Tag: stephen king

Random Stuff

Some random thoughts on a Friday night shortly before bed when I am so tired I can’t think straight.

16 days until our next Rush concert. It will be my 28th dating back to December 1987. It is the last show we currently have tickets for. Will it be my last Rush show ever? I thought my last Rush show ever was in 2015 but I’ve seen them three times since June and that is a seemingly miraculous gift. I’m very thankful.

I watched the new TV version of Carrie. It was so fucking good. I read the book years ago and while it was fine it is not my favorite Stephen King novel. King might be my favorite author. If he’s not my favorite he’s probably top three… or top two… I’m a huge fan. Carrie though, that one is good but it seems somehow… lesser than most classic King stories. There’s something missing. I don’t have the vocabulary skills needed to describe what is missing.

The show though… Mike Flanagan made the show. I’ve never seen any of his movies, but I’ve seen all of his Netflix TV series and they are all fantastic. This show slots in perfectly. It’s so good. He’s supposed to be working on an adaptation of The Dark Tower and I can’t wait. I can’t wait. Did you hear me say that I can’t wait?

Now that I am through with Carrie it’s time to start watching Vision Quest. I’m also watching Dark Matter. That one is really good too.

I need to take the camera out this weekend and shoot a roll of film. I’m trying to shoot a 120 roll of both Kodak Gold 200 and Kentmere 100 each month. I already have a roll of Gold done for October but I still need to shoot the Kentmere. I just don’t know what to shoot. I won’t have time tomorrow (Saturday) so I hope to get it done on Sunday.

I want to write a couple of songs before October ends too. Think of it like releasing a single. I had an idea pop into my head yesterday but I didn’t have a chance to put it down somewhere and now its gone. I hate when that happens. I also want to replace an overdrive pedal. I don’t like Boss pedals as a rule but I bought a mod of a Boss overdrive pedal made by a boutique company a few years ago and I recently found out that the boutique company donated money to trump. Nope. Done with those fuckers. Now I want to find anyother boutique mod/clone of that Boss pedal that is better than the shitty standard Boss pedal. I hate how snobby I get sometimes but there’s no way I am using a pedal made by a fascist collaborator on the off chance that someone might someday see me playing it and want to pick one up for themselves and give money to a fucking fascist. Nope. Not happening.

What was I talking about?

I started rambling and started pissing myself off about the state of our shit country. I’ll change the subject.

Yesterday I wrote about our leaky tub getting fixed. At least I hope it was fix. We gave it all day today to let the fix set and dry and settle and do whatever it needs to do. I’m looking forward to running the shower tomorrow to see if we get any water in the cellar. Please no. Pretty please no.

Okay, I am really tired. I’m going to fall asleep. Correction, I am going to try and watch an episode of Vision Quest (episode two, to be precise) and then I am going to fall asleep. Hopefully in that order. Wish me luck.

Irritation

It has been one of those days. Everything that has happened today has rubbed me the wrong way. Well… maybe not everything, but most things. Why? Is it because the Bruins were shut out last night? It could be. Is it because the fucking Yankees are in the World Series? It might be.

Here’s hoping the drive home will be a turning point. Granted I will have to stop for gas before I get home, but I am finally going to finish my JRR Tolkien deep dive/audio book re-read. Well… I listened to the Silmarilian (boy, was that rough) and about 15 minutes into tonight’s commute I will complete The Lord of the rings (much better, except for all the singing… ouch). Up next in my Audible queue is Stephen King’s new short story collection. That should be a nice palette cleanser after all the Middle Earth fantasy. I guess I should read The Hobbit too, for completeness, and anything else that Tolkien may have published that I have never read. Naw, let’s get into some King for a while.

Once I get home the plan is to make a quick dinner for me and the love of my life. Burgers (fried on the stove) and fries (fried in the air fryer). Then we’ll sit down in the living room and enjoy a quiet night together making fun of our clinically insane cats. As per usual.

Here’s hoping for a fun, quiet night tonight and a less stressful work day tomorrow.

Not Double Booked

Turns out I was not double booked. The doctors appointment is in fact tomorrow and not today. The electricians are here and for the first time in ages the lights in the kitchen and the dining room are going to work correctly. If they are done by 10:30, or even if they just don’t turn off the internets, then I may be able to attend that work meeting. I’m on vacation though, so I’ll be all incognito like. Hi everyone, I’m not actually here. Ha! I’m so professionally funny.

