysis of it though?
I saw plenty of bodies and death before I joined the army, it’s interesting how people react to violence and death.
It’s often not pretty.
Knowing how you are likely to react is a good thing. I can’t see that coming from watching videos, reality hits differently. I never pulled the trigger on anyone but I’d it pulled on me a few times, they missed.
I’m not going to watch it but well, a warning was provided so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I mean why? We know what it was, some saw the real-time from afar and from up close. Why do we need to see the ‘moment’ it happened. It already happened, we know it happened.
a separate question
Is it good for people to be exposed to a certain amount of graphic and/or realistic violence or does it just traumatize them?
Is it good to experience and inflict some actual violence?
I think the answer to both is yes. It is especially important for boys to learn that they are not indestructible or invincible. Ideally, that lesson should come from someone they know and trust.
Yep.
Or omnipotent, but I guess that was implied already. There’s a reason why so many young boys like Space Jesus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UJphNPwDfk
I remember watching the VHS of this when I was 6. Watching it, came to me that either I’ll be the hero or the mad scientist. I chose the heroic path, as heroes are more popular.
Yes it is to an extent. Every June my kids got a dose of the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan and the Bastogne scene from Band of Brothers. I know its not actual violence, but a good indicator of it. Lives were lost at a tremendous pace. Lives were broken in unimaginable ways. Lives though, moved on with that trauma and were successful.
All to illustrate just how much carnage and death and destruction war and violence is/was. I would never actively seek out real violence but my standing order was if it happened, we’d be bluntly honest of the implications.
I never immediately stopped any fight by my boys and had allowed a natural outcome. Throwing fists hurt both parties and there were consequences; internal and external.
some soldiers play themselves in “snuff” films:
Audie Murphy kill count
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wpCIhiHTWo
Murphy talks about WW2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF1F1kRTpWE
***
Audie Leon Murphy (20 June 1925 – 28 May 1971)[1] was an American soldier, actor, and songwriter. He was widely celebrated as the most decorated American combat soldier of World War II,[4] and has been described as the most highly decorated enlisted soldier in U.S. history.[5][6] He received every military combat award for valor available from the United States Army, as well as French and Belgian awards for heroism. Murphy received the Medal of Honor for valor that he demonstrated at age 19 for single-handedly holding off a company of German soldiers for an hour at the Colmar Pocket in France in January 1945, before leading a successful counterattack while wounded.
***
Murphy is a common Irish surname. It means sea-warrior.
***
The surname is a variant of two Irish surnames: “Ó Murchadha”/”Ó Murchadh” (descendant of “Murchadh”), and “Mac Murchaidh”/”Mac Murchadh” (son of “Murchadh”)[1] derived from the Irish personal name “Murchadh”, which meant sea-warrior or sea-battler[2] (muir meaning sea and cath meaning battle).[3]
According to historian C. Thomas Cairney, the O’Murphys were one of the chiefly families of the Uí Ceinnselaig who in turn were a tribe from the Dumnonii or Laigin who were the third wave of Celts to settle in Ireland during the first century BC.[4] The O’Murphys as one of the chiefly families of the Uí Ceinnselaig is supported by John O’Hart in his 1892 Irish Pedigrees; or, The Origin and Stem of The Irish Nation.[5]
Murchadh is reported to have been gripped with a boiling awful rage, an extreme elevation and greatness of spirit and intellect when he joined the middle of the action and prepared to assail the foreign invaders, the Danes, after they had repulsed the Dal gCais. A gallantry and championship bird rose inside him and fluttered above his head and on his breath.[6]
***
My Irish surname means “artist”. The surname Fogerty is garbled Irish meaning “for a while” as in, “this guy’s gonna be talking for a while”. So Fogerty kinda means blabbermouth in Irish.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUQiUFZ5RDw
The Irish helped Africans fight for independence against British:
***
In 1963, he had helped draft the constitution of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU); following consultations on the constitutions of newly-independent Ghana, Zambia and Tanzania.[43]
In 1968, MacBride was elected Chair and, in 1975, President of the International Peace Bureau in Geneva, a position he retained until 1985.[44] He was also involved in the International Prisoners of Conscience Fund.[45][1]
In the course of the 1970s, he held various positions with the United Nations.[44] In 1973, he was elected by the UN General Assembly to the post of High Commissioner for Namibia, with the rank of Assistant Secretary-General. It was thought that, represented by man whose father had volunteered to fight alongside their forefathers, the Afrikaner leadership of Apartheid South Africa would find the UN’s assurances in return for a withdrawal from Namibia more credible.[43]
…
On the occasion of MacBride’s death, Oliver Tambo of the African National Congress (ANC), stated “Seán MacBride will always be remembered for the concrete leadership he provided to the liberation movement and people of Namibia and South Africa. Driven by his own personal and political insight arising out of the cause of national freedom in Ireland … our debt to him can never be repaid.”[43]
***
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1A6__HssHW8
Murphy’s exploits and the wartime depictions around them aren’t ‘snuff.’ Posting an analysis of someone being shot days ago, with full and clear views of death, is. You know the difference
Is this a snuff film?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fz3sZiVAO0k
Is it not because no one was killed?
