deliriumcrow: (Default)
Is there still the SCA group meeting at Denny's, and is it still in the same place as it had been the last time I was there, across the river? Is anyone going to be there? Is there another place I should go to find y'all? Because I'll actually be in town for a little bit.

(Also, if Maman and Papa are going to be there, could I have my books back, pretty please? I'd ask over IM but I haven't seen you on in forever and forever.)
deliriumcrow: (Default)
I am such a terribly bad goth. Probably I always have been -- there's a rather large part of me that I'd mostly forgotten about for years that would much rather listen to songs about hot rod lincolns than your standard goth band. Or even most non-standard ones. I'm not sure where this came from, as I think I might be the only one in my family with this passion (lord knows my parents didn't listen to this stuff, and my grandmother would have killed me for even trying to bring it into her house), but the hast time I thought something like that, I found out that my cousin has the entire body of Tom Waits's music, and my aunt has a large collection of Johnny Cash. And when I pulled out the Skip James, my father was shocked and impressed, and knew almost all of it. So it's probably all to be blamed on my father's family. Also, I'm not sure how exactly I managed to not remember for so long. I mean, loving the Cramps was probably a pretty good indication, among other things.

We've been listening to a 1950s station at work, which has prompted me to find a similar internet radio station, which claims to have lots of rockabilly. This is probably responsible for remembering, as is being madly in love with someone who has a superkeen car, and likes his music to be "rockin'". And yes, he really did phrase it like that.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
I am maybe a little too drunk to be posting right now.

But I would still like to say that Elvis's cover of Fever is incredibly hot, even if it isn't the one I heard on the oldies station today at work. Damned XM radio not posting their playlists. It's a hot song anyway (I love the peggy Lee version, and heard that and the other one both today) but there's something about the version he did in the 1950s that just makes me very happy. And not in a nice girl sort of way. Happily, D likes it as well.

Also, I'm ever so slightly disturbed that, having moved to Las Vegas, I've developed a taste for Elvis's music, which really wasn't supposed to happen, though is less frightening than my emerging appreciation for the Beachboys, which is unexpected to the point of being almost unwelcome. But fun. I do not listen to Liberace, though I do have to go to his museum before leaving town. Because, you know, I HAVE to. It's required, I think, for anyone in Vegas to see the monument to the man with the world's largest rhinestone. Or something.

But you know, I really have begun to see why people went wild for Elvis, as, having played the oldies station for this long at work, every time something he did comes on, I go a little wild too. And you know, I think I need more early rock. There's something about it that has much more life to it than most of what it developed into. Though, they really need to play more rockabilly and bee-bop. Les Vegas Swing and Rat-Pack stuff. More things that will keep me awake all day, really.

And you know how I got into 1950s music? It was the only thing I could find on the radio in Elementary school that no one else in my school listened to. I had my mother make me a poodle skirt for Halloween one year, as sort of a bit of a con. I wanted it for regular clothes, not just for costume. Little did she know, her daughter was unwilling to play by normal rules, even then. Little did I know that I was apparently taking part in a much larger resurgence than just in my bedroom. Oh well, I guess I can't be pioneering all the time.

I still want a poodle skirt, though.

Oh!

Mar. 22nd, 2008 05:14 pm
deliriumcrow: (Default)
And I"ll be in Panama from Thursday until Sunday, meeting my boyfriend's family, who are not from Panama. It's for a wedding, which is not ours (his uncle's. The new aunt is from Panama), and I have a spiffy new passport for the occasion. And a bag to carry it in, which has a monarchy button on it. I doubt this will get us stopped at the gates, though, as it's not really a common symbol, and resembles neither an anarchy symbol nor a V for Vendetta symbol. I think I will need more books, though. That's going to be an incredibly long flight.

I'm stark terrified of meeting his family. Especially because I rather do want to make a good impression, but it seems like generally I do just the opposite.

