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shadowkatBeen battling a sick sinus headache from hell all weekend and got really sick last night with it. Yesterday, it was mainly feeling dizzy off and on most of the day. It appeared to have gone away, until I lay down to go to sleep in bed - then the room began to spin. I'd sit up, the room stopped spinning. Lay down - it spun and naseaus resulting eventually in being violently sick - it was homemade chicken and root vegetable soup - so all liquid. But the PJ bottoms went into the laundry. I inadvertently picked up a cleaning wipe that smells like pineapples. Which didn't exactly help?
I wouldn't call it vertigo exactly? More sustained dizziness if I lay in or moved my head a certain way. Went on until 1 am. I ended up sitting up in bed with my head pressed against the wall and sleeping like that until 4 am then finally was able to shift to my side. If it happens again tonight, I'll sleep in my armchair.
So today, I cleaned and inserted new filters in the air purifiers and A/C. Did a little dusting. Took out the trash and recycling. And had Spike and Buffy take turns vacuuming the apartment. (My robot vacuums.)
I can't help but think this is brought on by allergies, it keeps raining or being really windy, and with the dried leaves, that means a lot of dust and mold particles in the air. And I may or may not have a sinus infection. I was running a low grade fever last night and had chills.
***
Not wanting to watch anything that requires too much concentration or movement. I watched Grey's Anatomy's Season Finale, and have been watching per yourlibrarian's rec on tv talk, "Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, the Last Movie Stars" - a documentary on HBO MAX directed/edited by Ethan Hawk, and the Newman children, along with someone else. It surprised me. It's not just a documentary, but rather a series similar to what was done with Billy Joel. And Hawk, who was given the task during the pandemic, decides to approach it from the angel of well, a fellow actor, director, and artist - not a gossip columnist or journalist. Which from my perspective - makes it far more entertaining and interesting. And looks at how the personal lives of the actors interacted with, informed, enhanced, and at times got in the way of their work - and how the work often got in the way of their personal lives.
Hawk opens the documentary off a Zoom group chat with all of his friends, who he's managed to convince to do the voice over narratives of the various people (long dead now) in the documentary. It works a lot better than you'd think - I was pleasantly surprised by it. And various actors/directors (aka his friends) help him explain various bits in the documentary from an actor/artists perspective. Basically showing that what was going on with Woodward and Newman is pretty much true of the profession and the highs and lows of it. They provide a kind of greek chorus to the proceedings.
Hawk tells them that apparently Newman had at one point decided to write his own memoir, contacted a friend to help him write it, and collected hours of audio tapes. They literally interviewed everyone - including his ex-wife, his kids, past directors, everyone - and over a period of 20 some years - it included Tom Cruise (which shocked Hawk and his friends). Then, Newman destroyed all of them. But, his friend/co-author had transcribed all of them. Newman's kids sent Hawk the transcriptions - which are 1000s of pages of text. A audio play of sorts. Hawk persuaded Laura Linney (Woodward), George Clooney (Newman), Vincent D'Orthio, Steve Zahn, Zoe ?, Karen Allen, Mark Ruffaloa and various others to lend their voices to the proceedings. Then he used family films, footage, news articles, television, theater, and film footage to tell the story. Hawk's take is - looking at the previous "film and Hollywood" generation from today's "current generation".
This is really well done. I like it better than the Billy Joel documentary so far. (Possibly because I'm more of film/television/theater geek than music geek? And more visual than auditory.) If you are film/televison/theater geek into the history of the medium, and an acting geek, like I am - you'll love this. If not, skip, unless you loved Woodward and Newman.
There's a clip from a film starring Newman, Poiter, Woodward, and Louis Armstrong...where they have Poiter talk about acting in a voice over. Bobby Caranvale asks Hawk if Poiter saw Newman as being hypnotic on screen or purely technical - and Hawk pauses, then states, if Poiter had seen him as hypnotic, I think he would have said so. It gets across how painful this profession is and how much rejection is involved. Newman took off by chance, he had lost out on top roles - 22 times, mostly to James Dean. James Dean dying in a car accident is how Newman finally got a good film.
I told mother about the documentary, and she informed me that my father, while he was giving tours back in early 1960s (his summer job was a tour guide with a travel agency in 1963-65), saw Robert Goulet singing at the Copacabana, with a very drunk Paul Newman chatting with the famous gossip columnist at a side table.
