We interrupt this haphazard Halloween Horror Month to bring you... an annoyed rant.
This morning, when I was blearily checking over the BBC News website to see what was happening in the world, I happened to notice this story: Amazon removes abuse-themed e-books from store. And what passes for my soul died a little, for I knew what this was all about.
For those who don't know, I write erotica e-books when I have the time. I haven't written for a while (which I'm trying to rectify) because hey, between my own problems and Nick's it's hard to find the time to be able to sit down for a few hours in the right mindset to be able to write. And in the eighteenish months since I started doing this, I've seen several little "moral panics" pop up about the "filth" on sale in online bookstores. This is just the latest one, but it bothers me more because of some of the wording and things being bandied around.
Okay, to get a few things straight: I don't like bestiality, incest or rape porn, and have never written any. That being said, I'm still anti-censorship enough to be really uncomfortable with the idea of banning them, because they're fantasy, not reality. And because every time this comes up, I never see Lolita, The Story of O or The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty included in the lists of things to ban. I've seen this double-standard before, when In The Realm Of The Senses got classed as "art" with its full-on hardcore sex scenes, while at the same time 39 other films were being prosecuted for being "obscene" despite having little to no simulated sex at all in them, just horror (the infamous Video Nasties of the early 1980s). So yeah, this bugs me. A lot.
So this time it's the "rape/forced-(pseudo)-incest" books being targeted, with the occasional bit of bestiality thrown in. Well to be quite honest, I always did wonder how those books were getting past Amazon's censors when most of the erotica writers I knew were fighting to get a cover with a "hand-bra" past them. Plus whenever the press gets onto this topic they're always the ones they point to as examples of the "depraved filth" out there. So there's a small, almost traitorous part of me that's not sad to see them go. But the BBC - and the article which started this latest witch hunt off - claim that "the search function automatically suggested explicit topics to readers typing seemingly innocuous keywords - without age verification taking place."
Well, duh. Search engines don't and can't check for age, for one thing. It would give extra work to the engine and thus slow it down, and unless we're now suggesting scanning something like a driving license or ID card in every time we want to look up something online (which would screw me over as I have neither) everyone's just going to lie anyway. So as stupid ideas go, that one ranks right up there with "try before you buy underwear". Secondly, what "innocuous keywords" were being used? Because I tested several - even some I knew should come up with erotica because I wrote them - and couldn't even get to my own books, as Amazon has already filtered them away from innocent and/or easily offended eyes months ago. And as I said, I don't even write any of the stuff referenced here.
So, having dealt with that issue, I now move on to the far worse one - the language of the article that started this all off.
"kindle filth"
"depraved amateur literature"
"illegal and immoral acts"
My gods, it reads like a Daily Mail artic-oh.
Let's ignore the subtle call to harrass the poor author they've focussed on (by pointing out what she says in her author blurb and pointing out that she "hasn't done much to hide her identity" - oh boys, everyone uses a nom de plume in this business) and focus instead on their persuasive language. In case you hadn't guessed, that's the quotes above. They're very carefully crafted to create an emotive response from the reader - in this case a knee-jerk one. Ironically, erotica does the same thing, but with a different response in mind. And it's exactly the same kind of wording used for the video nasties panics, the violent video game panics, and so on. I take specific offence at the use of the word "amateur" to describe erotica authors. We're published, people buy our works, we make money from this. What, exactly, is "amateur" about that?
*sigh*
So it goes on. Despite the popularity of books like 50 Shades of Grey; a book that was originally Twilight fanfiction and therefore is probably far more appealing to "underage" readers (and which also isn't under an age filter), we're still shaming anything that doesn't fit our narrow definition of "acceptable" smut. We're clucking our tongues disgustedly at books featuring fantasy creatures having sex with humans while smiling down on Lolita. Pearl-clutching at fantasies while ignoring the slut-shaming of real rape and abuse victims. And most people are going to fall for it.
And that, more than anything, makes me angry and sad.
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Monday, October 7, 2013
Halloween Horror Month - The Stuff
Two miners working underground strike an underground well of yoghurt - or something resembling yoghurt, at any rate. Being the sensible, scientific types that they are, they decide to eat some of this mystery substance bubbling up from the ground, and find that it tastes great. It isn't long before The Stuff is on shelves everywhere in America, and the ad campaign proudly states that "Enough is never enough". Other snack manufacturers aren't happy with being pushed out by The Stuff, however, and so they hire an ex-FBI and current industrial spy to find out the secret of The Stuff so that they can emulate it.
Of course, it turns out that there's something not quite right about an addictive goo that bubbles up from the centre of the earth - in this case The Stuff takes over the bodies of the people who eat it, eventually hollowing them out and wearing them like meat suits. In the end it's up to the spy, a PR woman, a 12-year-old boy and a slightly crazy milita leader to save everyone from being eaten alive by evil yoghurt.
The Stuff is a great movie. It's both a B-movie and a satire of consumerist culture; how people will buy anything if it's marketed to them right. It also feels like director Larry Cohen's version of what The Blob would be like if people ate the Blob instead of the other way round. Having Michael Moriarty in the lead role certainly doesn't hurt matters either. Most of all though, this is a movie that will make you worry about being chased by a giant sea of sentient, evil yoghurt. Not to mention the sight of what The Stuff does to your insides as it hollows you out will stay with me for a long time - not a bad effect at all for a low-budget 80s B-movie.
Of course, it turns out that there's something not quite right about an addictive goo that bubbles up from the centre of the earth - in this case The Stuff takes over the bodies of the people who eat it, eventually hollowing them out and wearing them like meat suits. In the end it's up to the spy, a PR woman, a 12-year-old boy and a slightly crazy milita leader to save everyone from being eaten alive by evil yoghurt.
The Stuff is a great movie. It's both a B-movie and a satire of consumerist culture; how people will buy anything if it's marketed to them right. It also feels like director Larry Cohen's version of what The Blob would be like if people ate the Blob instead of the other way round. Having Michael Moriarty in the lead role certainly doesn't hurt matters either. Most of all though, this is a movie that will make you worry about being chased by a giant sea of sentient, evil yoghurt. Not to mention the sight of what The Stuff does to your insides as it hollows you out will stay with me for a long time - not a bad effect at all for a low-budget 80s B-movie.
Saturday, October 5, 2013
Halloween Horror Month - Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror
A professor with a beard that would make Daniel Bryan jealous heads down into an old crypt muttering about the "discovery" he's made. As he's chiselling away at some stonework, some heavily clay-faced zombies turn up, attack and eat the professor even as he's begging them not to hurt him because he's their "friend". Then we cut to three couples (one with the strangest-looking son in existence, who we'll get to later) arriving at a villa that just happens to be next door to the crypt and where the professor was staying. It doesn't take long before the Etruscan zombies turn up there and lay siege to the villa, hoping to get to chow down on the tasty humans inside.
Yes, this is a zombie movie, and even better, an Italian zombie movie from that wonderful time period of the late 70s/early 80s. Bad acting, bad dubbing, bad writing, remarkable zombie makeup, gore and a fair amount of female nudity. None of this is what makes Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror so infamous in the zombie movie subgenre, however... but again, we'll get to that a little bit later.
The zombies in Nights of Terror aren't like your average zombies, however. In addition to having heads that looked like baked clay pots gone terribly wrong, they can also think well enough to use tools and lay traps. At one point in the film they even use a battering ram to break into the villa. There's no explanation for why these zombies scored higher on their cognitive skills rolls than the average zombie - but then again there's no explanation for why they're up and walking around either, save for the professor's vague mutterings about his "discovery" at the beginning of the film. The audience is really just expected to go with it and not ask too many questions.
With that in mind, there's not too much of a plot or any coherent writing in the film, either... and this is where the earlier points I alluded to come into play. You see, someone in their infinite wisdom when writing the screenplay for this movie decided that two of the characters would be a mother and her 12(ish)-year-old son, and that the best thing to add into the mix of a zombie movie would be an Oedipal/incest subplot. To accommodate this, they cast a 26-year-old dwarf in the role of the son. It's safe to say that the actor, Peter Bark, steals the film in this role, because you just cannot believe what you're seeing whenever he's on screen trying to act like a small child one minute and feeling up his mother the next. Truly, in the ranks of batshit insane Italian horror films, Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror has a special place.
Yes, this is a zombie movie, and even better, an Italian zombie movie from that wonderful time period of the late 70s/early 80s. Bad acting, bad dubbing, bad writing, remarkable zombie makeup, gore and a fair amount of female nudity. None of this is what makes Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror so infamous in the zombie movie subgenre, however... but again, we'll get to that a little bit later.
The zombies in Nights of Terror aren't like your average zombies, however. In addition to having heads that looked like baked clay pots gone terribly wrong, they can also think well enough to use tools and lay traps. At one point in the film they even use a battering ram to break into the villa. There's no explanation for why these zombies scored higher on their cognitive skills rolls than the average zombie - but then again there's no explanation for why they're up and walking around either, save for the professor's vague mutterings about his "discovery" at the beginning of the film. The audience is really just expected to go with it and not ask too many questions.
With that in mind, there's not too much of a plot or any coherent writing in the film, either... and this is where the earlier points I alluded to come into play. You see, someone in their infinite wisdom when writing the screenplay for this movie decided that two of the characters would be a mother and her 12(ish)-year-old son, and that the best thing to add into the mix of a zombie movie would be an Oedipal/incest subplot. To accommodate this, they cast a 26-year-old dwarf in the role of the son. It's safe to say that the actor, Peter Bark, steals the film in this role, because you just cannot believe what you're seeing whenever he's on screen trying to act like a small child one minute and feeling up his mother the next. Truly, in the ranks of batshit insane Italian horror films, Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror has a special place.
Halloween Horror Month - The Lords of Salem
There appear to be two camps of opinions when it comes to Rob Zombie's films, much like Marmite really. I happen to fall into the category of enjoying them (although I also hate Marmite). I see House of 1000 Corpses as his experimental art film, adore The Devil's Rejects (and recognise it as Zombie's love letter to 70s exploitation films) and see his two Halloween films has his attempt to put a modern spin on the Michael Myers story, with what we know today of serial killers and how they are 'formed', and the media's love affair with them and their crimes. So I've been interested in seeing The Lords of Salem for a while now.
It's a mindfuck of a film, I can tell you that.
Heidi is one of the three DJs that make up the "Big H" DJ team for the radio station in Salem, Mass. She's got blonde dreadlocks, wears glasses and is a cute, generally 'hip chick' who can keep up with the boys. Then one day she receives a strange record from a group with the mysterious name of "The Lords". The record consists of one song - a slow, dirge-like piece that doesn't have a melody so much as it seems to be attempting to find the Brown Note - and hearing it seems to have a strange effect on some of the women of Salem, particularly Heidi, who starts to sink into strange dreams and fugue-like states where she sees strange Satanic imagery and seems to be being called by the original coven of Salem witches from 1696. Has the curse of executed witch Margaret Morgan come back to get its revenge on the town?
One way to describe this film would be to say that it's a series of album covers tacked together with a plot for glue. It's a very artistic film, beautifully shot - but that's something that people should have come to expect from Zombie by now, as even I will say he's more of an artist than a filmmaker or even a storyteller. So admittedly the actual plot is a little flimsy in places, with the feeling that the editing scissors were heavily-used in some parts.
