Friday and I am working at home today. We’re probably going to be losing our work-at-home day in the near future, so I am going to have to get used to going back to the office five days a week. It’s been a hot minute. I haven’t had five office days since March of 2020, so it’s been over four years. And what a four years that has been. Yeesh. Pre-March of 2020 seems like a different world, doesn’t it? But that’s my entire life, really.
I have come to the conclusion that social media and the news–particularly as it’s being reported by the MSM–has been so infuriating lately that I just can’t with it. I am resigned to the election now and knowing that there are enough people willing to risk it, despite the potential consequences of that risk, but narcissists are incapable of thinking beyond themselves. Idiot pundits and rich white “Democrats” seem to be willing to just toss the election to the fascists without a qualm, because ultimately fascism won’t harm them. I honestly think CNN and MSNBC have decided they’re better off under Project 2025 than under Biden–and it’s those expiring tax cuts doing their thinking for them. I don’t know what else to do, myself. I do not know a single person who voted for Biden in the primaries who has changed their mind; this is entirely a pundit/rich white people issue–you know, less than one thousandth of one thousandth of a single percent of voters.
They learned nothing from 2016 and her emails.
No surprise that rich white straight people are willing to throw the rest of us under the bus because they’re “concerned.” They always put themselves first, which is why you seriously cannot trust anyone in a higher tax bracket. Tax the fuck out of them, since they can’t be trusted to use their extra money in a positive way, ever.
Last night was a bit of a loose one; I didn’t do a whole lot when I got home from work because I was a bit tired and worn out from the excessive heat. It didn’t rain yesterday at all, so it never cooled off, and getting into my car was like getting into a sauna. I didn’t stop anywhere and just came straight home because I wasn’t in the mood to handle cross-town traffic. I’ll go later on to get the mail and stop at the Fresh Market for a few things, and hopefully get some writing done. I think I’ve thought about Chapter Four enough so that I can actually write the damned thing now. I also realized a deadline for a short story I need to write isn’t until December, which is a bit of a relief. We watched The Boys and finished Outer Range, which is just incredibly bizarre–and more like Dark than anything else I’ve already compared it to–and that’s a really high bar to clear. I also plan to finish reading my book this weekend and move on to the next. I also want to get some of these other blog drafts finished before the end of the weekend. I also have chores and cleaning to do around here–the living room looks so nice now, but the workspace still needs some additional work. I also need to figure out meals for the weekend. I think I’m going to just order a pizza tonight or Sunday, but we’re both home at night now, which is awesome, so I am going to start experimenting with meals again.
I also need to clean up the recipe files, and my address book. Those are projects that have been languishing for years, because I will always just shove recipes or scraps of paper with addresses on them, into the folder or file box where they go without concern to organization with a flippant I’ll organize this later but never do. I did get my easy chair area carefully set up so I can use my laptop in my easy chair, and so we will see how that goes.
It’s hard to believe football season is drawing nearer, too. (The laptop set-up in the living room will be surely tested during football season.) And the Olympics! So much has been going on that I keep forgetting that is happening this summer.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. I have ZOOM meetings starting soon, and lots of things to get done for the day job today. Have a lovely Friday, I’ll probably be back later, and if not, I’ll be here tomorrow morning again.
Thursday, and I am so relieved that the recovery is going well, and that I can actually start fending for myself. The brace isn’t rigidly locked anymore, and I have a lot more freedom of movement–plus I no longer need that wretched sling, which I hated, and I am no longer attached to anything. Granted, I haven’t been since last Friday, when the pain ball1 was removed Later this morning I am calling to make my first PT appointment, and another referral to follow up on as well. I also slept in my bed last night for the first time since the surgery. I was sleeping super-well in my easy chair, and was a little worried about going back to the bed (I will worry about anything, thanks, anxiety!) because I usually sleep on my left side–which is the bad arm–but I fell asleep lying on my back and shifted to the right side and back a couple of times, but other than that, I was dead to the world. I also slept for another ten hours last night, and I am thinking that I need to get this rest. My body is demanding it, and it feels marvelous to sleep so deeply and restfully–this is what I am always longing for most of the time….but I’m not going to start going to bed at eight once I am back to work because yeah, that would be terrible.
I took it easy yesterday after getting home from my appointment and a couple of errands. The temperature has turned cold (for New Orleans, don’t @ me), which always makes the apartment feel a bit more snug. I did some straightening up, took a long hot shower (still not easy, but so much better than before), and then curled up in my chair with Sparky and J. D. O’Brien’s Zig Zag, which I enjoyed very much (more on that later). I’m still trying to figure out a way to comfortably type with the brace, which isn’t as easy as one might expect. because the brace raises the hand so it’s not flush with the keyboard. It just feels awkward and so I need to find a position to type that doesn’t feel awkward–or I need to get used to it. I don’t know that I’ll have the brace on long enough to worry about Carpal tunnel syndrome, but you know me–anxiety always on the starting line waiting for the starting gun. We also finished watching Bodies, which I also highly recommend. It’s extremely well done, and very clever. If you liked Dark, you’ll definitely enjoy Bodies. I haven’t picked out my next read yet, but I have some incredibly delightful options to choose from. Yay! I love having a massive TBR-pile filled with terrific books by great writers. I am leaning towards Christmas Presents by Lisa Unger; I do want to read some holiday themed novels this Christmas season.
Christ, it’s Christmas season already. I may have to have my annual viewing of A Charlie Brown Christmas soon. I feel more like being in the holiday spirit this year. We haven’t decorated in years (and what little decorating we did was kind of half-assed, anyway) because the one thing Scooter would–in his long, comfortable life as a lap cat–actually spring into action against was the tree. That first Scooter Christmas was the last time we decorated, and I feel pretty confident that Sparky would see the tree as an amusement park, since everything is a toy to him and all he wants to do is play. I didn’t notice until the other day–and maybe it’s a recent development–but Sparky has some orange in his coat. It’s more obvious when he’s lying on his back, but we did end up with another orange cat, even though we didn’t realize it! The string of orange babies continues!
