Ode to Summer...and Maude and Meryl and Prada

Belly up to the table as Mr. B shares his first course of pet peeves related to travel, a healthy serving of living a centered life focused on our Higher Power, delicious summer selections of poetry and for dessert: Maude and The Devil Wears Prada and its new sequel. Bon appetit!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:02

It's time for dinner. Ding ding ding ding ding dung. From the creative mind of Scott Bertelson, after four decades of teaching our impressionable youth, the dinner belt, you are invited to enjoy conversational morsels for the mind at Mr. B's dinner party.

SPEAKER_05 0:20

Yeah, dinner!

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Oh, what a beautiful morning. Hello, podcast friends. It's Mr. Bertelson Warbling, the joy of living.

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Mr. B's got a table so wide. Pull up a chair, let your worries slide. School days, tales, and a movie or two. He's serving up wisdom with a side of stew. Belly up to the table, my friend. The feast of thought will never end. From travels far to a spiritual climb. Morsels of music served in rhyme.

SPEAKER_01 1:16

OK L A H O M A Oklahoma. Anyway, enough of that. I should have tried up for the Bird Street show. Anyway, so I'm very happy to say that life is good in Mr. B's life. So let's just have you, you know it's coming, barely up to the table, and it's time once again for Mr. B's dinner party.

SPEAKER_02 1:48

Let's lend our ears to the wacky observations of the world, according to Scott. Mr. B's wacky, wacky, wacky, wacky world.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

My happy friends who are never bothered by anything. Yeah, right. Even though I practice my spiritual principles every day, which tries to keep me away from anger and jealousy and resentment and all those character defects I don't like. Sometimes I do get a little miffed. Yeah, I said miffed and my F F E D. Because I've shared with you a number of pet peeps for my wacky, wacky, wacky, wacky world. Well, since I do like to travel, uh, I am going to be going to Europe this summer. I don't know when this will be on. Maybe I already will be home, or maybe I will have been abducted. But whatever the case may be, I'm guessing some of these pet peeves I've experienced on a ship, on um a plane, uh on a tour bus, whatever the case may be. And so I'm just going to share these with you. Not necessarily in any kind of order. The first pet peeve that I have about travel would be lack of customer service. Now, many times I have great customer service. But you know what, my friends, airports sometimes don't really have the best. To me, airports are like, yes, I'm going to say it, a living hell. Because you are at the mercy of having them change um where you're going to leave from and whether the plane will be on time, and it's just crazy. Anyway, speaking of crazy, I remember last summer when I went to um Long Island to see my friend, and I should have checked the app. I mean, that's a lesson learned. I'm still learning how to use apps. And my flight was supposed to leave at 5 in the morning from Des Moines. So my uh Uber came, picked me up at my son's house, took me to the airport, and then when they printed my tickets, it said that I didn't leave until was it 11, 11:30 a.m.

unknown 4:29

What?

