Benched

So, having recently tested positive for Covid-19 has more than put a dent in my semblance of a summer schedule for over a week. I think I had contact in Niagara-On-The-Lake during our recent Ontario vacation, the first such vacation in about three years. The virus is still out there and even though we were diligent, while many others went unmasked outdoors and in, we caught it. Coming through it even now, but this will take time. More to follow once I have more full recovered.

Thor: Love and Thunder: Big, loud, stupid summer-popcorn fun

I kind of dug Thor: Love and Thunder, particularly for the music. Let's just say that a character even names himself Axl.

Director Taika Waititi was clearly chomping at the bit to get this flick out and have fun with the toys he grew up with. He obviously had a blast, even including some fun queer representation (and polyamory) as part of the story.

Much of Love and Thunder is played simply for laughs and it carries a lively, over-the-top, self-mocking tone (particularly Thor's character) with some serious, heartstring-tugging drama at heart with a surprisingly complex antagonist and a beloved recurring character. The film doesn't jive well with other Marvel Studios film continuity in many ways, and not only because the tone is like Thor: Ragnarok on speed (or cocaine). But I think that's entirely forgivable because it's big, loud, stupid summer-popcorn fun. Imagine if Monty Python did super-powered space opera on a massive budget with a kick-ass late 1980's/early 1990's rock soundtrack.

The person I saw it with kept questioning it; I just strapped in for the ride and kept laughing and enjoying the surprises. Very entertaining summer fare.

P.S.: You get to see a ripped Chris Hemsworth shirtless if that is any enticement.

Waxing Gibbous: A Study in Moonlight

Sometimes I take pictures of the moon. It's a thing I do.

Here is a photographic study and experiment from last night's Waxing Gibbous Moon. That is both moonlight and some ambient streetlight thrown off the gate in front of me.

Derecho storm knocks out power

So, the short version ... the power's back on. 

And the long version ....

We lost power due to the derecho that rocked (in a bad a way) the nation's capital Saturday, May 21. 

CBC stories are here and here.

Electricity returned May 24, only for our block to lose it again the evening of Thursday, May 26. 

Power returned yesterday, May 30, at about 4:30.

We had to say goodbye to a friend, and have been been parenting,  juggling teleworking, running our home offices, planning for imminent surgery and generally just trying to get through. Stressed, but okay.

Did we miss much?

Grief, twisting and turning

You can try to avoid grief, and push it back, but it remains, fixed,  immutable. How you talk to it is about all the control you have, like trying to reason with a drunk.

Approaching full dark

Describing going full dark this past fall at my other blog, Coping in Covid: A Writer's Journal.

WROTE Podcast Interview

I was on the WROTE Podcast talking with the ever-congenial Vance Bastian and Baz Collins about my upcoming Lethe Press collection Fear Itself, Burly, the writing and editing life, inspiration, and revising my second horror novel. I owe a great thanks to those two. In the interview, I even trace my earliest writing inspirations to comic books and Sunday matinees watching creature features such as "The Blob and "The Creature from the Black Lagoon" at the Port Theatre in Cornwall.

I also decided to talk publicly about the loss of my sister Kim this fall. Over the years, she had saved a stack of my earlier writings, including annual traditional Halloween stories and even the high school columns I wrote for the daily paper in my hometown. So since Kim always believed in me, and I miss her, I thought all of this worth mentioning.

There are shout-outs aplenty, including to my sisters, Steve Berman and Jerry L. Wheeler.

If you listen to some of it or any of it, please let me know how it goes. While I have the Irish gift for the gab, I cannot, ironically, tolerate hearing my own voice for too long.

Here you can listen to the Wrote Podcast S7Ep15 – James K Moran – Dramatic Shenanigans.