The Universe Loves Me And Is Trying To Kill Me

September 10, 2018September 10, 2018 ~ duane ~ Leave a comment

EDIT: I just realized that the beer post isn’t scheduled to go out until tomorrow. Was everybody confused? 🙂

And I’m ok with it.

I’ve written about how last week not one but two separate coworkers sought me out to tell me about a Shakespeare-branded beer (“ShakesBeer“). We’re still on the hunt for that one.

This morning a different coworker tells me, “I got this chocolate bar at the supermarket that had some sort of Shakespeare quote on it. I took a picture of it for you, but it’s on my wife’s phone.”

I’m intrigued. I knew about the beer, but the chocolate was new to me. I googled around, found some random novelty items, and told him, “Sounds like one of those independent brands you find at Whole Foods. Never heard of it. But definitely tell me more!”

While waiting for his wife to get back to him I decide to throw the question out to the Twitterverse, noting that “some sort of Shakespeare quote on it” actually meant “a sonnet inside the wrapper” which is even cooler.

Twitter delivered. Both @magpiewhale and @katep08 said that he’s surely talking about Chocolove, adding that “this brand is delicious.”

“That’s it!” says my boss. Then he sends me this picture that he’s googled, since we have a name now:

I’m crushed. “That’s not Shakespeare,” I tell him after reading about four words.

“I guess each one has a different poem,” he tells me.

Well, now the hunt is on. Their website has a “find a location” section and sure enough, it’s exactly what I suspected originally – straight to Whole Foods for me!

Success!

They actually have at least half a dozen flavors, but most of them were dark chocolate and I’m not as much of a fan. But I’m probably going to make multiple trips, who am I kidding. I swear I felt like the kid in Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, peeling open the wrapper slowly to unveil the golden ticket inside.

But did I get a Shakespeare or not?! The suspense!I did! Sonnet 24, to be precise.

A joyous day to be sure. The chocolate is pretty good, but I felt twelve kinds of guilty eating it, so noting that I was only in it for the Shakespeare, I put the rest out for my coworkers. One of whom, also a Shakespeare fan, examined the outer wrapper and announced, “It doesn’t say Shakespeare anywhere on the outside. What do they think, I’m going to spend good money for Keats?!” 🙂

And yes, I have a shrine of Shakespeare action figures and bobble heads on my desk at work. Doesn’t everybody?

P.S. – Last week beer, this week chocolate. I can’t tell if the universe loves me or is trying to kill me. Either way I’m ok with it, I’m going down happy.

P.P.S – Also! These are apparently part of the Whole Foods / Amazon Prime program, if that’s available in your area. So if you’ve done whatever soul selling thing you do to let Whole Foods know you’re a Prime member, you can get them at a significant discount. In my neck of the woods it was $3.19 for a single bar but would have been $4.00 for 2 bars if I had my accounts linked.

Salt Makes Life Better

September 10, 2018September 9, 2018 ~ duane ~ Leave a comment

So here’s a thought that occurred to me the other night. Bear with me, this is a strange one. But what the heck, it’s my site, the whole point is supposed to be my ideas about stuff.

Lately I’ve been salting my food a lot. Definitely when cooking regular entrees, but also seemingly odd choices, like peanut butter, or chocolate. If you haven’t tried it I highly recommend it. Why? Because, as the cooking shows will tell you, salt makes things taste better. The best way I heard it described was, salt makes things taste more like what they’re supposed to taste like.

Except, of course, if you use too much. Then your food tastes salty. And that defeats the whole purpose.

Ok, who sees where I’m going with this? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Shakespeare makes life better. This is kind of what I’m talking about. You experience something. You give it a little Shakespeare. It becomes a better, deeper, more enriched experience. Sure, you can give your girlfriend a card for Valentine’s Day, or you can drop a quote from Romeo and Juliet in there. Someone’s getting married, or having a baby, and you want to send congratulations. Shakespeare’s got you. Or maybe somebody’s passed on, and you need to express your grief or condolences. Shakespeare can handle that for you, too.

Just like salt, too much can ruin it.

Not many friends are to be made if you
insist on speaking all your lines this way.

