Notes from ShellyCentral

Idk.

I am tired and my eyes hurt.
I read a book about a dog (through his 4 lives) called "A Dog's Purpose" and I've been kind of cry-cry all day. It was good. Man I love my dogs, past and present.

But right now I'm thinking about my dilemma. It's about computers.

I need a new desktop big time. My big Mac stopped working sometimebefore I went to Europe. I didn't want to think about it then so I put it off, and I still don't want to think about it so I've still been putting it off.

I just don't know what I want to do. I know what I want, but of course I can't spend that much money. Finding the balance between what I want and what I can afford is the big line I don't know where to draw. Would I be happy with an older mac mini? Of course what I really want is an iMac, but wouldn't a mac mini be better than not having a desktop?

And then I think about how for about the same mony as an old mac mini I could get a pretty good PC. But do I really want a PC? Remember when the only computer I had was a PC? Those were dark days. And then remember how happy I was when I had a Mac again? But if I'm really so great and creative and all that, couldn't I make having a PC work? People do it all the time, don't they?

And then I remember all the cool people have Macs. And oI don't want that to have anything to do with my decision, because who cares what all the cool people are doing? Except I kind of care and I always think of that when I'm trying to decide.

So I don't know. But I want to decide so I can get back to it.
Let me know if you have an old iMac in your garage.

Man.

Even though I was busy just about all day today it seems like I did 't really get anything done. I've had those kind of days before of course. They're crap. I do not like them. And it seems I've ended it rather crap as well, watching the season finale of Dexter Season 5. It seemed rather anticlimactic. I watched the first 3 discs kind of obsessively over a couple days last week and couldn't believe the way the last disk ended. Major clifhanger. And then I had to wait through the weekend till today to get the last disc. With one episode. The last episode. That kind of sucked. And it was intense, of course. But I don't know. I just feel unsatisfied. I don't think it was a good ending.

I should be in bed now, really. I have to wake up early to get my very old car to the shop and then worry all day about how much it will cost to fix it. This is not a good time of year for an unexpected auto repair bill, but the light came on so I'm having the engine checked. Plus there's a funny noise. And my horn doesn't work which usually doesn't matter, until someone comes inches away from wrecking into me. As they did last week.

So I'm going to go to bed. Who knows, tomorrow might be a fantastic day.

I know, I know but I had to.

In what may be one of my dorkiest moves ever, I started a General Hospital blog on Tumblr. I found myself enjoying reading what other people have to say about it so much, and I of course have so much to say myself. It seemed like the right thing to do.

And I am loving it. Loving it.
Everytime some reblogs me or follows me I get so dorkily excited.
And I've barely started it, but still. It's making me super happy which is a super good thing.

In other news, the weekend has managed to flash by without me feeling like a caught enough of it. Yesterday was good and busy but today was mostly easy. I spent the morning making putting papers together to make myself an interesting book and the afternoon listening to an audio book and napping (yes, I'm still listening to Plains of Passage. I'm on disc 15 of 28). I warmed up some dinner and since then H and I have been hanging out, doing our own things. She has a job interview!! tomorrow morning and I hope she doesn't stay up too late. Of course I won't know because I am a forty something momma and can't stay up as late as a teenager.

This week I plan to be super busy and productive. I have some dreaded chores that I have put off long enough. I will be thinking of my family reunioning without me and wondering how it all got to be the way it is. I have printmaking class to look forward to. I hope I do better this week. It's time to get caught up with Project Life, as I've fallen behind a couple weeks again. I think it might be a good week. Next week is July, already! It's my favorite month and so close to August, which is when H and I leave for Europe (although not till the very end of August). It's also my birthmonth and the month they release the very last Harry Potter movie. So yeah. The outlooks seems cheery.

What I've Been Watching

Dexter, Season 4.
This season of Dexter was so much better than season 3. I love Dexter the first two seasons, but last season was just bad. To me. And so while I wanted to see this season, i expected to not like it.
But I loved it. Fantastic. I drank it up like it was a tasty mango margarita. Disk after disk I couldn't stop watching it. I'm not sure how they fixed whatever was wrong with last season, but I think part of it was John Lithgow. It's better when there's a bad guy out there worse than Dexter, and who makes us want to be on Dexter's twisted side. Go Dex. Save us from the bad guy.

