Kvetching, construction and Boston Legal

It’s Thursday and I’m finally beginning to feel like a person again; though an emotionally and physically drained one. Nah it wasn’t anybody, or anything, on the Internet.

Am going to Sarabeth’s for breakfast; Sarabeth’s is a New York breakfast/brunch/lunch institution. It has great regular food, and some of the best deserts anywhere. It also has lemon ricotta pancakes which are incredible, very light and easy to eat.

My sister told me to go to Whole Foods for their Creme Brulee; I will probably get it at Sarabeth’s to take home, or from Citerella’s. Like I said this can be a very fattening month, but I have lost some weight this week, and have the feeling that I will be losing some more.

I had expected the first surgeries to be difficult. They were almost too easy. I say that only because this one was supposed to be the easy one. Wasn’t. Not because of the surgeon; as always he was incredible. Sometimes things hurt more than expected; sometimes less.

The penthouse in my building is being worked on; heard the workers as they went up the pulley at eight AM; hear the construction on two of the first three brownstones that face my living room. Some of it sounds like dentist drills used to. Don’t need that sound today.

Thought my TV cable was out; it needed to be rebooted. Such a simple thing and I totally forgot. Fortunately the DVR recorded Boston Legal so I saw James Spader as Allan Shore, my role model in ethical behavior, because he does give a damn, defend Betty White who wasn’t playing Sue Ann Niven, or was that Sue Ellen? on The Mary Tyler Moore Show or whatever her name was on The Golden Girls but a character who began as sort of a joke and has evolved. Her name on this show is Katherine Piper.

The thing about characters on Boston Legal is that they grow and that they talk about stuff people really talk about but almost never on network TV. When William Shatner as Denny Crane talks about once being the best lawyer, and now is losing it due to what he calls his “mad cow disease,” you feel his suffering; you feel Allan Shore’s pain at not being able to help him. There really isn’t much Allan Shore can say to him. James Spader just keeps getting better and more complex.

I loved him during his “heart throb”days–or decades really, and plan on watching a few of his finer films today or tomorrow. But the new James Spader just blows me away. Katherine began as a minor character who lives in the town Allan Shore grew up in, and hated him. Believe she tried to blackmail him.

Now after she murdered somebody who might or might not have deserved to be killed, she only wanted Allan Shore to be her attorney. They grew to respect and like each other. I have to say that I was teary eyed when she said that they had never hugged; and he replied that had to be rectified. It was the way he looked at her that give his inherent goodness away; as much as his discussion with Denny Crane about successfully defending somebody he actually liked.

I know that he is supposed to epitomize the unethical lawyer. But James Spader can emote more with the blink of an eye than most people can with words and their whole body in motion. Am too brain dead to discuss more about James Spader/Allan Shore’s evolution as a character. But will next Wednesday probably.

Hope to catch up on sleep today, and tomorrow. Then begin catching up on life. Will be going round to blogs someday in the very near future. Sunday or Tuesday at the latest.

Jane, Mulligan and everybody else can’t thank you enough; will plug next week.

Have been having some server problems; tried to post this, it didn’t take. Tried again, it published twice.