Tragic

How terrible to hear of the deadly floods in Nepal and Tibet, from the melting Himalayan glacier. If this were a normal administration, we'd already be helping to rescue people and sending financial aid. Maybe some of the ships in Hormuz can leave for an Indian port now, and maybe the exhausted sailors can get sent home afterward. This fucking endless war... plus the dumb trade wars with Canada and other allies.

Meanwhile, Dolly Parton and Tim Curry died this week. So sad. I was only into country music for a few years, but I have several Dolly songs that I still love. Her duet with Miley Cyrus on "Wrecking Ball/I Will Always Love You" was great too. Dolly's philanthropy and her love of the LGBT+ community was so genuine and openhearted. I saw a righteous rant by a guy about how she could have been a billionaire, but instead she spent millions of dollars on helping people. We need less evil billionaires and more Dollys in the world.

Of course, Tim Curry has been fabulous in many things. I had just rewatched Clue the other day and have been on a quest to put together a cosplay Miss Scarlet costume lately, though I can't find a coat to match hers. It must have been custom, like the green dress. Anyway, RIP to him and Dolly.

Staycation

I'm on vacation for a week, though I'll have to take of care of errands like doctor appointments and house chores. I tried to buy a bookshelf for my Closetmaid corner thing, but it's too small. Apparently they don't sell the size I need.

Barnes and Noble is having a sale on their tablets, but I don't need a new LCD tablet. I wanted a new e-reader, preferably with color E-ink, but B&N only added Teal color to the case this year. (It's like their old Nook Color that only had color on the case, not on the E-ink screen.) If they were coming out with color E-ink this year, they should have released it by now for back to school season. I can only hope for next year maybe.

On the other hand, Kobo Reader has color E ink for $175 and apparently are selling at Best Buy now. I'm tempted, but I have to know if I can convert my current ebooks to upload to the Kobo reader. I read a review online claiming it can be done with Calibre software, but I'm not sure I know how to do it. I guess I can try downloading something on my computer and converting it.

Chronology part 19

Chronology of these short stories.

• SIXN - June 1900
• PRIO - May 16, 1901

Now we come to SIXN, first published in April 1904. Watson informs us that Inspector Lestrade is now a friend who sometimes drops by Baker Street just to chat in the evening. One such night, Holmes prods him to talk about his latest case. Lestrade laughs, then tells them, "Although it is trivial, it is undoubtedly queer, and I know that you have a taste for all that is out of the common." Lately there is a burglar who breaks in to places and smashes busts of Napoleon Bonaparte. Watson suggests that the vandal suffers from an obsessive hatred of Napoleon, but Holmes can see that the criminal has a method to his madness. It's another charming tale like BLUE, where a trivial incident leads to a serious crime.

Wishes and rants

In TV news, there's a new series in development called Sherlock's Secretary, based on the fact that Abbey National Bank occupied 221B Baker Street and hired a secretary to deal with all the Sherlock Holmes mail they received. Besides fanmail, some letters were actual requests for Holmes to solve cases. Andy Berman is apparently writing it to star a female secretary who decides to go investigate those cases, so it'll probably be a quirky procedural like Monk or Psych. The premise sounds interesting to me, and I wonder if they'll set in the past and/or acknowledge that the Sherlock Holmes Museum fought with Abbey over the address, eventually winning the right to 221B.

But still, I hope someone will finally decide to start making a straight book-to-TV series based on the original canon. It's public domain now; please try, and for God's sake, please have Holmes/Watson together at last. See how well Heated Rivalry did? Get some of that hot fanbase genuinely, instead of queerbaiting.

Color Harmony

I did a bunch of furniture moving, so now I'm sweaty and hot. My hot flashes haven't gone away either. I'm trying to buy more linen and cotton clothes lately for breathability. I never realized that all the synthetic rayon and polyester stuff I wore made me sweat excessively even if the fabric looked light and thin. I was sweating buckets in synthetics even when I wore anti-perspirant, so I wondered if there was something medically wrong with my lymph nodes. But no, when I wear natural fibers I do better. Naturally, I will still sweat some on a hot day, but not dripping wet down my skin and shirt. This apparently is why Victorians didn't overheat in their layers of clothes, because they wore natural fibers. What a difference the natural fiber makes!

Meanwhile I was researching colors, looking to adjust colors on my blog, but then I fell down a rabbit hole about hexadecimal code, old websafe colors, and named colors for browsers.

Plus I discovered the difference between violet and purple is more than semantics. I also realized that my vocabulary of red colors is confused. I somehow thought "vermilion" and "scarlet" are dark bluish red colors like "crimson" and "maroon" but they are actually more red-orange. I think maybe I got vermilion and scarlet confused with darker "cadmium red" in painting TV shows. Oh well.

