Edging Up on Thankfulness
Nov. 21st, 2006 01:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
itsallovernowWeekend ushered in an implosion of my finances and some serious depression, the two directly related. This is just an endlessly frustrating cycle and I am so miserably tired of it.
On the upside, I feel like whatever change or opportunity comes my way, I'm ready. (Although I also realize that you have to seek out change, seek out opportunity, but I've always been someone who both craved change and was terrified of it which leaves me a little stymied, push pulling myself into stagnation). I love LA, but I'm ready to look at what leaving will mean, and stop thinking about leaving here as just another example of failure.
I think re-reading "Tam Lin", which is actually a far more satisfactory novel of life at a private liberal arts college than it is a fairy tale, really took me back to being an undergraduate, to that person I was then and what I wanted and hoped for and thought, and I got stuck there for a few days, so disconcerted by looking around me at this hot and dry city, this place with light and palm trees and exhaust and that sheeny glow. I almost had to grieve for not being that person, for having moved on, and not lived up to my potential.
My parents are so dear, both thinking that demanding that I sell my novel as part of my debt to them will be signs of love and encouragement. It is, but the pressure makes it hard for me to breathe. They don't even know if I can write - I mean sure I could write as a child and a teenager, but how do they know I can write as an adult? It terrifies me, that faith they have in my abilities, how misplaced and misguided and genuine it is.
I did watch TV, and must say again that My Name is Earl is pure and utter love for me. Funny and sweet and clever and triptastic and so goddamned enthusiastic. I love it.
Heroes continues to fill me with glee as well. Despite the clunky writing, I find it so utterly charming, so whole-heartedly embracing its premise that I'm willing to trust it (even this early in the game), willing to trust that the answers and actions of the characters will be satisfying, will make me care. It isn't a show filled with tons of angst, but there's so damned much hear there that it's just such a lovely thing to show up for and buy into. I knew as soon as we saw the picture of Peter at the beginning that he would absorb Clare's powers and not die, but I love Peter's conviction (even if he is whiny). It makes a nice balance to Hiro's giddy enthusiasm. They both believe utterly, they are both actively using their powers and I so like how these two former disenfranchised guys, these middle of the road boys, are the ones most willing to risk in order to do good, do right. I find it charming.
I also find Clare to be a very real kind of teenager (and while I adore both Veronica Mars and Buffy, there's a necessary sophistication to those characters as part of the story as a whole that Claire lacks and I find that both charming and refreshing. She feels like a teenager, reacts like a teenage girl - brave and impulsive and bitchy and kind and happy about being homecoming queen, baffled that people would vote for her when their support doesn't match what she understands of how the world works, having her eyes opened in ways that are very real and unrelated even to the powers - kindness, and revenge, and being an outsider.
I like the mystery as well, who Sylar is and what relationship he has to the others; whether or not they saved the right cheerleader, etc.
All in all, I'm thoroughly enjoying the candy factor of this show, enjoying it's momentum and it's drive and the bits of cleverness and the characters.
I also watched Studio 60, although I wasn't sure I was going to, and lo and behold I thoroughly enjoyed this ep. This ep worked for me for predictable reasons - Sorkin dropped the moralizing (for the most part) and focused on the organic development of plot and storyline and character. He let the characters be themselves and screw up at will.
In some ways, it works because he's taking what he did well in TWW and Sports Night and putting it here - characters talking to each other in circles, last minute saves, doubt about ability and talent. Matt both being pissed off at Ricky and Ron, and wanting them not to leave because their pilot was going to tank made sense. He has been an asshole to them; they have responded in kind and sometimes that sort of bitterness can only end in a break.
I liked Danny and Jordan's communication/arguement and for the first time finally bought Jordan as an executive smart enough to hold the job she does.
I also liked the meta of Harriet as the poster child for Christianity which allows both the show (and Sorkin) to take potshots at Christianity with impunity. I liked the recognition of it more than the potshots which I do think are often over the top and unnecessary, and I liked that Matt figured out what was really going on and was still so sweet to Harriet.
On the upside, I feel like whatever change or opportunity comes my way, I'm ready. (Although I also realize that you have to seek out change, seek out opportunity, but I've always been someone who both craved change and was terrified of it which leaves me a little stymied, push pulling myself into stagnation). I love LA, but I'm ready to look at what leaving will mean, and stop thinking about leaving here as just another example of failure.
