Rebecca's blowin' her dough and goin' deluxe!

[rebecca_in_blue]

I woke up in the early a.m. this morning with a terrible stomachache. It was the worst I'd had in a long time. Pepto-Bismal and a hot bath didn't help, and I didn't get to sleep for a few hours, until I finally made myself throw up, something I hate to do. Sara was still awake, and she snarkily told me I'd better wash out the bowl I'd thrown up in, because she wasn't going to. (I hope I can remember to be just as bitchy the next time she's sick.) I was so tired when I woke up this morning.

Anyway, onto some more about our trip to Little Rock:

The bed-and-breakfast we stayed at for our first night in Little Rock was The Rosemont. It was a beautiful old Queen Anne house with a narrow, winding staircase that I hated. (I've had a problem going down - but not up - winding stairs ever since taking a tumble in the French House back in 2006. When Sara and I visited London in '08, it took me forever to get down the stairs from the Whispering Gallery inside St. Paul's Cathedral. I was so nervous.)



My room was the "sleeper porch," a little addition to the second floor of the house. It was small, with a low, slanted ceiling, and no air conditioning - just two rows of casement windows. I loved it. I immediately opened all the windows, and since it was on the second floor, I was surrounded by treetops and birds singing. It was like being in a treehouse!

(Hmm, an addition to the rest of the house with a slanted ceiling and no heating or air conditioning - why does that sound so familiar? Oh yeah, that was the bedroom I grew up in. Of course, that awful old room wasn't half as nice.)



Two of my travel accessories: my inhaler (an absolute must) and my Tanakh. I happened to be reading it when Athena walked in, and she said something like, "Your room came with a Jewish bible? How weird, it's like they knew you were coming." And I know what you're thinking: Wow, Rebecca, you remembered to pack your Jew Bible but forgot your toothbrush? Yes. Yes, I did.

That night, we were off to the James Taylor concert. We were sitting in the nosebleed section, but I promise the view was better than this photo makes it seem. I didn't take many pictures because it was so dark. (And yes, my date stamp is wrong. The year is still set on 2010, and the day is one behind.) 



JT is 63 and bald now, but he was so energetic and humble and he really rocked the house. Some bits to remember:

~ When he did "How Sweet It Is," he would sing "How sweet it is..." and then turn his microphone around to the audience and we would sing "...to be loved by you."

~ At the end of "Steamroller" - the only one of his hits that I really don't like - he squinched up his face so he looked really old, pulled his lips over his teeth so he looked toothless, and kept pretending to forget his lines. It was funny.

~ When he did "Copperline," it made me flashback to walking to the Grand Leclerc in Villers-Cotterets in the springtime. I don't know why, but I listened to that song a lot in France.



This lady a few rows in front of us was on her feet and dancing almost the entire time!

I loved sleeping with all my windows open in my sleeper porch that night, but the night was cool, and sometime in the a.m. I woke up wheezing. And I'd left my inhaler in the car! I had dropped it in the car on the way back from James Taylor, and it was so dark and I was so tired that I didn't want to bother looking for it. So I had to creep outside at five in the morning and root around in the car until I found it. Ugh. 


A cold front rolled in with the rain last night, and today was almost as cold as winter! (Which translates to, Rebecca had to wear a light jacket.) I throw up my hands at this!

Only one hour to go until the Tony origins episode of NCIS (Baltimore)! Can you smell the excitement?

Later: Updated to add my notes on the new episode, which run long because honestly, I could not find one thing to dislike about this episode. Michael Weatherly knocked it out of the park!


Notes for episode 8x22 Baltimore
(AKA Tony's origin episode)

Writer: Steven D. Binder (Kill Screen).

+ Ziva telling Tony that he is a "very capable investigator." I loved this, because too often she's insulting him, not complimenting him. I blame the writers. Having Tony dig around for his cell phone did make him look kinda stupid, but for the most part, it managed to stay on the funny side for me.

+ "Agent Barrett and her team left last night for Hawaii, following a new lead." I was glad to have an episode free of them. I have been liking the EJ episodes, but it was nice to just focus on our team again.

