40 Responses

1. I love it. My mom had a series of dachshunds; each was a female who was finished as a breeder. Unsurprisingly, they all had bad backs. But they were sweethearts.

2. That was fun. I’m enjoying 70 Up, the finale of a documentary series that began in 1964 with 7 Up, and has had episodes every ten years since. The fourteen people featured are the same age as me, and it’s been interesting to follow their lives. Otherwise, I’m not enjoying the second season of Ludwig as much as the first – the individual mysteries are sillier and the overarching story is progressing too slowly for me.

   I tried a new French detective series, Coastal Unit, set on the south coast of France, but it’s not a patch on Panda, set in a similar area but with great characters and genuine humour (cop turned hippie is pulled back into police work, but is liable to hug perpetrators or be AWOL meditating).

   1. Ludwig is back? I loved that first season. Must look into Panda.

      1. Jenny, Ludwig 2 premieres on Britbox on October 13th.

         1. Oh, right. Jane’s British so she gets the good stuff early.

   2. That’s disappointing to hear about Ludwig. I really enjoyed the first season, and will still watch the second when it comes to the US, but with tempered expectations.

      1. Don’t forget I’m an editor: low tolerance for stretched narratives.

3. I think I vaguely recall that commercial.

   A family across the street from me in childhood had a dachshund, Fritzel, the only one with whom I had any close experience. He was of a calm disposition, one might even say boring, at least to a kid.

4. Over the past couple of weeks, having re-watched “Legally Blonde,” “Sister Act,” and “Miss Congeniality,” of which the last is by far the best, we’ve re-watched all the sequels, of which the last is by far the best.

   Warning: RANT!!
   Also watched (for the first time) “Practical Magic” (the original) which … I don’t get it. Not funny enough to be a comedy, not romantic enough to be a romance, not scary enough to be thriller/horror, and supposedly all about girl power? but the women (ALL of them) spend the entire movie being bad for each other, right up to the hasty and poorly staged climax. Plus, that Halloween epilogue was eye-rollingly dumb. Sandra B was the best thing about this (as she usually is) and I resented the waste of Stockard Channing. Hmph.

   But then we watched the new Netflix movie “Best of the Best,” which is in the chick flicks framed around creative/sports competition category, and laughed a lot. Plus the entire cast is GORGEOUS. Plenty of genuinely good dancing. Now I want to re-watch “Bride and Prejudice.”

   1. Yeah, there’s a reason that movie tanked when it came out. I think a lot of the nostalgia is around the genuinely good cast. I should read the book to see what they changed. Or maybe you can get away with trickier things in fiction than you can in the movies. Hmmmm.

      1. The book is boring. I would not reread it.

         1. Agreed, Jan. I watched the movie before I read the book, and was (unusually enough) actually disappointed in the book. I’ve since tried to read some others of hers and just gave up. I’m going to see the new movie with a witchy friend who has already seen it and loved it. We’ll see.

            1. Same. Bought it, DNFd years ago. Tried again recently, and nope, still not for me.

   2. I love the first Practical Magic movie, sorry it didn’t hit for you. I take it as broken people trying to put themselves back together, pull the warped and broken lines of their family straight and definitely more of a sisterhood story than a romance. Not a comedy at all. But I don’t think much of Hoffman as an author. I gave up on her books years ago. A lot of needless pain for her characters, in my opinion. I will read Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen if I want a similar magical realism hit in word form.

      I refuse to watch the second movie on principle as it invalidates the HEA of movie one. Hate that so much.

      1. Thanks for letting us know that, Lupe.

   3. I enjoyed the first movie and have been to see the second. Have to say I enjoyed that too. In mitigation I am in a lot of pain and don’t get out much!

      Sandra Bullock was great and looked amazing. Nicole Kidman has had so much work done she doesn’t look like herself. It was great to have Stockard Channing and Dianne Weist involved too and I liked their story line.

      Can’t say I enjoyed the books very much but the movies were some escapism.

5. There’s a town that has an annual dachshund race that is also hilarious. Sorry I’m not remembering the name.

   1. Jan, We now live in The Future, where this sort of thing is trivial to look up. Starkville, MS seems to be the biggest one per Google, but one in San Diego is the “championship” per the Wikipedia. It seems that many towns hold them, even Cincinnati. Also, there is some opposition since dachshunds are liable to back injury.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dachshund_racing?wprov=sfla1

6. Hey, Jenny, for some reason I’ve stopped getting email notifications about new posts. Can you ask Mollie if she has any idea why? Has anyone else been having issues? I only saw the last three this morning because it finally dawned on me that it had been a while, and went looking.

