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Dec. 22nd, 2011 01:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwydion* So that's Solstice, then.
* It's looking like Ron Paul lent his name to racist and anti-Semetic newsletter articles in the 90's. I withdraw my "nice man" opinion, but the fundamentalist wrong bit stands.
* While I'm generally against censorship, my feeling is, releasing the method for weaponizing bird flu is on the very short list of things needing censoring.
* Greenwick's coming tomorrow evening. Yay!
* I finally gave in and moved the pretty shelf out of my room as it was holding up the next phase of unpacking. It's not a particularly convenient location given the current box maze configuration, but it looks to be a sensible spot long term, and I really like easy access to my reference section, and this is the shelf I really want my reference section on, if that makes sense. It's the right shape and size, which is why it's where it's gone in the past.
* I had to send Game of Thrones back half finished again, but made good note of where I left off this time. What else have I been reading? The second Strout novel, the Rift Walker by Clay and Susan Griffith, and some Farmers. Herein lies a story.
When I was small, my parents owned two air conditioners. One lived in the kitchen, for obvious reasons. The other was in my parents' bedroom. I've never been able to sleep in the heat, so when the weather got too hot and humid for me to sleep in my room, we'd make up a pallet on the floor of my parents' room. After my sister was born, they made up a second pallet for her. My spot was right by one of the many book shelves in the house. (I come by it naturally). This shelf mostly had my father's science fiction books and a smattering of mom's mainstream stuff. As I lay there waiting for sleep, I would look at this shelf, and amuse myself with the covers. When I learned to read, I started sampling things off the shelves. It was one of these summers, when I picked up Philip Jose Farmer's To Their Scattered Bodies Go and it's next sequel, The Fabulous Riverboat. I can't tell you which summer it was, but it was likely between third and sixth grade due to surrounding sensory evidence.
I certainly lacked a whole bunch of historical, political, literary, and sociological information one pretty much needed given the nature of the book and it's sequels, but we went to the library once or twice a week in summer, and I had a penchant for research, which I was perfectly willing to do on my own time, and I was not afraid to pull microfilm or wade through adult no fiction on topics that interested me. (Other projects I did for my own edification between 4th and 9th grade include, but are not limited to: PTSD/shell shock/related problems of returning veterans, Lenny Bruce, Kant, Freud, and Ancient Crete). Anyway, I set about learning a whole lot more about Richard Burton, Mark Twain, and a variety of other folks referenced therein. It lead to me slogging through a whole collection of lesser works by Twain and variety of related philosophical works.
I read the first three at least two more times before graduating high school, along with the other novels as they arrived in my house. Each time, with a more complex understanding, and increasing awareness of the serious problems with characterization, particularly of Sam Clemens, as well as of the problematic aspects contained in the books, re: race, gender, orientation, Sam's treatment of Joe, mental illness, etc.. (I have so many questions: What happens to the trans folk? (A question I first formulated my second time through). Is his handling of the problematic elements working or failing? How much is intentional and how much is unintentional? What was he trying to do with Soul City, exactly? On and on. The author being recently deceased, I can't ask him what he was trying to do). I am reading them all again now. I wish I had someone to talk about these things with who's read the damned things. Gah!
* I shan't be seeing War Horse. Long time readers know how I feel about WWI, and I do not think I can stomache sentimentality about any aspect of it. At least in the commercial it looks like sentimental drivel. If any of you see it and it turns out not to be sentimental drivel, let me know.
* This puts into words some things that were bugging me about episode six in particular, but also some larger things bugging me about the series. It's not enough to make me quit yet, but the bloom is off the rose: http://www.fangsforthefantasy.com/2011/12/grimm-season-1-episode-5-danse-macabre.html
* This really moved me: http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14572344490/yayponies-its-a-time-honored-tradition-at-navy
* Lovely: http://litharriel.livejournal.com/508574.html
* He really is just that good: http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14527990848/brilliant-snark-berrybell-hes-just-that
* O.o http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14588580842/helivesunderawaterfall-legionaries
* The stuff Republicans are trying to do instead of or force into the extension bill: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#45745497
* It's looking like Ron Paul lent his name to racist and anti-Semetic newsletter articles in the 90's. I withdraw my "nice man" opinion, but the fundamentalist wrong bit stands.
