I’ve said, “this feels like the future” before and I’ve only been half serious. Well, this feels like the future, for real. House of Cards is a modern political thriller representing Netflix’s first foray into original content that has a couple of futuristic aspects.
There are a lot of dining options in Oak Park. One of the best, without question, is the Marion Street Cheese Market. Don’t let that name mislead, it’s much more than cheese and much more than market (but Marion and Street are what you would expect). It’s a few blocks south of the main drag just across from the el tracks, don’t skip it.
I got sucked in to Downton about a year ago and it’s been quite a ride. My enjoyment of it has many facets. At times it’s a guilty pleasure, at times it’s a historical reference, and at other times it’s a commentary on class dividing lines applicable to today’s society. This thing has some range.
I can’t get enough of Bernard Samson, Len Deighton’s beautifully constructed British spy person, so I’m embarking on the second trilogy (of three). I have a backlog of reading and I haven’t been doing much lately. Call it a reading slump. I was hoping this would shake some of the reading cobwebs free.
This is the end of the run, and it’s about time. All of the remarkable story lines are played out and the last ten episodes have been a fitting series ending. Once again, it uncannily pulled in relevant topics that interested and enlightened me, which is baffling, considering the series is over five years old.
I have a friend who used to own a bookstore, the guy has read everything. So I’m wandering through Open Books with him and he’s casually remarking on books he’s read and he mentions something about Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim that makes me want to read it.
So these 30 for 30 things by ESPN are showing up on Netflix streaming. I was just flipping through the documentaries and Straight Outta LA popped up. Despite my hatred for the Worldwide Leader, I do love these sports documentaries, but I haven’t seen many of them. I hit play on this one thinking I’d check it out and I checked it out for an hour (I watched it all, yes). This is where you realize that not having cable doesn’t exempt you from becoming a TV-watching zombie.
I went down the Heartless Bastards path because a buddy of mine kept talking them up. Then I saw they were from Ohio and have a Black Keys style (somewhat), so I dove in. The leader, literally and figuratively, is vocalist Erika Wennerstrom. She runs the show, named the group, and has been the one constant in the band’s almost decade-long history. I Googled her and there are a ton of recent interviews with her because this album was released in Feb 2012 and they toured in mid/late 2012. She’s passionate about her music for sure.
I think everyone should make it a point to see each Denzel Washington movie. If not at the theatre, at least after the fact. He’s especially reliable for gratuitous TV watching on hotel HBO. He makes it a pretty safe bet that you’re going to get something worthwhile.
One of my clients mentioned the movie Searching For Sugar Man in passing and he seemed to have really enjoyed it. He said it was about a tortured American artist who had marginal success at home but was highly successful outside of the country.