BooksRule

I understand that the man's son wanted to let his dad have a few more 'good' years, but can you legally withhold a person's own medical diagnosis from them if they are --at least for now -- perfectly capable of making their own decisions?

Somehow, I need to figure out a way to work the phrase 'Rasputin in a man-bun' into a conversation. That made me laugh.

She didn't quite make it to 100, but she apparently lived a very interesting and full life. Hearing about her death reminded me of one of my favorite Rose Nylund quotes: 'My mother always used to say--the older you get the better you get. Unless you're a banana.' RIP Betty

I went to my local grocery store to pick up a few things (wanted some foods that aren't 'holiday-related') and remembered to pick up a bag of dried black-eyed peas to cook for New Year's Day (for luck) and cabbage (for prosperity). The cabbages they had for sale were huge! I chose the smallest one I could find and it was still as big as George Lopez's head (I kid. I like George). It's a good thing I like cabbage because I'm going to be eating it for days. They also had their NY strip steaks on sale, so I picked up a pack. I used to go out on NYE in my younger days, but now I'm very happy to have a nice steak dinner with a nice carb-y side (potato or corn) and a good dessert (I picked up some triple berry pastry 'blossoms' to bake).

I just put a pan of Christmas leftovers in the oven to re-heat. A big serving of homemade mac 'n cheese, some cornbread dressing, and cheesy squash casserole. (I had Christmas ham for breakfast.) Carbs...it's what's for dinner. :)

Yes! I left ample time at the end (or so I thought), but my DVR cut out just as the newly-married couple was walking down the steps of the church. I was glad to find that another station (although not one I receive in HD) is airing it later tonight. So, I'll catch the last few minutes then. But I loved all that I saw.

I still have two of his albums (from way back when I was a pre-teen). 'Seattle' is on the 'Greatest Hits' album. Hmmm, I might have to give them a play during my Christmas break. My old stereo still works.

I just got home from a long day at work, followed by a grueling trip to Wal-Mart. My feet hurt and I'm tired all over. So, dinner is going to be hot dogs with chili with a side of chips and dip, ginger ale, and a bakery 'cream horn' for dessert. All consumed while I lounge on the sofa and watch TV.

I'm sorry to hear that she suffered from Alzheimer's. I do have to admit that she was my least favorite character on 'Here come the brides', mainly because she was the love interest of Jeremy, played by Bobby Sherman and he was one of my big crushes back in the day. So, my very young self was a wee bit jealous (of a totally fictional character).

The first concert I ever attended was to see The Monkees (in the late '60s). It took some last minute begging to get my mother to buy tickets and to take me (I was a wee young'un and couldn't go by myself) so we were in the nosebleed section. I still have a couple of black and white photos of four tiny ants playing instruments on stage. I don't remember much about it, but I'm sure I had a good time.

With the Christmas holiday coming up, I hoped to get in the 'baking' mood this year since last year was such a bust as far as baking foods for others. But, it hasn't hit me too much yet, even though I've collected some good recipes I was hoping to try. I did bake an Eggnog Pound Cake this evening. I love baking pound cakes (and I will be making my usual Sour Cream Pound Cake for a luncheon next week and maybe another one for the family at Christmas) but I usually bake them totally from scratch. This one used a pound cake box mix and I added eggnog, freshly grated nutmeg, a couple of eggs, and 1/2 t. of vanilla. It makes one loaf. I tried a piece when it was still warm. Not too bad, and you could taste the eggnog a bit, but I had hoped for a stronger nutmeg flavor. My whole nutmegs might have lost their potency, too. I've had the jar for a while. If I bake another one, I'll make sure I get some fresh nutmeg to grate and maybe put in a little more than the 1/2 t. it called for in the recipe.

This episode was just okay, but it made me woozy. I know that they use the 'dash cam view' and 'body cam view' often, but except for the scenes at the police station, almost every scene was from a 'cam', including the shooter's, the cameras on the ship, etc. I guess they were doing it to make the episode a little different, but it made me a little dizzy.

I did a little forum searching, and it looks like there was some conversation a while back about the Hanes commercial with the guy on the mechanical bull (and other places) who talked about keeping things separated for 'BALL-ance'. Well, it annoyed me, but I noticed that when I've seen the same commercial during the last few days, he now definitely says 'balance', with no emphasis on 'ball'. Maybe there were enough complaints so that they had the audio re-recorded with the change? (I still don't like the commercial, but it's now slightly less annoying.)

Why on earth would Stevie confess to her mother that she was the one who had the van towed? Did she think that just because her mom did a few dishes she would be like 'That's okay. You were just doing it for my own good.' Does she even know her mother at all? I like that Dr. Abrams, although very opinionated and sure about his diagnoses, has been shown to actually be willing to listen to another doctor who has an alternate plan. No screaming or threatening to report them to the chief/board/etc. Speaking of doctors I like, where has Dr. Latham been lately?

Did I miss something? The description said that robbers hold up the 'iconic downtown public library'. Wasn't this just a warehouse space with that woman's father's personal belongings, which included those architectural drawings? I was disappointed, because as a librarian, I was looking forward to see what they got right and what they got wrong about libraries and how they operate in real life.

Okay, I had to laugh at the whole alpaca attack (even though I had heard that they could be mean). I know someone who raises alpacas. I wonder if she watches this show? To add to the whole scene, it sounded a lot like a few bars of the 'Jaws' soundtrack was playing when Hen was trying lead the alpaca away (not the well-known 'Jaws' theme, but background music from the movie) and Hen's 'Clever girl' when the other raptor (excuse me, alpaca) came in from the side. Some good quotes, too. 'You're on animal control.' 'What am I supposed to do?' 'Any animal makes a move, you control it.' and: 'You know a lot about alpacas.' 'Well, we were gonna get one.' 'It bit my ear off!!!' 'I wouldn't.' 'Not gonna.'

