Movies

It’s a Matter of Focus

~ Shara ~ 8 Comments

So lately, I’ve been having trouble focusing. Not in all areas, mind you: I’m doing well keeping up with the elliptical and my daily walks. My daily installment of Hellblazer is coming along without much fuss. The husband and I have dropped both DirecTV and our land line, and we’ve been using Netflix like it’s going out of style — I’m just now getting to watch Arrested Development for the first time, and we’re working through House of Cards too. Great stuff. Also, movies: World War Z was this past weekend, and Man of Steel the weekend before.

So it’s not like I don’t have plenty to do outside of my day job. But I haven’t been able to focus on reading. I read a page or two, get distracted and do something else. Even if I’m wanting to read the book, my brain is still churning a million miles an hour, thinking of other things.

Namely writing. But instead of THINKING about writing, my brain is pre-writing: in the past week-and-a-half my brain has been swimming in the world-building of Telepathic Soulmates***, working out details for future fixes of that draft while also trying to find the real story in the sequel, Prison Planet, for which I now have a promising arc for, thanks to my good friend Michele. And lastly, I’m writing (yes, writing) a page-a-day, but it’s what I’m calling Not a Prequel Novel. Because I’m not going into it with any sort of real STORY in mind. Rather, I want to take two characters who are supporting characters in Telepathic Soulmates and tell their story. Their story takes place chronologically before Telepathic Soulmates, so it gives me the opportunity I need and want to really explore the world-building in ways I won’t get to do in revision. So it’s fun. I think.

It is funny: when I’m REALLY into whatever I’m writing, I don’t have much brainpower for reading. Which goes a long way in explaining how, when I was book-blogging and reading all the time, I didn’t have any brainpower for writing. The book blog has been closed for month now, and I’m just now able to pore my energies into creating my own fiction instead of absorbing the fiction of others.

Don’t get me wrong: writers have to do both. I’m just trying to find the balance.

*** = as always, these titles are actually aliases for the novels I’m working on, not their REAL titles. Except for Not a Prequel Novel, because it doesn’t have a title and what I would call it would make no sense to anyone who hasn’t read Telepathic Soulmates

Weekend in Review

~ Shara ~ 20 Comments

1) On Saturday, my hubby and I visited his grandmother in the nursing home. The nursing home cat fell in love with me and tried to follow me home. An elderly lady resident fell in love with my hubby and wanted to keep him. Fun times.

2) On Friday night, I finally looked at my big toe on my right foot to see why I’d occasionally have a pinching pain on the side of it. Turns out, there was a blister UNDERNEATH a pre-exisiting callous. How does that even happen (I know now, but then, I didn’t)? So for my Saturday walk, I was so focused on the blister itself that I ended up walking funny and therefore rubbed the back of my right ankle raw. Also gave myself a SECOND blister beneath the callous. Go me! Took Sunday off from walking (sadly). I don’t think the blisters will be a problem (one’s already gone) but I want to let the back of my ankle heal.

3) Got a LOT of laundry done over the weekend, which always fills me with a sense of accomplishment.

4) Got a LOT of reading done over the weekend, including John Scalzi’s The Human Division (John Scalzi book = fun reading times) and more important, Jeff Smith’s epic graphic novel fantasy BONE, which I’d highly recommend. It’s unique, it’s fun, it’s original and different. The omnibus I read was nearly 1500 pages long (I started it last August and ended up taking a break because it’s such a LARGE volume), so for anyone who decides to read it, I suggest getting the trade paperbacks of the various volumes instead. 🙂

5) Watched a few movies: Cars 2, finally, and while I still think it was an unnecessary sequel, it was fun. Also watched (finally), Trouble with the Curve, which I enjoyed quite a bit. Not sure what the critics are gnashing their teeth over, unless they don’t like that the movie’s more about the father/daughter relationship and the daughter’s potential new romance (all set against a backdrop of baseball), but I liked it a lot.

6) We were supposed to have met with friends on Sunday evening for dinner, but plans changed, which was good: I had a weird headache all Sunday afternoon, and while I managed to chase it away before bedtime, it came back at 1:30 this morning and I ended up staying awake for over two hours. No elliptical this morning!

7) But while awake, I’ve decided that my cat’s snoring/wheezing is both cute and worrisome.

8) I also discovered he (my cat) considers my head his own personal teddy bear.

9) Ann Aguirre (author of Grimspace, a favorite of mine) posted a fantastic but utterly disheartening post about the existence of sexism in science fiction (I don’t not use that term as science fiction AND fantasy, just science fiction) and how it’s affected her. It’s a great post, and I encourage everyone to read it here. The bottom line: if you’re a guy, don’t be a douchebag. If you’re a girl, don’t be afraid to stand up for your rights (easier said that done, as evidenced by the backlash poor Aguirre is getting).

10) This past weekend was my 10-year college reunion. I did not go. I’m sorry that I couldn’t, and felt rather wistful looking at all the pictures on Facebook. A friend of mine posted some fantastic thoughts about reunion and out alma mater here (great food for thought, especially given that we went to all woman’s school), and I feel like I need to comment on my own experiences as an undergrad. Not today, of course. But soon.

