Category: weather

Runaway Lover

Thursday and it’s not my last day in the office for the week; I have a department meeting tomorrow that I need to come in for. I may stay for a few hours after and do some work here, but on the other hand I may just get back in the car and head home. I guess we’ll see how I feel, but it would be incredibly convenient to get all my errands out of the way. We’re supposed to start getting rain from Polo tomorrow, and continue with flooding rains all weekend…so I am not going to want to leave the house that often. I do have to go get my vaccines Saturday morning–I figured if they make me woozy again like they always do, it’s better to be home. LSU’s game is against McNeese State Saturday night–their fifth night game in a row–and I think a lot of the other games this season will be at night again. All the media alarm bells after the Mississippi loss subsided with the trouncing of Texas A&M last week, but…the remaining schedule remains brutal.

Well, Sparky closed my browser for me (thanks, babe!) and I lost three paragraphs of this entry which I will now try to reconstruct. Sigh.

I was tired when I got home from work yesterday, Sparky was needy, and I just needed to sit for a minute last night before doing anything, but I got sucked into the news–both national and football–and several wormholes (is it just me, but are Youtube videos becoming more and more AI-generated?) opened up for me before I switched over to this HBO documentary series about Warner Brothers–and old Hollywood stuff always works as research for the book. I went to bed shortly after that, and didn’t do a damned bit of chores at all. The apartment is still pretty well kept-up, but there’s some cosmetic cleaning that needs doing, the dishwasher needs to be unloaded and reloaded again, and there’s another load of laundry that needs doing, too. I’ll have to take care of some of that tonight so this weekend I can primarily focus on writing and deeper cleaning issues (baseboards, etc.). The house is also currently being painted, so much as I would like to go outside in this cooler clime to clean the windows…probably not going to happen until the house is finished being painted. (I have to negotiate an obstacle course most days when I get home to get into the house.)

Today is also the first day of Halloween Horror Month, in which I try to make sure all my reading and streaming needs are horror-related. I know I am going to revisit Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street–always excellent choices–and it’s always fun to dip into horror, which I need to read more of. I am going to listen to Shadowland by Peter Straub on my trip next Friday to Alabama/Kentucky–can you believe it’s next week already? I can’t–and will take some other horror along to read while I am up there. I am going to start reading The House That Horror Built, and I think on the way home i may listen to a Grady Hendrix novel.

I also need to get back to writing, either on short stories or on the book. I’ve been focusing a lot on writing nonfiction–the newsletters–and while I have really been enjoying doing that (and my writing is improving, which is always a delightful thing), I need to get back on the fiction horse. I’ve kind of been letting my creativity recharge, after finishing that story last weekend, but I definitely need to be climbing back into the saddle again. Maybe tomorrow, during the rains. We’re supposed to get up to five inches over the next few days–but we shouldn’t have any flooding concerns if the rain is spread out. Five inches in two hours or less and the city is underwater.

And on that note, methinks I shall head into the spice mines. Hope you have a lovely Friday Eve, Constant Reader, and I will be back tomorrow morning before my meeting. See you then!

My God, Alan Ritchson is just ridiculously handsome.

Amazing

Here we are, the last Monday in September and it feels like fall came to New Orleans this past weekend; we’ll see how long it lasts. But this absence of humidity is so lovely it just makes me happy to be alive. When I barbecued last night, it was so lovely outside were the Saints not playing I would have taken The Dead Zone outside and stayed out there. The days are also starting to get shorter, too. Yesterday turned out to be a nice day. I got up in the morning and did some cleaning and organizing and chores while the LSU game played again on the television, and so managed to get some things done. I cleaned up a lot of computer files, for example, and organized the desktop. I also worked on some newsletters (my rage about Cornell driving some of them, of course; rage so often fuels my writing), and did a little work on my fiction, too. The weekend was overall lovely, and naturally, I didn’t want to get out from under the pile of blankets this morning. I feel well rested this morning, too, which is also kind of nice–even yesterday I was feeling a bit run down still. We’re busy today in the clinic, but we also have a mostly slow rest of the week. I also had some things delivered, but I have to run uptown after work tonight, and will make another stop to make some more groceries; odds and ends we’ve run out of over the weekend.

The Saints lost yesterday, but they could have won had they not fumbled away winning chances in the fourth quarter. I never think about the Super Bowl with the Saints anymore–actually, not since they actually did win it sixteen years ago (still can’t wrap my mind around the Saints winning the Super Bowl, but they actually did once, in a magical season that had the whole city walking on air). But cheering the Saints on when they lose is a time-honored New Orleans tradition, and one that most likely will never get old. I like our new quarterback and am willing to give him more than another chance. I also like that his last name is pronounced shuck, which pleases me to no end.

