Tag: Australian open

Do You Believe in Magic

Saturday morning and here we are in the Lost Apartment as New Orleans slowly shakes off it’s blizzard break and returns to what passes as normalcy around here. As I look outside this morning after sleeping really late this morning (I was tired, okay?), the snow is almost completely gone. Yesterday after work I did go to the gym, and we did go to Costco, so I was pretty worn out when that was all completed and didn’t get anything else much done once we got home. We got one of those pre-made Costco pizzas (they really are quite good) which made for an easy dinner, which we ate while watching LSU Gymnastics; they were off last night, alas–but were also missing some of their best athletes. We’d started watching Prime Target on Apple Plus (queer main character? Oh hell to the yes, thank you very much), which we are also enjoying, but…I don’t think we watched anything other than news clips after the meet ended and before we went to bed? I also did my usual Friday chores around here, too–yay, me. Today I need to write and I need to run some errands. I wanted to go make groceries today, but am thinking I may need to wait for a few more days, after the stores are able to take deliveries and restock their shelves; even Costco looked a little picked over yesterday–we still spent over four hundred, and I forgot to look at the price of eggs–and there wasn’t too much traffic, despite the highways and interstate still being closed. I am pretty sure the city is back to what passes for normal around here today. Its cold outside, but sunny and the sky is blue, so whatever bits of snow that are left from the blizzard (it still feels weird saying that, you know?) will most likely melt off today.

It’s been quite a year already, and it’s not even fucking February yet. 2024 seems like it was last century already. This weird past week, though, as I said the other day, was a much needed respite, a forced period of rest for a city still reeling from starting the year with a terrorist attack, with both the Super Bowl and Carnival still on the horizon. I feel like I also kind of needed it, myself–I feel a lot more rested than I did last weekend, of course, and I do think returning to the office on Monday is a nice return to my usual routine. I need to work on the book this weekend as well as some other writing projects that need doing, and of course there are always chores to be done. I did the bed linens and two loads of laundry yesterday, got the sink all cleared out, and finally was able to do some more cleaning around here, too. Tomorrow I’ll walk back over to the gym for another workout–my shoulder and arm are tight and sore a lot more these days, so I am taking it easy for another week before advancing the workout to the next step. I am getting some exercise in, I am burning calories, and so my physical goals should be much easier to achieve this year than in years past. I am feeling more centered than I have in years.

It was also delightful this morning to see that Madison Keys won the Australian Open; good on you, girl! The US even had a man in the semi-finals, too. I’ve not been as big a tennis fan lately as I used to be; the Williams sisters and Rafa retiring left a big gap, and I don’t know many of the players as well as I used to. I guess I’m kind of a homer when it comes to international sport…but it just seems like there’s not been any newer players coming along with the kind of charismatic star power the Williams sisters (and Rafa) had. I really don’t follow figure skating as much as I used to, either; Paul and I primarily focus on US ice dance, of all things; who knew that would gradually become our strongest discipline? We’d even forgotten that US Nationals were this weekend (congratulations to Amber Glenn for winning again), but now that we do know, we can actually watch this weekend (thank God for streaming, right?).

The world continues to burn to the ground all around us, and what else is there left to say? The surrender of everyone to MAGA, from corporations to celebrities to the press, the capitulation in advance, went exactly the way it did in Germany in the 1930s. That’s yet another reason why I think being a writer in these trying times means being an activist. My books, my stories, about queer life through a crime or horror lens, kind of are important in that regard, and as I get older and I become more and more progressive (yes, I am going the opposite direction of the trope that everyone becomes more conservative as they age; hey, don’t blame my generation for the fucking Boomers who sold out everything they believed in after college) I find myself dancing around things in my work. And yes, I do want MAGA voters to suffer, and am saving all my empathy and sympathy for the victims of MAGA voters. I have no sympathy for mediocrities who need the state to made them feel better about their snowflake loser selves, and laughed excitedly about how they were fucking us over. I’m supposed to not want them to suffer the consequences of their actions? People who enjoy the suffering of others and voted for inhumanity? You can miss me with that kind of moral superiority, and if that’s you, just because you think you’re morally superior doesn’t mean you actually are.

And your education certainly doesn’t make you more intelligent and more moral than anyone else. All that means is you knew how to perform for professors by giving them what they wanted, kissing their ass, and not questioning them–which I did all the time, earning their enmity, and the little Napoleons in college English departments aren’t very interested in opinions other than their own correct ones, and punished me accordingly. (I have more publications than all of my professors, across all disciplines.) I don’t like to talk myself up (sing out, Louise!) because it seems arrogant and egocentric, and I don’t like those parts of my personality very much, but yes, I do have more publications than all of my instructors I’ve had throughout the course of my life, so…forgive me for interpreting essays, stories and books differently than a boring Lit professor’s1 (or writing teacher’s) dogmatic devotion to closing their eyes to any new interpretation. I’ve also always felt that you don’t learn by memorizing things; you learn by examining them, thinking about them, and evaluating. Theory is great, but implementation is far far better and way more important.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back at some point.

  1. As long as I live, I will never forgot my Shakespeare professor, talking about the many versions of Hamlet Shakespeare wrote, and how in earlier drafts Queen Gertrude was complicit in the murder of her husband and how that changed. The professor insisted that Shakespeare did this deliberately; which made Hamlet’s dilemma even worse–could he trust his mother? I raised my hand, and pointed out that at the time Hamlet was put on, James I was king of England, and his mother was believed to have been a party to his father’s murder, and married his murderer and the parallel was too close for comfort. He dismissed this with a condescending wave of his hand and said, “Shakespeare was an artist and wouldn’t worry about such mundane things” to which I replied, “several months in the Tower of London and running the risk of being hung for insulting the King isn’t a mundane thing.” That was the last day I went to class, only showing up for tests, and my paper was “Murderous Mothers: The Parallels Between Queen Gertrude and Mary Queen of Scots”, for which I did a lot of historical research. The paper got an A, and I also got one in the class, and I never really trusted professors again after that. ↩︎

Red Roses for a Blue Lady

Here we are on a cold Sunday morning and I hope everyone is doing as well as they can this morning. I went to bed early and slept well–I really do think adding another to the pile of blankets, and its additional weight, is making a difference. Today I have to do some reading and some writing, go to the gym and make groceries. I feel rested and awake this morning, so as I slurp down my coffee and wake up while Sparky wants my lap in the easy chair I have to admit I feel pretty good this morning. Maybe I shouldn’t let myself sleep so late on Saturdays? I don’t know, but the coffee is hitting the spot and I do feel more rested than I did yesterday, so your guess is as good as mine. It’s kind of gray outside this morning, and it’s forty degrees–yikes–but it’ll get warmer later once the sun is higher in the sky.