SPEAKER_01 4:30

What? What is that? I was not aware of this. So immediately I was very unhappy. And I remember I went up to customer service, which who wants to really face somebody at 5 in the morning? I get that. And I said to this lady, uh, what has happened to my flights? And she said, I can't help you, sir. Oh, you work for the airlines, but you can't help me. Then she quickly gave me a sheet of paper with a number on it. She said, You call this number and they will help you. All I can do is deal with um people checking their bags in. Okay. So, needless to say, not being a very happy person, I went back and sat down and I thought, what alternative do I have? But I will have to call this number. And I will say, because God always comes through, the person was very, very nice to me. I didn't have to wait long to talk to somebody, and he got me on an earlier flight, oh, direct flight, whereas previous to this, I was going to have um to um change planes from the Des Moines Airport. So it all had a happy ending. But getting to the happy ending was difficult. Um, TSA, uh, I know it's a tough job, I don't want to do it, but every time I go through the machine, I get padded down. I don't know why. They want me to take off my shoes. I what else do they want me to do? Then I'm always concerned about my bags going through. Will my carry-on, which is the only way I travel, is that going to get through? And or do I have to dig everything out? I guess I've got good about figuring out exactly how many liquids I can have in my bag because I haven't been stopped for that for quite some time. So I'm just used to it that I'm going to be frisked down, and they'll say to me, Well, do you want to go to a private room? No, just humiliate me here in front of everybody. I'm okay with that. So, there you go. Lack of customer service. Uh, here's one too. In confined spaces, when people don't cover their mouths when they cough, yawn, or sneeze. I haven't experienced this a lot, but you know, when you're in um just the general seating of the plane, I never fly first class, uh people are sitting very close to you. And it's just plain disgusting when somebody's going to leave some mucus on your uh sleeve or on your shirt or whatever. I just I just feel like I need to have some aerosol. So, ooh. I don't know. Uh, here's another one airports that don't have free Wi-Fi. Now, I'm guessing almost every airport that I've been to does now have free Wi-Fi. Uh, is it particularly effective? Not necessarily, but it's free. Um, but some uh foreign countries, uh, especially like London, they don't offer it. Now, places in the United States, yes. But I just think that's a given that you should provide free Wi-Fi. I don't know. Uh unclean facilities at an airport or on airplanes. I detest restrooms on planes. May I say again? I detest because you can't even turn around. And I'm so afraid that I'm going to get sucked into the toilet and be put out into space. And I do everything in my power to make sure I don't have to go to the bathroom, depending on the length of the trip, when I'm on a plane. But sometimes they're kind of messy. I don't know if they uh had the cleaning crew didn't come in and do an effective job before the next group of people got on. Uh you know, I just really don't want to have to worry about what the bathroom facility is going to be like. So, anyway. Oh, here's one. Uh-huh. People who need to be told a million times by flight attendants to turn off their phones, put their seats in the upright position, and close their trade tablets. I have been by people who don't follow any of these rules. I guess they think they're immune. Mm-hmm. I don't say anything because I don't know them. Do I want to get in some kind of uh free-for-all with somebody who's sitting that close to me on a plane? No, I don't think so. But it shouldn't have to be the flight attendant's job to constantly be telling them, put this away, put this away, turn off your phone, yada yada yada. Oh my gosh. Uh another one would be uh the ever-changing TSA restrictions. Okay, now I've been flying for quite some time, and I really enjoy it because even though I hate airports, oh yes, oh yes, I hate airports, but it's a very quick way to get somewhere, and that's a pain. I have to travel through Hades to get to heaven. So anyway, but remember when you had to take off your shoes? Well, now you don't have to take off your shoes, unless you're like me, and you go through, and you do have to take off your shoes. Well what's that about? I they never tell you why or give you a reason, but okay, I guess I just can count on that as much as I can count on uh the fact that I'm going to be groped when I get out of the machine, too. Uh another one would be uh lack of communication from airline agents when there are delays. Uh that's where the app comes in. And you should be able to check on that. But sometimes I've been in airports where the agents working there, they don't even know what's going on. And again, I don't want to do it. I know it's a tough job, and I know they deal with many unruly people, and they are God's creatures and they need to be loved. I get that. But please be up to date with the information, that would be nice. Uh, say that you're staying at a hotel the night before you fly out or the night you come back, and you're paying. Let's face it, folks, hotels are very expensive nowadays, and then most of the time, they don't even have complementary water. They might have a refrigerator full of beverages, but if you use one, it'll be $45 just to use it. I don't think so. I just don't think so. Um, lost luggage. Now I'm very lucky I've never lost any luggage. Uh one time I was getting off a plane with my carry-on, and I took the wrong person's um another person's carry-on because it looked exactly like mine, and got off the plane, and this person was saying, Oh, where's my carry-on? I went, I think this is yours and you have mine. But anyway, uh, but there's nothing more irksome than landing at your destination after, what, 30 hours of flying and finding your lane which never made it and still at your original destination. What are you supposed to do? What about your toiletries? What about a change of underwear? I mean, what's going on? Oh my gosh. So many times I get on planes now and they'll say, Well, there may not be enough room in the overhead bins. You can check your bag in for free. And I do everything in my power to avoid that because I'm afraid my ben my bag, my overnight bag, the only bag I have, my carry-on bag, will end up in Moscow and I'll never see it again. But sometimes I've been forced to do it, and I have been able to retrieve it. But anyway, wanted to mention that. And uh, oh, when you go to another country and they're checking your passport, uh some of them are just not very friendly people. I walk up, I'm smiling, I'm saying hello, I have my documents ready, and they just look at me like I'm a piece of blank. They're not interested in talking to me. Now, if you don't like your job, then why don't you change it and work at Hardy's instead? I don't know. I mean, I know your job can be rough, but it might work better if you flash a smile once in a while. It makes me a little more wanting to be in your country. So, anyway, that's just a partial list of some of my pet peeves. I'm sure there are many more. And as I continue traveling, God help me, I probably will come up with more. Maybe I'll share them, maybe I won't. So if you experience any of those, just realize that hopefully there is a light at the end of the tunnel. And you do get to your destination. Bon voyage.