And we watched the two episodes of American Horror Story: 13, and it’s weird…but is it wrong that I kind of figured out the big twist at the end of episode three, hence the cliffhanger (and why we had three episodes drop at the same time, and why episode three was only twenty-two minutes long). After Ben, the hospice worker, survives the plane crash that opens the show, and shows up for his new job at a big, imposing old apartment building in New York (think: the Bramford in Rosemary’s Baby), and as soon as Jessica Lange introduced herself as the dead Constance from the original season (and several others since)…I thought he died on the plane and this is the portal to Hell (I was also getting hints of The Sentinel, a 70s horror film, with a sort of similar set-up), and when they descended down into the basement at the end of Episode 3 and the big reveal1….I didn’t gasp, I thought, of course.

I do hate-watch Murphy shows at this point, and am pleasantly surprised when one of his shows doesn’t go off the rails. I suspect this one is overly ambitious, and will go off the rails relatively soon and whatever sense it made at one point…it won’t after that. It’s kind of like rooting for the Saints; you’ll have some fun, but you’ll end up disappointed.

LSU won, but dropped out of the Top Ten to number 11 in the rankings; Florida jumped, so they had to be ahead of Mississippi, whom they beat, and LSU, whom Mississippi beat the week before. It’s all stuff and nonsense at this point in the season, anyway–rankings and so forth aren’t important this early in the season at any rate–but it’s also interesting how the SEC games this season are either close, or blow outs. I have to say, I’ve been impressed by Florida so far this season, and they looked really good on the last two Saturdays, and the Florida-Auburn game’s outcome two weeks ago makes a bit more sense now, and Auburn looks a lot better than they did after that game.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a marvelous Monday, Constant Reader, and I will be back again tomorrow morning, bright and early. See you then!

The ceiling of one of the temples at Luxor. Sigh, Egypt.
  1. It also galls me that Murphy also casts so many queer actors–because I want to support them so they get more work, like Joey Pollari, who is playing the lead this time. It really is a ouroboros, isn’t it? ↩︎

Don’t Tell Me

Sunday morning in the Lost Apartment and I feel…slacker-ish this morning for some reason. Yesterday was a simply lovely day, from beginning to end, and I did manage to get some things done. Paul went to a show last night in the Quarter–a work thing–and so I was here all by my lonesome after about half-time or so of the LSU game (they won; GEAUX TIGERS!), and there were a lot of interesting games and outcomes yesterday, too. I did some reading, some writing, and some cleaning, and somehow wound up staying up later than I’d intended. I also got up later this morning than usual; but that’s also on me. The Saints play this afternoon, and I need to run to make groceries at some point this morning, too, but that’s not a big deal. I just need to get motivated.

Good luck with that, Gregalicious.

As I mentioned, LSU won, beating Texas A&M handily 35-6. It was only 14-3 at halftime, but again the Tigers had a big third quarter and put the game away. The defense looked impressive, and the offense misfired a few times, but overall, the Tigers looked dominant. We also don’t know how good or bad Texas A&M is this season (they lost to Kentucky in College Station last week)–but we also don’t know about Mississippi, either, after Florida embarrassed them in Gainesville yesterday 52-28 (!!!). Auburn beat Vanderbilt, and I caught the end of the Mississippi State-Missouri game, which MSU won with a strong defensive stand in the fourth quarter. I watched Texas-Tennessee, which came down to the last play, and Georgia embarrassed Oklahoma (shame) while Alabama buried South Carolina. I also caught the highlights of Iowa winning at Michigan and Wisconsin surprising Penn State. Overall, a very exciting day of college football. LSU takes a break from the SEC next weekend, playing McNeese State, while there are some other great games, too. I do love college football.

And yes, yesterday morning during the battle of the orange-and-white UT’s, I finished the first draft of my story, which pleased me to no end. It’s about forty-one hundred words, but they are mostly good words, and now I need to edit and revise. Again, it’s a very long shot, but I do enjoy writing, and it’s always nice to make very good progress on something. I may do some editing this morning after I post this and before I summon the energy and motivation to actually make the grocery list and head to the store. I also need to order some things to be delivered this morning, too.

While I mostly managed to avoid the news yesterday, I did occasionally check in on social media to see what was going on and that’s when I came across the horrific story of the Cornell 7….remind me about the masculinity crisis again? The real masculinity crisis lies in how they treat women, and so many of them fail. Cannot IMAGINE why so many women would choose the bear, can you? It’s hilarious, I’ve been trying to work my way into my newsletter essay about masculinity and my failures to be the traditional male in this patriarchical society and finally realize something about myself while reading up on the Cornell horror (and yes, there’s a rapist on the LSU football team–which is appalling–but I am not talking about that case because I’ve not had a chance to “do my own research,”–but I fail to see any research or reading that would make LSU look good, frankly)–the reason I didn’t feel particularly boy-oriented was because I never understood why we weren’t supposed to like girls at all, and that didn’t change after puberty, either, when girls were reduced to their breasts, ass, and fuckability, which is also part of the reason I wrote #shedeservedit, and now I have some more things to discuss there. (And no, I’m not saying my view of women wasn’t curdled by exposure to male-centering and women-dismissal; I’ve said and behaved in ways towards women that are toxic, but I learned and would like to believe I’ve unlearned a lot of my upbringing and social pressuring.)

