Category: books i’ve read

The Streak

Tuesday morning and staring down a brand new day; the week is passing every so slowly but that’s fine, you know. I slept really well last night, but was kind of slow to waking up this morning. The coffee is going down pretty well so far, and I do feel rested this morning; much more awake than yesterday, but not lively as of yet. Yesterday was a nice day, if a very busy one at the office; I suspect that is going to be the case again today. I think I’ll just come straight home from work tonight. I didn’t do much of anything when I got home from work yesterday, other than finish watching Monsters before going to bed relatively early. The kitchen is a mess and disaster area, so I need to get that taken care of tonight when I get home; tomorrow I can do the mail and the grocery store if I need to. Fascinating, right?

I did manage to do very little writing last night–Chapter Six proving to be a bit more difficult than Five was–but that’s okay; I was tired and not really operating on all cylinders, either. I was horribly lazy, too. When I came downstairs this morning to the kitchen I was horrified that I left it like that overnight, knowing I wouldn’t be able to do anything about it until after work tonight. The sink has dirty dishes and there’s stuff all over my counters. I didn’t even make the chicken salad, which I will absolutely have to do tonight. The refrigerator also needs to be organized. Sigh. And I’m sure there’s another load of laundry already, too. Heavy heaving sigh. This is why I need to get this shit completely done on the weekends.

I also didn’t do my daily German lesson yesterday, either, which is a total shame because I was on a rather long streak with it. Some of it is coming back to me, which makes the lessons somewhat easier; I remember a lot of vocabulary words–or they come back at least when I see them on the screen. Our plan is to go to Amsterdam and Germany at some point; I’d rather like to see Berlin and the German Museum where the stolen head of Queen Nefertiti–which belongs in Egypt–is currently housed. I don’t want to be fluent, but at least be able to speak somewhat coherently to the locals. So, definitely have to do it tonight, for sure.

I also discovered something chilling about my last name yesterday–I may have been aware but my mind had forgotten–but the Nazi Master Race theory? Die herrenvolk. Yikes. I’ve always assumed herren meant men–it’s on every men’s room door in Germany, Austria and Switzerland–but it also means lord…as well as master. Double yikes. It was definitely unsettling to be slapped in the face with a reminder (if I knew it once) of what herrenvolk means….triple yikes and gross.

I also didn’t get to read last night. I managed about six or seven hundred words written on the book, and Sparky really wanted me in my easy chair–he’s always super needy on Mondays after having us both home all weekend, and was climbing me while I fed him–so I obliged. He’s such a sweet baby, and he was in bed with me again this morning when I hit snooze for the first time. He’s not as docile as Scooter, and isn’t nearly as manipulative as Skittle was, but he’s a sweet baby doofus who’s gradually getting more calm than he was when we first got him. And I love how he’s always waiting at the door when I get home–he hears the gate close. Paul says he’ll be upstairs asleep on the bed and will suddenly pop up, jump down and run down the stairs…and he knows it means I’ll be coming through the front door in a moment or two. He still likes to ride on my shoulders, too.

It does look as if that tropical system off the Yucatan is going to form and head for the Florida panhandle, as there’s a cold front coming in from Texas to Louisiana which will push it that direction–which of course is always subject to change right up until the eye wall comes ashore. It’s projected to be arriving sometime Thursday afternoon. I wish everyone on the panhandle and in the path of said storm luck and a speedy recovery from the destruction, which will be minimal, fingers crossed.

I enjoyed Monsters, and so did Paul. He doesn’t really remember the Menendez case as well as I do–of course, back then I was a potential crime writer, so all big crimes interested me for a while until there was so much coverage I got sick of the cases. I honestly don’t remember the incest stuff, which apparently the real brothers are really bothered by; but I also had that sense when it was going on from somewhere, that there was incest beyond the paternal molestation and rape, and according to the show, Erik testified to molesting his brother with a toothbrush? One of the final episodes is more focused on Dominick Dunne, and frankly, I’d love to see a series where Nathan Lane plays Dunne; he deserves an Emmy for that episode alone. I’m going to think about the show a bit more before writing about it, of course–it needs digesting–but the acting was top notch, as almost always in a Murphy series; the actors playing the leads are very impressive…and will probably be seen in a lot of Murphy shows as he likes to work with the same people over and over again.

And on that note, I’m heading into the spice mines. I do have a ZOOM meeting tonight at 6, and will be trying to clean the kitchen before that gets started. I may be back later, I’m never really sure how that goes, you know? If not, I will see you on the morrow, Constant Reader.

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Room Full of Roses

Monday morning has rolled around again somehow, and it’s another week of work for me (and everyone else). I didn’t want to get out of bed this morning–and I’d really like to go back to bed–but I feel okay as far as rest and everything is concerned. My neck has been sore for a few days because I slept on it wrong (it’s sooo much fun being old), so I’ve been making sure my head is correctly positioned on my pillows the last couple of nights and what do you know, it’s gotten better. The one thing I hate about being older is that you have to be a lot more careful about doing things, else you’ll be sorry. I’m not very keen on that aspect of being older, frankly. The Saints lost yesterday in the final minute, which was disappointing, but I think the Eagles are one of the better teams in the NFL? I probably should start paying more attention to the NFL overall, I suppose, but it’s still too early in the season to start thinking about play-offs and so forth.

