Picking up from the middle of April, I went with the second in Peter David’s modern Arthur story, One Knight Only. This time, Mayor Arthur Penn of New York City has been made President of the United States following his strong showing in the aftermath of a 9/11-inspired bombing in New York City orchestrated by a Middle Eastern villain. The chain of events set into motion include the attempted assassination of Guenevere, at which point Arthur must make a gamble to retrieve the Holy Grail: setting out with the immortal Percival to find the relic, Arthur finds himself battling Gilgamesh. Yeah, it was a fun read, but disappointing when judged against the first book in the series.
Since I guess I’m reading series books now, I went for Eoin Colfer’s authorized sequel to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: And Another Thing…, which bills itself as the sixth of three volumes. I didn’t finish the book. I’ve got nothing against Mr. Colfer’s writing skill, it’s just that Douglas Adams’ particular style of humor filled the original books to such a degree that I could never tell if Colfer actually got it, or if he was just imitating what had come before. Because I could never get over that, ultimately, I put this book down early.
For a graphic change of pace, Killer Vol 1, written by it’s the tale of a never named French hit man who might be losing his mind, just when he most needs to keep his wits collected. Beautiful illustrations, gripping story, awesome violence.
Returning for the final time to Peter David’s Arthur world for Fall of Knight, in which the Spear of Destiny (said to have been the weapon which pierced Christ’s side during the crucifixion) and the Holy Grail are to be united by an evil alchemist to destroy the world, and the only person who can stop this evil plan? Yeah, King Arthur and the might sword Excalibur. There are some really great individual moments here (mostly towards the end), ultimately, it’s the weakest of the trilogy.
And then! Without even a break! More King Arthur, this time to the tune of John Steinbeck, with his uncompleted The Acts of King Arthur and his Noble Knights, a modern re-telling of Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur. What there is, however? Is absolutely wonderful.
If you’re interested in what other people have been reading, allow me to point you to The Lusty Reader (three guesses what genre she reads, and if you need more than one, I’mma smack you), and amperlee, who has a list of her 2010 52 books, 52 weeks reading challenge (number 19).
I mean, that sounds snobbish and random. I am in it. For all the reasons listed in the about page, but plus so I can look pretty darn good at my sister’s wedding next month (or, at the least, look better than I did).
So, really, I’m in-it-to-do-absolutely-whatever-I-have-to-do-to-stay-the-fuck-out-of-the-gym.com.
Unless you count Washington, DC as my gym. Well, that’s a different perspective: especially those areas that link my part-time job from my residence: Connecticut Avenue; Massachusetts Ave and the neighborhoods east of the National Cathedral; Adams Morgan; 19th Street and the Kalorama neighborhood. For that matter, my part-time job as a bookseller should count as gym time: you go lift hundreds of copies of Kitty Kelley’s Oprah bio and tell me that ain’t a fucking workout.
In fact, if anything, I am absolutely determined not to gym it. At all. I hate gyms, for reasons that have nothing to do with the physical environment, and more with the paranoid ramblings of my insecure self: namely, that I cannot imagine being in a gym (even just to put money on my laundry smartcard) without imagining everyone in there judging me on my weight and appearance.
So instead of gyming it, I walk. I walk to Target in Columbia Heights. I walk to the grocery store. I walk home from my part-time job, and on weekends, I walk there, too. I contemplate buying a Wii for the fitness programs.*
But you know what?
It’s working. Not alone, obviously. I don’t always do a good job of watching what I eat, I exceed my calorie budget quite frequently, but I continue to lose weight.
Last week, if you’ll remember, I’d gained back two and a half pounds and reported in at 244.
Today I report in at 240.5: a loss of three and a half pounds since last week, and a net loss of one pound.
It’s looking very likely that I might even hit the magic goal of TWENTY POUNDS** this time next week.
