Late to the party!

It seems like most of the world was busy ferrying their children back to school yesterday, but mine spent most of the day in their pajamas; it was, strangely enough, a PD day. I was glad it was a PD day though, because I was a little busy yesterday morning – I was on the local news!

That was a pretty fun and interesting start to the week; after that I came home to my life of glamour and made breakfast for the kids, washed the floors, and did the laundry. Today they are back at school and so we are mostly back to routine; I say mostly because the poor dog is desperate for a good walk but the snow and cold seems prohibitive to me. Tomorrow, Barkley, is only a day away.

It’s funny, because I was not at all nervous to go on live television in front of I don’t know how many viewers. A lot? We are a city of 1.1 million, and I’m assuming a decent percentage of them watch the morning news. Anyway, I wasn’t nervous at all about that but I was extremely nervous about driving to the studio.

A week or so ago, I received details about my segment and the address of the studio, which is located in an area of the city of which I am totally unfamiliar. My husband, being familiar with my driving anxiety, looked up the address and casually mapped out a few different routes, telling me which route he preferred and why. And this – this is one of the reasons I adore him, for his innate ability to zone in on the best possible route to anywhere. He factors in the approximate number of lights. He factors in the time of day of driving and possible traffic issues. He factors in my propensity to freeze up and panic in unfamiliar driving situations.

So, armed with detailed written directions, including how to get back home, which no, is not an obvious thing for me, I set out for a practice drive last Friday afternoon. My husband suggested that, if all else failed, I could pull over and type the address into the GPS, which is an insane suggestion. I will never, ever be fooled again into thinking that the GPS will actually get me to where I want to be, not after last year’s fiasco where I tried to drive to my brother’s house and ended up on a gravel road outside the city.

Here’s the thing I really hate about the GPS: if I somewhat know what route I want to take, and it’s not the route that the GPS thinks I should take, then I have to listen to the robotic voice suggesting that I make a U-turn somewhere in order to get onto the route the GPS is suggesting. Then, when U-turning on the highway is deemed impossible, it spends a significant amount of time saying “Recalculating. Recalculating. Recalculating.” until I feel like I’m going to have a nervous breakdown. The GPS is an evil, evil device.

When I woke up yesterday morning, it had snowed, and it was blowing snow, and the road reports were all talking about the delays that commuters would face and how poor the conditions were. Slightly panicked, I hauled my giant box of food to the car and left early. The conditions were bad; I had to resort to listening to talk radio, which I find soothing in bad driving conditions for some reason. The lanes on the road were not visible, so there was that thing where people make up their own lanes to drive in and it feels very willy-nilly, like at any moment someone is going to sideswipe your car. I remained calm, listening to the “Report on Business”, and ended up at the studio a full forty minutes early. Better early than late!

Speaking of television, about a month ago my husband started watching Game of Thrones. After viewing about thirty seconds of it, during which there was a beheading and two impalements, I decided this was not the show for me. Generally he would watch it after the boys and I went to bed, but during the holidays he watched a few episodes during the day, when the boys were busy with other things and I was reading or cooking. I ended up seeing a few minutes here and there and became a bit interested, to my husband’s chagrin since he had to pause the show every time I asked a question, which was often. Who’s that guy? Where did she get dragons from? Oooh that guy is creepy. He’s the king? Ugh, he’s creepy. Ew, she had sex with her brother? Wait, the king is a product of incest? Why isn’t his father the king? Ew. Why isn’t his grandfather the king, then? This doesn’t make sense. Who’s that guy? Wait, who’s she? Oh hey, it’s the guy from Downton Abbey.

Eventually I got semi-caught up on the major plot points, although I couldn’t remember any names and had to keep referring to characters by a ridiculously long description such as “the red haired woman who is married to the Peter Dinklage character” or “the guy who was Sir Richard on Downton Abbey but he’s way better looking in this show”. I found it so intriguing, actually, that I’m considering reading the books. Has anyone read them and would you recommend them? Given that I just finished the delightful “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?”, I feel like I could tackle something a bit heavier.

Comments

  1. So, this is going to seem like more information about me than you need to know, but I promise I have a point.

    I am a major lover of fantasy books and have been since I was a kid and my dad read me The Hobbit at age 7. I also have no problem reading books about the apocalypse/zombies/scary vampires. when I was younger gore in writing was no problem. However, as an adult I have a job that, on occasion, causes me to be faced with some really awful people and as a result I’ve found in the last few years I seem to have become unable to read books that involve seriously bad things happening to people even in the fantasy context. I can usually handle movies/TV shows in which bad things happen mainly because I can look away and plug my ears and have Husband tell me when it’s safe to watch again.

