Whine and Cheese

It's been over a week since my last post. Nothing major has happened, a bunch of little things here and there that don't amount to much.

• I've been trying to run more and more outside when I can. I got a lot of miles in this week. Today, I ran one mile and then did ten runs up the gravel hill that goes to the track where I run. Lord, that was a chore. I am going to be sore tomorrow. Still, it's been fun trying to vary the different exercises I've been doing.



• A friend recommended "Agatha Raisin," a BBC detective show about a loud, PR person who moves to a small village and ends up solving various murders. I'm only two episodes in, but I'm enjoying it. However, it does remind me a tad of "Murder, She Wrote," in that it's a small village and how many murders can happen in such a small place. Cabot Cove, ME must have been one of the most dangerous places in the 1980s (yes, I know it's fake).



• I've already written Issue 29 of my comic, but I am so reluctant to start drawing it. I'm not sure why. I'm so wiped out after work mentally that the idea of drawing has lost its luster. Even just general drawing, random scribbles, haven't really been happening. The stresses of our current situation has something to do with it, I'm sure.



• I took today off. I just wanted ONE more day to sleep in. And then I was up at 6:30 AM. Ugh!

The dream started out in small country town. I was more a spectator than a participant at this point. A young deputy sheriff was sparing with his brother, the latter who was giving the former some grief about something. The brother hit the deputy and took off running. The deputy was then in pursuit, tackling the brother then running himself. This became something of a game, where each would tackle the other or hit the other, then change positions as the pursuer.

Andy Taylor and Barney Fife showed up as the two brothers had caused a stir. Andy was upset that the deputy would do this, as it was an abuse of his position, so he and Barney started chasing after them to stop them. I decided to follow along.

At this point, it was near sunset and it was getting dark. The brothers ahead of us had ended up in a weird trap set by a third party, a local nutjob who didn't like trespassers. I didn't see the trap myself, but it would pull you into a bush covered area by a rope around your feet. The brothers may have known about the trap historically as they got loose. When Andy, Barney, and I got there, the trap caught Barney by the feet and dragged him into the covered area. Andy went in after him and I stood back.

The trap had bound Barney somehow and we needed to cut him loose. At this time, a young Native American woman was driving by on a large tractor. I stopped her and asked if she had a pocket knife I could borrow. She didn't, so I asked if she had something sharp. She offered me a piece of very stiff leather with a burnt edge. She called it something, but that dream detail is already lost this morning.

I threw it to Andy to cut him loose. I finally followed down the covered area and found Andy and Barney in a shed. Barney had been bound by duct tape and Andy was cutting him free. I told Andy that everything was going to be fine.

I explained that "in my world" they were both on television. Andy wanted more explanation. So I told him that in my world, we have television with 13 channels and that their adventures appear as a television program and that I had been watching them for years. Barney was loose and neither of them believed me about the television.

At this point in the dream, I knew that I wasn't part of their "world" and must have had a way of going back and forth between theirs and mine. I vaguely remember another guy coming in and grabbing something in the shed, but then I woke up.

This summer has been so busy with work and work travel that I really had not realized how quickly it was passing. August starts tomorrow, stores have back-to-school stuff out already, and everyone is already looking forward to Halloween. My time off has been almost non-existent, mainly due to having a co-worker out on maternity leave and training her temporary replacements.

I've been working on the next issue of my comic book in the evenings after work, so my days have been incredibly full. I should have it done in a couple of weeks. I've been going through my horror movie/TV show DVD's while coloring pages, ending this evening watching "Kolchak: The Night Stalker."

Once my co-worker returns and my comic book is posted, I imagine myself having some significant time off and what I will do with it is up in the air. I would love to go somewhere, but the idea of traveling makes me cringe right now.

So many mixed thoughts right now. No particular rhyme or reason, just having a stream of consciousness moment this evening.

I find myself less and less enamored with TV these days. There are a few standouts that I watch, but I have found myself drawn more and more to cable, Netflix, and Amazon Prime for nightly entertainment.

This past week, I was scrolling through the channels and came across WKRP, which plays a lot of 70's and 80's TV. It was a fun episode of "The Bionic Woman." I have the whole series on DVD, so I've been watching various episodes this week, enjoying the recall of vague childhood memories when they were first run. Some I honestly am not sure I ever watched, or was I too young to recall them when they were on before.

