Television and sigh COVID

Beautiful day, also cool, not too hot and not too cold (except inside my office, where I found myself wearing the union sweatshirt hoodie that they gave me way back in 2021. First time I wore the thing. It's huge, black, and very comfy. Well, I was cold, down to my fingertips, until that is - a hot flash came along and made me hot again. My internal heating and cooling system has been on the fritz for a while now. I'm either really hot, or weirdly cold. It's annoying.)

Sky was blue. It was sunny. And I was stuck in an office with no windows trying to stay awake, and focus on work. But my brain just kind of meandered. (Management should die a long slow death in a closet.)

According to mother, my brother is livid that they forced me to go back to work after only five days, and just because I wasn't running a fever.
Apparently his daughter keeps testing positive for COVID. She tested today and was still positive for COVID, so she's deferred her International Law Final to August. (I guess she'll take it remotely in the states. It's not in-person anyhow - it's down by computer and is eight hours.) But she is feeling better at least, and the scare is over - just kind of knocked for a loop.

I've not taken another test - and I don't see the point. I'd have to come in anyhow. They only let you stay out if you have symptoms and a fever. (Because they are idiots.) Plus, I don't have that many tests available at the moment. One of my at home test boxes didn't come with any cotton swabs, it had everything but the swabs. So I ordered eight more tests, and another box before that. The government tests are reliable at least.

I've also upgraded to a KN95 mask now. And bought more. As have many of my co-workers. Most don't wear masks at all. Also, more and more folks aren't wearing them on the subways and trains.

NYC is on high alert now - not that anyone seems to care - although I did notice that there are less folks on the trains this week. And less going in and out of the air train building.

***

Television Cancellation List...

Latest additions: Pivoting (FOX), Our Kind of People (FOX), In the Dark (The CW), Roswell, New Mexico (The CW), 4400 (The CW), Charmed (The CW), Dynasty (The CW), Legacies (The CW), Naomi (The CW), The Endgame (NBC), Mr. Mayor (NBC), Kenan (NBC), How We Roll (CBS), Good Sam (CBS), Magnum PI (CBS), B Positive (CBS), United States of Al (CBS), Dollface (Hulu), Queens (ABC), Saved By the Bell (Peacock), DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (The CW), Space Force (Netflix), Batwoman (The CW), Pretty Smart (Netflix), The Last OG (TBS), Kill the Orange-Face Bear (TBS), Raising Dion (Netflix), On the Verge (Netflix), The Real (syndicated), Locke & Key (Netflix), DailyMailTV (syndicated), Archive 81 (Netflix), Maury (syndicated), The Baby-Sitters Club (Netflix), Nick Cannon (syndicated), The Good Dish (syndicated), Judge Jerry (syndicated), Flip or Flop (HGTV), Muppet Babies (Disney Junior), Gotham Central (HBO Max), The Big Leap (FOX), Ordinary Joe (NBC), Adults Adopting Adults (A&E), The Wendy Williams Show (syndicated), Another Life (Netflix), Promised Land (ABC), Love, Victor (Hulu), The Boondocks (HBO Max), Saints & Sinners (Bounce TV), American Rust (Showtime), Bringing Up Bates (UPtv), Work In Progress (Showtime), Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol (Peacock), Bull (CBS), Gentefied (Netflix), I Know What You Did Last Summer (Amazon Prime Video), Hawkeye (Disney+), Head of the Class (HBO Max), After Life (Netflix), The Dr. Oz Show (syndicated), Cowboy Bebop (Netflix), and Gabby Duran & the Unsittables (Disney Channel).

And the rest can be found HERE - the CW went nuts, I think they are struggling to keep the lights on over at CW, hence the cancellation craze.

Shows that I watch which were cancelled, neither surprised nor really upset me that much, they were kind of winding down or felt concluded. Or I'd given up on a lot of them after five episodes.

Meanwhile there's the shows that cannot seem to die.

Me: Grey's Anatomy was renewed for a 19th season.
Mother: You are kidding me.
Me: Really not. So too was NCIS for a 20th season.
Mother: I stopped watching it - it reminds me of your father, and I get depressed. If that makes sense.

She used to watch NCIS with my Dad, who can no longer follow it now.

***

Mother has gotten nostalgic, or morbid. She's scanning the obituaries for all the people she knows, or looking up their death notices to see if they are still alive. She even calls the ones that are. Then regales me with stories of how folks she once knew, and I vaguely knew, died or their kids died.

Mother: It doesn't really upset me that much.
Me: No, I think you get some odd satisfaction from it - hey at least I'm alive and my kids are!
Mother: This is true. (giggles).
Me: You also remind me of your own mother. Granny used to do this too. I have deja vue. She'd read obituraries to me over the phone. You've inherited her morbid tendencies.
Mother: (giggles) I am her daughter.

Sigh.

**

Work is slow, and I'm debating taken the 27th off - assuming I can. I'm in a holding pattern, waiting on other people to provide me with stuff. It's hurry up then wait. Coordinating other people is frustrating.

**

Also I managed to completely forget the Senator from Kentucky's name. I think my mind mentally blocked it out finally. With any luck Booker will beat them both.

(no subject)

Hmm..I'm scrolling through my correspondence list again, and...

1. Discovered that Victorian mystery novel romance that I read several years back and actually remember, The Essex Serpent has been turned into a miniseries on Apple TV, starring Clare Danes, Tom Hiddleston, and Frank Dillane.

