Category: Random
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Iām usually all for covers
But this didnāt work for me.
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Civil War? I didn’t like it
I left the theater after watching Civil War with a gnawing feeling that I couldn’t quite place. It wasn’t until the middle of the night when I realized what it was.
This was me as I left the theater Alex Garland’s Civil War
The movie is not about another America Civil War, the politics and meanings behind why a Civil War would take place are implied in parts, but never fleshed out for the audience. This, I believe, is because that’s not what the movie is about.
In the movie with have Kirsten Dunst’s Lee, an experienced war photo journalist who’s been disenfranchised by her life’s work. She had the belief that what she was doing around the world, showing America the horrors of war, would have an effect on American’s appetite for war, and she now realizes that she was wrong.
That’s it, that’s the whole movie.
Ambiguity reigns supreme
There are no reasons, no politics, and no motivations given for the actions of each āsideā of this civil war. And that is the problem. Without knowing the why, itās hard for us to care. This unknowing extends to the characters, who are barely fleshed out. Lee is joined by Joel, who drinks away the horrors of what heās seeing. Sammy, an aging reporter who still wants to be involved. And finally Jessie, a wannabe photojournalist who just happens to be at the same place as one of her idols, Lee, at the beginning of the film.
Character development takes a vacation. We do get one scene of Lee and Jessie providing a little back story on themselves. There is also the absence of any sort of character arc for anyone. Jessie is the only one to develop into more of a full-fledged charater by the end of the movie.
I had no reasons to care for anyone in this movie, or for the state of the nation. There were no stakes, no high tension, nothing. The ending felt like a forgone conclusion from the opening frames.
Jesse Plemons was amazing though Pales to the greatest Civil War movie of all time
So what was causing my unease when I left the theater? As luck would have it, Tara and I saw the 85th Anniversary showing of Gone with the Wind last Sunday. While some of it has not aged well, it shows us what Civil War is missing, character development. We began to know who these people were, what there motivations, aspirations, and dreams were, and what they were capable of.
I was also reminded of 1917, the World War I movie from 2019. Since the people fighting WWI really had no idea what they were fighting for, it fit right in with Civil War.
In summary
Maybe I went in expecting too much. I wanted a commentary on what a civil war could be like in todayās day and age, and how others may react. Instead I got a cookie cutter travel movie with characters I barely cared about. There was no suspense, no surprises, especially in the end.
I believe the goal was to show the horrors of war. We know that war is terrible, but a war where we donāt know the why is not a way to do this.
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2023 July Checkup
Events
Grace did stand up paddleboating in Georgetown! The Colorado trip continues with watching a production of Kiss Me Kate at the Central City Opera House. This was one of the productions that Delaney worked on as a costumer. I bought the tickets online before we left, and I messed up paying way too much on them because I was on the wrong website.
Well, even though I spent too much on them, there was a mistake in the tickets and we got moved to the third row, so it sort of worked out. Sort of. The performance was fantastic!
Rocky Mountains
After the performance we went to look at the Rocky Mountains. This was an experience due to us needing to be there early so we could get in to the national park. To make sure we were there early, we slept in the car in Estes Park. This was not fun, but we survived. After a little clean up at McDonalds and some breakfast we were off to the Rocky Mountains!
It’s was a very cool drive, which included a visit to the Alpine Visitor Centre, the highest facility of its kind in the National Park Service.
Afterwards we visits Estes Park, which had a ton of people walking around. So many people that each crosswalk had a police officer directing the walkers. Of course I wasn’t paying attention, so I got yelled out for crossing out of turn.
We ate lunch at The Sandwich Mafia, a little out of the way shop.
Central City Supper
That night we went back to Central City to eat supper with Delaney, Aunt Elia, and Tara’s cousin Rick. The pizza was good at Dostal Alley Brew Pub.
Railroad
On the third we rode the Georgetown Loop Railroad, which was a pretty cool ride. We finished that up with a meal at Cooper’s On The Creek, a fancy restaurant in Georgetown.
4th of July
We spent the morning of the 4th of July going to downtown Georgetown’s parade. I rained a little bit, which didn’t really damper the parade.
Later on we went to Kashif and Karen’s house to visit with the family. Grace got to meet her (2nd?) cousins and we all got to catch up on things.
Time to fly home
Alas, all good things must come to an end. We had some time to kill, so we visited the Park Meadows Mall before dropping off the rental car.