I did make a grocery run yesterday morning–I’ll have to stop on the way home to get a few things I didn’t get, but other than that, it’s straight home for me tonight. We almost finished Monster: The Erik and Lyle Menendez Story, which apparently the brothers aren’t all that happy with; and in all honesty, I thought the first episode was truly terrible and we weren’t going to watch any more of it…but after the game yesterday we decided to give the second episode a try, and we got hooked into it. I’ve not seen much chatter about the show, but the acting is really good and while the writing and plotting are all over the place (the Dominick Dunne representation by Nathan Lane is quite good, but very reminiscent of Truman Capote from Feud), it’s very well done and while there are some things I don’t remember in the story (doesn’t mean they didn’t happen; it was over thirty years ago they killed their parents and my memory isn’t good anymore), it’s not intended to be factual but entertainment. I don’t know how I would feel about my life being offered up as fictionalized entertainment for the huddled, teeming masses (and hopefully will never find out). But we’re enjoying it, and I’ll talk about it more once we’ve finished watching.

I didn’t get any writing done this weekend, and that’s perfectly okay. I was very low energy both Friday and Saturday, and finally felt more like me yesterday. But after the grocery run and the Saints game, I just wasn’t up for writing…and the primary reason was I got very deep into Jordan Harper’s Everybody Knows and I even hated to put it down to watch the Saints game, but I was so into it that I was reading during the game. I will most likely finish it this week or this weekend, and I will have a lot to say about this incredible novel when I do finish it. I’ve really hit a lucky streak with my reading–this and the forthcoming Alison Gaylin are both fantastic; and I am really looking forward to all the good reads in my TBR pile. It’s also eerie reading Harper’s book, having recently watched Quiet on the Set and with the currently breaking Sean Combs story, which is truly terrifying and sending, it seems, even bigger shockwaves through the entertainment business than even Epstein’s arrest. I will have some things to say when I do finally write about Harper’s book, which is truly incredible; I can see why it got so much awards love; I would have short-listed it myself had I been a judge that year.

Reading other good writers always inspires me; this is how I can tell someone is a truly terrific talent–I get ideas of my own from reading their work, and will note phrases and sentences that sound like great titles. This is why, I think, I always have so much trouble talking about my influences, because I’m influenced by everything I read, whether I like it, enjoy it, love it, or hate it. Same will visual media–film and television. (For example, that Menendez show makes me think, again, about murders within the family, and how monstrous those stories are. I can’t imagine killing my father or my sister, under any circumstance, because it’s not even on my register. And killing your mother? Yeah, can’t even conceive of any reason powerful enough to do that…so I am lucky and kind of grateful to be lucky.)

So, I’m kind of hoping to have a good week this week, with reading and writing and cleaning and filing everything. I feel good going into the week, so let’s hope this lasts. And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in again at some point.

He Thinks I Still Care

Yesterday didn’t turn out the way I’d hoped, but low energy is sometimes completely unpredictable. I ran my errands yesterday–mail, prescriptions, groceries–and by the time I got home I was very tired, to the point I didn’t even finish putting the dry goods away from Costco on Friday (yes, there is a Costco-sized package of paper towels sitting on the living room floor, where it’s been since I tossed it over there on Friday). Instead, I collapsed into my easy chair and started watching games. First I watched Florida beat Mississippi State (how bad are the Bulldogs this season?), then the LSU-UCLA, the end of Vanderbilt-Missouri (probably the best game of the day) and at the end of it all got to watch Tennessee dominate Oklahoma for most of the 25-15 game before turning it off to go to bed as the sleepiness took over. LSU struggled with UCLA in the first half to a 17-17 half-time score, but went on to win it 34-17. The defense still looks iffy, the offense is starting to really gel, and they always seem to never really be into the game in the first half. There was a lot of sloppy play in the game, and I also do think LSU was the better team…but they just never seem game ready when the game actually starts. Both offense and defense looked better in the second half to me, but that is alarmingly reminiscent of the last two seasons….and historically, LSU always plays not as well in the first half. We’ll see how that goes in a few weeks when Mississippi comes to Baton Rouge. The Saints play at noon today, too–which is probably when I am going to make groceries today; it’s always best to do it in the ghost town New Orleans becomes during Saints games. I’ll have it on and probably won’t watch, as I still get too vested in Saints games.

My mind was too fatigued yesterday for me to process trying to read anything (although I did finally read that Advocate piece on jockstraps and their history, so I can possibly write that essay at some point; it also occurs to me this morning that maybe I should try outlining my essays, figuring out what I actually want to say rather than ad-libbing these essays that I post. I am very behind on them now–especially when it comes to writing up books I’ve read–and maybe, just maybe, outlining the points I want to make and the information that led to the coming up with those points and defending them might not be a bad idea. I do enjoy freeform writing–that’s what this blog actually is, isn’t it?–but it’s probably not the best for long form personal essays. I’m always learning, aren’t it?

