Ash Wednesday and the city is somber. We did have that horrible weather that was predicted, that messed with the parade schedule, but we stayed inside and rested and relaxed. I mean, that was a hell of a storm last night, and the wind was wild too. We even had a tornado warning! But we made it through it all, all that rain and wind made for a good night of sleep (and super-easy to fall asleep, too), and I feel pretty good this morning. I don’t feel like I am still sick, but I am also barely awake and my body hasn’t completely clocked in yet, either. Will there be a ticklish throat and a post-nasal drip this morning, or is that finally a thing of the past? Ah, there it is. I knew it was just a matter of time. Back to the DayQuil bottle. Sigh. Not feeling well over the past week or so certainly hasn’t helped matters much, has it? But we must endure and persevere, mustn’t we? And we can’t let the outside world burning to the ground interrupt our lives, no matter how pointless it all can seem from time to time. Staying positive isn’t easy when the forces of evil and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Trump, Musk, RFK Jr, and Putin) burn the world to the ground around us. But positivity in the face of evil is important. It is far too easy to give into despair in times like these.
It’s incredibly hard to get motivated to do anything, really, when reality becomes the latest uncertainty and you never know what you are going to wake up to. I’ve given into it a lot more than I should–the greatest trick about depression is it fools you into not realizing that’s what’s going on until it’s over. I fucking hate that, and it happens to me a lot more than I am even aware of, which is frightening. (My biggest self-delusion is that I am intensely self-aware; when the reality is I am intensely self-critical. They are NOT the same thing.) Depression always goes hand-in-glove with not writing for me; that’s why I never say I have writer’s block–because it’s actually depression. (I do not speak for all writers on this; this is how it works on/for me. But it’s also easier to say “writer’s block” than admit to “depression”–which turns it into a creative issue non-writers don’t understand or can experience, rather than a mental one everyone can relate to. Stigma about depression, I guess.) Not writing also makes me depressed, so it’s a very vicious cycle. It’s either “I can’t write so I get depressed so I get even more depressed” or “I’m too depressed to write which will make me more depressed” and I’m never aware of the cycle until it’s over or almost over–and why I always tell myself to write some fiction every day, even if it’s very little or even if it’s garbage; garbage can always be fixed, and even writing a few hundred words is an accomplishment, not matter how small it seems to my fevered, depressed mind.
I do sometimes wonder why people like me want to be writers, since we often create our own hells.
But I did work on my short story yesterday and it’s really taking shape. I started revising the words I already had written, so there was a lot of deletion, so I cannot even tell you how many words I actually did write yesterday, but the opening of the story is now shorter and also better, more involving, and works better. I am looking forward to working on it some more tonight. The mood and voice are coming together, and so is the setting–and my main character. I am excited, and want to get back to work on it again tonight when i get home from work. I also want to do some work on the book, which is falling behind again. I also have some emails to answer, bills to pay, finances to get under control, and numerous other things that I need to do–so yes, I am making a to-do list once I finish this and post it–and separate ones for personal and day job.
I also read some more of The Bell in the Fog, which I am loving, and we started watching The Madness on Netflix–more on both to come relatively soon.
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Ash Wednesday, everyone, and I will talk to you relatively soon, I am sure.
Everywhere else it’s just Tuesday! Happy Mardi Gras, everyone!
We’re supposed to have bad weather later on today–rain and high winds, with gusts of up to 40 mph–so the parade schedule was altered a bit. Zulu started earlier, isn’t rolling on its entire route, and no marching bands. Rex also has no bands and a truncated route. The lack of bands is why I don’t hear anything from the corner the way I usually do when parades are passing. I actually feel good this morning–and felt good from the moment I woke up. Yesterday I kind of relapsed with whatever this is that I have–whether it’s a head cold or a mild flu or whatever the fuck this is–so thought it was advisable to skip Orpheus last night. I hate that I only went to one parade this year, but…being sick doesn’t help matters much, and Iris did wear me out on Saturday. I got absolutely nothing done yesterday because I was so listless and not well; we binged a bunch of Arrested Development last night, which was quite entertaining. Tomorrow I have to go back to the office and work for two days before I have my remote day, and I hope I am finally past whatever this crud was. I hate being sick–yet another reason I don’t understand why anyone wouldn’t vaccinate their children….which was the subject of my latest newsletter, which you can read here, if you so choose.
It’s always funny to me that most bigotry and oppression manifests itself from the right with cries of “but the children!”–the ones they are willing to exploit and/or let die from preventable diseases. It’s not the blue states, after all, that are lowering the ages of consent and marriage, or allowing kids to work and have jobs with zero protections. That fine Christian leader Sarah Huckabee Sanders has certainly led the charge on that, and what a lovely job she’s done as governor of Arkansas. She’s been keeping a low profile lately; I wonder whatever happened with her corruption and embezzlement case, defrauding the Arkansas taxpayers and rewarding her friends with taxpayer money? But she hates queer people, so her passing laws legalizing child abuse is a-okay with her aptly named base.
Can’t imagine why people are leaving organized religion in droves. Way to spread the word of Jesus Christ, Madam Governor; such testimony of Christian love is sure to get you a prime spot…in the lake of eternal fire in Hell.
I don’t make the rules, your God did–and per his commands in your Holy book, he doesn’t like you very much. You’re not a crusader for Christ; you are a demon who drives people away from his embrace–and if that’s not some go-straight-to-hell shit, I don’t know what is.
