Tag: New York City

Help Me Make It Through the Night

I actually slept last night here at my hotel, and slept late this morning, both of which are so unusual it does bear remarking on. I also walked a lot yesterday here in Manhattan; it’s about fourteen blocks from the hotel to the MWA office; a straight shot up Broadway. That’s a lot more walking than my tired old fat-ass is used to, so perhaps that had something to do with the deep sleep. I also met a friend for drinks with Paul last evening (here in the hotel bar), and then we came back up to the room and I read for a bit before I got cross-eyed with sleep (I am really enjoying this Raquel V. Reyes novel tremendously; although I probably won’t get much chance to finish it before the flight home Saturday, which should give me plenty of time to not only finish reading Mango Mambo and Murder but to read (or make good headway on reading) one of the other books I brought along for the ride. (There will also be giveaway books at the banquet tonight…)

It really is remarkable how much I dislike working on a laptop, thought. Mostly it’s because the screen is too small for my aging eyes (note to self: make an eye appointment stat, maybe new glasses will take care of this for me) but I have my wireless keyboard (I hate typing on a laptop most of all) and my wireless mouse with me, which makes it a bit easier for me to deal with.

I was also surprised that I slept so well last night mainly because, well, the banquet is tonight and I have to be up on stage to begin with to welcome everyone and do some thank you’s and introductions, which I have to be stone cold sober to do–which, given there’s an hour of cocktail reception before hand, isn’t going to be easy for one Gregalicious, who never likes passing up free wine or champagne–and of course being stone cold sober is going to make it a bit more stressful, although the days when I used to drink heavily to deal with the stage fright anxiety are long in the past and let’s face it, was never a particularly smart thing to do (ah, the wisdom that comes with age). The awards are going to be broadcast live on our Youtube channel (if I were better at my job as EVP I’d share a link, but I am not better at the job so oh well) which means it will also be recorded and always be up there for all eternity (the Internet is forever, after all) so the possibilities of me doing something stupid and going viral, therefore burning MWA to the ground, are much higher than say, my speaking for a few moments at the Lefty Banquet. But I am trying very hard to manage my anxiety and stress–I handled the travel here very well, after all–and so this new calm centering thing I am doing seems to be working. I feel remarkably relaxed and rested this morning, in fact, which is highly unusual.

After I finish this and do some more emails, I will probably work on my short story a bit more.

Oh! I also did a ZOOM thing yesterday for the Jefferson Performing Arts Society (JPAS) for their upcoming production of Deathtrap; which of course was a huge Broadway hit comedy/thriller written by one of my literary heroes, Ira Levin (who also wrote A Kiss Before Dying, This Perfect Day, Rosemary’s Baby, The Stepford Wives, and The Boys from Brazil, for a few highlights). It was actually quite fun–I love the opportunity to talk about other writers; talking myself up is an entirely different subject–and I am not sure when or where it will be available to view on-line, but I don’t think I made a fool of myself.

I’ve been wrong before.

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines and get to work on that story some more. You have a lovely day, Constant Reader, and I will recap the banquet for you tomorrow.

Stray Dog

Well, top of the morning to you, Constant Reader! It’s a gray Saturday morning here in New Orleans and so far, so good–my arm still hurts like a son of a bitch, but the debilitating fatigue from yesterday (I took a nap in the early afternoon, another in the early evening AND went to be around ten) seems to be past–at least so far, at any rate. I don’t remember being exhausted yesterday morning, but that doesn’t mean that I wasn’t. I do recall thinking at several points during yesterday that if this was how people with chronic fatigue syndrome felt, ye gods! But today is another day, the enormous amount of work I have to do has not magically disappeared–it’s just a little more dusty this morning. As I glance around the kitchen/office this morning there’s a lot of clean-up to be done around here–not the least of which is filing and organizing, chores I always dread and put off, yet am alway find satisfying to do once I actually get started on it.

