Always too much, or none at all.
Sep. 29th, 2010 01:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
greygirlbeastSpooky and I just made a deal, that we would never again both smile at the same time. It was just all kinds of wrong. And we weren't even really smiling. We were sort of grimacing. So, we're really agreeing never again to bare our teeth like that at the same time.
Kind of muggy and sticky and too warm here in Providence.
I just got the artwork from Vince for Sirenia Digest #58 (and I love it). But it seems very unlikely that I'll be able to find time to get the issue out before we leave for Portland. Again I apologize. I hate being late with anything, ever. Tardiness just irks me. I am a punctual beast.
As for yesterday's interesting email from my agent, let's just say that not all unexpected opportunites are good, and so we move on.
I'm trying to be higgledy-piggledy without the --- dividers. Seems more honest.
Still much too much to get done before we leave in the morning. I have a very long list. Yesterday, we drove to South County, to Spooky's parents' place. We have a housesitter for the days we'll be away, but Spooky's mom will be coming up to give Sméagol the malt-flavored prednisone he takes for his plasma cell pododermatitis. So, we took her a key. On the farm, wild grapes and ferns were going yellow with autumn, and there were autumnal bursts of red in a few trees. It was raining and windy, and I thought about the much worse weather in New York and New Jersey and Connecticut. I visited the steamsquid, who's getting along quite well, a year and a half after we rescued himherit. Afterwards, we drove to Warwick, and I looked for a couple of pairs of pants at the thrift store. I have developed an almost religious enthusiasm for thrift stores of late (in spite of garish overhead lighting). Anyway, I found two pairs, including an absurdly large pair of brown corduroys. I almost got a pair of seersucker pants, but it's late in the year for seersucker.
I read two more stories in Haunted Legends, Steven Pirie's "The Spring Heel" and Laird Barron's "The Redfield Girls." I liked both, but found the Pirie story especially effective. And we finished Kristin Hersh's Rat Girl last night, which is truly excellent, and which I strongly recommend.
I also finished Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age late last night, when I should have been asleep, but was, instead, awake. My opinion at the end is pretty much the same as it was halfway through the novel. Wonderful worldbuilding, an intriguing (if far-fetched) future, an interesting quasi-Dickens pastiche, but not a single act of characterization in sight. The novel is actually more like a long outline for a novel. It's a great mountain of plot and ideas. This happened, and this happened, and this happened. But...we are never allowed to see into the people to whom all this plot is happening. Sometimes, we're told how someone feels, but we're pretty much never shown. Which makes this only one half of a good novel; I can't even consider it finished. It's sort of amazing, that a book can be so devoid of characterization. Anyway, I think I'll read the new China Miéville next. And probably a bunch of other stuff, because I seem unable to read only one book at a time.
This will be my last entry until after Portland, and I feel like I'm forgetting shit.
I read "Pickman's Other Model" aloud last night. It's the piece I want to use for my reading on Sunday. The reading's an hour long, and reading the story at a leisurely pace, it came in at about fifty-five minutes. So, I don't know. I'll either read it, or something from The Ammonite Violin & Others. Oh, and DO NOT FORGET. This weekend is be kind to Spooky weekend. Oak moss and voodoo donuts. I'm serious. Just don't try to hug her, because she bites.
And while I won't be tweeting, or blogging, or facebooking (???) on this trip, I will be taking tons of photos, and will post a bunch of them afterwards.
Now, I think I need a bath.
Oh, fuck! It's National Coffee Day!
Kind of muggy and sticky and too warm here in Providence.
I just got the artwork from Vince for Sirenia Digest #58 (and I love it). But it seems very unlikely that I'll be able to find time to get the issue out before we leave for Portland. Again I apologize. I hate being late with anything, ever. Tardiness just irks me. I am a punctual beast.
As for yesterday's interesting email from my agent, let's just say that not all unexpected opportunites are good, and so we move on.
I'm trying to be higgledy-piggledy without the --- dividers. Seems more honest.
Still much too much to get done before we leave in the morning. I have a very long list. Yesterday, we drove to South County, to Spooky's parents' place. We have a housesitter for the days we'll be away, but Spooky's mom will be coming up to give Sméagol the malt-flavored prednisone he takes for his plasma cell pododermatitis. So, we took her a key. On the farm, wild grapes and ferns were going yellow with autumn, and there were autumnal bursts of red in a few trees. It was raining and windy, and I thought about the much worse weather in New York and New Jersey and Connecticut. I visited the steamsquid, who's getting along quite well, a year and a half after we rescued himherit. Afterwards, we drove to Warwick, and I looked for a couple of pairs of pants at the thrift store. I have developed an almost religious enthusiasm for thrift stores of late (in spite of garish overhead lighting). Anyway, I found two pairs, including an absurdly large pair of brown corduroys. I almost got a pair of seersucker pants, but it's late in the year for seersucker.
I read two more stories in Haunted Legends, Steven Pirie's "The Spring Heel" and Laird Barron's "The Redfield Girls." I liked both, but found the Pirie story especially effective. And we finished Kristin Hersh's Rat Girl last night, which is truly excellent, and which I strongly recommend.
