Idle hands, etc.

There are times I write to entertain you and there are times I write to entertain myself. This, I am sorry to say, is the latter. Lacking any kind of narrative through-line, we shall resort--once more!--to a numbered list of miscellany.

1. Just now, in conversation with a friend, I uttered this sentence, "It will abut the Spiritual Life Center." My friend laughed. It was not my intention to make her laugh, but her point is taken.

2. Rather than going to the gym after work yesterday (as was Plan, oh I don't know, let's say Plan D, vis à vis gym-going), I got a deep dish pizza from Little Star, half of which I ate, very rapidly, while watching hour after hour of television. So fitness is going well.

3. I find that even if I am nearly hysterically tired, I will not go to bed at 10pm because, in my mind, 10pm is too early to go to bed. Instead, I will do something like watch a show about a Norwegian crime reporter (possibly Danish?) until I fall asleep in a chair. Wait. I take it back. There is a narrative through-line from #2 to #3, after all. Perhaps #4 will provide a conclusion.

4. While at the market during my lunch hour, I purchased a charmingly small bottle of fancy tonic water which I am eager to take home and introduce to my fancy gin. It seems to be that sort of day. Perhaps if I had not allowed myself to fall asleep in a chair last night, I would have met the day with greater joie to say nothing of de vivre.

Yes. That will do. Don't worry, I'm sure there will be more sloth and lack of will power to celebrate another day. Carry on.

Gold star

On my way to work every morning, I drive past Davies Medical Center. Today, I stopped midblock to create a little traffic opening so an ambulance could get out of the parking lot.

When I checked my email later there was a message from a friend whom I'd not seen in several months.
Subject heading: Hi!
Message: Hey, thanks for letting that ambulance out of Davies! That was me :-)


There's a moral here somewhere. Particularly (though I hope not solely) if you're personally acquainted with any paramedics.

Springing forward

Disclaimer: I am not noticeably springing forward in any way other than setting my clocks ahead an hour. I'd like to tell you that I have been propelled into some kind of frenzy of self-improvement, but that would be a lie. Thank you.

From observing the moderate outerwear of passersby, it is my belief that it is warm outside, but here in the north-facing apartment, I just keep adding layer upon layer of clothing and wondering if it would be de trop to put on gloves. I made a plan to meet someone at 2pm, with some notion that I would want to have the morning and early afternoon to--I don't know--sleep very late and then swan about gracefully? Read a book? Write a poem? I have no idea. What has happened instead is that I stayed up far too late watching some kind of murder mystery and then, thanks to raging Allergy Head, slept for what felt like about 37 minutes. All in all, 2pm turns out to be a uniquely inconvenient time to do anything. Not far enough away to really commit to anything else, but distant enough to necessitate a great deal of time-killing. I've been ricocheting around like an air hockey puck (or possibly a real hockey puck. I wouldn't know. I prefer air hockey and miniature golf to their grown-people equivalents). I'm listening to RadioLab! No! I'm reading an article about Burning Man! No! I'm listening to "Kill the Director" by the Wombats! No! I'm updating my blog with my up-to-the-minute thoughts and feelings! On and on it goes with little pauses to put on more sweaters and rotisserie myself in front of the heating vent.

1. I spoke to my neighbor about the construction-site-worthy racket that comes my way every time they feed their kid. He's made some adjustments to the high chair and the noise has gone from unbearable to really, really annoying. So that's improvement.

2. Often I "wash" my face with nothing more than water and a washcloth. This seemed perfectly adequate; it's not as though I work in a coal mine or on the Vaudeville stage. Recently, just for the heck of it, I used some make-up remover and a cotton um...disk (What are those things called?) which I generally use only on the rare occasion I've got to contend with mascara. And that is how I came to learn that I've been employing an Elizabethan style of hygiene. Oh. Hi, makeup. What are you doing on this cotton disk? Did you not notice the water I liberally applied a few minutes ago? Apparently not. Good to know. Sorry about that, pores.

3. I've been to a few lately and, secretly, I'm not sure movies are radically improved by being in 3D. This may be partially because I have exactly the wrong nose for wearing those glasses for two hours. Ow. But, really, why the sudden fervor for another dimension? Surely, that is what going outside is for?

4. The Blog Bully and I went to the theatre on Friday and he took issue with my insinuation that it's his fault I've been such a lousy blogger. He said he'd certainly noticed, but was trying to be kind under the circumstances of my lengthy indisposition. He's having no more of it. We're all on notice.

Oh, hooray. In ten minutes, it'll be time to leave the house. Enjoy your evening of lingering sunlight.

Out-of-work showgirls galore

Well, hello there you few, you happy few. How the heck are you? Since last we spoke, I've been doing my best to Participate in Life, which is not to say that I'm not also watching a great deal of television. Today is apparently National Book Day, so this evening I will endeavor to keep forging ahead with Zadie Smith's NW, with which I was making excellent progress after a rocky start (I'll be honest, the first section very nearly compelled me to abandon the whole thing, but the advent of the second section hailed a different prose style and my hope was renewed), until I happened upon some AMC series on Netflix called "Hell on Wheels," which I have subsequently been watching in back-to-back episodes. It is about laying the railroad across the country post-Civil War. Racial tensions! Frontier prostitutes! Backroom deals! [Understandably] Hostile Indians! There's a lot going on, but mostly what's going on is a--can I just say this? Sullying my refined reputation?--a ridiculously hot actor. I'd never heard of him, but Anson Mount, you are making me rethink my stance on beards. (Apparently, I'm not the only one to swoon, as evidenced by the fact that this even exists.)

Ahem. What was I saying?

Right. Participating in Life. I've had some cocktails. I had a dinner guest for whom I produced an actual balanced meal. I went to a lecture on climate change, the most encouraging aspect of which was that the scientist presenting was very visibly pregnant, leading me to believe she must see some cause for optimism that I somehow missed.

I've also been to quite a lot of movies at the Roxie because my very clever friend Elliot Lavine has programmed the hell out of this year's Pre-Code Festival. My favorites were Shanghai Express and Lady Killer. In the first, Marlene Dietrich spends a lot of time leaning in the doorways of railway cars smoldering silently while being perfectly lit. In no way do I resemble Marlene Dietrich, but I couldn't help feeling that if I could spend my life in black and white being perfectly lit, I too might be rather beautiful. I do need to work on my posture, admittedly, and learn to hold a silence for a long, long time. And maybe smoke. But I do think there's something to this theory. In the second film, I discovered that James Cagney circa 1933 was quite appealing in a wise-cracking upstart kind of way. Among many, many snappy comebacks this was my favorite:
Former criminal associate: So you're rubbing noses with movie stars now?
Our hero, now a big Hollywood success: Well, call it noses if you like.

Oooh.

All the movies are lousy with that kind of banter. I swoon. Here's a bit from Night World:
Woman: Why you all fall for that broad is beyond me.
Man: Not beyond you, baby. Behind you. By about ten years.

Ouch.

In other press-stopping news, I've been back to the gym. And--lo--I did swim. I know. We've been here before, but this time maybe I'll stick to it? Maybe? When I showed up and handed my card to the check-in guy, I told him to be careful, that the scanner might explode or something since I had not actually been there in A YEAR. Let's just not talk about the money. In any case, I have now been twice. Twice in one week, mind you. I plan to go tomorrow too. Look out, world. The hallmarks of "fitness" including sore shoulders and "I can't stop sneezing because chlorine makes me allergic to my own arm" are almost back!

In that I have never met Anson Mount, there has also been a small flurry of internet strangers, about which I haven't a great deal to say except this. There is a period before you go out with someone the first time when you wonder if this is a person who will come to matter to you. Whether, unbeknownst to you now, this first meeting will be something you'll look back on as a moment when your whole life changed. And mostly, that's not what happens, but it could. It could.

Blog gratia blogis

As is only too obvious, the Blog Bully is really not on top of his game. As such, I am a slacker. So this is me trying to do the right thing even when no one's looking (or whatever that Rule to Live By is). I'm going to warn you, however, that trying to be a good little blogger for its own sake means that there may well be no actual content. This will not stand in my way. Indeed, I can very easily continue to write sentences about nothing whatsoever for longish paragraphs at a time. I've been writing to online strangers for YEARS, so I've got the chops. But let's see if I can't rummage around in the untidy drawers of my brain and come up with something. Something more, that is.

1. Once a year, I hold a weekend meeting with s group of student playwrights to do a table reading of their plays. Whenever this event rolls around, I buy too many snacks. Far too many snacks. (The faculty room is now lousy with surplus hummus and cocoa-almond spread.) Deep down I must fear that teenagers in a room without snacks will go feral and turn on me. They probably wouldn't. Probably.

2. My previously mentioned imaginary friend Gideon Defoe attended the Oscars since The Pirates! was nominated. I actually enjoy the Oscars, unlike many people, but I enjoyed nothing so much as I enjoy this picture of Gideon looking at Charlize Theron with extreme anxiety.

3. For reasons that elude me, whenever I am in my office, I am cold enough to have blue fingers while I am also sweating in a "never buy anything that requires dry cleaning again" manner. Blue fingers and damp armpits. Equally unpleasant and seemingly impossible to achieve simultaneously. And yet. Every day. Only in my office, however. Vive the weekend.

What? I told you I had nothing to say. Can you be surprised it's come to armpits? I think not. The good news is that I know when it's time to wrap it up.