Though this is a rather amusing way of letting one's family know that the relationship is serious. Not just anyone takes a girlfriend along for a trip to another country.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Pattern and dress from black and white spiral fabric. This is a test.
Finish purple hippo feet, and assemble the Purple Hippo of Munchy Doom for Heart's Dearest
Lace for the crocheted shawl (yes, I learned crochet. That's what the hippo is.)
Finish the doll
Canvas shopping bags
Knitted mesh shopping bag, cotton
Knitted mesh shopping bag, bags. Because you can turn old plastic shopping bags into a yarn-like substance, make fewer, denser, stronger bags out of them, have fewer bags in the endless pile, and generally be an environmental do-gooder in one fell swoop. Oh, and make stuff too. And probably confuse people on the bus when I make them. Heh. They say it's between 20 and 30 bags cut into inch-wide rounds and looped together to make one shopping bag on a size 13-15 needle, which I think I can manage.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Am installing Open Office, mainly because I have heard that it will allow me to open .cwk files, which means I'll be able to work of a few stories that I never did quite finish. Also, Word has not been opening properly. Pretty much since I started using this laptop. It seems like something wasn't installed correctly, but it never mattered enough to make me *really* care.

Turkey Massacre is upon us! We will be having guests, which is lovely. The two out of state people are people we should see more often. I should also see the rest of you more often, and have been stupid degrees of homesick lately. Mainly for people, but thinking about home and what sort of things are there, well, they don't make it any better.

Things go beautifully with my sweet Crow, and all is ... about as perfect as anyone could ask. And more. I'm rather madly in love with him, which gets said about a lot of people, but there's something different about how this feels, and I can't define it. We're going east in the summer, to meet each other's families and see each other's homes. In a few weeks we're going to San Francisco. And he'll be at Turkey Day, as will his room mate, which will hopefully give her some idea that I'm not trying to take away her friend, and that I do (at least try to) like her. Sometimes it's easier than others, and sometimes harder. It's a sort of complex situation, and not one I'm wholly comfortable with, but I do at least understand it.

Sewing goes. Slowly. As ever. I should be working on that now, and am not, but frankly my fingers are bleeding a little and I don't want to push my luck on grey and ivory fabrics. Heh. Yet another not-goth hued show. Should get back to that though ...
deliriumcrow: (Spider Jerusalem)
To start with, she has a name, and is called Charlotte. It just fits her.

Also, I got a response from someone at the Springfield Armoury National Park, which says lots of things.

This letter is in reference to your request for information concerning an
old percussion cap musket in your possession. Thanks for the images. They
came across clearly and reveal an interesting old rifle. It’s a rather long
rifle- certainly not a plains rifle, but more likely a Pennsylvania or Ohio
Valley rifle of the second quarter of the 19th Century. It has a very fine
piece of curly maple for a stock. The weapon used a late-period percussion
lock that seems a bit small for the gun. Perhaps it was a pistol lock. The
sideplate, barrel, & stock form all point to PA & OH areas. The ramrod
thimble is not, however, your typical rifle form [octagonal facets], but a
pistol or fowler example [cylindrical pipe]. The front sight is nicely
preserved as is the fore end cap. Interesting piece! Thanks for sending the
images.

So that's kind of keen!

Today ...

Nov. 5th, 2007 08:01 pm
deliriumcrow: (half-lost)
... it has been a year since Avery tried to convince me you were a bird. You have had a home and been well fed and kept marginally clean (as clean as a white thing in a dusty place can ever be). It has been a year since you fell on my head, and a year that you have been as wel loved as any creature could ever wish. It has been a year that you've sounded the air-raid sirens in the living room, a year of being safe and warm. For a year you have kept me sane and whole and happy, licking up tears as they fell, curling up in my lap, getting your fur into my nose, my clothes, my coffee.

Happy Home-day, kitten.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
I have a gun! Well, sort of anyway ... it's really only gunlike in shape and intention, though I do intend to restore it to something at least appropriately decorative, if not actually useful. I don't know what it's capable of, though it's quite old and probably more than a little fragile. And weighs more than is really necessary. :) I tried to hold it to see if I could fire with anything like accuracy, and could barely hold the barrel straight. It's ... umm ... kind of massive. I can't tell whether or not it's rifled (how do you check that?) but the bore is about .5".



