page 434

[The following might be vaguely spoilerish. Spoilerish if you're like my brother who doesn't want to know a SINGLE THING before he sees a movie, not even a trailer. But there are no real plot details.]

Okay, we're past the plod. Willis has this thing in her books where she likes to make people run around a lot. It's her biggest weakness, and the main complaint about her books by people who really don't like it. The comments on amazon by the 1-2 star people is "repetitive" "tedious" "repetitive" "tedious".

The stuff about WW2 was still interesting, and I care enough about all the non-time-traveling characters that it helped keep my interest, but... since this is a part 1 of 2, I think the Running Around and Around went on longer than it should have. And of course the writing itself is just really good. You get totally transported into this other time and place. And in her comedies, there are so many good jokes and funny characters that I didn't notice the Running Around the first time I read them (Bellweather and To Say Nothing) -- I only noticed it during my most recent re-reads.

Knowing Willis there's probably some artistic-philosophical reason why she writes this way. How she sees history--its dependence on near-misses and chance and such. But that was the central theme of To Say Nothing... so like... I got it already.

It's certainly realistic... like trying to herd 9 managers into one office for a manager's meeting, in a relatively small store. You'd be surprised how long that can take, how much running in and out, looking for each other, paging, near misses, etc.

But just as you want dialogue to be "life like" rather than actually imitate life, so should the Running Around Effect.

The other thing the Running Around does is kind of halts character development, in my opinion. Or at least it does in this book.

Anyway, I've got to get back. I'm at 454 and things have been reaching a Crescendo of Excitement. Must reach the cliffhanger!

page 347

More tears.
Kleenex.

page 319-330

Plot's bogging down a bit. But it's the classic
Connie Willis kind of boggitude...
we'll get past it.

page 239

first official tears-from-laughing

Page 192

Page 192 - Connie Willis wrung her first tears out of me. Damn you Willis! So while I write this I'll play Gordon Lightfoot's "If You Could Read My Mind." It happened to be playing on my stereo when I was at My Most Balling Point of Willis' Doomsday Book, so now the song always depresses me.

Here's a funny passage from Blackout (not the teary part.) One of our heroines, who knows that a certain department store will be bombed that night, wonders if the other stores will open the next day:

Of course they'll be open, she thought. Think of all those window signs the Blitz was famous for: "Hitler can smash our windows, but he can't match our prices," and "It's bomb marché in Oxford Street this week." And that photograph of a woman reaching through a broken display window to feel the fabric of a frock.

(Sounds like the kind of sign I'd put up if my store was in a similar situation. ...And then get in trouble for my inappropriate humour.)



One of the best things about Connie Willis is the way she sees people. In Doomsday Book she did such a good job of writing about ordinary people in extraordinary situations, and Blackout is all about that. I can also see how part of her inspiration from the book came from 9-11. Hmm... on my computer here I've got something about the people holding hands before jumping from the building, that's very similar in tone to Connie Willis' books:

MARGOT ADLER, NPR Correspondent: I think that the power of that image is it doesn't give an answer. It takes us in two opposing directions. On the one hand, we are all alone at the end. Life is fleeting. There's no one to help us when we face the abyss. And there wasn't. No one came for them. And on the other hand, they reached for each other. They said that in that moment when they're facing the absolute ultimate, there are other human beings to reach out, to be there, to help them, to help us.

Sometimes I stop reading and google up info or pictures about things - Dunkirk, the Blitz, etc. I can't help but think about Haiti all the time, though. As awful as the pictures and stories are of the London blitzkrieg, or the bombing of Berlin, more people have died so far in Haiti than in those two city bombings combined. Which probably says a lot for how much richer and secure people were in 1940s London and Berlin than they were/are in 2010s Port au Prince. You could apparently see such differences in London too:

Those who lived in the poor areas such as the East End suffered particularly badly. Houses in these areas were in a bad state of repair to begin with and were destroyed easily by the bombs. By 11th November 1940, 4 out of 10 houses in Stepney had been damaged. (Holnet)

I'm sure there are innumerable heroic Haitian stories taking place every minute, and will be captured by Haitian writers like Evelyne Trouillot--whose description of the aftermath of the earthquake sounds very much like the descriptions of the blitzed out Londoners:

Après la stupeur des premiers moments, l'instant d'immense désolation qui déclencha les plaintes, provoqua la démence et la peur, l'humour reprit le dessus. Un humour souvent salvateur, porteur de courage et de dérision vis-à-vis du malheur. Le courage de regarder la mort et de continuer avec dans les yeux une tristesse incommensurable mais une détermination qui s'installe sous la plante des pieds pour en soulever un, puis l'autre, et initier la marche.