I also finished Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age late last night, when I should have been asleep, but was, instead, awake. My opinion at the end is pretty much the same as it was halfway through the novel. Wonderful worldbuilding, an intriguing (if far-fetched) future, an interesting quasi-Dickens pastiche, but not a single act of characterization in sight. The novel is actually more like a long outline for a novel. It's a great mountain of plot and ideas. This happened, and this happened, and this happened. But...we are never allowed to see into the people to whom all this plot is happening. Sometimes, we're told how someone feels, but we're pretty much never shown. Which makes this only one half of a good novel; I can't even consider it finished. It's sort of amazing, that a book can be so devoid of characterization. Anyway, I think I'll read the new China Miéville next. And probably a bunch of other stuff, because I seem unable to read only one book at a time.
This will be my last entry until after Portland, and I feel like I'm forgetting shit.
I read "Pickman's Other Model" aloud last night. It's the piece I want to use for my reading on Sunday. The reading's an hour long, and reading the story at a leisurely pace, it came in at about fifty-five minutes. So, I don't know. I'll either read it, or something from The Ammonite Violin & Others. Oh, and DO NOT FORGET. This weekend is be kind to Spooky weekend. Oak moss and voodoo donuts. I'm serious. Just don't try to hug her, because she bites.
And while I won't be tweeting, or blogging, or facebooking (???) on this trip, I will be taking tons of photos, and will post a bunch of them afterwards.
Now, I think I need a bath.
Oh, fuck! It's National Coffee Day!
Tags:
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no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 05:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 05:47 pm (UTC)"Pickman's Other Model" is one of your absolute best, if you ask me.
I feel that way myself.
And I think every weekend should be kind to Spooky weekend.
I quite agree.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 05:56 pm (UTC)Actually, biting's not much of a deterrent, is it?
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:03 pm (UTC)I'd hug Spooky though.
Well, you're a special case.
Actually, biting's not much of a deterrent, is it?
It's all an issue of demographics.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:03 pm (UTC)Cocksucker, according to the good doctor... What does he think?
Here's hoping your trip is exceptional and uneventful (in the best of ways, of course).
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:04 pm (UTC)Cocksucker, according to the good doctor... What does he think?
He has not, as yet, weighed in on the matter.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:04 pm (UTC)I love finding just the right pants at a Thrift store. I am a hard fit.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:05 pm (UTC)I love finding just the right pants at a Thrift store. I am a hard fit.
Same here. Being an alien, browsing through pants sewn from humans can be very frustrating.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:48 pm (UTC)Too few people understand the evolutionary origins of the smile, that it's a threat display in most primates, that somehow became this indication of happiness in hominids. I suppose it say, "You don't have to fight me." And then whoever smiles back says, "Me, either."
I'm a throwback.
I have always found smiling somewhat alarming, especially if teeth are revealed. Now, showing teeth are just fine if you mean to bite me (and I've given permission). But that's another matter...
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:23 pm (UTC)Let me know what you think of Kraken. I've been wanting to pick it up.
I hope that you have a great trip and an enjoyable festival.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 06:50 pm (UTC)Well, I'm fine with sudden and ambiguous endings. But yeah, it felt like he all at once ran out of plot, or hit the upper word limit imposed by his publisher.
and I feel he solves the characterization problems by the time we get to Cryptonomicon.
I'm not yet sure whether or not I'm going to attempt that one.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 07:04 pm (UTC)Right. Like he kind of lost what to do next.
or hit the upper word limit imposed by his publisher... I'm not yet sure whether or not I'm going to attempt [Cryptonomicon].
Yeah, I think that one puts paid to the "upper limit" idea, while-- to my mind-- simultaneously suffering from the Just Stopping problem.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 07:13 pm (UTC)I don't know how people write suck long novels. I need forever to write my shortish ones.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 07:52 pm (UTC)Hahahahaha! Gods, that made me laugh so frakkin'hard! :-D
"Just don't try to hug her, because she bites."
Ick, HUGGING! Especially when strangers do it to you as a form of greeting. WHY??? I strongly dislike doing the handshake thing, too. I'd rather just stand back and wave from a safe distance...
Have a safe trip here to Portland and I'll see you at the festival, (I'll be the one waving from waaaay across the room.) :-)
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 09:31 pm (UTC)Ick, HUGGING! Especially when strangers do it to you as a form of greeting. WHY??? I strongly dislike doing the handshake thing, too. I'd rather just stand back and wave from a safe distance...
GERMS!
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 09:17 pm (UTC)I just finished "The Red Tree," which was sad and lovely. You're a very good writer.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 09:25 pm (UTC)Thank you for taking time to read the book, and I'm very pleased you liked it.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 09:36 pm (UTC)Maybe it was just gas.
no subject
Date: 2010-09-29 10:31 pm (UTC)Maybe it was just gas.
Very likely.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-02 11:38 pm (UTC)'Owen, I'm not a girl.'
'What are you?'
'I'm nothing.'
no subject
Date: 2010-10-03 02:41 pm (UTC)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSx2OSuEzDI&feature=fvw
- Mel
PS: I hope you are having a decent time on the trip.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-04 03:26 am (UTC)And then we have this one too that I think you'd like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vM8fEP8FOqE
Things and stuff and things
Date: 2010-10-05 12:58 am (UTC)First, here's that photo we were able to get Saturday night (yes people, they don't hug ya, but they touch ya):
Second, someone did a nicely done Inception trailer, 50s-style:
Welcome home, since I presume you'll first read this from home...