Dreamed of being wafted through the wind like a fallen leaf; landing in Zurich on the way to Russia; reflecting on Switzerland's mixed record on Holocaust refugees in World War II. (Many kept their heads low and survived, but some were deported to certain death.)
The night before I'd dreamed of seeing an incomplete print of a silent movie titled Year of the Swan, with a scene of a woman landing at a country estate in a biplane.
Saw Zhang Yimou's Curse of the Golden Flower at the Cumberland with Puitak and Gordon. Colourful but thin drama, best for the action scenes.
Dreamed of remembering to tell Moira that before seeing the Met Opera cinemacast Tan Dun: The First Emperor, three weeks from now, there's an account of his life she can read in Larry Gonick's Cartoon History of the Universe. (Which there is.)
Finally got that big Ebay comics package mailed out to Carlos in Barcelona. (He bought the Little Orphan Annie and Abbie an' Slats packages, as well as half my On Stage strips after they didn't sell.) He's open to trading Steve Canyon and Li'l Abner.
Went to the Royal Ontario Museum exhibit of Italian design in the 20th century. (They had Giuseppe Pellizza da Volpedo's "The Fourth Estate," the picture of the peasant crowd they showed behind the opening credits of 1900!) It's the first time I've used my new ROM membership.
On the "Let them eat cake" quote attributed to her: "I would never say that!"--Marie Antoinette
Dreamed of a young king who made himself popular by buying up a whole lot of 78 RPM records and giving them away to a crowd of teenage girls; a children's book with a story by horror writer HP Lovecraft(!); saying that in my PhD thesis I left out a lot that could have been added, which Marco Polo said at the end of his memoir.
Went shopping. (Someone took our cart while we were in the checkout!)
Dinner was Chinese food. (My fortune said "You will inherit a large sum of money." A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.)
Saw Sofia Coppola's curious Marie Antoinette at the Regent. Kirsten Dunst shamelessly played herself, and darned if she didn't pull it off! I can somehow believe that Versailles was like high school. (If you ask me, MA was a scapegoat.) Something about Steve Coogan always makes me smile.
Dreamed of making a speech appealing to the NDP and the Greens to form an electoral alliance, referring to the song in the musical Oklahoma! that goes "The farmer and the cowboy should be friends"; looking out my window after "waking up" and seeing a view of the Glasgow neighbourhood we lived in for about a year in the late 1980s.
Went to a Classical Music Lovers Meetup. Mary and I attended a concert by classical singers, including Margaret, at the Heliconian Club Hall.
John and Kathrine brought over another vegan dinner. After a while I sneaked out to KFC again.
Baked gingerbread for the book club Christmas party.
Dinner was McDonald's.
Went to the book club Christmas party. Unfortunately, it was at 954 Logan Ave. but I thought the number was 454, so I had to go home again to check, and I was an hour and a half late. The worst thing about it was that I'd told the other people in my group that it was at 454! (I hope that not too many others tried to come...)
"If you have a mother for a friend you don't need any enemies"--Dad
Dreamed of my siblings and a group of other people reading my collection of Classics Illustrated comic books; telling Father that I wanted to return to Toronto from our old home in Sackville, N.B. stamping my feet and saying "We've been here a month! I'm getting bored!" [I've had this dream several times]; seeing newly planted flowers growing all over the lawn of our Sackville house.
Baked rye bread. (I had to go out and buy yeast.)
Went to the Sheppard-Grande Cineplex to buy a ticket to the opera I Puritani, but the place wasn't open yet.
Finished William Wharton's Dad. Quite believable.
Dinner was salmon.
My Coro Verdi choir had its Christmas concert. Leonard couldn't make it so the bassi were undermanned.
Sold my Prince Valiant, Abbie an' Slats and Pogo packages on Ebay. (Pogo sold soon after I'd posted it.) But Steve Canyon again failed to sell, so I've given up on that one.
Dreamed of the upcoming last episodes of The Sopranos, being a mystery thriller where the rest of Tony's family finds out who killed Adrianna [it was Tony], set near our cottage near my old home in Sackville, N.B.
Dinner was spaghetti.
At choir practice we went through the whole Christmas concert program again, and this time I had my music!
Four of my Ebay comics packages didn't sell. But at least I sold the Little Orphan Annie and They'll Do It Every Time lots.
The grandfather's fantasy world in William Wharton's Dad, where he imagines if he'd stayed in New Jersey, reminds me of my frequent dreams where I'm still in Sackville.
The choir performed a Sunday morning mass at Villa Colombo. (I had to get up earlier than usual.) I had a movie at the Cinematheque at 13:00, and only got there in time because Leonard drove me to St. Clair Avenue, then Father drove me to the Art Gallery of Ontario. (I had to go home in between because I'd forgotten to take my ticket with me!)
That movie was Roberto Rossellini's The Messiah. As it was, I only saw half of it because I felt sleepy. (Afterward I went to the Paramount and bought tickets for three of the New York operas they're showing on HDTV there.)
Dinner was roast pork.
Saw a DVD of some episodes of This Is Your Life, with celebrities like Johnny Cash and Jane Mansfield. On the smarmy side.
"Don't you get tired of always being right?"--The Rise of Louis XIV
Dreamed of a show with Kevin Spacey, being put on in an actual small building in my hometown of Sackville, N.B., where they used to have the Busy Bee Kindergarten; sneaking into the backstage area and getting out just as Spacey and others were coming in; a homicide case where a woman fired a gun at another woman standing next to her, except that it was a virtual-reality game gun that couldn't really hurt you, except that the latter was so close that she was killed by an empty shell(!), while a man a distance away thought the gun was real and shot the first woman dead before he realized he was never in danger; fleeing the law.
