My first thought (you might even call it my gut reaction) was “my microbiome,” so it’s along similar lines to yours.

I grew up in Honolulu, and every once in a while there would be a tsunami warning. I don’t know how old I was—I would guess 6 years old, give or take a couple of years—but during one tsunami warning my parents drove up a ridge and parked on the side of the road to wait it out. We had a VW Vanagon, and I remember sitting in the van playing with toys to pass the time. At some point, a girl around my age joined me in the van. Her parents had the same idea as mine, and I guess they invited her to play with me while we all waited.

I’m in my 40s now. I still think about that girl from time to time.

My thinking is along the same lines. I think OP and his wife both have good arguments for making certain dishes certain ways. And indeed, it seems (to me, in my unqualified opinion) that they need to have an ongoing conversation about which dishes each wants made which way.

OP’s wife is nostalgic for a certain boxed pancake mix because it reminds her of her deceased mother? Cool, that’s pretty low-stakes, just make the boxed shit. But part of OP’s self-care routine is cooking food from scratch, and that’s important too.

OP is right that fighting over this is silly. OP is wrong that scratch-made will always be better. Oh, I’m sure it will taste better, but in the long run it will be worse for OP’s marriage.

And crucially, they both need to be flexible. If OP takes pride in their cooking and the couple is having company over for brunch, then maybe leave the boxed pancake mix in the pantry and let OP wow the guests with their delicious and fluffy scratch-made pancakes. And of course, OP needs to remember that that flexibility is a two-way street.

If so, it’s propagating. I live in the NW USA and have been noticing it for years.

Lost, but not the one you’re thinking of.

Travel back in time with me to September 4, 2001. It was a golden age, and reality television had taken off in a big way. NBC and CBS were each set to premiere a new show, with basically the same format: Teams of two Americans would start somewhere in the world and have to race back to the United States to win a cash prize.

NBC’s show Lost was the first to air, with CBS’s The Amazing Race airing the night after. The premise of Lost was great:

Three two-member teams knew only the final destination (thousands of miles away) and were given only a backpack full of clothes and other essentials. In addition, team members were not acquainted with one another prior to the show, and were assigned to teams. Contestants were blindfolded and dropped off with a single camera person in a remote location of an unknown country to find their way back to their home country…Teams were given no money until they managed to figure out what country they were in. During the first set, the teams were abandoned in Mongolia. (Source: Wikipedia)

The show did not do well. NBC blamed the low ratings on the fact that 9/11 happened shortly after, which actually preempted the second episode. Considering The Amazing Race debuted at basically the same time and went on to tremendous success (Lost had 1 season with 6 episodes, whereas The Amazing Race had 36 seasons and 418 episodes), I suspect something else was the cause.

So if the show was so bad, why did I like it?

First, I liked the idea that the teams started out in a location that was a mystery to them. Their first challenge was to figure out where in the world they were in a country where they (almost certainly) didn’t speak the language.

Second, although they were two-person teams, any passage they secured for themselves, they also had to secure for their camera person. You want to catch a flight? Well, I hope you have enough money to buy three tickets!

And finally, I was hooked early on when this one moment happened. It’s still one of my favorite moments of reality TV. Remember, all three teams started out in the Mongolian desert. They were spread out from one another, so no two teams would cross paths right away. This meant that as they made their way to the nearest village, they were headed to different villages.

Two teams had a similar plan: To catch a bus that drove between the villages (and, IIRC, was headed to a larger city). So the first team gets on the bus in their village, and as the bus drives into the village where the second team is waiting, the first team spots them. They then quickly convince the bus driver not to stop and to just keep on driving instead. We’re then shown two shots: One from inside the bus, where we see the second team and their camera guy as they watch the bus go by, and then one from outside the bus, as the second team watches the bus blow past them and they realize the first team is on board.

Or Wonderfalls, or Pushing Daisies, or basically anything Bryan Fuller does.

It drives me nuts that people frequently leave out the words “to be” when talking. For example, they will say something like, “the car needs washed.” No, either the car needs to be washed, or it needs washing.

I do something a bit like this. I’ll pick a theme (animals, food, places, etc) and then go through the alphabet one letter at a time and something from the theme that starts with that letter. Alternatively, I’ll pick a letter and just think of as many different words as I can that start with that letter. Those work for me most of the time!

Just one on each end.

Develop my current podcast further, as well as work on at least 1 or 2 other podcast ideas I have. So many great ideas, so little time.

“Because we can.”

In Rock ‘n’ Roll High School Forever, the scene where they go over to someone’s house and pretend to worship their refrigerator doesn’t further the plot or character development in any way.

I completely agree about Ethan Frome, but perhaps you’ll like this video, which cracked me the hell up.

Two chapters, IIRC.

I enjoyed Gattaca, but the trailer is for a very different movie.

Also, stuff like this is often purchased not to drink, but as an investment.

It’s been awhile since I’ve seen it, but IIRC, the film isn’t saying the Christian Jesus we all know about is immortal, but that this character in the film who is immortal (and a white dude, BTW) was assumed to be the son of God because people 2,000 years ago found out he was immortal and had no other explanation.

ETA: Looks like I remembered reasonably well. Here’s the scene in question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bXtdr5BI74

I’ve always assumed this was faked, but based on this article, it really happened.

The Third Man has that fantastic zither theme.

Indeed not, which is why I was momentarily puzzled. 😂