Tag: Frendo Lives

The Life of a Showgirl

Work at home Friday and all is well and quiet in the Lost Apartment this morning. Sparky has been fed, so he won’t attack me for a while, and I have a team meeting on-line later this morning. I also have all kinds of on-line trainings that are due, as well as quality assurance and data entry that needs doing, which I will try to knock out this morning/early afternoon. I don’t have to work a long day today, and will have to run errands later. It’s probably foggy out there this morning–it certainly was yesterday morning when I drove to the office–and it is that time of year: fog season. I love the fog, to be honest–I don’t like to drive in it, but I think its beautiful and spooky and all those fun things that make Spooky Season spooky. There’s a New Orleans ghost story novel I want to write–and the fog will help set the mood for it, so it clearly needs to be set in November or late October.

I was very tired when I got home from work last night (still am a bit on the fatigued side this morning), and didn’t get anything done. After I did that ZOOM panel, I was wiped out entirely and repaired to my easy chair and searching for horror movies I want to watch before the end of the month. The panel–the fine line between horror and crime–was very interesting. I did think about it a lot yesterday during the day, and so I hope I didn’t seem as at sea as I felt. I don’t feel qualified to talk about horror other as a fan of the genre–I’m not as well read in the field as perhaps I should be, and I don’t write it very often–so I always have a bit of imposter syndrome when it comes to talking about horror. But I had a lovely time, and got just what I needed from it–more books to read. Heavy sigh.

I’m a little fatigued this morning, too. I have work duties to accomplish today, and errands to run later on. I also intend to start reading Elizabeth Hand’s Holokua Road this weekend, and I have some newsletter essays to get finished this weekend. I want to finish the ones I started about The Haunting of Hill House and Frendo Lives, and maybe work on some more. I also want to do some short story work over the course of the weekend.

My shoulder is also aching this morning, which isn’t a good thing at all. It never has ached like this since the surgery two years ago (has it really only been two years?), but it’s probably from being tired and then sleeping on it wrong, but I do think I need to get some serious rest this weekend. Driving back from Alabama on Sunday before having to work four days in the clinic (as opposed to the usual three) was kind of rough, but I think I handled it pretty well, even if I am a bit more tired this morning than I usually am on a Friday morning. But there’s naught to do but to get to it, is there? I also have to clean up this apartment, which is a disgusting mess…since I wasn’t here last week to do it. I can work on the house when I need a break from the day job duties.

Was anyone really surprised by the leaking of the Young Republican chats, and what these mind-numbingly ignorant bigots actually say and admit to when they think they won’t be held accountable? And again, we have the right ‘defending’ all of this as (wait for it) locker room talk by kids. The youngest was 24 and the oldest 41–that’s definitely old enough to know better, and tells me everything I need to know about the defenders. These are the people who wanted anyone who they deemed to be insufficiently mourning the bigoted weasel Charlie Kirk, but now want to excuse racism, homophobia, and being pro-Nazi? I’ve said for years this is what white people really think, and why they hate/oppose DEI and “political correctness”–but here’s the thing: if you know you’ll get “canceled” for being openly horrible, then you already are aware you’re horrible. You just don’t want to be punished for being horrible, and thus you need to believe everyone else is just as awful as you are, but won’t admit to it…and since everyone thinks that way, you shouldn’t be punished for your “honesty.”

Whatever helps you sleep at night, trash.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning for sure. Until there, auf weidersehen.

Gorgeous Max Parker of Boots.

Eldest Daughter

Thursday, and it’s my last day in the office for the week. Huzzah! I am very pleased with myself for somehow managing to make it through the entire week without any super-fatigue or brain fog–which means I am getting better and more healed. I ordered a pair of wired ear buds for my new phone, and am going to try to start going for walks regularly. I also want to start stretching a couple of times per week. It’ll make me feel better in the long run and less sore all of the time, and while it may not burn a lot of calories, it will burn some.

Plus, being stretched regularly will do wonders for the muscles themselves.

I’m very much dragging this morning, since it’s Thursday, and I have to do a ZOOM panel tonight after work. Not sure how that’s going to go, since I am sure I will be very tired this evening. I feel rested this morning, so it’s just a matter of the groggy feeling this morning. I slept deeply and well, and of course tomorrow morning I can sleep a bit later–Sparky permitting probably goes without saying. I had a quiet evening last night after I ran my errands on my way home. Tonight I am coming straight home, and will probably relax for a bit while doing some chores–the kitchen is a mess yet again–and I did try to do some chores last night, so I won’t have as much to straighten and clean up on the weekend. Paul was late getting home last night, so I just kind of sat in my chair catching up on the news (always a tense, fraught experience) until he did get home. I also watched this week’s Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, and once Paul was home we got caught up on The Morning Show, which we are really enjoying.