We watched LSU Gymnastics compete against three of the best teams in the country yesterday, and with half of their usual competitors out with an injury, they only came in second by three tenths of a point; and Haleigh Bryant can make that difference up all by herself, not to mention the other two powerhouses who sat this meet out–which bodes well for the rest of the season. It’s so cool knowing they are the defending national champions! We also watched some of the Australian Open last night, and I went to bed early. I also managed to get some chores done around here, and overall, it was a pretty good day. I don’t think I even went outside yesterday, to be honest–which is always a good day for me.

I spent some time yesterday morning with Ode to Billy Joe, and while Raucher is a very good writer, he doesn’t really know how to write for teenagers, I think. Just because the story is set in the early 1950s and people were more innocent (?) back then in theory, it’s almost like reading something from a past civilization, and in some ways it kind of is. Raucher tries very hard not to condescend to rural Southerners, but there is a touch of that “zoo animal” thing to the story, if that makes any sense? It doesn’t quite seem real, and Bobbie Lee, the female lead, seems so child-like it’s hard to believe she’s supposed to be fourteen, and “receiving callers”–did Southern girls still say that in the 1950’s? It’s like something from The Glass Menagerie, and I don’t know if that archaic social phrase was in use, if at all. But there’s definitely more depth to the book than there was to the movie, and I think I’m going to end up enjoying the book more than I did the movie–despite the beautiful presence of Robby Benson and his amazing blue eyes and surprisingly deep voice.

Thinking of Ode to Billy Joe being a historical now made me realize that my own 70s book is kind of an artifact of another time, too. Researching and remembering things from that time of my life is always a bit of a surprise; things that had been locked away in a corner of my brain coming back to the front of the memory banks. Television shows and commercials, the looming Bicentennial (which was, at the time, shockingly commercialized; although the Tricentennial–which I won’t make it to, but hopefully the country will–will be even worse), the gas shortages and economic fears, the ever-present threat of nuclear war and annihilation, the never-ending conflicts in the Middle East, and the massive clean-up of the country’s air, water and litter. Top Forty radio was a weird mishmash of all kinds of music, from the bubblegum of the Osmonds to the Rolling Stones, Queen, and the Who to horrible novelty songs that were incredibly popular and were overplayed to death to the point I never want to hear any of them ever again, and everyone watched American Bandstand on Saturdays to hear music and see the latest dance moves. I am really looking forward to writing it. I also have two short stories to complete sooner rather than later, and of course as always I have too much to do in too little time–but I can make it work.

I’ve also, since the election, been thinking about how to resist the new regime and the inherent hatreds, cruelties, and horrors that are coming with them. Our only hope as a country depends on the Republican-controlled Senate (well, Republicans plus the bootlicking traitor John Fetterman) actually standing up for the Constitution, and looking for a spine on the Right is as fruitless as a snipe hunt. I am not getting involved with the Democratic Party, because it feels like I’ve been throwing my time, money and energy on them while they just roll over and play dead since the 1990s; and nowadays seems to be no different. Here’s the thing about our system; the only difference between the two parties since World War II has primarily been on domestic and interior policy; the foreign policy has always been the same, and a lot of bad things have been done by our government in the name of “national security” and our endless thirst for oil. This changed a bit under the MAGA monarchy the last time around–turning our backs on traditional allies while cozying up to Russia, North Korea, and China (Ivanka needs her trademarks!). I also love how the MAGAts are so quick to whine and complain against the forever wars they fully supported, and does anyone else remember their toxic patriotism on the eves of the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq? How questioning the invasion decisions was basically treason and not supporting the military and pissing on the graves of the 9/11 dead? Because I sure the fuck do, and I also remember how the Right created cancel culture for the Dixie Chicks, as country music began to swing from being about the working class and resisting the rich? It’s also amusing to me that they complain about “forever wars” without remembering that the same people they are supporting today are the exact same people who lied to them and whipped them up into a disgusting “patriotic” frenzy?

I spent some time this weekend thinking about writing as activism, and that it used to be just that; my very existence and my career are made political by evangelicals and others of their ilk, and I had no say in that at all. Would I prefer to be left alone to live my life and make my own decisions without government interference? Absolutely. Is that ever going to happen? Not as long as trash and liars and false prophets continue to abuse the faith and the faithful for money, power, and control. How can anyone actually be a Christian and believe that the Prosperity Gospel of wolves in sheep’s clothing like Joel Osteen and other con artists of his ilk? Sinclair Lewis exposed all of this horror with Elmer Gantry, which is still as current as it was when first published in the early 20th century. Maybe Elmer Gantry, along with All the King’s Men, should be required reading in high school–but high schoolers won’t care anymore now than they did when I was one. (Also, back to the 1970s–there wasn’t an expectation that everyone would go to college, either. Only five kids from my graduating class went to college, I think, I could be off by one or two, out of forty-eight.) I’ve not thought of my writing as a way to make political statements–or at least I haven’t in a long time, at any rate, but someone pointed out to me several years ago (or longer, who knows anymore?) that my work was a lot more important than I’ve ever thought or believed; I did document what gay life was like in New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina changed everything. I also documented life in New Orleans in general, before , during and after a hurricane. I’ve written about gay con artists and corrupt hateful politicians and the far right and evangelicals and race and homophobia and misogyny. I often explore something that I find interesting in my books so I can learn more about the topic I am writing about as well as process my own complicated feelings about sensitive subjects. I even wrote a throuple into the Scotty series long before that ever became a subject for conversation in the community. It’s weird to think that my first two novels were released before Lawrence overturned sodomy laws nationally. My sex-life was against the law until I was forty-two. Forty fucking two.

