1. Of course within days after I wrote that post about my Amazon dilemma,
Dean told me his office was having a baby shower for
one of his favorite co-workers. And guess what? We had four days to get a gift, and only one retailer could ship his choice in time for the shower: Amazon. So
much for the purity of my protest.
2. When I mentioned the Amazon dilemma on Instagram last week, reader Julie responded, "It's
just so fucking complicated," which is certainly true. But it was also
the thing I needed to hear. My response doesn't have to be 100% fangirl OR 100% #notAmazon. I can use Amazon when it makes sense, and hopefully far less than in the past. I'm especially discovering if I want there to be independent
bookstores, and I want there to be Barnes & Nobles stores where I can
browse, I need to spread out my book buying. So I am.
(but p.s. Barnes and Noble seriously needs to update their site. I can't even get on it most of the time. Maybe it's just our awful internet, but I've seen some other complaints on social media.)
3. An independent bookstore posted a few months ago that one of the easiest things you can do to support non-Amazon retailers is to follow them on social media and like their posts. It costs you nothing, and it boosts their visibility. So I follow all kinds of independent bookstores all over the country. It's fun, and often informative about upcoming releases, etc.
4. I guess I'm old enough now that I just don't understand why people get so heated up about things. The new Star Wars movie was fine--not my favorite, but certainly not the worst of the series. It had some really good moments in it, in addition to some moments that were head-scratchers (where the hell did they dig up that old fossil -ha). I didn't want Rey to end up with anybody, not Finn, not Ben Solo, and certainly not Poe, so I was not as upset by that part of the story as apparently a lot of other people were. Geeze. Can't she just enjoy being a badass on her own for awhile? I thought the one thing they got exactly right was the Rey-Ben plot.
5. It is light years better than either Phantom Menace or Attack of the Clones, and since we re-watched all eight of the Star Wars movies the week before Rise of Skywalker came out, those were fresh in our minds (we watched Rogue One last summer so skipped that one). I don't understand why it's getting so much criticism. My main objection wasn't Episode IX itself, but the lack of any clear vision for the 7-8-9 trilogy. Did they even have a plan? I am in total agreement with the guy at Forbes who can't understand why it's getting so much heat. Best quote from that column: "I’d give each of [the new trilogy] a solid B. However, I’d give the trilogy itself a C simply because Disney and Abrams and Johnson and everyone involved in producing these films failed spectacularly at creating an overarching, coherent plot that could tie them all together. Why even bother making a trilogy without a plan?" That, exactly.
6. Loved Knives Out, partly because it was so unexpected. But we couldn't figure out why they put Daniel Craig (with an unforgivably bad Southern accent) in the role of the detective. I like Daniel Craig but casting him in that role made no sense. But that wasn't enough to keep us from being thoroughly entertained. (The inaccurate medical stuff bugged Dean but I don't know any of that stuff so it didn't bother me.)
7. And Little Women. Oh my word, is it good. It joins the ranks of the very few movies I think are better than the books. I liked the book when I read it around age 10 but didn't love it, and I don't think I ever re-read it until I was an adult, as opposed to other books that I read over and over. Long sections of Little Women (the book) are yawningly tedious, especially all the prose-y preaching from Meg and Marmee about how important it was for Jo to hold back her true self to measure up to some weird nineteenth century standard of what women should be. It just felt stifling. But the movie managed to be true to the moral tone without being so heavy-handed. Due in no small part to Florence Pugh, whose version of Amy is fabulous--the strong and capable counterpoint to Jo's fiery genius-- but only vaguely related to the vain, shallow Amy depicted in the book.
I could go on and on about LW, but I'll spare you. Just one more thing. The thing that takes a good, solid movie and sends it over the top is how Greta Gerwig took the autobiographical fiction of the book Little Women and merged it with the real biography of Louisa May Alcott at the end. It was brilliantly done. Just brilliant. Loved it.
That's all for me. Hope you're having a good week.