Staring at Strangers

Your New Year's Eve Entertainment

For those of you who are stuck at home tonight because you failed to make plans for New Year's Eve, or perhaps decided to stay home to avoid all of the amateur drunks that appear in public around this time, here's a favorite flick of mine which you can watch courtesy of Hulu, with limited commercial interruption. 

"Horse Feathers" is one of the Marx Brothers movies, a series of films made in mostly the 1930's and 1940's that still has some of the funniest moments in cinema.  Made in 1932, this film's irreverent humor will make you laugh, and goodness knows we need some laughs these days. 

The "Full Screen" option, which greatly enhances the viewing of this film, does not make it to the video here on SAS, so go directly to the Hulu website here where you can select this option.

Technorati Tags: Horse Feathers, Marx Brothers, 1932, comedy, New Year's Eve

Halfway Thru Life

When mentioning that I was 55 years of age on my birthday a few days ago, a friend said to me in a cheery tone of voice, "Aha, halfway thru life!"

At first I found that idea amusing, but then I thought to myself, "You know, it is possible, some people have lived to 110." Then I thought how great I would feel if I knew for a fact that I was just "halfway thru life," instead of some uncertain shorter period of time.

So right then and there I decided that this is what I really would believe until proven otherwise.

Technorati Tags: life, longevity, birthday

Faking It Thru the Years

Most people have mixed feelings about the end of the year, but somehow most of us make it into the New Year, and in January we magically go from the December "I feel so miserable because it's the end of the year and I haven't gotten done anywhere near what I wanted to get done" to "It's January, a new beginning, and I'm going to get so much done this year!"

How do we fool ourselves so well every year?  Should we just be grateful that we can? It wouldn't be much fun still being depressed in January about what didn't get done in the previous year.  Thank goodness we find a new sense of optimism or we'd never get out of bed. 

Technorati Tags: new year, depressed, optimism, faking it

The Traveling Knight and the Plastic Toilet

I am an admitted re-gifter. So much known for doing so that even when I give something thoughtfully purchased and brand-new, maybe not even on sale, the recipient will declare “So, who gave you that first?” instead of some expression of gratitude.

Years ago, someone, fortunately long since forgotten, gave my grandfather a knight in shining copper-plated armor, standing about 18” tall and bearing a sword which could be used a letter-opener, something else for a roll of stamps, a drawer for paper clips, and a base which was also an AM radio. The tacky knight promptly was sent to the closet, released only once a year to be re-presented to some lucky soul on Christmas, always bearing a note card from Elvis. As in that guy from Graceland.

So, the year we decided to fully induct my brother-in-law into the family, and we gave him the gift from Elvis. We thought he’d be on the joke by now, but he wasn’t. He placed the knight-in-not-so-shining armor on the night stand next to his bed, where it stood for years. I never have been able to figure out whether he really liked the damn knight or whether he kept it displayed only out of love and affection for my sister, who once gave me a bottle of Greek wine, insisting that it was some great vintage and cost a lot of money, the $.29 price tag forever exposing the fraud she’d perpetuated.

Even though my dearest and only brother-in-law is totally responsible for taking the knight out of circulation, I do have to credit him, just in case he reads this blog, for always prominently and proudly displaying the Franklin Mint heirloom porcelain plate of Dogs Playing Poker that I bought just for him, suffering an onslaught of mail from the Franklin Mint which would end only by moving out of the country. And I have never, and never will, re-gift the white plastic toilet that’s also a bank with a genuine flushing sound that he bought just for me and which is prominently displayed on the library bookshelf. We both know that the Dogs Playing Poker plate and the plastic toilet bank were originally and thoughtfully purchased for one another and that they’ll never suffer the indignity of re-gifting.

Maybe it’s a good idea that the knight finally found a home where he’s appreciated and revered. The family has now dwindled down to a number which could be counted on one hand, less a finger or two. We now swap Amazon.com gift certificates.

 

Technorati Tags: Dogs Playing Poker, re-gift, Christmas presents

Facebook Birthday

Yesterday was my birthday and the Facebook news feed let the world know (well, they let the 300 friends that I have on Facebook know), and as a result I received a stream of happy birthday wishes.

Now here's the thing about Facebook "friends," which I am sure my co-blogger Jennifer Rose will confirm.  Friends on Facebook are not necessarily your friends.  People send each other friend requests because they run across them as friends of real friends and they find them interesting or simply want to boost the number of their Facebook friends.  After all, what's more pathetic than having 8 friends on Facebook? (In case you're curious, Jennifer has 1,083 friends on Facebook.  Really, is anyone surprised by this?)

