...all beautiful and some obviously magical...

[Stanley Anderson]

[A#minor]

oooh, good idea for a thread, Stanley.

I want a music box where the ballerina inside steps out of the box and dances about on the table before returning to her place inside the box.
Not very creative perhaps, but certainly beautiful.

I'd like a map that if you look in one place long enough it zooms in and shows you the cities and places with people walking about, or just the country and beasts perhaps.
( Not real people maybe, but just a similitude of the sort of people that you would find in that country. If you looked at Rivendell, you'd see typical elves. If you looked South, you'd see Men. If you looked in Mirkwood, you'd see spiders. Not the actual people who were there at that time, but a representation.)

[Stanley Anderson]

Well, we just read Shadow of the Past aloud last night. Of course we love the whole chatper for various reasons, but what a wonderful scene when Gandalf reaches out the window and pulls the eavesdropping Sam up. Such a joyous ending when Sam, told that his "punishment" is to accompany Frodo, exclaims "Hooray!".

My idea for this chapter (hoping it goes over as big as my idea for the first chapter:-) is to post alternatives for whom Gandalf pulls up from outside the window, humourous or otherwise.

Can you imagine him suddenly pulling Gollum up instead, who, when told he must accompany Frodo, exclaims "Hooray! Precioussss...we follows it forever. But Bagginses, we hates it forever"

Or maybe Strider, to whom Gandalf exclaims "Aragorn! I told you to wait for us at Bree. Now get going..."

Or maybe Gandalf pulls up a Nazgul? (I have to admit, I'm stumped for a reaction here:-)

What about Bullwinkle who says "watch me pull a rabbit outta muh hat", and, pulling a rhino's head out instead, says "oops, wrong hat".

Any others?

--Stanley

[A#minor]

[contra mundum]

[Stanley Anderson]

[A#minor]

Gasp! Lucy wouldn't lie! :shocked:

[Stanley Anderson]

[Stanley Anderson]

Last night we read the chapter "Three is Company" aloud. Not sure if I can keep up a thread reply idea for each chapter we read, but I'll give it a try for a while anyway. In this chapter the wonderful conclusion following the black rider scare where the hobbits meet Gildor and the other elves and walk to the place above Woodhall is one of those many, rich "I wanna be there" moments in LotR (and which so few of, if any, were captured very well in the movie). They ate wonderful fruits -- apples at least, we are told, and bread, and wine (white -- or golden as it is described -- apparently). What are your most memorable examples of any or all three of these items?

For us the wine would surely be (we are normally red wine fans) an orange muscat from one of the Paso Robles wineries ("Justin Winery") that we used to get regular shipments of various types of wine from (sadly, we had to cancel our membership a while back in a cost cutting effort). Orange muscat is a dessert wine -- a little bit goes a long way, and they vary greatly in their quality. But this one (which was named "Debra's Delight" after the wife of the couple that own the winery) was about the closest to ambrosia that I can imagine -- not too heavily sweet, but with a light flowery scent and taste that was straight from heaven. Everyone that we ever shared it with was equally stunned and taken with it.

For the bread, I would have to probably go with sourdough from San Francisco. It is said that it is best from there and having lived in Berkeley while in college, I know this to be true. Not sure why it is so much better there, but though one can get sourdough bread here in southern California (and anywhere, I'm sure), it just doesn't compare. Somehow the crust is not right nor the texture and flavour (it doesn't hurt to have a tub of butter to spread on it just before a lobster dinner at Fisherman's Warf either:-)

And the fruit I had just yesterday. I was sweating on a hot day mowing the back lawn and I took a few moments to pick some raspberries off the raspberry bush and ate them right there. They were so refreshing, I found myself searching under prickly branches for all the ripe ones I could find. A bowl of berries is wonderful, but eating them one by one right off the bush has to be the best!

--Stanley

[A#minor]

I love that time with Gildor and the elves too, but I don't think I really paid attention to the food so much. I'm always more laughing at Sam and his reaction to the elves than thinking of food.

[contra mundum]

[Stanley Anderson]

Just read the chapter Shortcut to Mushrooms aloud last night.

As a side note, I'm continually reminded of the sorts of thing the Jackson movies chose to focus on to show their impression of what the book was mainly "about", and how they continually missed, deleted, or changed the parts and atmosphere of what I think the book is mainly "about". Of course the book is about a lot of things, and the choice of what to focus on (if such a choice must in fact be made -- such choices must probably be made in a two hour movie, but I'm not so sure it needs to be done -- at least to the extent Jackson did it -- in a nearly 12 hour movie!) is up to the director I suppose. And with a budget of three hundred million dollars acting about as effectively as the barrel of a mobster's gun against the back of one's head to force a guaranteed return on the money, I also suppose choosing a typical Terminator/Die Hard/action/horror/thriller-type focus was unavoidable. There was so much beauty and richness that the movies so completely overlooked or cheapened and changed to fit the MTV crowd.

Ok, sorry for the diversion -- I have to have my occasional rage-fix, don't you know:-)

Anyawy, let me see...for this chapter, hmmm...I suggest posting your feelings and thoughts about mushrooms in general. We have often referred to our son Gawain as a hobbit for various reasons, but one counterpoint is that he detests mushrooms of any sort (at least so far -- this is true for most kids I suspect:-). It took a while for me to warm to mushrooms. Even now, though I love them simply for the magical atmosphere their mere presence conjures, I don't generally crave their taste. Still, I don't dislike them and just seeing, for instance, those long stringy mushrooms ("enoki", I guess from just now looking it up on Google) on a salad is such a visual feast that they (or any other mushrooms) can make a meal seem irresistable. And besides, Tolkien makes them sound so delicioius in this chapter, I'd like them even if I didn't like them, if that makes any sense (and for Jackson to turn the mushrooms in to a stupid 60's drug referenece in the movie was unforgivable in my mind -- ok, sorry for going back there again:-)

--Stanley

[A#minor]

I completely agree with your PJ-ruined-the-movies rant.

As for mushrooms, I dislike them. I never eat them. Ew.
But Tolkien does make them sound good. I almost wish I did like them.

[contra mundum]

[Stanley Anderson]