Positively Fourth Street

Well it’s a Tuesday that feels like a Monday due to having Martin Luther King’s birthday off. I was happy with it, and getting out of bed wasn’t the trauma it usually is. I knew I had to get moving on to work so I got out of bed, showered, had some cereal and coffee. Bill was here but didn’t make any coffee or pour any cereal. I lived though and was able to do those things myself. I handled it well. Missed the first bus since I wasn’t hustling and I knew there would be another bus soon after. It was just me and the tousled headed kid that may be going to school in the city. High school it looks like. Definitely has the look of a high school student, reading a dog eared copy of Ethan Frome and lugging around quite a heavy book bag/back pack. Maybe he goes to Horace Mann.

I read the New yorker, specifically the article on the 14 year old girl who killed herself after harassment by a teen neighbor and her mother among other friends. It turned out they created a fake MySpace user who made overtures to the girl and after weeks of stringing her along, dumped her and dumped on her causing the 14 year old to lose it and wind up killing herself in a closet. It was found out later that the mother of the neighbor next door basically orchestrated the suicide and got off the hook, claiming that the 14 year old talked about, or attempted suicide before. Such beasts roam free across the land.

Sad to hear about Heath Ledger dying at age 28 in Soho today. Harpy scored major points with that phone call. Heath was found in his loft in bed surrounded by pills. Could be an accidental overdose. Poor guy left a two year old daughter behind too. He had a talent for acting and I certainly was looking forward to his performance as The Joker in the latest Batman movie this summer. A shame. Good looking bloke he was. Latest news is that Heath Ledger may have had pneumonia and mixed an Ambien with his meds. Autopsy tomorrow.

Last night Bill and I watched a documentary Life After People. It was about what would happen if mankind vanished off the face of the earth. No apparent reason was given for the disappearance, but it was how Manhattan would start breaking down after a few days, then weeks then months, years and centuries. Not just New York though, all over the world. It was good but not as good as one book that I’m reading, The World Without Us by Alan Weisman. The book tells the same story only better and it involves the imagination which is always better than CGI. I recommend the book and was thinking about getting a copy for my brother in law, Rex for his upcoming birthday. But maybe I’ll get him something more lighthearted rather than doom and gloom. I just did. Got a good price on eBay and hopefully it will get to Arcata by his birthday. I got it for my brother Frank for Christmas and I want a copy too, for myself. But then again I have more than enough to read.

Here is a clip of that Bill Clinton, nodding off at a service yesterday in Harlem in honor of Martin Luther King. I don’t like Bill Clinton. He is no friend of LGBT people. He used our vote, saying he’d get rid of the ban on lesbians and gays serving in the military, then came up with Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. Now he’s saying that the way he wanted it was that lesbians and gay men could serve closeted and when they’re off on leave or what have you, they can let their freak flags fly. Thats not how it works, even with rose tinted glasses when looking at the signature on the document he signed. And then there is the Defense of Marriage Act, more betrayal.

His marriage was threatened not by fucking around on his wife, or getting a blow job from a White House intern, no his marriage was threatened by same sex marriage, or at least the concept of gay men and women having the same thousand or so rights that he stomps on every time he unzips his pants in the company of women. And I did forget, but was reminded of his advice to John Kerry, telling him to throw the LGBT community under the bus, regarding same sex marriage rights. Yes Bill Clinton is no friend of the LGBT community. So here’s a clip of the scumbag nodding off. Way to go moron. Hillary should have divorced his tired ass.

Hail to the tired dumb ass.

Happy Birthday

It’s a freezing cold Monday in January. Juan came over last night, he watched half of The Wire and then we watched the rest of season three of Weeds. Today he goes back to Ewing for his off campus life. Hopefully they have heat down there since it’s presently 25 degrees which is the high for the day. Barometric pressure is out of control, clear blue skies, courtesy of a Siberian wind. I picture Juan living in a ramshackle house, peeling paint, bare light bulbs, cold wind blowing through the slats of the house. I’m sure it’s not like that at all.

Right now I am watching Edge of the City, a film from 1957 starring Sidney Poitier and John Cassavetes, directed by Martin Ritt. Pretty good, edgy, jazz score. Sidney playing the cool uptown cat and John Cassavetes the guy harboring a secret. Of course it being the 50’s, Sidney has to die and Cassavetes has to find some sort of gritty redemption.

Before that was A Patch of Blue, once again with Sidney Poitier, and Shelley Winters and Elizabeth Hartman. I remember that being on Channel 4′ s 4:30 Movie. They always seemed to show A Patch of Blue once a year and this was the first time I saw it and understood it. It may also have made an impression on me when I was growing up, seeing how ugly racism could be and also how some disabled people like Selena the blind girl in A Patch of Blue could be abused and mistreated. And how noble a regular person can be.

Man, that Shelley Winters was horrible. I mean she was good but her character was just horrible. She pulled it off and won a best supporting actress Academy Award. A ‘happy’ ending to the melodrama, but Elizabeth Hartman had a tragic life though. The acting parts dried up, she was manic depressive and jumped off a bridge in the 80’s. Such an affected performance. I am watching Turner Classic Moves more and more these days. Sidney Poitier turned 81 yesterday.

Back to work tomorrow, a four day work week which is something quite easy to get used to, but that ain’t going to happen. I’m sure I would complain about having to work four days after a while. Whittle it down to one day and I’d moan about that too. Then, if I had nothing but days off, I’d complain about not having any work to do. Ok, that might be a stretch. I’m thinking if I was wealthy enough not to work, which should happen, any day now.

On Friday I am going to see my first Samuel Beckett play, Happy Days. From what I gather, it mainly takes place at a hamburger stand in late 1950’s suburban Milwaukee. Oh and the cast are buried up to their waist in act one, up to their neck in act two.

Today is a day off, in honor of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, a great man. I’m sure you would agree.
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