Tag: thunderstorms

The Joke

And here we are on Sunday morning, rested and refreshed and ready to dive into my last day off for this weekend. I slept late again today, after not having much of a busy day; mostly, I watched football games while doing chores and reading. LSU lost, but it wasn’t as bad as I feared it would be. And who knew that Auburn-Vanderbilt would be the game of the day? It was the best I’ve seen Auburn play all season, and it was a shame they lost in overtime. Apparently, Kentucky shellacked Florida last night, too. Tulane played Friday night, and they also won, continuing to be the pride of Louisiana football. Roll Wave!

As I read deeper into The Hunting Wives, the book continues to deviate from the show (which was very fun) and the tone is very different. I will, of course, write about the book and the show once I’ve finished reading it. I had also pushed off writing about Boots until after Halloween, and now I am not sure I remember it well enough to write about it. Ah, well, I have some other newsletters that I need to get written, too. I had a crisis of confidence last night about Chlorine; which is normal for me, I think. (I was spending some time plotting the story and had one of those you’re going to blow this great idea moments; which is self-defeating and the entire point of those wretched kind of thoughts and spirals. Those are holdovers from untreated anxiety, and if I let them run their course without allowing them to take root, they always pass. I’m confident about it again this morning, so this methodology definitely seems to work.) I’ll probably read some more this morning before I hop into the shower and get cleaned up. I am making my own version of Swedish meatballs later on, too.

The cold apparently will descend upon us later today. It’s warm this morning, if cloudy; we’ll probably have thunderstorms in the evening and overnight as the temperature drops to a low of 37 (!!!) overnight. Yesterday was lovely when I ran my errands; I also spent some time pruning the books down again. You can actually see the dent I made in my book hoarder stacks! This is enormously pleasing, and while I did end up putting some books back into the stacks that I considered donating (they intrigued me again while looking at them), I did make the kind of progress I wanted. Maybe next weekend I can be even more ruthless…I mean, some of these I bought ten years or so ago and still haven’t read; maybe it’s time to set them free so someone else can enjoy them instead of collecting dust here in the Lost Apartment, right? And at least I paid for them.

I was also thinking yesterday about my newsletter/blog/personal essays, and how I am always so reluctant to talk deeply about my affinity for some authors and the books I love because I don’t have a degree in Literature and don’t read extensively academic explorations of literature, which makes me fear that anything I might have to say might have already been said (multiple times) by any number of Lit professors, and been dissected, deconstructed, and developed through vigorous debate and argument. It was more self-defeating talk; I may not have read as much of the classics as I maybe should have (most of which I didn’t enjoy in the least) or practiced such things on classics in the collegiate classroom (some day, I will discuss at great length my many failures at secondary education), but ultimately, it always boils down to opinion, doesn’t it? The newsletter essays also aren’t something I generally just write off the top of my head as I experience them; they marinate for a while in my head and I may take more than one run at the topic, too, before sharing them with my slowly growing subscription base. (This blog, on the other hand, is whatever comes to mind in the morning as I drink my coffee, and yawn and stretch and try to come alive.) That’s why I decided to separate opinion essays on movies, books, and television out from here to the newsletter, which eases the time burden on thinking about culture I consume. And the essays are supposed to be creative outlets for me to write about things that interest me, and I have soooo many varied interests.

And it also allows me to write personal essays about my life and past. I am writing one now that was inspired by going to my parents’ high school’s Homecoming game the last time I went up to Alabama. I also thought some yesterday, not just about Chlorine but several other things I am writing or have in progress that I’d love to get off my desk throughout the end of this year and next. I think maybe finishing all this work in progress might make me feel a little less harried and frenzied and behind on everything? Who knows?

And on that note, my book is calling to me, so I am going to head to my easy chair to do some reading. Have a great Sunday and I will be back in the morning.

Maidens supporting a roof on the Acropolis, Athens.

Lay A Little Lovin’ On Me

Thursday last day in the office for me for the week blog, and I am glad it’s nearing the end of this week. I got tired yesterday afternoon at work–the big tired; not fatigue but just super-tired from getting up and working so much already. The book continues to go well, and I got more work done on it last night, too. Huzzah! I am also having dinner tonight in the Marigny with a good friend, which I am also looking forward to. We’re having a bit of a thunderstorm this morning–thunder woke me up before either the alarm or the alarm kitty–but I remained snug in my bed under my pile of blankets and wishing I didn’t have to get up at all. I love rain so much. I am also a little bit on the tired side this morning, par for the course for a rainy Thursday morning. I hope the fatigue doesn’t set in, else I’ll be a drag at dinner.

