Odds & Ends
Some significant yardwork done between me and older son Travis (Nick's allergies preclude him from getting in on it) turned the back yard from the months-neglected zone of overgrowth -- unwanted saplings, hip-high weed grass and creeping vines scaling fence, wall and wiring -- into a back yard again. No pygmy villages and dodging of blowgun darts, but a couple bee hives gave us some trouble.Man-o-man are we going to have a huge stack of bagged clippings and debris out front for the garbagemen come Tuesday morning, especially since I also started to clear crap out of the shed. We finally pulled a weekend that wasn't dominated by rain and I wanted to take advantage of it.
Laundry, dishes, all that's largely been caught up on, too, making this a fairly domestic weekend.
Tonight sees the return of Deadwood for its third season, so I know what I'll be doing for an hour tonight. As I've just read over here, it's confirmed this will be the last full season for the show, with the following "season" taking the form of two, 2-hour movies. My take on it in the end? John From Cincinnati, Milch's next series for HBO will not be able to escape being tarred with the brush of being the series that was done instead of a fourth season of Deadwood. Regardless of the quality, it's unlikely that a show "about surfers living on the polluted border between California and Mexico" will be seen as an acceptable substitute even if it proves to be an engaging show on its own.Tonight I'll also be putting finishing touches on my Legends zine, as that has to be in CM Tim's hands by Wednesday.
On other matters, I've found myself picking up Heroclix LEs here and there, mostly off ebay. In the past couple weeks I've gotten (in addition to the ones noted in my convention post) Shiro Yoshida (Sunfire), Georges Baptiste (Wendigo), Elektra (as a Hand ninja), Dan Cassidy (Blue Devil), Ralph Dibny (Elongated Man), Eliot Franklin (Thunderball), Sam Guthrie (Cannonball), James Rhodes (War Machine), Barbara Ann Minerva (Cheetah), and Rex Mason (Metamorpho.) Several of these versions have distinct advantages over their REV counterparts, from better or ramped-up stats, different powers/power combinations, and/or other Team Abilities, presenting better opportunities for team-building.
The average price, including shipping, works out to $7.24, which is less than a booster and less, in fact, than what a mail-away LE works out to after shipping. That's all solidly acceptable for me. I still object intensely to prize-only LEs, and there are key pieces going for much more than this - more than I'm willing to spend. Still, it's the system that's in place, so I continue to complain (and found few non-sympathetic ears when I brought it up at the convention) but look for bargains in the meantime.
Okay... back to some other tasks while daylight lasts.
Comments
Besides, I did my section of the yard work in a concentrated burst -- I can be a devastating bomb burst of Order when I'm in the mood -- cutting down and up the saplings, pulling weeds in great, stringy clumps and pulling down walls of creeping vines taking care not to pull out any of the lines running to and from the house. As I spotted some poison ivy near the end -- and I'm terribly allergic to it, I doubled my speed to get it torn out, bagged up and then get myself inside to drop my clothes in the washer and hit the shower.
I was wearing work gloves and kept it away from my face and upper arms, but getting myself a vigorous washing using Bert's Bees Poison Ivy Soap, which we've had around since Travis got a blast of it last fall. Also, not knowing what I was going to come in contact with I took two Benadryl (well, the Walgreen's knock-off) before starting. One or more of the precautions seemed to do the trick, as I'm not swollen and miserable. Just miserable. ;)
I'm glad you had a good weekend. It's so nice to have those tasks on the "done" list. Wish I'd known about Bert's Bees Poison Ivy soap when I needed it. We used to have a serious problem with it in our backyard at one of the homes from my past. And I had no difficulty finding myself in it on a fairly regular basis.
We caught (and taped) Deadwood last night. Good that we'd finished watching season 2 last Tuesday, I think. You're right about how a subsequent series by Milch will be received on the heels of the disappointing news of the series finale. One has to wonder though, realistically, how far can you take a series about the gold rush days?
I'd realized how unaccustomed I'd become to a great deal of walking the weekend before last when I spent most of two days hoofing it around Philadelphia, the Convention Center, Reading Terminal Market, etc. My legs were complaining to me for days afterwards, which has reminded me to take the time to work some physical activity into the schedule.
The concern about Deadwood's lack of a full fourth season comes in part from some who've claimed to have done the historical research on the town, the real figures involved and the timeline for each -- something that I've been on the one hand very interested in but on the other have kept from looking into because I'd rather not have a hand tipped in a very enjoyable game. I can do the comparisons and contrasts after the fact. Still, I've seen enough to suggest that something less than a full fourth season is likely to give short shrift to seeing the story of the titular town and its major citizens through to their respective ends.
Oh, to be sure it can be done -- Six Feet Under enjoyably covered decades in an extended montage in the final episode. In a show such as Deadwood, however, where so much of the joy of the characters is in the language, a mute montage of the remainder of their lives would be a cheat.
Still, I understand HBO's position. It takes Milch a seeming forever to write these scripts, and as it's a period show requiring costumes, horses and sets, with an average episode taking two weeks to film and costing $4.5 million dollars. I can understand why they'd be anxious to get to a series in (presumably) a contemporary setting where the clothing is probably all off the rack and they don't need to maintain livestock.
Clippings!
As to shows being tarred with the brush of the preceding shows they killed -- I felt that way about WEST WING and SPORTS NIGHT, but it didn't keep WEST WING from being a pretty sizable hit.
I hadn't thought of it, but... yeah... I guess period pieces WOULD be pretty costly to put on. At least until we have another few generations of CGI under our belts. Eventually, gunslingers and Roman Centurions alike will do their scenes dressed in blue jeans (or shimmering unisex overalls with built in finned hoods, I suppose) and the FX department will just paint whatever outfit they need to have on them in post production. They'll also fill in all the draft animals and the back drops. But, why stop there? Why not just paint in the actors to start with, and be done with it?
Off I go!
HBO's on the edge of another of its bouts of insecurity, as The Sopranos is down to a final, 8-episode mini-season in 2007, Deadwood feels as if its end is in sight despite the season just starting, and as much as they might have good things to say about Rome, Big Love and The Wire you know that, secretly, at least some of the execs wish they could have kept Six Feet Under and OZ running on and on so long as they could keep the high viewership.
I'm sure that there have to be some in the mix who are even now trying to soften some players' positions on the acceptability of what would amount to a Sopranos spin-off, depending upon how things end for Tony, Carmella, etc.
I have bushes that need clippering (is that a word?), a bag of mulch that has been sitting on my front walk for close to 3 weeks, and I'm afraid to think what the gutters look like. I have GOT to get at it.
And yes, you can stop by even if you don't like coffee. I didn't for 39 years. the friend who hooked me still teases me about having some coffee flavoring with my hot chocolate (as opposed to mocha-flavored coffee, ha, ha).
Those "what kind are you?" quizzes are fun, aren't they?