Welcome Bang Bang Happiness Boat: Very 6

What a pleasure it's been to catch up with y'all!  And look at you all still keeping the faith!  My heartfelt thanks and gratitude, folks.

See, I do this. Big tramautic shit happens, and I jump ship for a year.  And I don't see it as a charming foible either; it's not an attribute I am proud of in any way.  Still, there it is - I retreat to my Rancho of Solitude and go incommunicado.  Even with the outside world.

How this has fucked me well and truly this time around is that, between me crawling into a hole and pulling it after me, and two years of Covid, I am now three years out of date. On everything.

That's a lot these days, come to find out.

I went on a news blackout.  Oh, a few things slipped in (I've been following the slowly sinking plague ship that is Trump and all he claims with the greatest imaginable enjoyment), but on the main I just didn't keep up.  Dang. Some shit happened out there.  And you folks are getting around!  Ikea-ABBA concerts and trans-world romps, pun intended if you so desire, and babies and graduations and new love affairs - wow!

Me?  I  

1. Re-examined and finally altered my study objectives,

My hero. Been studying his life and times for over twenty years. No shit. Me. Your secret Italian Renaissance specialist. Yup.  

AND

2. Began reading 'The Classics' in a serious way.

And you know what?  I'm happy.  To be able to devote whole, uninterrupted days to my study interests is the most satisfying thing I've done in years.  I can't garden anymore, but dammit, I can still grow my brain.  

I am reading all the classics, too, like The Epic of Gilgamesh and shit like that, not just English lit, because the Earth is round and covered in people and has been for a longass time and I need to read the words of all the people.  They have important things to say. 

Looking forward to the Tale of Genji. Fuckin' A right, I know how to party.   

I'm glad I waited until I was in my sixties to hit 'The Classics' because I would not have had the necessary context laid down in order for some of this to slot into place. For instance, I just finished 'Silas Marner.'  If I'd had to read that back in High School -when U.S. kids of my generation were traditionally made to choke down 'Moby Dick' 'The Mill On The Floss' 'Beowulf' and all things Jane Austen - I would have thrown Silas across the fucking room. and said screw English Literature. Give me drugs. NOW.  I would have grown up good for nothing but lying on a couch eating Cheetos and dipshitting around on my phone because my brain would be a vast empty wilderness full of vast emptiness.

And Cheetos. Yuck. Rather have a mouthful of dick than Cheetos.  Wouldn't you?    

I won't bore you with my reading list. But one thing I have determined after numerous dips into the pool is I SURE IN THE FUCK plan to avoid Jane Austen because NO. 

This is exactly the kind of content I turn to when I want to be entertained - the facile doings of a bunch of self-conscious high-school soshes with too much money, in a Regency setting.

I read Jane Eyre, it was good, and that's all the rural minor nobility/ class struggle/ dance of manners and taste I need for the rest of my goddamn life.  Have I tried reading Austen? Yes. Many times, over the years. And many times over the years, Jane Austin took a flying lesson across the room. Bam hit the wall every time. Fuck Jane Austin.  Now Oscar Wilde? OH YES INDEED. Come here you Stephen Frye-looking mad bastard you.  Charles Dickens?  Just about anybody else?  Get on in here!  Group hug! 

Heady stuff, I know. Working up a sweat here just thinking of all that page-turning and shit.

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Here's your assignment:  Tell me about your hobbies in the comments!  I mean yeah, tender the usual praise and worship but I'd love to know about all the illegal shit you're up to. Or even if it's perfectly legal; I don't care! G'head!

NOTE: MISS SCARLET, HOW DO I GET AHOLD OF YOU?????

             DINAHMOW! HOW THE Freakin' Freak DO I GET AHOLD OF YOU????

            Both of you please shoot me a viable link. I miss y'alluns.