Dot

Depressed states of mind pretty much kill most posts or any desire to get back to writing anything, but it's not helped by lack of time to sort things through while online either. Same as ever.

There were a zillion things to go into last week still, after all, so where did they supposedly go? Silence won't help slough through whatever it was.

Depressed again.

The inappropriate post, with tangents

And then I edit, because don't know if want this here or not.

What's a woman (and so on and so forth)?

There are a lot of assessing periods going on for me at the moment I'd say. The trouble with that is that it's a lifelong process on many of the things assessed, not least of which who you are or what you really want, something I've rarely known on the latter front at least.

I know I like Queen, if that says anything about whatever kind of a woman whoever might be. There was something here about dancing, but it probably doesn't need to be. Then again, most of the post probably doesn't.

I'm not an excessive drama queen or particularly extroverted, but I will not be walked over either, and if something actually matters, will not budge, no matter what the appearances of acquiescence given. Saying you're not unreasonable won't say a thing, when everything is about appearances and points of views in such things.

I will be unreasonable if you see it necessary to claim the LGBT front issues or people are wrong in their lives. While none of your business and me at least thus far in no way a chaser either, I personally rather love a man in a skirt and make-up for one, too. I quite love a good military uniform as well, so much difference that makes. *shrug* I haven't really run into either type thus far either. More's the pity me, and more shrugs on top.

I need very little when it comes to day to day life compared to some people it seems, but can say I'm a demanding woman on some other levels. Which ones would be telling. Or as if I knew. I know how to get off sexually in more ways than one, so may or may not demand on such fronts, too. I wouldn't know. Is it relevant? Does it matter? What the hell do you care?

I would rather not get involved if don't see a point for a relationship with some nobody, just in case you'd get cosy over the years, or just because you're supposed to be in a relationship, because you are. I've walked mostly alone so far as well, I rather expect you to add something to the equation if you want to be a part of it, you know?

I occasionally use the word ravenous about some sides, but that's not all of it either. Others have listed words like rational, insight, analytical, perceptive, thorough, determined, integrity, manipulative and sincere when asked what I might be like, and that's what people considered positive adjectives to match. Manipulatively sincere integrity, what a grand combination? Of course you end up with whatever the crowd asked reflects themselves, so whatever worth that is is up to whoever judging. The list did say perceptive. It didn't include dreamer, but that's what you get with others trying to pin you down then.

Running into questions like "What do you value most in life?" and "What is your most admirable quality?" hardly helps, when at least the first one takes more processing power than what you're currently willing to put into it.

The Harry Crawford Show (D)

I continue to have slight problems when watching what Boon there is on that rather well-known video clip site out there. I'm having problems because Harry Crawford half robs me of being capable of saying anything intelligible about any of the episodes. Actual reviews or noting what works and what doesn't in each episode seen would be more informative and work better from an outside point of view, but I end up half gushing over Harry instead.

"You know what I think, Ken? I think breaking and entering’s fun. It’s much more fun than security."
"That’s very interesting, Harry."
"Well, it’s true, innit?"
"Yeah, you always were the villain at heart."
"Now you say it. Anyway, it’s wonderful. I’m getting rid of years of repression."

Oh, Harry. How much can you love a character, anyway? Thieves Like Us for that quote exchange and what was watched the latest. The picture is from another episode. Thieves Like Us is still not one of Harry's finer episodes though, although his basic sense of honesty does show even there, despite quotes like the above.

Harry's a fine man. I'd be lucky to find someone even half as decent as him. I suspect there are plenty of episodes that I've yet to see where Ken plays as good a friend to him, too, but given Harry's supporting role to Ken Boon in the series, he gets more opportunities to exhibit what a good friend he really is. How anyone couldn't find that appealing is more of an existential question than I want to tackle right now.

I normally actually prefer villainous characters if talking characters. That I would have become so fond of a thoroughly decent type like Harry here instead is more of a coup for everyone involved than may be apparent.