The best part of all of this is that I have 24 hours left before I have to lose my head being afraid of another doctors appointment. Hooray and all that happy crappy*.

*That’s a Stephen King reference, from too many books to count. I think. Maybe he only used it in one book and I just read that book more than once. Who knows.

Patriots Day

Today is Patriots Day. It’s a state holiday in Massachusetts and Maine*. It’s the day we remember how this dude (and at least one other dude)…

Image came from here

went for a ride one night, which lead to some farmers and other dudes getting into a shooting fight with a bunch of foreign dudes in red coats at this spot…

750

*At the time Paul Revere went for his ride the area now known as the state of Maine was part of Massachusetts. It wasn’t until 1820 that Maine became a state on it’s own. Massachusetts has spent the last 201 years lamenting the loss of Old Orchard Beach and Bar Harbor and (eventually) Stephen King.

The Stand: Not Quite Spoiler Free Review

I’ve already written one mostly spoiler free commentary about the new CBS mini series version of Stephen King’s The Stand. Now that the final episode is out I can give another mostly spoiled free review that briefly covers the whole thing.

I’m trying to stay spoiler free, but I can’t guarantee success. If you want to watch the series and you don’t want even vague hints at how it goes then you should stop reading now.

Last warning.

Okay, kids. Here we go.

The best part of The Stand is that it’s over. Good lord this series is awful. Just terrible. Like, I’ve read the book (both the original and the expanded versions) multiple times and I can’t even begin to imagine how they could have missed the mark so thoroughly and completely and massively screwed up such a fantastic story. The level of awful cannot be overstated.

The first half of the book is the world falling apart. The second half is putting it back together while the good guys face off with the bad guys. In the series it opens up in the second half of the story and gives a few flashbacks to the first half. It basically skipped everything you wanted to see. In the book the good guys congregate in one city and the bad guys in another. In the series, literally everything that happens in the bad guy city is so horribly bad it is unwatchable. The setting, the mood, the dialog, the acting, the casting, the writing, it’s all so bad it was painful to sit through. The good guy city is better, much better, but they still miss all the things that made the book so good.

The best parts of the series, with a couple of exceptions, are boring. Not bad per se, just boring and uninteresting. The exceptions being the final episode, which was mostly pretty good. We knew going in that King had written a mostly new ending. It’s not that good, but it’s okay. the other exception is Greg Kinnear who is excellent as Glen. When he’s on the screen it’s almost good enough to make up for everything else being so boring.

The worst parts of the series are so far off the mark they made me feel sick. In the book the bad guy sets up a society that is basically a police state. Law, order, peace, safety, all paid for by the removal of all human rights and freedoms. Trump would have loved it. In the movie his town is depicted as one part orgy and one part gladiator blood sport. 24 hours a day, seven days a week. So instead of Flag being this menacing behind the scenes villain, he’s a pimp. They couldn’t have made it worse if they actively tried. Even the climactic ending was depicted in such an absolutely stupid way that I was thinking about offing myself so that I wouldn’t have to watch it all the way through.

All of that is maddeningly terrible, but it’s still better than whatever the hell Ezra Miller was doing. To say that his performance is the worst display of acting I’ve ever seen is possibly the biggest understatement in the history of language.

If you’ve read the book, I recommend that you never, ever try to watch this series. If you haven’t read the book, I still recommend that you never, ever try to watch this series. I don’t think it is humanly possible to tell the story of The Stand and make it worse than this. It can’t be done.

It’s About God Damn Time!

The first trailer for The Dark Tower movie has arrived.  I’m not going to lie to you, this doesn’t appear to have all that much to do with Stephen King’s books. I’m a little nervous about that.  I don’t want to just see the books on the screen, I want them to make the movie stand on it’s own, but I’m a little nervous to say the least.

 

Though I have to be honest… hearing the whole I do not aim with my hand mantra out loud was pretty freaking awesome.

Spooky

Try this…

Move to a house in the woods. On a dark night spend an hour plus driving home from work. While you drive, listen to a Stephen King audiobook*. Make sure you get home before your wife does, and that the house is dark and empty.

If that doesn’t spook your ass out then nothing will.

For a few minutes there I didn’t want to get out of the car.

BOO!!

*the audiobook was Joyland

Terror: Stephen King Style

I stopped at a stop light this morning, looked at the car next to me, and saw this:

image

If that dude looked over at me and started talking about things floating I literally would have crapped my pants.

“They float,’ it growled, ‘they float, Georgie, and when you’re down here with me, you’ll float, too–'”