SPEAKER_02 14:23

Let's have a seat round the proverbial table. Would you like to say Grace? With a nod to our higher power and Mr. B's spiritual journey.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

My spiritual friends, every day is a gift from my higher power. Every day is a gift from God. I have 24 hours to take care of my body, to be of service to other people, to like myself, and to find the best in everything around me. We have been talking about step five. I talked about that last time, where we admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs. And I've shared with you how I have made amends with people. And I'd like to continue reading uh the information from a book dealing with uh the twelve steps. It is important that we choose a trustworthy and understanding person with whom to complete step five. For many of us, that person is a sponsor who helped us take the first four steps of the program. Others of us have found that we feel more comfortable confiding in a person other than our sponsor. Either way is a okay way so long as it's right for us. We understand that if we pick a person other than our sponsor, we are not rejecting our sponsor. I did choose my sponsor because I trust him impeccably with anything that I share with him, that there will not be any judgment. Were there other people I would have chosen or could have? Absolutely. My pastor would be a choice. Uh a couple friends in this program I would have also shared with if my sponsor wasn't available. But I would not choose um people who are my friends overall. I just I just don't trust I have to have a hundred percent trust in that person. And sometimes even though I like the person I'm with and enjoy being with that person, that doesn't mean I want to share every aspect of my life with that person. Back to the text. Any person who's recovering in a 12-step fellowship and has completed the fifth step, himself or herself, is usually a good choice is at least to listen to our fifth step. Such a person will easily understand what we are trying to accomplish with step five. However, there is no rule which says we cannot give our fifth step to someone outside the program, a therapist, for instance, or a religious counselor. We ask for God's guidance, we give the matter some thought, and then we move ahead. We are not looking for someone to tell us how to manage our problems. No, that's not the point of this. What we need is a loving witness, someone who will keep our confidences and will listen without judging us or seeking to fix us. Nobody can fix this except our higher power. Although we want to confide in someone who will be objective enough to tell us if there's something glaring we've omitted, and who can guide us through this process if needed. Step five is usually our first attempt to fully open up our hearts to another human being. Most of us need loving guidance and learning this new skill. When working this step, we do more than just recite events from the past which we consider to be our wrongs. We need to discuss the quote exact nature unquote of those wrongs. This means we will need to talk about why we did the things we did. Let me mention that again. We need to talk about why we did the things we did. What feelings led to our actions and what did we feel afterward. We need to look at what those actions cost us. For instance, it's not enough to acknowledge that we have held a grudge against a certain person. We also need to talk about what it is in our nature that causes us to react that way. Are we jealous? Have we been resentful because of our desire to control another person? Then we discuss how these negative feelings and actions have affected us materially, emotionally, and spiritually. Sometimes coming to understand our motives helps us to forgive ourselves. Often we see that at some level we are fighting for survival when we did the things that we did. Most of us find that fear is at the root of many of our damaging emotions and actions. As we grow in the 12-step way of life, we learn that our fears usually come from our inability to trust that our basic needs will be met. The inability to trust that our basic needs will be met. Perhaps we have good reasons for our mistrusts. Perhaps people have failed us, placing us in situations we were not emotionally prepared to handle. Still, we find we have to outgrow our