Bay Window Bayswater Blues: Saturday, November 22nd!

It is paradoxical that many educators and parents still differentiate between a time for learning and a time for play without seeing the vital connection between them. -Leo Buscaglia, author (1924-1998) 

A Fuller Life

Thanks Mom, just in line to get my coat at the art gallery saw the Alex Colville exhibit. Really good. xx

Hi Patrick and Corinne, I think maybe we should do the 29^th as the Grey Cup is the next day. We appreciate the offer. Trust we didn’t force the issue but we really miss you folk and wanted to see you before it got all crazy around the holiday! BTW, my bridge playing is even better if you can imagine. So tell everyone to smarten up and brush up on their card playing. Charlie

 

Wayne Sutherland at Lihue Airport Leaving Kauai after a week on the way to Honolulu for a couple of days and then back to reality on Monday. 85 degrees here today and sunny again. Two weeks of sunshine have done both myself and Michele Darrow-Sutherland the world of good. I would recommend this as the best way to recover.

Hi Champers and Suzie Q!



See you on the 29th, around 5ish. Not sure of menu yet but will be in touch. Chloë is in Toronto, at a conference, until Thursday, so I haven't seen much of Cora Lee since she has been attending non-stop meetings. You may not be "forcing the issue" Champagne BUT this past Saturday we enjoyed two tables of bridge at the Keatings. Lovely time and I had the top score, don'tcha know! Easy for your playing to be better as it was always quite terrible! Fondestos and Cheers, Patrizzio! Pics: Your homework. To be done before this coming Saturday!

Michele Darrow-Sutherland 

Our last night in Hawaii - it has been Two weeks of healing and gratitude. To our friends Gregg and Francesa who gave us this opportunity -who knew when they invited us to come in February it would be so needed. Thank you. To My mom - who is my guardian angel and who watched over Wayne and to God who decided we needed him with us so we could love longer. Mahalo

"The biggest crime story of the century!" That’s how Sam Fuller described WWII, a typically punchy declaration from a guy who knew what he was talking about: Fuller was a tabloid reporter and crime novelist before joining the infantry in time for D-Day. Fuller returned to Hollywood and made noir thrillers (Pickup on South Street; Underworld USA; Shock Corridor), groundbreaking war pictures (Verboten!; Steel Helmet) and B westerns (40 Guns) with singular conviction. This is his story, as told by daughter Samantha.

Spotted Towhee

"A former crime reporter, he envisaged his viscerally dynamic camerawork and hard-hitting stories in terms of cinematic headlines… Though seldom subtle, Fuller’s films were dramatically powerful and, thanks to their dark ironies, complex in depicting America as a melting pot constantly boiling over into insane, violent aggression. In particular, few film-makers have been so brutally explicit about racial tensions… In short, Fuller’s sensibility was inherently cinematic, and the meaning of his work is embodied in its raw confrontational style." - Geoff Andrew (The Director’s Vision, 1999) "If you don’t like Sam Fuller, you just don’t like cinema.” - Martin Scorsese

Dear friends who are blessed to live north of our border:  I am of course never prepared in time for your early holiday, but I hope you will find some enjoyment (if not cause for merriment) in the annual grace I craft for our upcoming holiday. Wish I could get you a four day weekend to go along with these verses! much love to you and let's hope the year ahead offers a more positive set of events upon which to whip up a hymn of thanks! in peace, David K. and Nancy M. (aka Cactus and Donna Florida in real life)

Acorn Woodpecker

Dear Friend, (aka Cactus, in real life! Nice touch Vinnie!), who is blessed to be alive, south of our border! (For those of you on the list who probably don't know, The Casa Vicentians were involved in a very, very nasty car accident, on Hwy 80, of late, from which they somehow escaped, alive, and essentially unscathed, physically, if not emotionally!)

Thank you so much for your latest, extremely apt and certainly, stingingly well crafted grace. Much, much taken with the cleverly adapted Shakespearean/John Donne-like sonnet form, (Sir Rodney of Salem might well enlighten/elucidate/correct me on this.), particularly, the punch-line, so to speak: "Now to Turkey let us fall/Or to Tofu, it’s your call." Talk about being politically correct! All those those Vegans and Vegetarians out there are so damn sensitive!!! 
 