I was filling out the pre-production form for Hurricane Season Hustle Friday, and I went to Amazon to look at the page for Mississippi River Mischief to see if information I needed was there–it wasn’t–but I also noticed I have forty-seven reviews and an average ranking of four and a half stars, which was kind of a surprise, albeit a pleasant one. That meant that overall there had to be more five star reviews than any other kind, else the average wouldn’t be over four, you know? This was a very pleasant surprise, in all honesty; I never look at Amazon pages for my books and especially never at the reviews; likewise, I will never go wading in the fetid swamp that is Goodreads. Who needs that aggravation? But as I said, it was a pleasant surprise, one that almost tempted me to look at the others, but I resisted the urge. I am more emotionally stable now than I’ve ever been in my life before, but why borrow trouble? And sure, it could be another ego boost but it could also be a blow.

And the last thing I need right now is something to rock my already shaky foundations.

California continues to burn, and people continue to expose how dark and twisted their souls and psyches are. It’s beginning to sound like most of these fires were started as arson–which would definitely count as a terrorist attack on Los Angeles, in my opinion; if Luigi shooting that fucking piece of shit counts as terrorism, burning down billions of dollars of property and destroying people’s lives as well as killing some of them definitely is an act if terror. Please don’t be a dick about the fires on-line, people. I’ve lived through a different kind of “act of God” that basically destroyed my city and generational wealth with it. Angelenos are still in shock and are going to be for a long time. This is a serious trauma, and believe me when I say a lot of Angelenos are going to be medicated for years to come. I’m still not entirely sure I’ve gotten over Katrina, in all honesty. So, for God’s sake, show some empathy and compassion for their suffering. Playing the blame game or bringing politics into this is fucking bullshit, so can you not do that? There’s no place in this country that is safe from an unexpected natural disaster.

And trust me, when it happens to you–you will hate those people. I’ve never forgiven any of them, including Chicago Bears fans. I had hoped that disgusting child rapist Dennis Hastert would die in prison, but he remains proof that only the good die young. Henry Kissinger and Anita Bryant is more evidence of that as well.

So, think before you post or comment. I hate Florida and Texas and their politics, but I also worry about them and try to do what I can whenever a hurricane devastates them.

And if you’re feeling smug and judgy–I’m looking at you in particular, Louisiana MAGA racists, remember that when a hurricane comes crashing through your home town.

And on that note, I am going to my chair to read my book for a bit before I get to work. I worked on the book yesterday and it went very well; I am feeling good about writing again and think I am going to be able to hit my stride again sometime soon. Huzzah! Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll talk to you again later at some point.

Oh, those wacky ballerinos!

The Message

Monday morning and back to the office blog. I have my final PT for dexterity today, before I take a couple of weeks off before starting the strength PT, which will be the final step of getting recovered from the surgery. It seems like it’s been forever, but the truth is I injured the arm initially almost a year ago–so I have been dealing with this for almost a year, and it will be well over a year by the time I finally get through the recovery. It’s taking me a moment to get used to not wearing a brace, frankly–but god DAMN I am so glad to not have to wear that fucking thing anymore. The weather is supposed to be horrific today–heavy winds and flooding rains–which I am not terribly excited about, in all honesty, since I’ll be out and around in it. But I slept really well last night, and am feeling awake and good this morning so far, so we’ll see how the rest of the day goes, shall we?

I read more of Tara Laskowski’s The Weekend Retreat yesterday morning over my coffee, and it is truly addictive and mesmerizing. I am having the best time reading it, and shouldn’t have an issue spending about an hour or so with it again today. I also did some more filing and organizing and cleaning yesterday, as well as made dinner and some other things for the week. There’s another load of dishes that needs doing tonight when I get home from work and PT and everything else, but if I manage to stay caught up on these things, maybe the three day weekend won’t be as disrupted by needing to clean. I’ve narrowed down the stories I have on hand for the possible anthology submissions, so they’ll require reviewing again in addition to revising and editing. I watched some more War of the Worlds, which is interesting, and then I watched a bit of the Golden Globes before I went to bed–you can tell how much I cared about them by the fact that I couldn’t tell you who won any of them, really. I used to care about awards shows, but I don’t anymore. There are rarely any surprises, and there are so many of them now…by the time the Oscars roll around, it’s relatively easy to figure out who’s going to win most everything.

I can’t believe it’s already Carnival, too (but am loving that it’s also king cake season). Parades will be starting in a few weeks, and the Australian Open, and the figure skating championships, and the Festivals are on deck…Lord. I do get tired just thinking about it, in all honesty. But at least the brace is gone. It’s taking some getting used to–not having it on–and periodically I’ll experience some new sensation in the arm, but that’s also the nerves getting used to not having the brace support anymore. Thank God for the new meds, because I’d be a ball of anxiety by now otherwise.

I also saw the previews for a new show I am rather excited about–Mary & George, which is about George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, and his ambitious mother, who essentially groomed her handsome son to charm and seduce King James I (he of the King James Version of the Bible, no less), who preferred the company of men and had male favorites at his court. I’ve been meaning to track down a copy of Antonia Fraser’s biography of him, just to see how she handles the questionable sexuality of England’s first Stuart king, or if she erases or elides it. There were several queer kings of England–Richard I, Edward II, James I, Queen Anne–and I’ve also seen things questioning the sexuality of William III, too. (James was also the son of Mary Queen of Scots.) I can’t think of as many French kings that were queer; of the top of my head I can only think of Henri III and Louis XIV’s brother Phillippe duc d’Orléans, Monsieur. It’s also early and I’m not caffeinated enough, frankly, to face the day or put any more thought into gay French royalty. Anyway, one of the guys from Red White and Royal Blue (Nicholas Galitzine) is playing George Villiers, the handsomest man of his age, and if you remember your Three Musketeers, the British minister who was in love with Anne of Austria, Queen of France.

