No Place Like Movies at Home: Cast a Giant Shadow

 I am not lying when I say that the last few weeks have been a drudge. I have been very busy but I am super burnt out! Every single second I have had I have wanted to just not do anything. Trying to get motivated to do things have been hard. It's really been like this the last two weeks because my church is doing a fast and there is a church service at night six nights out of the week. However, this past weekend I was able to get myself to get some things done. One of them is to finally watch Cast a Giant Shadow.

The story of Colonel David "Mickey" Marcus during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.  

I have to say that this was actually a really good film. However, Frank Sinatra wasn't in that much. I will be watching this film again one. I hope that I will have more to say about it. However, if you are looking for a great star studded film this is one! Kirk Douglas, Frank Sinatra, John Wayne, Yul Brynner, Topol are all in this film. It's a war film but it's not slow or too fast or always having something blowing up! 

Tom Hanks Hustle: Greyhound

I was very upset earlier this year because I was really looking forward to this movie and so mad when they pulled it from the theaters. I was even more mad when I found that they put it on AppleTV instead of some other place where I could rent it. However, I ended up getting a free one year subscription to AppleTV this year so I was happy to watch it. 

During World War II a convoy of 37 allied ships are crossing the Atlantic to bring much needed supplies to Liverpool lead by the ship Greyhound with commander Ernest Krause. They enter into what is known as the "Black Pit". A three day journey for all of those ships to travel without air cover through territory of known German U-Boats. Trying to out maneuver and destroy the U-boats is no easy feat but they are able to make it through the terrible ordeal. They reach the other allied troops and are able to make the rest of the passage to safety. When told that the ship Greyhound was due for repairs and Krause would be taken off Greyhound and reassigned. It is then revealed that this was the first time in command of a Wartime ship.

It's movies like these that are, very slowly, getting me on board with war movies. I have never really been into them much. However, have to watch so many between watching Best Picture Motives, the 100 Movies in 2016, and all of Tom Hanks' movies I am really starting to see how great they are. I think what I like about the movies I have seen recently is that they are the stories that are not wildly known. They are stories about people who really did make a difference but we never learned their names in school. If they keep making those types of war movies I will be there to watch. I am very excited that I did get to see this movie and I can not wait for Mr. Hanks' next movie. 

The List: # 145- Have One Year with No Major Drama

 I really don't know how you tell you that this was a real thing. I wrote this one when I was in the middle of a really hard year. I honestly don't remember the year I wrote this one down because I have had this list since I was 17 years old... and I just turned 29. 

What I mean by "no drama" I don't mean no bad days and everything be happy and wonderful all the time. What I mean is that nothing super bad happening... like immediate family fighting, or a death in the family. I know that many people would say that COVID is major drama. I didn't see it like that. I saw it as a major inconvenience but not drama. 

The next question is how do I show you no major drama? Well, I was not planning on having this be a year with no drama major drama, but I was doing this color code days of the year to show how each day have played out for me. I am glad to say I have kept up with it every well.

On this chart there are five colors: Red, Orange, Yellow, Blue and Green. The colors match with moods: Red is Terrible, Orange is Bad, Yellow is blah, Blue is Good, and Green is wonderful. As you look you see there are no red squares. Meaning that I had zero absolutely terrible days this year. I had a few bad days at the start of the year and a few blah days but they were mostly good days or wonderful days. That is something I really never thought I would see. 

If I can escape 2020 without major drama I fee like 2021 is on my side. I hope everyone has a wonderful year!

 

2021 and the Projects to Come

 Happy New Year!

I am very excited that it is the new year, and I am sure that most every one else is too. I know that I am one of the rare people that is a little sad to see 2020 go, it was not a terrible year for me, but I am excited for this year because of all the wonderful things I have planned. 

I will still be doing the on going projects that I don't really have a set way of getting through quickly. Those would be The List, Tom Hanks Hustle, No Place Like Movies at Home, and the Best Picture Challenge. However, most of those are when the next one is available. So, those will not be taking up all of my time. However, this year I am doing three new challenges. I am very excited to be doing them because one of them is something I have wanted to do for a very very long time. 

The first one is going to be about Friends. In sticking with my whole Wizard of Theme, as I have done with most of my projects, this one is called "You're the Best Friends Anybody Ever Had". This theme is inspired by Toto. The Loyal Best Friend of Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. I have been working for the last six months on how I am going to pull all of this off. I have researched, and I have driven myself mad trying to get this project to come together. So, here is how... kinda. A few months back I asked my 8 Best Friends for a list of the 12 traits they looks for in a best friend. I took all of the lists and combined them into a great big list of the 12 most requested traits. I have assigned each trait to a month and I will be sending them gift that represent these words to them through the whole year. The other thing I have done is picked a picture out with them and put it on a puzzle that has 12 pieces and I will be sending them a piece every month and they will have the full puzzle at the end of the year. They don't know that yet, that is unless they read my blog. I have already sent them a letter kind of explaining what they will expect. Also, when I update about the month I am doing I will pick one of them and wright about who they are and how much I love them! I also had each of them pick out their favorite movies about friendships. So, I am going to watch those movies and I picked out 4 myself that I love that I am going to write about too! 

The second project is going to be Family. Looking In My Own Backyard. I picked this cause it comes from the quote in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy find she can get home with the Ruby Slippers. She says "if I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any further than my own backyard". I picked that quote cause the whole movies is about finding out what is really important and where you will find it. It telling everyone that family is more important that anything in the world. So, I am looking in my "backyard" as a family tree and finding out who came before me. The theme is courtesy of Auntie Em and Uncle Henry. I have wanted to research my family tree for a number of years and this year I am finally going to do it. I really wanted to be go on Ancestry and take a DNA test and just dive in. I am really excited because my Grandma as sent some of the stuff to my mom and Dad has a wealth of Knowledge on his side. So, I picked out 12 movies about families that I am going to watch and I am going to write about the interesting people I come across in my family tree.

The third project of the year is a plot twist theme and it will be called "Up Inside the Cyclone". Where is there a plot twist in The Wizard of Oz? Well, it's the cyclone. Now I know that not really a plot twist but it was for Dorothy and her family. It totally through her world into a tail spin for a little while then. So, the question then becomes how to plan for a plot twist for yourself? Here is how. The same 8 wonderful people that I am doing by Best Friend Project for I picked to help me with this. What I am doing is assigning them each a month were they get to pick 3 things to make me do. However, I don't get to know what they are going to make me do and I don't know what days of the month they are going to do it on. So, all I am going to going to be watching a movie that has a plot twist in it and wait for the torment to begin. However there are 4 months were no one is assigned. So, I ended up doing is telling all of them that they get a bonus day or one of the other month. So, four months two people get one day. I will be documenting this either by pictures or by video. 

I have to say I am very interested in seeing how this year turns out and I am excited to see what's to come. I already know it's going to be a great year!