Another way to describe it would be to say that it takes aspects from The Crucible, The Devils, Rosemary's Baby, Repulsion and maybe a dash from The Witches of Eastwick and blends them all together to make one very weird, but interesting film. We're never entirely sure for a lot of the film just what is going on - is Heidi just hallucinating everything, a combination of a mental breakdown and her falling back into drug usage? What is the role of her landlady and her two sisters and were they always aware of it? What is in Room number 5?
The Lords of Salem isn't going to be to everyone's tastes, that much is certain. But those who like Zombie's work, or who are prepared for a more than a little weird surrealism in their horror should definitely give it a look.
It's a mindfuck of a film, I can tell you that.
Heidi is one of the three DJs that make up the "Big H" DJ team for the radio station in Salem, Mass. She's got blonde dreadlocks, wears glasses and is a cute, generally 'hip chick' who can keep up with the boys. Then one day she receives a strange record from a group with the mysterious name of "The Lords". The record consists of one song - a slow, dirge-like piece that doesn't have a melody so much as it seems to be attempting to find the Brown Note - and hearing it seems to have a strange effect on some of the women of Salem, particularly Heidi, who starts to sink into strange dreams and fugue-like states where she sees strange Satanic imagery and seems to be being called by the original coven of Salem witches from 1696. Has the curse of executed witch Margaret Morgan come back to get its revenge on the town?
One way to describe this film would be to say that it's a series of album covers tacked together with a plot for glue. It's a very artistic film, beautifully shot - but that's something that people should have come to expect from Zombie by now, as even I will say he's more of an artist than a filmmaker or even a storyteller. So admittedly the actual plot is a little flimsy in places, with the feeling that the editing scissors were heavily-used in some parts.
Another way to describe it would be to say that it takes aspects from The Crucible, The Devils, Rosemary's Baby, Repulsion and maybe a dash from The Witches of Eastwick and blends them all together to make one very weird, but interesting film. We're never entirely sure for a lot of the film just what is going on - is Heidi just hallucinating everything, a combination of a mental breakdown and her falling back into drug usage? What is the role of her landlady and her two sisters and were they always aware of it? What is in Room number 5?
The Lords of Salem isn't going to be to everyone's tastes, that much is certain. But those who like Zombie's work, or who are prepared for a more than a little weird surrealism in their horror should definitely give it a look.
Thursday, October 3, 2013
Halloween Horror Month - Rites of Spring
The film gets off to a bit of a jarring start for me when the opening titles tell us of the missing girls over the years, one of whom has the name Tara Grinstead. Turns out the filmmakers managed to pick the name of a real life missing person for an incidental part of their backstory, which didn't go over too well with some people. Awkward, but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that they just managed to hit upon a rather macabre coincidence.
Then again, on the subject of coincidences, Rites of Spring relies on a lot of them for the plot. We start off with not one, but two plots - one is a farmer kidnapping women to apparently sacrifice to the cousin of He Who Walks Behind The Rows to ensure he gets a good harvest; the other is a group of kidnappers planning to hold the daughter of a rich businessman for ransom. It doesn't take anyone particularly genre savvy to realise that these two plots are going to collide and they do so, and messily at that. After that it's the survivors of the two groups running around an abandoned school trying to escape from the "Creature" (and whether intentionally or not, some of those scenes reminded me of some of the scenes from the Silent Hill game series). Other coincidences in the film include one of the kidnappers knowing one of the girls intended for sacrifice, as well as the fact that they also both know the father of the kidnap victim. Actually, I'm not too sure if these are coincidences so much as they are rather obvious tropes, as they're telegraphed right at the start of the film and so you'd only not have seen it coming if you hadn't paid attention to the opening five minutes.
Rites of Spring has a lot of stuff that's really, really obvious. If the title didn't clue you in to what was going on with all the missing women, you figure it out pretty quickly from the farmer's behaviour even before you see him praying to the giant goat-skulled idol in his cornfield. The kidnappers are a trope in themselves, consisting of the reluctant one, the girlfriend, the psychotic one and the one who's fate is to mess up and die first. It's also got plot holes-a-plenty, not the least of which is the throwaway implication that (highlight for spoiler) the whole town is in on the ritual sacrifice thing. Not to mention (highlight again) we're never shown what happens to the kidnapped girl. I suppose it's implied she ends up as a sacrifice as well, but she just disappears from the film abruptly and no-one asks about her.
All in all, Rites of Spring has some good ideas, but falls flat somewhat in their execution. That and the glaring plot holes and obvious plot twists make it something of a frustrating film to watch, because you just know it could have been better if it had tried just a little harder.
Then again, on the subject of coincidences, Rites of Spring relies on a lot of them for the plot. We start off with not one, but two plots - one is a farmer kidnapping women to apparently sacrifice to the cousin of He Who Walks Behind The Rows to ensure he gets a good harvest; the other is a group of kidnappers planning to hold the daughter of a rich businessman for ransom. It doesn't take anyone particularly genre savvy to realise that these two plots are going to collide and they do so, and messily at that. After that it's the survivors of the two groups running around an abandoned school trying to escape from the "Creature" (and whether intentionally or not, some of those scenes reminded me of some of the scenes from the Silent Hill game series). Other coincidences in the film include one of the kidnappers knowing one of the girls intended for sacrifice, as well as the fact that they also both know the father of the kidnap victim. Actually, I'm not too sure if these are coincidences so much as they are rather obvious tropes, as they're telegraphed right at the start of the film and so you'd only not have seen it coming if you hadn't paid attention to the opening five minutes.
Rites of Spring has a lot of stuff that's really, really obvious. If the title didn't clue you in to what was going on with all the missing women, you figure it out pretty quickly from the farmer's behaviour even before you see him praying to the giant goat-skulled idol in his cornfield. The kidnappers are a trope in themselves, consisting of the reluctant one, the girlfriend, the psychotic one and the one who's fate is to mess up and die first. It's also got plot holes-a-plenty, not the least of which is the throwaway implication that (highlight for spoiler) the whole town is in on the ritual sacrifice thing. Not to mention (highlight again) we're never shown what happens to the kidnapped girl. I suppose it's implied she ends up as a sacrifice as well, but she just disappears from the film abruptly and no-one asks about her.
All in all, Rites of Spring has some good ideas, but falls flat somewhat in their execution. That and the glaring plot holes and obvious plot twists make it something of a frustrating film to watch, because you just know it could have been better if it had tried just a little harder.
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Horror Movie Month - Halloween III: Season of the Witch
In ancient times...
Hundreds of years before the dawn of history
Lived a strange race of people... the Druids
No one knows who they were or what they were doing
But their legacy remains
Hewn into the living rock... Of Stonehenge
Hundreds of years before the dawn of history
Lived a strange race of people... the Druids
No one knows who they were or what they were doing
But their legacy remains
Hewn into the living rock... Of Stonehenge
[...]
And where are they now?
The little children of Stonehenge
And what would they say to us?
If we were here... tonight
The little children of Stonehenge
And what would they say to us?
If we were here... tonight
(Spinal Tap; Stonehenge)
Well, according to the events of this movie, the Druids moved to America, started up a wildly successful Halloween mask company, then secretly shipped one of the Stonehenge slabs over to an underground lab so they could chip bits off it to insert into their masks as part of a ritual to kill millions of children when they tuned into the Silver Shamrock Halloween 'show' on Halloween night while wearing said masks.
Yes, really.
After Halloween II, John Carpenter had the idea that each year a new Halloween film would be released, each with a different Halloween-themed story and none of them featuring Michael Myers from the first two films. Halloween III: Season of the Witch was the result of this idea, and after that they just decided to being Myers back again, which probably tells you most of what you need to know about this film.
I guess the nicest things that can be said about it is that it's certainly a memorable movie, and it at least has an original story (Nigel Kneale of the Quatermass TV serieses, among others, was the original writer until he sued to have his name removed because of how violent he felt the movie was). Other than that... I can only imagine that there were mind-altering substances involved during some of the film's shooting. Evil druids, okay. Evil druids owning a Halloween mask company, okay. Evil druids owning a Halloween mask company who want to use said masks to sacrifice millions of children on Halloween as a return to the old ways... okay, I'm still with you, just. Evil druids owning a Halloween mask company who want to use said masks to sacrifice millions of children on Halloween as a return to the old ways who have stolen part of Stonehenge and are using it to create microchips that, when activated in the masks, cause spiders and snakes to materialise out of nowhere and fill the masks to kill the children and anyone around them... yeah, now I've got to stop you there.
Oh, and there are androids too. I forgot to mention the androids. They're druid androids.
The main character of this film, a doctor who accidentally stumbles onto the druids' plans when an ER patient who had been ranting about the dangers of the masks gets his skull pulled apart by a mysterious man who then gets into a car, explodes and leaves only mechanical parts behind (bet you can't guess what the twist is there...) spends most of the movie investigating the Silver Shamrock company, only to quickly get captured. In the end this saves him quite a bit of time as the head druid ("Conal Cochran", just to make it really clear that the man owning a company called Silver Shamrock is Irish) is only too happy to tell the doctor everything and even give him a guided tour of the facilities before leaving him alone in a room and shoddily tied to a chair. But will the doctor escape in time to stop the druids' plans, and then stop a TV ad from going out on all channels across the country at the same time? And just how did they get that slab from Stonehenge without anyone noticing?
(Actually, considering that in the 1980s the British countryside around Stonehenge was apparently full of people making crop circles overnight and no-one noticed them, I could very well see an evil corporation of druids pulling up with a big moving truck one night, swapping a slab out for a styrofoam fake and driving off with no-one being the wiser.)
This is most definitely a movie to watch with friends while drunk, or giving it the MST3K treatment, or both. Probably both.
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Aftershock (2012)
I think I've just seen one of the most depressing and mean-spirited films I've seen in a while, and considering my track record with these sorts of films, that's saying something.
Aftershock is a film produced by Eli Roth, co-written by Eli Roth, and starring Eli Roth. So it's safe to say that Eli Roth had a hand in this film, and it's also safe to say that some of his signatures are also all over it. It's about three friends in Chile - one is on holiday there, the other two are natives - who are out to meet women and do so at a nightclub one night. They decide to stay together, and the next night visit an underground nightclub that is supposed to be one of the hottest events there. Then an earthquake happens. And then things go from bad, to worse, to oh dear gods why bother going on.
Now don't get me wrong. I have a not-so secret love of disaster films. I grew up on The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure and came out with only minimal mental scarring. But one of the key points of the disaster movie genre (at least in my opinion) is the hope that things will get better for the plucky survivors whose struggles to survive we're following. OJ Simpson will get that cat to safety! Gene Hackman will lead the survivors to the bottom of the boat and therefore the surface! It makes us feel better when we see people survive this kind of adversity, while also reinforcing our secret fears about ocean liners, skyscrapers, glass lifts and using lifts at all during fires. But Aftershock doesn't give us this. Instead we watch as, one by one, the main characters are brutalised and taken out one by one until it feels more like we're watching a slasher movie where Jason Voorhees has been replaced by an earthquake, a prison break and more besides.
