#and both times were in a nearly empty theater on purpose because i CANNOT do crowds

[barbitchian]

here is da boy!!!! the colors look SO much better than that one promo image from a while back, but it still suffers from that "skinned blue basketball" bulkiness, and the random line bullcrap like on every marvel suit. BUT.... it still looks better than the promo SIMPLY because of the colors lmao I didn't think they were gonna pull off the campy belt + buckle but they did!!! and they got the yellow S on the cape!!! I think it looks good I just wish the thickness was fixed lmao

and there's Mr Terrific too!! I will be completely honest I don't know as much about his character but he looks SUPER comic accurate too, legit looks like an Alex Ross painting

have you seen the new leaked pictures from the Superman 2025 set 👀

*would you like to* 👀👀👀 I don't think Google is showing results for them yet but Twitter is FREAKING out cause the suit looks... pretty good, actually! if you're not interested just delete this but if you haven't seen em yet lemme know and I can show ya....

ooh i haven't!! im terrible at keeping up with movie news honestly dhgsjh but hey sure if you have em i won't say no to looking!!

[greenninjagal-blog]

Even If It Kills Us (but it won’t hopefully) pt2

hey, Hey, HEy, HEY! Sander’s Sides Mafia AU Part Two! 

(Mostly for @kindly-falling @laragazzadellluna who surprised me with wanting more)

Part one is right here! Summary: Virgil is a normal college student, who’s never done anything illegal, much less something worth sending hit men after him for. Unfortunately, it looks like he’s going to die before he gets his answers.

“Do you think you can--perhaps--make time now?” the man says in the most pretentious voice Virgil has ever heard, “I assure you it’s quite important.”

Virgil thinks hes going to throw up.

Because this man is holding a gun--a gun and he just killed a man

(regardless that the other man has just been trying to kill Virgil)

He just killed a man like it was nothing. Like it was a simple chore.

 Virgil chest heaves and it feels a lot like trying to inhale his own tongue. There are alarms and screaming and people trying to kill him and Virgil doesn’t know why but he knows this isn’t the time to be here.

fuck he can’t breathe

Patton’s fingers wrap his arm holding him to this reality like an anchor but Virgil thinks that this can’t be real. It can’t be real.

There’s a dead body on the floor a few meters from them.

But it can’t be real.

“Virgil,” The man says, “You need to breathe. This is not the time nor the place for a panic attack.”

 Patton--Patton-- growls at him. It’s surprising because Pat is the nice one, the flowered crowns, the puns, the sweaters and the warm hugs. Virgil is the one who hisses at people who get too close. 

But this is Patton who just stood in front of Virgil to save him from being potentially shot and Virgil thinks that he came so fucking close to losing the best person in his life

And he can’t exhale. His lungs scream.

“Virge,” Patton says quietly, “breathe with me.”

“We don’t have time--”

“Shut up!” Patton snaps. It’s not like him. Virgil breathes in and it feels a lot like claws dragging through his chest. 

He does it again.

“I’m okay,” He rasps out as if saying it out loud would make it true in any sense.

“Excellent,” The man deadpans, “It’s time to go.”

“Where?!” Patton demands, “And who are you?!”

“The man who just saved you life.” He responds distastefully. “That’s all you need to know. It’s time for you to leave.”

“Excuse me?!” 

Virgil is certain he’s never seen Patton like this. If he wasn’t already scared beyond belief, this would definitely be the thing causing him a panic attack. He’s already shaking all over, his whole body. 

(If pat lets go hes sure he’d shake himself apart)

“This doesn’t concern you anymore.” The man says, “Its a family matter.”

Virgil has never seen the man before today.

“People got shot!” 

The man considers his gun for a second and Virgil was certain he was going to shoot Patton too. “Yes, that is because they are the enemy. And quite frankly its time for you to step out unless you want to be shot at again.”

“I’m not leaving Virgil!”

“I don’t have time to argue this with you.” The man says, “Your blood is on your own hands, not mine.”

It sounds like a threat. 

Patton squeezes Virgil’s shoulder.

Another form comes crashing around the corner behind them, but Virgil barely has time to register who they are before the man has fired two shots and they drop. It’s effortless. He fires again but the chamber is empty.

“Time to go,” He says.

He reaches out for Virgil’s arm and then stops himself-- “Can you run?”

