Leaving Gardiner, Montana

Evening Folks,

My time is almost up here in Montana. I have three more days of work and am out of here on Wednesday. I am headed down to Utah for a couple of plays at the Utah Shakespeare Festival  in Cedar City. It will be 21 years of the Bard in that venue. I did miss a couple of years in there somewhere but replaced summer attendance with their Fall offerings when those began. The first years were with daughter Natasha on our summer road trips.


These three months of my absence from AZ have been a good experience for the most part. However, I am ready to go home. I have met some nice people that in all probability I'll never see again. Besides, none of them I would call "friends," just acquaintances. Even though the job was fine I will not return (even if I were asked, which might be doubtful). First of all, they are going to make them paying jobs that go from May to October. I am not interested in long seasons any more. Secondly, and most importantly, they have no single housing so you will have two housemates. Having one this time has been less than desirable. I am done with "shared housing," to old for that.


I haven't "gone off" in my curmudgeonly mode in a while but I think it is time again. Like Rosanna Rosanna Dana I am going to start off with "what's all this stuff about . . .?" In this case, having dealt with the public, and had some of what I call "word inflation" running rampant around me all summer, I wish to take folks to task about the word "awesome." It is supposed to mean something that is extraordinary, not everyday and mundane. But that is what it has become. If everything is "awesome," then it is only average and not fabulous. A pure and simple case of "inflation," the word no longer means what it was intended to mean . . .


Then there are the common expressions in current usage. One of which is, "It is what it is." If I hear this major "cop-out" phrase again I may "freak-out." I wish that I could believe that people were intellectual enough to think they were existentialists. That is expressing the main tenet of that philosophy, "existence precedes essence," but I know that is not the case. They are just Parrots mouthing the words.
Of course nothing "is what it is." Every bit of experience is how we perceive it and that is not precisely the same for all. Unless of course you need another crutch to justify your life.


Lastly, on this tirade, I will mention the shorter phrase, "no problem," another catch all. When I worked as a ranger at an information counter with some younger rangers they would often respond to a park visitor's Thank You with a whinny no problem. My response to them was that they were being discourteous and rude. The response to "thank you" is "you are welcome." Of course it is "no problem," it is your job you wankers. If indeed something is no problem and it is the appropriate rejoinder then I say I do not have a problem.


That is probably enough of that for now. On to the movies . . .
Since last I communicated in this space I have viewed a few films. The plethora of comic book inspired super hero movies has continued across my summer. Two that I have seen lately were pretty good, even though not my favorite genre. The Amazing Spiderman was a lot better than I thought it would be, and in fact, and in my opinion is slightly better than the one's of just a few years ago. My most recent "flick" of this nature was The Dark Knight Rises, the end of the triology directed by Christopher Nolan. Even though I found it entertaining, I do not think it as good as the two previous. It was overly long, could have used some editing and the script could have been tightened up so as not to be the "hodge podge" it was. Having said that I did enjoy it. In both films the acting was very good.




Moonrise Kingdom was  a quirky little film with Bill Murray, Francis McDormand, Edward Norton, Bruce Willis and some kids that were the real stars of the film. It takes place in the 60's on an island off of New England somewhere and focuses on an outcaste "boy scout like character" and the girl he runs away with. All the adults, scout masters included become involved in the hunt. It was a nice, and strange film. I liked it a lot.


Well, that's about it forever from beautiful downtown Gardiner, Montana.


Adios . . . see you in AZ