I share two with Erin with Stand By Me and The Parent Trap, sort of, except it’s the 1998 version with Lindsay Lohan. My other eight are, in alphabetical order:
500 Days of Summer
Breaking Away
Crazy Rich Asians
Do The Right Thing
Field of Dreams
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
Moonrise Kingdom
My wife Kim shares five with me, Do The Right Thing, Field of Dreams, Moonrise Kingdom, and Stand By Me. Her other five are: Jaws, A League of Their Own Own, Mystic Pizza, Rear Window, and…one other to be determined, that I’ll add here later. She didn’t want to be pressured into a decision.
Instead of sharing the trailers from all of them, I think I’ll just share one of my favorite parts of Do The Right Thing, which probably is my favorite summer movie:
How about you? What are some of your favorite movies set during the summer?
Earlier in the week, I talked about my serious plans for my birthday, which is today and I’m celebrating with a four-day weekend. In that post, I said I’d talk about my fun plans for my birthday later in the week. This is that post.
The main two events that we have planned are tomorrow night, starting with the premiere of Episode 5 of Season 13 of Mystery Science Theater 3000: Doctor Mordrid. That will be followed by the airing on PBS of Prince’s live concert from The Purple Rain Tour at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, N.Y. from March 1985:
I also have a YouTube playlist of a few hours of DJs spinning dance tunes on the turntables and mixing boards. I’ve already started listening to that. I have another playlist of music to wind down the party or the after party.
Other than that, we’ll see, as they say, where the spirit takes me.
Almost every Sunday since mid-May 2020 with a few exceptions, I have been taking my own personal Sabbath, where I tune out of the news and social media and turn off my ringer and all notifications on my phone.Throughout the day and/or sometimes the next day, I share what I am reading, listening to or watching during my Sabbath.
This weekend, my own personal Sabbath comes early, on Saturday, since I work on Sunday. When I last left you two weekends ago, I was planning on reading Get Shorty by Elmore Leonard, Riverman: An American Odyssey by Ben McGrath, and Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer. I finished both Get Shorty, which was good, and Riverman, which was, and will be, one of my favorite reads from this year. As I was reading, I kept reading passages to my wife. That is one way I know a book is good.
That leaves me with Under the Banner of Heaven still to finish, but I don’t know if I’ll get to that this weekend as I might need some lighter fare after the past week. Last weekend, my wife tested positive for covid and I took home tests Sunday and Tuesday, with both being negative. She is getting better – like the end of a bad cold that keeps lingering- and I, to be honest, while so far physically well, need a mental respite from the world.
To that end, I’ve joined my sister in a social media break for a little bit. I’m really only on one, Instagram, as I “gave up” Facebook and Twitter several years ago. For me, it’s not “the feed” that is the issue but “Stories” where I hear about the latest news whether I want to or not. And it’s not that I necessarily disagree with what the person is posting, it’s just that sometimes it’s all too much. I need to get away from time to time.
While I don’t know what I’ll be reading, I do know what my wife, who is off all weekend, and I probably will be listening to and watching:
Mystery Science Theater 3000 and/or Rifftrax movies (this past week, we rented the “riff track” for Ready Player One, which we had on HBO)
The Mission to Zyxx podcast,which we slowly have been making our way through over the last couple of months.
I also have set up a a playlist of podcasts for this weekend’s Sabbath, some of which I’ll listen during a walk:
Other than all that, we’ll see where, or if, I’ll land on any reading.
I’ve seen a post or two acknowledging that May is Mental Health Awareness Month, with bloggers sharing about their own mental health. So I’ve decided to jump on the bandwagon, but also to discuss my other focus this month, which is watching bad movies with my wife.
Mental Health Awareness Month
Like some other bloggers have chosen to do, I’m not going to go into real depth, here. Instead, I’ll just be honest about where I’m at and where I’ve been, which is taking Prozac for over 30 years. Only within the last couple of years, I’m not ashamed to say, I have gone into therapy. Both have helped, but that doesn’t mean everyday is sunshine and roses.
Also, over the last couple days of years I’ve gotten into meditation. I’m not sure where it started exactly. However, I think it coincided with listening to a podcast I found on Spotify at the start of the pandemic called Wake Up/Wind Down podcast with Niall Breslin. I would provide a link, but the show ended this past week. He still has another podcast that is continuing, called Where is My Mind?
I also use two meditation apps: Headspace and Shine. Each has been helpful. I highly recommend looking into one or the other or both. Another good one that has lots of free meditations is Insight Timer.
I’ll end this section by sharing a few podcasts from Breslin, Headspace, and Shine, all available for free on Spotify…and maybe other podcast platforms:
Bad Movie May
Last weekend, my wife Kim and I had a bad movie weekend in celebration of Mystery Science Theater 3000 dropping most of the episodes from its first 10 seasons. We also had a selection of movies we found on Tubi for free by a local director who has a cult following among bad movie enthusiasts from which to choose. We watched one.
Now, we have extended it into Bad Movie May. I’d like to tell you all the bad movies we’ve watched so far, but there were so bad we don’t remember them — and, in some cases, alcohol helped us forget them. Most, to be honest, were from MST3K. Tonight, we’re having a double feature: Noah’s Shark, followed by the Rifftrax version of M. Night Shyamalan’s Old. We purchased the latter through Rifftrax. Using their app, you just sync the movie with the Rifftrax and wa la, a way to listen to commentary, and laugh your way, through what might be, and often is, an unbearable movie to make it through otherwise.
I’ll leave you with the trailers for both, the first being Noah’s Shark directed by the aforementioned local director and available on Tubi:
I was unable to find the trailer on YouTube for the Rifftrax of Old, but if you follow this link, you can see the trailer there for yourself.
Still an unfinished person... 