Virgil nods.

They run.

Everything in Virgil screams that they were going to be shot, killed. But the man seems rather confident as he shoves open the exit door, eyes darting the outside.

They aren’t more than a foot outside before an expensive red sports car is plows over the curb and blocks their easy exit. 

(Virgil doesn’t know a lot about cars, but fuck is this one nice)

The window is already down and the driver is smirking something awful. “Get in!”

The man who had saved their lives, stops short, “Absolutely not!”

The driver laughs good-naturedly and pulls a gun from somewhere. “How about now?”

There’s several gunshots from behind them. The glass door to the theater shatters.

“Fuck This,” Virgil breathes and because these people aren’t the ones currently trying to shoot him, he grabs the door handle and throws himself into the car. Patton lands sideways in his lap.

The man looks absolutely scandalized, “You cannot--!” 

“Get in the damn car, Logan!” The driver shouts, “What’s the worse that can happen?”

“You’ll get us killed!”

The man--Logan-- gets in the car anyway.

Several bullets hit the door as it closes.

The driver laughs again, and Virgil is pretty sure he’s having fun. He presses the gas pedal to the actual floor and the car just explodes. Virgil hits the opposite door and Patton tumbles off the seat to the floor.

“I swEAR!” Logan yells as the driver spins out of the parking lot going at speeds that were illegal for a good reason. They nearly collide headfirst with three different cars but they were already gone by the time the other drivers even honked their horns.

“Ooh! Tails!” The driver called, checking his mirrors casually and running a red light. He tosses his gun in Logan’s lap, “Do you mind?”

“You are a terrible driver!” Logan snarls at him. 

Virgil digs his hands into the leather seats. His stomach is in his throat as Logan leans out the open window, and fires again and again. Virgil can see him through the other windows, and his cold and calculating look that tightens when their driver makes an unexpected jerk of his wheel. 

He can’t hear a thing.

Then Logan throws the gun, having emptied it, into the open air and climbs back in their car with curses tumbling off his lips.

“Who taught you how to drive?” He snarls.

“Did you get them?” The driver asks unbothered.

“no I left them--of fucking course i did. I’m not you!” 

Awesome. Virgil who’s never even jaywalked before, realizes that he is in a car with two strangers, both of who had guns and knew how to use them, not to mention their driver had already broken at least fifty driving laws. 

what the fucking hell

“Ouch harsh,” The driver laughs though, he reaches up and tilts the rearview mirror, “How’s it going back there, Sanders?”

“I’m going to throw up.” Virgil says. It’s not a lie.

“Hey, watch the leather, Jack Smellington, I just got her cleaned!”

Then for some ungodly reason Patton starts laughing too.

(Further proof, Virgil thinks, that Patton is crazy)

“Wow!” Pat reaches up and fixes his glasses, “I didn’t know the movie was in 4-D!”

“This is not a movie!” Logan hisses but his seriousness is in stark contrast with their drivers booming laugh. 

(it’s different now, Virgil can’t quite put his finger on why, but it just sounds different)

“Who’s the puffball?” The driver asks, “I like him.”

“Patton Pater!” Patton!! says!! brightly!! “I like you too! What’s your name?”

“Roman Prince!” He says, “Resident Knight in shining armor!”

“A reckless playboy, with far too many cars and not enough rules.” Logan corrects with a sneer, “This is not your business, Prince.”

“It is when the next heir is as cute as he is!”

Virgil’s heart stops, “what?”

“i said you’re cute! Do you swing my way?”

Logan turns around in his seat. “Ignore him,” He commands, but Virgil gets the feeling Roman is not going to let that stand. “Based on your reactions in these past few minutes, I’m going to assume that you have no clue what is going on.”

Virgil’s throat is so dry he can barely breathe again, “Are you taking me somewhere to kill me?”

Logan sighs and takes off his glasses to clean them which is not an answer.

Roman zooms onto a freeway, “Did you even introduce yourself, Specs?” 

(Virgil absently wonders why there are no Police cars chasing them down)

“My name is Logan. Sanders.” Logan says slowly, “We’re cousins.”

“That’s...” impossible is on the top of Virgil’s tongue, but he then remembers how cagey his mom always was when holidays came up. He knew he had relatives, somewhere but he had known better than to ask after the first time. “....alright.” 

(it’s not alright. Its very, very far from alright.)