Wedding in the Smoky Mountains
The traveling for 2023 continued with a drive to the Smoky Mountains for Kolt’s wedding. The venue was the fantastic Foxwood Manor, and Kolt was married with the Smoky Mountains in the background. After the ceremony, the reception moved inside with some great food and good dancing. The festivities continued a week later with the Hardin County reception out at the community building.
The next morning I ventured out to get some steps in, and downtown Gatlinburg was an interesting place. Tons of places already opening on an early Sunday morning. There are a multitude of activities and food places to take advantage of, a little something for everyone.
On the way home we stopped at a Buc-ee’s in Richmond Kentucky. Our first visit was a little overwhelming! There were a million gas pumps and a million people inside, with some great bathrooms. The service was so quick, I don’t know how they did it.
Buc-ees reminds me of the riots during the zombie apocalypse Other July activities
New tires on the Fit on the 10th and then a meal at Salsa’s on the 11th.
Unfortunately, we had a funeral visitation on the 13th with Jenny’s dad passing away. But, we also had Jerry’s 80th birthday party, along with a whole family visit at Caesar Creek State Campground. The rain didn’t slow us down.
I ended the month with another great year at 4-H Camp, and the 4-H festivities didn’t end because Grace had her last state 4-H judging at the Ohio State Fair.
On the 27th I got to go see Rochelle’s sketch comedy at the Cafe Kerouac.
Movies
- Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny: Solid movie, it just seemed like it was lacking a little charm. I liked it better than the Crystal Skull though.
- Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising: Underrated movie.
- Mission: Impossible ā Dead Reckoning Part One: One of the best movies I’ve seen this year!
- Barbie: Mattel really went all out with this one, spotlighting failure after failure of the Barbie line. I was quite surprised at how honest they were. The movie is really, really good, you should watch it.
- White Chicks: I never watched this when it was first released, and it was surprisingly good.
A very good month for movies!
TV
TV I watched (number of episodes in parenthesis):
- Caroline in the City (2) – Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were in one of the episodes. They are the geniuses behind Clone High, The Lego Movie, and more.
- Cheers (9)
- Freaks and Geeks (1)
- King of Queens (1)
- Parks and Recreation (2)
- Rules of Engagement (1)
- Star Trek (1)
- Star Trek: The Next Generation (1)
- The Neighborhood (2)
- The Office (2)
- The Office Superfan (5)
- Wings (2)
Health
- Average Steps/day: 14,906
- Most steps in a day: 20,832
- Min steps in a day: 12,077
- Resting Heart Rate: 53
- Average Time Asleep: 7hr 25m
- Miles walked: 114.9
- Miles ran: 113.3
Potpourri
I don’t think we’ve ever traveled as much as we did in July, 2,251 miles by car and 1,152 miles by air.
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2023 June Checkup
Events
First up for the month was my niece Rachel’s wedding! It was held at the Perry Community Center, a very cool place. The wedding was great, from the ceremony and violinist to the reception and DJ. And by DJ, that was me and I turned that mother out.
I presented at the CREATE conference on the 8th at Maumee High School. It was great catching up with people that I haven’t had a chance to talk to in real life for over 3 years.
My BIL Craig was in town on the tenth, and we took him out to 101 Smokehouse. Three days later was Tara’s and my 25th Anniversary dinner with Tara at Ralphies. I know, such a romantic spot.
This summer I decided to dye my hair purple. Why? It’s all about no regrets. I don’t want to be bald in my 80s thinking, “I should have dyed my hair in my 50s”.
If I had know the Barbie movie was going to be so popular I would have gone with pink, but there’s always next summer.
Mom had a check up at The James. Everything is looking good, and we got Culver’s!
In sad news, Jeff Rickenbacher passed away. I have such great memories of 4-H club meetings at his house, along with our many video game sessions throughout HS. He was able to do one last trip with the family.
4-H Chicago Trip
I am very thankful I was asked to help chaperone the 4-H trip to Chicago. It was a fantastic trip. The bus drive seemed to fly by, and we started our outings in Chicago with some Chicago deep dish pizza at Lou Malnati’s Pizzeria. The next day was a trip to 360 Chicago and some spectacular views of the city. There was also The Tilt, a “ride” which tilts you over the side of a skyscraper. It didn’t agree with some people, but I thought it needed to tilt out farther!
Afterwards we all went to Ed Debevic’s. The name sounded familiar, and then I remembered I ate their when I came to Chicago from college for a Music Conference.
