The Cookie Conundrum
Well, the rumors are true: the movie JoJo Rabbit really is . . . kind of problematic. Which is to say, I agree with a lot of the mixed reactions of critics, and not so much with the unfettered delight of the festival audiences. I suppose in all likelihood regular-release audiences will fall somewhere in the middle, but when it comes to Academy voters, unfortunately, they tend to fall more in line with film festival audiences. I actually did enjoy this movie, generally, but there is no one single category of Academy Award that it deserves even to be nominated for, really, let alone win. And festival reactions have made people predict this movie to be an eventual Best Picture contender, which will only make me increasingly resentful of this movie, which is still . . . fine.
Anyway, I went straight to Pacific Place after work yesterday to see it. I arrived at home at about 7:30. Shobhit had made another batch of rice to go with leftovers from dinner he made on Monday, which allowed me to pack yet another lunch out of it. We had frozen parathas with it. Well, I fried the parathas to heat them. And they were already mostly thawed after Shobhit moved the packet to the refrigerator. These are sure important details, aren't they?
Then I went to write the review, and I never did really watch any TV with Shobhit last night. I should have expected that, really, given it was election night. Some pretty great things across the country happened, but a lot of the results here in Washington State were not the greatest: we (but not me) voted yet again not to legalize affirmative action, and longstanding local fuckwad Tim Eyman gained a victory that, if expected court challenges come back at it, seems to me kind of tentative. But, potentially, it means billions in lost tax revenue for Sound Transit, which is expanding our beloved Light Rail network.
What annoys me most is this is the result of a 23% voter turnout. That's fucking pathetic.
Many people are relieved, though, that Kshama Awant has likely been defeated as the City Council member representing my district. That woman had a lot of love, as well as a lot of hate, around here. Shobhit always wanted her out; he feels her socialist ideals are too extreme. I was honestly never all that invested either way, but I was actually swayed into voting for Egan Orion over her based on one issue, really: this city's massive homelessness problem, for which Sawant supporters seem to think she's a big problem solver. On that front, I call bullshit: if nothing has changed in four years, then our representative leadership needs turnover. And I'm not that swayed by arguments that Orion is "bought by Amazon," which is a quick go-to for Chicken Little types. (And I don't by any stretch think of Amazon as a "great" presence here. I don't lie about purchasing products through them, though, which is a separate, nuanced conversation.) The Stranger sure loves her, and sure hates Orion, but whatever. I use their election guide but only follow their suggestions when their arguments make sense. There are some races where they give reasons not to vote for someone and it comes across to me as a reason to vote for them. And I don't buy that Sawant has been the Second Coming of anything at all.
Let's see, what else? Oh! Ivan told me on Monday via Facebook Messenger that he is down to 148 lbs. And I found that both worrying and infuriating. I was convinced, first of all, that it's way too little weight for someone of his height (5'10", I believe). Secondly, it's the first time since I've known him that, even though he's two inches taller than I am, he's lighter than I am. God damn it! Also: is he eating at all down in New Zealand? Ivan replied, "I eat like a pig." What an asshole.
But, then, yesterday I looked up BMI charts, and it turns out 5'8" (my height) and 5'10" are essentially within the same range where "normal" is, and we both fall within that range. True, I am closer to overweight—having weighed in at 157 lbs yesterday morning; 156 today—than he is to being underweight, but we're still both well within the "healthy" or "normal" range. And, yes, yes, I know BMI charts can be misleading as they do not take body types into account. Ivan is naturally thin and I come from a family of obesity, although I do much more take after my dad, who has gained a fair amount of weight as he's gotten older but was very thin for most of his life.
"Slow and steady wins the race," I keep telling myself, when it comes to shedding the pounds I have put back on since 2016. So, so far today I've had four small cookies, a small packet of candy coated peanut butter chocolates (basically a natural version of Reese's Pieces), and half a delicious "sticky croissant" Robin walked around sharing, which I had completely forgotten I had eaten when I snagged that last cookie. I'm well on my way, can you tell!
I constantly go back and forth on this shit. I thought I would save the packet of peanut butter candies until tomorrow but I really wanted it, and I went through this stupid debate in my head, until I finally thought, This is so stupid. There's no reason to beat myself up over eating something I just want, so I just went ahead and ate it. Still, it would have been better not to have that at my desk to begin with. It was enough that I had the little three-pack of biscuit style cookies Scott gave me yesterday, which I had dipped in my tea after arriving at work this morning. Pretty much all of them were worth the calories, to be honest. Well, maybe except for that last cookie. I should not have snatched that from the counter in the kitchen. Bad Matthew!
Also, there's not the greatest need for this inner turmoil in any context of vanity, given how many truly hot guys I regularly come across who are for some reason into me. It's quite clear I have no need to start any particular workout regiment in order to get any action. I'm legitimately sexy to far more people than I ever would have imagined before I embraced my inner slut. I still don't understand it, but I have finally reached a point where I can accept that it is true. And that kind of dampens any incentive to lose these roughly 15 lbs I really wish I could lose. There's also what my doctor recently told me: that aging alone, with nothing else changing, adds roughly one pound per year. Which means that I would otherwise now be at least 9 lbs heavier by now than I was after losing all the weight in 2010 anyway. Fuck, getting older is such a pain in the ass!
Oh well. At least I can still enjoy my life. And a few cookies.
[posted 1:01 pm, delayed half an hour due to a Squarespace outage]