I spent some more time yesterday with The Dead Zone, and John Smith is one of my favorite Stephen King characters. I am remembering, too, while I reread how much I’ve always loved this novel and how big of a fan I used to be (not getting into it now, or maybe ever), and that incredible run of great novels he had from Carrie through Misery. Maybe I should revisit another one, too? It’s been a while since I’ve revisited Firestarter….

I was reminded yesterday also about Richard Speck. He murdered nurses in Chicago when I was five years old, and I remember the horror vividly (I also remember when the news broke about Sharon Tate and the other victims on Cielo Drive in the Hollywood Hills). I’ve never read up on the Speck murders, but I read Helter Skelter as a teenager and it was terrifying–I’ve generally avoided reading anything else on the Manson family since. I remember, in both cases, how upset my mother was–a rural country girl living in Chicago with generalized anxiety disorder–and again wonder how much it must have terrified her when we weren’t home. Mothers worry, of course, but I wish I’d known when she was alive about the anxiety; I would have worked harder to ease her mind. (I also believe the anxiety shortened her life, but…she did make it to eighty-one.) Does anyone know of any good books or writing about Speck?

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and GEAUX SAINTS!

Candy Perfume Girl

Here we are on a college football Saturday1 (GEAUX TIGERS!) and all is quiet in the Lost Apartment. I ran errands yesterday, got the mail, picked up my copy of the new Tananarive Due (yay! Hello, October Halloween Horror Month!), and after working at home, I did the laundry and cleaned up around here–somehow the kitchen had somehow gotten out of control again–while the Real Housewives screamed at each other on my television. I don’t know why I find that so entertaining, but I do and I am not apologizing for it. (And yes, I am going to write about it at some point.) We also watched The Traitors: New Blood and started the new American Horror Story: 13, which hurray for Jessica Lange, and hurray for Joey Pollari, who is playing the male lead–been a fan since catching the young openly gay actor in American Crime, an excellent anthology series from the 10s that didn’t draw near the audience it deserved for its writing and incredible cast, which included Regina King in every season. (I’ll watch Regina King in anything.)

I also went back through the book cases and massive TBR stacks to pick out an ambition list of reading for October, especially given how little I’ve been reading lately. My rereads are going to be The Dead Zone (long overdue for a reread, at least since 2016) by Stephen King and The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson. The new to me reads, if I manage, will be Christina Henry’s The House that Horror Built, A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher, and Shadowlands by Peter Straub, which I’ve never gotten around to in the forty years and more it’s been available (people always say their favorite Straub is Ghost Story; mine is Floating Dragon); I started it when it was first out in paperback, but never finished. I guess it didn’t grab me, but I grabbed another copy when I read a really interesting piece about it sometime earlier this century. (I also met Straub at Stokercon in Nassau, Long Island at least fifteen or sixteen years ago–the same conference I first met a pre-Gone Girl Gillian Flynn. Both were delightful and charming.)

I actually started my reread of The Dead Zone, and while I only got a few pages into the prologue, I was immediately reminded of why I love King, and that Johnny Smith is probably one of my favorite King characters, and while this book was always overshadowed in my mind by The Stand, which is my favorite King, as the books were released consecutively. I remember back when King was still a new writer and unappreciated by critics and reviewers while his books were literally flying off the shelves–one of my English professors in college, was very disdainful when he noticed I was carrying a copy of Firestarter with me, again shattering any thought I may have had about pursuing English as an undergraduate major because the professors were the worst kinds of snobs and my fellow English majors put no thought into their reading or analysis that wasn’t spoon-fed to them by the professors, whose egos definitely needed stroking (they all had mediocre minds).2 The irony is that while King has always done work of the highest quality, he was unappreciated while he was doing his actual best work. That run of novels, beginning with Carrie and ending with It, is probably unmatched by any other author in the canon of US authors; certainly in horror and crime….and those earlier works stand the test of time; I’ve reread all of those books numerous times.

Yes, a revisitation of a King classic is de rigeur.

Yesterday was a stunningly beautiful day. When I walked out to the car to run said errands, I was amazed at how gorgeous is was outside: warm but not excessively hot, and a coolness to the air that was very refreshing. Then I got in the car, started her up and looked at the temperature gauge and laughed. It was 86 degrees outside–but it wasn’t humid, which makes all the difference. (It’s currently 77 degrees outside; the kind of weather where you want to sit outside and read….or would, if I had a comfortable place to sit outside and read.) This is how the summer breaks us here. Anyway, as I drove around I was reminded again of how beautiful this city actually is, and again how lucky I am to live here so I can be continually inspired by this stunningly beautiful city.

