We’re coming up on two years’s time since the first time we heard about Covid-19. We’re about a year and two thirds from when we started the lockdown.
In that time we’ve come up with a vaccine, distributed it, and gotten a shot into more than 50% of the planet. That’s half of 7.7 BILLION WITH A BEE people! Which is an amazing accomplishment.
I’m one of the very lucky people who has received three shots and, as such, we’ve started hanging out with people again. Thursday night, we had a friend for dinner who lives in Denver but comes down to Colorado Springs a couple days a month to provide support to her Southern office. Before she goes back up to Denver for another 3 1/2 weeks, she asks if we can feed her. Back a dozen years ago, she and I had a friendly rivalry where we would go to the others’ house to enjoy a home cooked meal. We went bigger and bigger and bigger until our spouses told us to knock it off. So we don’t go over the top anymore. But I still want to put my back into it.
I made ham and cheddar sandwiches and broiled them for a minute under the salamander. I served mozza sticks with my homemade spaghetti sauce for dipping. Dessert was apple blossoms and dulce du leche ice cream. Nailed it.
Friday at 4:30, we’re going over to some friends’ to bolster each others’ spirits and watch a single episode of The Wheel of Time and then we have all agreed that we will leave immediately after that so everybody can be in their own basements on Friday night.
Saturday is a game night with the gaming group.
Sunday will be spent soaking in some serious isolation because, dang, that’s nowhere near the amount of introvert time that anybody involved is used to getting after 20 months in nigh-isolation.
But it feels so good to be doing things with friends* again.
*Note: Everybody in this story is fully vaccinated and 80% of them have received their first booster.
So… what’s on your docket?
(Featured image is The Good Robe. Taken by Maribou.)
This weekend, I build a new gaming rig. It’s not the rig I really wanted, thanks to chip shortages, but it’ll do until supplies are back up there and I can source better things than refurbished parts.Report
On Sunday afternoon going to an old friend to watch District Nine at his place. We’re dragging our early teenage sons along – intention is both to show them a great movie and work on their social skills as guests in adult company.
Said friend is the only unvaxxed in our entire group of friends and family, but we’re all zapped (including the 13 YO) and our infection numbers are really really low at the moment so we feel ok with the risk. Friend works remotely, lives alone, doesn’t have a really active social life. Am resolved to bite on my tongue to avoid the topic, though. Old friendships are hard to come by, after all.
Looking forward to re-watch the movie after 12 years (?) and also to see the boys’ reaction to it.Report
What the heck happened to Neill Blomkamp? I remember really enjoying that one but everything since has whiffed. It would’ve been cool if they’d let him do the revamped Alien installment that was rumored though. Even if it failed it would’ve been more interesting than Ridley Scott’s great spectacles of meh.Report
I watched the first two ep’s of WoT last night. I’ve read the books (twice) and as such, spent much of the first episode identifying characters and marking things that deviated from the books (I don’t mind the deviations as long as the story is good).
The second episode really seemed to take off. I like it…but right now it feels like “The Shannara Chronicles,” which started off with such promise but slowly deprecated to the point where I was just watching because I couldn’t believe how much worse it could actually get. I hope WoT doesn’t suffer the same fate, but the writers have A LOT OF WORLD to deal with.
Saturday, I’m hoping we can get through character generation and at least get through the first little bit of the campaign I’ve got planned. I’m existing right now in that middle state where I simultaneously believe I haven’t planned enough and hope I haven’t over-planned! Either way, it’ll be good to roll some dice again.Report
On episode 6 of Netflix’s live action Cowboy Bebop. Very much enjoying it. Not the exact same story as the anime, but it’s pretty close.Report
I just finished watching Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. I’m pretty lukewarm on the MCU feature films, but this is heads and shoulders above the them, and pretty much anything else I’ve seen recently.Report
I watched the first episode!
Get this: I didn’t feel like making fun of it after it was done!
I like Mat (gambling addict, opportunist thief, good big brother), Perrin doesn’t seem to have much of a personality (I guess “the guy who settled down” is a personality…), and Rand is… well, he’s got one hell of a jawline. Egwyne is okay, I guess. I liked the scene with the wind.
I’m looking forward to the next episode.Report
My take away on WoT was that if it turns out to be bad, I don’t think the issue will be a lack of fidelity to the source material.Report
My feeling about the WoT books is complicated. The story has good bones, but there’s a lot an adaptation can improve on.Report
You can definitely tell Martin and Jordan were contemporaries.Report
Somehow, I landed on RED this afternoon. Lots of memorial lines, if you assume the basic premise. So far, I’ll take “So if you break his heart, I will kill you. And bury your body in the woods.” Although instead of the second sentence, I would have written, “When most people say that, it’s a figure of speech.”Report