All Time High

I had a mostly pleasant day. I did my volunteering in the morning after waking up early for yoga. It was busy, despite Erica's complaints that there were lots of customers, but no one was buying. I put aside a copy of the DVD of "42nd Street" to pick up on Saturday when I have the money. I need to get Erica a birthday card, too - I think her birthday's Monday.

I did make my trip to Deptford after lunch at the Pop Shop Diner in Collingswood. Unlike my visit to Deptford in late March, everything went fine, and I didn't spend more than I planned. I picked up a few items in the Target, notably a new pair of cheap sneakers to run errands in (so I can save the good sneakers for work) and got some ideas for my brother's junior high graduation and Father's Day.

I think I'll pick up a gift card for my brother. I'll get my stepfather a combination birthday/Father's Day barbecue tool; the Acme has some nice ones. I'm still a bit clueless on my biological father, but he has a birthday coming up in July, so I may just give him a card and a small cake, like I did last year.

I got a flat tire coming home from the PATCO Train Station in Collingswood. It must have happened when I went off the curb near Uncle Ken's house too hard. This is going to be a pain in the rear. It's the second time I've replaced a flat tire on the older bike. What I really need is to find a basket for the mountain bike I got at Christmas, but I either haven't found them, or they were too expensive for me. It's going to be very hard to carry groceries and things from the farm market home without that basket!

I picked up seven James Bond videos from a yard sale last week. No, I don't care that they're videos. I have a pretty good idea of what went on from Bond film to Bond film by now anyway. My mother and stepfather are both big Bond fans, and I grew up watching them fairly often, long before they became staples of Spike TV and TBS. My stepfather had (and probably still has) these great videos of the Sean Connery and Roger Moore Bond films that had Pink Panther cartoons in the beginning of some of the shorter ones.

Most of the ones I bought were the original Sean Connery movies - "Dr. No," "Goldfinger," "You Only Live Twice," "Diamonds Are Forever." The last named is a particular favorite of mine; I know a lot of people think it's one of the cheesiest Bond films in the series, but hey, I like cheese. Come on, where else are you going to see James Bond drive a moon buggy across the Nevada desert, almost be cremated by two homosexual hitmen, or drive an ugly 70s sports car through some of the narrowest parts of Los Vegas?

"Octopussy" is another sentimental favorite; I believe it's the first Bond film I ever saw. Just as "Moonraker" was probably intended as the producers' way of latching onto "Star Wars" and the science fiction bandwagon of the late 70s, so "Octopussy" has more than a touch of Indiana Jones, from the Indian and German locations to the almost Nazi-esque bad guys and an unusually tough Bond woman (Maud Adams, in what was actually her second outing in the Bond films). The complaint here, other than Roger Moore was starting to look a tad tired (though not as much as in "A View To A Kill"), is the length. At over two hours, it's one of the longest Bond films, and it does drag in spots.

Before tonight, there were only three official Bond films I'd never seen, the Roger Moore mid-70s flick "The Man With the Golden Gun," last year's "Casino Royale," and "Tomorrow Never Dies," a Pierce Brosonan installment from 1997. My stepdad had it on video, but I just never got around to it until after I got back from my trip today.

Actually, I'm going to go as far to say it's the best of the Brosonan Bond films after "Goldeneye." Frankly, I thought "Die Another Day" was silly and "The World Is Not Enough" only so-so, but this one has the goods, from a genuinely thrilling opening sequence to a (literally) kick-ass finale onboard a submarine that makes a lot more sense as a headquarters than some of the more elaborate hideouts in other Bond films. As someone who's studied the mass media (and how to use it) for most of her life, I also appreciated the emphasis on media manipulation and Jonathan Pryce's scenery-chewing performance as what's basically Rupert Murdoch with a homocidal streak.

Something else I've noticed in the Bond films, starting as early as the late 70s - increased parts for women. Dame Judi Dench's M had major roles in "Tomorrow Never Dies" and "The World Is Not Enough"; "World" and "Die Another Day" had two of this series' rare female villians. Halle Berry was a little stiff as Bond's female counterpart in "Die Another Day," but Michelle Yeoh kicked ass (literally and figureatively) in "Tommorrow Never Dies."