I ordered myself a pair of Apple Beats Pro to finish off the gift card Dad sent me for my birthday. One of the most annoying thing to me about the new iPhone I got last year was that wired earbuds don’t work when plugged into them–and besides, I can’t use earbuds and my hearing aids at the same time. The other night when Paul came home I realized he uses over-the-ear headphones that wirelessly connect to his phone and a long overdue lightbulb turned on over my head. I can use over the ear headphones too, so I went ahead and ordered them. They came this week, but alas, I haven’t had time to set them up yet, so I intend to do that this morning. Just in time, too–since the weather has changed (hopefully for good) and I can go for walks now with them. My goal is to go back to the gym in January, and I need to start building up my stamina before that return.

At this point, kicking Ed Sheeran when he’s down is a bit mean and bullying, but I did laugh when his shows at Kraft’s stadium wound up canceled because of this huge nor’easter heading for New England, which has me worried about my friends up there. Take care everyone, don’t take unnecessary chances, and stay safe up there, okay?

And on that note, I am going to get cleaned up and head into the spice mines for the day. Hope you have a marvelous Saturday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be here bright and early before the Saints game tomorrow. See you then!

Love this image of birds over a bayou near Lake Borgne.
  1. Very bad news for the Tennessee Vols, though–Trump is coming to their game with Texas today, and wherever he goes, the home team loses. I don’t like either team, but will watch and hope for a good game. ↩︎
  2. My college experience remains the biggest disappointment of my life. I expected so much more than a continuation of high school, you know? But…I also went to two really shitty colleges. ↩︎

Sky Fits Heaven

Thursday last day in the office for the week blog. Yesterday wasn’t unpleasant; I paid the bills, as one does once one has the funds, and it was very quiet around the office yesterday, which was odd. I didn’t feel terribly tired at any point during the day, which is always a pleasant surprise. October and Spooky Season are just around the corner, and I think I will go ahead and enjoy my annual October Halloween Horror Month. I generally reread The Haunting of Hill House and a classic Stephen King every October, but my reading focus just hasn’t been there for a while. I think it might be because I am out of practice with both writing and reading, and every time I start reading something I think oh I should be writing and that brings me to a crashing halt, every time. My copy of the new Tananarive Due should be arriving today or tomorrow; so I am definitely going to read that for Horror Month. I need to look through my horror TBR pile, and maybe I should give Peter Straub’s Shadowland another try. (I started it when it had just been released in mass market paperback, and for some reason it didn’t click with me; maybe I can listen to it in the car on my drive north next year, take the physical copy with to keep reading if I don’t finish it in the car…should see how long it is, shouldn’t I?)

I was a bit tired after getting home from running errands last evening–my headphones arrived; more on that later–and putting away the paltry and meager bags of groceries I’d made for sixty dollar, heavy sigh, and things were on sale–and so I made a Sparky bed out of my lap while I caught up on the news and watched some videos bashing Ed Sheeran (which will, at some point, I imagine, get old) before Paul got home late, and we hung out for a bit before I went up to bed. I slept well, too–woke up at four rather than three thirty this morning, but was able to get back to sleep without a problem. I feel alert and awake and ready to go, which is quite unusual for Thursday morning. I’ve even had breakfast already and feel pretty good. Today is the busiest day in the clinic for the week, and so I imagine I’ll be a bit worn down when I get home tonight. I am going to head uptown to get the mail, so I won’t, hopefully, have to get in the car this weekend. Huzzah for the convenience of deliveries!

I did work on my short story some yesterday–not as much as I would have preferred, but my mind was buggy and I was tired, so I really just started revising what I had already written, which was more than a little bit on the messy side. I am trying to write more fiction in the present tense, which seems to be more common/popular these days, and my sweet spot is past tense/first person…so trying things differently, I think, is kind of important to my continued development as a writer. Anyway, I noticed the prose sometimes slipped from present to past tense, and sometimes even from first person to third. Honestly, my first drafts are so fucking dreadful….which is why nobody ever sees my first drafts.

It’s in the seventies this morning, which will have to do for the transition to fall. They’re saying we’ll get colder weather and a lot of rain next week, which is fine.

And on that note, I should get going on my day. I’ll be here again tomorrow morning, from my workspace at home, and I hope to see you then, Constant Reader.

