The first draft of my 2nd Valeria novel is nearly complete. The final chapter is in progress, to be followed by the first rewrite. Certain aspects of the story need to pared down, and other ones brought to the forefront. There is always a plan when a story begins, but as most writers know, novels and their characters have a way of steering things in directions even the best planners can fail to predict. Valeria herself, the child of very ancient vampire parents, is 13 and has been raised as a vegetarian. While her character develops more than the others in the story, including her friends, everyone is growing up and changing on the go. Anyway, Val helps keep me young, and likely her parents, too.
As righteous anger continues to boil over in the world, staying home is a good way to avoid confusion. Deb and I have both adjusted very well to staying home during the last 5 months, and will likely continue to do so for some time. Our days are filled, and some days there is even time to get everything done that we wanted. That's not to say we don't share the outrage over social injustices that have been going on for centuries, and not surprisingly, continue to go on to this day. While it's good to see so many people demanding change and justice, during a pandemic it can really confuse people, who seem to bounce from one crisis to another like a pinball machine. Essentially, if we don't get a grip on climate change really really soon, all of the other issues won't matter much at all. Mr. Trump, if doing nothing else, is helping prepare the world for the chaos to come.
In gaming news, we received our new cards and play decks from The Netherlands. The Lidless Eye is a full set expansion of Middle Earth: The Wizards, which we have been playing since about 1995. Instead of playing with a company of heroes, one now manages a deck of evil rogues. The games can be combined, playing an original hero deck against a minions one. First we must learn to play the basic game, though.
One of the cards from The Lidless Eye, a new game for us.
We also bought our newest board game, based on the famous and very popular Bob Ross PBS TV art show, where you paint along with Bob as he creates one of his "masterpieces" in about 30 minutes. Called Art of the Chill, we played our first game yesterday. It's for 2-4 players, and takes less than an hour to play. It is easy to learn, and quite fun.
Art of chill, our newest board game.
In astronomy news, I have managed one mosquito-infested outing so far this month, with another planned for Friday evening. The sun has really began moving southerly once again, though July nights are still bright ones. I can begin observing deep sky objects around 10:30 pm. I am currently working mostly in the constellation Draco, a haven for galaxy lovers.
In movie news, we watched Atom Egoyan's acclaimed film The Sweet Hereafter, which I detested. Though winning high praise from critics and several big film awards, it never caught on with the public. Could it be that the film is actually really empty, and has covered the images and dialogue with so much pretension and garbled story telling that it literally makes little sense to viewers? There is zero entertainment value in watching the afterlife of a small town that lost many children to a school bus accident. The lawsuit is sabotaged by a young teen girl getting revenge on her father who raped her (I am not making this up). The lawyer has a daughter who is a drug addict. Not sure how that fits into this movie, but we see a lot of it. There is good acting, great photography, and the accident scene is realistic in a dream-like and surreal way. I would much rather have seen a first class documentary about this event (based on an actual bus crash) then this confusing mess of a feature film.
From 1997, now showing on Criterion.
My choice this week is an early work by Wim Wenders, as I continue to seek out all available films by him and Fassbinder. The American Friend is Wenders' take on Patricia Highsmith's Ripley's Game, a favourite novel of mine from many years earlier. Dennis Hopper plays Ripley, who comes to the rescue of a Hamburg art framer, who has been taken advantage of by a mobster. Shot in Hamburg and Paris, the movie is slow to build, but once it gets going it has some terrific moments. The entire train sequence is very tense, as the two killers have to improvise under very strained conditions. Parts of the movie are quite silly, including the first murder on a subway station escalator (why follow him all around?), and the way the framer is so easy and obviously manipulated over his medical condition. But of course he knows this, right? And parts of the movie are fun, especially once the murders begin, and never seem to stop, as one bad thing leads to other bad things. Not a great movie by any means, but it has its moments. Sam Fuller, Nicholas Ray, and several other directors have small roles. We now have a small host of extras to watch now about this movie.
Now showing on Criterion, from 1977.
I'll be back soon with some landscape art from the DIA.
Mapman Mike
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