feels of efficacy

 I had a pretty good day. Had good eats and a long walk - found a park modeled on Versailles. Lotsa flowers

I was feeling kinda raw at the start, but I kept just doing things as I thought of them and that gave me good feels of efficacy. Too often I think, I should do whatever, see a chore attached to an object, but move on to some other activity. Just little things, like calling the pharmacy for a refill. I did get shut down there - I found out my prescription for test strips was suspended because I got a med that's supposed to lower my blood sugar. I had to get a special authority to get it - Jardiance. I told my doctor I wasn't going to try the new psych med, 3rd gen to the 1st gen one the hospital made me take until I was also on the diabetes med. It's actually supposed to protect my kidney function as well.  I'm supposed to drink a ton of water, and somehow that's part of the mechanism - you pee out the excess glucose.  Something like that anyhow. I'll be able to eat carbs if I want I guess, but without test strips, how will I know how many carbs I can eat? People talk about Canada having free healthcare but it's tightly managed and how much you pay for medication depends on what kind of insurance you have and what province you're in.  Regional disparities are biggie sized. Another hoop to jump through,  - gots to get another special authority for making sure my blood sugar is okay. I immediately felt despair due to my medical trauma. Too many times I've had to negotiate the medical system. I know I could be grateful, but honestly it's a fucking chore looking after my fucking failing body.

I was talking to Joe about my feels, how I felt my pain body looming, an undifferentiated mass of woe suffusing my being as my morning began - well 2pm is when I arose, went to bed around 6am after all. I tried to identify why I felt shitty and I tracked it down to feeling lonely. This covid and depending mostly on social media for my peoples time - and mainly shallow interactions eh. I don't feel connected to others. I don't feel seen or heard. I guess lots of people in the same boat. Isolation be part of social distancing. I did txt my mom and sister and niece right after, and made arrangements with my friend down the road to have a picnic when Popeye's opens.  Got to connect with the people I care about.

I got an Indigenous NFB link sent to me from my screenplay group - this vid spoke to me.

b'Very Present', b'Conor' b'McNally', provided by the National Film Board of Canada

genocide and rape

 It's been a hard week. Friday news came out about ground penetrating radar being used to confirm that 215 children's bodies were dumped in an unmarked graveyard at the Kamloops IRS.

Sad fucking shit but worse still, that night my niece was raped. 

It's been difficult dealing with her sexual assault because of the distance, she's in Regina, and I'm far from her in Vancouver. And there's already some difficulty in communicating with her. We mostly use messenger, with the odd audio message back and forth - no actual calls or facetime. It's made figuring out what actually happened to her very difficult. I feel frustrated that she hasn't gone to the police, her story seems to change too. Did she tell the cops about the sexual assault and they ignored it, as she last said, or did she not say anything because she was embarrassed and afraid of the man who raped her? She initially said she asked them not to charge him, but that could have been the assault, not the rape?  He beat her up so she wouldn't tell his girlfriend is what she said too. Her leg is in a cast. Tonight she said that she told the cops and they did nothing because her rapist is a white boy. Um he looks like an NDN to me, but whatever. Joe right away said that we should call them. Cops asked if we were making a complaint. Uhn Yeah, but we want to know what happened - FOI act, can be requested in writing but ongoing investigations only the victim can be told info.  Ugh.

Damn right I'll make a complaint. I just don't know what the fuck happened.  She might not either. There's a good chance she was roofied. Told her we could do a group call to support her in contacting the cops, but it sooo doesn't seem like that's something she wants to do.

I'm so mad and sad and just fucking fed up with the whole situation. I don't know how to help her get through this. I don't know what will help her deal.

I BEAT UP MY RAPIST from Katrina Saville on Vimeo.

Shrink my troubles away

Yesterday I talked to a shrink. I had a list of things I'd written down, areas of diagnosis I wanted to explore - Asperger's ADHD, what other personality disorders I might slot into besides Bipolar.  My desire there was to figure out what would be the most effective, efficient form of therapy, but I got shut down. Especially around Aspergers. Dude said something like, "You present really well and follow conversational conventions." Yeah, but that's because I've learned coping strategies...

Whatever I guess, I got referrals for 3 different places. It's nuts that I got fast tracked since I was in the hospital, and I still waited more than a month to get this shrink appointment. And who knows how long I'll be waiting before these therapy things come online for me.  Triage in the medical system is leaving a whole lot of people out in the cold.

I googled shrink after. He has an abysmal score on Rate My MD. He was part of team responsible for discharging a man from hospital who killed himself shortly after. 

Sad business.  Joe noticed he perked up when I said I was willing to explore medication. I'm not hopeful I will like meds, but I'm gonna give them a chance. Only once I get the diabetes med that will conteract the higher blood sugars that the psych med is supposed to produce though.

I get so tired of trying to stay on top of all my medical shizz.  not enough spoons!!!

TV, time sucks

I spent most of the waking day with the tv on.

I woke up late, after noon and puttered around with coffee and messenger, had a video chat until home support came. I had a shower then munched the scrambled eggs Joe made.