doubts. If we are to recover, we must learn to trust other people and entrust our lives to a power greater than ourselves. Once again, I'm going to repeat that statement. If we are to recover, we must learn to trust other people and entrust our lives to a power greater than ourselves. For all of us, learning this kind of trust has been a gradual process, taking a long time. It took me a long time, long time. Our fifth step is a giant stride forward. By opening our past life to another human being and showing this witness our deepest secrets. We are making ourselves vulnerable in a way that we have not ever been since childhood. And many of us, including me, had this great fear of being vulnerable. And what would the other p person think of me? Could I live with the fact that my sponsor would be judging me? But that never happened. Never happened. Can we trust that this person won't use this knowledge to hurt us? Determined to get well, we willingly take the risk. When we do, a miracle happens. Another human being knows us truly and fully, yet accepts us anyway. Accepts us anyway. We begin to experience trust and we feel that if another person can accept us unconditionally, perhaps we can accept ourselves unconditionally as well. Look at that. We can learn to love ourselves. Learn to love ourselves. Sometimes the process of doing steps four and five brings to our awareness more than our character defects. Sometimes we uncover old traumas, experiences of being abandoned, abused, sexually molested, or raped are far more common things than anybody would like to believe. These and other memories have been so deeply painful to those of us who were victims that we have spent our lives running from them. That's what I did. I ran away from my problems by overeating. And I used eating to cover them up until we began to deal. With them, some of us found that our abstinence was precarious, or we continued to feel unhappy even while we were abstaining and working the steps. That's when you um, even though you may not be feeling um a great connection with your higher power, you just do the talk and do the walk, and that will come back to you. In such cases, some of us have supplemented our program with therapy from qualified professionals and groups, especially geared, to help us deal with these issues. At the same time, most of us find that therapy alone doesn't permanently solve our eating problems. We need a continued involvement with the 12 steps. As we complete step five, we may feel many emotions, among them humility, elation, relief. We often feel nearer than ever before to our higher power and more loving and trusting of other people. Whether we feel these things or not, we can rest assured that we are nearer to God and more capable of trusting others. The fruits of having faithfully completed step five may be apparent immediately or gradually, but they will appear. Having taken step five, we are free. Yes, my friends, you will be free of that baggage that you have been carrying around and continue to stuff down with food. The great burden of our past mistakes has been lifted, we find we can face each day and challenge when it comes. In the process of sharing our inventory, we have become more honest with ourselves and others than we have ever been before. Honesty is a key factor in our recovery from compulsive eating, and so we will want to develop this trait. The best way to do so is to continue working the 12 steps. In this way, we can learn how to deal with those troubling aspects of ourselves which we discovered in steps four and five. Simply knowing what is wrong with us isn't always enough. Steps six through twelve will show us more actions that we can take to bring about the necessary changes in our lives. From this point on, we begin to leave behind the character defects which has caused us so many problems in the past. We have to, my friends, let go of our character defects and hand them to our higher power. If we hang on to them, then we're not trusting in our higher power and we're going to continue eating. That's not what we want. That's not what our higher power wants. I want freedom, I want joy, I want happiness. That can come from giving up and saying, this is truly who I am to another human being. I'm not perfect, but I'm going to do the very best I can from this point on to live a life centered on my higher power.

