Thursday, July 30, 2015

Days of Bliss

Finally we've gotten some decent summer weather here in the Chicago area after June and the first half of July were filled with far too many cool and rainy days. And, to top it off, it looks like my upstairs neighbors are moving. Yea! I don't know if they're both leaving or just one, but I saw the female part of the dynamic duo outside with the UHaul. I resisted the urge to tell her, "Don't let the door hit you on the way out!" With my luck, someone new who's even more annoying will move into the apartment in her place. But, in the meantime, I'll enjoy not having to hear or see that chick and, hopefully, her bearded compadre.

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Insomnia

Years ago, when I was living in New Jersey, I went through a serious bout of insomnia. I could fall asleep at night, but I couldn't stay asleep. I tried all kinds of herbal remedies before finally breaking down and going to my doctor. She prescribed a small dose of Ambien for me and it helped me sleep through the night, but I had weird dreams while I was on it. We all have weird dreams from time to time, but the Ambien made me have weird dreams much more often. I haven't been on Ambien for years, but I still have occasional nights of insomnia and it's the same thing: I fall asleep and then wake up and can't go back to sleep for several hours. I've  read all kinds of self-help tips for falling asleep: only use your bed for sex and sleep, don't watch or read anything with a digital screen before you go to sleep, blah, blah, blah. But what happens when you use these tips and you're still wide awake at three in the morning??? I'm all for the use of prescription and/or OTC drugs to knock me out when I need to sleep and can't. Insomnia is a bitch and that bitch sometimes needs a little help to be taken down.

Sunday, July 26, 2015

Grace and Frankie

I watched the first episode of the Netflix series Grace and Frankie last night starring Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin and found it very cute. It's the story of two older women whose husbands (who are also business partners) announce they're gay, that they've been having a relationship for twenty years behind their wives' back, and that they're planning to marry, now that it's legal. What's refreshing about the show is that the main cast is filled entirely with older people (Fonda, Tomlin, Martin Sheen, and Sam Waterston. That's not something you see a lot these days. The writing is tight, the acting is great, and the storyline is interesting. I'd read about the show in the NY Times and now that I have streaming service, I was actually able to sit down and watch it. I read a comment online somewhere that the bulk of good writing these days is on TV because TV writers don't have to be concerned about overseas appeal the way movie writers do. Shows like True Detective (the first season--I haven't seen the second yet though I heard it sucks), Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, and others probably wouldn't translate well overseas because they deal with largely American themes and issues, but that's okay. Everything can't appeal to everyone nor should it have to. Good writing is being churned out for a lot of small screen shows and these shows seem to be finding an audience, which is great.

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Upstairs Downstairs

When I lived in Brooklyn, I had a weird guy living in the apartment upstairs from me. He looked weird and he WAS weird. He had a nightly ritual of pacing between the kitchen and the bedroom before he went down for the night. I likened his behavior to that of a dog who has to circle his dog bed several times before finally climbing into it and going to sleep. Prior to that, when I lived in New Jersey, I lived briefly below a couple involved in a domestic abuse situation. I don't even think the man lived there, but he was there enough that I suspected he was beating the woman who did live there. The first weekend after she moved in, she and her boyfriend fought violently. I could hear her sobbing. I complained to the management about the situation and it would stop for a few weeks before starting up again. Thankfully, I was on a six-month lease at the time, so I didn't have to endure this situation for a long time before I moved to Brooklyn, but riding out those last months wasn't easy. The woman also had children in the apartment so these kids, no doubt, had to witness their mom getting her ass kicked on a regular basis. Sad. I probably should have called the police on my neighbor, but I didn't because I feared for my own safety. I would see the abusive boyfriend sitting in the parking lot of the complex in his car waiting, I assume, for the woman who lived above me to return home. (I guess he didn't actually have a set of keys to the place.) I didn't want this guy coming after me if I called the cops on him. Hell, I lived there alone! After I moved, I read there had been a shooting at the complex and a woman was killed by her boyfriend and I wondered if the murdered woman was my upstairs neighbor.

