Chariots of Fire – Life In A Word

Thinking Inside of the Box

When my wife and I travel we toe the line on the weight limits the airlines impose on baggage. Our suitcases, looking ready to burst, always come in at 48-point-this or 49-point-that on the front counter scale. There’s a sigh of relief when we don’t hit the number where we’d have to pay more. So call it unfamiliar territory when my suitcase was only two-thirds full for a weekend getaway earlier this month. I mean, there was space in there still looking to be filled. I was tempted to throw in the pillow I sleep on just to keep everything from jostling around. It was a dilemma that came back to me just this morning over breakfast.

Allow me to introduce you to one of my favorite foods. Nature’s Path Organic produces grain-based cereals with the rare double-win: they taste great and they’re good for you. Nature’s Path combines exotics like amaranth, quinoa, millet, and spelt, and somehow makes them taste delicious alongside a little fruit and milk. My wife loves their “Golden Tumeric” variety while I prefer their popular “Heritage Flakes”. Sometimes I go with the sweeter “Flax Plus Maple Pecan Crunch”. Trust me, breakfast cereal has come a long way since Kellogg’s Corn Flakes.

What hasn’t changed about breakfast cereal however, is the amount of product you find in the bag when you first open the box. The photo you see here is a source of constant irritation for me. You have a box, a bag, and some cereal. The size of the bag is consistent with the size of the box. So why-oh-why (like my recent suitcase) is the bag only two-thirds full? Why not a) dial up the setting on the bag-filling machine to top things off, or b) reduce the size of the box to match the amount of the cereal?

This is the age-old game manufacturers choose to play with us consumers, of course. As production and material costs rise, they find subtle (or not-so-subtle) ways to make us believe we’re buying the same amount of the same product for the same price. At least Nature’s Path doesn’t swap out their ingredients for some chemical alternative. But they do fill the box with air along with the cereal. Honestly, I wonder if the box was ever completely full.

Here’s another sales ploy. Nature’s Path claims this cereal has a “new look” with the “same delicious taste”. What exactly is the new look (and do I even remember the “old look”)? Did the flakes change shape or size or is it the box that has a new look? More importantly, why would I care about a new look when all I want is the same bowl of cereal I bought last time? What aren’t they telling us here?

Now note the fine print at the bottom right corner of the box. First we have a disclaimer of “fruit shown as serving suggestion”. Followed by “enlarged to show texture”. Both statements let me know that what I see is not what I will get. There is zero fruit in the box. The cereal flakes are not as large as the photo suggests. And for today’s water cooler question, does cereal flake texture make it more likely you’ll buy a box?

Finally – and this one probably goes back to the early days of cereal production – the “serving size” suggested by Nature’s Path is one cup. One cup. Try the following some time: Without measuring, pour out what you’d think would be one cup of cereal into a bowl. I guarantee you’ll pour more than a cup. Imagine the saddest, smallest portion of food you will ever see and I present one cup of cereal in a decent-sized bowl. But “one cup” allows Nature’s Path to boast “about 9 serving per container”. No sir. My serving size (and yours) means I’m lucky if I get four bowls out of the entire box.

Look, I get it; organic foods are expensive. A box of Heritage Flakes would run me ten dollars or more if Nature’s Path filled the bag to the top. Add blueberries and milk and it’s an even pricier breakfast. But I’m willing to pay more for flakes instead of air. I suggest Nature’s Path go with the plan for my two-thirds-full suitcase instead. Throw in a giant marshmallow to take up all of that extra space.

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LEGO Neuschwanstein Castle – Update #8 (read about the start of this project in Fit for a (Fairy Tale) King

Neuschwanstein Castle’s (unfinished) “Palas”

Today’s construction felt like building a miniature castle within the walls of a much larger one. Bags 15 and 16 (of 23 bags of pieces) were entirely dedicated to the “Palas”, Neuschwanstein’s main residential structure. Within the walls of this building you’ll find King Ludwig’s stateroom, his servant’s quarters, a conservatory, a salon (a room to entertain guests), and an enclosed grotto at the very top. Makes me wonder why Ludwig needed to build the rest of Neuschwanstein, but I guess that’s just his way of showing off.

