Went to see The Last Samurai yesterday. What a load of Hollywood hooey!! I had high hopes for this movie and was soooo disappointed in the simplistic treatment given to Japan's struggle for modernization, the tired stereotypes, the moralistic dialogue, the glorification of war. The best thing going for the movie were the landscapes and village/city settings. The cinematography was luscious and enthralling. I absolutely loved the scenes of 1876 Tokyo. Alas, these scenes flitted by all too quickly, while the gory gut-wrenching battle scenes seemed to go on forever. The user comments on IMDb summed it up best for me: " 'Born of the Fourth' tries for Kurosawa, gets 'Dances with Wolves.' "

Interestingly enough, I just finished reading "Master and Commander", one of the books that inspired another recent film and the first in a series of novels by Patrick O'Brian. I found it to be quite a difficult read. This book is so faithful to the speech patterns of the time period of its setting (early 19th century, during the Napoleonic Wars) that I found I had to read and reread passages just to figure out what the hell was going on. The book employs a lot of nautical jargon. So much so, that I relied heavily upon a companion glossary, "Sea of Words". Even so, I feel it was worth the effort. This historical fiction is credible in plot, dialogue and characterizations. The central characters of the book, Capt. Jack Aubrey and Dr. Stephen Maturin, present intelligent, though opposing, viewpoints on war. Aubrey is not presented as a romanticized hero who can do no wrong; he has obvious faults and indeed is grounded during the last battle of the narrative, leaving it to be won by one of his compatriots. Well, Brad has been trying to get me to read the Aubrey-Maturin novels for some time now. Even though Brad says M&C is not the best of the series, I think I just might be hooked.

More White Stuff

It snowed again last night. Third snow of the year. We only got a couple of inches, but this storm seems particularly nasty, accompanied by frigid temps, black ice, freezing rain... The main roads are fine, but I imagine the secondary roads are treacherous. At least Brad only has to take main roads in to work. Odd thing is ... I read in the news that the weather in Baltimore has been much the same as here in northern England.

Yesterday was a lovely clear winter day so we drove up to the Yorkshire coastal area. We have heard about the seaside resort towns there in northeast England and have also heard about fossil collecting around Robin Hood's Bay. This was sort of a scouting mission for us to decide where we would like to spend more time and what might be the best route. We drove up near the coast towards Scarborough wending our way through many small towns and villages. We didn't stop in Scarborough, just drove through. It was slow going too, due partly to major road works. The streets were clogged with soccer crazy fans. Scarborough's team, dubbed affectionately by the natives as Boro, had, beyond all expectations, made it into an FA Cup match against the favored Chelsea team. I really don't know much about the game but there has been much excitement on the local news about the event. Turns out Boro lost 0-1. But the team did much better than had been expected and are happy to have been in the competition at all.

Shortly after leaving Scarborough we came to a road that leads to Robin Hood's Bay, a small village on the bay of the same name. This stretch of the Yorkshire coastline is a favored spot for fossil hunters. During low tide Jurassic period rocks, known as scars, are exposed. The coast is lined by crumbling cliffs, also another source of Jurassic specimens. Robin Hood's Bay is perched atop a tall cliff and there are many buildings clinging to the road that follows a deep ravine. We walked down that road to the beach. What a strange looking beach it was -- otherworldly was the only way I could describe. Strewn over the "scars" were some odd seaweedy plants. The leaves of these plants were studded with little pods so that when we walked over them it sounded as if we were walking on bubblewrap. Pop. Pop. Pop. We watched as oystercatchers scuttled along the shoreline on their stiltlike legs, digging into the mud with their elongated red beaks. I was surprised by the crumbling rock from the cliff face. We witnessed several sprays of tumbling rocks and I understood why it is recommended that fossil hunters wear hard hats. We'd like to go back to the coast for some fossil hunting some day. We've heard Ravenscar is a good place to go for that.

We made our way back up the hill and headed further north to Whitby, another little seaside resort town. Whitby is situated on the River Esk, looked over by the ruins of Whitby Abbey. The little town is packed with history. This is the town from which Capt. James Cook sailed on his circumnavigating voyages. The inventor of the crow's nest hails from Whitby. England's oldest poet, Caedmon, is a native son. And Bram Stoker found inspiration, and a setting, for Dracula in the town of Whitby. I so wanted to like Whitby but I confess I was a bit disappointed. The streets along the near side of the river were crowded with tacky seaside arcades and sweet shops. It seems every other building was a fish and chips joint. Across the river seems the best place to go. That's where the Abbey is. And there the streets were narrow and winding. Alas, most of the little shops were closed for the winter season. This practice has become a big frustration (and surprise) for us.

It was getting too late to visit the Abbey -- we'll save that for another day. We drove home on the A169 -- it cuts straight through the North Yorks Moors. What a difference in scenery. Miles and miles of nothing but wild moorland. I'll bet it is beautiful in spring and summer when the heather is in bloom. Eventually we hung a right onto the A170 and drove through some very interesting towns. Pickering had a lot of antique shops that seem worth investigating. Thirsk, the home of James (All Creatures Great and Small) Herriott, also seems worthy of exploration. Yep, we understand why the natives are so proud of Yorkshire.

Our House on the 'Net and a Bit of Constructive Criticism

I was just searching for photos of The Stray when I came across a site that has a photo of our house. You'll find it here. Ours is the building to the left of the large white building in the photo labeled "High Harrogate & Christ Church Stray".