Skin

Well, we survived Monday, didn’t we? It wasn’t even iffy this time. I woke up before my alarm yesterday morning, only hit snooze once, and then got up, wide awake and feeling rested (Sunday I was still feeling a bit worn out, not sure why), but I felt very good all day yesterday. I ran a couple of errands after work on my way home, which was nice. We weren’t terribly busy yesterday so I was able to get caught up on some things around the office, and somehow tomorrow we get paid again? It seems like we did just get paid, you know. And it’s almost October, and we’re well on our way into football season. I feel pretty good this morning, now that I’ve got some coffee and my breakfast sandwich into my system and my body is going oh yes, we like how this feels. I also ran some errands on my way home, but Sparky was very needy when I got home. He didn’t even want to be fed until I’d picked him up and let him wrap around my neck while headbutting me and purring. After he ate, he wanted my lap (he’s so needy after he’s not been home alone all day for a few days) and so I thought let me catch up on the news but once he was asleep in a puddle in my lap, I was done for the evening. When Paul got home we caught up on Lanterns–which is really phenomenal and may be the best super-hero TV show of all time–and then we started a Spanish language show, Oasis, which is the same kind of show as Elite was, only with a summer spa/resort in the place of the school. I guess it’s more The White Lotus?

Tonight I have to swing uptown to get the mail, and may stop to get some things on the way home; we need some bananas (they get so overripened so quickly these days) and maybe some ice cream as a treat? We’ve not had anything like that in a while–we’re consciously trying to be more healthy, food-wise–so maybe, maybe not. I’ll see how I feel once I get in the car and to the store. The weather is still scorching during the day, topping out around 100 or thereabouts, but it’s dropping into the seventies at night. This is what passes for fall here in New Orleans, or football weather, at any rate. I know next month is when we’ll experience the big drop, down into the seventies/low eighties during the day but dipping into the sixties overnight, and sometimes colder. I doubt we’ll get snow this winter, when it finally comes, but you never know anymore, do you?

I see that Jaxson Dart got injured last night1, the day after Aaron Rodgers did. Shame that karma came for you both; I wonder whatever for? What could either quarterback have done that would…oh, who cares. Fuck them both. I don’t waste empathy on garbage.

I am going to try to be productive today, since I failed so miserably last night. I need to empty the dishwasher and reload it, pick up things in the kitchen, take out the trash, and straighten the rugs. I made lunch for the rest of the week this morning, so that’s taken care of for now. Outside of the bananas, I don’t think we really need anything else….maybe I should just stop at the grocery in the CBD on my way home from work tomorrow? I don’t know. Decisions, decisions, right?

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Tuesday, and I will check in with you again tomorrow morning!

The Krewe of Dolly is anchoring the second-line on 9-25.
  1. Can a Congressional investigation be far behind? ↩︎

Swim

Wednesday morning and we’re making our way through the week nicely, I think. Today is going to be very busy in the clinic, and so I am expecting to be very tired when I get home tonight. That’s fine, the weekend looms, as well as my work-at-home day on Friday. I wasn’t terribly tired when I got home, but then I had to make a bed for Sparky out of my lap while I caught up on the news. What a wild day yesterday was, in unimportant news in the overall scheme of things. The whole Ed Sheeran1 torching his career2 wasn’t on my bingo card for 2026, but then again, neither was Arch Manning being a misogynist asshole about Holly Rowe either (he did apologize, both publicly and privately, but…I guess I’ll just chalk that whole mess up to he was smart enough to apologize, even if it reeked of a PR team). Bottom line–grabbing your ankles and bending over for a morally corrupt billionaire doesn’t fly in these times. The country is angry, angry about everything and rightfully so; but…I also don’t have a lot of sympathy (any, really) for the people who gleefully voted for all of this but are so penitent now (not penitent enough to abandon the Republican Party, though) and upset that they aren’t being treated like the “innocent victims” they claim to be–and he “lied” isn’t a defense. I heard him very clearly, and I saw the signs and shirts at the rallies and heard the chants.

If I knew, there’s no reason why you didn’t–because you literally cannot concede, even now, that you based your vote on your own bigotry. Given into, and following, evil isn’t a mistake and you were a very willing participant. We all saw it. You just chose not to, because it felt good to strike a blow for white supremacy, economic disaster, and another forever war. Oh, excuse me, it felt good to strike back against social justice progress and stick it to those libs, right? You voted to hurt queer people and did so with a great big smile on your face…well, this liberal faggot feels nothing for you. Finally, at long last, people are sick to fucking death of your bullshit and you’re finally feeling those consequences you wanted for everyone that you don’t like…and I’m supposed to now feel sorry for you?3 I didn’t vote for you to lose your family’s generational farm and wealth, why should my tax dollars bail your stupid asses out? I’d rather student loan debt be retired than another bailout for MAGA farmers and ranchers.

Life’s hard, bitches. Pull yourselves up by the bootstraps. FREEDOM! Maybe cut back on some of your streaming services, or make coffee at home instead of going to Starbucks. And avocado toast, I hear, is really expensive so don’t waste money on fripperies. Economize. Where’s that American “can do” mentality? Work harder! Maybe do some ride-sharing work, or delivery for an app. There’s all kinds of ways you can make some money to supplement your farm/ranch, isn’t there? You don’t need any of that socialist bail out money, do you? No, you thought “he fucked us but bailed us out with welfare the last time, so he’ll take care of us always”–ha ha ha ha ha.