J'entends l'humanité survivre dans les voix autour de moi, railleuses envers le malheur, envers soi-même, comme pour dire à quoi ça sert de pleurer, tu es vivant, oui ou non ? Des voix pleines de compassion pour soulager un autre et l'aider à porter sa peine. Des voix qui protestent et réclament plus de justice, plus d'efficacité dans la distribution de l'aide. Des voix pleines de dignité qui disent que la vie ne peut être accueillie à genoux, mais debout, toujours debout, il faut vite se relever et lui faire face.

me n' connie

spending the day reading in bed

then in the bath

and then back in bed

Lights please!

Did some freshening up of my web site, added some more content. I sent out 7 queries tonight, and query-sending always makes me think about my web site.

Not to mention... I like playing with blogs and web sites. Satisfies some part of my brain... the part that likes to sort and organize things I guess. It's like reorganizing a collection into a new formation, but without the mess.

You see why this scene from High Fidelity speaks to me.


The question remains... am I ready to buy a domain yet?


By the way, if you want to see another example of how a weebly site can look, this is my brother's.


His main page is a blog, and then he has tabs for his various artistic endeavors.

My vair vair creative brother has never been able to settle on one preferred art form to express himself because his soul needs to be heard IN SONG! IN COMIC STRIP! IN BOOK! IN SCRIPT! IN FLASH CARTOON! IN MUSICAL INSTRUMENT! IN HUMOUR! IN MOVIE! IN ACTING! It just cannot be contained by one measly medium.

Luckily the internet--that specialist at multi-tasking--has come along to free him from the confines of having to be One Thing. Every day he comes closer to that Perfect Form... like a flash humorous cartoon movie ukulele video with voice acting. (Okay he hasn't combined voice acting and song yet. But he will. ... ... RUSHTY!)

Zoos? Evils?

The internets... such a strange place.

I was researching the next agency to send a query to, which means I was looking at the authored represented, and recognized one book--Monkey Love by Brenda Scott Royce--which I bought but haven't yet read. So I read the first chapters, and then went to look up her web site, and discovered she's done primate conservation work, and she writes articles on animal issues for the Huffington Post, which led me to a debate between animal activists and a zoo over an elephant, and her interesting argument for zoos.

As she's worked both for sanctuaries and zoos I think her arguments are interesting. That (a) when activists talk about "Free the elephant!" we have to investigate what they mean by free. And (b) free usually means a sanctuary rather than a zoo, but sanctuaries receive less income/funding than zoos and don't have to go through the same strict accreditation process, so animal treatment can be worse than at a zoo. And (c) that while anyone who loves animals would prefer them to be free in the wild, there are fewer and fewer safe wilds left for animals to live in. Which is just depressing.

I'm queery for queries!

I've been slowly putting together and sending out queries this evening, in between bits of cooking, bathing the cat, reading Connie, listening to music, and internetsing.

I've sent out three. Want to do about... 8. Then if they're all rejected I should take a look at my query letter before continuing with the next batch. Or so someone somewhere in something I read suggested.

"If you start me up--if you start me up I'll never stop!"

And once that's done I'll be set free to follow Henry V with a clear conscience. Weee!

I'm using Query Tracker, a free web site for keeping track of who and when you've queried. Nice site.

Diane Birch "Fire Escape"

Heard her on Q one day this winter. Apparently Prince once saw her performing and invited her to come and jam with him.

Research--one of the funnest parts of writing

In my new book my heroine is reading her great-grandmother's diaries, and I'd like to incorporate some of them into the book. So I needed to find some writing by women at the turn of the century, to capture a bit of the tone. I was having trouble finding good online sources, so wasn't I pleased when this book turned up in the bargain section of my store! 700 pages of historical women's letters.

I've been reading them over breakfast each morning, and they're so interesting.

Crazy Like Us by Ethan Watters - looks interessant

The author of this book was interviewed on The Daily Show this week, and the book looks vair vair interessant. He proposes that mental illness are often specific to a culture, or a period of history.

Reminds me of Fanon, who stopped practicing psychiatry in Algeria because he decided he was just treating the symptoms, when it was the disease that needed to be faced--that disease being colonialism. People were going crazy for a good reason, and he didn't want to just help them get better at tolerating it.

The book is timely since the psychs will soon be on their way to Haiti to *help.* Here's an excerpt from the book:

There is now a remarkable body of research that suggests that mental illnesses are not, as sometimes assumed, spread evenly around the globe. They have appeared in different cultures in endlessly complex and unique forms. Indonesian men have been known to experience amok, in which a minor social insult launches an extended period of brooding punctuated by an episode of murderous rage. Southeastern Asian males sometimes suffer from koro, the debilitating certainty that their genitals are retracting into their body. Across the fertile crescent of the Middle East there is zar, a mental illness related to spirit possession that brings forth dissociative episodes of crying, laughing, shouting, and singing.