George got around, apparently.

The seventeenth is also one of my favorite centuries.

And on that note, I should head into the spice mines. We’re going to have some bad weather today–potential hail and tornadoes–as well as heavy rains. Hopefully I’ll be able to get to PT this afternoon and then home safely. Have a great Monday, CR, and I may see you again later.

Put Yourself in My Place

Thursday morning and I am groggy. I was afraid that would be the case this morning–I probably should have gone to bed an hour earlier (nine instead of ten…I feel so old) but Paul was late getting home anyway so I was waiting for him, and he got home just before ten. I think I slept fairly well, despite waking up again at four-ish and then drifting in and out of a half-sleep for the next two hours, finally getting into a deep sleep right around the time the alarm went off, naturally. (I had a very good sleep score last night, according to my Fitbit, so I’ll just accept that and be done with it.)

I got another chapter of the book done last night–so am still behind and trying to get caught up. Two chapters a day was an ambitious thought for work nights, but if I can get at least one done today the weekend will have to make up for it. I was hoping to not have to kill myself at the computer writing this weekend, but alas and alack, here we are. The book is being reshaped nicely, and my emails are getting answered–slowly but surely–but they are getting answered. I still haven’t had the time to make a to-do list (desperately needed) but am going to see if I can make that a priority this morning. I also am leaving work early today so I can keep a doctor’s appointment this afternoon, so I will get home a bit earlier than usual–which will help with the writing of two chapters, of course–and I am hopeful Paul will get home at a decent hour so we can spend a little time together before bed. Tomorrow I work at home, and next week I start having Mondays as a new at-home day (this was the only week with four days in the office), which will be kind of nice if odd. Adjusting to change gets harder and harder the older I get.

But the sun is coming up and it doesn’t look terribly cloudy out there this morning. Yesterday was a lovely, if chilly, day; today will also be chilly. It’s so weird; having a heating system that works properly hasn’t been easy to adjust to. It’s weird not having to wear slippers because the floor’s so cold, or having to wear layers, or having to get under a blanket in my easy chair to watch television comfortably. (I have wondered if the sleep issues of this week have to do with it not being freezing upstairs at night now. But it’s better that the cold doesn’t make me resent getting up every morning, so there’s that.)

But the coffee is kicking in, although I still feel a bit off this week; I am not sure what that’s all about, quite frankly. It’s very weird that the Australian Open is almost over and we’ve not watched a single match; maybe that’s why this week has seemed off? Paul hasn’t even mentioned it once, and usually every night we have matches playing on the television while I watch and play with my iPad–commercials are always lovely times to doom-scroll on Twitter or check in on Facebook or Instagram. There’s still a stack of things on my kitchen counter that needs to be sorted and filed away; I am actually thinking now in terms of simply throwing almost all my paper files away to clear room for stuff I actually need to keep. Maybe this will be a good project for after the book is finished, one Saturday? Empty the filing cabinets and the file boxes? There obviously are things I would need to keep–contracts, for one–but partial story print outs or early drafts are unnecessary to keep because I rarely go back and look at them; I usually look for the file on my computer anyway when I think about finishing something I’ve already started–mostly because my filing system is such a fucking mess. I can also scan copies of articles I’ve written, important things I want to keep but don’t necessarily need a hard copy of, and so forth.

I actually like the sound of this, and then maybe I can find an archive willing to take on my manuscripts and so forth. The older I get the less I care about future scholarship on queer writing and preserving my history–the books will live on forever in ebook editions anyway, and when I retire or die within a few years I’ll be forgotten, and I am actually fine with that. I don’t even know that anyone would ever be interested in actually studying me or not; I know that I am one of the few queer writers who wrote about New Orleans gay life before and after Katrina, but again–the books will always be available electronically, and God knows this blog will probably be accessible for all eternity as well. Soooo…,making a decision about that goes onto the year’s goals list.

But I can definitely start cleaning out the file boxes and the file cabinets. I can keep research in the file cabinet, as well as contracts and tax returns and important business stuff. There may not be enough to fill a single drawer, but that’s not an issue. The more I talk this through the more I like the idea.

Hmmm.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader!

5 8 6

And now it’s Thursday.

Ye Gods, how lovely was it to get in my car yesterday morning and turn the heat all the way up? I actually felt warm for the first time in days, and the heat was on at the office, too! Marvelous, simply marvelous, really. The weather also got significantly warmer–still cold, but twenty degrees was a significant improvement–over the course of the day. It’s going to drop into the thirties again overnight on Friday and Saturday, per the forecast, but if I can sleep through it I don’t care how cold it gets at night. I did have ice on my windshield yesterday morning–that was an unpleasant surprise–but my wonderful car warmed right up as I sat there and the ice melted and all was right in the world again. The drive to work was a bit of an ordeal; I left early, just in case, and was right–New Orleanians cannot drive under the best of circumstances–and when I got on 90 highway from the west bank to connect to I-10 East….my ramp was blocked off by an apparent car fire? And then of course the next exit from I-10 West (don’t try to follow the highway nonsense in New Orleans, seriously) was Carrollton. Because people drive like morons I wasn’t able to take the Carrollton/Tulane exit and had to get off at Carrollton right in front of Costco…and you always need to remember that when you need to make a left turn in New Orleans, you probably can’t. I wound up detouring around Xavier University and our OTHER building on my way to work this morning…thank God I left early so I got here around the time I usually do….it only took me almost three quarters of a fucking hour.