Our waiter was not impressed That afternoon we had a fantastic tour of Chinatown, taking the train down and getting a walking tour. We painted kites and ate authentic Chinese food.
In the evening was our river cruise around Chicago. The cruise was very cool, although the fireworks were a little underwhelming.
The next day was a trip to The Bean. I’ve seen it a couple of times, so it’s lost a little of it’s luster to me, but the kids really liked it.
After the bean was a Chicago Cubs game at Wrigley field! Although they lost against the Orioles, 6-3, the first hit of the game was a home run by the Cubs! We had awesome patio seats with free food. My only negative for the day was troubleshooting some network issues back home, but luckily Kolt was available to run up to the high school and get everything working.That evening was the “walking ghost tour” of Chicago, which I wasn’t too psyched about, but once we got there it was amazing.
Our guide, Baylor, was amazing. What I learned was that a lot of people died in rather senseless ways, usually in a fire. I also learned that Al Capone did more by the end of his thirties then I have done now!
Out last day was some shopping, a visit to the Lincoln Park Zoo, and then off to the Chicago School of Shoemaking. I made an awesome leather belt!
Colorado Trip
We flew out to Colorado to see Delaney and one of the productions she worked on at the opera house in Central City. Unfortunately, we got going a day late do to a ton of travel delays. Our flight was supposed to leave from Columbus and return to Columbus, but due to the issues we switched to flying out of Cleveland. This was going to be a pain except weāre grateful that Joel offered to drive us to Cleveland. This meant that we could take the Pilot down to Rochelleās before we left, and when we returned she could pick us up at the airport and we could drive home from her place. Anything to save on parking!
Our hotel was in Georgetown, a really cool town a little over 30 minutes west of Denver. However, the airport is on the extreme east side of Denver, so we had over an hour drive to get there. Picking up the rental car from Thrifty was an experience. Basically, they just point you to a car and register you on the way out. The funny thing was this huge barricade that comes up out of the ground to stop you from just driving away with a car. I donāt know if people steal from rental places a lot, but they act like it does.
The rental car was a Kia Forte, which was a pretty nice car. It had lane assist, which was cool. I assumed it also had adaptive cruise, but I couldnāt figure it out and I was too lazy to look it up.
On the way to Georgetown we stopped at Red Rocks Park & Amphitheatre. Tara and I had been there before, but Grace hadnāt. After a brief rain, we were all set to go look but unfortunately there was a concert that night and so we werenāt allowed in.
Our first stop at Georgetown was the Georgetown Visitor Center. Your typical visitor center. After that we checked in and headed over to Cabin Creek Brewing for supper.
By this time I was starting to feel lightheaded. Denver is around 5,000 feet and Georgetown is even higher at 8,500. I figured I wouldnāt have an issue with all my running, but I was wrong. The first morning I went out for a run, and the first mile feltā¦ Wrong? Different? I toughed it out, but I didnāt break any speed records. It didnāt really get any easier either.
Next up was a visit to Garden of the Gods and the Visitor Center. We do not have geological formations like this in Ohio. It felt like it could be a planet on Star Trek, I was ready for a Gorn to pop out.
After the Garden of the Gods we bought a timed pass to climb Pikeās Peak. We had some time to kill before we could go, so we stopped at the North Pole, Home of Santa’s Workshop which is on the way up Pikes Peak. If you are under the age of 7 that place is great. It was free admission that day so we walked around. The magic show was way better than you would think. Also, the map hadnāt been updated. It showed an arcade, but the building now looks like it is used for storage. There seemed to be some games inside, but nothing we could play.
Finally, it was time to climb Pikes Peak, and oh boy, what a drive it is. There are no guardrails as you are driving up, and if you went off the road, it was a mile or two straight down. On the way up we saw our first marmoset crossing the road. The temperature on the way up dropped 40 degrees, getting down to the 30s at the top. It was snowing a little bit! The oxygen level at the top is 50% of what it is at sea level, so I was not doing well. We did hear the best conversation though, a man was on the phone and he told the caller ājust here watching a marmoset lick a rockā. It looked like someone had spilled a drink, so the marmoset was cleaning it up.
While we were up there the rangers came in to the center alarmed, telling us that if we drove up that we needed to leave NOW! The weather had totally changed since we got there, with the clouds rolling in and visibility dropping down to 20-30 feet. We started our descent, using the GPS and the lights on the car in front of us to help. They warned us not to ride the brakes, but as we were going down I started to smell them. About four miles down is a stop and the rangers check the temperatures of the brakes. The smell was coming from the car in front of us, their brakes were over 400 degrees! That car had to stop and wait, while our brakes were at a cool 160 and we were allowed to proceed.