I’m trying not to make plans for today, which is what I’ve done every day since being at home since Thursday. I’ve not been able to get anything much done, other than some light cleaning and organizing, since really getting sick last week. I’ve not been able to do much reading or focusing on anything, really. I hate that for me, but I generally try to look at these things as my body and health telling me I need to slow down, or at least take it easy and get some rest, so while it’s not a good thing overall because it makes me fall further behind on things, the rest is needed and hopefully means I can get back to work and get some shit done. The house is a mess again, and there’s so much to get done. But…I need to shake off the malaise from being sick and get back on it, you know? I’m also going to spend some time today reading my book, which I am enjoying. I wish I was better with my time management–but I am also realizing how much easier it is to manage your time the more you have to do; the more free time you have…well, it’s easier to think oh I’ll do that later and then never somehow get to it and suddenly it’s time for bed and you’ve gotten nothing done all day.
Just me? Ah, well.
The Thriller Award nominations came out yesterday, and as always, I have a lot of friends nominated, which is always fun and delightful. I’m not going to try to name them all, because I’ll inevitably forgot someone, but congratulations to everyone on the list, and I’m happy for all of you! Go on with your bad selves!
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines and start getting this place cleaned up and better organized. Have a great Fat Tuesday, everyone, and I may be back later–but if not, tomorrow for sure.
Orpheus Monday and we’re in that weird final gasp of parade season. Yesterday I had to think, several times, about what day it was. Carnival parade season is always a disruption to the time/space continuum, at least for me. I didn’t go to any parades yesterday, deciding not to really push my luck and energy reserves. I do miss being younger during Carnival, I have to admit. I took today off because I knew I’d need to run errands this morning, after being trapped at home all weekend since Friday afternoon. I have a lot of things to do this morning before I get on with the day–I’ve been pushing off unpleasant chores and tasks all weekend, and I really need to stop doing that. I hate when I get that way; avoidance never makes anything better, and thus the bandage needs to be torn off quickly and easily rather than pushing off another day. And it’s also very easy on Fat Tuesday to pull the celebratory feel out of the air and not do anything all day. I have to work on Wednesday and Thursday at the office, but then have my remote day and the weekend. March is going to be over before I know it and I have a lot I need to get done this month.
Politics and the state of the world aren’t helping much, to be honest with you. And the news that Homeland Security can now track queer people isn’t reassuring. It also hasn’t helped being sick most of last week–I still feel a little of it ongoing–and that hasn’t exactly had me leaping to get things done this past week, either. Yesterday I decided that it was better for me to rest rather than try to push to get things done, and this morning I do feel like that was a pretty wise decision, deadlines to the contrary. I definitely need to get into my email inbox today and trim that down, and I also have bills to pay and you know, all the usual horrible things that we all have to deal with on a daily basis in our lives, the little trivialities and minutiae that would be so lovely to pass off to an assistant if I had one, you know? That’s the kind of thing I’m talking about–and I’ve started doing so many things that I haven’t finished that it’s actually kind of embarrassing to admit. I have a load of dishes in the dishwasher that need to be put away, there’s a load of laundry in the dryer that needs to be folded and put away, I need to change the HVAC filter, etc etc etc. And that’s not even taking into consideration how messy and dirty my house is. Heavy heaving sigh.
And apparently the Carolinas are on fire? Were they not raking their forests? Or was it Jewish space lasers again? I am so sick (already) of living in the stupidest country on the planet. Wasn’t that disastrous White House “meeting” on Friday, in which our country abdicated its leadership of the world, enough to make everyone see what this insanity, this voting to punish people, leading with hatred and contempt for anyone who isn’t a straight white cisgender male? And this administration is clearly showing why these people are so vested in white supremacy: they are proving once again how mediocre so many cishet white men are. JD Vance is a couch-fucking piece of shit who should not be a heart beat away from the presidency, and Mike Johnson is an apostate blasphemer who sees religion as a means of control–after all, all churches teach are obedience, not love and kindness and morality. If you need to go to church because you’re a shitty person the other six days of the week–well, maybe stop going to church and stop being a shitty person the rest of the week, since going to church isn’t working? I always love, too, how the “faithful” always demand obedience rather than morality, and how they are very quick to wonder how atheists can be moral without religion. Well, I wonder how you can be religious without being moral. See how that works? If you go to church twice on Sunday and once during the week for Bible study, and are still immoral…well, your religion isn’t working and you don’t really believe. Religion is about power and control to you.
How… Christ-like.
I do feel good this morning, and am not entirely sure how long that is going to last for me. It seems every morning feels like a good morning lately, and yet I still run out of steam at some point in the late morning/early afternoon. I guess it’s better than waking up feeling like something the cat dragged in before getting acclimated to my day and still being alive. But I definitely need to get back to work on cleaning out my email inbox, and I definitely need to be writing more than I currently am. I know how to finish my short story, but I need to get back to revising/editing/writing it again. My goal for today is to finish the first draft so I can work on it cleaning it all up by the end of the week.
I hate being behind.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Lundi Gras, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back again later or tomorrow.
