Haines His Way

Yes, Lisa Hartman was Neely, and she was terrible, but so was everyone. Even though the 1967 movie also changed it from a period drama covering many years to a more modern piece, it still had lots of old fashioned notions (like longterm studio contracts for films stars, etc.). The 1981 miniseries did away with all of that. It was totally modern (and thoroughly awful.)

I say this because I must have read the original book 20 times. Terrible writing, but a good read.

DR Ann: Shouldn't you be on a surf board or up a palm tree?  Did you notice that the State flag of Hawaii still has a Union Jack?

It seems that the Washingtonians and I having been meeting up around this time quite a bit. . .don't it?

Just a quiet entry to the world above by a new GOD BK.

Good evening DRs, and esteemed and sultry BK --

Kerry and I went to a real movie theatre tonight, and saw "Somethings Gotta Give."  I really enjoyed it, and Diane Keaton gave a marvelous performance (which I expected).  The surprise for me, was that Jack Nicholson didn't just rely on over-mugging, but actually created a believable, flawed character with more than one dimension.  Also, it provided many good "right out loud" laughs for me.  It was a very enjoyable outing, and then we came home and watched the Kennedy Center honors, 4/5ths of which I enjoyed immensely.  Seeing Itzak Perlman's kids on stage made me all verklempt.

Sugar sends a big "welcome back home" to Roller !!

Time to toddle off now.  Sleep good, and don't forget to turn off the light BK.  

Good evening!

WOW!  I go away for a few hours, and come back to a loverly number of posts!

My trip to the mall was.. OK.  Just OK.  Most of the stores I went into - and I didn't go into many - were cleaned out already.  Some even looked like they had re-arranged their displays to "hide" the low stock.  And anything that was bargain priced, seemed to be bargain priced for a reason - ugly, non-functional, still-overpriced, or all of the above.  However...

I had seen an ad for Nordstrom's in the morning paper, and a pair of shoes they were advertising caught my eye.  I had never really shopped at Nordstrom's just walked through it, but I decided to give it a try.  What a pleasantly surprising experience.  As soon as I walked into the shoe department, at least three or four clerks offered their assistance.  Once I found a pair of shoes I was interested in - which were the ones I saw advertised - "Anna" came over, and offered to pull a pair in my size from the back room.  She came back with my size and one and half-size bigger - "just in case".  Well, the "just in case" ones were just a hair too big, but the other pair was just right - and sooooo comfy.  Anna put them at the counter for me, and brought me back a claim ticket so that I could just present it at the cash register when I was ready to check out.  I started looking at the other shoes - nice selection even on the sale racks - and there were some good deals too!  Most of the shoes on the non-sale racks were out of my price-range - well, any shoe over $100.00 is out of my price range - it just seems weird to have something on my body that costs the same as a minor car repair.  However, there were some other shoes on special, and I'll most likely go back in a few days and try a few more pairs on when I have more time to browse.  So, after heading to the cash register, presenting my slip, and finishing the sale, I walked away with a new pair of "winter mocs".  I'm sure I'll be putting them to good use.

I also made a stop into Sur La Table and Williams-Sonoma.  The only things on sale in both stores were seasonal items.  I'm not a big fan of serving dishes that only come out once a year, so I passed them on by.  *But there was this one $60.00 (sale price) porcelain pie whistle at Sur La Table I almost bought...not!

Then came Macy's...  They too were pretty cleaned out - at least in the home department - and their Christmas stuff seemed pretty picked over too by that time.  I came across a crockpot that was on clearance for $13.00 - originally $35.00 - so I held onto that.  Then I found a neat blue metallic frame that was also on clearance, and added that to my take.  Then came a truly sobering moment...

