Be-Mused — Karen Templeton

Did any of you see that piece in the news about the smugglers who were lured to a fake wedding on a luxury yacht off the Jersey shore (as in, Joisey, all you across-the-ponders), only to find their butts thrown in jail? The sting operation was months in the making, including a pair of undercover FBI agents who posed as a couple, befriended these yahoos (whose stock in trade included counterfeit money, cigarettes, Viagra and blue jeans, with a few semi-automatic rifles thrown in for variety), and then “invited” said yahoos to their “wedding.” The “guests” were guaranteed transportation to the yacht, only there was a slight detour.

I mean, does this sound like a proposal (as it were) for UNDERCOVER WEDDING or what? Sandra Bullock could do the movie. With. . .? Colin Farrell? Hugh Jackman? Jackie Chan? Anybody but Brad Pitt. I’m seriously off Brad Pitt these days. With Jude Law running a close second.

A moment of silence while we all contemplate not nice words of our choice.

Complete track switch ahead.

Two reasons why I love my husband (there are more, but we’ll just deal with these two for now):

1. He gets a phone call from an old friend yesterday, who tells him friends took her out to a play and dinner for her birthday.

“They went to see THE VIRGIN DIALOGUES,” he says.

I blink. “You mean THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES?”

“Yeah, that’s it.”

At least he was close.

2. The roar of the vacuum, the pungent scent of pine cleaner, assailing my senses from downstairs. Yes, boys and girls, the man cleans. Without being prompted. Our house will be clean until approximately 3:41, when #5 returns from school.

Bliss.

Actually, strike that. This newsflash just in — our big red cat promptly sprawled his loose-furred self across the clean, dark green carpet (what were we thinking?). Ah, well. At least the bathroom still sparkles.

In anticipation of the release of Harry Potter VI, which I knew was the one in which A Beloved Character Was to Bite the Big One, I decided to catch up on Books IV and V, which have languished in my youngest son’s room lo these many years. (I hadn’t read III, either, but I saw the movie, which — as I stood there, contemplating a pair of books which individuallyweighed more than my cats — I decided was close enough. I knew what happened, I figured I was up to speed.)

In any case, and with a light heart, I dove in. Some 1500 pages later, I had finished both IV and V (impressing the hell out of my non-reading spawn — what’s up with that, anyway?), loved them so much I didn’t even envy J.K. Rowling her millions (not too much, anyway) and couldn’t wait to get into VI, even though it was now some weeks after the book’s release and I already knew who died.

About a hundred pages in, however, I started to feel like a participant in one of those see-who-can-scarf-down-the-most-brats-in-ten-minutes contests. I got slower. . .and slower. . .and began. . .to wonder. . .if it would ever end. So I’m wondering. . .was my ennui due to having swallowed the previous two books practically whole, so that the magic was no longer special (bearing in mind that I do not generally read fantasy, anyway)? Or were Dumbledore’s conversations with Harry really as interminable as they seemed? Did Rowling — who I still truly believe is one of the most brilliant plotters in the known universe, and whose attention to detail, both in world-building and characterization, is unparalleled — resort to as much “telling” as I think she did?

In any case, I think I’m just as glad the last book won’t be out for another couple of years. It’ll take me that long to digest the three I just ate.

Currently reading: THE INTERRUPTION TO EVERYTHING, Terry McMillan