Tag dailyprompt

10 Movies I Like a Lot

Todd R 4 Comments
Daily writing prompt
What are your top ten favorite movies?
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As a change of pace today, I’ve decided to answer a writing prompt: “What are your top ten favorite movies?”  I don’t really have a top ten list, but I’ll share ten that I could probably watch over and over and not get tired of.  So, here we go…

Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Most of these won’t be ranked but this one is definitely #1.  There’s no other movie where I’m laughing constantly before things even happen because I know what’s coming.  People probably don’t like watching it with me.  Sure, the ending is terrible, but it’s so much fun along the way!

Braveheart
This one is the clear #2, but the other 8 are in no particular order.  Not many movies are 3 hours long, and you don’t mind it or feel it at all.  There’s no wasted time in this one, and it’s a great story.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
This is my favorite of the books, and my favorite of the movies.  The scenes from Weathertop on through the Mines of Moria are probably my favorite sequence within any book or movie.  None other shall pass!

The Matrix
This was so stunning when it came out in terms of special effects and also the big ideas in it.  Philosophically, it’s still an ugly mess but it remains interesting long after you see it.  It may seem like you’ve been living two lives.

Spider Man: No Way Home
The Marvel Cinematic Universe movies are a mixed bag, but this one was definitely made for the true Spider Man fanboys.  He was my favorite for the short time I collected comics, and this movie was chock full of references without seeming contrived.  I left the theater saying I wanted to walk right back in and watch it again.

Tenet
This one makes the list ahead of Inception partly because of when I saw it, in November 2020 in the theater.  Times were tough during the Covid-19 pandemic and I needed to get out and escape.  The complicated and bizarre premise and plot of this movie got my mind off of everything else for a while.  It also made me want to borrow a fire truck.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
This one is in the same camp as Fellowship above, my favorite book and movie in a series.  The scenes in and around the shrieking shack part are so well-paced and move the story forward so much in a short time.

Empire Strikes Back
Many other people are much bigger Star Wars fans than I am.  I like only a few of the movies, but this was the first one I saw when it was new in the theater!  Full of iconic moments and lines, I think this is where Star Wars peaked those many years ago.

Shawshank Redemption
A true classic and one of the best movies ever made.  The sequence of revelations at the climax of the movie, while seeing how diligently Andy overcome the injustice of his situation, is fiendishly clever.  Also, Red is one of Morgan Freeman’s best roles.

Singin’ in the Rain
Last but definitely not least, another true all-time classic.  This movie just makes you laugh and smile all the way through it, and Make ‘Em Laugh does exactly what it says.  I love that they gave Donald O’Connor a moment to shine, because Gene Kelly tends to steal every scene he’s in. And there they are, 10 movies I really like a lot.  Which of these are your favorites too?

Dominion: My Favorite Game

Todd R 2 Comments
Daily writing prompt
What’s your favorite game (card, board, video, etc.)? Why?
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Today’s writing prompt asks: “What’s your favorite game (card, board, video, etc.)? Why?”

Other than reading and writing, playing games probably takes up the most of my spare time.  I do play some video games, especially ones my kids are into, and that we can play together, but my favorite type of games are board games.  I’ve grown much more interested in board games in the last few years after meeting a few people at church who play them a lot, especially some of the more complicated ones.  These are people who refer to Catan and Carcassonne as “gateway games.”  We try to have regular game nights, but differing schedules often get in the way.  But fortunately, everyone in my family likes to play them, and so we do, often!

Dominion is my favorite board game and there are good reasons for that: it combines a pretty simple basic structure with a vast library of card expansions.  Typically, on your turn, you draw 5 cards, and each turn has 3 phases that go in order, using the starting 5 cards and likely some others.

First, you play Action cards that do things like give you more actions to do, draw more cards, attack other players, and many, many other things.  Next, you have a Buy phase where you play Treasure cards (basically, money) to, well, buy more cards.  Dominion is considered to have popularized (if not invented) the “deck builder” type of game because of this mechanic.  You end your turn by putting all the cards you played and all cards in your hand into your discard pile, which you shuffle when you need to when drawing 5 cards at the start of your turn or at other times.  The rest of the rules are essentially to follow the instructions on the cards you play.  You win by getting the most victory points, which are on Victory cards you can buy.

A basic example Action card is Market (pictured above), which lets you draw one more card, play one more action, buy one more thing during your buy phase, and get one more coin to spend.  A more complex card is something like Jester (also pictured) which gives you 2 coins but also may let you get a card for free from the supply.  It might also let you give your opponent a Curse (-1 point) or some other card you don’t want.

Jester doesn’t come with the base game, but from one of the 16 current expansion sets (I have 7 of them).  These expansion sets, which typically have about 25 more, different cards, are what makes the game so replayable.  Aside from the Victory and Treasure cards, which are pretty standard from game to game, each game has 10 “Kingdom” cards that you can choose however you want.  I’ve played hundreds of hands of Dominion and it’s never been the same way twice, unless we really liked a set of Kingdom cards and repeated it.

And that’s what makes Dominion my favorite game: simple basic mechanics combined with near-infinite customizability.

Honorable mention goes to Wingspan, a game where you collect bird cards.

If you’re into board games, what’s your favorite?

The Most Memorable Vacation

Todd R 4 Comments
Daily writing prompt
Describe your most memorable vacation.
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In June – July of 2022, we took a 12-day family trip to the UK and it’s a trip I appreciate more and more as time passes.  Our days were packed with activities, and I can’t write about them all, but here are some the best memories, in the order we did them.  I’m writing this post in response to a prompt on WordPress: “Describe your most memorable vacation.”

After landing at Heathrow on the morning of June 27th, we drove our rental car to Oxford and did a tour of Christ Church college.  Having only a few hours, we chose this one college since some of the Hogwarts campus in the Harry Potter movies was based on it.  There’s a distinctive stairwell there that appeared in some of the films, and the Great Hall here inspired the dining hall in Hogwarts (the one with all the floating candles).  What I didn’t realize until visiting Christ College was that Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) was a student here and much of his “Alice in Wonderland” world and characters were based on his experience here.  Some of the stained glass in the Great Hall features his characters.[1]

On our second day, the family split up and my son and I, who love going to amusement parks together, went to Alton Towers, the premier park in the UK.  We love roller coasters, and my son was really grateful that we prioritized this, even choosing the house we rented based on how close it was to the park.  The highlight of the day was riding The Smiler, the coaster with the most inversions (14) in the world, 3 times.  Our son wore a T shirt that day listing some coaster manufacturers, and The Smiler checked off the last one listed on the shirt, Gerstlauer.

A view from our day on Mount Snowdon.

Day 3 was our only day spent outside of England.  We did a road trip to Wales, and this ended up being my daughter’s favorite day of the trip.  On a friend’s recommendation, we took a train up Mount Snowdon, the tallest mountain in Wales, but unfortunately due to construction we were only able to go ¾ of the way up the mountain.  The train stopped there, and we spent ½ hour walking around before heading back down.  The views were amazing!  I’ve written another blog post about how beautiful and green this mountain was, which you can read here.

On the fifth day, on our way from our rental house in the country to our rental in a London suburb, we spent the afternoon in Bath, England, one of my favorite cities.  My wife and I visited there once before, and we were glad to come back and share it with the kids.  We toured the old Roman baths, which I wrote about in this blog post, and also had afternoon tea in the “Pump Room.”  It’s called that because they pump up water from the hot springs below and you can have a taste.  In Victorian times, they thought this water had medicinal properties, but now it just tastes like bad mineral water.  The tea was rather formal, and our kids tried some new foods, some good, some bad.

On day 8 we finally made it to London (on July 4th!) and the first big memory was our visit to the National Gallery, an art museum.  It’s an amazing museum that has one of my favorite works, The Supper at Emmaus by Caravaggio.  But this wasn’t the most memorable part.  You may have seen news of protests targeting works of art across Europe, where the protestors glue themselves to art frames or otherwise vandalize it.  Turns out that while we were in the National Gallery, some of these protestors posted a dark, dystopian version of The Hay Wain by John Constable over the original.  Because of this, they closed off the part of the gallery we were heading to.  Remarkably, on our flight home we were playing a trivia game on the plane and The Hay Wain was the answer to one of the questions!

Day 9 may have been the best day of the trip, which started with a Beefeater-guided tour[2] of the Tower of London, and ended with seeing Les Misérables at the Sondheim Theater.  Seeing a show on the West End was a bucket list item for my wife, and my son worked in theater production in high school, so it was a big deal for both of them, but we all really enjoyed the show.  If I ever see a better show, I’ll be shocked.  It was amazing and will be hard to top.

Those are the highlights for me, and of course we did many other things like visiting many “castles and churches,” as my kids say.  We did some touristy things like going to Harrod’s, seeing the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace[3], riding the London Eye, and visiting the British Museum.  It was a packed vacation and my most memorable ever.

Have you been to the UK (or live there)?  What are some of your best memories?

[1] Later in the trip, we saw his burial place in Westminster Abbey.
[2] Our guide, Emma Rousell, was great and was just the third woman ever to be appointed as a Yeoman Warder (“Beefeater”) at the Tower.
[3] Among other things, the bands played songs by Bon Jovi and Queen.  The crowd sang along.