The diversity that can be found across cultures can be seen across time as well. Because the troubled mind has been perceived in terms of diverse religious, scientific, and social beliefs of discrete cultures, the forms of madness from one place and time in history often look remarkably different from the forms of madness in another. These differing forms of mental illness can sometimes appear and disappear within a generation. In his book Mad Travelers Ian Hacking documents the fleeting appearance in Victorian Europe of a fugue state in which young men would walk in a trance for hundreds of miles. Symptoms of mental illnesses are the lightning in the zeitgeist, the product of culture and belief in specific times and specific places. That thousands of upper-class women in the mid-nineteenth century couldn't get out of bed due to the onset of hysterical leg paralysis gives us a visceral understanding of the restrictions set on women's social roles at the time.

But with the increasing speed of globalization, something has changed. The remarkable diversity once seen among different cultures' conceptions of madness is rapidly disappearing. A few mental illnesses identified and popularized in the United States — depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and anorexia among them — now appear to be spreading across cultural boundaries and around the world with the speed of contagious diseases. Indigenous forms of mental illness and healing are being bulldozed by disease categories and treatments made in the USA.

Charlie Simpson - cute!

CNN - London, England — He’s no Wyclef Jean or George Clooney, but that hasn’t stopped seven-year-old Charlie Simpson from raising more than £120,000 ($195,000) for the Haiti earthquake.

Simpson from Fulham, west London had hoped to raise just £500 for UNICEF’s earthquake appeal by cycling eight kilometers (five miles)around a local park.

“My name is Charlie Simpson. I want to do a sponsored bike ride for Haiti because there was a big earthquake and loads of people have lost their lives,” said Simpson on his JustGiving page, a fundraising site which launched his efforts.

“I want to make some money to buy food, water and tents for everyone in Haiti,” he said.

[Saw this posted on Wyclef's blog.]

From pants to blitz

Read Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants all day, so that I can start Blackout.

I kept this freebie of Pants for years now because Friend Maewitch enjoyed it and our tastes are similar enough. Here are my thoughts.

* It was unintentionally funny, because after reading so many Georgia stories, which are British and therefore "pants" means underwear, and the characters are ALWAYS making jokes about pants, it's now hard for me to take the title of this book seriously.

* Great characters.

* Sadder than I expected, which wasn't quite what I was in the mood for. But since I'm heading into Connie, who will most certainly throw some tragedy at me, I might as well get used to feeling melancholy.

Too many teen books have all this You Must Learn to Deal With Life ness to them. No wonder Gossip Girl books are so popular.

Onto Blackout. The thank-you page is already awesome, and hints at some of the great research she did:

"I want to thank the marvelous group of ladies at the Imperial War Museum the day I was there doing research--women who, it turned out, had all been rescue workers and ambulance drivers and air-raid wardens during the Blitz, and who told me story after story that proved invaluable to the book and to my understanding of the bravery, determination, and humor of the British people as they faced down Hitler. And I want to thank my wonderful husband, who found them, sat them down, bought them tea and cakes, and then came to find me so I could interview them. Best husband ever!"

Sounds like something Fernando would do.

So here's my idea

With Kate McGarrigle's death, her music's been selling well. And I'm sure we'll get an upswing of JD Salinger sales in the next couple weeks.

But it seems a little sad for authors to get a sales hit when they die! Here's what we need to do...

- put together a database of all reasonably successful artists (the kind who get news coverage when they die)

- put it in a computer, and have a randomly generated "winner" every month

- and then all media outlets in the world will agree to talk about, and do shows on, that one artist

- then we'll all get exposed to someone awesome without them having to die first.

Sound good?

some muusic

Rihanna "Redeption Song" on Oprah


And some of the Hope for Haiti performances

Jay Z, Rihanna, Bono, the Edge: "Stranded (Haiti Mon Amour)


Jennifer Hudson (with The Roots) singing "Let It Be"
Check out the tuba guy--he's really rocking!

Ahhhh staycation

Spent my evening after work wrapping up paperwork stuffs that have been piling up. Want everything off my mind cause it's vayyyvayyytion! Not going anywhere, just plan to stare at the walls for 10 days.

Connie Arrived!

Connie arrived today. But I recently started Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, so will finish it first. I'm on vacation in a day, so lots of time.

I was also reading an ollld Janet Evanovich romance novel. It's pretty funny and cute, but by the fifth I finally just read ahead to the ending. She definitely found her niche with her mysteries (as she knows.)

books books lovely books

Oh the cookbook addiction!

Gave into temptation and bought a new vegan cookbook. I had my eye on Vegan Lunch Boxes, and on The Urban Vegan (I read her blog), but they both have faux-vegan processed food which I don't like. (a) Because I can only buy a lot of those things at the health food store, and I'm way too cold-resistant to go that far (7 min walk) in the winter. Seriously. I don't even go to the library across the street. ALL outdoor activity ceases once we reach 5 degrees C.