I was also thinking some more yesterday about being a writer–and the many different ways there are to be one. What is the difference between an author and a writer? Are authors artists? What is literary art and what is not, and who decides? Can genre fiction be art (of fucking course)? This was triggered by one of those things on one of the social media platforms where you were supposed to “quote text” my favorite books by women, and right off the top of my head I rattled off five great ones…and then I started remembering more, and more, and still more. I’ve read hundreds, if not thousands, of marvelous novels and short stories and essays and columns written by women. Why were those the five that popped up into my brain at first, why are they so implanted on my brain that I would come forth with these titles; any such list from me will always include The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier, and I will never apologize for that. Which left me with only four, and there were so many options. My mind immediately defaulted to four women writers I love, and then had to pick which of their canon was the best. Then I remembered a beautiful novel about friendship, love and loss that made me weep (Somewhere Off The Coast of Maine by Ann Hood) and thought, damn it, I loved that book and I want it on my list…and then started remembering all the others, the dozens if not hundreds, of other women writers whose works entertain, enlighten, and edify my life. There are so many great women writers, currently and in the past, who wrote so many amazing books that it would be hard to name them all, and I would certainly always forget scores of them. For some reason yesterday I was thinking about Taylor Caldwell–who used to write massive doorstopper books about rich people and industries, as well as interesting historical fiction. If remembered at all today, it would probably be for Captains and the Kings, but that wasn’t one of my favorites of hers–that would probably be Testimony of Two Men, which was about medicine in the late 1800’s and a courageous doctor who believed in modern breakthroughs rather than “we’ve always done it this way”–so of course the entire medical establishment was trying to ruin him as he bravely stuck to his principles and tried to modernize American medicine. I would probably hate it if I read it today for the first time–my politics, ethics, morals, and tastes have dramatically changed since I was a teenager, which was when I read Caldwell–but I do remember it fondly. And there’s Grace Metalious, who wrote Peyton Place; Jacqueline Susann and Valley of the Dolls; Jackie Collins and Hollywood Wives; any number of Agatha Christie novels–I mean, there have always been so many great women writers around. Does anyone remember Rona Jaffe? I’ve always wanted to reread The Best of Everything, and I think I have a copy of it somewhere. Then there’s the scifi/fantasy writers, too–Anne McCaffrey and The Dragonriders of Pern, Ursula LeGuin and A Wizard of Earthsea, the amazing Octavia Butler….as I said on whatever social media platform that was, I could sit here and name women writers who wrote books that I loved all day. Victoria Holt, Mary Stewart, Phyllis A. Whitney, Dorothy Eden, Susan Howatch…seriously. Maybe I should write a book of essays about women writers that aren’t remembered much today? ANYA SETON! How I loved Anya Seton back in the day–and all the crime women–Margaret Millar, Charlotte Armstrong, Dorothy L. Hughes, Mary Roberts Rhinehart, Helen MacInnes, Patricia Highsmith, and Mignon Eberhard, to start.
I bet no one else remembers Edna Ferber–and if they do, it’s for Giant and it’s because of the movie (many of her books became famous films: Cimarron, Saratoga Trunk, Show Boat, and So Big). Now that I think about it, I think she addressed race issues in both Saratoga Trunk and Show Boat….which may be worth revisiting. She was also a member of the Algonquin Round Table.
This entry sounds and feels more like me than the more recent ones have, doesn’t it? I am itching to dive back into the book this morning, after I pay some bills and do some other aggravating chores. I also have a prescription ready to pick up; so since I have to go to a Midcity pharmacy to get it, I may as well make a grocery run on Carrollton.
I didn’t realize what a difference sleeping in the bed would actually make, really.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines for the day. Have a blessed Thursday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check in with you again a little later, as I really need to do a lot more promo. OH! That reminds me, here is a lovely review of Mississippi River Mischief; check it out! That absolutely made my day–and reminded me that I need to do more self-promotion.
I had a contraption attached to my left shoulder that dispensed a nerve-deadener to the arm, so I wouldn’t feel pain. It lasted for 72 hours, and by the time it was empty, I didn’t have any pain, which was great. I also had to carry it around in basically a fanny pack, so it was one more thing I had to drag around those stressful first 72 hours. However, if you are going to have surgery, ask for one. It was amazing. ↩︎
I’m about to head to my first follow-up appointment with the surgeon this morning–far earlier than I would prefer, but best to get it over and done with so I can get on with my day. Heavy sigh. I have a lot of questions…and am hoping to get some more information about wearing shirts and so forth. There’s a part of me that’s hoping I get a smaller brace today, but I am also aware that’s probably magical thinking on my part. The physical therapy is going to last for three months, and that’s going to wreak havoc on my daily schedule. I am hoping that I’ll be able to not miss a lot of work for it–or come up with ways to work around it–which may not be that easy. I am starting to get antsy with so little ability to be at the computer and type. Having a rambunctious high-energy kitten that I am having to try to fend off with the one good hand doesn’t help, either. He’s very sweet and I hate not giving him the attention he wants, but if he wants flea medicine and vet appointments and food, Daddy has to be able to work. And my typing time is limited as the left hand/arm tires quickly.
I haven’t worked on the book since starting it the other day, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot (and about a lot of other things I want to write/am writing/editing), which is part of the problem with having so much down time and a creative mind with a touch of attention-deficiency…I start getting ideas as my mind wanders as I sit there. I was able to focus on reading my current book for a couple of hours yesterday, but didn’t get as far as one would under ordinary circumstances. I do have trouble remembering the day of the week, and as far as the date is concerned–that ship has long since sailed. (I know the first is coming and am prepared to spend some time paying bills at some point soon.) I am enjoying the book very much; I just wish my brain had more bandwidth than is currently on hand. I am genuinely worn out by ten every night, and I’ve been sleeping remarkably well. It’s also cold here this morning, and I have to go out into it wearing sweat pants. Yay.