I'm watching a movie from 1985 on the FXM Channel and saw Jeffrey DeMunn's name in the opening credits. I'm glad I saw his name, because when he appeared on the screen (he has a pretty prominent role) it would have driven me crazy until either I figured out who it was or looked up the movie's cast online. He had the same voice, but looked a lot different (as he would have--1985, after all!) The movie is 'Warning Sign' and it's about a bio lab way out in the desert that has a lab accident involving a deadly virus. Apparently, it was considered to be a fairly good representation of what would happen (inside the lab and out) in this type of event (1985 tech and protocols, of course). I thought I had caught all of the movies of that genre, but I missed that one. FXM shows it now and then, if you want to see a much younger Dale.

I just finished reading the 'Crazy Rich Asians' trilogy (by Kevin Kwan). 'Crazy Rich Asians', 'China Rich Girlfriend', and 'Rich People Problems'. I loved all three books and wish there were more in the series, but he seemed to have wrapped up most of the stories, so I guess that will be all of them. It was really interesting to read about a culture that I don't know much about and I found myself googling a lot of phrases and locations to see images. (Kwan has excellent footnotes explaining things, but sometimes I just had to see a photo of what he was talking about. And his footnotes were sometimes hysterical to read.) I really wanted to try every food that was described in the book. They were so delicious-sounding! Also, a thank you to the person who mentioned Hayley Mills' autobiography. I'll definitely have to give it a read.

One of my favs as well. I have to get out the DVD once in a while and re-watch. (Mary Clancy: 'I've got a scathingly brilliant idea!)

I haven't watched this show in a long time, so I thought I would let today's marathon (on DLife, or whatever the channel is called) run in the background while I cleaned house. I just saw the episode from 2010 with the woman who has OCD and had problems throwing anything away because she had to examine everything (read all the labels) and also clean anything that she was actually throwing away (such as the empty cat food cans). I had lots of sympathy for her because I know that she wasn't being lazy. When OCD thoughts take hold, it's hard to overcome them (and I'm speaking from a person who gets 'stuck' sometimes due to my compulsion to make lists before I do anything and to do certain things a certain way or I can't do them at all). Her husband seemed understanding and was really trying to help. I would love to know how she's doing now. Jeff, on the other hand, was a real jerk. Him and his newspaper, magazine, and book hoarding. He was sarcastic, rude, and I wanted to smack that smirk off of his face more than once. I also know that he was so resistant to cleaning out his house that when they showed that perfectly clean (except for the overflowing bookcases) downstairs at the end, you just know that he had just moved the paper hoard upstairs (or into a storage unit). We saw him go ballistic when the organizer started to fold one newspaper clipping. There was no way that he could have gotten rid of that hoard all by himself in two months. I think that they should have just left him to his hoard. He wasn't hurting anyone but himself.

Today was the first day of the fall semester. The library was fairly busy, which is a good thing (it's been so slow all summer). We do have a 'masks required' policy for all campus buildings, which is good, but they've relaxed all other mandates, including the social distancing rules (everyone is just being told to be sensible and stay at a distance from others). It would have been a good day, except that the A/C wasn't working well and although the first floor was pretty cool, the 2nd (and I'm guessing 3rd, but I didn't go up there) was warmer than it should have been. And my office was hot (mainly because I needed to keep my door closed so I wouldn't disturb any students studying in the public area when I was on the phone or had the occasional visitor who wanted to talk). I had a fan blowing on me all day but it got up to 85 degrees by lunch. Hopefully, it'll be better tomorrow. I didn't realize it was raining until I left the building--in fact it was raining really hard--but I just walked on to the car, happy to be pelted with nice cool raindrops. (Funny, I live about 2 miles from work and it hadn't rained at all at my house, but now it's really dark outside, thundering, and very windy.)

I just saw on Facebook that American humorist (and public speaker) Jeanne Robertson has passed (that's how you have to say it, according to her. Not died, not passed away, but 'passed' -- while you bow your head). I loved her videos and hate that I was never able to go see her in person. And her husband Jerry (aka 'Left brain') passed just this past June. I'll miss watching new videos, but I'll be re-watching my favorites online, including 'Don't bunjee jump naked' and the very first one I ever saw 'Don't sent a man to the grocery store'.

Bailey: 'No one is taking home a kidney in a jar! Diseased kidneys are not tchotchkes for your coffee tables!' ('There's no I in team', Season 5, Episode 5)

Have any of you noticed TCM advertising a certain movie, but then when the time comes for it a totally different movie is aired? Way back in May I set my DVR to record 'Earth girls are easy' (I had never seen it and am a Jeff Goldblum fan). It was one of those late-night segments (Up All Night, TCM Underground, etc.). Well, I finally go around to watching it yesterday and was very surprised that even though it was still labeled 'Earth Girls are Easy' on the DVR recording, the movie that actually aired was Blake Edwards' 'S.O.B.' :( (Now I do like that movie, too, but I already own it on DVD.) I was a little bummed. I can understand changing the schedule due to the death of a big star and they decide to air some of their movies or something, but this seemed to be a little random. Oh well, maybe they'll show it again sometime (although I don't remember ever seeing it on the schedule before). I had noticed that on occasion TCM would start a movie much earlier than I expected and I would miss some of it. I remember one time going to the channel to watch 'A Raisin in the Sun' and even though I was several minutes early for it (according to the online guide and the onscreen guide) the movie was obviously well underway when I changed the channel.

Bailey: 'Nobody holds a scalpel till I'm so happy I'm Mary Freakin' Poppins!' ('The first cut is the deepest', Season 1, Episode 2)