Thabo and the Rhino Case

I finally found this 2023 movie on streaming! It's a kid's movie about an 11-year old boy in Africa investigating the murder of a rhino on the local nature reserve. Apparently it's adapted from a book series about the boy detective, but I don't know if there's an English translation available. In the film, Thabo's uncle is a park ranger who drives tourists around, while Thabo helps narrate the tour. There's also a German lady Agatha who lives nearby, and her young niece Emma is visiting.

After the dead rhino is discovered, Thabo and Emma try to find the poacher who cut off the rhino's horn, while also worrying about the rhino's orphaned baby. Based on a footprint near the corpse, Thabo's uncle is accused of the crime and arrested by the local police. So Thabo works to clear his uncle's name, and he enlists help from his friend Sifiso too. Sifiso is an older boy raising his younger siblings Pilot and Lemonade as best as he can. There's a couple of tourists who are constantly posting videos on the internet, and it seems like most everyone has cellphones. I believe that is common in Africa, as they use phones for banking in a way that's more prevalent than here.

I was able to predict the twists in the mystery, but I liked the film for showing the beautiful landscape and promoting wildlife protection. The reason that Thabo and Sifiso have time to solve cases is sad. Agatha tells Emma that Thabo's mom, and Sifiso's parents, are dead from AIDS. Even though life-saving medicines exist for that disease, not everyone in Africa can afford them, so it's common for kids to be orphaned. That's chilling, and nowadays it makes me think of everyone who died because DOGE killed USAID. Still, the movie overall is light and heartwarming, as the friends work together and learn lessons about trusting the wrong people.

Meanwhile, I keep seeing Halloween stuff on sale in stores lately. It's only August, so they're trying to force Halloween early, since Christmas started swallowing up Thanksgiving and Halloween? So annoying.

Disappointed

I found out this weekend that Hugh Jackman is conservative and apparently friends with Rupert Murdoch. The only bad rumors I heard about him previously were concerning him divorcing his wife for an actress, which I shrugged off as being his personal business. But if people had told me his politics, that would have made me pay attention to them boycotting him. He's apparently been this way for years, but I thought if he had been rightwing, that it would be mentioned all the time, like with the actors Kevin Sorbo and Kirk Cameron.

This sours me on The Sheep Detectives, but at least that's an ensemble film. If it ever becomes a franchise with sequels, his character is already dead, so they may focus on the daughter character instead. I guess this was the risk I took watching an Amazon film anyway. Makes me glad that Sam Neill was always so genuine.

Meanwhile it's been difficult to sleep lately due to the Texas heat. I keep waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to go back to sleep. All this week will be in the 100s too, and my hot flashes make it worse. At my office I'm hot and cold constantly. I guess I should be glad I'm not near any of the Canadian or European fires.

Chronology part 18

Chronology of these short stories.

• DANC - July to August, 1898
• RETI - summer 1898, there is now a telephone installed at 221B

DANC was published in December 1903, and most Sherlockians agree that the case took place in July 1898. It also features the stick-figure cipher which Holmes solves with his cryptography skills. This story needs the hand-drawn images, so it loses something in audio-only adaptations.

Love and Community

So the FIFA World Cup is over now. I didn't watch any games, but apparently the final game was in a New Jersey stadium and had a halftime show. People said the Muppets were there, so I found a YouTube link afterward. Nice use of the Electric Mayhem band, and then starting at 10 minutes, there were Muppets and Sesame Street Muppets among the children singing about love. That's nice. Somewhat rushed and more like a cameo, with no dialogue.

I'm also glad that Trump got booed. He's always trying to steal glory for himself, while at the same time pretending he's so in danger that he needs the stupid ballroom bunker.

Congratulations to Spain, though I still don't care about sports. For the fans I guess it was a bit of joy, community, and fun to relieve the darkness. An escape from war and terror and pestilence.

Meanwhile, the big Odyssey movie came out this weekend. I don't care for Nolan's non-linear storytellling, so I didn't see it. But I'm glad that it did well at the box office. All the racists complaining about Lupita as Helen of Troy are so stupid and out of touch. Meanwhile, Sam Neill died, so I'm gonna try to watch all my favorite movies of his.

Professor and Colonel, chapter 2

So here's part 2 of the story. This part is more sketchy and not fully fleshed out; it's more like an outline, in present tense, with incomplete sentences and scenes. I have story ideas all the time, but not enough time to execute them. If I did write out the whole thing, it might develop and expand to many chapters rather than one. There are references to canon stories like VALL, DYIN, FINA, EMPT, and MAZA.