    With all of that as background I’ll tell you that I could not read the GoT books. I tried. I got 1/2 way through book one and it became clear that this was going to be a series with amazing, compelling characters and a rich, well-imagined world in which really bad things were going to happen to all and sundry and I had to walk away. That said, I do watch and enjoy the GoT show. I can cover my eyes and ears when necessary and H (who has read all of the books multiple times) fills me in as needed on what happened, who is who, things left out of the show etc. It is SUCH a great show. Last season things happened that kept me awake at night stewing in the way I haven’t since I watched The Wire. BUT it is violent, and unpredictable, and stressful.

    • This is a good reminder re: the Wire. I’ve been meaning to watch it. This is also good feedback on the books. As a rule, I tend not to like reading graphic, violent, BAD things. So thanks!

  2. Your driving anxiety (and how your husband helps ) is exactly like me! Every detail I can totally relate to. Made me laugh! Well written 🙂

  3. bibliomama2 says

    HELL no, getting back home isn’t obvious, especially if there are highways involved – I feel ya, sister. One of my biggest anxieties about my appointment at the hospital FOR MY ANXIETY is the parking – I had to go there a few times for the sleep stuff, and sometimes the parking lot is virtually empty and sometimes it’s ridiculously full. I’ll probably end up forty minutes early too. I still love my GPS, though. I kind of delight in screwing with it, so the ‘recalculating’ doesn’t bother me (“That’s right, you go ON and recalculate, bitch!”)

    I haven’t read the books (Hannah has, I think). I’ve heard conflicting reviews of them. I do enjoy the show, especially how my husband can’t stop himself from commenting every time there’s a sex scene: “They do enjoy their sex scenes in this show, don’t they?” “Oh my, more boobs”. I have a theory that the posted auditions are for actresses who possess an ear for dialogue and a heart-shaped bottom.

  4. smothermother says

    I’ve read books 1-4 and will tackle book five when I finish my current YA addiction The Host. I am a huge fantasy fiction fan. I have enjoyed the books. But they are HUGE! I find I skim a lot because GRR Martin really does like to describe things in great detail. Which is fun at some points and tedious at others. Sort of like Tolkien actually. The series is actually very true to the books for the most part. Season one and two were bang on. Three diverts a little but still pretty close. Anyhoo, I say grab the first book from the library and give it a test drive.

    And my hubby claims that the show is every man’s boyhood wet dream come to life. Weapons, dragons and lots of boobies.

  5. Nicole! I know her! I know her! You’re famous!

    Yeah, I made it through one GoT episode and I can’t do it. I’m a delicate flower.

  6. I had to take J to gymnastics at the University of MD on an unfamiliar public transportation route last month because B had to work on a Saturday. I had the trip all planned out and was so proud of myself when B asked if I knew how to get back. And of course, I hadn’t researched that– and it wasn’t one of those routes where the stops for different directions are across the street from each other. It was in a whole different part of campus. But we made it there and back!

  7. BTW, I watched your clip. You were great.

  8. I saw your TV clip – it was great! Congrats!

    As for Game of Thrones, something similar happened to me in that my husband read all the books, then started watching the show, and I said I was not interested due to all the violence and fantasy and sex and whatnot. Then, after he’d watched three seasons and the fourth was just starting, I saw the cutest little map in Entertainment Weekly of Westeros, showing you the locations of all the characters, this one:

    http://insidetv.ew.com/2014/04/05/game-of-thrones-season-4-map/

    And suddenly I was curious, and my husband, after hitting his head against the wall several times, was nice enough to start over at Season 1 and watch along with me. And I have to say, I LOVED it, I OBSESSED over it, it is fantastic. Great dialog, great characters. Warning – don’t get attached to anyone, chances are good they’ll be dying soon. But despite the maddening tendency to kill off all the good people, I still cannot stop watching.

    No desire at all to read the books, though, and I have to say I did not feel you needed to read the books to follow along with the TV show. My husband occasionally provides a little backstory but it’s not really necessary. Hubby says that books 1, 2, and especially 3 are great, but he had trouble getting through books 4 and 5 as they veer away from the main characters – in fact, the show is now all caught up to book 4 and is having to introduce some original storylines because there’s nothing more for the favourite characters in the books…

    OMG, I am RANTING. OBSESSED, I say. Give the TV version a try. Then EMAIL ME so we can dissect every single thing EVER, OMG.

Trackbacks

  1. […] spot on the news and I woke up to 10 cm of snow and traffic in a snarly mess. This happened the last time I was on the news, which filled me with slight foreboding. Fortunately, I got there safely and the spot went off […]

Leave a Reply to Nicole Boyhouse Cancel reply