Week in Review

[kate_nepveu]

Wednesday, our first full day back from vacation, we had the exterior house painting finished and more bookcases (the last, we don't have any more room) delivered. Work had been pretty quiet while I was away. Other than that, mostly everything else notable about the week was dog stuff.

We picked her up Wednesday morning and she was fine, very happy to see us; so happy, in fact, that she wiggled extravagantly, licked us both, and then peed on the floor. Whoops. Oddly, my first reaction was, "She's so small"—the friends we stayed with over the weekend had a Rhodesian Ridgeback, i.e., a dog bred to kill lions. It was over a hundred pounds and not at all wide, just very tall and long. Somehow my default for "dog" had become reset to "enormous," which Emmy is certainly not.

On Saturday, she rolled in some dead stuff (ah, dogs) and so we headed to a pet supply store to get dog shampoo. We had her nails clipped while we were there, and she met a number of dogs without freaking out too much, which was good. She was very patient through her bath; it probably helped that we have a detachable showerhead, which speeds the process. Once or twice she put her paws up on the bathtub edge, in a very "May I leave now, please?" manner, but didn't fuss when we put her back on all fours. She's such a good dog. We gave her a new toy afterward as a reward, and it took her a full twenty frantic minutes to rip the squeaker out.

Today she was sick in the afternoon, vomiting several times over a couple of hours. Her behavior was otherwise pretty much the same, so we think she just ate something in the yard that upset her stomach. We're fasting her (is that a proper verb use? I don't think so, but "starving" sounds so bad) until tomorrow to let her stomach settle, as recommended, and we'll see how she does.

[ Chad just gave her a new toy, as the pig-frisbee from the very first night home finally disintegrated in an unsafe way. It's a long fuzzy thing with a rattle inside, and she is just going to town on it, prancing all around shaking it to hear it rattle, pushing it on the floor with her nose, the whole nine yards. She's just absurdly cute. ]

[ETA: twenty minutes later, by my system clock, she's got the squeaker out from one end and has about half the stuffing pulled out. The rattle is down the other end and she seems to be having some trouble getting to it; we'll see how long that takes. Definitely talented in a very specific and useless way . . . ]

Oh, by the way: if a recipe for sauce calls for an egg yolk, do not use an whole egg because you misremembered the recipe. They're really not equivalent. This hard-won lesson is brought to you by our overly-sticky alfredo from Saturday night.

Entertainment this week: the DVD of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. This was only the second time I'd seen it, and I can now definitively say: we hates it, the nasty tricksy movie, we HATES it. Every single element, with the exception of the emotional dynamics between Frodo, Sam, and Gollum (okay, and some pretty Aragorn-in-motion shots), is flawed in precisely the right way to drive me stark raving mad. I see that I got most of them in a Usenet post I made last December, so I won't repeat myself now, though I now have more multi-faceted objections to the Theoden thread.

Gah. I am hopeful that the third will be better, but I'm probably not going to do the marathon all-three thing, even if I wouldn't have to take off work, just because I don't want to be in a bad mood going into Return.

Comments

[orzelc.livejournal.com]

I can now definitively say: we hates it, the nasty tricksy movie, we HATES it.

"We" in this case referring to Kate and the mouse in her pocket. I actually liked it better the second time around (despite moderately frequent interruptions), and could in clear conscience make arguments in favor of most of the things they changed. (Mostly of the form "books and film are different media, and require different methods.")

Except Sam's big speech. God, that sucked.

[kate_nepveu]

Sorry, yes, I didn't even think that the Gollum-speak could be construed as meaning you. I'm glad one of us enjoyed it, at least.

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

All sounds very familiar...
Once or twice she put her paws up on the bathtub edge, in a very "May I leave now, please?" manner, but didn't fuss when we put her back on all fours.

Mine do this too, with the most piteous looks on their face. Now if I can just get them to connect the gross stuff with the bath we'll be all set.

[kate_nepveu]

Problem is, she always looks piteous, so it's even more useless than usual to try to read her facial expressions.

It's amazing how much nicer her fur feels when it's just been washed; I didn't realize how dirty it was, even before she rolled in the dead stuff.

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes!. I have keeshonds, as I may have mentioned, so the wash, blow dry, comb out process is rather time consuming... I'm afraid I don't get to it nearly enough. Although I am better about simply grooming. At this time of the year especially (when they are blowing coat) it's vital unless you enjoy fuzz everywhere!

[kate_nepveu]

I was also amazed how much fuzz came off her after the bath. She's got a fairly short coat, so after we towel-dried her and she finished dismembering the reward toy, I hand-dried her (that is, petted her vigorously, stopped every so often to scrape the damp fuzz off my hand, getting nudged for having stopped petting as I did so).

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

Doggie sounds adorable, in that God-they're-a-lot-of-work way. And yeah, an efficient dog can disembowel a new toy and 'kill' the squeaker within thirty minutes without breaking a sweat.

Re: TTT, I read your UseNet post, and I just found myself nodding my head frantically. You summed up everything I disliked about it, and every reason why, while I will probably rent it on DVD (if only to see the deleted scenes), I am unlikely to buy this instalment. Though I did like Gollum. I thought he was very well done.

[kate_nepveu]

I'm given to understand that some of the deleted scenes were more comic relief from Gimli, which, ugh. The preview on this DVD, though, indicated some interesting things: an extended flashback with Boromir, Faramir, and Denethor; the Ent-draughts; Pippin and Merry wading through the flood waters; and some other stuff I don't recall now. I'll be very pleased to see Sean Bean as Boromir again, though.

[annewashere.livejournal.com]

Having just watched TTT again on DVD, I can say that I definitely loved it, with the notable exceptions of Gimli's Burp (how pointless WAS that?) and Sam's speech at the end. Otherwise, very nice, and from the extras on the DVD, seems like the extended version will be worth buying. But as you say, watched much before the last Movie, in case it is actually worse.

One of my old dogs had a sensitive stomach. Once I quit buying her toys and bones that she could disintegrate, she quit getting sick. I recommend a very hard purely rubberish toy - she liked that one, and couldn't swallow bits of it. Of course, yours is still new to you, and the vomiting might be completely normal.

Also, I make alfredo without eggs. Is that weird?

[kate_nepveu]

We've carefully watched her dismember toys and she doesn't eat them; she might chew the stuffing once or twice, in a way that suggests she's just mouthing it to make sure nothing interesting is hidden inside, and then she leaves it on the rug. She's really not interested in hard rubbery toys; we have one that's been in her crate for days, untouched. I suspect it was a particular kind of weed or a bug or something; she'd spent a lot of time outdoors that day and the day before.

It's not weird to make alfredo without eggs. I'm sure if I left the yolk out the sauce would be fine, but last time I made it properly the sauce reheated really nicely, so I'm not going to mess with it.

[marykaykare.livejournal.com]

and more bookcases (the last, we don't have any more room)

Much hysterical laughter as MK rolls around on the floor. I've heard that before!

As far as substituting a whole egg for a yolk, it depends. In some baked stuff it wouldn't matter. But those whites can firm up pretty dramatically.

MKK

[kate_nepveu]

Oh yes--the sauce got very thick much more quickly than I was expecting. I've brought leftovers in for lunch today, we'll see how it reheats.

And really, we *don't* have any more room for bookcases. Honest. (At least not in this house . . . )

[orzelc.livejournal.com]

And really, we *don't* have any more room for bookcases. Honest. (At least not in this house . . . )

Not unless we add more rooms, at least. Though there is that one corner of the dining room...

[kate_nepveu]

That's what I meant, and it's not wide enough.

[aor.livejournal.com]

I still think that Gollum was really irritating. I can deal with manic characters in books, but not in movies or television. Or in person, for that matter.

The changes to Faramir didn't bother me so much.

The movies fail to capture the mythic tones of the books. They try, in parts, but it's undermined by the effort to "humanize" the characters.

I haven't had any particular urge to watch TTT, though I watched FotR a few times. I'll probably get and watch the extended edition, mainly because I enjoyed the commentary tracks and extras on the first one a lot (in fact, I've never watched the extended edition with the main audio track).

[kate_nepveu]

Yes, I really liked the commentary tracks too. They help me notice things I hadn't noticed on a conscious level, like the way Jackson constructs shots.

The changes to Faramir didn't bother me so much.

The movies fail to capture the mythic tones of the books. They try, in parts, but it's undermined by the effort to "humanize" the characters.

You see, for me the two statements are part of the same objective.

[kate_nepveu]

Objec_tion_. Not objective.

[ex-mahoney365.livejournal.com]

I totally agree with all of your complaints. I'm unclear why so many people love TTT so much. When I went to rent it, the twentysomething guy ringing me up said "You'll like it, it's a pretty good movie." I said, "Eh, I liked the first one better." He then froze and stared at me as if I had insulted his religion; and then proceeded to stutter at me about how it was better than the first, and each subsequent movie was just...just...better than the one before it etc. I said "well, the battles are pretty cool" which seemed to mollify him somewhat. Yeesh.

And, actually, the battles are pretty cool. If I want some fantasy swashbuckling, I can watch TTT, skipping the walky, talky parts. On the other hand, it's so incredibly disappointing to only be able to enjoy the battle scenes, when there was much more to enjoy in the book.

Incidentally, ignoring the book's Theoden entirely, I liked movie Theoden, in that watching the actor I felt as though I was seeing a living version of the aged Beowulf. Specifically, I loved his speech at his son's grave, and his speech as he put on his armor at Helm's Deep. It wasn't Theoden, per se, but it was spiffy.

[kate_nepveu]

I was very pleased they got the "where is the horse and the rider" poem in, though I liked it better in the post-_FotR_ trailer--I think it was longer and less frantic. And I thought the actor did a very good job with what he was given; the Pelennor Fields ought to be amazing.

[(Anonymous)]

I've given up complaining about the Faramir changes, since everyone just looks at me like I'm a weirdo. I haven't even gotten around to renting the DVD; I figure I'll just wait until the extended version comes out.

Trent

[kate_nepveu]

Well, I don't, and a few other people here don't; surely that removes "everyone" from the picture?

[(Anonymous)]

Damn lawyers are so literal minded...

I know, but "everyone" sounds so much more rhetorically satisfying than "everyone (who hasn't read the books at least ten times, starting from when they were 12 years old or so)"

Trent

[larabeaton.livejournal.com]

Well, I enjoyed the movie, which is quite unusual, as I really didn't enjoy the book. The only reason that I even got through it was the fact that I was stuck in an airport for 11 hours with nothing else to do.

Well, that, and my own bloody-mindedness, of course.

I liked the first and third books, but TTT was one hard slog of a read for me. Oddly enough, I think that the things those of you that have read it over and over again hated about the movie are the very things that make me like it.

[orzelc.livejournal.com]

I actually liked The Two Towers the best of the three, I think-- Fellowship starts off soooo slowly that it's annoying, and Return of the King has both the utterly miserable slogging-through-Mordor bits and the tedious, drawn-out denoument. The middle book hits the ground running, and there aren't any really dull part.

I didn't like the movie as much as Fellowship, but then, the cinematic world wasn't new the second time around, which cuts the impact a little. I didn't think it was awful, though, and the changes that were made weren't to parts of the book that I particularly hold dear, so I'm not bothered by them.

[leighdb.livejournal.com]

I love dogs. I miss my dog. She is in New Orleans, and not long for this world, according to Mother.

As to TTT, I don't hate it, I in fact think it is a very good movie and has some truly amazing shit in it, but I do agree that I simply don't love it the way I did FOTR. FOTR had... a unity to it that the second movie couldn't retrieve, and TTT for all its coolness did strike a couple of false notes.

I think the difference here is that I think that lack of unity was unavoidable to a certain extent, and am waiting to see ROTK before judging "the middle child".

(Also, not being particularly wedded to the source, the only change that bothered me unduly was the lack of Ent-draughts, which I understand is reinstated in the extended version anyway. And I actually liked Sam's speech.)

[kate_nepveu]

Sorry to hear about your dog. I hope she has a peaceful life and end.

I understand the middle-movie syndrome, but I'm not sure that the things that bother me are attributable to that or could be redeemed in RotK. I would be very pleased to be wrong, of course. But I'm glad you liked it--muttering "hate it hate it hate it" isn't much fun.

Yes, the Ent-draughts are in the extended version.