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characters, TV, Watch

Sherlock S3 Ep1 (Spoilers!!)

elouisebates

I, being the patient part of the fandom, waited to watch Sherlock S3 until it aired here in the States. And then I waited one more day because a 10:00 start time is way too late for me, especially when the next day is a school day and I must have some semblance of a brain in order to teach.

But now! Now I’ve watched it, and I’m exploding with Thoughts.

(Spoilers follow. You’ve been warned.)

(I personally don’t mind spoilers for some things, but I did, very much, want to watch Sherlock without anyone else’s thoughts or reactions influencing mine, so for this one I did avoid spoilers like the plague.)

**********

I loved it. Mostly.

Side note: I have struggled, in the past, with calling myself a fan, because I don’t obsess over things, or have to know every detail, and because I don’t mind admitting when the Thing I Love has flaws. But I’m getting over that, and even though I say yes, Sherlock has flaws, and even though I waited to watch it until a sensible time, I really am a fan. Just not a fanatic.

So yes, it had flaws. I really dislike how the show has gone from Sherlock being aware of social conventions and how people will react to him, and merely choosing to ignore it, to how he is utterly clueless about everyone. Before he was well aware that the things he said were hurtful, and just didn’t care. Now, especially with John, he hasn’t got a clue. “No, of course John won’t mind that I never told him I was dead! Of course he’ll think it a big joke that I surprise him in a restaurant, in public, while he’s on a date, to reveal that I’m alive!”

Um, no. Sherlock Holmes is many things, but he’s not dense.

(I also don’t like how the viewers are invited to wink wink, nudge nudge, snicker snicker along with him whenever he plays John. The raw pain of John’s goodbye last season is not something I care to giggle about now that it’s over. Sorry.)

But! I love Mary (really, really, surprising even myself, love her character). I love how smart she is (she figured out the code within moments!) and her common sense, and her adventurous side, and her warmth, and pretty much everything about her. I hope she sticks around for the rest of the show’s duration, because it would be tragic to lose her.

I like the playing with all the different theories the fandom has concocted explaining Sherlock’s demise, and that we’re never exactly sure how it really did go down. I do hope that the explanation Sherlock gives Anderson is at least partially correct, because that was MY theory – the before part, not the actual jump part.

I was certain, upon my last watch of Reichenbach Fall, that Sherlock and Mycroft were playing Moriarty from the beginning. It seemed impossible to me that he could trick Mycroft the way he claimed to, or that Sherlock could really be two steps behind him all the way. I wasn’t quite sure of their purpose in playing him, but I knew that they were. So when Sherlock told Anderson that he and Mycroft had it all planned, in order to discover the extent of Moriarty’s network, I felt rather pleased with myself. I don’t care if the jump part is right, but I very much want that aspect to be true.

I like the relationship between Molly and Sherlock, and how she humanizes him more than John, even, maybe because he got used to John and didn’t listen to him after a while, but he’s not as familiar with Molly and so still pays attention to her. I  love how she’s not intimidated by him anymore. All in all, it was the women of Sherlock that really won me over this episode (Mrs Hudson, of course, was spot on as always. Her little comments during Sherlock’s exchange with Mycroft in the flat were priceless.).

The mystery itself was fairly uninspiring. I never felt much tension over it, or even cared that much – but that was okay. The focus of the episode was clearly on Sherlock coming back to life, and that’s as it should be. I did hate the scene at the end, where Sherlock tricks John into forgiving him, and John finally breaks down and laughs, ha ha, you’re a jerk Sherlock but that’s okay, everything’s fine. Um, no. Mary, please slap both of them upside the head.

Although I did like how they poked gentle fun at the shows where, with one minute left on the ticking clock, the scene plays out for fifteen or so minutes. I was sitting there snarkily going “well, that’s the longest two minutes ever,” and then you find out Sherlock stopped the clock and it really wasn’t meant to be two minutes at all. Well played that, show.

All in all, it was a great episode, and I do like how they’re trying to show Sherlock becoming more human. It’s a fumbling effort on their part, but that’s okay, because one can only imagine Sherlock is fumbling in it too. He’s very adept at pretending to be human, but he sucks at the real thing. It’s okay if the show drops the ball here and there, too.

