by jphilo | Dec 29, 2015 | Top Ten Tuesday
2015 was a wonderful year that included the births of 2 new grandbabies, the release of 2 new books, meeting more people in the special needs ministry community, and the completion of my mystery novel. (No need to mention chance encounters with kitchen knives and the consequences thereof.) I am looking forward to 2016 with as much anticipation as last year. Here are 10 things I’m excited about.
10. Fresh fruits and veggies from our CSA. Fresh strawberries and sugar snap peas in June. Sweet corn and tomatoes from July through September. Melons in August. Are you drooling yet?
9. New seasons of Sherlock, Doc Martin, and Downton Abbey. I’m even putting together a new outfit, all black, to wear during the final episode of DA.
8. Receiving an email from my agent saying my novel, See Jane Run!, has been accepted by a publisher. I believe in positive thinking.
7. Spending a week in Idaho at Shadow Valley family camp next summer. (See photo above.) Hopefully with the Man of Steel this year.
6. Co-presenting a workshop about special needs inclusion with Katie Wetherbee at next spring’s Accessibility Summit in McLean, Virginia.
5. Visiting my sister and her husband in Phoenix from January 16-23. This one’s doubly sweet with 8 inches of snow on the ground.
4. A year’s worth of Wednesdays with Dorothy playing Rummikub, Uno, and waiting for her sense of humor to peek through.
3. Going to Latvia to participate in a special needs family camp. Yes, you read that right. Latvia. At the end of June and beginning of July. More on that later.
2. Watching our kids navigate the world as adults and marveling at how well they do it.
1. Hugging and smooching the grandkids every chance I get. They’re all at that completely kissable age and love to cuddle. This stage doesn’t last forever, but should hold firm for 2016. It’s gonna be great.
What are you looking forward to in 2016? Leave a comment.
by jphilo | Apr 25, 2014 | Current Events
I’ve been on a BBC drama/Masterpiece Theater kick lately, trying to get my fix of life on the other side of the pond between seasons of Downton Abbey. A friend recommended Doc Martin, a quirky series and lots of fun, though not a costume drama.
Definitely worth watching if you aren’t hooked on it already.
Browsing the DVD shelves at the library, I ran across Lark Rise to Candleford. It is a costume drama set in the late 1800s. Think Little House on the Prairie goes to England. A fun series the whole family can watch. The trailers at the beginning of Lark Rise featured Cranford, another costume drama set in a small town in 1840s England. It is so, so, so good. The downside? Masterpiece Theater made only one series.
Five beautiful episodes that left me wanting more, more, more.
These programs are wonderful, but the appearances of the same actors in various English drama feels too close for comfort…dare I say incestuous?
A strong word, I know, but here’s what I mean.
Eileen Atkins who does a bang up job as spinster sister Deborah Jenkyns in Cranford also plays Ruth Ellingham in Doc Martin. Jim Carter, who Dowton Abbey fans know as Mr. Carson the butler shows up in female-heavy Cranford as the retired Captain Brown.
But that’s just the beginning.
Actress Julia Sawalha is his Cranford daughter, Jessie Brown. But in Lark Rise to Candleford she’s postmistress Dorcas Lane, linchpin of the community who bodice heaves like a true damsel in distress.
Are you with me so far?
Another Cranford to Lark Rise in Candleford crossover is the actor Claudie Blakely. In Cranford she’s Martha the loyal maid, and in Larkrise she’s Emma Timmins, the wise and loving mother of the main character.
But wait. Here’s the real shocker.
The actor who plays Emma’s husband Robert Timmins on Lark Rise is Brendan Coyle. That’s right! Downton Abbey’s Mr. Bates really is married to another woman! What will Anna, his Downton wife and Lady Mary’s personal maid think when she finds out?
Now you understand why I chose such strong language.
The whole sordid situation almost makes me want to pull the plug on British dramas. But not quite. Because it’s my duty to watch Downton Abbey. And Doc Martin. And Lark Rise. To keep an eye on Mr. Bates. And Ruth Ellingham. And Dorcas Lane.
In case things get too close for comfort, and England calls on me to save the day.
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by jphilo | Apr 2, 2013 | Top Ten Tuesday
A favorite recent pastime of mine has been watching BBC TV comedies and dramas via Netflix streaming. The origin of this bad habit can be traced directly to last spring, when Hiram was laid up with a bad back for 6 weeks. After 2 weeks of me driving to the library every day to check out more DVDs for the man of steel to watch, we decided a free month of Netflix was well worth the money.
Well, you know how that kind of thing goes. By the end of our free month, we were hooked on Doc Martin and Lost. We’ve been paying for the service ever since, and to make sure we get our money’s worth, a whole lotta BBC TV dramas…and a few comedies are part of our instant queue. So now, almost a year into my addiction, here are the top ten perks United States citizens can enjoy while watching BBC TV entertainment shows.
10. BBC miniseries of classic English novels are a much more entertaining way to “read” CliffsNotes than CliffsNotes.
9. Dr. Who is an inter-generational bonding experience. Hiram and the kids talk about episodes all the time. So do high school kids when I talk to their classes. So do middle and high school kids at church. Though I have yet to watch the show, the time is drawing near to bite the Dr. Who bullet and start laughing with them.
8. BBC shows allow Americans to vicariously enjoy a good, old-fashioned English tea–complete with scones, clotted cream, lemon curd, and cucumber sandwiches–while wondering how the English can eat 4 meals a day and not struggle with obesity as much as we do.
7. Nobody does costume dramas like the BBC. Ever heard of Dowton Abbey? Case in point.
6. Thanks to the scenery shots in several shows, Hiram and I are developing quite a list of places in the United Kingdom we plan to visit when we are rich.
5. All those Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cockney, Yorkshire, and aristocratic English accents make a person admire Hugh Laurie for nailing his plain, old, ordinary American accent in House.
4. BBC shows are the perfect opportunity to visit a different culture without having to learn a new language.
3. Then again, you can feel sorta bilingual once you’re able to translate the following UK English terms into good ‘ole US of A English:
jumper=sweater
trainers=tennis shoes
boot of a car=trunk
bonnet=hood of a car
vegetable marrow=squash
spanner=wrench
torch=flashlight
2. When you get tired of watching BBC shows, you can day dream, as I do, of a movie where Rowen Atkinsen and Robin Williams are co-starts. Do you think they would stick to the script?
1. English actors rotate from show to show, and from miniseries to miniseries. So every new series or production is like old home week. For example, consider the BBC miniseries North and South based on the English novel by Elizabeth Gaskill. (Not to be confused with the American miniseries based on John Jake’s books.) The male lead, John Thornton, Richard Armitage, plays Thoren Oakenshield in The Hobbit. Anna Maxwell Martin, who is Bessy Higgins in North and South, was the female lead in Bleak House. And guess who plays Nicholas Higgins, the father of Bessy? Brendan Coyle, also known as Mr. Bates in Downton Abbey. Kinda feels like watching Hollywood westerns from the 1960s when the same actors played the character roles in every movie.
What are your favorite BBC perks? Leave a comment
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