But now the week is starting, so happy Monday! How was your weekend?

The Quiet Game…

~ Shara ~ 3 Comments

It’s been quiet around here, and I apologize. The past few weeks have had me running around like a chicken with my head cut off, and this weekend won’t be any different. But I’ve got a moment of downtime before I carry on to the next adventure, so I thought I’d say hi.

So, hi!

One thing I would like to share: the hubby and I visited Chattanooga a few weeks ago to visit friends and go see Iron Man 3. In Chattanooga, they have a theater: the Carmike Majestic 12. In the Carmike Majestic 12, they have a special theater called the Ovation Room. This room is 21 and over, and the ticket price is more expensive than the regular price, regardless of 3D. What makes it special? By being for people over the age of 21, it means no screaming babies. It also means you get to order alcohol off their special menu. Also, THEY HAVE A SPECIAL MENU with items you can’t get at the concession stand. You have a waitress. You have an assigned seat (so none of this, “Hey, can you scoot down so we can all sit together even though we got here at the last minute and can’t find seats?” bullshit). You have leather reclining chairs. You have a never-ending bowl of popcorn.

I could get used to this kind of luxury. 🙂

Do any of the theaters near you offer cool and unusual experiences to their customers?

Movie Ramblings, with a Side of Headaches

~ Shara ~ 4 Comments

Currently, my husband and my cat are getting more sleep than I am. Admittedly, this is my fault, because it’s hard to say no to a good margarita, and then you really, really wish you’d said no after you wake up in the wee hours of the morning to worship the great porcelain goddess.

That, and stealth headaches. These are headaches I’ve dubbed stealth because I wake up, and there’s pain, so I get up to take something, realize the headache isn’t bad at all, really, but when I lay down again? PAIN! Stealth headaches: you don’t know they’re there unless you’re horizontal, which puts you in the unfortunate position of trying to figure out how to sleep vertically, because those headaches always how up in the middle of the night.

ANYWAY. It’s been a productive weekend so far: Friday, the hubby and I watched Argo, which I really liked, but I find myself disappointed now that I’ve learned that Ben Affleck’s character, Tony Mendez, was actually latino. It’s especially painful since, in the credits, the film makes a big deal to compare the real life counterparts to the actors, and honestly, the resemblance was uncanny for most of them. Except they didn’t do it for Mendez/Affleck. The Book Smugglers, in their post devoted to the Oscars, have the comparison picture here.

The more I think about it, the more it frustrates me. I didn’t have a problem with Affleck in this role or his acting before I learned this. I left the movie feeling great, warm, fuzzy feelings for the man he was portraying, and now that I know the man he was portraying was latino, I’m pissed, because so many people who watch the movie are going to think a white guy saved the day. And even though I’m a white woman, it pisses me off: race relations can be so tense in the US that we need to see heroes of all shapes and sizes and colors. Having a latino hero in a movie that’s based on a real latino hero who did a great service to the US? Who was one of the most important operatives in CIA history? That would’ve been beyond awesome.

Anyway. Argo was still really good, a really tense movie, but that just bugs me to no end.

We also watched Seeking a Friend for the End of the World. I’m pro-Steve Carrell, but not a huge fan of Keira Knightly lately. She’s a good actress, and I’ve liked her work in the past, it’s just that I can’t look at her now without wishing she looked healthier. She’s so thin it’s frightening, so I tend to avoid her films. Shallow of me, I know, and it’s not like I have a vendetta against skinny people (when I was growing up, my mother had a whacked-out metabolism that kept her super-skinny, the kind of super-skinny that made you realize being super-skinny wasn’t awesome. To get jeans, she had to get them from the boy’s department — not men’s, boy’s — and then hem them in using a sewing machine). Anyway, I still really wanted to see this movie, so that was Saturday’s entertainment. And it was good. It was really, really good. I was surprised by the end, and I loved seeing an alternate take on the apocalypse. We always assume sheer anarchy and mutiny, but seeing other ways of coping was a fascinating study of human character.

And while I’m babbling about movies, I did watch Battleship last weekend. It was no where near as bad as I thought, and I thought I’d have to be drunk to enjoy it. I wasn’t drunk, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. Going in with low expectations really helped, but it’s quite entertaining for a big, dumb action movie with dubious source material. Also, I admire Battleship utilized a super-diverse cast without it seeming contrived. At any rate, it was fun to watch. It was also free to watch (via HBO, so it’s not FREE, but I didn’t pay extra just to watch that particular movie), so that helped too.

Tonight is Oscar-night, which I’ll be watching despite not having yet watched as many of the nominees as I would’ve liked. There was a time when I was in college when I’d make a point to see every film nominated for Best Picture. Of course, that was back when only five films were nominated for the category, but still: I wish I had that time now. Yesterday, it was super-tempting to go to the theater and do a marathon of The Silver Linings Playbook and Zero Dark Thirty. Maybe even Life of Pi. Oh well, I’ll get to them eventually.