Bicycling

This photo was taken of Ruby when our grass was still green! 

Lately, I've been bonding with Ruby, my new Schwinn beauty. This morning I took her out for a spin on the Prairie Path and went over to the Great Western Trail, both lovely bike paths. My goal for this summer is to do as little exercising indoors as possible. So, last night I took my first-ever tennis lesson with the Elmhurst Park District and may do some swimming or water aerobics as well. Gotta love summer in the Midwest!

Movie Reviews: Stranger than Fiction and Rum Diaries

Over the weekend, I had the chance to watch two movies. The first I'll review is Rum Diaries with Johnny Depp, one of my favorite actors. It starts off with him looking pretty rough with a hangover, and sadly, the movie really doesn't get any better from that low-point. I found the storyline had strange twists and unsatisfying resolutions. Finally, at the end I paid attention well enough to realize that this was based on a biography of a real reporter who went to Puerto Rico in the early 1960s. Knowing that helped me to appreciate the plot better because life is never as neat and clean as the storyline of a good movie or novel. But still, it wasn't my favorite movie.

The second movie, Stranger than Fiction (2006) played with motifs regarding writing, plotting, and storytelling in general. The movie starred Emma Thompson, Will Ferrell, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Dustin Hoffman. The main character (Ferrell) finds himself in the middle of his own life being narrated by a novelist's voice (Thompson). So, he's simply brushing his teeth, but the voice-over is about his obsession with numbers, including the amount of brushstrokes in his dental care. When he begins to hear the narration of his own life, the story begins. It's a fun, lighthearted comedy with some serious overtones. I thoroughly enjoyed it.