Thursday, January 19, 2012

Poem for Thursday, Squirrels, Sherlock

Funeral Blues
By W.H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,
Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

--------

I was going to keep all my journals silent on Wednesday in solidarity with the internet strike against SOPA and PIPA, but Colin Firth ruined that plan...well, it's not his fault exactly, but his appearances on Craig Ferguson's and Ellen's shows made it necessary for me to follow links to find the video clips. Since I couldn't do much research online or waste much time on the internet, I did a bunch of chores -- rearranged things in my closet, rearranged the DVDs, and folded laundry while watching Voyager's "Remember" since I can watch Voyager for free on Amazon Prime. As I had remembered, it's a very good Holocaust allegory and since there's no Janeway/Chakotay interaction and not a lot of Kate in general, it did not make me want to scream as "The 37s" and "Resolutions" are wont to do.

Evening TV was Harry's Law -- liked the kidneys-for-sale storyline, did not like the Evil Twins. The night before we watched Glee, which I liked less for the storyline than because they let Emma, Mercedes, Santana, and even Tina sing so much more than usual and Rachel so much less, then we watched Sherlock's "The Reichenbach Fall" which I liked better than the other two this season, largely because Freeman's performance was so good, Cumberbatch's wasn't bad but there were so many badly done reaction shots that there was only so much he could do -- spoilers!

I loved the opening sequence with falling "Keep Calm and Carry On" mug and the Crown Jewels, then the rabid misogyny started with Faux Fangirl Journalist and continued at the same clip throughout. Once again, I get that historically the character of Sherlock Holmes is condescending to women and that Sherlock is always the smartest, and John is always the most loyal, and Lestrade is fairly loyal by default, but in a series set in the 21st century there is just no excuse for every other woman being a bitch or a mother or a pathetic love interest. I had no concern that Sherlock would die and I had very little interest in looking for clues that would give away how he outsmarted Moriarty in the end (truly, it made me happy that someone could put Sherlock in his place even for a while, even if it was a psychopath). The producers taunting on Twitter that their fans aren't even clever enough to figure out their gimmicks don't endear me in the least, either.

Here are more squirrel photos because everyone loves squirrels and obviously squirrels love each other. Let's call these two Sherlock and John, just to make certain people I know happy. *g*















No comments: