A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

Checking In     Image credit: Pixabay Hi, Dear Reader. It’s been a while – a month, almost – since I last posted here on Blogger. I didn’t plan it that way, but I’ve been working hard to establish A Certain Point of View’ s sister blog – named A Certain Point of View, Too – over on WordPress. That endeavor is going well; I have over 60 posts up there and I have 68 followers so far – which is almost three times as many as this blog has now. I don’t have as many pageviews on WordPress as I have here, but this blog is far older and has over 1300 posts. Nevertheless, A Certain Point of View, Too is doing okay and I’m happy with it…even though I am not pleased at the reason why I had to create it in the first place. I had hoped that I’d be able to juggle writing for two blogs at once, either by creating content for both on a daily basis and posting at night, or by writing here one day and writing there the next. I had no set plan for this juggling act, though, so ...

Today is Sunday, May 10, 2020. As I start this blog post, it's almost 3:30 PM in my corner of Florida. It's a warm afternoon ﹘ 81℉ (27℃) under partly sunny skies ﹘ and it looks like it might rain. Of course, this is immaterial; ever since I left Miami and moved here I rarely ever go for walks or do anything outdoorsy, so the weather only affects me if there are thunderstorms or severe cold snaps. Right now, according to the forecast, we are experiencing the high for the day; at night the temperature is expected to drop to 65℉ (18℃). In a few weeks, if Florida weather sticks to its normal patterns, the days will be increasingly hotter, stickier, and less pleasant. Today is also Mother's Day, the 10th occurrence of the occasion since Mom got sick in 2009/2010 and the fifth since she died. My older half-sister Victoria and I managed to "celebrate" the day with our Mom for the last time in 2015 ﹘ she died a little over two months later, on July 19, 2015 ﹘ and eve...

Publicity photo of Buena Vista Home Entertainment's region-free Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga 18-disc box set. © 2020 Buena Vista Home Entertainment (BVHE) and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) On Monday, April 20, Buena Vista Home Entertainment (BVHE) and Lucasfilm Ltd. released the 18-disc variant Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, a counterpart to the larger 27-disc box set of the same name released less than a month earlier as a Best Buy exclusive. I bought my from Walmart.com – I haven’t seen it as an official release on Amazon, although I have noticed that the 27-disc version of The Skywalker Saga is sold at the site by third-party sellers at inflated prices – this smaller, less elaborate box set was intended primarily as the region-free European release, as it sports the rating seals from the British and Irish counterparts to the Motion Picture Association of America as part of its indicia.  From a young Anakin Skywalker’s descent into the dark side to the rise of the Resis...

Photo Illustration: Pixabay Hi, there, Constant Reader. Well, it's Saturday, May 2, and it's late morning here in my corner of Florida. The current temperature is 71℉ (22℃) under mostly sunny skies. Looking at the forecast, it looks like it's going to be a warm, sunny day, with temperatures expected to reach a high of 84℉ (29℃), dropping at night to a low of 63℉ (17℃). No rain is expected to fall in our area today. Well, here we are in the fifth month of 2020, and we Floridians are still hunkering down in our homes due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Sadly, the Sunshine State is governed (for lack of a better word) by the Republican Party, and our governor, Ron DeSantis is a Donald Trump loyalist who is rarin' to reopen the state for business ASAP. This is not an attitude unique to our state; other Southern (and Republican-dominated) states like Tennessee and Georgia are reopening some businesses, although this is pretty much asking for trouble, as ...

Promotional photo of Buena Vista Home Entertainment/Lucasfilm Ltd.'s 18-disc Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga Blu-ray box set.  This is the region-free edition made for the UK/Europe but sold in the U.S. by Walmart. © 2020 Buena Vista Home Entertainment and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) Hi, there! Welcome to another edition of Bloggin' On, the more "personal" section of A Certain Point of View where I just chat about everyday topics and stuff that doesn't fall neatly into the categories that I usually write about ﹘ reviews, politics, or life in the time of COVID-19. It's a nice morning in my corner of Florida; as I write this, the temperature outside is 78℉ (25℃) under partly sunny skies. According to my computer's weather app, today's forecast calls for a high of 84℉ (29℃) under mostly cloudy skies. It's going to be a humid and maybe even rainy day at times (52% humidity and 60% chance of precipitation), but it doesn't look as if it is going to ...

Cover art by Drew Struzan. © 2015 Del Rey Books & Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) Well, I finally did it.  After four years, a cross-state move, and a multitude of ups and downs, including adjusting to life in a new hometown, getting used to living with what amounts to a new family, and now a state of COVID-19 quarantine, I finished reading Alan Dean Foster’s novelization of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. I usually don’t consider the act of finishing a book a huge achievement. I usually finish most of the books I start reading, unless I run into one that I really hate and can’t even get to the halfway mark because, ugh, it’s so awful that I’d rather have my eyes plucked out by crows rather than have to read…one…more…page.   I’ve had that unpleasant experience quite a few times in six decades’ worth of reading, and I’m sure I’ll have it a few more times before I die. The last time I felt that completing a book without skimming through “the slow parts” was worth writin...

© 2020 Del Rey Books and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) Hi there, Constant Reader! Welcome to another edition of Bloggin' On, the no-reviews, no-politics section of my original blog, A Certain Point of View. Today is Sunday, April 12, 2020, and as I start this, morning is ending, and noon is not that far away. (By the time I'm done writing this, it'll be afternoon here in my corner of Florida.) Before I get to the main topic of this post ﹘ my reading list for April 2020 ﹘  I need to update you on what's going on with my blog and why I'm not posting here as often as I was before late March. I have had to slow my pace of one-post-per-diem on Blogger for one reason: Facebook has blocked this blog from its site. I have two theories as to why this was done, though I'm more inclined to put more weight on one of them above the other theory. Theory No. 1: Someone on Facebook, more than likely a Trump supporter, reported one or more of my posts to Facebook's Comm...