Oh, Bai, Dine-in Movie Theatre!

Okay, so I finally got to go see The Disaster Artist, which I’ve been anxiously awaiting ever since I first heard about it.  And yes, it’s fantastic.  Definitely see it, especially if you’ve seen The Room.  (I have no idea how well it works if you haven’t.  Seems like it ought to work, though.)

But for some reason every theatre chain in this city decided it was “an arthouse flick.”

Which means it was only showing in the two artsy theatres — one located in a shopping mall (this close to Christmas!) and possessing the tiniest seats ever, and the other located in a hard-to-deal-with shopping district and only open at night — and in the “dine-in” theatres of the regular chains.  You know, the ones with the La-z-boy seats and the double price tickets.

The one in the shopping mall was absolutely out.  That’s a last resort theatre even when it isn’t Christmas-shopping season, just because it’s so uncomfortable to sit there.  And the one in the shopping district really wasn’t appealing as a prospect because their first showing of the day starts at 4-something, and trying to park there is a nightmare.  And Tuesdays are half-price ticket days at the major chains.  (Possibly only for their frequent viewer members; not sure about that.)

So we decided to risk it and went to what used to be a really nice theatre, packed with viewers.  In fact, that might be where I first saw Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, with a lobby so crowded that it’s giving me agoraphobia just to think about it.  (Thank goodness I was less mentally fragile as a teenager! (Yikes, that’s a terrifying sentence.))

The place was deserted.

Clue one that closing it down for a year to re-fit the entire interior to “dine-in” viewing was a mistake.

Struggling

I want to post things that are seasonal, because it’s October, and Halloween is the only holiday I really like.  But I can’t think of anything to post that’s seasonal.  (This is even worse on my other blog, since it’s about my toy collection, and I don’t have time to take new photos, but the only photos I have sitting around waiting to be used are either singles for Wordless Wednesday, or a set for a review of the new(ish) Monster High two-pack of Cleo de Nile and Deuce Gorgon, but my next post on that blog will be my 100th, and I want it to be something a little more special than just more Monster High.  (Then again, the son of Medusa would be appropriate, given what’s going on right now in my myth re-tellings, and given this past Wordless Wednesday was my vintage Calibos action figure… (I am horrified beyond words, btw, that a toy younger than I am is now considered “vintage”…it was only the 1980s!  That’s not that long ago!  *whimper*)))

Worst of all, I shouldn’t be online anyway.  I should be reading.  I have tons more reading to do for next week — at least 150 pages for the Thursday only class, and about as much for the Tuesday-Thursday class — and I need to be researching my final papers.  But it’s so hard to concentrate on my reading.  I just don’t wanna read it right now!  I want to play games, prepare for NaNo, blog, photograph my dolls, buy new dolls (not that I have the money for that right now) and generally do anything that isn’t reading one more word about the Wars of Independence in Spanish America, or about the fall of the Roman Republic.  Halfway through the semester (roughly) and I’m utterly sick of both my classes.

Ugh.

Sorry.  I know I wasn’t going to do these kinds of pointless posts after leaving the daily format, but…sometimes I just want to vent, and venting to the few people available to me just doesn’t feel right, somehow.  (Especially venting to my brother.  He’s very sympathetic, but it makes me feel guilty; he’s never finished college, and here I am whining about my Master’s studies?  It’s very awkward.)

The worst thing, really, is how much I want to do NaNo this year, though I know I don’t have time.  But I really like the idea I came up with — though that’s bitten me before — and I just…I just don’t like the idea of not doing it, for the first time in years.  (Ilios was my first NaNo novel.  I think that was 2011?  Sounds about right…)  But with two major research papers due mid-December, one 25 pages and the other 5,000 words, plus a 3,000 word paper due earlier in December, I don’t see how I could have time, because I’ll need to spend every spare minute reading.  (Though at least the 3,000 word paper is expected to be based only on the readings assigned for class.  Which, of course, don’t let up for a minute.  At least the TTh class doesn’t have any more assigned readings after the ones for this coming week.)  And yet, on the other hand, I haven’t done any serious amount of writing since April, so if NaNo can get me back on track again (which I had hoped, actually, to have last year’s NaNo do, if I recall correctly…) then surely that’s a good thing, right?  (Then again, my writing sucks, so maybe it isn’t…)

I shouldn’t be writing this.