I put on the tv to watch the Jets/Oilers playoff game but Joe wasn't into it and we finished off Minari.  Then I watched the Billboard Awards. Was a big Canadian content, Toronto night with The Weeknd, Drake and Marshmello performing, and taking home awards.

I liked The Weeknd's performance, felt very LA with all the vehicles.

Awards show, and news are about the only thing I appreciate about having cable. Feels weird watching tv, I always feel like I'm wasting my time.  Commercials are fascinating though, the consumer culture they push, their power is undeniable, especially the food commercials. The allure of a well crafted ad, well it's no wonder it's such a big industry - drives desire and that's what the big money folk need is more consumption. buy buy buy

I can't get into new shows.  I see intriguing ads and titles that give me pause when I'm scrolling the guide, but fack it feels boring too.

I just don't care enough.  I'm not grabbed easily with the time commitment.

Yet I'll scroll forever on FB or tiktok or reddit

I feel real addicted to my internets

I doan know what to do about it. 

Boxes of books

Dayum, I have let this blog languish.

I was checking the blog and saw all this drafts and published a couple, but fucking annoyingly didn't make sure to change date.

Whatever

I think I'll start up a diff blog anyhow, one where I just write whatever instead of focusing purely on the things I watch.  I'm not watching as much movies as I used to anyhow.  Since I moved to my new place, I can count on my fingers the flicks I watched in last 2 months approx - far cry from my old habits of multiple movies a day.

I was feeling crap the other day. Figured out it was because of unpacking some books and letting go of a number of them.  

Esthero - I don't want to let you go playing as I ponder this chain of events lol

I've always been very attached to the things I own.  I gave up a Henry Miller - Quiet Days in Clichey. Dude I met at hostel that I stayed at when I first moved to Vancouver gave it to me. I found a transfer and a postcard in it.
.
Rilke - Letters to a Young Poet
I don't remember who gave me that or if I bought it myself, but I liked the dedication in it.  I like when you can tell a book had a life before you had it.

Books are romantic like that.

Any object can be I guess, if you think about it.  You can wonder on who made it, where it travelled from, any number of axis of what it is could take you on a thought journey.  All I'm saying is my things hold stories, and unpacking them, I realized these books maybe don't fit who I am anymore, don't complement where I want to be, and there's loss in that.

Hannibal

I haven't been this riveted by a tv show since I can't remember when.  It's dark and grim and serial killer convoluted, with Hugh Dancy's Will Graham jittering along careening down the wilfull manipulations of Mads Mikkelsons Hannibal Lecter.  It's always grimly gorgeous even when it's grotesque, espcially when it's grotesque with a grand guignol somber ghoulish beauty bathed in darkest blood and pathos.  This Hannibal is under wraps and contained, all dressed to the nines in his suits,  of humanity practicing his psychiatric skills on various hapless patients.  Gillian Anderson guests as Hannibal's shrink and she's puzzling, haven't quite figured her out yet. 

It's a great show and I hope it airs all 7 of the seasons Brian Fuller has envisioned.  Apparently he has yet to get the rights to Silence of the Lambs from MGM, but if he doesn't, he said he would approximate the story line with similarly named characters. 

Race

You're not a thinker Jesse!", paraphrase of dialogue sums up this film pretty well. Athletic glory is not important really, but that's just me I guess. I feel like this status quo pro, individual responses to systemic problems, with its huge disdain for the importance/effectiveness of the power of political action, so squandered the legacy of Jesse Owens. The best parts were the blurbs at the end over the photos of the real people explaining what happened to them after the '29 Olympics. There were a bunch of Olympic athletes in the theatre and they ate it up with a corporate sponsored spoon, makes sense that they would though. They are cogs in the machine of sport being fed on hopes of glory. Also who the hell cast Jason Sudekis as the coach?? Made it seem like satire right from the start.

Hello Destroyer 2016

Hello Destroyer 2016
written and directed by Kevan Funk

Hello Destroyer was the last film of the TIFF Top 10 showing in Vancouver tonight, simultaneously with a screening in Toronto.  That meant that the director wasn't able to attend, but there were 5 guests for the post screening Q&A - one of the producers, Haydn Wazelle, and other members of the cast: Sara Canning, Kurt Max Runte, Paul McGillion, and drum roll ....future most valuable NDN player....Joe Buffalo.

It's a hockey movie, but mostly it's a movie about the toxic trap of masculinity.  Working title of this could have been "It's Hard Being a Hockey Boy", because holy shit it is! Guys have it rough, and they are brutal with each other, and especially brutal engaging in their sport, and to those of their sex who don't keep to the gender lines.

The movie uses the milieu of junior hockey to show how tragically narrow the acceptable parameters that comprise masculine identity are, and the terrible toll such restrictive roles can take.  Also the ruthless capitalism and exploitive nature of sports and industry as a whole is an overarching theme.

