History of Western Europe • This is a great find, being in good shape and printed in 1903. Always interesting to read out-of-date history!
Thunderbolt • Memoirs are never a bad buy (unless it is someone who is unscrupulous, such as this book by a mobster I read a long time ago… by the second chapter it was obvious he was just making everything up. It was crazy.)
Why The Germans Lose At War • Interesting analysis of the skilled people in the German military/political scene, and the wildly unskilled people in the German military/political scene.
Mathew B. Brady’s Civil War • Amazing how old these photographs are, and we are very lucky to have them. Sure would be interesting if photography had developed earlier and we could have seen the War of 1812 or Revolutionary War. This is a great book though.
Nobody • From the writer of John Wick. Has to be good then, right? It was! Bob Odenkirk does a great job, the action scenes are great, and it’s a nice start to a good movie franchise! I did read that this is set in the John Wick universe, and they’ll have hints to that in the next movie.
Unhinged • Look at how similar the movie poster is to Nobody! Doesn’t matter, this is still a good movie. There are a few moments in this that really caught me off guard. The first ten minutes or so is very slow, but once it gets going, the movie runs at full speed for the rest of the film. Russell Crowe does great as a road rage instigator… one should watch this movie simply to add to the reasons never to honk one’s horn!
To Hell and Gone • This was one of those low-budget movies that I picked just for the fun of it. I have a lot of these that I never get to because so many turn out to be a waste of time. But this one wasn’t. Even with a low budget, it looks great and kept my interest. I’m always thinking “what would I do, could I do that?” when watching movies like this.
Finally got my new Defender mask to replace my old Sportmask. The Sportmask was second-hand, didn’t cost much and has lasted a very long time. However this new one fits better and doesn’t have all of the battle damage. It’s been a long time coming, but the weakest aspect of my goaltending gear has finally been dealt with! The Defender is a custom mask and is definitely not a thrifty bargain like the Sportmask was as it cost as much as my leg pads did, but it is a long-term commitment and I’ll definitely be getting my money’s worth out of it!
Just waiting to get my custom pants, leg pads and glove back from being repaired and refurbished and I should be good to go for a few years!
Rome • Season 1 & 2 • I haven’t watched this since it came out fifteen years ago… and I picked this up, which is both seasons… for $1.50! The discs are in perfect shape and so far I’m several discs in. What a deal! Also, it’s in a sort of book form, with the discs easy to access, without even really opening the ‘book’ up. Great packaging.
Eyewitness Auschwitz: A very raw, first-hand account of being in Auschwitz.
Fulcrum: Escaping the Soviet Empire. That’s what people don’t understand about Communism/Socialism: They wall you in, you have to escape it.
Fatal Voyage: I have several books on the USS Indianapolis now. Sounds like such a sad story.
The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II: I have other books by this editor, and of the same kind… they are big books! Interesting to just look through, and a handy reference when reading my other books. Amazing that a book this big can be had for next to nothing. This was one of those really neat bargain priced books that would be sold at Waldenbooks or Barnes & Noble. They used to have a really nice amount of great books at decent prices, for new books that is. Now, there is no Waldenbooks and Barnes & Noble only has a fraction of the Bargain Book section that they used to have. So sad. Every time I see one of the bargain price stickers on a book, it makes me think of the time I spent agonizing of which books to buy because they were all so good and all so cheap (not compared to thrift prices, but I didn’t hit the thrifts back then).
Nothing too shocking here: The Zemlinsky Symphonies is totally new to me. The Beethoven Overtures is a nice collection but not totally new to me. The Britten: Spring Symphony is new to me, and the disc and case are like new even though it is a 1997 release!
I have listened to almost all of these already, the Debussy / Ravel album has been the best so far, along with the Faure: Requiem.
Iwo Jima: Twenty-two first-hand accounts. Very interesting read.
Franco and Hitler: How the war would have been different if Franco had joined the Axis, this is very interesting stuff.
The Last of the Doughboys: More first-hand accounts, but this is from the Great War.
Now, this The World War II Album was a risk, as it looked so familiar, and my list had The World War I Album in my library and was very familiar, but all it would take would be one little typo, a “I” instead of “II” and I’d have a double on my hands. This is why it’s good to sample books from one’s library, as to know the library better. There shouldn’t be books in my library that I am unfamiliar with. But as it turns out, I won this gamble and now I have the two-book set! I have never seen this book before or I would have it already. I actually read the first volume five or ten years ago in its entirety. I don’t pay attention much to authors and book titles, which is not a great habit, but there it is. In any case, I’m really happy with all of these buys.
This soundtrack was a gamble as it was scratched up more than I usually accept… and it ripped to my computer perfectly. No issues, I listened to the entire thing, expecting some sort of audible errors… nothing! This is great as I really like the soundtrack to these movies and only have one of the five so far (now, two of the five). This is one of those soundtracks that never hits the thrifts, and was only there because it was so scratched that nobody wanted it. I really like Hans Zimmer soundtracks.
This is one of my favorite symphonies, so another rendition of it is a good find.
This Decca / Haitink series of Shostakovich is almost complete. I’m trying to get the releases with this format of cover, and this Decca / Haitink series contains the first copy of Symphony 11 that I bought right after hearing it live, which hooked me.
This is actually two seperate physical releases that I combined into one cover since it’s a complete collection of Dvorak’s symphonies. It’s nice when the entire set is available at the same time as to avoid having to put up with an incomplete set, waiting for that opportunity to come across the missing discs.
This was still in the shrink-wrap! Thibaudet is one of those pianists I am specifically collecting.
Finding all of these completes my Deutsche Grammophon / Abbado set of Symphonies. I do have to wonder where the missing 3 & 4 and 7 were as I didn’t see it at the thrift I found these at.
I have been listening to more organ music lately thanks to some orchestral transcriptions, so it was nice to find these. One of them was still in the shrink-wrap, too!
Below is the rest of my finds, all good! It took some time to sort through them all, check them against my list, check the condition… I’d thought they were all full price ($3.00) since they were all together in a plastic tray, but it turns out they were all half-off! The Rachmaninov Symphonies and Schubert Lieder were both three-disk sets that come in custom boxes, and looked to be completely unused!
randyrydberg.org 