My copy of Julia Dahl’s I Dream of Falling arrived yesterday, emphasizing further the need for me to get back to reading. I have way too many great books to read on deck, and not reading every day is a mistake. I should come home from work every day, put my stuff down, feed Sparky, change into more comfortable clothes, and read for an hour. There are good games on next weekend, but nothing to take me away from doing things (LSU plays South Alabama, and it will most likely not be televised), so next weekend should be a good time for me to get reading. The following weekend is a bye, so…the next two weekends should be more productive than the usual weekend in fall.

I did, however, do some thinking about the next chapter of the Scotty book, and I think I need to reread the previous, already written chapters. I also want to mark up Scotty books–I was incorrect, Garden District Gothic was never marked up–so that I can start transcribing and getting everything organized. So, I need to get this done with the last three and transcribe the mark-ups from Jackson Square Jazz, too, which I can do during the Saints game if I so choose. I want to do some cooking today, too–things for the week for lunch, healthy snacks (making a salad to eat from over the week; roasting Brussels sprouts, and making chicken salad)–and I need to get some filing done, at least out of my inbox, which has been a royal mess for quite some time. I also need to look at deadlines and so forth, and plan some short story writing time as well, and take some time today to at least start that next chapter. I also found some great inspirational pictures for a short story I am writing; one can never go wrong with bayou and swamp pictures, seriously. Maybe the LSU bye weekend I can drive out to the Manchac Swamp and LaPlace and take a look around so I have a better idea of how to write that story. It’s very lengthy already–focuses on desire for a gay college student for his straight best friend (does this still happen?)–but the ending has to not be rushed as it is now, and just as layered and complex as the opening of the story; right now the story feels like it’s front-loaded with a lot of set-up than BANG! It’s almost over instantly. So much work to get done…

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. The dishes aren’t going to do themselves and that food isn’t going to prepare itself and the filing won’t put itself away, either. I hope you have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and if I get some of those entries done, I’ll be back later. Otherwise, till tomorrow morning, adieu.

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Please Don’t Tell Me How The Story Ends

And now it’s Saturday, and I feel pretty good this morning. There’s lots to do, of course, before the LSU game at 2:30 today; dishes to put away and filing, a couple of errands to run, and of course, as always, cleaning. After work yesterday and running the errands–including Costco–I was very tired when I got home. I wasn’t very energetic yesterday as it was–I could tell the low energy from Thursday had carried over–and it was hard enough putting away the Costco purchases when we got back from that. We also started watching Agatha All Along (more on that later) before going to bed. I slept really well, which was nice, and now I am hoping to get some things done today. I want to finish entering the notes from the marked-up Scotty books into the Bible this weekend, and I also want to mark up the last two so I can get that part of it finished before going through it all and organizing it. I also want to write tomorrow before the Saints game. I also have to make groceries tomorrow morning, but I am going to try to get up fairly early (like today, Sparky got me up at seven) so I can get that done early so I can write some more tomorrow. I also want to do some reading this weekend. I’m really enjoying Jordan Harper’s Everybody Knows–he has a terrific writing style and authorial voice–and it would be great to finish reading it this weekend so I can move on to my reread of We Have Always Lived in the Castle to prep for Halloween Horror Month.

I also need to check the to-do list. I do want to wash the car this weekend, too–perhaps I can get that done this morning if I time everything correctly and I don’t laze around this morning–always a problem. I have any number of other entries I’d also like to get finished at some point–especially two book reviews of recent reads I enjoyed a lot–and I haven’t done a newsletter on Substack for two weeks now, so I am a bit overdue there, too. Heavy heaving sigh, and there’s some emails to answer as well. But…things will get done when they get done, and I don’t really berate myself (or feel like a loser) when I don’t get things done. There’s an essay (which would fit into the ‘my gay life’ essays) I want to get done about jockstraps, of all things; jockstraps are definitely a gay fetish object, they turned 150 years old a few weeks ago, and there’s a piece on them in The Advocate I want to read for background purposes. I cannot speak to why they are such objects of eroticization for so many gay men, although I suspect it has a lot to do with junior/senior high school locker rooms, gym classes, and sports. There’s also some other topics I want to address, but there’s only so much time in a day, isn’t there? Like I want to finish this, get another cup of coffee, and go sit in the living room and read for a while rather than doing anything else on the computer.

There’s also a system in the Gulf near the Yucatan that may organize into another tropical storm–same place where Francine got her act together–that I need to keep a wary eye on, and there are two more crossing the Atlantic, too. Heavy heaving sigh. But at least the heat has broken into something bearable–maybe not for people who don’t like warm weather, we’re so acclimated here that what we consider ‘bearable’ would be miserable for other people. Likewise, people from elsewhere are often excited when the weather gets back up to the fifties and sixties, which is literally winter down here.

