The NFL & Golden Globes

I watched some NFL wildcard weekend on Saturday and Sunday, then went to see Veep on Sunday, returned home, and watched the Golden Globes.

I think the Golden Globes can learn a few things from the NFL. When San Diego was beating Baltimore, I knew it was the fourth quarter, and so many minutes remained. As Baltimore drove and scored, tension grew because the score was getting close, and they were running out of time.

That’s not really germane.

What I want the Golden Globes to take from the NFL is how much time is left to the presentations. They could have a little clock counting down on a scroll on the bottom, along with what movies and stars have taken what awards so far.

Sure, the G2 could also break their broadcast into quarters, too. I wouldn’t have a problem with that. That would give the hosts some more talking points. I could imagine Oh saying last night, “That ended the first quarter, Adam, and we haven’t still heard anything about the big movies and stars.” Adam could reply, “Yes, but there’s still time, Sandra. There’s still a lot of presenting and awards remaining.”

Then we could have a decent halftime, with a recap by Variety and ET analysts about who won so far while we all go to the restroom and get something to eat and drink.

Just sayin’, y’know?

January 7, 2019 0

Monday’s Theme Music

Today’s theme music comes via my cat, Boo. Boo is a large black cat with a minute white triangle on his chest and two long, white whiskers. Tailless, he came to us as a stray few years ago. We tried to find his people but failed, so he became part of the household. Although big and smart, Boo has issues, and it’s clear that someone mistreated him.

So, I was singing to him last night as I stroked his head and back, “Say it loud. I’m black and I’m proud.” That brought to mind the James Brown song from 1968, of course. Hell, it’s the title.

James Brown’s song is a powerful and affirmative statement of identity and clarity. I used to get goosebumps when I heard a large group of blacks singing it and clapping to the beat. It was amazing to witness.

Look a’here, some people say we got a lot of malice
Some say it’s a lotta nerve
I say we won’t quit moving
Til we get what we deserve
We’ve been buked and we’ve been scourned
We’ve been treated bad, talked about
As just as sure as you’re born
But just as sure as it take
Two eyes to make a pair, huh
Brother, we can’t quit until we get our share

h/t to A-ZLyrics.com

Here’s “Say It Loud (I’m Black and I’m Proud)”.

January 7, 2019 0

Isak Said

January 7, 2019 1

Floofmotic

Floofmotic (floofinition) – of or relating to common housepets, especially their speech.

In use: “When it came to her pets, she took a gothic, floofmotic approach, dropping to her hands and knees to bark, purr, whine and mew.”

January 7, 2019 0

Archfloof

Archfloof (floofinition) – a perfect example of a housepet, such as a cat, dog, or bird.

In use: “She, petite, clean, quiet, and loving — except when birds or squirrels rushed past in a noisy flurry outside, or she got into the catnip and acted a little crazy — was the archfloof of domesticated felines, happily living from can to can and treat to treat, snuggling up to her lady at night, comforting the woman with a brush of whiskers, a kiss of fur, and a whisper of purrs.”

January 6, 2019 0

Color

Red, white, and yellow peered out from the covers of foggy drizzle and gray sky, an aberration among the bare trees and stolid grave markers, calling to him out of their difference. Swinging that way, he strode past the long dead, eyes mostly on the colors, finding a small, cheery snowman in the decorations of poinsettias, daisies and lilies, along with a petite bluebird of happiness.

Reaching the stones, he stared down at them for a few seconds. He’d expected recent deaths, but none of those were recent. Grandfather and father, side-by-side, born seventeen years apart, had died in the early nineties. Grandmother – “I’m just taking a little nap” – was born in 1929 and passed in 2006. She was the most recent.

Son and brother, never forgotten, had been born the same year as him, 1956, but the dead man had preceded him by a few months. Son and brother had passed in 1974, the same year he’d graduated high school, the same year that he’d joined the military. He noticed son and brother was exactly eighteen years old when he died.

Nothing told him about their lives and deaths, nor why the graves had been visited, or who visited them. A recent windstorm had knocked some of the flowers over. Water filled the fake plants’ pots. He emptied the water, set everything upright, and arranged the flowers.

His journey was resumed, nothing learned. It was just a little color on a dreary winter day, a short break in the accumulation of miles.

January 6, 2019 0

Joan Also Said

I enjoy researching and finding these quotes about writing and publishing. The process often unveils writing’s individualized nature, how each finds their own truth about what they’re doing, how, and why.

January 6, 2019 3

Spinning Up

I’ve been conducting an agent search pursuant to having my novel published, writing the query and synopsis for it (and the series, as it’s the first novel in a series of five), and editing the novel (and series) again.

My agent search uncovered a lot of agent hunger for MG and YA novels. That seems to continue as a hot market. Apparently my subconscious took note, because the muses delivered a YA character, premise, and title to me in a dream last night. As I recalled the details this morning, other characters jumped into existence in my mind. Dialogue, scenes, plot details and twists began racing through my mind as I showered and shaved. Sitting down at the computer, I typed up dozen pages as I drank a cup of coffee, and then had a chortle.

My muses love novel writing’s inventing and imagining phase. A new project? Yes, naturally, they were excited. They kept on through the morning, punching more of the novel into me, spinning up my excitement as they fed me words. Like them, though, I enjoy the the inventing and imagining phase, putting it all together, playing with the logic puzzles behind motivation and voices that underpin establish a novel’s underpinnings. That shouldn’t be a surprise since my muses and I share a mind.

Got my coffee. Time to edit and write like crazy, at least one more time.

January 6, 2019 8

Sunday’s Theme Music

Today’s theme music is “(If Loving You Is Wrong) I Don’t Want to be Right”. Humming along with it as it flowed through my stream this morning during the routines, I thought about the song’s complex, grown-up nature.

I was sixteen when the song was released in 1972 and going through the standard processes involving discovering love and sex. Little did I know how complicated it could all be. The big lie still held about finding someone and falling in love, marrying for laugh, and growing old together. Big cracks were appearing in the big lie. Love and sex, as well as gender identity and sexual orientation are all more complicated than the big lie’s straightforward depiction. Then religion society gets involved – a black man and a white woman? Social norms add new pressures and dimensions.

That’s behind the song. He’s in love with another woman, having an affair and cheating on his wife. And the woman is having an affair with a married man. Both of those are taboo. The man understands that he has commitments. Needs change.

I’m not trying to defend him so much as think about how complicated love, sex, society, marriage and life can be. It’s not as clean and simple as the big lie leads us to believe.

Am I wrong to fall so deeply in love with you
Knowing I got a wife and two little children
Depending on me too
And am I wrong to hunger
for the gentleness of your touch
knowing I got somebody else at home
who needs me just as much

And are you wrong to fall in love
With a married man
And am I wrong trying to hold on
To the best thing I ever had

h/t to songfacts.com

Of course, the other part of this is what it would do to his wife if she discovered his betrayal, and what could result from that, nor what the guilt can do to him and his thinking and psyche.

Many performers and groups have covered this R&B classic, but that original voice and music is seared into my brain. Luther Ingram didn’t write it, but he delivered the sound.