Another day that I didn’t go out to get bagels and other things I need; another day not leaving the house. COVID-19 has taken me prisoner and I have Stockholm Syndrome. It’s just so much easier to not move. Now it’s raining heavy so I can’t go out. If it’s not raining I go out tomorrow. That’s my plan. We’ll see if I can stick to it.
On the bright side I finished writing my postcards to voters in areas with voter suppression in Georgia. This is what the postcard looks like.
They will think a second grader is mailing them. Of the 60 postcards I sent this was the neatest. I did three cards in 18 minutes, an average of six minutes a card. I’m not sure how much time I waste between cards. This is not a task my skillset is well suited for. I did reword the cards as I went along. This was the final form. Writing is one of my skills. I made it punchier and more direct. I’m a second grader that prints terribly but writes well. The same was true when I was in the second grade. That’s what my teachers told me. They were always surprised by the disparity between my talents. I’ve always accepted it as who I am. I’ve worked on my handwriting as an adult. I should show you an example of my handwriting when I’m not trying to make it look good. Tell you what. I’ll do that right now.
Now I’m worried that you won’t see the difference. Oh well. I’m available to write wedding invitations. Spread the word.
I finished my binge-watch of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D including rewatching the first episode of the current season. The more I watch the higher my opinion of the show gets. Each time I watch I like it more. First time through I thought of season 4 as weak, on the rewatch I see it’s wonderful, and brought new things to the show. Season 5 was always a favorite but now I see that season 6 was not a letdown. I kept having difficultly pulling myself away from watching. The writing and acting are so good that I’m drawn in. I love Coulson, Daisy, Fitz & Simmons, and Melinda May. I don’t like Mack and Yo-Yo but not because they aren’t well-drawn characters, but because they guided by their feelings and religious beliefs, not reason. It became a superhero show but at the start the only superpowers were intelligence and skills. Fitz & Simmons are super scientists, while Daisy is a super computer-hacker. May is today’s answer to Emma Peel. I didn’t like that Daisy and even Fitz and Simmons because super spy fighters, but May could always pull it off. The show’s cast is diverse without even thinking about it. May, the team’s best fighter is a middle-aged Asian woman. I didn’t know how old the actress was until I looked her up. He character seems to be the same age as Coulson but looked younger. For a while in season 3 Coulson dated another woman that I thought of as closer to his age. Nope, she’s ten years younger than the actress playing May. They make a point that Coulson and May started at S.H.I.E.L.D around the same time. Unlike so many shows the romantic couples make sense. Fitz and Simmons, who everyone thinks of as Fitzsimmons are a natural; the two prodigies with multiple PhDs and the youngest graduates of the S.H.I.E.L.D science academy. Mack and Yo-Yo get together, bonded by the things I don’t like about them. Eventually Coulson and May, the two career spies pair off. The show’s executive producer is Joss Whedon, but it avoids the Buffyverse problem of throwing together the mismatched pairs.
The show has the greatest Buffyverse virtue, at least the first three seasons, the balancing of humor and storyline. The humor comes because the characters have a wry sense of humor. I always love that when they are in a tight spot and one characters brings up their love life to another, the response is pretty much always, “Now? Really?” And even the first character bringing it up is not silly. It happens when they are afraid they will die and want to say it before they do. Mack’s fear of robots is always good for a laugh. He’s seen every single robot turning on humanity movie and has rattled off their titles, including the sequels. Mack and Coulson are nerds, they kind of people that would be watching Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D if they were real. All the characters are very away of how weird their life is. They joke about how many times they died and came back to life and how many times they’ve crossed the universe and time to rescue each other.
The show has officially entered my pantheon of greatest shows ever. Another current show, The Expanse is in it too. I hate to say it, but they are better than Star Trek my archetypal favorite show. I was nine when it premiered so can be excused for overestimating it. For it’s time it was magnificent, but after watching each episode 50 times I’ve noticed the flaws. Twilight Zone still holds up.
I’m not alternating the mood and subject matter of my entries. I had a deep and reader challenging take on the current political situation that I chose to not write today. That’s deliberate. I know some people feel guilty dealing with anything else, but that’s wrong. No matter the weighty matters of the world our own lives go on and we should never neglect them. We should be taking even more joy out of life’s pleasures. We need them to maintain not just our happiness but our perspective. We might need to fight but we should never lose sight of what we are fighting for, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Just because we are fighting for those denied these rights doesn’t mean we should surrender them ourselves. I’ll go back to one of my favorite quotes from Bertrand Russell that I have used here often. While looking for it I found this one.
“I do not myself think there is any superior rationality in being unhappy. The wise man will be as happy as circumstances permit, and if he finds contemplation of the universe painful beyond a point, he will contemplate something else instead.”
Here’s the quote I was looking for.
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy – I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
I wish happiness to all My Gentle Readers and for your virtue to make the world better.
Wise Madness 