We stayed out there into July, so youāre going to want to read the July checkup to see how the rest of the trip went!
Movies
- Spider-Man Across the Spider-Verse: Visually amazing, story is amazing, being part one of two was a bummer.
- The Little Mermaid: Pretty good, I like how they tried to make Ariel more a part of her story. But, having her sing “Part of That World” instead of “Part of your World” because she hadn’t met Eric yet didn’t really work for me.
- Moonfall: I expected this to be more fun and outrageous. It was just ok.
- Date Night: Tina Fey and Steve Carrell, of course it’s good.
- Adventures in Babysitting: Rewatching a classic.
- The A-Team: Better than I remembered.
- The Flash: It was ok. I liked how they just decided to burn down the whole DC movie universe since it’s going to be redone by James Gunn.
- The 40 Year Old Virgin: Another Stever Carrell classic, and it’s pretty good.
- Happy Gilmore: Adam Sandler movies are like comfort food, when you can’t think of something to watch, put one on and veg out for 2 hours.
TV
TV I watched (number of episodes in parenthesis):
- Cheers (11)
- Everybody Loves Raymond (2)
- Family Ties (5)
- The King of Queens (1)
- Wings (2)
Health
- Average Steps/day: 16,705
- Most steps in a day: 28,640
- Min steps in a day: 12,049
- Resting Heart Rate: 58
- Average Time Asleep: 7h 3m
- Miles walked: 171.2
- Miles ran: 31.8
Potpourri
I don’t think I’ve ever traveled more miles in a month then I did in June. There were 2,133 miles driven (which includes the bus ride to Chicago) and 1,199 miles flying, for a total of 3,332 miles traveled.
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2023 May Checkup
Events
Back on the first of May, Tara and I got to haul a trailer to Akron because not only was Grace moving home for the supper, she had then acquired a couch for us to store for the summer. And now that couch has become the catās couch in the garage. At least I got Chipotle!
The very next day was something that I had been looking forward for a couple of years, the chance to see the stage production of Spirited Away. The production and filmed and distributed to movie theaters for a limited run. And it was amazing.
We took mom & dad out to an anniversary supper at Salsaās on the 7th. Katie and Grace L. Joined us.
On the 15th I traveled to Sandusky for the ITIP Ohio Google Summit. It was nice to attend a conference without the pressure of presenting. Stephanie H. remembered me from the February Ohio Educational Technology Conference because of my name tag.
End of year festivities for school took place at the end of the month with Cabaret, Carlyās grad party, the senior cruise, and graduation.
On the 28th we attended church at the Church of the Nazarene for Dave Dooleyās last sermon there. Heās such a great guy, he will be missed.
Movies
- The Stage production of Spirited Away!!! – Spirited Away is a fantastic movie, and the stage production is amazing. I loved how they figured out how to portray the larger than life characters on the screen.
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 – So much better than 2.
- G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra – One of my dirty pleasures. Don’t bother with the second one, that one is like they forgot about what makes the first one great: a simplistic plot along with cool gadgets, cool fights, and overall fun scenes.
- But Iām a cheerleader – The cast excels in this movie, I mean, how could you doubt RuPaul?!? A great movie about a girl coming out which doesn’t exactly wow her parents.
- Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga – I didn’t know what I was getting in to, but this movie was excellent.
- Dirty Grandpa – Hilarious movie about getting older and making the most out of what you have now.
- Fast X – It was ok, 9 was better. However, itās only part one! I didnāt know I was getting into a two parter when I went to see it.
TV
TV I watched (number of episodes in parenthesis):
- Andor (2)
- Beavis and Butt-head (1)
- Cheers (9)
- Jury Duty (1)
- The Neighborhood (1)
- The Office (3)
- Wings (3)
Health
- Average Steps/day: 15,981
- Most steps in a day: 31,445
- Min steps in a day: 12,045
- Resting Heart Rate: 51
- Average Time Asleep: 7h 15m
- Miles walked: 194.8
- Miles ran: 16.6
Potpourri
For my Thursday morning playlist I added I2I from the Goofy Movie, a song that slaps more than you think.
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2023 April Checkup – Spring Break & half-marathons!