I will have to consult my to-do list at some point today, to see if I am getting anything done this week. This weekend will mostly be a resting and reading and cleaning weekend, I suspect. Having the LSU game on early Saturday will be helpful; sure, there are other games for the rest of the day but they aren’t anything I would be horribly upset that I didn’t watch, so I am hoping to get some reading done this weekend. I need to finish a couple of newsletter essays (reread of The Haunting of Hill House; Frendo Lives) and start looking at one about Boots. The end of the month is sneaking up on us, too, and then it will be NOVEMBER….and then it’s the end of the year. 2026 is a bit daunting, because that’s the year I turn sixty-five. Yikes, indeed!

I’ve also not watched anything scary this month, other than the first episode of the 1990 reboot of Dark Shadows. I was a little bummed that Scream, my favorite “scary movie,” isn’t available to stream for free anywhere, and I’ve seen the movie far too many times to justify paying to watch it again. I think Scream 2 is probably available? Maybe I will watch that tomorrow while I am doing quality assurance so I can write about my favorite slasher series. (I was also disappointed to see that the original Halloween isn’t available for free anywhere–the same rationale exists for not paying to see a movie I’ve seen multiple times; maybe I should look for A Nightmare on Elm Street1–it’s been years–or Prince of Darkness or The Omen, which could be fun, or even the original Carrie. IT’S SPOOKY SEASON GODDAMMIT!) The weather has become cooler, too–the breeze is chilly rather than warm; the sun is shining every day so it’s in the eighties, but the cool breeze plus lack of humidity is a marvelous reminder of how magical October weather can be here.

I also am doing an on-line ZOOM panel about supernatural mysteries, which should be fun; That Bitch Ford will also be on it.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning!

The Nile River in upper Egypt
  1. I looked and it’s streaming on HBO! Huzzah! And Prince of Darkness is free on Prime. Looks like I know what I’ll be watching Sunday morning before Paul gets up! Huzzah! ↩︎

Wish List

Somehow I’ve made it to Wednesday this week, so praise the Lord and pass the ammunition, thank you very much. I was very tired yesterday–muscle fatigue more than anything else, thank God no brain fog–but there have been worse days than yesterday. I got almost completely caught up on all the work I was behind on, and can head into the office today knowing that I will be caught up and current on everything by the end of the day, which is marvelous. Yay me! I also updated all bills and made a to-do list yesterday, which should work for the rest of the week. I also get to start reading a new horror novel when I get home from work tonight–either Scott Carson or Elizabeth Hand, which should be awesome.

We finished Boots last night, which I enjoyed very much. I have seen some people complaining about the lack of romance on the show–it’s boot fucking camp, hello?–which seems kind of a ludicrous complaint, really. Were they expecting soft-core gay porn? Wasn’t all the eye candy enough? Honestly. I enjoyed the writing, the acting, and the story itself. I may go into more deeply at some point, after I’ve digested it a while and thought about it some more. I also enjoyed Miles Heizer in this, and given how much he annoyed me in Thirteen Reasons Why, and that is saying something. But I will say this–I think Max Parker is the breakout star from this show. Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous man, and his performance as a decorated (and closeted) drill instructor during those horrible times when homosexuality was a crime in the armed forces, and yeah. There was a part of me that hoped the characters of Miles and Max would end up together–but I wasn’t terribly disappointed (SPOILER) that they didn’t. It was the story of Miles getting through boot camp with his platoon brothers, the relationships they built with each other, and literally maturing and growing up; and while the notion of ideal Marine masculinity can be troubling…they are being trained to work as a unit and for war.

Something to ponder there. Was modern-day toxic masculinity developed during war-time service in the Pacific and Europe, only to have the returning soldiers seep into the popular culture? Yeah, I’ll probably write longer-form about Boots, because it will easily play into my essay series about masculinity that I am planning to write.

Also, very nice to see openly gay actors not only getting work but getting to play gay characters in something as well done as this.1 It also reminded me that my dad thought it might be a good idea for me to go into the military for two years before going to college–and I wanted absolutely nothing to do with that idea. I don’t regret that decision, but you always have to wonder how different everything would be had I went along with that idea.

Must be my old age that has me going down these alternate history paths.

I did make a to-do list yesterday and I plan on getting started on that today. I am going to fetch the mail on my way home from work tonight, and then probably again on Friday afternoon. Since the LSU game is so early on Saturday, I’ll try to get all errands done either on Friday or Sunday morning. I also started writing a longer-form essay on Frendo Lives, too; what’s the point of Halloween Horror Month if I don’t write about the horror media I am consuming this month? I also seriously want to write about the whole concept of the slasher story, which is what Adam Cesare’s “Frendo” trilogy basically are. I have to say I’ve always wanted to write a slasher novel.

Still not completely caught up on everything that’s been going on in the world, and not really sure that I actually want to, either. Ah, well.

And on that note I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning, methinks.

The adorable Freddie Stroma, who plays Vigilante in Peacemaker
  1. Apparently it filmed here in New Orleans, too. ↩︎