We’re still enjoying Bodies, and it’s very like Dark–very clever, high production values, terrific acting, the questions of morality and fate and free will; very deep and very interesting. I am also starting to get bored, to be honest, which is a novel concept for me. The lack of focus so I can read for long periods of time is seriously being felt here, believe me. I am going to try to read more of my book today, and then I might have to go back to another volume of Alfred Hitchcock Presents–short stories work better when you have no ability to stay focused for a long period of time. I rewatched The Terminator yesterday–what a remarkably well written and done film it was. It is also, with the recent rise of AI, unnerving; the future Kyle and the Terminator come back to the present from `was 2029. Eep! Funny how back then 2029 seemed so far away, but then it kind of was. When that movie was released, I would have never believed that I’d still be alive in 2029–I still might not be, of course, but my longevity is completely out of my control to some extent; who knows how much or how little we control our own destinies? One of the key concepts of Bodies is that we don’t really have free will, as much as we would like to believe we do, and there’s something to that, I think. Sure, we make our choices, but are the choices presented actually our choices?
Deep thoughts from a Netflix series!
I was also thinking–as I am wont to do when my mind is free to wander–about whether I am an artist or not. Literature is an art, after all; we may not work with paints or oils or clay or marble or ceramic, but we are making art when we write. I’ve always been reluctant to call myself an artist or writing “making art”–the only authors I ever see or hear calling themselves artists or their work art tend to be very well-educated literary writers. It always felt inorganic and pompous to consider myself an artist and my work art. I write genre fiction, for one thing, and for another I write about queer people mostly. (Oh, the disdain I used to get from the literary writers when I worked at Lambda Book Report and they discovered that my forthcoming novel was crime fiction! I think that kind of hardened me against literary fiction and literary writers–not entirely true; some are absolutely lovely, but it certainly left a bad taste in my mouth about being overly pompous about what I do; I kind of embraced being a genre hack. I’m not ashamed to write crime fiction and horror; nor am I am ashamed of my erotica past.) But thinking about myself as an artist–the more I thought about it, the more I was sure I fit the description and perhaps what I do is make art, after all; but at the same time worry that thinking of it in that way will increase the pressure on me to do good work, and the last thing I need is more stress in my life.
But I am excited to get back to work on the new book. I really enjoy writing–which was also something else I was thinking about over the past few days. Writing is work, but I love to do it (publishing, on the other hand…it’s the necessary evil that follows the work I enjoy), which is another reason I don’t think of myself in terms of art/artist. But writing requires just as much focus and dedication as any other kind of art–and we are painting pictures with words rather than oils or watercolors, aren’t we?
Some interesting thoughts on a Wednesday morning. Have a great day, Constant Reader, and I may check in again later.
Monday morning and all is well in the Lost Apartment as I swill coffee and brace myself for the day (and week) ahead.
I returned from Kentucky on Friday. Both the voyage up and back–despite their great length and the brittle stiffness of my aging body–didn’t seem quite so bad or to take as long as they usually do. I did make great time in both directions, while listening to two audiobooks (Ruth Ware’s The Woman in Cabin 10 on the way up, Carol Goodman’s The Disinvited Guest on the way back; both are superb and highly recommended) but of course once I got home on Friday night I was quite exhausted. I spent Saturday trying to get caught up on the apartment itself while football games played in the background (more on that later). I did a lot of laundry, a lot of dishes, ran errands and made groceries, before finally settling in to watch the LSU/Texas A&M game, which was disappointing (more on that later). Yesterday I got up early (I’ve been getting up early a lot lately) and chose to stay off-line for the most part. I did clean out the junk out of my inbox, wrote up the books I read while on my trip for blog entries, and wrote another blatant self-promotion post for A Streetcar Named Murder while also trying to get a handle on everything I need to get done for this coming week. I felt very well-rested yesterday at long last. I didn’t have as much trouble sleeping while I was away as I usually do, which was cool–I found another sleep-aid that seems to be working very nicely–but Friday night I didn’t sleep as well as I thought I would, given how worn out I was from the drive. Saturday night’s sleep, however, was quite marvelous.
Ah, the Insomnia Chronicles. How I long for the day when my sleep isn’t of concern (or at least as not as much interest) to me.
The weather was also kind of terrible when I got back–raining and humid, but cool; the kind where you aren’t sure if you need to turn on the heat or the air, and yesterday there were tornadoes and high winds in the river and bayou parishes outside of New Orleans. Yesterday however was beautiful; sunny with blue skies with the low in the mid-sixties and the high in the mid-seventies. Not bad for Christmas season, is it? It’s also hard to wrap my mind around the idea that it’s Christmas already, to be honest. I got a great Kindle deal on a collection of Christmas crime short stories, which I am really looking forward to digging into–perhaps a story a day for the season? The Christmas Murder Mystery project? (You know I love me some projects to work on.) It’s also weird that it’s the holiday season again, which means Carnival is also right around the block. YIKES. This also means I need to start planning around the parade schedule and when I need to leave work and so forth. Ugh, much as I love Carnival, it’s always stressful and exhausting, if fun and delightful.
It was an interesting weekend of college football. The Mississippi-Mississippi State game on Thanksgiving was a lot of fun, right up to its crazy end; South Carolina somehow managed to beat Clemson; and of course, Michigan blew out Ohio State in Columbus. This kind of set the stage for the LSU game on Saturday night–I had a very queasy feeling about the game, partly because it seemed as though everyone was looking ahead to next week’s SEC title game with Georgia and the possibility of a play-off berth for the Tigers; but Texas A&M always plays LSU hard, no matter how bad their record is, and for some reason they’ve decided LSU is their big rivalry in the conference. The game looked awful; LSU was playing very sloppy on both sides of the ball and my heart and spirit continued to flag with each missed tackle and each missed opportunity. It was disappointing, to be sure, but on the other hand, I am thrilled to death with how the season went. No one gave LSU a shot at having a winning record, let alone beating Alabama and winning the West division, so I am choosing to be grateful for a wonderful winning season after two seasons of mediocrity and looking forward to an even better, more glittering future for the Tigers. I have faith in Coach Kelly, I have faith in what he is building there, and who knows? In a year or two we may win it all again. GEAUX TIGERS!
In other blatant self-promotional news, I also appeared recently on Alexia Gordon’s The Cozy Corner, which was a lot of fun, and I also appeared on Dru’s Book Musing, and how lovely that she gave me such a wonderful view. Thanks to both Dru and Alexia, both being lovely people who have gone out of their way to be kind to me and A Streetcar Named Murder, for which I will always be eternally grateful. It’s hard to believe the book is going to be published soon! And don’t worry, there will be plenty more blatant self-promotion to come.