And (b) some products we don't have at all in my store, and I don't have a car so I'm not going any further.

And (c) I just don't want to eat a lot of processed food. Yes I'll buy bread and cereal and spaghetti sauce. But if I'm going to buy processed food, I'll buy a whole meal (hummus), or as a treat (vegan cream cheese, ice cream). Not as stuff I have on hand at all times, for any recipe.

Anyway, so I bought The Supermarket Vegan because it's based on 2 things: (1) food you can get at a suburban grocery store, and (2) not very processed.

I tried it tonight. In minutes I found two recipes I could make using the ingredients I have on hand, even though I haven't done a big shopping trip lately; I made them both, and was done, and cleanup done, within an hour. (I like to make big pots of things to eat over a couple days.) I made chilli with pasta, and curried orzo.

...Yes I know I'm the only vegan who read this blog. But I... I needed to shaaare. Probably a good book for people who want to make more vegetarian or vegan meals, but without having to buy kooky ingredients.

Old Men in the Balcony... at the Haiti concert

I'm watching the Haiti concert stuff on fastforward while I do my finances. Jennifer Hudson is on now, and it's the best performance so far. But that's probably not just a factor of her talent, but that in 2008 her mother, brother and nephew were murdered. This has got to be someone who understands tragedy. She chose to sing "Let It Be."

...Why does Brad Pitt look like the Unabomber?

I have to admit that Justin Timberlake and Whoever did justice to "Hallelujah" but it's a song I associate with romantic relationships, and not really with country-wide devastation. Or like Madonna singing "Like a Prayer." It feels like... each artist flipped pulled out the Songs to Sing in Tragic Times folder, and Stevie Wonder found "Bridge Over Troubled Water" in there, while Justin had to choose between "What Goes Around Comes Back Around" and "Hallelujah."

Madonna could have done better. Something from the "Ray of Light" era, methinks.

Beyoncé kinda blew it. She started with a pretty rendition of "Halo" but changed the lyrics from "Baby I can see your halo" to "Haiti I can see your halo." ...I don't know. Kinda cheesy.

Sting probably has lots of good stuff in Tragedy Folder, esp from The Police. He pulled out a good Guilt Song.

Denzel Washington could be reading from the phone book and I'd feel like I need to give money to someone. What a great voice.

Wyclef is doing "By the Waters of Babylon." Good choice. Sadness.
Oh and now he's doing the "enough of the moping" upbeat song thing. Finally! I'm so depressed.


***
Sting's song:

How can you say that you're not responsible?
What does it have to do with me?
What is my reaction, what should it be?
Confronted by this latest atrocity

Driven to tears

Hide my face in my hands, shame wells in my throat
My comfortable existance is reduced to a shallow meaningless party
Seems that when some innocent die
All we can offer them is a page in a some magazine
Too many cameras and not enough food
'Cos this is what we've seen

Driven to tears

Protest is futile, nothing seems to get through
What's to become of our world, who knows what to do

Driven to tears

Where's Sean Penn's boat when you need it?

Hmm... I sense the presence of the Haiti benefit concert on iTunes. K'naan has pulled past Tik Tok and Lady G! And his Troubadour album is in the Top 10.

But this Hope for Haiti album is only $7.99. I usually crow over a good deal (there's 20 songs) but considering this is for charity... I feel they have significantly underpriced. You never see compilations for under 9.99, and this length would usually be 14.99.

Well, I'm in anyway. Sean Penn aside, singing us songs is what artists are supposed to do in bad times. Tell it like it is, or mourn, depress us, cheer us up, give us hope, make us mad -- whatever the emotion, standing at the mic is a good place. Unless you're Sean Penn. Then you need to be in a boat! Rescuing the people! (And because I've still got Chappelle in my head: In a BOAT motherfucker! In a Goddamned BOAT!)

The Connie Cometh

Turns out my parents bought me a second Christmas present which only shipped this week. Why would it only ship now you ask? Because it is Connie Willis' new book! Yippy! (And looks like it might arrive before the release date. Shhhh!)

This one takes place in her time travel setup, which is a good start cause those are her best works. But it also takes place during the Blitz which is a subject she's been enamored of for decades. So this should be a labor of love. It's also, I believe, a part 1 of 2... which sucks! But okay. I'll deal.

What's the appeal of setting stories during the London Blitz?

I love the pluck and stamina of the British and the humor and courage with which they held out against Hitler. And I love the intensified nature of wartime existence, where a few minutes' delay can cost you your life and a mistake or a change in the weather can alter the entire course of the war. I think those things are always true in our lives, but they're ramped up during wartime, where every decision is life-or-death. (Publisher's Weekly)

And here you'll find an interesting bit on how 9-11 played into this book for her.

