Sleepy Sunday

I didn’t sleep very well last night and then I got up pretty early (though not as early as I had planned) this morning. I did a bunch of stuff, including lots of chores around the house. There was a little time earlier this afternoon where I actually conked out on the couch. It was only a few minutes, but it happened.

That leads to the sleepiness question… am I going to be able to stay up long enough to watch the season two finale of House of the Dragon on HBO? It comes out at 9:00 on the Max app. I have clean sheets on the bed (one of today’s chores) and sitting up in bed while watching HotD is going to be a challenge.

I thought I might take an actual nap after dinner tonight but Jen and I discovered that the first chunk of the new season of Cobra Kai is out on Netflix so we can’t do anything until we watch that, right?

Right?

TV… we live in the golden age, my friends.

Futurama was Wrong

I was just playing a game of Space Invaders on an Atari 2600 emulator I found online. I had a pretty good game.

Then I thought of that one episode of Futurama where the aliens from planet Omicron Persei 8 invade and Fry defends the Earth armed with his bottle of Shasta and his all Rush mix tape.

So I put on the Moving Pictures album to see if listening to Rush would improve my game. While it did improve my mood and my general sense of mental well being (that album RULES), it did not improve my game. Not even a little bit.

I guess the bottle of Shasta is the missing link. Either that or Futurama was wrong, and we all now Futurama is never wrong.

Good(?) Morning

I woke up in a mood today. I don’t know what is bothering me. I feel a sense of doom and gloom. Am I suddenly psychic (Robert pauses the narrative to let anyone reading along finish laughing hysterically) and something is on the horizon?

Nope. Just in another bitchy mood. I didn’t get enough sleep last night and it shows. I have a small project at work that is hanging over me like a dark cloud. It’s not a big deal, I just don’t have the energy to deal with it. Crud, right?

The traffic was crappy this morning, but it was the normal level of crappy, not some extra thick level of crappy or anything. I don’t know.

Hey, did you watch the season finale of The Acolyte last night? It was good. I liked it. I liked the whole season though I will quickly admit that the action heavy episodes were by far the best of the bunch. No spoilers, but that scene last night where you actually see the light saber do that thing that light sabers are supposed to be able to do? You know, the thing that we never saw Anakin or Dooku or Maul or Palpatine actually do even though we all saw the end result? Hint Hint Sithy Hint? Awesome.

That should be putting me in a good mood, right? Star Wars is like my own personal dopamine fix. Nope. I was all smiles watching it last night, but today? Grumpy gus. Or should I call myself Darth Grumpy Gus? Does that work better?

No guitar playing today. Maybe before work tomorrow. I did use a guitar for today’s photo a day picture. I think the next time I play I am going to use a different guitar. I haven’t played my Gibson SG in ages and it’s kind of calling to me. My wife thinks that guitar looks cool so that alone should be incentive to play it more often, don’t you think?

Okay. Cheer up, everyone. It’s hump day or some shit. For my personal work week, once I get through the day in the office today, I am working from home for the rest of the week. That should cheer me up, right? Ugh.

321/365
321/365

Directionless

It is weird, you know? Now that I’ve run out of daily writing prompts and have kicked the habit (so to speak) I feel like I’ve lost my blogging mojo somewhat. Like… now what do I do? You know what I mean, jelly bean?

Today is the 4th of July. That is meaningless now that the united states supreme court has declared that the president is above the law. We the people, except for the president, right? Fuck it, I don’t care. My country is dead. Nothing to do now except vote for the guy who won’t abuse his new dictatorial powers. Whatever.

The holiday no longer has any meaning except that it’s now 50 songs in 90 days challenge season. From today through October 1st I am going to try to write a shite load of shitty songs. Be warned, I am going to write about that a lot. It’s only 8:18am and I already have one riff written. There will be tons more to come, I think. Unless I wuss out and lose motivation and stop working… like last year… and almost every year that I’ve tried this dumb thing.

The holiday is meaningless now but it’s still a day off during the summer. The plan is to have a cookout. Burgers on the grill for lunch. Chicken on the grill for dinner. Of course climate change has turned New England into New Seattle and it rains here almost every day. The forecast calls for thunderstorms right around dinner time. Hoo-fucking-ray, am I right?

What else… binge TV watching. What are we checking out these days? The Acolyte is excellent. It was good through three episodes, then ramped up big time starting with episode four. There are six episodes out and two left to go. Really looking forward to seeing how it ends. The Boys has a new episode out today. I haven’t watched it yet. House of the Dragon is just as spectacular as you hoped it would be. Over on Netflix I am trying to get back into The Witcher. I watched each of the first two seasons when they came out. They were okay. I started the third season when it first came out but lost track of it. I’ve watched a couple more episodes this week and am having a hard time remembering who everyone is and what they are trying to do. I’ll power through. I started watching Dark. I think I am three episodes into the first season. It’s okay. It’s a little tough to follow given that multiple actors are playing each character. Also, it’s a German show and I’m having a hard time taking some of the hairstyles seriously. I mean… wow. Not that that sort of thing catches my eye at all, but really… wow. There is also Torchwood on Max. It’s good. It’s not great. I’ll power through it, for completeness sake.

I’m sitting at my desk in the cellar right now. I just saw a spider. That’s not unusual. Our cellar is kind of the Spider Kingdom. I am not one who is afraid of spiders or weirded out by spiders or anything like that. I usually just ignore them and let them eat the other bugs. This guy though… it was big. Like… it’s going to haunt my nightmares big. I tried to terminate it with extreme prejudice using a fly swatter but I missed. I can’t find it now. I fear that it is going to come hunting for me to get revenge. I mean… it was big enough that if we still have mice hiding out down here then they might be in trouble. It was that big.