I think re-reading "Tam Lin", which is actually a far more satisfactory novel of life at a private liberal arts college than it is a fairy tale, really took me back to being an undergraduate, to that person I was then and what I wanted and hoped for and thought, and I got stuck there for a few days, so disconcerted by looking around me at this hot and dry city, this place with light and palm trees and exhaust and that sheeny glow. I almost had to grieve for not being that person, for having moved on, and not lived up to my potential.
My parents are so dear, both thinking that demanding that I sell my novel as part of my debt to them will be signs of love and encouragement. It is, but the pressure makes it hard for me to breathe. They don't even know if I can write - I mean sure I could write as a child and a teenager, but how do they know I can write as an adult? It terrifies me, that faith they have in my abilities, how misplaced and misguided and genuine it is.
I did watch TV, and must say again that My Name is Earl is pure and utter love for me. Funny and sweet and clever and triptastic and so goddamned enthusiastic. I love it.
Heroes continues to fill me with glee as well. Despite the clunky writing, I find it so utterly charming, so whole-heartedly embracing its premise that I'm willing to trust it (even this early in the game), willing to trust that the answers and actions of the characters will be satisfying, will make me care. It isn't a show filled with tons of angst, but there's so damned much hear there that it's just such a lovely thing to show up for and buy into. I knew as soon as we saw the picture of Peter at the beginning that he would absorb Clare's powers and not die, but I love Peter's conviction (even if he is whiny). It makes a nice balance to Hiro's giddy enthusiasm. They both believe utterly, they are both actively using their powers and I so like how these two former disenfranchised guys, these middle of the road boys, are the ones most willing to risk in order to do good, do right. I find it charming.
I also find Clare to be a very real kind of teenager (and while I adore both Veronica Mars and Buffy, there's a necessary sophistication to those characters as part of the story as a whole that Claire lacks and I find that both charming and refreshing. She feels like a teenager, reacts like a teenage girl - brave and impulsive and bitchy and kind and happy about being homecoming queen, baffled that people would vote for her when their support doesn't match what she understands of how the world works, having her eyes opened in ways that are very real and unrelated even to the powers - kindness, and revenge, and being an outsider.
I like the mystery as well, who Sylar is and what relationship he has to the others; whether or not they saved the right cheerleader, etc.
All in all, I'm thoroughly enjoying the candy factor of this show, enjoying it's momentum and it's drive and the bits of cleverness and the characters.
I also watched Studio 60, although I wasn't sure I was going to, and lo and behold I thoroughly enjoyed this ep. This ep worked for me for predictable reasons - Sorkin dropped the moralizing (for the most part) and focused on the organic development of plot and storyline and character. He let the characters be themselves and screw up at will.
In some ways, it works because he's taking what he did well in TWW and Sports Night and putting it here - characters talking to each other in circles, last minute saves, doubt about ability and talent. Matt both being pissed off at Ricky and Ron, and wanting them not to leave because their pilot was going to tank made sense. He has been an asshole to them; they have responded in kind and sometimes that sort of bitterness can only end in a break.
I liked Danny and Jordan's communication/arguement and for the first time finally bought Jordan as an executive smart enough to hold the job she does.
I also liked the meta of Harriet as the poster child for Christianity which allows both the show (and Sorkin) to take potshots at Christianity with impunity. I liked the recognition of it more than the potshots which I do think are often over the top and unnecessary, and I liked that Matt figured out what was really going on and was still so sweet to Harriet.
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-21 10:01 pm (UTC)this week's earl was beyond fabulous. just delightful and so very them. love that show.
and heroes is getting better and better. or i'm getting more hooked. my love for hiro grows, but i worry that any character is expendable to the people making the show. hits my happy ending kink. meep.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-21 10:08 pm (UTC)And yeah, last week's Earl was just fabulous:) Muppets will win everytime (even against other muppets:)
no subject
Date: 2006-11-21 10:32 pm (UTC)as for the muppets, i just about fell off the couch during that part of the episode. and oh, if only john crichton was on earl's list. imagine the meeting between randy and rygel. the eyebrow action would be very fine.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-21 10:49 pm (UTC)I very much know what you mean about not being the people we were, and not living up to the potential those people had. Sometimes, I wonder, though, if maybe we've just forgotten, and the problem isn't grieving their loss, but is instead that part of us still is those people, and just when we think we've moved on, it re-emerges to protest, and throws everything into confusion.
no subject
Date: 2006-11-22 09:06 am (UTC):::leaves you chocolate, licks your ear and runs off:::
no subject
Date: 2006-11-22 06:19 pm (UTC)