November 13, 1997
Dear Everyone:
Those of you who receive this via
Snail Mail, please
note new return address on the envelope.
Others, look to the end of the Letter.
Well, I’m all moved in, although there are still
boxes, boxes everywhere and where-in-the-world-am-I-going-to-put-this? But it hasn’t been
easy.
As you know, the move was delayed when my buyer for
the condo didn’t get her financing approved in time.
So I called the
real estate
agent and she and I decided that setting the moving day to the
following Wednesday, instead Friday, should make everything OK.
I called the moving company and Wednesday was fine with them.
Then I realized that I needed to call a lot more
people. Like the
phone company,
so they wouldn’t shut the phone service off on Saturday.
And the
cable company. I even
called the garbage company in
San Ramon
to let them know that I wouldn’t be moving in until Wednesday.
Now, can anyone
explain to me how I forgot to call
Pacific Gas and Electric with this news?
When I got home from work on Monday, my condo was
as dark as the inside of a chocolate chip.
All plans for spending Monday evening packing were scrapped.
Instead of packing candles, I was lighting them.
(Candle-light is very relaxing and romantic, but I’ve noticed
that it’s more relaxing when it’s voluntary.)
Fortunately, there was still enough hot water in the tank for a
bath. Nothing sets the world
to rights quite like a good, hot bath.
On Tuesday, I used a travel alarm clock to wake me
up so I could dress and drive down to San Ramon to meet the cable
company technician who was scheduled to arrive promptly between 9:00 and
11:00. I also checked that
the phone line was active.
Later, “Jeannie” helped me move all the clothes that were in the
closets. She was quite impressed
with the fact that all the clothes from two closets actually fit into
the trunk of my car. While I
was hanging things in the closet of the townhouse, my Realtor was
leaving a message on the phone machine at the condo (got the power back
on Tuesday afternoon) that my escrow had officially closed.
Wednesday, the movers came to take all the
furniture, 14 grocery bags full of books, and more boxes than I care to
think about. In fact, I was
packing boxes even as they were taking them out to the truck.
A mover would load four or five boxes on a hand-truck and wheel
them away. When he came
back, there would be at least five more boxes waiting.
Kind of like the
fishes and
the loaves.
We had a little trouble moving in when the driver
announced that they couldn’t bring the
futon in because of its
shape. It would need to be
taken apart, at least partially, and they didn’t have any tools.
They needed an
Allen wrench of
a particular size. I had
been working on something else with a bag of screwdrivers; and in the
bag was a single Allen wrench.
The driver pronounced that it wouldn’t work; but when one of the
movers tried it, it was a perfect fit.
Obviously, this was the Allen wrench that came with the futon
when “Jeannie” and I assembled it back in December, 1989.
Just goes to show there’s a reason for never throwing anything
away.
Apart from that, and the
clothes dryer that
couldn’t be plugged in because the power cord doesn’t reach the outlet,
and the sideboard that mysteriously locked itself shut, everything went
pretty well. After the
movers left, I took a stab at putting some things away.
Then I made the bed and fell into it.
Thursday was pretty hairy.
The original plan had called for this stage to land on Saturday,
when I had some volunteers lined up.
Because it was a weekday, all my volunteers had vanished, and I
had to move everything that was left in the condo by myself.
I filled the car to the rafters three times, but managed to get
everything out and the keys delivered to the real estate office before
it closed.
On Friday, I went back to work so I could get some
rest. Spent the weekend
trying to get organized and finding a self-service laundry so I could
dry my clothes. Then
“Jeannie” and I went to a much-needed movie.
Starship
Troopers is a new sci-fi movie loosely “blamed” on a
novel by
Robert A.
Heinlein. It’s so bad
that it’s destined to become a classic.
It’s absolutely terrible on so many different levels.
First, the book.
When I learned that someone was making a movie based on
Starship Troopers, I thought, “That’s crazy.
You can’t make a movie out of that book.”
I had read it many times during high school and college.
In fact, I still had the paperback copy that I bought in high
school (retail price: 75¢).
When I took it off the shelf, the cover fell off.
(“Jeannie” says that I collect books the same way she collects
clothes.) The novel is about
5% action and 95% Cold
War philosophy, first published in 1958.
The producers kept the title and the names of three
characters. They took two
totally disparate characters and mushed them together into a new,
composite character and gave that part to
Michael Ironside,
the only actor we recognized.
Everyone else appears to be alumni from
Beverly Hills, 90210
and
Melrose
Place. Now I know
why I’ve never been tempted to watch either TV show.
They also changed the sex of another
character, but since he originally died in the first chapter, I
don’t suppose there would be any complaining.
Having scrapped all of the plot in the book, the
producers substituted “action” for intelligence.
At one point, “Jeannie” leaned over and whispered, “I hate to say
it, but I think the plot to
Mortal Kombat would be
better than this.”
Mortal Kombat is a movie based
on a video game.
As for acting, there is none.
You’ve got a bunch of 25-year-olds playing 18-year-olds, with all
the depth of character of
Ken and
Barbie dolls (no
offense to Mattel).
That leaves action scenes, which are ludicrous in themselves.
The troopers are being attacked by giant
spider-like creatures, imaginatively referred to as “bugs”.
The only weapons they have are souped-up machine guns.
It takes about 20-30 bullets to chop down one “bug”.
And, thanks to computer-generated images, there are thousands of
“bugs”.
In the book, this was no problem because the
soldiers wore powered body-suits that allowed them to (literally)
jump over buildings when necessary, and take a direct hit from anything
less than a nuclear weapon with magnanimity.
However, if the movie had used the power suits, all their Kens
and Barbies would have looked like so many copies of the
Michelin Man and you
would have even less reason to identify with or care about any of them.
And how could you not care for a luscious brunette
who can get stabbed through the chest without getting a hair out of
place, stop bleeding in seconds, and, yes, outrun a nuclear explosion?
Rated R for violence, language, coed showers and fraternization
between troopers.
If you never read the book and enjoy all of the
above, it’s worth the matinee price.
Love, as always,
Pete
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