The white building was originally The White House Hotel. It had a good reputation and was said to have a nice restaurant and pub. Too bad the hotel has closed down. Right now the building is covered with ugly scaffolding. It's being renovated into luxury apartments. The construction is way behind schedule. It's been going on since we moved into our apartment; was scheduled to be done by last Nov/Dec. Latest I've heard they don't expect to be done before March or April. Uggh! I never thought this construction would bother me so much. I really don't mind the occasional noise, but they've made a mess of the area surrounding our two buildings. Digging up the alleyway (or should I say "ginnel") next to our building to lay pipes, etc. Now the sidewalk around our place is always a muddy mess. They say they will repave the ginnel, but God knows when. During the day our street is jampacked with the vehicles of the contract workers. Oftentimes they park right on the sidewalk in front of our building. Whenever I walk by the construction I peer in to see if any progress has been made, but it always looks like a wreck inside. The latest development has been the construction of a makeshift office right in front of the scaffolding. I don't know if that's a good sign or not. Why would they erect such a thing if they were almost done? I'm afraid to ask.

Strayside Stroll

Today I chose to walk an alternate route from the Safeway. I usually walk along some side streets past a variety of Victorian-style buildings and the Harrogate Baptist Church. It's a pleasant enough route, but I take it so often that I wanted a change of pace. My alternate route, which took a bit longer than my usual 10-minute stroll, is along York Place. All along one side of the street is the Stray, the grassy stretch that forms a crescent through the center of Harrogate, where already the crocuses are begininng to emerge. On the other side of the street are huge townhouses from the Victorian era. I haven't walked along York Place since the summertime when we first moved here, though I drive it often enough. For one thing, I wanted to investigate a sign I've noticed while driving. It's an orange and black sign that says "The Gables" and has a silhouette of a house. What are The Gables, I've wondered... an inn, a bed and breakfast, an historic house? Turns out The Gables are a series of brand new townhouses built to complement the surrounding original Victorian structures. Walking along York Place does bring me past an historic building -- The Cedar Court Hotel, just about a block from our apartment. The Cedar Court Hotel used to be called The Queen's Head Inn and has the distinction of being the oldest hotel in Harrogate. But the best thing about walking this new route today were the crocheted flowers I saw hanging from a hedge. They were about the size of a half dollar, faded yellow. Dozens of them, all carefully tied to the delicate branches of the hedge. Who would do such a thing? And why? Someone who just couldn't wait for the crocuses?

I switched over to another commenting service, HaloScan. The service I was using, BlogSpeak, was apparently run by one guy. I think the service became too popular for him to handle it, so all BlogSpeak users were taken over by HaloScan, which appears to be a more stable and professional service. HaloScan provides comments for free ... all I really had to do was strip out the code provided by BlogSpeak and add the code provided by HaloScan. Pretty simple, huh? But I didn't accomplish this task without a bit of head scratching. I really need to get cracking with my web building software skills even though the technical mumbo jumbo aspect is a bit daunting.

It is one of those dreary gray rainy days today. Thankfully, the temps are a bit milder, so the roads are just wet and not icy.

Last night we went to see "The Return of the King." We both loved it. The movie lived up to all my expectations. I especially enjoyed getting a glimpse at Smeagol before he became Gollum. And the portrayal of Gollum was outstanding. The hobbits were the true heroes of this film, especially good ole Samwise Gamgee. I found the battles scenes to be excrutiatingly painful to watch. (Was it just me or did anyone else find the scenes with the giant mammoth-like creatures reminiscent of the monster machines in one of the Star Wars' battle scenes?) I'm inspired to reread the trilogy, which I originally read while living in Germany during my high school years and I've not reread it since. I remember clearly how riveting the books were -- true page-turners. Incidentally, the Lord of the Rings trilogy was voted number one in BBC's Big Read campaign, "officially" making it the UK's best-loved book. And even though I loved the trilogy, I'm not sure it deserves to be number one. But then again, I have to remind myself, the Big Read was basically a popularity contest and I'm sure the movies helped boost the popularity of the books. I was glad to see that at least one American book made it to the top ten ("To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee).

After the movie we had dinner at Betty's Cafe. The first time we've been there for dinner and it may be awhile before we go there again. Betty's is good but is oh so expensive. All told, dinner and the movie set us back about $100. Jeesh!! And we thought Tokyo was expensive.

It snowed again today. When we left the house this morning there was a light dusting of snow. By the afternoon it had all melted. Funny thing, even though the snow melted it still felt incredibly cold. It was extremely windy and combined with that really damp cold it cut right through to the bone.

We watched an interesting show tonight, Britain's Real Monarch, hosted by Tony Robinson (Baldrick from the Blackadder series). It seems an obscure document has been unearthed proving the illegitimacy of Edward IV. And if Edward IV was illegitimate then the succession to the throne has been flawed and, according to Robinson, Queen Elizabeth is not really the rightful British monarch. Robinson proceeds to determing just who the rightful heir to the throne really is and it turns out it's a regular guy living in the Australian outback. Don't know how much credence historians will give to this lively theory, but it was right entertaining. I've been struggling a bit with British history, particularly with the monarchy and the royal line of succession. This theory certainly adds a prickly twist to an already perplexing subject.

Well maybe it was the champagne that made me giddy. We only got about three inches of snow. And it's melting away already.