Category: Livejournal

When I wrote in my journal that I ran out of DVDs to watch from my sickbed, Cowboy Ron drove down from the Valley and dropped off two Ray Harryhousen boxed sets, the first two seasons of Lost, The Day the Earth Stood Still, and Clash of the Titans.

When I wrote in my journal that I could not sleep, Cowboy Ron called me up and told me, “Go to the drug store and get Primatene Mist. I did, and two hours later, my coughing has subsided greatly.

God Save Cowboy Ron.

Oh, and Lord Strange has something to say on the matter, too.

Thanks again, Ron.

I haven’t slept for a week.

I have bronchitis. A persistent, violent cough. During the day, it’s bad. The coughing is so hard, I bend over. I nearly threw up today, standing in line at the bank. My voice is a gravelly whisper.

I’m on a regular diet of chicken soup and orange juice. I haven’t had a Coke in 7 days. 7UP is my new friend.

I can’t stand for too long because I get dizzy. I get hot flashes. Headaches from the persistent coughing. My chest aches and I can feel my diaphram revolting to the constant badgering.

During the day, it’s bad. At night, it’s impossible. I get regular coughing spasms every twenty seconds.

I have three kinds of nocturnal coughs. The first is the straight forward series of six. The first two loosen up the junk in my lungs and the last four bring it up my throat. The second is a kind of slowly spiraling series of small coughs. These don’t let me catch my breath. It takes about twenty seconds to clear the cycle and all the way, I cannot breathe. All I can do is try to slow them down by inhaling between them. If I try too hard, the phlygm goes right back down my airtube and I choke. All I can do is wait it out.

The third kind of cough is the wet, soggy hard cough. Usually in a series of two. This one causes physical pain. I’m usually meeping after it.

I cannot sleep. The Big Fucking Q does not help. Each time I’ve fallen asleep, I’ve awoken without breath, choking. I’m the only one here.

My HMO doctor will not see me until Monday. I called last Monday to make an appointment. I told them it was an emergency. They told me, “Go to the emergency room.” Yeah. Like I have the money for that.

I cannot sleep. I haven’t slept in a week. Not more than four hours.

Can’t sleep; cough will kill me.

____

You know who doesn’t want a National Health Care System? Rich people. Because they have medical insurance and they don’t know what it’s like to be poor and not have medical insurance. Or, at the very least, to not have good medical insurance.

Jack Shephard is Scott Summers done right.

I’ve been coughing all night. Not a wink of sleep for two nights. Every twenty seconds (I timed it), a violent cough. The kind I had when I was staying with ‘s family two years ago.

Cowboy Ron brought me a ton of DVDs to watch. He rules. Those DVDs include the first two seasons of Lost.

Watching the first couple of episodes, I was intrigued. But then, something happened that knocked my friggin’ head off. I mean, really. Something that just plowed me down. No mercy. Hammered on me. Kicked my ass and didn’t care what my name was.

Locke wiggled his toes.

I cried like a baby.

From that moment on, the show owns me.

Preview Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers and Bastards.

(Right now, they have 30 second snips of Brawlers up. They’ll be adding more as the release date gets closer.)

Yes, I’m dancing. And probably throwing up.

Like most members of the male gender, I ignore the physical consequences of my actions. Despite being sick, I went to a movie last night.

And at 3:00 AM, I woke up unable to breathe, choking on the phlegm I’d been coughing up in my sleep.

There was a moment, a real moment, when my mind told me, “You’re alone. Nobody can help you. You’re going to die like this and nobody’s going to find your body for days.”

A few more moments of asphyxiation and I finally manage to choke it up. And breathe.

Today, I stop being macho and go to the doctor.

In the first act of the movie, one of the characters shows the secret of a trick to a young girl. “Never let them see how you do it,” he advises. “As long as they don’t know, they’ll respect you.”

Christopher Nolan has given away the secret of translating written work to the visual medium. He’s done it three times now–twice successfully, I might add, and once not as much. With Memento and Batman Begins, he had both a brilliant and flawed success, respectively. With The Prestige, however, he’s succeeded even more than his first attempt.

I’ve often said the trick of transferring the written word to the silver screen had little to do with changing the plot and everything to do with being true to the material. A film like Fight Club, for example, deviates heavily from the source material, but maintains a truth to the original work. So much so that Chuck Palahnuik–the author of forementioned book–now admits to being ashamed of his first novel, preferring to tell people, “Just watch the movie; it’s better.”

In this case, Nolan has taken The Prestige, a dense, dark and amazing novel and done something remarkable with it: he’s actually made it better.

Okay, maybe that isn’t fair. I enjoyed The Prestige when I read it and looked forward to the movie with all sorts of expectation. Watching the previews, I noticed Nolan had ditched the modern chapters of the book and gone for a straight telling of the flashbacks. This was wise on his part: with a limited amount of time, he had to focus on the meat of the story. Yes, he ditched an element of the book that made it brilliant as a whole, but he also pruned down the material to its source.

The Prestige is a book about duality and everything that comes with it. Opposing forces. Counterparts. Both trying to destroy each other, both unable to live without each other. This is the theme of the book. It is not a book about revenge, although revenge is omnipresent. Those who claim this is a revenge story are wrong. They don’t see deep enough. The two magicians are the complete opposite of each other, incomplete without each other, driven to destroy each other. Nolan knew this, and knowing it, created a streamlined version of the book that altered key plot components, simplified a few characters, and even changed the ending… but in doing so, he has made what is not only a breath-taking film, but also a darker story than can be found in the pages of the source.

With Memento and Insomnia, we saw a director who was unwilling to flinch when it came time to reveal just how ugly the human soul can be. With Batman Begins, we got a glimpse of it, but I would suggest that the folks who own the Dark Knight Detective would not allow him to go as far as he did with his previous works. We almost got the Batman Nolan wanted to give us. We even see glimpses of him, but never the full view.

With The Prestige, Nolan is back in action, giving us a story and an ending that does not turn away from the depths mankind can delve. It is a dark, ugly story. As they got up, the audience around me were visibly disturbed. Some were confused. Almost all of them–who were talking loud enough for me to hear–said pretty much the same thing the two young black girls behind me said.

“I’ve never seen anything like that,” one of them said.

The other said, “I don’t know if I liked it.”

I liked it. I liked it a lot.