Harry gets things done and always seems to have a plan even after losing his previous business. He's the one who originally kicks Boon enough to get him off his ass, so to speak. Can I have one, too? Oh, I'll arrange things fine if I have to or want to, but of the two friends, I'm probably more on the dreamy Ken side. It probably figures that at this stage I'd then remember what I read of Harry's plans getting in the way of Ken's business in earlier seasons, but I also have a problem in appreciating some pragmatism like that in people. If he had pulled a move like that against a mate (of the romantic sorts), it'd be inexcusable. Toward a friend, I can live with the move in a character.

However, it's Harry's "No, honestly, mate, I’m sorry if I was unsympathetic," line in the Honourable Service episode that probably most wins me over. I don't know if it's me or the kind of people I know, but I don't think I've run into that kind of words from anyone throughout my life. Not only is Harry someone who can see if he's done something a bit dodgy or unsympathetic or anything that may not be in the best interests of his relationship with someone, he's also not afraid to apologize outright for it all. Seriously, can I have a Harry Crawford in my life, please? I'd even try to remember to reciprocate like that for everything dodgy I ever do in turn, and I'm sure there'd be more with me than with Harry in the series.

As may be apparent, there is that problem, as said. I end up watching The Harry Show, not Boon.

Calling your suspense

Why is it that in every movie that has ancient treasure grounds of some sort in it, there is never an out without somebody needing to die? I saw National Treasure: Book of Secrets a while ago, that is. I have to spoil it a little in saying that someone is required to stay behind to hold a mechanism up or a certain way for everybody else to get out, or they all drown instead of just one. While I get that traps may be necessary to keep people out, I'm not entirely sure what purpose a mechanism like that serves anymore once someone is in, hence my question.

Did the people who built the place also leave behind someone as a supposedly necessary sacrifice when they were getting out in the first place? Or did the engineers back then have a fancier mechanism to sort it all out, bypassing that stage entirely? Because other than to deliberately kill off that one character, the point of the thing doesn't seem to exist.

It's not quite Galaxy Quest mocking the computer game style obstacle courses which characters have to run through to get to their objective in far too many movies, but it sweeps close to that. I believe The Phantom Menace was mocked for doing precisely that soon after Galaxy Quest came out, for one.

So I'm sure there are infinite reasons for the people of old to have the balancing board in place as in Book of Secrets, but until somebody gives me an actually sensible or reasonable one other than "It's to kill everyone" (which leads to "Then why have it there as a sporting chance in the first place? Just kill the buggers if you're going to"), I can only look at it as Ye People Of Olde having had strange pastimes. This one on the sports side, their having used it as a make or break level balance- and Being a Bit of a Bastard- test.

In other old ways to build suspense in movies, there is having the landline cut or not finding a phone booth on time when you're in peril. Usually a young woman in peril, more precisely. The new version goes not having network coverage on your mobile phone or having the battery run out while in peril. Once we move to levels where everyone has chips or circuits installed somewhere in their body, the kinetic energy used to power keeping in touch with the world, we run out of even that excuse for creating suspense in movies.

I recently discovered that even cameras can have a GPS tracking system these days. I'm not entirely sure I want them even in my phones, everybody being far too locatable even as it is. Or not locatable enough when a real emergency arises and such get thrown away, or they lose power at critical times if talking someone merely lost. As if kidnappers wouldn't find ways to short-circuit or blatantly cut out GPS-style communication chips even if they were under someone's skin, too. Chips I'm rather clearly against, by the way, if I dislike the Big Brother or nanny state societies even as they currently are. But when I first see a movie use that solution once we've reached the chip states, I'll probably call people out on using that one, too.

Everything is always of its time, but same as my being tired of people instantly jumping at painting in rollercoaster rides and the sort for the new fad of 3D movies, I'm tired of nothing changing on these movie fronts otherwise, too.

