A post in which I have a busy day, but relax afterwards

Since I knew today would be a long one, I girded my loins with coffee and cigarettes on the porch this morning.

By the time I got to the office, the attorney was already there. After finding a mug, getting him some coffee, and scanning 60-odd pages of documents to his office in California for him, I was able to start on my own work.

He did take me to lunch today, with my boss and some other co-workers. It was interesting to note the menu choices. The country boy, of course, had chicken fingers and sweet tea. The fitness guy had steamed vegetables and water with his sandwich. I had a big ole nasty plate of nachos, since I had wanted one since we went to Atlanta. I had to have seafood ones, since if you took the chili off the regular ones, there wasn’t much left. They were good, but very rich, with cream sauce and cheese along with salmon, shrimp, and capers. I ate every bite, and of course got indigestion. I usually don’t eat heavy food like that at lunch. Of course I paid for my meal by getting a bunch of documents together for him, in triplicate, when we got back.

Then later in the afternoon I went to have my back done. Christie thankfully was back – she does great deep tissue work. The doc was back too, and did a good adjustment on me. Christie told me confidentially that doc who did my adjustment last week is pretty bad, and they are always trying to get patients to switch over to her because no one wants to. That is the doc that Terry sees. I made sure that when I made my appointment that they had me down for Christie and my doc for next time.

I’ve been living life virtually this week when I get home. I collapsed tonight, turned on the computer, and flipped the telly over to Turner Classic Movies. It was swashbuckler/western night. I don’t usually watch westerns, but I listened to Mail Order Bride, an old Buddy Ebsen movie. It actually wasn’t too heinous.

I then saw The Wicked Lady with Margaret Lockwood, who was a big British star at the time (1945). She was incredibly beautiful. I had seen the end of it before, but hadn’t seen the movie itself. It was pretty good. It was one of the first US vehicles for James Mason, and he was excellent in it. Margaret herself had a pretty juicy part, with gorgeous clothes, lots of good scenery-chewing opportunities, and a death scene that lingered pitifully on her at the end. Britain apparently had a Production Code equivalent, and her character had to pay for being such a Wicked Lady.

That went off about 10, and Johnny Guitar came on next. I hadn’t planned on watching it since I’ve seen it before. But I just became fixated on the performance from Mercedes McCambridge. She was riveting. The first time I saw the movie, I watched because it was a Joan Crawford vehicle from later in her career, and it was kind of kitsch. I mean, Earnest Borgnine in a western? Please. But since I’ve already seen the movie, know the plot, and have kind of exorcised some of the kitsch value, I was able to watch it in a different way this time. Joan was apparently at pains to let everyone know during the filming that this was her movie, but Mercedes steals every scene she’s in. She’s always acting, whether she has lines or not, and when she does get the camera, she is electrifying. She crackles with hatred in every scene with Joan. Despite the distance of years and film, she radiates energy – even on the small screen. When her character made her initial appearance, I couldn’t peel my eyes away. I just stood there in my living room with a toothbrush in my mouth.

It’s kind of sad to watch Joan’s scenes with Sterling Hayden. Despite the lighting, hairdressing, cinematography, and makeup, she’s looking old. She’s 49 and Sterling is 38; but the drinking was showing on Joan by this point, and she had gone to the “big lips and eyebrows” thing that kind of made her look like a caricature of herself. They have few close-ups together, and when they do, it’s usually over his shoulder or something like that so they could use special lighting and filters on her. I did eventually get to sleep watching it, thanks to some of the long cowboy plot-furthering scenes. I missed Joan’s “white gown and piano scene”, sadly. It’s by far the most over-the-top scene in the movie. You can see Joan’s fingerprints all over it. It really seems like a scene from one of her earlier pictures, just kind of dropped in to this one.