Well, dear readers, I am sitting here like so much isolated fish, getting to these here notes a little late, as I was writing away on the essay I’m doing for some book. Only another 150 words to go, so it’s basically almost done, although I suspect I’ll keep futzing and finessing it right up until the time it’s due on April 1. And, of course, I’m listening to yet more obscure classical music and my butt cheeks are weary from sitting in this chair for three hours straight. I don’t know about you, dear readers, but I don’t care for the weary butt cheeks. The Weary Butt Cheeks – that’s the title of my next novel.
Yesterday was certainly yesterday. I got six hours of sleep, got up, did a few things, got a lovely text from Sami Staitman’s mom saying she loved the new book (I gave her the PDF because Sami’s mentioned a lot) and asked if there was a way to hear some of the songs that won’t be known by anyone. And we’ve been puzzling out that very thing. I have a lot of YouTube videos, plus the Sandy Bainum recordings, so that’s all easy, and, of course, a lot of stuff has recordings, so that’s easy, too. But I also have a bunch of demos and so I think we’re going to add to the Kritzerland release page a page of links and I’ll put the demos up on Sound Cloud or somewhere like that. Because reading lyrics on their own is fun, but they are kind of missing a key component, their music. I went back to bed at noon-thirty and woke up again at two-thirty, so I guess that was eight hours in a roundabout way.
For the meal o’ the day I had two count them two tuna sandwiches on onion bagels. I did some work at the piano, listened to mp3s of all the songs from the musical I’ve been working on, which was interesting in many ways – I definitely have to re-record a few of them – and then at some point I finally sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I watched a motion picture entitled The Year of the Comet, a Twilight Time Blu and Ray I’d never even opened. Want to know why? Because I got it confused with a movie called Night of the Comet, which I didn’t like. Well, this is an entirely different Comet and one I’d never seen. Peter Yates was the director and William Goldman the writer – how could it miss? Well, it misses in just about every possible way. Written as a lark in the 1970s, because Goldman loved wine and wanted to write something like Charade, it sat gathering dust for many years. It should have stayed on the shelf. The plot is mundane and really not compelling, it’s a souffle that simply won’t rise, and it’s nothing like Charade, but more like a bad Romancing the Stone, although I don’t like that movie either. Penelope Ann Miller is good enough, but Tim Daly, in a role clearly meant to be played by the Robert Redford in the 1970s, is just not good enough – he’s actually annoying, which basically kills the film. It was fun to see Louis Jourdan back on the screen, but his character is simply inane. But then again, since the only other picture that Yates and Goldman did was The Hot Rock, which is equally bad, this probably had no chance. It was a huge flop that seemed to surprise everyone. They were baffled that preview audiences didn’t like it at all. Watching it, it’s very obvious. It’s eighty-five minutes of actual film seem like three hours. The score is nice but doesn’t really help things. Transfer is fine.
After that, I had one of those Lean Cuisine Pizza Bread things and that was an okay evening snack. I had some Cheetos with it, and then some Milk Duds, too. Then I buckled down, Winsocki, and wrote many about five hundred more words for the essay. I’m looking forward to writing the last 150 and being done with it. And I will say that the already insufferable Facebook gets worse with each passing day, and some Facebook “friends” that seem like very nice people have gone off the damn deep end with the doom and gloom scenarios, fueling yet more panic and hysteria with nothing much more than idle guess work and supposition. And when people find something positive to post, they are taken to task, as if we should all succumb to this miasma of negativity. I wish we could have what the kiddies call cancel culture on Facebook, because if you took that out of the equation, we would not be seeing what we’re seeing. I has spoken.
Today, I’ll arise when I arise, I’ll finish the essay and begin the futzing and finessing, I’ll ascertain whether there is mail and if there is I’ll go gather it up – that reminds me, I haven’t been out today and must go start up the motor car and drive it around the block – I’ll eat, probably bring something in or make eggs in tortillas with cheese or some such thing, and then I’ll watch and listen.
Tomorrow is more of the same and hopefully the book will go to the printers so I can get my test books and then place an order, I’m hoping an important envelope shows up on time, and I’ll try not to overeat and to get some sort of exercise.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, arise when I arise, finish writing an essay, futz and finesse, see if there’s any mail to gather up, eat, and watch and listen. Today’s topic of discussion: Who are your favorite French actors and actresses? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, needing to move the weary butt cheeks off this chair.