My current upstairs neighbors don't have a pacing ritual and they don't seem to abusive towards one another, but they're still weird and annoying. The male and female couple (I'm not really sure what they're relationship is--friends, lovers, whatever) just give me the creeps. My interactions with them have been brief and uncomfortable. One time I heard someone trying and failing to unlock the front door and when I opened the front door, I found the woman who lives upstairs standing there. She claimed she'd mistaken my apartment for her own. Really? Whenever I see Frick and Frack (my nicknames for them), I avoid them like the plague. There's something off-putting about them. They look sickly, like they don't get enough sunlight, and they just creep me out.

Wednesday, July 22, 2015

Jesus, Take the Wheel!

I have said in the past that I'm not the greatest driver. I used to be a better driver, but after not having a car for a few years when I lived in Brooklyn, my driving skills suffered. Actually, they suffered before then, but that brief stint didn't help. In any case, I'm forced to be a driver once again and I'm dealing with it. This morning while I was on the way to my day job, I was behind a truck towing a trailer on 294 and one of the back trailer tires just blew out. There was debris everywhere and the smell of the blown tire was enough to choke you. I was praying none of the tire parts would crack my windshield or cause any other kind of damage to my car. I wasn't even able to get from behind the trailer due to traffic, so I just rode the brakes until the truck was able to maneuver onto the shoulder. The whole experience was frightening but, thankfully, no damage was done (or none that I know of).

In other vehicular news, I can't stop thinking about Sandra Bland and her traffic stop from hell. How does a woman end up dead after being pulled over for a minor traffic violation? This whole thing stinks and I hope the family gets to the bottom of it and finds out what really happened. I've only been pulled over by the police twice while driving and both incidents happened a long time ago. One time I was pulled over because I had a brake light out. (I had no idea it was out.) The other time was due to speeding. In both cases, I wasn't ticketed. And, in both cases I, a non-white woman, was stopped in suburban largely-white communities. So how did I manage to avoid getting tickets? I got lucky. The police officers I dealt with were not aggressive or hostile towards me, I was apologetic, and I had a clean driving record. I hope I never have to deal with the police in a situation similar to Sandra Bland. The thought scares the hell out of me. Jesus, take the wheel if I ever have the misfortune to be pulled over by some cop who decides he wants to flex his muscles through intimidation. Ending up in jail for a weekend because of a failure to signal when changing lanes? That's absurd. It's also frightening.

Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Reading and Writing

Since my move from New York about a year and a half ago, I've found that I'm not writing daily as much as I used to. Maybe living in Brooklyn just put me in the mood to write more. (Nah, I was just so broke that I couldn't go anywhere and stayed home and wrote!) Whatever the reason, I'm trying to right that wrong by getting myself back on track. I have two pieces in the works now. One is farther along than the other and almost done and the other still needs a lot of work, but it's coming along. I'm also working on a shorter piece that it's a nice break from the longer stuff. Normally I don't work on more than one thing at a time, but I'm breaking that rule temporarily because I feel I need to. I'll be taking a little vacation from my day job next month to relax and, hopefully, get to work on my own work.

In addition to slacking on the writing, I've also been slacking on the reading, but I'm working on improving that too. I hate that I'm forced to drive to work now, hence losing my precious public commuting time that I used to read. Yes, public transit is sometimes awful and there were days when I was riding the F train and I wished I was in my own car away from everyone, but at least I had some uninterrupted time to read during my commutes to and from work. I could sit back for those 45 minute rides to and from Brooklyn and get some serious pages knocked down. Those days, sadly, are over. I need to get back on the train. Seriously.

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Feeding the Beast

Ever since the whole Gawker debacle involving the outed Conde Nast executive unfolded last week, I've been thinking about it. I've had mixed feelings about Gawker for some time, as I've expressed here on my blog and, for a while a few years ago, I had stopped reading the site entirely because I found it too vicious and nasty. I am not a fan of outing anyone who is minding his/her business and not obstructing the rights of others (via government legislation or something similar). To just pick on some guy and put his failed hookup out there for public consumption seems juvenile to me, but I understand why it was done. The Internet is a beast that must be fed. Web pages don't view themselves! Many clicks are needed to justify advertising prices. In other words, putting people's personal lives on blast via the Internet is a financial decision. The public wants and needs gossip, preferably about people who are in the public eye. The sleazier the news, the larger the audience. A failed hookup between a married guy and a male hustler? Clickbait! Hey, I read the story before it was taken down as did many other people, I'm sure. But when the drumbeat of criticism came from other media outlets, the story was pulled and an apology was issued. I find it amazing that so many other sites have jumped on the bandwagon to criticize Gawker for doing the same thing they do themselves. Everyone's fighting for page clicks and, sometimes, that fight gets nasty.