In the Q&A, I asked if the inclusion of native iconography in the film was deliberately provocative and the producer said yeah.  The team is called The Warriors, and there's a scene in the beginning where the game star is given a headdress regalia to wear in the locker room after the game as a reward for his prowess as a player.  bleagh.  There's also a character who is NDN - my fav - played in his first feature role by the wonderfully understated and emotive Joe Buffalo.  He's one of the few characters allowed to show compassion for the hockey boy sundered from his team.  After I asked my question about the Native content - he threw it back to me - saying he loved that the team was called The Warriors because a Warrior is a good thing to be, and of course for us NDN's, hell yeah that's f'n right on :D  He asked me what I would have them be called.  I said I didn't know, but then in that so common way, after the moment had passed,  my answer came to me - I would have used Spartans - since they were famous for sacrificing the members of their tribe no longer deemed useful.

It was a sad sad f'n film, and how could it be anything but -  the commodification and exploitation of  athletes and the dearth of allowable human expression our society affords for male identity is so detrimental to the psyches of our men,  and that our boys are currently learning how to contort and  suppress their natural human impulses and needs in order to become the men this system demands is the most pressing and ongoing disaster our society collectively faces - see TRUMP.

More of that provocative NDN content in this scene:

I believe it's getting released in March.  Not sure how wide, or if that's a theatrical run, or on a streaming platform or what, but however it plays, you'll get your chance to see it this spring.

Dirty Grandpa

Dirty Grandpa 2016

Directed by Dan Mazar from a screenplay by John Phillips


This was my first promo screening this year, the only one I tried for so far, and it turned out to be an entertaining watch.  I told someone I hoped it would be like Bad Santa, and when I looked it up while waiting on the screening to start - yes!  Written by the team who brought you Bad Santa and Borat, among others. :D

First the good - it's rude as fuck, and really funny -  I laughed a lot.  It's sexy, silly, and sweet, and it has anti-materialistic, and follow your bliss, heart positive, along with sex positive values.  And in spite of the rudecrudeness, it's very family values oriented too.  De Niro and Efron have the most screen time, but I thought the scenes with the supporting characters had the best humour.  Aubrey Plaza kills, as an unashamed girl on the make, with that inimitable dead pan delivery of the filthiest lines.  She's got that schtick down pat. Adam Pally plays the most inappropriate cousin ever, and Jason Mantzoukas is an over the top ridiculous drug dealer with the best connections.

Now for the bad - it's super white bread, with a trajectory you can see a mile off, and it's chock full of stereotypes standing in for real people. The plot has Zac Efron as Jason Kelly, a thwarted photographer pushed into business law, who's about to get married to a horribly shallow fiance, in order to solidify his father's as well as his own career. Robert De Niro, Dick - of course that's his name - Kelly, wants to rescue him from that doom, by taking him on a spring break road trip to Florida.  Dirty Grandpa is an old school "real" man, ex-military type, reifying and endorsing paternalistic, patriarchal values, where women are sexual objects, and/or mothers, men bond by insulting and abusing each other, while shoring up their masculinity identities by putting down queers and women.  All that's framed as right on, men being men, kinda shit.

That it's casually and constantly homophobic was also irksome, especially since the way the token queer character is handled is supposed to redeem De Niro's queer-baiting commentary.

Dirty Grandpa spends all his interactions with this lone queer character,  Tyrone, (Brandon Mychal Smith), making fun of him,  until he witnesses him being harassed in a bar, by a group of homophobic and hostile black men.  Tyrone isn't capable of defending himself, of course -  It's De Niro to the rescue - with the aid of his Grandson - teaching Zac the importance of taking a punch to the face, and defeating them with his mad special ops skills - nobody makes fun of that queer but me!  Later he charms the same thuggy men with his weed and Wu Tang knowledge,  because that's what black people respect, I guess.  White man to the rescue!  And that's another thing - the big reveal on Dick Kelly is that he was training insurgents during his military career,  not just being a mechanic like his family thought.  Hmmm, I read that as unacknowledged superhero man, but the fact that De Niro has to keep that shit on the down low, and his country got major blowback in the form of 9-11 is pretty right on in terms of condemning those values. There was a scene where De Niro gives a major head injury to a jerky jock and that was just way too much too.  I dunno. I'm on the fence about this movie - is it condemning mas macho?  Kinda sorta depends on whether you agree with those values or not, I guess. 

Finally, I was totally squicked by a scene where a father sees his child interacting with Zac Efron in a way that looks sexually abusive, even though it's totally innocent, and also some by the way Aubrey Plaza fetishized De Niro's oldness.  Tell me that you've fallen and you can't get up - ridiculous right??? I might be reacting on an ageist level there, but it seemed like the implication was she was recreating previous sexual abuse.  In both cases I laughed, but there was definite discomfort - why da F did you go there??? - in my laughter too.  I'm uncomfortable when sexual abuse is made light of. :(

It's such a dumb movie that it's hard to take any of it seriously, though, and I think most people who will watch this, won't notice any of the things I took issue with.  And that's kinda sad, because the patriarchy is invisible almost always to the people who uphold it.