I should be reading Plutarch.

Or one of those ten zillion books and journal articles waiting for me to read them.

Except it would have to be the journal articles; I’ve already used up all my little post-it-note-flags in the two biographies assigned for this week.  (The journal articles, of course, are .pdfs on my iPad, so I can mark them up in the .pdf reader.)  Once I’ve written the paper for this set of reading — due the Thursday after this coming one, naturally — then I can take out most of the flags, and rededicate them.  (But only most, ’cause the pink flags are all for my final paper.  And I’ll have to check which of the rest of them are for this first paper and which are for the second-to-last paper.  But most of them are for this coming paper.)

Also, it doesn’t help that my arm is acting up horribly, despite that it’s getting cooler outside.  (Though it’ll be back up in the 80s by Wednesday!)  But I’m stressed over all this reading, so of course my arm is acting up.  It responds to stress and hormones as well as heat.

Have I said lately that it sucks to be me?  Because it totally does.

All right, I’ll stop moaning and whining now.

I’ll get to reading that Plutarch.  Should be a faster read than the biography of San Martin, right?

Another Rant You Won’t Want To Read

So I met with a new physician. (The old one retired.) It was not a promising first appointment. Now, my old physician always used to harp on my weight, too, but the way she did so was different, more friendly, more maternal. And she certainly didn’t ever suggest surgery. Seriously, this new physician said something about how I wouldn’t be able to get down to my “ideal” weight without surgery, because all I’d be able to lose would be about 60-80 pounds, with diet, exercise and medication, in 6-8 months, so I should really consider surgery as well.

Um, seriously, wtf?

First of all, losing more than that any faster than that would be freakin’ unhealthy.

Gotta be kidding me

This is why I would never, under normal circumstances, trust other people to transfer my data from one computer to another.  On top of the fact that I now have to re-install or re-download every single piece of software I had on the old laptop–even things that were small–

Oh.

My.

F–in’.

God.

That.

Lying.

Sack.

Of.

Salesman.

That button on the touchpad that he promised me turned off the touchpad doesn’t do a damned thing!!!

This computer was several hundred dollars more expensive than others that didn’t have that button.  That button which turns out has no function whatsoever.  That button which will in no way stop my fat hands from accidentally brushing the touchpad and deleting half of what I’ve typed.

Is it too late to return this damned thing for a cheaper one?

I hate it.

I already hate it.

I’ve had it less than 24 hours and I already hate it.

I don’t want it.

I want my old one back.  I’d rather pay the same amount to fix the bloody motherboard than deal with this.

But if I start refusing them my business over this debacle, then where am I supposed to go?

Well, eventually normality will return.

If there is such a thing as normality, anyway.

Last night, I got the call.  The call I had been waiting all day for.  The one from the repair center.

Unfortunately, it was bad news.  The motherboard on my laptop was fried, and since the processor was  attached to it, replacing the motherboard would have been ludicrously expensive.

So I had to buy a new laptop.

But I wanted the data on the old one–some of it was vital and I had no back-ups, ’cause this sort of thing had not occurred to me, for some stupid reason (a mistake I will not be repeating)–so I had to leave the new one at the repair center so they could copy over my data.

Normally, I do that myself, ’cause duh.  But when you’re replacing the computer ’cause it won’t turn on, well…then you kind of don’t have that option.

So I won’t have it back for who knows how long.  He said it usually takes about 72 hours, but might take less.  But is that 72 total hours, or 72 store-is-open-hours?  Because that’s a very different end result, y’know?

Sigh.

Anyway, I’ve got some actually on-topic posts planned, and Monday’s post is about Aias, so I want everyone to read it, because Aias is my second favorite Achaian after Patroclos!  (I’m not sure when I’ll actually get to those on-topic posts, btw.  I just have some of them planned out.  And I’ve started work on one of ’em off-line.)