Connie Willis at Worldcon 2009 Montreal
Photographed by Kyle Cassidy
Series: Science Fiction fans

"I'm finally done with my two-volume time travel to the Blitz novel, BLACKOUT-ALL CLEAR! Oh, frabjous day! Calloo, callay!"

Golz

Well I didn't meet my writing goals this week. Mostly I felt tired because I stayed up too late every single night, and watched a lot of Entourage and Chappelle's Show. So yesterday (first day of weekend) I slept for 12 hours. Then watched Entourage and Chappelle's Show. I did a lot of healthy cooking this week... that's got to count for something right?

But actually I'm not too disappointed, because I did finish my synopsis tonight, which was the biggest obstacle. I can officially say my damned story is done. The first goal I didn't meet was to actually send off some queries. And the second goal I didn't meet was to go back to my new story, and outline what I wrote in November. We'll see if I can catch up this week!

And I still did more work than the weeks when I had no goal set. ;-)

"Charlie Murphy!"

I can't get "Rick James'" voice of out my head.

...I want to be funny tooooo.

web site update

I can't believe I forgot to post a Pets Page on my web site! Very important. All romance authors post pics of their pets. Most authors really.

Alanis Morissette singing The Police's "King of Pain"

The Story of Me: In Animals

If you ever want to make me weepy in under 1 minute...



And I never even liked that song!

Where's Kanye when you need him?

I'm taping the Haiti special tonight. There are two reasons to watch fund raising specials, both exemplified by Katrina:

1. You might hit a really great musical performance, like the first time Mary J and U2 performed One together.


2. and the chance that Kanye West will be there.


(Okay, there's a third reason which is to be convinced to give money if you haven't already!)

pahty

Here I am frightened by my coworker at the staff party. (Figured I could post his picture since he's in disguise.) The funny part of the joke is that he shares the character's name. "Jason came as Jason! Ahhh ha ha haaaa."

Oscar

"Bitch I live in a fucking trash can! I'm the poorest motherfucker on Sesame Street!"

"Your body... your body... is a port-a-potty."

Fernando and I used to love Chappelle's Show but it's not on tv right now. So Fernando bought me season 2 on DVD and I'm so glad. Soooo funny. I'll have to go pick up season 1.

One of the funniest series of skits is Charlie Murphy's True Hollywood Stories. They're real stories told by Eddie Murphy's brother, and acted out by Chappelle. SO funny. And apparently he really did used to say: I'm Rick James bitch!



In season 1 he made a joke about the R Kelly peeing-sex story. Fernando and I used to sing this when Nombly would spray around the house... we imagined he was singing this song:

Here's what he says about R Kelly's reaction: "R. Kelly was pissed. No punchline to that. Nigga was pissed. He was all, "How could you go and make a video about peeing on someone?" Nigga, how could YOU go making a video about peeing on somebody?"

some humour

Another aspect of this tragedy in Haiti

From the New York Times:

Along with everything else stolen by last week’s earthquake, Haitians must now add another loss: the ability to identify and bury the dead. Funeral rites are among the most sacred of all ceremonies to Haitians, who have been known to spend more money on their burial crypts than on their own homes.

It is the product in part of familiarity with death — the average life span of a Haitian is 44 — but also the widespread voodoo belief that the dead continue living and that families must stay connected forever to their ancestors.

“Convening with the dead is what allows Haitians to link themselves, directly by bloodline, to a pre-slave past,” said Ira Lowenthal, an anthropologist who has lived in Haiti for 38 years. He added that with so many bodies denied rest in family burial plots, where many rituals take place, countless spiritual connections would be severed.

“It is a violation of everything these people hold dear,” Mr. Lowenthal said. “On the other hand, people know they have no choice.”

...

After the 2004 tsunami in Asia, aid groups and governments established a system in which people were photographed before being buried so loved ones could search for them. Here, all the dead are anonymous. Mr. Lowenthal, the anthropologist, said this did not reflect callousness on the part of Haitians, but rather an unprecedented catastrophe that has overwhelmed the country and the aid groups.

“This is worse than the tsunami,” he said. “Look at the concentration of destruction.”

