Winter Mountain Trip '23

We're starting a new tradition: the winter mountain trip. This year we went to Lake Arrowhead and stayed in a nice VRBO:

Last year we did the same thing, but stayed on the other side of the village of Lake Arrowhead. A few years back, while Corrie was still very pregnant with Camille, we went to Wrightwood, a small mountain town just outside the metro area.

This year we invited many people, and a few even joined us. We went for snow fun, but missed out on the snow, as we only went to the village and didn't trek off into the hills.

The kids got to read to tante Delphine and sit in front of the fire and watch cartoons, in some order. 

We played pool and laughed and imbibed. It was a great time.

Across the street from our large A-frame cabin was a construction site, and down the hill from it was a golf course. Apparently, we were in the country club region, and the surrounding houses belied that truth.

It was quick; it was great; it was transplanting that helped celebrate Corrie and Camille; and it was the true beginning of a serious new tradition. Woo-freaking-hoo.

Cue the (Random) Comic Book Characters from Pre-WWII for Big Movies

We finally watched the 2 hour and 46 minute eulogy to Chadwick Boseman this past weekend. Wakanda Forever is a great tribute to the late superstar, if an uneven Marvel movie experience. It was bound to be impossible to strike a balance. 

Corrie mentioned that it sometimes felt like it should have been a Disney+ show, what with all the storylines trying to reach some kind of satisfactory conclusion and Shuri finally donning the suit just before the two-hour point. [[Side note: 

At one point I definitely said: "Okoye, Shuri as the Panther, N'kia, and Riri in her suit? I'm 100% all-in! Give THEM their. own movie!" And at a different point I said: "WTF? Namor's beef is with land-locked Wakanda? CAN'T YOU SEE YOU'RE DOING WHITEY A FAVOR?"

Explaining to Corrie about Namor got me thinking of another pre-war comic-book rando with pointy ears and a vaguely-foreign look that got a MEGA movie just recently:

Black Adam got the Dwayne Johnson treatment, which is good for him. The DC movie peeps trying to do some justice for the power of the Shazam character(s) and their history and move Teth Adam into a position as Superman's peer seems to have failed. But I enjoyed parts of the movie, for sure. Other parts, like them not letting Dwayne Johnson (who I do enjoy) do "Dwayne Johnson", was a mistake. It had tone issues and didn't seem fun enough. Also, the Justice Society lives in a world without Team America? Did the producers learn nothing from that satirical puppet classic?

Namor, the Sub-Mariner, is Marvel's oldest continuously used character that hasn't gone through any changes and dates back to the time before they were known as Marvel Comics. Timely Comics's first big hit was titled "Marvel Comics," and the first issue had the Human Torch (an android unconnected to the Fantastic Four character) and Namor, the Sub-Mariner, the prince of an undersea kingdom who vows to crush the world of the white man because of the damage done by them to his realm. (That first issue had about eight other stories that didn't achieve the same lasting power.) But that was in June of 1939, when Batman was a month old and Superman a year.

People liked that Namor jacked the surface world up. It was a different type of comic character. He was a villain, but he was righteous and usually had Justice with the capital J on his side. Timely ended up focusing on the Human Torch and Namor, as you can see in their first cover share together above, as a dynamic contrast---water and fire. Incidentally, the creator took the name by writing things he considered regal, but in reverse order. 'Roman' as 'Namor' had the easiest going sound, and that's what he went with.

Anyway, if you'd told 13 year old Pat that effing Black Adam AND Namor, the effing-Sub-Mariner, would've been headlining MAJOR Hollywood blockbusters? The SAME year?

It would have been the same if you'd told me that the following rando Gotham side-vigilante character:

...would have been a major part of a popular television franchise AND a major Hollywood production...

Arrow and Birds of Prey

...I just...I just don't think I could have been convinced.

Anyway, as much as I like comics, I'm looking forward to originality making a return to the cinema.

Dual Birthday Party in Long Beach

We hosted Camille's first-ever birthday party this past Saturday, which also happened to be Corrie's birthday itself, and so we celebrated that, too. With it ostensibly a birthday party for a three year-old, the kids were outnumbered by adults 3-1.

Corrie did a bang-up job decorating our small, downtown apartment, with rainbow streamers and a pink/purple/blue wall, befitting the combo idea of "Unicorn/Frozen" party:

Camille was dressed up in her newest and finest Elsa gear, with Corrie dressed up as Anna:

Turns out Corrie likes being a girl-mom. We had a bunch of food set up, and what may have been a reasonable amount of alcohol for a three year-old's party.

My mother made it fromArizona, as did my cousin and her husband from Boyle Heights.

Because of when Camille was born---right before the pandemic---we didn't get a chance to do many of the cool things (story time at the library; swim as a baby; weekly aquarium trips) that usually yield friendships with same aged kids. All we have is daycare, which is admittedly enough. Many kids were sick or busy, so her friends were few in number, but big in love:

All in all, it was good day, and a fun first party, and a fun mommy-and-me party time.

One More Quick Thing About "That '90s Show"

I was originally going to title this piece "Ruining 'That '90s Show' With Math", but I don't like the idea of "ruining things with math" in general, and I knew I had to do a little research. For a trivial thought experiment. That's definitely not a waste of time.

Anyway, were you a fan of That '70s Show? If the answer's 'Yes', you may remember this scene:

This is from Topher Grace's last episode as a regular cast member, before his character Eric Foreman left to go teach in Africa. In this scene his girlfriend Donna appears to have decided to fulfill one last fantasy for Eric, dressing up as Princess Leia from Star Wars.

An idea I had while watching Netflix's That '90s Show was that since the main character, Leia Foreman, Eric and Donna's daughter, celebrates her 15th birthday after July but before September in 1995, she must have been born in 1980.

Which means that Donna must have been pregnant in the last scene of That '70s Show's last episode, when she tearfully greets Eric in the driveway after he's finally made it back stateside for New Year's Eve and the end of the 1970s.

After looking it up, I found out that the entirety of the seventh season, Topher's last as a regular, took place in 1979, and it seems like the picture above, and later, below, after the grease fire, had to have been at the end of the summer:

And seems like the right time for Donna to end up pregnant.

Unless Eric isn't the father, which doesn't seem it was the plan, based on the look, neuroses, and strengths that attribute to Leia Foreman.

Anyway, I liked the reboot. I guess I'm lame.