Thoughts Made Bald

Where's the Drivel? - or Bluebirds Over the White Cliffs of Dover

Here I promised more drivel and I haven't provided it! What's wrong with me?

The main thing is that I seem to have come down with a major case of laziness. All week at work I've looked at the stack of paperwork on my desk, sighed, then spent the rest of the day ignoring it. In fact, I think I left early on three out of five days just because I was bored and had had enough. Then, once home, my sloth seems to have carried over to the rest of my life, too. Of course I am going to have to do all this paperwork - and all this house cleaning - sooner or later, so I'll eventually have to pay for my week of leisure.

One thing I've been doing instead has been a little sad: watching the final DVD in the first season of Torchwood, which arrived in its red Netflix envelope early in the week. Ordinarily, I'm not a fan of science fiction. But having read so much hype about this series, especially its homoerotic undertones, I decided to see what it was like. I got the first DVD in the series about two months ago, and from the first episode I was hooked.

Far and away the best of the whole season, in my opinion, was the penultimate episode, "Captain Jack Harkness", that I just watched a couple of nights ago - and then promptly watched a second time. Being fascinated by the history of World War II, I was enthralled by the setting of forties wartime Cardiff. And then there is the whole concept that time may not be linear, as we usually think of it; I know this idea is probably old hat to science fiction aficionados, but the idea that perhaps different points in time can coexist still fascinates me. Finally, the episode had one of the most romantic plots that I've ever seen on television. All the way through I kept thinking "Kiss him, kiss him" and so when the kiss that I had imagined and rooted for actually did take place, it was even more gratifying... and swoon-inducing.

The bad news is, as I mentioned earlier, that I've finished Season 1: no more episodes to watch. The good news is that Season 2 is supposed to come out on DVD in June, so I don't have long to wait for my next Torchwood fix.

And I suppose that I can fill that time by writing a post on my new boyfriend John Barrowman for my Dreamboys series. He is, in fact, dreamy. And I guess I'm going to have to finally check out Doctor Who!

I'm Back!

I think I've achieved a new record: it's been over a month since my last post.

Well, suffice it to say that it's been a very rough month, and a month that I don't think I want to write about here.

But during my long absence, both from my own blog and from the others that I used to read regularly, I've realized that this online part of my life has become important to me. When I'm not posting and keeping up with my blogger friends, it feels like something is missing.

So, I'm back. Get ready for more of the usual drivel. ;-)

Chameleon

Unbelievable. Tuesday afternoon I sat out on my porch in the sunshine reading a book, and this afternoon as I walked to my car after work the sleet was beating against the side of my head so hard that it actually hurt. It's a little disorienting when the seasons change back and forth so quickly.

I am getting better, but my stomach is still uncomfortable and queasy from time to time. This bug is really hanging on.

I indulged in an orgy of music-buying this week - new stuff from a lot of my favorite bands:

• Accelerate, by R.E.M. (of course!)
• Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings, by Counting Crows
• Funplex, by the B-52s
• Last Night, by Moby
• Shine a Light, by the Rolling Stones

At least my ears are happy!

Self-Indulgence

It's been a long time, eh?

Before you go any further, here's fair warning: you may just want to skip this entry, because it's mainly just going to indulge my current case of self-pity and my indignant sense of life's unfairness, most of which seems to be directed squarely at me.

All right, if you're still reading, you only have yourself to blame.

What it boils down to is that I've been sick, and for a long time, it seems. First I had a chest cold which went on and on and eventually became bronchitis and laryngitis. Stupidly, I kept getting up in the morning and going to work and doing everything I usually do, despite the fact that I could hardly breathe or talk. That foolishness probably had something to do with the fact that it took me nearly three weeks to finally get back to normal.

Then, to put the icing on the cake, after feeling pretty good for about a week, last Friday afternoon my stomach started to ache violently, and before long I was rushing to make it to the bathroom in time. Two days of constant vomiting - to the extent that my throat was raw - have subsided to what is currently the third day of an achy, queasy stomach and an unwillingness to get too far away from the bathroom, just in case.

In a less disgusting vein, this stomach bug has also resulted in the cancellation of:

1. dinner and movie plans with a friend Friday evening;
2. a hot tub party Saturday evening; and most importantly,
3. my annual work-related trip to New York City this week.

(Well, the trip wasn't cancelled, just my participation in it.)

I am not happy, not at all. In fact, truth be told, I pretty much feel like crying. I'm tired of being sick and tired of having things I've been planning go down the tubes because of it.

So there. You can't say you weren't warned.

My Brother...

... is vacationing in San Francisco with his boyfriend and all I get is this sentence to post on my blog!

That's true, but I really just wanted to make a quick post to say that I'm still alive. I'm trying to recover from a bout with bronchitis (my own diagnosis) and hoping not to have to go to the doctor for it. I guess my consolation for San Francisco is that my university is on spring break this week. That means that even though my employer won't cooperate, at least I have a vacation from my class on Tuesday. So, instead of discussing French films I'm getting together with my new adopted little brother - not to be confused with my real brother - for coffee and catching up.

