Hello my friends
I'm very happy you are visiting!
Hello my friends
I'm very happy you are visiting!
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Saturday, February 16, 2019
Families in the technological age are splitting faster and farther than in history.
Families in the technological age are splitting faster and farther than in history.
Coincidentally, the day after I had to cancel my trip to Florence, time and event changes, my son called with a proposal that we have an immediate-family get-together in May, to end several days before my then planned trip to Florence.
Plans had to be made to be possible for four siblings who live in Pennsylvania, Seattle, Brooklyn, and Sharon, Ma, as well as for myself, in Boston.
In addition, three spouses had to be accounted for.
In addition, five grandchildren, in Seattle, Pomona, California, New York City, and London, England. Unfortunately, we will miss our studying-in-London member.
Woven into the planning were three college schedules, internships, and various other work and activity schedules.
We’ll arrive at nice hotels in the designated city on a day in May, the event to last three nights.
Each day will have common breakfast and dinner spots, and an optional activity. Of course, wanting to share more experiences and fewer memories with the family, I’ve already opted ‘in’ for all of them, whatever and wherever.
All-in-all the planning a herculean achievement.
But the tricky part is over and done, the organizer none-the-worse for wear.
Families in the technological age are splitting faster and farther than in history.
But we can take steps to overcome the negatives.
Grotta Azzura, named for the Blue Grotto on the Isle of Capri is an Italian restaurant on the corner of Mulberry Street and Broome Street in the Little Italy section of the borough of Manhattan in New York City.
The dining establishment was founded in 1908 by the Davino family and reopened in October 2003 in its original space after having been shut for six years.
It is noted for having been a frequent haunt of Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack as well as Enrico Caruso.
In its later incarnation it was a hangout for Heath Ledger, the young actor who spent some of his final days living in a rented loft space at 41 Broome street just down the street from the eatery.
Grotta Azzura was one of the first places to serve "Lobster Fra Diavolo" (brother devil in Italian), an Italian American dish rather than a continental Italian one.
In 1977 a member of the restaurant's founding family, John Davino published a book of recipes associated with the establishment called "The Recipes of the Grotta Azzurra".
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Tagging Today
Saturday, February 16, 2019
My 310th consecutive posting, committed to 5,000.
Time is 12.01am.
On Saturday, Boston’s temperature will reach a high of 41* with a feels-like temperature of 34* under mostly sunny skies.
Dinner is Lobster Diavolo.
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Tick Tock
310 posts to date.
Today we’re at the 6.20% mark of my commitment,
the commitment a different way of marking the passage of time.
5,000 posts will take 13.69 years, taking me to a new phase of my life.
Will see twelve more
But thirteen “Winter-Spring Shoulder Season Calendar, Feb
14 to April 7.”
This calendar features a panoply of weather conditions, from stormy winter to lovely spring, the latter somewhat rare.
The most important takeaway this calendar is to avoid delusional expectations.
Accept that we will not see a mild day.
If we get one, hoorah!
But, basically, accept that we will not see a mild day.
Tick Tock.
In clock language: Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think.
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Question of the Day
Who was Heath Ledger?
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Elephant Jokes to tell at a bar:
What do you do with an elephant with 3 balls?
Walk him and pitch to the giraffe.
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Love your notes.
Contact me at existentialautotrip@hotmail.com
This one from Sally Chetwynd.
Dear Dom,
Today's image of the crocodile clamped onto the end of the elephant's trunk brings boldly to mind Rudyard Kipling's Just-So Stories, specifically "The Elephant's Child," which is the legend of how the elephant got its trunk. To anyone who hasn't read these stories, child or adult, and exulted in delight over Kipling's own marvelously detailed illustrations, your growth has been stunted! Hie ye immediately to the bookstore or library and get ye a copy!
Sally
Web Meister responds: A nice reminder. Thanks, Sally.
![Heath Ledger: His Beautiful Life and Mysterious Death is the first book-length biography of Australian actor Heath Ledger since his death on 22 January 2008, written by British journalist John McShane.[1][2] It was published on 7 April 2008 by John …](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5a6a6ccee45a7cb3647a5856/1550270575299-949HPO7DS17IFNS4BDL7/heath+ledger+book+about.png)
Heath Ledger: His Beautiful Life and Mysterious Death is the first book-length biography of Australian actor Heath Ledger since his death on 22 January 2008, written by British journalist John McShane.[1][2] It was published on 7 April 2008 by John Blake, in London, and on 15 June 2008, in the United States.[3][4][5]
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Answer to Question
Heath Andrew Ledger (4 April 1979 – 22 January 2008) was an Australian actor and director. After performing roles in several Australian television and film productions during the 1990s, Ledger left for the United States in 1998 to further develop his film career.
His work comprised nineteen films, including 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), The Patriot (2000), A Knight's Tale (2001), Monster's Ball (2001), Lords of Dogtown (2005), Brokeback Mountain (2005), Casanova (2005), The Dark Knight (2008), and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), the latter two being posthumous releases.
He also produced and directed music videos and aspired to be a film director.
Ledger (rightmost) posing with the cast and the director of I'm Not There at the 64th Venice Film Festival in September 2007.
For his portrayal of Ennis Del Mar in Brokeback Mountain, Ledger won the New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Actor and Best International Actor from the Australian Film Institute, and was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role and the Academy Award for Best Actor.
Posthumously, he shared the 2007 Independent Spirit Robert Altman Award with the rest of the ensemble cast, the director, and the casting director for the film I'm Not There, which was inspired by the life and songs of American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan. In the film, Ledger portrayed a fictional actor named Robbie Clark, one of six characters embodying aspects of Dylan's life and persona.
Ledger died on 22 January 2008 from an accidental intoxication from prescription drugs.
A few months before his death, Ledger had finished filming his performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight.
His death occurred during editing of The Dark Knight and in the midst of filming his last role as Tony in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.
His untimely death cast a shadow over the subsequent promotion of the $185 million Batman production.
Ledger received numerous posthumous accolades for his critically acclaimed performance in the film, including the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, a Best Actor International Award at the 2008 Australian Film Institute Awards, for which he became the first actor to win an award posthumously, the 2008 Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actor, the 2009 Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture, and the 2009 BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actor.
From 2000 to 2005, he starred in supporting roles as Gabriel Martin, the eldest son of Benjamin Martin (Mel Gibson), in The Patriot (2000), and as Sonny Grotowski, the son of Hank Grotowski (Billy Bob Thornton), in Monster's Ball (2001); and in leading or title roles in A Knight's Tale (2001), The Four Feathers (2002), The Order (2003), Ned Kelly (2003), Casanova (2005), The Brothers Grimm (2005), and Lords of Dogtown (2005).
In 2001, he won a ShoWest Award as "Male Star of Tomorrow".
Ledger on the March 2006 cover of Rolling Stone
Ledger received "Best Actor of 2005" awards from both the New York Film Critics Circle and the San Francisco Film Critics Circle for his performance in Brokeback Mountain, in which he plays Wyoming ranch hand Ennis Del Mar, who has a love affair with aspiring rodeo rider Jack Twist, played by Jake Gyllenhaal.
He also received a nomination for Golden Globe Best Actor in a Drama and a nomination for Academy Award for Best Actor for this performance, making him, at age 26, the ninth-youngest nominee for a Best Actor Oscar.
In The New York Times review of the film, critic Stephen Holden writes: "Both Mr. Ledger and Mr. Gyllenhaal make this anguished love story physically palpable. Mr. Ledger magically and mysteriously disappears beneath the skin of his lean, sinewy character.
It is a great screen performance, as good as the best of Marlon Brando and Sean Penn."
In a review in Rolling Stone, Peter Travers states: "Ledger's magnificent performance is an acting miracle.
He seems to tear it from his insides.
Ledger doesn't just know how Ennis moves, speaks and listens; he knows how he breathes.
To see him inhale the scent of a shirt hanging in Jack's closet is to take measure of the pain of love lost."
Heath Ledger Brokeback Mountain Theatrical release poster
After Brokeback Mountain, Ledger costarred with fellow Australian Abbie Cornish in the 2006 Australian film Candy, an adaptation of the 1998 novel Candy: A Novel of Love and Addiction, as young heroin addicts in love attempting to break free of their addiction, whose mentor is played by Geoffrey Rush; for his performance as sometime poet Dan, Ledger was nominated for three "Best Actor" awards, including one of the Film Critics Circle of Australia Awards, which both Cornish and Rush won in their categories.
Shortly after the release of Candy, Ledger was invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Theatrical Poster
As one of six actors embodying different aspects of the life of Bob Dylan in the 2007 film I'm Not There, directed by Todd Haynes, Ledger "won praise for his portrayal of 'Robbie [Clark],' a moody, counter-culture actor who represents the romanticist side of Dylan, but says accolades are never his motivation".
Posthumously, on 23 February 2008, he shared the 2007 Independent Spirit Robert Altman Award with the rest of the film's ensemble cast, its director, and its casting director.
Ledger's performance as The Joker in the film earned him the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, making him the first actor to win an Oscar for a comic-book movie.
In his penultimate film performance, Ledger played the Joker in Christopher Nolan's 2008 film The Dark Knight, which was released nearly six months after his death.
While working on the film in London, Ledger told Sarah Lyall in their New York Times interview that he viewed The Dark Knight's Joker as a "psychopathic, mass murdering, schizophrenic clown with zero empathy".
For his work on The Dark Knight, Ledger posthumously won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, which his family accepted on his behalf, as well as numerous other posthumous awards, including the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor, which Christopher Nolan accepted for him.
At the time of his death on 22 January 2008, Ledger had completed about half of the work for his final film performance as Tony in Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.
Gilliam chose to adapt the film after his death by having fellow actors Johnny Depp, Jude Law, and Colin Farrell play "fantasy transformations" of his character so that Ledger's final performance could be seen in theaters.
As a baseball fan I can prove that one should pitch to a 3 and o count, even if their elephant IS at bat.
”A Baseball Guide for Idiots” says so right here.
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Good Morning on this Saturday, the 16th day of February.
We talked about families as technology isolates individuals.
About time and weather and Lobster Fra Diavolo.
We presented another elephant joke and we asked and answered the question of who was Heath Ledger.
And now? Now gotta go.
Che vuoi? Le pocketbook?
See you soon.
Love
Dom