Sick Day 4 - I'm Not Dead Yet

I wish it were my robot double dealing with all this BS cold

Well, yesterday was the part of being sick where you just sit and sweat and try to understand what other people are saying to you and answer in monosyllabic grunts or head movements.  Which meant I had a crazy, sweaty night in which I dreamed I was an astronaut in the 1960's.  Or I think it was the 1960's, because we came down in a capsule.  Anyway, I had a swank, swank pad at the top of a hotel, which seems right.

Fever dreams are the absolute best dreams.

All I have to say today is:  Thank Jebus for antibiotics.

I did manage to go to the doctor yesterday since I'd been running a fever for a couple of days straight.  I am now enantiboticked, and today I feel much, much better, which is an upgrade from "you know, being dead sounds not half bad right now".

Through all this, Jamie has been an absolute hero.  She's not complained once about my hacking, sneezing or various methods for discharging the seeming endless globs that my body is making.  She's fed me.  Brought me glass after glass of water and ginger ale.  She's checked on me at night.  Nor has she complained when I watched Superman III.  She's been a trooper, and I appreciate it.

Signal Watch Watches: Superman III

I learned long ago that watching anything new while you're sick is a pretty big mistake, and so rather than watch stuff I'll have to re-watch when I'm feeling better, I went for the comfort food of the Superman Blu-Ray set.  It had been a couple of years since I made my way through Superman III or IV, and so I busted out the Richard Pryor starring 1983 feature, one of the first movies I can recall my folks dropping me off for with Jason at the local cinema for us to watch on our lonesome.

This movie was released at an interesting time in comics and in cinema, and its hard to not see the movie as a product of its time.  The overriding sentiment of the film is irrational technophobia, some of which is still kind of funny, I guess.  By this point my family had already had a VIC-20 (a predecessor of the Commodore 64) and would be purchasing an Apple IIe within two years.  This was also the same year that saw the release of WarGames to theaters, so it would be interesting to see the cover of Time and Newsweek from 1983 to see what my folks, then in their late 30's, would have been making of all this digital malarky.  The movie is basically about being very afraid of what the computers will decide to do once we depend on them, which made way more sense before the worst thing any of us thought a computer could do was lose all the files we hadn't backed up.

I'm probably dying (Sick Day 2)

Oh, woe is me.  I have a cold.  No allergies.  Not a hoax or imaginary tale.  I'm just wrestling with a low-grade fever and too much phlegm.

Anyway, I'm going to take it easy.  You guys rest up, too, and hopefully with a bit of soup and some rest, I'll be back up and running soon.  Right now I just hope I didn't give Jamie this bug.

I am sort of sick from allergies (or so I hope)

Well, our little nature walk yesterday has meant I am now suffering from particularly nasty allergies.  I'm not even sure what I'm allergic to, but the great thing is that Austin has so many allergy-producing things in the air at any given time, you don't really need to know.

I may be having cedar issues.  Or oak.  I know I'm crazy allergic to oak (which is why I have two in my yard.  Because I am a GENIUS).

all of these symptoms for me

Anyway, I feel lowly.   I left work around 12:30 today, took some Benadryl and slept for about 4 hours. And I still feel like 5 miles of bad road.  So I'm just going to lay here for a bit if that's cool with you.

I am really afraid this isn't allergies.  I rarely fall ill, and I'm not good at just being sick.  Anyway, I'm going to just hold still and make a call in the morning.

Update:  Tuesday at 10:50 AM - Nope.  I'm just straight up sick.  Wish Jamie luck, people.

Signal Watch Watches: Giant (1956)

The first time I tried to watch Giant (1956) was in 1998.  It came on one of our local affiliates as the Sunday afternoon movie, and I sat down on what passed for a sofa in the living room of what passed for an apartment and started watching.  For some reason the audio was messed up, and was broadcasting too quietly.  I tried calling the station about a half-dozen times over the course of an hour, but nobody was answering the line at KTBC that day, and so I eventually gave up.