Lenny
Dustin Hoffman is Lenny Bruce. It's a pretty good story, interestingly told. I have heard some of Lenny Bruce's stand up but didn't really know his story. I do now, so successful there. It held my attention and made me think about things. Good movie all around.

Mad Men, the first three episode
The thing is I could never stand fatalism. I understand the point, but I have never had the illusion that heros existed, so I've never needed to have that bubble burst. I don't need to be informed that despicable people exist, that is evident anywhere you look. I like my characters much better in shades of gray. I find that much more interesting and complex. Beyond that, it was certainly fun to look at the olden days in all it's glory; dial phone, no seatbelts, crazy wardrobes, rampant misogyny, and drinking and smoking all day long. I don't think I'll watch any more of it

Beyond and Back
This is some cable channel show about near death experiences. My tivo grabbed a bunch of them during a marathon. It seems like it would be right up my alley, and it's ok, but they spend way too much time on boring stuff like how the person died and hardly any time on what happened when they were dead. Plus I'm still just waiting for one person to say they say their old dogs.

Mr Show
When I showed Hannah Mr Show on DVD, she said she could see that it was funny but it wasn't her kind of humor. When she accidentally watched them with me now that they're on tv, she can't stop laughing.

Match Game 74
Sometimes my tivo used to record this for me and I'd always enjoy it. I love the hair and outfits. I love it because I remember watching it. And I love 1974. My favorite years are about 1968 to 1976 so 74 is great.
I was 8 in 1974. I knew a lot stuff they talked about was about sex or drinking or something, but I didn't really get it. One night Alan and I were watching it and I was waxing on about how I like it and he suggested I get a season pass. Brilliant idea. Now there's always a couple of them waiting around to get watched.

Media Monday

I've been trying to think up themes for each day of the week, so that if I don't know what to blog about, I'll at least have a suggestion. I don't know if I'll like it or stick to it, but let's say Mondays will be Media Monday, when I'll talk about movies or music or books or teevee or some kind of media I've been ingesting.

I'll start with movies. I've seen a couple in the last week or so. I rented Salt from the Red Box, watching a copy of Young Guns I bought recently, caught the second half of My Dinner with Andre on the teevee and my Tivo recorded Monty Python's Holy Grail for me.

Salt was pretty good. I thought i would watch it while I was working on some projects but I ended up paying my whole attention to it. Pleasant surprise there. Young Guns used to be my favorite movie. I hadn't seen it for ages and still found it super enjoyable. Kiefer is so sweet and cute in that movie, I really love him. I started a page of movies I'm watching in 2011 (with my little reviews)  here on my blog.

My Dinner with Andre is truly one of my favorite movies. I could listen to those guys talk for hours and hours, which is good because that's all the movie is.  Andre Gregory and Wallace Shawn (from The Princess Bride and a million other movies) sit at a table and prattle on. Especially Andre Gregory. When I watched it in my 20s, he was my favorite. As I watch it in my 40s, Wallace Shawn is. Interesting evolution? I missed a lot of good dialog before I stumbled on it but it's still good to have on when I'm doing other things, like cleaning or writing or falling asleep.

Holy Grail is of course entirely hilarious. Especially the first bit. I don't even know what to say about it. The swallow and the bring out your dead and the snotty french guy and on and on. If you think Monty Phython is funny you've probably already seen in, and if you don't like Monty Phython there's no reason to.

About music, I'll just say I've been listening to nothing in particular. Whatever comes up on iTunes shuffle is good enough. The only books I've read lately are the free bits of some Rick Steves' travel books on Kindle for the iPhone. I don't know if I should buy Great Britain or England since the only part of Great Britain we'll visit besides England is Edinburgh. I plan to start reading a book about Queen Elizabeth 1 this week.

Oh, I did read a book, on my iPhone Kindle, in about 2 hours. But it was such a horrid book and I'm so embarrassed I even thought about reading it I don't want to tell you!

And on the tv front, man it's all boring these days. Last weeks Hoarders, with the scary lady who lived with chickens in too tiny pens full of poo and the man with too many bunnies - man. Those are some crazy people. Seriously. I wish they'd show some not quite so crazy people that had some hope of living successful non hoarded lives after getting some help. General Hospital is lame and even Brenda Barrett barely makes it watchable. If it weren't for the fast forward magic of the Tivo I would certainly not be watching it anymore.

