Still Educating Sam Hasler: Obsessions! The Odyssey! The Week That Was!

Excessive heat and an ear infection could be my excuses. They were real, debilitating, inhibiting a range of actions. I had an incident last Sunday that still bothers me where I almost fainted. It left me light-headed and shaken through Monday.

But the truth is, I got caught up in an obsession. I worked on my research project until I wanted to write nothing more. I blistered my eyes with articles and editing my own work. Why is it that creating footnotes and translating information is both more tiring and less than writing fiction? Fiction feels like painting with sweeping brush strokes and then filling them with details. Writing this article is more like taking tiles to make a mosaic - finding a piece and then aligning it to fit other pieces.

What I had at the end of the week were notes for a supervised release post and nothing more.

I do not seem to recall when the heat advisory started this week. Certainly on Wednesday, but maybe Tuesday.

When Tuesday came, I made enough progress that I decided to treat myself to (finally) seeing The Odyssey. Paying my light bill only strengthened my resolve to see the movie. Using someone else's air conditioning seemed like a very good idea.

Nolan wrote and directed a great movie. Not a perfect movie, though. The criticisms about Calypso are spot on - never have I seen Charlize Theron reduced to a cipher; worse, a sexless, charmless cipher. Yes, there is no sex as in the poem; also, there is not much of the erotic. Yes, Pattinson excels as the villain. What has gone unmentioned, or unseen by me, has been anything complimenting the scenes of Odysseus and Penelope. To them is one the scene of passion. Anne Hathaway is a Penelope that matches the wits of her Odysseus. For all of Elon Musk and the online wankers complaining of Lupita Nyong'o's casting, I have been unable to imagine another actress in the parts she plays. Yes, she has few lines as Helen, but what she does have is devasting. More importantly, as Helen, is her face. No, she has power in her roles that I cannot imagine another pulling off with words, let alone her silence. My biggest surprise was Matt Damon. In my memory are Kirk Douglas and Armand Assante, both more in my mind the adventuring, wily Odsysseus of my imagination. Damon portrays a king with responsibilities to his men; who uses his wits in service to his responsibilities rather than for mere glory. Lastly, the scenes with Circe and Osysseus understate their power and importance.

I suspect it will win Best Cinematography just for the madness of filming directly on Imax cameras. The only competition should be the next installment of Dune.

It should win Best Adapted Screenplay, depending again on the forthcoming Dune.

Nolan should get Best Director for holding its scope together. I prefer Olive Wilde for The Invite; she did more with less, but that will probably be why she will not be in the running. Denis Villeneuve will then be the one to watch for.

And it will be the Best Picture winner.

Wednesday, I made the writer's group. That went well. I think I also made a trip to Walmart.

Thursday back to research and putting together that manuscript and enduring the heat and humidity. I think I finished watching Graveyard on Netflix. It is a Turkish police show that has finished its second season. It is a sort of Turkish Law and Order: SVU. Although I think that lessens Graveyard. It has none of the righteous melodrama of SVU. The social critique of Graveyard actually hits harder by being less overt. A scene between two fathers with one talking about bringing up his son in a world with online hate towards women stays in my mind. Oddly, it also brought to mind The Closer/Major Crimes for all it lacks in the humor of those shows. It is also a workplace drama where private lives often intrude. Last, but not least, its production values and direction are better than what we get on our cop shows.

Friday was the group and shopping at Payless. Nothing much else was accomplished that day besides small work done on the project. I started the second season of Guy Ritchie's The Gentlemen. This I finished on Saturday. I am not sure what Ritchie is doing with this; it feels different from what he has done before. He has not been one for paying attention to monsters.

Saturday, I indulged in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. I have seen some headlines criticizing this season. I have not taken the time to listen to them. It seems to me the show has not the usual sanctimony of Star Trek. It also seems to be establishing the future in small ways. Not so much in terms of plot but in character. Back to the project, putting off a trip to Payless of milk and disilled water. The things I had not enough hands for on Friday.

Sunday was church. A wonderful time, a settling of the spirit. I had thought I had polished off one section only to realize as I was closing the door to leave that I had not. No, that came after church.

Today, it was up early, computer troubles, dealing with the ear infection, and finishing this post. I have a table to put together and a kitchen to clean. So this is the end of this report. What follows are the things collected during the past week that were supposed to have been published before today.

Submissions for 9/4:

Uncanny Magazine was sent “The Unintended Consequences of Art”.

“After Making Landfall” went to West Branch, Ninth Letter

“Plain Tales From The Flatlands (Excerpt)” to Kenyon Review.

7.13 Books got the full version of “Plain Tales From The Flatlands.”

Rejections from the past week follow.

9/5

Thank you for submitting Agnes to Thin Skin. We appreciate that you chose to submit to us, but regretfully we’re going to decline.

Best Wishes,
The Thin Skin Team

9/1:

Thank you for sending us "A Heart’s Judgment Judged."
This particular piece did not work for us, but we were impressed by your writing. We hope that you will send us something else. Our submission schedule can be found on our website at http://americanshortfiction.org/submityourwork/.
Sincerely,
The Editors, American Short Fiction
***

We are freeing this story from the rat cage today. We hope it finds a better fit (and pay!) elsewhere. Rejections suck, we get it. But, hey, you are doing the thing! You should celebrate that you are sending your work out into the world.

We're sorry to say that Lesson Learned On A Green Meadow is not quite right for us at this time.

If this was a quick reply, please don't be discouraged. Though rats are considered nibblers, we devour our reading and are always hungry for more! And what do we know? We're rats!

We hope you'll consider trying us again. You're welcome to submit again during any of our open calls.

Best wishes,
Rat Bag Lit
http://www.ratbaglit.com

8/31:

“After Making Landfall” rejected:

Thank you for submitting your work to MudRoom for review. We are grateful for the opportunity to engage with your writing and thinking. Unfortunately, we do not have a place for this piece in our upcoming issue. We hope it finds a loving home.

All the best,
Kiera Wolfe
MudRoom Mag

Talent gets forgotten by the passing tides of popularity: