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A Working Man, 2025 - ★★★
57 year old construction worker with a military past, after proclaiming he's "not that man anymore", very ably becomes "that man" and kills an entire family faction of the Russian Mafia to save his employer's kidnapped and sex-trafficked daughter. You basically get it all in this one: bad guys aim is horrible, the henchmen are often entertainingly inept, if there is a moon on the horizon it is always enormous, kidnapped girl is extraordinarily violent for a music major in college, bad guy on a motorcycle goes through a window for absolutely no reason at all, and Statham keeps poisoning the water supply with crystal blue meth from Breaking Bad… oh and his young daughter is cool with it all and kinda sorta doesn't like her gramps, who's a weird douchebag.
This is about the most modern “Statham movie” you can get. Better than the Beekeeper and co-written/produced by his good pal Stallone. A silly movie for sure that is 30 minutes too long but… at least it was more entertaining/amusing than not.
Venus, 2022 - ★★★½
If you want to know what one half of the directors who made the mostly excellent REC franchise are up to, you won’t go wrong here! It’s definitely a horror sub genre that is prone to jumping the shark and boy howdy… does it ever in the last third!
A nice looking film with some characters that earn the right for you to root for. It’s takes a bit, but there’s definitely some blood and gore to be had if you are a little patient. Some of the digital gore effects fall flat, but there’s plenty of practical stuff to make it worth your time.
The Rule of Jenny Pen, 2024 - ★★★½
Woof… this was a hard watch for me. Mostly because my Dad is in a similar community for elderly folks (though without the staff) and it was heart-breaking watching that kind of extreme elder abuse occurring in such an environment.
Well made, well acted, really nicely shot… I can’t say I enjoyed this film at all, but I certainly respect that it was made and that clearly there was a lot of passion behind creating it.
Gladiator II, 2024 - ★★½
No… I was not entertained!!
I can’t remember the last movie I saw that had this much genuine top tier talent involved that was this mediocre.
Bizarre.
Paris Is Burning, 1990 - ★★★★
Can’t believe it took me so long to watch this! Should be required viewing for everyone and anyone. ❤️🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️
Dead Mail, 2024 - ★★★½
A genuinely odd and compelling film. One part detective drama, and one part fatal attraction. All filmed in a retro, VHS high grain sometimes handheld sometimes steady cam fashion. Clearly talented film makers put a lot of care and intention into writing and shooting this film. The acting was on point as well! Everyone involved brought their A-game! The length was its only fault, and at well under two hours, that’s a bit of a conundrum. It would’ve made an excellent short!
The Accountant², 2025 - ★★★
Yes it’s preposterous. Yes we’ve seen this a million times before but…. The thing is, I’m the younger brother of two older brothers who couldn’t be more different from me. We love each other a lot though, so parts of the movie surprisingly hit me in the feels. That’s why I gave it a heart. I’m a total sucker for that kinda of stuff and Daredevil and the Punisher have genuinely good chemistry in this.
12 months later...
Reflecting on a tumultuous year marked by personal loss and global challenges, I find solace in family and new beginnings while also cherishing moments of joy amidst the struggles. Click the link above to read the full post.
Relationships with a parent can be complicated.
A reflection on the complicated relationship I had with my mother, expressing both admiration and regret while acknowledging our shared human imperfections.
After 4 years… it finally got me.
Mild symptoms at the moment but, I definitely feel ill. Bummed to finally catch it, but not surprised either with the numbers climbing as much as they have in recent weeks. 🤒😷
Not too bad 📱 13 Pro macro lens!
Been a while...
I’ve intentionally stepped back from participating in social media for a variety of reasons, most of them boring and, by today’s standards, cliché. But, to boil that particular ocean, I did it for my mental health. This last autumn brought a lot of change and the rise of Omicron had me refocusing on the things that are important. Well, important to me anyways, and as much as I love y’all, participating in social media was waaaaaaay down at the bottom of that list. Not at the very bottom mind you, but close.
Still, I do recognize the value in letting friends and family know that I am still alive. So, yeah, hi there! :)
Some things that have changed quite a bit since the last time I updated this space:
Professional stuff. I got a “new old” job back at the Duke Clinical Research Institute. I worked there for about 13 years before heading out on my own for a bit. It’s going great! It’s surreal to be back and seeing a lot of familiar faces. It’s also nice to be working/collaborating with long time friends - and to be able to walk to work again - if we ever head back to the office. Before heading back to the DCRI, I worked a little over a year at a wonderful design firm in Raleigh called Walk West. I learned a ton from that awesome crew of hyper talented people and it was not easy to leave. But life can take you in unexpected directions. RIP Conduit Designs, it was a good ride!
Requisite chicken update. Our chickens suffered a really awful loss in January. A loose dog got into our run and we lost six hens. Pretty devastating on a lot of levels as those hens saw us through some tough times. Looking forward, we still have Banana and she gets consistently broody when the days get longer and warmer. We are hoping to slip some fertilized eggs under her the next time she is, to see if we can get some new chicks for the Spring!
Last big thing is my sobriety. It’s been 2 years and 4 months since I’ve had an alcoholic beverage. I’ve battled substance abuse off and on throughout my illustrious drinking career. Right before the pandemic took over the world I had been leaning WAY too much on alcohol for just about everything and it was changing me into someone I didn’t want to be anymore. It was the easiest toughest decision I’ve had to make thus far and literally everything in life has improved significantly for it. It’s nice to be back and present for all of life’s slings and arrows. It’s nice be present for all of the lovely things as well. 10/10. Highly recommended. Would do it again.
That’s it on my end! I’m doing all right and I hope that, on your own terms, in your own time, you can do the same.
And just like that! We suddenly have 7 active egg layers! The coop also gets a roost upgrade. 🐓
The last few weeks have been kinda crazy in the egg laying department. We went from three eggs consistently a day to five to six on the regular. The biggest surprise? The two younger pullets we replaced the roosters with started laying last week!! We had no idea that they were mature enough and expected them to not start laying until the spring. So, needless to say, we were genuinely surprised to find the cutest speckled dark brown eggs mysteriously showing up. All three of our Welsummers are stealth layers (our term, not technical) in that they don’t sit in the egg laying boxes for terribly long. They hop in for five to ten minutes tops and hop on out. The others sit in there for an hour so.
One of several deciding factors in choosing our hens was the prospect of naturally colored eggs. I am so glad we did this, as we end up with quite the spectrum of colors in our dozens. The eggs taste the same of course, but seeing them laid out all pretty is quite joy-inducing. 😊
We now officially have had our first traffic jams at the egg laying boxes and we couldn’t be happier. They all make a crazy racket pre, during, and post, laying. Luckily our neighbors find it as amusing as we do! I’m sure the occasional free eggs help a bit. 😅
One last thing I recently did with the coop was to upgrade the roost rails. The original roost I built worked just fine, but as they grew I kept Frankenstein-ing more scrap pieces of wood to it until it became quite heavy and unwieldy to remove whenever we turned their coop bedding. It only made sense to give them more space and get it all off the coop floor. Now that it’s installed, I honestly wish I’d done all of that when we built it originally. So much cleaner (visually and spatially) and now there’s more space for them to move around inside.