Fools.

As I mentioned, creating a lap for Sparky last night kept from doing much of anything except watching the news, as I can’t use my laptop with a cat in my lap–and oh, the dirty looks I get whenever I even slightly shift while he’s asleep! Plus, it’s so lovely to come home from work and get affection from a cat. On the way home tonight I have to run some errands, and it’s also supposed to rain today. So, who knows what kind of place I’ll be in tonight when I finally trudge up the stairs and enter the Lost Apartment, having survived another day in the mad jungle. Oh, and my latest newsletter went out this morning; click here to read my takes on Flipper.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines for the day. Hope your Wednesday is charming, lovely, and happy, Constant Reader, and I will be back bright and early tomorrow morning.

I’ve always loved this image, taken out my bay windows during a thunderstorm around noon on a Sunday a few years ago. It has a real creepy Gothic feel to it.
  1. One can’t help but be amused that Sheeran’s statement, primarily focused on him being “responsible” to the other artists on his tour–resulted in them all quitting. That did make me laugh. When I read his statement, all I could think was, dude, this is going to blow up in your face, and I was right. Regardless where you come down in your opinions and thoughts about Gaza and Palestine, the principle here–suppressing of political speech for an artist–should concern you, and it’s partly why Sheeran is being dragged for filth so intensely. ↩︎
  2. By the way, the billionaire who caused all this is the one at whose wedding he performed at, and has called “super sweet” before…yes, those are words often used to describe billionaires. Yes, Ed, you sacrificed your public image for a “super sweet” billionaire suppressing free speech. I’d delete you off my Spotify, but guess what? I don’t listen to your hackneyed pablum music. Way to be a free speech warrior and stand up for your fellow artists….god knows, we certainly can’t expect the half-billionaire cosplaying as Irish (cultural appropriation, especially when he has no clue how the Irish feel about oppression) to stand on principle. ↩︎
  3. Also, did you mask during COVID? Did you get your vaccines? Because as a public health worker, there’s yet another reason for me to completely despise you, your ancestors, and your descendants. Consider it a generational curse. ↩︎

Drowned World

And here it is, Tuesday morning, and I feel pretty decent. I slept better last night than I have in a while, which was lovely, and comfy as the bed was this morning, I got up and wasn’t tempted to stay in bed longer than I could or should. Sparky wasn’t too hungry this morning, because he didn’t even come up before the second time I hit snooze. I didn’t do much of anything last night after I got home from work; I should have made groceries (or had some delivered) but it was 100 degrees when I got into the car to come home yesterday afternoon and it just sucked all the life out of me before I put the car in drive and pulled away from the curb. Ah, well. I also didn’t do much of anything once I got home, either; I plopped down into my easy chair and Sparky curled up in my lap and that was it for the evening. I caught up on the news, started watching another episode of Scream Queens, which I interrupted when Paul came down to eat and we watched the latest Lanterns. I really love that show; it may be one of the best super-hero TV shows of all time; definitely up there with Agatha All Along, which was amazing.

And while I may not have done any writing yesterday, I did think about what I am writing right now, which is always a good thing, and far better than actually not thinking about it at all. I should be able to get this hellish transitional chapter finished tonight or tomorrow, and then I can move on to the next chapter. And yes, I just remembered I always have problems with Chapter Five. Sigh. It’s amazing how much we forget how painful writing a book can be whenever we start writing another week; helpful selective amnesia, much as how we here in New Orleans forget every year how bad summer can be; every year it’s like a horrific reminder, and the same goes with writing a book, especially when your only deadline is your own, you know? Contractual deadlines are entirely different kind of stress and aggravation, but much as I always worry when I sit down to write that words aren’t going to come, or that I’ll veer away from the story I am telling (it’s easy when your mind wanders as much as mine does), and while I always hate having to cut good writing out of my work because it doesn’t fit, no matter how pretty the language is (“kill your darlings”), sometimes it is necessary. (Right now I am resisting cutting this opening sentence for the chapter: There’s nothing better than a nap after some intense fucking. I love that sentence.)

Ah, my coffee is kicking in and I am feeling pretty good and awake and cheerful now (I know, right? What is wrong with me?) ; we’ll see how the rest of the day goes, shan’t we? We’re not terribly busy in the clinic this morning, so I should be able to get some of the paperwork done that I need to get done around my appointments. My new testing room is taking some getting used to, because I always have had my clients sit to my right when I am testing them; now they are on my right and the entire room is geared to the left instead of the right, which is taking me some getting used to; it’ll probably feel normal to me by the end of this week. Changes of habit aren’t easy when you’ve been doing something almost exactly the same way for twenty years, you know?

