Thursday, January 28, 2016

Empathetic Voles

1. There was a sort of interesting article about how prairie voles manifest signs of empathy. Interesting in that there are people out there who study prairie voles. I am pretty fascinated by the career path of those people. Did they always have a thing for voles? Or did they get into college and find them? Or did they leave college, become an accountant, go on a vacation to Kansas, spot a vole in the wild, and have an epiphany that THIS is what they have been missing all theirs lives? Or are they just animal behavioral scientists who just happen to have voles on hand to study?

Of it it because voles are cute


And, also, the word vole is funny to say.

2. Thirty years, you guys! It's been thirty years since the space shuttle Challenger exploded. Some of you weren't even born! I was in the 5th grade and we did not have a TV in the room so we got the news when the secretary called Mr. O'Clock to tell him and some dumb kid laughed and Mr. O'Clock lost it on him. And then when I got home I sat in our living room and watched the news all afternoon. Boy, that was a sad day. I was already set on being an astronaut by that time. I'd like to thank my 1st grade teacher Mrs. Boyd for that. She talked a lot about Sally Ride. 

3. I had a cold over the weekend (and all this week and I am so D.O.N.E. blowing my nose) so naturally I spent it binge watching the 2nd season of When Calls the Heart. If that isn't the corniest show out there, I don't know what is. And I love it. We all love it! Admit it! But I have one serious beef with it. The styling of the characters looks like they just strolled into a some junior college theater department and rummaged through the generic period piece costumes and threw them on. All of the lady's blouses look like they could have been purchased at JC Penny's. And every casual outfit that Mountie Jack wore was straight from an LL Bean catalog. And the hair and make-up! What respectable woman in Olden Times wore her hair down like that? Or that much make-up? Lori Loughlin looked like she literally just strolled in from Malibu with her beachy highlights and tan and threw on a long skirt and a peasant top. I couldn't handle it. But then they'd say something endearingly cheese-ball and I'd forgive them and their lack of authenticity.  And then I'd blow my nose.

3 comments:

Stacy said...

I can't get past the cheesiness of that show. I tried to like it, but failed.

Valerie said...

When Calls the Heart, indeed. I mean, it calls now. It calls me now. And, boy, am I ever answering. It's like Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, Little House on the Prairie, and some bastardized Anne of Green Gables all got together and had a baby . . . in the 90s. Because even though it's supposed to take place--when, the late 1800s? I have no idea--it just LOOKS like it was made in the 1990s. But, I know it's not. Otherwise Laurie Laughlin would be playing Elizabeth Thatcher.
But, seriously, I agree. I just leaned in to the saccharine, cringe-inducing dialogue, and now I love it.

Valerie said...

Holy crap. I just got to the 2nd season. What is going on with everyone's hair? This is supposed to be the turn of the century for crying out loud! Why does everyone have long beachy waves like they just stepped out of The Bachelor?!

Okay, not everyone. The uptight ladies in the town have period appropriate hair. But the cool girls are all wearing their hair down. Abigail is wearing her hair in a side pony like she's Kelly Kapowski for crying out loud!

Okay, maybe this should be an email to you next time.