((Patton takes his hand and its enough support for Virgil to remember to exhale))

“Excellent,” Logan replaces his glasses. If it weren’t for the blood on his tie he could have been a TA at their college. “Our family is a mafia.”

Roman jerks the wheel and Logan’s head slams into the head rest. Patton lets out a yelp. 

“Sorry Padre!” Roman shoots a sideways glare at Logan, “Really? Spock, there were a hundred other ways to break it to the kid. He looks like he’s going to faint. We’ve talked about this.”

“You talked, I did not listen because I do not want any misconceptions to arise.” Logan hisses, “I don’t want him to think anything other than the honest truth!”

Roman’s smile quirks viciously, “Oh that would be just awful wouldn’t it.”

Virgil doesn’t like the connotation of that.

He doesn’t like any of this.

(Part of him is horrified because he can understand it?? Why does it make sense to him?? His mom obviously never wanted anything to do with this part of his family, how she tried to keep him at home, how she always seemed to be looking over her shoulder, too paranoid to let him out of her sights. Part of him wonders if he always knew this, always knew something just wasn’t right.)

“What does that have to do with Virgil?” Patton asks innocently. 

(Virgil knows he does that on purpose: its a load question and Patton is the barrier between it and Virgil himself)

Logan clenches his jaw, “It has to do with Virgil, because Virgil is the only other viable heir.”

“....what?”

Virgil’s voice is dry and broken. He had to have heard wrong. This wasn’t, couldn’t be real.

“Three nights ago the head of the family, Thomas Sanders, was murdered.” Logan says and then pauses.

“Murdered?” Patton repeats.

“Most of the family thinks it was our rivals--”

“Rivals?” Virgil interrupts, “You mean that’s who trying to kill me?”

Roman laughs, “God, that would be ironic!”

Logan makes an annoyed noise, “No the Prince’s aren’t the ones attempting to kill you. Though they should keep to themselves as this does not include them.”

“I can drop you off right here if you want.”

Virgil makes a noise in the back of his throat.

Roman meets his eyes in the rear view mirror, “Chill out, Winter Sulker! None of my family’s going to touch you without my say so. I’m my families heir.”

“Then who is trying to hurt my kiddo?” Patton asks, “And why?”

Logan clicks his tongue. “Thomas well...

“He named you, Virgil, heir to the family, although it is not logical in any sense--” He stops himself again seeming to remember who he was speaking to. “You are Thomas’s heir and therefore are slotted to take over. And unfortunately, not everyone in the family is...agreeable to this course of action.”

Part Three

[aion-rsa]

Godzilla vs. Kong: Who Should Win?

https://ift.tt/3sB2eYO

Ever since Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures announced they were building a “MonsterVerse,” this is the fight everyone’s been waiting for: Godzilla vs. Kong. Fire meets fur. As the undisputedly most popular monsters in movie history, King Kong and Godzilla are responsible for the entire idea of a “kaiju versus” film thanks to their first bout nearly 60 years ago. Since then they’ve each appeared in countless sequels, spin-offs, and reboots. But never again have they crossed paths. Until now.

Some might say that’s because one movie isn’t big for the both of them. After all, there’s a reason why each has coasted to the top of our Movie Monster March Madness bracket, right? But we disagree with the idea that you can’t choose. There should be a clear cut winner in Godzilla vs. Kong, and Den of Geek editors David Crow and Alec Bojalad are ready to go to the mat over who that should be.*

Godzilla Should Win

David Crow: It took several years after the original Ishirō Honda masterpiece, Gojira, was released for it to reach the U.S. When it did, the Western distributors clearly got a lot of things wrong: the awkward inclusion of American actor Raymond Burr; the removal of all direct allusions to the Bikini Atoll nuclear radiation disaster; and not nearly enough mad scientists with eye-patches. But what they got right? The title. It was all right there when the film became an international phenomenon–Godzilla: King of the Monsters! (even the declarative exclamation mark is theirs).

Godzilla might’ve been the second big guy on the scene, but ever since he lit Tokyo up like a Christmas tree, he’s been first in our hearts. From ‘56 to 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters, there’s only been one undisputed reigning titan, and he’s not a gorilla. King Kong is good enough for an island no one’s heard of, I guess. But Godzilla? He’s been the top dog all over the world, and he’s more often used that supremacy to protect all of us from intergalactic aliens and ancient monsters… as opposed to only having eyes for blondes with a healthy set of lungs.