Go figure.

I tried out the air fryer yesterday on chicken nuggets in the afternoon for lunch (then again for dinner; I wasn’t hungry but made nuggets for Paul) and it works just fine, frankly. The nuggets were good if different–and I realized the difference was the lack of greasiness and if they were a little drier than usual, that was the lack of grease. It’ll take a while for me to get used to the lack of grease in things like nuggets and so forth, but I deeply approve of this new healthier alternative to deep-frying, and I am going to see about using it for other things, like Brussels sprouts and asparagus and other healthier things. I may eventually have to get a bigger sized air fryer, but the one I have will certainly work for now. As one of the goals for the year was to work on being healthier over all, this is an excellent first step.

We did watch Uncle Frank on Prime last night, and while it was enjoyable on some levels, it was painfully difficult to watch in others. Perhaps it hit a little too close to home for me in some ways, but at the same time, while it was about the main character’s relationship with her gay uncle and his partner–and his estrangement from his family because of his father’s homophobia–there were some horrific scenes of familial homophobia and the emotional/psychological abuse that comes with it. I thought it was going to be more of a comedy–at least that was how the trailer made it seem–but it most definitely was not a comedy, although there was some humor. I’m not certain that the audience for the film was really gay men–it seemed, particularly towards the end, to be like Philadelphia–a movie about gay issues that was really for straight people, and that really can make a difference in how the story is told and how the characters are presented. I do recommend it–it really recaptures that early 1970’s feel, both in South Carolina and New York City; some of the homes and settings in South Carolina (as well as the performances of the actors) made me feel like I was a kid visiting relatives again; and since some of the in-progress works (short stories and novellas) I have are set in the 1970’s South…it was interesting to see and triggered some memories for me. But one thing that was delightful about the movie was it sort of had a happy ending–sure, the two gay characters had a lot of suffering to get through to get there–but neither one of them died, so that was lovely, and the 1970’s setting meant the specter of HIV/AIDS was long in the future. I also couldn’t help wondering, though, as I watched, if either of them would make it through the 1980’s alive, and just having to wonder that about fictional characters is rather sad.

I’m also looking forward to seeing the new Russell Davies series, It’s a Sin, when it drops on HBO MAX next month. (I much preferred the original Queer as Folk to the American version, quite frankly. I’m curious to see if they do an American version of this one, as well…but since it’s airing on HBO MAX I tend to rather doubt it; but I don’t remember how Americans watched the original Queer as Folk either.)

Paul is off to the office later today so I will have the house to myself for the most part until this evening, which is nice but also going to be a bit weird. I keep forgetting that the festivals are looming, so of course he is late getting home every evening and will disappear on Saturdays; it is the time of year when I become a Festival widow. I of course should use this time productively, and am actually planning to go read for a bit once I finish this, spend some time straightening up in here, and will sit down with the manuscript later on today to see what needs to be done and get organized with it as well so I can plan out my writing and editing needs for the rest of February. Hmmm…thinking about organizing and getting stuff done hasn’t fatigued me–we’ll see how that goes once I start actually moving around and trying to do things, shall we?

And on that note, I am off to the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday wherever you are, Constant Reader!

Style

Friday morning, and I had an absolutely lovely night’s sleep, thank you for asking. It’s the final day of the work week, the weekend looms, and as always, I have a million and a half things to get done before Monday. I somehow managed to fall behind on the writing again–by the time I was finished with my work-at-home duties yesterday I was exhausted again–and as such, didn’t write another word. So I need to get my writing going again today, knowing I am at least two chapters behind that need to be caught up, and yes–NO PRESSURE THAT AT ALL, is there?

