Who Knows What Evil Lurks In the Hearts Of Men?

I awoke around 9:30 to a massive monsoon. It was POURING like mad, and continued to do so on and off all morning. Needless to say, I spent most of it continuing with If I Don't Do It Now.... At the very least, I have now figured out two things. First of all, I neither like nor fit in a large corporation. The Acme is too restrictive and just too darn big. I want to work somewhere that's less conventional, with a smaller, somewhat younger staff who have more to do than stand at a register. I want to do something creative, something that might actually engage my brain.

I had a peanut butter and cranberry pear butter wrap and a pear around 1 and ran two episodes from 80s sitcoms that dealt with the supernatural...and the consequences of obvious disbelief. In the Night Court second season show "The Gypsy," Harry fines the title fortune teller for contempt of court and fraud. She insists she's real, and proves it by cursing the entire court. Suddenly, Bull collapses and Dan's accountant drops dead in the middle of an audit. Harry puts on an elaborate bit of magic of his own to prove to Bull and everyone that there is no such thing as magic...or is there? (Dan never does get his money back, though.)

Larry Appleton of Perfect Strangers is also skeptical about magic and the supernatural. In the seventh season episode "Fright Night," his cousin Balki insists that there's a ghost in his room. Balki, Mary Anne, and Jennifer are convinced, but Larry isn't...until strange things start happening in Balki's overly-decorated bedroom.

I spent the rest of the afternoon reading more of If I Don't Do It Now... and working on the nonfiction book inventories. Two of the books I added were for pilates, a yoga-style exercise that involves strength and flexibility training. I'm wondering if I could pull off some of the leg and arm motions that don't require standing up while I'm on the mend? It was kind of late to try by then; I'll see what I can do tomorrow.

Made tilapia in white wine sauce, leftover green beans, and sauteed Brussels sprouts and tomatoes for dinner while watching The Shadow. Based after the famous radio show and pulp fiction stories of the late 30s and 40s, this unusual superhero caper has the title character Lamont Cranston (Alec Baldwin), who can appear invisible and "cloud men's minds" (i.e, manipulate them) searching New York City in the late 40s for an insane warlord from the Far East who claims to be the descendant of Genghis Khan. He's kidnapped the absent minded professor father of psychic Margo Lane (Penelope Ann Miller) who has created an atomic bomb. The charming Asian and the smooth American play literal and figurative mind games, with Margo caught in the middle...

Weird. Very, very weird. More based after the pulp stories, where Cranston had a whole team to work with, than the radio show, where he mostly just worked with Margo. The plot is actually quite involving, and the special effects are excellent for the early-mid 90s, especially the nifty Art Deco set design. Casting is the big problem. Neither Miller nor Baldwin were really meant for roles that stress mystery and adventure - Baldwin tries but tends to be too stiff, Miller is too silly.

While the blurbs on the back of the DVD case compare this to Indiana Jones, it has more in common with The Rocketeer, Dick Tracy, the Tim Burton Batman, and other stylish superhero extravaganzas of the early 90s. Fine for fans of those films or of Baldwin.