PLENTY.
I also spent some good time with the book yesterday and it’s not nearly as bad as I thought it might be, as I feared it would be. Yes, the first half needs some work, but not nearly as much as I had thought and I also went through and made a character list as well as outlined the first half. Tomorrow I am going to work on the edits and finishing the outline for the rest of the book; and I am also going to write in and ask for more time. I never finish on time, do I? But the book is good, there’s lots of material for the second half, and I am kind of excited about getting this one completely under control at long last. Huzzah!
We also binged 1899 yesterday; it’s from the same people who did the superlative German series Dark, and had the added bonus of having one of our favorite actors from Elité, Miguel Bernardeau, in the cast as well. It’s delightfully creepy and strange, and you never have a very good sense of what is going on (like Dark), so of course we were glued to the set the entire time. It’s quite good, actually; I’m not sure how I feel yet about the final episode other than curiosity about how that is going to lead into a second season–because the finale raised more questions than it answered (like a good finale), but I’ll be happy to continue watching.
I feel rested this morning, though, which is lovely. I am sure by the middle of the week I’ll be tired and short of temper again, but for now, for this morning, I am going to just enjoy myself feeling rested and relaxed in the meantime. I have, as always, an insane amount of work to get done this week, but right now I am going to enjoy the peace and quiet of this morning before I have to start getting ready to leave for work; I even got up earlier than I usually do on Mondays.
And on that note, I am heading headfirst into the spice mines. Have a lovely Monday morning, Constant Reader, and I’ll chat at you again tomorrow morning.
I see it’s time for all of the “end of the year” lists, from the best of’s to the worst of’s, and literally, I had to scroll back through my blog to find my “favorite” short story of the year to reply to a tweet in order to enter a giveaway–and it was such a confounding year that I just posted the first one I came to, whether it was the best or not–“The Day I Died” by Cornell Woolrich, and immediately after I hit send, I thought, “that wasn’t even my favorite Woolrich story I read last year; that was ‘It Had to Be Murder’ (filmed as Rear Window)”. But that’s indicative of the kind of year this 2020 has been, not just for me but for others: I can’t remember shit. I can’t remember what I read and when I read it; was the Diversity Project this year or last? When did I started the Reread Project? And the Short Story Project certainly didn’t het much traction here on the blog this past year. This year now blends with other years in my memory, and I am not sure when I read things or what I liked or what movies I watched or television shows I enjoyed–and there were a lot; but was this year the year we started watching foreign language shows like Elite and Dark? I know I watched a lot of films for the Cynical 70’s Film Festival–still have a lot to go on that, for that matter–but as for reading….I know I read some books this past year, and I know I started the Reread Project–not just to revisit books I’d enjoyed, but to get back into reading because the pandemic shutdown–and the basic state of the world in chaos–made it hard for me to focus.
Even more maddening, the lack of focus also hurt my writing schedule (which really needed no assistance–I can not write all by myself without assistance from outside influences, thank you very much), and I cannot keep track or remember what I wrote and what I sold and so forth. I know I wrote my first ever Sherlock Holmes pastiche this past year, and it will be out in the new year–“The Affair of the Purloined Rentboy” (and I am so glad to finally get that title used; although, in fairness, the title I had lying around forever was The Purloined Stripper; I was originally thinking to parody Poe titles with the Chanse series, hence Murder in the Rue Dauphine. But the publisher (Alyson Books) wanted to brand them with the Murder in the titles, and once I made Scotty a stripper and wrote about him, I revised the plot and made Chanse’s boyfriend a former gay-interest video wrestler and that book became Murder in the Rue St. Ann instead)–and I also sold some other stories, like “The Snow Globe” and “Night Follows Night”–but it also seems like I sold more stories than that? I think this was the year “The Silky Veils of Ardor” came out in Josh Pachter’s The Beat of Black Wings, and of course “The Carriage House” came out in Mystery Tribune this year. Was this also the year of “The Dreadful Scott Decision” and The Faking of the President? I think that may be the case.
I do know I spent most of the year trying to get Bury Me in Shadows finished and ready to go–it’s still not completely finished–and I also started researching Chlorine. I kind of am feeling a bit discombobulated lately–no idea what day it is; I really had to stop and think this morning before recognizing that it’s actually Sunday. Crazy, right? I went shopping yesterday to make groceries and get the mail and air up the car tires again–the ‘tires are out of balance’ light came on the other day, which means they are low in air–and then I came home. I spent some time trying to locate my copy of Otto Friedrich’s City of Nets, which I may have read already and donated; the library also didn’t have it, so rather than going through the storage space I ordered the ebook, which was only $7.99. I spent some time with it yesterday reading it–it’s a period that always fascinates me; my interest in Hollywood begins to die out in the 1980’s, and beyond 1990 my interest wanes considerably.
Last night we watched two movies: 1917 and Bombshell, neither of which proved to be very involving. Both movies were very well done, but…I really didn’t feel any emotional involvement with either. Bombshell was probably the more interesting of the two–primarily anchored by Charlize Theron’s terrifyingly spot-on performance as Megyn Kelly, which really dominated the film, and I’m glad there’s a film sort of documenting the crazy goings-on at Fox before the 2016 election; in all honesty I’d pretty much forgotten many of the pertinent details about Gretchen Carlson and Megyn Kelly’s departures from Fox News, but once the movie had finished all I really thought–I’m a really terrible person, I admit it–was that while the working environment at Fox was indeed terrible for women….it also wasn’t a big surprise to me? Why would anyone think that a network that was so definitively anti-women would be a nurturing environment for women? But as we saw with the “#metoo” movement…men have been abusing their power and victimizing women over whom they have power–whether real or perceived–since the beginning of time, and that cuts across the political divide. And while there was some reckoning, there wasn’t nearly enough–and I am sure it is still going on in companies and businesses and corporations today.
But again, Charlize Theron was eerily perfect as Megyn Kelly; I’m sure Kelly didn’t care for it, and she has since proven that she’s still a garbage human being despite everything that happened and everything she experienced; she’s still anti-feminist, still homophobic, still racist—now she just spews her bile on Twitter instead of in front of a camera. Same with Gretchen Carlson–and I am willing to bet that both of them learned nothing from their own experience and still question women bringing charges against men.
