Hawkeye was an asterisk

Sutherland as Fortinbras

Ten days before Canada Day, we learned we'd lost another Canadian institution - Donald Sutherland.

He played a wide variety of roles, many of them in films that aren't exactly my cup of tea, but I remember him for three things - none of which were Shakespeare.

In the wake of Sutherland's death, I was looking for some of his performances when I stumbled across him at something like 28, appearing  briefly, as a gangly, snaggle-toothed Fortinbras, the Norwegian prince who turns up to clean up the carnage in Hamlet.  This was the 1964 televised production (available, thankfully, on YouTube, it's well worth a watch), filmed on location at Elsinore in the autumn of 1963, which starred a very dishy pre-Sound-of-Music Christopher Plummer, and a rather heavily made-up pre-Alfie Michael Caine.  

None of these guys were famous at the time, all three became so, although it took Sutherland considerably longer.

M*A*S*H was, of course, the film that did it for him.

It's one of the three things I do remember Sutherland for, along with his appearance in the music video of "Cloudbusting" with Kate Bush (based on the more sentimental aspects of the life of Wilhelm Reich),  and his performance of the easy-going, bewildered father in Ordinary People.  "Cloudbusting" is easily found on line, but Ordinary People must be on some streaming service I don't get.  My days of simply renting the DVD have disappeared, along with my beloved Pic-a-Flic, which closed about nine months ago.

M*A*S*H, if you can believe it, is available on Disney+, which we do get, in order that the Resident Fan Boy can get his Doctor Who fix.  

I settled down to watch M*A*S*H for the first time in years.

Just a little personal context:  Demeter loved this movie.  She saw it years before I did, of course, and now denies liking it so much, but I remember her raving about it years ago.  When I finally got an opportunity to see it (probably at the university cinema), I was puzzled.

Oh, it's entertaining.  And it was ground-breaking:  the improvisation, the overlapping dialogue, the gore in the operating theatre (which is mild, by today's terms, but shocking for 1970, particularly in a comedy). However, I remember feeling somewhat uncomfortable, and it took me several more years before it hit me - while I was watching it last week.

Hawkeye Pierce is an ***hole. 

Sure, he's a surgeon, and saves lives under appalling conditions, but plenty of surgeons are jerks.  The guy who safely delivered both my daughters by Caesarian was a jerk.  A fellow mum who was a doctor herself, smiled when I described my experiences with him and said "Well, he's an excellent technician." (Which helped, actually.) 

Also, I realise that M*A*S*H is set in the early 1950s, and seen through the lens of the anti-war attitudes of the late 1960s.  (The movie was released in 1970, but filmed a year or two earlier.)  

Even as a young woman, though, I felt uneasy about how the nurses are treated in the film, i.e. as fair game.  Hotlips Houlihan is, admittedly, a pain, but her punishment for being a lippy female and a senior officer is really over-the-top, isn't it?  Her humiliating exposure in the shower is the prelude of her reduction to a simpering hanger-on.  In one of our last glimpses of her, she's standing like an escort, as the men play cards. 

Here's a famous exchange from early on in the film.  The punchline from the late René Auberjonois is funny, but listen to what Pierce is saying to Houlihan.

See, if she were a normal woman (and apparently she's sufficiently pretty) he'd hit on her, and she'd acquiesce, because that's the natural order, right?  (Yes, she's being a highhanded twit; he's still an ***hole.)

Donald Sutherland, according to all reports, was not a jerk.  He was a fine, multi-faceted actor. We are diminished in the loss of him.

Stand on guard?

The Resident Fan Boy and I are taking the two-minute stroll to check on Demeter, about dinnertime in the warm sunshine of a rather lovely Canada Day.  As we pause to determine a safe time to cross the street, we are taken aback.

A young man on a motorized skateboard sails by.  He is shouldering an enormous Canadian flag on a wooden pole; it flies out behind him, catching the early evening sun. On the other shoulder, he's strapped some sort of ghetto-blaster, blaring out a song that sounds faintly country, but we haven't the time to register it, because, in a matter of seconds, he's a block away.

We come to our senses, and once again, check carefully before crossing.  As we approach Demeter's building, the RFB muses about motor on the skateboard, and the rather terrifying speed at which it's travelling.

"Well, you can't say he isn't visible," I point out.

Ignite your bones

Glastonbury, the annual music festival in Somerset, has been on this weekend. 

We used to be able to watch long stretches of it on television and online here in Canada, but for the past few years, I've only be able to access highlights on YouTube, usually a couple of songs per act.

 I've found three Canadian appearances at the festival this year, bringing back memories of my daughters' childhoods.  Both Shania Twain and Avril Lavigne appeared to be having a whale of a time, just ahead of Canada Day. 

However, the third Canadian appearance left my jaw on the carpet. I glanced at Saturday night's recording of Coldplay, and thought: 'Wow. That guitarist looks a bit like Michael J Fox.' Then I realized that the guitarist was in a wheelchair.

I'm not what you'd call a Coldplay fan, but this was a helluva moment.

