Dancing With Wolves While Thinking About Going To The Academy Awards

Since it is Sunday today, with this Sunday being the last Sunday of the 2nd month of 2013, I took my usual Sunday walk with the Indian Ghosts who haunt Arlington's Village Creek Natural Historical Area.

I was a little surprised to see that the trail obstruction that has been obstructing the Pioneer Trail is still obstructing. I think this obstructing has been going on for around 3 weeks.

Today, looking closer at the "stump" I wondered if this may have been the work of a tomahawk being wielded by one of the Indian Ghosts.

There were a lot of people walking with the Indian Ghosts today. And for the first time I saw one of the big fireplaces being used. What I assumed was a couple of dads with about 10 kids. Hamburgers were the item being barbecued.

Speaking of Indian Ghosts, I think Dances With Wolves was the last time I saw a movie prior to it winning the Academy Award for Best Picture. That was sometime back in the last century.

I used to look forward to the Academy Awards Show. Way back in the last century. Not so much anymore.

The Academy Awards is broadcast live, like the Super Bowl, or the State of the Union Address. With Los Angeles being on the west coast this had the show starting at 5:30, if I remember right, in my old time zone. In this time zone I am currently in, the Academy Awards starts 2 hours later and ends way past my bedtime.

I think the time change may have contributed to my diminished enjoyment of the Academy Awards.

I have been in Los Angeles a few times on the day of the Academy Awards Show.

Way back in the last century I drove my friend, Miss Chris's, Ford Pinto, to California. Along with me and Miss Chris, Miss Maxine and Big Ed were also crammed into the tiny Pinto.

We were camping at San Clemente State Park and on the day of the Academy Awards decided to see how close we could get. It was way easier than I figured it would be. Found a place to park then started off walking to wherever it was the show took place back then. Miss Chris and Miss Maxine got a bit shy, but Big Ed and I climbed over a cyclone fence and found seats in the stands where people sat to watch the incoming celebs.

Seems so bizarre to me, in this post 9/11 era, to remember how lax security was way back in the last century.

The only celebs I remember arriving were the Bridge's family, as in Jeff, Beau and dad Lloyd. I think we got there near the end of the arrivals.

Miss Chris and Miss Maxine got a bit cranky waiting on the other side of the street. Eventually we all made it back to the Pinto. It was now dark and I quickly got a little lost. Eventually I got re-oriented and found my way to Sunset Boulevard where Miss Maxine spotted a Mexican joint she wanted to go to. And so we did, but I remember very little about it.

Tonight's Academy Awards Show's host is Seth McFarlane, the creative genius behind the cartoon called Family Guy. If there was a place to place a bet, I think I'd bet on this not going well...

The Last Sunday Of February On The Red Carpet For The Academy Awards Tonight

I was up late Saturday night, which has me up late looking through the bars of my patio prison cell on this last Sunday morning of the second month of 2012.

Stepping outside was a bit bracing this morning. According to my computer based temperature monitoring device the outer world at my location is currently being chilled to 40 degrees.

Four mornings from this morning March is scheduled to roar in like a lion. Whatever that means.

Tonight is the Academy Awards Show. I can not remember the last time I made it through an entire Academy Awards Show or found it fun to watch. Last year's show was unbearably bad with unbearably bad hosts. I think I made it through less than an hour. I have no idea who the likely unbearably bad host is this year, which is indicative of how far the Academy Awards have fallen off my radar screen.

I only know of a few of the movies that have gotten award type attention this year. One of them, The Descendants, I only know about because I know one of the actresses in it, an actress I went skinny dipping with a long long time ago. The actress I went skinny dipping with is not up for an Academy Award tonight.

Speaking of the Academy Awards, I do not know if I am up to going to the Red Carpet Oscar Party at the Fort Worth Modern Art Museum tonight. Elsie Hotpepper and I are scheduled to go as Margaret Thatcher and Brad Pitt, but after last night's exhausting Party in Fort Worth at Fort Worth's private party club, the Fort Worth Convention Center, where I was the pirate Blackbeard and Elsie Hotpepper was my wench, the idea of going to another party so soon after last night's does not seem appealing to me at this particular point in time.