I know that S. A. Cosby’s Blacktop Wasteland was one of the best books I read last year, along with The Coyotes of Carthage. Elizabeth Little’s Pretty As a Picture was also a favorite. I think this year included my first-ever read of Mary Stewart’s Thunder on the Right (is there a more hard-boiled, noir setting than a convent in the Pyrenees?), and I also enjoyed Daphne du Maurier’s The Scapegoat (although I recently read a review which suggested the book would have been much more interesting as told by the other doppelganger’s point of view, which is a very interesting suggestion). I know I reread several of Stewart’s books, including Airs Above the Ground, The Moon-spinners, and This Rough Magic, and in the case of the latter two, I remembered so little of them from my original read it was like reading something new. I also read a lot of histories of New Orleans and Louisiana, which was a lot of fun as well–and of course, my Chlorine research led me to reading some gay Hollywood histories–as well as some basic Hollywood histories. I know I also greatly enjoyed Kelly J. Ford’s Cottonmouths.
Highlights of my television viewing have to include at the very top two of the best comedies ever done on television, Schitt’s Creek and Ted Lasso. Both shows were both funny and tender and heartwarming, and one of the great pleasures of 2020 has been watching other people discover how magic and wonderful both shows are. Paul and I also got into foreign language television at long last, thoroughly enjoying shows like Dark Desire, The Club, White Lines, and several others, but two of the best were Elite (from Spain) and Dark (from Germany), but Babylon Berlin was probably my favorite watch of the year. We also thoroughly enjoyed The Morning Show, Little Fires Everywhere (the book was also pretty spectacular), and of course, The Mandalorian. I also would be remiss without shout-outs to two of my favorite trashy binge-watches, Outer Banks and Tiny Pretty Things. Ozark continues to be terrific, as was the second season of Castle Rock and HBO’s The Outsider. We also saw Mr. Mercedes‘s first season on Peacock, and liked it a lot as well.
I still miss Game of Thrones, disappointing final season notwithstanding.
As for movies….I spent most of my time with my Cynical 70’s Film Festival, which included some rewatches (Cabaret, which I love more every time I see it) as well as first time watches of films like The Candidate, The Parallax View, Three Days of the Condor, The French Connection, and Chinatown; all of which served as an interesting re-education into the decade that was the 1970s, and probably one of the more formative decades of my life. There are still some 70’s films I need to see for this–I really want to rewatch The Last Picture Show, which I’ve not seen in years, as well as The Sting, What’s Up Doc, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, A Woman Under the Influence, Starting Over, An Unmarried Woman, Saturday Night Fever, and so many others. It was such an interesting decade for film…but of the rewatched films, the ones I have always loved–Don’t Look Now, Cabaret, Chinatown–I appreciated even more than I have on previous watches, if that makes any sense. Of the ones I hadn’t seen before, I think my favorite would have to be The Conversation, which was simply brilliant, and a perfect illustration of what the 1970’s were really about on many different levels.
There are a lot of books coming out in the new year that I am excited for; new novels from Alison Gaylin and Laura Lippman and Megan Abbott at the top of the list, of course, and so many others! There’s never enough time to read everything I want to read or watch everything I want to watch, let alone write everything I want to write….which sounds like an excellent place to wrap this up and head back into the spice mines.
Hey there, Saturday! It’s gray and raining here in New Orleans, which explains why I slept so deeply and well last night–there’s really nothing like the sound of rain to put me to sleep. (I wish it would rain every night, quite frankly.)
I didn’t write at all yesterday. After I finished work I went to the gym and did my workout, then came home and was quite tired, both physically and mentally. I repaired to the easy chair with a bottle of Sunkist (I’m trying to reduce my caffeine by not drinking as much Coke, but I also like sugary fizzy drinks, so non-caffeinated Sunkist works just fine as a substitute; I am also considering 7-Up) and switched on the television, going into a loop of Ted Lasso reviews, clips, etc. Everyone is already starting to prepare their Best of the Year lists, and I wish that I could do the same, but trying to remember 2020 isn’t particularly easy. I know I didn’t read as much as I usually do, and most of what I did read I’ve forgotten already–even forgotten that I read them, to be completely honest. I also really can’t remember much of what I watched on television or what films I watched or what short stories or documentaries or movies. But Ted Lasso continues to stand out for any number of reasons–it also helps that I regularly recommend it to people who then wind up loving it as much as Paul and I did. I know a book I read early in the year–Elizabeth Little’s Pretty as a Picture–is making a lot of Best of lists; I read that before the pandemic shut down when the world changed, and literally, it seems like it was a million years ago when I read it.
Then again, I also don’t limit myself to things that came out during the calendar year when I make a best-of list; my list is the best things I read or watched during the calendar year, regardless of when they were actually released. My list, my rules. So, at some point I guess I will go through my blog entries and find the things I enjoyed enough to talk about on here, and will thus pull together a list of what I enjoyed most in 2020. (I know that television is going to be a three way tie between The Mandalorian, Schitt’s Creek, and Ted Lasso–and I am also going to have to come up with a foreign-language television so I can mention Dark and Elite and Toy Boy.)
Today I plan to write all day–or most of it–around doing household chores and so forth. There’s literally no need to turn on the television and watch football–although as a diehard LSU fan I’ll have to tune in to the horror that will be the Florida game tonight–and so I might as well take as much advantage of a free-from-football day to write and get caught up on the book. Two chapters a day this weekend will take me to Chapter 21, with only five left in this draft, which will–again, as I have reiterated over and over–give me some down time to let it rest before going over it one last time before turning it in. I am also very excited about the prospect of getting back to work on the Kansas book one last time before turning it in and calling it a day on it as well.
I also want to spend some time reading The Spy Who Came In From the Cold. John LeCarre is widely considered one of the greats when it came to spy novels–or whatever the genre is called–and while it has been quite some time since I read Ian Fleming, Helen MacInnes, Robert Ludlum, and Alistair MacLean, I am very interested in reading LeCarre. The first few chapters of this book haven’t exactly grabbed me, but I do appreciate the writing. One of the things I love the most about the mystery genre is there are so many fascinating and interesting subgenres–the broad spectrum of what is routinely considered mystery fiction is quite vast; everything from traditional mysteries to romantic suspense to police procedurals to international intrigue. (I also want to finish it so I can move on to the new Alison Gaylin, and I also have the new Lisa Unger–and I think I have the new Ivy Pochoda as well) Spending the rainy morning reading really sounds like a lovely way to spend the morning, does it not?