There are more photos in the gallery, if anyone wants to hazard a guess about what it might or might not be, and a possible age on it? Suggestions for repairs?

My crow-boy does give the best of gifts. Strange gifts, maybe, but very terribly keen.
deliriumcrow: (Jane Austen)
29-- Jonathan Strange & Mr Norell -- Susannah Clarke
Still loved it by the end, though it finished leavign me wanting more. Like, you know, a more final resolution. This does, however, leave room for more books, which isn't a bad thing at all.

30-- Cheap Amusements
Academic book on the leisure time of working women in Victorian Manhattan. Very well researched and written, and brought up all sorts of interesting questions on how working amusements have shaped and are still influencing modern culture.

31-- Wives and Daughters -- Elizabeth Gaskell
Mrs Gaskell being not especially political. Sort of like a more socially conscious Jane Austen, with more psychological introspection. Loved it, and need more of her books. Four in the house is insufficient.

32-- Secret Country
Apparently part of a series, the rest of which I do not have. This makes me sad. Children have a make-believe country, which they think is make-believe until they accidentally stumble upon it.

33-- Wooden Sword --lynne Abbey?
Should have either been longer or had a sequel. I rather liked it, and its darkness, but there was, again, it ended rather uneasilly and without any indication of how things would turn out. Things could have improved, or could have gotten worse. Which, I suppose, is a little of a Lady and the Tiger ending ... As an effect, though, it works a little better on a short story where you have less invested in the characters than on a full novel. I mean really, nothing got resolved.

34-- Kushiel's Justice -- Jacqueline Carey
I'm not sure how well I like this book in relation to the rest of the series -- it's good, mind, but not quite at the same level as the rest. It definitely had the feel of being a build-up to the next book. Which is not to say it's bad, or that it could not stand on its own, because I'm thinking it probably could (without any frame of reference by which to judge, having read all the previous books) just that it's not as good as the rest. But even still, that's not saying much. Because yes, it is still gorgeously written and I do love it.

35-- I know for certain I've forgotten something ... I just can't for the life of me remember what it was. I hate that.

Books I am currently reading:
The Golden Bough (hate it, it makes me twitch)
Song of Roland (I keep forgetting about it)
A book on the Victorian underworld, whose name I cannot recall. (quite good, though not wholly certain about its academic value)
The Interpretation of Fairy Tales (have been meaning to read it for a while)
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Or not, really, but it does contain a small amount of news that I'm spamming all over the bloody place, because damn it, I want people to see it, even if they are people I already know.

Anyway, read this and you'll know why I'm happy.

I am Spam, Spam I am! (but soon I will be Spam that people have seen on occasion ...)

And now, back to the salt mines. You know, where I get the clothes from ... So I have something to show in December ... And Delchi, who did the interview, has agreed to do the announcing and music for the show as well. ^_^ Of course, something to show will be essential. And having people to show it on. We're working on that. We're mainly looking for people who are willing to model more or less for free, or close to it. I will, as always give discounts for models, and something else might be able to be arranged. Drink tickets were mentioned in passing but nothing like guaranteed. There's also space for other designers to show as well, which is cool. So far all I have as a date for this is December, so ... yeah. It will be fun. I have several dresses done, from Convergence, but ever since people said Steampunk, that's where my mind has been going, and since listening to Coil, the designs have been getting dirtier and rougher. And I don't think there's space enough for what I have done, and what will be done.

Now, for finding bodies. Heh.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
This is gorgeous. It's not so much a game as interactive graffiti/photography, sort of creepy sometimes, sometimes just incredibly beautiful.

There are five more books to go into the list for the year.
There's the last of the Dark Materials Trilogy, the Amber Spyglass. It went by *very* quickly, and was pretty much exactly what I had expected of the ending, given its inspirations. No more can be said on that, as it's still part of a series, and thus, well, if you want to read it, I don't really want to give things away.