Away from her

Elder daughter is criss-crossing Norway with a friend who has resided there for the past few years, a dream-trip twice postponed by circumstances financial and pandemic. Yesterday, she found herself in Oslo's Deichman bibliotek, the largest library in Norway, and confronted with a Canadian (and Victorian) connection.

Nine years ago, I wrote about my brief encounter with Alice Munro. She died about a dozen days ago, and readers across the country mourned, even though she had been sidelined by dementia.  Her short stories remain, though: wry, pointed, and bleakly funny.

I bet Norwegians really got her, I texted elder daughter this morning.

Hackers in Hades

So, yesterday, I was rather pleased with myself.  I'd managed to publish a blog-post, something I've been not doing enough lately.  I'm under no illusions that I have much of an audience, you understand; this blog was always for my own satisfaction.

Still, I took a few moments to look back on some recent entries ("recent" being a relative term) and, on a whim, clicked one of my own links, leading back to an older post.

I was horrified to find myself on an unfamiliar "Blogger" profile, featuring a message saying my link wouldn't work for "this blog", which appeared to be entitled "Ostitnotesfromhades".  The profile was some entity called "Nag", no information about them, except that s/he hosted five blogs, "Ostitnotesfromhades" being one of them.

I don't claim to be all that tech-savvy, but I knew better than to click on any of those links.

Unnerved, I set about reporting "Nag" to Blogger.  What particularly worried me is that "Nag"'s homepage appears to be on a Google account under my old Hades email address.  This is because my blog has remained there since 2007 -- mainly because I've never discovered how to change this. If Blogger tries to contact me, the messages will go to a dormant email account, which may make me look suspicious.

I then set about the irritating process of changing my Google password for that old account, and the even more annoying procedure of introducing two-step verification. Then I shut more barn doors, by going to the older blog post with the nasty, "Nag"-ated link and switching it to "edit" mode to remove it from the blog without deleting it.  (I was able to find it by doing a keyword search.) And I simply deleted the link on the more recent post, but I have a sinking feeling I may need to go through all the 1500 or so entries and check for any links back to my blog.

I think, from a flash of a map, while I was doing these things, that "Nag" may be burrowed somewhere in Australia.  He may also be burrowed somewhere in this blog, or even in the old Google account.  

Hello, "Nag", you insect.  You're not at all welcome.

So I may not be here tomorrow.  Or today -- it's already tomorrow in Australia.

How depressing.  Hackers really do belong in Hades.

Spelling counts

It's cold for May, and I'm willing myself up a hill.

Well, it's hardly a hill, just one of those barely perceptible inclines that make you wonder why on earth you're feeling tired.  My steps feel somewhat off-balance, and I tighten one strap of my packsack to redress the balance.

Halfway up, I spot a man in a dark green hoodie, standing in the sidewalk, head bent over his phone.  I note the baseball cap under the hood, but can't make out his face.  I feel a slight whisper of anxiety, and bend my path around him, giving him a wide berth.

"Excuse me," I hear him say as I pass, and I keep going, thinking that perhaps he's apologising for taking up the sidewalk.  This is Canada, after all.

"Excuse me," he repeats.  I stop and return.

"Just a random question.  How do you spell 'guitar'?"

I feel myself smiling.  "G-U-I-T-A-R."

He raises his phone.  "And there it is; it came right up!"

I giggle, and turn to continue.

"Thanks!" I hear him call.  

I revolve in the also barely perceptible rain.  "It's not often I can solve a problem so simply!"

"You have a great day," he says.

I head home, feeling less burdened and footsore.

We've both turned into human beings.

The advantages of a liberal arts education

"Actually, this is perfect viewing for the day between Good Friday and Easter," said the Resident Fan Boy, not quite pompously.  

After an exhausting afternoon guiding younger daughter and Demeter (and, truth be told, the RFB himself) through the steps of decorating eggs using shaving cream, I felt like kicking back with a bit of ballet on my Royal Opera streaming subscription, and chose The Dante Project.

As we watched Dante descend and dance through a tour of the circles of Hell, with the poet Virgil as a guide and partner, the RFB continued:  "Because Jesus spent the day after the Crucifixion..."

"Harrowing Hell," I said, not taking my eyes from screen.

"...he went down to..."

"Harrow Hell."

"....save the people born before Christianity..."

"The Harrowing of Hell!"

"What?"

"It's called the Harrowing of Hell. It's like you couldn't even hear what I was saying!"

"Well, I never heard it called that."

The Resident Fan Boy is also a son of the rectory, so I, the lifelong Unitarian, was rather surprised. 

"You've never heard of the Harrowing of Hell?"

"Well, I guess you're the one who studied theology..."

English literature, actually.  It did come up.

We was getting nowhere

For the first time in a long time, I watched a Doctor Who episode twice.  I used to do this regularly on writer Stephen Moffat's episodes; in fact it usually took at least three watches for me to figure out his plots.  I'm a bear of little brain.

