Kathryn Hays

            On Tuesday morning I memorized the thirteenth verse of “Allons z'enfants” (Join the Ranks Kids) by Boris Vian. There is one verse left to learn. 

            I memorized the fourth verse of “La vague à lames” (The Bladed Wave) by Serge Gainsbourg. There’s one verse left to nail down plus some repetitions and I should have that done on Wednesday. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar during song practice and audio and video recorded the session for the last time of this year’s 45 day project. I’m glad it’s over and I can get that extra hour back. I can also return to sanding my bathroom. Tonight I’ll start reviewing all the songs I recorded to hear if any turned out well enough to upload to YouTube. I spent more time today doing retakes of “Vomit of the Star Eater” than I have throughout the entire project because I wanted to get a good version on this last day. I redid “Sixteen Tons of Dogma” a few times and I think I ended up with an okay take. 

            I weighed 84.95 kilos before breakfast. That’s the lightest I’ve been in the morning in a long time. 

            I weighed 85.75 kilos before lunch. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and stopped at Freshco on the way back. I had planned on just using the Freshco washroom and then walking over to Metro to buy grapes. But the red grapes at Freshco were in pretty good shape so I got five bags and did a price match with the Metro Price at $5.38 a kilo. When Priscilla looked at the flyer on my phone she caused the image to go away and so she looked it up on her much faster phone. 

            I weighed 85.35 kilos at 18:30. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 20:07. 

            I searched for videos of rainbows but there isn’t much. I think I’m better off turning still images into a video for the opening of my “Seven Shades of Blues” project. 

            I grilled two T-bone steaks and had one with a small potato and gravy while watching season 1, episodes 11 and 12 of Branded. 

            The first story starts with a flashback to the Civil War. Jason McCord takes shelter in a bomb crater where he is attacked by a Confederate soldier. They fight and McCord kills him. The dying man forgives him and gives him a pocket watch to give back to his father if he has the chance, but he dies before he can tell him his name. It’s McCord’s first kill and it haunts him but he hangs onto the watch in case he can ever find the family of the man he killed. Years later McCord goes to a saloon for a beer. A poker game is going on and the inebriated Adam Manning has just lost to a man named Rand, but Adam is short $20. Rand demands the money but Adam doesn’t have it. Rand shoves him in anger and he falls against McCord who catches him and turns him around to see a man who is identical to the man he killed. He takes him home where he meets his father Sam Manning. He learns that the man he killed was Tad Manning and Sam has made him into a giant in his memory. He is constantly comparing Adam to Tad and often tells him what a disappointment he is. Rand comes for his money but Adam still doesn’t have it. Rand says he’ll get it from Sam but Adam tries to stop him and they fight but Rand wins and he’s about to beat Adam more when McCord stops him, easily beats him, and then gives him the $20 that Adam owes. Later McCord is about to leave and tells Sam that he killed his son then gives him the watch. Sam is angry and encourages Adam to do something about it. Adam confronts McCord with a rifle but McCord easily takes it away from him. He hands him the knife he made from the sword he used to kill Tad and tells him to use it if he can live with it. Adam can’t do it and walks away. Sam says he was wrong, thanks McCord for giving him back his son and then goes to Adam. 

            In the second story, Christina Adams hates Jason McCord because she blames him for her brother’s death at Bitter Creek. McCord was Clark Adams’s commanding officer and Clark was killed in the massacre. Before the war Clark and Christina inherited the ranch and Clark tried to manage it but it wasn’t in his blood. There were financial pitfalls and so Clark took out a loan from the bank, putting up the ranch as collateral. He also took out an insurance policy on the loan so that if he died the debt would be canceled. But the banker now contends that Clark joined the army so he would be killed and the loan canceled to protect Christina. If the bank can prove that Clark had a death wish then the bank can take the ranch. That’s why despite her hatred of McCord she needs him as a character witness in court. Her lawyer tracks McCord down and he agrees to testify. The court learns from a witness that Clark always requested transfer to companies that were under fire. When McCord takes the stand the courtroom is in shock to hear his name. He says that at first Clark was reckless but then he realized that his recklessness was putting his comrades in danger and so he changed his ways. He says Clark was one of the last men standing and protecting a wounded man. He says he was that wounded man. That conflicts with McCord’s earlier account that he was knocked unconscious and missed the battle altogether. McCord later tells Christina that before he died Clark was writing a letter to her talking about his hopes for the future which would be evidence that he did not want to die. She says she never got it but McCord suggests it was unfinished and never sent. He tells her to check his effects that were sent to her after he died and to look inside his cap, which was often where soldiers kept their letters. She goes to look and while she is doing so a group of men, including the banker, come to tar and feather McCord. He fights off several men but is about to be overwhelmed when Christina fires a shotgun. Then she reads the men the letter she found, which proves that Adam wanted to live and also that Jason McCord inspired that change of attitude. McCord and Christina are friends at the end. 

            Christina was played by Kathryn Hays, who started as a model but quickly moved to acting on stage. Her TV debut was in Hawaiian Eye and her film debut was in Ladybug Ladybug. She co-starred in the TV series The Road West. She played the Minaran empath Gem on the Star Trek episode “Empath”. She co-starred in the film Counterpoint. She spent 38 years playing the matriarch Kim Sullivan Hughes on As the World Turns until the final episode. She was married for three years to Hollywood legend Glenn Ford. After dinner I looked in the mirror and saw that my gnawing the T-bone had caused my front filling to wear away in the corner. It’s a happy coincidence that it happened after I shot the last video of my project. My book launch is supposedly at the end of November so I don’t want to get the filling fixed too soon before then and run the risk of it breaking again before the event. I’ll wait until about a month from now.