I liked the previous book by Greer Hendricks & Sarah Pekkanen — The Wife Between Us (2018) — and looked forward to their 2019 novel.
It’s even better.
Jessica, a Manhattan makeup artist, signs up for a research study into morality and ethics. She needs the money. It pays $500.
But what does Dr. Shields’ actually want of her?
A TV series based on the book is planned.
To Calgary.
… Or was it Chernobyl? 😀
I was prepared. With a POINT 1 NANO mask. Supposedly N97.
Shield. And Shadyrays.
But Alberta is suffering badly from COVID. 1,828 new cases Friday and 15 additional deaths.
So I decided to stay on Vancouver Island at least through New Years.
A surprisingly good film. … And I hate motor racing of all kinds.
Matt Damon is good as Matt Damon. As always.
But Christian Bale is by far the highlight of this movie. I’m going to watch more of his films.
Ford v Ferrari stars Matt Damon and Christian Bale …
The plot follows a determined team of American engineers and designers, led by automotive designer Carroll Shelby and his British driver, Ken Miles, who are dispatched by Henry Ford II and Lee Iacocca with the mission of building the Ford GT40, a new racing car with the potential to finally defeat the perennially dominant Ferrari racing team at the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans race in France. …
… at the 92nd Academy Awards received four nominations, including Best Picture …
For his performance, Bale was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Drama and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role. …
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
As usual, the real story has been altered to make the movie more dramatic.
Fact is, neither of the Ferrari cars made it past the half way point of the race.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
When Lee Child announced his retirement after the 25th novel in the Jack Reacher series, fans like me were disappointed.
The 26th book is The Sentinel (2020) co-authored by James Grant and his younger brother Andrew Grant but published using their respective pen names of Lee Child and Andrew Child.
Sounds like the much younger brother did most of the writing.
He’s taking over the franchise.
Happily, Sentinel is excellent.
In this one, Reacher battles those behind a ransomware cyber attack in a small town a couple of hours out of Nashville.
related – A bad review of the book.
20 Minute Workout is a Canadian-produced aerobics-based television program that ran from 1983 to 1984, in which “a bevy of beautiful girls” … on a rotating platform. …
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Abaddon’s Gate is 3rd in The Expanse series — preceded by Leviathan Wakes and Caliban’s War.
James Holden and his crew have been successful in their ship-for-hire business, cashing in on their celebrity …
But things go wrong when our crew goes first through the Stargate called “The Ring”.
They have a camera crew onboard.
Abaddon’s Gate was adapted into episodes 7 to 13 of the third season of the television series The Expanse in 2018, with its title taken for the final episode of that season.
This is one of those rare series where the TV show is better than the books.
I find the books too slow.
December 1, 2020.
Or is it March 273rd ??
One #COVIDgoal of mine was to improve my video editing. I’ve spent many hundreds of hours working on it. Put together dozens of videos.
Not my best. Not my most important. But my favourite video so far is this glimpse into my daily coffee break at dawn Rathtrevor Beach.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
If forced to show my work to real videographers, that’s the one I’d show.
In the past I was terrified of audio. My first inclination was to delete all audio. Replace it with a musical soundtrack.
But in recent weeks audio has been my favourite part of editing. Selecting the right music critical.
Here’s some state of the art videography. Pros attempting to duplicate big budget Hollywood cinematography with relatively inexpensive gimbals that hobbyists can afford.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Hardest and dumbest race in the world.
The Barkley Marathons is an ultramarathon trail race held in Frozen Head State Park near Wartburg, Tennessee.
If runners complete 60 miles (97 km) this is known as a “fun run.”
The full course is 100+ miles (160 km) (distances are approximate). The race is limited to a 60-hour period, and takes place in late March or early April of each year. …
The full, five-loop race has been completed 18 times by 15 runners as of the 2019 event. …
Jared Campbell finished 3 times. #respect
Click PLAY or watch Gary Robbins‘ – 2016 & 2017 races on YouTube. What a man!
I’m happy for John Kelly too, a 2017 finisher.
Sue Grafton (April 24, 1940 – December 28, 2017) was an American author of detective novels. She is best known as the author of the “alphabet series” (“A” Is for Alibi, etc.) featuring private investigator Kinsey Millhone in the fictional city of Santa Teresa, California. …
Grafton described Kinsey Millhone as her alter ego, “the person I might have been had I not married young and had children.” …
The first book in the series is easy reading.
Her style has been described as “laconic, breezy, wise-cracking”. It reminds me a bit of the Harlan Coben books featuring crime solver / sports agent Myron Bolitar.
Not literature.
In “A” Is for Alibi (1982) Kinsey, age-32, investigates the death of prominent divorce lawyer eight years earlier. His wife was convicted of murder.
When the wife is released on parole, she hires Kinsey to find the real killer.
Good stuff. I recommend it.
Over the past year my main economics / tech guru has been Professor Scott Galloway.
He summarized his thinking in a new book:
I’ve not been so optimistic about the future since February 2020.
IF we can survive another 6 months or so — psychologically, financially — we could see another boom like the Roaring Twenties.
A new Roaring Twenties.
… a period of economic prosperity … Everything seemed possible through modern technology …
That’s how people reacted after the pandemic of 1918.
We got lucky this time. Vaccine technology has improved so quickly that I’m likely to get the Oxford before having to join the herd immunity segment of the population.
IF the majority of the population has either had the virus or taken one of the vaccines, I might be able to avoid it myself.
IF only 5% of those who were infected have lifelong problems — and most of those not too serious — …
OK. This is the most optimistic scenario.
Hope for the best. Plan for the worst.