Next is Hardcore Zen, by Brad Warner. He's a punk who lives in Japan and makes monster movies and Ultraman, and is a Zen priest. Needless to say, it's full of funny, anarchy, and meditation, which aren't quite as far removed from each other as one might expect. It's also very down to earth, insightful, and easy to read.

Bleak House by Charles Dickens was a hell of a lot funnier than I had ever expected of Dickens, especially with a title like that. It's richly sarcastic, and presents an excellent satire on -- well, pretty much everyone in every level of English society. Except the main character, who actually got to be rather annoying on occasion. I realise this is because I don't live in the sort of society that appreciates a proper middle class Victorian female, but the depth of her self effacement was infuriating at times. I know there's supposed to be modesty, but she took it to extremes. I know I'm too spirited to live like that, but really, there's practically no one who lives like she does, and those that do are some of the most singularly annoying people in existence, when you actually talk to them. THey're all well and good on paper -- provided they stay firmly there. Going back to Jane Austen for a bit, Esther and Fanny (Mansfield Park) are for too similar for my liking either of them -- I much prefer a female like Lizzie Bennet, who is still modest and middle class, but has some fire to her. Much better role model there.

Oh Harry Potter, how I am addicted to you. Yes, I read the seventh book. Yes, I loved it, and yes I cried, and that's all you'll get from me. Even at this point, I'm sure some people have not read it. There are those who say that it isn't all that great, but you know, it got people reading. Maybe not all people, and maybe those seven books are the only things some of those people will read. But it also encouraged more YA fantasy, and caused re-prints of older stuff, like the Young Wizard series. And some of the people who were reading HP will be going on to those as well, which means even more of them. Heh, this is good for me. For that matter, some of the YA fantasy seems to be written on a higher reading level than some of the adult stuff, and has far more interesting variations on plot. There's really only so much sword and sorcery you can read.

Err, I seem to have wandered. Point is, I can find no fault with books that make large segments of the population pick up books. And lead them to more books, and more, and yes, I do happen to think literacy is a good thing, thanks.

I'm missing a book here. Wonder which it was?

Currently almost done with Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. It's brilliant.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
The Subtle Knife, Phillip Pullman

Second in teh His Dark Materials trilogy.

Now really. Milton for kids? That's really what this boils down to, and I find it disturbingly lovely. Says the girl who read Poe from the second grade.

IT's not the standard "Good vs Evil" book, in that neither good not evil is all that appealing, though at least evil might be a little more honest about it. The first book worked a little better as a standalone, in ym opinion, as the second was a little more obviously a setup for the third book, which I now absolutely MUST GET. It's slower than the first, un that it took me thre days to read it rather than one, but all the same, it was intense. I expect the third book will be full of all the terrible urgency the first one had.

Yes, it talks about religion. And science, and the intersection of the two, whic isn't so much an intersection here (at least in some worlds) as a co-mingling. And, well, the church is pretty much evil, as evil as the evil side of the war. Not that wither side sees itself as evil. Both think, of course, that they are right, which is why they fight in the first place. I suppose it would be more accurate to say that it's ignorance for the common people (theoretically good) vs education and exploration (or knowledge and power) for the common people (theoretically evil).

I honestly am surprised that people would write things like this for children, more so than before. I'd been under the impression that teaching things like religious criticism was frowned on for anyone under the age of 25 or so, but this ... it's pretty well subversive. And I'm not really sure that even a child would be able to miss that, and I'm now wondering if the censors ever noticed that.

