I weighed 86.5 kilos before breakfast.
Around midday I brought the stepladder in and filled the upper left quarter of the eastern wall of the bathroom. That part of the wall is not so bad and mostly I filled in the space between the frame of the air vent and the wall. While I was up there I had time to also fill the upper right quarter of the northern wall. On Sunday I’ll probably have time to do the northern and western walls above the bathtub.
I weighed 86.95 kilos before lunch.
In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back for the first time in about two weeks. I noticed since yesterday that my new bike is squeaking sometimes when I use the brakes so when I got back I took it to Metro Cycles. Jack said it’s common for the brakes on new bikes to squeak at first. My knee feels a bit weird since I got the bike but the seat seems to be at the right level. I noticed when I started riding my vintage Raleigh that there was an adjustment process then for my knee as well. When I got my bike home and started backing it into my apartment it was squealing. Then I noticed that a cable was rubbing against the wheel, I moved it out of the way and also noticed that there was some transparent tape in that area, which I peeled off. The squealing stopped.
I weighed 86.85 kilos at 18:19.
A couple of weeks ago I filled out a “suggested title” form for the U of T Libraries asking them to order my book from Ekstasis. I got an email today from Grant Hurley the Canadiana librarian at U of T.:
“Just a note that I’ve received your suggested title request for your book Paranoiac Utopia. Your request has made me realize we’ve missed quite a few Ekstasis Editions titles for the past few years, so I have reached out to the press to place a larger backfill order to fill the gap, which will include two copies of your book for UTL. Unfortunately, the press doesn’t seem to have any distribution through our usual purchase channels, so this slows down the process a bit. I expect it may take a couple months or more to get it in the stacks, but rest assured it will get there!”
So that’s good news even though I still can't find a book store to order Paranoiac Utopia.
I noticed that my humane mouse trap was closed but when I picked it up and shook it, it didn’t feel like there was a mouse inside. On several occasions the trap has closed by itself so when I opened it up to reset it I was surprised when a mouse jumped out. I should have opened it up outside. It looks like the Vegamite works better as bait than the cheese I tried but unfortunately I doubt that particular mouse will fall for the trap twice.
I was caught up in my journal at 19:57.
I watched the first twenty minutes of Riot On the Sunset Strip as I looked for clips to harvest for my “Seven Shades of Blues” video. I’m looking for something to fit my line “Mom and dad want baby’s freedom” but there’s nothing so far.
I had a potato with gravy and the last of my pork ribs while watching season 3, episode 15 of Batman.
Egghead, Olga Queen of Cossacks and her men enter the Gotham City Museum. The guard is pinned to the wall with thrown swords. Olga finds what she has come to steal: the silver scimitar of Taras Bulbul. It can’t be pulled out of the Golden Egg of Ogg except by the rightful ruler of Bessarovian Cossacks. Egghead is always following far behind Olga because she and the Cossacks are the only ones allowed to ride horses while everybody else must ride burros. Olga tries to pull the scimitar from the egg but it won’t budge until Egghead takes from his pocket a bottle of Egg of Ogg Acid, applies a touch to the point where the blade meets the egg, and then Olga is able to extract it. Commissioner Gordon hears of the thefts and we learn that Egghead is not in prison because of a technicality and Olga and her Cossacks were not deported because Bessarovia didn’t want them. Gordon calls Batman. Meanwhile Egghead is planning an enormous heist because Olga requires a big dowry before they are married. They are going to steal a vault full of 250 kilos of dehydrated Samarqandian caviar. It’s worth $1.5 million and that would be about $15 million today. When Barbara Gordon learns from her father that Egghead, Olga and the Cossacks are back she heads home to change to Batgirl. Meanwhile Batman figures out that Egghead is after the caviar and he and Robin head for the Gotham Bank where it is being stored. Olga and her Cossacks steal the caviar and leave. It is only then that Egghead arrives on his burro. The bank manager tells the guard to shoot Egghead even though he had nothing to do with the theft. Batgirl arrives and tells Egghead that she will let the guard shoot him unless he shows her the location of his and Olga’s hideout. He agrees and rides on the back of her Batgirl Cycle to a certain warehouse. Batman and Robin arrive at the bank shortly after Batgirl has driven away. Batgirl and Egghead get to the warehouse and she tells Egghead to enter ahead of her. He warns Olga and they think they have the jump on Batgirl but she comes in through the back. Batgirl takes on the Cossacks by herself and holds her own until Olga throws caviar in her path causing her to slip and knock her head on the floor. She wakes with her hands tied behind her back. Olga says she must now do a sabre dance and so the Cossacks rhythmically stab at her feet while she steps and jumps to avoid them and shows off Yvonne Craig’s dance training. Batman and Robin track Batgirl to the warehouse by the radioactive sparkplug in her Batgirl Cycle and they enter the warehouse to fight the Cossacks. As Batman and Robin are winning, Olga has Egghead grab Batgirl and dump her into the vat of caviar. The crooks escape while Batman saves Batgirl from drowning in frozen fish eggs. Then Batman tells Batgirl that perhaps crimefighting is better left to the men, but then adds “Perhaps not. But this isn’t exactly women’s work”. She tells Batman she’s no ordinary woman and he agrees. We only learn later that Egghead, Olga and the Cossacks accidentally ran right into a paddy wagon while trying to escape the building. Barbara arrives at Gordon’s office and says she just saw a car with whiskers on its front fender and it was driven by Catwoman accompanied by the Joker. The car is Catwoman’s Kitty Car and it also has a curly and fluffy tail and pointed ears on the side.
One of the Cossacks was played by Gene LeBell, also known as Judo Gene LeBell and “The Godfather of Grappling”, which is the precursor to mixed martial arts. He began studying wresting at the age of 7 and then studied judo in Japan. He became a world champion in both judo and wrestling. But he only held the heavyweight wrestling title for twelve seconds because after receiving belt he swung it around in excitement, hitting and severely injuring a wrestling commissioner causing his title to be immediately revoked. He acted and worked as a stuntman for film and television for fifty years. He was still teaching grappling into his 70s. He was a close friend of Bruce Lee and studied from him his own unique martial arts techniques. He was once attacked by Steven Seagal on a movie set. He put Seagal in a choke hold until he was unconscious. He defeated a Milo Savage in a boxer vs wrestler match even though Savage was wearing brass knuckles and had greased himself with Vaseline. Some say he was the inspiration for Brad Pitt’s character in Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, but Tarantino says he wasn’t.
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