* While I'm generally against censorship, my feeling is, releasing the method for weaponizing bird flu is on the very short list of things needing censoring.
* Greenwick's coming tomorrow evening. Yay!
* I finally gave in and moved the pretty shelf out of my room as it was holding up the next phase of unpacking. It's not a particularly convenient location given the current box maze configuration, but it looks to be a sensible spot long term, and I really like easy access to my reference section, and this is the shelf I really want my reference section on, if that makes sense. It's the right shape and size, which is why it's where it's gone in the past.
* I had to send Game of Thrones back half finished again, but made good note of where I left off this time. What else have I been reading? The second Strout novel, the Rift Walker by Clay and Susan Griffith, and some Farmers. Herein lies a story.
When I was small, my parents owned two air conditioners. One lived in the kitchen, for obvious reasons. The other was in my parents' bedroom. I've never been able to sleep in the heat, so when the weather got too hot and humid for me to sleep in my room, we'd make up a pallet on the floor of my parents' room. After my sister was born, they made up a second pallet for her. My spot was right by one of the many book shelves in the house. (I come by it naturally). This shelf mostly had my father's science fiction books and a smattering of mom's mainstream stuff. As I lay there waiting for sleep, I would look at this shelf, and amuse myself with the covers. When I learned to read, I started sampling things off the shelves. It was one of these summers, when I picked up Philip Jose Farmer's To Their Scattered Bodies Go and it's next sequel, The Fabulous Riverboat. I can't tell you which summer it was, but it was likely between third and sixth grade due to surrounding sensory evidence.
I certainly lacked a whole bunch of historical, political, literary, and sociological information one pretty much needed given the nature of the book and it's sequels, but we went to the library once or twice a week in summer, and I had a penchant for research, which I was perfectly willing to do on my own time, and I was not afraid to pull microfilm or wade through adult no fiction on topics that interested me. (Other projects I did for my own edification between 4th and 9th grade include, but are not limited to: PTSD/shell shock/related problems of returning veterans, Lenny Bruce, Kant, Freud, and Ancient Crete). Anyway, I set about learning a whole lot more about Richard Burton, Mark Twain, and a variety of other folks referenced therein. It lead to me slogging through a whole collection of lesser works by Twain and variety of related philosophical works.
I read the first three at least two more times before graduating high school, along with the other novels as they arrived in my house. Each time, with a more complex understanding, and increasing awareness of the serious problems with characterization, particularly of Sam Clemens, as well as of the problematic aspects contained in the books, re: race, gender, orientation, Sam's treatment of Joe, mental illness, etc.. (I have so many questions: What happens to the trans folk? (A question I first formulated my second time through). Is his handling of the problematic elements working or failing? How much is intentional and how much is unintentional? What was he trying to do with Soul City, exactly? On and on. The author being recently deceased, I can't ask him what he was trying to do). I am reading them all again now. I wish I had someone to talk about these things with who's read the damned things. Gah!
* I shan't be seeing War Horse. Long time readers know how I feel about WWI, and I do not think I can stomache sentimentality about any aspect of it. At least in the commercial it looks like sentimental drivel. If any of you see it and it turns out not to be sentimental drivel, let me know.
* This puts into words some things that were bugging me about episode six in particular, but also some larger things bugging me about the series. It's not enough to make me quit yet, but the bloom is off the rose: http://www.fangsforthefantasy.com/2011/12/grimm-season-1-episode-5-danse-macabre.html
* This really moved me: http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14572344490/yayponies-its-a-time-honored-tradition-at-navy
* Lovely: http://litharriel.livejournal.com/508574.html
* He really is just that good: http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14527990848/brilliant-snark-berrybell-hes-just-that
* O.o http://lettersfromtitan.tumblr.com/post/14588580842/helivesunderawaterfall-legionaries
* The stuff Republicans are trying to do instead of or force into the extension bill: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#45745497
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