Later I'd rent the movie on Netflix and fail to watch it.  I once went to the Paramount Theater in Austin to see the movie, and had gotten my dates wrong and saw Black Sunday instead.  I didn't know I was in the wrong movie until the first frames rolled, and, boy howdy, was I confused.

Last year Jason's lady-friend, AmyD, loaned me the DVD, and somehow we just never watched it.  But it came on cable a few weeks back, and I finally DVR'd the movie.

Lazy post for the end of the weekend

Wow.  That was one full weekend.

I won't rehash, but its left me feeling a wee on the worn-out side.

Some items:

• Nashville people - I hope all is well.  Holy smokes.  Why do you keep living in the path of horrible weather?  That's Galveston's job.
• I'm slowly making my way through Archer in order on Netflix.
• I am watching Giant in chunks.  I DVR'd it off TCM in February and I'm finally watching it.  My history of trying to watch Giant and failing is as lengthy as Giant itself.  I'll most definitely be writing the movie up when I'm done.  But, boy howdy, Elizabeth Taylor.  Amirite?
• We have entered into the period in Austin where it is just ridiculously gorgeous out.  I usually miss it thanks to work and various obligations.  But, trust me.  75 degrees.  Blue skies.  The grackles aren't even hanging out with their beaks open because its too damn hot yet.  That'll be May.  
• Austin's 6th Street is now just kind of embarrassing.  As are most of the dudes I see down there.  And the return of the microskirt in the age of KFC Food Bowl.
• My gym was sort of 24 hours, but only M-F.  It just went 24-7.  This changes everything for Sundays.  Sweaty, hang-over workouts, you will be happening later.
• Last night, I was hilarious.  But, anyway, its good to catch up with friend you haven't seen in a while.  Even if it leads to sweaty, hang-over workouts.  Actually, not so much hung-over as really ashamed about what I did to that enormous piece of carrot cake intended for two around 12:00AM.
• How awesome would it be to just go ahead and name your kid "Maud'dib Usul Kwisatz Haderach Jones" or whatever your last name is?  Man, see, this is why its best we'll never have children.

It is really nice out today

So its, like, 75 degrees out, sunny and 0% humidity. We were going to try to do the Austin Kite Festival, but, man, the traffic was insane. So, we headed down to the green belt under MoPac.

Jamie hobo's it up under the bridge

me and my pals

Happy Birthday, KareBear!

The King and I wish you a very, very happy Birthday.

Signal Watch attends: Staple! - The independent media expo

So, every year since moving back to Austin I have wanted to attend the Staple! Independent Media Expo.  That's the name, but its really mostly about self-published comics on a regional level.  That doesn't mean that Austin's KO-OP radio didn't have a table, and a few others things like The New Movement Theater.

But, mostly, self-published (and self-stapled - thus the name) comics.

I have mixed feelings on the whole thing, but a few caveats:

1)  I attended by myself

2)  I have mild social anxiety issues, so I really didn't talk to anybody there

3)  As at all conventions (including the ones I've attended for work), I am not a huge fan of the table approach.  I don't know how to improve it, but there's really no polite way to approach a table and explore what is on said table without clearly raising the hopes of the seller or without feeling like you need to buy something.  There's some weird desperation going on there.  And if its not, then there's just a very bored person sitting behind the table contemptuously eyeing you for spending time at their table and not buying anything.

You cannot win.

But I figured if I was going to be serious about sticking around comics even if I'm pulling out of the monthly  superhero thing, I should probably check out what's going on with indie books.

Signal Watch Re-Watches: DUNE (1984)

A few years back I finally read Frank Herbert's Dune, and then watched the David Lynch film adaptation that's a bit of a cult movie, but which showed up DOA in 1984.

The Alamo Ritz had a late night screening of the movie, starting at 11:30 PM on Friday in glorious 35mm which Jason recruited me for (the man likes his Dune).

Whether you're a fan of the book or not, when seen on the big screen, you have to admire the sheer audacity of the movie, of trying to bring the insanely detailed world of Herbert's Arrakis to a 2.5 hour movie.

It's a bit telling they try to start explaining themselves starting on the poster