I have some copy edits for an essay that dropped into my inbox this morning, which shouldn’t be too terrible an issue to deal with over the course of the weekend–then again, I’ve not really looked at them, either, so it could be absolutely horrifying once I open the document–but again, I don’t see that I won’t be able to get caught up on everything that must be done this weekend. What I really need to do is make a to-do list; I’ve been meaning to all week and yet somehow have not managed to get around to it yet. Gah. But that’s the kind of week this has been; 2020, after dragging all fucking year, seems to have now speeded up time now that it’s coming to a close, continuing to prove itself to be a shit-bag of a year.

Given how much optimism we all had for 2020 and what we ended up receiving, I am a bit afraid of 2021, to be completely honest.

I did manage to get some things done yesterday, and I managed to watch Superman whilst making condom packs yesterday; the 1978 version with Christopher Reeve. I hadn’t seen the movie in years–I saw it originally in the theater and then watched again when it was on HBO in the early 1980’s–and wasn’t really prepared for the impact it would still have, many years later, on a rewatch. As I watched, my nimble hands breaking off condoms in groups of four and shoving them into little plastic bags, along with a packet of lube and instructions on how to properly use them, I found myself catapulted backwards in time and remembering the time period. The movie’s slogan was You will believe a man can fly and you also have to remember the late 1970’s was when films–and special effects–were changed forever after Star Wars and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Superman was the acme of super-heroes; perhaps the most famous, the most loved, and possibly the very first comic-book hero with superpowers, and bringing him to the big screen with a huge budget and special effects to make it look like he actually had powers was a huge deal. It was a huge hit, set the stage for several sequels, and showed Hollywood that comic book heroes were big-ticket items–it can easily be argued that there would be no MCU, no Arrowverse on television, and no Batman movies had there never been Superman first. The first sequel was also a huge hit, but the franchise began to run out of steam with the third, and the fourth was misbegotten from the very beginning.

On this rewatch, Christopher Reeve was even more perfect than I remembered, and Margot Kidder, whom I always believed was miscast, actually fit the role much better than she had in my memories. But what made the movie work–just as how the Patty Jenkins Wonder Woman worked–was how Reeve, at that point a complete unknown whose biggest role had been on the soap Love of Life, fit the role like a hand in a glove. He looked the part, had the right body for the part, and he just was Clark and Superman–and the physical differences between the two different characters–entirely dependent on how Reeve held himself, stood, and his posture–I could see how you wouldn’t see one as the other. Obviously, there were some flaws–how on earth did Lois Lane afford a penthouse with that glorious view and patio deck on a reporter’s salary? How did reversing the Earth’s spinning turn back time so he could save Lois–and didn’t turning the clock back change a lot of other things as well? DC was still in its Golden Age–the Crisis on Infinite Earths reboot was still some years in the future–and so this film fits into that comic book era; they were trying to update the comics and giving their characters more of modern flare and new costumes for the most part at this time, before realizing their universe was so convoluted and confusing they needed to start over. This was the period when Wonder Woman had gotten rid of her powers; when Supergirl was poisoned, which led to her powers becoming unreliable and actually coming and going beyond her control; when two more Green Lanterns turned up on earth in addition to the original; and Green Arrow going more in a Batman-like grim direction.

But it was an uplfiting movie, putting a clear-cut hero on the screen, and it is to Reeve’s credit that he made Superman’s integrity, code of ethics, and kind concern for all humanity from a two-dimensionality to a fully fleshed out, completely believable character that you root for. The John Williams score was excellent, and it really was perfectly cast–I apologize to Margot Kidder for hating her performance for all these years. It was also interesting to see the New York of the 1970’s (passing off as Metropolis), and remembering the way the culture saw the city in that decade (the Cynical 70’s Film Festival has also done a really good job of this); in some ways the perception of New York hasn’t really changed much since then, but it isn’t the same city today that it was back then. It was, I think, in the latter half of the 1970’s that Hollywood began to turn away from the cynicism of the decade and began making movies with happy endings or that were more uplifting in general–Star Wars, Superman, Rocky–the melding of those polarities in film deeply influenced the films of the 1980’s.

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