We've lost a McGriddle :-(

Oh noes! Friend Midnightstreet sent me this article--one of my favourite artists has died. Hapoo. Here's a quote from Rufus Wainwright, her son:

"as I was saying to her sister Anna last night while sitting by her body after the struggle had ceased, there is never enough time and she, my amazing mother with whom everyone fell in love, went out there and bloody did it. I will miss you mother, my sweet and valiant explorer, lebwohl and adio. X”

Here's one of her best songs: I Eat Dinner

I eat dinner
At the kitchen table
By the light
That switches on
I eat leftovers
With mashed potatoes
No more candlelight
No more romance
No more smalltalk
When the hunger's gone
I eat dinner

At the kitchen table
And I wash it down with pop
I eat leftovers with mashed potatoes
No more candlelight
No more romance
No more smalltalk
When the hunger stops
When the hunger stops

Never thought that I'd end up this way
I who loved the sparks
Never thought my hair'd be turning grey
It used to be so dark
So dark

No more candlelight
No more romance
No more smalltalk
WHen the hunger's gone
No more candle light
No more romance
No more smalltalk
When the hunger's gone
When the hunger's gone

I'm the luckiest giiirl in the woooorld

The first time my brother and I saw this, O How We Laffed. And I still love to say: "I'm the luckiest boy in the world. I'm the LUCKiest Boy in the WOOORLD!!"

I'm feeling lucky too. I was on the staff holiday party committee this year, and it all went off without a hitch tonight. Now I have sore feet, and four gigantic slabs of the heaviest cake you've ever carried, which I have to find a way to bring into work. It's a cake-boss time cake... have you ever lifted a cake with a fondant cover? You could do a workout with fondant.

And we had a vegan cake too. Minoum-minoum.

Great song alert! Charlie Winston - In Your Hands

I'm sure this is the best "free single of the week" I've ever had off Canada's iTunes store. Free until end of day Monday.

Costume - trial run

I had to put together my costume to make sure it would all work. It's hard to see the details cause it's black (and I was photographing myself in the kitchen), but the 3 key parts turned out to be:

1. Tying a ribbon tightly along the empire waistline. The original waistline didn't fight tight against the body, which it needs to for Regency effect.

2. Pinning the wraparound skirt along the waistline to create a train. I found a picture online of a train, and it was pinned all the way up to the front sides of the dress, and I think that ended up being the key to the train effect.

3. The accessories. (I forgot to photograph my little reticule, and my black handkerchief for weeping in, or for challenging zombies to duels.)


I'm wearing my high quality boots, so my feet should be ok. And they passed the dancing test. (You don't want shoes that grip too well.) My skirt's a bit short, but better for running and fighting. (Or I'm very fast and showing off my ankles to the boys.)

The Vair Serious look on my face is the famous British Stiff Upper Lip in the face of disaster.

I still need to make a sword, and maybe a fan.

Rich Person Guilt, Comfort Food, and one Good Cookbook

I guess when I'm in a blah mood I feel like cooking. Yesterday I made pasta, and vegetable soup with dumplings. Today I made muffins and bread. There's something comforting about the process. I turn on CBC radio, then I sit down and poke through my cookbooks until I find what I'm in the mood for (and have ingredients for), then I unload and reload the dishwasher, clean all the counters with vinegar and water, fire up the oven, pull out my beautiful green mixing bowls, and get started. I load the dirty cooking things into the empty dishwasher as I go, so by the end I have a warm kitchen, good food, and a clean kitchen.

The CBC show was Definitely Not the Opera, and the theme was guilt--parental guilt, cultural guilt, survivor guilt, guilt of a woman who got out of Afghanistan, guilt of the grandson of a concentration camp doctor, green guilt, etc. It was perfect for my mood, because right now I'm steeped in Living in a Rich Country guilt.

I should plug my favourite cookbook again. I was in the mood for muffins and for a herbed no-yeast bread, and decided to go with the two recipes in Jae Steele's book because 99% of her recipes turn out great. And they did once again.


I made apple cinnamon muffins (but with cranberries instead of raisins) and the "almost focaccia bread." Both turned out dreamy. I've never seen a bad review for this book, and you don't need to be vegan to enjoy it. She doesn't rely on prepared vegan foods (fake cream cheese, fake cheese etc) but instead emphasizes whole foods, so at work I recommend it to people just looking for a healthy cookbook. The recipes are also quick... so good for lazy people like moi...
Get it in...

Canada
The US
The UK
France
Japan
and probably a lot of other countries.

And she has a new book out this spring! Yays!

Locked in the bathroom

In a blah mood today. I'm still feeling sort of overwhelmed by how awful this earthquake is, and will be, for Haiti. I find this more depressing than 9-11, Katrina or the tsunami. 9-11 was shocking, but the damage was very concentrated/contained. Katrina was sad, but even more it was anger-making because it was handled sooo badly. The tsunami was awful, but it didn't happen in the middle of the frikkin' capital.

When you're in dev areas and political science, you spend a lot of time reading and talking about possible solutions to the extreme economic and power inequalities in our world. And if at some point in your studies you don't feel overwhelmed by a feeling of hopelessness, then you're not (literally) doing your homework. Or maybe you're not old enough--maybe that feeling only comes if you're over 30 and you've been thinking about the topic for at least 10 years. I don't know.

The one country that seemed like the most complex, its problems the most difficult to untangle, was Haiti. They've experienced some really unique successes, like the only successful national slave revolt, and they beat off an invasion by Napoleon's army; but they've also been exploited for gold, had their Amerindian population wiped out, been repopulated by slaves, were colonized (even by pirates) and all the goodies that entails, were apparently so brutal to their slaves that 1/3 of Africans "died within a few years" (wiki); after getting rid of the French (two battles and a payment) they had a despot, then coup after coup, and multiple invasions by other countries; they were occupied by the US, which resulted in a genocide of Haitians who found themselves on the Dominican side of the newly made border; then it was rule by dictator, propped up by the US; then the questionable rule of Aristide, who was violent and stole from his people; and then his debated removal by the US; and just as things might have been getting a leetle bit better, a leetle more stable, this earthquake happened (besides the other tropical storms Haiti regularly endures.)

And that's just a simplistic summary of the bare bones wiki entry.

I'm so emotionally wimpy right now, if Céline goes on Larry King and sings "The Prayer" I'm gonna lock myself in the bathroom and cry like a girl.

Everyday poetry

Hm. Definitely the most poetic comment I've ever received on a post!

Anonymous said...

I want not approve on it. I assume precise post. Specially the appellation attracted me to study the sound story.

yay for prorogue!

Well... on second thought, I guess I'm pretty glad Harper prorogued parliament. Just like the emperor, overconfidence is his weakness baby.

The lead enjoyed by the Conservatives over the Liberals has dramatically narrowed since Prime Minister Stephen Harper suspended Parliament last month, a new poll suggests.

The Conservatives now lead by a marginal 1.6 percentage points over the Liberals, compared with the 15-point advantage they had in a mid-October survey, according to the EKOS poll released exclusively to CBC News. (CBC News)

CBC story comment (can we start a petition?)

Hamilton77 wrote:
Ban Earthquakes.

the job resignation heard round the world?

I get New York Times email updates, and when the Haiti story first came out it got billing behind Conan O'Brian quitting the Tonight Show. (head smack yes?)

My favourite tweets about Pat Robertson

jen_n_tonik RT @MrColdBlooded: Hey Kanye, i know ur a douche, and Ima let u finish, but Pat Robertson is the biggest douche of all time! less than 10 seconds ago from web

ambeck613 RT @michaelianblack: What kind of deal with the devil did we make to deserve Pat Robertson?

RobKaas RT @MitchBenn: Ah, Pat Robertson. Is there no tragedy you can't make just that little bit worse?

Baberton I'm not an overly religious gal, but my thought is that God doesn't appreciate Pat Robertson being His mouthpiece.

linksalpha Andy Borowitz: Pat Robertson: Haiti?! I Thought They Said "Hades

daveidfx RT @TheBloggess: I thought "Pat Robertson" was trending because was dead. Turns out it's just because everyone wishes he was.

chopshopzak I think Pat Robertson made a pact with the devil to keep those photos of him blowing little boys quiet. My source is just as good as his.

Ireneartist RT @Truth247: Pat Robertson should be taken to Haiti and dropped in the middle of Port-au-Prince where he must dig the dead out of the r ...

KellyBean76 RT @SOLDIER1: To be fair, Pat Robertson doesn't blame ALL natural disasters on sin, only the ones where lots of brown people are killed. ...

greensisters RT @hauntedchimp RT @traversability: I'd sell my soul to the devil to get rid of Pat Robertson. #douchbagery #haiti

shawnarena RT @adamchristensen: God loves Haiti & Pat Robertson even though both are natural disasters.

kryanoutloud HA!!! RT @omarg: Is there a code I can text to 90999 to take $10 away from Pat Robertson instead?

dougfun thinks Pat Robertson is an idiot - the devil makes pacts for gold fiddles, not Haitian earthquakes.

bradleygarwood ... oh, Pat Robertson. I was reading "Robert Pattinson" the whole time.

*

A the Haitian ambassador explains all the ways in which the US benefited from Haiti's pact with the devil.

Ghosts of Bloggies Past 13

And the topic that started my blogging--my parent's cross-country move to Nanaimo.

Discovering Teena Marie in my teens...

...was like discovering the female Prince. I was in love.



Other women I loved in the 80s:
The Pointer Sisters
Chaka Khan
Patti Labelle
Annie Lennox
Aretha Franklin
Heart
Toronto

Need some Elvis?

Here's another super iTunes deal. Elvis' #1 hits album:

30 songs
plus the "A Little Less Conversation" remix

for $5.99.

I do like me such deals. I like to stock up on "best ofs" of people who are sort of Classic, but I don't want to buy their whole backlist.

The End of Georgia

I stayed up til 6 AM so could read all of the last Angus book. I'd read that the dénouement was too quick, and they weren't kidding. You wait ten books for Georgia and Dave the Laugh to finally get together, and their get-together scene last about 4 lines. One page at most. Like being brought up a gradual incline, and then pushed off a cliff! Either it's crummy writing, or she has some sort of follow-up series/short story or something planned. Grrr!