The news continues to be grim, and while I see many people being excited about a blue wave, that’s not taking into condition the possibilities that there will again be election shenanigans, or election outcome shenanigans. We’re already well on our way down the path to authoritarianism; it’s now a question of what will be left to rebuilt from once this administration and its un-American treason. (Interesting how the presidencies regarded by historians as the most corrupt in our history always has an R after their name, isn’t it? Grant, Harding, Nixon, Bush II, and now this thing.) I also believe two things about yesterday’s dialing back of AI by the plagiarists who want to make “thinking machines’; one, that the money dried up and it’s all about to crash and take the economy with it, and two, they’ve finally realized they can’t contain it, and that technology, in the wrong hands, is extremely dangerous. (Has no one at all ever watched the original Terminator movie, or Blade Runner, or The 100, or read Dune? Christ, even Azimov killed off all the robots in the universe except for one!)

Oh, I did finish writing a newsletter about Flipper, which is scheduled to go out tomorrow morning. I have to say, I am enjoying myself writing these newsletters, and I am slowly but surely beginning to feel more confidence about writing them, which is a really good thing, methinks. The fiction I’ve been writing at a snail’s pace is also much better than things I’ve done over the last six or seven years–or at least, I feel much better about them. I feel more confident about writing in general, I think; it’s just a matter of reining everything back it and focusing on getting things done.

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Hope you have a great day, thanks as always for stopping by, and hope to see you again tomorrow.

Those boots? With THAT bandanna? Gurrrrlllll…

Secret

Work-at-home Friday, and here we are! I am taking the day off because I have a doctor’s appointment this morning and I have another one in the afternoon. Sigh. That’s what sick time is for, after all, and I am going to try to get caught up on things I’ve let slide longer than I should have. It rained most of the day yesterday, along with flash flooding in the metro area and yes, they were thunderstorms. When I woke up yesterday morning, I opened my eyes in time for a very bright flash of lightning, followed instantly by a low rumble of thunder that lasted as I pulled on my sweats and fumbled around in the dark like Velma on Scooby Doo Where Are You looking for my glasses. By the time I got downstairs, turned on the kitchen lights and the coffee maker, it was pouring. The water draining off the roofs and the rain fall on the side yard made a stream about two inches deep, and the current heading toward the street was very, very fast. I’d used my wagon last night, and hadn’t folded it up and put it away, so it was out there filling up with water. It was still raining heavily when I went to work, then the rest of my work day it was off and on all day. Yesterday was an odd day at work, actually. We’re restructuring the department again, which meant the testing room I usually use needs to be used by someone else–our next nurse, which meant a big production of moving me to another testing room. Long story short, they set me up in the wrong room but I couldn’t get into the room they wanted me in because someone else had already set up in there for the day. So, I couldn’t set it up or anything, and piles of the stuff I used in the original room was stacked up on a table, which made the room look messy, and yeah–I didn’t like that off-balance feeling. It wasn’t raining when I ran some errands on the way home, and then Sparky and I got in the easy chair and got caught up on the news. Paul came home late, but we watched the finale of The Shards (more on that later), then Coco’s exit from the US Open before going to bed. I did sleep very well, and I actually feel pretty good this morning. I am going to do some chores around here before cleaning up for my appointment, and this afternoon I’ll get to work cleaning and doing laundry.

It’s also 9/11 today, and the 25th anniversary of that horrible day when everything changed. I’ve been working on a newsletter about my own memories of that day and time; and everything that happened afterwards. It’s a very somber day–kind of how Pearl Harbor Day was more of a thing when I was a kid, because it had only been twenty years since the Japanese attack when I was born. Not even twenty; I was born in August and the twentieth anniversary was in December, of course. We barely even notice December 7th anymore, which is wild to me; when I was a kid I thought we’d always remember World War II–which is clearly not the case.

The Shards was infuriating. For one thing, nothing was resolved in the finale. Why would you open the season finale of a show with a major subplot involving a serial killer with a new, completely unrelated murder and turn the last episode not doing much with the serial killer at all into a whole new whodunnit, which is completely unresolved. Nothing was resolved, everything was left hanging, and I have no one to blame but myself for watching another beautiful mess produced by Ryan Murphy. I am going to start reading the book this weekend–people I know and respect loved the book and hated the show (quelle surprise), so I am hopeful that the book will provide more of what I wanted from the show (and didn’t ever get).

There are some good games this weekend, but LSU is playing Louisiana Tech tomorrow night at the same time as Texas-Ohio State, which means flipping back and forth between games. Will the Tigers have a big night against La Tech? Will Clemson rebound from last weekend? The Saints also play this Sunday, and I imagine we’ll watch the US Open men’s final, too.

And on that note, I am going to get another cup of coffee and adjourn to my chair to relax a bit before getting to work on chores and getting ready for my appointment. So, gave yourself a lovely little Friday, and I will be back tomorrow morning bright and early. Til then!

