We have so many video options that keeping track of what we’re watching is often challenging.

We love the great series that seem to run into perpetuity.
West Wing, Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones, Breakin’ Bad, Walking Dead will always recall to us important moments of times in our lives: children in grammar school, a new job, and/or whatever other significant events occurring at that time.
Like favorite rock and roll songs that become anthems for our first loves, a special vacation, a special person.

In a rare hiatus from a favored series, most recently, Victoria and My Brilliant Friend, I trolled Netflix to ideas and I have a couple to pass on to you.
But we also love the shorter pieces, the single season of “The Bodyguard” out of Britain, which I am watching now, or the plethora of mini-series available.

And don’t we love binge-watching.
So rich.

Or a subscription to TMC with its treasure trove of classics.

Or Netflix.

Like anything else, screen-watching can be abused, can detract from other parts of our lives.
But we learn to deal with it and eventually put it in proper perspective.

Occasionally, offerings like “My Brilliant Friend” pop up and bring art into our lives.
Nothing wrong with that.

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Tagging Today
Sunday, December 30, 2018
My 262nd consecutive posting, committed to 5,000.
Time is 12.01am.
On Sunday, Boston’s temperature will reach a high of  35* under mostly sunny skies.

Dinner is a pork roast.

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Question of the Day:
What TV are you currently watching?

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Love your notes.
Contact me @ domcapossela@hotmail.com

From Sally:

Dom, 

That sleeping trio painting certainly is bizarre. I’m not sure I’d have the courage to ask the artist (if I could) what inspired it. 

The new job is going well so far, as well as can be expected. Because of the holidays and people on vacation, it’s taking some time to get me fully equipped there with hardware and software, but the required in-person and on-line orientation and training on SOPs keeps me occupied. Such things will no doubt come around after New Year’s Day. About 70 percent of the training curricula is familiar, from my work for two years at Genzyme. Everyone seems pleasant and friendly, and no one has stuck me with pins yet, so I think I’ll stay. Quite a few people I’ve met have mentioned their longevity with the firm, so I take that as a good sign that people are happy there. And I’m getting much needed exercise – the nearest kitchenette is over 100 yards away, and the main cafeteria is in another building. 

Our Christmas always starts on Christmas Eve at my #3 brother’s house, where we make merry with good food, good family, and good humor. This year, my brother’s three grandchildren serenaded us, which I hope will become a new family tradition.  Annie, the 7-year-old, dressed as an elf, sang five Christmas carols, hopping on one foot and another the whole while, while her younger sister Charlotte (age 5) and baby brother Will (age 18 months) danced around her most energetically. (I thought that Will would wear a hole in the carpet with his whirling.) The performance had us all in stitches – it was marvelous.  Annie announced that she had learned the carols by heart at a school “shindig.” Now, there was a term I hadn’t heard in many, many years. 

Our Christmas dinner was shared at a long table in our church sanctuary with a dozen others of our congregation who had no particular plans to be elsewhere, which went very well.  We did this at Thanksgiving and had such a good time that our junior pastor offered to repeat it for Christmas.  Phillip’s family traditionally gets together on the Sunday following Christmas, so our festivities continue tomorrow.  More food and fellowship, and laughter over the antics of the young generation that’s carrying the family on. 

A most Merry Christmas season to you, Dom, and a happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year! 

Sally

Web Meister responds: Sally is referring to yesterday’s blog in which I failed to identify the painting. Here it is.

I love Sally’s way of illustrating the universal theme with her personal takes.
Peace and joy back at you, Sally.  

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Answer to Question:
Recently I have watched three TV series.

My Brilliant Friend, certainly the pick of the litter, I’ve referred to on several occasions and won’t review here.
But two entertaining series I have recently watched are Bodyguard and Ozark.

Bodyguard is a British television drama series, created and written by Jed Mercurio and produced by World Productions for the BBC.
The six-part series stars Richard Madden and Keeley Hawes.
The series began broadcasting on BBC One on 26 August 2018,[2] achieving the highest viewing figures for a new BBC drama in the multichannel era and the highest BBC viewing figures since 2008.