In terms of physicality alone, Godzilla has an advantage in reach that exceeds even his towering height. With nuclear fire breath that can span the length of 15 devastated city blocks, Godzilla should be able to cook Kong before he ever gets down from the Empire State Building.

King Kong Should Win

Alec Bojalad: Who would win in a fight between Godzilla and King Kong? The only possible answer here is the big monke, himself: Kong. 

Do me a favor real quick. Head on over to the Homininae Subfamily Wikipedia page. Take a look at the header photo and let me know what you see. A chimpanzee, a gorilla, and… a human being. Of course we all know that humans and gorillas are closely related, but for the purposes of the monster fight to come, it’s important to see just how closely related we are. To argue that Godzilla has a prayer in a fight against King Kong is to argue that a big dumb lizard could ever triumph over the ingenuity of the human species and our homininae subfamily. 

As one of humanity’s closest cousins, Kong brings so many things to a fight that his scaly counterpart just can’t. Let’s start with the obvious: Kong is strong. Those rippling arm muscles and pectorals of iron aren’t just for show. Kong is also highly intelligent. Observe his use of tools in his many film appearances throughout the years, up to and including his big whooping stick in the Godzilla v. Kong trailer. And if raw strength and intelligence weren’t enough. Kong is highly lithe and nimble. That should prove quite useful in battle against the largely inert Godzilla

Look, I don’t mean to body shame this very chonky lizard. In fact, I admire his dedication to not skipping meals. But when it comes time to face off against a quicker foe, all that raw strength is gonna hold him back. As any boxing fan could tell you: speed beats strength 100 times out of 100. That’s why Kong won during the pair’s 1962 matchup and it’s why he’s going to win again now.

About King Kong vs. Godzilla…

David: Alec, I’m glad you brought up King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962). It’s a solid throwdown between ape and lizard that arguably invented the monster mash-ups we’re still enjoying to this day. All that said, Zilla was ripped off in the movie.

Back in ‘62 , Godzilla was the new kid on the block, and Kong was the legacy pick, with King Kong (1933) being the paterfamilias kaiju movie before Toho Studios made that word a thing. However, they did make it a thing, and Godzilla was already doing monster battles with glorified armadillos in Godzilla Raids Again (1955), back when a “King Kong vs.” movie was still a twinkle in special effects guru Willis O’Brien’s eye. So as the sentimental fan favorite, Kong was basically rigged to win while Zilla was just playing the Heel. But I’m going to let you in on a secret every wrestling fan knows: deep down everyone all prefers the villain.

So yeah, the lizard lost round one, but he took a fall for the good of the genre. Almost every time since then, however, he’s been on the side of the angels (or at least Venus princesses, look it up), protecting us from three headed dragons who’d eat Kong’s lunch.

And saying Godzilla isn’t smart? This is a beast who, in the American MonsterVerse, has been around since the time of Atlantis. Kong is just the youngest in a long line of gorillas while Zilla has the age and wisdom of a god. Underestimate that experience at your own peril. 

Alec: Sure, David, we all enjoy a good villain. But how often do they win? Godzilla’s resume is just L after L. Godzilla lost to Kong in ‘62, he lost to an oxygen destroyer before that in ‘54, and he lost in ‘98 to Matthew Broderick (but to be fair, we all lost with the existence of that movie). And doggone it, he’s going to lose again in 2021. 

Perhaps I shouldn’t have denigrated the beast’s intelligence because I must concede that Zilla is pretty sharp for a lizard. Kong, however, is smarter, more adaptive, intuitive, and quicker in thinking. Godzilla’s nuclear-powered fire breath is certainly formidable to lesser monsters, but Kong is just too elusive for it to prove that big of a threat. Imagine Godzilla’s confusion upon watching Kong simply sidestepping a fire blast. Huh, Ghidorah didn’t do that. Yes, Godzilla, that’s because Ghidorah is very slow. Just like you, I’m afraid.

A Skull Islander or the Savior of the World?

David: First of all, that was not Godzilla in ‘98. It was a stinky-breathed fish-eater from the hacks who got lucky once because of Will Smith. Toho Studios corrected them though when the real Godzilla turned that American monstrosity into a marshmallow in Godzilla: Final Wars (2004).