Melanerpes formicivorus

At any rate, I am planning to "re-purpose" it for our Christmas dinner so thanks again for gracing us with your grace, your Grace! Fondest of Fondestos you, Bard of Berkeley, and to Lady Florida of Twohee Manor, Patron Saint of The Acorn Woodpecker! Cheers, from the fens and bogs of False Creek, from the Tap Room of Granville Island Brewery to the Tasting Rooms of both Long Table and Liberty Distilleries, yer ever 'humble Plonkified Patrizzio and Mistress Slowly, Madame Coriandre of Sweet Dreams and Calm Benevolence, still, as is ever her wont, abed!

Saturday we enjoyed two tables of bridge at the Keatings. Lovely time and I had the top score, don'tcha know! 

Hi Elaine and Theodorakis! Thank you both, (and to your two scullions as well, of course), for the wonderful, wonderful meal and evening of bridge, together with the fabulous prizes. You have set a new standard for the latter, (your gastronomic creations have always been superlative!), so not sure if that is a good thing or not. How else will we be able to de-clutter and re-gift now? At any rate, we all had a terrific time so thanks again from Clan Durston. Cheers, Patrizzio! Please forward to Viola/Colin, Marion/Bill. Thanks and Cheers, Patrizzio! 

People generally dress according to convention -- what society will accept -- rather than comfort. Rarely has this been more true than among the stylish in New York in the late 1800s, and lavishly dressed theatergoers had the worst of it. One solution became a craze -- open air roof gardens. Theaters were built with retractable roofs so patrons could stroll on elaborately decorated roofs and listen to the music emerging from the theater below: "[In the 1880s, visitors to New York] might see stylishly dressed Manhattanites out and about. A closer look would reveal those sophisticates to be red-faced, panting, and drenched in sweat. It was considered impolite to notice. ...

"Men who braved the theater [in summer] steeled themselves for a night of piercing headaches, with clothing completely soaked from their woolen underwear all the way out to their coats. Women, crushed into their corsets, tended to faint from the heat. Or perhaps they would slip out to the ladies' lounge in order to vomit in privacy. ...

"[Recognizing this problem], conductor Rudolf Aronson decided to make his own bid for summertime business with the brand-new Metropolitan Concert-Hall; ... it boasted an auditorium ceiling that could slide back on hot nights to expose the evening sky. The roof was designed as a promenade for audience members, who were invited to stroll about the perimeter of the opening, enjoying the view while sounds of the ongoing performance drifted up to them. This was such unusual sport for New Yorkers that visiting the Metropolitan Concert-Hall quickly became a hot-weather craze.

"Before long, a number of cities throughout the United States were boasting their own roof gardens atop theaters, hotels, and restaurants. New York had the largest and lushest network of these places, nine of which crowned the city's major theaters, featuring the biggest names in vaudeville and visited every evening by big-spending 'roof garden rounders.' Some of them were as elaborate as the buildings that supported them. The roof garden above Madison Square Garden was a super-luxury operation, large enough to accommodate 4,000 patrons. The Paradise Roof Garden wasn't as spacious, but it outdid its competitors in schlock quotient, featuring among its attractions a 'village setting' complete with a windmill, a pond, a waterfall, two cows, and a milkmaid. 

Within a few years, the Hotel Astor would outdo them all by outfitting 20,000 square feet of its immense roof garden as ... a dirigible station. With an absolutely straight face, the manager told the New York Times that a garage and repair shop had been installed 'so that should an airship party sail up to the hotel they would find ample accommodations for landing.' "
 

Cool: How Air Conditioning Changed Everything, Salvatore Basile Fordham University Press, 2014

Drunk Tank Pink by Adam Alter. "Gloomy days help us think more deeply and clearly: The same mental haze that sets in after weeks on a summer vacation muddles the mind from one sunny day to the next. This might seem outrageous claim -- that sunnier days bring on a mental stupor --  but it's a claim that's backed with real-world evidence. In one study, social psychologists sprang a surprise memory test on shoppers who were leaving a small magazine shop in Sydney, Australia. Before the shoppers entered the store, the researchers placed ten small ornamental objects on the store counter -- four plastic animals, a toy cannon, a piggy bank, and Matchbox cars. 