Ironically, the temperature in the Lost Apartment last night was one that would ordinarily have me bitterly bundling up and complaining about the cold…last night as I moved around the apartment getting things done–all the things I wanted to do and intended to on Fat Tuesday, I was laughing at myself…because after Fat Tuesday last night seemed very pleasant indeed in the Lost Apartment. I slept like a stone last night–God, if I could only sleep every night the way I do when it’s this cold!–and didn’t really want to get up this morning, either–it was warm and comfortable–but even so, this cold this morning is completely bearable and something I can handle with aplomb, methinks.

One great tragedy of the cold, though, was I lost a day’s work on the manuscript on Fat Tuesday, which means really having to buckle down on working on it this weekend. I may wind up having to ask for an extra week, but it’s very close and if I can get a lot done this weekend I might not have to ask for another week–but I am not going to kill myself and am going to try to be reasonable and realistic about how much I can get done this weekend.

Rather than finishing Mr. Mercedes last night, we chose to watch Serena Williams play Naomi Osaka at the Australian Open; some amazing tennis, but I have never enjoyed watching Serena lose. I suspect that was her last Australian Open; I think after this year she will undoubtedly retire and enjoy the rest of her life, maybe even have another kid. She owes us tennis fans nothing, really–I just hate seeing her marvelous career come to an end.

It’s forty-two in New Orleans right now, with a projected low of thirty-nine for the day. I will undoubtedly feel very warm and toasty when I retire to my easy chair to watch movies and remake last week’s condom packs (they were exposed to a temperature that was too low for them to stay good; so I have to remove the condoms from the packs I made last week and put new ones in); I’m not sure what I want to watch today. I watched Young Rock last night while I waited for Paul to come home; I can’t make up my mind as to whether it’s meta and charming, or cheesy yet charming. Dwayne Johnson is just so damned charismatic…I have been a fan from the early days (just as I have been a long-time fan of John Cena; I don’t watch WWE at all anymore for a variety of reasons, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t appreciate the talents working for them), and there were times watching the show when I laughed out loud–the actors playing him when he was younger were very well-cast, as were the men cast as the professional wrestlers he knew and hung out with when he was a kid; and the woman playing his mother is very likable. Also–the guy playing his father Rocky Johnson is eerily well-cast as well. So, I’ll probably keep watching, but am reserving judgment on it.

Oh, I wonder if either version of My Cousin Rachel is available to stream anywhere? I’ve never seen either, and I do love the book very much. If my mind could focus better, I’d give it a reread–for some reason I’m having trouble reading again, so at some point today, tomorrow or over the course of the weekend I am going to delve back into some short stories. I started reading an ol Dan Girls mystery, The Clue in the Cobweb, because I want to start doing blog entries about the kids’ series I loved so much (I’ve already done The Three Investigators and Ken Holt; I am also rereading a Three Investigators tale, The Mystery of the Fiery Eye as well), and eventually would love to cover every one of the series I read when I was a kid and continued collecting as an adult. I know I’ve also already done Trixie Belden–but I’ve not done any of the others. I am hesitant to approach Nancy Drew or the Hardy Boys; even with the ones I’ve already done I barely scraped into the extensive research and scholarship on those series, and as I’ve noted before, fans of these series take them very, very seriously (I still want to write a book about that; I think a very interesting murder mystery novel could be set at one of these fan conferences they do annually because I don’t have enough to write already.)

And on that note, tis time to head back into the spice mines. Hope you have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and please stay warm and safe out there!

Are You Ready for This?

Ugh, Valentine’s Day.

The epitome of what I call the “Hallmark holiday”–a holiday primarily invented to sell products and cards, all under the guise of love and romance–I’ve never really understood the point of this “holiday”, really; shouldn’t we be showing the people we love that we love them every day without the necessity of a “holiday” forcing us to do so? And if I can recall correctly, the actually story of St. Valentine is actually creepy and sad; more like a John Carpenter version of a holiday than what billions of dollars of advertising over the past six or seven decades have embedded into American culture. I know, I know–I’m a spoilsport and perhaps a touch too cynical about these sorts of things, but seriously.

I mean….

It’s a frigid forty degrees in New Orleans today, with a deep freeze in the forecast for tomorrow night and the possibility of snow on Fat Tuesday. Ironically, the cancellation of the parades and the partying ban/restrictions in the French Quarter–which essentially cancelled Carnival’s bacchanal–while being an enormous economic blow to the city for this year, may have saved us of next year. Cold weather Carnivals are inevitably miserable and not as fun; and the following years see a dip in numbers and attendance before it starts building back up again. Not having hordes descend upon us for what may be record-setting cold for Carnival may be a blessing in disguise. It’s certainly too cold to go stand around on the corner for hours today for the four parades that would be rolling–but I am missing my corn dogs and mango daiquiris and funnel cakes this year. I have tights on this morning beneath my sweatpants, and may end up putting on a T-shirt underneath my sweatshirt. I have a stocking cap on, fingerless gloves, and the space heater is going on full blast. The sun is hiding behind cloud cover so it seems gray out there…I am dreading the inevitable rain that will come as well. But I intend to spend most of my day in my easy chair (huzzah for laptop computers!) under a blanket while music plays–I am going to be a Festival widow again today–and work on my book some more. I managed four chapters yesterday; don’t be impressed, as they were flashback chapters so the tenses isn’t need to be shifted, but I also saw places that need actual revisions, and made note of them for the big final push. I am hoping to actually get through this entire manuscript by Ash Wednesday, and then next weekend I’ll be able to start inputting the serious changes it needs, as well as some additions. There also needs to be one more, final chapter written. This will clock the book in at about a hundred thousand words, twenty-two chapters, and of course the inserts between each chapter I also need to write. I do think I should be able to get all of this finished by March 1 deadline; we’ll have to see. I am trying not to get into the mindset of well, I don’t have another deadline right behind this one, so I can be late without damaging the writing schedule for the year too badly–which is a thing for me, really; it’s never ceased to amaze me how easily I can talk myself out of doing the work.

