Swashbuckling Tales

A banging noise and cursing outside woke me up a bit earlier than I've been rolling out of bed recently. Charlie was working on finishing the small roof over my door. Wish he could have given me some heads-up about that, but at least he was getting it done. The plastic slats for the underside of the roof had been leaning against the front of the apartment under my kitchen window for weeks.

Ran Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood during breakfast to drown out  his potty mouth. The duck who hatched in the previous set has to be returned to the farm in "Duck Goes Home." Daniel and the other kids are sad that they'll miss their friend. Teacher Harriet makes sure to take lots of pictures of them together and on the farm and reassures that they'll always remember him."Daniel Feels Left Out" when he sees Katerina and O playing at their treehouse without him. His dad assures him that it's ok to feel sad when you're lonely or disappointed.

"Daniel Is Frustrated" when he can't find what he wants to play with at home. Mrs. Tiger tells him that he needs to step back and ask for help before he gets even more angry. This also works with his classmates in "Frustration at School." Dan can't find the pretend spaghetti to play restaurant with O, Katerina, and Wednesday. This time, it's Teacher Harriet who reminds him that he needs to take a step back and ask for help finding what he needs.

Granpere cat-sits Katerina and Daniel at Dan's house. The green-eyed monster rears its head when "Daniel Is Jealous" that his grandfather seems to pay more attention to his friend than him. Grandpere reassures him that he'll always be his favorite grandson. Katerina and Daniel get more than a tinge of green-eyed when "Jealousy at the Treehouse" has them coveting O's cool new science tools. O's uncle X helps them figure out how they can all use them.

Spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon signing up for Upwork, a web site that provides online jobs for writers and other people who work exclusively on the internet or remotely. Trouble is, they wanted a profile picture...and no matter how much I tried, I just could not upload my photos from my camera, including a quick selfie I took of myself. It would load a few pictures, then stop. Then I'd start over, and it would do it again - if it loaded anything at all.

I finally gave up around 1:30. Opted to do the beginning of the next Daniel Tiger episode while having a quick banana-peanut butter smoothie lunch with the last coconut muffin. Daniel learns about "Someone Else's Feelings" when he whacks his toy hammer too loud for sensitive O the Owl. Mrs. Tiger reminds him of a time when Miss Elaina played too loud for him and how it made him feel. The boys finally agree to play more quietly.

It was past 2 when I hurried off to the Acme to do this week's grocery shopping. I was hoping to get more turkey bacon for that bacon-spinach salad. Not only is that sale over, but they were out of the turkey bacon I like. Since ground chicken was on sale, I bought that and tortillas for tacos. I enjoyed my pumpkin donuts so much, I grabbed another box of that clearance pumpkin bread mix. Took advantage of a few buy one-get-one sales to pick up two containers of oatmeal and packs of taco and spaghetti sauce seasoning. Restocked oranges, apples, bananas, carrots, skim milk, buttermilk, peanut butter, honey, yogurt, canned chicken, mandarin oranges, and brown sugar.

My schedule for next week is even better than this week. All morning hours, Sunday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off, and slightly more hours. I'll have plenty of time to look for more writing gigs and think of how I can find another apartment. Asked for February 19th off for counseling. I tried to see if my W-2 was there, but they appear to be late.

There was a box downstairs for me as I was on my way out. I brought it upstairs and opened it after I finished putting everything else away. My new robe from Amazon arrived! It's a wine-red plush velour that is soooooo soft and comfy! It reminds me a lot of my red velour blanket, only slightly lighter in color and even softer. That means it also has the same problems as my red velour blanket, namely being static-prone and likely to attract fuzzies.

Finished out Daniel Tiger while I got organized and cuddled my new robe. Daniel learns "Empathy at School" when older girl Chrissie loses her favorite charm bracelet while they're playing doctor. He wants to keep going...until he remembers how upset he was when he couldn't find his stuffed tiger when Prince Tuesday babysat him. He and Teacher Harriet finally help her look for it.

"Daniel Is Mad" when it rains on the day he and Prince Wednesday have decided to go to the beach. They make their own beach inside with sand from under the porch. Mrs. Tiger gets pretty angry herself when she sees that her son and his best friend have brought real sand in for their "beach" and ends up taking her advice about calming down to heart. "Katerina Is Mad" when she can't be first in line and Miss Elania picks the triangle she wanted to play. Stan helps Katerina calm down and encourages the girls to come up with a solution.

Worked on writing for a little while after the cartoons finished. Hera Sylendulla, the head of the rebel group, recognizes Leia, a fellow leader. They were all driven out of their homes by Sheriff Vader and Prince Palpatine and their cruel taxes. Luke and Leia have an idea of how they can get back at them, but Han's not sure he's all that crazy about it...

Broke at 6:30 to make my tacos for dinner. Experimented with cookie baking after I ate. There's a couple of recipes for cake mix cookies in my cake mix cookbook. Double-Fudge Cookies became Confetti Cookies with a box of confetti mix instead of chocolate and no chocolate chips. Not bad. I might use a bit more butter next time to make the batter less stiff.

Watched the 1937 version of The Prisoner of Zenda while I ate. Rudolf Rassendyl (Ronald Coleman) has come to the Kingdom of Ruritania for a vacation, only to discover that he's the exact double of King Rudolf (also Coleman) who will be crowned king the next day. The new king's general (C. Aubrey Smith) and best friend (David Niven) insist on Rassendyl taking the king's place at the coronation after the king is drugged. Rassendyl has his doubts at first, until he meets the ravishing Princess Flavia (Madeline Carroll). The king's dastardly brother Michael (Daniel Massey) and his roguish co-hort Rupert of Hentzau (Douglas Fairbanks Jr.) also have their doubts, kidnapping the king and holding him at Michael's castle in Zenda. Rudolf finds himself having to keep up the charade of being king while getting Michael and Rupert off his back and dealing with his feelings for Flavia.

My favorite movie version of one of my very favorite novels. The cast here is absolutely perfect, especially Coleman as both Rudolfs and Carroll as a glowing Flavia. If you love swashbucklers like I do, this is an absolute must-see.

Finished out the night with a more recent swashbuckler, The Mask of Zorro. This 1998 adventure goes the Force Awakens/Last Jedi route of having the older Zorro (Anthony Hopkins) train former thief Alejandro (Antonio Bandares) the ins and outs of being the "Masked Avenger of Old California." Both men are looking for revenge, Alejandro on the Californian Calvary officer Captain Love (Matt Letscher) who murdered his brother, Diego on Love's boss, the governor of California, Don Rafael Montero (Stuart Wilson). Montero killed Diego's wife and stole his baby daughter, who has grown into the beautiful and fiery Elena (Catherine Zeta-Jones). Alejandro goes undercover as a nobleman with Diego as his servant to find out what Montero is really up to...and discovers a fiendish plot to take over California and murder the men working the gold mines.

I fondly remember when this was one of the bigger hits of the summer of 1998. Unlike with Prince of Thieves, I can understand why it was so popular. Everyone's having a grand time with the goofy material, with Bandares and Zeta-Jones nearly combustible as the sword-swinging Latin lovers and Wilson and Letscher making especially hissable villains.

If you're a fan of the cast, Zorro stories, or love rousing action like I do, you'll want to spend time with this action-packed tale.