But if you don’t remember, I can understand since Godzilla has won far more bouts than he’s lost over the years, from American embarrassments, onward. That’s because Zilla has been putting in the work. Ghidorah? A three course meal. Biollante? Fertilizer. Gigan? Who even cares. Mothra, arguably the smartest of all the kaiju, and a celestial creature with the gift of flight and her own cult, more often bows down before Zilla as a friend. Why? Because of respect.

Meanwhile what’s Kong been doing? Hiding like a coward on a rock in the Pacific. If he’s so tough, why didn’t he ever leave Skull Island in the MonsterVerse while Godzilla was busy saving the world? Because he’s scared. He knows pound for pound, he doesn’t have the strength or the cunning of Godzilla. The original Kong was slaughtered by biplanes; Zilla eats jets for breakfast. Filmmakers had to size the new Kong up to even have a ghost of a chance. It won’t save him.

Read more

Movies

Godzilla: First 15 Showa Era Movies Ranked

By Don Kaye

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The Weirdest Godzilla Moments from the Toho Movies

By James Hunt

Alec: There is no doubt that Godzilla’s won more bouts than he’s lost because Godzilla only faces monsters he can defeat. Biollante is literally a plant. What, was Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors not available? Mothra bows before Godzilla? Well, I would too if I were a highly flammable bug. Ghidorah is a solid enough victory, but Ghidorah also doesn’t have Kong’s advantages.

Sure, Kong spends most of his time on Skull Island. You know why? Because he appreciates some gosh darn peace and quiet like the king he is. Kong doesn’t need to prove his mettle by trading fisticuffs with whatever misguided kaiju comes knocking at his door. He’s perfectly happy to spend his days eating comically big bananas and kicking back. Why not outsource the world saving to Godzilla, who seems pathologically obsessed with proving that he’s a big, scary monster whenever he can? Kill all the Ghidorahs and knock down all the buildings you want, dude, it’s not gonna make up for the emptiness inside.

Ultimately, however, I’m confident in a Kong victory over Godzilla for one reason above all. Godzilla has such a glaring physical weakness that it almost feels rude to point out. When things get really heated in this matchup, and the punches start actually flying, what is Godzilla going to do with those itty bitty T. Rex arms? I’ll believe Godzilla has a shot against Kong when I see him raise his arms over his head.

Final Round

David: Don’t worry, Alec. You’ll see him raise them high enough when he stands victorious over Kong’s smoldering corpse. With fire breath like that, his reach far exceeds whatever big rock the wittle bitty ape thinks can save him. And while I cannot see the future, I suspect on March 31 we’ll both see the denizens of Skull Island bow down in awe. They’re about to meet their real god, and this one won’t die on them because of “beauty.”

Alec: Damn, now I almost want Godzilla to win just to watch him try to raise up his baby arms. Sadly we won’t get to see that spectacle. Come March 31, Kong is going to make Godzilla rue the day he ever crawled out of the sea on his belly.

Godzilla vs. Kong opens in theaters and premieres on HBO Max on Wednesday, March 31.

*Editor’s Note: This conversation was recorded before either editor reviewed Godzilla vs. Kong.

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[theloniousbach]

Week 33: Resist/s/urge: An Epilogue

[This entry concludes a weekly series of Facebook posts started as I sought to cope with going on lockdown.  Though we may well be heading back or should be, I have ended the series.  They are no more than ephemeral, but I archive this one as a record of the series.]

My title is meant to mash up “resist surge” and “resists urge” as I bring to an undoubtedly temporary end to this series which I started as we headed into lockdown.  I used it to focus on how I was coping—how as a measure and how as methods.  I shifted the heading every eight weeks as it seemed that we and I were entering new phases.  

We are certainly entering a new “resist surge” phase as we seem to have had almost 100,000 new cases yesterday and deaths over 1,000 the day before and nearly that many yesterday.  Most states are surging as is Europe and Latin America.  So, despite the profound US leadership crisis, the problems are not even primarily of that character.  It is not who is captain of the Titanic but that we are on poorly designed vessel sailing into a sea of icebergs.