I didn't go into the film with any false expectations either. I knew it was Eli Roth; I knew it was going to be pretty shocking and extreme. But I still wasn't expecting the level of... meanness that the film gave us. Meanness and some pretty transparent plot twists, actually. There's one moment in the film where I saw exactly what was going on and what was going to happen, and yet it still took an extra half-hour or so before the rest of the (surviving) cast knew and even then it wasn't a shock.
It also piled a lot of contrivances on top of each other and expected us to accept them all. Earthquake in an underground club causing utter carnage, yes. Risk of tsunami afterwards, yes. Earthquake also just happening to destroy the nearby prison to let out all the gangmembers who, instead of getting the hell out of Dodge, decide it's time to go on a rape and murder spree? This is where I have to draw the line. (Also for those sensitive to those sorts of scenes, be warned - there's a very unpleasant scene that I found very uncomfortable to watch, and I'm not triggered by that sort of thing.)
So yeah, I'm not 100% sure what I make of Aftershock. I watched it to the end, but that was more out of horrified determination to see how it ended than any actual enjoyment of the film. I can see it appealing to fans of Eli Roth, or those who like a certain bleakness in their movies, but it just left me feeling slightly unwell. And that's a pretty difficult thing to do.
Aftershock is a film produced by Eli Roth, co-written by Eli Roth, and starring Eli Roth. So it's safe to say that Eli Roth had a hand in this film, and it's also safe to say that some of his signatures are also all over it. It's about three friends in Chile - one is on holiday there, the other two are natives - who are out to meet women and do so at a nightclub one night. They decide to stay together, and the next night visit an underground nightclub that is supposed to be one of the hottest events there. Then an earthquake happens. And then things go from bad, to worse, to oh dear gods why bother going on.
Now don't get me wrong. I have a not-so secret love of disaster films. I grew up on The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure and came out with only minimal mental scarring. But one of the key points of the disaster movie genre (at least in my opinion) is the hope that things will get better for the plucky survivors whose struggles to survive we're following. OJ Simpson will get that cat to safety! Gene Hackman will lead the survivors to the bottom of the boat and therefore the surface! It makes us feel better when we see people survive this kind of adversity, while also reinforcing our secret fears about ocean liners, skyscrapers, glass lifts and using lifts at all during fires. But Aftershock doesn't give us this. Instead we watch as, one by one, the main characters are brutalised and taken out one by one until it feels more like we're watching a slasher movie where Jason Voorhees has been replaced by an earthquake, a prison break and more besides.
I didn't go into the film with any false expectations either. I knew it was Eli Roth; I knew it was going to be pretty shocking and extreme. But I still wasn't expecting the level of... meanness that the film gave us. Meanness and some pretty transparent plot twists, actually. There's one moment in the film where I saw exactly what was going on and what was going to happen, and yet it still took an extra half-hour or so before the rest of the (surviving) cast knew and even then it wasn't a shock.
It also piled a lot of contrivances on top of each other and expected us to accept them all. Earthquake in an underground club causing utter carnage, yes. Risk of tsunami afterwards, yes. Earthquake also just happening to destroy the nearby prison to let out all the gangmembers who, instead of getting the hell out of Dodge, decide it's time to go on a rape and murder spree? This is where I have to draw the line. (Also for those sensitive to those sorts of scenes, be warned - there's a very unpleasant scene that I found very uncomfortable to watch, and I'm not triggered by that sort of thing.)
So yeah, I'm not 100% sure what I make of Aftershock. I watched it to the end, but that was more out of horrified determination to see how it ended than any actual enjoyment of the film. I can see it appealing to fans of Eli Roth, or those who like a certain bleakness in their movies, but it just left me feeling slightly unwell. And that's a pretty difficult thing to do.
Monday, August 19, 2013
Long Time, No Post
Well, it's been an interesting (and busy) few months. A few highlights:
- Cracker got an abscess on her face. We're still not entirely sure how, as normally cats get abscesses after being bitten in a fight with another cat, but as Cracker's an indoor cat and the only other cat she's in contact with is Lily the flump, and the two of them just don't do fighting (the worst they get is the occasional wrestle where Cracker gets scared and cries till Lily lets her up), but she did. At first we just thought it was conjunctivitis, as for the first couple of days it was just her eyelids that were slightly swollen, but when we saw her on day three and her eye was swelled shut and she looked like she'd been in a prize fight, we figured it was time to take her in for a vet visit. In fact, she ended up having four vet visits over the course of two weeks, first to drain and clean the abscess (which smells like nothing on this planet and is something I never wish to experience again), and dose her up with antibiotics and painkillers till it was healing well enough on its own. This led to a stoned Cracker sitting in her cat carrier for seven hours, staring wide-eyed at everything that moved around her. Of course, now everything's healed up and she's growing back the fur on the side of her face, so you'd never know anything happened to her except for the amount of money we had to spend on taxi fares to and from the PDSA.
- I developed sciatica. Basically an inflammation of the sciatic nerve in the lower back, it has to be one of the least fun things to get ever, about on a par with planar fascitis. In fact, it might even be worse, as I was laid up for two weeks, and on some days literally unable to walk because of the pain in my back. The bad news is that it is something that can reoccur now, so I probably have more bouts to look forward to in the future. The good news is that we eventually discovered the optimum amount of painkillers to take so that I could at least sit up for a few hours at a time.
- I started going to a knitting group at my local carer's association. This was primarily so that I could try to socialise and get out more, isolated as I am here at the moment; that turned out to not work too well as I'm the only one who turns up. On the other hand, it's a nice, quiet, air-conditioned building, so I go every fortnight anyway because it gets me out of the house and the staff/volunteers there talk with me even if I am the only one there knitting/crocheting. I do, however, appear to have been recruited into helping them with things to make for their craft stall at Christmas. I've been looking at a good few patterns for small items (washcloths, small bags/purses, scarves et al) so we'll see how I do there. Hopefully some more people will one day turn up, as with my speed of working they'll be lucky to get more than a few items by Christmas...
- Cracker got an abscess on her face. We're still not entirely sure how, as normally cats get abscesses after being bitten in a fight with another cat, but as Cracker's an indoor cat and the only other cat she's in contact with is Lily the flump, and the two of them just don't do fighting (the worst they get is the occasional wrestle where Cracker gets scared and cries till Lily lets her up), but she did. At first we just thought it was conjunctivitis, as for the first couple of days it was just her eyelids that were slightly swollen, but when we saw her on day three and her eye was swelled shut and she looked like she'd been in a prize fight, we figured it was time to take her in for a vet visit. In fact, she ended up having four vet visits over the course of two weeks, first to drain and clean the abscess (which smells like nothing on this planet and is something I never wish to experience again), and dose her up with antibiotics and painkillers till it was healing well enough on its own. This led to a stoned Cracker sitting in her cat carrier for seven hours, staring wide-eyed at everything that moved around her. Of course, now everything's healed up and she's growing back the fur on the side of her face, so you'd never know anything happened to her except for the amount of money we had to spend on taxi fares to and from the PDSA.
- I developed sciatica. Basically an inflammation of the sciatic nerve in the lower back, it has to be one of the least fun things to get ever, about on a par with planar fascitis. In fact, it might even be worse, as I was laid up for two weeks, and on some days literally unable to walk because of the pain in my back. The bad news is that it is something that can reoccur now, so I probably have more bouts to look forward to in the future. The good news is that we eventually discovered the optimum amount of painkillers to take so that I could at least sit up for a few hours at a time.
- I started going to a knitting group at my local carer's association. This was primarily so that I could try to socialise and get out more, isolated as I am here at the moment; that turned out to not work too well as I'm the only one who turns up. On the other hand, it's a nice, quiet, air-conditioned building, so I go every fortnight anyway because it gets me out of the house and the staff/volunteers there talk with me even if I am the only one there knitting/crocheting. I do, however, appear to have been recruited into helping them with things to make for their craft stall at Christmas. I've been looking at a good few patterns for small items (washcloths, small bags/purses, scarves et al) so we'll see how I do there. Hopefully some more people will one day turn up, as with my speed of working they'll be lucky to get more than a few items by Christmas...
Saturday, April 13, 2013
Leaguing and Legending
Last week I was introduced to League of Legends. Much to my surprise (because I'm not really the type of person who likes PvP and playing with random strangers normally) I'm actually quite enjoying it.
For anyone who doesn't know the game, it goes a little something like this: there are two teams of five, and the objective of the game is to destroy everything that the other team holds dear. Towers, inhibitors, their big glowy crystal in their base... and them too, if they get close enough and don't run away in time. It's based on Defence of the Ancients from Warcraft III, which I have to take Wikipedia's word on because I've never played it. And there are Champions to play. Oh, there are many Champions.
LoL (yes, that's its short form) is free-to-play, and every week provides you with 10 free Champions out of its pool of 111. Of course, those 10 change each week, so if you've become particularly attached to one particular Champion then you can buy them to use whenever, which is where the micro-transactions come in. Either you buy points to buy the Champions (and special skins that change their appearance) or you earn your points the hard way by playing and winning matches. Currently I'm doing the latter; slowly grinding my way to a Caitlyn of my very own.
In the meantime though, while I'm doing that, I've found myself playing Soraka in matches. It seems that no matter what game I play (with the exception of WoW, where the first time I tried a healer the rest of the dungeon group said I was terrible and I slunk back to my Warlock in shame) I end up gravitating to a healer/support role. Don't get me wrong, I like shooting people, blowing shit up and generally DPSing like a mofo, but... There's something about support roles that just appeals to my OCD nature.
And it does appeal. I can't stand it when green bars aren't at full, and will my heals to recharge faster, faster. If someone dies on my team I wince and feel guilty that I wasn't there to save them (LoL being a game where you can generally only heal one, maybe two people at a time). If the person I'm supporting dies, I'm just about ready to commit seppuku. Interrupting a heal to run away from oncoming death is something many people have had to beat into me, and I still haven't managed it. I am the OCD healer... and yet despite the anxiety, I actually quite enjoy it.
My friend who introduced me to LoL was watching me play earlier today, and commented that I was doing a lot better than he'd expected me to considering I'd only been playing a week. I was mildly confused by this, as as far as I can see the tactics are pretty simple - try not to die, run away a lot, heal a lot if you're support or shoot minions a lot otherwise. (Okay, I've still got a small problem with the running away sometimes, desperately trying to stay in range of someone to heal them one more time and suddenly finding the whole of the enemy team giving me a group hug of death.) So maybe I've got some potential in the game. But not right now, as I'm only level 8 and still faceplant if someone breathes too hard on me.
For anyone who doesn't know the game, it goes a little something like this: there are two teams of five, and the objective of the game is to destroy everything that the other team holds dear. Towers, inhibitors, their big glowy crystal in their base... and them too, if they get close enough and don't run away in time. It's based on Defence of the Ancients from Warcraft III, which I have to take Wikipedia's word on because I've never played it. And there are Champions to play. Oh, there are many Champions.
