Is the World Still in One Piece?

Wild fires out West, flooding in West Virginia, Great Britain voting to pull out of the European Union, stock markets plummeting world-wide and suicide bombers in a busy international airport. Sometimes I feel guilty writing about my silly life when so many serious things are happening around the globe. But other than show sympathy or shock or sadness what can the average person do to help those suffering in different geographical areas? Not much. The stock market volatility, however, that’s a different kettle of crap---I mean fish. I haven’t even dared to look at how it might have affected me personally nor have I responded to my financial institution’s ominous e-mail telling me, “We are here to help.” Thank you, but I’d rather stick my fingers in my ears, close my eyes and sing, “Soft kitty, warm kitty, little ball of fur; happy kitty, sleepy kitty, purr, purr, purr."  Hey, it works for Dr. Sheldon Cooper on The Big Bang Theory, why not me.

On a personal level---of which I am an expert and fully qualified to comment on and critique---I got some great news this week from my orthopedic doctor. The results of my bone density scans show that I’ve lowered my risk factor for a major osteoporotic fracture down from last year’s 20% to this year’s 15%. The Reclast infusion did its job---far better than the daily Forteo shots did after two years of use which only lowered the risk factor by 1.3%. Now I’m glad I followed the rule about having no caffeine for the two weeks after the infusion was given. Boy, did I miss my Starbucks fixes. Getting all your calcium and vitamin D3 in during those two weeks is crazy important as well. It’s in the first two weeks when the Reclast does 95% of its work and it needs that stuff to maximize the treatment. 

I wish I had asked the doctor a question about the possibility that three more infusions could lower my risk factor to zero. Wouldn’t that be nice!  Four broken bones without a car or hang gliding accident to explain them is enough for one life time, thank you very much. As Sheldon Cooper says, “A fear of heights is illogical. A fear of falling, on the other hand, is prudent and evolutionary.” I do fear falling so I don’t roller skate or snow ski. Nor do I ride bikes, horses or elephants although it would spice up my autobiography if I did that latter. In my younger years, however, I’ve done all of the rest. Nope, I’m a dull old woman who is an obsessed fan of The Big Bang Theory---both the TV show and the scientific theory on how the universe began. And if you bought into the idea that I’d still be doing all those things with wheels or four legs if only I didn’t have bad bones then I’ve got a mountain top monastery to sell you. I have no desire to do activities that routinely come with bloody bruises and Band-Aids but now that I think about, that mountain monastery sounds pretty good so I’m retracting that real estate listing in case my imagination needs to go on a retreat. Do you know what Sheldon Cooper’s most popular phrase is? “I am not crazy; my mother had me tested.” My Mom never had me tested but I’ll bet she wanted to a few times. 

Speaking of the importance that two weeks can make. (Yes, I was doing that two paragraphs ago in case you’re memory isn’t what it used to be.) The dog is back on solid foods again after his $527.14 dental surgery. He had to have the gums on two teeth cut back to below the roots so a treatment for puss pockets could be done and then the gums were sewn back in place. He had so many teeth pulled last year that we need to save these two, if possible. In the canine world they are the ones the Tooth Fairy pays top money to acquire. Levi hated the canned mush he had to eat until his two week follow up appointment cleared him for dry kibble again and he lost 1.4 pounds over that time frame. That’s a lot for a dog who only weighed thirty to begin with. I really should try to schedule his yearly dental work and my next, yearly Reclast infusion for the same day. That way, my two weeks without caffeine and his two weeks of getting force fed disgusting stuff would fall at the same time. No point in being miserable alone when we can do it together. 