Last night after Paul got home we watched the Australian Open; particularly the Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams matches, which were both quite entertaining and saw some amazing tennis being played, particularly Serena’s match. I spent most of the day working around the house. I ran errands early (mail, returned a library book, made groceries) and then came home and cleaned through the cold. Finally around two o’clock I adjourned to the easy chair and started revising and rewriting, and making notes. I also rewatched a beefcake movie about teenaged male witches called The Covenant, which objectifies its beautiful young male stars–their characters are conveniently on the swim team, so there are plenty of scenes in the water and in the locker room–and starred Chace Crawford, Sebastian Stan, Taylor Kitsch and Toby Hemingway in their youthful beauty; but the lead was played by Steven Strait, who was gorgeous and is now starring in The Expanse. It’s not a great movie by any means–a trifle, an entertainment–but the young beefcake was quite lovely to look at. Is there a term for young beefcake? There should be.

I also reread an old kids’ series book that I greatly enjoyed as a child; The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot, which is a Three Investigators mystery and going to get–as it deserves–its own entry. When I was a kid, I loved the kids’ series books, collected them (continuing to do so as an adult because I am a completist and if I have any of the series I must have ALL of the series), and often reread favorites multiple times. I always used books as a child to escape from the reality of my world, in which I was an outsider and strange and may as well have been from another planet or dimension. Books were my source of comfort–I could always escape whatever was going on by slipping into a book. I have reread The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot any number of times–but this is the first time I’ve gone back to it in years. I am considering writing middle grade mysteries–not because I think I will get rich and famous that way (which I have long since learned in this business is a fool’s fantasy) but rather because I have always wanted to, and want to see if I can actually pull it off. I came up with the concept for a kids’ mystery series when I was a kid, patterned if not plagiarized from the ones I was reading, and believe it or not, I still have the list of titles and synopses of some of the books I’d intended to write in the series. Why not give it a shot? As the clock slowly runs out on my life–like sands through the hourglass–I am becoming very aware of how limited the time I have left in which I want to write everything I want to write (with new ideas popping up all over the place, all of the time) and so I am beginning to need to focus to get the ones that truly matter to me finished.

And yes, I am fully aware how morbid that sounds.

But it’s also reality. I suppose examining one’s mortality as the sixtieth birthday looms (seven months) is a cliché; sue me. I’ve never really thought about my age a whole lot before–other than being pleased that I don’t look my age–but I do find myself in quiet moments thinking about the past and wondering how much time I have left and when am I going to find the time to write everything I want to get written before Papa Legba comes to claim my soul. (Also, only this week did I learn how to make special characters on my computer…)

And on that note, I need to make another cup of coffee and do some things around here before settling in for today’s manuscript work. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader; I hope to get my blog entry on The Mystery of the Stuttering Parrot finished today as well.

Amazed

Show of hands: who predicted I wouldn’t get as much done yesterday as I wanted to? I was pretty confident that would wind up the case, as it always is. But I did get a lot done yesterday–some of it even writing-related, so have a seat, guilty conscience!–and that pleases me. I am hopeful I’ll be able to get more done today as well. Granted–it’s easy to say that as I sip my first cup of coffee. I also stayed in bed later this morning than I wanted to–since I woke up at seven on my own yesterday I thought perhaps this morning would be the same so I didn’t set an alarm–but I wound up getting up at eight, so that wasn’t too terrible I also hit a wall yesterday around four thirty–I got very tired–and so I repaired to the easy chair to finish reading my book.

It’s rather gloomy out there this morning, and it’s chilly here in the Lost Apartment–the space heater is on–and I’m a little annoyed by this return of coldness. Yesterday. while starting out chilly, eventually turned into quite a beautiful day; I didn’t even wear a jacket when I went out to run my errands. But that’s okay; I probably won’t have to go out into much today, or at least I hope not.

We watched a lot of the figure skating championships yesterday–will probably do so again today; I think the men’s is on this afternoon and Europeans is on tonight–and Paul’s been watching the Australian Open on his computer. We’re very behind on all the shows we watch, and there are also any number of new shows we want to watch–or shows we watch have returned for another season, which is very cool–and of course, the Williams Festival is approaching, which means late nights at the office for Paul; yes, it’s about that time when I become a Festival widow again. I should be able to get a lot of reading done during this time–which is what I generally use it for. I got a copy of Lori Rader-Day’s new novel yesterday in the mail, The Lucky One, and since I’m moderating that panel, I’ll need to read it soon.

I also have to make travel arrangements today for some upcoming trips in this new year; Bouchercon, Malice Domestic, etc.

Ah, it’s raining. That explains the gloomy grayness outside.

It’s the kind of day, really, where I’d rather curl up under a blanket and read all day, quite frankly, but I can’t do that. I need to work on the Secret Project, and there’s all kinds of other things I also have to get done today–odds and ends, emails to answer, etc. I’d also like to make some headway on getting my taxes at least started; I am missing only one 1099 form, and once I have that I can turn everything over to my accountant and get my return filed, which will be lovely.

I did finish reading Elizabeth Little’s Pretty as a Picture, which is fantastic–and then I started reading Dorothy B. Hughes’ Dread Journey when my energy finally flagged in the late afternoon.

pretty as a picture

They say a picture’s worth a thousand words.

That’s not what I’d say.

I’d say it depends on the picture. I’d say it depends on the size and the color and the subject and the print and the framing and the focus and the composition. I’d say it depends on what you were doing the hour before, the day before, the year before, the life before. I’d say it depends on whether you’re looking at it on a wall or scrolling past it on a screen or cutting it carefully out of a book, digging your knuckle into the gutter of the spine because the margins are so small and the blades are so long and it’s impossible to get a straight line, but you don’t want to dig up a guide and an X-Acto knife because you aren’t willing to wait, you have to have it, you have to have this picture, right now, and your kitchen scissors are close enough and good enough–yes, good enough–and Jesus Christ, Marissa, when will you get it through your thick head: Imperfection is a price happy people pay to cradle the weight of something they love.