Tuesday of Jury Duty and parades; Sunday’s parades are rolling tonight, which should make getting home tonight a lot of fun. Jury duty was painless, other than I sat there without being called up to the pool until all juries were seated and they let us go in the early afternoon. I then had to go to work because the slip they gave me was for only five hours, and I wasn’t up for using my paid time off to get to eight for the day, so…there I went. I mostly scrolled through my phone while reading Lev AC Rosen’s marvelous The Bell in the Fog, which I am really enjoying. I do have to report again today, and I hope that’s it for the week. They did say that the city was shutting down at 5 tonight until Ash Wednesday (yes, we do pretty much close the city down for the last week of parades, don’t you wish you lived here, too?), so I don’t think I’ll have to go back after today. But that’s fine. I’ll either go up for voir dire or be let go after the morning, so hopefully I’ll be able to spend time reading my book while waiting to be called or released and that will be the end of it. Sunday’s rained out parades are tonight, so I am going to want to be home well before four. (I did slalom by driving on St. Charles Avenue; they have barricades so no car can get up enough speed to really do a repeat of the New Year’s terrorist attack on Bourbon Street…and it’s kind of fun. Traffic will continue to be a nightmare until after it’s all over. I just need to make it through this week until Friday…
I managed to work on my story last night. I deleted the extra, unusable 900 words, which dropped it down to about a thousand, and am now at a little less than three. Good progress, and I should be able to get it finished tonight. I doubt I’ll go out to the parades tonight–getting up at six every morning certainly puts a damper on that–but I do want to get home before the true madness starts. I’ve been very lucky with parking so far–praise be to the Carnival gods–and I know that’s not going to last through the entire season before the car is permanently parked for about five days Friday morning. I am debating whether to take all of Lundi Gras off, or going in for a few hours and leaving early. The latter makes the most sense, after all; save that time jealously! I don’t want to run out again, and I am actually at the point where I’ve got a nice amount of both (sick and vacation) in my bank now. Woo-hoo! At least I don’t have to worry about the time off I need to use for parade season. That’s a lovely release.
The country continues to swirl around the toilet bowl more with each passing day. Yesterday we betrayed NATO and Ukraine at the United Nations, joining with the true axis of evil on this planet–Russia, North Korea, Iran, etc.–and continue to lose whatever moral leadership and authority we ever had (not that we ever had much of anything on that score to begin with); we are becoming isolated, the way we were before and between the world wars…which turned out so well for the world in the end, didn’t it? What happened in Coeur de Lion, Idaho the other day was appalling and recorded for the entire world to see (another black eye for the country); the violent abuse of a woman simply because she was calling out the bullshit she was hearing, while white people (men and women) cheered and applauded and the moderator of the event taunted her from the stage on his microphone, making jokes? That is some seriously small-dick energy, really. It also resulted in the usual social media nonsense, with people on-line responding (especially white women) with the usual lack of self-awareness: “I would never allow that to happen in front of me without saying or doing something!” Newsflash: white people–both men and women– always turn their heads and look away, “not my problem” or “I am not putting myself at risk to intervene” and so on…until it actually affects them. Where was all this energy on November 5th? Where was it for George Floyd or Breonna Taylor? Where is it for trans people, being stripped of their rights every day? Where it it for queer people, ever? Where, after all, were all the Southern white people who were opposed to racism, Jim Crow, and lynchings that I always hear about now, but actually did nothing while it was actually happening?
Not my problem is always the response, but everyone marginalized (you know, the people so many straight white women like to lord it over) is supposed to immediately DO SOMETHING when it’s a straight white woman–and if you point out their blatant hypocrisy…you’re a misogynist. Straight white women LOVE to pull out their “oppression” card whenever a discussion isn’t going their way and they have no defense for the appalling things they say other than “you have male privilege.” Really? My sex life was a crime until 2003. Was yours for the first forty-two years of your life, ma’am? I couldn’t marry my partner until 2014. Did you have to wait until you were fifty-three before you could legally marry the love of your life? I watched all my friends die (twice over!) in the 1980s while most straight white women smiled dismissively and said “not my problem.” Some of the biggest public homophobes of my adult life were straight white women. I know as a cisgender male I do have privilege; I certainly have more than lesbians and trans people, for example. But I have always lived under the threat of violence as a gay man; and before I owned my identity I did not pass as straight.
And yes, gay men also get sexually assaulted–and usually with objects. Gay men also get beaten and attacked, even killed, by straight white men. Sometimes with straight white women cheering them on. You just don’t hear about it up there in your precious lily-white privilege tower because you don’t care. Often assaults on gay white men–just like assaults of straight white women–don’t get reported because the cops don’t care and blame the victims. You don’t care unless it’s a white woman…when white women made sure the ERA didn’t pass; white women got Black and brown men killed all the time; and the Daughters of the Confederacy weren’t exactly gay white men, were they? A Republican controlled US government laughed about AIDS killing gay men.
But do go on with your homophobia, dear.
We all need to do better. It’s very easy to see something appalling in an online video and be very upset at the failures of witnesses to act, and to say “I would never.” But ask yourself this, white people: have you ever seen a white someone being racist to a Black person and said nothing? Have you watched as homophobes come for queer people, in real life or on-line, and did nothing? Do you challenge racism, homophobia, misogyny, and transphobia when you see it, or do you leave it alone? I know what the answer to that question is, by the way, and keyboard warriors who do nothing but talk big on-line sicken me to my core.