But how enjoyable it all was. Definitely my favourite cats and toddler of all time. "He laaaiiikes it!"

Ghosts of Bloggies Past 12: One Cat's Opinion

Nombly used to have his own column called: One cat's opinion.

Ghosts of Bloggies Past 11

Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

[written when I'd just brought a third cat into my home and all hell broke loose]

A cold peace has fallen across the Meowee East, pockmarked by occasional gun fire and border incidents. It is difficult to find the right balance of power between three states, and all day they have been cautiously testing each other... a bum sniff here... a whack attack there... Occasionally the UN has to intervene and either doll out the softie food, or lock someone in their territory.

O kitties, give peace a chance!

20:54 Posted in Crisis in the Meowee East | Permalink | Comments (1) | Email this

My Day: Part 2 - The Movies

Sherlock Holmes was exactly what I hoped for. Just a fun beat-em-up period piece with lots of Holmes deductions. I luuurv Downey Jr., so I can enjoy anything with him in it. Not the definitive Holmes, but durn sexy.

Jude Law's Watson was perfect. They recovered the original ex-military-man character, rather than the clichéd buffoon. He's got lots of sass.

The only part that annoyed me was this whole Holmes-trying-to-sabotage-Watson's-engagement storyline. There's nothing like it in Holmes that I recall, but more to the point it was more House than Holmes. I am soooo tired of House's assholitude, I didn't really want to watch it in Holmes too. (The show House is a modernization of Holmes, so their in-common assholeness isn't an accident. But in Doyle's stories Holmes didn't go out of his way to make other people's lives miserable, he was just very egotistical.)

Hans Zimmer did a great job with the soundtrack. And one of my fave bits was the CGI London. It was really cool to see the Thames with a half-built Tower bridge, and old cruddy looking sailing ships etc. Computer technology is allowing for more and more realism in historical movies and I'm mclovin it.


We enjoyed it so much, we thought It's Complicated might be a bit of a letdown. But not at all. Holy mother that was a funny movie. At first most of the laughing was coming from the other side of the theatah, where I assume the 50-something women were sitting. But about halfway through the movie is just HIlarious.

John Krasinski of the American Office plays Streep's son-in-law and he stole every scene he was in. There's no way his scenes would have been as funny with someone else. He was brilliant. I hope this gets him some great future comedies.

Streep was great--she says in Vanity Fair that Bette Davis would be rolling in her grave to see a 60 year old actress starring in a romantic comedy. Steve Martin was his usual genius self in the one scene where he was able to be a bit unrestrained (given that he's not one of the focus characters.) And I've loved Alec Baldwin ever since State and Main. He's so good at comedy.



I didn't know Nancy Meyers' name, but I gather she's one of the few powerful women in Hollywood, and she wrote/directed/and or produced this movie, plus The Holiday (which I recently enjoyed), Something's Gotta Give (another older-woman comedy), and Baby Boom. I'm pretty in for her romantic comedies, they're always original.

My day: Part 1 - The Costume

It's hard for Fernando to get me out of the house, especially in the winter. But I needed to go to Value Village which is next to the theatah. So we went to Village, then supper, then saw Sherlock Holmes and It's Complicated.

-1- Village des Valeurs

The upcoming staff party theme is "The Nightmare After Christmas." Dressing horror isn't usually my shtick, but I thought of the perfect costume for someone like moi. I will be a Pride and Prejudice zombie hunter. (Working at a bookstore, I assume everyone will get it.)




I bought a blouse at Reitman's that has an Empire waist,
but needed a floor length dress. I decided on all black so that it's easier to piece together (after all I'm sure to be in mourning because zombies killed some family members, right?)


I found a long enough black dress that will fit well under the blouse. I bought a black wrap around skirt so I can add a train or cape.

I also picked up a black handkerchief, and a purse which I can make look reticule-ish.There were no long gloves, so I'll just wear my semi-long fall gloves.

I can't wear my hair up cause I'll get a headache, but I bought curlers. I'll try to make ringlets, and then maybe tie a black scarf around, turban-style.

[The best I can do is Billie Piper in Mansfield Park.]

I bought a black flower-and-feather corsage, black plastic pearls, a broach, and I have the perfect earrings.

[Looking sad because my family's been eaten.]

I have to make a fan next, and a sword. (We used to have a foil, but I may have finally convinced my husband to part with it. Not that you could kill a zombie with a foil. You'd need a sword for decapitating, or a pistol.)


This is the first time I've ever had a chance to make up a Regency costume, so it's vair vair exciting. The only sad thing is that the black won't photograph well. But I'll keep you updated.