Duck Soup
I had an endoscopy on Wednesday. (An endoscopy is a procedure used in medicine to look inside the body. The endoscopy procedure uses an endoscope to examine the interior of a hollow organ or cavity of the body. Unlike many other medical imaging techniques, endoscopes are inserted directly into the organ.) They put me to sleep then stuck a tube down my throat which took photos and did biopsies. That it can do a biopsy blows my mind. Modern medicine. The procedure took about twenty minutes. I was at the medical enter for a little bit over two hours. The first thirty minutes of which I was occupied with filling out forms and yakking with my wife who’d kindly accompanied me. She’s aces.
With insurance the visit and procedure set me back $100. That’s with medical insurance. Without insurance the cost would have been prohibitive and I’d have had to taken my chances that nothing was amiss.
Thursday was Juneteenth so I had an extra day to relax. It wasn’t the happiest day of my life. I’ve had a horrible case of the sniffles with constant sneezing and a nose running like the Colorado River after a monsoon. No other symptoms. I was also wracked with depression, a particularly bad case. Depression can be like a terrible pain that has no discernible source, it’s just there beating the hell out of you. On top of the sniffles and the blues I have a pain in my right leg that seems centered around my knee. I don’t know what it is or where it came from. It’s been around for a few days but yesterday was the first time it really bothered me. Calling the doctor later.
I wiled the day away with movies, reading and naps. Wednesday after I got home from the “procedure” was the same. I watched Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) Lean. I hadn’t seen it in I’ve no idea how long but I know I’ve seen it a lot because throughout the movie in addition to knowing what was about to happen I knew what lines were about to be said — verbatim. It’s quite a remarkable film in many ways. I remember as a kid I thought it had the coolest ending ever. Oh the irony! (I was precocious when it came to irony.) But the key to the film is William Holden. He can turn a good movie into a great one. No one has ever been a better or more affable cynic.
In the evening the missus and I finished Dept. Q on Netflix. What a terrific show. Matthew Goode played against type starring as the angry, troubled but brilliant detective.
Thursday I watched The Big Trail (1930). Much of the acting is wooden and uninteresting, especially from the lead, one John Wayne in his first starring role, but it is an otherwise amazing film shot in widescreen (yes, in 1930!) on location. It looks nothing like other films of the era. It surely gives you a feel for what life on a real wagon train must have looked like. It’s got everything but the smells. A remarkable achievement well ahead of its time.
With the depression weighing on me in the evening I did the best I could to withstand it by watching the greatest comedy of all time Duck Soup (1933) McCarey. To suggest that they don’t make comedies like that anymore is a massive understatement. It’s only a shame that I’ve watched it so many times that I know the gags by heart. Imagine watching the mirror scene for the first time! I remember that when I did watch for the first time as a child I thought it was magical, surreal and hilarious and utterly wonderful. Same with the stateroom scene in A Night at the Opera. Duck Soup was the last film the brothers Marx made before Irving Thalberg Hollywoodized them by adding sappy songs and boring love stories. The first of those films was the afore-mentioned Night at the Opera which ranks right behind Duck Soup, Horsefeathers, Monkey Business and Animal Crackers as among their best work. The subsequent films pale in comparison.
Okay so I started this Friday morning before heading off to work and I finish it now on Saturday morning. The sniffles persist but are not nearly so bad, the knee pain has also abated somewhat but clearly I need to have it checked out. I’m assuming that the doctor’s office will return my call sometime Monday. I guess they’re too understaffed to return patients’ calls. God forbid I had an emergency. The depression is gone — for now — but it lurks and one never knows when it will next strike. It’s a right bastard.
Going for a long walk in a bit. May accidentally swing by a bookstore. These things happen.
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