Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1541
An Olivia Rodrgio dream, a reticent daughter, rewatching Game of Thrones and pondering on America's trauma and ensuing beliefs from the finale.
Morning morning morning. Still negative today, that is nice. Have a bit of a stomach ache though. Been having some nausea issues last few days. It’s always something. Oh wait. I forgot to eat breakfast. Or maybe it’s this Vitamin D or Quercetin I am still taking. That says to take with a meal. Whoopsie daisy.
Had a pretty solid Olivia Rodrigo dream last night. Jane and I went to see her at an indoor venue, large club like. Maybe akin to a slightly super-sized Roseland. It was in a city that had a parking lot, though, because there was tailgating. Maybe like the Ritz in Raleigh. The weird thing was that the crowd a) loved her, but b) nonethless slowly trickled out as the concert progressed. Got the sense it was late at night and past most kids’ bedtime. Not Jane, though. We stuck it out. Also Jane was maybe 11 or 12, and not seven as she is in reality. But Olivia was not any older. As the crowd thinned out, Jane and I made our way up front, and eventually we made it to the barricade. During an extended vamp during an extended “Bad Idea Right,” Olivia came and talked to the audience, did little hellos. But when she got to us we had a nice long conversation. Somehow Jane and I had met Olivia before.
Fast forward in the dream and now Olivia is our friend, mine and Jane’s, and she is coming to the pool in our neighborhood with us. My friends think its real weird I am friends with this 22 year-old girl. I keep explaining to them its not creepy honest but no one believes me. She is now best friends with Jane, and best friends with me, but they are sort-of separate friendships. She seems to now be living somewhere nearby. We spend a lot of time talking about Karl Marx…
…Which I will spare you about today. Not a lot of interest from the GMHHAY audience in the new Marx translation as it turns out. Which is a shame because it is probably gonna take me 30 days to read the thing.
Last night I raw-dogged it when going to sleep. No booze, no nyquil, no Advil or Tylenol or edibles or melatonin (is melatonin a proper noun? no, right?) or anything. Just me and my brain. First time in like three weeks. Was nervous. But no need. Fell asleep right away but woke up at 1:50 in the morning.
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Still working on the “To Investigate” playlist. Did not get 10 hours done yesterday — had a lot of work calls — so I have 12 hours left on this thing. Will not finish today, probably tomorrow. Listening to Karol G now, whom I know nothing about. A latina pop singer. I like her a lot even though I can’t understand any of the words, even though I took Spanish Duolingo for a year and used to watch Selena videos with subtitles trying to learn pop singer Spanish. But no luck. But man. I sure like Karol G. Even though I don’t know if this is her first album or tenth. Or what she looks like or how old she is or what country she is from. But she is pretty dang catchy.
Okay I have peeked at her Wikipedia. She is 34 and has nine grammies and is five foot five. She is apparently dating a gentleman named Feid, whom I have also never heard of, but he is on this track I am listening to right now, “Verano Rosa,” which is a real catchy tune. The “Early life” section is suspiciously vague about her parents. Does that make her more or less likely to be a nepo baby. Hard to tell, hard to tell.
I have been rewatching Game of Thrones. I did this because it seems like the finale, and the final season of Game of Thrones, overshadows the whole show. People are still so pissed about the Game of Thrones finale. I stumbled upon this Reddit thread yesterday about it, and the comments are unanimous on several interesting points:
The actual outcome of who ended up on the throne(s), what happens to Dany isn’t so bad, but the whole thing was rushed rushed rushed. I agree with the latter half of this sentiment, but not the former. My memory is hazy, but I remember who ended up on each throne and I think that was dumb. But most people do not now.
People are unanimous that the actors and HBO were both totally supportive of David Benioff and D. B. Weiss (referred to as D&D everywhere. Took me a while) taking as long as they needed, making as many episodes as they needed, spending as much money and time as they needed to do the ending right. Everyone is universally adamant about this. I do not know if this is actually true or not, but it is stunning how universally believed this is in the public’s (or at least GoT fans’) consciousness.
The public is 100% convinced that D&D rushed the final season and finale of GoT so they could go work on their Star Wars trilogy. You will not find a single person disputing this in this Reddit post of thousands of comments. Everyone believes this. Is it true? No idea. But everyone believes it.
Everyone thinks it is glorious poetic justice that D&D then lost their Star Wars trilogy because they fucked up the GoT finale so badly. I vaguely remember this whole situation, and I do not think that was why they lost their trilogy. Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins also lost a Star Wars film in this period. Star Wars was retrenching after Solo’s middling box office performance. But, well, it definitely didn’t help. But people are VERY into this idea, they find it very very satisfying to know D&D were punished for this shitty finale.
I do think the public is kind of justified in this belief because D&D have done barely anything since, and 3-Body Problem is, well, not that good compared to the books. Has it been renewed? What’s up with that anyway? Ah, yes. Wikipedia says it has. For two more seasons. Well, then, they have a chance to redeem themselves.
People are absolutely convinced the last season killed the streaming views of GoT in re-runs, that no one watches it anymore precisely because the last season and finale were so bad. One guy who seemed to have some inside knowledge disputed that, but it is a firmly held anecdotal view. My own re-viewing seems to confirm this, as:
Every single person I have told I’m re-watching it has expressed zero interest in this action, and you ain’t fooling me, you all watched it when it came out. But no one wants to talk about it anymore.
I personally am watching it almost precisely because of this phenomenon. It was more nebulous in my brain when I made the decision, but it was definitely a decision based on the perception of finale shittiness. Maybe kinda like “It can’t really be that bad, can it? Or maybe the whole show was bad and we just didn’t realize it?” My contrary nature sensed everyone hated GoT now and that is basically what compelled me to rewatch it, and why you are now reading a bunch of words about a show you probably don’t think about or don’t want to think about anymore.
One other interesting thing many people exhibit in that Reddit thread is a widely held belief that the shitty last season of Game of Thrones ruined careers of the actors and I think there is some truth to this! What happened to Kit Harrigan’s Marvel turn!
I would be very interested to know the truth in all of these widely held theories, but I suppose there’s no way to know. It seems quite possible there was some outside pressure, somehow, to wrap things up: HBO rushing, a pregnancy, an illness — I don’t know. Something other than “D&D wanted to go do Star Wars.” Creative projects of that vast scale are rarely without constraints it seems unlikely to me this would be an exception but who knows!
It really just strikes me how tenacious and widely held this beliefs are. Intractable really.
Jane’s in a last-minute camp this week since we did not go to Boston. It is a story-telling camp. Something happened yesterday, maybe a fit. She wouldn’t tell us but damn was she cranky when Emma and I picked her up. Took hours to get her to snap out of it and she would not tell us what happened. She is so secretive! About so many things! She hates brushing teeth but in all these years of hating it she has never given us a single reason beyond “it’s boring.” Which… I mean, I am trying to give her the benefit of the doubt but lots of things she has to do are boring and she doesn’t resist those in the same way? There’s a deeper mystery. And for years — years! — she has resisted letting us in and explaining it.
It is kind of crazy to sort-of realize the extent of your seven-year-old’s private life. So many secrets.
Justa mix today, a bunch of new stuff from the To Investigate clean-out and review. I threw on a Karol G song for you so you could get hooked like I am. New Garbage is better than I expect. New Matt Berninger is… fine? I don’t know. It’s weird. Some of his solo stuff I have loved but this album didn’t hit me the way other stuff did. He did a KCRW set this week though I will have to check that out.
Okay have a lovely day I miss you. Eat a yummy meal for me.
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Thanks for reading.
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Good Morning, Hello, How Are You vol 1.