Why didn’t I plan ahead?

I should have had more posts waiting on standby.  Then I could have just posted them now, y’know?

Or if I could just charge that $&@$?$&@in’ iPad keyboard, that would help a lot.

I’ll see if I can do that tomorrow.  Then I could at least share all that cool stuff about the book, even if I’d  still be a bit high and dry on other things.

This will be post 306, though, so tomorrow’s already written post is 307, so…that’s actually still a long way from 335, isn’t it?

…sigh…

 

Broken laptop

Today was supposed to be a “book report” on the book I’ve spent half the summer reading, since I finally fonished it and wanted to share all I learned from it.  (Well, some of the highlights, anyway.)

But then my laptop wouldn’t turn on.

Fortunately, I can still get into my account from my iPad (I tend to rely too heavily on the “remember me” function on most sites) but my iPad’s keyboard is out of battery power, and no way I’m typing anything that long in an on-screen, touch-pad keyboard!  (And y’know how you charge the keyboard?  Yep, by hooking it up to a computer’s USB slot.)

Anyhow, I’ve pre-scheduled the next two Missing Letter Mondays due to, well, serendipity/inspiration, but other than that…this may actually interfere with my plan to complete the full year of daily posts on time.  ‘Cause I’m not sure I’ll always be willing to slog out into this heat to go to the library or my brother’s place to post something every day, and the repair place isn’t even going to look at what’s wrong with my laptop until Thursday, let alone start fixing it.  (And there’s a 50% chance it can’t even be fixed.)

Just, y’know, an FYI, in case I end up not posting tomorrow.

(Also, I apologize if there are spelling errors in this post.  This thing is really annoying to use, and doesn’t seem to do the nifty squiggly line to point out “you made an oopsie!” that I normally detest.)

A really terrible day

It started out indifferent.  When I got bored of what I was doing this morning, I decided to try clearing up some cluttered space in the back room, to make room for a package that’s on its way (even though it won’t be here until next month, as it’s coming from the other side of the world).  While I was at it, I realized I needed to do something about the way the blinds on the window were partially broken, letting in extra sunlight.  (Previously, that hadn’t been a big issue, as I’d blocked off the lower half of the window with bags of assorted stuff, but that had been the clutter I was un-cluttering.)

Since this room has been routinely ten degrees hotter than the rest of the house (in warm weather), despite having the same number of vents as my bedroom, which has always been the coolest room in the house in summer, I figured the window had to be the problem, so I thought I’d measure it for a curtain rod, and put up some of those super-heavy light blocking curtains.

While I was up there with my face right up at the top of the window, I saw that the window was actually open a crack at the top.

Not enough to see daylight, but enough to let in the hot air.

No wonder it was always so freakin’ hot in here!!

I don’t even want to think about how long it’s been like that.

Of course, in the past, I always kept the door to this room mostly shut, just barely propped open, so it’s only since March that I’ve been trying to use it for human habitation, so it could be worse.  But I still feel like such a grade A moron.

Obviously I closed it, but in trying to pull the blinds up to get a good look in order to make sure I was closing the window properly, not only did I accidentally pull the blinds off the wall, I actually managed to break them.

So, on the hottest day in a long time, I had managed to break the blinds stopping the afternoon sunlight from streaming into the house, and I had to go out to the hardware store to get more blinds.  Because of my arm, I don’t like to drive on sunny days, so I called my brother to see if he would drive me.

When I called him, he told me that my parents had called him–I’m not sure why they hadn’t called me, as well–and told him that they had gotten the bad news back from their veterinarian.  I didn’t ask for the details, so I don’t know if they’ve already said their goodbyes to their cat, but it sounds like it’s inevitable.  Well, they had taken him to see the vet because he wasn’t eating, so it’s not a surprise, but it certainly adds to the general lousiness of the day.