So I got happy birthday posts on my Facebook wall from people I know and from people I don't know.  What made the latter group of people wish happy birthday to a complete stranger?  Beats me.  But I liked getting them anyway. 

Technorati Tags: Happy Birthday, Facebook, stranger, friend

10 More Great Expat Blogs About Mexico

In Round Two of the Great Expat Blogs About Mexico, Blogs.com brings you 10 More Great Expat Blogs About Mexico:

Business South of the Border

David Lida

La Ciudad de Mexico

MexicoWoods

Midwesterner in Mexico

The MexFiles

The Mexile

The not-so-low-rent correspondent

To Dream to Touch

Viva Veracruz

Technorati Tags: expat blogs, blogs about Mexico, blogs.com

The Most Beautiful Plum Pudding in Mexico

 

Estadounidenses call it fruitcake. In our part of the world, we call it pastel navideña. The Merry Olde English would have you call it plum pudding. Sometimes we lose ourselves in translation.

Inside will be a thimble, a ring, and a silver coin, and that means that someone will become single, another will get married, and someone will just get lucky. Come Christmas Day, we’ll know.

Yes, it came from Horno Los Ortiz. Where else?

Technorati Tags: pastel navideña, fruitcake, Horno Los Ortiz

Fans We Love

All right, I don’t know Rumbear, except that he says he’s constantly reminded that he’s not smart enough to be a Democrat, he’s occupied, lives in the United States Minor Outlying Islands, and is “urbane, witty and handsome in a bucolic sort of way.” He’s obviously a man of quality and style.

And we’re in love with him, at least for tonight. Among the good reads he read during 2008, right up there with Rick Perry’s book, Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism, and H.W. Brands’ Traitor to His Class: The Privileged Life of FDR, he read my book – How to Capture and Keep Clients. How cool is that?

Technorati Tags: Rumbear Chronicles, books, How to Capture and Keep Clients

It’s More than Household Finance

Mexico Bob writes about about the holiday bailout, which got me to thinking about Monte de Piedad. If you’re not familiar with Mexico’s national pawnship, go here.

Debtors can pawn just about anything at Monte de Piedad, and that means that just about everything under the sun’s for sale there. I've snared some wondrous treasures from Monte de Piedad: ancient carved wooden doors which now separate the library from the living room, dining room chairs, a genuine Oriental rug, some garden statuary, and a couple of masks, all charged to American Express. But just as important are the idle moments of wondering about  the circumstance that might've landed a curiosity on the store's floor. An old Comptomer. A Smith-Corona. Old power tools and odd assortments of priceless valuables and junk. After all, how much money might one expect to borrow by pawning a wrench that might retail, brand new, for $3? What desperate times had befallen the original owner?

Rounding the corner towards the door, one time my eye caught something even more startling: a vibrator. Oster, in fact. One of those personal kinds, usually displayed in print ads with some woman rubbing the appliance along her cheekbone. How did the vibrator end up at Monte de Piedad? Did some lonesome soul pawn it to buy Day of the King toys for her children? Had its utility been superseded? Had it been hocked by someone who felt threatened by it? Is there someone in the neighborhood now bereft of his or her vibrator, mourning its loss, knowing that it's now for sale to anyone with the yen for a used vibrator? Who would buy a used vibrator anyway?

 

Technorati Tags: Monte de Piedad, pawnshop

How Will 2009 be Remembered?

Okay, this is for the really smart people.  See if you can predict how 2009 will be remembered.  Any unusually prescient people out there?

I'll take a shot.  The year 2009 will be remembered for:

-the economy finally bottoming out (I don't dare to guess at what level)

-something bizarre happens to the Internet (I'm thinking a crash of a significant portion of it, although by design the whole thing can't crash simultaneously)

-People finally lose interest in Paris Hilton (please!!!!!)

-People are still fascinated by the Olsen Twins (ugh!)

-major legislation is passed to prevent another financial meltdown (and 70 years later the business community finds a way around it, causing another financial meltdown)

-a new movement is born out of the chaos and uncertainty, rejecting all modern contrivances (except disposable diapers and iPods; you have to draw the line somewhere)

What say you?

Technorati Tags: 2008, 2009, prediction, future