Saturday, July 18, 2015

Brian Culbertson / Boney James

I am a huge smooth jazz fan and last night I had the pleasure of seeing Brian Culbertson and Boney James in concert at the Chicago Theater. The show was great. I'd seen Brian in concert years ago in Philadelphia. He's an excellent performer and a very talented musician. He plays the piano and the trombone during his shows. Fun fact: in my books, I have a character named Brian and I got that name from Brian Culbertson. When I first started writing the book that turned into Clean Hands I was living in Philadelphia and I had Culbertson on my mind after seeing him in concert, hence the name. His performance last night was  great but he didn't do one song that I love called "Secrets" so I was a little bummed about that, but the guy has a lot of albums and he can't do every song from them.

Saxophonist Boney James did an equally great job last night. I'd never seen him in concert before, but he put on an excellent show. His music is just very soothing and sexy and I love it.


Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Oy!

Are Amy Schumer's 15 minutes of fame up yet? I'm tired of seeing her name and tired of seeing her face.

And what's up with people refusing to read Harper Lee's new book because Atticus isn't the hero they thought he'd be? Really? Grow up, folks! Atticus isn't Gregory Peck! I don't understand how anyone can disregard a book before even reading (or at least attempting to read) it.

Sunday, July 12, 2015

A Dark-Adapted Eye

I recently read Barbara Vine's mystery A Dark-Adapted Eye and I also watched the BBC adaptation of the novel again. (I'd seen it in the 1990s when it aired, but I didn't remember much about it.) Thankfully, it's on You Tube now since there's no DVD version available in the US. It's the story of two sisters. One sister kills the other and then hangs for the crime. What's fascinating about the book is the way Vine weaves and later exposes so many family secrets into the plot. As I was reading the book, I kept thinking, If these people just talked to each other honestly, a lot of these problems could be worked out! But these upper-crust British folks during the time period when the novel takes place (largely during WWII in the 1940s and after the war in the early to mid-1950s) just didn't discuss personal things freely. The main characters were so concerned with keeping up appearances and lying to make others think that nothing was wrong that their lies and denial ultimately wrecked their family. Pay no attention to the main behind the curtain! There's also a homosexual plot line within the novel, something I didn't recall from the miniseries (but I did see it initially probably 20 years ago). The gay character who is later revealed as such in the novel, came as a surprise to me because I didn't see it coming. (Watching the miniseries now, I certainly picked up on it, but when I read the book, I didn't.) I wrote recently about another Barbara Vine book I read and enjoyed called No Night Is Too Long and that book, as with this one, had gay characters. I'm about to read Vine's novel The Child's Child and that one also has a gay character. I had no idea Vine rolled like that until I started reading her work. Kudos to the late author for being so progressive in her writing.

Thursday, July 9, 2015

Unsanitary

Normally, I don't post a lot about celebrity shenanigans, but I had to say something about Ariana Grande's Donutgate. I haven't watched the donut-licking video, but I've read enough about it to be disgusted. How can anyone lick food and then not buy it? That's nasty and unsanitary. You lick it, you buy it! What amazes me is, not only did Grande give a non-apologetic apology after her donut-licking was caught on tape, but she doubled-down and turned her anti-American statement into a criticism against what Americans eat. Huh? You lick public donuts (and don't pay for them), criticize America and Americans (the country where you live, were born, and became successful), and then you turn your insults into a condemnation of the eating habits of Americans. Girl, please. Let's see how long it takes for her to issue a real apology, hopefully written by an adult (i.e. publicist).

Wednesday, July 8, 2015

Do Your Job, Kentucky Kim Davis!

What a bizarre day. The NYSE went down for several hours, United Airlines stopped flights for a time, the Wall Street Journal's website went down. Oy! But the story that really got my attention today was Kentucky County Clerk Kim Davis refusing to issue a marriage license to a gay couple who came to the clerk's office to get one. These kind of stories have been in the news a lot lately since the SCOTUS ruling a week or so ago, but I was shocked to read about the latest case because the Kentucky clerk and I share the same name. Kim Davis denies a gay wedding license? What? From this Kim Davis to the Kentucky one, do your job, lady! If you were hired to issue marriage licenses, issue them or get another job. I bet Kim's religious beliefs didn't stop her from issuing licenses to heterosexual couples who may have been previously divorced or who were former (or current) adulterers or spousal abusers. People like Kentucky Kim are the same kinds of people who probably refused to issue marriage licenses to interracial couples after the law was passed allowing people of different races to marry. Ridiculous.

