reincarnations

The most-recurring topic of conversation at Tuesday's Independence Day/anniversary party was the new Indiana Jones movie, in which I have no interest, having found the first movie terminally dull and not having seen any of its successors, none of which claimed to surpass it anyway. One said he'd name Raiders as his favorite action movie: defining that category narrowly (i.e. not just a movie with action in it), I'd name the latest Mission Impossible movie, which I thought did a fabulous job with the action. It's about to be succeeded by a later one, so we'll see how that does.

Aside from the plays, about which I already wrote, the trip to Ashland for the Shakespeare Festival was mostly uneventful. Temperatures were in the 90s, but not too broiling, and the power didn't go out as it did one broiling June a few years back. The exciting part was on the freeway coming up seeing an electronic sign display saying that the freeway was closed some miles ahead. Listening to the emergency radio service (which is AM: what happens when that option disappears from cars?) and inquiries to the service workers when we stopped at a rest area revealed that a tanker with liquid nitrogen had overturned and blocked all the lanes.

I'd stopped to look at the AAA area map I'd brought along just in case something like this happened. Fortunately it was in an area where alternative roads were plenty. I turned off the freeway when the congestion started to hit and threaded my way through suburbs and countryside for a few miles until I was sure I was past the affected zone. Timing was tight because we had a later-than-desirable start and a dinner reservation at our favorite local restaurant, but we made it without trouble.

Someone dented our parked car in the theater garage, and was kind enough to leave a note. So I've had to go through the business of phoning them, getting the information, then dealing with the insurance company and the body shop, far more work than, in my opinion, a small dent is worth. To me a car is a machine to get you places, and as long as it's working right, who cares if there's a small dent? But the world doesn't like that attitude, and I'm expected to go through all this rigamarole.

Thing learned this year: the online list of closed rest areas that's good on Wednesday will be entirely obsolete by Saturday when you come back, so best look it up again.