AJ (Dave) Green’s 60th Birthday

On By Rick McIn friends, travelLeave a comment

I hadn’t seen AJ in over 35 years. Not since he moved to Munich, Germany.

We’d coached together at Altadore back in the 1980s. And were College roommates for some months, as well.

But when he invited me to a big birthday party in southern Spain, I really wanted to go.

And it was superb. AJ is an excellent event organizer.

It started Friday night on the rooftop of the 5 star Gran Hotel Gvadalapin Banus in Marbella.

Two birthdays were celebrated. AJ and one of his original business partners from Munich in AJ’s Fitness. This is Bettina, a classy lady. She and her husband are an impressive couple.

The guests were friends from the fitness studio — as well as friends and family from North America. AJ’s husband Darin is originally from Reno. (A very funny guy. Constantly entertaining. They’ve been together for 31 years.)

Saturday afternoon was a pool party. I skipped it fearing all large bodies of water. 😀

Saturday night was the BIG party at a huge, exclusive villa.

I slept on the upstairs patio couch.

You’d be correct in ASSuming that a smelly backpacker was out of place in a mansion this impressive. 😀

Birthday presentations.

I was happy and honoured to be able to attend.

I do love southern Spain, too. If forced to live amongst the chain smoking Europeans, it would be in Andalusia.

My #2 choice would be Portugal.

The Bodies Left Behind by Jeffery Deaver

On By Rick McIn uncategorizedLeave a comment

Having run out of books in Deaver’s Lincoln Rhyme series, I resorted to trying one of his stand alone novels.

Very good.

When a night-time call to 911 from a secluded Wisconsin vacation house is cut short, offduty deputy Brynn McKenzie leaves her husband and son at the dinner table and drives up to Lake Mondac to investigate. Was it a misdial or an aborted crime report?

Brynn stumbles onto a scene of true horror and narrowly escapes from two professional criminals. She and a terrified visitor to the weekend house, Michelle, flee into the woods in a race for their lives. …

jefferydeaver.com

Sounds somewhat conventional?

Not at all. This book is all twist and turns. It kept me guessing.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Spook Street by Mick Herron

On By Rick McIn books, TVLeave a comment

Spook Street (2017) is the 5th book in the Slough House series — and the best so far.

Herron is an entertaining writer. Most of the best lines are from boss Jackson Lamb who’s a bigoted, philistine, obese, spectacularly flatulent, alcoholic chain-smoker.

Oscar-winning actor Gary Oldman plays Lamb in the TV series.

What happens when an old spook loses his mind? Does the Service have a retirement home for those who know too many secrets but don’t remember they’re secret? Or does someone take care of the senile spy for good?

These are the paranoid concerns of David Cartwright, a Cold War–era operative and one-time head of MI5 who is sliding into dementia, and questions his grandson, River, must figure out answers to now that the spy who raised him has started to forget to wear pants. But River, himself an agent at Slough House, MI5’s outpost for disgraced spies, has other things to worry about. A bomb has detonated in the middle of a busy shopping center and killed forty innocent civilians. The “slow horses” of Slough House must figure out who is behind this act of terror before the situation escalates.

Amazon

WOW ➙ Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

On By Rick McIn books, ethics, governmentLeave a comment

An awesome book.

Demon Copperhead is a 2022 novel by Barbara Kingsolver. It was a co-recipient of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and won the 2023 Women’s Prize for Fiction.

Though Kingsolver lives in southern Appalachia, I can’t fathom how effectively she puts herself into the mind of the boy — Demon Copperhead. It’s a coming of age story.

Ground zero of the opium epidemic. Demon is born to a drug-using teenage single mother in a trailer in Lee County, Virginia. 

Since his mother is in and out of rehab, Demon is partly raised by the sprawling, warm-hearted Peggot clan. 

Almost everyone in this dirt poor place is drastically hurt by the Sackler family’s killer drug OxyContin.

“I don’t know a single person my age that’s not taking pills,” Demon says at one point.

The Sacklers paid a $6 billion settlement to avoid civil lawsuits. It’s fair to call them killers.

I listened to the audio book. Recommended, as the reader has the right accent and tone of voice.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Enjoying Pizza in Italy

On By Rick McIn food, travelLeave a comment

I love all pizza.

But if forced to name my best ever, I say Sorbillo’s in Naples. Gorgonzola, ham, mushroom. Fantastic. And inexpensive.

When I first travelled Italy at age-17, Rockin’ Ronnie introduced me to Calzone. Oven-baked folded pizza made with leavened dough.  It originated in Naples, as well.

Back in Italy in 2023, I thought I’d further explore the pizza homeland.

Alice Pizza is a super popular chain. Light, airy dough made with little yeast.

Of 60 varieties, my server in Lucca recommended something unique. Like a pizza ham sandwich. Served cold, not hot. Delicious.

In the mountainous north, Mikey likes a Trento pizzeria run by a family from Napoli.

This was the combo recommended to me by the boss. Spinach. Pork. …

This Capricciosa in an airport restaurant was surprisingly good. Plenty of artichokes.

The Bonnie Dead by Andrew Raymond

On By Rick McIn booksLeave a comment

An excellent book.

A stolen child. A killer stalking the streets of Glasgow. A troubled detective running out of time.

Five years ago, DCI John Lomond led the search for notorious Glasgow child-killer ‘The Sandman’, until personal tragedy forced him off the case.

In Lomond’s absence, the killer was never found.

Now, with nothing but work left in his life, Lomond remains obsessed with the case – despite the nightmares it brings.

When a child is abducted in similar Sandman fashion from an affluent Glasgow suburb, Lomond is brought in to find them before it’s too late. …

Amazon

Sadly, the next 2 books in this series are not available in audio. Yet.

“Do not go gentle into that good night”

On By Rick McIn books, ethicsLeave a comment

Some of the most famous lines in poetry:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Dylan Thomas

Fight on to the end.

Read the full poem.

Dylan’s father was going blind when DT wrote this poem. Some suggest that dying of the light is a reference to darkness and being blind.

For me it’s always urged not to capitulate in the face of evil and wrongdoing.

If you see something wrong, take ethical action. Do something. Do not ignore it.

In the context of social media I often get the comment … “Why are you so negative?”

Typically from friends who don’t like me challenging some statement they’ve made that I consider wrong. (I’ll unfriend if you insist the world is only 5000 years old, by the way. 😀 )

Click PLAY or listen to the poet read it on YouTube.

Hallowe’en Party by Agatha Christie

On By Rick McIn books, movies1 Comment

This is the murder mystery adapted for the 3rd Hercule Poirot film by Kenneth Branagh , retitled as A Haunting in Venice.

I’m surprised as this book seems a bit simplistic compared with others in the Christie archive.

It begins at a Hallowe’en party.

A girl at the party claims to have witnessed a murder, which at the time she was too young to realize was such.

Though disbelieved by those around her, the girl herself is drowned in an apple-bobbing bucket and Poirot must solve a two-pronged mystery: who killed the girl, and what if anything did she witness? …

wikipedia

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed by Helene Tursten

On By Rick McIn booksLeave a comment

Very entertaining. Translated from Swedish.

Don’t let her age fool you. Maud may be nearly ninety, but if you cross her, this elderly lady is more sinister than sweet. 

I’ve never cheered a homicidal lady more. 😀

En route to a luxury vacation in South Africa, Maud recalls half a dozen earlier times when her generally untroubled life was threatened by someone who ended up coming to grief. …

A guidebook to growing old without a single regret for victims who deserved just what they got.

Kirkus

This is book #2 in the series.