It is also odd to suspend this series right as we end a US Presidential Election cycle where this issue is at the center.  But I have easily “resists urge” to write about that.  More challenging to resist is the urge to write about the broader, more fundamental politics underlying it.  I have such opinions and lived them in my 20s and 30s with pride and no regrets.  But this format is far from the avenue for those discussions—and, frankly, dear readers, even the young ones, for those discussions to matter very different social forces will be involved and lead them.

But I felt the series drifting in that direction as I have been settling into personal solutions to the profound challenges are living through.  So, it’s time for a balance sheet and an epilogue for now.  Again, there are new challenges/icebergs on the horizon.

But I started with addressing how I would keep body and soul together with attention, focusing on physical and mental health in the face of stress.  I continued and continue with intermittent fasting and, rather than the pandemic 15, I have continued to get rid of that middle aged gut and my weight is down 3% (rather than up 10%).  I am back in the range I was 30-35 years ago, but I am well aware that I don’t have the body of a 30 year old.  

Still I might be as fit as I have ever been.  From the start, I knew that daily exercise was key—and daily walks had been my prime exercise for year.  They were and are important for getting out of the house.  But I made daily yoga the focus witchin that first month.  I’ve been doing yoga fairly regularly for over 20 years, since I gave up alcohol as part of a detox prompted by getting off Codeine 3 for a long term bout with kidney stones in 1999 that culminated in surgery.  So I know my poses and had been using Yoga with Adrienne once or twice a week for several years.  I ramped it up with her several annual 30 Days of Yoga series working my way through all of them.  Now I’m a subscriber and follow mostly her daily classes.  I have much better muscle tone, posture, and lung capacity.

So, with the body part of body and soul going, I took up soul in parallel.  

I rolled with the punches with work and teaching fairly well, adjusting to the technology and tempo of remote work.  I am productive in ways that I couldn’t/cannot be at the office and feel connected to students and colleagues.  I get enough peopling in.

But, as someone important once said, life begins when this activity ceases, at the table, at the tavern, in bed.  Now the sale of my labor power is complicated and elements of it truly are unalienated and the rest of it is certainly rewarding and meaningful.  But it is alienated in the sense that, at 65 years of age, I can see the day looming when I can choose not to do it.  Life begins when I do the things I doubled down on to keep soul together.

STORIES—At first it was quite hard to concentrate and I could not read anything with a long arc.  So I read the Decameron, a story or two, but no more than three, a day until I had all 100.  It was a story of plague and distraction, so it fit. I also discovered streaming plays at first from the National Theatre of London but soon the Globe and Stratford Festival.  I homed in on Shakespeare, particularly lesser known plays.  That welcome habit has fallen off and I have missed an October series of three Shakespeare plays from a National Theatre partner.  But it is an acquisition that I hope to foster and grow.

I settled back into novels soon enough with mysteries mostly.  Right now, I’m rereading Elsa Hart’s The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne to teach and for a Webster University Book Club with my class and Elsa herself.  Since she is someone I take my beginner’s questions about my retirement project book, it is useful to outline it on this reread as I took my note taking to a deeper, multiple purpose level.  Recently I got caught up in the 1632 universe of alternate history.  There have been several Anna Eliot/Charles Veley Sherlock Holmes/Lucy James pastiche novellas which are also good to study for my own project.  I got back into mysteries by rereading, 35 years on, the Martin Beck series on the occasion of Maj Sjowall’s death.  I also dipped into the Hogarth Shakespeare series to see how modern authors dealt with the very challenging source material of “The Taming of the Shrew” and “The Merchant of Venice” which were part of the theater season.  There were also a couple of Jodi Taylor St. Mary’s/Time Police novels as I keep up on that series.

SCHOLARSHIP—My teaching, an unalienated part of my labor and the part that I will do after retirement from the day job, has been rewarding.  I took Science in the News remote and asynchronous as we locked down.  That worked in the moment as I could make COVID our subject matter (because that what we were all studying anyway) and could think about how the world was testing us far more than I as a teacher could.  So I could relax about some of the mechanics.  I had already built eight weeks of rapport with them, so that helped too.  My current class happens synchronously but largely remotely.  It’s topic—the role of place—has been a way to test some concepts (place as human constructed, therefore rich in history worth studying, and where community happens) that are part of a broader collaboration that may result in a conference.

