A Splitting Headache ... Several Actually ...

Sorry I have not been posting lately. The reasons are the same ones that are giving me the headaches.

1. It took me three hours on the phone, another hour to write a letter and get the documentation Hydro wanted faxed, and another hour to take it into Wakefield and fax it because their line was continually in use. Five hours and the problem is still not resolved. My bank took my money, deposited it in a non-existent Hydro account, and then Hydro told me my bill was overdue. So that was one day and one major headache.

2. The following day the dial-up refused to do anything without bumping me off-line. Headache #2.

3. That was also the day I went to the ByTowne to see a movie with Marta. The movie was a disappointment. One of my favourite novels, The Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence, had been badly translated into a film. The novel is a wonderful sprawling rendition of a life; the film is an awkwardly patched together attempt to capture what perhaps is unmanageable. The filmmaker's changes to time were disconcerting, as was the incorrect aging of the characters. Hagar was far too young for 90; Doris and Marvin far too young for 65; and the age difference between Marvin and John which was perhaps five years suddenly at one point became a twenty year spread. I am usually not as upset by the liberties taken by film makers attempting to move a novel onto the screen, but this was a travesty. Dickens' novels like Bleak House are also big novels, but the BBC did not ruin Bleak House by trying to fit a 400 page novel into 1 1/2 hours. They made a 3 DVD production. Better to have put The Stone Angel aside as undo-able than to seriously damage the integrity of a fine novel. Headache #3.

4. Today Tom and his crew came to finish up the removal of the cottage debris. They did not finish. They did create clouds of bilious, headache-causing smoke ... and on the May 24th weekend. (My neighbours are likely cursing me.) When I went to get them clean boxes out of the big blue bin, it (the bin) ... 4 1/2 feet high here in Quebec ... came crashing down on my head raising a long ridgelike goosebump on the scalp. Ouch! Headaches #4 and 5.


Not a good few days ... but I hope the air, my head, and my schedule will all be clear by tomorrow morning so that I can prepare for company (faithful blog readers all) and post a morning entry.