The BBC commissioned the series from the then independent World Productions in 2016.
After ITV Studios Global Entertainment bought the company in 2017, they have handled international distribution for the series.
Netflix agreed to a distribution deal to broadcast the show outside the United Kingdom and Ireland.

The series is set around the fictional character of Police Sergeant David Budd, a heroic British Army war-veteran suffering from PTSD, who is now working as a specialist protection officer for the Royalty and Specialist Protection Branch of London's Metropolitan Police Service.
He is assigned to protect the ambitious Home Secretary Julia Montague, whose politics stand for everything he despises.
Viewing figures for the series were high, with 10.4 million (peaking at 11 million) viewers watching the overnight broadcast of the finale live on BBC One alone.
As significant numbers of viewers watched the show on catchup service iPlayer after transmission, the series sparked a debate on how the media should handle spoilers.
Radio Times revealed the fate of Montague in a cover story during the series' original transmission run.

The series received positive reviews.
The review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gave the season a 95% approval rating, with an average rating of 8.31/10, based on 58 reviews.
The critical consensus reads, "Bodyguard maintains a palpable tension throughout its pulpy proceedings to create an absorbing and addicting psychological thriller."
On Metacritic, the season was given a score of 79 out of 100 based on 12 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

There was criticism that the character Nadia was Islamophobic, due to the replacement of one stereotype of Muslim women (that they are oppressed by Muslim men) with another (that Muslims, men and women, are terrorists).
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Ozark is an American crime drama web television series created by Bill Dubuque and Mark Williams and produced by Media Rights Capital.
Jason Bateman stars in the series; he also directed the first two and last two episodes of season 1 and the first two of season 2.
The first season comprises nine one-hour episodes and a final 80-minute episode, and was released on Netflix on July 21, 2017.
The series was renewed for a 10-episode second season on August 15, 2017, which was released on August 31, 2018.
On October 10, 2018, the series was renewed for a 10-episode third season which will be released in 2019.

Bateman portrays financial planner Marty Byrde, and Laura Linney portrays his wife Wendy Byrde, a public relations consultant on political campaigns who became a homemaker before the family moved to the Ozarks.

PLOT
Financial planner Marty Byrde suddenly relocates the family from the Chicago suburb of Naperville to the summer resort community of Osage Beach, Missouri after a money laundering scheme goes wrong, and he must make amends to a Mexican drug cartel by setting up a bigger laundering operation in the Ozarks.
When the Byrdes arrive in Missouri, they become entangled with local criminals including the Langmores and Snells.

Production
The show is set at a modest waterfront resort at Lake of the Ozarks, inspired by the Alhonna Resort and Marina, where series creator Dubuque worked as a dock hand while attending college in Missouri during the 1980s.
Most of the shooting locations are in the Atlanta area at Lake Allatoona and Lake Lanier, rather than at the Lake of the Ozarks, because of tax breaks offered by the state of Georgia.
The film crew constructed a set in Georgia after extensively studying the Alhonna Resort property.

Some scenes are filmed at Chicago locations.
Only a few scenes of the pilot were shot in the city of Lake Ozark, Missouri; these include shots of the locally famous "Welcome To Lake Of the Ozarks" sign and the "Injun Joe Muffler Man" statue.

Originally, Jason Bateman was supposed to be the sole director for the first season, but scheduling conflicts prevented it, so he directed only the first two and last two.
The series was renewed for a 10-episode second season on August 15, 2017.

Opening credits:

Graphic designer Fred Davis created a white letter 'O', which is featured on a black background at the beginning of each episode. Within the quartered circle of the 'O' are four symbols which foreshadow the main plot points in that episode. Additionally, each of these hand-drawn symbolic images are formed to represent the remaining letters in "Ozark". For example, for episode one, a kneeling man represents "Z"; a building represents "A"; a gun represents "R"; and a falling man represents "K".

Good morning on this Sunday, December 30
We talked about the joys of the better TV series and then we used Wikipedia to supply cold information on the two series we’ve enjoyed recently, The Bodyguard and Ozark.

Che vuoi? Le pocketbook?

See you soon.

Love

Dom