And for the record, I will always go on the offensive when some ignorant bitch of a white woman tells me I’m a misogynist when I am agreeing with her–especially when she tells me she’s done more for queer rights than me, using the condescending straight people “honey.” Literally, go fuck yourself with barbed wire, you homophobic bitch. Misogynist enough for you? (She also trotted out the “gay friends” defense–and when I pointed that out she then claimed “I never said they were friends”–oh, so you don’t have any friends but you’ve been to Pride a few times and even marched in a parade once! My God, let’s put up a statue of you in front of Stonewall! WHERE WOULD QUEER PEOPLE BE WITHOUT THE SACRIFICES OF STRAIGHT WHITE WOMEN? I guess I should be glad you didn’t go with the old pedophile/groomer shit, Miss Zero Followers. I screen capped the entire thing before blocking her flat bony unwashed ass.)
Coeur de Lion is now in the “find out” phase, and if we actually had a real government this would be investigated as a civil rights violation by the Department of Justice…but we don’t have a real government anymore. I always wondered what it felt like to be an abolitionist in the 1950s, when the government was geared to protect slavery in the land of the “free.” The company that employed the thugs that assaulted the woman has lost its business license, and it also looks like the grinning douchebag sheriff has been defrauding the LAPD pension fund–working another LE job while drawing a disability pension from another one–so I hope California throws the book at him.
This is what we are. This is what we have allowed our country to become. Even those of us who voted against this didn’t do enough to stop this—and it should have been stopped when it was the Tea Party. Remember those racists? The ones who didn’t want healthcare and the media dutifully reported on everything they said and pushed it breathlessly without ever calling out ONCE the clear and obvious racism? FOTUS climbed aboard the Tea Party train, remember? He started the birther bullshit and promoted it on every network who would let him because he was a “celebrity.”
But no, white people who patted themselves on the back for voting for Obama were very quick to stay home in the 2010 midterms because cleaning up the Bush mess was taking longer than everyone thought it should.
And God forbid everyone get health insurance. The HORROR!
We all own this, you know. Every last one of us white people. And we’re the ones who need to clean it all up–even though we know the fucking assholes we’re saving will knife us in the back again at the very first opportunity. They might regret their votes now–but they would do it again in a heartbeat. They prefer this to having a biracial woman in charge.
This is exactly what they wanted. And we should never let them forget. Letting them getting away with it was a mistake in 1865.
And on that note I am heading into the spice mines. Have a great day, and remember to do your part–even if it’s something you think small or inconsequential. Water wears away stone and the effects may not be immediate.
Monday morning and have to head to the parish courthouse for jury duty at criminal court. I am one of the few people who don’t mind doing jury duty, and don’t try to get out of it when I am called. I was originally called to serve a week after my surgery in 2023, but got excused as I couldn’t drive, let alone serve on a jury. I slept well last night, too.
It rained all day yesterday and the parades were all cancelled, postponed until tomorrow night. I am sitting here getting ready to go report for jury duty, and trying not to worry about dealing with a week I can’t plan in the least. Before the anxiety medications I would have been a bundle of knots and nerves and on edge the entire day; probably wouldn’t have eaten anything or gotten much of anything done. I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked, perhaps, but I was a bit out of sorts yesterday. I’ve not been feeling super-great over the weekend–kind of nasally and sore throat-ish, which was annoying, and enough of a distraction to keep me from getting a lot done and being able to focus. I did get some things done–the boring kind of things I generally hate to do and put off. I did struggle a bit trying to work on both the book and a short story I need to finish, but it wasn’t flowing or coming and it just wasn’t working so I gave up and gave rein to my creativity in other ways.
I did realize, thank goodness, that I hadn’t revised as much as I had thought, and so have a lot “more room” to work with than I had thought, which was a relief. What I mean here by “more room” is the word count; I have about 900 words in the word count that are going to be excised or slashed down dramatically, so I have approximately a thousand more words of room before I hit the outside word count. I always write short stories this way, which I know makes no sense to anyone other than me. I have to have a title that works for me and puts me into the right mindset/mood to produce the story I want in the voice and tone that I want–being in a very cheery mood when you’re writing about someone who’s planning to kill his mother and sell her farm to a corporation doesn’t really lend the right tone, if you know what I mean (which is why my story “The Sound of Snow Falling” remains unpublished in my files; I need to make it darker in tone than the cheery voice it’s currently in)–and then I start writing it, knowing how many words I have to tell the story. Sometimes I know the entire story, sometimes I know the beginning, sometimes I know the end, sometimes I have a title and an opening sentence. It’s wild and chaotic and freestyle, really; the only thing for sure is I have to know how much room I have. I also figured out the story last night as I brainstormed and cleaned and did other things, so now I have to write it in the room that I have. I also need to go ahead and read those 900 words to see if any of it is even worth trying to save or just delete it all…since I know now what the story is, and I like it.
And now you know why it’s so hard for me to write short stories.
But I think I will get this one done soon, and then I’m going to be free again to dive back into the book. Yay!
I also spent some time with Lev AC Rosen’s The Bell in the Fog, which I am really loving. Reading it reminds of Chlorine–which will be very different even though set in the same time period. Los Angeles and Hollywood are a different mood–sunshine noir as opposed to foggy noir. (I always see Lev’s story in my head in the style of The Maltese Falcon film, whereas Chlorine I see as more of an American Gigolo style but in the 1950s–Palm Springs, Hollywood, Malibu.) I am still excited to be writing again, can you tell? Everywhere I turn, everywhere I look, whatever I think, my mind steers itself back into thinking about something I am working on. That’s a good sign, I think. I like when my thoughts are mostly filled with creative thoughts and inspirations and breakthroughs. It always puts me into a much better mood–certainly better than watching the news and rolling my eyes and wondering what the fuck is going to happen next and knowing this is not going to end well under even the best, most hopeful outcome will include death and violence.