Be prepared for more on this, since I liked it. Oh, Ken Burns documentary, The American Revolution is on PBS tonight. You know the guy who did The Civil War documentary, Jazz, and Baseball. I've discovered I like documentary's well enough depending on the subject and how they are done. I don't like watching people talk to me through a television or computer screen, but over video footage or film footage - works really well for me.
I wouldn't call it vertigo exactly? More sustained dizziness if I lay in or moved my head a certain way. Went on until 1 am. I ended up sitting up in bed with my head pressed against the wall and sleeping like that until 4 am then finally was able to shift to my side. If it happens again tonight, I'll sleep in my armchair.
So today, I cleaned and inserted new filters in the air purifiers and A/C. Did a little dusting. Took out the trash and recycling. And had Spike and Buffy take turns vacuuming the apartment. (My robot vacuums.)
I can't help but think this is brought on by allergies, it keeps raining or being really windy, and with the dried leaves, that means a lot of dust and mold particles in the air. And I may or may not have a sinus infection. I was running a low grade fever last night and had chills.
***
Not wanting to watch anything that requires too much concentration or movement. I watched Grey's Anatomy's Season Finale, and have been watching per yourlibrarian's rec on tv talk, "Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, the Last Movie Stars" - a documentary on HBO MAX directed/edited by Ethan Hawk, and the Newman children, along with someone else. It surprised me. It's not just a documentary, but rather a series similar to what was done with Billy Joel. And Hawk, who was given the task during the pandemic, decides to approach it from the angel of well, a fellow actor, director, and artist - not a gossip columnist or journalist. Which from my perspective - makes it far more entertaining and interesting. And looks at how the personal lives of the actors interacted with, informed, enhanced, and at times got in the way of their work - and how the work often got in the way of their personal lives.
Hawk opens the documentary off a Zoom group chat with all of his friends, who he's managed to convince to do the voice over narratives of the various people (long dead now) in the documentary. It works a lot better than you'd think - I was pleasantly surprised by it. And various actors/directors (aka his friends) help him explain various bits in the documentary from an actor/artists perspective. Basically showing that what was going on with Woodward and Newman is pretty much true of the profession and the highs and lows of it. They provide a kind of greek chorus to the proceedings.
Hawk tells them that apparently Newman had at one point decided to write his own memoir, contacted a friend to help him write it, and collected hours of audio tapes. They literally interviewed everyone - including his ex-wife, his kids, past directors, everyone - and over a period of 20 some years - it included Tom Cruise (which shocked Hawk and his friends). Then, Newman destroyed all of them. But, his friend/co-author had transcribed all of them. Newman's kids sent Hawk the transcriptions - which are 1000s of pages of text. A audio play of sorts. Hawk persuaded Laura Linney (Woodward), George Clooney (Newman), Vincent D'Orthio, Steve Zahn, Zoe ?, Karen Allen, Mark Ruffaloa and various others to lend their voices to the proceedings. Then he used family films, footage, news articles, television, theater, and film footage to tell the story. Hawk's take is - looking at the previous "film and Hollywood" generation from today's "current generation".
This is really well done. I like it better than the Billy Joel documentary so far. (Possibly because I'm more of film/television/theater geek than music geek? And more visual than auditory.) If you are film/televison/theater geek into the history of the medium, and an acting geek, like I am - you'll love this. If not, skip, unless you loved Woodward and Newman.
There's a clip from a film starring Newman, Poiter, Woodward, and Louis Armstrong...where they have Poiter talk about acting in a voice over. Bobby Caranvale asks Hawk if Poiter saw Newman as being hypnotic on screen or purely technical - and Hawk pauses, then states, if Poiter had seen him as hypnotic, I think he would have said so. It gets across how painful this profession is and how much rejection is involved. Newman took off by chance, he had lost out on top roles - 22 times, mostly to James Dean. James Dean dying in a car accident is how Newman finally got a good film.
I told mother about the documentary, and she informed me that my father, while he was giving tours back in early 1960s (his summer job was a tour guide with a travel agency in 1963-65), saw Robert Goulet singing at the Copacabana, with a very drunk Paul Newman chatting with the famous gossip columnist at a side table.
Be prepared for more on this, since I liked it. Oh, Ken Burns documentary, The American Revolution is on PBS tonight. You know the guy who did The Civil War documentary, Jazz, and Baseball. I've discovered I like documentary's well enough depending on the subject and how they are done. I don't like watching people talk to me through a television or computer screen, but over video footage or film footage - works really well for me.