Yesterday I watched The Ruling Class while I was making condom packs for the Cynical 70’s Film Festival. The film hangs entirely on yet another award-worthy performance by Peter O’Toole as the fourteenth Earl of Gurney, who is completely insane–and yet because of the terms of his father’s will (his father was into auto-asphyxiation, which finally went terribly wrong and he hung himself while wearing a military jacket and a tutu) the entire estate is his–and any attempt to break the will means everything will go to a charity. So his vile family cooks up a scheme to get him married and produce an heir, after which they will promptly have him committed. It’s a satire, and occasionally the cast will suddenly break into song-and-dance; which was disconcerting the first time it happened, but after that I went with it. Coral Browne–most famous for playing Vera Charles to perfection in Auntie Mame–is also a standout here as his grasping aunt-in-law; she really should have had a bigger career. When we first meet the new earl he thinks he’s God and insists on being called “J.C.”–and as the family continues to try to either cure him or have him committed, O’Toole could easily have started chewing the scenery and gone over the top; yet he is remarkably restrained and completely believable in the part. He was nominated for an Oscar (losing to Marlon Brando in The Godfather), and deservedly so; his great misfortune as an Oscar contender was to always be nominated against performances that became legendary. The film is quite a send up of the British class system and how it rotted and how it really didn’t make sense from the very beginning–noblesse oblige, indeed, and yes, cynical. It would be interesting to see how a remake/reboot could work, with one of our fine British actors of the present day in the role–but I also can’t see how anyone could ever outdo O’Toole.
And now, I am going to repair to my easy chair with John LeCarre, get under my blankets and hope that Scooter joins me for some kitty cuddling–if he hasn’t gone back upstairs to bed with Paul. Have a lovely Saturday, Constant Reader!
Netflix is, frankly, killing it with their original programming, and since I’ve finally conquered my issues with subtitles, the foreign language Netflix shows we’ve been watching–from Boy Toy to Elite to Dark–are far superior to the shows from American Netflix (with, of course, the exception of the magnificent Chilling Adventures of Sabrina and the original seasons of Stranger Things).
Dark was being suggested to me regularly by Netflix–because it’s the kind of thing I would enjoy, obviously–for years now; but the German language/subtitles thing always made me choose not to watch. The premise of the show also seemed, well, a bit on the cliche side, frankly; a small German town where kids disappear in the woods. Was it a mystery show about a serial killer? A horror show, like Stranger Things? What precisely was it? Finally, last week Paul and I decided to give it the old “one or two episodes” rule, and within minutes, we were completely sucked into it.
It begins as a mystery; a teenage boy has gone missing without a trace in the small south German town of Winden. Our main character, Jonas, has recently returned home from what was essentially a brief stay in a mental hospital after having a breakdown upon finding his father’s dead body earlier that same year (his father hung himself). While Jonas has been gone, his girlfriend Martha has started dating another guy in their friend group, Bartosz. One night, the group of friends decide to sneak into the woods nearby; the missing boy Erik was a drug dealer and Magnus (Martha’s brother) and Bartosz believe they know where Erik kept his stash; stuffed into an abandoned reclining chair near the cave. The town main industry is a nuclear power plant. Magnus and Martha’s parents are a police detective and the school principal; there is also a parents’ meeting townhall at the school on the same night; the babysitter is sick, so Magnus and Martha are forced to take their younger brother Mikkel with them into the woods. They find the drugs; there’s a weird, scary sound from inside the cave and their flashlights go on the blink. They all take off running–but eventually discover Mikkel isn’t with them, and they can’t find him anywhere.
Is there a serial killer out there preying on young boys, or is something even creepier going on?
It also rains a lot in Winden. An awful lot, and no one ever seems to mind being caught out in it–so much so that I started commenting on it.
Jonas, Martha and Bartosz
But the problem with talking about Dark is the issue of spoilers; part of the joy of the show is being surprised when the twists come–and they literally are so surprising that each one completely changes the show and how you watch it. It turns out, of course, that there is a thirty-three cycle of young boys disappearing–kind of like It–and it is all connected. It’s confusing in the first episode or two because there are so many characters and so much going and two different timelines, but once you get used to it, it’s fascinating to follow.
Everything is connected, so you really do have to pay attention.
One of the things I love the most about the show is how it depicts small town life–how grudges from childhood can last for decades; how everyone’s lives are interconnected; and all the dark secrets everyone is keeping. It’s also filmed and scored beautifully; the camera angles are surprising but visually stunning, and the writing is incredibly smart. The acting is also terrific, and so is the casting. It’s amazing how they were able to find talented actors to play the same roles as younger and older who actually looked like the older version of the younger character and the younger version of the older character. I do highly recommend the show; it lasts for three amazing seasons, which is precisely how long it takes to wrap up the story.
Leave it to the Germans to do a crime/suspense/thriller/horror/scifi show based in logic, reason, science and philosophy that is compelling and impossible to stop watching.
And here we go, Sunday and a new week. Huzzah, I suppose.
Yesterday was actually a very good day. Not only did I manage to get some work done on the Secret Project, I got some excellent work done on the Secret Project. It was quite a relief, actually; I’ve tried this first fucking chapter I don’t know how many times and could never get it right; plus I could never get the voice right, it seemed. I despaired, in fact, that I would ever get this under control. But yesterday I opened the most recent draft of the first chapter, started reading it, and thought oh no this will NOT do at all and started fixing it; reordering things, and finding the character’s voice in the process. Before I knew it several hours had passed and not only had I gotten the first chapter under control and whipped into shape, I’d managed to do the same with the second.
This was, as you can imagine, an enormous relief. I can’t speak for other authors, but I always fear it’s going to go away–the ability to construct decent stories and realistic characters and how to write something good, quite frankly. It’s why lovely feedback, like I got recently with the two short stories I sold, is so beneficial and helpful; it also always seems to come around when I need it the most.
