This year we’re making changes to the schedule of posts. Here’s what’s going to happen:
Monday
Éric Desmarais will randomly write things like an unspecified number of monkeys with typewriters… which is totally not how he writes his posts… *Shifty Eyes*
Tuesday
How I Taught My Dragon will post the results of the previous week with all the cute pictures of Dragon learning.
How I Taught My Dragon will post the plan for the next week of Draconic (but rarely draconian) learning.
Friday
The monkeysÉric returns with serial stories, regular stories, rants, coffee info, and really whatever comes out of the typewriters… uhm mind, his mind.
Saturday
JenEric Movie Reviews continues to watch movies, over-analyse them, and tell you all about it.
Sunday
Unless 2021 ends up being as movie watching heavy as 2020, this will be left blank and let the monkeys, time machine, and Dragon rest.
Looks like another exciting year for JenEric Designs. Hope you enjoy it!
Today marks the first day of a whole new year. A made up, arbitrary, unimportant date that nonetheless feels like a renewal and rebirth. The human mind and spirit is a fascinating and messed up thing.
Last year was all over the place. I was on paternity leave, we went to Disney World, and then PANDEMIC. I’m ridiculously privileged that I got to work from home and we didn’t lose much income (Jen’s travel booking did suffer). I got to spend so much more time with my son than I would have and that’s a blessing.
It was a terrible year for my New Year’s Resolutions, however. This year I’m going to take it easier… I think.
This will be the 8th year for the serial story. Voting Ended yesterday and I’ll have the first installment by the end of the month. I’ll be writing 1 installment every month of 800-1000 words.
2. Start and write half of SUPER MYSTERY BOOK PROJECT
This year will see the start, and hopefully the finish, of a new book. I’m really excited about this one. The goal is to get to at least 40,000 words this year.
Our schedule and lineup will be changing, but that’s another post. I’m going to hopefully keep up the streak of having at least 5 posts per week.
Editing and Marketing
5. Start Editing Dinosaur Road Trip
I wrote this novel in 2017 and my weditor edited it. I need to go through it and make the recommended changes and edits. Maybe even pass it to the next beta reader… It’s just such a personal book that it’s hard to revisit.
6. Keep Working on FADDS
The system isn’t perfect, but it’s getting better every playtest. I want to keep playtesting and adding on to the powers. Maybe rethink the advanced classes and powers.
Personal
7. Read 15 Books
Like writing, I need to carve out time to read. It’s important to both my mental energy and health.
8. Play more games with the kids
I need to play more board games and video games now that the kids are getting older. It’ll be a fun activity.
9. Be More Patient
This is a hard one. I yell a little too much and it’s not good for me or the kids. I need more patience with them, work, and life in general.
10. Keep pressing my doctor to find out what those attacks were in November
In November I had some serious health issues. I had massive cramping in my lower left abdomen, fever, weakness, nausea, and fatigue. It happened twice in November and both times faded away.
It also happened last year and I went to the emergency room, but they couldn’t find anything wrong.
In mid-December, I called and asked the receptionist to get a referral to a specialist. I think this is related to my IBS and other issues, but I’m not a doctor.
I’ll keep pushing.
Those are my resolutions for 2021. Ambitious, but less so than in the past.
What does it mean to be human? Do we have a fated purpose? What is life? Do cats have souls? This movie answers and philosophizes left, right, and centre. All while pulling us along a body swap adventure. It’s funny, fun, and has lots to think about.
Despite the trailers making it look it it would, I’m glad the movie didn’t fall into the “Transformed POC” trope.
Story: 1
Characters
The main character is written in such a way that we sympathize with him immediately. There’s no doubting his dream. Then as we see his life through the eyes of another character we start to see his obsession with making it has hurt his ability to live in the moment. It’s a subtle transition that was so well done.
Score: 1
Dialogue
The dialogue was mostly okay but in some parts was amazing. The conversation with his mom, the barber, and the double meanings of so many bits of dialogue between him and 22 are extremely well done.
Score: 1
Visuals and Music
This movie wasn’t about grand vistas and fantasy landscapes like Onward but instead was a lot more about details and abstract concepts. This movie was beautiful. The wood grain on the mother’s tailor shop to the minimalist interpretation of the great beyond’s light. This was breath taking.