Anyway, at the hardware store, we look at the blinds for a while, unsure of what the heck to get, and eventually I pick a very nice-looking lined number that looks more like a tatami mat than blinds per se.  And I skip the curtains, in the hopes that I won’t need them now, ’cause I don’t want to have to install the hardware.  It’s a “wait and see” thing.  While we were there, I also picked up some stain for the deck at the back of my house, because if I don’t get that thing stained or painted soon, I’m afraid it’ll start to rot, and tomorrow is supposed to be about 15 degrees cooler than today, the coolest day we’re going to have in more than a week; if I don’t do it tomorrow, who knows when I’ll do it.  (Probably not until September.)

Once I get home with the blinds, I start trying to install them, and after a little confusion and staring at the instructions in befuddlement, I realize that they expect the window frames to be constructed in a completely different manner than mine are.  I tried to cobble something together based on their intended method for a while, then I said “#$*!@ this!  I’m just going to nail it in place!”

So I did.  I got a hammer and nails and nailed it up.  And that worked.

Of course by that time, I was completely exhausted, drenched with sweat, and needed a bath so badly that I couldn’t bring myself to clean up my mess first.

After my bath, while my dinner was cooking, I stupidly thought to myself “hey, while I’m doing stuff, why don’t I quickly adjust that shelf I’ve been wanting to adjust?”

Said shelf is not easily adjusted.  We’re not talking those wooden shelves on pegs here.  This is a metal jobbie that needs crazy adjustment and really has to be emptied and turned upside down, or at least on its side, to be adjusted properly.

My dinner was done long before I was finished with it–and my dinner takes 20 minutes to cook–and eventually I really did have to empty everything off the shelf and turn it onto its side.  And even then I didn’t quite adjust it as far as I wanted, because it wasn’t cooperating.

And I was so exhausted by the time I was finished that I didn’t manage to get everything put back on the shelf properly; some of it’s just stacked up on the other shelf I was emptying this morning when all this started.

Worst of all, after all this, I bet I’ll be so sore tomorrow that I won’t be able to do the deck after all.  Ugh…

What helmet would you wear?

Would it be dragon-shaped?

Bronze? Leather? Boar’s tusk? Dainty or massive? Or would you wear a hat, because you–like me in this lifetime–would prefer to avoid harming other living beings?

I’m asking because I’ve recently realized that the one thing I want more than anything else is to go to sleep and wake up to discover that my whole life has been a bad dream. I guess I’ve wanted that for a long time, but it’s become a more pressing desire lately than it has been in the past.

I’ve figured out that it is impossible for me to succeed at anything; I am congenitally bred for failure in all things, but particularly in all things that could lead to anything emotionally or financially rewarding. The better I think something I’ve done is, the worse it is received by others, though sadly the reverse is not the case.

This has its obvious problems, as you can well imagine.

The question is, then, how in the world am I supposed to make it in this world?

I obviously can’t do so by my writing: born and bred for failure definitely applies to my already underwhelming writing skills.

But I haven’t any other skills to use, either.

Too stupid for academia. We’ve established this repeatedly.

Literally no ability to process visual imagery, so no hope of discovering any latent ability in any visual artistic medium.

Even if I had any acting ability (and I don’t), I look like the south end of a north-bound hippopotamus (only less gray) so there’s no chance of going into the performative arts.

No physical stamina, no social skills and no work history, so I can’t go into basic career paths like sales clerks and whatnot.  (Plus I’m way too old to be starting at entry level positions.)

I am left with literally nothing, unless I get someone else to win the lottery on my behalf and give me the money.

Like that would ever happen.

How the heck did I manage to screw my life up this badly?  Usually, to wreck a life, you’d expect someone to have to engage in danger sign activities like drugs, drinking and wild sex.  I’ve never done any of those things.  (Well, I did at one point in my life I did do a tiny amount of drinking, but one margarita on the rare occasions when I went to a nice Mexican restaurant hardly seems to count.  Especially since I always asked for it to be a weak one.)

I often like to think it’s karma.  That I’m so screwed up in this life not (just) because I made so many spectacularly stupid decisions, but because I did something so terribly wrong in a previous life that this life is punishment for it.