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Favorite riders, favorite life. Making your hearts bend.

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One more spot, my lovely listeners, you know in the past I've shared some poetry with you.

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Not that it's original on my part, but I sometimes find poems that really speak to me that are fun, and I'd like to share them with you. And so today we're going to focus on summer Summer with all of the heat and the vacations and the free time and the lemonade and the iced tea and whatever else you associate with summer. Here's my first poem when we got to the beach and the poet is Holly McNish. I screamed, sprinted to the sea, flung off shoes and socks, ran towards imagined heaving waves, and jumped each tiny trickle that I found there with just the right excitement. You stayed back. Took your socks off more timidly, giggled at your stupid mother, eventually took my hand. We jumped together, and we jumped together, and we jumped together. Three hours later, collapsing on our backs, we made angels in the sand. The seaside always makes me want to scream. Now with you. I can. Next I have a poem from probably the greatest playwright of all time, William Shakespeare. And this comes from a midsummer night's dream. And it takes place in a wood near Athens, and a fairy speaks this. Over hill, over dale, through bush, through briar, over park, over pale, through flood, through fire. I do wander everywhere, swifter than the moon sphere, and I serve the fairy queen to do her orbs upon the green. The cow slips tall, her pensioners be, and their gold coat spots you see. Those be rubies, fairy favors, in those freckles live their savors. I must go seek some dewdrops here, and hang a pearl in every cow slip's ear. Farewell, thou lobe of spirits, I'll be gone. Our queen and on her elves come here anon. My third poem is entitled A Green Thought, and it's by the poet Catherine Towers. Say instead it was an evening in head high bracken with his smell of darkened medicine, thinking green of the infecting fern, where you may crouch and not be known, lodging your feet for good amid the stalks. A bower is a dwelling place or once it was. A case for pent up singing birds. Look down to see the warp and weft of root. All the world is in these clutches. Look up to clock the ferns drab underneath blots with spores you mustn't breathe. Breathe in deep. There's nowhere else to live. I hope that painted an interesting picture for you. I have two more poems, my happy poetry friends. There are many, many more I could look at, but these are the ones I chose for you today. This is called Midsummer by Derek Walcott. Broad sunstone beaches White Heat, a green river, a bridge, scorch, yellow palms. From the summer sleeping house drowsing through August. Days I have held days I have lost. Days that outgrow Like daughters my harbouring arms. So that is a great reflection on midsummer. You know most of it's gone. You're wishing that you could keep it forever? Because we know what's coming next if you live in Iowa Okay And my last one, my poetic friends, is called Moonlight Summer Moonlight by Emily Bronte 'Tis moonlight, summer moonlight, all soft and still and fair, the solemn hour of midnight breeze sweet thoughts everywhere. But most were trees are sending their breezy boughs on high or stooping low are lending a shelter from the sky. And there in those wild bowers a lovely form is laid. Green grass and dew steep flowers wave gently round her head. That's a beautiful description of a countryside. Okay, you talked me into it, I'll do one more. And this one's called June by John Updike. I promised my last one. The sun is rich and gladly pays in golden hours, silver days, and long green weeks that never end. School's out, the time is ours to spend. There's a little league, hopscotch the creek, and after supper, hide and seek. The live long light is like a dream, and freckles come like flies to cream. This gives me so many memories of what it was like for me as I was a child. We didn't have video games, yeah, I know I'm archaic. And um we spent so much time playing outside that we just really, really enjoyed it playing hide and seek, getting dark rich tans, and just worshiping the sun. It was a golden time. So, folks, always have summer in your heart and always think about if you ever fall into the trap of, oh, it's so hot today, oh, it's so humid today. Think about all the positives of the day. It could be twenty-five below zero. Think about that. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 33:24

Miss my child. A good one, ladies and shell for the light full of rest.

SPEAKER_00 34:22

I sing and dance while I'm getting ready. Keep up the good work.

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For the next course, come one, come all. Nothing spoiled here from Comfort Classics to What's Hot Now, film reviews from Mr. B's Rewatchables.

