And the winner is....

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you know that Barry and I enjoy movies. We had intended to go see one or two on Sunday but we were somewhat sidetracked by predictions of snow (that never materialized) and by running one errand that turned into another.

It all started with baby clothes. With the impending arrival, our daughters were trying to track down all the baby clothes they had passed back and forth between them when each of the four grandchildren was born. But they discovered that after Maya, the youngest, the clothes went to the sister of our other daughter’s husband, who had a girl last year. She lives on Long Island and delivered the clothes to our other daughter’s in-laws’ home a few towns over. Early Sunday morning, we drove out to retrieve them and will take them up to Sharon on Friday. I think I can say that we spent no more on gas than the baby clothes were worth.

While we were driving out there, it suddenly occurred to me that there is an Amazing Savings near our in-law’s home. If you have never been to Amazing Savings, it is quite an experience. I am not sure quite how they do this (and maybe I do not want to know) but they sell a lot of good stuff at prices far lower and with selections far broader than you would find elsewhere. Among those things are items that are most useful with both Passover and a new baby coming: very nice disposable plastic tableware, and every imaginable shape and size of foil pans. Yes, I know, not environmentally friendly, but sometimes you have to prioritize. Between the three bins of baby clothes and the umpteen bags of foil pans and dinnerware, we had a completely full car, both the back seat and the trunk.

We had thought about driving back from Long Island through the City and stopping to see a movie. But a combination of the weather forecast and the fact that we had a bit too much sitting in the passenger section of the car convinced us to head back home. As it turned out, the snow never came. So perhaps we could have gone to see a movie, but instead we took care of something that truly needed to be done, pulling together all the 2013 tax documents and completing the workbook that our accountant provides each year. Just between you and me, I think Barry and I both secretly wanted to go see a movie just to avoid that task. 2013 was a complicated year because of my separation from Pfizer and our efforts to consolidate a bunch of retirement savings accounts. But in fact it went much more smoothly than we expected.

We knew we would have a hard time staying awake through the entire Academy Awards Show last night, so we set up to tape it and watched it early this morning, fast forwarding through some of the fluff.

In case you missed it, here a partial list of the 86th Academy Awards winners:

Best Picture	12 Years a Slave
Best Actor in a Leading Role	Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)
Best Actress in a Leading Role	Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)
Best Actor in a Supporting Role	Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)
Best Actress in a Supporting Role	Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave)
Best Animated Feature	Frozen (Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, Peter Del Vecho)
Best Cinematography	Gravity (Emmanuel Lubezki)
Best Directing	Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón)
Best Documentary Feature	20 Feet from Stardom (Morgan Neville, Gil Friesen, Caitrin Rogers)
Best Original Song	Let It Go - Frozen
Best Original Screenplay	Her (Spike Jonze)

The film that did very well was the one we know we should have seen but did not: 12 Years a Slave. I mentioned this in passing back in January when I wrote about the Golden Globe awards. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, whatever minimal tolerance I may have had for watching intense suffering on the silver screen before my diagnosis has been exacerbated to the point that I simply cannot subject myself to it. The clips alone have been too intense for me to watch! But I have no doubt that this was an excellent film deserving of all the accolades. 

Back in December I wrote about Dallas Buyers Club “There may well be some Academy Award nominations from this one.” This, too, was a painful film to watch, but I think I was able to see beyond that aspect because of my early experience in antiretroviral drug development. In fact, the film won both Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor for two brilliant performances. Cate Blanchett, who won Best Actress, was excellent in Blue Jasmine. The Best Supporting Actress category also included two other outstanding performances by less well known actresses, Sally Hawkins in Blue Jasmine and June Squibb in Nebraska, not an easy choice.

Frozen, another movie we thoroughly enjoyed and about which I had written “with or without children, I recommend this movie,” won Best Animated Film (the animation was spectacular) and Best Original Song for “Let it Go” (good luck getting that one out of your head once you hear it a couple of times). I was happy to see that Her, a movie we enjoyed immensely, got a nod, presumably for its thought-provoking storyline.

The next few days will be cold but next weekend should begin to warm…it cannot come too quickly!

Love,

Rebecca