How about this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcPElnvb6bI
For most eyes and brains, there is no relevant difference between realistic fantasy violence and actual violence.
To say that for ‘most eyes and brains’ they cannot see the difference I am calling bullshit. For most people, there’s still a clear line between artistic depictions and actual footage. Maybe that line’s eroding in places, but it hasn’t vanished. We know when we’re watching a story and when we’re watching someone die.
Great weekend without the shit going on. Felt like a man when I fixed the auto choke and rebuilt the carburetor in the pressure washer. There is something about doing all that work and when you do that first pull and the motor chugs along.
Its weird on some things I am listening to tonight…there are a lot of streamers that are so close to flirting with libertarianism because of both reactions from this fallout.
JFC it is impossible to avoid stupid even when I’m not looking for it.
Or… just maybe, stick with me here… maybe SmartFood sucks now because a bag of the original formula would cost double because of the inflation the assholes you voted for caused.
We all have our personal wars I guess.
It’s just so obnoxious as the author raises several theories but does not even consider the actual cause of the issue. Xe touches on “supply chain” issues but does not ask why everything is so expensive now.
“Saving money is always appealing” is about as close as it gets.
And honestly, I would much rather companies offered the original quality of their products at real prices.
Maybe people might wise up then.
But that’s probably why I’m not a billionaire yet. 🙄
Bill the Galactic Hero, as portrayed in a student film
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbzEu7086mk
***
Bill, the Galactic Hero is a satirical science fiction novel by American writer Harry Harrison, first published in 1965. A novella length version appeared in the magazine Galaxy Science Fiction in 1964 under the name “The Starsloggers”.[1]
Harrison reports having been approached by a Vietnam veteran who described Bill as “the only book that’s true about the military”.[2] Terry Pratchett once said: “I don’t think The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy was the funniest Science Fiction novel ever written. The funniest Science Fiction novel ever written was Bill, The Galactic Hero”.[3]
***
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill,_the_Galactic_Hero
Stop back-pedaling over yourself when the crowd turns and find a therapist that fits.
Then work it out.
OK, how’s this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-kj3vHUnnY&rco=1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsEbvwMipJI
Stare into the abyss and make it your cuddly pal!
Anyone else remember the Encyclopedia Brown HBO show?
Nope, I do remember the books, which were insufferable about jumping to conclusions based upon data points which didn’t support the conclusion most of the time, or even to the exclusion of many, many better possibilities.
My aunt got a Murder She Wrote puzzle, where once you finish the puzzle there are clues to solve some crime laid out in the instructions. She was that into this shirt.
Maidin mhaith a Glibs!
🇮🇪☘️🧇
Éirigh suas agus bain taitneamh as do chuid oibre.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTA8F3PG4hE
🎶🎶
English, please.
Ты не мой руководитель!
Good morning (if it is indeed morning where you are,) Sean, U, Roat, EfE, Ted’S, and (maybe?) CPRM.
Morning.
How goes?
So far, so good, but it’s early yet. I’m hoping it will be a quiet work week, but I expect to have to sit in on a meeting where we’ll find out how much our health insurance is going up. 😖 (We have a bunch of sickies in our group.)
How are you?
Well, there are so many people in my insurance group that our prices don’t swing too much year over year.
I have to pick a day to use my comp time. But I have time since my supervisor is out today.
I have to make the eye doctor visit this afternoon.
You can make him come to see you? That’s convenient! 😁😉
Took me a moment…
Started my Friday’s shift, chillest of the week. No boss-boss and few roaming the aisles.
Hope y’all are as lucky as I hope to be. Onward
I’m off work this Friday.
Yeah, well, like, I’m off tomorrow. And Wed. So, like, there.
*Toddler kicks pebble*
Yeah, but do you have a four-day week this week?
Top of the morning to y’all, and the rest of the day for myself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjjiPUk6AHE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMtjj7AxxiU
suh’ fam
whats goody
Mornin’ to each and every Glib, Glib wannabees, lurkers and any of those that made a mistake and got here accidentally and decided to stay and learn more,
Breakfast and then off to get snow tires on the Senior Citizen Mobile.
Happy Respect for the Aged Day!
https://www.nippon.com/en/guide-to-japan/gu051004/
Now to convince Mrs F…
Good morning!
The sign in the cafeteria tells me today is National Linguine Day.
Consistency is important. I wound up in a top 10% finish even though I only had one stage finish that high — but I didn’t fuck up anything. Points Down scoring is not your friend in a match.
BD 🙂
demon wedding procession from Hindu mythology, Bollywood style
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5qSdRUBtMc