The music was fantastic. I love how the pieces he plays are representative of his character growth. I look forward to buying this album.
Score: 1
Fun
This movie was beautiful and fun. My mind still races at the world building. My daughter (4yo) loved it but my 18 month old didn’t sit through it. I’m not sure why. Either way, it’s not a knock on the film but it certainly isn’t the best for small kids.
Score: 1
Overall
The writing and music alone had me enthralled with their complexity and subtly. This movie is smart, funny, beautiful and certainly full of Soul.
Final Score: 5 Stars out of 5*
*A 5 star review doesn’t mean the movie was perfect nor that it is perfect for everyone but it is a movie I believe is as close to perfect as possible.
This year I seem to have watched, and reviewed, 73 films. Wow. Below is a list of them in decending star order. Within each catergory they are in alphabetical order.
Balto seems like a fitting choice for the first movie of 2021 (the week of the 4th), both because of the cold Alaskan setting and because of the need for medicine/vaccine.
Singing, listening to different pieces, learning piano
Crochet
The project she is working on (currently she is making herself a poncho)
Basic Information
We talk about the days of the week and play games with the cutouts of the names. We do the same thing with the names of the months of the year. You can find the print-outs here.
Printing words
In download materials
Counting objects/math-type activities
Practice counting objects and writing how many of each type –in download materials
Addition and pattern – worksheet
Storytime
Activity
Viruses – play pandemic (the game) – if you don’t have it, watch this youtube video Learn about sled dogs (can be a video, a worksheet, etc) Make book of shapes – one shape per page, colour it and describe it (eg. A purple square, a green triangle, a pink heart, a yellow star). Use staples to attach pages together.
Overall, I am incredibly happy with how well the homeschooling of Dragon went this semester. We were able to coordinate with her virtual school teachers, and supplemented her assigned schoolwork with pop culture and other activities.
However, some things are going to change next semester, as I feel like the usefulness is not to it’s full potential.
Overview of each section:
Dance
Ballet and martial arts on alternate days – this will stay the same, although hopefully we’ll be able to do more martial arts.
Music
Singing, listening to different pieces, learning piano – I need to remember to change the disc more often! Piano will continue as long as Dragon and my mother are okay with it.
Crochet
The project she is working on (currently she is making herself a poncho) – We’re going to keep working on this in the new year.
Basic Information
We talk about the days of the week and play games with the cutouts of the names. We do the same thing with the names of the months of the year. We are also doing the seasons of the year, but verbally. – We will keep doing this. She’s doing well with it.
Printing words
This is going to be changing. Rather than asking questions and having one-word answers, I am going to change this to be a bunch of words related to the movie. Hopefully this will help to increase her vocabulary.
Counting objects/math-type activities
This will also be changing. I am going to have two different worksheets in here. One will be a grid similar to this past semester, although I’ll be making it more squares instead of 25. The other will be an addition/subtraction and/or pattern worksheet.
Storytime
This will continue, as Dragon enjoys it, especially since the virtual school gives excellent online books to read.
Vampirina or other short Disney Junior shows will be watched one episode/day in French.
Activities
These have been a big hit and I will continue doing them.
I will be continuing this blog in the new year with a whole new set of movies, sarting with these four in January:
I’ll be honest I only vaguely remembered this and expected it to be a hammy comedy. I was pleasantly surprised. The story was the traditional Musketeers with lines very similar to the book. The beginning was a little slow but overall it was great.
The book is a classic and most movies and shows don’t do it justice.
It was very white, which is both historically inaccurate and frustrating for a work by a black man.
Score: 1
Characters
The characters are great and hold their own versus other versions. The actors are fantastic at what each needs to do. Tim Curry chews the scenery in a way that’s both hilarious and terrifying.
Score: 1
Dialogue
There are lines in it that are brilliant and picked from the books. (With a flick of my wrist I can change your religion.) and then there’s nearly everything Porthos says that is pure gold.
The dialogue manages to oscillate between drama, comedy, and gravitas in a way that is rarer than I like.