I wish I could say I am going swimming now, but I can't, it is too cold.

A Windy Morning On The Last Day Of February In Texas

As you can see, looking out my viewing portal on the world, the last day of the second month of 2011 has dawned windy.

Very windy.

I only lasted about an hour watching last night's Academy Awards Show. I made it through the wobbly part with Kirk Douglas and turned off the TV soon after James Franco turned into Marilyn Monroe.

The Grammy Awards and Emmy Awards used to be way more boring than the Academy Awards. But, the Grammys and the Emmys have improved, particularly the Grammys.

The Oscar show is a real snoozefest for me anymore.

It is under 50 this morning, as in, 46. I have learned to attempt swimming only when the 24 hour average is 50 or above. We got in the 70s yesterday. I'm guessing the average over the past 24 hours has been above 50. I'll let you know how the swimming attempt went later.

The Last Sunday Of February With The Academy Awards Tonight

The last Sunday of the second month of 2011 has dawned at a balmy temperature of 65.

You can not tell from the picture looking through the bars of my patio prison cell that it is cloudy. I do not know this portends for rain to be falling today.

Tonight the Academy Awards start up at 7, I think, on ABC. I pretty much lost interest in the Academy Awards show by the time I moved to Texas.

The Academy Awards used to be sort of like watching living history, with stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood in attendance. In 2011 most of the stars from the Golden Age of Hollywood are no longer glittering.

James Franco and Anne Hathaway are the hosts tonight. I like James Franco. I don't know that I've ever seen an Anne Hathaway movie. When someone like Bob Hope was the host it somehow lent more stature to the proceedings. Maybe that was just my youthful perception.

The Academy Awards is not time delayed. So, in my current location the show starts up at 7. In Washington it started up at 5. Starting at 7 puts the way too long show's ending past my bedtime. Very inconvenient. I'll likely watch The Amazing Race while the DVR records the Academy Awards. And then fast forward through the Academy Awards til I get caught up to it being live.

And then go to bed.

In the meantime I am going swimming.

Today Is Sunday In Texas

Another blue sky Sunday here in North Texas. Things green seem to be springing to life. Soon Texas will turn colorful for a month or two with the sprouting of wildflowers. And then it'll turn brown, for the most part.

Tonight is Academy Awards night. Last year I think I lasted less than a half hour before turning off the TV. I've not gone to a movie in a theater in this century.

The Academy Awards used to seem sort of like living history with all sorts of famous movie stars from as far back as the 1920s, alive and on display in their elderly form.

Only a few of the Hollywood Stars of Old are still alive. Mickey Rooney, Elizabeth Taylor, Debbie Reynolds, I can think of no others. I'm sure there must be some.

You know you're getting old when Warren Beatty and Clint Eastwood get Lifetime Achievement Awards.

And tonight they are giving the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award to Jerry Lewis. I read this morning that those humorless, clueless French still think Jerry Lewis is a comedic genius. That's troubling.

Speaking of Humanitarian Awards, this morning I got an interesting, empathetic email from someone in Tacoma who, apparently, has been reading my blog ever since I was up in Tacoma and who has been, and is, appalled by the childish rantings of a fellow Tacomaite and amused by my ongoing attempts to make sense of what I've come to understand was/is very difficult to understand behavior. I had no idea, til this person told me, that the party in question, previously, had me up on a pedestal and referred to me as her second husband. Just typing that sent a chilling shudder down my spine.

I've not read any of the ranting in awhile, the last instance was pretty funny and so embarrassingly self-revealing, making clear, for any and all to see, what I meant by toxic madness.

The funniest part of that particular ranting was a line, something like, the party in question "had been warned that it would end badly if she allowed me back into her life." Now, I long ago understood that this particular person creates her own alternative reality, that bears little relationship to truth. I love the idea that she lets people into or out of "her life," as if it is some sort of Theme Park one gains admission to.