That’s what I’d say.

Elizabeth Little’s debut novel, Dear Daughter, is one of my favorite first novels and one of my favorite books of this past decade. Her novels–why they do focus on crime, or criminal activity–are more than just crime novels; they’re stories about women–messy, complicated, complex, interesting women you want to see get past not only their current crisis, but also pull their lives together. One of the most impressive things to me about Dear Daughter is that she didn’t wrap it all up neatly with a bow at the end, with justice being served and our heroine coming out of everything triumphant; she gave the ending a more realistic, this-is-how-it-would-play-out-in-real-life ending.

I’ve been waiting a long time for Pretty as a Picture, and it was worth the wait.

The story is told in a very tight, first person/present tense style that pulls the reader into the action and the head of our main character/narrator–Marissa Dahl, an up-and-coming film editor who has primarily worked on the films of her college best friend and current roommate, Amy,  an up-and-coming director. Marissa is socially awkward–there’s a lovely scene in which she talked about meeting a superstar director, Tony Rees, at the Venice Film Festival and pulls him into a fountain with her when she loses her balance–and very unsure of herself. She meets a guy named Josh, who winds up dating Amy, and having been interested in him herself, she now has become an incredibly awkward fifth wheel and has decided to separate herself from Amy, personally and professionally, to give Amy and Josh’s new relationship room to breathe and grow–and she’s more than just a little resentful about Josh, whom she now actively dislikes (which is also wrapped up in her own social awkwardness), which is why she ends up agreeing to work on a Tony Rees’ new film–a project wrapped in secrecy and sixteen page NDA’s. She heads out to Kickout Island, off the coast of Delaware, and even has a big security man–Isaiah–who picks her up at the local airport and takes her out there.

One of Marissa’s neuroses includes a fear of the water–and we eventually do find out where that fear came from.

The film turns out to be a fictionalized film version of an actual murder that took place on Kickout Island many years ago–the murder of a pretty teenaged girl; a murder that was never solved. Strange things are going on around the set–accidents, cast and crew being fired–and we slowly but surely are made aware, through Marissa’s eyes, that things are not as they seem…and then someone else dies, and Marissa is reluctantly on both cases.

I have to say, though, that my favorite characters–besides Marissa, whom I really liked for all her tics and strangeness and constant film references (which is actually very cool)–are the two teenaged girls she first encounters in the hotel kitchen while she is scrounging for something to eat–Grace and Suzy–who are also trying to solve the original murder case. I’d read an entire series about these two girls.

But Pretty as a Picture is a great read; well-written and clever and witty and snarky at points, but an enjoyable read with a complicated, twisty plot that never condescends to the reader. Well worth the lengthy wait for this second novel by Elizabeth Little–the only problem is now I have to wait (hopefully not as long) for her third.

Sweet Desire

Friday morning and it’s a bit chilly here in the Lost Apartment this morning–but the temperature’s supposedly gradually rising from how cold it was at the beginning of the week.

Hilariously, I have just one jacket–one really doesn’t need more than one in New Orleans–and it’s a wonderful black leather jacket I’ve had since before Katrina, I think. I believe it was a gift from my mother; I’m not entirely sure. I had a great leather jacket before this one, but the sleeve ripped on a door frame nail, and I think I got this jacket to replace it? I don’t know, the jacket is old. I’ve been struggling with the zipper, which would sometimes jam–it did walking in the snowfall in New York Saturday night–but as I waited for the parking lot shuttle here at the airport, I managed to zip it all the way up. (Every time I have trouble with the zipper I think I need to get this zipper replaced, but have never done it because, you know, procrastination) When I got out of the car at home, I realized that the zipper teeth had come apart at the bottom, and had separated all the way up to my chest. I tried to get the zipper teeth back together so I could unzip it, to no avail. Finally I pulled it up over my head like a sweatshirt and ripped the zipper open, thinking, great, now I HAVE to get the fucking zipper replaced. Heavy sigh. But as I emptied my suitcase into the washing machine, Paul–who was upstairs reorganizing our disaster of a shared closet, came down the stairs with a lovely jacket on a hanger. “Is this yours?” he asked. I had no memory of buying it–I still don’t–but it’s gorgeous and my size. We finally had to assume that I bought it at one of our trips to the outlet mall in Gonzalez, probably with the intent to take it to New York for the January board meeting years ago–and then it got swallowed into the closet and completely forgotten.

FOR YEARS.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been wearing this week, and now I have a terrific winter coat to take next January to New York with me.

It also should go without saying that now I am really curious about what else is in that closet that I’ve forgotten about.

This has been a lovely week of getting re-acclimated to my normal existence, and I’ve actually been having a lovely time. My new duties as Executive Vice President of MWA have forced me to get organized and start planning my time better–and I’ve also slept remarkably well all week. I’ve also started setting my alarm to get up at seven on the mornings I don’t have to go in at eight–while the extra sleep is absolutely lovely, I can’t lose that extra hour or two every morning. There’s always a lot of emails that need answering, and keeping up is going to be crucial–I can’t let myself get either overwhelmed or defeated by my emails. And I still need to have time to both write and read; the evenings before sleep just aren’t going to cut it anymore. So now I am determined to get up at seven every morning but Sunday–I’ll allow myself to sleep in on Sunday mornings, since Monday is one of those hellish six a.m. mornings–and I also am aware that once my body is trained to get up every morning at seven, I’ll probably get up at that time on Sundays, too. I need to start going back to the gym as well, and watching my diet again. I’m going to be fifty-nine this year, and so I should probably get back into a healthier lifestyle, which is going to be much harder now than it was when I was thirty-three and originally made that change.

Plus, I actually enjoy working out. But like writing, which I also actually enjoy doing, I always dread it and have to force myself to do it. #madness.