It also helps that I wasn’t distracted, and could absolutely focus on what I was doing. Focus is so crucially important, and I have so little time where I can actually sit at my computer, ignore the cat’s whines for attention, and focus on what I’m doing; whenever I can I see everything so clearly and the work is so much better. The times, alas, this year when I have that ability, that clarity of focus, to write, seem to be few and far between.
I did also realize this morning as I lay in bed lazily waiting for the mood to get up to strike, that I am well on my way to having another collection of previous published short stories ready. Granted, some of them haven’t seen print yet–and might not until next year–but some of them have: “The Silky Veils of Ardor”, “The Affair of the Purloined Rentboy”,”This Town”, “The Carriage House”, “Night Follows Night”, “The Dreadful Scott Decision”–and there are three more still out on submission, although one has already been accepted, but I have no idea when that will ever see print–“A Whisper from the Graveyard”–and the other two–“Moves in the Field” and “This Thing of Darkness” will inevitably and undoubtedly be rejected; those two were submitted to literary fiction markets and we’ve already ascertained , numerous times throughout my life, that I am not a literary writer. There may even be more that I am not even thinking about right now–I’m still on my first cappuccino, don’t you dare judge me–but that’s nearly ten stories, and I generally think of a collection being somewhere between sixteen to twenty; unless there’s a novella included. (I’ve decided that “Once a Tiger,” the Chanse short story, is really a novella, and if I ever do finish writing it–and the other novellas–I’ll probably just bind them all into one volume.)
Last night we finished watching Dark, which is superb (it’s so good it deserves its own entry) and then we watch Andy Samberg’s Palm Springs on Hulu, which was a cute little piece of fluff with some truly funny moments, and then moved onto another Mexican crime show, Dark Desire, which also stars Alejandro Spietzer, the gorgeous actor (pictured below) who was also the star of The Club–and is also dating Ester Exposito, who played Carla so superbly in Elite. It’s quite interesting so far–we’re two episodes in–and will continue with it. It’s so weird how we pay more attention to foreign language shows because of having to read the subtitles, while if whatever we are watching is in English, I’ll periodically reach for the iPad.
I’m also having dinner with a writer friend tonight who is in from out of town; so I need to make sure I get all the chores finished and get the rest of these chapters done on the Secret Project, so I can start writing the proposal and then it’s out of my damned hair.
And on that note, it’s back to the spice mines with me. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader.
Anyway, my shoulder is still sore this morning and in a little while I am going to close my browser–I like going dark on the weekends from social media and email; it makes my weekends ever so much more relaxing and I am able to get so much more done than if I have everything open on my computer. My goal is to get the Secret Project finished this weekend–there’s absolutely no reason why I shouldn’t be able to, other than laziness–as long as I don’t allow distractions to rear their ugly heads. My new milk frother–I know you’ve all been wondering about it since I mentioned it yesterday–got its first trial run this morning and it is quite marvelous. The first one was a low-cost no brand and very inexpensive; I decided to go with a more expensive one this time around and so far, it’s earning its keep.
I slept well again last night, although my shoulder is still sore from the vaccination on Thursday, but the icky feeling I experienced the rest of that day is long gone, thank the heavens. We also watched almost all of the final season of Dark last night; we only have the series finale left, and its really very good; riveting, hard to tear your eyes away from (and not just because of the subtitles; I am learning that shows with subtitles require your full attention, since listening doesn’t do any good) and I’ve also started picking up phrases and words that I recognize from studying German as a teenager. It would actually, if I have any desire to become bilingual, make sense to study German again; since I have a background in it….although I still would prefer to learn Italian.
Paul is also going into the office today to work on a grant, so I also have the house to myself today–yet another reason to turn off the Internet. I still have some cleaning to do around the house as well–and there’s always filing that needs to be done–but I am hopeful that I won’t spend the day falling into an organizational wormhole. (It happens, trust me.) And while I would like to spend some time at some point with the top drawer of my filing cabinet (having already taken on the bottom drawer last weekend) I am going to use that as the carrot for getting work done on the Secret Project this weekend–as well as reading some more of Cottonmouths. I also have to run to the post office today–some things I ordered arrived yesterday–and I also need to get gas and air up one of my car tires (it has had a slow leak ever since I bought the car, and of course my lazy ass has never done anything about it other than airing it up again); which means going out into the heat and humidity, which is so draining and soul-destroying. I’m having dinner tomorrow night with a friend in from out of town–socially distancing ourselves from each other, of course–but this will also be my first experience eating out at a restaurant since, well, since I went to New York in January for the MWA board meeting (Paul and I rarely go out to eat–generally we just get it to go on those rare occasions when I don’t cook). I know how bizarre that must seem, given we live in a city stuffed to bursting with terrific places to eat, but I genuinely like to cook and have no problem with doing so.
It really is amazing, now that I am actually thinking about it, how far off course I’ve gotten this year with everything I wanted to get done. Sure, I’ve sold some short stories (always a pleasure!) but I’ve also not gotten a lot of things done that I had wanted to get done. Bury Me in Shadows is still languishing, waiting to be completely overhauled; the Kansas book is doing much the same; and while I did make some progress on Chlorine, I am nowhere near as far along this year as I would have hoped. Granted, MWA business has taken a lot more time than I thought it would, and of course, the pandemic and all those months of being ill didn’t help matters much. We haven’t found a new gym, because we aren’t sure how long whatever gym we might join would remain open after joining; COVID-19 cases continue to rise in Louisiana and have started rising again here in Orleans Parish. I also know I shouldn’t beat myself up over this stuff because there is no right way to handle a pandemic, or any of the PTSD it brought along with it. Now that I am feeling healthy and myself again, of course, I have to play catch up with everything, but I can’t help but bemoan somewhat all the lost time from this year. I’m not getting any younger–next month I will be fifty-nine, with sixty just one short year away–and if I want to accomplish as much as I want to accomplish in what time i have left, I really need to stop wasting time.
On the other hand, there’s also the point that I should try to at the very least enjoy the time I have left on this planet. Who knows? I could get killed in a car accident today on the way to and from the postal service. Man plans, after all, and the gods laugh.
