My wife’s away for a while, so I had a lot of free time on my hands this weekend. I got quite a bit of work done, especially yesterday, when I did another draft or two of a couple of short stories, wrote a book review and finished my presentation for Northern Fancon, which I’m attending next weekend. I’ll be checking in with the Dollar Baby Film festival at that event from time to time, but I have a Content Creator panel on Saturday morning at 10:30.
I checked the weather in Prince George this morning…brrr! When I looked at 6 am it was around freezing and it’s only a couple of degrees above that now, although it will get into the fifties later in the day. It’ll be at or below freezing at night when I’m there, and there’s the possibility of flurries. I sure hope they told the talent coming from Los Angeles what to expect!
On Friday evening I finished watching Season 5 of Bosch on Amazon. This one is based on Two Kinds of Truth, and although there are numerous differences from the source novel, the spirit of the book is captured very well. Unlike some crime drama series, this one has several different things going on at the same time, mostly unrelated, and they spend a significant amount of time setting up the events that will transpire in Season 6.
At noon on Saturday, after successfully dodging spoilers, I went to see Avengers: Endgame. The Ironman Triathalon was taking place near the movie theater, so I had to do some circumnavigating to get there. I hadn’t realized I’d signed up for a 3D showing. I tend to avoid those because, as a glasses-wearing person, the 3D glasses are an awkward addition, but it wasn’t bad and I appreciated the extra depth of field the 3D effect created. I’d put myself on a liquid-free diet for several hours before the movie, since the running time is 3 hours and there’s always half an hour of trailers beforehand. I’m not as conversant with the Marvel Cinematic Universe as many of my friends and colleagues, but I’ve watched at least half of the previous films and re-watched Infinity War on Thursday to prepare myself for this event movie. It was well done. Not as many deaths as I’d expected. The ending was like the curtain call from a long-running play as everyone who’s anyone is trotted out for a few onscreen seconds.
So far I’ve seen a grand total of about 10 minutes of the NHL playoffs. We saw the final 5 minutes of the penultimate game between Toronto and Boston last weekend and I saw the final 5 minutes of the Columbus/Islanders game yesterday. I need to track down more. I’d forgotten how much fun it is to watch a good hockey game.
One of the songs featured on Killing Eve this week was “Where Evil Grows” by the Poppy Family, a Canadian act from the 70s that consisted of Terry and Susan Jacks. Haven’t heard that song in many, many years. Terry Jacks was on the radio all the time when I was growing up with his “Seasons in the Sun” dirge. I wonder if Sandra Oh was the one who came up with that song for them. Aside: I saw Jodie Comer on Graham Norton this week and was amazed by her normal accent. She sounds like one of the Beatles.
My friend Linwood Barclay described this week’s episode of Game of Thrones as “World War Z meets Saving Private Ryan. The most ambitious ep of TV ever.” I couldn’t agree more. It was amazing from beginning to end. I found it interesting that the writers understood that prolonged battle sequences can get boring, so they found interesting ways to break them up and change the mood/tone. As with Endgame, there were fewer deaths of major characters than I expected, but there are still battles to come.