And that won’t be much fun, will it?

Probably not.

Gloom and rain all day, though, should pick me right up, right? LOL. I do hope, though, that it rains through the night.

I did come straight home from work yesterday, and the groceries were delivered shortly after I got home. We caught up on the news (Paul worked at home, so was here when I got home), and watched this week’s episode of The Morning Show before we went to bed early. Exciting, isn’t it? I also worked on the book last night and I am very pleased with how it is all coming together. It’s been so long, you know, since I’ve finished a book. Did I just go two years without a book being released? Yep, it looks that way, and so much has happened since the last time I finished a book that I don’t really remember much of writing or finishing it, and frankly, I’m not even sure what my last book published was, in all honesty. My memory issues are becoming a little bit on the scary side…but it’s probably all related to trauma and surgeries and getting older. It also started getting worse when I changed medications…but trading my memory for no anxiety was well worth it, frankly. I sleep better, I don’t freak out, my moods don’t swing…it’s really lovely.

Although the frequent memory lapses get concerning occasionally.

I’m also very glad I am back into the right writing headspace. I am enjoying doing the work again–memory lapses mean I don’t remember the last time I enjoyed the work and didn’t view it as drudgery, in all honesty. The book is becoming much better as I work through it, and yes, I do have some chapters to write still, of course; but I am confident I can get all of it done by the revised deadline, which is next week. I will be watching football games on Saturday, but will most likely work on the book in the morning before the games start. I can also copy edit with the manuscript in my lap, too. I also need to finish reading The Hunting Wives so I can officially move into Halloween Horror Month, kicking it off with the annual reread and discussion of The Haunting of Hill House, which I consider a perfect novel. I may reread The Dead Zone by Stephen King as well; it has seemed very timely since 2015 to me, and I’ve wanted to reread it again ever since the bloated monster’s escalator ride. (Et tu, UN escalator?) I am also going to work on short stories during October, methinks, because I don’t want to immerse myself in another book while working with my editor on making this new Scotty an excellent read. Huzzah! I’m kind of excited about it, to be honest.

I can’t wait to get my box o’books.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines on this gloomy and rainy day. Hope you have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will commune with you again tomorrow morning!

Don’t Cha Stop

It was supposed to rain this morning, but the sun is shining and the sky is bright blue. I slept well again last night until Sparky got me up this morning, wanting his breakfast. (He is such a sweet boy.) I had a lovely day yesterday, actually. I ran my errands in the morning, ordered groceries to be delivered last evening, and had a pretty nice day overall. I finished rereading my Jay Bennett and Barbara Michaels novels1, and hope to finish reading the Megan Abbott today. I also watched a lot of television while doing chores and reading before falling asleep in my chair last night after a nice, relaxing day. Here’s to having another today, right?

Netflix has a new show about the 2024 SEC football season called Any Given Saturday, and so I watched about four episodes of that while Paul slept on the couch. It’s very well done, and while I don’t feel it pays enough attention to LSU–and what there is focuses on games they lost (really? No coverage of the amazing upset of Top Ten-ranked Mississippi?)–it is nice to see the stories on the other teams and get a recap of the season. The show, of course, is hype for the upcoming season; the pro pre-season is already under way. I think LSU can be really good this year, but LSU always manages to find a way to LSU. There are only two episodes of the show left–we switched it off to watch Wednesday, which we also didn’t finish last night–that I may have on in the background this morning while I read.

I think I am going to go ahead and spend some time with the news and my coffee this morning before finishing this. I’ll be back momentarily, Constant Reader. (According to the weather, we should be having a thunderstorm in five minutes, which I don’t think is going to happen, given how it currently looks out there.)

It’s now noon, and it never rained here. It does look like the calm before a storm outside my windows at the moment, but I’ve already closed up my wagon and put it away (I’d left it out last night after the delivery) just in case. I got cleaned up–even shaving–and that woke me up and made me feel being productive for a while. I put Any Given Saturday back on to stream, getting through the last two episodes while reading more of El Dorado Drive and marveling at what a fucking MASTER Megan Abbott is; she may be the best writer publishing today, and is definitely in the top tier without question. I also picked out my next reads: the reread will be Life Among the Savages by Shirley Jackson2 and the juvenile/young adult will be The Secret of the Red Scarf, which belongs to a close-to-forgotten girls’ series featuring Nancy Drew rip-off Kay Tracey, and I won’t decide on the new new-to-me read until I finish the Abbott–I’m currently torn between Mia Manansala’s latest or Disco Witches of Fire Island or Lev AC Rosen’s Rough Pages; all queer authors, I might add.

