the deep moans round with many voices

Work today was very frustrating.

1. I had two scheduled tours, both prospects replied to confirm, and then both people were no-shows. ARGH.

2. I intended to stage and photograph a unique studio in the morning, but I got an email from Ms. Rise-and-Shine literally twenty minutes after I clocked in saying that the tenant for that apartment had picked up the keys, so there went that plan. :(

3. I worked out a nice, solid plan for me and Mr. Geniality and Ms. Rise-and-Shine's daughter-in-law to do apartment videos on Friday, only to discover that nope, it's going to be me and Mr. Geniality and fucking Lawyer Man. *headdesk*

( extended ranting about coworkers and logistics )

...

Also, I ate lunch while on the clock and editing photos so I could used my actual half-hour off the clock to participate in a church Board of Trustees EXCO (executive council/committee) meeting at 3:30pm, because I have, possibly foolishly, agreed to serve as clerk for the 2020-21 fiscal/business year. I mean, SOMEONE has to do it! And I can demonstrably take notes and organize documents, so.

My new computer has a functional webcam, which is lovely, but it doesn't seem to have software to process audio inputs. (I may have mentioned this previously? I have been quite stressed for the past couple weeks. My memory is a little scattershot.) So I have been participating in Zoom audio via my phone, which is a little annoying but functional. I also had to use my phone as a mobile hotspot because A) I don't want to conduct church business on company computers, B) I'm not sure I could make Zoom work on my office computer even if I tried because I don't have admin permissions, and C) we use ethernet rather than wifi for our company internet and intranet. But it worked, which is the important thing. (On battery power, no less! It's nice to have a computer that believes it has a battery.)

...

So yeah, that was my day. Now I'm going to drink some more alcohol, possibly write something, and then fall into bed.

...

(Oh! One good thing: I finished putting together my nice new office chair, so hopefully my butt will be less sore going forward. That will be nice.)

Today C. from Maintenance and I knocked off all the inspections of our other main building. We were able to do this in a single afternoon, rather than the day and a half it took for [building name redacted], because despite this building having more tenants, its has FAR fewer apartments. (Multi-person units rather than studios, you see.) Also the heat is not under direct tenant control, so there was no need to check thermostats and turn on vent fans.

We found a lot fewer plumbing issues, but a lot more bongs and glass pipes. This doesn't really surprise me, given past years' precedent. No cigarettes, though, which is new and different!

(Listen, I personally do not care what recreational drugs anyone wants to partake of, but we have a strict no-smoking policy in our buildings and that applies regardless of which plants you choose to burn and inhale. Marijuana smoke stinks just as bad as tobacco smoke -- if not more so; while cigarettes are universally vile, some pipe tobaccos can actually be quite nice even once lit on fire -- and that kind of miasma is just straight-up rude to inflict on your neighbors. Also, smoke inhalation fucks up your lungs. Take your weed in edibles like a polite and sensible person.)

Now I am home and have had leftover roasted asparagus (from last night) and leftover macaroni and cheese (from today's lunch) for dinner, and I think I may just go to bed -- you see, I am scheduled from noon to 4pm at Not the IRS tomorrow and after that my afternoon/evening will be eaten by grocery shopping and the monthly Board of Trustees meeting, so if I want to get any personal stuff done, it will have to be in the morning. I am still not really sold on mornings as a concept, but I can do a reasonable imitation of a morning person when needs must, and I think this may be such an instance. *wry*

You know, just once this decade I would like to have a simple, easy choice in my state senate election. But the local Democrats keep picking people I cannot vote for, and the incumbent Republican, while objectionable on gun rights, further right than I'd like on health care, and endorsed by Tom Reed (that fucker), is otherwise mostly interested in environmental protection, local museums and parks, ensuring citizens have access to government agencies, and things like establishing regular schedules for parking garage structural inspections -- which, you know, I am also in favor of.

Furthermore, this year's "Democratic" candidate has not only been accused of domestic violence against her ex-wife, she has switched to calling herself a "progressive Republican" after she lost a bunch of endorsements over the domestic violence thing, is equally objectionable on gun rights, and has an economic program I find questionable on both theoretical and practical grounds.

Gnrgh.

There was a perfectly good alternate candidate running in the Democratic primary! I voted for him! I would have been happy to vote for him again tomorrow!

...Maybe I'll do him as a write-in, just because. (I am pretty damn sure the incumbent's going to win anyway. *sigh*)

I saw Mad Max: Fury Road yesterday, and intend to go see it again on Thursday or Friday.

