Author: Roger

I'm a librarian. I hear music, even when it's not being played. I used to work at a comic book store, and it still informs my life. I won once on JEOPARDY! - ditto.

Movie review: The Lost Bus

2018 SoCal fires

My wife wanted to go to the Spectrum Theater and see the new movie, The Lost Bus. Unfortunately, when I looked at the schedule on what I believe was the first Friday after it had opened, it was no longer available there, which disappointed my wife.

I wondered if it’s on one of those streaming services we happen to have, which I can access on the Roku that will facilitate that. Sure enough, there it was on Apple+. My wife made popcorn.

The film is based on a true story about the 2018 California fires. Kevin McKay (Matthew McConaugh) is a guy just hanging on. His father died recently, and he is taking care of his mother and has joint custody of his angry teenage son. He has a job as a school bus driver, but he’s not good with the regulations, such as bringing the bus in for inspection.  

Meanwhile, a moderate-sized fire is miles away, but because of the terrain, it cannot be contained. As the fire spreads, schools need to be evacuated. Kevin has an empty bus, so he goes to an elementary school and picks up Mary (America Ferrera) and her nearly two dozen students. 

McKay’s son Shaun was played by McConaugh’s real-life son, Levi. Matthew said on a TV show that because his father-son relationship with Levi was so solid, he encouraged his son to play the role as caustically as possible. 

Burning

Harrowing fire stuff happens, which probably would have been more intense on the big screen. But it was nerve-wracking enough, especially at the highlight of the film. Indeed, the exposition setup was necessary, but the disaster creates the tension. What was as interesting as the attempted escape from the fire was the firefighters’ scenes as they slowly realize this is an inferno like they had never seen.     

The film was directed and co-written by Paul Greengrass, who’s known for how well he presents films based on real events (United 93, Bloody Sunday). 

Scores on Rotten Tomatoes were 87% postive with critics and 94% with fans. One critic noted, “This is a spectacle-type movie but didn’t feel like a spectacle.” Another critic complained about “the refusal to acknowledge the climate changes making bushfires ever more savage.” As I complain a lot, that wasn’t the film Greengrass was making; he was addressing the surprise/shock and ultimate lack of preparation in 2018. 

There’s Red Cross page featuring McConaugh and Ferrera urging people to be prepared for wildfires.  

The joys of homeownership

The fence was good, at least

Ah, the joys of homeownership.

We needed to get a new fence for our property. Our 20-year-old wooden fence had fallen (some parts of it, literally) on hard times.  So my wife, whom I cede most home stuff for reasons explained later, contracted with a company to tear down one day and build the new one the next day.

A sidebar: After that first day, the construction people needed two parking spaces in front of our house to park their truck closer. Not having a driveway is a hassle for people working in our backyard.

Fortunately, my wife is one of the best car parkers ever. Seriously, she can get into tiny spaces and does it so well that once a FedEx driver saw her parking and complimented her. But what she needed to do in this case was to park to take out two spaces so that no other car could get in there. She moved her car so the fence contractors could put their truck into that space. She did this perfectly.

So, the process went fine as far as we were concerned. But one of our neighbors was dissatisfied with one element, complicated to explain. The person harangued my wife and the workers on day 1 with BS (the workers “probably weren’t licensed,” the person surmised, using subtle ethnic bigotry).

On day 2, the person rang our doorbell – my wife was at work – and kvetched about something that was not the workers’ responsibility. The person was so insistent that the workers jerry-rigged a fix without me asking. They were great guys.

Oh, geez

The next day, another contractor looked at things in our house to do some handyman work, notably the clogged sink in the downstairs bathroom. Someone else had told me that I could take off the pipe underneath,  blah blah blah. I said Well, yes, I could; my issue has always been, ‘Can I reattach it?’ Based on previous experience,  the answer is probably not.

He quotes us for that and some other small jobs around the house. But then he saw some construction someone else had done in 2024, and he pointed out that part of that construction was not up to code. Yikes. And, not incidentally, that tracks.  Should we get the previous person to rectify it,  something my wife is resistant to doing for reasons, or get somebody else to replace it?

This falls into my general anxiety about owning a house. I never owned a home before marrying in 1999, and my parents did not own a home until 1972 or ’73. But my wife had purchased her first home independently, so she’s better at this stuff.

I need to do stuff

moderate dilation of the ascending aorta

I need to do stuff. Specifically, I need to clean my office to work on some reimbursements for my health care expenses. In the midst of starting to clean, I put things on top of other things, and it has become even more challenging to do what I was trying to do in the first place.

I started this process two months ago and have made no real progress. Not only is it irritating to me, but it’s probably a physical hazard. My wife came in here and almost tripped over the garbage can, which is the greater motivation. Her hand is still healing.