I was also rather thrilled because they had one of my extravagances at Costco yesterday, Clearly Canadian flavored sparkling water. I generally get individual bottles at the Fresh Market for about three dollars not on sale, and yesterday they had a box of twelve for $11.99! You best bet that box went right into the cart, and I am now hoping they will always have it. I do miss my mozzarella salad, or those bacon wrapped chicken breasts stuffed with cheese that they never seem to have any more, but the Clearly Canadian was an absolute score–and I don’t mind having to get three of my least favorite flavor (cherry) to get nine bottles of flavors I like. I really miss the green apple, though–that was my favorite.

I also dipped into this new season of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, which I only began watching last season, and wow, is this show off the chain or what? This season the insanity begins in the very first episode, and it looks like this entire season is going to be insane. Hurray!

All right, I need another cup of coffee and something to eat so I can get this day underway. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I may or may not be back a little later; one never truly knows, does on?

Back Home Again

It is very lovely to be here at my desk this morning, with my coffee and Sparky begging for more food, knowing I don’t have to go into the office today. The work-at-home duties today are tedious, but hopefully they will make that time go back more quickly. I was very tired yesterday–I felt great in the morning, but as the day started to pass by I felt fatigue settling in and a feeling of not feeling terribly motivated, which is shameful, so when I got home last night I made myself transcribe the notes from three Scotty volumes into the Bible, and I only have maybe four or five left to go? Light at the end of the proverbial tunnel, quite frankly, and of course once it’s completed it’ll have to be updated. I have lots of errands to run later, after I finish my work-at-home duties, including a Costco run, which will probably wear me out a bit the way it always does.

We started watching Monsters, about the Menendez Brothers, and I’m not entirely sure we’ll continue to watch. I know the story fairly well, even if I may have forgotten a lot of it, because I followed the story as it happened. I also read all of Dominick Dunne’s columns in Vanity Fair back in the day–it was my favorite part of the issue, every month–so..it didn’t really engage me all that much. American Sports Story is kind of on deck (along with Agatha All Along), and there are some other things I’d like to watch dropping either soon, or have already, too. And of course it’s a football weekend; LSU-UCLA being the marquee game of the afternoon. There was also a lot of insane news breaking yesterday–not the least of which was that North Carolina jackass hate-monger’s exposure as a porn addict and a real insane freaky man. It’s exhausting. I’ve also taken the Bluesky/Threads methodology of “block at first sign of annoyance” to Facebook1. It’s much easier to block people than to indulge their idiocies and passive micro-aggressions. For the record, the people that think we shouldn’t allow politics to interfere with relationships? Tell me you’re a straight white cisgender person without saying the fucking words. Fuck you and all your descendants, now and forever, for all eternity. And I don’t owe anyone my friendship or affection, thank you very much.

I do have some plans for the weekend–around the games, of course (Saints at noon on Sunday)–I am going to have to make groceries again this weekend, and the apartment is a disaster area (but not as bad as usual on a Friday morning); I have dishes and filing to do, and of course there’s always laundry. I’m a little worn down this morning, but I’m hoping that will change once I’ve had more coffee and eaten something. The Internet is also out for some reason–this has been happening a lot ever since Francine; it’s annoying as fuck. I’m using my phone as a hotspot so far this morning and I’m really sick of Cox’ incredibly shitty service, which is getting less and less reliable. Every time I think maybe I should ditch the streaming and go back to regular cable, something like this reminds me why I’d really not have all eggs in Cox’ fucking basket.

Ah, remember the extolling virtues of the Internet and streaming back when it was first getting started, about how much better our lives would be now? As always, no one ever answered my questions of how reliable will it be? My personal favorite is everything you have to do with Cox pretty much requires an Internet connection…how can you reset your modem on-line when you can’t get on-line? All the instructions and so forth are on their website, and yes, sure, I can do it all on my phone but I shouldn’t have to. Bastards, really.

Wow, this is not only dull, but taking a really long time for me to get finished and posted. I must be running on accessory this morning, with my energy levels not quite reaching optimization. Man, I was tired when I got home last night–I stopped to get the mail and a few things at the grocery on the way home and didn’t even finish putting everything away, let alone finishing the dishes or doing anything else. Heavy sigh, but probably will get going once I have something to eat. I did eat jelly beans last night (yes, I succumbed to their allure while at the grocery last night) so maybe it’s a sugar crash. It’s possible, and i really do need to stop eating (and bingeing) jelly beans.

I did make a to-do list yesterday, and I need to make a Costco one today. I also need to get cleaned up and head into the spice mines, so I’ll bring this dullness to a close and get going with my work-at-home day. Till I return again, adieu.