Events
Spring Break 2023, Tara and I checked out an AirBnB in Millersburg. It is a house built out of containers, and the layout shows why you may not want to build a house out of containers. The stay was really cool though.
It was a pretty relaxing stay, although my runs through the hills of Holmes county were pretty tough. Lehman’s was pretty cool too.
A new restaurant came to Kenton, the 101 Smokehouse in the old A. E. Roby building. An extension of their food truck service, the restaurant serves various pulled meat dishes. It was really good, although our waitress was a little stressed.
The last weekend was a whirlwind of activities. On Friday we went to Akron for Grace’s dance recital, and then on Saturday I ran my 6th half-marathon in Columbus with a time of 2:22. Monday was a trip back to Akron, but that’s a story for the May check up.
The half-marathon was a pretty fun run, although the DJ at mile 12 was just plain evil. When you’re getting close to the finish line of these big races, you’ll hear an announcer cheering on the runners. Well, at mile 12, where you take a right to head down to the finish line there was a DJ doing the same thing. You may think this isn’t that big of deal, but when you’re running and you hear that, you think you’re close to the end. In this case, you turned right and found out you have almost a mile to go.
Miles Traveled: 1,102
Geekiness
The Krogers in Dublin had self checkout carts!
As you walked through the store, you scan items before placing them in your cart. It must have a pretty sensitive scale in it or some other mechanism to detect unscanned objects. I tried putting items in the cart without scanning and this just made it angry. The cart turned red and started beeping at me. At the end of the shopping trip I paid at the cart, put my groceries in bags and left the store. Pretty slick, and I didn’t have to talk to anyone at the store. I don’t think they’re used very much, there were probably 20 carts available and I didn’t notice anyone else in the store using them.
April 2023 also marked the 40th anniversary of Return of the Jedi!! I had finished the half-marathon that morning when I noticed it being played that day, so of course we had to see it on the big screen. And it was glorious.
Movies
- Murder Mystery 2: Adam Sandler and Jennifer Anniston’s attempt at a Knives Out mystery. It didn’t hit that level, but it was better than the first.
- Up in the Air: Kind of depressing movie that I knew nothing about. Apparently it had 6 Oscar nominations, including best movie, best actor in a leading role, and 2 for best actress in a supporting role. Who knew?
- Cocaine Bear: Did this live up to the premise? Almost… The ambulance scene sold it for me.
- Super Mario Bros.: What can I say, one of the best video game movies released so far. I’m not going to say the best, that goes to Mortal Kombat, but it’s up there.
- Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: This was a movie that gave me a throwback to the fun movies of the 80s. Smart, funny, witty, and an exceptional cast. I so hope it gets a sequel!
- Return of the Jedi: Except for the CGI crap added, this still holds up as a great, fun movie.
TV
TV I watched (number of episodes in parenthesis):
- Cheers (14)
- Coupling (1)
- Parks and Recreation (2)
- The Bad Batch (1)
- The King of Queens (2)
- The Love Boat (1)
- The Mandalorian (7)
- The Neighborhood (1)
- The Office (4)
- The Office Superfan (3)
- Wings (6)
Health
- Average Steps/day: 15,848
- Most steps in a day: 32,530
- Min steps in a day: 12,073
- Resting Heart Rate: 50bpm
- Average Time Asleep: 7h 35min
- Miles walked: 137
- Miles ran: 71
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I’ve completed my first year of 12,000 steps of day
Continuing my streak of 10,000 steps a day, I decided to up my game to 12,000 steps a day. That’s not an average, I walk at least 12,000 steps a day. My original plan started back on September 18th, but for some reason I missed my 12,000 steps a day on the 24th, so I had to start over.
Here are my stats for the past year:
I am not a fan of August… It’s 850,000 steps less than the year before, but I didn’t get embroiled in a step competition this year.
Time to retire the Fitbit One
Let’s pour one out for my Fitbit One. It’s battery is still going strong (although if I use it for sleep tracking it needs charged every 2 or 3 days) even after 6 years. I bought it on September 16th, 2014. First year of the Fitbit barely broke 3 million steps.
I bought an Apple Watch a year and a half ago, but it had an issue with steps. Whenever I would use my treadmill desk, it would not be able to calculate the steps correctly. A couple of months ago I did some research, which led me to purchasing an arm band for my Apple Watch. Now my Apple Watch can accurately track steps not only when I’m on the treadmill desk, but also when I’m grocery shopping or push mowing the lawn.