Tag Archives: blogging

A New Start on Tired Tuesday

Here I sit, on Tired Tuesday, feeling, you know.  Additionally, I fear I am coming down with the same bug which has ailed my husband for two days.  Or my allergies are acting up again.  Or I am just a common or garden dizzy broad (I KNOW which one you think it is) (you know who you are).  Nevertheless, a blog post must be made.  Because I say it does, dammit!

One of my favorite things to do to procrastinate writing my blog post is to read other blogs, many of which handily pop up as soon as I log in to WordPress.  Today I read “Return of the Modern Philosopher” and was encouraged.  This fellow is doing a lot and still progressing on a screenplay!  Additionally, two of the things he does are write a blog and write for a TV show.  Two WRITING things.

What this means for me is, I have to stop coasting.  I can’t just say, “Well, at least I am making my blog post.  That’s writing”  or  “I worked on a letter to a friend”  or  “wrote in the TV Journal.”  I stand by my rule that All Writing Counts.  However, it is clear that no matter what, I can do MORE writing.

In fact, I did try to start a new novel yesterday.  I wrote a few more notes on it today, before my dizziness drove me away from the notebook.  Well, I won’t do that again.  I will just learn how to write when I don’t feel well.  I suppose a few of you are thinking that it is too bad I did not start by making this a better blog post.  Or is that just my inner critic?  No matter.  This is what I typed, this is what I’m posting.

But after I post this,  I shall seek out a pen and paper (my favored medium of composition) and see what I can do.

 

Halloween Bonafides on Wrist to Forehead Sunday

I let another movie run while I make my Wrist to Forehead Sunday post.  We usually watch True Crime television on Sunday, notably episode after episode of Snapped, but it is autumn, and that means it is time for Halloween movies!  Of course, I like horror movies all year long, particularly the cheesy variety, but there is an especial feeling of comfort in watching them as the weather begins to turn cool, as it did today.

We began our movie watching with Return of the Body Snatchers, which is not cheesy but something of a classic.  Mostly I like the classic cars.  It is a selling point to me in an old movie when the characters do a lot of driving.  I like to have a connection between the movies I watch, so we are now looking at House of Wax.  The connection is that both movies feature Carolyn Jones, most famous for portraying Morticia Adams.

Our other potential choice was The Birds, because of bit parts in both movies played by that guy that was on The Dick Van Dyke Show.  Steven had to look up his name for this blog post:  Richard Deacon.  I never would have remembered that, if I ever knew it to begin with (I am not at all sure I did).  I felt Wax was a better movie to go with, because an actor famous for Morticia clearly has better Halloween bonafides than one who played some random guy opposite Dick Van Dyke (YES, I love Dick Van Dyke, no he is not a Halloween guy, shut up).

I would really like to write some more posts about cheesy horror movies.  We have watched a couple, but I just can’t seem to put pen to paper about them.  I’ll have to work on that.  In the meantime, I sit here, poised with one wrist to my forehead, watching what we’re watching and lamenting my lack of a better blog post. You would think I would be used to it by now.  Never mind.  The largest room in the world is the room for improvement.  That gives me plenty of space to maneuver.

 

The Best Lame Plans…

Have I used that headline before?  I’m too lazy to go back and check.  Also, I am feeling distressed because I have gotten no Likes on my last two posts.  I know, I shouldn’t be such an approval junky.  I’m sure there are many people who disapprove of my need for approval.  Then again, I write a blog that goes out over the Internet for people to read and, I hope, be entertained by. When people hit Like, I know I have succeeded.  I mean, why write a blog if nobody is going to read and enjoy it?  If I’m only writing it for me, why not scribble it in a notebook that I hide away forever?

By the way, today is definitely Lame Post Friday.

It has not been a bad week for me, but for some reason it has felt so long.  I could swear they snuck in an extra day or two somewhere.  At the very least, it’s been 72 minutes per hour some hours.  Yes, yes, here I am whining again, as I keep saying I’m not going to do any more.  Quick, Cindy, counterbalance it with something positive.  It’s Friday and I don’t work Saturday!  And my husband is home!  And it’s fall!