LoL (yes, that's its short form) is free-to-play, and every week provides you with 10 free Champions out of its pool of 111. Of course, those 10 change each week, so if you've become particularly attached to one particular Champion then you can buy them to use whenever, which is where the micro-transactions come in. Either you buy points to buy the Champions (and special skins that change their appearance) or you earn your points the hard way by playing and winning matches. Currently I'm doing the latter; slowly grinding my way to a Caitlyn of my very own.
In the meantime though, while I'm doing that, I've found myself playing Soraka in matches. It seems that no matter what game I play (with the exception of WoW, where the first time I tried a healer the rest of the dungeon group said I was terrible and I slunk back to my Warlock in shame) I end up gravitating to a healer/support role. Don't get me wrong, I like shooting people, blowing shit up and generally DPSing like a mofo, but... There's something about support roles that just appeals to my OCD nature.
And it does appeal. I can't stand it when green bars aren't at full, and will my heals to recharge faster, faster. If someone dies on my team I wince and feel guilty that I wasn't there to save them (LoL being a game where you can generally only heal one, maybe two people at a time). If the person I'm supporting dies, I'm just about ready to commit seppuku. Interrupting a heal to run away from oncoming death is something many people have had to beat into me, and I still haven't managed it. I am the OCD healer... and yet despite the anxiety, I actually quite enjoy it.
My friend who introduced me to LoL was watching me play earlier today, and commented that I was doing a lot better than he'd expected me to considering I'd only been playing a week. I was mildly confused by this, as as far as I can see the tactics are pretty simple - try not to die, run away a lot, heal a lot if you're support or shoot minions a lot otherwise. (Okay, I've still got a small problem with the running away sometimes, desperately trying to stay in range of someone to heal them one more time and suddenly finding the whole of the enemy team giving me a group hug of death.) So maybe I've got some potential in the game. But not right now, as I'm only level 8 and still faceplant if someone breathes too hard on me.
Monday, April 8, 2013
Wrestlemania 29
It's that time of year, when pro-wrestling's best and brightest gather to put on the show of the year, and in this house myself, Nick and good friend Jack gather with pizza to watch them.
The pre-show is just wrapping up now; it's mainly been hyping up the big matches of the card (Cena/Rock, Undertaker/CM Punk, Lesner/HHH) as well as giving us The Miz and Wade Barrett in an IC title match. This match got bumped to the pre-show for time issues apparently, which is a bit insulting really; even more insulting in our opinion was the fact that the match lasted about 5 minutes and involved a title change. Really, title matches like that should be on the PPV main. Also, the match seems to have made it start raining.
00:00 - And we're off. Nick is ordering a very large amount of pizza. There are minor disagreements over who is sitting where.
The WWE is starting the PPV with a Hurricane Sandy tribute, apparently, which is nice.
00:06 - I will admit, the "Coming Home" song is starting to get on my nerves; I've heard it way too much these last few weeks. First match is Shamus, Randy Orton and the Big Show V The Shield (of Justice).
00:15 - Missed the opening minutes of the match due to pizza order problems. Currently the Shield are stomping around the Big Show, who's apparently getting his minutes done early so he can be a walking prop for the rest of the match.
00:17 - Seth Rollins kicks like Steve Blackman and looks like a Hardy Boy, according to Jack.
00:19 - And the Whitest Man in Wrestling fights to tag out, while Orton and Big Show vie for the tag. Orton wins and catches Ambrose in a Cutter... only to get caught in a spear from Rollins at the same time. Shield takes the win. Nick predicted the win for this match, and they remain undefeated.
00:22 - And Now Show spits his dummy and punches out Orton and Shamus before storming off in a post-loss sulk. So Show is remaining heel, although I don't know how successful Orton can be if they're wanting to keep him face. He just... doesn't fit it, IMO.
00:28 - And there's Snooki. And here's Mark Henry, the world's largest contractual obligation. He's facing off against Ryback. Nick says this match was drafted as running for 12 minutes.
00:37 - This is a match so interesting that we're currently wondering if a Snorlax can be taught Rollout. But overall, this match has had less moves from both wrestlers than Kevin Nash has in his whole moveset - no, wait, an actual move! (scoop slam). The crowd does not sound happy.
00:39 - Okay, Ryback getting Henry up for the Shell Shock was impressive. Mark Henry still won though, so that's Ryback's push flattened.
00:42 - So yeah, the fact that Miz/Barrett was relegated to the pre-show and Henry/Ryback got to be on the PPV has not impressed us. Also, the WWE are sponsors of the Special Olympics.
00: 46 - The food is here, and so is the Tag Titles match. Dolph Ziggler, Big E Langston V Team Hell No. Good timing.
00:49 - And Daniel Bryan nearly got the pin with a kick in under a minute, which would have been awesome. Ziggler also looks an awful lot like Mr Perfect tonight. Meanwhile this is Langston's first match. "It's like Carlton Banks on steroids," states Jack.
00:52 - "Michael Cole's come a long way from doing interviews in a back room being called a hermaphrodite by the Rock, hasn't he?" Meanwhile, this is the most energetic, exciting match of the card so far. And I'm not just saying that as a Kane mark.
00:55 - And Team Hell No retain, with a chokeslam and a Flying Goat. We do wish Bryan would get a different move than that though. Too many injuries associated with it. Nick totally didn't predict the result though.
00:57 - John Cena, one of Make-A-Wish's hardest workers. It's nice.
00:58 - and now, on Dancing With The Wrestlers, Fandango V Chris Jericho.
01:01 - Jack: "Is it just me, or is Jericho starting to look like Ewan McGregor?"
01:05 - So far this match has been dancing, a slap fight, a Codebreaker and a top-rope move. And Lawler having fun saying "Fandango". Nothing really standing out about Fandango though, which is a shame considering the wrestler behind the gimmick.
01:09 - And Jericho is bleeding. He's like the Steve Corino of the WWE.
01:12 - And Fandango wins with a Small Package. Other than a flying legdrop and what Jack named "The People's Prancing", he didn't really have any signature moves at all. Still, Nick predicted that Fandango would win his debut match.
And apparently you can get an $80 Wrestlemania steel chair from K-Mart. And The Miz, although I'm not sure how much he retails for.
01:17 - Jack: "People who don't like The Rock are Communists."
"It must be awful to have an argument with The Rock. All he has to do is raise that eyebrow and you just automatically lose."
01:19 - And now P Diddy is here to entertain us. I'd rather watch more wrestling.
01:25: Well, that was a thing. And now, a Jack Swagger promo, complete with disclaimer. The Swagger/Del Rio match must be next up, which should be good. Justice for Ricardo!
01:29 - Every time I hear Zeb Coulter say that he and Swagger are "real Americans" all I can hear is Hulk Hogan's "Real American" entrance theme. Also, Coulter's moustache is practically a character in its own right at this point.
01:31 - Jack (on Ricardo): "Where can I get this guy to announce me whenever I enter a room?" Also, who else remembers when JBL had an angle where he went out shooting boarder-crossers while he now equivocates over Swagger and Coulter's views?
01:38 - So far, this match has been damn good. Both wrestlers have brought their A game tonight. Jack Swagger still bears a startling resemblance to Owen Hart in that singlet, though.
01:42 - Apparently the fans are chanting for Ziggler to come out. I know he has the Money in the Bank briefcase, but can't they at least wait till the match is over before demanding the next one? It's a terrible shame that the crowd seem so disinterested in the match considering how good the two wrestlers in the ring are doing right now.
01:44 - And Del Rio retains with a cross-armbreaker. Ricardo is going insane with happiness, and it at least woke the crowd up. Good match. Best so far, in fact.
01:48 - Undertaker/Punk time, possibly the only time a match didn't have a storyline reason for being till someone died.
01:51 - Paul Heyman does make a disturbingly good Paul Bearer.
01:59 - When the Undertaker's music started, I went up to use the bathroom, petted the cats twice and got ice cream from the freezer. By the time I got back, the Undertaker had only just gotten into the ring. The two wrestlers are now laying into each other like nobody's business. We may mock the speed at which the 'Taker walks nowadays, but he's going all-out now.
02:05 - Punk walking the rope with the Undertaker is a ballsy move in a match that's been unsophisticated but damn good so far. Not that we were expecting great amounts of technical or high-flying wrestling in it, mind.
02:08 - At this point it's also 50/50 whether Kane is going to come out at some point and chase Heyman round the outside of the ring Benny Hill-style.
02:11 - Punk got a 2-count with a Hail To The King (a top-rope elbow drop in honour of Randy Savage); Taker gets a 2-count with a chokeslam. They're keeping the crowd up and down on their seats here.
02:15 - Okay, who screwed up the setup of the Spanish Announce Table?
02:17 - Jack: "This is an entertaining match, even with Heyman doing a seagull impression outside the ring." Also, damn that was a close count after that Tombstone Piledriver.
02:21 - That was fucking cheeky, that pin of Punk's.
02:22 - Two Tombstone Piledrivers, a Hell's Gate and a chokeslam and Punk finally stays down. Now, who'll it be for Wrestlemania 30?
02:27 - Jack: "The Undertaker is like Santa. He only works one day a year and everyone loves him."
02:33 - Holy crap, HHH with short hair looks creepily like my brother.
02:35 - And now we're all singing along to Shaun Michaels' entrance music. It's still that damn catchy.
02:40 - And this year HHH enters via Castle Greyskull, it seems.
02:45 - Oh, now the Spanish Announce Table breaks.
02:53 - It's taken till HHH pulls out the Pedigree for the crowd to get excited here. Which is unfair really; this has been a pretty good match really. Also, hello Sweet Lady Sledge.
03:00 - Not that this match is getting boring or anything, but we're now discussing the fates of the four Radicalz.
03:02 - Kudos to Heyman for being willing to take that Sweet Chin Music there.
03:05 - HHH wins with a Pedigree onto the steel steps, which is a surprising finish really. Good match though, even if I did think I saw some of it that the end of the Conan the Barbarian movie.
03:08 - And now HHH celebrates by apparently doing the Robot.
03:10 - Highlight of the Hall of Fame package for us was the Spinaroonie.
03:12 - And the crowd boos Trump. Heh.
03:15 - No Funkasaurus? Did an asteroid hit?
03:19 - Okay, not that we're complaining that the mixed tag appears to have fallen into the ether, but are they seriously going to ask Cena and The Rock to go 30+ minutes?
03:25 - Cena seems to either no-sell or oversell. Never a happy medium.
03: 28 - News just in - in Pokemon Black/White, Snorlax learns Rollout at level 44. In other news, the main event is going rather slowly.
03:34 - Oh hey, the crowd woke up at the possibility of the People's Elbow. This match has gone 15 minutes but if feels longer. That's not good for a main event.
03:36 - Let's be fair here. This is not a bad match. For Smackdown. And when you consider that we had Mark Henry/Ryback earlier tonight. So that's something, I guess.
03:41 - The big question here - will the match end before my battery runs out?
03:44 - Counter, finisher, kickout. Counter, finisher, kickout. Where's the Benny Hill music?
03:45 - Oh hey, Cena won. Now, please Eris and whatever god oversees wrestling, can we have a different main event next year?
