the daily grind

I'm spending my days these days working on the writing of short fiction. This is extremely hard work that takes a tremendous amount of time, doesn't offer much hope of reward, and often feels silly and self-indulgent.

I'm reminded of that admonition to be careful what you wish for.

The daily life I lead these days would have seemed a dream to me in the past: Oh, The luxury to do nothing but write! The joy of creating stories!

Ha.

Rainy Dream Cruise

BB and I have been in our new house for a little more than a year now - a fact I was reminded of by The Woodward Dream Cruise. This is a classic car event that takes place each August along Woodward Avenue through Detroit's northern suburbs.

I'd heard of it, but never actually see it or paid it much attention, and so last year, being unaware of how crowded and crazy it can be, I actually tried to go to a grocery store ON Woodward. Big mistake! There was nowhere to park and I was stuck in traffic for an hour.

This year, I knew better. BB and I took a side street to a Woodward Ave. coffeeshop, parked behind it, and got a great seat at a table by the window. It was fun to just sit and watch it all go by for awhile, but a shame it was so rainy and grey.

This was the view from our coffeeshop window this morning:

The parking lot behind the coffeeshop:
A lot of Detroiters complain about the Cruise - especially those who live around here. It does cause an awful lot of congestion and inconvenience. It's technically a one day event, but cars start cruising and viewers start viewing a week or more in advance.
If you live in our neighborhood I think it's expected that you'll dread the Cruise, but I had fun observing the little bit of it that I did. It certainly is festive and fun and the kind of thing you'd expect to find happening in the Motor City.

Trailer or Preview?

Do you remember when movie trailers were called previews? I sure do. And I don't understand why we made the switch. "Preview" makes much more sense since it is, indeed, a pre view of a movie. And trailers don't follow behind movies, so why call them that?

By doing a little investigation (which means I looked it up on Wikipedia) I learned that ads for new movies did originally follow the main feature. But this practice didn't last long since most movie patrons left the theater before the trailers were over.

But even after they began being shown before the movie, they were still called trailers - by the movie industry. I think it's just us peasants who called them previews. Or if we were being really formal we might have referred to them as the "coming attractions. "

Now everyone uses the term trailer, which I think is too bad. But, whatever they're called, I enjoy them. And I love that you can find so many of them on You Tube these days.  Here's one of my favorites:

Inception

I went to see the movie Inception because I thought it would be interesting and visually compelling, but it turned out to be one of the most boring movies I have ever seen.

I feel like I was duped. Swayed by the hype. I was led to believe that this movie would be something special, but it's just another action flick with LOTS of explosions, shooting guns, and chase scenes.

I was so bored I wished I was at home doing laundry.

What a waste of movie making technology. I couldn't even appreciate the special effects because I wasn't drawn into the story and didn't care about the characters. The premise was too far-fetched and implausible for me to be able to "suspend" my disbelief.

2010 Festie Moments

The weather at this year's Michigan Womyn's Music Festival was especially hot and humid, but the mood was as joyous and inspirational as ever. As usual, the music was great, the food was delicious, the sights were delightful, and I had my fair share of "festie moments." My only regret is that I didn't take more photos, but here's a few of my favorites:

The 35th anniversary quilt. I thought it was one of the best ever.

A quilt is made each year at the festival

and raffled off to a lucky winner.

These are some of the breast casts done at the breast- casting

workshop - an interesting workshop to observe!

Hula-hooping has become popular at fest,

especially for the "Gaia Girls"

My favorite festie moments from Mich Fest 2010:

• The 35th anniversary fireworks on Friday night
• Meeting the woman who sang in the movie Winter's Bone
• Handing out ice to women dancing in the sun
• The sound of women howling