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  1. Blockity blockity block block. If you annoy me once, you’ll probably do so more times and each offense is progressively worse than the last, always. Bitch, bye. ↩︎

Would You Lay With Me In a Field of Stone

Thursday, and my last day in the office for the week, which I’m not going to cheer about but I am starting to feel it. I haven’t had a full week of work in what seems like forever, between Labor Day and the hurricane and all. This week is the reset week, when you have to get re-oriented and back into the normal flow of life. I think I’m there; I wrote again this week, and I also worked on the Scotty Bible. I didn’t write anything last night, but I typed up the notes from three volumes. Left to go are Jackson Square Jazz, Vieux Carré Voodoo, and Garden District Gothic, and I also have to go through the last two and nock pages. Then I have to organize it, as well as summarize each book and list key plot points and characters. One of the lovely things about having a lengthy backlist is you can go back and mine the old books for references and even “hmmm, could this character be interesting to bring back at this point?” Yes, I am enjoying myself, and it’s great. I ran an errand after work last night–just the mail–but I also have to stop on the way home tonight at the grocery for a small run (I am resisting the urge to splurge on jelly beans, which are my literal favorite thing right now, and I am trying to break the habit but they’re so good!!!!) and will probably take the evening off from doing anything other than chores. Paul caught up the laundry yesterday, which was a very pleasant surprise, and I am currently soaking the dishes so I can finish washing them tonight. I would love to cruise into the weekend with all of these chores already taken care of so I can lose myself in college football while correcting the manuscript so far (as well as reading it all the way through to see how repetitious and tedious it must be).

I feel good and alert this morning, which is nice, and also think I slept through the night for the first time in a while–I’ve been waking up lately in the middle of the night, but am always able to get back to sleep–and I feel rested. No telling how long that will last, of course, but–last day in the office for the week, so as long as I make it through the day–and it will be a busy one, too. That’s fine; being busy always makes the day go by faster, which is nicer than having it drag all day. We’re still catching up on appointments that were canceled last week because of the hurricane, and looking ahead to next week…well, next week isn’t quite as busy once the “oops I need to do my STI swabs” worries from Southern Decadence experiences starts to fade. Halloween, of course, is just around the corner, so we’ll have one of these periods in the two weeks following it, as well. My people are like clockwork, really.

WE got caught up on English Teacher, Bad Monkey, and Only Murders in the Building last night. There are also a lot of other shows dropping soon that look great, too; I’m interested in American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez because that case always interested me. I’d even thought about basing a book on it, using LSU and the Saints rather than Florida and the Patriots, but I don’t know if it’s that compelling anymore, so seeing it through the eyes of a fictionalize television adaptation will help me make up my mind if it’s something I want to attempt in the future. I’d like to spend some time reading Jordan Harper’s Everyone Knows, which is wonderful, and I’d love to finish it this weekend and move on to my Halloween Horror Reading challenge for October. I want to reread an old horror favorite to prime the pump, maybe Stephen King or The Haunting of Hill House, which is overdue for a reread, or I could perhaps reread We Have Always Lived in the Castle, which I’ve not reread in a very long time. Yeah, maybe that’s what I’ll do.

There are some big college games this weekend, too. I want to wash the car this weekend and clean out the interior, which I think I might be able to do tomorrow afternoon when I finish my work-at-home duties and on the way home from picking up the mail. My messy workspace needs to be organized and cleaned this weekend, and maybe–just maybe–I’ll be able to take a box down out of the attic. I can clean all the copies of my own books out of the cabinets once there’s space for them to be stored in the attic, which will be a lovely way to free up space and reorganize the kitchen. I’d also like to get a few more chapters done before the end of the weekend and Monday rolls around again. I really do need to get into the habit of making to-do lists again…

And on that note, I am going to bring this to a close. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning, if not sooner; one never knows.

You Can’t Be a Beacon (If Your Light Don’t Shine)

Ah, back to the office Monday and what passed for normality this week. Tropical weather, even the smaller ones, are so disruptive. It generally takes about a week for everything–grocery stores, traffic lights, and other little things like that–to get back to normal. (Although after Ida it took weeks and I swear the grocery stores have never completely recovered from that, but I’m also older and crabbier now. Scary thought, ’tisn’t it?) The light at Prytania and Felicity, for example, is dead–not blinking, just dead to the world. It’s not a busy intersection, but….New Orleans drivers, and I’ll leave it at that.

Yesterday wasn’t nearly as lovely as Saturday. It wasn’t super hot, but rather muggy. I think that’s even worse than super-hot and humid; this is that unpleasant feeling where you know you’d be more comfortable if you’d start sweating, but you never do, you just feel greasy instead. It’s yucky, seriously. I did a big grocery run because we were out of things, but I forgot perhaps the most important thing–sweetener for my coffee. DISASTER! But I can drink my coffee unsweetened, I just don’t enjoy it as much. I’ll have to walk across the street at work today and get some from CVS. Ah, well. But the Saints trounced the Cowboys yesterday, in Dallas. They’ve scored over forty points per game so far, and are looking really good. Or, the two teams we’ve played really stink, who can tell? But I should probably start paying more attention to them again. I know that sounds band-wagon fannish, but what I mean by that is paying attention to the NFL overall; I only do that when the Saints are playing well. If they aren’t, I don’t care enough about pro football to pay attention to anything but the Saints themselves. If anything ,I am fair-weather fan of the NFL.