The pre-show is just wrapping up now; it's mainly been hyping up the big matches of the card (Cena/Rock, Undertaker/CM Punk, Lesner/HHH) as well as giving us The Miz and Wade Barrett in an IC title match. This match got bumped to the pre-show for time issues apparently, which is a bit insulting really; even more insulting in our opinion was the fact that the match lasted about 5 minutes and involved a title change. Really, title matches like that should be on the PPV main. Also, the match seems to have made it start raining.
00:00 - And we're off. Nick is ordering a very large amount of pizza. There are minor disagreements over who is sitting where.
The WWE is starting the PPV with a Hurricane Sandy tribute, apparently, which is nice.
00:06 - I will admit, the "Coming Home" song is starting to get on my nerves; I've heard it way too much these last few weeks. First match is Shamus, Randy Orton and the Big Show V The Shield (of Justice).
00:15 - Missed the opening minutes of the match due to pizza order problems. Currently the Shield are stomping around the Big Show, who's apparently getting his minutes done early so he can be a walking prop for the rest of the match.
00:17 - Seth Rollins kicks like Steve Blackman and looks like a Hardy Boy, according to Jack.
00:19 - And the Whitest Man in Wrestling fights to tag out, while Orton and Big Show vie for the tag. Orton wins and catches Ambrose in a Cutter... only to get caught in a spear from Rollins at the same time. Shield takes the win. Nick predicted the win for this match, and they remain undefeated.
00:22 - And Now Show spits his dummy and punches out Orton and Shamus before storming off in a post-loss sulk. So Show is remaining heel, although I don't know how successful Orton can be if they're wanting to keep him face. He just... doesn't fit it, IMO.
00:28 - And there's Snooki. And here's Mark Henry, the world's largest contractual obligation. He's facing off against Ryback. Nick says this match was drafted as running for 12 minutes.
00:37 - This is a match so interesting that we're currently wondering if a Snorlax can be taught Rollout. But overall, this match has had less moves from both wrestlers than Kevin Nash has in his whole moveset - no, wait, an actual move! (scoop slam). The crowd does not sound happy.
00:39 - Okay, Ryback getting Henry up for the Shell Shock was impressive. Mark Henry still won though, so that's Ryback's push flattened.
00:42 - So yeah, the fact that Miz/Barrett was relegated to the pre-show and Henry/Ryback got to be on the PPV has not impressed us. Also, the WWE are sponsors of the Special Olympics.
00: 46 - The food is here, and so is the Tag Titles match. Dolph Ziggler, Big E Langston V Team Hell No. Good timing.
00:49 - And Daniel Bryan nearly got the pin with a kick in under a minute, which would have been awesome. Ziggler also looks an awful lot like Mr Perfect tonight. Meanwhile this is Langston's first match. "It's like Carlton Banks on steroids," states Jack.
00:52 - "Michael Cole's come a long way from doing interviews in a back room being called a hermaphrodite by the Rock, hasn't he?" Meanwhile, this is the most energetic, exciting match of the card so far. And I'm not just saying that as a Kane mark.
00:55 - And Team Hell No retain, with a chokeslam and a Flying Goat. We do wish Bryan would get a different move than that though. Too many injuries associated with it. Nick totally didn't predict the result though.
00:57 - John Cena, one of Make-A-Wish's hardest workers. It's nice.
00:58 - and now, on Dancing With The Wrestlers, Fandango V Chris Jericho.
01:01 - Jack: "Is it just me, or is Jericho starting to look like Ewan McGregor?"
01:05 - So far this match has been dancing, a slap fight, a Codebreaker and a top-rope move. And Lawler having fun saying "Fandango". Nothing really standing out about Fandango though, which is a shame considering the wrestler behind the gimmick.
01:09 - And Jericho is bleeding. He's like the Steve Corino of the WWE.
01:12 - And Fandango wins with a Small Package. Other than a flying legdrop and what Jack named "The People's Prancing", he didn't really have any signature moves at all. Still, Nick predicted that Fandango would win his debut match.
And apparently you can get an $80 Wrestlemania steel chair from K-Mart. And The Miz, although I'm not sure how much he retails for.
01:17 - Jack: "People who don't like The Rock are Communists."
"It must be awful to have an argument with The Rock. All he has to do is raise that eyebrow and you just automatically lose."
01:19 - And now P Diddy is here to entertain us. I'd rather watch more wrestling.
01:25: Well, that was a thing. And now, a Jack Swagger promo, complete with disclaimer. The Swagger/Del Rio match must be next up, which should be good. Justice for Ricardo!
01:29 - Every time I hear Zeb Coulter say that he and Swagger are "real Americans" all I can hear is Hulk Hogan's "Real American" entrance theme. Also, Coulter's moustache is practically a character in its own right at this point.
01:31 - Jack (on Ricardo): "Where can I get this guy to announce me whenever I enter a room?" Also, who else remembers when JBL had an angle where he went out shooting boarder-crossers while he now equivocates over Swagger and Coulter's views?
01:38 - So far, this match has been damn good. Both wrestlers have brought their A game tonight. Jack Swagger still bears a startling resemblance to Owen Hart in that singlet, though.
01:42 - Apparently the fans are chanting for Ziggler to come out. I know he has the Money in the Bank briefcase, but can't they at least wait till the match is over before demanding the next one? It's a terrible shame that the crowd seem so disinterested in the match considering how good the two wrestlers in the ring are doing right now.
01:44 - And Del Rio retains with a cross-armbreaker. Ricardo is going insane with happiness, and it at least woke the crowd up. Good match. Best so far, in fact.
01:48 - Undertaker/Punk time, possibly the only time a match didn't have a storyline reason for being till someone died.
01:51 - Paul Heyman does make a disturbingly good Paul Bearer.
01:59 - When the Undertaker's music started, I went up to use the bathroom, petted the cats twice and got ice cream from the freezer. By the time I got back, the Undertaker had only just gotten into the ring. The two wrestlers are now laying into each other like nobody's business. We may mock the speed at which the 'Taker walks nowadays, but he's going all-out now.
02:05 - Punk walking the rope with the Undertaker is a ballsy move in a match that's been unsophisticated but damn good so far. Not that we were expecting great amounts of technical or high-flying wrestling in it, mind.
02:08 - At this point it's also 50/50 whether Kane is going to come out at some point and chase Heyman round the outside of the ring Benny Hill-style.
02:11 - Punk got a 2-count with a Hail To The King (a top-rope elbow drop in honour of Randy Savage); Taker gets a 2-count with a chokeslam. They're keeping the crowd up and down on their seats here.
02:15 - Okay, who screwed up the setup of the Spanish Announce Table?
02:17 - Jack: "This is an entertaining match, even with Heyman doing a seagull impression outside the ring." Also, damn that was a close count after that Tombstone Piledriver.
02:21 - That was fucking cheeky, that pin of Punk's.
02:22 - Two Tombstone Piledrivers, a Hell's Gate and a chokeslam and Punk finally stays down. Now, who'll it be for Wrestlemania 30?
02:27 - Jack: "The Undertaker is like Santa. He only works one day a year and everyone loves him."
02:33 - Holy crap, HHH with short hair looks creepily like my brother.
02:35 - And now we're all singing along to Shaun Michaels' entrance music. It's still that damn catchy.
02:40 - And this year HHH enters via Castle Greyskull, it seems.
02:45 - Oh, now the Spanish Announce Table breaks.
02:53 - It's taken till HHH pulls out the Pedigree for the crowd to get excited here. Which is unfair really; this has been a pretty good match really. Also, hello Sweet Lady Sledge.
03:00 - Not that this match is getting boring or anything, but we're now discussing the fates of the four Radicalz.
03:02 - Kudos to Heyman for being willing to take that Sweet Chin Music there.
03:05 - HHH wins with a Pedigree onto the steel steps, which is a surprising finish really. Good match though, even if I did think I saw some of it that the end of the Conan the Barbarian movie.
03:08 - And now HHH celebrates by apparently doing the Robot.
03:10 - Highlight of the Hall of Fame package for us was the Spinaroonie.
03:12 - And the crowd boos Trump. Heh.
03:15 - No Funkasaurus? Did an asteroid hit?
03:19 - Okay, not that we're complaining that the mixed tag appears to have fallen into the ether, but are they seriously going to ask Cena and The Rock to go 30+ minutes?
03:25 - Cena seems to either no-sell or oversell. Never a happy medium.
03: 28 - News just in - in Pokemon Black/White, Snorlax learns Rollout at level 44. In other news, the main event is going rather slowly.
03:34 - Oh hey, the crowd woke up at the possibility of the People's Elbow. This match has gone 15 minutes but if feels longer. That's not good for a main event.
03:36 - Let's be fair here. This is not a bad match. For Smackdown. And when you consider that we had Mark Henry/Ryback earlier tonight. So that's something, I guess.
03:41 - The big question here - will the match end before my battery runs out?
03:44 - Counter, finisher, kickout. Counter, finisher, kickout. Where's the Benny Hill music?
03:45 - Oh hey, Cena won. Now, please Eris and whatever god oversees wrestling, can we have a different main event next year?
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Daytime TV
Two days after my trip to A&E and I can finally walk again - albeit with a walking stick borrowed from Nick and only for short distances. Still, it's a great improvement, a sign that I'm not going to be consigned to the sofa forever and freedom from said sofa. Sunday and Monday I was pretty much stuck there, apart from when I had to feed the cats or go to the bathroom, and apart from the Chromebook the only things I had to entertain myself with were my crochet and daytime TV.
Crochetwise, I made five more hexapuffs for the ongoing Beekeeper's Quilt project I'm working on, and made plans for some more things I'm going to be working on when I can. The rest of the time, I was reminded why I don't watch very much TV any more normally.
I think we have over 100 channels on our cable package, and yet I think I only watch about 5 of them. Two crime channels - Investigation Discovery and the Crime and Investigation channel - Challenge TV (home of old gameshows, strange foreign gameshows and TNA wrestling), Living TV (mainly for the episodes of Jerry Springer and Maury), CBS Reality (for Judge Judy and Jerry Springer) and the Horror Channel (for, obviously, horror movies). Oh, and ITV2, home of the Jeremy Kyle show.
Nick believes that Jeremy Kyle is Satan, or at least some sort of demon sent from the pit. He doesn't like Kyle's moralizing, his regular anti-benefits rants (maybe about once in a blue moon can we actually agree on what he says, like earlier today when he went off on someone who tried to argue that he didn't need to provide for his children because their mother was on benefits), the guests on his show... Basically, he doesn't like the show. And if I'm completely honest, I'm not too sure why I watch it so regularly, except for the entertainment factor. A judge once described it as "human bear-baiting" but I'd disagree with that, because with bear-baiting the bears are forced into performing and don't know what's going on, while the guests on the show are (theoretically) fully aware of what they're getting into and have volunteered to come on the show. Plus bear-baiting is cruel.
But I think I'm temporarily full up on Jeremy Kyle, after two days' worth of him and Maury Povich keeping the DNA testing agencies in business. Instead today I'm going to use my new-found freedom to watch Law and Order: SVU on the computer and work on the lap-blanket.
Crochetwise, I made five more hexapuffs for the ongoing Beekeeper's Quilt project I'm working on, and made plans for some more things I'm going to be working on when I can. The rest of the time, I was reminded why I don't watch very much TV any more normally.