   I mostly have experience herding cats, but I suspect herding dachshunds would go about as well.

   1. I have just sent her an email with your comment and e-mail. If anybody else is having problems, let us know, please.

7. My supervisor describes my job as herding cats. It’s close to accurate.

   I’m looking forward to Great British Bake Off’s new season. It starts this week in the US on Netflix.

   1. I used to run a shop with 50 local artists. Definitely a case of herding cats. Actually, the cats are easier.

      1. Cats have less ego.

         1. And less delicate feelings…

      2. I would rather heard actual cats! So much better than dealing with people.

         1. Sigh, *herd

   2. OOh, I was just going to stop my Netflix. Guess I have to keep it now.

      1. Watched it, and Nigella is going to do well. Lovely bunch of bakers once again.

      2. Or you could pause your membership for 2 months and then binge-watch it.

8. I finished watching The Highland Vet before it went away on Prime. As I said, it was worth watching for the scenery.

   I started watchin Blue Murder Motel which was fun but Acorn has only shown 4 episodes and according to IMDb there’s 8. It’s not as much fun as Brokenwood but it will tide me over until the new season.

   1. Brokenwood season 12 releases next month, right?

      1. Season 12 is already on Acorn and it’s my understanding that 13 is in production.

9. On our kids free Saturday, hubby and I binged the Julie and the Phantoms series on Netflix. I’d seen it some time ago, but was surprised how much hubby enjoyed it. Honestly, I mainly wanted to re-watch it to re-fresh my knowledge of Ch. Gillespie who’ll be the new Troy Barrett in season 2 of Heated Rivalry.
   Honestly, wedecided to finish watching the whole series to give our furry kid 2 more hours of time to sleep as we always encourage her to go back to her real family (the cat has successfully partly adopted us and is very smart in domesticating the four of us – we’ve become clay in her competent potter-y paws).

10. I love that commercial and made everyone in my family watch it the last time you shared it.

    We continue to watch old episodes of Dan Rather’s “The Big Interview” on AXS TV–lots of fascinating conversations with entertainment stars, especially musicians.

11. I watched the new season of Reacher (lots of fun) and then the spin-off, Neagley, which I was less enamored of. I still like the character a lot, but wasn’t wild about the secondary characters, and the writing wasn’t as good as the performances. It didn’t help that the premise (illegal drug testing) is something I know a bit about (not the illegal part, but how real drug testing on humans works), so I had trouble suspending disbelief. It did inspire me to renew my plans to write a mystery set in a somewhat more realistic human research lab, so I guess that’s good!

12. This is a yesterday post, or a tomorrow post, but I just read this and had to share immediately! Rebellious crafters unite.

    https://theconversation.com/needlecraft-this-hobby-has-a-long-history-as-a-subversive-form-of-protest-247969

13. And so I’m vaguely on topic, I watched The Princess Bride with my niece. At 10, she is the same age I was when it was released.

    I wonder, how much of what I like best in stories now was formed by that movie? Disney princes. Romeo and Juliet at 14. Love against the odds. Why is it I love Heated Rivalry, but can skip pretty much every other book in the series?

    Also, don’t get me wrong, I still love it, but bloody hell Buttercup, don’t just sit there! The short arse has taken the knife away from your neck. Rip that blindfold off and hit him over the head with a rock. Girl! don’t just stand there! Hit that ROUS with a stick, and honestly can’t you hear the popping for yourself?! And your Wesley will come? Babe, princess, if it’s true love, take some godamned initiative. Ugh. (Yes I know, I know, power and agency etc, situationally driven choice, expectations and training and still, gah).

14. I watched the first 6 episodes of Lanterns, on HBO. It’s a rather dark take on Green Lantern from James Gunn’s DC Universe. I’m kind of enjoying it, though I’m not fond of when they jump back and forth to various time periods. It’s mostly about John Stewart, Hal Jordan’s backup, and jumps back and forth from John Stewart’s childhood, when he’s getting trained by Hal Jordan, and present day. There are two more episodes to go and I’m curious to see where they’re going with this one.

15. I discovered All Creatures Great and Small (I’m old enough to remember the original existed, but not old enough to have watched it). I’m really enjoying the remake, and I don’t entirely know why. Nothing much happens. But the interactions between the characters is endlessly fun (Mrs Hall managing Sigfried without him noticing never gets old!)

16. We just started “After The Flood” and I’m three episodes in and enjoying it so far. It’s my first watch and my husband’s second, so I’m optimistic it’s going to be pretty good.