Shorter: AP reporting today on fires

in Malibu ...ummmm, didn't they used to do re-runs only in the summer-time?

Is this due to the writer's strike???

Tja, questions....

DVD review. High School Musical

I just do not know, hey.

I wanted something mindless to cheer me up, so of course you turn to Disney.....

Some people here don't think too highly of their products. One Easter, I had this dysfunctional family living across from me, and the lady, a religion teacher, had her kids over for the weekend.

I brought over the two Disney videos I had to distract them, since they were hyperactive. (So the 'grown-up' could talk, you know...) One of them was Bambi. The other was Fantasia, and didn't we love that, huh? As an aside, my former boss used to go off the charts for what an experience that was when it first came out. He was an usher. People were so unused to color and stereophonic sound, they had to have nurses on hand because it made some people ill.

That is not a joke, that is how he remembered it from 1939. Whatever, the mother went off the charts for angry about that one. Putting pictures into children's heads, regarding classical music. I ALWAYS saw pictures in my head when I heard classical music. My greatest amibition as a child was to make a cartoon to something by Tschaikowsky. We didn't have computers, or I would have.... We had such an argument about that.....

I didn't get it then, I do not get it now. They were brilliant. Needless to say, I gave the kids both of them as an Easter present, subversive as I am.... They were thrilled.

As mentioned below, I have this wonderful colleague. We both like musicals, so one of my main pleasures is sharing some of the things I have in my collection. She keeps telling me that one of her two daughter's major things is watching 'High School Musical', and did I want to borrow it. Somewhat reticent. And seemingly, this film caught or touched something in young people here, because they get on the cover of every youth magazine. Well, have been off on sick leave for two weeks and going up the walls for feeling useless, and whaddaya know, it was on sale at the crummy shop next to the tobacconists.' So I went and bought it just so I don't have to sit home and pity myself.

I needed something 'happy'. I can't remember when I last bought something from the Disney company.

It is very slick. Dance numbers very nice. But there is a HELL of a lot that bothers me about it. Sports are more important than art, or science. At first, at least. And at the end, it does not really get resolved. Winning the ball game is better than being an artist. Win the ball game and then you can do your 'art'. How condescending. That so sucks, I can't find the words. On the surface, it LOOKS like they are trying to support indiviuality, but underneath? You conform, or you don't get anywhere.

When the hell did Disney get so into brainwashing? And it is so subtle.

My high school experience was much different. I got so tortured, it was a nightmare... I was the geek.

Because I was 'different'.

Now my young neighbors think I am 'cool' Go figure.

Just the IDEA that they would think that they could get away with this shit is awsome. 'You just do your sports and win, and then you can be a fucking faggot artist, for all I care.' Well isn't that some kind of 'acceptance', hey.

It left me with an upset stomach. Pretty kids, but the message is the pits.

Just when you think you did EVERYTHING to make things RIGHT

The person fucks it up and FUCKS YOU OVER.

Isn't that a hoot?

Isn't that just a laugh-riot.

Isn't that just pitiful.

And after thirty years, you get to decide, hey. Sorry, still ill and do not know what is really going on. But....

I thought I could go back to work this week, still wonky, but hey, two day shifts and then do two days off, rest, then five evening shifts. Since I consider myself indestructible, I went in Monday, and it started all right. I got there an hour early to upload all those photos, on my time, not work time, because my pc won't do it. Then an hour later, I started feeling odd. Dizzy. I never feel dizzy. I thought I was going to fall off the chair. My lovely colleague came in and literally rescued me. (I have some of the nicest colleagues in the WORLD.)

So I saw my doctor. My blood pressure was off the charts for high. It has always tended to be low.

(There IS a point to this by the way....)

I went home, and he told me to lie down for a while. Just when I did, whaddaya know, the fucking phone rings.

My Ex, the one supposedly in assisted living? Was at the old house, and he lost the key for the bottom lock. There was some sort of confrontation, and he either got kicked out, which is my assumption, or went into overdrive. So he gets back into the old place, which has been cannibalised, more or less, no electricity, no heat, and it is COLD here, nothing edible since July, and says he is so glad to have his peace and quiet. He didn't pay his phone bills, although I TOLD him to turn it off, and so he can get calls, but not call out. A nightmare.

And they moved all the old stuff into his house, and he is the epitome of a caricature of Miss Havisham. (The crazy lady in Great Expectations who causes the tragedy....)

The vultures in the place who had already taken almost everything from him began gathering. The 'concern' was so GREAT, I got the dry heaves, literally. TROLLS. Now concern trolls and I'm the bad guy who put him into a very horrible place. Hokay....

