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Been watching movies from my teen years (more or less) that I never caught on first go-around for one reason or another. I'm making an effort to see them in the theatre. Toronto isn't quite as amazing for movies as it was in the 90s, but it's still pretty good between TIFF Lightbox, The Revue, The Fox, The Paradise, and Carlton. Once in a blue moon HotDocs shows a non-documentary movies. Friday was Withnail and I at the Revue (totally packed house) and today was Mermaids at TIFF.

Just wrapping up the 3rd (of 7) novellas that make up Mutis's Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll (NYRB). I had read these first three not long after the English translations came out, but then never got around to the rest. But NYRB published all of them in one volume, which I have finally gotten around to reading. The remaining stories will all be new to me. I'm also wrapping up Alice Munro's Runaway. I wanted to make sure I had read the first half of the collection before watching Almodovar's Julieta, as the film is based on 3 of her stories.

I'm in a sort of similar bind. UPS and FedEx absolutely refuse to deliver to P.O. Boxes. But if you are mailing a passport to the US for renewal, they only give you a P.O. Box. Well, as you may or may not have heard Canada Post workers were on strike for 3 weeks and they were forced back to work (and are seriously unhappy about that). Due to the backlog, they simply refused to accept mail to the States for another week or so. (Apparently, Canada Post can mail to P.O. boxes...) The FedEx folks said I was completely out of luck. UPS looked up the street address and hopefully the passport will get to the right place, but I have serious doubts. 🥺

The End is bizarre. It's probably 15-20 minutes too long, and I didn't like the musical aspect of it. If all the songs had been stripped out it would have been much more powerful. So I guess I'm saying I thought the director's vision was naff.

Apparently a few people here caught Tolliver at the London Jazz Fest. Jealous... Anyway, this episode of BBC Round Midnight (on BBC Radio 3) with him being interviewed and introducing tracks he either played on or inspired his music is available for just under two weeks. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0024xv8

Lots of Tilda Swinton this month. She (and Julianne Moore) are in Almodovar's The Room Next Door. I'm seeing that towards the end of Dec. at TIFF Lightbox. Then next week, I see her in Joshua Oppenheimer's The End (also at TIFF). It's a post-apocalyptic tale about a wealthy family living in a salt mine when an outsider arrives. And it's a musical! It sounded too bizarre to pass up.

A lot of short stories this Dec.: Lucia Berlin - A Manual for Cleaning Women Joy Williams - Taking Care Alice Munro - Runaway

I was hoping Toronto would pull it off, so I decided the best thing to do would be to pull for the Bombers instead, as my sports bets never pay off... 😉 Anyway, way to go, Argos!

Scored a real bargain on Dorati's complete Haydn Symphonies (re-issued as a Decca box set) at a library book sale. Worked out to less than $1/CD. Now when I'll have listened to the whole thing is another story.

RIP. What a legacy! I saw him once in NYC in the early 2000s and then again in Chicago in 2007. There may have been another time, but that's likely it.

Winnepeg 50

I'd hoped to check out Guy Maddin's Rumours, but it lasted in theatres all of 2 weeks then vanished (during a time I was extremely busy at work). It isn't on any streaming services yet. Anyway, TIFF is doing an Almodovar retrospective. I have tickets to 10 of his films and hope to sneak in to two screenings that are currently sold out.

Argos definitely the underdogs now, but I suppose stranger things have happened (than them pulling it off...).

I saw him just a few months ago and he declined requests to play "Rocket Launcher." Maybe he'll have a change of heart tomorrow. I should try to catch him on his next Toronto show. As fine as he is as a solo artist, I would also like to see him backed by a band.

>>Next will be Eric DuPont's Songs for the Cold of Heart. (Which is much better known as The American Fiancée.) I'm mostly done with this. I'm liking the second half (in modern era) more than the parts set in Quebec in the 50s and 60s (pre-Quiet Revolution). I decided to take something different on a trip out to Edmonton. I got almost all the way through Oliver Twist (never tackled it before) and read a bit into Manu Joseph's Serious Men.