Well, dear readers, what is it about power, that’s what I’d like to know. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, what is it about power? Not personal power, not power players, not that kind of power – I’m talkin’ about power, baby, the kind that gives us electricity kind of power, that’s what I’M talkin’ about. And yesterday, we had the kind of day when you just have to ask why power companies in California seem so ill-equipped to not only deal with their power failures but to also have the common courtesy of giving customers the information about what’s going on and why it’s going on. How hard is that? Our particular company are on Facebook and Twitter and have an outage website, and there was not a single acknowledgment as to why we had the power go off for all of about ten seconds, which is plenty of time to screw up everything you’re doing. The computer shut down, the microwave and stove clocks had to be reset, it really messed with my audio receiver, and then all my minimized documents had to be found and reopened. That, dear readers, is a pain in the ASS, as you know. But that’s not the end because ten minutes later, after everything was back up and running it happened again. Thirty minutes later, it happened again. That was three times of having to reset clocks, reboot the computer, retrieve documents, and make sure all the electronics were back working. At that point, I went to the SCE Twitter page and told them they should have a little respect for their customers – no response. And so, I went to Facebook and wrote them a private message AND posted to the page the same thing. No response. And thirty minutes later, it happened again. This time, when it came back on I refused to restart the computer and reset the clocks. I just went and finished watching a motion picture. Two hours later, I felt okay about resetting and restarting, and knock wood it’s been fine since then. They also responded to me privately and publicly – but did not acknowledge or explain the issue, just standard “We’re sorry if you were inconvenienced” crap on a stick covered with sauce. They asked for my address. I responded with the zip code, said they didn’t need my address, told them they were fully aware that I and hundreds of others had the same issue, and that I would not stop posting everywhere until we had an explanation. I haven’t checked to see if there’s a response to the response. It was so irritatingly irritating that I was irritated. The fact that this can happen four times in less than two hours is mind-boggling. And irritating.
Yesterday, other than the power stupidity, I had an okay day. I got eight hours of sleep, got up, answered e-mails, did stuff that needed doing, worked at the piano, then went to the mail place and picked up a couple of packages, one of which included eighteen cube boxes of Kleenex, which I was out of. If I were to buy these separately at Gelson’s, I would have spent almost fifty bucks rather than the eighteen that I spent. I came right home and ordered food from the California Pizza Kitchen – just the roasted garlic chicken pizza, which, because of the issues of the day before, was very inexpensive after using my ten-dollar coupon. That arrived about thirty minutes later, nice and hot, and I gobbled it all up and I must say it was great. Then I did more work at the piano, happily chose all but one song, so only one more to figure out, and I think the song choices in this show are really fun and really interesting. Still waiting on two guests and hoping they’ll both do it. After all that, I finally sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I watched a TV mini-series on Blu and Ray, entitled The Blue Knight, from the novel by Joseph Wambaugh, starring William Holden and Lee Remick. I’d heard nothing but great things about this from the time it was aired – it was a mini-series classic, blah, blah, blah. So, it was nice to finally see it, although my reaction to it definitely fell into the blah, blah, blah category. In fact, I thought it was terrible in the directing (really pedestrian and at times like a five-year-old was behind the camera) and writing (terrible script – episodic in the worst way, with a nominal murder plot that is, throughout, treated as an afterthought and whose wrap-up WAS an afterthought and ludicrous. Those two culprits were Robert Butler and E. Jack Neuman. And for a movie shot completely on location in Los Angeles, Mr. Butler had zero feel for the city (all shot downtown). You know how bad a director is when he tilts the camera at an odd angle because a character has had too much to drink.
So, was there anything good? Of course – William Holden and Lee Remick were wonderful. He won an Emmy and she was nominated. There are one or two decent supporting performances, but the rest of the casting is terrible – horrible choices in the playing, attributable to the director – if it wasn’t his choice, then he should have stopped the actor from doing terrible work. The worst, for me, was a super smug defense attorney – I literally wanted to hurl my shoe through the TV. Anyway, a huge disappointment, other than watching Holden and Remick be the pros they are.
After that, I listened to music, had a telephonic conversation, and then I decided I needed something sweet but without calories. So, I went over to Ralph’s and got some honey crisp apples (so much cheaper than Gelson’s) and some red seedless grapes, which I’ll eat as soon as I finish writing these here notes. Then I came home and continued listening to the John Williams I have in iTunes, and now playing is his incredible score to The Reivers.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I’ll choose the final song and start pressuring my guest asks, we’ll begin making the tracks in earnest as Richard Allen now has most of the music. I’ll hopefully pick up some packages, I’ll eat, do work at the piano, and then I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
The rest of the week is more of the same, plus a Zoom one-on-one, perhaps a lunch meeting, and whatever else comes up.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, do whatever needs doing, choose the final song, start pressuring the guest asks, hopefully pick up packages and mail, eat, do work at the piano, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s Ask BK Day, the day in which you get to ask me or any dear reader any old question you like and we get to give any old answer we like. So, let’s have loads of lovely questions and loads of lovely answers and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, hoping we have no further power outages.