Anyway, it was a nice weekend. Joe retook his SAT on Saturday because he thinks he can get a perfect score. His last score was very close to perfect, so I don’t know why he’s unhappy with it. But I think he could get a perfect score too, and he said this time he wasn’t as nervous as he was last time, and he thinks he *might* have missed one question. Watch out world, this MIT bound kid is going to go far!
Afterwards, I spent some time doing some online shopping. I bought a few books, a few things for my laptop, two sets of Egyptian cotton sheets, a new video game (Monster Hunter World) and an iPhone 8 for Callie’s graduation. I’m hoping to go to CA to be there for that big occasion. I think she’s still debating about which college to choose— UCLA or Brown. I’m hoping for Brown. I think I've decided on this duvet cover for the goose down--this pic doesn't really portray the colors--it's supposed to be navy blue and black.
I tried to pick something that wasn't too girly, yet not too manly either. I joked with James that I had ordered this one:
James worked on the little front yard pond, and it looks great. He’s only got a little left before it’s totally finished. It even has a solar powered light that illuminates it at night.
Here's the most recent progression of his work. All we have now is to finish the stone border (not shown), and finish landscaping the back of the bed.
It's hard to see, but there's a bubbling water fountain in the bigger pot:
We have some new eggs by the Duck family that lives seasonably in the nest by our front door. The weird thing is we've been letting Zuri out on the screened porch to stare hungrily at birds and squirrels. She loves to sit out there on an office chair. She's the boss. Well, apparently she caused some alarm in the Ducks, so they moved their eggs! We were sad, so we kept Zuri inside the next few days to see if they would come back. I didn't think they would, but the other day, the eggs suddenly reappeared!
Here's Zuri making the most of a UPS delivery in the front living room:
And on the upstairs balcony:
While James was outside, I worked on organizing the master bedroom closet. It’s almost done, too. And then I made dinner (my famous bbq chicken and rice). Then we put the new sheets on the bed and watched movies all night.
One movie we watched was “The Shape of Water,” and I don’t really know why it won any Oscars.
In my opinion, it was a little slow. The relationship between weird fish man and Elisa seemed too rushed. Getting to know such a creature that already distrusted humans would probably take more time than it did.
The subplots also seemed rushed. The dude with the slowly festering fingers obviously had a raging case of sepsis. He was going to die anyway, so his death wasn’t very satisfying. I admit, though, when his new Caddy got smashed, I snickered with glee.
The subplot of the painter guy’s gay tendencies came out of nowhere. And went nowhere.
The fish man had a cool glowy outfit, though. I liked that he could heal people and of course, I liked the thought of him eating cats (James didn’t like that, though). Lol.
Even the subplot of the Russian interference seemed shallow and not fully developed.
The only characters that were close to being fully developed were Elisa and the black lady friend. And Elisa was pretty believable. I liked that she was utterly fearless, even going as far as to sign “FU...” to Festering Fingers defiantly in his face. That was awesome.
So, on a scale of A - F, I’d grade “The Shape of Water” a B +. Maybe a B-.
Yesterday, I played my video game for a little bit, then made a big lunch, and then watched some YouTube stuff while James took a nap. I’m enthralled with Blue Planet II. I love all David Attenborough’s narration.
And then James woke up, and we watched a short documentary about poisonous snakes. He’d never heard my personal coral snake story from when I was 2 or 3 years old. So I told him.
We lived in Stuart, FL, on a dirt road on the edge of a swamp. It was a nice house though, brand new with a pool. And my dad bought us ducklings. One morning, I was outside playing with my duckling in the grass. I was barefoot, as almost all Florida kids are when they play outside on a warm day.
Here's a couple of pictures of pictures of the old place:
Here I am, topless and unashamed, and doing something I probably thought was cool, but came off as awkward. Lol.
As I was petting the duckling, I felt something. It was like a coarse whisper against my big toe. I ignored it for a few seconds, then put the duck down to look. A coral snake was gnawing on my toe. What’s funny is that I remember the next scene like it was yesterday.
I kicked my foot upward, and the snake went flying, twisting it’s red, yellow, and black banded body as it soared into the air.
My dad had seen my kick and the snake. He rushed over and he thought the snake had possibly broken the skin. There was a slight scratch, so my dad didn’t want to take any chances. We sat in the ER all day until the doctor declared the bite was “dry.”
So, that’s my close-call snake story.
Don't you hate it when your alarm goes off in the middle of a dream? I wasn't having a particularly good dream, but it was interesting. I don't remember what it was about, but I know there were bears.
And oh yeah, the other night I had a dream about a horse pulling a moving truck we were using up this tall hill in a beautiful countryside. I don't know why we couldn't drive the truck, but we couldn't. Madison was doing a great job, though, as she was virtually tireless. And the best thing was that all Madison needed to maintain her remarkable strength and endurance was cherry Fruit Roll-Ups.
Anyway, it’s time to get ready for work. Happy Monday!
No, it's not you.
The Shape of Water was at par at best and unoriginal (was it suppose to be a Swamp Thing remake at first?)
But that's the direction the Oscars is going and why nobody is watching it anymore. I mean, Moonlight? That garage is what they wanted to represent Best Picture? Its political. They got complaints about being white washed so they are doing their due diligence so that the next time it's brought up they can point and say, "No, Moonlight won best picture"