The reality is, it has always been her behavior that causes things to "end badly." The time previous to the final instance was way back in the 1990s, at Sunriver, when I'd had enough of her lack of impulse control causing multiple temper tantrums. By the time I moved to Texas we were on friendly terms again. I remember returning in 2000 and being confused as to why there had been a move to Tacoma, but I didn't ask and didn't learn why til a couple years later.

By 2003, or so, this person had pretty much faded from my consciousness. Then I got a call from my brother. A friend of his, who knew I knew the party in question, had been unable to reach her. I called the number, I had, to find it'd been disconnected. I contacted a mutual friend, in Bellingham, who told me there had been some trouble, that I'd have to find out the details elsewhere. But, she gave me a phone number.

So, I called and told the person, who was warned "not to let me back in her life because it would end badly," that Miss X was trying to get in contact with her. The person who runs her life like a Theme Park and I exchanged pleasantries. And then I got off the phone. I did not realize, at the time, that my calling had given her my cell phone number.

So, with that cell number, the calls began. Soon the calls came daily. I have no idea at what point in time I was granted admission to this person's Fabulous Life. I do know I flew up there in February of 2004 and this was the first time in years I'd physically been in this person's Fabulous Life. I was back again, for a month, in August of 2004. That time I really was deep into that Fabulous Life, staying the month in her apartment building. That was actually fun.

I returned again in November of 2004, 3 flights up to Seattle in one year. I did not like that. I was up there again in, I think, October of 2005 and then again in April of 2006. On that visit I house sat for the person who now villifies me, while she and her first husband went to Mexico.

My next return was July 20 this past summer, for an entire hellish month that ended August 20. The person who now says she has divorced me (again, shudder) had convinced herself that I was moving back to Washington, at least part time, to do flea markets with her. The concept had been discussed, but not seriously, by me. The person who now villifies me, in stereotypical Only Child Syndrome fashion, did not take it well when I said I was returning to Texas and that no, I did not think I was interested in a flea market career. Though it had been sort of fun helping out with several of those, 3 times at the Fremont Sunday Market, once at Art in the Park and one really boring one in Lacey, called the Saturday Market.

Of course, me good-naturedly doing these flea markets, drivng all over, making magnets and even washing dishes and cleaning a filthy kitchen floor is totally forgotten when some minor thing upsets the Only Child, causing a fit to be pitched with a temper tantrum. Which, with the perspective of time and space, makes it all seem pretty funny, with such a high level of groundless acrimony on display. It was I who had valid reason to be righteously offended and upset.

The biggest irony is it was actually I who let this person back into my life. And I actually did have someone remind me of how difficult she was. But, I've always found her very amusing and I figured she was older, maybe the hormonal rages no longer happened. I knew she'd been in therapy and was taking mood altering medications, all of which made me think the temper tantrums were a thing of the past.

I was wrong.

Everything had gotten worse. I don't think I was ever able to get my balance back from the shock of my second day in Tacoma last summer, when seeing the party in question, for the first time in over 2 years, to see that she'd at least doubled in size. I don't know if I was able to keep an unshocked looking expression on my face. I do remember that upon seeing me she told me I looked sickly and gaunt! I probably did. I felt like throwing up.

The Academy Awards, Car Wrecks & Iraq

Well, Little Miss Lulu called early this morning. Just as I predicted yesterday she did not watch the Academy Awards except for seeing a bit of it on a TV in a bar in Tacoma called Tempest that caters to mostly a female clientele that Lulu and her husband frequent. I've been to this place once with Lulu and some of her friends. I'd never seen a restroom with so many photos of Marilyn Monroe.

So, last night I made a bowl of popcorn and tried to watch the Oscar show. I don't care for Jon Stewart so that was strike one right there. That show has just become tedious to me. And almost as bizarre as the Super Bowl in how such a fuss is made as if it is something significant if someone wins or doesn't win. It all seems so pompous. I used to like watching it when I lived on the west coast because it came on at 5:30 and was done by 9 or so. And since it is a live broadcast odd things used to happen. Like streaking. But it's been sterile for years now.