Have you seen it? What are your thoughts, if so?

children, school

January School Days

elouisebates

We unintentionally took most of the month of December off from scheduled school, due to my grandfather’s death, our unplanned trip to up my folks’ for the calling hours and burial, and then, of course, CHRISTMAS. We’d planned to take the first two weeks of January off because of traveling, which did indeed happen. All told, though, it’s been somewhere between four to six weeks since we sat down at the table and actually did a day’s worth of schoolwork. So I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised when Joy and I sat down with her math book this morning and she couldn’t even remember how to add up to ten without counting on her fingers.

We’re plugging away at it, though, and I trust that we’ll be back in the swing of things by the end of the week. I hope so, because I want to add “project time” to our school day soon – a time set aside for the girls to work on a specific self-directed project, with me available to assist and talk if they need it, but not in charge. I think first those will be finishing up some previously started and then abandoned projects, but then we will be starting from scratch. Much of our apartment rearranging right after the New Year was to give the girls a space dedicated to their project work – we have their little table and a desk set aside just for them now, right by the big window in the living room.

Gracie is almost finished with her Kumon preschool books. She can read “cat” “dog” “kitten” “woof” “meow” and “Biscuit.” (Can you guess what her favorite stories are?) With help, she can sound out most other basic words. It is just as thrilling to see her start to unlock the joys of reading as it was her sister. Never, ever gets old.

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Joy and I have learned about the desert and the woods as habitats; the difference between mammals and invertebrates; tackled bacteria briefly before deciding it was too advanced for first grade; and are now learning about birds. Science is her favorite subject right now. We’re partway through her Singapore Math 1A book. It’s a slow process, but since these are basic and crucial skills, I want to make sure she’s grasped them before moving on to the next level. We’ve made it up to Moses and the Exodus from Egypt in our Story of the World social studies book, and will be reading about the Phoenicians next. She’s almost finished with her handwriting book, which means it will be time to start grammar soon (she’s actually excited about this, because she’s started writing stories and wants to know how to use punctuation properly). We’d been reading through Little House in the Big Woods for school, but she reads enough – and at a high enough level – on her own free time that I’ve not been pushing that recently.

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Drawing, ballet, figure skating, knitting, weaving, winter walks, cooking … we try to keep up with all these “extra-curricular” activities, too. As well as getting together with friends outside of scheduled activities on a regular basis!

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We’re still mostly following a classical model, but we eased the pressure off of ourselves to adhere too strictly to the curriculum – aside from math, she’s already well ahead of most public schooled first graders, so I don’t think I need to panic quite so much about us being told she’s not receiving a proper education at the end of the year. Which was, honestly, my main reason for trying to do SO much. Our main goal, for both girls, is that they learn how to learn, how to think, how to figure something out if they don’t know how to do it, and how to take charge of their own education (eventually). Carl and I spent a lot of time over “winter break” discussing goals, methods, plans, curriculum, etc, and I think we’re both really excited for laying the groundwork over these next few years for the kids to grow into enthusiastic and independent learners.

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God, Life Talk, philosophy

{Don’t} Plug In

elouisebates

In the second year of our marriage, all the guys in our Young Marrieds/College Student Bible Study got together for a game night. Hey, thought I, I’ll invite the girls over to our apartment that same evening for movies and snacks. I sent out the invite, everyone responded enthusiastically, I spent that day cleaning and baking in prep.

Carl headed out for the game night, and I eagerly anticipated doing one of the things we’d dreamed about when we were engaged and talking about married life – opening our home to others, making it a warm, welcoming place, having it be full of life and laughter. We hadn’t had too many chances to invite people into our home yet; somehow, the folks in the church seemed hard to get to know, despite their often-quoted statement of “plug yourselves in! Find where you fit! Reach out to others!” This, though, reminded me of the Saturday game/movie/pizza nights I’d hosted all through college. This, surely, would start to bring us closer to people.

Five minutes before everyone was supposed to arrive, just as I was starting to hover by the window in case anyone got there early, I got a phone call from our Bible Study leader. Everyone had called her earlier in the day to let her know they weren’t going to be able to make it after all. She couldn’t come either, and she felt so bad about nobody coming that she hadn’t been able to bring herself to call me before. She felt so bad about making me feel bad, in fact, that I had to spend our entire  conversation consoling her. When I finally hung up the phone, feeling a bit bemused, I thought that at least Carl and I would have plenty of baked goods and a nice clean apartment for the next few days.

Then I got another phone call, this one from the new girl in church, the college student who had just started coming, the one that I hadn’t even met yet but only communicated with through email, the one I had invited on impulse, thinking she might like a chance to get to know some other students. She was on her way, she said, but she was going to be a little bit late because she’d gotten lost. I told her not to worry – it looked like it was just going to be the two of us, so she wasn’t holding anyone up.

