Holiday in the Hospital
I spent five days in Audubon Hospital here in Louisville KY over the Christmas season, for blood clots in my left leg. I am really glad to be discharged. Last October I was in the same hospital for the same reason, but was in for about 10 days.
I hated the hospital stay, but ironically had one of the best Christmases I've had in a long time. It's well known among friends and acquaintances that I'm usually an insufferable scrooge who hates that holiday, but the ton of love and support from a constant stream of visitors softened my heart on the matter a little, if only for a year. I wish I could get that many folks to come to my birthday parties. I loved seeing everyone, and it made me forgot the pain I was in for a little while.
I even saw my family for a few hours on Christmas Eve, the first time I've seen them in three years. That was totally my doing. A lot of people have asked me over the years why I never seem to talk about my family or visit, but it's hard to explain. I wasn't abused or anything, there were just too many bad memories in Grayson County, and after my mom died, my family didn't feel so important anymore. That sounds cold to say, but my siblings were already grown with families of their own, and I wanted more than anything else to get the hell out of there and start a new life. A niece I loved very much would text me a lot in the past few months on my new Blackberry (as opposed to my sister who won't try to adjust to the fact that I'm nearly deaf at this point and keep demanding audio calls), and because of my niece I've eased up on the negligence a little. I'm still uncomfortable around my sister, but my older brothers seem content to let me live as I see fit. I had pleasant conversations with them.
I got pumped full of more cumadin, a blood thinner I'll be on for the rest of my life. It also means I can no longer drink alcohol. My days of drunken facebook posts are over, I guess. I don't think that will change the content much, but the spelling and grammar should improve. I went through a six month period of not drinking last year while one cumadin, with the exception of one beer just to see how it felt (it made me sick to my stomach), so I'm fairly sure I'll be okay without liquid courage. It's so weird talking to friends who let alcohol damage their lives, and seem assured that I'm okay now that I can no longer drink. I never thought alcohol was the problem. I had plenty of anger and unresolved issues when I didn't drink, and I still have them. Those things haven't magically disappeared in the three days since I've last let the rum in Porschas eggnog dribble across my lips.
I sat in bed for five days and went stir crazy. I watched my arms get mutilated with medical tape and stabbed with long needles in weird places when they ran of room because my left arm has a dialysis shunt (and thus cannot be prodded by the nurses). My leg didn't hurt hurt much after they started the cumadin drip, but my head ached badly and my stomach felt invasive waves of nausea from time to time. They gave me something called norvo for the pain, which Tom Waters told me was another form of Vidocin. I didn't really care for it as a drug, but I couldn't convince the nurses to give me Demerol instead, like I had last year. I saw so many visitors and spent so much time in naps that I didn't have enough time to wallow in depression. I also didn't have any nightmares, which was unusual.
Becky Becky gave me some art supplies, and I promised to draw her a tree when I got out. I've got the pad right beside me and will start after a late dinner. Her gift is 'lingerie', as I jokingly call it- a gift given so it will benefit the gift giver (because why else would a guy buy a girl lingerie?). She also brought me a meatball sub, which kept me alive in spite of hospital food. Porscha gave me the best damn meatloaf I've ever had in my life, tons of people brought me baked goods, and Dodd brought me an art book filled with 70s horror-comic-style pages. Jeff Gaither signed one of his old drawings and gave it to me on his visit my roommate Brian got me more lingerie in the form of several pulp novels (I'd just started a GURPS pulp campaign).
If this blog entry is a little dryly written it's because it's more of a reminder of what I went through at the end of the year that to be artsy. I'm glad to be out of there.
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A myth is by definition--a story. I doubt it actually happened. (ie: I doubt there was actually a minotaur, ect.) And, yes liberties can be taken with them (in retellings, ect.)
However, there's a definite story and if you're going to compare your work to the original, it should be accurate.
Inglourious Basterds is an alternate history, a re-imagining, a "what-if." Which is totally different than comparing a myth to an event in the movie which has no comparison.
When something like Triangle makes an "allusion" using a Greek myth, it's the literary equivalent of using "like or as." It's saying: "This story is "like" the Greek myth." or "These characters at as the ones in the ancient myth do." However, when the characters are only loosely acting in similarity, it's just an unnecessary or poor comparison.
If you want to continue using Inglourious Basterds it'd be like saying the movie is an allusion to the Iliad. Yes they do sneak into enemy territory to kill a military leader, but other than that, it's just a really poor comparison.