I also watched Civil War yesterday afternoon. I wasn’t sure what I’d think going in, and I know it was kind of controversial at the time–but while it didn’t really do anything for me one way or the other, I can see why it disturbed people. It’s very graphic, shot in an almost documentary style, like the filmmakers are following and documenting journalists covering what looks like the end of a prolonged, and bitter, American civil war. The backstory isn’t really explained much, either–so you can’t say it’s pro one thing or the other, so it’s kind of like a true news documentary in that way. It’s very realistic about what the country would look like in that situation, and how the weary journalists don’t have an opinion about what they are witnessing (and experiencing the danger right along with whoever they are photographing; they also still shot some of the images they are taking, showing the action through endless shots in one case, which I thought was an interesting technique. The acting was good, it was completely unsentimental, and while I wouldn’t say it worked completely, it’s not a bad film and if you’re curious about it, check it out for yourself. But I was inured to the whole “disturbing” aspect of America at war with itself, because there’s a long history of this sort of thing in popular culture and I’ve come up with at least three or four book ideas that are variations on the very same theme of American collapse, what would come in its wake, and what kind of dystopia/civilization would rise from the ruins. I think about those ideas from time to time, usually when I’m watching some kind of dystopian movie or television series. I’m just kind of ambivalent about the movie, but it really left me without much of an opinion one way or the other.

I did sleep really well last night, and my supervisor is out for the week at a conference, which leaves me in charge of my program and the answer-man for questions with other testing. Yay, responsibility. But hopefully this week will be normal; a quick look at the Hurricane Center reveals Tropical Storm Gordon out in the Atlantic heading west and something forming along the coast of the Carolinas….so at least a week without having to worry about another disruption. Huzzah, I suppose.

We watched the Emmys for a while last night before going to bed, and it wasn’t a particularly good show–it rarely is, most awards shows are incredibly tedious (and getting even more tedious with every year), and the older I get the less I care about who wins them. I know this makes me a bad gay, but I was very into them for decades and they were a part of my formative gay years, so they did have an influence on me, but I’ve never considered the Tonys or Oscars to be the ‘gay Super Bowl’. There are some good shows coming out this month, everything from Grotesquerie to the Menendez Brothers series, and English Teacher is something I’m hearing very good things about, so we’re going to try to check that out this week, too. I didn’t read yesterday, but I did work on the Scotty Bible and did some planning on the next chapter, and want to get back to work on it as soon as possible.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Monday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again perhaps later.

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If You Love Me Let Me Know

I slept late this morning, but feel good now that I am awake. I did stay up later than I should have watching games last night, but I couldn’t turn off the Georgia-Kentucky game until the end. Georgia survived their closest non-Alabama game in quite a while, before prevailing 13-12 in a nail-biter in Lexington. My coffee tastes wonderful this morning, and I am slowly swimming up from the depths of Morpheus-induced slumber (strongly aided by Trazodone). When I first got up I debated maybe you don’t have to make groceries today but I really do need to. The Saints game starts at 1, so I’ll probably go during that to avoid traffic and other shoppers; New Orleans is a ghost town during games, and as long as I am home to catch the second half, that should do the trick. I did have a good day yesterday, despite all the games I watched; I was able to get more work done on the Scotty Bible (finding more discrepancies in the series), I did read some more of Everybody Knows, I got the dishes done finally, and did some cleaning around here, which is cool; it was nice coming downstairs and not seeing a pile of dirty dishes in the sink. I also worked some more on the books and straightened up the living room. Still need to do more cleaning, but am very pleased with the State of the Lost Apartment.

LSU played early yesterday, and it was a nail-biting, sloppy game with lots of penalties (and I feel like the officials kind of had their thumb on the scale a bit for LSU; some of the calls they made raised my eyebrows, and I was rooting for LSU. They did wind up winning, 36-33, but they look like they haven’t completely gelled as a team. Garrett Nussmeier can throw for sure, but there was also some incredibly stupid play-calling by the offensive coordinator (I was reminded of the Les Miles era; I wasn’t the only one because a headline on the Times-Picayune reads “Les Miles would have enjoyed LSU’s sloppy 36-33 win”). It was also weird because we actually don’t know how good South Carolina really is; they trounced Kentucky last week, and last night Kentucky almost knocked off Georgia, only to lose to LSU this week. After the LSU game ended, I watched Florida’s season start circling the drain again as they got trounced at home by Texas A&M, who lost to Notre Dame last week; you see how this is going? This is, I think, going to be an extremely strange season, and right now I am picking Texas to win the SEC.

Tulane also lost to Oklahoma yesterday, but they gave the Sooners what-for before going down to defeat.