I am also looking forward to finishing Elizabeth Little’s stunning Pretty as a Picture. I am enjoying this book so much, Constant Reader–you have no idea. I’m also learning a lot about how a movie gets made, behind the scenes, which is something I’ve always been interested in. I need to get some serious writing done this weekend too–despite the US Figure Skating Championships, the European Figure Skating Championships, and the Australian Open all taking place over the course of this weekend. Yikes. I also have to go to the grocery store and make plans for trips later in the year and oh my God there’s never enough time but you know what? To-do lists are fantastic, and were always the key to my getting everything done in the past.

We also have to finish watching Messiah, Sex Education, and get caught up on Dare Me. Hilariously, a few weeks ago we had nothing to watch; now we have too much to watch.

And on THAT note, tis back to the spice mines. Happy Friday, everyone!

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No More Tears (Enough is Enough)

Good morning, and welcome to another cold January morning here in the Lost Apartment. I have some errands to run later today–later this morning, to be exact–and then I am spending the rest of the day holed up inside reading, cleaning, and probably watching figure skating on the television. We did watch the ladies’s final last night, which was quite fun, and am looking forward to seeing the competitions today. The European championships have also been going on this past week, so it’s all saved on Hulu for us to watch at our leisure. The Australian Open is also still happening–so much sport!–and so there’s that as well. I do want to finish reading my book today, and I want to read a short story, and start reading my next book as well.

And tomorrow I am cleaning out my email inbox if it kills me, and it just might.

I slept really well again last night–that’s three consecutive nights of good sleep, which is amazingly lovely.

Yesterday was also kind of a crazy day in the world, although it’s pretty safe to say that everyday has been kind of a crazy day for a while now. As I said to Paul the other night, “it’s like world politics has turned into Game of Thrones, only much scarier because it’s real.” And I know, world politics has always been very Game of Thrones, it’s just never been so obvious and apparent.

It’s hard to believe it’s almost February already, but there you have it and there it is. Carnival hovers on the horizon, and the Williams Festival/Saints and Sinners is just behind it. I am moderating a panel this year with Alafair Burke, Samantha Downing (My Lovely Wife) and Kristien Hemmerechts (The Woman Who Fed The Dogs) so I have some homework for that as well.

So much good reading to look forward to! Art Taylor also very graciously, along with Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, made a pdf of his Edgar nominated short story “English 398: Fiction Workshop” available on-line, which I downloaded and look forward to reading. Art’s a terrific writer and a master of the short story (when I was nominated for the Macavity for “Survivor’s Guilt”, Art was the winner, and his story was amazing), and it’s always terrific to read one of his stories. (Hint hint: Art, how about a short story collection? Hint hint.)

I’m also going to dissect some short stories I am in the process of editing–unless I get lazy again. I rarely do this when I am editing/revising short stories, which makes my short stories actually kind of hit or miss; if the story works, it’s because I simply got lucky with it. But I think if I actually break the story down into what it’s about, and who the characters are and why they are the people they are, more of my stories would probably work. It’s a theory, at any rate, and there’s nothing I love to do more than break down my work and put it back together again (I’m being sarcastic, if you couldn’t tell).

And on that note, I am heading out into the frigid cold to get my errands out of the way before coming home to mine spice.

Have a lovely day, everyone!

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More Love

So, yesterday I went to pick up the mail–I’d ordered some sleepy-time tea on line, and they’d arrived on Wednesday, and yes, this tea actually works–and discovered FOUND MONEY in the mail. Back when I worked for that Unnamed Airline (Continental), in my last year there they gave us stock–something I would imagine they continued doing–but it was Class B or something; whatever it was, we couldn’t sell it. Flash forward and they merged with United. Fine, it was only ten shares, whatever, I always get the notice every year and just toss it in a drawer.

Yesterday, I actually read the thing and discovered that–wait, it’s now the kind of stock you can sell. It took me five minutes, but I signed into the stock website and sold that. It only took another five minutes for it to actually sell. How cool! I love when found money suddenly shows up, you know? It makes me quite happy.

I knew when I woke up yesterday was going to be a marquee day for the week, and it was. Huzzah! Part of it was after feeling so low energy all week, despite being rested, was waking up with batteries recharged; that happened again this morning in time for my short day this week. I have some errands to run this morning before I go in this afternoon; and some other things I need to get done around the Lost Apartment.

I’m still reading Last Seen Leaving  by Caleb Roehrig, which I am enjoying. I hope to finish reading it today, and then I am moving on to another Diversity Project book (after reading some short stories), and I think I’ve decided to read The Klansman by William Bradford Huie. I read this book when I was about nine or ten originally; I know the book belonged to my uncle, and I read it one lazy summer I was spending in Alabama (the same summer I read To Kill a Mockingbird.) Huie isn’t really talked about much anymore–at least not that I’m aware of–and The Klansman was a look at the violence and horror of the Civil Rights Era from the perspective of a white sheriff in a small county in Alabama who’s trying to keep the peace. Huie also wrote The Execution of Private Slovik, and other books illustrating social justice issues. I liked the book a lot, and it was, I think, the first time in my life I was ever given a different perspective on civil rights other than what I was hearing at home or at school, so I am curious to see how it holds up. I can’t remember when I remembered the book and tracked down a used copy on line; but am pretty certain it was after some tragedy involving racism in the last few years–unfortunately I can’t be more specific than that because there have been so many.

So, I have a nice busy weekend ahead of me–reading, cleaning, reading page proofs, and perhaps working on the Scotty revision. I’d also like to go to the gym both days as well; it never hurts to get the working out monkey off my back and start making time for the self-care and self-improvement I desperately need to make this year a winner.

Our Internet was out last night, so we couldn’t watch anything on television–no Australian Open, no US Figure Skating championships, none of the shows we watch regularly, nothing–so I spent the night doing some cleaning and some more reading. The good news, of course, is that it back this morning and a lot faster than it was before the crash last night (or of the last few weeks or so), which is lovely.

And on that note, probably should get back to the spice mines. Happy Friday, everyone.

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