RedShoulder

I'm not going to lie--I am ready to put 2020 behind me. This year was...well, to put it nicely, awful. A pandemic that has taken close to 350,000 lives in the US (and counting), lockdowns, having to isolate from friends and family, rampant corruption in the White House via the most corrupt President in modern history, and his political party openly calling for taking voting rights from people and overturning an election because they did not like the results, smug @$$holes on social media spreading lies and gleefully hoping for everything to fall apart.... I knew family and friends who were affected by COVID, and let's be blunt--everyone knows someone who has been affected by this pandemic. I lost a good friend this year--not to COVID, but to a tragic one-in-a-million complication from surgery. I missed seeing family and friends. I missed going to the movies and places that I used to go to. I missed seeing someone who I realized--only after things were closed--I had developed

Syd Mead went from designing cars and industrial products to designing worlds.  And while he was already well known for the former, it will be the latter than many will remember him for. Mead, who passed away on December 30, had lent his distinctive look to films such as ALIENS, TRON, SHORT CIRCUIT, and others.  Starting with STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE (1979), Mead would go on to re-define the look of SF films with BLADE RUNNER (1982), the classic film that has inspired numerous artists and authors over the years.  He even came back for the sequel, BLADE RUNNER 2049 (2017), with his designs for a future Las Vegas. For the film BLADE RUNN

I haven't put up a journal entry in quite a while--more like since last year--so it's time for a update. I left 2018 in a state that could only be called, well, being content.  I was just glad to be alive, to have some money in the bank (courtesy of a seasonal job), and to see my niece turn one year older and also realize just how much she's grown, and that my family and friends for the most part were still here. Yet the biggest change I saw was in myself.  I'll explain that one. For many years I pretty much hated myself.  Many didn't see it at all; only a couple of friends and close family members could tell that there was a lot of self-h