Rebel Autumn

It was cloudy, windy, and cool when I rolled out of bed this morning, probably no more than in the mid-60's. I brightened the day with Laurel and Hardy in honor of the movie biography coming out on them this fall. The owner of a bank sends them to England to be educated after they foil a robbery, but they end up feeling like A Chump at Oxford when the students do nothing but pick on them. (A very young Peter Cushing can be found among the jokers.) Stan turns out to be Lord Paddington, one of Oxford's best students, who lost his memory during a prank. He does regain it...and proceeds to treat Ollie like his butler.

"The Music Box" is a classic Oscar-winning short from 1932. The duo have to push a piano up a very long flight of stairs. A nanny with a baby stroller laughs at them, a cop almost arrests them, and they annoy a man (Billy Gilbert) who won't walk around them. Even after they manage to get the piano up to the house, they can't get it in the house and try to haul it upstairs. They proceed to make a shambles of the house...to the horror of it's owner, the man who wouldn't walk around it before.

I tried one of the recipes from the honey cookbook I bought from the Vermont Country Store this morning. Honey Apple-Cinnamon Muffins required boiling the apple bits in honey. Oh, yum! Other than I browned them a bit too much, they came out delicious, extremely moist and not too sweet.

Perfect Strangers did a homage to Laurel and Hardy early in their seventh season. I dug out the episode while getting ready to head out. Balki and Larry are supposed to be working on "The Gazebo." Their antics so remind Larry's wife Jennifer and Balki's girlfriend Mary Anne of Laurel and Hardy that most of the rest of the episode turns into a black-and-white recreation of their typical routines. (Bronson Pinchot made such a convincing Stan, he'd play him again in a TV movie in the late 90's.)

Dodged fierce, chilly winds as I made my way to the Oaklyn Library. Their DVDs needed a lot of work, both in the adult and the kids' section. I was there for a half-hour, mostly organizing DVDs while listening to the librarian chat with the people doing research on the computers.

Next stop was the Haddon Township Library. Unlike Oaklyn, they weren't that busy. The DVD returns cart wasn't nearly as full as it has been the last couple of times I was there. I was able to put away all but one kid's title with no trouble within an hour.

They continue to get more full-season and series sets of children's programming. I saw Season 6 of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and a 30-episode set of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. Ended up with another Season 2 set of The Cat In the Hat Knows a Lot About That, the fourth and final season of Star Wars: Rebels, a collection of episodes of Big Hero 6: Back In Action, and a 2-disc set of two of the most notorious musical flops in film history, the movie versions of Man of La Mancha and The Fantasticks.

Left around quarter of 4 and made my way back to Oaklyn. Stopped at Dollar General on my way home. I needed trash bags rather badly. Also picked up a mouse trap (that mouse has been getting into my trash and nibbling my fruit for weeks) and sponges.

Did some writing when I got home. Yoda reveals to Luke and Leia that a series of traps have been set up around the Jedi Temple to make sure that only Jedi, Guardians, and those worthy of the Force and the Swords may enter. Leia wants to know more about how to pass them, but her uncle's notes are blurred.

Broke for dinner at almost 7. I had leftover lasagna and salad with home-made honey dressing while watching Star Wars: Rebels. The first two episodes, "Heroes of Mandalore," returns us to the embattled home world of Sabine Wren. She and her family are trying to rescue her father and destroy a terrible weapon she created while working for the Empire. The rest of the Ghost crew do their best to help out.

Did the rest after a shower. Ezra, Chopper, and Sabine discover how far they're willing to take war "In the Name of the Rebellion" when they're picked up by extremist Rebel Saw Gerrera after a mission goes wrong. Saw wants to find evidence that the Empire is building a massive weapon. The kids help him find the engineers who are being held prisoner and discover the khyber crystal that's being used to power the new weapon. Saw blows it up...endangering them in the process, and making the kids and droid question just how effective his "extreme" methods are.

"The Occupation" and "Flight of the Defender" returns Ezra to his home planet of Lothal. He and the Ghost crew want to check out a new version of the TIE Defender that's being built there. Ezra is dismayed at how much has changed on his planet. The Empire has killed many of his old friends for harboring rebels and polluted the land with their factories. He and Sabine manage to steal the Defender, only to crash in the desert. They're able to hide its hyperdrive in a cave before they encounter the mysterious Loth-Wolf, who seems to have a connection with Ezra...

The hyperdrive and the Loth-Wolf reappear in "Kindred." Zeb, Ezra, and Ezra's friend Jai go out in search of the hidden engine. The Empire is also looking for the missing piece of equipment. The boys evade them, but inadvertantly lead them to their hideout. Fleeing the Imperials, Ezra once again comes across a Loth-Wolf, who leads them to a secret Jedi city...and discover that the Loth-Wolves are a lot more important than they seem.