Fun and Entertainment

     Upon choosing "Fun and Entertainment" as my first area of interest, I was required to look into "geocaches" which I knew absolutely nothing about. After minimal research, I discovered that geocaching is actually an outdoor sporting game where one uses a GPS to find containers called, you guessed it, geocaches. These geocaches are small, waterproof containers that contain logbooks in which the geocacher logs their code name and the date of signing. I was shocked I had never ever heard of this, since records show that there are over 5 million geocachers worldwide. You can learn more about geocaching here. It is an activity that, in all honesty, if I ever were to find myself in a fit of boredom, I might consider indulging in.

      The next resource I was asked to access was that of the Discovery Kids webcam, however the site appears to be down at the time and I was not able to view it. In place of this, I visited the Panda Cam San Diego Website where I watched for quite a while as the wind blew the foliage to and fro and I was afraid I would not be able to witness a panda, but at last one appeared in the corner of the screen, though not for long. However, the website remains on my desktop and I check it on occasion in hope of seeing more of the pandas, and perhaps will continue to do so.


     Next, I checked out the Internet Movie Database where I searched for information on one of my favorite movies, The Man From Snowy River. I read through Tom Burlinson's biography, as he plays the main role of this movie, starring as Australian horseman Jim Craig. Burlinson was born in Toronto, Canada to his English parents and though this particular movie is the only I have ever seen him in, I have heard of his two other main roles, Phar Lap and Windrider. Another major character in this film are brothers Harrison and Spur, played by Kirk Douglas. One might be surprised to find that Douglas actually had the difficult upbringing of being raised in the ghetto; nonetheless, he attended university and received an acting scholarship that initially began the process that led him to stardom. As he worked his way into his career, he worked with such names as Burt Lancaster, John Wayne, Jack Nicholson and Farrah Fawcett. The director of this film is George Miller, though there was little to no information about him on IMDB.

    I also did some research on this informational website on one other film, Roman Holiday, starring the one and only Audrey Hepburn. Hepburn was born into wealth in Belgium, with an English banker for one parent and a Dutch baroness for the other. She suffered from depression and malnutrition during the time of Hitler, but attended ballet school in London afterwards and prospered there as she began her career as a model. Her position as an actress grew from that and she went on to star in such popular films as Breakfast at Tiffany's, Funny Face, and My Fair Lady. Audrey has been named by Empire magazine one of top 100 movie stars of all time, and few people would beg to differ. Her co-star in Roman Holiday is the suave and successful Gregory Peck, who experienced a rough and unstable childhood in California. his parents divorced when he was but a young child, and his father was a drug addict. However he did attend college where he began his studies as pre-med but soon became interested in acting and theater and changed his focus. From there he was very successful, after all, he did play a major role in this debut film of Hepburn's. William Wyler directed Roman Holiday, and has been considered on of the most influential directors of all-time. At the time of his death (1981) he was considered second only to the great John Ford. 

    I also visited Entertainment Weekly's EW where I took a look at three of the top stories. One of them being the top 8 most brutal jokes at a recent Charlie Sheen roast. One of the top 8 was made by Kate Walsh: “It’s amazing — after abusing your lungs, liver and kidneys, the only thing you’ve had removed is your kids.” Another story was on Paul Simon's performance of "The Sound of Silence" at Ground Zero's memorial today. And the third story that I brought up was that of the "family reunion" of the cast of Home Improvement, a highly popular comedic sitcom of the 90's starring Tim Allen and Patricia Richardson.

And last, but not least, was asked to review the information I could find on The Beatles at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum Website, along with information on one of my favorites. But first up is The Beatles, who I am also a very big fan of, inductees of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The band, inducted in 1988, consisted of: George Harrison (guitar, sitar, vocals), John Lennon (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Paul McCartney (bass, guitar, keyboards, vocals), and Ringo Starr (drums, percussion, vocals). The band's first number one single in the states (as they were a British band) was I Want to Hold Your Hand. This was the first of 45 more singles that would become Top Forty hits over the next 6 years. The Beatles would eventually have 20 number one hits, three more than runner-up Elvis Presley. In 1970, McCartney left the band, and the group that had rose to such fame in such little time ended just as quickly as it had begun. Fans remained hopeful that the band would reunite, but the brutal assassination of Lennon in December of 1980. In 1995, the three remaining Beatles came together to produce a 6 hour documentary, which was the closest they ever came to reuniting, though their effect on the music industry is permanent.

     My final bit of research was done on one of my favorite artists, and also an inductee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Eric Clapton. Clapton was the first individual to ever have been inducted three times: first as a member of the Yardbirds in 1992, second with the band Cream in 1993, and finally as a solo artist in 2000. Clapton jumped from group to group over the span of his career; first the Roosters, then the Yardbirds, followed by the Bluesbreakers, and then Cream. He remains a remarkable influence on music today. Below is a clip to one of my personal favorite Clapton pieces, Layla.