I finished revising the most recent short story and submitted it to the intended market. It’s one of those places that promises (and usually delivers on) fast responses, sometimes as short as 24 hours. Given that it’s been three days since I submitted, I’m taking that as a good sign. At least it wasn’t an overnight rejection. I think the story could go to any number of other places if it isn’t accepted by this anthology, but it would be a cool one to get into.
One of my nieces (I have five) is leaving in a couple of weeks to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. That’s a name that has resonance with me, because I read the Hemingway book in high school. Although the climb will take 4-5 days, and there will be the African equivalent of Sherpas carrying most of the gear, it won’t be anywhere near as daunting, I hope, as the climbs described by Dan Simmons in The Abominable. I think it’s more of a walking climb, but there are still issues of altitude acclimatization to deal with. My niece is doing this as a fundraiser / awareness raiser for Ovarian Cancer Canada. She was interviewed in a local newspaper recently and appeared on CBC radio in Saint John this morning. I’m jealous!
Last night was the series finale of Burn Notice, and it went out with a bang, a boom and a hail of bullets. Bruce Campbell got to re-use the tag line he’s been uttering in the intro credits since day 1 (“You know spies. Bunch of bitchy little girls.”) and Gabrielle Anwar quoted Michael Weston’s intro line, too. Not everyone got out alive, but it probably doesn’t come as too much of a shock to an actor to be written out of a show with only 20 minutes left. Plus this person got to take a bunch of bad guys out, too. The only downside: if there’s a spinoff, this character won’t be around for it.
It was never a great show, but it was always fun. There’s always a degree of sadness associated with deleting a series from the DVR recording schedule. When I nuked Burn Notice, I took a few others with it. I noticed that I still had Body of Proof in the queue, though it was canceled a while back. I observed Breaking Bad while I was in the B-section and mused that it will be a bad month for B-shows. I also took out The Killing, which won’t be renewed for a fourth season and noticed that I still had Zero Hour listed, too. While I was at it, I figured I’d get rid of Once Upon a Time, because I’ve lost interest in it. It’s trying to be too much, and with the spin-off show and all, I figured it was time to cut it.
I caught up with Rizzoli & Isles last night. They still haven’t had to deal directly with the loss of the guy who plays Agent Frost. There was an “in memorium” message a while back, but he’s still doing his thing. The show’s on hiatus for several weeks now.
I have this feeling that they’re going to punt on The Bridge. In the Scandinavian precursor, something very bad happens at the end, and I’m not sure they’ll repeat it in the US remake. I may be wrong. They already eliminated the scene where Martin’s (Marco’s) son slept with Sofia (Sonya) and a very interesting section where a runaway spends several days with a disturbed young man who was conned into killing on the murder’s behalf.
The new season of Sons of Anarchy is off with a bang and a fusillade. The creepy little kid was a neat gimmick. It made us wonder if it was someone we should know. Instead, he’s “the straw” that will break the back of SAMCRO’s gunrunning days. There was an interesting bit of foreshadowing when Gemma gave Nero’s son a toy gun for his birthday. There’s something about this series, though, that isn’t as compelling as the greatest ones: The Wire, The Shield, Breaking Bad, Dexter. Can’t quite put my finger on it, but I am becoming less and less engaged by the characters. Interesting to see Kim Dickens, the former madam from Deadwood, back in the game. Tara proves at the end that she’s someone you don’t want to mess with. Tig had his Very Special Moment with the guy in the cage. I swear, though, Tig with a mouthful of donuts is still easier to understand than Chibs at his best. And, hey, there’s Peter Weller, reincarnated from Dexter.
