I have been working on the final Island sequence. The Island sequence required more research than any other sequence. Fortunately, we live in a researcher’s paradise.
Towards the end of the sequence, Wall gets his hand chopped off. Not having had this happen to me or anyone I kow, I really did not know how to write about it. How far would his arterial bleed spray? How long could he stay on his feet before he passed out?
A little bit of research turned me on to this great little website called Writing Realistic Injuries. It let me calculate just what Wall’s physical condition would be as a he lost more and more blood. I also liked Writing Injuries, which has nothing to do with carpal tunnel or paper cuts. I even found a site for writers that catalogs emotional wounds in detail.
There are a tremendous number of online resources for writers. I recently came across Stack Exchange for Writers, which is a Q and A board. It is a place for writers to share their knowledge and experience. It features a wide range of questions. One appropriate to my story was “Are there situations where it makes sense to tell a character’s plan even if it is going to fail?” I do this all the time in the story, as their elaborate plans often fail in elaborately spectacular ways. Knowing how much work went into a plan makes its failure seem even bigger. One person on the site wrote that a writer mentor had told him you only tell the reader a character’s plan if it is going to fail. Watching the plan fall apart increases the dramatic tension. If a plan is going to succeed, you describe it as it happens. Otherwise, you are describing the plan twice, which is redundant. I agree completely. It goes into much deeper discussion on the topic, but you get the drift. Useful stuff.
There are a lot of very specialized resources for writers online, even on very obscure topics. Seek and ye shall find.
What’s Going on With Us?
Covid numbers are dropping despite this new even more contagious variation, BA.5. We still go out masked, as recent research has shown that while people with Fibromyalgia are no more susceptible to catching it than anyone else, the outcomes if you do catch it tend to be significantly worse, even if fully vaxed, which I am. I will continue to err on the side of safety.
We do movie night on Wednesdays and try and have a friend over. It is often science fiction. Last week was the truly terrible Jurassic World: Dominion. I think this week’s movie helped get the bad taste of that out of our mouths. We saw the amazing Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. It combines martial arts and science fiction and humor very effectively.
It was directed by Daniels, which is the combo of Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert., who also wrote the script. It has an exceptional cast headed by the wonderful Michelle Yeoh, who first came on my radar with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and became much better known in the U.S. with her appearance in the Bond film, Tomorrow Never Dies. She works all the time, and pops-up frequently in science fiction, including Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, a regular role on Star Trek: Discovery, and she will be in the upcoming Avatar movie. She got her start in Hong Kong martial arts films, and she still has the moves in this movie, despite being nearly my age. She is incredible and her performance here is complex, nuanced, and award worthy.
I think describing the plot does it a disservice, other than to say it is about the metaverse and the infinity of lives every person lives, in this case, all at the same time. They pull it off, and you are in for things you have never seen before in a movie (I am looking at you, hot dog fingers). It has the kind of innovation that took me back to how I felt when I saw The Matrix for the first time, another incredibly innovative film that also took inspiration from Hong Kong martial arts films. There are also quite a few laugh out loud moments. If you are into science fiction like me, you need to see it.
We also just binge watched Severance on Apple TV. We certainly have a wealth of great science fiction movies and shows available these days! (Well, except on network television, which is a desert oasis). This series is about workers who get an implant so that their work lives and home lives are completely separate, including their memories of them. Their unremembered work life is strange and incomprehensible.
Many of the episodes are directed by Ben Stiller. The cast is amazing. Maybe beyond amazing. It stars Adam Scott, who was so fun as a demon in The Good Place, the complete opposite of his role as Ben in Parks and Recreation. The supporting cast is a dream ensemble. John Turturo and Christopher Walken play two workers seeking friendship and maybe more from each other. Patricia Arquette is the menacing boss. Dichen Lachman plays a mysterious mental health care worker. She came up on my radar with her excellent work in the science fiction series Doll House. If you have not seen it, binge watch it. It holds up and was way too prematurely canceled. It and Severance will hold up better than Jurassic World: Dominion, which Dichen is also in. Britt Lower plays the new worker. She’s done a lot of television and her work here should bring her additional positive attention. I first noticed Zack Cherry when he played the vlogger Klev in Spider-Man: Homecoming. He brings the perfect comedic touch to Dylan, another of the workers. These are the main actors but it is a top notch cast top to bottom. Also, don’t skip through the opening credits. Watch it if you can.
Our new cat Lily has a lot of problems with her health. We just got her from the pound. I am happy that we chose her, as the pound was filled with young families, many of whom I would guess would have found this cat too big a financial burden. That would have been heartbreaking for them. Happily, we are in a good financial place now and can afford her medical bills. Not that long ago during harder times we would not have been able to.
She did not look particularly healthy when we got her. We have a habit of going to get a kitten and coming home with the cat who really needs us. She was unbelievably skinny. I think the problem was that she had an infected gum and all she was fed was kibble, which was hard for her to eat. She has been on wet food for many days now, and antibiotics have knocked down the gum infection. She has some other weird infection that the drugs should knock out in another week.
Unfortunately, she also has an incurable, although not fatal, disease: Feline viral rhinotracheitis. It is more commonly known as Feline Herpes, and it uis very common in cats, much like the human form is common in humans. It is not transferable to humans. You have to watch for outbreaks that can lead to upper respiratory problems and eye infections. Can she infect the other cat? Yes, she will be infectious during outbreaks. All we can do is our best to keep a close eye on her health.
We also have to deal with her video game addiction. It started innocently enough. She has been separated from the other cat and limited to the office areas of the house. In my office I have a 43 inch 4k monitor for my computer mounted on the wall above the desk. When we played a bird video for cats, I thought she was going to leap through screen. After looking behind the TV, she sat on the desk and just watched.
She is not that interested when most things are on TV. However, when we played a walkthrough of the popular summer release of Stray, a videogame where you play a stray cat in a humanless and decaying cyber city, she sat up and watched intently. Her head followed every move of the on-screen digital cat. She was totally engrossed by it, more so than the bird videos. I got bored with it before she did. Not that the game is boring, but this was not interactive. The game itself looks pretty amazing, different, and wildly imaginative. Sales of the game also help raise money for animal shelters.
