Let Them All Talk (2020)

Rotten Tomatoes

Let Them All Talk (2020): Author takes a cruise ship to England to receive an award and takes two old friends with her. There's time for lots of conversation, enough to surface long suppressed issues. Watching Meryl Streep, Candice Bergen, and Dianne Wiest work is a joy. B-

Parsing the Reasons Why the City Council Said No

The Richardson City Council voted unanimously to reject a plan to build a five story apartment building on the George Bush Tollway just north of the coming Silver Line station by UT-Dallas. You might think if there's anywhere an apartment building just might get approved, it's on a property like that: on a freeway, near public transit and a large (and growing) university, and nowhere near a single family neighborhood. But the City Council said "no." Let's parse the reasons why.

POTD: Nubian Woman

Caption

From 2019 11 19 Aswan

Today's photo-of-the-day is from a Nubian village on the Nile River near Aswan, Egypt. The woman is hawking souvenirs to tourists.

An Unintended Benefit of COVID-19 Denial

Different countries have adopted different strategies to control the coronavirus. New Zealand, for example, imposed one of the world's strictest lockdowns and, perhaps as a result, New Zealanders are looking at a Christmas season free of any restrictions. Sweden, on the other hand, shunned lockdowns in the belief that so-called "herd immunity" would soon follow. Perhaps as a result, Sweden had a death rate much higher than its neighbors. Its prime minister has admitted that the country misjudged its response.

What about the US? As you might expect, our response continues to be divided along tribal lines.

Dick Johnson is Dead (2020)

Rotten Tomatoes

Dick Johnson is Dead (2020): Documentary filmmaker and her aging father use his mental and physical decline as the inspiration to stage various accidental deaths for him on camera. It's their way of laughing death in the face. Eccentric and heartfelt. Bittersweet. B+