"After leaving the store, the shoppers were asked to remember as many of the ten items as possible, and to also pick the ten items from a list of twenty that included the ten correct items and ten new items. The researchers conducted the experiment on fourteen different days across a two-month period, between 11:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m.; some of those days were clear and sunny, whereas others were cloudy and rainy. The shoppers recalled three times as many items on the rainy days as on the sunny days, and they were approximately four times as accurate when identifying the ten objects

The researchers explained that gloomy weather hampers our mood, in turn makes us think more deeply and clearly. Humans are biologically predisposed to avoid sadness, and they respond to sad moods by seeking opportunities for mood repair and vigilantly protecting themselves against whatever might be making them sad. In contrast, happiness sends a signal that everything is fine, the environment doesn't pose an imminent threat, and there's no need to think deeply and carefully. 

"These contrasting mental approaches explain why the shoppers remembered the ten trinkets more accurately on rainy days; the rainy days induced a generally negative mood state, which the shoppers subconsciously tried to overcome by grazing the environment for information that might have replaced their dampened sad moods with happier alternatives. 

If you think about it, this approach makes sense. Mood states are all-purpose measurement devices that tell us whether something in the environment needs to be fixed. When we're facing major emotional hurdles -- extreme grief, an injury that brings severe pain, blinding anger -- our emotional warning light glows red and compels us to act.  For most of the time we sail smoothly through calm waters, allowing much of the world -- including small trinkets on a store countertop -- to pass by unnoticed." 

Drunk Tank Pink: And Other Unexpected Forces That Shape How We Think, Feel, and Behave, Adam Alter, Penguin Books, 2013 

A Fuller Life is a terrific documentary made by Sam Fuller's daughter Samantha. She attended screening and I had a chance to chat with her for a few minutes after showing. I really did not know him or his work. Absolutely fascinating life and fascinating, fascinating, highly principled individual. Certainly a more than remarkable, larger-than-life character who many credit with revolutionizing how war films were shot, given that he himself knew of what he was talking, having participated in three amphibious landings during WWII: North Africa, Sicily and then Normandy.  

 Work is based on readings from his autobiography. Furthermore, his mother sent him a 16 mm movie camera when he was serving overseas and Samantha discovered three boxes of film in his study when she began shooting the film. Clips of original footage appear and add much to the story, as you can well imagine.

Don Johnson is more than wonderful. He plays a savvy, grizzled P.I. who drives a monster red convertible caddie with gigantic steer horns on the bumper. He wears what seems like a 50 gallon stetson as well red alligator boots. He and Sam Shepard are Korean vets and go back a long way. Very, very well and excruciatingly, on-the-edge-of-your-seat crafted, with a credible plot. Not to be missed, either. I find it most interesting that quite a few American films I've seen, of late, seem to be set either in Texas or elsewhere in the American Southwest. 

"How can a split-second decision change your life? While investigating noises in his house one balmy Texas night in 1989, Richard Dane puts a bullet in the brain of a low-life burglar, Freddy Russell. Although he’s hailed as a small-town hero, Dane soon finds himself fearing for his family’s safety when Freddy’s ex-con father, Ben, rolls into town; hell-bent on revenge. However, not all is as it seems. Shortly after Dane kills the home intruder, his life begins to unravel into a dark underworld of corruption and violence.

Twists and turns continue to pile up as the film reaches its inevitable destination: a gore-soaked dead end. Michael C. Hall brings a shell-shocked vulnerability to his portrayal of Dane that contrasts perfectly with the grizzled "badasses" portrayed by Sam Shepard and Don Johnson. Directed with an excellent eye for the visual poetry of noir, this pulpy, southern-fried mystery - adapted from a Joe R Lansdale novel - is a throwback to an older breed of action films; one where every punch and shotgun blast opens up both physical and spiritual wounds. Cold in July is hard to shake as an east Texas summer."