Claire's Life

Three years ago, I was leading a team of wish-granters for New York Cares's Winter Wishes program. We had received letters from needy children all over the city, and the time had come to shop for the Christmas gifts they wanted. One little girl had asked for "accessories that would fit an 18" doll." Since I lived not too far from the American Girl Place, I decided to go over there and browse my options. To understand the rest of this story, you need to know three things. At the time, the American Girl Place was located on the corner of 5th Avenue and 49th Street; I was heading there from a doctor's appointment on 59th Street; and Weeks earlier, a man who lived at 57th and 5th had been elected president. I innocently hopped on a bus, and minutes later realized I had a problem. In fact, I had three: the traffic, the crowds, and the Secret Service. Between the pedestrians and the security barriers, the bus physically couldn't turn onto 5th Avenue. Nei

Dear Readers, We must speak about the Game of Thrones finale. I recognize that I might be several months behind the story, on this one, but please see my previous post for what I've been doing instead. Game of Thrones  became our business when, after 8 seasons of murder, politics, and dragonfire, the epic saga culminated in   a fictional character assassinating his girlfriend. via GIPHY via GIPHY  - Video version here Yes, the climax of the series finale involved Jon Snow (who is one of the last sympathetic protagonists alive at this point) killing Daenerys (who is his sworn queen, long-lost aunt, and intimate partner). Per the GIF above, they are passionately kissing when he stabs her, and she stares at him in shock and betrayal before collapsing. This, of course, prompted me to launch a special investigation for my Dead Fictional Girlfriends Research Report (DFGRR). Let us focus our attention on Jon Snow, his dead girlfriend[s], and their universe. Why does Jo

Readers, I feel bad . You haven't heard from me in 3 months, and this is why: so much has happened, and I've felt so many feelings, that I never had the energy to write about them. Allow me to summarize. July I got married on July 13, 2019. To which I say: yay! It was an amazing wedding, I have an incredible husband, and I'm so happy we got to celebrate with everyone. Two days before the wedding, however, a few things happened. For example, there was a massive rainstorm that shut down our nearby airports, and the bridesmaid ended up in Richmond, VA when she'd been aiming for Newark, NJ. Pictured: a small problem. Also, my 91-year-old grandmother got too sick to travel. She had been counting down to the big day. We'd hired a nurse to make the 5-hour road trip with her, and arranged for hospice nurses to be on-call at the hotel. She was even packed for the journey! But then, she got an infection and couldn't get out of bed. We ended up having her

After a short foray into the 21st century, I'm bouncing back to the "Old Hollywood" section of my bracket. For round 3, we had to pit You Can't Take It with You (1938) vs. Casablanca  (1942.) First Contestant: You Can't Take It With You Nowadays, if you mention the name Frank Capra, you mostly get blank stares. He is remembered, when he's remembered at all, for It's a Wonderful Life , the 1946 anti-materialist movie that starred Jimmy Stewart, Lionel Barrymore, and Jimmy the Raven . It's a Wonderful Life  won no awards, flopped at the box office, lapsed into public domain, and became a Christmas classic because stingy networks would slap it on the schedule every December. Eight years before directing that masterpiece, however, Capra directed a different movie with anti-materialist themes, also starring Stewart, Barrymore, and Raven. That was You Can't Take It With You,  which won Best Picture of 1938, and has since been almost complete

When a person sets out to watch every single movie ever awarded "Best Picture", a person learns things about the entertainment industry, film preservation, public libraries, special effects, and oneself. Among these lessons is, "it is currently easier to get ahold of very old or very new movies than it is to get ahold of movies of intermediate age." This is due to the intersection of copyright law and the law of supply and demand. Brick-and-mortar libraries tend to keep newer movies in stock, so as to attract patrons who just  missed them in theaters. Online streaming services tend to have easier access to old stuff that's passed into the public domain, or at least into the domain of cheap royalties. Movies of middling age might, or might not, pop up in either place. I say all this by way of explaining why, for the fourth entry in this tournament, I have skipped forward in the timeline of Oscar-winning films, to  Chicago  (2002) vs.  Birdman  (2013)

My sister organized a book-themed bridal shower for me this weekend. The following was the most popular game. Directions : Read each quote below and determine if the quote is from a published book or if the bride wrote/said it. Get 1 POINT for each correct answer, 2 EXTRA POINTS if you correctly attribute a quote to a specific book, and 3 MORE POINTS if you identify the book's author. "In those days the people did cry unto the Lord, 'Uh, a little help?'" "What Dad means by 'see' of course, is 'drive past at 67 miles per hour.' Dad feels it is a foolish waste of valuable vacation time to get out of the car and actually go look at an attraction." "Today, the homemade antenna fell off the wall and got eaten by the robot." "Act confidently, never say 'I don't know,' and when all else fails, keep 'em busy." "You cannot use a bone saw for many things, besides sawing bones." "I need t

When Entertainment Weekly  published its 66-movie bracket, they devoted the bottom-left corner to the "Blockbuster Era," aka 1979-1998. Bryan and I skipped ahead to that section because we'd already seen Titanic  (1997). Which brings us to... Blockbuster Era, Match 1:  Titanic  (1997) vs.  Platoon  (1986) First Contestant: Titanic There have been 11 films entitled Titanic, but only one of them has won Best Picture. I refer, of course, to the supersized James Cameron flick that came out in 1997 and was immediately responsible for every song on the radio being replaced by Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On." This  Titanic  was in theaters for almost 10 months and broke the record for domestic box office gross. Critics have advanced several explanations for its success, including the amazing star-making performances of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet; the innovative special effects; the director's loving attention to the human details of a co

In 2018, Entertainment Weekly  published a bracket called "The Greatest Best Picture of All Time." I am now on a quest to watch and rate all the represented movies. Old Hollywood Continued:  Gone With the Wind (1939)   vs.  Marty  (1954) First Contestant Gone With the Wind  is the longest Best Picture winner, the record-holder for  the most-watched American movie of all tim e, and winner of 8 competitive Oscars in addition to two honorary ones. It is also, in my opinion, not worth half the hype it has. But here goes. The plot of Gone With the Wind  is four hours long, and goes something like this: a spoiled brat named Scarlett is growing up on an antebellum Georgia plantation, surrounded by slaves who seem downright happy to be there. She is in love with a man, Ashley, who doesn't love her back. So naturally she marries his fiancee's brother to make him jealous, which doesn't work. Then the Civil War breaks out. Her first husband dies off-scree

Back in February 2018, Entertainment Weekly  magazine published a bracket to help readers determine the "Greatest 'Best Picture' of all Time." They also ran a poll on their website, in which I couldn't participate because I hadn't seen enough of the movies. Since then, I've been on a quest to watch them all. I report here on the results of my first round. Part 1: Old Hollywood The top-left corner of the bracket featured 16 movies made between 1930-1960. With the help of our county library system, Bryan and I started here. First Contestants:  All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) vs. The Lost Weekend  (1945) All Quiet on the Western Front  was the third movie, second talkie, and second war flick ever to win Best Picture. War is a theme that the Academy loves and has returned to frequently. All Quiet on the Western Front , however, is a war film that could not have been made in any subsequent decade, for two reasons: It's about World War I. It