SPEAKER_01 34:36

Folks, for my TV Rewatchable this week, I've been thinking about this show for quite some time. And I just thought I have to tell you about it. If you've not seen it, it should be on your list. Now, yes, the show came from the 70s. Most of you weren't born. I get that. But it was a classic, it was ahead of its time. And you can still find it on Tubi, the streaming service. You can find it on Antenna TV, and I'm sure there's another outlet you can find it. And I come back to this show, I'm building the anticipation here without giving the title of this show once every two weeks or so, because I loved, loved, loved the show and watched it in its entirety when it first ran. I'm talking about the American sitcom created by Norman Lear, who created what I think is the greatest TV sitcom of all time, All in the Family, the spin-off Maud. Maud. It was on from 72 to 1978. The series starred one of the Golden Girls, B. Arthur, this is prior to the Golden Girls, as Maud Finley. She was a politically liberal middle-aged woman living in suburban Tuckahoe, New York, with Bill Macy, who was her fourth husband. And there's a lot of jokes about all of her ex-husbands. The cast also had Adrienne Barbeau, Conrad Bain, Rue McCallahan, who played Blantz on The Golden Girls, Esther Roll, who uh got her own show on CBS called Good Times. Now, the thing about Maud is that like All in the Family, it had superb comedy, but it also dealt with social issues. Scholars have said that it's one of the most overly political American sitcoms of the 1970s, particularly for the treatment of feminism, because Maud was a great, great feminist. And it dealt with such topic, excuse me, and it dealt with such topics that maybe even today we couldn't talk about anymore on television. They talked about abortion, alcoholism, domestic violence, mental health, race, sexuality. And just did it in a very comedic way, but it really made you think about these topics. Now, you can probably imagine that as the show ran for that many seasons, it was very successful, but it was also very controversial. Um Be Author won the primetime Emmy Award for a comedy series in '77. And in 1972, I'll always remember this two-part episode. I just recently watched it again. Uh where Maud, a woman in her 40s, not that this is something that can't happen, becomes pregnant. And the two-part episode deals with what is she going to do? Is she going to have the baby? Is she not going to have the baby? How would it change their life? It is very funny, but it's also very, very moving. And she does decide to have an abortion. So it dealt with lots of topics. Maud was a very outspoken liberal. And Carol, her daughter, lives with them and young grandson Philip. And the show really focused on Maud's domestic life and how it coincided with social and political issues of the day. She at one time in the show ran for public office. She was a real estate agent. Her husband, Bill Macy, who plays Walter, owns an appliance store called Finlay's Friendly Appliances. And many times, one of my favorite phrases from that show, when Maud was engaged in an argument with uh Walter, she would say, God'll get you for that, Walter. Very, very funny. She was the queen of sarcasm, the character of Maud. Very, very, very sarcastic. And then she had neighbors. She had Dr. Arthur Harmon, who was very, very, very conservative. So you know that rubbed Maud the wrong way. And that was portrayed by Conrad Bain. And then Vivian Rue McCallahan. And she was Maud's closest friend since college. And as I said, Arthur is a very strong Republican, but he and Walter are the best of friends since World War II. Esther Roll played her first maid. She was a no-nonsense black woman who would argue with Maud. Maud would want to make her feel equal because Maud felt like all people should be treated with uh equality. But then she left and got her own TV show. She started with a cameo on All in the Family, where she was Edith's cousin. And she comes in one episode to take care of the family when they're all sick. And Archie hated her. Hated her because she was a liberal and she hated him. And the basis of that episode is absolutely outstanding comedy. So I highly suggest if you want a comedy that had darker dramatic material and social controversy and centers on an outspoken politically liberal protagonist who makes her um opinion very well known, you don't have to agree with it, then I would suggest you watch Maud. It's 30 minutes of complete hilarity. And even though it's set in the 70s, and you're going to notice the difference in hairstyles and clothing and all of that, well, she'll probably come back anyway. Uh Maud is timeless. And B Arthur as this large, tall, towering woman is absolutely a gift. And Maud, that show will never, ever be out of style. Check it out. Alright, my happy cinematic fans. I'm going to talk about two films today briefly. The second one is a sequel to the original. I just recently saw the Devil Wears Prada 2 and very much enjoyed it. Uh, this came 20 years after the original in 2006, called The Devil Wears Prada, which I have probably seen 25 to 30 times. Yes, Amanda loves the Devil Wears Prada. Why? Primarily because of Meryl Streep. I think this is one of her greatest acting roles as uh Amanda, the manager of uh fashion magazine called Runway. And she had some of the best one-liners. And they decided then 20 years later to do a sequel. So, first of all, let me say the 2006 American comedy drama was directed by Dave Frankel and starred Meryl Streep, Ann Hathaway, Stanley Tucci, and Emily Blunt. And it follows the story of Andy Sachs, played by Hathaway, an aspiring journalist who gets a job at a fashion magazine, but finds herself at the mercy of her very demanding editor, played by Miranda Priestley. Meryl Streep. The film has