Movies, music, books, tv - I think that's it!

Brenda Barrett Bits

I wish SoapNet had a show called something like "Just the Brenda bits". It would just be the parts of General Hospital that either had Brenda Barrett in them, or people talking about her. I can fast forward to her scenes easy enough, sure, but there is a whole set of other characters that Might be talking about her so I have to watch their boring scenes to figure out what they're on about. It would have to be on once a week  to have enough Brenda bits to make an entire show. I'd like that, too. I'd rather have one big chunk that scrolling through and hour for maybe 10 minutes of Brenda.

What you put in your head... *

I thought I'd write a little about what I've been putting in my head lately:

Movies:
The Lost Prince: So. King Edward and Queen Mary of England have a son who has epilepsy and some sort of learning disorder. Of course they ship him off away from everyone and out of view. This is a two part BBC show about his life. Done badly. Mostly because few characters are interesting or likable, especially the Prince. And the Queen (are all Queen Marys bad?). And etc.  In terms of the history geeking, in second part some things get interesting. WWI breaks out and the King’s beloved cousin, Nickolas of Russia and his whole family get wiped out by the revolutionaries. That was an interesting relationship I’d never thought of before even though I love the Russian Revolution. Over all I’d say it was just bad and boring. Maybe also frustrating.

Season 1 Disc 1 of Secret Diary of a Callgirl : Dirty! I know. But also very good. Sleek and glam looking, I especially love all the scenes of London! And I love that girl, even though her name is Hannah. Her accent is fascinating. I’ll try the next disc after I watch some Sarah Connor Chronicles, which is next on the Netflix queue.

Hello Dolly: Forgot how much I love Barbra Streisand and this movie. I’ve been just watching it on repeat as I go about my day. Love it!  I’ve seen it a thousand times I think, starting when I was a small child. This set of viewings is the first time I realized that as much as I love Babs, Dolly should really be played by someone much older. She’s a widow who was married for a long time. And she’s going to marry Horrace/Walter Matthau who is quite older and ickier than her (I do not like him so much). I love all the songs in this movie, from ‘Just leave everything to me” to “So Long Dearie”, but I guess my favorite is Put on Your Sunday clothes is my favorite. It’s upbeat and encouraging, everyone gets a few lines, and what’s not to love about that giant dance number. I also love when Babs stands still in the middle of the marching and sings ‘Before the Parade Passes By’. And I can’t not mention the clothes in this movie = fantastic.

Godspell: I love everything about Godspell (almost). The hippiness. The hapy love joy joy wandering about the countryside. The super great costumes I wish I could wear and of course, of course Victor Garber with his super young face and his dreamy dreamy voice. Victor makes the best Jesus I’ve ever seen. The songs are catchy, meaningful and irresistable. Ok, sometimes the clowning is a little cheezy but I’d still leave home to join that crowd. Did I mention I love the costumes the most? I’d like to wear the outfit of the girl with the little tiger puppet. Oh, and I seriously appreciate that there are the same number of girls and boys. Most movies about Jesus dis the girls. Most everything  about Christianity disses the girls but that's another entry. My favorite songs are many but my tops are probably “All for the Best’ (how trippy now to seem them dance atop the twin towers), "All Good Gifts" and "Save the People". One of the best musicals ever.

Listening to: Mostly just soundtracks. Pippin. Godspell. Camelot. Hunchback of Notre Dame.
Downloaded from iTunes this week: 4 songs from Enchanted, 3 old Barry Manilow songs, 2 Victor Garber singing Sweeny Todd.

TV: nothing much to watch lately
Lost - I’m just trying to follow the flow, trusting they’ll give me some satisfaction in a couple weeks. Do I really think I’ll get it? No. But a girl can hope.
General Hospital: I have no idea whose baby Elizabeth is having, but I hope it’s Nikolas’s and they move back to whatever pretend island he’s Prince of. While Lucky is often a fool, Jonathan Jackson is always so terrific. Same goes for Luke/Tony Geary. I still want to join their family really really badly. Shelly Spencer, I’m telling you.

And sadly, the only thing I’ve been reading is the internet and various recipes and food labels. Hopefully that’ll change right away.

* Lyrics from a Todd Rundgren song: "What you put in your head just can't help effect how you feel."