By the time Carl got home that evening, Ash and I had been so busy talking that we’d completely forgotten about watching a movie. She left with the invitation to return for dinner in a couple days, and the promise that we would, in fact, get to watching the movie soon.

In the next four years that we lived in Pennsylvania, Ash became much more than just a friend – she was our little sister. She helped me buy a pregnancy test when I was too scared to go alone. She was actually at our house when I took the test and found out Joy was on her way. She came to us with family troubles, with guy troubles, with her joys and fears, and we likewise shared with her ours. She spent many a night on our couch because she’d stayed too late for us to trust her to stay awake driving home. She used our house and kitchen when she wanted to cook for friends. She and I went skating together, sharing our love for the sport. When she fell in love, it was our house she brought her boyfriend to, for our approval, not her actual family’s.

I’ve lost touch with most of the people from that Bible Study. Some I keep in very casual contact with through FB. But Ash is still one of my dearest friends. I was matron-of-honor in her wedding; Joy was flower girl. Through many moves and life changes we’ve stayed in touch, even if it’s only a few emails a year, and we each have a standing invitation to come to the other’s home if we’re ever in the area, even if a visit isn’t planned.

I am not a fan of the “plug yourself in to a group” mentality. To me, authentic friendship takes time, it takes effort, it takes a few individuals working together to build something meaningful. Even in blogging – when I try just jumping in and commenting on someone’s blog, I most often get no response. But there are one or two bloggers with whom I’ve slowly, over time, with both of us making the effort to get to know each other, gotten to be good friends with. And those relationships are far more meaningful to me than a few scattered comments on (or even from) a hundred different blogs.

Maybe, instead of “plugging in,” giving an image of instant electricity, we should start trying to “build fires” instead – a slow, painstaking process, but one infinitely more satisfying in the end.

Baby Joy with “Tia” Ash on a family picnic
Uncategorized

Happy Winter Thoughts

elouisebates

It’s a cold day outside – granted, practically balmy compared to the -16°F (with ice! and snow!) we had here at my parents’ the last few days, but it is windy – and I am snuggled onto my grandmother’s couch while the family fun goes on next door and the girls rest upstairs in preparation for more fun this evening. I told them “only an hour” almost two hours ago, but they’re so quiet, and the house is so cozy with the furnace roaring, and the thought of crossing the driveway to get back to my parents’ house is so bleak, that I’ve not yet fetched them.

Today Mom watched the kids while Carl and I ran some errands in town. You know you’ve been parents for a while when running errands childless feels like a date. We closed our old bank account, visited Dad at the hardware store, and went to the Co-op and grocery store. When we got back to the house, Mom had helped Joy knit one row in a doll blanket, and helped Gracie make a bead necklace for Aunt Zizzy. We always did fun crafts with Grammie when we would visit her. It’s fantastic to see my kids doing the same with their grandmother.

I’ve been reading Project-Based Homeschooling and getting all sorts of great ideas from it. I need to hurry up and finish it so Carl can read it before I have to return it to the library. I think it was Melissa Wiley I saw recommend it on Twitter. I’m so glad I did!

The US Figure Skating Championships start tomorrow. So does Downton Abbey (though I won’t be watching it until Monday evening, after we’ve returned home). The Bobsled, Skeleton, and Luge races are heating up. We’re moving closer to the Olympics! And, of course, SHERLOCK RETURNS on January 19.

I’m making lists of books I want to read this year. Trying to put more non-fiction on there, since that (to my surprise) is what I loved most out of all my plethora of books I read in the last two years. I keep getting disappointed by most of my fiction reads. (But not Jinx, which Maureen recommended and I promptly bought, devoured, and loved. I’m already planning a re-read so I can really savor it – I was so eager to find out what would happen next that I know I missed a lot of the beauty of the writing itself).

Joy just came downstairs and told me Gracie is asleep, which means I need to go wake her up so she will sleep tonight. Poor little chickadee! All this traveling about to visit family has been wonderfully fun, but exhausting. I have a hunch we’ll all be happy to settle back into a routine when we return home.

May this first weekend of 2014 be full of peace and rest for you all, my friends.

Life Talk

New Year, New Goals

elouisebates

I don’t really do New Year’s Resolutions. I do like to take each new year to look back, check out last year’s goals, and set some new ones. “Goals,” for me, work better than “resolutions.” Yes, semantics, but hey, whatever works.