I don't normally nitpick, I don't see loopholes particularly clearly when watching movies, I just enjoy them. But could I enjoy something that doesn't automatically just repeat the same old patterns, please?

From lost text to Hamlet (How dare she?)

I hate mistypings on pages that do strange things and delete your two paragraphs of text through mere three new letters typed in.

I had something about the site still not being able to flourish, the way their file manager still isn't working, and you can't do FTP from public computers. Now I don't. I also don't have whatever it was I had written down about having finally seen Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet (minus the first half an hour or so).

I know I was about to write something of 101 reasons to see that being right about the Placido Domingo and his "In Pace" at the end though. That and having appreciated Derek Jacobi and Charlton Heston the most in the actor-fest that it was, having things to say of some details maybe, lose them as you did as more of it passed in front of you.

I usually appreciate Derek Jacobi, sure, but somehow he seemed the most appealing of all the actors in that Hamlet there. Maybe it's that I'd rather play Claudius or Gertrude than Hamlet or Ophelia. Maybe it's that I have problems with some Shakesperean deliveries, no matter how appreciated in general.

While good and audible and all that, I had the occasional flashback to Patrick Stewart's speeches in Star Trek- The Next Generation, all Shakespeare from one angle or another. I don't remember what I thought of Stewart in A Christmas Carol or whatever I saw in London, but there are times when the delivery or "RADA-accented savages" from Blake's 7 or other things begin to grate me for how well everybody projects everything and whatever the technique and skill set. It seems even more bad form to get tired of what is necessary on stage and brings clarity, especially when you generally like Shakespeare and the same actors in other circumstances. Sometimes it just gets too much and you end up rolling your eyes over the same thing yet again. Which is where appreciating Jacobi and some others of the lot comes in, no doubt. Wield it well and it works better than the others, skillful as all may be.

I assume it's me though. "I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire! Why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours." Ho, ho, ho.

Once I get back home, maybe I'll have something more intelligent to say, too, although again you're in territories where you'd need to have decades of scholarly attention directed at the thing you're daring to say something about. I do however disagree with an IMDB reviewer on the "Act 4 scene 4 soliloquy (Which again is usually cut out) is nothing short of a cinematic marvel as the camera slowly pulls back as the intensity grows". I thought it the worst if meant to be serious. It was too much for my taste, with the music and the ridiculousness of it all. I couldn't tell if it was intentional, there being potential for that as well, but if not, count me among those to see through such things then.

Things rusty and otherwise

I'm aware that the blog currently looks a little creepy if coming in out of the blue. I imagine it'll even out in a couple of months once I get more things going on the side.

Before that I need to figure out where I can properly stash the website side that have in mind. My HTML skills are indeed severely rusty. I can tell now for sure after getting the main things mostly sewn together, but I dislike the templates that most sites seem to offer these days and apparently prefer to suck on my own levels instead.

Other than that and unrelated, I'm in states of mind where I again half dislike having to as if hold back or control whatever is said or shown in places like these. I'm enough of a hermit to not want excessive attention and aware of how public some things can end up being, but I also find myself displeased with civilized limits to what you should be or seem, when with one flex you'd surpass beyond such in no time. There is a feeling of "I'm bigger than this" and a dislike of not flexing closer to ranges where you'd move unrestrained.

In further unrelated nonsense, I wonder if astrology blogs or sites had anything to say on Venus, Mars and the asteroid Eros apparently having transited the same degrees around 13-14 Scorpio just before this. I have no idea if that should happen often in whatever sign, but admit that my natal Eros at 13 degrees Scorpio may have something to say in my passing interest. These things happen?

Life is complicated

Yesterday's "A Clean Slate" episode reminded me of some other things in mind the past few weeks. The character of Mr. Frisby says something about things not going the way we think they will in life. I figure my grandmother had no intention of having a kid before marriage, to someone she a few weeks ago said just kept hanging around and not giving up on her until she agreed to marry him. I figure a lot of things in life don't work along the official storylines of How Things Are Supposed To Go.

