Beets would always be my choice.

Today is Fiona's birthday. I haven't seen her around these parts in quite a while, but I do hope she is doing well and is enjoying her day.

Happy day to Fiona, who always inspires happy thoughts.

Are you ready for a true Halloween horror story?

I was flipping around my streaming options idly wondering if the new Fantastic Four was available yet.

I wasn't curious enough about it to go see it in theaters, but I do like that '62 World's Fair aesthetic and who doesn't like Pedro Pascal?

Up popped the thumbnail for Fantastic Four: First Steps all bright and shiny and I clicked on it.

I start watching the movie and it's not all bright and shiny and Jetsons in Manhattan vibes. It's gloomy and outer boroughs and it's incredibly slow moving. Also, there's this long prelude with other actors playing younger versions of the heroes, that nobody mentioned. I can't help but compare it to the new Superman which opens in the middle of action and goes bam bam bam all the way through to the end.

Then Michael B. Jordan shows up and I realize I'm watching the bad Fantastic Four. The worst reviewed superhero movie of all time. The 2015 version.

I don't know what's worse, that I wasted 20 minutes of my life on it, or that it took me that long to figure out what I was watching. Definite sign of cognitive dysfunction.

The horror! (Dag, it really really sucked though. So bad.)

I don't know what's worse, that I wasted 20 minutes of my life on it, or that it took me that long to figure out what I was watching.

Thoughts and prayers in this confusing superhero multiverse. #neverforgetthose20minutes

You will very much like the new Fantastic Four movie.

We're in serious concern mode here over the impending disaster in Jamaica. Brendon's closest friend's mom and one of her sons are right on the beach in Negril, with the eye headed for them. As I feared, they are not leaving or going to a shelter. The house itself is old enough to have gone through many storms, but being on the coast, it could well end up underwater. It doesn't surprise me that they are being stubborn, but I really wish the family could have talked them into leaving.

A huge percentage of the homes in Jamaica won't withstand this storm. Too many live in lean-tos made from scrap materials. I really hope people have gone to shelters. This is just horrifying.

eta: I haven't been to their home, but Brendon has and says it is about 20' above sea level because there is a sharp incline going down to the ocean. Still, completely insane to stay when they had other options.

This is just horrifying.

Yes. I don't have better words to describe it.

Yikes, that is scary, Laura.

I am at my sister’s house and managed to leave behind the cable I needed for my second screen. I tried several of hers and they did not work, so I’m not sure if it’s a cable issue or the screen has somehow died. But I can’t work just from my laptop I’ll go nuts, so we hauled out/unpacked my brother in laws GIANT MONITOR which is a 34” wide screen. I think I can see pivot tables into the FUTURE on this thing it’s so big.

Very worried about Jamaica, that storm looks terrifying

It really does. Safety ~ma to, well, everyone there.

I trudged forth into the Monday morning and did my Pilates.

After a rainy weekend, it's another gloriously sunny October day in SF.

There's a long, detailed, exceptionally well done article in the NYTimes today about sex trafficking in Los Angeles, and it's so fucking heartbreaking.

These are very young girls, 13-15, more than half of whom were in the Foster care system. Pimps literally park outside halfway houses and grab them as they come out.

They get taken out of Florida, Texas, everywhere and they're brought to LA and there's a five block stretch on Figueroa where the cars just slowly cruise through like they're picking up an order at In N Out.

The girls are tortured, killed, forced to do half a dozen customers a night, and the pimps make $12,000 a night on their stables. And these girls are loyal and devoted to their pimps because they have nobody. They get taken off the streets but they just return.

The whole thing is horrific and I get queasy and outraged thinking about the lines of customers.

But I also think birth control and abortion would prevent a lot of unwanted children from being born. There are no Pro-Life evangelists out trying to help these girls.

Sorry, for the heavy thoughts on Monday. But I didn't really grasp how entrenched and broadly reaching it is the States.