I think we have over 100 channels on our cable package, and yet I think I only watch about 5 of them. Two crime channels - Investigation Discovery and the Crime and Investigation channel - Challenge TV (home of old gameshows, strange foreign gameshows and TNA wrestling), Living TV (mainly for the episodes of Jerry Springer and Maury), CBS Reality (for Judge Judy and Jerry Springer) and the Horror Channel (for, obviously, horror movies). Oh, and ITV2, home of the Jeremy Kyle show.
Nick believes that Jeremy Kyle is Satan, or at least some sort of demon sent from the pit. He doesn't like Kyle's moralizing, his regular anti-benefits rants (maybe about once in a blue moon can we actually agree on what he says, like earlier today when he went off on someone who tried to argue that he didn't need to provide for his children because their mother was on benefits), the guests on his show... Basically, he doesn't like the show. And if I'm completely honest, I'm not too sure why I watch it so regularly, except for the entertainment factor. A judge once described it as "human bear-baiting" but I'd disagree with that, because with bear-baiting the bears are forced into performing and don't know what's going on, while the guests on the show are (theoretically) fully aware of what they're getting into and have volunteered to come on the show. Plus bear-baiting is cruel.
But I think I'm temporarily full up on Jeremy Kyle, after two days' worth of him and Maury Povich keeping the DNA testing agencies in business. Instead today I'm going to use my new-found freedom to watch Law and Order: SVU on the computer and work on the lap-blanket.
Sunday, March 10, 2013
Eyes and Feet
It's been an interesting few days.
Friday I had an eye test. One of the things they have to do when you get diagnosed with Diabetes is get an eye test to check for diabetic retinopathy. This is when high blood sugar levels damage the cells of the eye, and can lead to blindness. They check for this by taking photographs of the back of the eye, with the help of eye drops that dilate the pupil and some very bright lights when taking the photograph, both of which leave you with very blurred vision for a couple of hours afterwards and a need to wear dark glasses till your eyes recover.
My eyes were fine for diabetic retinopathy, of course, but I am slightly short-sighted and have astigmatism of my eyeballs - basically my eyeballs are short and more rugby ball-shaped instead or sphere-shaped like they should be. So I now have glasses for distance work and whenever I'm using the computer or doing fine detail work for a long period of time. It's slightly odd because last time I had an eye test (which was admittedly about 12 years ago) I had one short-sighted eye and one long-sighted eye. Apparently since then the long-sighted eye has fixed itself a bit to enthusiastically as now both eyes are short-sighted.
Saturday morning I went to the gym again. I went by bus this time to save money, and while I learned the routes I had to walk a fair bit further than I'd planned as the bus driver on the way there dropped me off at the wrong stop. But hey, an extra 15 minutes walking each way isn't going to do me any harm, is it? Once at the gym, I worked on the treadmill, some of the resistance machines and the stationary bike - and it was on the latter that I started to have a problem. The soles of my feet started to hurt as I was cycling. I recognised the pain (or at least I thought I did at first) as the return of my old enemy plantar fasciitis, which I've suffered from on and off since I was six years old. So I didn't think too much of it, even when it hurt so badly that I could barely walk to the bus stop when I was done.
Except that several hours after I'd gotten home, the pain in my left foot hadn't gone away, and painkillers had done nothing to touch the pain. (For the record, the pain was at about an 8 on this pain scale, occasionally going up to a 9.) The pain in my right foot had gone away after about an hour, which made it even more noticible. So I started to get worried. And by Sunday morning, both Nick and I were quite worried indeed, as the pain was so bad that I couldn't sleep and even Nick's codeine painkillers weren't touching the pain. Concerned that I'd managed to give myself a stress fracture of the foot, we headed off to the A&E department.
An hour and a half and an x-ray later and they were reasonably sure I hadn't broken my foot, and it was in fact just a really bad case of plantar fasciitis. One that still requires me to be off my feet for the next few days, and that I actually have permission to take double the normal amount of painkillers for until it eases up. Which leads me to now, lying on the sofa with the Chromebook and spending my time crocheting and watching the Investigation Discovery channel on TV. The pain is still there, wobbling between 6 and 8 on the scale, but the increased painkiller amounts do dull things enough that I can sleep when I've taken them. And Nick is in the unusual position of having to do and fetch things for me for once, which isn't much easier for him but it's not like we can train the cats to do it.
Oh, and I probably won't be going to the gym for a few days either.
Friday I had an eye test. One of the things they have to do when you get diagnosed with Diabetes is get an eye test to check for diabetic retinopathy. This is when high blood sugar levels damage the cells of the eye, and can lead to blindness. They check for this by taking photographs of the back of the eye, with the help of eye drops that dilate the pupil and some very bright lights when taking the photograph, both of which leave you with very blurred vision for a couple of hours afterwards and a need to wear dark glasses till your eyes recover.
My eyes were fine for diabetic retinopathy, of course, but I am slightly short-sighted and have astigmatism of my eyeballs - basically my eyeballs are short and more rugby ball-shaped instead or sphere-shaped like they should be. So I now have glasses for distance work and whenever I'm using the computer or doing fine detail work for a long period of time. It's slightly odd because last time I had an eye test (which was admittedly about 12 years ago) I had one short-sighted eye and one long-sighted eye. Apparently since then the long-sighted eye has fixed itself a bit to enthusiastically as now both eyes are short-sighted.
Saturday morning I went to the gym again. I went by bus this time to save money, and while I learned the routes I had to walk a fair bit further than I'd planned as the bus driver on the way there dropped me off at the wrong stop. But hey, an extra 15 minutes walking each way isn't going to do me any harm, is it? Once at the gym, I worked on the treadmill, some of the resistance machines and the stationary bike - and it was on the latter that I started to have a problem. The soles of my feet started to hurt as I was cycling. I recognised the pain (or at least I thought I did at first) as the return of my old enemy plantar fasciitis, which I've suffered from on and off since I was six years old. So I didn't think too much of it, even when it hurt so badly that I could barely walk to the bus stop when I was done.
Except that several hours after I'd gotten home, the pain in my left foot hadn't gone away, and painkillers had done nothing to touch the pain. (For the record, the pain was at about an 8 on this pain scale, occasionally going up to a 9.) The pain in my right foot had gone away after about an hour, which made it even more noticible. So I started to get worried. And by Sunday morning, both Nick and I were quite worried indeed, as the pain was so bad that I couldn't sleep and even Nick's codeine painkillers weren't touching the pain. Concerned that I'd managed to give myself a stress fracture of the foot, we headed off to the A&E department.
An hour and a half and an x-ray later and they were reasonably sure I hadn't broken my foot, and it was in fact just a really bad case of plantar fasciitis. One that still requires me to be off my feet for the next few days, and that I actually have permission to take double the normal amount of painkillers for until it eases up. Which leads me to now, lying on the sofa with the Chromebook and spending my time crocheting and watching the Investigation Discovery channel on TV. The pain is still there, wobbling between 6 and 8 on the scale, but the increased painkiller amounts do dull things enough that I can sleep when I've taken them. And Nick is in the unusual position of having to do and fetch things for me for once, which isn't much easier for him but it's not like we can train the cats to do it.
Oh, and I probably won't be going to the gym for a few days either.
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Fun With Yarn
I've been getting back into my crafting over the last few days (especially the last two, while I've been recovering from my first gym session...). Our house is practically overflowing with various balls of yarn, packs that I've picked up at a "bargain" because I was certain I'd be able to come up with something to do with them and random single balls that I bought because I wanted to try something out or they were left over for something, and of course with the yarn comes the half-finished projects. It drives Nick crazy, but then again, most of the space that's not taken up with my stuff is taken up with his Warhammer (Fantasy and 40K) models, paints and suchlike, so I'm pretty sure it balances out.
But I've decided to take a more pro-active approach to my crochet and knitting now, and so I'm trying to set myself a few new rules. The most important of which is that I'm only allowed a maximum of four projects active at any one time - two "short-term" and two "long-term". And connected to that, I'm not allowed to buy more yarn unless I've finished a project (or it's an essential part of a long-term project).
So with that in mind, this is what I'm working on at the moment:
- Star Lap Blanket. I started this last week while looking for something to do with my hands while Nick and I were marathoning through a TV series. Nick likes to just sit and watch stuff for hours, and while I like watching things with him, I find it a lot more difficult to do so and so I tend to pick up something to knit or crochet while it's going on. In this case my eyes came to rest on some random balls of cotton-mix yarn that I'd had for a while but didn't have anything specific in mind for them, and I remembered a blanket pattern that I'd seen in a recent crochet magazine that I'd liked.
This photo was actually taken a couple of days ago; it's grown a bit since then and I'm hoping to have it finished by early next week. I also know that it's going to be a comfortable blanket, as whenever I put it down one of the cats immediately settles on it and goes to sleep (not pictured: Cracker waiting patiently for her chance on the blanket).
- Doctor Who Scarf. No photo for this yet, as I'm not very far into it at all. Nick asked for this - well, he's wanted me to make him a scarf for a while, and when I found a site (Doctor Who Scarf.com) that had patterns for the Tom Baker scarves I pretty much knew I had to make one for him. He did get me my Chromebook, after all, which buys him so many boyfriend points. I also let him choose the colours, so his scarf is going to be dark/bottle green, grey and black. So like the Doctor if he got sorted into Slytherin.
- Beekeeper's Quilt. This is one of my "long-term" projects, because I can't see myself getting this one completed any time soon. I saw it on Ravelry a while back and thought it was beautiful, but having to do it on dpns put me off, because I've never worked with them before. Yesterday though I decided that I should at least try to learn how to knit with dpns and so took the plunge.
...I still haven't managed to get it right yet. Thankfully for the meantime, there's also a crochet version that uses front post crochet - which coincidentally I've also never tried before - and so I've at least managed to learn one new skill today.
This is my first hexapuff, done in crochet. Surprisingly easy to do, once I'd gotten the front post crochet down. One down, a couple of hundred to go...
But I've decided to take a more pro-active approach to my crochet and knitting now, and so I'm trying to set myself a few new rules. The most important of which is that I'm only allowed a maximum of four projects active at any one time - two "short-term" and two "long-term". And connected to that, I'm not allowed to buy more yarn unless I've finished a project (or it's an essential part of a long-term project).
So with that in mind, this is what I'm working on at the moment:
- Star Lap Blanket. I started this last week while looking for something to do with my hands while Nick and I were marathoning through a TV series. Nick likes to just sit and watch stuff for hours, and while I like watching things with him, I find it a lot more difficult to do so and so I tend to pick up something to knit or crochet while it's going on. In this case my eyes came to rest on some random balls of cotton-mix yarn that I'd had for a while but didn't have anything specific in mind for them, and I remembered a blanket pattern that I'd seen in a recent crochet magazine that I'd liked.
- Doctor Who Scarf. No photo for this yet, as I'm not very far into it at all. Nick asked for this - well, he's wanted me to make him a scarf for a while, and when I found a site (Doctor Who Scarf.com) that had patterns for the Tom Baker scarves I pretty much knew I had to make one for him. He did get me my Chromebook, after all, which buys him so many boyfriend points. I also let him choose the colours, so his scarf is going to be dark/bottle green, grey and black. So like the Doctor if he got sorted into Slytherin.
