"Brokeback Mountain" and "Wuthering Heights" - both "one of a kind"?

[serious crayons]

That's The Jungle.

Yeah, I know. I meant I haven't read The Jungle, but I do know vaguely what it's about.

A lot of series seem to do that, these days.

Yes, it does seem to be the new standard structure for dramas, and even comedies.

Did they give him aspirin? I think I read somewhere outside of work that Bayer invented aspirin, but we really don't deal in medical history where I work.

No. Oh, no. That would not be nearly haunting enough for The Nick.

Put it this way, it's the season finale and the final shot lingers on the bottle of the new miracle addiction-curing medicine. I'd give you one more clue regarding how it got its name, but that would give it away.

[serious crayons]

Just now getting back to you on this question. I was frankly PO'ed that four of the five headlining actors in the movie were male, in a film about the Brontës! What's up with that?

I can't even think of four men who'd have been integral to the Brontës' story! There's Branwell, the dad, and eventually Charlotte's husband. Who was the fourth?

Their father reportedly opposed Charlotte's marriage at least partly because he was afraid she'd die in childbirth. Because in those days, marriage inevitably meant pregnancy (unless one of the spouses was infertile or, I guess, maybe gay). And pregnancy often meant death, especially for an older mother. And sure enough, Charlotte got pregnant soon after the wedding and died, not in childbirth but according to Wikipedia for mysterious reasons that may have included dehydration due to severe morning sickness. (Wikipedia mentions the father objecting to the marriage, but because of the husband's finances, not the pregnancy issue.)

The acting was overall very good and the scenery was spectacular. There wasn't much grittiness, at least not period grittiness.

I've been to Haworth, and the scenery is spectacular.

Still their story is inherently fairly gritty. At one time it seemed strange to me that people in 19th-century novels (like Wuthering Heights, for example) so often were depicted as physically frail and dying young deaths. Turns out that's because in the 19th century, people often were physically frail and died young deaths. (Well, not frail -- in fact, arguably stronger than people are now -- but too frail to survive the era's diseases and lack of available health care solutions.)

My ex-husband and I once noted that if we'd lived in the 19th century we'd both have died long before -- him because he has asthma and is allergic to horses. Me because I had a very serious case of measles at age 6 -- so serious the doctor actually made a house call to deliver the life-saving injection. And our oldest son, who once got an infected toe that led to several days in the hospital, would have lost a leg at the very least.

I also was not ready for a three-hour movie, I thought it would be a one-hour first program of a series. Thus, I had to watch it in two parts.

I have it safely tucked away in my DVR, and maybe I'll do the same!  

[Jeff Wrangler]

My ex-husband and I once noted that if we'd lived in the 19th century we'd both have died long before -- him because he has asthma and is allergic to horses. Me because I had a very serious case of measles at age 6 -- so serious the doctor actually made a house call to deliver the life-saving injection. And our oldest son, who once got an infected toe that led to several days in the hospital, would have lost a leg at the very least.

I sure would have, even through the first four--or even five--decades of the 20th century, before antibiotics, or at least before they became common (I forget when Fleming discovered penicillin; I seem to remember reading somewhere that it was only during Word War II that its use became common). I'd have died at age 4 of appendicitis and peritonitis. In a sense I feel I've lived 55 years on borrowed time.

[serious crayons]

I sure would have, even through the first four--or even five--decades of the 20th century, before antibiotics, or at least before they became common (I forget when Fleming discovered penicillin; I seem to remember reading somewhere that it was only during Word War II that its use became common). I'd have died at age 4 of appendicitis and peritonitis. In a sense I feel I've lived 55 years on borrowed time.

Not to keep harping about The Nick, but you would love it. In 1900, they're just starting to experiment with bloody new surgical techniques. They've just discovered X-rays. The only anesthetic the use is cocaine, which is why Clive Owens is addicted to it.

At one point, Dr. Clive Owens, high on cocaine, has this brilliant idea for a surgical technique that involves a blood transfusion. He rushes into the operating room and immediately tries it out on a patient, who promptly dies. Oops! Didn't realize there was more than one type of blood!

There are all kinds of events like that. I guess I don't know how closely it adheres to actual medical history, but I assume it's pretty close.

[southendmd]

It gets off to a very unpromising start but 17 minutes later picks up.

I tried, but I'm afraid I gave up, and earlier than 17 minutes in...

[Front-Ranger]

I tried, but I'm afraid I gave up, and earlier than 17 minutes in...

Yes, it's a very unpromising beginning, that's for sure! Almost daring you to view further.

I've been to Haworth, and the scenery is spectacular.

Haworth is not far from my mother's mother's family's burial place at St. Thomas Beckett Church in Hampthswaite, North Yorkshire, on the river Nidd. I spent a wonderful afternoon there, making rubbings of the family gravestones. The family name is Hardesty, which means hard (close) by the sty. A sty is a little stairway that goes over a fence, in lieu of a gate.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Haworth is not far from my mother's mother's family's burial place at St. Thomas Beckett Church in Hampthswaite, North Yorkshire, on the river Nidd. I spent a wonderful afternoon there, making rubbings of the family gravestones. The family name is Hardesty, which means hard (close) by the sty. A sty is a little stairway that goes over a fence, in lieu of a gate.

That's a stile. But perhaps that's what they call it, or how they pronounce it, in North Yorkshire? So they started spelling it that way?

Otherwise I'm afraid it might mean your ancestors lived close by a place for keeping pigs, That's a sty.

[Front-Ranger]

No, it comes from the Old English word for stair: stǣger; akin to Old English & Old High German stīgan to rise, Greek steichein to walk. Stile is an alternative spelling.

[serious crayons]

I tried, but I'm afraid I gave up, and earlier than 17 minutes in...

  I haven't tried yet.

When I read Wuthering Heights in fifth grade, I made it through the confusing and lengthy introduction by Mr. Lockwood, Heathcliff's tenant and kind of a boring guy who ultimately has little to do with the plot except as a foil for the main characters' vividness, as well as the hard-to-decipher, written-in-dialect rants by Joseph, the servant, an even less essential character, and was able to tolerate the story-within-a-story-within-a-story structure, so maybe I can stick it out to the 17-minute mark.

Then again, when I was in fifth grade there was no such thing as an internet, and I'm afraid I was a much more patient reader then than now.

If I were a fifth grader now, I'd be going, "Emily who?" and "F. Scott what?" and "Did you read that piece in Slate arguing that Bob Dylan actually does have a great voice? Well, I didn't finish it, but it sounded like the guy had a point."

(Actually, I did finish it, and he made a pretty decent argument.)

Haworth is not far from my mother's mother's family's burial place at St. Thomas Beckett Church in Hampthswaite, North Yorkshire, on the river Nidd. I spent a wonderful afternoon there, making rubbings of the family gravestones. The family name is Hardesty, which means hard (close) by the sty. A sty is a little stairway that goes over a fence, in lieu of a gate.

That's a stile. But perhaps that's what they call it, or how they pronounce it, in North Yorkshire? So they started spelling it that way?

Otherwise I'm afraid it might mean your ancestors lived close by a place for keeping pigs, That's a sty.

Stairway or pigpen, it sounds like a beautiful place for a burial ground. And what a great idea to make rubbings of the family gravestones!

(Brokie extra credit: Notice anything familiar in the construction of the first sentence in the paragraph above?)

[Jeff Wrangler]

Stairway or pigpen, it sounds like a beautiful place for a burial ground. And what a great idea to make rubbings of the family gravestones!

(Brokie extra credit: Notice anything familiar in the construction of the first sentence in the paragraph above?)

You just like the direction it's going?