Fandom: Sherlock Holmes
Story: chapter 2 of The Professor and the Colonel
Pairing: Moriarty/Moran, Holmes/Watson
Warnings: slash, internalized homophobia, asexual Holmes, depression and suicidal thoughts, attempted suicide

The Professor and the Colonel

Forgive an indulgence. I just remembered this sketch/story I wrote in 2011. It was a plot bunny on the Holmesslash mailing list, inspired by Chapter 2 of Valley of Fear, when Holmes speaks of breaking into Moriarty's office "with the most unexpected results." In fact, maybe I should call it "Unexpected Results" instead, since only the first chapter is about Moriarty and Moran? Sorry that I keep changing present tense to past tense and vice versa. It would take time for me to fully clean it up. I'll post the second chapter in a day or two.

Fandom: Sherlock Holmes
Story: chapter 1 of The Professor and the Colonel
Pairing: Moriarty/Moran, Holmes/Watson
Warnings: slash, internalized homophobia, gay sex not described explicitly

Chronology part 17

Chronology of these short stories.

• CHAS - January 4-14, 1898
• SOLI - April 23, 1898. I changed the year from 1895, so that the date is actually Saturday, and the case doesn't conflict with 3STU

First published in March 1904, CHAS features the master blackmailer Charles Augustus Milverton, whose visiting card only vaguely calls him an "Agent." Watson says it has been "years since" this case happened and that someone concerned, probably the murderous woman, is now "beyond reach of human law" i.e. dead. Watson tells us he will conceal the date "or any other fact" that could give someone a clue.

Idiot Cultists

I have the day off but I'm bruised and achy due to falling down yesterday. I'm sad to hear that Bonnie Tyler died. I looked for the CD I bought of hers years ago, but can't find it. I hope I didn't sell it.

Meanwhile I'm glad that the Supreme Court upheld birthright citizenship, but it's concerning how close the vote was. The 14th amendment is plain language, and the landmark Wong Kim Ark ruling helped Chinese people finally get be citizens despite the racist Chinese Exclusion Act. But a lot of American-born Asians are still treated as perpetual foreigners to this day. Always asking "where are you from?" when you actually mean, "what's your race?"

People finally abandoned Graham Platner due to the rape allegation. But he's had red flags ever since the Nazi tattoo, so I don't understand why it took so long for people to drop him. Why on earth would I trust a Nazi liar with no previous goverment experience, and a bad history? I'm supposed to believe he's super sincere about leftwing ideals, the working class, and protecting people's rights? Plus his obnoxious fans would constantly frame the Senate race as him vs. Susan Collins, not acknowledging that there were other Democratic candidates still in the race. Even after Janet Mills dropped out, there were still other candidates in the race, and Mainers had ranked-choice voting to push progressive leaders in the primary. But no, they clung to Platner cultishly, even after months of time to find a better candidate. People were saying, "oh that bad behavior was just a phase. He's all better now." Telling women and minorities to shut up about their doubts and vote for the disingenuous asshole, for the good of the country. When the fuck will "progressive" white men shut up and vote like how we tell them to, for the good of the country?

Some people are STILL supporting Platner even now and whining about the "Establishment" corruptly sabotaging him. As if Susan Collins wouldn't have attacked him the same way, with much worse timing, in the general election. Blame Platner for being a fucking shitbag liar. He better stop dragging his feet and officially leave (he's yet to do the paperwork to drop out) so that Maine Democrats can pick someone before it's too late! Fucking Nazi.

Chronology part 16

Chronology of these short stories.

• ABBE - late January 1897
• MISS - February 1897
• DEVI - March 16, 1897
• REDC - October 1897, or maybe winter

ABBE begins on a "bitterly cold night and frosty morning, towards the end of the winter of '97" when Holmes wakes Watson up, announcing that the game is afoot. He doesn't even let Watson say anything, just urging him to get dressed before dawn. They skip breakfast and take a cab to the train station in silence. Only after they have hot tea on the train does Holmes explain himself by showing him the note from Stanley Hopkins, dated at 3:30 AM that morning. The reason for choosing January rather than February will arise later.

Movie Malaise

Well, I was finally able to sleep through the night despite the summer heat. Pride month is almost over, and next weekend is July 4th. At work, my office will celebrate on July 2nd. I don't feel that happy about this 250th anniversary, and I'm short of money until my next paycheck. The short-term disability money while I was on leave was much less than my normal paycheck. Plus I had to reapply to make them cover the final couple of weeks. Anyway, because I was afraid I had cancer, I had previously signed up to get the "critical illness" coverage, and that benefit is just now kicking in. I should just be happy I have it in case I get any else later.

I saw Supergirl yesterday hoping it would be a fun romp like Superman in 2025, but I was disappointed. I had hoped that Gunn was finally allowing bright colors back into DC movies, but no, it's all dark browns and greys, desaturated and subdued. Kara doesn't even wear the Supergirl costume until late in the movie. I know, it's thematic, to show that she's depressed and traumatized, not feeling like a hero. But even if she's going to wear that brown coat and Blondie shirt most of the movie, at least let me see the colors of those clothes! Let me see vibrant, saturated colors with full sun!