And yeah, I’d rather focus on my own writing and creating and art, you know? Create my own joy and try to brighten the darkness a little bit?
And on that cheery note, I am going to get ready to head to the courthouse. Have a lovely Monday, wherever you are, and I’ll be back, most likely tomorrow morning.
I also love to boogie–especially in the disco round, oh yeah, baby.
Sunday morning in the Lost Apartment after kind of a nice, slow and easy day around here. Paul stayed up late working so pretty much slept the entire day away again, and I myself got up late yesterday, too. I didn’t mind, even though I was a little perturbed that I got up so late. But I had a nice morning. I did some things I needed to do and cleaned and organized some more, and I got up pretty early this morning, too. I don’t know how motivated I feel today, but I am hopefully going to get some good writing work done this morning so I can spend the afternoon reading. Sounds like a winner to me. We did finish catching up with Reacher, Abbott Elementary, and Prime Target last night, too. Tomorrow I get to report to Criminal Court for jury duty in Mid-city, so I will be finding out what’s going on with that. I’m hoping to be dismissed before parade days start; I’d rather go to the office and leave early than try to get home at five from Criminal Court in Midcity, which would probably require taking I-10/90, getting off at Tchoupitoulas, and doubling back from there with no place to park. Ah, well, this too shall pass, and as a crime writer, it’s always interesting to see how criminal court–or courts in general–operate up close and personal.
It’s gray outside, and rain is expected, which should put a damper on any and all parades today. There are no night parades, so technically I could make a grocery run after King Arthur ends, but I doubt I’ll want to be out and about at that time anyway. I do have all kinds of things to do today–I want to spend the morning writing and the afternoon reading, if at all possible. It’s always so nice to curl up in my chair with a blanket and read while it’s raining, you know? I like feeling snug and cozy; which is why I am so particular about sleep arrangements. Want to know something weird about me? I sleep with four blankets, because that’s enough weight to make me feel snug and comfortable. I have a soft wool one on the bottom and one really velvety soft one on the top. I need two pillows, always, and also need the ceiling fan on and a little personal fan on my nightstand going. Weird? Just a little bit. But I think we all have things that we do, little rituals, that bring us comfort and joy. Just me? Probably. I always default to me not being normal, I suppose; the product of my youth. Thanks, bully trash!
I did work on an essay yesterday a bit, one called “Try That in a Small Town.” I started writing it when the Jason Aldean nonsense happened last summer, because that “real America” bullshit has always, always pissed me off; and essentially has always been used to demonize cities–you know, the economic engines that fucking drive the country–and reassure provincial types who stay in rural areas that they are more important than the city dwellers. This of course goes back to the lies that were always told to encourage immigration when white people felt the need to “fill the continent” with white people while exterminating the natives. You can be free, you can own land and property, you can prosper because the government will leave you alone to do as you please and not restrict your freedoms. No, the rich people needed more consumers, and they also needed population in the “empty” territories to produce and buy. The United States has always been expansionist; even the Founding Fathers assumed more states would be formed out of native land, after they were pushed out. Anyway, I actually lived in a very small town in a very rural county in an underpopulated state for five horrible years–and I will dispute to my dying breath this notion that small towns are the “real America” (fuck you again and again with razor wire, Sarah Palin)…because everyone acts like they’re like Mayberry when they are really Peyton Place–horribly judgmental with lots of cruel gossip and backstabbing, and the sexual perversions of these “good meat-and-potatoes Americans” not even Grace Metalious could have dreamed up–and Peyton Place was nothing more than a novelization of things she witnessed and experienced in a small town. It always infuriates me, you know, to hear this “real America” shit. Try to make it without Chicago, New York, LA, Boston, and San Francisco. The fucking economy would crater in about two seconds. But…cities are usually Democratic strongholds, so they must be demonized, always.
And there’s the rain! I knew it was coming. It’s just a drizzle but it’s enough for the gutter to drip water on the cat enclosure just outside my laundry room–and it’s only raining on that side of the house. This happens here a lot–it can be raining on one block but not the next; one part of the city can be getting a flooding rain while it’s sunny and bright in another–but I don’t remember the last time it only rained on the other side of the house. New Orleans, always so bizarre.
It also seems that the American people are getting fed up with what’s going on in Washington, and they are starting to push back. I’ve progressed beyond FAFO, to be honest1; the danger to the country’s future is that strong that the mocking and pointing fingers and laughing and atonement can come after the threat has been overcome. I think this is the kind of lesson we needed to learn; we’ve always taken our system for granted and always assumed the government was stable and would hold–forever smug about governments toppling and falling in other countries while we remained stable. The problem is that stability was only achieved through horrific compromises…and human rights should never, ever, under any circumstance, be left to public or government whim. The seeds of self-destruction were planted in the Constitution with the compromise on enslavement. Senators used to be appointed by state legislatures, not the people. BUT it was also designed to be a living document, changed and amended over time to clear up inconsistencies and always, always, intended to protect the people from government overreach. I also agree with something I saw on social media yesterday–every elected official should be required to have regular town halls to meet with their constituents, and they also need to remember they were voted in to work for their district, not the president. Separate but equal branches of government means nothing when elected officials in Congress abdicate their roles for whatever reason.
