Tag: NBC

Unconditional Love

Saturday morning and all is well here in the Lost Apartment. Yesterday turned out lovely, after the rain, there was this lovely chill dampness to the air that was quite nice. I got all of my work done without a problem, and worked on the house. The kitchen looks terrific now–I still need to do the floors and some touch up; same with living room–and it was nice to come downstairs to a very clean kitchen and work space. I also did all the dishes and all the laundry! I also spent some time icing my ankles, and will probably do that some more today. I never got around to writing yesterday, and I didn’t read anything I have in progress already (I honestly don’t know what’s wrong with my brain lately), but as I was moving things around I picked up a couple of books that I paged through a bit (The Last Picture Show and Michelangelo, but more on those later), so that’s something. I watched the reunions for The Traitors seasons 3 and 4, which were fun (more on those later). When Paul came down, I finished the day’s chores and settled in for the LSU-Dartmouth baseball game, before we switched over to the LSU Gymnastics meet against Alabama (yes, if you didn’t know already, we are a very LSU house), and then it was off to bed. I slept really well for the first time in a while, and feel rested. My Achilles tendons also need icing this morning before I head out for my errands later this morning.

Today, I am going to pick up the mail, and make some groceries on the way back home. I had planned on washing the car, but now I don’t think I am going to. I also need to get mailing envelopes because I’ve been terribly lazy about sending the copies of my book to the people I need to; but this whole month has been kind of weird in some ways, which I am still thinking about and processing. I am also a little freaked out that tomorrow is March 1 already, but that’s how time passes in New Orleans in the first two months of the year. It also looks gray outside this morning, but it’s supposed to be sunny and warm by the early afternoon.

As I had mentioned, as I was moving books around yesterday, I came across copies of Larry McMurtry’s The Last Picture Show and Michelangelo by William E. Wallace, both books I enjoyed, and The Last Picture Show was influential on me, I think, as a writer. The Last Picture Show was basically another, male-driven version of Peyton Place–the dark, dirty sex secrets of a small town, and it also made me a lifelong fan of McMurtry. (I also loved the film version.) I was going to reread it a few summers ago, but I gave up on the read when we got to the calf-fucking and taking Billy to the hooker who bloodied his nose. Billy was unable to give consent to anything, so from a modern reading this entire sequence is pretty disturbing, but I think I will give it another go because of how the book treats homosexuality; I’d like to see the book through that lens, and see precisely how the future Oscar winning screenwriter of Brokeback Mountain dealt with it in an early novel.

Left Coast Crime is criming right now, and of course I am enjoying everyone’s social media posts, but…I don’t have any FOMO? Considering FOMO has been a major driving factor throughout my life, and often to my own detriment, I think this is some serious personal growth. I never really liked the “pick me” side of my fractured personality, and I am not in the least bit sorry to banish that part of my brain into some remote, dusty and not easily accessed back wrinkle in the very back of my skull. I think this is a big step forward for me, you know?

Connor Storrie is hosting Saturday Night Live tonight, and I may stay up to watch some of it–I can also replay it on Peacock tomorrow morning, or find clips on Youtube if I can’t stay up that late. They are also bringing on one or two of the Hughes bros–trying to rehab them in front of the audience Connor will bring them (straight women and gay men–yeah, I am sure they’ll be embraced by the live audience and we should be prepared for NBC to mute any negative audience reactions to their stain of an appearance. Since NBC also hosts the Olympics, obviously they feel the need to rehabilitate the men who can’t say sorry, ladies, we totally fucked up in the moment and we are so sorry to spit in your faces about your accomplishments like that. You see how institutions always rally to the cause of infantile boys who never grow up? I do love the way the country has stepped up for the women, though. My favorite thing this past week has been reading the comments on the social media posts of the NHL or the teams’ accounts.

And I think a harsh critique and rebuke of that infantilizing “boys will be boys/locker room talk” enabling bullshit is in order, and could be the introduction to my essays series on masculinity. Hmmm.

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

David Florentine is a great New Orleans photographer; check out his work! I especially love the spectral mist in this shot. You can check out his website here.

It’s My House

Tuesday, Tuesday. Ruby Tuesday?

I slept better last night than Sunday night; being tired was definitely a big help in that regard. It rained a lot yesterday, which is always Kryptonite when I’m tired; rain just makes me want to get under a blanket and go to sleep (there’s nothing better than sleeping while it’s raining, is there?), which also always makes me a bit on the loopy side for the time it’s raining. Being tired I didn’t get as much done when I got home as I had wanted (quelle surprise)but I did get most of the dishes cleaned up and loaded into the dishwasher, and I did get the mail and make groceries on the way home from the office, so that should count for something, right? I also tried to read when I got home, but my mind was too tired to focus, so yes–it was back to Youtube and history videos for me until Paul got home from the gym and I was able to put on Outer Banks, which is not disappointing at all in its second season. I’m a little bit Olympics-ed out; the shitty coverage and commentators from NBC aren’t exactly lighting up the screen with their amazing work, frankly.

I do rather miss the days when ABC Sports actually operated as a news reporting team; actually doing in-depth coverage as opposed to the “entertainment news” style coverage NBC has given us this Olympiad. I’ve never been pleased with Olympic coverage ever since it left ABC, frankly–and even ABC Sports isn’t what it once was when I was a kid watching–which probably all is tied together in the weird shift from actual journalism to journalism as entertainment.

But at least I am feeling pretty good this morning, which hopefully will mean a more productive–and useful feeling–day than yesterday was.

I really need to get back to work on my own stuff. Chapter Four of Chlorine is calling, of course–and I need to do some revisions of short stories, and I also need to get those notes for the Kansas book typed up so I can start working on those for next weekend. I also have to do some writing for my friends’ website, which should have been done over this past weekend, but it was also a low-energy weekend for me and therefore one that I rode out rather than trying to force anything, other than the completion of Chapter Three. I did finish reading Razorblade Tears, which was great, and started The Other Black Girl, also terrific, so the reading life is coming along. The new Stephen King and Megan Abbott novels should also be in my hot little hands today or tomorrow as well, which is absolutely lovely to contemplate (although I am so far behind on my Stephen King reading I despair of ever getting caught up; perhaps I should spend October catching up on King? There’s a thought, isn’t there?).

God, there’s so many good books I need to read! GAH! (And this is why I end up hoarding books, you see.)

I’ve also noted that I am starting to hoard food again–this is always a problem for me; it comes from years of being poor; whenever I have a surplus of cash (as I do currently) I tend to buy more food than we need, or could eat, which comes from the mentality that oh this stuff will keep and if I can’t ever afford food again we’ll be able to eat this along with oh I want to try this recipe but I don’t have this ingredient in the cupboards okay I will go ahead and buy it even if I only use it once and then it sits in the cabinet connecting dust….and then I will forget I have it and wind up buying another one when I need it again (hello, three bottles of red wine vinegar in my cupboard!), which is yet another sign of my lack of organization and my inability to prep before shopping (in other words, check what I have on hand before adding things to the grocery lists).

I really do need to get better organized so I can maximize my use of time.

And speaking of which, I should probably get ready for my day at the office. Have a great Tuesday, Constant Reader!