My DVD collection has had some recent additions of "RuPaul's Drag Race" Seasons 4 and 5. I play the episodes when I work out at home. I'm almost through Season 4 and I'd forgotten how really despicable Phi Phi O'Hara was to the other queens. On the current season (10), RuPaul asked contestant Asia O'Hara about her drag family and she mentioned several queens. According to Wikipedia, Phi Phi is Asia's drag daughter, but she didn't mention her on the show. Now, to me, that seems like shade. Maybe her past performances on the Race didn't sit well with her drag family.

Anyway, I'm watching "The Terror" on AMC right now, about two British ships trying to sail over the Arctic Circle to find a way to the Pacific, only to get stuck in the ice while a creature hunts them. It's very British, with mostly British actors, so I'm really digging the slow burn with spikes of horror and drama.

Whenever I work on an issue of my comic book, I tend to fall into "hermit mode," a sort of self-imposed exile from social things while I draw, ink, or color pages. It's not necessarily intentional, but I tend not to seek anything social to do in the same window of time. I felt into hermit mode a couple of weeks back when I started concentrating on the next issue. Taking last Friday off, I had a three-day weekend to color comic pages. I finished coloring the interior pages last night.

After work today, I went for a run. Only two miles done, as my foot felt a bit wonky, so I didn't push it at all. No racing, just two miles at a regular pace. My time was horrible, I'm sure. After a couple of walking laps, I went home and then raked leaves for the next 90 minutes, so every extremity is worn out, along with my shoulders.

I'll sleep really sound tonight.

After eating, I decided to take a break from the comic book, which is hard considering how close I am to getting it done. Tonight was catching up on "American Horror Story: Cult" and LJ.

Luckily, I get to sleep in a bit tomorrow as I'm working from home. I don't take advantage of teleworking as much as I should. It's one of the nicer perks.

I was off yesterday. I originally requested the day off because I was going to be driving up to Detroit for the softball tournament. Since I got injured, I couldn't go, but then the patio door installers called and rescheduled for that Friday. And then it rained all day and they had to reschedule again.

I'm not devastated, as this just happens. And it allowed me to sleep in a bit and gave me time to get ready in the morning, which takes more time due to the boot.

One of the perks of being relatively couch-bound is that I've managed to catch up on my DVR a bit. I love watching "The Strain," about modern-day non-handsome vampires taking over NYC. It's definitely a dark show.

I'll be spending a bit of time writing issue #23 of my comic book while taking it easy.

And now I'm seeing photos of my team at the softball field this morning in Detroit on Facebook. Darn. Sigh.

I usually don't watch any "reality" TV shows. I think they have wrecked TV for the most part for years. TV seems to be recovering a bit these days with more interesting sitcoms and dramas. However, despite my usual dislike for it, I have watched "RuPaul's Drag Race" since the beginning because I find it to be a fascinating window into a particular part of gay life and entertainment.

After eight regular seasons and one previous All-Stars season, the second season of "All-Stars" is currently running. For those who don't watch it, All-Stars brings back queens from previous seasons for a second chance for the crown and the money. This season is fun because it brings back a lot of fan favorites like Alaska Thunderf*ck, Detox, and Alyssa Edwards, as well as known "villains" Roxxxy Andrews and Phi Phi O'Hara. One particular spin is that instead of the bottom two queens lip syncing for "their lives" and the lesser being eliminated by RuPaul, the top two queens perform for "their legacy" and the winner eliminates one of the bottom queens of her choosing. I personally didn't like this twist, but it does create more drama and changes the dynamic in the work room.


In her regular season, Phi Phi O'Hara was pretty vicious to the eventual winner Sharon Needles. Phi Phi blames the editing, but there were things she said that you couldn't have viewed differently no matter how you edit the scenes. She herself admits that she was too aggressive in her season, that it hurt her ability to get gigs afterward, and that she had received death threats and attacks online. She supposedly re-invented herself as a cosplay queen, doing some pretty impressive looks online, and the perception of her seemed to change.

She came on All-Stars to get a TV redemption, proving that she had grown and she wasn't the vicious person TV made her out to be.

While she's not the yelling shrew she was in Season 4, she still seems a bit devious, giving advice to queens that makes them change their minds about how they pursue a challenge, usually to their detriment. Now that the show is being aired, Phi Phi has gone online stating that the show is editing her scenes again to make her the villain.

I was reading her twitter and she's gone off the deep end, ripping on RuPaul and the show overall, promising to skip the reunion show where they crown the queen (which makes me think she gets eliminated at some point). It looks like RuPaul herself has unfriended her. Phi Phi just dropped a new album. She's using the hype to push her new album under her male name. Somehow, I don't think pissing off RuPaul, the unquestionable queen of drag, is a smart idea career-wise, but it looks like Phi Phi is shooting for a real music career out of drag. However, she's definitely dropping hints about the show, so the producers may have a case to sue her for breaking her confidentiality agreement. It's real drama, versus the staged stuff that the show might have made.

