Tuesday Voted on Saturday and went to the doctor instead..

1. On a brisk sunny Tuesday morning, with a crystal blue sky - I lugged myself off to the doctor. It's about twenty-twenty five minutes. Train is fifteen. Walk is about ten to fifteen, depending on how fast I go? Ten blocks.

The knee wasn't bothering me though, sciatic, yes, knee no. I'd been using a hip compression, and wandering about at home. Also I can sit with my legs elevated at home. This was leading me to believe that - it was indeed sciatic nerve and back/hip related, not knee related.

Got the X-ray. Waited about thirty-five minutes to see the doctor. And after the assistants took my vitals. A wet-behind the ears kid came in.
I stared at the kid. Okay, granted the doctors are getting younger - but this is ridiculous. I have Doogie Howser.

Kid: Hi I'm Lucas, I'm the student intern working with the Doctor.
Me (oh thank god.): Oh...right.

His job was to ask me what was going on. I was kind embarrassed because after killing me for weeks on end, the knee decided not to hurt today. When the Doctor eventually came in - he wasn't a kid at least (thinking mid-thirties) - he quipped, yeah it's like taking your car to the mechanic and all of a sudden it stops having mechanical difficulties.

The Knee Orthopedist thankfully found nothing wrong with my knees, outside of mild arthritis. (I was relieved. Mother was relieved - after I told her.) This is the second time I checked the knees out this year. So clearly this is a hip alignment/sciatic nerve issue. The knees just have mild osteoarthritis. Additional proof - the hip compression sleeves that I've been using this weekend, which I bought on Amazon, have actually helped. My knees weren't bothering me that much today. Of course I only went to the x-ray/doctor's office, then shopping after. Less steps, more walking, than I do going to and from work. The commute has more steps, less walking.

Apparently the knee doctor sees approximately eighty patients a day (explains a lot) while the pain management doctors only see ten, which is why it is almost impossible to get an appointment with the pain management. He didn't recommend muscle relaxants either - last resort and all the do is knock you out (or screw with digestion). PT is the best bet - and I've scheduled that.

Afterwards - I bought stuff. ( Read more... )

2. Voted on Saturday. I will be happy when the election is however, the ads are annoying. So is the discourse.
( Read more... )

We won't know the results until tomorrow - I think - or late tonight, since the polls close in NY at 9pm. Over 300,000 voted early. It's the highest turnout for early voting in the State's history.

3. Still rewatching Buffy and Angel.


* There's two very subversive character arcs in these series, actually more than two. But Spike and Cordelia, which are in some respects similar characters - are at the top of the list. ( Read more... )

The other takeaways from Buffy - is Buffy and Riley don't really work. They become bland fast. There's not enough conflict. It's kind of like Buffy S3 with Angel take 2? But from another angle? ( Read more... )

Overall - the episodes are still good, even if the central plot is flawed?
Oh, learned recently that Robin Sachs who played Ethan Rayne died several years back. He was a good friend of Juliet Landau's, apparently.

Almost forgot? S4 Buffy makes it clear to me that the writers watched Doctor Who, the Prisoner, and various British sci-fi shows. Buffy almost states - when she runs into the secret underground facility underneath Riley's frat house - that it's bigger on the inside than on the outside.

And..I realized that biggest problem with the whole Initiative storyline, is that they kind of combined Reptile Boy with Some Assembly Required - not the best episodes of the series? ( Read more... )

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On Twitter, someone asks to name a better show than Buffy. And people named Charmed. Charmed??? I found Charmed unwatchable at times. I tried. But it took campy to a whole new level. Also I felt the writing was horrible.

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Saw this The Future of Storytelling on John Scalzi's blog "Whatever" - he posts other's writer's blurbs for their books or big ideas for their upcoming books, without any comment. Just lets them write a snyopsis or idea for their book and post it on his blog.

"A revolution in storytelling is taking place, and it is going to have profound implications in almost every field. It’s happening in the top-secret tech labs of Meta, Apple, and Google; in avant-garde performances at fringe theater festivals; in escape rooms housed in storefronts of suffering shopping malls; in cores of quantum supercomputers containing next-generation artificial intelligence; in the newest VR and AR headsets; and in centuries-old museums. It’s happening at festivals like SXSW, Cannes Lions, and Comic-Con; in restaurants and bars; in old garages and abandoned bowling alleys; in Hollywood studios and Madison Avenue advertising agencies; on university campuses and at nonprofit organizations. It’s happening in the middle of the desert in Nevada and on a palm-sized device that lives inside the pocket of nearly every person who will read my book The Future of Storytelling.

As the publisher of Melcher media and the founder of the Future of StoryTelling (FoST) Summit, I’ve been incredibly lucky to get invited into the studios, labs, offices, and academic corridors where the future of living stories is being invented. I have come to believe that if we can understand the mechanics and unleash their full power, living stories – a term I coined – have the potential to become more popular than Hollywood and gaming have ever been. Artists and storytellers have a new opportunity to serve their audiences by creating experiences in which the audience plays an active role.

Something beautiful happens when creators relinquish control of the narrative to their audience. The reason living stories are so powerful is that they engage not only our eyes and ears but our whole person. They gift us experiences that our brains and spinal cords are primed for, thanks to millions of years of evolution. You can feel your response to a living story in the hairs on the back of your neck, in the pit of your stomach, in the ache in your thighs as you move and choose, emote, and think through these experiences.

Just imagine: How different is it to read a book or see a movie about surviving a natural disaster than to believe in the moment that you did? How much more satisfying is it when you, not King Arthur, are able to pull the sword out of the stone? Stories have always provided us with a safe, instructive way to survive the world, as we observe characters making choices (often the wrong ones). With living stories, those characters are us, and we learn from the choices we make, and learn deeply, because we feel them throughout our own bodies. Living stories are a gateway to a more intense emotional life, to living more fully in the world."

I don't know? I think I read stories for different reasons than this individual does? I don't want to live them? I want to escape inside another point of view? I'm not really interested in turning the story into my own, I'm interested in seeing and understanding their story?

I feel something is lost by living the story virtually, or in a role-playing sphere?

I don't know. I've never been a fan of improv or role-playing games. And I don't tend to like interactive theater - I like the fourth wall firmly in place. I tend to get annoyed when it is removed? If that makes sense?