I am sick. I hate being sick, and I’m a whiny bitch when it happens. Which seems to be more often than is warranted. I woke up feeling a bit wonky*, but I soldiered on. After class that night, however, I felt draggy and low energy. I went home and thought I could just sleep it off. No. I felt worse and worse that night until I fell into an uneasy sleep.
I woke up feeling that specific, “I’m about to get sick” feeling. It wasn’t sickness itself, no, but the precursor to it. I skipped class, flopped on the couch, and snuggled with my cats while watching Poirot. I was miserable and gross and felt flashes of heat. I dozed off from time to time, and I did a good imitation of a rag doll for most of the day.
Today, I felt even worse when I woke up. I have no energy, and I only did a light routine. I’m having alternate heat flashes and cold sweats, and I’m miserable as a dog. I don’t do sickness well, even if I don’t say anything. I’m a sour bitch in my head, and I would rather be hurt than sick. Speaking of hurt, I jammed the pinkie finger on my right hand when I was trying to save my water bottle from falling out of the freezer. So now I have matching aching pinkie fingers.
I finished Poirot today. That was a sad moment. I can’t believe I don’t have any more episodes to watch. I may watch the series again and count how many scenes have drinking and/or smoking in them. Anyway, I tried two episodes of Rosemary & Thyme because it was done by the same guys who started the Poirot series. I like the two lead characters and how they interact. I like that they’re middle-aged women who aren’t just frumps or asexual. They’re witty and capable, though sometimes act stupidly, but the plots are atrocious. I can see every twist coming a mile away, and I keep thinking, “Why are they doing that?” I gave up after the second episode and tried an episode of Paranoid.
It sucked. It was so horrible. I wanted to like it because the lead role is played by an British-Indian woman, but it was terrible. The psychiatrist was horribly written–by the way, what do the Brits have against psychiatrists? They’re always portrayed so terribly in British procedurals. It really pisses me off. Also, the plot point of having Nina’s (the lead) husband/partner dump her in front of his parents’ place without any warning and her going off the rails just left me cold. I turned it off after ten minutes.
Then, I tried Crossing Lines, which is Interpol meets Criminal Minds. I like the idea of it, gathering police from different countries to solve cases that, duh, cross lines (borders), but the writing is horrible. The plot of the pilot (2 episodes) was simple and boring, and any fascination of the characters faded pretty quickly. I finished the pilot and moved on to Happy Valley, a gritty British procedural, which I’m watching now. I really like the main character, Sergeant Catherine Cawood. She is my favorite part of the TV show. I think the acting is incredible, but the plot is weak. The whole disgruntled employee stages a kidnapping of the boss’s daughter which then turns out to be more than he bargained for. There’s the obligatory ex-con who raped the sergeant’s daughter, got her pregnant, then went to jail for drugs. She hung herself. Of course, this same con is involved in the kidnapping, and he raped the kidnapped girl. Not on screen, but still.
It’s really boring as a concept. Let’s put this woman in danger. Let’s show how terrible her life is. Let’s have her raped. Also, the psychopath. I hate those characters, and they seem to be proliferating. They. Are. Boring. There is no there there. But people love them, apparently. Again, the acting is fantastic. The characterization is really good. But, the main plot is just…trite. I think they could do so much better. It’s frustration to have such fabulous acting dedicated to sub-par material.
I want to clarify that rape itself isn’t dull or boring, but the fact that it’s used as a shorthand for, “This person is a terrible person” so often in criminal dramas is the boring part. Frustrating, too. Rape is too important to be treated in such a cavalier manner, which is one reason it’s criticized when it’s shown in TV shows or movies. It’s a plot device or motivation and not treated as an entity in and of itself. In this show, it’s the motivation for the sergeant becoming obsessed with this ex-con (and current criminal) and the second incident is, “Look how awful this guy is.”
In addition, I hate this new thing of introducing a dozen people in the first ten minutes of a series. I’m like, “Who is this? How does this character relate?” Especially when some of them resemble each other, it makes for a very confusing situation. I still have five minutes left of the second episode, and I don’t think I’ll be watching another. It’s a shame. I had heard such good things about the show, and I really wanted to like it. Ah well. I’ll just move on to another series, vainly hoping for another that makes me as happy as I was watching Poirot.
I hope I get over this sickness sometime soon. The worst part is that I feel so helpless and hopeless. Going to the bathroom is enough to wear me out, and when I took the trash out, I got lightheaded. I’m so tired. I’ve been in bed for the last three hours, just watching criminal procedures. By the way, I prefer shows like Criminal Minds sometimes because they know how to stay in their lane. They don’t try to be high concept or anything resembling reality. They’re the equivalent of junk food, and they’re fine with it. Same with Law & Order. They’re feeding the masses pablum and are comfortable doing so.
Anyway, it’s discouraging that I can’t even do half of what I could do three days ago. I’m tired and grumpy, and I want this to end now. I’m not high energy in the best of times, so when I get sick, my system really takes a hit. My immunity system isn’t great to begin with, though it’s gotten better since I’ve started studying taiji. Still. Taiji isn’t a panacea or a cure-all, which means I’ll still get sick from time to time. I just hope it won’t last long.
*Watching BBC shows has influenced my vocabulary.