Monday, July 6, 2015

New Kindle


I got my new Kindle last week right before the holiday and earlier than expected. (Thanks, Amazon!) I do like it, but I still hate myself for breaking my old one. One thing I would suggests that Amazon run book ads that are actually based on recommendations they give you. I'm sure they would have more success with those ads if they were actually tailored to the reader based in the reader's book purchases. I see ads for books by Nora Roberts on my Kindle and I have never read nor bought a book by this woman and I don't intend to. (No offense to Nora or to fans of her work.)

Sunday, July 5, 2015

Halloween III

I know it's July 5, but I've got Halloween III: Season of the Witch on my mind. (Thanks, Svengoolie!) When I initially saw Halloween III back in the 80s, I was disappointed because it didn't follow the Michael Myers storyline from the first two Halloween movies. No, Halloween III went off the rails entirely with a plot involving mind control via a corporation that made Halloween masks. I didn't appreciate the greatness of Halloween III until many years later when I saw the movie as an adult. It really is a good movie and the message of corporations controlling the public would be timely today, too. Plus, the little Silver Shamrock song with the London Bridges theme that plays throughout the movie is infectious. "Two more days till Halloween..." Another mind control movie from the 80s that's good is They Live with Rowdy Roddy Piper. That one involved non-humans taking a human form that wasn't detectable unless you had special glasses. They Live and Halloween III were both ahead of their time. I don't know if the whole mind control plot device was popular in the 80s because of things going on politically at the time (Reagan, the Berlin Wall, AIDS, etc.). Was there more paranoia out there because of current events? Probably, but, as someone told me once at a job interview, the paranoid have enemies, too.

Magic Mike XXL

During this long holiday weekend, I did manage to go to the movies and see Magic Mike XXL and I found the film largely entertaining. The first Magic Mike certainly had its moments (mainly those involving Channing dancing and Matthew doing anything), but it wasn't that great overall. It was too long, Alex Petty-whatever-his-name-is annoyed me, and Cody Horn was as dry as a Saltine cracker. But XXL tried to make up for those mistakes by getting rid of Alex and Cody and focusing on the strippers (or "male entertainers" as they liked to be called). Too bad Matthew bowed out of this one, but I guess he figured he was too "big time" to star in the sequel since he's an Oscar award winning actor now. Don't expect any Academy Award winning dialogue here, just a lot of bumping, grinding, and pelvic thrusting. Sometimes I just want to go to the movies and be entertained and Magic Mike XXL did just that.

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Random Stuff

I don't have a coherent theme to my post today, so I'll just throw out some things that have been on my mind.

1. Flip Flops: I've been reading articles on NY Magazine's site about men wearing flip flops. Is this a bad thing or a good thing? I am not a fan of flip flops on men or women because I hate the sound of the sole slapping against someone's foot. (Full disclosure: I do have two pairs of flip flops, but I really only wear them when I'm going to get a pedicure or around some body of water like a pool or the beach.) But back to the question at hand: should men wear flip flops? I say anyone should wear the footwear he or she prefers, but if you're going with the flip flop, at least get your feet done. This applies to men and women. Spring for a pedicure!

2. Kindle: If you're a frequent reader of this blog, then you know I destroyed my Kindle last week. I've been Kindle-less for more than a week now, but my new one is (hopefully) coming tomorrow. I can't wait. I miss my Kindle! I'll never go totally digital because I love books, but I have grown to depend on my Kindle.

3. Suits: I'm glad it's back on, but why is Mike's hair starting to look like Harvey's? And why was Patrick Adams annoyed that he was not the dominant one in the bulk of the Suits homosexual Harvey/Mike fan fiction that's out there? Did he really think Harvey/Gabriel wouldn't come out on top (literally and figuratively) in any possible relationship between the two of them?

4.. Independence Day: Is it here yet? No? Okay.