I watch the nightly news, see people’s houses float down a swollen river and entire neighborhoods go up in flames, know others are watching the stock market volatility suck money out of their retirement accounts while dozen lie dead in an airport and sometimes it seems surreal that my life goes on as usual. “As usual” this week involves going on an out-of-state day trip to Amish country near Shipshewana, Indiana to something billed as a Quilt Gardens and Mural Tour. But I’ll save that story for the weekend, assuming the world will still be in one piece by then. ©

In Hot Pursuit: Movie and Lunch Day

Before our monthly movie date, my club went to brunch at a place that was a favorite of my husband’s. I call it the Breakfast Only Café because, 1) they’re only open between 4 AM and 2 PM, and 2) they specialize in breakfast food with a few token items thrown in for those who don’t like eggs or gluten. The tables on one side of the place are crowded close together and striking up conversations with fellow customers is the norm rather than the exception. On the other side it’s like the old-school diners with its long counter and line of stools where you can sit and watch the ten waitresses and five cooks hustle. And I do mean hustle. I’ve never been there when they weren’t swamped with customers. If you don’t like waiting in line you don’t go there because getting seated usually takes a half hour or more. They have fantastic food, but it’s not a good place to go if you’re not going right home in warm weather because they serve twice as much food than any one person can eat. Knowing this, I came prepared with a cooler and ice packs in the car. No way was I going to pay a fortune for brunch and see so much food go to waste. And did I mention the bakery goods you have to walk by to pay your bill?

The cafe was a terrible place to bring a person in a wheelchair, though, because Don’s chair bottle-necked the place even more than it naturally gets. There are only three tables that a person in a wheelchair can even get to and use, so our wait was often longer than other people’s. But how do you say ‘no’ to a guy who lost so much of his life with the stroke? I rarely could. If he wanted to go to the Breakfast Only Café we went even though I felt guilty doing it. I must say, though, the waitresses and other customers never, ever once showed annoyance of him being there clogging up the place. He was treated like royalty by the owner/hostess who, no doubt, set the tone for the others. I can’t say that about every place we’d been to over the twelve years of me pushing a wheelchair. Some people treat the disabled like they hate being reminding that life is fragile. Movie day was only the second time since Don died that I’ve been back to the place. I swear a widow would have to move to another city if she needed to avoid all the memory triggers. 

The movie we saw was Hot Pursuit with Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara. IMDb sums up the plot like this: “An uptight and by-the-book cop tries to protect the outgoing widow of a drug boss as they race through Texas pursued by crooked cops and murderous gunmen.” Don’t you just love how some people can sum up an entire movie or book in one sentence like that? I could never do it. The reviewer at Rotten Tomatoes called the movie, “shrill and unfunny” and “bungles what should have been an easy opportunity to showcase Reese Witherspoon and Sofia Vergara's likable odd-couple chemistry.” The New York Times review said, “We are in the midst of a comedy boom, and within it an explosion of feminist and woman-driven humor, but the news has apparently not reached Warner Bros. headquarters. Hot Pursuit is cautious and tentative in its pursuit of laughs, and almost entirely unsure of how to go about being funny.” 

Personally, I think both the reviews above were a little harsh and I suspect they were being pickier than they’d be with males in the leading roles. But I didn’t go into the movie expecting to see a classic in the making. It’s a genre film, after all---slap stickiest and silly and dependent on the kind of humor you’d see in a Paul Bart (Mall Cop) movie. If I wanted to see smart humor, I’d stay home and watch The Big Bang Theory on TV or reruns of Frasier and Barney Miller. I like both Reese and Sofia---what I know of their off camera lives---so I won’t bad-mouth their acting in anyway. The characters they played weren’t the type that gave them an opportunity to stretch their craft like Reese's character in Wild did. And who cares? They’re making a living doing what they love and how many of us can say that?

How did the other fourteen ladies in my group feel about Hot Pursuit? Pretty much the same as me. We agreed it was lighthearted and funny enough to give us a break from the type of movies we usually see and we all found things to make us laugh out loud. But at the same time it's a forgettable movie that I doubt any of us will be adding to our video libraries when it comes out on Blu-ray. ©
  
See the movie trailer here.