The only way I will clean this room and put away the recently played compact discs is if I don’t have to write a substantial blog post.

I wanted to say that I’m OK. I find art in my house every sunny day. Above is what the hallway looks like going upstairs, and below is a shrunken image. I’m not sure which one I like better, though I don’t think either picture really represents how cool it looks, but I can cope with that. It’s still discovered art, and multiple rainbows to boot.

 

Ticker

The one thing I can tell you is that I went to my cardiologist in late September. I like my cardiologist; he’s amusing. As I mentioned at some point, I have a “moderate dilation of the ascending aorta.” If the “maximum diameter of the enlarged segment” reaches 5.5 cm, I will need to have heart surgery. It was 5.1 last year, and it’s 5.1 this year, so no open heart surgery for me in 2025! Yay, me.

So, to the question: “How are you doing ?” I answer, “Well, I’m not having open heart surgery this year, which means I’m just fine!” Or fine enough for the nonce. 

Why people hated the Yankees

Chief antipathy

Even though I was a fan, I remember why people hated the Yankees when I was growing up. They won too much. From 1949 to 1964, they were in the World Series every year except two, 1954 and 1959, a fact I didn’t even have to look up. They won 9 of the 14 Series. More recently, they won the Series in 2009 but haven’t gotten there since.

I thought about this as I realized I would be rooting against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series. Though they’ve “only” won two of the last five World Series, in 2020 and 2024, with the expanded number of teams, that’s still quite impressive.

Their current roster has a unicorn. Shohei Ohtani’s legendary game (throwing 10 strikeouts as a pitcher AND hitting three home runs) got the Dodgers there, but I have to root for the underdog.

It’s not that I dislike the Dodgers particularly, though I was distraught when they beat the Yankees in the 1963 Series. I liked Maury Wills, who stole over 100 bases the year before; Junior Gilliam; and Tommy and Willie Davis, who were NOT related. I also admired their two best starting pitchers, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale.

Two teams, both established in 1977, will play in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series tonight. The Seattle Mariners have NEVER been in a World Series, and the Toronto Blue Jays won back-to-back Series in 1992 and 1993 but haven’t appeared since.

NFL

I’ve discovered that I have developed an antipathy against the Kansas City Chiefs. Although I was glad they didn’t have a “threepeat” when they lost the Super Bowl in 2025, I was wary about claims that the Chiefs were getting special treatment. Well, until the game against the Detroit Lions on October 12.

I’m still rooting for the Lions, who lost last week and play tonight. And of course, the Buffalo Bills, the only NFL team that plays its home games in New York State, lost last week and have a bye this week. 

I’ve discovered that, now that coach Bill Belincheck is coaching in the college ranks, I don’t have the antipathy towards the New England Patriots hat I did for years.

Yes, these are irrational feelings. So it goes. 

Sunday Stealing — Meme Schmeme

Milky Way

unions.afl-cio.2013Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!

Cheri is a blogger from the beautiful state of Georgia who didn’t often participate in memes but stole this one because “for whatever crazy reason” it appealed to her. Let’s see how you like it.

Meme Schmeme

Complete the thought:

I AM that kid who used to write his address with way too much detail, adding North America, Northern Hemisphere, Western Hemisphere, Earth, Milky Way galaxy, and probably other markers.

I LIVE by some basic mottos: the Golden Rule, helping others when you can, sharing information, listening to music a lot, and trying not to be an @$$4013.

I THINK I am a klutz with even the simplest physical tasks. We had to put new license plates on a vehicle this weekend. So I unscrewed the old plate on the back and put on the new one. Then I went to the front and unscrewed the plate. Where’s the replacement plate? I managed to attach two plates to the back of the car; they seem thinner than the ones I used to screw on, which was probably a half-century ago.

Fred MacMurray

I KNOW an inordinate amount of useful and more than occasionally mundane info. Just this weekend, there was a Facebook conversation about the television show My Three Sons. Someone wrote that they had a crush on one of the sons, Robby. In response, another asked if he was the oldest. I jumped in: “Originally, there were three bio sons, Mike, Robby, and Chip. But Mike got married and left; the dad then adopted Ernie. So if you were watching in 1965 or later, Robby was the oldest. Simple question, but complicated answer.” Except for the year, I KNEW all of that.

I WANT to declutter the house, and occasionally, my mind.

I WISH people would stop believing comments, often made by political figures, that are, to my mind, clearly lies. Also, the rationalization of bigotry by JD Vance, over “jokes” about gas chambers and rape, approving of slavery, and sneering about “watermelon people,” among other comments, reflects a moral bankruptcy. 

I PRAY that people recognize that climate change is real and act to slow its progression since it is apparent that we are beyond reversing it.

Thank you for playing! Please come back next week.

Ramblin' with Roger
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