Hey, everyone. First, let me say that I am having trouble again with the blogger function called New Editor and have found it necessary to revert to Old Editor. This probably meshes better with my age. That's a joke. For this reason you will not see chapter indents until this is resolved. Also, the post I produced called South Bound Train had a problem crop up with the photo. I just deleted the picture.
We went out to eat today and everywhere we went, people seemed to be having trouble with their air conditioning. The south and a lot of other regions are really having a heat wave, here in the good ole U.S. of A. I went to Books-A-Million while we were in civilization. I was hoping to buy some books at a reasonable price. There were several books I wanted, but didn't buy. One of them was $15 for a paperback. Yeah, you heard me right. I priced them as e-books Friday night and I've noticed that publishers have started their campaign of Gradualism on that front. They have jacked up the prices yet again. Now the e-book version of new books like Tom Clancy's Against All Enemies has escalated to an immodest $12.99 to $13.99. In a matter of months they have increased from absolute top price of $9.99 to $13.99. An e-book is ridiculous at anything over $6 to $7, in my opinion. The big five publishers will not sleep at night until the price is at $27 each. That's for books with no paper to buy, no ink to buy, no shipping costs, etc. Is this a great country or what? At the book store today it was almost deserted. The hardcover of Clancy's book, and I use the term loosely since it has a co-writer, which I will not go into; the hardcover price was $27 or $28 without any discount. I'll just start reading independent author's books exclusively, along with various freebies that are numerous. By the way, when I wanted to go to the restroom, there was a sign that instructed me that I would have to get a key from the service desk. Let's commit ceremonial suicide as a book store and drive the few remaining customers into the arms of a new technology.
Hey, something really cool happened at the book store! I saw a lady in there who recently appeared on Baggage, the TV show. Did you see the episode where the attractive blond lady with short hair had a cane to walk on because she had recently had surgery? Either I saw that lady or her identical twin. Very cool.
Gee, I think I was supposed to talk about something... Oh, yeah. I saw a movie today about yet another Super Dude. It was pretty good. I would rate it as about 4 stars out of 5. That might be just a bit high. The flick was good, with a decent story line and a fair amount of action and decent special effects. It had decent acting and was quite adequate. I think it would have been well served to have had about 20 minutes cut from it. There are very few movies which can carry well if they run over the 1.5 hour mark. It just seems like a natural length. That said, the movie was definitely good enough to pay to see and I think you'll like it. I had actually planned on going to see Friends With Benefits. The times of the shows did not coincide well with my dedicated eating expedition for the day.As I get older, good food tends to trump good movies on occasion.
For the patient among you who have stayed around to read about the film let me give you the recipe. There is a scrawny guy named Steve Rogers who wants very badly to get into the action during World War 2. He has an ocean full of desire and a 25 cent body. A professor decides to use him in an experiment that has been undertaken in the hope of producing a super soldier. The experiment works and Steve goes from 98 pound weakling to hunk. He soon proves his worth by going 30 miles behind enemy lines to rescue several hundred captive soldiers. Well, this is cool but there is this guy called the Red Skull who is, himself, a super soldier. He has serious personality issues and is played quite well by Hugo Weaving. Steve Rogers, alias Captain America, is capably played by Chris Evans.
The Red Skull and his companions have some serious weapons for WW2 guys. Things like laser cannons on tanks and a Flying Wing; an advanced aircraft. Captain America throws a shield-shaped monkey wrench into the whole darn thing, as one might expect.
I have to give a few thoughts on Cap's shield. When I was a kid, I took a garbage can lid and painted it white. ( Didn't have any blue or red paint) I would throw this shield at things and pretend to be Captain America. You would be amazed how much trouble you could get into with a garbage can lid. During the movie it showed these kids with a garbage can lid running around playing Captain America and it gave me such a surprise and a thrill. It was like I had stepped back through the decades and saw myself in this ragged little bugger. The kid in the film actually had his 'shield' painted all three colors, though. That's not realistic but that is fine. People rarely had money to waste on lid painting.
Bottom line, it's a good show. It is a cut below the X-men flick but that's okay. Hope you have a good week and I hope I do too. From the author's green retreat, I'm CE Wills.
We went out to eat today and everywhere we went, people seemed to be having trouble with their air conditioning. The south and a lot of other regions are really having a heat wave, here in the good ole U.S. of A. I went to Books-A-Million while we were in civilization. I was hoping to buy some books at a reasonable price. There were several books I wanted, but didn't buy. One of them was $15 for a paperback. Yeah, you heard me right. I priced them as e-books Friday night and I've noticed that publishers have started their campaign of Gradualism on that front. They have jacked up the prices yet again. Now the e-book version of new books like Tom Clancy's Against All Enemies has escalated to an immodest $12.99 to $13.99. In a matter of months they have increased from absolute top price of $9.99 to $13.99. An e-book is ridiculous at anything over $6 to $7, in my opinion. The big five publishers will not sleep at night until the price is at $27 each. That's for books with no paper to buy, no ink to buy, no shipping costs, etc. Is this a great country or what? At the book store today it was almost deserted. The hardcover of Clancy's book, and I use the term loosely since it has a co-writer, which I will not go into; the hardcover price was $27 or $28 without any discount. I'll just start reading independent author's books exclusively, along with various freebies that are numerous. By the way, when I wanted to go to the restroom, there was a sign that instructed me that I would have to get a key from the service desk. Let's commit ceremonial suicide as a book store and drive the few remaining customers into the arms of a new technology.
Hey, something really cool happened at the book store! I saw a lady in there who recently appeared on Baggage, the TV show. Did you see the episode where the attractive blond lady with short hair had a cane to walk on because she had recently had surgery? Either I saw that lady or her identical twin. Very cool.
Gee, I think I was supposed to talk about something... Oh, yeah. I saw a movie today about yet another Super Dude. It was pretty good. I would rate it as about 4 stars out of 5. That might be just a bit high. The flick was good, with a decent story line and a fair amount of action and decent special effects. It had decent acting and was quite adequate. I think it would have been well served to have had about 20 minutes cut from it. There are very few movies which can carry well if they run over the 1.5 hour mark. It just seems like a natural length. That said, the movie was definitely good enough to pay to see and I think you'll like it. I had actually planned on going to see Friends With Benefits. The times of the shows did not coincide well with my dedicated eating expedition for the day.As I get older, good food tends to trump good movies on occasion.
For the patient among you who have stayed around to read about the film let me give you the recipe. There is a scrawny guy named Steve Rogers who wants very badly to get into the action during World War 2. He has an ocean full of desire and a 25 cent body. A professor decides to use him in an experiment that has been undertaken in the hope of producing a super soldier. The experiment works and Steve goes from 98 pound weakling to hunk. He soon proves his worth by going 30 miles behind enemy lines to rescue several hundred captive soldiers. Well, this is cool but there is this guy called the Red Skull who is, himself, a super soldier. He has serious personality issues and is played quite well by Hugo Weaving. Steve Rogers, alias Captain America, is capably played by Chris Evans.
The Red Skull and his companions have some serious weapons for WW2 guys. Things like laser cannons on tanks and a Flying Wing; an advanced aircraft. Captain America throws a shield-shaped monkey wrench into the whole darn thing, as one might expect.
I have to give a few thoughts on Cap's shield. When I was a kid, I took a garbage can lid and painted it white. ( Didn't have any blue or red paint) I would throw this shield at things and pretend to be Captain America. You would be amazed how much trouble you could get into with a garbage can lid. During the movie it showed these kids with a garbage can lid running around playing Captain America and it gave me such a surprise and a thrill. It was like I had stepped back through the decades and saw myself in this ragged little bugger. The kid in the film actually had his 'shield' painted all three colors, though. That's not realistic but that is fine. People rarely had money to waste on lid painting.
Bottom line, it's a good show. It is a cut below the X-men flick but that's okay. Hope you have a good week and I hope I do too. From the author's green retreat, I'm CE Wills.
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