Walking And Looking Back With Buddy Guy and Peter Sellers; Reading Lists Included

 Saturday was about writing for this blog, recuperating from the efects of my echocardiogram, and going to the Muncie Downtown Fire Up.

I posted stuff from my email, which will show up throughout this week.

When I was about to take a nap, I checked my text messages. No reason to do so — it just was a whimsy. I had a message from DM that he was in town for the Downtown Fire Up. I had invited others and got negative responses, so I thought no one was coming. Any inclination to go on my own was negated by my feeling pretty rough. Well, since DM was downtown expecting me, I cleaned up and made my way there.

I have not seen that many people in Muncie since the old Barbecue Fest days. And there was barbecue for sale. Too bad, I was virtually broke after paying rent. DM and I hung out for about an hour. Then he headed back with his daughter and granddaughter to his daughter's place in town. I came home.

Back to reading and writing until late in the evening.

I am looking at Sequestrum's Themed Submissions: The Unknown. Having paid rent, I do not have the funds to submit for now.

Broken Sleep Books has new publications for purchase.

Nat 1 Publishing is looking for books with more than 20,000 words. I have two ideas for this; both need reworking.

Summer Reading 2025 from The Walrus.

The Booker Prize Longlist 2025 (thanks to Thornfield Hall) is another possible reading list.

WTP VOl. XIII #2 (Woven Tale Press) — I wish I could get into flipbooks; it looks so good but it is hard on my eyes.

The Millions’ Great Summer 2025 Book Preview

The enduring brilliance of Peter Sellers: ‘There’s never been a better comic actor’  (The Guardian). Does anyone even know Petter Sellers today?

‘Everybody was fondling underwater!’: the Rocky Horror Picture Show at 50 – an oral history  (The Guardian)

Sunday:

Church, some more posting, rewriting “Colonel Tom”, and talking to T2.  She was a blast, even though no idea when I get my box. I also set up the Ethernet connection, and it seems to be working better than the Wi-Fi. After going out for cigarettes after church, I stayed home.

Hard to resist the following headline, even if I were not a fan of Shteyngart: Vera, or Faith by Gary Shteyngart review – is this the future for America?  (The Guardian). Let us hope it is fantasy and not prophesy.

The novel is busy and ingratiating, almost to a fault, which is to say that it feels distracted, unsettled; a cultural code-switcher itself. Vera, or Faith was reputedly drafted at speed in a little under two months, incorporating elements from a spy novel that the author had recently abandoned. That accounts for its messy vitality and its frequent, perturbing shifts of gear. Shteyngart’s ode to a good American in a bad America conspires to be, by turns, a rueful human comedy and a coming-of-age caper, a dystopian chiller and an espionage yarn. The colourful tale never satisfyingly hangs together; its component pieces tend to jar more than gel. But Shteyngart sets about his material with abundant energy and charm. He sketches a convincing caricature of a near-future USA and provides a stoical heroine that we can uncomplicatedly root for. Even in a degraded, compromised, up-is-down social climate, that has to be deserving of a solid B grade at least.

For those outside of Indiana, the State Fair's Band Day is an important event. My high school won enough that they might have been banned; I cannot recall the details all these decades later. My high school became a junior high, consolidated with our old rivals Anderson High School, but AHS did something that was not accorded to the other subsumed high school, Madison Heights. They kept our band. It has paid off for them: Anderson Wins When it Counted Most (Woof Boom Radio News).

Two more reading lists, of a sort: 7 Books That Break the Confines of Plot and 7 Books That Show There’s No Place Like Pittsburgh to Come of Age.

This morning I ran across what seems a new Buddy Guy song — chilling, amazing, there is life still in the man and in the blues. A sign that not all Americans suffer from historical amnesia.

I first heard of Pedro Almodóvar in the late Eighties, certainly the early Nineties. I remember taking KA to see Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown at the old Irvington Theater when they were the only one showing foreign films in Indianapolis. Dress It Up with Reality (Los Angeles Review of Books) reviews a new book on his films. If you have not seen an Almodóvar movie, do so, and if you want suggestions for what to see, check out the book for suggestions. 

I got obsessed with getting “Colonel Tom” into the best possible shape, and it was almost midnight before I go to bed.

Today:

I did not want to get up this morning. Work lasted until almost noon - one of those days of lots of hamburger pans. I got on the bus tired, achy, and with a creeping headache. A nap of an hour, then back on here. It has been close to an hour. My memory is a little foggy, and there is still too much achiness for me to be too ambitious. I need to do my laundry. Then, too, I should get myself to the grocery for some items. I may do neither.

With “Colonel Tom” done, I am planning a campaign of submissions. The actual submissions will need to wait for me getting more money.

Tuesday morning - I forgot to post this last night. Any better sign of my tired brain is beyond my imagination.

A reaction to chorizo woke me in the middle of the night, but I was up at 4:30. I got the email trimmed further. I thought there was more to do there.

No sign of an order out of Howard Circuit. I am trying to restrain my paranoia. I need to look for another place.

MSNBC continues to understand what is wrong with the Maxwell transfer to a camp.

The Article's Conrad’s ‘Victory’: shades of death, Joseph Conrad novel I have not read, but now will try to find a copy. I urge Joseph Conrad for everyone.

Over dinner, I watched several videos about fishing in Indiana. I will try to collect them for you. Getting out on the water seems highly unlikely this year.

Not been following their advice, have I?

Made a quick trip to the convenience store for smokes. Now, it is time to get ready for work.

sch