Elementary Season Finale/Spoiler Alert!

Ok so over this last year I have given my critique on this TV show. For the most part my thoughts have been that it’s kind of boring and slow, and reminds me of Monk. It didn’t really move me at all. Also, since Lucy Liu is not a very good actor, it makes the show even more mundane.

Having said that, last nights episode is how the show should be every week. If your going to do an American version at least have good writers. So that it doesn’t get compared to the exceptional BBC show. Oh yes good actors would help too.

The captain, makes me fall asleep, his second, boring as ever, and Watson, please. What I do like is the lady playing Moriarty/Irene, Natalie Dormer. She was AMAZING.

I thought they played that right, very interesting to mix the 2 characters together and dupe Sherlock. Very interesting touch.

That was the most cleverly written thing they did all season. I pray we will see more episodes like that for season 2, PLEASE! That might make Lucy Liu forgivable!!!

 

Daily Prompt: The Interview/A Conversation With Sherlock Holmes

Jeremy Brett, the quintessential Sherlock/photo by: fanpop.com

Interview your favorite fictional character.

So today, I interviewed Dr. Sherlock Holmes, a well renowned investigator/finder of lost loves, etc. He doesn’t normally give interviews but since he enjoys my blog he decided to talk to me. I feel rather privilege to say the least. The only things off-limits to talk about were, Irene Adler, and specific cases. 

Me: Well sir I want to thank you for speaking to me today, I feel so honored to have this opportunity.

Dr: You’re welcome. By the way, please call me Sherlock.

Me: Well, Sherlock, I just wanted to ask you a little about your upbringing and how you came to understand your gift for deduction?

Dr: Well, I knew something was different about me very early, maybe around the age of 9 or 10. Always, getting into trouble in school, etc.  The funny thing is, my brother although he and I share some of the same gifts, his manifested earlier than mine, and he knew how he wanted to use his gift, very early in life. I, however, needed lot’s of direction. You know, to guide my gift in a positive way.

Me: Interesting, can you expound on that? What do you mean, when you say more positive?

Dr: Yes, I can explain, I mean when I was young and started using this gift as you call it, I would usually use it to make others uncomfortable. Surely, you understand what I mean? For instance, I might start, looking at one of my mother’s friends, and start telling them their life story for that day, because, maybe I didn’t like them. Or something like that.

Me: Oh, yes I understand, you would start reading them?

Dr: Yes, exactly, I think I did that because I wanted attention, and since my brother got most of it, I decided, attention was attention negative or positive, and I took whatever I could get, at the time.

Me: So, do you think that maybe by getting in trouble for doing this, made you think, maybe using it for good will be a better direction? Or did someone have to help you come to that conclusion?

Dr: Dear, I came to that with the help of my brother. He showed me how I could have the right kind of reaction, by using it in a positive way. As well as, becoming a kind of local hero in my hometown, if you will.

Me: Did your mother and brother continue to encourage that? Or, did it become a kind of competition between you and your brother? Oh and did your mother also have the gift?

Dr: My mother and brother did encourage me, but it was also obvious, that this is what I should be doing. I gather, I just needed that first push, if you will. It’s something of a curse, so it’s interesting that you call it a gift. I understand why you call it that, though. Because, it really helps others and for that, I guess your right it is a gift. However, I wouldn’t wish this gift on anyone, because, it’s hard to rest the brain. My mother, did not have that gift, but my brother and I, taught her how to deduce, kind of like I’ve done with Dr. Watson. And yes, now it’s become a bit of competition with my brother, but he uses his gift in a more secretive way then I.

Me: Oh yes, how did you get your doctor status? Did you attend college to get it?

Dr: Yes, but not to be a doctor, I got an honorary doctorate, for outstanding investigative work on a case, blah, blah, blah. I think it’s kind of silly these titles. Dr. Watson always, rolls his eyes at me when I say that, I think he disapproves that, I don’t take it that seriously. (chuckling).

Me: Oh dear look at the time, I think we are done, they told me only 30 minutes. So, thank you so much for speaking to me, hope to chat with you again. And thanks for reading and commenting on my blog posts!!! Cheers, Sherlock.