One goal for the new year involves this blog. I’m changing things up a little here. It’s not going to be so exclusively writing-related. My favorite writer blogs these days are the ones where the writer talks about all the different things happening in his or her life, not just writing stuff. So, since that’s what I like to read, that’s what I’m going to do. I’m not turning this into a personal journal, but I will broaden my outlook. Homeschooling, thoughts on various shows I watch, book reviews, recipes I really love, ideas I passionately engage with, quotes that inspire me … it’ll be much more of a hodgepodge. But hopefully a fun one. And yes, I will still write about writing too.

Speaking of books … I have an odd book-related goal for 2014. My goal is to read fewer books. Bizarre, right? Except not, for me. I read approximately 200 books in 2013. Around 130-150 of those were books I’d never read before. Of that number, I remember about a dozen. Of that dozen, I loved maybe five.

So, my goal is to read less, but retain better and love more what I read. If I start to read a book and really don’t care for it after a bit, I’ll stop. I won’t force myself to finish just because it feels like quitting to, well, quit. I will try not to plow through so many books so quickly that they all blur together after a bit, but to actually savor them. And I’m going to try to read longer, more thoughtful books as well as the fun, light, easy reads I gravitate toward so naturally.

Writing goals? Well, that’s easy. Finish Wings of Song and start Magic in Disguise. Figure out a better marketing plan. Write for at least 30 minutes every day.

I want to sew more, to improve my skills as well as my speed, so that a supposedly one-hour project doesn’t take me one month, and will actually look tailored instead of homemade at the end.

And, in general, I want to eat better, exercise more (at all, really. Since moving and not taking ice dance lessons anymore, I’ve fallen into very slothful habits), engage with people more. In real life, not just through the internet. Be less boring. Have more fun! Stress less, always.

I know the goals will shift and change as the year progresses. They always do. But this is where I’m at right now, at the start of 2014.

What are your goals or resolutions for the new year?

Family

Another Year …

elouisebates

2013 was kind of crazy. In an awesome sort of way. 2013 saw the publication of my first novel, something I’ve been very seriously planning since second grade.

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2013 saw my husband start seminary, something we’ve been working toward for seven years.

2013 saw the birth of my niece, my sister and brother-in-law’s first baby.

2013 saw my mother receive her MA.

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2013 saw us pull up roots from the city we’d lived in for five years to move to an apartment on a college campus, five minutes from the ocean.

2013 saw my oldest girl lose her first tooth.

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2013 saw my littlest girl learn how to pronounce her r’s, her l’s, and her th’s.

2013 saw my dad’s church grow (both in number and, more importantly, in love and understanding) beyond what anyone ever thought possible.

2013 saw Joy falling head-over-heels in love with ballet, and Grace conquer her fears of falling to persevere with figure skating.

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2013 saw my grandfather die.

And 2013 saw me come to new understanding about life, me, God, and all that good stuff.

Big year.

Who knows what 2014 will bring? Not me, but I’m OK with that. I think it’s going to be a great one, no matter what happens.

Life Talk

Grief and Joy

elouisebates

Legacy

 by Louise Bates

~

With laughter, song, and courage he met the world

Fearless, great-hearted, and strong.

Never hesitated to help anyone in need

Despised meanness and cruelty.

He worked hard his entire life without complaint

To take care of his own, and others too.

 ~

A single life can touch so many

Bring hope, give inspiration, share joy.

Like ripples in a pond

Radiating from a single tossed pebble

The goodness of one man’s quiet life

Has spread – and keeps spreading.

 ~

He is gone, but his legacy endures

Love, faithfulness, compassion

Kindness, hard work, music

And laughter – always laughter.

In the hearts of all who knew him

Who he was lives on.

~

We buried my grandfather this morning. It’s been a rough few days. Thank you, everyone who offered condolences and comfort (and poetic assistance) on Twitter.

(Seriously, the above poem (which was printed on the hand-out at Grandpa’s calling hours) would not have been written without help from my Tweeps.)

Many times this past week I’ve said that I don’t mind getting older myself, but I really wish my grandparents’ generation would stop aging. I’m never ready to say goodbye.

The grief has hit me oddly this time around. I’ve not been extremely emotional, just tired. So, so tired. I’m not sure how much posting I’ll be doing in the next few weeks. With holidays coming and more traveling planned for immediately afterward, I’m not sure when my creative well will get a chance to be refilled. I had been participating in the #nerdlution (check it out on Twitter) before all this happened, and I hope to get back to my goal of 30 minutes of creative writing a day soon. Maybe when we get home (and unpacked, and laundry washed, and Christmas tree set up and decorated) I’ll be able to get going with that again.