Ok, so to be more clear, I'm not actually sure that the argumetn is against religion itself, or against specifically the way it's handled by mortal authorities. And I have no real problem with that (or with anything else really, I'm a grown up and am more than capable of making my own decisions regarding my beliefs) as I honestly *do* think that mortal authorities have a bad habit of fucking shit up. Like, oh, the Crusades and the Inquisition. Those be the Really Big Examples. There are lesser ones, various formes of religious abuse that I've seen from the Priesthood on down to children fighting in the school yard. Yes, it does happen, and in my own school when I was a child. Yes, it's silly. But when they grow up and continue doign it, it's no longer silly, it's actually dangerous -- it just shows that there's a disturbing trend of religious intollerance being taught -- again, mortal authirity going wrong. And really, that's a big part of why I left the church. So far, no one has really said anything against God in the book. BEcause, well, he's pretty much just there, He doesn't intervene, and doesn't much seem to care. It's very Deist in that respect, actually, unless he's somehow influencing probabbility and chance and messengers? I don't know and probably won't until the third book, which will hopefully make everything clear.

Though the Lyra in the first few chapters was much more annoying and much less capable than the Lyra in the first book. She seemed much, much younger, and much more silly, and in truth I didn't much like her at first. Which was odd, given the last book.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Something's Rotten, Jasper Fforde

And now it all comes together. Books in the real world, real in the books world, Hamlet in the real world and a coup in Hamlet and invasions by the Merry Wives of Windsor. It's purely nutty. And, if course, a book character in real world politics, trying to eradicate Danish influence in England. I kept expecting Freedom Pastries, actually, though I suppose that would have been too obvious. Also, time makes a little more sense in this book, but not enough to really matter much. By the end, it's pretty well non-linear again, and has a bit of the "but we have to remember to do it" going on. THough apparently that was going on the whole time. Meh, it makes sense once you get there. Problem with writing these things is hat there really is so much to give away, and so little that can be easily commented on without revealign major plot points.

There are probably plot holes, but I was too busy being amused and confused to notice or care. And they were probably patched up later anyway.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
The Well of Lost Plots, Jasper Fforde

Third of the Thirsday Next books, and much like the others, it's full of literary silly, and in jokes, and trouble. The mispeling vyrus results in things that look like Varizo's posts, for anyone familiar with those in a.g. and other such use-netty places. It also makes the inner lives of books that much more ... strange. Mis Havisham's fate was truly unfair, though.

It kept the pace nice and fast, which, when dealing with brain candy, is probably a good thing, though it did make it rather hard to put it down and go back to work after a nice break from reality.
deliriumcrow: (Tanky)
Zombies came. They come in waves, you know ... much like living shoppers. Fortunately, the back of the five and a half minute hallway that we live in is pretty good at filtering out zombies -- they're dead, and too stupid to figure out how it works, and get stuck two rooms in. However, if we come out, it will probably be just them and the roaches ... not sure who to bet on.

I wonder how baking soda works on zombies? I surely does kill roaches ...
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Phillip Pullman, The Golden Compass.

Yeah, I know. More YA. So? The thing that made me read it was the preview for it before Pirates, and ... well, it looked neat. So I got it. I'd been meaning to read it, but had never really been *forced* to do so, and they made it look all steampunky, and I'm a sucker for that.

So. It opens with a quite from Paradise Lost. I knew it was goign to be good from there on, because really, who would open a children's book with Milton if they didnt' have something good to to with it? And it didnt' disappoint. It's clearly also not of the "insulated children" genre -- more for the ones that can read the Juniper Tree and not be permanently scarred. Remember when they had brutal stories for children? Yeah, I read those when I was little. (Explains soemthing, doesn't it?) It's more fantastical than the Holly Black books, being not set in this world. But it's also *far* more sophistacated than I've come to expect of books written for people of abotu 10-12 years. To start with, there's the drinking and near poisoning in the first chapter. Lies, deceit, betrayal, death, murder, war, some more death, some gore, people doing horrible things to children, rebellion, the endless debate between destiny adn free will, the strained and hazy definitions of good and evil and the general lack of difference between the two, compassion, love, caring, deep friendship, cunning, politics ... I want to say this isn't for children. But in all good conscience, I just can't. The world is a shitty, fucked up place, and if you grow up thinking it's all just rainbows and roses, that no one dies and no one ever gets realy hurt, how are you going to be able to cope with the real world, once you grow up and out of the protection that chidren are given these days? (Thus begins another rant ...) Anyway, the book is *very* well written. It also took one day to read the 400 pages, around an eight hour work day. It goes quickly, as the story is too engrossing to really *want* to put it down long enough to savour. There's always something happening, and very few good stopping points. That is not, by the way, a complaint.