Dr: Thank you dear, my pleasure.  Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

The Great Gatsby (2013)

Ok, so I’m not sure why anyone would want to make a movie about this topic?

I thought it was super down trodden and kind of pointless. Having said that, Leonardo is brilliant in it. I also thought the costumes were great. The music was a little strange, and the moral of the story was convoluted, and confusing.

photo from http://www.reviewtrailers.com

Sometimes, trailers mislead you and this is one of them. If you don’t know anything about the story, you will think it’s about something else.

Director, Baz Luhrmann, (Romeo & Juliet, Strickly Ballroom) loves to use actors in their late 20′s and 30′s pretty much across the board as his main characters, in most of his productions. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen anyone over 40 play a main character ever. He likes everything sparkly, which is fine but, it lacks range, to his directing style and makes him kind of predictable.

This movie was ok, but I’m not a fan of Toby McGuire, and his narration or acting. Basically if he had divulged certain information to the main character Gatsby, he would have been helpful instead of looking dumbfounded/baffled, in every scene.  Also, I have yet to understand, why was it in 3D? Anyway, I give this movie a grade of C. Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

Daily Prompt: I Want to Know What Love Is/God Is Love…

We each have many types of love relationships — parents, children, spouses, friends. And they’re not always with people; you may love an animal, or a place. Is there a single idea or definition that runs through all the varieties of “love”?

I love flowers

Wow, what a great topic, and what an easy answer. God runs through all varieties of love, without God we wouldn’t know love. One definition of who God is, is love. 1 John 4:19 ~ We love because he first loved us.(ESV) There are as many examples of his love for us, as their are emotions for us to love.

Agape ~ In the New Testament, the fatherly love of God for humans and their reciprocal love for God. The term extends to the love of one’s fellow humans. (Merriam-Webster, Dictionary example)

There’s also a difference between emotional love, and godly love, emotional love is fickle and impulsive. Godly love however, is everlasting and faithful.

1 John 4:8 ~ Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.

One that I really love quoting from scripture is, 1 Peter 4:8 ~ Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.(ESV)

This verse helps me remember that if someone does me harm, or treats me badly, that instead of being embittered toward them, I should forgive them. These concepts although difficult, are the best way to stay healthy emotionally, and physically.

The other interesting thing about these concepts, is the only way anyone can practice this, is by being Christian, trying to do these concepts any other way will lead to failure, because it’s by His spirit, that makes anyone able to do these things. Without that spirit, impossible.

Since, love begins and ends with Christ, the ability to practice this great truth can only be done because of that kind of love. John 3:16 ~ For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.(ESV)

That’s, that genuine love that never fails, but always endures, without it we would be useless. One aspect that love isn’t, is self-centered. Self love does not endure but dies with the person that loves themself. Love is an outward action. Show me what you love, and I will show you if Christ lives there. Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

Weekly Photo Challenge: Patterns

Pattern. Patterns are everywhere. Patterns are sometimes intentional and sometimes accidental. They can be decorative or merely a result of repetition, and often patterns can be in the eye of the beholder to discover them. 

Here is my post for patterns, some natural, some man made. I got all of these today when I went to Raley’s. Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

Daily Prompt: Morphing/Poppin Tags…

Language evolves. The meaning of a word can shift over time as we use it differently — think of “cool,” “heavy,” or even “literally.”

Today, give a word an evolutionary push: give a common word a new meaning, explain it to us, and use it in the title of your post.

So, the other day I got a lesson in slang 101 by my daughter. She asked me of we could go to the store and pop some tags? I looked at her puzzled and asked, “umm, what did you say?” She then laughed and said,” can we go thrift store shopping?”

Since we live in Sacramento, CA, there are many thrift stores around so she says this town is heaven for her. But back to “poppin tags.” If you look in the urban dictionary it says, poppin tags, is taking price tags off new clothes, but, no. She says it means, going thrift store shopping, and there is even a song about it called, poppin some tags.

Some serious poppin tag shopping going on

I think young people’s language can be pretty creative and funny, as well as, one blogger put it, disrespectful and lazy. They can have some real clever sayings, that instead of putting someone down can make it funny. As well, as being a code so that others don’t know your putting someone down.