Eva Dahlgren's beautiful "Vem Tänder Stjärnorna" love song says something about saying words you never thought you would likewise, of love changing things so much. At least two sides of the same thing. Doing what you don't expect to because you love someone that much, and ending up in situations that don't work for you, without love.

Also that someone would not have been entirely too keen to marry someone even after getting pregnant. It's not what people expect or think about the past. This especially in light of my grandmother also noting that when someone else had a kid by her husband, your grandfather, that woman moved to another country for feeling she could not show her face around town anymore. Or that loving the same man would have landed a third woman in a mental institute for a short while, things being unstable to no end.

Life. I've been listening to a lot of Julie London and Ella Fitzgerald as of late, love being a big theme in both their songs, of course. "I'm Always True to You Darling in My Fashion" from London happens to be currently on, adding to the above. My grandfather wasn't true per se, but through other reminders and my grandmother's attitude to it, I can't really say anything particularly against his cheating on her either. His not divorcing her, and abusing her otherwise, yes, but not running around town if she didn't care.

Things don't always go the way they're supposed to? When I looked into Leonard Rossiter a couple of years ago I read something about his having had a long term mistress, in secret from what I recall. Others left their wife to marry a younger mistress, yet more others had mistresses that their wives knew about all along. Not exactly polyamory, that not always going as you'd expect either. Life is complicated, circumstances are mixed. Is it better to know and suffer through knowledge, or not know and eventually suffer when finding out? God, life is complicated.

Why are people so willing to ignore it ending in tears or all the hurt it'll cause when it comes to the prospect of love? You know it'll be pain, sooner or later, and yet you want to go for it like nothing else. You keep ignoring the pain later in favour of whatever you can get now. Or keep believing the pain won't last forever and love, anyway. The one thing you do that in exchange for and want.

Not enough love, too much love, nothing ever going as you expect. All so complicated. What are you supposed to say to that?

Holby City: A Clean Slate (D)

I loved Holby City's "A Clean Slate" episode. Or the David Daker-related Mr. Frisby parts that I watched in any case. Thank you. I'd been wondering if simply (?) playing patients and older guest roles in more recent years wouldn't necessarily have much there, but I loved Mr. Frisby.



The above starts it off in a way, about 7:45 minutes into it from what I recall. The theatre scene is probably my favourite though. Two minutes and then some into the second one below.



Like I've said, I love watching what actors do if focus on it from such angles. That rather cheered me up after a weekend of slightly flattened feelings and more, so I'm thankful that the episode was out there and I got to see it.

Who? (D)

I have to say I'm looking forward to getting to catch more of David Daker wherever it is. I saw some of Tom Baker's Doctor Who episodes when I was twelve and always retained a fondness for the series despite my very limited contact with it for some five, six serials, at a guess. So whatever I read of Daker in Who appearances works for me on more levels than one and makes me want to catch it all.



There are so many reviews I need to round up and organize together if ever find the time, but some of the more fun ones say things akin the following.

"THE TIME WARRIOR gives us Irongron, one of the series' best villains: a powerful and ruthless feudal lord whose rich and witty dialog is the equal of any fictional bad guy."

How could I resist? I'm told it's Sarah Jane Smith's first episode, the one that introduces the name Gallifrey to the series, and it has Jeremy "Yes, I actually do know his face since I used to watch Robin of Sherwood" Bulloch as a less lethal sort than his Boba Fett ever was. What's not to like?

His second appearance as Captain Rigg in Baker-era Nightmare of Eden along with the Creatures of Beauty audio work later on cement some sort of a spot in Doctor Who history for Daker, so I'm not entirely sure why his presence online even on that front remains so low profile. I know fans, I know how cult TV or movie circles latch onto the most random things at times, so why not this?