I have a million and one things to do tomorrow.  Oh, OK, not quite that many.  But at least 8,479 choices of things I MIGHT do.  Go running, write post cards, walk to the post office, go to the library, finish the murder mystery I’m writing, start a new novel OR find one of the many I have not finished and continue working on it, watch Halloween movies, crochet, knit… Oh, and pet my dog, cook something good for supper, make a salad with some tomatoes and cucumbers I bought two days ago, call my parents (oh dear, are they going to read this and feel bad that I didn’t mention them sooner?  Sorry, Mom and Dad, I love you!).

While typing all that in, I was slipping back and forth to Facebook and making plans to meet a friend and go to a wine tasting at a local liquor store tomorrow.  So that is one thing planned.  How many of the other things can I fit in and when?  A little uncertainty adds spice to my weekend.   Happy Friday, everybody.

 

Wrist to Virginia Woolf

I knew it would be Wrist to Forehead Sunday; I just didn’t know how long I would put off making the post.  This weekend was going to be SO productive, writing-wise!  I guess next weekend I will plan on getting nothing done and see if the opposite thing happens with that.

I couldn’t even have one of my favorite Severed Head Sundays, because Steven wanted to watch Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in respect for recently deceased playwright Edward Albee.  I could have no possible objection.  I love Edward Albee.  I had a great directing experience once directing The American Dream, which of course he wrote.  My greatest dream role has always been Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?  I still think I could play the hell out of that part.  Perhaps I flatter myself, but who would disillusion me?  At least, I suppose somebody might try, but I will not believe them.

It is really a very good movie.  Some people have problems with places where it departs from the play script, but you’ll have that with a screen adaptation.  I have never seen the play on stage, although I have read it numerous times.  I think it is time for me to read it again.  It would be a good idea for me to read more plays, since I am currently working on writing a couple. If I keep reading plays, I can internalize the form, as they say.

In the meantime, I need to publish at least 200 words to feel I am still writing a blog.  When I realized I had not done so yet, I said, “Crap!  I haven’t make my blog post!”  Steven said, “Don’t make one today.  Everyone will be saying, ‘Where’s Cindy?’ ”  But I could not let today be the day I did such a thing.  So I pulled out the laptop and started typing.  And look, I am over 300 words.  I call that respectable.  Happy Sunday, everyone.

 

Humid with a Chance of Lame

Have I written a post this summer about how it is too damn hot for me to write a blog post?   I know I have written several of those in the past, but have I written any in 2016?  I bet I have.  Well, this is another one, but being as it is Lame Post Friday, I believe I can get away with it.

This whole week has been dreadfully hot and humid.  Unofficial end of summer my ass!  Of course there is no use in complaining about it.  The weather will do what it decides to, whoever is pleased or otherwise.  So, anybody who is saying huffily, “I LIKE summer weather” can just say it to somebody else.

I am going through a downswing.  Mood-wise, writing-wise, blog-wise.  But I must fight the tendency to mope around in a corner.  Oh poor, pitiful me!  Said with one wrist at my forehead, of course.  Perhaps I could manage a swoon.  The problem with that is that you can’t count on somebody being around who will revive you with a glass of brandy.  Why did those ladies in the old time novels push away the brandy?  Where they nuts?

Well, that was kind of a stream of consciousness paragraph, wasn’t it?  That is probably a side effect of stewed brain, which is what I fear is in my skull today.   The only other thing I can share in hopes of offering some entertainment is the following:

When I am cleaning my machines at the end of my work day, I sometimes sing the theme song from The Blob.  “It creeps and leaps and glides and slides across the floor, right through the door and all around the wall, a splotch, a blotch, be wary of the Blob! (Beware of the Blob!)”  That’s it, over and over.  Then I do “dah daah!” and other random syllables for the musical interludes.  Then back into the lyric.  Sometimes I dance a tango step or two.

Today, when I got back to the lyrics for the third or fourth time, I heard myself sing,  “…a splotch, a blotch, be wary of the Blog!”