And really, what is MAGA but the modern Confederacy? Yes, they are also Nazis…but remember–the Germans learned about how to deal with undesirable sub-populations by studying enslavement and Jim Crow. There’s your heritage, rednecks. You were Hitler’s blueprint. And weren’t plantations simply concentration/work camps with a nicer name?
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll be back tomorrow morning (or night).
I’ve not, and never will, forgive MAGA voters, to be sure–just like I’ll never stop mentally dancing and pissing on Ronald and Nancy Reagan’s graves. But I can put that aside for now to overcome this threat. But there needs to be a reckoning–unlike after the Civil War and 1/6/20. ↩︎
A cold Saturday morning in the Lost Apartment. My doctor’s appointment went well–all my vitals were at appropriate levels, my lungs are clear, and all medications appear to be working properly, which is lovely. I came home from that appointment to do chores and make the house orderly before we headed out to Metairie for Paul’s appointment, after which we went to Costco. You know, for the first Friday of parade season, it wasn’t that terrible. It was crowded, yes, and there were times I had to wait for inconsiderate assholes who were blocking aisles thoughtlessly (a regular occurrence at the grocery store, a rarity for Costco) and the check out lines ferociously long, but it didn’t take us long to spend a shit load of money (Paul also ordered a new pair of glasses and our membership was also due for renewal). I was a bit concerned about parking when we got back, as it was closer to parade rolling time that I was comfortable with. I had noticed there were a lot of cars parking in the neighborhood–unusual–when I left for my appointment, and there was also a lot more traffic on the roads I usually traverse. Understandably, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to park within a mile of the house, but once we departed for Metairie/Costco I realized why everything was the way it was–they’ve turned the side of St. Charles people can drive down1 while parades are rolling into an obstacle course2. This is, I imagine, for crowd safety precautions after New Year’s, but damn…it’s going to make negotiating St. Charles and the neighborhood about ten times harder than it is usually is.
Thanks, asshole terrorist. I hope you’re roasting in hell like you deserve.
I also spent some time with Lev AC Rosen’s marvelous The Bell in the Fog, the second book in his Andy Mills detective series set in early 1950’s San Francisco. It’s an interesting period to read about: after the war but before Stonewall, when sodomy was still an enforceable crime and the hatred of queer people was so intense they were targeted mercilessly and no one fucking cared.3 Lev is a terrific writer–I loved Lavender House–and this one starts out really well. It’s very reminiscent of the old masters of crime/noir/hardboiled–Hammett, Chandler, Cain–which is why he gets nominated for awards so regularly.
I also have apparently sold another short story. I had sent something to an anthology at some point last year and completely forgot about it, to be honest; yesterday I got an apologetic email from (I guess? It has been a while) the editor saying they want it if it’s still available. That was a lovely bit of news, to go along with the terrific feedback from the other anthology that asked me for one. I am going to finish writing another one this weekend (if it kills me) so I can focus on finishing my book. I’d forgotten–as it has been a hot minute–how nice it is to get positive feedback from peers. And rather than questioning or explaining it away in my head (just being nice, etc etc), I decided to accept it and feel good about it, which is a lovely new approach to my career. In the moments when I allow myself to go down the natural path of current events (my publisher will get shut down, my books removed from the bookseller websites–it galls me that they’re on Target’s website, although they probably make very little me off me–and my career shut down completely in the de-queering of the country), I find it ironic that my stress, anxiety and depression didn’t allow me to ever enjoy my career very often, and that now I am finally beginning to enjoy myself and the nicer side of publishing/writing, it could all be stripped away from me. (For the record, straight people, losing our writing careers because of our sexual identity is something we have to think about all the time. Do you? So, fuck off with your I’m-an-ally-as-long-as-it’s-just-words-online bullshit. DO SOMETHING.)
But yes, I am feeling like I definitely need to get back to producing work, and that feels good for a change, you know?
Sparky also let me sleep late this morning, the little darling, and even curled up in the bed with me rather than trying to get me up. I think he waits for my alarm like Pavlov’s dog; I’ve trained him to react to the sound as well as his stomach. We watched LSU Gymnastics win at Kentucky last night, but they didn’t have a great meet–a bit of a letdown after defeating Oklahoma last week in Baton Rouge and a packed house–but it was fine; they hadn’t won in Lexington since 2016, and this year they did despite a bad meet. We then watched the premiere episode of Season Three of Reacher, which is based on one of my favorite Reacher novels, and am loving it. (I also like that his portrayer, Alan Ritchson–whom I’ve liked since I first noticed him on Smallville–is a devout Christian and not a cosplay one; he calls out the evangelicals and their false prophet regularly. He recently gave an interview to GQ in which he talked about Matt Gaetz, whom he went to high school with, and just ripped him to fucking shreds. You see? I don’t object to Christianity when people actually are real Christians.) We also watched some Arrested Development, too, before going to bed much later than we should have.
Overall, Friday was a pretty good day. I am going to get some reading and writing and cleaning done today–I need to unload the dishwasher and refill it at some point; and there’s always organizing and cleaning to get done. I also need to answer emails–I no longer have to stick to my old rule of “no emails on the weekend”–and I need to get some more newsletters written and finished to send. I’m trying hard to not deluge people with my newsletter; I am very prolific, as has been pointed out in the past repeatedly, and who wants to read my thoughts, views, and opinions on a daily basis? Even though I didn’t publish anything–not even a short story last year–I still produce a prodigious amount of writing all the time.