Now I know I have put back on some of the weight that I lost over the past year, and I know I've been allowing myself some spluging diet-wise the past few weeks, but...  I came across of display of bathroom scales that were on sale... I stepped on one... WHOA!  I stepped on another model just to make sure it was the scale and not me... WHOA!  It was me, not the scale...Ugh!  It's not bad, but bad enough to make me buy a new body-fat monitoring scale... and to make me get back on the wagon pronto!  I'm getting a head start on my New Year's resolution.

But I did get some good deals on the crockpot, picture frame and scale.  And even though my "extra discount" coupon applied to only one of the items - the frame - I didn't even break $50.00.  Not bad.

I was going to check out the Men's Clothing department, but after the Scale Incident, I just wasn't in the mood to look for clothes.. Besides, it was getting late, and I had to head to the theatre...

For td.
Young Mr Jackman.

WOW!  There does seem to be quite the posting frenzy going on right now!

...We had a good show tonight.  And some of the actors seemed to be trying out some new line readings tonight - nothing drastic, just different... and fun.

Before the show, the greenroom tables started filling up with various and sundried Christmas goodies: cookies of all sorts, chocolates, fudge, caramel corn, chocolate covered espresso beans...  Hmm.. maybe that's why the show seemed a bit peppier tonight?!?!?  

We did have one "laugh out loud in the pit moment".  During the last sequence in "Take Me To The Fair", our Guenevere jumped the last set of rhyming "challenges".

"You'll open wide him?"
-"I'll subdivide him!"

..."You'll open wide him?"
....-"I'll subdivide him."

Oops!  She had jumped the "You disconnect him?" "I'll vivisect him." lines... and couldn't think fast enough to backtrack...  The conductor just got this really big grin on his face, while a bunch of us under the stage just started laughing out loud with questioning looks on our faces.  -You may have had to be there.

The gremlin in my keyboard also made another appearance tonight.  When I played one of the exposed bell cues, the decay did this "wobble" thing and settled down a half-step lower.   Even some of the players heard it and wondered, "What the "  A few nights ago, the note sounded a half-step lower, but the decay came up to the right pitch.  Who knows?  At least it keeps it interesting.

And the final tally for our fundraising drive was $22,000.75!!!  Half will go to BC/EFA and half will go to Food & Friends.  Many thanks to all who gave money to the cause.

DR Panni - Any DVD player update?

Wow! Tomovoz!  You could say he's got biceps to spare, couldn't you?
But, is every last inch of him covered with hair? ? ?

Young Hugh, Old Hugh. . .and just think of the anagrams one could make of that! ! !

td: He was a wonderful Gaston and then went on to play Joe in "Sunset". I have never seen bad press about the man. He played a prisoner in a TV series here and was a hearththrob for people on both sides of the fence before he took so naturally to the musical stage.

Did Hugh do his stint as Joe opposite Deborah Byrne? ? ? ?

Indeed Hugh and Deborah together. Brilliant performances.

I don't remember who was posting earlier about having pancakes, but der Brucer must have picked up on the vibes, because when I asked him what he wanted for dinner, he said "Pancakes!"

We ended up going to the grocery store, because he also wanted sausage with his pancakes, and all we had on hand was bacon and some very tired looking scrapple.  Finishing off the meal were some Stouffers Harvest Apples.

I also picked up some fresh snow peas and bean sprouts, because I want to do something asian-ish tomorrow to go with the roast pork I've got planned.

Speaking of roasting, has anyone out there tried using a digital probe thermometer yet?  I've got one, made by Polder, and it's great.  It consists of a battery-powered computer unit, and a probe with a long wire attached.  The probe goes into the meat, the wire is flexible so you can shut the oven door on it, and the other end plugs into the computer part.  You can either use it as a timer, or program it to let you know when what you're cooking reaches the temperature you want.  Even better, you can punch in the type of meat you're cooking (beef, ground beef, veal, lamb, pork, chicken, turkey) and what done-ness you want, and it will beep you when the meat has finished cooking!  Nifty gadget.

(But it's not the best tool when cooking pancakes.   )