+ Gibbs let Tony answer a call from dispatch on his phone!

+ Tony's expression when Ziva asked if they should call EJ. He looked relieved when Gibbs said no.

+ Wow, Tony's expression and reaction when he recognized Danny's dead body at the crime scene. Michael Weatherly just hit this whole episode out of the park. I also loved his acting during the atuopsy scene: trying to suppress the emotion in his voice when he was talking about Danny and refusing to look at his dead body on the table.

+ Cutting from the tattoo on Danny's arm to the flashback at the Baltimore headquarters. I loved how nonchalantly he shoved the chair in front of the addict's way. He was making movie references even then! And we found out where he got his Mighty Mouse stapler!

+ Abby's large-print "Gibbs version" of the fortune inside the fortune cookie. Lol!

+ There was even more to love in the stake-out scene between Tony and Danny. You could really see there what good partners and friends they were, how well they worked together, almost like brothers. Tony told Danny, "You dress like my father," but later, he started dressing the same way. And we found out that Tony was engaged once -- to his high-school music teacher!

+ I saw it coming, but I still loved it when the "crook" Tony was chasing in Baltimore turned out to be Gibbs. He tackled the boss and called him a dirtbag!

+ I awww'ed at Ziva and McGee acting concerned for Tony, and Ziva telling him that he was "not just any partner." Friendship scenes between those two are so cute.

+ The Russian immigrant running the Chinese resteraunt.

+ Tony and Danny making digs at Gibbs after they arrested him. I especially loved how Tony settled on calling him Gibbs and his reaction when he realized that Gibbs wanted to get arrested.

+ Gibbs lost his glasses... in the same episode where Tony lost his cell phone. Does this have anything to do with the P2P killer? Has he been in the bullpen? Is he spying on our team? And Gibbs called Ziva "Ziver" -- always a nice touch.

+ Gibbs asking Tony point-blank if he was okay. Even though Tony answered that he was fine, Gibbs and the rest of the team could tell that Danny's case was effecting him, and they were concerned. Awww.

+ Ziva, Gibbs, and Ducky all ugh'ing at the smell in interrogation. It was a good, funny little moment in a middle of a dramatic episode.

+ The team discovering that the killer was actually a copy-cat and Tony finding his lost cell phone with the voicemail from Danny were good twists. And did you see Gibbs's expression when Tony said that he left his phone at EJ's? He really does not approve. I wonder if he knows something about EJ that everyone else doesn't, and that's why he doesn't trust her.

+ "Who'd want to be a Navy cop? I'd rather have the plague." Hahaha! Why not do both?

+ Abby saying that it was so sad how Tony and Danny drifted apart, and hoping that it won't happen to her Three Musketeers. It was such a sweet sentiment, and I love it when she calls Tony, Ziva, and McGee her Three Musketeers.

+ "35: Always watch the watchers." A new rule! It's been too long since we got one of those.

+ The flashback to Gibbs in the bullpen was full of nice touches: the glimpse of Pacci, Gibbs's slightly darker hair, and his hanging up on his wife (he was still married then!) and answering a call from his divorce lawyer (but wouldn't be for long).

+ Tony referring to Danny as "my partner" in interrogation. It a good, subtle way of showing how much Danny's murder really did effect him.

+/- It was very clever and well-done how the replay of the opening scene was revealed to be a new scene, set in the past. It got a tad bit heavy-handed, though, when Tony figured out that Danny was a dirty cop just from a look in Floyd's eyes.

+ Ziva telling McGee that she would rather arrest her father than Gibbs.

+ "I don't have a lot of rules, but number five is you don't waste good." And we get another new rule! This episode is climbing the charts!

+ Tony's initial reactions to his first view of the bullpen ("I'm not a big fan of the orange and the glare off that skylight's ridiculous") and his first head-smack from Gibbs ("Did you just physically assault me? Don't make a habit of that"). Priceless! And such a solid foundation for the bond that these two would build working together over the next ten years. Interesting that EJ said almost the same thing about the same skylight the first time she showed up in One Last Score.