Weeknotes 3.3 (March 25, 2020)

Various hands, March 2020

Still drawing when I can, which is more than nothing, but not nearly as much as I want. Making progress, though.


Having everyone here, staying at home, staying in place, isn’t much different from my life before, except there’s no opting out. My son’s not going to school. My partner isn’t leaving for work or going out to do his own thing. I don’t have the uninterrupted hours I had before to do my own work. I can’t even run errands to get out of the apartment by myself.

But I like these people, my cats, my little home. We already split our time together on the weekends between actually being together and doing our own activities by ourselves in separate corners of the apartment. We’re still doing that, but for more days at a time. I cook more, because three people x three meals a day, and clean more, and I’m keeping my son on a loose schedule that has us doing art and schoolwork all throughout the day, but in between, we have chunks of time for ourselves. My son plays games or watches videos, and I spend a little time on my computer, or – whenever possible – draw. An hour later we’re doing the next activity together.

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Movie Review: Stretch and Bobbito: Radio That Changed Lives (2015)

Stretch and Bobbito: Radio That Changed Lives is basically a love letter to Adrian Bartos and Robert Garcia, who hosted “The Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Show” from 1990 to 1998, on the Columbia University radio station, WKCR. If you don’t already know the fundamental difference between a DJ who makes music, and a DJ who talks between playing tracks on the radio, this documentary won’t be for you. If you don’t already know the difference between rap and lyrical hip-hop, this won’t explain it. If you’re not intimately aware that the 90s rap scene in New York was unlike anywhere else in the world, well… you get the idea.

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Movie Review: “Pride” (2014)

Poster for the film

I know this is an older movie, and in fact I’ve watched it a couple of times before, but I saw it again last week because it’s streaming free on Amazon Prime. Plus, it’s a great movie to watch when you’re stuck at home as a precaution against the plague because at its heart, it’s about found family and community building. It’s about the small ways we win even when we don’t succeed at defeating the big problems, and the repercussions of having hope.

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Weeknotes 1.3 (Jan 22, 2020)

When I don’t sleep, I doodle…

Without any warning or reason, my insomnia faded away. I’ve been sleeping at least 7 hours a night, all at once instead of broken up into separate naps, for the last week. By itself that’s wonderful and I’m glad. But I’m also dreaming a lot more — not just more than I did when I wasn’t sleeping, but more than I usually do when I sleep okay — as if my brain is trying to shove in an extra two months worth of dreams on top of my usual slate, to make up for what I missed. Maybe this will recharge my brain, get my creative writing back on track? Or maybe it’s only pretty pretty lights playing merry hob with my brain, and in a few weeks it’ll fade away.

When I’ve gotten some sleep, I can decide to draw something specific, and then actually do it. Amazing!
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