Apparently, I need to read more Milton, too.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Holly Black, Valiant.

This book ... it afected me on levels that I should probably explore more. It's similar to the touch of a deLint, only more raw, less forgiving, and *much* more cruel. Yes, it's more modern fairy tales, with all the decaying beauty of the New York subway system, and for all that it's actually a Young Adult book, it is not of the "insulate children from all social ills" genre.

It begins with family problems and just goes down hill from there. The main character, not very sure of herself and her place in the world as anything other than a follower, leaves home and starts making some rather bad decisions, but is proud enough of them because they are *her* decisions. Hey, it's a start, and many of us had our start there. Among the homeless, she finds faeries living in New York, and that the medicine they take to reduce the effects of iron makes humans high. Oddly, though, it doesn't seem to have the same anti-drug message that one would expect of YA literature. The point instead seems to be that it's massively stupid to take anything from the fae, be it food, drink, or drugs.

It's incredibly hard to read sometimes, in that it's a pretty damned brutal book. Or at least, painfully honest.

I keep finding myself wishing they wrote books like this when I was younger. Ah well, there's nothing stopping me from reading them now. :)
deliriumcrow: (Default)
Lost in a Good Book, Jasper Fforde.

Similar to the last entry. Read it. There's more trouble going on, and the end of the world, and evil corporations, and bizarre govenrment stuff, and the Global Standard Deity (how's that for religion?) and travel and time travel and books and literary jokes.

But there is nothing. NOTHING. to rival the image of Miss Havisham -- yes, *that* Miss Havisham -- driving a Porsche like a maniac.

Nothing at all.
deliriumcrow: (Default)
When we were at Convergence we went to Powell's Book Store. I got lost and could not find the entrance. Seriously. It's that big. I went with [livejournal.com profile] blackavar, who, on leaving, handed me a rather large pile of books. I said I'd send them back, but he insisted that he already had the lot of them, so ... public thanking is in order. :) One was a Kipling that I shall get to in due time (I've read bits of it, but nowhere even close to all) and the rest were a series by Jasper Fforde. The two F's are intentional.

The first in the series is called the Eyre Affair. This was suggested mainly, I think, due to the fact that I snatched up a copy of Wide Sargasso Sea *very* quickly on the way to the coffee. Which was how we ended up there in the first place, but I digress. I read it, and it was every bit as fabulous as he claimed. It's sort of hard to explain fully without giving away very large parts of the plot, but ....

There's a woman called Thursday Next, and she works in the literary branch of the English Special Ops. There are several other Very Odd Branches, and some of those are explained. it becomes possible to go into books, and to take out characters, which causes many interesting problems, murders, explosions, and assorted fun things, as well as dealing with the People's Republic of Wales. It also explains rather nicely exactly who wrote Shakespeare's plays. Oh, and there's a love story, and I swear there's a sideways reference to the Charge of the Light Brigade.

Obviously, this is not in our world. It's a clever paralell of 1985, written by a lit geek for lit geeks, and I'm quite certain I didn't catch half the references it gave. It is, however, very, very funny. And, coming down from Sargasso, it was a pleasant diversion from the depression that book leaves. And there are punctuation jokes.

In short, read it. It's quick, and you won't regret it. So far, the second in the series is proving to be much the same, and I've already been laughing far too loudly. At a goth joke in the first chapter. Heart the books.

December 2018

S M T W T F S
      1
2345678
9101112131415
16 171819202122
23242526272829
3031     

Syndicate

RSS Atom

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 13th, 2025 04:08 pm
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios