Hey, there were a couple college football upsets this weekend … not that it mattered to me and Ms. S.
I.
It’s homecoming around here, so I hear. We wisely stayed inside this Saturday afternoon and since we’re approaching Halloween we decided that even though the 13th was a Saturday this month, we could and should return to the original Friday the 13th movies.
I’ve watched ‘Jason in Space,’ and I think I watched ‘Freddie vs. Jason’ at some point in the last decade, but other than that my only exposure to the franchise was with the first, from 1980. Several years into that decade my mother bought that and several other movies on BetaMax for me, including the first Terminator film. Not all the videos were entirely appropriate for a 12-yr-old or so. My mother was always a bit unpredictable when it came to television and movie choices. On the one hand it was through her that I encountered so much of The Waltons and Little House on the Prairie, but on the other after The Waltons I got Buck Rogers, and we began watching The Next Generation together in 1987. Then again, I also watched Clan of the Cave Bear with her, and that was a slightly uncomfortable experience.
In any case it had been about 25 years or so since I’d seen the first movie, so Ms. S. and I sat down to watch it this afternoon, and afterward we added the sequel. Neither holds up particularly well, but I thought I have about the first, a thought I need to develop further later and elsewhere, is the notion that it’s actually three different movies/stories/genres being packed together in serial form; the sequel — and, I suppose, all the rest — lacks this, as do most slasher films. Perhaps it’s being an “early” such movie that leads to this, perhaps it’s just the overall general incompetence on display in the film-making, though hints of by-the-books film-school technique shine through.
II.
Thereafter came dinner and then the rotation, including SG-1, to help with the ‘S’ theme for Saturday. Only two more episodes to go — ‘Dominion’ and ‘Unending’ — before the end. We also got in the most recent (episode 4) of Elementary, which I’m really coming to like. While Ms. S. found it to be a bit of a bummer, so to speak, I found the character development convincing if not exactly captivating. Elementary is following a common procedural pattern: one of the first guest stars you meet is the villain. That person may or may not be the first subject, mind you. A variation on this formula is that on shows prone to stunt-casting the villain is the named guest star (or that person is otherwise involved in the crime) … else why would they be on the show?
But when a show follows this formula too obviously, you have a couple of options. One is what they did in the 3rd episode: it was clear rather early that the woman in the coma ‘did it’ … but her coma gave her a perfect alibi, so the trick was to figure out how she had done it, not that she had done it. This week the path to the secretary was similarly direct (though perhaps not quite so quick) — and others might note that the idea of the secretary nobody pays attention to is similar to the cabbie everyone ignores from the 1st episode of Sherlock (BBC) — and so that story (the actual crime) became just window-dressing for the triangle that is made of the three leads and how they relate to each other. Tension had been building; here we got some resolution and development.
III.
A while back I bought some beets, but then I forgot about them.
I also had a head of red cabbage … I did not forget about it, but I just did not get around to using it. The refrigerator safely and conveniently saved both for me.
My love of red cabbage grew due to time spent in Germany; a tangy plate of Rothkohl, perhaps with potatoes and roast beef or similar is a delight. On the other hand, my long history with beets goes back most of my life, but includes huge chunks of missing time. As a child I ate them frequently and gladly, sometimes from the garden and sometimes cubed and from a can. They were also sweet and earthy, never mushy. Then I went years without them. About a decade ago when I was eating healthily and such I spent time cooking my way through a little book of recipes my stepmother bought me, and a tasty borscht was one of the entries. I had a slow-cooker. I bought beets. They seemed bleached and gray by the end of the process, but the stew was at least tasty. I made it once more, maybe twice, and then forgot about beets for another half decade or so.
Earlier this year when I was interested in red and orange foods I bought a bundle. Roasted in the oven? Sweet and tender. Thinly sliced, oiled, and roasted in the oven? Sweet chip delight. These autumn beets were a bit large (I should have purchased smaller specimens) and less sweet, but they worked out fine. And the cabbage? Caramelized onions, cloves, cider vinegar, some vegetable stock and pepper? A big bowl of yum (even without tart apples to seal the deal).
And 3/4 a head left to cook!
