Long overdue

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Long overdue: my phone conversation with dear fiend and Finkville citizen, Suzanne! She and her husband are visiting the states from the Netherlands, and she called me last night from her mom’s home in Michigan. A 48-minute treat that was.

Suzanne and HaroldSuzanne and her dashing Dutchman Harold are wonderful people who met “online” and have turned their relationship into a 10-year success story. I “met” both of them on the #newbies channel on the IRC network of chat servers (for those who don’t know and don’t want to wade through the link: it’s kind of like Instant Messenger, but you can see dozens of folks talking all at once. It’s basically what AOL calls a “chat room,” only for people with brains).

!

We, along with the Thriller, were channel operators, helping people new to IRC get acclimated to software and network issues. It was fun and I think the four of us can say we met a lot of cool people from all over the world.

Suzanne was in my wedding, flying all the way from California to Florida to be with us. [Remember when your dress got lost in shipping and we had to get you another one, last minute? That was not stressful AT ALL…]

We have a lot of funny stories and some great memories. She is a super fiend, and top-drawer in my book.

Well looky thereOh yeah, and her wedding back in 1999…who’s the cute little piano player?

:-)

Make sure you check out their website for the story in Suzanne’s words, as well as some great pictures to look at: hettenvan.com.

I will let you all know about my Mary Poppins experience. I hope I won’t need a spoonful of…well, nevermind.

FO

Step in time, ya da da…

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Never need a reason, never need a rhyme…

Yes, I am going to Playhouse Square in Cleveland tomorrow to see the Broadway touring production of Mary Poppins. My fiends Stoney, Wendell (and her fam), Bar-Jai and G will be joining me.

Not sure I’m remembering this correctly, since I haven’t seen the movie in years, but here goes. Remember the scene in the 1964 film, in which little Michael refuses to hand over his tuppence (two pence) as a savings deposit, preferring instead to use it to feed the birds? Then the bank president — a grumpy old curmudgeon played by Dick Van Dyke — tries to grab it from him, which eventually causes a run on the bank. Funny how a slapstick scene from a 45-year-old movie can take on a different meaning all these years later. Greedy banks that haven’t a care about customers’ wants or needs: who knew? Hmm.

Anyway, the show is certain to be *big* if nothing else. Disney and Cameron Mackintosh, are you kidding? I’ll probably experience sensory overload before the kids ever start with “The Perfect Nanny.” I hope I’m not offended by the singing (next to opera singers, Broadway belters are the absolute worst perps of the crime of Ten-Mile-Wide Vibrato). I hear the dance sequences are sensational, though.

Did you know that scholarly treatises actually exist regarding the inherent symbolism in the character of Mary Poppins? Check this out from one paper I read in part (even I don’t have that kind of time):

  • One researcher comments on the “combination of sadism and control in Mary Poppins, ‘making order from disorder, making magic then never admitting magic took place…'”
  • Another scholar highlights Poppins’s “ability to enter into a state inaccessible to most people, distancing [herself] from the human world in order to establish a more direct relationship with the sacred and its manifestations.”

As Cheech & Chong were wont to say: heavy, man.

OK. The Thriller and I get Jakey all day today, yippy! Face and hair go into the shop for maintenance at 11, and after that…well, fiends, it’s summer vacation, so you know…quien sabe?

Happy Tuesday,

Your friend Rat Fink

Image: Disney/CML


Joy

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Jake, playing in a jungle gym tunnel at the park. Innocence, trust, discovery, making a big plastic tube a secret adventure…that’s kind of what it’s about, no?

I know it’s Monday, but try to rejoice in it anyway. :-)

Schmenglish IX

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Yesterday I snickered at a list of five “atrocious science clichés to throw down a black hole.” After additional snickering at the comments which followed the article, I got to thinking about overused phrases that bug me. Many of them have to do with redundancy. For instance:

  1. Almost identical
  2. Past history
  3. Quite/very/really unique
  4. An added bonus
  5. Tuna fish

And some all-stars on my peeve team:

  1. Controlling his/her/their own destiny
  2. My bad
  3. Same difference
  4. Literally
  5. Ironic (when something is in fact just a strange coincidence, having nothing to do with irony)
  6. Happy/unhappy camper
  7. All the sudden
  8. Staycation (I mean it. I will hit you.)
  9. Git ‘er done (See above.)
  10. Referring to a presentation at a meeting as a “piece” (“Regarding the education piece I talked about the other day…”)

And there are many more, but I’m out of time. I covet your peeves. Please post them here for all and sundry — especially if you hate the phrase, “all and sundry.”

The Thriller and I are off to Potter matinee madness today. Fun.

Fink out.

RNF XXIII

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Random Neuron Firings

1. Fantastic pictures from Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland came out three weeks ago (I must have missed it; just saw them for the first time at the Grand Theater in Lincoln on Monday). JD looks appropriately and delightfully creepy as the Mad Hatter (photo is clicky).

But does anyone see a resemblance, however fleeting, to this? Gotta say, it bothers me. Must be the teeth.

2. I have to learn to not let some things bother me so much.

3. I am glad to be home. Last night, the Thriller & I had some KFC and watched the Indians actually win a game.

4. PK sent me a link to a list of eight dumbest apps for the iPhone. Only a matter of time before BlackBerry earns a similar article. Actually, RIM would probably have more apps available to poke fun at if they didn’t extort their potential contributors. (Apple charges half of what RIM asks for, and the RIM stakes are higher — and dumber.)

5. Didn’t sleep well; much work to do today regardless. Blah.

6. Anyone see the new Potter film yet? What did you think?

Gotta git. It’s Finkday and there is much on the plate. Have a goody!

Photo credit: Walt Disney Pictures