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The light in the bathroom has been on and off since we moved in, although since there were three separate lights within the fixture we've almost always had some light. The other night, though, the last light refused to come on. (Then, of course, the next time we flipped the switch it did, and has worked fine since, but I guess that's the way with dying ballasts in halogen lights.) I called the property management office yesterday to ask if they would mind if we bought a new ceiling light for the bathroom and they could get it installed, and they called back to say that they already had a fixture they would install. This wasn't quite to my liking, because we'd spent hours deciding which fixture we would use to replace the one which is there - ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
eor actually has rather specific parameters of what he wants in the bathroom. But it seems we have no choice. And they'll put regular bulbs in it and we'll replace them with fluorescents and have yet more 'working' bulbs lying around waiting to get broken.
I did manage to get ahold of the District Worker's Compensation office yesterday - they sent me a letter which seemed to indicate they are considering denying my claim because they don't have a dr.'s report, and I have only until the end of October to rectify this. I was sure my doctor had written a report, so I called her office, but the person I need to talk to about it wasn't in, yesterday. Hopefully I'll get a call back, today. I haven't yet called the Maine Worker's Comp Commission - I'm not sure I have any faith that a State entity will prevail against the Fed, anyway.
This morning I had to finish Fortress of Solitude. (Jonathan Lethem)
Two notes, before I go into the detail -
First, I did misrepresent the story by saying that the boys get to give each other a hand job. They then proceed to continue that way for like three years or something like that, and the main character, Dylan, never gets over being obsessively in love with Mingus, and there is at least one scene near the end which gets partly hidden from the viewer where they spend a night talking. So there might be space for fanfic.
Second: Remember the old party conversation starter, "Which would you prefer as a superhero power - flight or invisibility?" This book seems to have sprung from a careful consideration of that question. The same ring confers both flight and invisibility and sometimes breathing underwater and sheer luck, but it's a fickle ring. It might or might not confer something that will help the person.
, because I was in the last fifty pages last night and this book was freaking KILLING me. I liked it, but... it's not an easy read in a lot of ways. He uses a thick, poetical style of putting words together and goes deeply into all the different things going on in his characters minds and all sorts of reverberating associations with different aspects of culture. (Almost always, when you're reading books or watching movies set in the recent past and there's much about the surrounding culture brought in you notice the flaws, because you actually do remember this time period, but I noticed no flaws with his world as described.) And then he does this thing where you are thinking something is about to happen, everything is this pregnant pause of careening daily events which MUST be leading up to something... and then you just sort of segue into the next sequence of anticipation.
The hardest thing, though, is that the end is not really and 'end' and the point of the 500+ pages has to do with appreciating things for their flaws and impermanence. It sounds depressing, but it doesn't need to be. Damn it, I'm writing things and erasing them like mad, here, you can't even know the kind of spewing of words I'm doing and then disappearing and rearranging because I realize they're not going anywhere toward explaining what I'm thinking.
It's actually kind of similar to how I felt when we walked out of watching "A Prairie Home Companion" - I think I was the only one who really liked the movie. I usually run away from anything depressing, but at the same time that's because I've got this core of really worrying about things like this and needing to put them in some context, and I just don't think that angst and depression should be treated as light entertainment. It's something to think about.
Now I'm going to leave some spoiler space for those who might want to actually read the book without knowing the end.... I know sometimes I'm lured by the end and want to read a book to find out how they get there.
Mingus, at the end, has spent years in and out of prison and it looks like his life is just going to dwindle away like that. Dylan manages to break into the prison and spend one night talking to him through the bars before the end of the book. The veil is drawn over exactly what they say, but it's implied that Dylan comes away from it understanding how much Mingus protected him. But in the end Mingus had to run away from life and be either a drug addict or in prison partly because he felt he couldn't live up to Dylan's expectations and couldn't protect Dylan in his naivete forever. Or at least that was how I understood it.
Shoot. Now it's time for the woman from the doctors office to call back. Any time in the next two hours. And I haven't gone to the gym. Again, today. Damn it. And I'm starving. Oh yeah, two cups of tea and a book do NOT breakfast make.
eor actually has rather specific parameters of what he wants in the bathroom. But it seems we have no choice. And they'll put regular bulbs in it and we'll replace them with fluorescents and have yet more 'working' bulbs lying around waiting to get broken. I did manage to get ahold of the District Worker's Compensation office yesterday - they sent me a letter which seemed to indicate they are considering denying my claim because they don't have a dr.'s report, and I have only until the end of October to rectify this. I was sure my doctor had written a report, so I called her office, but the person I need to talk to about it wasn't in, yesterday. Hopefully I'll get a call back, today. I haven't yet called the Maine Worker's Comp Commission - I'm not sure I have any faith that a State entity will prevail against the Fed, anyway.
This morning I had to finish Fortress of Solitude. (Jonathan Lethem)
Two notes, before I go into the detail -
First, I did misrepresent the story by saying that the boys get to give each other a hand job. They then proceed to continue that way for like three years or something like that, and the main character, Dylan, never gets over being obsessively in love with Mingus, and there is at least one scene near the end which gets partly hidden from the viewer where they spend a night talking. So there might be space for fanfic.
Second: Remember the old party conversation starter, "Which would you prefer as a superhero power - flight or invisibility?" This book seems to have sprung from a careful consideration of that question. The same ring confers both flight and invisibility and sometimes breathing underwater and sheer luck, but it's a fickle ring. It might or might not confer something that will help the person.
, because I was in the last fifty pages last night and this book was freaking KILLING me. I liked it, but... it's not an easy read in a lot of ways. He uses a thick, poetical style of putting words together and goes deeply into all the different things going on in his characters minds and all sorts of reverberating associations with different aspects of culture. (Almost always, when you're reading books or watching movies set in the recent past and there's much about the surrounding culture brought in you notice the flaws, because you actually do remember this time period, but I noticed no flaws with his world as described.) And then he does this thing where you are thinking something is about to happen, everything is this pregnant pause of careening daily events which MUST be leading up to something... and then you just sort of segue into the next sequence of anticipation.
The hardest thing, though, is that the end is not really and 'end' and the point of the 500+ pages has to do with appreciating things for their flaws and impermanence. It sounds depressing, but it doesn't need to be. Damn it, I'm writing things and erasing them like mad, here, you can't even know the kind of spewing of words I'm doing and then disappearing and rearranging because I realize they're not going anywhere toward explaining what I'm thinking.
It's actually kind of similar to how I felt when we walked out of watching "A Prairie Home Companion" - I think I was the only one who really liked the movie. I usually run away from anything depressing, but at the same time that's because I've got this core of really worrying about things like this and needing to put them in some context, and I just don't think that angst and depression should be treated as light entertainment. It's something to think about.
Now I'm going to leave some spoiler space for those who might want to actually read the book without knowing the end.... I know sometimes I'm lured by the end and want to read a book to find out how they get there.
Mingus, at the end, has spent years in and out of prison and it looks like his life is just going to dwindle away like that. Dylan manages to break into the prison and spend one night talking to him through the bars before the end of the book. The veil is drawn over exactly what they say, but it's implied that Dylan comes away from it understanding how much Mingus protected him. But in the end Mingus had to run away from life and be either a drug addict or in prison partly because he felt he couldn't live up to Dylan's expectations and couldn't protect Dylan in his naivete forever. Or at least that was how I understood it.
Shoot. Now it's time for the woman from the doctors office to call back. Any time in the next two hours. And I haven't gone to the gym. Again, today. Damn it. And I'm starving. Oh yeah, two cups of tea and a book do NOT breakfast make.