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I've applied one of these new Gmail themes, the one showing a little garden outside a pagoda, i think it's called Tea House. It asked me where i lived before it applied itself and i wondered why. I thought, is it going to show a local tea house or something? But, no. Later in the day i thought i noticed the "sun" had moved to the other side of the display screen. Odd... And then last night when i checked my gmail, the whole scene was a night scene, with a moon and stars! Eek! I guess it took the location and figured out the night/day timings. Now it's day again, the sky is a glowy yellow rising up to blue and the sun is on the top left just past the "Gmail" header. If they really watched the weather, it would be raining, grey, dark and the trees would be bent over from the howling wind out there. I'm supposed to get Mom's car today to do some errands and later go to the visitation. The weather is supposed to be pretty wild though. It's not cold, which is something, i guess. The temp is up to 15C ! No threat of freezing rain there. I took today off because i've been finding this week a bit of a struggle.

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I didn't get the car after all, because the weather was threatening all day and neither mom nor i wanted to risk going out in it for fear of being drowned or blown away or both. I attended the burial earlier in the week so i don't mind too much missing out the visitation tonight. If i hadn't seen my aunt, uncle and cousin then, i would have gone tonight even if i had to take a taxi. So what did i do instead? Pretty much nothing. Just pottered around here, watched some dvds. I'd bought a stack of cheap ones when Graham was here, mostly movies you've never heard of, or tv-movies on dvd but sometimes you come across a little gem that way and at least one of them so far was very good.

It's called Aurora Borealis, staring Donald Sutherland, Louise Fletcher, Juliette Lewis and Joshua Jackson. Jackson is a young 20-something slacker and waster who drifts from job to job, arsing around with his friends and not making very much of his life though he was a talented hockey player in his school days. He coulda been a contenda! Now he's interested in engineering but not brave enough to take the leap back into school. Sutherland and Fletcher are his grandparents. Grandad is ill, Parkinsons and the onset of Alzheimer's. He gets a job working in the same apartment building/senior's building and helps out with his grandad. You just know, from the start... sick old man... there's going to be a death by the end of it so you have to prepare yourself for that. Donald Sutherland's performance blew me away, I have to say. It's not always an easy movie to watch. Age and illness rarely is. Of course there's a love story in there too. Juliette is a home care worker and she and Joshua's character get together, naturally. It's a standard plot but very well acted. Definitely a keeper.

One of the other ones was clearly a movie of the week shifted to dvd and was a real scenery chewer. Overacting was the order of the day. Rip your hair out over-dramatics. Couple get chucked into jail on a trumped up charge. Harrowing jail scenes for the woman. Scenes of the man staring out the barred windows sadly. Half of the movie spent with her trying to get her kids back after they'd been taken away into care. Teeth gnashing, moralistic speeches about poverty and doing the Right Thing By Your Kids. All very predictable. I've got a few more, at least one of which may be similar, i dunno, but it was cheap. Also got a dvd of very old Hitchcock movies, some of them are silent! I think some of them will be very good!

Got a call today from something that displayed on the call display box as "Alarm" and a 1-800 number. I almost didn't answer it but i'm glad i did. I am listed as the emergency contact for my friend Tracey's house alarm system. Seems the alarm went off and they were going to send the police and could i meet them there. Only the key i have isn't the one that fits their new locks anyway. They said they'd call me back if there really was a problem. Where it was really windy, i wondered if the wind hadn't disturbed a window or something that tripped the alarm. it has happened before. They didn't call back but Tracey did awhile later. Seems it was her mother who has a key and the code but didn't put the code in properly. But i do have to get new keys and instructions for the system again.

After all this miserable weather, it's going to be clearer tomorrow. The funeral is at 1 but we'll have to get there plenty early to get a place to park and seats. I think there will be a very large turnout to give Eddie a good sendoff.