Well, dear readers, as I write these here notes I hear no music playing. That is an oddity around these here parts and frankly these here notes are easier to write when there are musical notes playing, so let me find something to play, otherwise it will be a long haul and I’m starting them very late and so we need a short haul. Ah, now, yes – the rousing fourth and final movement of the Shostakovich eleventh, which I hadn’t finished the other day because other stuff happened. So, Andre Cluytens is leading his band and it is rousing and bombastic and so like sands through the hourglass, so are the notes of our lives. See, now these here notes have purpose and energy, not necessarily in that order and I’m typing away madly with verve and forward momentum. I did manage to stream another new motion picture, this one with the awful title of Don’t Look Up, a title just as lazy as the film it accompanies, by Mr. Adam McKay, a writer and director who I simply don’t care for. This is a satire, only people don’t know how to write actual satire anymore, so it’s only a smart-assy, smug, full-of-itself pretend satire that has, for me, zero laughs, despite an all-star cast doing everything they can. Also, when there are drugs and vomit in the first five minutes, I’m done. I did stick it out until the very end, which occurred two hours and twenty-five minutes later. Yes, it’s that long. On and on and on it goes, along its rather ultimately pointless way. Dr. Strangelove – that was satire done right. Even The Loved One, messy and ungainly thought it may be, is satire done right. And, of course, like most misbegotten attempts at satire, it also wants it all ways from Sunday and wants to have emotion, too. Nope. I’m sure there will be those who like it, and that’s what makes horse racing. The reviews are mostly tepid and I cannot imagine this doing any business. Paramount was going to release it, but Netflix bought it – something they’ve been doing a lot. I guess this business model works for them, but I find the whole model ridiculous in terms of the amounts of money they’re spending to produce and acquire stuff.
Yesterday was a weird little day. I got six hours of sleep and was up at around ten-fifteen or thereabouts. I answered e-mails, found out the plumbers were coming to snake at one, so that was good news. Then on my iPhone suddenly about ten voice mails showed up – all from last Tuesday and Wednesday. I couldn’t believe it – birthday wishes and the like. I don’t get it. Does anyone understand this phenomenon and is there anything to be done about it aside from smashing the iPhone to smithereens? Since I wasn’t sure exactly when the plumbers would arrive, I ordered in – mac-and-cheese from Granville – it arrived about thirty minutes later and was very good. Then the plumbers came and did their thing, tested things and said everything seemed to be fine.
Then I spent two hours writing for the project with David Wechter and got the first two long sequences I was doing finished, leaving only the third, which I’ll get to today, hopefully. David had finished his sequences, so we were able to see how it all flowed. Based on what he wrote, I adjusted a few things – he does the same so that it’s all seamless. It’s going to come out much longer than we want, but better that than too short. At this point, we just want to get it all on the page, tell the story beats properly, and then we’ll do all the futzing and finessing and cutting together. We then Zoomed and talked through the next two big sequences.
Then the gardeners arrived, and I showed them a little leak near the front sprinkler valves – that’s been going on for at least a week. So, they replaced the part that had gone wonky and now that’s fine. I then ascertained that there was no mail or packages, which is odd because I saw a bunch of screener envelopes there on Saturday and I know people have gotten two or three more movies. Hopefully, I will, too, and sooner than later.
I did a quick Gelson’s run and got their small chicken Caesar for my evening meal, came home and ate that and it was pretty okay. I’d received a jar of C.C. Brown’s hot fudge for my birthday, so I made a little sundae and it, too, was very good. Then I watched Don’t Look Up and after that about three episodes of Adam-12. I’m now on the final disc. Some great locations – some things I see I know I know but can’t figure out exactly where. Sometimes I catch a street sign and that makes things very easy. That happened with a scene that took place just off Lankershim one block south of Moorpark. It’s amazing how occasionally some of the buildings haven’t changed but more often than not certain streets are unrecognizable to what they were back then. One little scene took place on Weddington, the street where The Federal is, but this scene took place two blocks east of there. It was easy to identify because of a small theater named Pacific Ballet Theater – I looked it up, found some history about it from the 1970s along with the exact address, and then Googled it with a street view. There isn’t a single building left there – it’s all condos, including some brand-new ones being built on the exact location of the Pacific Ballet Theater. And then it was time to write these here notes to the final movement of the Shostakovich eleventh, which is just finished.
Today, I’ll be up by ten or thereabouts, then I’ll have a visitor whose bringing me the digital file of the Nudie Musical trailer along with the digital files of the twelve Outside the Box videos, so I don’t have to go searching for them on the two hard drives where they reside. As I mentioned, I’m trying to license them to the same company who took Nudie and Creature. Then I have a noon-thirty lunch with Kay Cole, then hopefully I’ll pick up some packages, I’ll come home and write for a while, and then I can watch, listen, and relax.
The rest of the week is more of the same – some meetings and meals, some writing, and more screeners and streamed motion pictures.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by ten or thereabouts, have a visitor, have a lunch, hopefully pick up packages, write, and then watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What were your favorite online or streaming viewing experiences for 2021? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy to have written notes to the accompaniment of notes.