Then the following week I do have some vacation time from my job, but not from my class. Plus, my brother and boyfriend will be back, probably with photos to rub it in.

C'est pas juste, la vie!

Well-Behaved Women Rarely Make History

Last week Booking Through Thursday asked:

Who is your favorite female lead character? And why? (And yes, of course, you can name more than one. I always have trouble narrowing down these things to one name, why should I force you to?)

This one was a bit difficult to answer, because most of the books that I read seem to have male lead characters – which may be a sign that I need to broaden my horizons, I guess.

But there are two female characters who have always fascinated me.

The first is Anna Madrigal, of Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City series. (I suppose Anna can count, even though she started her life as a man.) I like Anna because she had the courage to live her life the way she wanted to live it, in a time period where displaying that kind of courage was even more challenging than it is today. Not only did she insist on being herself, she lived with flair and gusto, and she encouraged other people to be true to who they were, as well. On top of all that, Olympia Dukakis's portrayal of Anna in the PBS miniseries based on Maupin's books was one of the few times when I haven't been disappointed with a filmed version of a favorite fictional character.

A second female character that I like is Temperance Brennan, the forensic anthropologist featured in Kathy Reichs's series of novels. I have always been taken with her because of her intelligence and her independence, as well as the fact that she is an American who speaks French much of the time since she works in Québec as well as in North Carolina. In contrast to Anna Madrigal, though, Emily Deschanel's portrayal of Tempe in the Fox series Bones absolutely did not live up to my own mental portrait of the character!

Obama's Epistle, Barack's Blog

I'm obviously having difficulty thinking up a catchy post title, aren't I?

I am mightily impressed by Barack Obama's open letter about LGBT equality.

I guess it's a good thing that I am, since it looks like Hillary's campaign is going to run out of steam. I'll be sorry if it does, but Obama is also a candidate that I have no trouble whatsoever in supporting. And I hate to admit it, but I am coming to agree that Hillary is ultimately probably less electable than Obama would be.

If he wins the Democratic nomination – and I think he will – I'll be proud to add an Obama'08 sticker to my car.

Doorbells and Sleigh Bells (My Favorite Things, Part 8)

My recent doctor post inspires me to mention this:

I love love love Advair; it is my drug of choice. (I know, I'm a real bore.) But ever since I've been snorting a dose of steroid and bronchodilator twice a day, I have felt amazingly better. It's not that I still don't have symptoms from time to time, but they're a lot fewer and farther between and they seem to be much more mild than they used to be.

Of course, there is that one slightly disturbing study that implies that Advair could kill me – which my doctor likes to keep reminding me of, just so I won't get too complacent, I guess. But what the hell? At least I'll die being able to breathe deeply.

(Previous entries in the "My Favorite Things" series can be found by clicking on the category name in orange at the bottom right of this post.)

Crisp Apple Streudels (My Favorite Things, Part 7)

A couple of my posts last week inspired me to revisit my Favorite Things series, a project that has been dormant for nearly a year. But after mentioning my Moleskine planner in my post on paper-based versus electronic media, I feel obliged to write a paean to these little objects that I like so much. Here are a couple of them:

The red notebook on the left is my pocket weekly planner, with the left hand page displaying the seven days of the week and the right hand page lined for notes. The black notebook on the right is just a lined notebook that I use for random writing, although I'm using it a lot less now that there's room for that kind of thing in this year's red planner.

In addition to these, I also use a Moleskine cahier for notes in the class that I'm taking, and I have the city notebooks for Paris, New York, and (soon, I hope) Montréal. And along those same lines I've been toying with the idea of taking a blank Moleskine and making a city notebook for my own little town, which might be an interesting project.

I know that Moleskines are a bit more expensive that comparable notebooks, and I know that their publicity – the same notebooks used by Hemingway! by Van Gogh! – is a bit overblown. But still, the thickness and smoothness of the paper, the convenience of the sewn-in ribbon marker, the security of fastening the notebook closed with the elastic strap – all of these characteristics conspire to make using the Moleskines a sensual joy.

And for that pleasure I'll gladly pay a little bit more and overlook the company's exaggerated advertising claims.

(Previous entries in the "My Favorite Things" series can be found by clicking on the category name in orange at the bottom right of this post.)

Gift Card Blues

My friend with the precocious four-year-old was shopping in Target recently when little Mark saw a toy that he wanted.

"No, Mark, I'm not buying that today," my friend said. "You have plenty of toys at home."

"I'll buy it myself, then," answered Mark, determined, "with the gift card that I got for Christmas."

"You can't use your gift card any more," my friend explained. "You already bought something with it last month."

"But I still have the card," little Mark protested, digging into his pants pocket and pulling it out.

"With maybe a few cents worth of value left," responded his mother. "Once you've spent the amount of money that the card is worth, you can't use it any more, even if you still have it."

"Oh," said Mark quietly, crestfallen at the heartless machinations of big business. Then, after considering for a few seconds, he loudly pronounced his opinion of the ephemeral nature of gift cards.

"Well, that sucks!" he announced with disgust to Target's entire toy department.