Yeah… see what I mean about me being directionless, bloggily speaking?

Up and Unmotivated

It’s an office day today. I’m up early to start my exercising and to get some shite* done and here I am typing in this completely useless blog post.

Motivation level = Zero.

Hey! I am trying to pick off another episode of Torchwood because I am trying to finish off the show (even though I don’t exactly love it) and here is season three episode one and Peter Capaldi is in it! Doctor Who Number 12’s actor in his second of two Doctor Who related roles from before he was actually cast as The Doctor. Fascinating.

Where was I?

Oh yeah. The morning routine. Let’s start my exercising and maybe get some shite done before I have to drive in to work.


*Back in the 1980’s I started obsessively reading the novels and short stories written by Clive Barker. Mr. Barker, in at least one of his works, used the word “shite”. I had never heard or read that word before. Mr. Barker is from Liverpool. Is shite a Liverpudlian thing? I don’t know. I do know that I am currently a little more than half way through the audio book version of Weaveworld and hearing the word shite get used again is making me feel nostalgic for the old days of language discovery and shite.

Now What?

It finally happened today. After over a year’s worth of effort the Great X-Files Rewatch Adventure finally came to an end.

I finished season 11. 11 seasons and two movies and the rewatch is complete.

Now what?

Part of me wants to go back to Star Trek. Jen and I started watching Voyager. I already rewatched Deep Space Nine. the original series and The Next Generation have both been rewatched numerous times in the past. Do I want to rewatch one of those again? Maybe. I don’t know. Enterprise? I don’t know. I was really not liking that show in the last year or so. Maybe I should give it another try?

Maybe I’ll poke around Netflix looking for some science fiction and if I don’t find anything that jumps out at me I’ll give Enterprise another look.

I’ll let you know.

Sleep and Spoilers

I did something I rarely do. I let myself sleep late on a work day. Not too late, but later than usual.

The last few nights I have had the worst sleep. Barely five hours on Sunday and Monday nights. Less than five hours on Tuesday night. I was practically in a coma for much of the day yesterday. I needed sleep so badly.

Last night? Almost seven hours. Still not enough sleep, but so much more than I’ve been getting. Bliss. I usually set an alarm on my watch for 5:00am. Jen has an alarm set for a half an hour after that, but I am usually down cellar exercising before her alarm goes off.

Today? I slept until a little after 6:00. It meant I was running behind throughout my entire morning routine, but it was worth it. I’ll still probably be asleep on my feet by around 7:00pm tonight, but for now? I feel a little better.

Okay then, part two of this post is going to deal with Star Wars: The Acolyte and it is ABSOLUTELY SPOILER FILLED. If you haven’t watched the show, bail out now. I have two stupid comments that are burning a hole in my tiny little brain and I have to get them out and THEY ARE SPOILERS so you have been warned.

Seriously… if you want to watch the show and you haven’t yet, get out now.

You have been warned… again…

Last warning…

Okay. So this is the same comment made twice. Once is me being a snob, the other is me getting mine.

Before the show aired, people online were over the moon about Carrie-Anne Moss playing Jedi Master Indara. People who’ve read the High Republic books and/or comics were all excited about what a bad ass warrior Indara is and how viewers were going to be over the moon at how awesome she is. Also… it’s freakin’ Carrie-Anne Moss. People were foaming at the mouth over having such an awesome actor in the cast.

Episode one… the first scene… Carrie-Anne Moss as Jedi Master Indara in a lightsaber fight. This is it! Here it comes… oh… she’s dead… oh.

I laughed out loud knowing that the internet would be turned on its ear over that scene. People were going to be pissed and it made me happy. Screw your expectations! Take that, know it all book readers! I was just tickled.

Fast forward to episode five. The episode was awesome. They saved up a whole season’s worth of action scenes and threw them all in our face at once. Just fight after fight after fight. It was fantastic. When Jedi Padawan Jecki Lon started fighting our dark side bad guy, the action was incredible. I was watching on my laptop and I thought to myself, if they want to do a spin off show where this kid just fights everyone, I will be totally, 100% on board… oh… she’s dead… oh… I guess that’s what I get for laughing at the Indara fans… Okay… I totally got what was coming to me. Serves me right for being snobby about people being snobby. Lesson learned, Acolyte. Lesson learned.

Okay, the spoilers have ended. You may go on with the rest of your day now. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. I appreciate your patience.

Dark Matter

I just finished watching Dark Matter on AppleTV+. I really enjoyed it.

It’s weird. They ran a show called Constellation that centered on the idea of a multiverse and people swapping between parallel universes. That show was okay but it was a little confusing and they never really spelled out the hows or whys or even the whats. Apparently that show was cancelled after it’s one season.

Almost immediately after Constellation ended, Dark Matter came out. Nine episodes focusing on the idea of the multiverse and people swapping between parallel universes. The difference between the two shows? Simple. Constellation was okay. Dark Matter was excellent. At times it was riveting. Just when you thought you had your brain wrapped around it, BAM so new piece of information that turned everything upside down. It was just really good.

Will there be a season two? I don’t think so. The show was based on a book (and you can bet your sweet ass that the book is on my reading list now) and I believe the entire book was covered. They could always come up with some new issue for our main characters to deal with, but I don’t know. I think we’ve gotten all we’re getting.

If that’s the case and the show is a one and done… then it was really well done and I’m glad I watched it all the way through.

If you like science fiction and good TV, and you have an AppleTV+ subscription… check it out.