But The Hunting Wives might win the race in a photo-finish.

As I finished off Any Given Saturday, I found myself very curious about the lack of coverage for Texas, Georgia, Oklahoma, and Auburn, among others…and LSU and Alabama were only covered in reference to their games with South Carolina and Vanderbilt, period. Was it about getting some of these lesser-known programs more coverage? And it’s definitely difficult to cover 16 teams with any degree of depth and certainly every team had a story to tell this past year. But it definitely whetted my appetite for the return of college football, which was its intent, so mission accomplished, Netflix.

I’d forgotten we’d watched Towards Zero in between the SEC show and Wednesday; I’d seen bad reviews of it so was curious as to what we would think of it. I remembered the story as soon as I saw the geography of the setting, which is crucial to the crime, and yes, I was proven correct in the third episode. It was fine, if perhaps not really needing a third episode? It did feel like it was dragged out more than it needed to be, which is not a good sign for a murder mystery.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. I need to do some picking up and organizing and cleaning, and I am also going to write for a while before probably returning to the Abbott. I doubt I will be back later; I may finish a newsletter today and I may not. If not, I will be here again in the morning before the infusion. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader!

  1. I will write newsletters about both authors at some point. ↩︎
  2. I’ve always wanted to write about this unique Jackson book; I usually reread The Haunting of Hill House every October. ↩︎

Moving in Stereo

Good morning, Constant Reader! Hope you sprang forth from your bed wide awake and a-rarin’ to go, because today is Wednesday! We’ve made it to the halfway point again this week! Huzzah! Although this week hasn’t been terrible, other than being tired when I get home from work every day. I feel oddly more awake and alert this morning; not sure what that is about, but I am not going to argue with it, either. I’ll ride this wave as long as it lasts before petering out at shore.

It rained off and on for most of the day and it was gloomy a lot yesterday. I am never really sure what’s going on with the weather when I am at work; my testing room doesn’t have a window, and I don’t get near the windows on the floor very often. But a couple of clients were wet from the rain when they came in, and the few times I was around the front desk I could see the rain. It was nice when I made groceries after work, but it started sprinkling when I got home and it rained for most of the night. I got very tired yesterday afternoon, just as I was getting ready to head home. (I did cancel one errand I was going to run because I was tired, but was very proud of myself for making groceries.) I also did some writing work when I got home, too. Yay for me! I’ve not really experienced the page opening and me falling into it yet1. I haven’t had that experience in quite a while; which I think is what has been fueling the Imposter Syndrome2 of the last few years. But I am slowly doing more and more, and my creativity, despite being covered in dust and cobwebs, is getting better, too.

I slept well again last night–trust me, I do not miss insomnia–and could happily go back to bed this morning. It looks like a sunny morning out there, and the forecast shows no rain for the day.

Then again, yesterday’s forecast said no rain until the evening, too. They’re inevitably always wrong here in the tropical season.

I do think being tired affects my ability to write, because now when I’m tired physically, I also am tired emotionally and mentally.

Being Tuesday, I made tacos for dinner last night when I got home and in spite of being tired, I managed to do the dishes before making dinner. Paul came downstairs, and I queued up Unspeakable Sins, which continues to be a rollercoaster ride (spoiler: the only decent character in the show is the escort; everyone else is kind of awful but so fun to watch) and we’re over halfway finished. There were two more kidnappings and now everyone knows the faked death was actually faked and Claudio is still alive–and last night we did find out who was behind everything going on. I kind of suspected that character already, and they just became a lot more interesting! One thing I have noticed about this show–I noticed it right away–is how they’ve embraced the physical beauty of Andres Baida and how much the camera sexualizes him in a way usually reserved for women3. He is shirtless in every episode at least once, and we generally see his bare ass every episode too–and how the camera lingers on his body is the way it usually does on women. His introduction to the viewers was him rising from a swimming pool in tight little square cuts, slowly revealing his muscular form as it rose, shining and wet and dripping, out of the water. Last night there was an episode where he was being tortured for information by a ruthless gangster. His wrists were chained together, his shirt was gone, and his arms were straight overhead, the chain holding him up. He looked like he was being lifted right out of his low-rise pants which were barely hanging on, his face and torso covered in oil and sweat and some blood, and it looked almost like a scene from a gay bondage porn film.

