I saw this Grimm’s Fairy Tales book in Hamburg and loved the pictures in it .. but it was so heavy, and a little pricey.
Luckily, Amazon had a used one for me that I could order (from a book dealer in England; shipping only $4), and earlier this week, it landed on my porch.
Saturday/ book store treasure hunt
My friend and I went on a second-hand bookstore treasure hunt on Saturday.
I am looking for a few out-of-print Afrikaans books from my childhood.
It looks like I will have better luck scouring the offerings of local online booksellers – but it is still fun to browse through the shelf inventory of second-hand booksellers!
Friday/ Julian Assange’s cat
Here’s an internet meme to celebrate National Pet Day (even though it was yesterday).
The feline is Julian Assange*’s cat Michi, pictured in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2016. After Assange’s arrest on Thursday, Ecuador threatened to put Michi in an animal shelter – but the kitty kat is now reportedly with Assange’s family.
*Assange is an Australian journalist, computer programmer and the founder and director of WikiLeaks [Source: Wikipedia].
Wednesday/ there is an end to everything
‘There is an end to everything, to good things as well’.
Proverb that dates back to about 1374 (Geoffrey Chaucer, poet).
We learned yesterday that the reason the Rolling Stones had to postpone their upcoming concert in May in Seattle, was for Mick Jagger (75) to undergo heart surgery (a heart valve replacement). Yikes. Apparently surgeons can work new wonders these days with a much less invasive procedure, but even so.
Is this not a sign for Mick and the Stones to finally, just pack it up, and call it quits?
Sunday/ iTunes tune-up: completed
Alright .. I’m done for now with my iTunes tune-up. It was a lot of fun. In some cases I broke the ‘rules’: uploaded a singles album cover from online, if I had only imported the hit song from a full CD, and I did not like the CD cover much. In other cases where I had multiple CDs for one artist or group (ABBA), I could upload several cool old vinyl covers or CD covers.
Here comes 2019.. Happy New Year!
It’s just about 2019 here in Hong Kong.
Cheers! Happy New Year!
By 9 pm, the Hong Kong Police Dept. were out in full force in the small square of streets called Lan Kwai Fong in the Central District (party central for expats and locals alike). The surrounding streets were closed for traffic.
Also: the Yung Kee Restaurant nearby had posted a sign by the entrance ‘Our Signature Charcoal Cooked Goose Has Been Sold Out’. (Aw. Out of goose on New Year’s Eve. And I guess wait staff could no longer announce ‘Your goose is cooked, sir!’, as they put the goose on the table).
Wednesday/ Christmas light enchantments
The Seattle Mariners baseball field – south of downtown – is set up as a Christmas light maze (the Seattle ‘Enchant’ Christmas market and festival). So that’s where we went after beers & dinner tonight. There were forests of light trees, a scavenger hunt for Santa’s reindeer in the maze, and a little ice rink as well.
Saturday Night Live/ the ‘cold open’
‘President Trump’ was again featured in this Saturday’s SNL cold open, portraying him and other world leaders at the G20 meeting in Buenos Aires. Hmm. Is this really funny? I thought. In this case, Putin and Mohammed Bin Salman are – by all credible accounts in the real world – savages, directly responsible for murdering their political enemies. They should be persona non grata at the G20 (and maybe they are). So is it cool to ‘celebrate’ and poke fun at them?
I guess I’m too serious. This is simply an offer to the audience to escape the horrors of the real universe, and jump into a parallel one of parody, for a little while. Another problem could be that I only have one beer on a Saturday night, and not three or four, as I’m sure most in the studio audience must have had!
Sunday/ ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ rocks
We ran out to the movie theater today to go see the just-released Freddie Mercury/ Queen biopic called ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. It had gotten mixed reviews from the critics – but as it turned out: what do they know? I thought it was very, very well done.
American actor Rami Malek worked hard to undergo a stunning transformation to portray Freddie Mercury’s flamboyance and human side. The filmmakers collaborated with Queen’s drummer Roger Taylor (71) and lead guitarist Brian May (69). (Bass guitarist John Deacon (67) retired from the band’s activities a few years after Freddie Mercury passed away in 1991).
The movie ends with an amazing recreation of Bob Geldof’s Live Aid concert that was held in 1985 at Wembley Stadium in London (worldwide rock concert organized to raise money for the relief of famine-stricken Africans).
Wednesday/ Oktoberfest is over
Oktoberfest 2018 in Munich is over, but here is a cute little cartoon from German cartoonists Greser & Lenz.
Sunday/ the fantasy worlds of LEGO
We went down to the annual ‘BrickCon’ LEGO exhibition, at Seattle Center today. This is where LEGO master builders show off their work, and fans come to admire it. Here are some of my favorites.
Saturday/ wearing many layers of clothes
I am under the weather. Sometimes today I had to put on several layers of clothes to keep me warm out of bed, and to keep the chills under control.
‘That reminds me of the Friends episode with Joey wearing all Chandler’s clothes’, I thought.
Tuesday/ no Aviation Gin for you (or me)
I see actor Ryan Reynolds’ gin has arrived in Seattle (Aviation Gin). It made me think of our gin of choice, for after-work cocktails, back when I worked in China: Bombay Sapphire. So I should give the Aviation Gin a try.
P.S. Alas, party-pooper researchers have published the results of a sweeping global study in the Lancet, that says that not even modest amounts of alcohol is good for one’s health. What is one to do?
Thursday/ LEGO’s Castles
Below is the used LEGO Castle #6075 set from 1981 that I had bought from a Craigslist seller in Tacoma.
I had to fill in quite a few yellow brick pieces of my own. I bought it knowing there were no knight or horse minifigures. (Aw). The red drawbridge is also missing its pulley and rope, used to draw it close.
Fun as it was, to build this set, it’s really outdated. The modern medieval sets from LEGO use gray bricks and not yellow, roof tiles, and add in a lot more detail to the castle walls and roofs, and to the minifigure characters (see the picture of ‘Kingdom’s Joust’).
Monday/ pleased to eat you
The popcorn movie ‘The Meg*’ is out on the circuit. Even though I have not seen it yet, it’s fun to check the movie’s trailer online, and the posters for it. The movie is a co-production with China, and features actress Li Bingbing alongside Jason Statham.
*Short for Carcharodon megalodon, a really, really big shark (60 ft/ 20m) that roamed the oceans until about 2.6 million years ago.
Friday/ a scene from Texas
Here’s a simple Texas-themed construction. I was inspired by pictures that I found online for a 1977 set called ‘Texas Rangers’.
Wednesday/ LEGO House on the Hill, 2.0
May I present the new and improved version of what I will call ‘LEGO House on the Hill’? The original one was only a shell, with no floors, and not much detail inside.
This house is still very compact, and built with pretty basic bricks. I don’t have custom furniture and kitchen appliance bricks that come with some LEGO house sets – yet.
Sunday/ I loved ‘Love, Simon’
I went to see Love, Simon, on the spur of the moment today. It is a coming-of-age film, a romantic comedy-drama about a closeted gay high schooler called Simon. (He is forced to come out of the closet – of course. He makes mistakes in the process, hurts people, but his parents and friends are supportive).
I see some film critics wonder if the movie is already too little, too late, for today’s kids for whom being gay is – finally – O.K. So they don’t need this movie. Well, I think I disagree. The movie will be watched by old guys like me, and by parents, and by gay kids that have a rough time where they grow up. And it will mean an awful lot to them.
Thursday/ there is a terrible lizard in my backyard
I did not buy the big T-Rex I saw at Toys-R-Us (my post a few days ago), but this red one at Walmart was on sale for just $1.97. Besides, the dinosaur – the terrible lizard * – goes nicely with the garage that I added to my Lego house. It’s all just for fun. I will eventually box up these toys and donate all of it to Goodwill.
*Dinosaur comes from ancient Greek δεινός (deinos), meaning ‘terrible, potent or fearfully great’, and σαῦρος (sauros), meaning ‘lizard or reptile’.
Monday/ my house, in Lego bricks
What would my actual house look like in Lego* bricks? I wondered. Well, only one way to find out, I thought: build it – and so I did. I’m pleased with the result. I had to scavenge bricks and roof tiles from my 2004 Lego Designer House kit, destroying it in the process – but that’s OK. The roof was a lot of fun to build.
*Lego is short for leg godt, Danish words that translate to ‘play well’.