I did run out yesterday to the Fresh Market to pick up a few things–fresh ground hamburger for grilling, and a meal kit of shrimp scampi for tonight–and so heading over to the West Bank today (which I was on the fence about when I got up) doesn’t seem as daunting now that I am waking up. Paul might have his trainer today, and thus will be gone for a bit anyway; perfect timing, and I can also stop for lunch at either Five Guys or Sonic; this decision is a tough one, frankly, but will probably go for Sonic. (These are the important decisions I face down every day, you know.)

I also took notes on the next chapter of the book, which I hope to tackle at some point this week. It’s Chapter Five, where I always have trouble in a first draft (come to think of it, Never Kiss a Stranger also stalled out at Chapter Five), but the good thing to come out of Hurricane Francine is now I remember how it goes and how it feels and how it sounds to ride out a hurricane. I know this is where Venus and Blaine turn this into an actual crime story–the dead body in front of their place the boys find in Chapter One–and it’s going to be really fun figuring out the rest of this book, I think. But I think I have an excellent grasp of what this chapter needs to be to move the story forward, plus it’s more of an intellectual puzzle of sorts because they can’t really go out and do any investigating because of the storm conditions. It’s so nice to feel excited about writing again, Constant Reader, you have no idea.

The story of Springfield, Ohio, and its perfectly ordinary Haitian immigrant population, working hard and building a better life for themselves and their families in this country with the opportunities here, despite the deeply imbedded racism and xenophobia they’ve surely encountered since being recruited to immigrate to Springfield to keep the town from dying. Now that the right’s candidates have decided to target that small town with blood libel and slander and racism, the town’s public schools, city hall, and hospitals have all been receiving bomb threats, because the Right has embraced stochastic terrorism for years now. There’s nothing American or patriotic about any of this, and the Right thinks it’s funny and laugh about it, particularly their Queen of Sewage, Chaya Raichik, who should be in a women’s penitentiary trying to explain how she’s not a racist to the brown women in there. Imagine being a “brand” and making money on being a stochastic terrorist, and celebrated for it. I’d actually like to see an IRS audit of Moms for Liberty and their bitch goddess to see where their money is coming from. We really don’t utilize the IRS nearly enough when it comes to lawbreaking cults and psychopaths when they are white, which is completely despicable, but part of those horrific baked-in values of racism in American society, carefully developed and nurtured over four hundred years. When I first saw they were targeting Haitian immigrants, I had two thoughts: 1. I was surprised the old blood libel about Haitians and HIV/AIDS weren’t dug up (it took just another day and 2. since it was pets, I was a little surprised it wasn’t the blood libel of Haitian satanism/voodoo’, i.e “they’re stealing our pets for ritual sacrifice!” Thanks, by the way, to perennial presidential candidate and new age lunatic Marianne Williamson, for making that connection for everyone. She’s fucking trash, and someone else Oprah owes us all an apology for platforming. She actually has quite a track record for charlatans and frauds, doesn’t she?

And on that note I am going to get another cup of coffee and perhaps some coffee cake for breakfast before I head into the spice mines. Have a great day, Constant Reader, and I may be back later, one never can be sure.

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Rub It In

Saturday morning of this disrupted and off-track week. I went to the office yesterday and did walk-in testing, primarily because I’d already been home for two days getting paid and didn’t really think it was right to then work-at-home on Friday, too. But it has thrown my routine off, just as the hurricane did, because now my days are all messed up. LSU plays at eleven this morning, which means I should make a grocery run this morning before the game starts, but I also slept late and am not really sure if I have the energy to do so before the game starts. There are also good games on for the majority of the day–which will make that trip even trickier to do later, so i really do need to get to the Fresh Market before hand. Sigh. I didn’t do much when I got home from work, either, as I was very tired; mostly watched the news and cuddled with Sparky until Paul got home–late–and then I went to bed shortly after.

I also have to go to make groceries tomorrow, too. Sigh. The run to the Fresh Market is to get some fresh meat and shrimp for the weekend. I want to barbecue burgers today–a college football Saturday thing–and shrimp scampi or maybe even shrimp creole for tomorrow night. But I need to clean this goddamned godforsaken kitchen first. I have a sink full of dishes that I’ve just let sit there all week (we were supposed to use water sparingly after the storm, because the sewers were full of water already) and of course, now it’s going to be a major undertaking. I let the entire house slide this week, which is shameful. I’m going to work more on the Scotty Bible today while I watch games, try to read some more of Everybody Knows (which is fantastic), and try to pick up around here. Next week isn’t going to be an easy one, as my supervisor will be out at a conference (which basically means everyone will come to me with questions and concerns) so it will be a lot more hectic. Sigh. I have so much to do! I guess today I’ll go ahead and make a to-do list today before I start working on the house.

Ah, there’s the coffee kicking in at last! I was getting worried as I was feeling a bit groggy still, and thought ugh is this going to be a tired day? I fell asleep in the afternoon one day this past week, during the storm days, which was wild, but hurricane fatigue is a thing. Yeah, running over to Fresh Market after finishing this and getting a bit cleaned up before the game is definitely do-able. I want to seriously clean off my desk and organize this area a bit–the great thing is I can play whatever game I’m watching on the computer while I am in the kitchen, which is very cool (something I always forget–that my desktop AND laptop are also television screens).

