There’s a bird outside my window whose spring call is, “Wheeeee!”

It’s hilarious and adorable, and I wanted to play Amateur Ornithologist and find this bird out, so I hit the New York City Birding Wiki ID Template, which has this helpful image guide on its front page:

Fuck you, Not an American Robin! You’re such a poser.

(I imagine an actual American Robin sitting at some Internet Cafe, furiously banging out the image code.)

Also, my little tweeter is a European Starling.

Gillian Kearney was in The Tide of Life, and I liked her because:

1) She is a sweetie, and
2) She has leftover goodwill from being in The Forsyte Saga, where she was repeatedly whacked with the short end of the stick.

But she should just be lucky that she made very few bad decisions in that miniseries, which made her the only one.

When I saw The Forsyte Saga back in 2004, I wrote it up for Defenestration, because I was amazed that you could yell, “What a terrible plan!” at EVERY character you saw EVERY time ANYONE did something and it would ALWAYS be right. I saw it again last year, and seriously, it’s like a How Not To Do This of bad decision-making.

(Disclaimer: At the end of Forsyte Saga: To Let, I cried so hard I basically bruised a lung. So don’t think that just because I’m snarking means the miniseries isn’t good. It’s good; Damian Lewis and Amanda Root carry even the dull parts of the original series, and Damian Lewis pulls the entire second series basically by himself, and his performance is good. It’s really good. It’s so good it bruises your lungs when you sob like a nerd through the end credits.)

So, there are two or three more really dismal installments of The Catherine Cookson Experience coming up, and I thought that before I hit all the marital rape and spouse-slapping, everyone could use one that’s pleasantly absurd. Behold, The Tide of Life!

Here’s the thing about this miniseries; Gillian Kearney is a really good actress. She worked her ass off in The Forsyte Saga, and I really love the sort-of-documentary biopic she did on BBC, and – she’s not the poor soul who played Cissie Brodie, is what I’m saying. She has genuine charisma, and you root for her.

The problem with The Tide of Life is that while she seems perfectly sweet and capable of making normal-person decisions, she agrees to go steady with any dude who enters the frame, so you end up wondering if she has a concussion. Also a problem: the title sounds like a tampon ad. (Not Cookson’s fault; just saying.)

Era: early 1900s
Heroine: Emily Kennedy, housekeeper and concussion victim
Siblings that require looking-after: One sister, also a concussion victim
Illegitimate (Self or sibling): Shockingly, all the major characters are legit.
Asshole Father?: Nary a dad in sight.
Romantic interest(s): Sep, her first employer; Larry, her second employer; Nick, who wanders into frame in the last twenty minutes.
Bairnsketballs: One for our heroine, one from an extra, plus a tumor everyone thinks is a bairnsketball. (Nobody in this movie is very bright, come to think of it.)
Fistfights: Hell yes. Also, murder, pistol-whipping, chasing someone into the ocean, and lighting a houseful of stuff on fire.
Assaults: Two (attempted)

“That’s what you are – NOWT!”
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I walk through midtown twice a day, passing the Fendi store. The spring shop windows are out.

On the right hand side, a tea dress from 1915, from the Seduction exhibit at FIT.

From the Fendi Spring 2009 collection. I am on to you, fashion house! (And I approve!)

By the way, as is traditional after costume overposting, Darin Bradley gets to pick some super-macho topic next. Already covered: monster trucks.