A.J. Maguire

Tag: Fun

  • A Discussion on Sherlock Holmes …

     

    So I’m sick this weekend, which is good timing since school starts on Monday so if I’m going to be sick, it might as well be now.  I’m hoping to be 90% better and climbing by Sunday night.  But that means I get to do lazy-fun things like watch movies.

    I bought Sherlock Holmes Game of Shadows for Christmas and hadn’t gotten around to watching it until last night.  I enjoyed Robert Downy Jr. and Jude Law in the first Sherlock Holmes movie they put out, so I was confident I would like this movie as well.  And I did.  Those movies have a distinctly steampunk flavor to them, though that might just be the era they are written in.

    However, I have to admit that the BBC’s Sherlock — which I watched several months ago on Netflix — has forever altered the way I look at Sherlock Holmes.  They are, in a word, brilliant.

    So when I sat down to watch Downy Jr. and Jude Law go gallivanting through London I had to make a conscious effort to ignore the Sherlock and Watson duo that Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman had portrayed.

    Granted, the BBC version is really an updated Holmes, putting him into our century with Blogs and things, so it is distinctly different from the period setting that we find in the movies.  But I promise you, if you watch the BBC version of Sherlock you will have the same problem as me.

    So!

    The verdict is that Game of Shadows was really quite good — even if it did rely on the shadow camera a bit more than the first movie — and the Downy Jr. – Jude Law duo is funny in an action-packed sort of way.    However, if you’ve read the books then you know how much dramatic license was taken with stuff there.  It’s a fun romp through Europe, but slightly less Holmes-ish due to all the action.

    Watch it and enjoy it, and -then- you should go watch the BBC’s Sherlock.  That way you’re not spoiled by the Freeman-Cumberbatch performances like I was.  (Because seriously … they’re brilliant.)

  • Costumes

    Last weekend I had the pleasure of riding the Thunder Mountain Railroad train to the pumpkin patch with my mother and my son.  It was great fun and my son got to pick out two pumpkins — both of which have been properly carved and set outside our door.  Then, because we had a bit of time before my mother had to go home, we went costume shopping.

    It’s been a while since I’ve done that and I was more than a little startled at some of the costumes they had out there.  In particular, costumes for women that were blatantly meant for sex appeal.  I’m not going to rant and rave about that.  Honestly, if you feel comfortable in something like that, then have fun.

    However, there are many of us who would prefer to wear something fun without freezing in the late October weather.  There was only one small section of costumes that fit this bill and one of them included a Gumbi outfit.  (There was also a cute wizard costume but it was over a hundred dollars and I’m afraid I’m too cheap to permit myself such a purchase.)  I ended up purchasing a Star Trek costume even though it was made for a man and twice my size.

    Since I am a geek, this made me happy.  Even if I did choose to forego the Spock ears and just get a phaser (which has been commandeered by my son as one of the coolest toys we own).  In retrospect, however, I would have been three times as happy with a female Star Trek costume.  I can’t imagine this costume store had run out of such a thing since its shelves were full to bursting.  Which means they just didn’t think to put it in stock.  As if every woman in the world wants to wear fishnet pantyhose and above-the-thigh skirts.

    Like I said before, if you enjoy wearing those things then that’s fine.  I just wish they had a little more variety for those of us who don’t.    And I should probably qualify that statement with the fact that this was a family costume store, not just an odd-ball store.  My son is going to be Bumblebee from Transformers and they had plenty of stuff in there for him as well.

    But I’ll have fun on Halloween anyway, dwarfed in my Star Trek outfit and using my phaser every time my son does something silly.  I’m sure I could have found something online that fit me, but half the fun of Halloween is hunting for that costume and rifling through the stuff in the store.  As much as I love doing things online, using my Kindle, and rating books on Goodreads, there are still some things that you have to do physically — if only to get out of the house now and then.

  • Alphabet Soup Blog Thingy

    Alright!  So about a week ago my friend Lisa Janice Cohen — author of The Between — challenged me to write a post about ten things I love that begin with the letter “P”.  It seriously took me this long to come up with my list, but here it is!

    Potatoes!  — Anyone who knows me at all will laugh at that this.  I love potatoes in just about any form I can get them.  Except chips.  I’ll eat chips, but I just … yeah.  Not a huge fan.

    Philanthropy — Honestly, we’re all on this planet together and we have a responsibility to each other.  There’s no reason any child should ever go hungry.  We all just need to step up and help where and when we can.  (I’ll even share my potatoes if I need to.)

    Puppies

    —  Oh, come on.  Who doesn’t love puppies?  Just look at them!

     

     

    Panda’s  — Well, I’m kinda cheating here.  I love Red Panda’s especially.  My local zoo just got a new pair and they are so fuzzy and adorable I would just love to take them home and snuggle them.  If I wasn’t afraid of the big teeth, of course.  They do have some sharp chompers.

    Procrustean — Just the word, I promise.  But I mostly love the word because of the history behind it.  And in case you weren’t aware of it, I think I’ll educate you!  In Greek mythology there was this dude called Procrustes.  He was a bit of a bandit, but not in the fun Robin Hood way.  He would put his victims on an iron bed and if they were too short, he would stretch them until they fit.  If they were too tall, he’d start lobbing off appendages to get everything to conform just right.  Thus leading to the definition of Procrustean as ::  marked by arbitrary often ruthless disregard of individual differences or special circumstances.

    And now I’ll bet you’ll never forget what that word means.  And yes, if I’d been given the letter “H” for this, I would likely have chosen History as one of my great loves.  Since I couldn’t, I get to torture you with that image instead. 

    People — Generally speaking, I love people.  We are all so weird.  I mean, just watch us for a day.

    Patterns — I like ivy patterns the best, but when it comes to decoration I do like anything colorful and patterned to give a sense of diversity to a room.

    The Princess Bride — I’m cheating here, too.  But, eh, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out the Princess Bride.  In fact, my son and I just watched it the other night.  He’s insistent that he is the man in the black mask.  But I wouldn’t worry too much.  He insisted that he was Spok when we watched Star Trek, too.

    Paper & Pens — It’s a dangerous thing to let me loose in the office supply section of any store.  Seriously.  I write my first draft via pen and paper.  Every story.  Every time.  I’m sure I’ll have horrible arthritis when I’m older, but for now it works.

    And last but not least …

    Parenthood — There are moments when my son drives me crazy.  When he won’t listen and I have to sit him down and have a discussion with him about what he did wrong and why he can’t do it anymore and all that jazz … but on the whole, being a parent is one of the most fulfilling, wonderful things in this world.

    That’s my list!