Daker's Gilbrook in Creatures of Beauty (watch for spoilers with that review) gets praise as the performance of a lifetime, so again, I'm left both wanting access to that and wondering what I'm supposedly seeing that others do find good, but not enough for more than passing mentions. Most reviews glanced through in recent times mention his doing solid work at the least, or things like Boon's creators being pleased that he got cast, and the career's been long enough, for goodness's sakes. I'm just surprised that there has been so relatively little attention overall even so.

To offer some perspective, I say I in passing follow about 400 actors and what they do if happen to catch them somewhere, since I seem to pick them up like others flint. It's far less time-consuming and more selective than the number may suggest, there being few that you focus on at a time and even fewer for whom you'd accept a fan tag.

I'm not sure I'd qualify for a fan of Daker's either for now, in my opinion. I'm rubbish at being an actual fan. I'm far too irreverent and my sense of humour competes with the roses around Sleeping Beauty's castle. Thorny affairs, me and fannishness. But the interest remains and while much like Monty Python's famous Pope, not knowing much about art, we both know what we like. So maybe, since I do like what I see.

After all, how could I (Potentially. We'll see. I hope) not? "Irongron (David Daker, mesmerizing, right up to the top but thankfully never over it)", "...never far from a flagon of wine, delivers about eleven of the niftiest put-downs you'll hear on TV," both from page two of the above reviews. Even with the conclusion that neither episode is Who's best, I always watch for performances. Have a bit of fun.

Then again, you're in shoddy waters whatever you say of Who as a layperson unless an expert of several series of it. By which time you're presumably no longer a layperson, but I digress. As usual.

Mind you, having had a chance to opt for some more lateral jumps, Z for Zachariah needs to be checked out more what I can sometime soon, although I was slightly ambivalent on the book when I read it age nine or ten. Checking things out goes for that other thing talked about as well though, I see. Life is good?

I love a good lateral jumps hunt

I'm doing slow background work for putting together that aforementioned site that I said I wouldn't have time to organize, against my better knowledge. I was reminded of how much material I managed to dig up about something else several years ago simply through lateral jumps and basic use of logic and the tenacity to scour through the web for related info and wanted to try the same here. Half because of how much I apparently enjoy the process of hunting things down.

The main hits you get on search engines may have up to four vaguely relevant hits, but even that depends on what you're looking into. After that it's all the useless spamming junk and sites that have the building blocks and the big name tags and flashy lights to lure you in, but no content. I have an hour or so at most per weekdays to devote to any sort of searches and shifting through sites. I've been glancing through things for a week or two and despite there not being much, if it was all linked to or housed under one roof, it would be a dozen times more than what the flashy sites have. Until they grab any content anyone else has gathered as their own, but alas, that's their problem then.

Because I was good back in the day, I had content on my topic. Style I wouldn't say about, but content there was. I was a little thrown at the reminder from years back, but good for me then.

My personality type in the Meyers-Briggs typing system is INTP. Long story short, much of the type's fun falls under analysis and organizing systems. You may see where this is going. Give me the whole Net to search through as a challenge, add on top the "lateral jumps will be necessary to find anything" factor, provide me with enough time and if it's listed, I'll love the challenge and rewards of having thought up another angle to get something that other people would give up on.

Regrettably, I doubt there will be Internet records about theatre performances from the 1960s unlike some things in the late 1990s that I found in my previous unrelated hunts, but I'll still be having fun in seeing what I uncover through simply using the brain a bit more than most. Oh, for some actual newspaper archive access, come to think of it. You get a lead and start reeling the thread in, see what else you get, nothing wrong with that as a pastime.

Unrelated searches and privacy issues elsewhere have in any case reminded me about how much completely unnecessary information there also exists online, or what can be found out about people when they don't watch it. Me included no doubt, since some of the things I was reminded about last week were new to me in actual practise. I'd heard about them, but not stumbled upon them in practise. Suffice it to say, I don't approve of everything being locatable online. A matter of public records or not, people in Europe do not generally need access to records about US citizens, for example. I'm not going to buy your researching genealogy excuse there.