Tuesday, December 18, 2018

Evanston: 500 opossums for Christmas




        Some of you will have seen that most of my last journal entry has appeared at Sailing Anarchy along with the above photograph.
        I had second thoughts about that entry and considered deleting it.  Perhaps Webb Chiles like cask strength Laphroaig needs to be watered down. 

        The photographs appear with an article I wrote in the current issue of CRUISING WORLD.  They were taken by Ross and Topher at Hilton Head earlier this year.  It is instructive to see myself as others must see me.  In the one where I am staring down at the phone—I’m looking at iNavX, not checking my email—I think I look almost frail.  I don’t feel frail.  I feel strong.  If I hadn’t done my full workout yesterday, I might fear I am deluding myself.

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        I finished EUROPE CENTRAL this morning, a monumental, fascinating, thought providing novel that I became caught up in and finished much more quickly than I expected.
        Here are links to the Wikipedia article on the book and the NY TIMES review, with which I agree.

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        THE BALLAD OF BUSTER SCRUGGS is a good movie.
        Directed by the Coen brothers, the film consists of six short stories set in the post Civil War American West.  I think the first five are good.  The sixth a dud.
        Some parody.  Some tragedy.
        Be prepared for surprise hard-headed and hard-hearted endings.
        BUSTER SCRUGGS is made by Netflix.  As I have recently read, Hollywood should be trembling, and doubtlessly is.  Netflix plans to release more than twice as many films next year as the largest Hollywood studio.  And then there is Amazon.  And Apple.  And.  And.

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        I thank Lee for bringing to my attention a NY TIMES article that caused him to recall ‘Last Born.’
        I checked to see when I wrote the story.  It is dated 2007.  A decade for the world to catch up sounds about right.

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        I’m not promoting anything, but I know how to stretch a teaser and last you get the opossums.
        Tim likes to peruse old newspapers.  He does some of this online and some in person and sends me oddities from time to time.
        Here is a wanted ad from the Butler, Missouri, WEEKLY TIMES, dated December 14, 1881, from someone I don’t think I would want as a neighbor.