I may have to watch that after I finish watching Star Trek: Discovery.

2. Also, I discovered via Twitter that Stephen Moffat's take on "The Time Traveler's Wife" on HBO Max did not go over well with the critics. What worked on Doctor Who, does not work ahem elsewhere. In Doctor Who, the time traveling Doctor runs into River Song out of sequence, meeting her as an adult, then as a child. Same with Amy in a way. This works in Doctor Who for a couple reasons - mainly though, because the Doctor isn't really seen as "sexual" in the series. Nor do we ever see them kissing or having sex.
Plus it's a given that he's a time traveling alien.

Time Traveler's Wife has Henry's wife first meeting him as a grown naked man, when she's about eight years of age. And she goes to get him clothes, and no one asks any questions. In the film version - this was about five to ten minutes of screen time, in the HBO version it's apparently an entire episode - which is kind of Skeevy. Particularly when Henry is kind of hot, and portrayed to be very sexual. So the chemistry is off.

The fact that the writer is oblivious to this and lacks nuance - makes it worse.

The Guardian Review - Far Too Much Ick Factor To be Truly Great

Salon's review: The Time Traveler's Wife can't quite get past the ick factor...or would be a mess in any era

On Twitter - the reviewer stated that the production value is rather cheap, the wigs bad, and the direction off - considering the talent behind it.

I think the problematic nature of the story was easier to hand-wave in both the movie and the book, although I did not like the movie and couldn't get into the book. My mother despised the book. I have issues with the time travel aspect - it doesn't work. And I didn't think the book worked. The problem with time travel in novels - is it is linear, because we think linearally, but time isn't linear in reality or scientifically. We can't understand it. Star Trek and Marvel, and possibly DC are the only ones that I've seen handle it well on a science level - showing how traveling in time results in a temporal distortion or parallel universe. They are the only ones who delve into the science of it - everything else kind of romanticizes it or uses it as a gimmick. (I'm on the fence regarding Terminator.)

I'm still curious, so may try it - after I finish Discovery.

3. Smart Bitches provided an interesting link to a movie starring Emma Thompson on Hulu, about an older woman who hires a giglio or male escort to have sex with her - because she's never really had it and would like to experience it.

Good Luck to You, Leo Grande, kind of reminds me of American Gigilio, except, Richard Gere was hotter.

Mother was into art house films in the 70s, and told me about Diary of a Mad Housewife with Frank Lagenella (who she adored and saw on stage as Dracula), and we saw again with Albert Finny in a Russian Play that I can't remember the name of. Also, American Gigilio.

4. And yet another Kindle Daily Deal advertised on Smart Bitches attracted my attention...

Spin the Dawn by Elizabeth Lim is $2.99 and another KDD! This YA fantasy was featured on Cover Awe and was marketed as Mulan meets Project Runway. Which HELLO!

Project Runway meets Mulan in this sweeping YA fantasy about a young girl who poses as a boy to compete for the role of imperial tailor and embarks on an impossible journey to sew three magic dresses, from the sun, the moon, and the stars.

Maia Tamarin dreams of becoming the greatest tailor in the land, but as a girl, the best she can hope for is to marry well. When a royal messenger summons her ailing father, once a tailor of renown, to court, Maia poses as a boy and takes his place. She knows her life is forfeit if her secret is discovered, but she’ll take that risk to achieve her dream and save her family from ruin. There’s just one catch: Maia is one of twelve tailors vying for the job.

Backstabbing and lies run rampant as the tailors compete in challenges to prove their artistry and skill. Maia’s task is further complicated when she draws the attention of the court magician, Edan, whose piercing eyes seem to see straight through her disguise.

And nothing could have prepared her for the final challenge: to sew three magic gowns for the emperor’s reluctant bride-to-be, from the laughter of the sun, the tears of the moon, and the blood of stars. With this impossible task before her, she embarks on a journey to the far reaches of the kingdom, seeking the sun, the moon, and the stars, and finding more than she ever could have imagined.

Steeped in Chinese culture, sizzling with forbidden romance, and shimmering with magic, this young adult fantasy is pitch-perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas or Renée Ahdieh

Meanwhile, I entered a giveaway for T Kinfisher's Nettle & Bone, on Good Reads.

Meanwhile, I've decided to stick with Sarah Maas's Throne of Glass series. I'm on book one. She got the idea for it from Cinderella of all things. What sparked it was this: she felt the music when Cinderella runs down the palace stairs was rather dark and foreboding, and she wondered what if Cinderella was an assassin who made an attempt on the Prince's life and escaped - why would she do that and what would bring her there to do it?

My difficulty with it is the whole age thing - I think the lead character should be older, all the characters should be. Although it's admittedly easier to write them younger - I get that, and there's a broader audience for the younger character.

In mine, they are older - my difficulty with my novel is I suck at naming things. I should do what my sister-in-law's father did when he hunted her name - go to a library or book store and open a book of names and randomly pick them.

At any rate, I'm sticking with Throne of Glass - because it doesn't require much concentration. It's easy to read in other words, and I don't have to focus that hard. No complex description and the dialogue is fairly simple, no dialect. That's probably why its so popular, now that I think about it.
People don't like to work that hard to read stuff. And I'm reading it solely on my commute or before bed.

Meanwhile, I keep buying Regency romance novels and fantasy novels on sale on the Kindle. Everything is below $2. I've spent about $10 on ten books. LOL!