And on that note, I think I am going to head into the spice mines–more accurately, I am going to repair to my easy chair with my book for a while before I actually start getting things done around here–and I may be back later. I am trying not to do more than one post here per day…but anyway, have a lovely Saturday, and I’ll be right back here tomorrow.
Screenshot
I’ve always marveled that one side of the neutral ground is for the parades and the other side is open to traffic heading uptown. St. Charles is a major artery of the city, and they usually have to keep that side open because everything inside the parade is blocked off–and people do need to get uptown. Not really sure how this obstacle course drivers need to negotiate will work, or if they are going to take them down every night and put them back up again before the parades start–which means shutting St. Charles down for however long it takes to set up. Sigh. ↩︎
Thursday and my last day in the office for the week. Tomorrow is my usual remote day, but I have a couple of doctors appointments so I am taking the day off. I was right about being tired; by the end of the day I was so tired I thought I might fall asleep driving home! But I didn’t, and I got the mail and came home and got inside safely, locking the door and the cold outside. It’s very cold this morning, too (currently a toasty 31 degrees!). We watched some Arrested Development last night, and I did some work on my writing. I got some welcome feedback on a short story I wrote for an anthology, which was also very nice. I slept very well last night, too–the cold, I think, played a part in that as well as my physical exhaustion when I got home last night. I even did some chores last night, which was very pleasing. I have an errand to run on the way home from work tonight, and once I get home from the appointments tomorrow, I’ll be in for the rest of this very cold weekend in New Orleans, and buckling down and writing. The parades also start this weekend, so I need to be very judicious in my parade attendance so I can get some writing done. I am feeling more into my writing than I have in a very long time, so that is very cool and kind of exciting to me. I was terribly concerned over the last two years that I’d never write anything again. I think that the combination of everything else going on, in my life and in the world, along with severe burnout, was why I was struggling to write, and when the depression is mixed in, well, it’s no wonder I was uninterested in writing anything and couldn’t get anything done.
Definitely wearing layers today, too. The apartment is warm, but here at my desk? Not so much, really. But I am so grateful for last night’s sleep! I actually am awake and alert and not foggy in the least. It feels good to feel like I’m totally present, which I didn’t feel like the first part of this week. God, sleep is the best, isn’t it? I feel like today is a day when I can get things done and function and get my entire act together for a change. Hopefully, this feeling will last me for a while. I guess the trip last weekend required some readjusting back into my life–it’s weird how something like that can be so disruptive once you’ve settled into a routine (rut, whatever) with your life, isn’t it? But I am also in a very good mood this morning, and I’ve kind of been too tired lately for that to be a thing, you know? And definitely plan on riding this wave as long as it lasts–it’ll probably crest this afternoon. I do have some chores I need to do once I am back home, and of course, back to the store today on the way home (thank God for CBD Rouse’s, so I don’t have to go the long way uptown).
IN my tired state last night (and after being scolded/lectured by two trolls on social media, whom I made very sorry that they emerged from under their bridge) I was thinking about things–going to Alabama always makes me think about things from the past, plus all that 70’s research I’ve been doing lately–and I was remembering, with Sparky curled up in my lap, how different life is now from when I was a child. (Shocking, right? Who knew that I’d go through the same things every other older person has throughout history!) I was talking to Dad about Mom and her mother and what things were like for Mom growing up (Dad always talks about how great Mom was and how she never complained, despite how poor they were when they were first married; I replied, “Yeah, that apartment in Chicago might have been tiny but she had running water and a telephone, so that probably seemed like a step up. She didn’t know any better.”), and of course that led into how Mom and her mother never, ever reminisced or thought about the past…and I said “Well, it’s also kind of weird to think when my grandmother was born the Archduke hadn’t been assassinated yet and Europe was dominated by monarchies and empires”…which tripped him out a little. And she had older relatives who’d seen the Civil War. I was born during JFK’s presidency, before Vietnam and in the midst of the civil rights movement. Women couldn’t have credit in their own names and were erased as people, assuming their husband’s name legally as “Mrs. John Smith” rather than as “Lisa Smith.” There was no such thing as no-fault divorce, and the grim reality was most women made their hellish marriages work, dooming them to a life of misery.
Our country really hasn’t been around that long, and neither has our progress toward the ideals of the founding–we’ve never achieved that original ideal, and now we are sliding back into the abyss as a tyrant is in charge (Reagan could only dream of the power the FOTUS has assumed and been gifted by his craven political party) and our constitutional republic is on the ropes. I also have realized over the last week that the only people who can save the country from this threat is the opposition–the courts aren’t going to do it, Congress sure as hell isn’t, the media is laughably unconvincing propaganda-pushers with no desire to do their jobs properly, and neither are the “all-in” party that supports this. I no longer subscribe to the notion that MAGA voters and politicians have been “fooled” somehow, conned…at this point, we just need to accept the fact that they are willing participants–all of them. They can’t say they didn’t know because he told them, for years, what he wanted to do and they cheered, so yeah–I have no empathy for any of them. I don’t believe there’s such a thing as “MAGA regret” because I will personally guarantee that if the election were done over and held again tomorrow, every last one of them would vote for him again despite what they now know.
There can be no forgiveness without atonement and true repentance–that should be the lesson of the Civil War.
Well, this turned into a rather lengthier tome than anything else I’ve done on here this week, hasn’t it? That’s a good sign I am going to take with me into the spice mines for today. Have a great Thursday, everyone, and stay warm!