In the meantime, thanks again for your friendship, and your patience while I’m sporadic with social media.

Malcolm W Bates, September 7, 1925-December 5, 2013
Malcolm W Bates, September 7, 1925-December 5, 2013
Baby Joy with her Great-Grandpa, 2007
Baby Joy with her Great-Grandpa, 2007
fiction, humor, influences, philosophy, writing

Lowbrow

elouisebates

I remember reading Agatha Christie’s autobiography (which I looooooved and read in one day even though it’s non-fiction and it usually takes me MONTHS to read non-fiction) and being amused and a little taken aback at how casually she referred to herself, her writing, and her reading as “lowbrow.”

“Max is highbrow,” she says casually, of her second husband. “And I am decidedly lowbrow.” And then she goes on to detail all of their differences in taste, in a comfortable, matter-of-fact manner.

I read beautiful prose, writing that is definitely “highbrow” even when it is, say, MG fiction, and I think “Ooh, I wish I could write like that.”

But I’ve tried, and it’s ridiculous. Seriously, I can’t even read it myself without snickering.

I’m lowbrow. My writing’s never going to be considered great literature. No one’s going to talk about Tolstoy and Bates in the same category. I write for pleasure, for enjoyment, for fun, for a chance to put a smile on someone’s face. I hope, usually, to also sneak some Deep Themes underneath it all, but let’s face it, nobody’s reading Magic Most Deadly in hopes of finding out the Meaning of Life. And they aren’t going to find it even if they look.

In one of the Anne books by LM Montgomery, Anne and Gilbert are discussing their future goals. Gilbert has decided he wants to be a doctor, to fight disease and help people live better lives. Anne, though she knows wanting to help people and teach them is more noble, just wants to add some beauty to other people’s lives, to give them one or two moments of joy that they might not have had otherwise.

You know what? That honestly seems pretty noble to me. If that’s lowbrow, I’ll take it.

I don’t have to write Great Literature to bring joy to others. I just have to write joyously. And that I can do.

God, Life Talk

Thankful

elouisebates

We had a lovely Thanksgiving yesterday. Quiet and peaceful, just the four of us here at home. We had invited some friends to share the meal with us, but all plans fell through, and in the end, that was okay.

I roasted a turkey for the first time ever, and it was delicious. The gravy also turned out perfectly, which pretty much never happens for me. Every component of the meal fell into place, and my only bit of stress came about Wednesday afternoon as I was working on the second pie (which stress resulted in me forgetting to put foil around the edges, and the crust getting burnt a little).

The pumpkin pie turned out perfectly. We had to trim the burnt crust off the apple.
The pumpkin pie turned out perfectly. We had to trim the burnt crust off the apple.

Next year, I’m only making one pie.

At dinner, the girls started sharing, unprompted, everything they are thankful for. Top of Gracie’s list were the homemade doughnuts we’d had for breakfast. The goof.

It was awfully precious to sit there and listen to them rattle off thanks … thankful for their new cousin, thankful for our new home, thankful for our old home, thankful for grandparents, thankful for each other, thankful for the ocean (“and tides!” Gracie clarified. “And REALLY BIG WAVES.”), finally winding up with Joy declaring she’s thankful for the whole world.

Well, really, how can you top that?

As I sat and listened, my chief thanks was that I was able to be thankful at all. I spent so many years numb, not able to be unhappy or happy, thankful or miserable, or anything at all except exhausted and overwhelmed, that to be able to sit with my family and really delight in them, and be utterly thankful for them, was so beautiful.

One question Christians are asked frequently – and it’s a valid question, a really good one – is that if God is so good, and so powerful, why did he allow evil to come into the world at all? There isn’t one simple answer for that. One facet of one possible answer, however, is that in a world where all is light, the light isn’t known; it’s taken for granted. But against the dark, we see the light, and we love it. The contrast makes it stand out so much brighter.

I had a really happy childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood. And I’m just now starting to grasp why, possibly, God took me through so many years of darkness after I hit adulthood. Because the joy I have now at actually having joy again is so much richer, so much better, than the simple unthinking happiness I had back when I had known nothing else.

So this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for thankfulness.

And I suppose, like Gracie, I’m also thankful for homemade doughnuts. They were really good.

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