I’ve also been wondering lately about the next Scotty book–should there be another Scotty book–and have actually been thinking about going back in time and writing a book that would fit between Mardi Gras Mambo and Vieux Carre Voodoo. I’ve never done a Scotty post-Katrina book, and have only vaguely referenced that period in his life–but then I think, well, you don’t really have much memory of that time any more left in your brain anymore and you did a Chanse book set in the post-Katrina city, so why bother revisiting that with Scotty? Wasn’t the whole reason you never did one in the first place because you couldn’t figure out how to do a light, funny book set in that time period?
So, yeah, there’s that. It’s more likely that I’ll do a pandemic murder mystery with Scotty–Quarter Quarantine Quadrille has a lovely ring to it–but of course, it’s kind of hard to do such a book without knowing how the pandemic is going to end–how and when. But I did leave the Scotty personal story on a cliff-hanger, and I have to do something about that. My original, pre-pandemic thought, was to do a book based around the Hard Rock Hotel collapse (remember that? No one else seems to); after all, one of the husbands of the Grande Dames from the last book was a shyster developer, and Canal Street Canard also has a nice ring to it–and then I could always do the pandemic book right after it.
It’s a thought, anyway. I also have titles for numerous Scotty books for the years to come…but perhaps at some point it will be time to let him and the boys retire.
And on that note, I am going back into the spice mines. I’m going to read Cottonmouths until it’s time to run my errand, and then I’ll come home, shower and dive into the Secret Project. May you have a lovely, restful, peaceful Saturday, Constant Reader.
Wednesday morning and we’ve somehow survived to the midpoint of yet another week; another hellaciously hot week in July, for those of us here in New Orleans.
I rewatched Mildred Pierce the other night for the first time in years (how much do I love the TCM app on HBO MAX? A LOT) and as I watched–Crawford really was terrific in the part, and the movie is so well done it actually is an enjoyable experience (although I really wish, at the end, as Bert and Mildred walk out of the police station, he would have said to her,”Let’s get stinko!” the way he did in the book; it would have made for a better ending) and it could have easily lapsed into melodrama; in the hands of a lesser writer and director, it undoubtedly would have. But it also struck me, as I watched the film, how markedly different it is from its source material, James M. Cain’s masterful novel, and that most people remember the film more so than the book. Also, it’s incredibly rare for the film version of a novel to veer so drastically from the source material, while both book and film are considered classics (perhaps the other, and best, example of this is Dorothy B. Hughes’ In a Lonely Place, and the marvelous film version directed by Nicholas Ray and starring Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame; again, enormous changes but both are excellent in and of themselves.)
The most interesting thing to me, at least in recent years, about Mildred Pierce is the character of Veda. Veda is fascinating; the daughter as noir femme fatale, which is a fascinating turn on noir. Ann Blythe does a great job playing her in the film, and it’s been a hot minute since I’ve read the book (in the To Be Reread pile), so I don’t know or remember if in the book there are any explanations as to why Veda was so awful; and I worry that in my mind I’m conflating the film with the book. When I do get around to rereading the book, I am going to pay more attention to Veda. In the movie Bert comments in the beginning, that Mildred puts the children ahead of him as well as complains that Veda is spoiled…the younger daughter, Kay–soon to die tragically from pneumonia–is “worth more than Veda will ever be.” As I have pondered about Veda, I’ve wondered if in the book Mildred favored Kay and Bert favored Veda–which would of course cause resentment in Veda, towards both Mildred and Kay.
I really need to reread that book.
I went to the doctor yesterday–actually, I saw a nurse practitioner, as the new doctor I was assigned to when my old doctor moved to Utah didn’t stay with the practice when it was recently sold (it’s very complicated; I supposedly was sent a letter alerting me to these changes, but I never received it) and when I finally called them last week to try to get the mess straightened out (one of my 2020 goals was to get all my medical stuff handled and under control and to continue, moving forward, staying on top of this and my health–ha ha ha ha, as the old saying goes; man plans and God laughs)–but I was able to see a nurse practitioner yesterday and can I just say, damn? It was the most thorough examination I’ve ever had, she was asked lots of questions, and we talked about a lot of things. Usually, they’d take my vitals, “how you doing” and then boom, out the door. The nurse practitioner actually discussed things–my lengthy illness that came and went, starting at Carnival and ending recently–she had X-rays of my lungs and chest done; got the process started for both my colonoscopy and a mammogram (I have a lump in both pecs; they’ve been there for a long time and have never grown at all–the doctors always just said, “it’s a fatty cyst” and left alone; she was the first to say “well, why don’t we make sure that’s all it is”); I had an EKG done to make sure my heart is operating properly: she felt everywhere for lumps–underarms, groin, throat; checked out ears and nose–I mean, I actually felt like I got my money’s worth out of an exam for once. But my blood pressure was good for once, which was lovely, and after the lengthy discussion about my lengthy illness, she added a different test to my regular bloodwork, to check for septicemia; as some of the symptoms I experienced could have been from an infection of some sort that could still be lurking around.
Hey, I’m all for it. Like I said, my main goal for this year it to take better care of myself and take my health more seriously.
Last night we lost the wifi with eight minutes left of the season two finale of Dark, which, as you can imagine, was enormously frustrating. I cannot rave about this show enough; but the primary problem with talking about it is that it is hard to explain how intricately clever it is without giving away spoilers–and believe me, going in blind and knowing very little about the story is WAY fun. The writing is pinpoint, and as I said, I cannot imagine how much work it is keeping the relationships, the characters, and the storylines all straight because it’s very hard as a viewer. The one thing I can say–without spoiling anything–is there’s a cycle of disappearances of children; every thirty-three years–and so while the show begins primarily set in the present, like Stephen King’s It, eventually it begins to also show what happened thirty-three years before….and you have to remember, everything is always connected. It’s brilliant, absolutely brilliant, and smart. We’re really enjoying it.
I also took Cottonmouths with me to read while I was waiting at the doctor’s–you inevitably always have to wait, and I prefer to read rather than play on my phone–and it really is quite a wonderfully written novel. Kelly. J. Ford is an excellent writer with a very strong sense of place; and place is always important to me as a reader.
Queer and Loathing in America 