Day #30 of Year #2 of the pandemic

I saw an article about the signs of the pandemic lasting longer...and thought, I don't want to know.

Although, the pandemic did prove that most office workers can work legitimately from home. All you really need is a lap top and a good wifi and you're all set.

It's a rainy day. We've a nor'easter apparently.

Today's impulse buy - courtesy of former Minister on FB - is The Essential World-Building Blueprint and Workbook with Fantasy Cover I got the print and digital version for $40.

Why?

Oh, I'm fiddling with science fiction and fantasy novels, and could use a little help in the world-building department. I might try drawing my fantasy creatures. Then maybe painting them.

All the information you need to develop epic fantasy, urban fantasy, paranormal romance, sci-fi and space opera worlds.

70+ pages of blueprints on how to build a world that readers can’t resist.

100+ pages of worksheets to guide your world creation.

Built-in project bible to track and organize your world all in one place. Never lose details or search for lost sticky notes and files ever again.

Prompts to make you think deeper about your ideas and explore new aspects of your world, story and characters.

Your choice of cover to fit your project (note: contents of each book are the same).

I'll let you know if it works for me or not. Up in the air at the moment.

***

I scanned the NY Times Corona Virus briefing - and..I don't really want to talk about it. Suffice it to say, for once, I'm happy I don't live in Canada. My Canadian friends have been struggling to get the vaccine. Although the roll-out in the US and elsewhere hasn't exactly been stellar - it's just better than in Canada and France.

Mother: Well, if Wales has been vaccinated maybe you can hang out with her.
ME: She hasn't been.
Mother: Surely by now?
Me: Nope. She's no clue how. And I can't help her - wouldn't know how to start.
Mother: Well your company helped you.
Me: And my doctor's office reached out to me finally. I told her to reach out to her doctor's office. I knew from the beginning it would either be through my company or doctor's office.

Crazy Org is desperate to vaccinate all its employees - it keeps adding sites.

***

Mother is bummed out. The only people in my family who aren't bummed out are my brother and his family. He's planting seedlings. And off to coastal Main tomorrow - Main is about 3 1/2 hour drive from where he lives. (I'm about 3 hours from him. The northeast is wonky in shape and distances.)

She asked how my little herb garden is coming along. The plants are sprouting. Just waiting for my curly parsely to emerge. It does take 14-21 days to sprout, and it's only bee 13. The others have sprouted thankfully.
I was most worried about the mint. They all look really cute. I talk to them. Mother was pleased. Yes, my new hobby is trying to grow things in an aerogarden.

***

Work is duller than dirt. I'm slugging along. It sucks having no control over your own workload and depending on others or waiting on them. Sent a how to guide to a co-worker yesterday - regarding a software application. (I wrote up how to do something in the application and sent it to them. I do a wide variety of writing at work. You'd think I'd be sick of writing by the end of the day - but no.)

Also read through new guidelines on responsibility - which appear to be the same as the old ones - except easier to read. Honestly they've changed the guidelines more times than I can count. Procedures and regs change constantly. No wonder its impossible to pass the Bar in NY. They can't make up their minds on the laws, rules, regs, and procedures.

***

According to the Governor - more than half of New Yorker's got vaccinated, yet I see 39%. That's not more than half. Although, we did get 12.6 million doses, and 26.4 % completing the series. My definition of more than half and the Governor's is not the same. I'm beginning to wonder if the Governor knows math?

Shrugs.

We're at the dregs of Tuesday's photos...

Books, podcasts and a movie...

1. Just because Kate ‘Middleton’ McGrath, wants a man to call ‘daddy’ in bed doesn’t mean—
Oh, you stopped reading. Cool.

LOL! Yep, I did.

That was blurb from Smart Bitches.

2. On reading, I'm actually really enjoying the audio book version of A Gentleman from Moscow. Currently an old Count is babysitting? Or just taking care of? A small girl. This is Sophia, the daughter of Nina, a young girl he befriended several years ago. Nina had to follow her husband, who has been sent to a work camp up in Siberia. She's getting a job nearby, and needs someone to take care of her daughter while she's gone. Meanwhile, the Count is working for a restaurant, a tutor, and living in an old Hotel in Moscow. He returned to Russia because of the Revolution, he'd been exiled prior due to a duel.

Some of it - I'm missing of course, because audio book, but it's not plot heavy so doesn't really matter.

[writing this post inspired me to write an email to college buddy who rec'd it.)

3. Finished Becoming by Michelle Obama - which was okay. I liked aspects of it. I think it was too long in places, and kind of repetitive.
Also I wish she talked more about the last years in the White House, then again maybe not - they were depressing, and anything regarding Trump set my nerves on edge.

Also finished Renegades - the Spotify podcasts with Barack Obama and Springsteen, which served as a nice chaser to Becoming. Barack comments on some of the same things Michelle does in her book.

Of the three - Promised Land, Becoming, and Renegades - I think I got the most out of Promised Land. Becoming felt a bit on the preachy side, and I got annoyed with the writer at various points. Although overall its a good book and I recommend - gives some interesting insights into the White House, and what it is like from the First Lady and first family's perspective. Not a cake-walk that's for certain.

4. The flick Promising Young Woman won't quite let go of my head. It's the kind of flick you want to discuss after you've seen it. Very dark black comedy. I didn't find it funny so much as haunting. With that gut punch of an ending.

It kind of puts it in high relief - the raunch culture - and lambasts it. The whole "walk of shame" bit. Where the woman gets drunk, has a night of sex that she can't quite remember, and creeps out the next morning? Well this film kind of underlines how that is date rape. And no, the woman being too drunk to remember is not an excuse for you to have sex with her. Or anyone who is really drunk.

But...what is haunting about it, and kind of disturbing, is how it subverts so many of the myths and preconceptions. The guys aren't hunks. They are just kind of boy-next-door types. The sort you go to college with. Adam Brody from the OC. And the raunch talk is the type you'd hear in frat houses or bars.

Also all the excuses are highlighted and derided. It's a haunting and disturbing film on multiple levels. Did I like it? I don't know. But unlike a lot of flicks it stuck with me.

Actually four of the five Oscar nominated films I've seen stuck with me:

Nomadland, Sound of Metal, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, and Promising Young Woman. (I can't remember Trial of the Chicago 7 quite as well - although it does have a resonance, but it was no where near as good as the other four. And I couldn't get into One Night in Miami - gave up half-way through (I was bored) or Judah and the Black Messiah - gave up after twenty minutes - also bored.)