If you’ve been following my monthly reading (both on my posts here, yes, April is coming soon), or Twitter, you know I’ve read a lot of King Arthur books lately — everything from Peter David’s Arthur-as-Mayor-of-New-York series, to Steinbeck’s take on the legend, and currently Twain’s satiric A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. I branched out recently into a film version of the legend (did not care for the Clive Owen 2004 film), with John Boorman’s Excalibur.
I watched the movie once before, years and years ago, when I was in high school — I don’t actually remember it very well. However, I appreciate it considerably more now (particularly with all of my recent reading).
My favorite scene, which pretty much says anything you’d need to know about Arthur’s character, is this scene, from the beginning of the film.
I particularly love how Uryens goes from “I’m going to chop this fool down!” to “I can’t believe I’m knighting him!” to “I want to have this man’s babies!” All in about the time it takes him to tap the flat of Excalibur three times on Arthur’s shoulders.
(Also, unrelated, an interesting article on the design of the Excalibur prop from the film).
My folks return today from a week in Colorado. One of the consequences of their trip is that they asked if I wanted to borrow my old car for the duration, and I said, “Yes!” So, since Sunday a week ago, I’ve had my old Toyota Matrix parked behind my building, and accessible whenever I’ve desired it.
So, here’s a day-by-day breakdown of my week, and of my lack of exercise and poor food judgement skills.
On Monday, I went to a work-sponsored lunch to greet a new coworker. I ate an entire California Pizza Kitchen Meat Lover’s pizza. I worked at the Bookstore in the evening, and walked home.
On Tuesday, I had two ham & cheese grilled sandwiches for lunch, then caught the bus home from the Bookstore after we stayed much later than usual preparing for the annual audit.
On Wednesday, because I did not have to work at the Bookstore, I drove to work in the morning. Because it was the monthly birthday lunch, the office ordered a whole ton of pizza from Ledo’s, and I ate far more than I should. After work, I went to a coworker’s house to play some Call of Duty, and was treated to homemade waikki meatballs and rice (oh my god, nom nom nom). Departing shortly thereafter, I made trips to Target, Petsmart (bought eight of these), and IKEA (for bookshelves, and assorted shelf-inserts).
On Thursday, after the Bookstore, I once again chose to utilize the bus over walking home. There were no extenuating circumstances – I was just lazy.
On Friday, after working at the Bookstore all day, I and several of my coworkers took Greg Luce out for farewell drinks at Mackey’s. More on Greg later, but let’s just say he’s been a fixture of the store, and he will be dearly missed. I had a beer, a coke, and far more french fries than I should have.
Saturday I ventured down to Open City for lunch with another former colleague from the Bookstore, this time a tall Swedish blond, her boyfriend (another former coworker from the Bookstore), and their daughter, all of whom were in the area (from Sweden) for a funeral. I had an Open City burger, piled high with cheese and bacon, and it was soooo good. I spent the rest of the day (my first, by the way, day off since April 3rd) assembling bookshelves and cleaning (most of) my apartment. Dinner was a whole bag of ginger snaps and several glasses of milk while I watched Sherlock Holmes (very good film, highly enjoyable).
Sunday I was out of my apartment super early, raced up to Rockville, bought some stuff at Target (yes, I know there’s one in DC, but when I have access to a car, I like to shake up my routine a bit, okay?), then drove straight down to the Bookstore, parked outside, worked all day, and upon leaving, hunted around until I found an open Subway, ordered a foot long Spicy Italian, and ate it at home with a couple handful of jalapeno chips and a tall class of Coke Zero.
So you might expect, having completely blown any weekly calorie restrictions, and having walked only two miles out of the fourteen I usually walk in a week, that I would’ve gained like twenty pounds. Honestly, when I stepped on the scale this morning, I was pretty sure I was going to be at the 250-mark.
I am at 244 pounds. A gain of two and a half since last week, but still a total loss of fifteen pounds since March 4th. And I am determined to shed those two and a half pounds by this time next week.