For "Wild Blue Yonder", the second of Russell T Davies' bridging episodes leading up to the intro of the next Doctor, Ncuti Gatwa (whose Rwandan first name is pronounced something like "Shooty" - he's another sexy Scot), the plot is easy enough for me to follow, but I had to go back to check a particular moment.

If you haven't seen the episode and want to avoid spoilers, stop reading.  (But I'm really pleased you're here!)

"Wild Blue Yonder" reminds me strongly of "Midnight", a Tennant episode from his third season,  In WBY, there are also formless malevolent beings who are using enfleshed beings to manifest themselves and take over - in this case, the Doctor and Donna, who have crash-landed on a marooned space-ship hovering in nothingness on the edge of nowhere, due to an accident involving coffee.

As promised, the special was scary, and provided a nice illustration of the advanced acting skills of Tennant and Tate.  Predictably, the Resident Fan Boy was particularly impressed with Catherine Tate's performance, while I admired Tennant's dramatic acrobatics.  Years ago, he switched seamlessly between the frenetic Doctor and the repressed John Smith in "Human Nature/Family of Blood" (my very favourite DW episode).  Here, he transformed himself by adopting the empty-eyed black stare of a predator. Brrrrrr.

Next episode is predicted to be one of Russell T Davies' world-gone-ape**** extravanganzas.  I tend to not quite like those.  We'll see.

When watching the previous Doctor Who special episode "Star Beast", I was startled to hear Donna declare that her grandfather Wilf was alive and well, because I knew Bernard Cribbins had died in the summer of 2022. In fact, I'd screen-saved this rather wonderful re-imagining of the Sergeant Pepper album cover, illustrating Cribbins' career, which went so far beyond Doctor Who:

And then (this is another spoiler - you've been warned), "Wild Blue Yonder" drew to a close, and there was Wilfred Mott, in his wheelchair.  It was the only scene Bernard Cribbins managed to film, a few weeks before he died at age 93.

Which left me with this earworm (composer Ted Dicks and lyricist Myles Rudge).  I've had worse.

Furby or not Furby

Iphis texted me this week.

Have you seen the new episode of Doctor Who!!

Had I seen the new episode -- who does he think I am? (Okay, let's not go there...) I cheerfully replied that I had seen it at the earliest opportunity.  I hadn't planned to, but the Resident Fan Boy had tuned in to  Disney Plus at the moment of release, and I just happened to return from the coffee shop at the same instant.  I sat down to watch a few minutes, and, of course, ended up watching the whole thing, and was late for Demeter's breakfast call.  It was David Tennant, after all, narrower than ever, and now with a deeply lined brow.

Iphis was, I suspect, especially excited about Russell T Davies' carefully inclusive story.  (If you haven't seen the "Star Beast", and wish to be surprised, you might want to stop reading about here - and I thank you for reading at all.)

"Star Beast"'s plot turns upon a number of circumstances, one being the fact that an important security office uses a wheelchair, and a major one being the gender identification of Donna's daughter Rose.  It's the inclusivity that, no doubt, thrilled Iphis and, undoubtedly, irritated and infuriated a certain cohort of Whovians. They're just going to have to suck it up, as I'm sure this is how Russell T Davies intends to continue.  

I understand this week's episode (which begins in less than an hour, as I type this) is supposed to be very scary and not particularly child-friendly, and the finale of this David Tennant three-parter will be over-the-top crazy, which is usually where RTD leaves me behind.

"Star Beast", with all its modern sensibilities, is a bit of the gentler, family-friendly outing, and even features a Furby-like creature called The Meep.  Sounds precious, doesn't it?  (You know you're in trouble if a creature is voiced by the not-at-all reassuring Miriam Margolyes.). The plot reminds me strongly of "Smith and Jones" from Tennant's second season as The Doctor.  You've been warned.

I plan to head out to Demeter before this morning's first broadcast of the apparently terrifying next Doctor/Donna outing - mainly so she gets breakfast, rather than brunch, but also so my hands don't shake the tray.

"He didn't carpet-bomb Cambodia"

Shane MacGowan and Henry Kissinger had pretty well nothing in common, except for dying within twenty-four hours of each other.

Because I'm a Canadian, and therefore blocked from news organizations on social media, I learned about the demise of MacGowan from actor Christopher Eccleston, who posted his picture on Instagram.  My heart sank, because I was rather a Pogues fan.  (I was rather surprised to hear that Henry Kissinger wasn't dead already, to tell you the truth; he was 100 years old, after all.)

Someone on Twitter - I continue to refuse to refer to it by its rather Teutonic rebranding - was nonplussed, not that either of the men had died, but that MacGowan had received rather more coverage and longer articles.  The wags were quick on their keyboards: "He wrote better songs."

One of them, and my personal favourite, is "Haunted" which was first recorded in 1986 with Cait O'Riordan.  Some years after getting kicked out of the Pogues for his legendary benders, MacGowan re-recorded the song with his friend Sinéad O'Connor (who later would report him to the police when she witnessed his taking heroin, but they were still friends when O'Connor died earlier this year.) 

You were so cool, you could have put out Vietnam.

Another tenuous link to Henry Kissinger?  (Nah.)