Baker Street Studies

I bought a bunch of Sherlockian books, but I still can't get the rare chronology books by H. W. Bell, and Ernest Bloomfield Zeisler. Even if I could afford those out of print books, I wouldn't spend that much money on them. After all, their information may be superseded by more modern books; I just wanted to hear their logic and know their sources. The Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia provides their chronologies, but those are plain lists without the reasoning behind the dates.

However, I was able to buy Baker Street Studies edited by H. W. Bell in 1934. It's one of many reprints by Otto Penzler's Sherlock Holmes Library, to keep Sherlockiana available to readers; check libraries and used bookstores for them. Baker Street Studies contains essays from other Sherlockians on various topics, but Bell does provide his own chronology of SIGN at the end. So I can at least get a taste of his opinions. He thinks that SIGN took place in 1887 too. This probably explains why Bell dates VALL to 1887 before the marriage, when most others place it in 1888. However, it looks like he believes in Watson having 3 wives per the Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia above.

Happy Juneteenth

Obama's presidential library is now open in Chicago, so that's nice. Meanwhile the FIFA games have been on TV, and even playing at movie theaters. I don't care about sports, though, and I'm surprised that any tourists still came here under this anti-immigrant regime.

I bought a Magic Bullet recently, and it did well making pudding, though I had to do two batches. It saves me having to do it by hand with a whisk or get out the electric mixer. On smoothies, it works fine with protein powder, but if I want to use ice or frozen fruit, I will have to thaw it and use plenty of fruit juice or other liquid to help the Bullet blend the solids.

I've started doing some core exercises to try to recover. I still get fleeting flashes of pain, plus irritation from seatbelts in my car. The summer heat also exhausts me easily.

Chronology part 15

Chronology of these short stories.

• VEIL - late in 1896
• THOR - Oct 4-5, 1896
• SUSS - Nov 19-21, 1896

VEIL was first published in January 1927, and, like in SPEC and FIVE, Watson spends the introduction calculating the years of Holmes's career. He says that Holmes was "in active practice for twenty-three years" while Watson was only involved in seventeen of those years. Which years does he mean? Certainly not May 1891 to April 1894, when Holmes faked his death.

Holmes's first case was GLOR while he was still in university, but it's not much of a case. I think Watson only counts when Holmes moved to Montague Street and started working as a detective for money. Sherlockians typically work backward since Watson didn't give a definite date for Holmes in Montague Street. We know Holmes returned in 1894, and looking ahead to CREE, we know he retired in 1903. CREE is set in September 1903, "one of the very last cases handled by Holmes before his retirement from practice." 1903 minus 1894 is 9 years, so we just need 14 more years. 1891 minus 14 is 1877, a good date halfway between GLOR and MUSG.

Chronology part 14

Chronology of 1895.

• 3STU - spring, maybe May, 1895
• BLAC - July 3-12, 1895; Hopkins comes on the 10th, after Holmes attempted to spear a pig at the butcher's shop
• LADY - summer 1895 or 1896
• BRUC - 3rd week of November 1895

The famous Vincent Starrett 221B poem, full of nostalgia about bygone Victorian days, ends with the wish that "it's always 1895" for Holmes and Watson. I wonder if Starrett picked that year just for the rhyme, or if he really thinks that 1895 is when Holmes and Watson would be happiest at 221B. Why that year and not another? Anyway, it's time to finally tackle the cases occurring in 1895.

Chronology part 13

Chronology of these short stories.

• WIST - mid June 1894 to be near a different quarter-day.
• NORW - August 1894. Watson mentions having sold his Kensington practice to move back to Baker Street.
• GOLD - November 1894

WIST has an impossible date. Watson claims that the case happened at the end of March 1892, but Watson thought Holmes was dead from May 1891 to April 1894. He must have changed the date out of discretion, but not realised his mistake; he didn't proofread, and as always, he never corrects mistakes once they're published. We have to at least find a new year for the case, and there's a hint in NORW that the case takes place in 1894. NORW mentions "the case of the papers of ex-President Murillo," and WIST features Juan Murillo as a villainous dictator from a Central American country. "Don" is his title, not his name.

Actually there are no presidential papers mentioned in the case, but the reference is similar to how Holmes sometimes refers to SCAN by talking about papers, instead of the photograph that the King of Bohemia wished to retreive. NORW was actually published in October 1903, and WIST wasn't published until August 1908. So it's a case of Doyle having an idea for a story, but changing the details when he actually writes the story later. In that way, it's similar to the 3 versions of SECO.