Wednesday and we made it to midweek. I am tired this morning–I tossed and turned all night yet again last night, and I’ve also been having heartburn1 lately, too, despite the medications I take for each–but this morning I don’t seem to have the heartburn problem, at least for now, and I’ll take it. I have things to do today, too, that definitely need to be done. I got one of them done already. I am tired physically this morning and my brain is a little spacy this morning, but that should clear with some more coffee and writing this.
It started sprinkling last night, and after the rain clears up today we’re having lower temperatures and high winds. It’s going to get close to freezing again down here, so it’s going to be another pipe issue weekend. Not for us, but definitely around southeastern Louisiana for sure. I don’t mind, as I don’t think I really need to leave the house all that much this weekend–it’s nice to be warm and toasty inside while it’s horrifically cold outside–but I definitely need to work this weekend. I did work on my short story yesterday and got about 1500 or so words down, so hopefully I can get that done this week as well as get back into writing the book again.
Parades supposedly start this weekend, but it’s supposed to be cold and rainy all weekend, so I am not sure if I’ll be going down to the corner at all this weekend, other than for King Arthur on Sunday, which is the unofficial queer parade. I always get lots of stuff at King Arthur.
I had wine and appetizers (truffle fries, yum) with a friend in from out of town last night, which was fun. I walked to meet her at Gris-Gris, but it was closed, so we walked over to St. Vincent’s and sat in their bar. It was drizzling last night, giving the city that weird sky glow we get when it’s raining (all the lights and neon reflecting back), and there was kind of a fun noir, opening scene of Mildred Pierce (with Joan Crawford walking out onto the pier in her mink) feel to the early evening. It’s always fun to talk to another writer, you know? One of the things I miss is having local writer friends that I see periodically. Emails aren’t the same thing, you know? (Mine are always far longer than they need to be, and probably don’t get read all the way through.)
Okay, I think I’m going to head into the spice mines. Sorry I’ve been so dull lately, but here’s hoping I’ll get interesting again relatively soon!
And this morning, I figured this out when I went to take my pills and noticed…I hadn’t put my acid reflux medications in the pill sorter. So, I’ve not taken it since Sunday morning. Duh. ↩︎
Tuesday morning and we made it through Monday. I was correct; after running errands yesterday I was very tired when I got home from work. I spent some time with Sparky and did some chores, but overall, didn’t do a lot once I got home. We did watch some Arrested Development, too, before I went to bed. It’s very cold again this morning, but I’ll just wear layers to work and it’s also super cool that I came home to a warm apartment yesterday (as opposed to how it felt when I got up yesterday morning in the bitter, bitter cold–okay, maybe I was the bitter one and not the cold). Tonight I have to get the mail on the way home, before settling in to get my chores done and maybe do some reading and writing. I feel like I’ve already acclimated back into my regular life, but it’s also still relatively early in the week. There’s no telling how I will feel by Thursday. And next week is jury duty, and this weekend is not only parades but rain, so not sure how that is going to go at all for parade season.
I did breakthrough yesterday on something I’m working on with a bunch of other writers (to be honest, I’ve done very little thus far and have basically been one of those who came along for the ride) and did the things I was supposed to have been doing mostly yesterday, and must say I was very pleased with the result. Huzzah! I felt very accomplished, I have to say; that’s been hanging over my head for months, and I’ve certainly been checked out since the election. I’m not sure that I’m checking back in completely–it’s kind of been nice staying insular in my own little world these past few months–and I do think, going forward, that some of the decisions I’ve made about my peace and peace of mind are going to be a definitive priority in my life. I don’t need people upsetting me and/or pissing me off, and the methodology I use for social media now–annoy me and you’re blocked–is going to be the foundation for dealing with people from now on. I used to let things slide with people, and it’s definitely worn me down and out with those folks…because they always get worse. So, yeah–no more Mr. Nice Gay.
And I am finished apologizing to other people for not living up to their expectations. That is your problem, and it’s never going to be mine. I disappointed you? That’s on you.
Just like I got tired of people telling me, in excruciating detail, of what a bad person I am and a terrible friend. Well, I never claimed to be anything other than who I am. You don’t like it? I don’t give a fuck.
We’ll see how long that lasts, won’t we?
Probably not long. I think sometimes I might have too much empathy? I mean, I feel bad for fictional characters that don’t exist, too.
But I am going to try to not let the bastards get me down, and I feel like the best way for me to fight back, given my old age, is to write. Writing is activism, and always should be. Writers have changed the world for the better–the writings of French philosophers about the ancien regime and its abuses eventually led to the French Revolution; Marx and Lenin also wrote manifestos; and that’s not taking into consideration all the writers who opposed tyranny and wrote about freedom and justice led to our own revolution–and the Civil War. I am not a journalist nor a political scientist nor a historian, but I’ve read enough history and followed politics (and the combination of the two) over the course of my life to understand where all this bullshit we’re dealing with originally came from1, and while I am certain, better analysis of things would come from experts in that field…but I can write about them as a citizen, what I think about these issues and why, can’t I?
And I could never be as entirely wrong about everything as MAGAs and Andrew Sullivan.
And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a great day, Constant Reader, and I’ll be here again tomorrow morning.
Helpful hint: remember how Hilary Rodham Clinton was mocked for talking about a “vast right-wing conspiracy” in the 1990s? Once again, she was right–and had people listened to her maybe we wouldn’t be where we are, here today. ↩︎
Queer and Loathing in America 