So the trailer came out for Season Seven of Game of Thrones, and of course it has already broken records for viewership.
First I checked out my friend Pat’s blog to see what he thought of the trailer and get his input. If you want the opinion of another person who has read all of the books and is a fairly obsessed ASOIAF/GoT fan (like myself, and in a good way) then go check him out.
So here’s my thoughts.
As I have often done before a new season of Game of Thrones, I thought I would make a few predictions as to what we might see when Season 7 begins this July.
We have already heard a few things, and can guess a few more based on the bits and pieces that we have been shown in the teaser trailers, some clues that have slipped out, and on the logical progression of the story.
Continue reading “Some predictions for Season 7 of Game of Thrones”
Back on March 6th, Kelly and I attended a very special sort of concert at the Garden. As anyone who knows us reasonably well already knows, we are really big fans of George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire book series and the TV show based on it, Game of Thrones. Thanks to one of her coworkers, we got two tickets to the Game of Thrones Live Concert Experience. It was by far the most enjoyable concert experience I have ever had. It was some three hours long, and I never got tired or bored. It was simply amazing.
Yesterday we had our first major snow event since we bought our house in Winthrop, and what do you know, it turned out to be a blizzard.
Dash Linus was not impressed.
Since Kelly and I were stuck at home yesterday, we had a marathon viewing of Season Six of Game of Thrones, just to watch it all again. So it was so very appropriate when we re-watched the scene where the white ravens were sent out to announce the arrival of winter. When I got up this morning, the temperature was 12 degrees Fahrenheit, with a wind chill of about -20. When I went outside this morning, the winds had blown the snow around quite a bit, which at least made a pretty picture in the back yard.
It looked like we had gotten about a foot of snow, at least when I was out clearing the walks.
Officially, we got around 11 inches of snow, according to Boston.com. As you can also see on that data table later in the article, the wind was blowing pretty hard – it got to over 50 mph here. At one point yesterday afternoon when Kelly and I looked out the window, we could not see more than 100 yards or so.
So puppies did not go out a lot yesterday. This morning Dash was excited that he was finally going to get to go outside, but he became much less excited when he realized that conditions were still far less than ideal for anyone really close to the ground.
Note that in the above photo, we are looking out onto our concrete patio, which is covered by our deck. So all of that snow you see out to the support beams was blown in by the wind. I’m just glad we didn’t have to try to crank up that generator. That would have been truly awful. As it was, Kelly and I were marveling over the difference in experiences between our new place and our old one. At our old place, we would have been feeling terrible cold drafts even in our bedroom.
As it was, some members of the household decided that it was best if they stayed under blankets during the snowstorm.
Dash and Thumbelina also decided that it was best if they stayed in our bed.
And last but definitely not least, little Violet wanted me to come snuggle with her in “her” room (the guest bedroom) for a while. She does this thing where she sees me, waits for me to walk up to her, then she jumps over the baby gate we have installed in the doorway of the guest room, then turns around to see if I am following her. When I come through the gate, she will walk over to the bed and flop down on her favorite blanket, which is actually Kelly’s bathrobe. And then it’s snuggle time.
We may get even more snow this weekend, with predictions for “heavy” snow on Monday, although I have not yet seen any estimates of how much.
Stay warm, everyone.
-Geoff
It’s been a while since I have written anything about Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire. I have been struggling to figure out what to talk about. Then the other day Kelly and I were talking, and it occurred to me that Donald Trump and Cersei Lannister actually have quite a bit in common.
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Follow my logic, if you will.
While I have been in parades and candlelight vigils and such, I have never been in what could be called a political protest until this weekend. But I am glad I did it. In fact, it has given me a great deal of satisfaction, and has cheered me up somewhat from what has been for some time a generally dark mood. The crowd ended up being MUCH bigger than was originally anticipated. I think they were expecting maybe 90,000 people, but the totals were probably more like 150,000 to 175,000.
I would never have imagined that I would look back on the Presidency of George W. Bush with any type of nostalgia. And I certainly never imagined that I would live to see a Presidency that was not only worse than Bush’s, but is well on the way to topping the administration of James Buchanan as the absolute worst Presidency of all time.
Goodbye 2016, don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. All things being equal, this year was a social, geo-political, and popular culture disaster. From the deaths of David Bowie, Prince, Alan Rickman, Leonard Cohen, Ron Glass, and Michelle McNamara, to Mohammed Ali, John Glenn, and Elie Wiesel, the list of those we mourn is really long and really hard. Then again, Hell also got a little more crowded with the additions of Antonin Scalia, Fidel Castro, Rob Ford (the crack smoking Mayor of Toronto), Phyllis Schlafly, and Nancy “Just Say No” Reagan.
Continue reading “This is Your Card – Our Annual Holiday Post”
because the real world has been just awful lately. Terrible. Horrible. I just can’t bring myself to talk more about it because it’s just too depressing. Things just get worse and worse rather than better.
So yeah, let’s talk about Westeros – the North in particular, although I am sure I will wander around to other places at some point.
In the time since our last posts, so much has happened in our lives, and in the greater world, and in the world of GoT, that it feels truly overwhelming. I can’t keep up with it all. If I was to try to describe everything in great detail, it would take multiple posts of extraordinary length. And right now I don’t have the time or the energy.
I am just going to try to summarize everything with just one one post. At least for now.
Continue reading “Sometimes, there’s just too much going on to write”
Frankly, I am just stunned that the voters of the United Kingdom decided to leave the EU. Obviously I am not British, and I can’t pretend I understand all of the issues going on there that might motivate people to vote that way. But I do know that many of the consequences predicted were not good. And I also know that many of the people who voted to leave are in the parts of the UK that depend on the EU the most, like Cornwall. The government of Cornwall is now insisting that the UK government make up for the 60 million pounds a year of EU funding that will be lost by Brexit. To quote from Cornwall directly:
Prior to the referendum we were reassured by the ‘leave’ campaign that a decision to leave the EU would not affect the EU funding which has already been allocated to Cornwall and that Cornwall would not be worse off in terms of the investment we receive. We are seeking urgent confirmation from Ministers that this is the case.
Suddenly Cornwall is like some teenage kid who seriously pisses off his parents, and then suddenly doesn’t understand why they aren’t going to pay his college tuition anymore. You guys really didn’t think this through, did you? And you believed everything that the Leave Campaign told you?
Oh, dear.
You know, that would be comical if it wasn’t so damn tragic, because there are going to be real consequences now, which will affect a lot of people’s lives.
Continue reading “Brexit, or when people vote to harm themselves”
The Books are Taking Over... 