See the swan parked in the middle of the Grotto?

The grotto sounds like a nice place for a king to hang out, even if the LEGO equivalent makes it look a little cramped. It’s a covered outdoor space with a waterfall, colored lights, and sliding glass doors for unobstructed views of the surrounding Alps. Pretty darned progressive for a castle built in the late 1800s.

Finally, Ludwig had a thing for swans. He probably had several live ones living at the base of the waterfall but he also had the large sculpture you see above, placed prominently in the grotto. For the record, it’s a futile exercise to create a realistic-looking swan out of LEGO blocks. And the “headpiece” is so small LEGO threw in an extra one in case I somehow misplaced it.

Running build time: 7:57

Total leftover pieces: 52

Accompanying movie soundtrack: Chariots of Fire (1981). The theme song from Greek composer Vangelis is iconic; easily one of the most recognizable pieces of movie soundtrack music ever composed, whether the leadoff with the hunting horn or the sweeping piano tune itself. The melody really does evoke images of the human body in motion. However, I was quickly reminded this film score hardly represents a satisfying listen without watching the film at the same time. The rest of the synthesizer music can only be described as bizarre. Some parts are designed to accompany dramatic slow-motion running scenes. Other parts have zero rhyme/reason when they stand alone. And right in the middle of the soundtrack you get an abrupt shift to church organ music and the voices of a beautiful choir. But never mind all that. Just listen to the famous theme here.

What’s the Score?

Among the televised game shows I remember watching as a kid was one called Name That Tune. The version I watched wasn’t the original but it was the most successful, running from 1974-1981. Contestants competed for cash prizes by guessing the name of a song from a sound bite performed by the live band. The appeal of Name That Tune was the ability to play the game yourself while you watched (like you can with Jeopardy). But there was one genre of music Name That Tune didn’t tap into very often: film scores.

Here’s my question of the day. Name the last movie you saw where you also remember the music that accompanied the film. Titanic? Okay, but I’m not talking about soundtracks made up of popular songs you’d hear on Spotify (sorry, Celine) but rather instrumental scores where the music is tied to particular scenes of the story. Here, listen to the following sound bite and see if you can name the movie. Bonus points if you can picture the scene where the music was played. (scroll to the bottom for the answer)

Maybe your brain doesn’t associate movies with music the way mine does, but to demonstrate this acuity it took me no time at all to come up with a dozen of my favorite film scores; instrumentals so memorable I instantly recall the movie. Some, like the one I teased above, won Academy Awards (for “Best Original Score”). Others on my list weren’t even nominated… but maybe should have been.

Speaking of Academy Award winners, perhaps examples will help you “hear that tune”. The Best Original Score in 1965 was for The Sound of Music, primarily original songs with lyrics but several instrumental turns as well. The winner in 1973 was for The Sting, in which Scott Joplin’s ragtime piano tunes played the major role. The winner in 1975 was for Jaws, and I wonder who can’t hear that threatening theme whenever they picture a man-eating shark. The 1977 winner? Star Wars, scored by John Williams, who created the music for dozens of blockbuster films. 1990? Dances With Wolves by John Barry, another giant of the world of film scores. The list goes on and on.

As for my own list of favorites you’ll have to be a little more patient. I’ll include them – one at a time – as I give updates on the construction of my LEGO Neuschwanstein Castle over the next several months. If you’re wondering what movie soundtracks and a German castle have in common, I refer back to Chitty Chitty Bang Bang of course, with scenes filmed at Neuschwanstein. The story is a vivid childhood memory start to finish but so is the music. Trust me, for the number of times I’ve seen the film I can “name that scene” for just about every piece of the score.

LEGO Neuschwanstein Castle – Update #1 (read about the start of this project in Fit for a (Fairy Tale) King)

You’d think the construction of a castle would begin with the cornerstone. With the LEGO model you’d be wrong. We’re moving mountains instead. King Ludwig already had the Bavarian Alps at his disposal but we have build them from scratch before they’re crowned with his creation. Good thing this structure isn’t full-size or I’d be renting some serious earthmoving equipment!