Score: 1
Visuals and Music
I’ve watched this movie on VHS, DVD, and now Disney+. The scenery, sets, costumes, and shooting are fantastic. However, when this movie goes dark, it’s so dark that I can’t see it (I’m talking contrast not content. Also I hadn’t watched this in over 20 years and the frustration with the dark scenes was the only thing I remembered clearly). I missed 90% of what happened in the tunnels and darker scenes. It’s extremely annoying.
The music absolutely splendid. The ballad at the end is so completely 1990s.
Score: 0.5
Fun
I really like the balance of funny action adventure, with serious drama. It kept everyone in the family interested (except the toddler who only sat still for a few sword fights).
Score: 1
Overall
This is quite possibly my favourite adaptation of the story and I have nothing but nice things to say. I think it’s pretty good at adapting the material.
Today we’re talking about the 1998 film Ever After.
Story
An interesting twist on the Cinderella story that concentrates more on the meeting and courting before the ball of the lovers. It makes the love story feel slightly more real.
One of the few “realistic” takes on a classic fairy-tale that manages to work.
Score: 1
Characters
The evil stepmother was evil, the prince was handsome, and the Cinderella was spunky and kicked ass. I like that one of the stepsisters was nice.
I’m not super comfortable with the portrayal of the Romani in the movie. Showing them as brigands and thieves with a sense of honour and humour is very cliché and borders on racist.
I adore Da Vinci as an artist, inventor, and plot device but it made me sad that they had to remove a positive female role from the story to have him in there. Couldn’t they have made Gustave’s patron a famous female artist?
Score: 0.5
Dialogue
This is a movie with a lot of dialogue and a lot of subtext. It might be a Cinderella story but it takes a lot from modern romantic comedy banter and Much Ado About Nothing.
I’m not sure how quotable it is, but listening to the banter and dialogue is like listening to a good musical piece.
Score: 1
Visuals and Music
This movie includes some beautiful locations and clothing. It was beautifully shot but everything was marred by a weird blue-green filter. It darkened the movie and made everything look wrong rather than stylish.
The music was lovely and unobtrusive but nothing special.
Score: 0.5
Fun
Watching a movie this long with a three year old and a fourteen month old isn’t very conducive to fun. The three year old liked the colours and movement but lost interest in the long conversations that were the heart of the movie.
Despite that, I enjoyed myself and look forward to watching it with them when they’re older.
Score: 1
Overall
The movie manages to strike the perfect balance between love story, fairy tale, and alternate history. It’s romantic and lovely without much to cringe at.
Borrowing partly from indie slice of life and partly from Christmas romances, this is an easy to watch mix of the two. There’s a mystery and a little angst, but overall wasn’t too bad. There are two parts that I didn’t like. I hate the trope of forcing a character to go on stage and then they rock it. If someone doesn’t want to do it, they shouldn’t be pressured. The second time it happened the character didn’t even do what they were supposed to.
I did however love the mirroring in the story of the train station and the main characters. That was cute and awesome.
Score: 0.5
Characters
Fran Drescher plays the perfect meddling mother. She’s never hurtful and she’s somehow always respectful. A nice change of pace for this character archetype. The rest of the cast is both pretty and easy to watch. The characters are believable and overall pretty authentic. I really liked the dynamic of the brothers and how they had to work at understanding each other.
I also like that the main couple being gay didn’t add to the drama but still influenced the character’s stories and conversations.
Score: 1
Dialogue
This movie had an interesting effect. I laughed and loved the clever dialogue… but I don’t remember any of it. It was fast and clever and never took itself seriously.
Score: 1
Visuals and Music
The movie was well shot, the clothes were fantastic, and locations were stunning. That being said, I wasn’t a fan of the “Northern Lights” scene that looked pretty fake.
The music was good if not memorable.
Score: 0.5
Fun
The movie was fun to watch. It kept my 18 month old completely enthralled. I’m thinking it was the banter, but it could have been my popcorn. The entire family liked it and I hope there will be more like it in the future.
Score: 1
Overall
This is an adorable Christmas love story that is made all the better by wonderful dialogue and authentic representation. I liked this one and look forward to buying a copy for annual watching.