And tonight Wednesday drops. Huzzah!

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

I always thought Michael Newman was hotter than David Hasselhoff on BAYWATCH.
  1. Callback/shout out to Misery by Stephen King. ↩︎
  2. Whom we are no longer listening to under any circumstances. ↩︎
  3. Make no mistake, I am on board with the sexualization of men in film and television. ↩︎

Photograph

Saturday morning and I feel rested after a very good night’s sleep. I got my work done yesterday after which we went to Costco, and groceries were delivered last night. All of this wore me out on top of all the chores I got done yesterday as well. I finally collapsed into my easy chair, Paul and Sparky curled up on the couch, and we binged about three or four episodes of The Hunting Wives, and there’s only two episodes to finish off tonight. I have a lot of errands to run this morning–prescriptions, mail, and two other stops–and then want to spend the afternoon writing and reading. I am having dinner with two friends from high school (!!!) that are in town for the weekend later on this evening, but it’s early enough so when I get home we can finish off the show, which is amazing (although there is no way that kid has a basketball scholarship to Baylor).

We’re supposed to have thunderstorms tonight, which will be fun as it always is (and will help me sleep very well again). Tomorrow I don’t have to leave the house at all other than taking out trash or using the grill (I think I’m going to make beef stroganoff tomorrow rather than burgers), which will be nice. I am going to try to do some more straightening up around here today–and will try not to be horrifically lazy the way I sometimes get on weekends–around writing and reading. I’d like to finish the Abbott today (or this weekend), and I also need to get through my Elizabeth Peters and Jay Bennett rereads as well. I’m not really sure what to read next: Rough Pages by Lev AC Rosen, perhaps, or maybe some horror, I can’t and don’t need to decide right now, either. I think my next Gothic reread might be either a Phyllis Whitney or Victoria Holt. Not sure on the kids/young adult next read or reread, either.

And I think Wednesday comes back next week, which is cool.

I did make some good progress on my workspace yesterday. It’s still a bit messy this morning, but just some straightening and filing is all that is necessary to get it all under control again. I think I’ve been feeling closed in and claustrophobic in the house because we have so much clutter everywhere, which isn’t much fun (the claustrophobic feeling), and that’s also because the heat and humidity of August is almost a sentient thing outside my windows; something oppressive and thick to the point where it feels like we’re in a cave sometimes. I just don’t have the energy to spend an entire day focused on cleaning, you know? Sparky making messes everywhere he goes doesn’t help on the cleaning front, either–always knocking shit off flat surfaces, like all cats do. He’s lucky he’s so sweet and cuddly.

I did actually think about what I need to revise this weekend yesterday, and I kind of know what to write now; it’s going to be an extensive revision, which should be fun to do and I will feel like I accomplished something today when I am done.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines for the day. I’m going to go catch up on the local and national news (depressing and horrifying as the national news inevitably always is) before I go run the errands and kick the day off.

Excitable

Ah, Thursday. Last day in the office for the week, and it should be a good day, methinks. We’re in another heat advisory with thunderstorms hitting periodically through the day. (It also rained yesterday, which was a surprise.) I stopped and made groceries on the way home from work, despite being fairly tired–my legs were fatigued and a bit sore all day for some reason that escapes me–but I slept well last night and feel pretty good–if groggy–with my coffee this morning. I didn’t write yesterday–I was tired when I got home, but did some chores anyway–but am hoping to get back in the saddle tonight. Fingers crossed, but my lower body doesn’t feel fatigued this morning so I think that’s a good sign.

It’s actually pleasant outside this morning–I just took out the trash–but as I said, we’re in a heat advisory which will hit us later on. I’m going to have groceries delivered tomorrow, and after my work-at-home duties we are making our biweekly Costco run. It should be a good weekend. A couple of old friends from high school in Kansas are going to be in town this weekend, so may get to see them at some point, and I should be able to get work done and the apartment cleaned this weekend as well as get some rest. I’m glad that I feel good on the fourth morning of the week in the office; that certainly bodes well for the rest of the weekend. I do need to write this weekend, so I can’t be the lazy slug that I would prefer to be. Sigh.