With Bags 1 and 2 (of 23 bags of pieces) we got our hands dirty piling up dirt, rock, and other rather undefined landscape to create a mountaintop. Well, one-third of a mountaintop or so. If the next few bags represent the other two-thirds I’m not gonna an exciting update for you next week. At least the pieces snapped together smoothly. As with all LEGO models I’ve built, there were moments where I thought LEGO left out a piece, and other moments where I backed up a step or two to correct the construction. One change I’ve noticed from previous models: LEGO puts the tiniest pieces into paper “baglets”, which I’m not a fan of. Those little bags aren’t transparent, so you don’t always know when a piece gets stuck way down in the corner.

The model’s instruction manual – which henceforth shall be called the “tome of construction” – includes a few teasers about the real castle. Neuschwanstein has secret passageways! It also has “ingenious” inventions of its time, like modern toilets, central heating, and an electric call system for all of the servants who never spent a moment inside the walls. If any of these details are worth seeing before I “close in” the castle, you can bet I’ll be snapping a few photos for your viewing pleasure. Until next week!

Accompanying soundtrack: Mary Poppins . Did the magical nanny really make my list of favorite film scores? No she didn’t (not even for a spoonful of sugar), but I couldn’t find Chitty Chitty Bang Bang on Spotify and Dick Van Dyke was already singing in my head so… I went with Bert the chimney sweep instead.

Running build time: 44 minutes. Leftover pieces: 4.

“Name the movie” audio answer: Chariots of Fire (during the scene where several runners clad in white jog barefoot on the beach).

Some content sourced from, IMDb.com, “the Internet Movie Database”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

Golden Recall

My wife and I go for massages once a month, which has turned out to be a solid therapeutic routine. As is the case with any spa, the air is diffused with pleasant scents as well as soothing instrumental music. They also overlay a soundtrack of birds, as if to place you in the out of doors. The sensations are designed to relax and they do their job; so well in fact I’d swear I was transported to the shores of a pond. More on that in a minute.

Candidly, it’s not often I notice the background music in a spa. I focus on breathing deep and keeping my eyes closed instead. But I couldn’t ignore the music when “Bring Him Home” from Les Miserables started playing. Whatever playlist the spa chose included a simple rendition of that song; just piano and violin. It was beautiful, and suddenly I was back in the Broadway theater where we saw the show years ago. I would’ve put “Bring Him Home” on “repeat” if I could have.

But we’re not talking about Les Miserables today. We’re talking about a pond. “Bring Him Home” was followed by a nameless instrumental piano piece, and again my mind began to drift. Then I heard the birds. Piano keys. Birds. And there I went… back to “On Golden Pond”.

Several instrumental movie soundtracks will reside in my brain forever. Whenever their signature melodies play I’m immediately returned to the film itself. I’m not talking about the bold, orchestral works of John Williams (think Star Wars or Jurassic Park) but rather the simpler repetitive tunes that still somehow define the story on the screen. Chariots of Fire is a good example. Cast Away is another. Leap Year was a so-so movie but the soundtrack is wonderfully catchy. And the music of A Little Romance – Diane Lane’s debut film – was so well done it won 1979’s Oscar for Best Original Score.

So you see, this is how a massage becomes a trip back to On Golden Pond, a movie from almost fifty years ago. The piano plays. The birds sing (even if they aren’t loons). And there it is, that simple poignant story playing out in front of my closed eyes as if I’d just seen the film last week.

Was I ever a fan of Jane Fonda? Not really. I remember her more for her workout videos than her movies. But On Golden Pond was the exception because she’s on screen with Henry Fonda, her father in real life and her father in the movie. The movie is about the struggles of their father-daughter relationship, which surely echoed real life. Add in Katherine Hepburn as the mother character and the bar is raised well beyond the movie itself. The story is good enough, but who from my generation wouldn’t watch Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn in anything together?

Henry Fonda died less than a year after the filming of On Golden Pond. Katherine Hepburn made a few more movies but this was pretty much the conclusion of her career as well. So On Golden Pond is something of a swan song for both. If you have any recollection of the film, try this: Ask Alexa for instrumental piano music. Ask Siri for a soundtrack of birds at the same time. Then close your eyes and relax. You may be transported back to a golden pond. It’s pretty cool.

Some content sourced from IMDB, the “Internet Movie Database, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.