The parents and I went to the Cumberland to see Nicholas Hytner's movie of Alan Bennett's play The History Boys. (I would have liked a bit more history in it.) Afterward we ate at Pizza Hut again. The parents had a pizza and I had spaghetti.
Then I went to the Queen Mother and met Enoch for an Opera Lovers Meetup. But I had to leave early for a movie.
Saw Roberto Rossellini's The Rise of Louis XIV, which left me wondering "What happened next?"
Baked multigrain bread overnight. (I would have baked whole wheat, but I'd forgotten that we'd run out of that flour.)
Dreamed of being stranded overnight in a Moncton subway station(?) so dark that I couldn't see the time on my watch; being in a dance class and learning a dance where you do a shuffle and trace the letter "T" over and over as the music faces out; the Art Linkletter illustrated encyclopedia (which we had when I was young) in a reprint(?); theorizing that Mary Magdalen is a composite of women Jesus met.
Didn't get out of bed till about 13:00.
The parents and I were going to see the movie The History Boys, but we drove to the Bayview, ran into slow traffic on the 401 highway, and didn't get there in time. (I would have preferred taking the TTC to the Cumberland, but Father thinks Mother finds the TTC uncomfortable.
Dinner was Swiss Chalet. (We ate there for their pre-Christmas special.)
Saw a DVD of National Film Board animated shorts. The only one I'd seen before was Evolution.
Dreamed of visiting a dancing school the week before a final exam.
Went shopping. (The brass-monkey weather has arrived!)
Dinner was McDonald's.
Had my new book club's first Meetup. There were only four people, but it went pretty well. Next month we'll be discussing Pat Conroy's college basketball memoir My Losing Season (which I've read before).
Posted three new comics packages for sale on Ebay. I also cleared enough space in my room for the electric heater. [My room back then was in a poorly-built addition to our house, with only one vent connection to the central heating!]
Dreamed of being on a train going from Halifax to my hometown Sackville, N.B.; preparing to get off at Sackville and assembling a huge mess of baggage to take off; getting off and thinking I'd left one bag behind, but finding out that someone else had taken it off for me.
Dinner was scalloped potatoes and ham.
The choir had a rehearsal for Sunday's mass. We also went through the Christmas concert songs. (I'd been rearranging the music in my binder to match the order in the concert, and left the Christmas songs home! Fortunately, John Allec let me look at his binder.) We did "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" and "Joy to the World" for the first time. I remembered the bass notes for the latter song from when I sang it in a choir at Goodenough College in London 11 years ago!
Had my first singing lesson in a while. Giuseppe's been putting up Christmas decorations, so his house looks even more ornate than usual!
Dinner was microwaved Indian food.
Saw the DVD of the first episodes of the surreal gothic TV show Carnivale. It's very strange. (I'm still unsure whether to see more of it.) [I watched the first season, but not the second.]
Dreamed of a female professor returning my law school essay and flicking a disk at me so that it struck my throat; me saying I wouldn't have done that to her; being part of a superhero quartet taking off in a space vehicle to fly from my hometown Sackville, N.B., to Halifax; doing research for the team suggesting we just use our superpowers for travelling around the world!
Ebay had a cheap posting day, so I posted six more comic strip packages for sale.
Dinner was shepherd's pie.
At choir practice we did another "Ninna Nanna" Christmas song.
Dreamed of Sigourney Weaver bravely dealing publicly with her cancer(?).
Saw Roberto Rossellini's miniseries The Age of the Medicis at the Cinematheque about Cosimo de Medici. It was four hours long, so I only saw two of the three episodes. Much talk.
Afterward I went on a Meetin Christmas walk in the neighbourhood northeast of Yonge & Lawrence. We looked at various Christmas decorations. There were some snow flurries too.
Dinner was Burger King.
Found thebricktestament.com , an eerie website showing stories from the Bible illustrated with Lego figures!
Red Skelton (to an annoying kid): "I wish you were my size, then I'd cut you down to your size!"--The Fuller Brush Man
Dreamed of waking up in a car on the ferry leaving Cape Breton for Newfoundland; the car driving down to an amusement park with a Ferris wheel decorated with lollipops.
Dinner was KFC.
The parents spent the afternoon watching the Liberal convention. (I had a feeling that Stephane Dion might win, just because of the Liberal tradition of alternating between Anglophone and Francophone leaders.)
Three DVDs which zip.ca mailed Tuesday still haven't arrived! We have two others, but they're Moira's choices and she's away in Kingston this weekend. So instead I watched a videocassette that I'd recently bought cheap: the 1948 comedy The Fuller Brush Man, which I recall seeing as a kid. Lots of goofy slapstick.
I feel oddly depressed these days, and can't even finish sorting my comics.
Father wrote me a $1500 cheque, so I'll be able to make a big payment on my Visa debt.
Baked whole wheat bread overnight (with a bit of rye flour because the whole wheat flour ran out.)
Dreamed of going east on Eglinton Avenue West and finding a place where they were casting extras for a Roald Dahl movie; getting into a nasty quarrel with someone.
Dinner was spaghetti. (I ate too much!)
I was going to go out to the Low Key Singles Meetup, but I felt unwell from eating too much spaghetti.
Posted three new comic strip packages for sale on Ebay.