But at least I got the dishes done last night! I’ll put them away after work tonight, as I need to straighten up the kitchen for on-line department meeting tomorrow. I think I’ve permanently blurred out the background for my on-line things, but one never knows.

I also reread something that I need to get revised sooner rather than later, which made me think about my writing process and how the drafts actually go. I always do the first draft in my own voice; I haven’t gotten a firm grasp on the characters yet, so have to go back in other drafts to hone the character’s voice and erase mine. Future drafts are to clean up language, catch discrepancies and fix them (which is becoming harder as I get older because my memory is getting so bad). I also rework the earlier chapters a lot more than I do the later ones, primarily because the voice starts making its presence known the further I get into the book, so I don’t need to rework the voice as much in the later chapters.

Even if it’s a little bit, I consider it a win when I write something fictional, or work on something for which I’ve already done a first draft, or a partial first draft–there are so many of these in the files, seriously; it’s past time to let go of some of them and accept I may never ever get around to writing them.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Thursday, and I rather doubt that I will be back later today! Check for me again tomorrow morning.

Run Riot

Wednesday Pay-the-Bills Day has rolled around yet again! Seems like it was just yesterday, doesn’t it? Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future…sorry for the musical interlude1, but surely I cannot be the only one who writes a sentence that’s a song lyric and has the song itself crowd its way into my consciousness? My life has always had a soundtrack; music has always been important to me, and I love listening to it. I wish I had any musical ability, really. I can’t sing and I play no instruments…well, I can sing in the sense that we can all do so, but doing it well? That’s a whole other subject.

I found out this week that National Geographic included the Tennessee Williams Literary Festival/Saints & Sinners as one of the top literary festivals in the world! How fucking cool is that? If you want to see it, you can click above to get there. Paul is very good at his job, I have to say.

I wrote last night. It was editing/rewriting/revising work, so I don’t know how much work I actually did2, but the file was a couple of dozen words over four thousand when I started and when I finished, working from front to back (as one does), it was a few words past five thousand. Some came easily, some did not; but when it would be difficult I didn’t give up but thought some more and looked ahead and back and it worked, I got unstuck. It felt good to write, I didn’t once have a moment of doubting myself or Imposter Syndrome3, which really made me feel better about everything and good about myself. It’s easy to slip into depression and bad thoughts when I am not writing, or am having difficulty with it. I am also looking forward to getting back to work tonight after work as well.

I have to run errands tonight on the way home from work; I’d rather not, to be honest, but we’re halfway through the week and said errands will cut down on leaving the house on the weekend, which is looming. Now that I am getting back into my writing every day I hope to get a lot done this weekend. I’d love to work through the month of August–despite the heat and tropical weather–so I can get everything finished by Labor Day so I can spend September figuring out what to write next. I also have a lot of short stories I need to revise and rework and get out on submission somewhere…anywhere.

We had a nice thunderstorm last night as I finished my writing work; thunder and lightning and a downpour, none of which were mentioned in the forecast. The heat advisory is still in place, and today’s forecast was updated to include a thunderstorm later this morning, and throughout the afternoon. Clearly the forecast changed since yesterday morning, as the rain was for later in the week. AH, well, I don’t mind rain as long as I am not out in it. Paul was home late–he waited to come home until the storm passed–and so we watched another episode of The Hunting Wives, which continues to be a trashy joy on the lines of classic television like Dynasty or Melrose Place. I actually hope Paul will be home earlier so we can watch two episodes tonight. Dermot Mulroney is also aging like a really fine wine…

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines and need to start paying bills. Have a great day, and I may be back later. You never know.

I’m developing a crush on handsome Will Sharpe.
  1. I’m also rediscovering my enjoyment of the Steve Miller Band. ↩︎
  2. I always measure it by word counts. ↩︎
  3. I am trying to not be so hard on myself, and Imposter Syndrome is one of those things that needs to be in the rearview mirror. ↩︎

Love Bites

Work at home Friday! My windows are covered in condensation, as we are expecting rain throughout the day–the thunderstorms are this afternoon. I have some things I need to get done today, including running to the postal service, and I would love to get the apartment finally under control (probably won’t happen) once I am finished with my work. It was a good week in the office, I must say. I slept in until about seven thirty this morning, before Sparky’s need to be fed became overpowering for him and he started hitting me in the face with one of his paws. Poor thing, he has no control over being fed so I always feel a bit guilty sleeping in.