Verses to Live and Blog By

Todd R 2 Comments
Daily writing prompt
What gives you direction in life?
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Today’s post is another response to a writing prompt: “What gives you direction in life?”  The short answer to the question is a who, not a what: God.  Without a meaningful origin and destiny that comes from having a loving Creator and Lord, I’m not sure where I would find direction.

The longer answer is that God’s communication to us through the Bible provides direction for both life and for this blog.  Here, I write what I need to hear.  I write about things I learn about the direction my life should go, and I share it with my readers.  So, my longer answer to this writing prompt are some key verses and themes that guide both my life and my writing.  Although I routinely fail to live up to them, they provide a good and meaningful direction.

The first verse is Hebrews 10:24, which says: “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works”. Christianity should be lived, not just known or believed.  So, how do I stir up myself and others to loving action? We can’t do it without knowing that’s the goal and by consistent meditation on it.  We should ask ourselves what tools, gifts and resources we have to help others grow in “love and good works.”  For me, this blog is one of those tools.  For others, they could approach this very differently.  We all have our own directions, but similar goals.

The second verse is Ephesians 2:10. “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” We are not created and saved just to do whatever we want, but God has plans for each of us.  He puts work to do in front of us, for the good of us and those around us, and for His glory.  Nothing is an accident.  He made us each for a reason.

Next comes Philippians 1:6. “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”  We all fail so often; therefore, we need reminders that God isn’t done with us, and will never give up on us.  He didn’t die for us just to leave us hanging and alone.  His purpose is to make us perfectly loving people, like Jesus was, and His work will certainly be completed in eternity.  Thank Him for this!

Jeremiah 29:7 is another important guiding verse. “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”  Which world was Jesus referring to in John 3:16 when He said, “God so loved the world”?  There’s only one world, the one we all live in, and He wants us to work for the good of that world.  Imagine if Jesus had taken the attitude that this world is hopelessly lost in its sin.  He would have never came to die for it, and we would all be lost forever.  Likewise, we can’t give up on the world around us, especially our nearest neighbors.

And finally, Matthew 22:37-40. “And he said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.  On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.’”  In my opinion, Christians don’t talk enough about love, and we don’t put enough thought and effort into how to do it.  Many Christians even have trouble defining what love is.  For more on that, read this article I wrote a while back.  Without Christ, we are all God’s enemies, so if He didn’t love His enemies we could never be His neighbors.  Only by living a life entirely guided by love for God and our neighbor, even if they are our enemy, can we live the life God intended us to live.

So, what gives me direction in life?  Trying to understand and live by what God wants of me.  These verses are only the beginning, but they’re verses that mean a lot to me.

What gives you direction in life?

Separating Good and Evil

Todd R 2 Comments
Daily writing prompt
Do you have a quote you live your life by or think of often?
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Today’s post is responding to a writing prompt: “Do you have a quote you live by or think of often?”  The most influential quote to me is this one from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn:

“The line separating good and evil passes, not through states, not between political parties either, but right through all human hearts.”

Much of the conflict in history, and in modern times, comes from a human tendency to group people into separate groups, where one is “evil”, and the other is “good.”  There are probably thousands of examples throughout history, but some that come to mind are religious categories like Catholic versus Protestant, political categories like Republican versus Democrat, or Marxist categories like “oppressed” versus “oppressor.”  Humanity follows a pattern over and over again, where we lump people into categories, then attack our enemies accordingly.  If someone belongs to the “other” group, they are evil, and if someone belongs to our own group, they are good.

In opposition to this, the Solzhenitsyn quote calls to attention Romans 3:23, which declares: “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  This verse, and the quote, tear down the idea that people can be easily separated into “good” and “evil.”  That nations can be divided into good and evil.  That political parties can be categorized as good and evil.  Because every single person included in every single one of these categories is themselves a mix of good and evil, each of the groups themselves is a mix of good and evil.

Therefore, the quote calls us to treat people as individuals, dealing with them according to their specific situation and needs.  Without accepting that each person is imperfect (at best), societies may pretend to treat people as individuals, but they’re really stereotyping people according to their groups and pitting them in battle against each other.

For the Christian church, the quote doesn’t demand that we withdraw from politics altogether, but it does demand that we act with more compassion toward those we disagree with.  All too often, and especially on social media, we see category-based name calling and condemnation coming from Christians who categorize people and work hard to defeat those enemies that belong to other groups.

However, Jesus said in Matthew 5:43:
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

Imagine if we followed Jesus’ words.  Imagine if everyone could be humble based on the evil that lives within them, and therefore treat the people who we view as evil as equals before God, and just as in need of grace as we are.  The church, and the world, would be much better off if Christians were as good at loving their enemies as they are at identifying them.

Therefore, a quote that drives a lot of what I think, write, and do is this one:

“The line separating good and evil passes, not through states, not between political parties either, but right through all human hearts.”