The show used to seem sort of like living history. There'd be all these Stars who were Big Stars, but one by one they've mostly died off leaving only a few remaining. And they are old. I think Paul Newman is in his 80s now. I don't know if Elizabeth Taylor still walks. I don't know if Debbie Reynolds can stay out of her wine long enough to attend a long, nighttime event.

Yesterday afternoon I went over to see the Puerto Rican Illegal Alien I've mentioned before. She'd had a stressful week and had left me a couple voice mails. So by mid-afternoon she was self-medicating a bit and somehow spilled a huge glass of spiked water and ice on me. Part of this week's drama was her 15 year old nephew in El Paso had stolen his mother's brand new car and took it for a 2 block joyride when he had a wreck and totaled the car. The kid was not hurt.

The father of the kid is the brother of the Puerto Rican, he is stationed in Iraq. The kid claimed he took the car because he misses his dad so much. I don't quite see the connection. The dad had already been injured once in Iraq, was sent to Germany to recover. That's where the family was stationed. Then the army decided to move them back to the U.S., to El Paso. And then Bush's surge happened and despite being told he would not be sent back to Iraq he got shipped back last August.

My friend up in OK who is moving back to WA who set her property on fire last week also has a kid in Iraq. He is only 25, married, with 3 kids. He was shipped to Iraq with the 3rd kid on the way and has been back for two weeks to see the kid after it arrived. I forget how it was that he ended up in Iraq, it was like he was supposed to be in some officer's training deal, and then he got told it'd look good if he did a tour of active duty during a war and that it'd only be 6 months. But somehow that turned into 15 months. How can they/we send a kid with 3 kids to a war that should never have happened?

Bush should do a tour in Iraq or Afghaniststan when his current job ends. It'd be good for the boy. No one should ever get to send anyone to war who has not been in a war. Or in the military for that matter. Bush's military experience apparently consists of having watched Patton and The Longest day a number of times.

And the Oscar Goes to Lulu

Long ago I used to enjoy watching the Academy Awards Show. I can't remember the last time I made it through the whole thing. Certainly not since I've been in Texas because it starts at 7:30 here and runs til almost midnight, well past my bedtime.

I think the last movie I've been to that may have won an Academy Award was Gladiator, I think that is what it was called. Russell Crowe fought Romans. I saw it in the restored Cinerama in Seattle. Paul Allen had a fondness for a landmark Seattle theater and so he bought it and restored it to its former retro glory. I remember the theater more than I remember the movie.

Lulu, you remember Lulu, I'm sure, all you who religiously read every word of my blog, well Lulu went to the grand re-opening of the Cinerama. Her first husband was there doing photographer duty. Lulu found herself talking to a disheveled looking guy. The guy introduced himself, but Lulu had no clue who Paul Allen was. She was just along for the ride. And the free food. So, Lulu goes over to tell her husband that that guy she'd been talking to had invited them to another party, after this one is done, at that EMP thing by the Space Needle. It was then that her husband, let's call him Geff, told Lulu that she'd been talking to Paul Allen. Yes, I know that, Lulu replied, to which Geff informed Lulu that Paul Allen is the Microsoft billionaire who bought the Cinerama and built the EMP (Experience Music Project). Apparently Paul Allen was quite charmed by Lulu's cluelessness and gave her a private tour of the EMP.

As you can see, Lulu is not the most culturally aware person on the planet. Which means, quite obviously, that she will not be watching the Academy Awards tonight. Lulu has a history of encounters with well-known people who she knows nothing about. She had a store in Tacoma called Frona & Zigz. It was a cool store with cool stuff in a cool part of town. A band called U2 was in town to play at the Tacoma Dome. Members of the band somehow found Lulu's store. One of the members of the band bought a vintage bicycle. When the band members left the store one of Lulu's customers came up to her and said something like "I can't believe you were talking to Bono all that time and weren't acting excited." "Bono?" Lulu asked. "Yes, the lead singer for U2". "U2? What's U2?" I do not know if all these years later Lulu has yet bothered to learn what U2 is or who Bono is.