As we were shutting down, I had made some significant changes to my “last” Edgar Anderson paper for the Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden with Gar Allen’s suggestions.  It received further polishing from the Annals editor and also pal Peter Hoch.  So it is well and truly done, set to appear in the last quarterly paper issue of that renowned journal.  While I have said it’s the “last” Edgar paper, gee, maybe I could write about his collaboration with Pioneer Hi Bred Seed Company and so might see if Agricultural History might want it.

Place and a historical mystery are where my intellectual interests will shift.

MUSIC—The biggest threat of the pandemic is/was the loss of live music.  That very first weekend of lockdown I had the decision to not go taken out of my hands by cancellations of the SF Jazz Collective celebrating Miles Davis’s In a Silent Way and Sly Stone’s Stand at the Sheldon and Joe Russo’s Almost Dead (where I have invested my Deadhead energy as I don’t think I’ll see any original members again, though talk about “resists urge” pressures) at the Pageant.  Those cancellations were sensible and necessary, but gee it would have been hard to make the decision to stay home.  

The pull for live music is that strong.  

But I’ve found it in ways that might even make for more opportunities.Jorma Kaukonen has done two dozen Quarantine Concerts, mostly solo with local friends from his Fur Peace Ranch operation, but Jack Casady came in for two shows in July and is around currently with the third show tonight.  Kaukonen is not only musically formative, but so forthrightly himself that it is comfortable to be with him.  I have similar warm feelings of connection with Larkin Poe who are extending the southern Americana blues roots etc tradition with slide guitar and killer vocals.  They have done various streams, both from their spare bedrooms to empty venues with their band.

The piano has been key and, at first, the recitals under the auspices of the 92nd Street Y and Fred Hersch’s almost 40 Tunes of the Day were the start.  The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the BBC 4/Wigmore Hall collaboration (with the helpful YouTube algorithm kicking in) gave me more choices.  Wigmore Hall is my go to source and through them I have seen Angela Hewitt wrap up her Bach cycle and Andras Schiff dig into the last three Beethoven Piano Sonatas.  I have discovered key parts of the horn repertoire including the Brahms Trio and the Mozart and Beethoven Wind Quintets and some of the clarinet chamber works (watching Gassenheuer for example.  I’ll click on most cello sonatas and ensembles and all piano trios.  There is something about this listening that has paid benefits to my jazz listening, particularly more challenging out there works, as I can hear structural elements better.

Jazz is my go to though and there is a wealth of in real time performances as if we really were in New York and had to choose between the Jazz Gallery (got a membership), the Vanguard (an annoying platform but top drawer stuff), the Blue Note, Smoke, and Small’s (a place to check for up and comers but also, with a contribution, through their archive, people who upped and came on the scene).  I have seen folks I wouldn’t have otherwise—George Cables, last night Oliver Lake/Reggie Workman/Andrew Cyrille, David Murray, Billy Hart with Mark Turner, Kenny Werner, Omer Avital.  It goes on and on.  I have lots of Couch Tour FB Note/Tumblr entries.

I was playing piano lots until we went on vacation, exploring how tunes fit together.  Nothing ready to unplug the headphones even for Ellen, but rewarding.  I have a new tune, “Everything Happens To Me” to understand, so I think that habit is returning.  But I do sit at the piano frequently for my almost weekly discussions with a young singer/songwriter/marching band tuba player about music theory where we explore things together.  They’re free to her and she still may be getting a bad deal but it’s part of keeping my body and SOUL together.  Between her, Jorma, and my own inclination, I do play lots of guitar and that helps too.

But it is WRITING that has been my biggest solace.  I come out of this experience comfortable saying I don’t just like to write and that I have a decent body of published work but I am a writer.  It’s how I live in the world.  It’s how I pin down my musical experiences for example.  

But obviously this series itself about coping with the pandemic is how I have coped with the pandemic.  I treasure that more of you have read these than I would imagine and I do take you all into account somewhat as I write these.  I want them to be organized, appealing, and clear.  But I am a writer and I would do this even if you weren’t here.  But social media means that I’m not Franz Kafka or Emily Dickinson writing to make sense of the world but creating papers that they would just as soon be destroyed.  That said, these are thoroughly ephemeral and this one will be the only one in the series curated in the sense that it’s on my Tumblr.

So, I am a writer who makes sense of the world by writing.  The world will call me to write by being insensible.  Very soon very likely.  But this series has run its course.  So as we resist the surge, I will resist the urge to do the same old thing.

Still I bet I see you soon.