Paul was late getting home again last night, and we watched the season premiere of South Park, and oh, how we laughed. It was one of the most brutal take-downs I’ve ever seen, and not only did 47 get burned like he was Dresden in early 1945, they also went after Paramount, CBS and 60 Minutes—and every last bit of the burns was well deserved. The fact that Paramount just paid $1.5 billion for five new seasons of the show and the streaming rights for every season is just *chef’s kiss*. (Which makes the Administration’s claim “the show has been irrelevant for over twenty years” even more butt-hurt hysterical.) I’ve not watched South Park in a very long time–not sure why or when I stopped watching, but I did–and this isn’t likely to make me want to go back and catch up on all the seasons I’ve missed, but it seems their anarchical mentality for satire has never been lost over the years?

I also kind of love that apparently the show has irritated liberals over the past decade for “punching down”, which made the Right think South Park was for them…and they just found out that it’s most definitely not. Thoughts and prayers, trash, thoughts and prayers.

No one is safe from South Park.

We’re in another heat advisory today, and things may not cool off should we actually get the rain forecast later. I am most likely going to spend as much of the weekend indoors to escape the brutality of the dog days. The new Entergy bill wasn’t as horrific as I thought it might be; it’s still ridiculously high, but not so high that paying it will be a struggle. The bill that will be due in September will be horrible, as well, but then it will start coming down for fall and winter. However did people live down here without air conditioning is a question I ask myself almost every day in the summer–but if you’ve never had it, you don’t miss it, and you adapt to the climate.

There have been a lot of celebrity deaths lately. Ozzy Osbourne, Malcolm Jamal-Warner, and Chuck Mangione all died this past week. Hulk Hogan also died, but that one didn’t hit me with a slight pang of oh that’s a shame; hearing of his death was another one of those good riddance to racist homophobic MAGA trash. I used to be a fan of Hulk Hogan, back in the days when it was the WWF and they did all those crossovers with MTV, which was a lot of fun to follow…but Hogan began wearing thin on me in the 1990s, and by the time we found out he was a bigot (and MAGA), I’d long since been done with him; that information only served to let me know I was right to think he was a garbage person. He did a lot for professional wrestling back in the day, but that didn’t mean he was good at actual wrestling. He had a large personality and knew how to work a crowd, but in the ring he didn’t really have much of a repertoire; he had very limited skills and clearly no desire to learn more…he was just a big man. (Ultimate Warrior was also a shitty wrestler with a huge body.)

Have fun in hell, Hulk.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Friday, Constant Reader, and I’ll check back in with you again tomorrow.

Such pretty eyes!

Pour Some Sugar on Me

Thursday and my last day in the office for the week. I slept well again last night–didn’t want to get out from under my pile of blankets this morning, yet again–and we also had an amazing thunderstorm last night. Lightning was very close, the thunder rolled for what seemed like forever, and twice the power fluttered on and off before I went to bed. I had a good day at work yesterday–got a lot done there–and picked up the mail on the way home and there was plenty of it, too. This weather is the return of the system that was supposed to flood us this past weekend; it made a U-turn and basically came back. There’s no flood watch or anything, so it’s not as scary this time around, methinks. I did some chores when I got home before my usual catch-up on the news, and once Paul got home we started watching Untamed. We were on our second episode of the evening when the power blinked out then back on the first time, and it took forever for the wireless server to come back on line–Netflix is always slow to load, too–so we gave up for the evening. We’ll probably finish the show in another night or two, and then will have to find something new to watch again. Huzzah.

I am also still reeling a bit from how much my bi-monthly medication costs (#madness). It’s almost two hundred thousand dollars per year. Granted, that also includes the cost of the injection device that I have to attach to myself every eight weeks (I thought it was four; this is much better on me). It is on its way, and should be arriving sometime Friday at the postal service, so I can pop it into the refrigerator and keep it there until I need it in September. I have to go to the service on Friday anyway; I received the title pages for Double Crossing Van Dine anthology to sign (my co-editors, Donna Andrews and Art Taylor, have already signed them; I’m last to go) for the clothbound edition of the anthology. My story “The Spirit Tree,” is another Alabama story, for the record; yet another return to Corinth County! So one of the things I need to do either tonight or tomorrow morning is sign them.

Apparently I need to watch last night’s episode of South Park? Social media is completely abuzz with clips and general hilarity about this new episode, which targets Dumble-dumb. Something to stream while bonding with my precious Sparky tonight, at any rate. I also need to check my to-do list as well as make a more comprehensive one for the weekend. I have plenty of work to do at home tomorrow, of course, and lots of chores and writing and editing and cleaning to do around that, as always. I am trying to get my email inbox cleaned out, and I also need to do some studying on things. I don’t think I have to sign up for Medicare before I actually retire or stop working, according to what I have read, which is kind of a relief; I’d rather not deal with that frustrating red tape until I actually have to, you know?

Insurance shouldn’t be this crazy and complicated and irritating, frankly.

Neither should life.

I also want to get another newsletter out–either about the recent trend by gymbros to build up a beautiful butt1, or my one about the kids’ series featuring Vicki Barr, (pre-feminist) stewardess! I also owe a gazillion emails…sigh.

And on that note, it’s off to the spice mines with me. Have a lovely Thursday, Constant Reader, and I will be back in the morning.

The Temple of Poseidon
  1. So much of a gym trend that Men’s Health published an article about it! ↩︎

The Main Thing

Work at home Friday, as we head into this weekend. It started sprinkling here around lunch time, and the deluge came after one. It was pouring, but only lasted for about an hour or so–but a lot of water came down. The rest of the day was just gray, with an occasional light sprinkle. My sinuses behaved, surprisingly, and I wasn’t that tired when I left for home. There was no traffic on the highway; I only had to slow down on the ramp to I-10 rather than the usual stop-and-go fifteen minutes it is usually. I guess a lot of people stayed home yesterday…but all of our appointments also showed up, which was nice. Looking at the weather this morning–currently sunny with scattered clouds, potential of rain at any moment until tomorrow–it appears we missed most of the rain yesterday, which wound up west of the city. The Atchafalaya basin got 11 inches of rain (!!!) yesterday instead of us; 11 inches of rain would have shut New Orleans down for the day. I slept very deeply and restfully last night, so I have no idea if we got any rain overnight. I feel pretty good this morning, too. The coffee is going down well, my coffee cake was perfection, and I’ll have either toast or cereal or yogurt as a follow up later. We’re still planning on going to Costco after work today, but that will depend on the rain. I also have dinner plans with a friend, but again–that will depend on the weather.

I did some chores when I got home from work last night–dishes and laundry–but my mind was pretty much mush by the time I was done with that, and then Paul came home while I was catching up on the news (Epstein! Epstein! Epstein!), and we started watching season two of America’s Sweethearts: The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders–which we used to watch when it aired on TNN as Making the Team. It’s definitely lots of fun; Paul and I are always fascinated by the two women who run the program, Kelly and Judy, who’ve pretty much dedicated their entire lives to the Dallas cheerleader program. (They also belong on a Real Housewives franchise, but are probably too busy.) I’m always fascinated by how these young women are sexualized by that uniform, but the show is always very careful to focus the cameras on the ones who come across as very sweet and virginal–or can play the part for the cameras, at least. I will definitely be talking more about this show!

But we’re on the cusp of another weekend, and I don’t have nearly as many chores to get done as I usually do, so I have a bit of a head start on the weekend; I won’t have to spend tomorrow morning cleaning or doing much of anything around here, so I can focus on reading my current books (Megan Abbott, Elizabeth Peters, Jay Bennett) and write. I’m not sure if the plans for the weekend include seeing Superman, but it’s playing in convenient nearby theaters, so it’s not a huge stretch for us to be able to see it. I’ve been a Superman fan since I was a kid and discovered the comic books and all the other media featuring him; I’ve read books, comic books, watched television shows and movies with him over the years–but I am also not one of those “fans” who feels betrayed by differences in adaptations, either. (Did Archie purists whine about Riverdale?) I’ve always been interested in the concept of super-heroes/metahumans etc., and have wanted to explore it in fiction sometime. But how can you be original when so much has been already done? Sigh. I always feel derivative when I’m writing anything, but that, I suspect, is a part of my imposter syndrome.

I really wish I could analyze the imposter syndrome right out of my brain.

It looks like we aren’t getting much rain today, after all, which will make the day a lot easier to deal with for errands and so forth. Huzzah! (The sun is shining now.)

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Sorry to be so dull, but that’s just the way it goes some weeks, you know? I will be back tomorrow morning, if not sooner; one never can be sure when the mood will strike! But have a great Friday, Constant Reader!

Steve Reeves in Trojan Horse