Like, being “loud” or “intense”, can morph into, being “all the way turned up.” Poppin tags though really needs a translator, I would never imagined that meant, going thrift store shopping, and when she explained how that means that, I was more confused. However, it was very funny, and made me chuckle and then she proceeded that, by singing the song…THE YOUTH OF TODAY!!!! Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

Daily Prompt: Success!!!

Tell us about a time where everything you’d hoped would happen actually did.

Raising my daughter

1 Corinthians 13:7 ~ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. ~

Lani, was born, July 4th, 1991, she was 8lbs. 10oz. She was a very easy going baby and child as she grew up.

She had a very keen understand of how and why things happened, she loved arts and crafts, actually thrived on being creative. During her whole life, I hoped she would be a sports enthusiast like me, but she wasn’t. More importantly though, I wanted her to be a Christian.

In my mind this was a huge undertaking, I mean really, how do you teach that? Especially when this wasn’t happening in your home as a child? By reading the bible and pressing on. So as I raised her, I tried to keep this always in the for front of my mind, be a good example, teach her about Jesus, remember your example, don’t be a hypocrite, give her life pictures of Christ, help her to memorize scripture, and on and on. Knowing for the most part, that as a baby, she would only be doing these things I was teaching her as behavior. Until, she reached a certain age and all the outward things connected to her heart and they became her hearts desire.

~God is not dealing with just outward behavior, but what is deep and down and dirty, and in our thoughts.~

As we attended to church each Sunday, my pastor John Macarthur, would encourage us to talk to our young children about sin, and what that means.

How sin is the dominant problem in our lives and we must hate it. So as I took his advice, and did just that, I found out that she didn’t like me to call it sin, when she did something wrong, but “mistakes.” I thought, that was interesting. She would have been about 5 when she told me this. 5 was a key number of understanding in her life I guess.

So I told her that wasn’t going to happen, that we were going to call sin what it was, sin. So as I had to talk to her about things she did wrong, I continued to use this word. As I had to use it when I did something wrong as well. Over time, it just became how we talked about things that we did wrong. I tried not to justify my bad behavior or hers.

By the time she was 14 and went to a winter camp, she said she understood why Jesus died on the Cross. This was a profound moment, she understood what all that sin talk meant as a kid, and said she wanted know more about Jesus. This was a wonderful moment for me, I was so excited that she was now mourning over her sin and understanding that God hated it.

Over time, about the age 18 she was really convicted about the sin in her life, we at the time, were living with family, who didn’t know or honor God, and we had to move out of there quickly.

We settled in Sacramento via Oakland, CA. Found a church home after leaving Southern CA, and started attending our new church by the time she was 19. All the while, trying to encourage her to see the world for what it was, and to not put any hopes in it, but to trust God for all things.

As we attended our new church in Sac as the natives call it, she blossomed and was hungry for Christ, wanting to know and love him now.

So this is what I hoped, and long for, all the while dealing with my own sinful heart. I mean really, how does one sinner, teach another sinner, to hate sin? The answer is, a sinner can’t, but Christ can, and he uses my weaknesses, and my confession of my weakness to show others not to trust in themselves and their weakness, but to trust in Him and His strength, because He conquered sin, He killed it with his sinless/righteous life. So, as she saw my sinfulness, she realized that all of us are in a spiritual battle to hate and to put away the sin in us.

~A Christian has sin in their life but it’s been paid for because Christ conquered sin and death on the cross, so as a Christian repents and turns away from that sin, he’s washed clean and made right with God.~

This also, is quite humbling as a parent because your children look up to you, but as they get older, they start to see the imperfections and sinful character in you, and it’s not pretty. However, I hope parents who love Christ, are being honest about sin from the beginning, so that Christ is exalted, and not their clever parenting style. This is the only way for my child to see Christ, as I submit to Christ, it becomes Christ in me that my daughter see’s. Here is the scripture, about what love is, and that God is love, and as we teach our children about Christ we are loving them fully and completely, but not because I say so, but because of this scripture:

1 Corinthians 13:7 ~ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. ~

This was my hope for her and that’s what I received, that she would be converted to Christ not because of my parenting but because of Christ, and that is my encouragement to you and your children. Shazza ~ Musings&Rants

Lani at grad night 2009. She loves color!