I’d Rather Be Your Lover

Thursday and the last day in the office for the week. I woke up to a marvelous thunderstorm that I am not going to want to run to the car in, but there are worse things. I wish I was still in bed and under the covers! There’s no rain just yet–or it’s not coming down very hard–but the lightning is very close, so I’m getting quite the light show outside my windows as I swill my morning coffee. It also explains the sinus attack I experienced as soon as I got out of be (thank you, sweet relief from Claritin-D), and I do feel a bit groggy physically–not mentally–but the shower will take care of that. I am very delighted it’s Thursday, and I am having my work-at-home day again tomorrow. I do have a doctor’s appointment at eleven, and I’ll run errands after that before getting home and settling in for the evening. I doubt I will do much of anything when I get home tonight–which is what usually happens on Thursdays–but I need to at least do a load of laundry and empty the dishwasher. Ah, the glamorous life never ends, does it?

For a pay-the-bills day, yesterday wasn’t that bad, other than watching my bank balance dwindle as I paid said bills. I slept really well and didn’t want to get out of the warmth and comfort of the bed; I even went to bed early on Tuesday night because I felt a little inside-out. We were steadily busy in the clinic but not in a bad, exhausting way, and that was nice. It had rained overnight Tuesday night as well so it was a little cooler yesterday–in the 80s and not terribly humid (or, horror of horrors, I’ve adapted to it), and I did run errands on my way home. I spent most of the evening getting caught up on the news for the day, ignoring that gathering of evil in Dallas (GRINDR crashed again, quelle surprise), and rolling my eyes about all the college football lunacy and the complete meltdown of on-air personalities around it (more on that later) and I eventually went to bed early. (Paul was late getting home, and will be again tonight too–meetings.) It’s so dark outside with the storms! I really want to get back into bed and pull up my warm pile of blankets over me, but that isn’t anything I can do, alas…tempting as it is to call in sick.

I’m not sure what the hell is going on, but I find it interesting that as everyone is struggling to put gas in their cars and food on their tables is that my credit cards have been raising my limits. Now, my credit rating has been improving, as I continue to pay the debt down, but not so significantly that my credit companies have raised my limits by either doubling or even tripling my credit with them. I know having more available credit improves your credit score, but increasing the available credit also means more available credit which means the rating will go up again which means the credit lines will increase again and damn, what a fucking merry-go-round this is. Ah, he’s paying off his cards that means he’s more solvent and can take on even more debt! Seriously, fuck off with these evil increases.

It’s quite exciting that we have two US women and two US men in the US Open semi-finals; when was the last time this happened in the same tournament? It’s been a long fucking while. Andy Roddick was the last US man to win the Open, and of course, there were the years of Venus and Serena at the top of the women’s draw.

Well, it looks like all the LSU/SEC drama has subsided. For the record, y’all should know that not only has LSU embraced its villain era, so has the entire state. I’ve also been highly amused watching all the ESPN “analysts” beat their chests and scream to high heaven that the Lane Train is trying to undermine and ruin college football. First of all, the initial question–can people who signed pro contracts but were never paid and never played regain their final year of eligibility in the wake of a recent court decision granting some players from 2022 an extra year; does that apply in this case as well1? It’s a fair question that deserved an answer. The Big Ten and the SEC then decided to ban “pro” players, defining “pro” as anyone signing anything with a pro team, without question and without discussion. It’s murky, and it was our governor and attorney general who started the legal shit. LSU is being blamed for the actions of its governor and attorney general–and remember, the governor fired anyone who could oppose his will at LSU and its Board of Governors, and our new athletic director is just a Janky Jeff rubber stamp. The real problem in Louisiana is its elected officials. I kind of hoped people would turn on him for potentially fucking up LSU’s football team, but instead Louisiana reverted to its usual “everyone is out to get us!” mentality that is the reason we have the elected officials we have.

And really, wasn’t this all about Greg Sankey’s ego? He’s already fumbled the leadership position the SEC had for years, letting the Big Ten take over. And really, look what happened as a result of all this nonsense. LSU’s season opener was one of the highest rated season openers in televised college football, even with a two hour rain delay before the game started. The ratings for LSU-Mississippi are going to be off the charts. Everyone is talking about LSU and Lane Kiffin in ways they’ve not been talked about since Joe Burrow graduated. Every single pundit forgot all the legal mess after that game Saturday night and has just raved about LSU and its potential this season ever since…and that’s his plan: make LSU impossible to ignore. As for me, I just rolled my eyes. Were they really going to kick LSU out of the SEC? I think Sankey got in his widdle fee-fees because he wasn’t asked how high as LSU jumped to his fingers snapping, and he sure didn’t like that, did he? Very testerical of him. Maybe we should have a woman commissioner, since men can’t handle their emotions?

I did manage to get a little work done on the book yesterday–very little, but something is better than nothing.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Enjoy your Thursday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning without fail.

  1. Note: pro basketball players from all over the world have played in the NCAA, notably at Alabama, with no controversy. ↩︎