SCOTUS CASE & Other Fun Things..

1. So, here's the SCOTUS decision regarding ROMAN CATHOLIC DIOCESE OF BROOKLYN,NEW YORK v. ANDREW M. CUOMO,GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK ON APPLICATION FOR INJUNCTIVE RELIEF for those remotely interested in Constitutional Law.

Some background? ( Read more... )

With the above in mind - here's the excerpt from the Court's opinion.

( EXCERPT )

That's an excerpt of the majority opinion written by the new Supreme Court Justice who is a conservative Catholic, and has a strict constructionist view of the Constitution similar to Scalia's.

The dissent?
( Chief Justice Roberts Dissenting - excerpt )

And ( Breyer, Kagan, Sotomayer dissent - written by Breyer )

My take? It's not a happy court.
( my take on the ruling )

2. More on the whole Whedon is Leaving HBO Show - Read His Statement

It doesn't tell you a lot - except it appears to have been Whedon's decision.

I know that Whedon has been cohabiting with a Canadian Artist named Heather Horton, who he appears to have fallen in love with. He keeps posting about her in Twitter. Actually for a while that was all he was posting, video clips with her, video clips of her art, and pictures of her art. He's even changed his tagline to "painter's fella". Why the media hasn't picked up on this - I've no idea. I wasn't exactly paying close attention and noticed it.
He's one of about 200 people that I've been following on Twitter, where I mainly lurk, because I find Twitter scary. It's very easy to be misread or misunderstood on Twitter, and easier still to misread and misunderstand others.

3. Watched the Netflix Christmas musical Jingle Jangle. It's notable for it's mainly all black cast, crew, and creative team. There's only one white guy in it - a banker, played by Hugh Bonneville (of Downton Abbey fame). The musical composition is by John Legend, who is everywhere at the moment. (I'm not crazy about Legend's music - so the musical compositions and songs didn't exacly wow me. There are two very good numbers in it, but neither are really memorable.) The other thing it is notable for is the stop motion wooden and mechanized puppetry, which I adored.

The animation - is quite marvelous, it's intricate, realistic, and well woven into the live action and plot. The movie is worth seeing for that alone.

The plot? Kind of derivative, except for the fact that it's an all black cast playing roles that you usually see white folks in. That is another reason to watch it. We have token white casting instead of token black casting, reminiscent of Black Panther. I honestly think Black Panther was a game changer in that regard.

It's about a toy maker whose designs are stolen by his apprentice. He loses everything including all hope and creativity, until his granddaughter visits years later and helps him rediscover all of it. (Kind of similar to the plot of Babes in Toyland...or Chitty Chitty Bang Bang). Kind of innovative in the sense that it is his granddaughter and daughter who help him rediscover his gifts. And his granddaughter who inherits his abilities and carries it forward.

The casting? Nice to see Forrest Whittacker and Phyllisha Rashid pop up. Ricky Martin does one of the voices. So overall pretty good. Also, again all black casting with one minor exception!

The musical bits? Eh, two good numbers. The rest not so much, and hard to hear. Also it was bit jarring and seemed to come out of nowhere. I'd have preferred it if they hadn't done the numbers for the most part. I'm not sure they are needed.

4. Also watched, yesterday, Family Stone on HBO. I don't get the appeal of this film. I spent most of wanting to smack Dylan McDermott upside the head. I can't think of one film that stars that actor in which I don't spend the majority of the film wanting to smack him upside the head.

Also oddly, we're supposed to hate Sarah Louise Parker's Meredith, but I disliked everyone but her for most of the film.( Read more... )

Note - I've realized while writing this that there are a couple of actors whose films never quite worked for me. Claire Danes, Diane Keaton, and Dylan McDermott. I've no clue why.

As a palate cleanser - I watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer S4 Episode "Pangs" which after all this time, still holds up pretty well. It's hilarious in places, even more so now that I'm not shipping anyone nor care who Buffy ends up with. Also, say what you will about Buffy, it has great one liners and dialogue. The dialogue and the actors delivery of it is spot on.

Day #253 of the Corona Virus/Lockdown

Another day of being rather lazy. I was up way too late last night writing the post about SCOTUS decision, and various movies I saw. The SCOTUS decision basically pissed off everyone who knows anything about the virus, has been seriously impacted by it, and understands constitutional law - including Chief Justice Roberts. (It pissed me off.)

Today, I read mostly. ( What I'm reading )

Also went on a walk around Greenwood Cemetery after talking to mother. I'm somewhat irritable - possibly due to overdoing it on the sugar. Or it's the full moon. God knows. There were less people wandering about the cemetery this evening, thankfully. Possibly because it was in the 50s, not the 60s, and later. I love walking around the Cemetery at twilight, just before sunset.



Took a swing by the pharmacy on the way home to pick up the new metroformin, apparently they had a recall on the old one, but not my brand. My doctor asked if my pharmacy had called me (they hadn't) and said then I was the rarity.

When I left, I saw how bright the full moon hung in the sky and how close and big it was, so attempted to take a picture with shaking fingers - holding bags and taking photos with phone on sidewalk does not work.




The image got blurred.

Anyhow, on television -( Read more... )

Almost forgot to tell you - that my cousin who works for Disney + - hates The Mandalorian.

Cousin's Mom: She hates the Mandalorian.
Me: Okay, why?
Cousin's Mom: Because they spend hours in Zoom arguing over how to digitize baby yoda. And what baby yoda should like and how he should act, and work in each scene. Hours. Sometimes all day long. And ...it doesn't help that she really isn't a Star Wars fan.

I was amused. So that's a little gem for anyone who made it that far.

Cousin like everyone in my family except for the essential workers/health care workers, is working remotely. She turned her dining room table into a desk. (I don't have a dining room table - I turned my art desk into a computer desk - which is actually higher and sturdier than cubicle desk, but not quite as spacious. I may need to get an end table to add on to it, or a small computer end table that can hold a printer/scanner.

I don't feel like talking about COVID tonight. I've been taking a break from it and the news at large. It still annoys me. There's too many idiots on the planet. But, less maskless wonders out and about. I did see about six, but out of the twenty or thirty people (not all together - I live in a city, if I walk around, I will pass over a three mile radius at least fifty people separately) that I passed at various points, not too bad.

People aren't very mindful of others - I've discovered. That's the biggest takeaway from this year is how incredibly careless we are, and mindless when it comes to boundaries and others. It's not deliberate cruelty, it's thoughtlessness. People don't mean to deprive others of toilet paper, they just don't think - all they are thinking about is that they might run out. (Oh toilet paper is disappearing from the shelves AGAIN. So too are disinfectant wipes. But good news? You can find purell hand sanitizers and masks pretty much everywhere now. I'm guessing this is a sign we're about to go on another lock-down. Considering I've been more or less on lockdown since March, I honestly don't see much difference.]