All the Updates

I tried to take a picture out the front and back doors as so to document the fact that it is snowing today, October the 27th, 2017, but the camera on my phone couldn't capture it and I thought posting a picture with superimposed snow (even though it is happening) would be a fake, cheater thing to do.

I've never not loved the piano.

Someone asked me today where my film review of It was, which means that this one person must have enjoyed my film reviews at some point over the years and therefore this validates me as a person, as a writer, and as someone who paid for and is still paying for a (mostly useless) film degree. The truth is, I haven't done many film reviews because I took a full-time job two years ago with Americorps as a reading tutor, and then just last May started full-time graduate school at Augsburg University for a masters degree in music therapy, which is to say my spare moments are all pretty much spoken for. In addition to piano, my at-one-time major instrument, and violin, my at-another-time second major instrument that's been left to sit way too long, I'm learning guitar, ukulele, and . . . (shhhhhh) voice. The interesting thing about this is the fact that my voice is not particularly ideal for singing, it's low and nasally, so more equipped for things like humming, ranting, or annoying people but it's coming along.

The education piece been exciting, challenging, and at times, very scary, but I really do love it, and have found myself more than once appreciating all the years of writing at Iowa's Summer Writing Festival and The LOFT Literary Center, because as it turns out, graduate school, even for music, is a shit ton of writing. Although in an interesting side note I'll add that chemistry, biology, and anatomy (all prerequisites for my admission) did not draw upon any writing, liberal arts, or narrative-based skills at all, and having to re-learn how to be tested on solid, scientific facts was somewhat of an adventure for someone whose main scholastic efforts tended to be, "GOOD ENOUGH," or "ALL MY BULLSHIT SOUNDS LEGITIMATE WHEN WRITTEN OUT THUS," (see former).

Regardless of my life, work, and educational commitments, I have missed writing about film and television. I taught a film appreciation class for Minneapolis Community Ed for five years and had to bow out this semester, and I find myself missing that, too. Funny how the things you tell yourself are too much seem to find their ways back to you if they're important enough.

We've started The Walking Dead and everyone loves it, especially the dynamics between Rick and Negan, which are admittedly very graphic, very unpredictable, and kinda sick. Here's the reason I'm okay with it: YOU CAN USUALLY ACCEPT AN ENEMY AS LONG AS THEY HAVE A SOMEWHAT WINNING/UNSTABLE-YET-NOT-ABRASIVE PERSONALITY. And I think a bit of comedy is also necessary. Some favorite examples:

  Howard Payne in Speed. Intelligent (he makes bombs), mildly unstable, but high on the comedy factor. Loved this guy.

  Bobby Peru in Wild at Heart. Not terribly smart, quite abrasive, and extremely unstable but enough comedy to carry him through (and by comedy in a David Lynch film I mean grotesquerie.) 

  Annie Wilkes in Misery. This bitch is crazy AF but still finds time to play with her pet pig, listen to Liberace records, and watch The Love Connection. Bonus points for being a dedicated fiction reader.

There's just something about a bad guy/girl who manages to entertain you while being bad. You don't necessarily root for them, but you get a little excited when they come on. This isn't always the case; there have been tons of terrible, disgusting villains that you really just wish would piss off and die. Scorpio in Dirty Harry, Martin Keamy in LOST, or Ramsay Bolton in Game of Thrones. Gross, abrasive, and no redeeming qualities therefore prompting wild applause in their respective deaths. Do you have any favorite villains? Or any you absolutely hated? I'd love to talk more about this, Walking Dead, or any other similar topics!

I don't like you, Negan, but I don't want you to go, either.

Tomorrow, I'll talk about It: why I loved it and why I took the family to it.