In which case, in the previous life, I must’ve been an oversexed, male chauvinist who routinely went about a battlefield slaughtering people left, right and center.  Not really a very nice thought.  Particularly because I haven’t really been “good” enough in this life to earn a better next life, I wouldn’t think.  (Then again, what the heck do I know?  I have little to no knowledge of the Hindu religion from whence the reincarnation terminology springs, and while I’ve read a summary of the Socratic/Platonic philosophic equivalent of reincarnation, it was only a one page summary, and I read it a couple of days ago, while my head was all wobbly with medication, so my information retention was not at its best, to say the least.)

Anyway, I realize that complaining about it isn’t going to make it any better, but I’m not quite sure what will, and sometimes just talking about it (or–in this case–typing about it) can help me work through my thoughts and try to come to grips with the situation in the hopes of understanding things and finding possible solutions.

Though at the moment I certainly don’t see any.

And my head is still a bit wobbly, I’m sorry to say.  I was hoping I’d be adjusted to the medication by now.

This is why I don’t shop.

Also why I don’t go to parties.

See, there’s going to be a family party for the fourth of July.  A relation has an apartment in a high-rise building, from the balcony of which the fireworks downtown can be viewed, crowd- and mosquito-free.  (And just plain “free.”)  So said relation is having a party, starting with dinner, and staying until the fireworks.  This is not the college variety of party.  This is the standing around talking variety of party, with minimal drinking, and zero fun of any kind.  (In fact, it is likely to be sheer torture, since it will involve coming up with answers to the question of “what are you doing these days?”  My brother will have no answer whatsoever to that, and I can only answer regarding my studies.  But I am currently addled by new medication, and I’m terrified that I’ll start talking about how my thesis hinges on the sexual relationship between Achilles and Patroclos.  Even though that’s actually not it.)

Anyway, that’s not what I wanted to talk about.  (I’ll whimper about that on Sunday, after it’s actually happened.)  What I wanted to talk about was today’s misery.  Because today I was informed that the party was going to be on the “fancy side of casual” and that I didn’t have anything nice enough to wear.

Of course.  Because telling me the day before the party is the right time to tell me.

So, dizzy and lightheaded with my medication, I had to be driven to the mall to go and hope that I could find something to wear.

Despite that this is the third of July, and the medical condition in my arm that this medication is so far not resolving requires me to wear three-quarters length sleeves (or longer) at all times.  Because it’s so easy to find those in July.  In my size.

The first two shops we hit were a total bust, as expected.  And the second one added insult to injury by having three mirrors in the changing room instead of one, to ensure that I could see just how hideously overweight I really am.  Consequently I tricked my brother into thinking that I had gone back to the pretzel place for a pretzel dog while he ate at the food court, when I really just went back and had a diet soda for lunch.  Well, at least I had some caffeine and liquid, right?

Anyway, after lunch, I see a promising store, which has a sticker in the window saying that “select stores carry plus sizes” so I go in to see if the store in question is one of the “select stores.”  I see a number of nice shirts, some of which have long enough sleeves, but none of them are large enough, so I have to find a sales clerk.  As I approach the clerk, she immediately goes into a sales pitch about the sale they’re having this weekend.  Once I can get a word in edgewise, I ask if the store carries plus sizes, and she admits that they won’t get any in until Monday.

If the store didn’t have any merchandise that would fit me, then why in the name of all sanity would she waste her breath giving me that sales pitch?!  Who did she think I was going to buy those on sale shirts for?!  She could see that there was no way I was going to fit into any of the clothes in that entire store!

I’m not sure if that was insensitive, rude, or just downright offensive.

Either way, it ticked me off.

See, this is exactly why I never go clothes shopping unless I have to.  Normally, I only go into stores that sell toys, books, games, DVDs or Blu-rays.  (Uh, and necessities like groceries.)  It just cuts through all the garbage.  And my size has nothing to do with whether or not I can find something acceptable.  Plus I don’t have to look in any mirrors.  That helps a lot.

Honestly, I’m still kind of hoping that I’ll somehow break a very minor bone between now and the party so I won’t have to go.  Or having some other minor medical emergency.  Really, just throwing up would probably do, as long as it was dramatic enough.  I wonder if I can throw up on cue…