The episode "House Of Cards", specifically, for Lo! is it not written that a middle-aged man must watch murder mysteries on a Saturday afternoon*.
The mystery is that someone has been murdered - kind of par for the course when you talk about murder mysteries, you certainly don't expect a tale about large-scale insurance fraud - during a bridge party. There are four people in a bridge party, it seems.
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| A bridge table, with cards |
The thing is, Poirot makes a big deal about how the game was played, which involves "Grand Slams" -
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| No, Art. Just - no. |
- and "Rubbers" and "Two No Trumps" and "Bidding" -
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| Welllll - okay, Art, I'll give you this one |
It all sounds ferociously complicated, which Your Humble Scribe frankly resents, as he's not got the time to gain even a basic understanding of how bridge is played. I seem to remember that Lieutenant Hornblower was fond of bridge. Now, Poirot thinks he can suss out the killer by analysing people's bridge scores, which requires him and the four suspects to retrospectively recall how and what they played. This is dullness in drama, and I won't have it. I won't have it, I tell you!
O I say! Here's an interesting minor plot point. Someone, a good few years ago, was poisoned when they 'accidentally' drank silver polish. Silver polish, it appears, is an hideous chemical cocktail that can include ammonia, nitric acid and very high levels of <drum roll> cyanide. Which is not good for living things that wish to stay living; I anticipate it being good at restoring the lustre of silver as it's also able to dissolve gold. Art?
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| CAUTION: not for human consumption |
Blimey! There's still another 40 minutes to go and I thought the hammer was about to drop.
Motley, would you like to have a drink of tea? Milk and five sugars, just the way you like it ...
Conrad Is ANGRY!
(Yes, again). First of all, the weather is awful, when yesterday it was actually quite balmy, despite the day beginning with a thunderstorm that had gone completely by the time I left the house. Unless it was an artillery barrage in Rochdale - them pesky zombies, probably. Thus dog-walk problematic.
No, what I object to <a very long list indeed - the horrid truth courtesy Mister Hand> is the targetted adverts aimed to a particular demographic. Firstly there's 'Careco', the channel's sponsors, who supply mobility Zimmers and scooters and beds that lift you up in order to get out of them more easily.
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| In a little more subtle fashion than this, Art |
Then there's all the blather about "Older Insurance" for those aged 50 plus. Really, you could be a little less heavy-handed about it, you know.
Bah!
The Haul
Whoopee, said in a muted tone. Your Humble Scribe has just taken delivery of two books ordered from South Canada only recently, which have arrived well before a couple ordered a lot earlier from British booksellers, so Abebooks has redeemed itself. A bit. Art?
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| Thus |
The volume to port is another memoir to do with the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry, edited by the ubiquitous James Holland, who appears to be single-handedly conquering the military history market for the Second Unpleasantness. Stan was an officer in the SRY from 1939 until the end of the war, and was only out of action for two weeks. He eventually became their OC and led them from D-Day until May 1945**.
That work to starboard is one I've been interested in for a little while, since hearing Ol' Bob go into some detail about the central thesis, and my palms are practically sweating in anticipation.
Speaking Of The Weather
<see above> Conrad noted on Tuesday that it was still night when he strode purposefully to the bus stop outside The Pleasant Inn, and one could still see stars in the sky.
That day winter came to an abrupt end, because the next morning what do we see but everything. Art?
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| Evidence |
This is taken at exactly the same time as the morning before. Not only that, Your Modest Artisan has noticed that night is not falling until 17:30, so he can officially state that Winter Is Over.
Which is not to say that the weather has improved, because it hasn't, though you can at least see how vile it is, instead of it being camouflaged by darkness. Not sure if that's a good thing or not. I'll get back to you on that.
The Flop House - "The Happytime Murders"
One of the pluses of getting a lift from Degsy is that he always but always has a podcast going, frequently TFH but occasionally other podcasts that exhaustively analyse Batman or Star Wars or Galactica 80***.
This time it was TFH live in front of an audience, who were both lapping and whooping it up, and they were dishing the dirt on THM, which I believe richly deserves it's critique.
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| CAUTION! These are NOT Muppets. Adult content |
The drive home takes a good thirty minutes and yet the lads are only about 10 minutes into the film, because - I'm sure they have an outline to work from - they keep improvising and going off on tangents, including a long skit where Elliot imitates Sly Stallone and Stewart imitates Michael Caine, quite badly; I forget exactly why they did this, unless it was simply because they could.
| The peaches, hard at work |
They do point out some rather bizarre contradictions within the film; the Melissa McCarthy character is said to have a "puppet liver", yet when a massacre of these Mup- - these puppets takes place, all their interiors are shown to be white fluff. How does that work? A serious question, because it prevents the willing suspension of disbelief.
There is more, but we are up to the Compositional Ton, so maybe more later. No promises, however.
* Yes it is. It's a law.
** When the Second Unpleasantness ended in Europe. Just so we're clear.
*** I lied about that last.
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