- Beekeeper's Quilt. This is one of my "long-term" projects, because I can't see myself getting this one completed any time soon. I saw it on Ravelry a while back and thought it was beautiful, but having to do it on dpns put me off, because I've never worked with them before. Yesterday though I decided that I should at least try to learn how to knit with dpns and so took the plunge.
...I still haven't managed to get it right yet. Thankfully for the meantime, there's also a crochet version that uses front post crochet - which coincidentally I've also never tried before - and so I've at least managed to learn one new skill today.
This is my first hexapuff, done in crochet. Surprisingly easy to do, once I'd gotten the front post crochet down. One down, a couple of hundred to go...
Monday, March 4, 2013
Getting in shape
I had my first trip to the gym today. Going to the gym was one of those things that I'd wanted to do for a while, and even made some vague plans to do so that never really went anywhere. There were always reasons to not go through with it, not the least of which was never really having the time for a regular schedule or anything like that with Nick's disabilities. Not to mention my own lack of self-esteem and shyness that meant I was uncomfortable going to a small gym. Also nearly every gym I looked at seemed to have "circuits" to use the equipment, so that you spent only a few minutes on each one. I didn't really like that, because what if I just wanted to stay on the treadmill for 30 minutes one session?
Then I got diagnosed with diabetes, and it became considerably more important for me to lose weight, and so I found and signed up for Pure Gym. Pure Gym is a chain that has a specific hook that got my attention - they're open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If you want to turn up for a gym session at 2am, you can do so, and I liked that idea because I can never guarantee when I'll be free to go for a session. The monthly fee was also remarkably cheap for a gym, and so I figured that between the money I'd be saving with not eating as much junk food and some of the royalties from the writing, I could afford to give it a try at least. There was a bit of a delay at first as they required me to get cleared by my doctor before I could start exercising there, but I got that sorted on Friday and promptly booked my induction session after that.
The gym is very nice - large and clean and airy, with more than enough machines for people, even during busy times (which I ended up seeing some of, with people coming in after work). Treadmills and exercise bikes (and Spin bikes which do... something that you can do in classes, I'm not sure what yet but I know the classes get booked up very quickly), rowing machines, cross trainers, a whole load of resistance machines, a weights room, and a lot of extra equipment people can use when working out. Kettle bells and Swiss balls and stuff like that. There's also showers for people to use after their sessions (not to self: remember to bring shower stuff next time). So all in all it's pretty damn good.
So after my induction (basically getting shown round the gym, seeing the machines and getting a 30-second tutorial on how each one worked) I stayed and did my first workout. 20 minutes on the treadmill at a walk (I'll have to slowly increase the speeds there till I find the best one for me), 15 minutes on two exercise bikes (the first one I tried was a bit too tall for me), and one minute on a cross trainer. I didn't like the cross trainer. I kept feeling like I was about to fall backwards on it and that was a pretty distracting and uncomfortable feeling. I also tried a couple of the resistance machines on the lowest weight sessions (10lbs) and they were pretty easy, easier than I'd expected so once I figure out what I need to work on I'll do more of them as well.
Now I'm home of course the post-exercise exhaustion has hit and I expect tomorrow I'll be reminded of all sorts of muscles I'd forgotten I had, but al in all it was a successful afternoon. My plan is to go to the gym at least twice a week, so I'll probably be visiting again on Wednesday or Thursday, and so the only other thing to do is to look into bus routes to the place, as right now getting a taxi there and back is stupidly expensive...
Then I got diagnosed with diabetes, and it became considerably more important for me to lose weight, and so I found and signed up for Pure Gym. Pure Gym is a chain that has a specific hook that got my attention - they're open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. If you want to turn up for a gym session at 2am, you can do so, and I liked that idea because I can never guarantee when I'll be free to go for a session. The monthly fee was also remarkably cheap for a gym, and so I figured that between the money I'd be saving with not eating as much junk food and some of the royalties from the writing, I could afford to give it a try at least. There was a bit of a delay at first as they required me to get cleared by my doctor before I could start exercising there, but I got that sorted on Friday and promptly booked my induction session after that.
The gym is very nice - large and clean and airy, with more than enough machines for people, even during busy times (which I ended up seeing some of, with people coming in after work). Treadmills and exercise bikes (and Spin bikes which do... something that you can do in classes, I'm not sure what yet but I know the classes get booked up very quickly), rowing machines, cross trainers, a whole load of resistance machines, a weights room, and a lot of extra equipment people can use when working out. Kettle bells and Swiss balls and stuff like that. There's also showers for people to use after their sessions (not to self: remember to bring shower stuff next time). So all in all it's pretty damn good.
So after my induction (basically getting shown round the gym, seeing the machines and getting a 30-second tutorial on how each one worked) I stayed and did my first workout. 20 minutes on the treadmill at a walk (I'll have to slowly increase the speeds there till I find the best one for me), 15 minutes on two exercise bikes (the first one I tried was a bit too tall for me), and one minute on a cross trainer. I didn't like the cross trainer. I kept feeling like I was about to fall backwards on it and that was a pretty distracting and uncomfortable feeling. I also tried a couple of the resistance machines on the lowest weight sessions (10lbs) and they were pretty easy, easier than I'd expected so once I figure out what I need to work on I'll do more of them as well.
Now I'm home of course the post-exercise exhaustion has hit and I expect tomorrow I'll be reminded of all sorts of muscles I'd forgotten I had, but al in all it was a successful afternoon. My plan is to go to the gym at least twice a week, so I'll probably be visiting again on Wednesday or Thursday, and so the only other thing to do is to look into bus routes to the place, as right now getting a taxi there and back is stupidly expensive...
Saturday, March 2, 2013
A Visit To The Vet
Yesterday I took Lily to the vet's. This was not the usual easy visit.
First off, because of Nick's disability we use the PDSA for our vet services. Without them, we would have been in serious trouble (and more importantly hock) when we got Cracker and discovered she had her stomach problem/food allergies and she had to go to the vets four times in the first month alone. Now of course whatever it is (even after all that time we're still not 100% sure, and since no-one's really keen on cutting her open just to have a poke around that's the way it'll likely stay) is under control and she only has to go in for quarterly check-ups and her booster vaccinations once a year, but the PDSA cover them too and they're good and so we take Lily to them as well.
Lily went in yesterday for her booster shots and to have her weight checked, because Lily is of course a flump. We've been doing this with her for about four months now, and her weight has been see-sawing all over the place - up, then down, then strangely down, and now up again. But regardless, Lily goes in once a month, which she hates, because (a) she's 16-17lbs being put in a small box, and (b) she doesn't travel well. Yesterday was worse than usual, because the taxi driver who took us there was the kind to accelerate sharply, brake sharply... generally if there was a way to make the passengers bounce around in their seats, he'd give it a go. So by the time we got to the vet's Lily was quite distressed, and she ended up doing two types of business in the carrier. Embarrassing for sure, but hardly the first time an animal's done that at the vet's.
I always arrive to appointments early, because I'd much rather be early than late, and so I was there a full 15 minutes before my appointment and, for once, the place was empty. Well, one couple came in with their elderly and reluctant dog, but that was it. I ended up being seen 10 minutes before my actual stated appointment, so I'm pretty sure they weren't hideously busy like I've seen them be in the past.
Appointment starts off normal, I apologise for Lily's accident in the carrier, get it up on the table and open it up. We weigh Lily and discover that, as I said, she's managed to put on weight again (I suspect she's been eating the wet food that Cracker refuses to eat when we're not looking, but every time I've asked whether to stop free-feeding them the vet advice has always been that it's fine to carry on like that). The first bit of bother came when the vet seemed unwilling to discuss this with me, telling me I really need to see a nurse about that. Well, fair enough, but when I had made this appointment I had stressed I had wanted to have her monthly weight check, and the boosters were just conveniently at the same time. Ah well, maybe they just got confused about what the appointment was for and decided it was just about the boosters. No big deal. The vet told me I'd have to make another appointment, which is added stress on both Lily and myself, but when she made the appointment for me she didn't write it down for me or anything like that. Okay, again, no big problem, maybe they just ran out of cards.
Booster shots were given, Lily being Lily she didn't make a peep, and it was time to get back in the carrier. Only... you remember I said she'd made a mess in the carrier? Well, every other time I've ever had this situation at the vet's, they've offered to clean the box out for me while the appointment's going on, I don't know if this is standard practice or if I'm expecting something that I shouldn't have been, but it was always offered in the past and I always thought it was a nice touch. This time, I realised that the vet expected me to put Lily back into a carrier that was, basically, covered in cat pee and poo.
I asked if there was something I could use to clean the box up a little. Almost as an afterthought, the vet handed me a wad of paper towels, and then watched as I did my best to clean the carrier with them. She then watched as I got Lily back into the carrier (to her credit, Lily is both clever and well-mannered, and all I had to do was put the box up on the table and ask her if she wanted to get in it herself to go home, and she stepped in and curled up in it without a peep. Then she watched me close up the box and leave. All this time the vet never said a word to me, other than a "goodbye" when I was leaving and even then she was already scrubbing down the table with disinfectant and some better-quality towels.
the whole thing just left me feeling... strange. Confused. And angry, after a while. Like I said, the PDSA are great people and I've never had a bad word to say about them before today... and honestly I've been second-guessing myself over whether to even write this since yesterday afternoon. But it just felt... not right, to me somehow. Almost like I wasn't really welcome there for some reason. This could, of course, be my OCD talking, as it kicked in after this and I've spent a lot of time since worrying that this was all, in fact, my fault but I just haven't figured out how yet. Obsessional thinking may well be the death of me. But regardless, it bothered me enough that I eventually felt I had to write this down, for better or for worse.
Lily's got her weight clinic/nurse's appointment in two weeks' time. I admit I'm now slightly scared about what's going to happen when I take her there. It's also why I don't feel like actually making a complaint or anything like that to the hospital, in case it turns out it's all in my head and they decide not to treat the cats any more because of it (hello again, obsessional thinking!).
I think I'm going to be stressing out a lot about this for a while.
First off, because of Nick's disability we use the PDSA for our vet services. Without them, we would have been in serious trouble (and more importantly hock) when we got Cracker and discovered she had her stomach problem/food allergies and she had to go to the vets four times in the first month alone. Now of course whatever it is (even after all that time we're still not 100% sure, and since no-one's really keen on cutting her open just to have a poke around that's the way it'll likely stay) is under control and she only has to go in for quarterly check-ups and her booster vaccinations once a year, but the PDSA cover them too and they're good and so we take Lily to them as well.
Lily went in yesterday for her booster shots and to have her weight checked, because Lily is of course a flump. We've been doing this with her for about four months now, and her weight has been see-sawing all over the place - up, then down, then strangely down, and now up again. But regardless, Lily goes in once a month, which she hates, because (a) she's 16-17lbs being put in a small box, and (b) she doesn't travel well. Yesterday was worse than usual, because the taxi driver who took us there was the kind to accelerate sharply, brake sharply... generally if there was a way to make the passengers bounce around in their seats, he'd give it a go. So by the time we got to the vet's Lily was quite distressed, and she ended up doing two types of business in the carrier. Embarrassing for sure, but hardly the first time an animal's done that at the vet's.
