Cat Scratch Saturday & March Books & Movies

Igor and Boris looking like they get along...silly boys.

Books

11. Enchantment: The Life of Audrey Hepburn by Donald Soto - 340 pages - I love Audrey Hepburn. She was an unbelievable woman - living through WWII, dealing with the abandonment of her father, the coldness of her mother, etc. All she ever wanted in life was to be loved and to be a mother of many children. She ended up married to two men who did not appreciate her or love her the way she wanted to be loved. Such a sad story.

12. Mystery of Crocodile Island by Carolyn Keene (#55) - 180 pages - Nancy and friends left River Heights and its myriad mysteries for the Florida Keys and some bad guys owning a crocodile farm and smuggling illicit goods. I know this will shock you but she solved the mystery and avoided great danger to her and Ned.

13. The Thirteenth Pearl by Carolyn Keene (#56) - 179 pages - This is the last of the Nancy Drew books. She leaves the country with her father, Carson Drew, for Japan where she dresses in disguise as a Japanese girl (somehow the people she comes into contact with fall for it), figures out the key that will help her solve the mystery of the missing pearls once she gets back to River Heights where her friends help her once again. Whew, I was worried on this one. ;-)

14. The Rhino with Glue-On Shoes and Other Surprising True Stories of Zoo Vets and Their Patients Ed. by Lucy H. Spelman, DVM and Ted Y. Mashima, DVM - 311 pages - The title of this book caught my eye as I do love rhinos, the subtitle convinced me to buy it. It contained great stories of vets figuring out what was wrong with their animal patients and how they cured them - at least most of them. It also had pictures of all the animals. I would definitely recommend this book to any animal lover, especially LL.

15. A Walk in the Woods By Bill Bryson - 274 pages - Somebody gave me this book years ago and told me it was very funny, but I had just never gotten around to reading it. After I read his Shakespeare book last month, I finally took it off the bookshelf. The person (whoever it was) who gave me the book did not steer me wrong. This book is one laugh after another and is about Bill Bryson's attempt to hike the entire Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine. I actually know someone who has accomplished this particular feat and I've also hiked the last bit in Maine myself where I saw people who were finishing the AT themselves (some were nice, some were a bit snotty, as if they are better than day hikers). Whatever. I'd definitely recommend this book, even if you're not hiker (I don't consider myself to be a real hiker).

Movies

11. A Night To Remember - 1955 - Retroplex - I read the book that this movie was based on when I was in grade school (multiple times). I was fascinated by the Titanic story. While I hate the James Cameron/Leonard diCaprio movie, Titanic, I loved this movie, as it's based on the book by Walter Lord and he had interviewed many of the survivors to get as true a story as possible. I cried throughout The Night to Remember which I did not do at all during Titanic.

12. Ratatouille - 2007 - Encore - I have a thing for animated films, but I hadn't seen this when it came out. I thought this was very cute. The concept is a rat that has a thing for cooking shows and ends up in a Paris restaurant where he helps the true owner (but we don't know that yet) take over the restaurant from the mean guy. If you haven't seen it, and it's shows up on cable, definitely check it out.

13. Coffee and Cigarettes - 2003 (N) - This marked the end of my Jim Jarmusch phase and I have to say that I bloody well hated this movie. It was all I could do to finish watching it. And it had Iggy Pop, Tom Waits, Steven Wright, Roberto Benigni and Kate Winslett in it. Premise was a series of vignettes where people meet over cigarettes and coffee, not a horrible premise, but it was horrendously boring and I wanted to slap people. Honestly, it had Iggy Pop in it and I hated it.

14. Slumdog Millionaire - 2008 (Star-Sfld) - I don't see many movies in the theatre, but I really wanted to see this one, so I went one Sunday with Pamela after she cut my hair. I didn't know much about it (i.e., the violence and torture), except that it was about a slum kid in India who gets on their version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. I quite liked it.

15. Velvet Goldmine - 1998 (N) - I had been wanting to see this movie again for some time, especially after reading the Iggy Pop biography. I have to say that knowing more about Iggy gave me a new perspective on the movie. It's not a bad movie, but it didn't work for me as well as it had before. Sometimes too much knowledge can take away the enjoyment of a thing.

16. MacGyver - Season 2 - I love MacGyver.

Book of the Month: This is tough...the Audrey Hepburn book was great, but it was sad. The Rhino with Glue-On Shoes was fabulous, but Walk in the Woods was hilarious. I'm going with A Walk in the Woods.

Movie of the Month: A Night To Remember - See it...especially if you think DiCaprio's Titanic was good.