grossed millions of dollars. It has become a cult club. Classic and people have been wanting for years to have a sequel, and that finally happened this last May. And the story of the first film, Devil Wars Prana, is that Andy has recently graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in journalism. She can't find any positions, so she resolved to work at Runway to be Miranda Priestley's, so to speak, secretary. And she decides that she will put up with Miranda's abusive treatment so that she can use her connections to find a journalism-focused job. Well, Andy doesn't fit in at all with the superficial fashion people at the magazine, include Emily, and they all pick on her and make her life miserable. Except for Nigel, who's the art director, and he tries to take her under his wing. And she starts dressing very, very uh fashion-like, and um gets in the way of the assistant to uh Miranda, Emily, who was going to go to Paris with uh Miranda, and Andy takes her place instead, and she somewhat loses herself. And at the end of the film, she realizes that there's way, way more to life than simply fashion. And uh she quits the job and looks for a career in journalism. And so she finds that this life there's a lot of backbiting, there's a lot of deception, there's a lot of lying, and she just doesn't want any part of that anymore. And that's part of the reason why I really enjoyed that movie because it dealt with a person coming to grips with finding what he or she, in this case Anne Hathaway, really wants to do with her life. And she's not going to sell her soul for uh a pair of shoes or a Gucci handbag. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but she's just not interested in that. And so it ended with her quitting, um finding a journalistic job, and not necessarily having a good uh farewell from Miranda. Then twenty years later, we have The Devil Wears Prada 2, which again is directed by David Frankel, who directed the original 20 years ago, and all the cast comes back, and in this one, Andy Sachs Hathaway, Anne Hathaway, helps Miranda Priestley navigate a new media landscape and corporate threats to the survival of Runway magazine. Um it has been immensely popular, it's made millions of dollars since it's been released. Overall, the it has received positive reviews from critics. Uh, it's grossed over six hundred and eight million dollars against a hundred million dollar production. So once again, two decades after leaving her position, Sachs has become a re Andy Sachs has become a respected reporter in New York City. But she gets laid off uh in the department that she's been working at. And so at the same time, Miranda Priestley's Andy's old boss, Runway boss, is under fire for publishing a puff piece about a brand that uses sweatshop labor. Well, she's brought in to improve the magazine's credibility by the owner of Runway, hires Andy as the features editor without Miranda's consent. Um and uh even though some of her tyrannical office behaviors remain, uh HR complaints have blunted um some of Miranda's behavior. Um Miranda's right-hand man Nigel explains that nobody reads Runway's print edition anymore, and most of it is done online now. And uh one of the people that used to work there, Emily, who was Miranda's assistant, uh now works at um Dior. So anyway, the long story main short is uh the story involves how Andy and Miranda uh become closer and when the magazine unexpectedly enterprise is going to be sold, how Miranda and uh Andy come together to uh avoid that happening. And so as the one runaway staff uh comes back to um America after going to Italy for a fashion show, um Miranda admits to Andy that she really wants to keep working, even though she is definitely a retirement age, but she loves to work. And she also reveals that she knows about Andy's tell-all book about her and encourages her to write it, even talking about the negative aspects of Miranda's life. So she does a lot of uh changing in this film, much different from the first film. And Miranda has Andy have a nicer office, and who would have thought that she would live and be happy to work at runway with renewed invigoration. So there's a lot that I'm missing out here, but I'm basically telling you this. If for no other reason, see Deverworth Prada for Merrill Streep for all the great one-liners. I think in the future I'm going to just give you all the one-liners that are quotable. You can find them on YouTube all the time. People say them all the time. They're done in commercials. There's people who do uh parodies of uh certain scenes on YouTube. You can find that all the time from the movie Deborah Wars Prada. Uh the second film is a little more serious. Miranda doesn't have as many one-liners. She's not the same, I guess I would say, vicious, vile person that she was 20 years ago. Uh, age, so to speak, has caught up with her. But it is great to see all of these people come back and make a really exciting story. So do yourself a favor sometime and watch both of these films. Start, of course, with the 2006 Devil Wears Prada, and then go to the theater or uh or on demand and find the film, the sequel, part two. And you will find a very enriching fun experience. I am not at all interested in fashion, but I am interested in good acting and a good story. And these both films had that. The Devil was Prada 1 and 2. Okay, my loved ones, there you have it. It's time to leave the table, make your way to your cars, go home and eat your alcohol seltzer if you had too much to eat, or Malox, or Pepto Bism, whatever works for you. How much I enjoy spending time with you today, and I look forward to the next time that we get together to sit at the table and share tidbits of morsels of information. Goodbye from Mr. B's dinner party.

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