It's not objectively the greatest movie, I think? I mean, it's a damn good action movie! It's basically a two-hour car chase scene with occasional pauses for breath, punctuated by intense fights and explosions; the characterization and world-building is done mostly through background visuals, body language, and implication. But you know, it's not aiming to be anything other than a damn good action movie. Which is cool. The world can always use more damn good action movies if you ask me. :-)

As for why people are saying it's great and deep and important...

Um. How to phrase this?

Okay. The thing is, I love action movies. I love action movies A LOT. I am so there for chases and fights and guns and knives and explosions and the rules of physics and biology being overwritten in the service of "Dude, wouldn't it be cool if?" propositions.

But with almost every action movie in the world, there's a little niggling sense of, "Yes, but..." in the back of my mind.

"Yes, but where are the women?"

Where are the women among the heroes? Where are the women with speaking roles? Where are the women in crowd scenes? Where are the women in the backgrounds of organizations? Where are the women just getting on with their lives? Where are the women who have any contact with other women?

With Fury Road, I didn't have to ask that question, because THE WOMEN WERE RIGHT THERE ON-SCREEN. I'd say about a dozen with speaking roles, and they had their own arcs and their own goals and they talked to each other, and they didn't exist to glorify the male characters or to serve as sexy inspiration (whether living or dead). Some of them were traditionally action-movie badass (with guns and fists and cars and whatever), and some were not, and that's okay because there were enough women on-screen that no single character had to bear the burden of representing ALL women. They could just be themselves, who they would logically be in their positions. Some were young and gorgeous, some were middle-aged, some were old, and they were all treated LIKE PEOPLE, not sexy lamps or dumb jokes or burdens -- just like men always get to be treated.

So it's not that Fury Road is a great movie with a deep message. It's just that for once, it's a movie in a genre I love that doesn't punch me in the face with one hand even as it clasps the other and takes my money. Instead, this movie pulls me in for a hug and says, "Welcome home."

I love it so much for that.

(And I think I am retroactively even more annoyed about all those past face-punches than I was at the time. Dammit, people, PUT WOMEN IN YOUR MOVIES. Do you see how easy it is to do? Do you see how it doesn't spoil the adrenaline rush at all?? Do you see how you don't have to invent contrived romantic subplots to "justify" putting in a single woman as a narratively useless love interest??? Do you see how much money I am willing to give you in return???? ARGH!)

Today I am thirty-three years old -- a palindrome year!

My parents are coming up on Sunday to attend a concert at my church and take me out for a nice birthday dinner. They will bring cake and gifts and supplies for champagne cocktails, because that is how we roll. (Mmm, champagne cocktails...) I will keep Dottie overnight, because apparently the price differences between the motel that allows dogs and the motel that doesn't are currently dramatic enough for my parents to decide that saving money outweighs the small logistical inconveniences of leaving her with me.

I got my taxes done this morning, for free -- this is a side benefit of working for Not the IRS. The hill office was crazy busy this afternoon, which I suspect is partly just that we're reaching our peak couple weeks, and partly that everyone who didn't come yesterday because of the weather came today instead.

Vicky gave me my birthday present at Christmas and I duly lugged it back to Ithaca and let it sit untouched on my coffee table for a month and a half, but tonight I got to open it. For Christmas, she got me a Talavera ceramic mug from one of her trips to Mexico, and for my birthday she got me some plum wine, some matcha chocolate pocky, and a bowl, a whisk, and what I think is a tin of powdered green tea, all purchased on her trip to Japan last summer. (The Mexico trips are for work -- she's a linguist and currently does stuff with ESL testing -- while the Japan trip was as a chaperone for her church's youth group.)

I also got ten bucks from one of my maternal uncles, and a cool metal charm with an engraved lucky horseshoe from Aunt Cara. All in all, a good day. :-)

---------------

In less pleasant news, I got an email today from...

Did I ever tell you guys the story of Longwinded Man? I don't think I did. I was too annoyed at the time, and it was a little too personal. But today's event needs context, so.

( cut for length and vaguely personal details )

I just.

ARGH.

I will give him this: it is a shorter email than he usually manages. But it's exactly the same type of emotionally manipulative garbage and making me into an object instead of seeing me as myself that he used to do.

I'm not going to answer. In fact, I'm going to block his email address, like I should have done a long time ago.

And hopefully I will never have any contact with him again.