Bearshorty's musings

Papa and I went to see my Grandparents this morning in Brooklyn. Their building, which is full of old people, had no working elevators. And this was not a new problem. There are fourteen floors and while we could walk up to the eight floor, my grandparents were pretty much stuck. And my grandmother really needs to see a doctor. I’m worried about her because she is not really connecting words together. She understands everything but when she was trying to express a thought some words just seemed to evade her. My grandfather said it happened a long time ago and got better with medication and she was doing better than yesterday, but still she needs a doctor. I really hope those elevators, or at least one of them could be fixed by tomorrow.

The rest of the day wasn’t too eventful. I sort of had the Emmys in the background for a few hours but I really didn’t care for it. I’ll read the winners list tomorrow.

I did write a lot in the evening since my story is due this Friday. It is almost done. Yay.

Netflix is being super cool. Because “The Wedding Banquet” wasn’t available in local shipping center they are sending it from another place. Meanwhile, they sent an extra movie. That is nice of them. I love “The Wedding Banquet’ and I wanted to rewatch it and was a bit sad not to get it this week. So yay!

Highlander “Something Wicked” and “Deliverance” Really a two parter. How do you know if your good character turns evil - he gets an earring (somewhere in the middle of the ocean too) and wears black. Very good two-parter too. Duncan was very gleeful when he was about to kill Richie. Good thing Joe was actually doing his job and witnessed the earlier quickening. Methos is just the perfect person to help Mac. Definitely the ‘best of friends.’ Mac didn’t kill Sean until he saw Methos, though.

We went to Brooklyn this morning and ended up staying for a while. We stopped by Brighton first in a repair shot since our vacuum needed some repair. Since it would take a few hours, we had time to kill. We went to visit my grandparents and ended up watching a tv program on Russian tv about a Russian composer who died at 50.

I filled out the day planner I got in Minsk. Every single school child in former Soviet Union uses this type of planner, where they record homework and grades and where parents need to sign every week. (One time I really didn’t want my parents to see a note about a refusal of dental appointment at school, so I sneakily made my grandfather sign it. Mama found out about it six month later when she was looking through the planner, but she did not get mad about it.) When picturing days of the week I still think Mon-Wed, Thur-Sat like the planner shows on its pages. So I bought one in Minsk and that is what I will use this school year. It is very patriotic toward Belarus too.

Mama and I were cleaning out the room downstairs in preparation for Papa’s medical stuff. Lots of going up and down the stairs.

I was going to watch “Invictus” but I really really hate having to be forced to sit thought more than 10 minutes of previews with no way to get to the main menu. It is fracking annoying. I let it run in the background but really it is ridiculous. So I didn’t watch the movie today.

Creative Arts Emmys were today. Mia Michaels got an emmy for her choreography last year. Definitely deserved.

I started reading “World War Z: oral history of the zombie war” by Max Brooks this morning and I was not expecting how much I would like it. I couldn’t put it down. Well, partly because I knew I had to grade papers and wanted to do anything but. But it is really, really good. It is not the zombies who are fun, it is people’s response to a plague that is encroaching and terrifying. Reactions of governments and different people are very realistic. The book is written as an oral interview with a bunch of survivors and that writing choice works incredibly well. So far I read just the first part about people from all over the world processing various information about the new plague. I liked that people from different cultures sound like they are from that culture in the style of storytelling. But I just wanted to keep reading which does not often happens with books now.

Went rollerblading for 35 minutes today. The ocean was very pretty blue and sun was shining.

Most of the afternoon I spent grading papers. Paper 1 on Kingsolver and genetic engineering. Grading papers is such a brainsucking work especially in the beginning when their papers just don’t make sense. I feel like a zombie myself afterwards. At least I reached my goal of 7 papers. Now I just have to do that for three more days.

My friend N. called me today. And she has an extra season of “Farscape. Season 3” which she will give to me just because. Yeah!!! Does it mean I will eventually have to get other seasons?

I discovered today that adding feta cheese is really delicious in the regular salad Mama makes.

Watching the Emmy’s right now. NPH rocks. Great to see “Dr Horrible” on mainstream TV. Emmy is not my favorite awards show; I don’t always watch it but this year it is brilliant. Funny. Lots of jokes. Great introduction to writers of Variety shows and other writers, great introduction to directors, and great commentary for people walking to the stage. Plus Neil Patrick Harris is awe…wait for it… some. Ok, that was a lame joke. I was also reading EW liveblog for a bit to combine the media, that proved too much hassle, I don’t have attention span for that.

Today I was also learning HTML language a bit which I will need when I will talk about “House” tomorrow so as not to spoil it.

Genesis WTF moment of the day: Abram(Abraham) and Sara and their sojourn in Egypt. So Abram and Sara and their nephew Lot go into Egypt for a time. Abram is worried that if people in Egypt find out that Sara is his wife, they will kill him since she is so beautiful. So he figures he will introduce her as his sister. When that works rather well and Sara is “taken” into Pharaoh’s house, it made Abram very happy and he grew rich. God had to pretty much intervene and tell the Pharaoh that Sara was Abram’s wife. That made the Pharaoh of Egypt, of all people, very uncomfortable and he told Abram to take Sara and leave Egypt. I wonder what Sara was thinking at that time. The Bible curiously doesn’t mention it.