I always arrive to appointments early, because I'd much rather be early than late, and so I was there a full 15 minutes before my appointment and, for once, the place was empty. Well, one couple came in with their elderly and reluctant dog, but that was it. I ended up being seen 10 minutes before my actual stated appointment, so I'm pretty sure they weren't hideously busy like I've seen them be in the past.
Appointment starts off normal, I apologise for Lily's accident in the carrier, get it up on the table and open it up. We weigh Lily and discover that, as I said, she's managed to put on weight again (I suspect she's been eating the wet food that Cracker refuses to eat when we're not looking, but every time I've asked whether to stop free-feeding them the vet advice has always been that it's fine to carry on like that). The first bit of bother came when the vet seemed unwilling to discuss this with me, telling me I really need to see a nurse about that. Well, fair enough, but when I had made this appointment I had stressed I had wanted to have her monthly weight check, and the boosters were just conveniently at the same time. Ah well, maybe they just got confused about what the appointment was for and decided it was just about the boosters. No big deal. The vet told me I'd have to make another appointment, which is added stress on both Lily and myself, but when she made the appointment for me she didn't write it down for me or anything like that. Okay, again, no big problem, maybe they just ran out of cards.
Booster shots were given, Lily being Lily she didn't make a peep, and it was time to get back in the carrier. Only... you remember I said she'd made a mess in the carrier? Well, every other time I've ever had this situation at the vet's, they've offered to clean the box out for me while the appointment's going on, I don't know if this is standard practice or if I'm expecting something that I shouldn't have been, but it was always offered in the past and I always thought it was a nice touch. This time, I realised that the vet expected me to put Lily back into a carrier that was, basically, covered in cat pee and poo.
I asked if there was something I could use to clean the box up a little. Almost as an afterthought, the vet handed me a wad of paper towels, and then watched as I did my best to clean the carrier with them. She then watched as I got Lily back into the carrier (to her credit, Lily is both clever and well-mannered, and all I had to do was put the box up on the table and ask her if she wanted to get in it herself to go home, and she stepped in and curled up in it without a peep. Then she watched me close up the box and leave. All this time the vet never said a word to me, other than a "goodbye" when I was leaving and even then she was already scrubbing down the table with disinfectant and some better-quality towels.
the whole thing just left me feeling... strange. Confused. And angry, after a while. Like I said, the PDSA are great people and I've never had a bad word to say about them before today... and honestly I've been second-guessing myself over whether to even write this since yesterday afternoon. But it just felt... not right, to me somehow. Almost like I wasn't really welcome there for some reason. This could, of course, be my OCD talking, as it kicked in after this and I've spent a lot of time since worrying that this was all, in fact, my fault but I just haven't figured out how yet. Obsessional thinking may well be the death of me. But regardless, it bothered me enough that I eventually felt I had to write this down, for better or for worse.
Lily's got her weight clinic/nurse's appointment in two weeks' time. I admit I'm now slightly scared about what's going to happen when I take her there. It's also why I don't feel like actually making a complaint or anything like that to the hospital, in case it turns out it's all in my head and they decide not to treat the cats any more because of it (hello again, obsessional thinking!).
I think I'm going to be stressing out a lot about this for a while.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Cowboys and Aliens and Bars
Nick and I watched this movie yesterday, after it had been sitting on his desk in its Lovefilm envelope for about two weeks (Nick apparently needing that time to get over the fact that The Time Traveller's Wife wasn't the scientific drama about one scientist's quest to unlock the secrets of time travel and his devoted wife helping him that he'd thought it was).
As the film progressed we started listing all the Western (ie. cowboy) movie tropes we could see in the film. Daniel Craig was, of course, The Man With No Name, a man who wakes up with no memories and a strange device attached to his wrist. Harrison Ford was the Grizzled Veteran, the Guy You Think is Going to be the Villain But Isn't (if anyone considers that a spoiler, bear in mind the movie's title) and the Estranged Father all in one. There's also a Kid Trying to Rescue His Father, an Adopted Son Who's Better Than The Real Son, a Mysterious Woman, a Man Who's Never Shot a Gun Before and a Heroic Dog. Oh, and a medium-sized tribe of Apache warriors and about 30 bank robbers. No Invisible Swordsman though (but then again, who could tell?)
So, the plot. Well, there's a small wild west town with all the usual characters one would expect to find (and the Kurgen as town priest) and Daniel Craig wanders in not knowing a thing about himself. He gets arrested because of something he may or may not have done, but then aliens attack and carry off half the townsfolk. Turns out the device on Craig's wrist is a weapon of some sort, which is good because he ends up leading a ragtag band of the town's survivors to go fight the aliens and get their loved ones back.
It's an interesting film from the point of view of cultural tracking (a term from ufology used to describe how, quite often, the UFOs seen in the sky that resemble structured craft would seem to be only two or three steps removed from current levels of tech), although I don't think that was deliberate; more of a "grimy steampunk" sort of thing. It's also, perhaps unsurprisingly, not huge on plot revelations and shocking storytelling - you can probably guess most of what happens in the film without too much difficulty. But it's also a fun little film, the people involved seem to have had a good time making it, and we had a good time watching it (and admittedly MSTing it in parts). What more can be asked for?
We also watched a couple of episodes of a show called Bar Rescue, that Nick discovered while watching his internet Gordon Ramsey channel a few days ago. It's like Kitchen Nightmares but with less swearing and with bars instead of restaurants, and it's not a bad show either. The only thing Nick and I think could have improved it is if they had been able to get Patrick Swayze (I know he's dead) to narrate the show as Dalton from Roadhouse. Either that or replace the "bar science" guy with Diamond Dallas Page. Then the show would have gone to a whole new level of awesome.
As the film progressed we started listing all the Western (ie. cowboy) movie tropes we could see in the film. Daniel Craig was, of course, The Man With No Name, a man who wakes up with no memories and a strange device attached to his wrist. Harrison Ford was the Grizzled Veteran, the Guy You Think is Going to be the Villain But Isn't (if anyone considers that a spoiler, bear in mind the movie's title) and the Estranged Father all in one. There's also a Kid Trying to Rescue His Father, an Adopted Son Who's Better Than The Real Son, a Mysterious Woman, a Man Who's Never Shot a Gun Before and a Heroic Dog. Oh, and a medium-sized tribe of Apache warriors and about 30 bank robbers. No Invisible Swordsman though (but then again, who could tell?)
So, the plot. Well, there's a small wild west town with all the usual characters one would expect to find (and the Kurgen as town priest) and Daniel Craig wanders in not knowing a thing about himself. He gets arrested because of something he may or may not have done, but then aliens attack and carry off half the townsfolk. Turns out the device on Craig's wrist is a weapon of some sort, which is good because he ends up leading a ragtag band of the town's survivors to go fight the aliens and get their loved ones back.
It's an interesting film from the point of view of cultural tracking (a term from ufology used to describe how, quite often, the UFOs seen in the sky that resemble structured craft would seem to be only two or three steps removed from current levels of tech), although I don't think that was deliberate; more of a "grimy steampunk" sort of thing. It's also, perhaps unsurprisingly, not huge on plot revelations and shocking storytelling - you can probably guess most of what happens in the film without too much difficulty. But it's also a fun little film, the people involved seem to have had a good time making it, and we had a good time watching it (and admittedly MSTing it in parts). What more can be asked for?
We also watched a couple of episodes of a show called Bar Rescue, that Nick discovered while watching his internet Gordon Ramsey channel a few days ago. It's like Kitchen Nightmares but with less swearing and with bars instead of restaurants, and it's not a bad show either. The only thing Nick and I think could have improved it is if they had been able to get Patrick Swayze (I know he's dead) to narrate the show as Dalton from Roadhouse. Either that or replace the "bar science" guy with Diamond Dallas Page. Then the show would have gone to a whole new level of awesome.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Colds and Chimneys
I'm currently typing this in my bed, while the cats sit nearby watching with mild curiosity between cleanings. But that's cats for you. If they can't eat it, sit on it, sit in it or play with it they couldn't care less, and they haven't quite worked out what category the Chromebook falls into yet.
I'm in bed at nearly 3pm for two reasons. One; it's bloody cold in the house and I can't put the heating on as my my little arms are about two inches too short to reach into the gas cupboard and activate the meter. These are the perils of being short that people don't tell you about. Two; I'm bloody tired. I don't know if it's because I'm just not sleeping well (because I'm not), because I've come down with what feels like another sinus infection that leaves all my internal face tubes clogged up and liable to produce headaches and/or other unfortunate symptoms, or for some other reason, but there it is. I get up early in the morning, have breakfast and get stuff done, and then around 1-2pm my body suddenly feels like it's been hit with a truck. It's especially annoying because I had thought that the metformin tablets and the shiny new healthy diet were supposed to have fixed this - and they did. For about two weeks. Now I'm right back to needing to nap in the afternoon. My productivity may never recover at this rate.
At least I know why I didn't sleep well last night - the constant fear of hearing the sound of crumbling brickwork above me, followed by crashing as the chimney keeled over onto next door's parked car or a wandering drunk. I'd been hoping that the landlord was going to call or e-mail this morning to say someone was on their way to look at it or even better fix it, but no such luck. I'd dreading the possibility of having to place an anonymous call to the council about the "dangerous chimney" that's leaning and sending bits of masonry down to the ground whenever there's a still breeze, but if he doesn't get back to us by the end of the week I have the horrible feeling that's what I'll have to do.
I am a ball of exhaustion and neuroses: is it any wonder I'm having a problem getting any writing done right now?
I'm in bed at nearly 3pm for two reasons. One; it's bloody cold in the house and I can't put the heating on as my my little arms are about two inches too short to reach into the gas cupboard and activate the meter. These are the perils of being short that people don't tell you about. Two; I'm bloody tired. I don't know if it's because I'm just not sleeping well (because I'm not), because I've come down with what feels like another sinus infection that leaves all my internal face tubes clogged up and liable to produce headaches and/or other unfortunate symptoms, or for some other reason, but there it is. I get up early in the morning, have breakfast and get stuff done, and then around 1-2pm my body suddenly feels like it's been hit with a truck. It's especially annoying because I had thought that the metformin tablets and the shiny new healthy diet were supposed to have fixed this - and they did. For about two weeks. Now I'm right back to needing to nap in the afternoon. My productivity may never recover at this rate.
At least I know why I didn't sleep well last night - the constant fear of hearing the sound of crumbling brickwork above me, followed by crashing as the chimney keeled over onto next door's parked car or a wandering drunk. I'd been hoping that the landlord was going to call or e-mail this morning to say someone was on their way to look at it or even better fix it, but no such luck. I'd dreading the possibility of having to place an anonymous call to the council about the "dangerous chimney" that's leaning and sending bits of masonry down to the ground whenever there's a still breeze, but if he doesn't get back to us by the end of the week I have the horrible feeling that's what I'll have to do.
I am a ball of exhaustion and neuroses: is it any wonder I'm having a problem getting any writing done right now?
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