I also want to get some progress made on the book this weekend. I’m sure the Saints are playing tomorrow, plus the grocery trip (I may go to the West Bank, now that they’re finished installing the lights on the bridge, and may even treat myself to Sonic while I am over there), so the window for writing tomorrow could be a little tight. It’s always hard to write on the weekends during football season! But I’ll get it done. It really is impossible to be able to focus completely to write when there’s a storm on its way, or even immediately after. But the positive is the book itself is set during a storm, and now I have fresh memories of time-lines, what it’s like outside, and the tension. No matter how much you try to relax, you’re always on edge because you never can be certain the roof isn’t going to come off or there won’t be a tornado or the wind won’t pick up a tree and deposit it on your house–sometimes hurricane winds can rip the facade off a house, too. I also need to do some brainstorming on the rest of the book. I’ve got some ideas about how to write the rest, but the primary trick is going to be not using anything that can slow the narrative down–like over-explaining (what I call “filler”), because it really does need to keep moving.

And see? After a tropical weather break, I am getting right back into it again. Huzzah!

And on that note, I am going to get cleaned up and head into the spice mines and get that grocery run out of the way…and perhaps start on cleaning up this kitchen, too. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader; I doubt I’ll be back today but you never know. GEAUX TIGERS!

I Can Help

Friday after the storm and I am heading into the office in a bit to see what is the situation with our testing supplies, which have to be in controlled temperatures. The exciting day job responsibilities of a Gregalicious. These interrupted weeks are always a bit difficult to re-acclimate back from, especially these sudden and unexpected ones; the ones you plan for are disruptive enough. But I have to go in on a Friday after being home for two days, to then be home again for another two days, and then go back to normal, whatever that may be now. My mind and body clock are sufficiently scrambled now, and it may not be easy getting back into the old routine again–which may not be a bad thing, if I can perhaps establish a new one out of this chaos?

Always a plus!

We finished watching The Perfect Couple, which really didn’t stick the landing, but otherwise was a lot of fun to watch. I imagine the book was probably better. Yesterday was an odd day; it’s weird to have a hurricane day (let alone two in a row) and not have to worry about working at home and so forth; it was like having a weekend in the middle of the week and now I have a day to go into the office when I usually don’t before the weekend, which is very odd. I also started reading Jordan Harper’s Everybody Knows, which is phenomenal, and I also collected all the marked information from Who Dat Whodunnit for the Scotty Bible. The next book up is Bourbon Street Blues, and what’s interesting is catching the continuity errors I’ve made over the years, which points out the need for the Scotty Bible, which I should have done after the first three when I went back to write the fourth.

The Internet is out this morning–it survived the storm, but a day later goes down? Excellent service, Cox. Fortunately I have an iPhone hotspot so I can check my emails and everything before I head into the office. The email communiqué yesterday afternoon about the office being open this morning mentioned that we’d be using generator power if Entergy was still down; which means limited access to the Internet and so forth. It could make for an interesting day, but I kind of think Entergy might have the power back on across the city by now? There are, per the outage map, still some parts of the city that are without power, but most people have it. It does look like the office is still down, but there was so little red on the outage map I doubt it will be out for much longer.

The aftermath of a hurricane–no matter the size, whether’s it’s a tropical depression or a Category –always feels like awakening from a disorienting dream. The release of tension–because no matter how calm you feel, you’re super tense waiting for the unknown–and once the storm is past, you just kind of let all the internal pressure out and feel exhausted. I didn’t work on cleaning up the house much; I have a sink full of dishes to do and bed linens to launder today, and I should probably stop on the way home to get something to make for dinner, as there is very little of anything in the house. I got a pizza for us last night (I was starving), and have to do some writing tonight when I get home. I think I am going to take some of the Bible information and put it into the first four chapters, and I may even go ahead and do second drafts while I am in there. There’s a lot of “riding the storm out” bits and pieces I can add in–the tension, the worry, the hurry-up-and-wait of it all; how the day before is simply stunningly beautiful, the howling of the wind and the steady downpour of rain. Figuring this book out isn’t going to be easy, but the time frame I was originally looking at does work–so the entire book will take place over about thirty-six hours, from start to finish, with some flashbacks to the past. I am still excited about this book, and compiling the Bible, to be honest. I don’t know why it took so long; the post-it notes have been in volumes of the backlist since before Royal Street Reveillon was published–the last two books don’t have post-its in them.

The weekend is going to be fun, methinks. A plethora of college football games to watch; LSU plays at eleven, so that will free up the day later. I am going to try to do some writing tonight when I get home from work, and I definitely am going to read more of Everybody Knows. I have errands to run and some things to get done this weekend, and I definitely need to clean the damned house. Sigh. Stop being lazy, Greg!

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I may be back later; one can never be entirely certain!

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