Movie Fest
June 30, 2007
As Suzanne and the kids have been in Dallas since the cruising visiting with her family, I have had an opportunity to watch a lot of old classic movies. Well, maybe not really classics, but old movie that I really like.
Last night was a bit different as I rented a couple of movies that I hadn’t seen before: Flight of Fury with Stevan Seagal and Deja Vu with Denzel Washington.
I wasn’t expecting much from Flight of Fury as Steven Seagal movies have gone down hill lately, but some of his have been quite good, mindless action movies that keep your attention. Not this one. It was pretty much a waste of time. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone, not even Seagal fans. I don’t mind movies that make you suspend belief for the movie, but they have to keep your attention. I found mine wandering for much of the movie last night. The action was even kinda slow. Steven Seagal is definitely slowing down.
Deja Vu was another far fetched movie that asked you to suspend belief. It was, however, successful in keeping your attention. In fact, I was quite riveted to the TV throughout the movie.
Without spoiling the movie, Denzel’s character is investigating a terrorist bombing of a ferry in New Orleans. Some “modern technology” gives the investigators the ability to view back in history about 4 1/2 days for clues as to the bomber. They plan to use this technology to catch him and bring him to justice. Of course, there are plenty of twists and turns. It is definitely far fetched for today, but it was easy to forget that and just enjoy the movie. I would recommend this movie to most anyone. It is suitable for families too. If you are a Denzel fan (ie Suzanne), you will like the movie even more.
Most of the other movies I have enjoyed during my bachelor time have been old favorites of mine, like I mentioned. The list is below, but I may have forgotten a couple:
- Independence Day (give it a watch with Fourth of July next week)
- Armageddon (Bruce does it again)
- Space Cowboys (all star cast)
- Pure Country (There;s only two kinds of music: Country and Western…
- Galaxy Quest (nice light comedy with adventure)
- October Sky (Great movie – a must see)
- Last of the Mohicans (awesome soundtrack)
- Lethal Weapon 4 (ummm, well, yeah I like it)
- U-571 (great action and drama)
- Apollo-13 (how can you not like this one)
- Toy Story (needed my animation fix)
- Gladiator (Russell Crowe in Rome)
- Forrest Gump (that’s all I gotta say ’bout that)
That’s a lot of movies! Lately, I have gotten away from watching too many movies. My website work has been taking up the time. Most sites are now running where I want them and I have no new ones planned, except for helping a few buddies with theirs, so I plan to get back to my movies.
On a website note, a couple of folks let me know that they hadn’t been receiving their daily digest of posts to Mr Papa’s World. After some troubleshooting, I hope I have the problem solved and everyone who has subscribed will get their daily digest. If not, please let me know. Subscription is optional and you must take the step to sign up. You can always unsubscribe.
Wild Night of Wild Fires
June 28, 2007
Yesterday evening and last night was rather interesting around here – weather wise that is. We should be 2 – 4 weeks away from the onset of our monsoon season. I even heard one report saying it was going to be late this year.
Last night, it didn’t look like it was going to be late. In the early evening, dark ominous clouds began rolling in just like a monsoon. In the distance, near the Canelo Hills and the Huachucha Mountains, heavy rain could be seen falling. About an hour before dusk, the thunder and lightning began. It was quite remarkable. There must have been 25 thunder bursts that caused the house and windows to rattle quite loudly. Many, many lightning strikes could be seen in the distance. The power must have flickered on and off a dozen times.
As it turns out, it never really did rain. Turned out to be a bunch of dry lightning, though surrounding areas clearly got some rain. With our extremely dry conditions here, the lightning set off 3 wildfires that I could see, maybe more.
One of the wildfires never amounted to much as it was quickly extinguished or just didn’t have any fuels. A second wild fire began right out back of our place. I couldn’t actually see where the fire was but thick smoke rose quickly. About 300 yards behind our house at our property line, is a good size valley. We are at the top of the hill, so we don’t actually see down into the valley. The fire was somewhere down in that valley. Judging by the smoke and intense orange glow on the hill, it looked like the fire was very close.
I called my neighbor who actually lives on the land adjacent to us and pretty much right on the start of that valley slope to see if it was close or not. He had just called 911 to report the fire and said it looked a couple miles away. Wow, it was pretty intense color and smoke for that far away. The fire burned for most of the night and threw a lot of smoke and burnt wood smell our way. When I got up in the morning, the fire appeared to have been contained and put out. Some light, lingering smoke was still in the area as there was almost no wind. This is the second wildfire nearby in the last few weeks that could have been a whole lot worse had there been any wind.
A third wildfire was started over near the Santa Rita Mountains by the town of Patagonia. It is much too far away to really tell it’s exact location. When I drove to work this morning, the smoke was very thick near Patagonia, but I couldn’t tell if it was left over or if the fire was still burning. When I came home this evening, it was quite clear the fire was still raging as heavy smoke filled that area. The fire may even be growing in size. It’s not a threat to us in Sonoita.
With the lack of much rain this winter, it is going to be an interesting fire season. We have already had more wild fires near us this year than any prior year. And with the monsoon approaching more weather started wild fires are likely.
Again this evening, monsoon like clouds and weather appears to be rolling in.
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