And with that, I LEFT, Preciousses. I'm on sick leave, and not supposed to be out of the house. I just unlocked the door, gave him one THOUSAND pieces of my more or less incoherent mind, and left. This past year, I worked my ASS off to find a solution, it wasn't perfect, but it was a starting point. And I was the one who was THERE every day of hospital as best I could.... Well isn't that a kick in the PANTS, hey, as Harvey Fierstein said.

I have NOT been back. His problem. Oh, I called, of course. Just to make sure he hadn't fallen down in the WC again. He's happy....

Just when I feel at my weakest point, the jackals gather. It wasn't pretty.

So for all the people who told me he just used me all these years, yup, probably right these past several years. So get out the balloons and the things you make those jeering noises with, and celebrate, because I have HAD it.

But before you get all euphorious and everything, think of this. Did you ever consider me so stupid? Because when you criticise, it always comes down to: I was STUPID. There have been many reasons I made the decisions I made, but I have never been blind, nor stupid. There WAS a time, long ago, when he touched something deep within me, and made me feel wonderful, and desirable and even attractive, and taught me so much. Otherwise, I would have dissed him as I did Hellmut. (See 'Scraping the Barrel' in the Graz section. And there was a lot more to THAT than I will ever tell....) As far as my Ex goes, those feelings are long gone, but gratefulness..... also only stretches so far. So I tried it with Christian feeling. He was so ill, and I OWED him so much. I've paid him back.... I thought it my Christian DUTY... it's a stupid Catholic thing....

Thirty years is a very long time, ok? You go through good times and bad times. But THIS time, am at the end of my wisdom, and throw in the towel, hey.

And then he just threw it in my face.

Which is not helping my blood pressure much..... Tja..

and I thought they only did re-runs in the summer.... right

Just when the driver thought it was safe

to get out of the car and save the rabbit who seemed glued to the tarmac and blinded by the headlights for over fourteen months, he opened the door, and the pretty cuddly bunny hopped away on his own and disappeared after sadly looking back just once.

See? I can be terse, sometimes. A whole tragedy in one sentence.

It doesn't need further explanation.

So yes, no birfday present this year, and the chances are huge that all I get is coal in my stocking. Yup.

Update: Goodness, after seeing it up there, I just realised, I could enter that in the Bullwer-Lytton fiction contest. I only did that once, and got a citation in my name, with the line: 'Whose pen is less mighty than the sword'. And I worked HARD to get that. I was so proud.... The contest involves writing the worst opening sentence imagineable for a novel. This one just slipped out. Go figure.

Signs of the times...

Note: these photos and the ones below are far nicer if you click on one and open it in a new tab or window. The condensation hampers them somehow. Tja. Blogger.... Live and learn.

Once some years ago, Jesus asked me to show him the red light district.











Told him this awning wasn't a one-time manufacturing mistake, there used to be three in town.










He thought this one looked a little seedy....











although the main entrance looks respectable enough.










He thought this one was a bit too garish.










And this one too french.










He nearly chose this one, but I know the woman at the bar sits there and knits all the time, just like Madame Defarge. Creepy.










He liked the phallic graphics on this one










And that is where I left him, turns out. Asked him next day if he had a nice evening, and Jesus said he certainly did. 'I visited with a lady.' Jesus was of Mexican descent, from Austin Texas, and a body-builder. His friends called him Jess. Jesus was a gentleman.










So we have disaffected youth around here, but they always seem to interchange 'save' with 'safe', and 'live' with 'life'.











Although they get the expletives correct, at least....










as we see here.....










but sometimes they get weirdly cryptic. I still am not sure if I read it correctly.











Annti would love this place. They make tattoos into a 'life-style'.











Of course there are weird events posted on kiosks. I'm not so certain I want to know what a kiddy contest is, though.....











There is a mountain and adventure movie festival, though.











And I thought he was dead....













And when these oldies play Graz, you know their career peaked a long while ago.











But having these guys guest at the opera is just beyond necrophilia. And the NEXT big thing will probably be having the mummified Ronald Reagan displayed, with a showing of Bedtime for Bonz0, or the Western series.... Just save me.... or shoot me....

Signs of the times, all right.

Late Autumn....

A week ago Sunday, the weather wasn't too nice, but I needed some air, so I took a walk.





































Seeds ready to drop....



























emergency row-boat across the river.













































I always love feeling like you are out in the country when you are in the middle of town.



















And these remind me of how Impressionism might have come about....














































Chestnut vendor. When they open you know it is autumn.










Not quite the last rose of summer....








There are lady slippers here too.... who would have thought.....










This is in back of the Mt. Calvary church. You can do all the stations of the cross on it, seemingly....



















These are little gardens you can rent. Some of the huts are very elaborate inside, and everyone has a little plot they can tend. Some people spend half the summer out there, and I hear they are sort of clannish, and can tend to be wild. And everyone has dwarves in the garden.













































































I have always loved autumn...