Wouldn’t that be a great title for a post?  But if I used it for this one, it would spoil the joke.  I’ll keep it in mind for the upcoming Halloween season.  In the meantime, I’m over 300 words.  Happy Friday, everyone.

 

Middle-aged Musings on a Not Real Monday

Happy Labor Day, everybody!  I am still feeling a giddy, feet-shuffling delight that I have a three-day weekend.  Many years of retail, army then retail rendered me quite jaded regarding Monday (and other day) holidays.  I have had Labor Day off since 2011 and it still feels wonderful to me.

Oh, I KNOW other people will never get Monday holidays off, most notably police, firemen, medical workers and other important folks.  Also those of less gratifying work such as retail and fast-food (at least, I was never particularly gratified by working in these fields; perhaps others feel differently).  Why do I feel guilty about being so happy about having a three-day weekend?  I have worked plenty of Monday holidays!  Many people other than me have Monday holidays and other days off that I don’t have.  I suppose I am more susceptible to guilt.  Perhaps it would benefit me to stop taking so seriously what other people say.

I guess I am not letting the guilt take away all my pleasure in my unusual Monday off.  I ran this morning (after first having coffee; I meant to write a blog post about it, oops). Steven,who, quite surprisingly, has today off (he worked the weekend), fixed a lovely breakfast.  We have been watching movies since about noon. It has been a MARVELOUS day.  If only I had written a blog post earlier and, you know,written a better blog post, my life would be perfect.

However, one publishes what one can.  We’ll call this a Monday Middle-aged Musings and drive on.

 

 

We Interrupt my Sunday for a Wrist to Forehead Moment

I pause in the midst of my day for a Wrist to Forehead Sunday post.  It is not really a bad Sunday; I just don’t feel up to making a good post.  I feel sure my readers will understand or at least forgive.  If not, oh well, what the hell, as a wise woman once said (it was my mother).

I got up and ran this morning, managing a better run than yesterday.  In fact, the day all around has been a better day.  I did some laundry, I did the dishes, I finished a letter and wrote a post card, Steven and I went grocery shopping (I neglected to put cilantro on the list, although I had planned to make salsa), I did some chopping and mixing.  I could probably manage a blog post about one of those.  Yet, I feel strangely disinclined to do so.

Oh who am I kidding? There is nothing strange about it.  I often feel disinclined to make what I call a real blog post, especially on a Sunday.  Hence, my usual Wrist to Forehead Sunday.  This is what comes of a blogger not taking any days off.  Would one suggest I make fewer posts per week but make them better?  That won’t work for me; I would just stop posting entirely, because nothing would ever been good enough.

That would be no tragedy, you say?  You could be right, but it is not a very nice thing to say now, is it?  On the other hand, that gives me a reason to have a wrist to forehead moment.  Alack and alas!  Somebody, somewhere does not want me posting every day!  Whatever will I do? Who is this discouraging miscreant?  Ah yes, the imaginary critic in my own head.  Silly me.

Now I am getting entirely too silly.  I shall sign off and get back to enjoying my Sunday.  I hope all my readers are having a similarly enjoyable time.

 

It’s As If I Had a Lame Lobotomy!

This is dreadful.  What little brain I had seems to have up and deserted me.  At first I thought perhaps it was still partially here, since I am typing quite competently.  Then I remembered:  muscle memory.  It means nothing.

There is little point in even saying, “But I MUST make a post!”  We all know I will not willingly let a day go by without hitting publish on SOMETHING, however lame and foolish.  Waaaait a minute!  Today IS Lame Post Friday!  Now I’m wondering if I shouldn’t re-name it to Foolish Friday and go for that alliteration I so love.

Sometimes when I feel quite brain dead at 4:47 p.m. (according to my computer), I can put off posting till later in the evening.  Occasionally that works out for me and I come up with something not contemptible (don’t ask me for an example; I am certainly not up to searching previous posts much less making a link).  However, today I must head to Much Ado at Herkimer Elks.  We had a dress rehearsal last night.  I had taken a decongestant and was extremely lightheaded, but I managed to say most of my lines correctly.

