Caught Up

Yesterday was all about catching up with tasks as well as recovering from celebrating a little too much over the weekend; first with birthdays and then the Patriots game. Buddy lodged yet another protest for spending most of the game in his kennel and was promptly rewarded with a mouthful of Tums which he took like a trooper and seems better today. The rest of the day was dashing around grocery shopping,  house cleaning and a couple of movies.

I was also caught up in the past weekend’s phenomenon which was the movie – American Sniper. For the first time since it opened at my local theater I was told the movie was sold out. I usually watch movies there with less than a dozen people so this was telling. Judging from news reports it reflects the movie’s reception from across the US where theaters in small towns have been packed with movie goers all weekend.

I did get a ticket for a later showing which was also sold out by show time. The movie featured Eastwood’s usual technical expertise and the story was very compelling. I think it connected with a lot of Americans because it was so unapologetic, as Hollywood is certainly wont to do. A simple Texas guy has a gift with his rifle and is motivated to protect his fellow countrymen. The left wing nutbags are coming out bemoaning the glorification of violence but I thought it did a great job of painting the price Kyle paid for his heroics.

That’s really my only complaint about this superb movie – they didn’t really explore in any great depth how Kyle overcame his PTSD. It seemed one minute he had it and then all of a sudden he was better. Cooper richly deserves the accolades he’s receiving as the title character as he delivers some real nuance to the role as a supremely tough guy dealing with some demons. They also did a great job with the military aspects; spot on with American military jargon as well as the small unit tactics such as room clearing.

War is a very nasty affair – the supremely violent human expression – to sugar coat it would amount to undue veneration. Eastwood eloquently demonstrates war isn’t something to be taken lightly, there’s real pain associated with the sacrifice. Go see this movie, it’s the best one I’ve seen in a very long time.

Wife and Her Mother Yesterday

My wife was finally able to attach me to a telephone last night after a frustrating (for her) weekend of relying only on texts to monitor my activities. She wanted me put the Panama phone next to the house phone so she could talk with our son and daughter but it was too late for that. She eventually settled for the Maine Musquetera and they happily gabbed away for about forty minutes until they decided to try face timing with their I-Phones. Five minutes after they successfully connected on that device I was released from holding the other two phones together. Four phones was overkill – even for these two.

And Her Sister