Sadly, I was hoping Phi Phi had changed as I respect her for her new looks, but she's coming across as a loon. And I have to admit that I find Jaremi (Phi Phi out of drag) kind of cute, but looks aren't everything.

While I've been sick, I've not done much other than flop on the couch and watch TV. I've been in recovery mode. I think I'm about 90% better, so I'm going to attempt going to work tomorrow. My co-workers will just have to get used to my raspy, frog voice for a while.


Stanley Tucci, Sofie Gråbøl, and Richard Dormer of "Fortitude"

The first disc of "Fortitude" showed up from Netflix on Monday. I popped it in the DVD player and settled back. This British series involves a murder in a small fictional Arctic Norwegian settlement called "Fortitude." One murder leads to another death along with other discoveries and indiscretions among the townspeople. US audiences will recognize stars Stanley Tucci, Michael Gambon, Christopher Eccelston, and (possibly) Sofie Gråbøl, the last being the lead in the award-winning Danish series "The Killing."

When I got through the first three episode on the first disc, I was disappointed. Netflix is good, but I knew it was going to be two days before I could watch more. While I was looking at Amazon.com to see season one was available on DVD, I found the season was available through Amazon Prime for free. And there was much rejoicing (yayyyyyyyy!!!)

So Tuesday and today, I binge-watched the rest of the season. I thought it was remarkably well-written, with various storylines interwoven together. I also enjoyed how the series led me to question the morality of a character, believing his or her actions to have been shady, only to reveal later that other circumstances were involved that exonerated him or her in my mind. It's a good mix of police drama, murder and mystery, and even a touch of horror. There was also quite a few bearded bears (series lead Richard Dormer is a handsome blond bear of a guy) as well as a bit of delightful male nudity (though sadly none with Mr. Tucci).

I am learning to appreciate the short seasons that British TV usual goes. Twelve episodes are actually quite a large season for the UK. According to Wikipedia, there is a second season being made. I'm looking forward to it already.

Nothing major happened this week. It's been busy at work and I've been relatively tired when I get home from work. A few naps occurred. Here are some bits and pieces of news and other things I remember (so far):

• Glenn Frey of the Eagles passed away this week. During my teenage years, his hits "The Heat is On" and "You Belong to the City" were popular thanks to the movie "Beverly Hills Cop" and the show "Miami Vice." I remember thinking that he was very handsome and I enjoyed his videos for the music and the eye candy. It's rather sad when artists you sort of grew up with start passing away. It brings your own aging to the forefront.



• I have managed to get the next issue of "Grizzly and The Bear Patrol" plotted out. Hopefully, I'll have the pages plotted out and can start drawing soon. However, I've been in a bit of a drawing slump of late. After the 365 days of cartooning, I guess I subconsciously took a bit of break.



• Caribou Barbie (aka Sarah Palin) endorsed Donald Trump for President. What a spectacle... As one circulating online meme states, "Hot Mess Endorses Dumpster Fire!" I snort-laughed at the one, which almost never happens. Since McCain lost the presidential election with her as a running mate, I don't see her endorsement as a positive one for Trump. I dread the election season. It makes us look so ridiculous to other countries.



• I've been binge-watching "Criminal Minds" and "Keeping Up Appearances" on Netflix. How is that for two ends of the spectrum in terms of entertainment.



• The snow is a-coming apparently. The volume keeps changing, but it looks like my area will be getting around 6 inches. The rest of KY is looking at much more. Luckily, I've already been to the store for groceries. Friday is looming, so I'm good with the snow.

After the Thanksgiving holiday week, I spent a lot of time catching up on my DVR. One of the perks of this time of year is that a lot of series are hitting their mid-season finales, which frees up a lot of time from TV to watch other things.

I went through my Netflix and finally decided to watch Jessica Jones, after reading rave reviews by various folks on Facebook. I hadn't read the comic book, but I was familiar with the character and I could see it would make for a great series.

Admittedly, I was hooked after the first episode. Krysten Ritter plays the damaged superhero/private investigator really well. She comes across as tough, but cautious; caustic, but vulnerable. The supporting cast is just as good. David Tennant as Kilgrave (the Purple Man from the comics) is especially villianous.

The first season only has 13 episodes and I've been trying to meter out my watching of them. I have three episodes left and I'll probably go through those this weekend.

With this series being so good, I am now planning on watching the Netflix "Daredevil" series next, as I've heard good things about that one too.