What I Watched: Extreme Cake Makers, a lovely bit of background/filler television. Apparently huge cakes are all the rage – and these bakers are astonishing. There is no competition; rather the camera follows them from design through delivery.
The goth cake was created in chocolate, the pony was life-size, and the fish was amazing. The finished cakes can weigh up to 200+ pounds, and the ingredient quantities are huge.
What I Read: Lost: A Christmas Novella by Jenny Schwartz. A short, easy read with good vibes.
Here’s the Amazon blurb: Merry Christmas, son. Don’t come home. Stuck on Central Transit Station, Sergeant Ryan Dabrowski receives a Dear John letter from his family. The home he fought to protect doesn’t want him. He’s left too much of his body out among the stars. The aug-doctors patched him up better than new, but cyborg freaks aren’t welcome on Earth. “Don’t ruin your sister’s life.”But what about Rye’s life? Lost is a short Christmas novella about found family, new beginnings, and believing that anything is possible. Merry Christmas! Happy Wishing Tree!
What I Listened To: Father John Misty – Josh Tillman and the Accidental Dose; Devansh -Just Breath; Wallace – All You Fascists (daughter of a friend); and Frogers – Indigo:
Thank you for playing Brain Drain! How are you, Darling DeadSplinterites? What’s going on, dearest ones? Please do share with us!
I saw The Feast of the Seven Fishes on Amazon. It’s a rom-com starring Skyler Gisondo, who plays the skeptical son of Jesse on The Righteous Gemstones.
He plays a high school senior in 1983 who meets a college student and brings her to his Italian family’s Christmas Eve seafood feast.
It’s definitely corny but also really endearing. In almost every case where another movie would dial up the fake drama, this one sidesteps it. The food looks great too.
Also I’m reposting this from last night. Dick Van Dyke turned 99 yesterday and he is in a new video with Chris Martin directed by Spike Jonze. I don’t even like Coldplay but I’m totally won over.
It’s genuinely funny without being at all smarmy, ironic, campy or precious, and Dick Van Dyke talks about facing the end without resorting to Successory Poster platitudes.
He comes across as remarkably balanced, and while he acts in the video he’s not putting on an act. It’s a joy seeing someone showing what people half his age can’t pull off – you don’t have to fronting a persona every damn minute of your life.
Did you hear about this?
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-12-13/dick-van-dyke-saved-by-neighbors-in-malibu-fire-lost-cat-found-safe
Yeah, that sounds scary. I know people who were in a similar situation a few years back who also had a fire almost come down the ridge they lived by. Don’t try to fight it, just run.
Andplusalso, as Sarah Palin would say, he drives (or is probably driven) all over SoCal to engage schoolchildren with stories and songs and dancing. The man can’t sit still. Good for him. We need more of that.
I’m usually pretty stoic, but that had me tearing up. He is a part of the background of my life; there is comfort in consistency. I remember my grandparents taking me to see my first movie, his Mary Poppins, at the “fancy” theater across the river. Happy birthday, Dick.
He shows so much grace and resiliance in that. I’ve heard interviews with him in the past few years and it’s impressive how engaged he is, when so many other famous people just throw up their shields and cruise on autopilot.
It’s unfortunate how our culture has convinced so many people they have to wear the same mask all the time. It’s exhausting.
I watched Beetlejuice Beetlejuice last night which was a little chaotic but fun.
Also from that movie, I am listening to:
Actually got the wife to agree to go on a brewery crawl today with me and see one of my first friends I met in this state that I haven’t seen in over a year. Plus, one of the breweries has a reindeer today. It should be fun if we survive the high winds and rain.
We’re watching Day of the Jackal. So many hitmen, so little time.
The title always gets me only because of this stupid Family Guy mockery of pictionary.
i watched the jackal once
but all i remember about it was bruce willis shooting off jack blacks arm…..which was kinda funny
Watched The Honey Trap – a doc on Showtime and I guess shitty Paramount Plus about this German dude who got recruited by ISIL and then the FBI had a translator working on his communications who up and moved to Iraq and married him to become one of his wives, eventually left, came back to the US and somehow didn’t end up in prison forever for whatever state secrets she could have given up, and then the dude conveniently died.
Anyways, it was interesting, but it needed to be episodic in form instead of just like 2 hours long. Episodic form would have been easier to follow along and make for better pacing.