You know, I’m seeing kind of a head pattern with me lately.  Either I am lightheaded, I have a headache, or I am brain dead.  What the hell, head?  Maybe I have too much hair.  I am getting a haircut tomorrow; maybe that will help.  I am getting a pedicure as well, but I somehow doubt pretty colored toenails will improve anything other than my disposition (still, that is definitely worth improving).  On the brighter side, I will be able to make a blog post about Hot Spot Salon and Spa in Herkimer, where I get my beauty work done (I was going to say I use the term “beauty” loosely as applied to myself, but would that not be insulting to my stylist?  She is pretty awesome).

At least I am over 300 words.  Sometimes we settle for quantity over quality.  If only I could think of a headline, my life would be perfect.

 

After Dinner Lame

Ooh, is my stomach full.  We just got back from Salvatore’s right here in Herkimer, NY, where I had the first calzone I have had in years.  I must say, YUM!  But, what a surprise, I ate too much of it. I still have plenty left over for further pig out activities.  In the meantime, I am quite late in making this week’s Friday Lame Post.  What, I ask, is a blogger to do?

It is hardly a “real” Friday for me, because I work tomorrow.  No, I am NOT complaining about it, I’m just SAYING.  Sheesh!  Then again, there is no pleasing some people so I might as well just stop trying.  Why, yes, I had a glass of wine with dinner, why do you ask?

I had thought I might possibly write something earlier today, on breaks at work, and avoid sitting here in front of a blank screen trying to be funny (or at least coherent).  I started by working on a letter I had started to a friend.  It did not go so well.  I ended up going back to a puzzle book I had handy and working on some puzzles.  It was all my brain wanted to do.  As the day wore on, things got even worse, brain-wise.

Yes, the heat and humidity continues in the Mohawk Valley, along with its deleterious effect on my writing activities (don’t you just love that word, deleterious?).  As I left work today, a work friend was talking about what he was going to do next week.  I said, “I am going to get my act together.  Do you believe me?”  Nobody did.  Even I didn’t believe me.

On the other hand, here I am, over 250 words and it’s past my bed time.  I hope to see you all again tomorrow on Scattered Saturday, or whatever kind of Saturday it turns out to be.  Happy Friday, everyone.

 

We’ll Always Have Lame Post Friday

I really did try to write while I was at work today (YES, on a break, don’t go speed-dialing my boss!).  For one reason, I ran out of cryptogram puzzles from the newspaper and I didn’t bring a book or magazine nor yet my script to study (that last would have been a good idea; missed a bet).  Well, the brain dead thing continues, I guess. Anyways, it’s Lame Post Friday.  I can’t get too exercised on Lame Post Friday (exercise!  That would be another good idea!  Oh well).

It isn’t even a “real” Friday for me, because I work tomorrow.  Oh, don’t sneer at me, all you non-Monday-to-Friday people.  I know, you all work harder and longer than me at more challenging, important jobs.  Blah, blah, blah.  I wasn’t complaining.  Much.

My plan had been to write about LiFT’s performance of Much Ado About Nothing last night at Benton’s Landing in Little Falls.  It went very well.  Actors and audience both endured high temperatures and humidity.  We were rewarded with a live Shakespeare experience.  Oh, I do love theatre.  I love writing too; I just don’t seem to be capable of doing much of that lately.  As I often say, one must persevere.

Tomorrow afternoon we have another performance, this one on the stage where we have rehearsed the most, Sterzinar Park, Canal Place, Little Falls.  Saturday’s show is at 4 p.m., then Sunday we have one at 3.  For more information, you can visit LiFT’s Facebook page.  You can also see some fun pictures of our other performances.

And in case anybody was wondering, Sunday will conclude All Much Ado All The Time and we return to our regularly scheduled blog posts (you know, a few “real” posts surrounded by foolishness about How I Can’t Write a Post Today).  I do hope you’ll stay tuned.