Back From The Slough Of Despond

Well, it's been a while. Sorry about that, but there's been a strain of flu going around which basically (thank God) missed me, but did sort of flick me in passing...the result of this was that I couldn't keep my eyes open for a solid week and had a ghastly hacking cough which produced nothing of any interest and went on and on and on. I am now feeling MUCH more human.

The other thing was that I just got really depressed about the state of this damn apartment and, because of falling asleep all the damn time, couldn't do a thing about it. However, as of this moment, there are books in the new bookcases (oh, all right, not all of them, but you gotta start somewhere), and the USA channel on TV has been handing me one of my favorite cures for depression, which is lots of Indiana Jones. It's very hard to be depressed when Indiana Jones AND his father (what an inspired pairing that is - Harrison Ford and Sean Connery) are searching for the Holy Grail. Also when Indy is racing along underground in a tram car escaping the Thuggee cult. That was last night and tonight...and the result is that I almost have an actual working living room (every now and then commercials are useful). So there.

Other than that, no further word from Boardwalk, but I wasn't expecting it because I got a look at the shooting schedule and it's all indoor small scenes at the moment...we should be going back to the crowd scenes in a week or so.

But I've decided to get some more money from my trustee because I really CANNOT live another moment without kittens. I have now been without any animals in the house for more than three months, and I think that's the longest I've ever gone in my life...and I hate it. You will understand the depth of my need for kittens when I tell you I'm looking forward to changing a litter box. I mean, face it...that's NEED.

And I have totally lost faith in anybody's ability to use the English language. I was reading the book review today and as always, I ran my eye over the page with the self-published books from XLibris, which I invariably do with a sense of wonder that the authors felt any of this was worth writing about to begin with...although authorial pride is certainly a prime mover, and now that you can do it with your very own desk top software, anybody can publish a book! They mostly shouldn't, but what the hell. They're having fun.

For instance, one of the potential best sellers on today's page was a tome entitled "Analytic Philosophy Adrift" by Elston Van Steenburgh. The blurb reads as follows:

"Elston Van Steenburgh believes that what analytic philosophy needs, both English and American, both ordinary language analysis and logical analysis, is a convincing proof that sense qualities are continuous and, derivatively, lack ontological status. 'Analytic Philosophy Adrift' further expounds this concept."

I don't know about you, but I'm going to order dozens of copies for Christmas presents.

However, what actually caught my eye was a book entitled "The Very Little Book of Children Sayings." No, that's not a typo. That's the title. And not only did no one catch the problem while printing the book, they repeated the title on top of the blurb, and it's evidently what's on the actual cover of the book, since there's a picture of same. That's THREE TIMES they perpetrated the damn error. The Very Little Book of Children Sayings. Good GOD.

There's also what looks like a fascinating book called Obamaism Is Socialism, which is fascinating because the author's picture is on the cover, and she looks exactly like an older version of Snooki from Jersey Shore. Although I seriously doubt that Snooki has any idea of what socialism is. For that matter, I'm not at all sure Snooki knows who Obama is.

And this smoking outdoors crud is getting old...particularly since at the moment it's pouring rain and they took down BOTH the handy bits of scaffolding, one on each side of my building. This means I have to stand out there with an umbrella. Growl.

Onward. I am listening to a great show on Channel 13 which involves 50s and 60s doo-wop and pop music, for which I harbor an unholy passion. Right now they're playing Sha Na Na Na...otherwise known as Get A Job. And some poor fools are listening to heavy metal.

Love, Wendy