Not my greatest couplet but that was kind of my point. Working some Shakespeare into your life isn’t supposed to be a challenge or a chore, it’s supposed to come naturally. If you have to force it, maybe change your approach.

My favorite part of this analogy is when you add the salt. You add it at the beginning (or during). That brings out the flavor at every level. If you add it at the end, after you’re done cooking, all you get is a surface layer. So when’s the best time to teach Shakespeare? When a student’s formal education is approaching its end? Or right at the beginning?

That Time Shakespeare Punched Burt Reynolds

September 6, 2018September 6, 2018 ~ duane ~ 2 Comments

Burt Reynolds has died.

When a celebrity dies, I tend to go looking for a Shakespeare connection. Often I find nothing. Sometimes I find a bio that says they performed in college. If I’m very lucky I’ll find a quote or even some video of a performance.

This is the first time I found evidence of Shakespeare punching the celebrity out.

Look how young he was! Reynolds, not Shakespeare. This turns out to be from an episode of The Twilight Zone called “The Bard“, that aired in 1963.

Does he call him a gleep? What is that?

All kidding aside – this article suggests that we have Shakespeare to thank for discovering Reynolds in the first place:

He began taking English lessons with a view to becoming a parole officer but his teacher, having heard Reynolds reading Shakespeare aloud, cast him in a production of the play Outward Bound, and his performance won him the 1956 Florida State Drama Award.

Later in his career (2008) we find A Bunch of Amateurs, which seems to be at least somewhat related to King Lear:

A sleazy Hollywood agent tricks one of his clients, a faded action star, into playing King Lear in an amateur charity production in England.

Found it! Oh look, Derek Jacobi:

RIP Mr. Reynolds. Flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

Ophelia In The Water

September 5, 2018 ~ duane ~ 1 Comment

There’s a certain painting of Ophelia, by Sir John Everett Millais, that you’ve almost certainly seen. It’s that gorgeous green one that shows Ophelia in the water (and not much else). I’ve seen it on all kinds of merchandise, in fact. It was seeing it on a t-shirt today that inspired this question.

Here’s a link to the biggest version I could find.

When I saw the smaller merch version I thought, “Wait, who is that near the right edge of the painting? Is somebody there? That can’t be a fairy, that’s the wrong play!” So I went in search of a higher resolution image. Turns out it’s just flowers.

But that made me think. What flowers are they, exactly? When you see the picture in its colorful glory you see just how many flowers there are – the red, yellow and blue with Ophelia in the water, the white in the center, the purple that I thought was a lurking fairy.

Can somebody identify all of these flowers for us? Are they representations of the flowers that Ophelia hands out in Hamlet IV.v?

Ophelia. There’s fennel for you, and columbines. There’s rue for you,
and here’s some for me. We may call it herb of grace o’ Sundays.
O, you must wear your rue with a difference! There’s a daisy. I
would give you some violets, but they wither’d all when my father
died. They say he made a good end.

I am assuming that they are, but then again, maybe not. After all, she’s already gone flower picking and already given them away – so has she gone back out to the river to pick more of the same? Or something different? Or did the painter even get into that level of detail?

I’d love to appreciate this painting on a whole different level. Somebody tell me that the different flowers are what I hope they are.

When You’re A Jet (West Side Story Reboot Is Coming)

September 5, 2018September 5, 2018 ~ duane ~ Leave a comment

Are we ready for a new West Side Story?

What if I told you Stephen Spielberg is directing?

The casting call is up! September 11.

The announcement comes from the office of casting director Cindy Tolan. Auditions will take place at Gelsey Kirkland Academy of Classical Ballet in Brooklyn, with the sign-in for men beginning at 9AM and the sign-in for women beginning at 1PM.

The call stipulates auditionees should be between 15 and 25 years old with a strong dance background and ability to sing, and also specifies: “the Sharks are Latinx, the Jets are Caucasian.”

The original is certainly dated (look at that dialogue!) so that’s screaming for a rewrite. Will all those dance numbers still hold an audience’s attention? All the “coming to America” songs and aspects of the story are still as strong as ever, but I hope they don’t go over the top and make it purely commentary on the current administration.