Many fun things

[beowabbit]

I have done many fun things lately (most of them with plumtreeblossom). In no particular order:

• Saw The Social Network and The King’s Speech. Both were great and had very good (if very different) acting. The King’s Speech led to a lot of poking around on the net looking up historical information and finding actual recordings of speeches (see comments) by George VI (including the eponymous one) and Edward VIII.
• Got together with desiringsubject and plumtreeblossom and a few other people after work a couple times for drinks and had an epically lovely time.
• Had my weekly dinner with cathijosephine (having had to cancel the previous week). Since the weather was so terrible and plumtreeblossom had had a rough and very wet and cold day at work, I asked if she could join us so she could decompress from the day (and get a ride and not have to trudge through the snow and ice), and that was lovely.
• Saw gilana and ladrescher in The Vagina Monologues. This ended up with a delightful bonus: We ran into joyeous at the show, and went out to Grendel’s afterwards. (Maybe sometime I’ll get my picture of the snow koala we saw on our way up; in the meantime, if you follow joyeous on Twitter or Facebook you can see her photo of it. Too cute!)
• Went to surrealestate and DD’s for games, and played Dominion for the first time in a very long time, and had a wonderful time. It’s so wonderful to have DD local again!
• Continued to enjoy owning a car again.

Another wonderful thing I have been doing a lot of is sleeping! I’ve always had a problem getting enough sleep, but lately I’ve been managing to get to sleep earlier than usual, and sleep late on weekends, and I’m feeling much better rested than usual. (Not that surrealestate and DD would have noticed this the other night. :-) I wonder if all the snow I’ve been having to shovel might have something to do with how well I’ve been sleeping. :-/

So in general, I am feeling very good. I am, however, not so thrilled these days with living on this side of the river. Anybody wanna buy half of a duplex in Quincy with a garage and ample off-street parking?

Comments

A few historical links related to The King’s Speech

[beowabbit]

In case anybody besides me and plumtreeblossom is interested in them, here are a few of the links I found after watching the movie:

George VI opening an exhibition in Scotland in 1938.

George VI’s coronation speech.

The original speech and the movie version overlaid. The movie really exaggerated the pauses.

An article by Christopher Hitchens in the Guardian criticizing the movie’s portrayal of Churchill. (I read that before watching the movie, and after seeing it, I’d say that the article was extremely exaggerated. Churchill isn’t that big a character in the movie, and you don’t see him in situations where he’d be likely to be speaking very freely. The movie doesn’t make it clear that Churchill was supportive of Edward VIII, but it doesn’t try to claim he wasn’t, either.

Speaking of Edward VIII, here’s his abdication speech. Almost as slow and hesitating as George VI's speeches, so I think a lot of the pauses were stylistic.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I had a wonderful time, love! Everything's more fun when I'm with you!