Category Archives: Art, Theatre, & Film

Briefly

Despite my quiet monitor, dual hard drives and new cordless ergonomic keyboard, I’m still having anti-computer issues, so here’s a summary of Life in General:

Regarding that ergo keyboard: things are just a bit off, and I keep hitting odd buttons, which creates situations where I have to go back and delete or re-type. My arms and shoulders are happy, though.

I think the US publisher still hasn’t received my press packet and NDA. I’m mildly stressed, and I can’t locate the tracking tag that the post office gave me. My desk has been cleaned a couple of times, new equipment has been installed, and the apartment has been thrown into turmoil twice over the last week for various reasons, so it could be anywhere (except the places I’ve looked, apparently), or even thrown out.

My doctor is so pleased with how things are going that I no longer have to see her monthly. We’re down to quarterly.

For some reason, now that the weather is tolerable, my allergies are hitting hard and fast. Thank the gods for Reactin.

The Kim Possible DVD contains four episodes only. Fortunately they were all episodes I hadn’t seen, so I loved it from start to finish. I’ve enjoyed later episodes from the first season more, though.

The new electric baseboard heaters were finally installed yesterday. The wire they used is bright red, to indicate that it’s a live wire. The landlady wanted the cheapest and fastest labour possible, so the wire is just stapled to the ceiling as opposed to set behind baseboards or fished through the ceiling. It looks terrible, and the electrician agrees. We call them our apartment go-fast stripes.

First classes of all three sessions went well over the weekend. It feels like we’re right back in the swing of things, as if we never had a summer break.

I found two second-hand books I’d been looking for. Hurrah!

Enough!

Mumbles and Mutters

I want a mouse with a scroll wheel set into it. I use one at work and I love it.

I want an optical mouse. I now hate my mouse cord. I’m still considering a light tablet.

I want to try an ergonomic keyboard. I almost had a free one, but it won’t work for various reasons.

I need to put new lenses in my previous pair of glasses, because now that I’ve started wearing glasses all the time, I take them off and forget them in odd places. My glasses on the coffee table at home do not help me when I’m sitting in an office staring at a computer screen. (Two pairs of glasses might mean I lose them twice as often, but at least I’ll have increased my chances of having an operational pair close to hand.)

The Kim Possible: Secret Files DVD was released this week, as was the second season of Angel, and the second season of 24 comes out on DVD next week. Either studios are counting on the arrival of student loans across North America, or it’s all an evil plot to keep me in abject poverty. (What? You didn’t know that I’m a huge Kim Possible fan? So huge that I want a new cell phone so it can beep like her pager? Yes, I’m a geek. Sue me. How can I not love a show with a theme song that begins, “I’m just an average girl/And I’m here to save the world”?)

I’m tired of slow dial-up, and I want high-speed or DSL.

And the problem with waking up before dawn is that you’re ready to do things like banking and shopping before banks and shops are open. Drat.

Status Check

Since my mother addressed an e-mail to her Darling Lost Daughter this morning, methinks ’tis time for another Update.

Status: Warm. I think I have pulse, too. That’s good, right?

Detailed Status: I lost my sense of humour somewhere along the way a couple of days ago. If found, please return it; it’s lonely. Also, I am moving into An Anti-Social Phase (TM). It’s not that I don’t love you, it’s just that after two weeks of a wonderful high, I’m cocooning.

Good Things: My hair is behaving. The humidity has broken.

Bad Things: My cats are insane and pains in the neck. Especially the one who thinks the waterbowl is her personal playground.

Synchronicitous Events: I had a wonderful history of the qabala class on Saturday afternoon led by one of my students. While I know the basics of the qabala, I knew nothing about the history of the thing. A day later, I was reading a book which took a side trip and addressed qabala history, both mystical and factual. It was nice to (a) refresh the info I learned on Saturday, and (b) feel smug because I already knew it.

Irritating Events: You may remember the day over a month ago when my radiators were finally torn from their moorings after an earlier false start. Guess what? The electric heaters were scheduled to go in a couple of weeks ago; the electrician never showed up. Today, he was scheduled to show up first thing in the morning. If you check the time stamp, it’s just past eleven. I’m staying home today instead of going in to work just so that the electrician can do his thing. If he does not show up again, I Will Have Blood For This.

Something You Ought To Have Guessed: I picked up The Two Towers DVD yesterday. I know, I know; we’ll own the extended edition too. But not for another three months or so, and we only saw this one twice in the theatres.

More Something You Ought To Have Guessed: I will so be in attendance for the nine-hour LOTR extended marathon in theatres this December. Join me?

Overheard on the Radio News: Mars is “just 56 million miles away.” It’s all relative, you know?

I’m immersed in writing stories and reviews for the next three days. Then I’m in Toronto for Labour Day weekend, visiting my parents. Combined with my Anti-Social Phase (TM), this means you won’t hear a lot from me. Unless, of course, something happens for which I must rant or rejoice.

Studio!

My husband has finally moved into his studio space, and while I’m grateful, I’m sure he’s even more relieved. We got to unpack a couple of his boxes that hadn’t been opened since our move six months ago, and lo and behold, in one of them I found a tiny box of my things too. It held copies of press releases I’d written, articles, things like that. In amongst them, though, I found an old file box of business cards left over from my F/SF bookselling days, and I opened them and sorted through them, just for kicks. I found some odd stuff.

Like William Gibson’s fax number scribbled on a slip of paper.

And Cory Doctorow’s Charles Atlas-style business card.

And Forrest J Ackerman’s full-color photocard.

All in all, it was an interesting trip down memory lane. Besides, it was a terrific lesson on how-not-to-design-a-business-card. The majority of them were disastrous from a marketing point of view – no charisma whatsoever.

I’m thrilled, thrilled, thrilled that my husband is now officially Set Up in his artist space. I’m equally overjoyed that he’s decided to spend at least an hour every other day working there to relax. I love being there too, so this might be an answer to those restless evenings were we can’t settle down but have no real idea of what we want to do. I’ll grab my laptop, he’ll grab his sketchbook, and off we’ll go.

Make no mistake – we know exactly how lucky we are.

Hmm

Who has our Merlin soundtrack CD?

I ask because I’m currently listening to a King Arthur opus on Saturday Afternoon At The Opera, and I don’t want words while I write, but now I’m on an Arthurian music kick. And, stunningly enough, we don’t own any Arthurian-related music. Except – that’s right – the Merlin soundtrack.

Only it’s not here. And I vaguely remember lending it to someone over a year ago.

Was it you?

(Note to self: Update ye olde Wishe Liste…)

Comics Woe

The Alan Moore Fan Site quotes Kevin O’Neill on LXG (no, I haven’t seen it yet, and likely won’t until I come across it in a Video Rental Emporium someday):

Also, O’Neill gave his thoughts on the film, currently in theaters, based upon the series he and Moore created. He “actually liked” it. “We knew for a year that they weren’t adapting the comic,” says O’Neill. “They just bought the premise.”

Meanwhile, rumours that Moore’s ABC line will fold all lament the loss of Top Ten and hope that League will indeed continue, but no mention is made anywhere of Promethea, one of the best books I’ve read in a long, long time, and currently the only serial I still purchase on an issue-by-issue basis as opposed to in collected graphic novel format.

It’s personal, isn’t it.

I thought so.