Through the Looking Glass

It was hot, humid, and sunny when I got up around 9:30 this morning; not a good combination. Nevertheless, I did have a few errands I wanted to do. Since I needed to go to the Acme anyway, I started off with a good work-out at Lucile Roberts. I did 20 minutes on the elliptical machine and got a good sweat in. There were more people doing the weight machines. I used the hand weights while other people used the arm machines.

Surprisingly for a holiday weekend, the Acme was busy but not overwhelming. It was almost 1PM by that point. A lot of people must have been on their way to the Jersey Shore or the Poconos. I was pretty much just restocking after Lauren's visit. I needed eggs, boxes of Emerald Trail Mix (Lauren loved those - I gave her a couple to take on the train), cans of crushed pineapple and no-salt tomato sauce, peanut butter, and chicken broth. Fruit concentrate was on a good sale, so I picked up two cans. I also used a coupon for a new Red, White, and Blue Kool Aid in packs I thought I'd try. It'll be another week or two before more fruit debuts at the farm market, so I grabbed pears, bananas, and grapefruit.

By the time I got home, I was sweating bullets...and it wasn't entirely from the gym. It was sunny, breezy, and humid out, probably in the mid-upper 80s. Once again, I spent the afternoon inside, watching movies and mini-series and eating out of the fridge for lunch.

Alice is SyFy's second modern update of a classic fantasy story. This Alice (Catherine Scorsone) is no precocious little girl in a ruffled pinafore. She's a tough martial arts instructor in modern-day San Francisco. Unlike D.G, she's pretty content with her life. She likes living with her mother Carol (Teyrl Rothery) and she has a hot boyfriend named Jack Chase (Phillip Winchester) she might even be in love with. The only bruise on the apple is the disappearance of her father when she was ten; she's been searching for him ever since.

Jack is kidnapped by strange men in suits shortly after giving her a fancy ring. Alice thinks it's a proposal, but the ring has far more important implications. Seems it controls the mirror that allows humans to enter Wonderland. The Queen of Hearts (Kathy Bates) would do anything to get her hands on it. She's been capturing humans and draining of them of emotions, which are then sold as drugs to the Wonderland public. Alice is aided by The Mad Hatter (Andrew-Lee Potts), a con-man who plays both sides of the coin, and Charlie (Matt Frewer), the last surviving White Knight. Even when she does find Jack, he's hardly what he appears to be. Her father is closer than she thinks, too. It'll take all of Alice's guts and cunning to rescue both from the wily Queen and her bizarre assortment of henchmen...and to learn how important those human emotions are when encourages the "oysters" (Wonderland parlance for drained humans) to revolt.

While I didn't like it quite as much as the longer and more elaborate Tin Man, this had its moments. I especially enjoyed Potts' Han Solo-eque Mad Hatter, Frewer's sweetly daffy Charlie the White Knight, and Bates as the manipulative Queen.

I needed to hit the bank, so I went for a short walk after Alice ended. It was quarter of 5 when I made my way to the White Horse Pike...and barely got across it both times. I completely forgot today is the start of Memorial Day Weekend. The Pike was jammed all the way down to the Collingswood side! Everyone must have left as soon as work let out.

I, on the other hand, just went home to make a mushroom and Colby cheese omelet for dinner and watch Roberta. This is the original film version of the tale of two guys who inherit a dress shop in Paris and fall for the ladies who work there. In this case, the guys are Randolph Scott (very far from his usual western digs) and Fred Astaire. Scott is a football star, Astaire is a dancer and band leader, and neither knows anything about dresses other than how good a woman looks in them. While an old flame of Astaire's who has become a star in Paris (Ginger Rogers) gets them a job, Scott finds himself running Roberta's with his aunt's favorite assistant (Irene Dunne). Astaire and Rogers hope that the two partners end up falling for each other, but an old girlfriend of Scott's (Claire Dodd) makes a play for him after he inherits the shop. The two finally come together in time for the big Roberta's fashion show and one last awesome dance from Classic Hollywood's favorite hoofing pair.

There's a reason this one is included with several Astaire-Rogers sets. It's all about the movies' most famous dancing duo, no matter how much it wants to pretend it's about the slightly stiff Dunne and even stiffer Scott. (Dunne would do much better in another semi-operetta made two years later, Show Boat.) My favorite number was the adorable challenge duet "I'll Be Hard to Handle." Their more romantic dance to "Lovely to Look At" at the end was also nice.

("Look At," "Handle," and "I Won't Dance" were written for Astaire and Rogers to perform in the film; they weren't from the original Broadway show. They became so associated with Roberta that they've since been added to the stage version and were sung in the 1955 MGM remake, Lovely to Look At.)