are you out of your vulcan MIND?
19 Dec 2008 07:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cimorene∞ It's seriously unnerving when a combination of tea, Ferrero Rocher and Xanax (aka alprazolam, aka benzos if you're a doctor...) fails to completely soothe my distress/anxiety. I mean, what other methods could I employ? One of those giant, living fur blankets that purrs like Miles buys in... um - is it The Vor Game? One of the early Vorkosigan novels, anyway. I could use one of those.
∞ One thing that I do frequently do, when distressed, is flip open my phone and look at the wallpaper, which is
My phone looks a bit like a TOS communicator, except for being a sort of dark metallic pink/violet colour (this picture was strangely hard to find). The TOS angle also makes me goofily (geekily) giddy. I also have a penchant for compelling other people to look at Spock's stressed little face.
∞ I grew up a fan of Cynthia Felice's collaborations with Connie Willis, Light Raid and Water Witch and the more recent but even better Promised Land, which is hands-down one of my favourite sf novels. But it wasn't until the past few years that I had the opportunity to read any of Felice's solo work (Willis is of course well-known). Iceman was... funny. The one I picked up recently second hand - these are from the 70s, both - is called Down-Time and would actually, with very little work, make a pretty great movie screenplay, I think. In spite of some confused thematic issues and some messages about romantic love that might possibly be sketchy, the plot is really cool, the pacing and pov shifts good; it's almost a screenplay already, in fact. And the main protagonist, a short, fiesty, 50-something female military commander of common birth and risen to the rank of General, afflicted with arthritis and allergies to most common medicines, famed for her brassy hair... she's really, really cool. It's too bad Judi Dench is now too old to play her, because that is awesome casting in my head (Judi Dench with a wig of copper ringlets!). And the time-dilation part of the premise of this universe is also really interesting, and allows for a relationship of unequal age where her lover is scandalously older when they meet in The Land of Rose-Coloured Flashback, but she's twenty years his senior when they meet again for the main action of the novel. ...In spite of all these attractions of story, the novel itself isn't very good, paradoxically. The idea is there and much of the structure; but the writing itself is workmanlike, not truly prepossessing or enchanting - there's none of that glimmer of genius; and the pacing is uneven, a little uncertain. It's always both sad and intriguing to read a great story that's become only an indifferently good book. (Also, I was kind of amused by some of the similarities to the denouement of Water Witch. Someone has a thing for caves...?)
∞ I have this bad feeling about having volunteered to make roasted potatoes for Christmas... Because that's seven adults and four children, which means like... 20 potatoes. Oops.
∞ I wish someone would invent a widget to strip the vapid commentary out of RSS feeds that consist mostly of newslinks. I'm constantly at war within myself: "MUST UNSUBSCRIBE" - "No! I need the news!" And apparently, I can't just teach myself to skim...
∞ One thing that I do frequently do, when distressed, is flip open my phone and look at the wallpaper, which is
My phone looks a bit like a TOS communicator, except for being a sort of dark metallic pink/violet colour (this picture was strangely hard to find). The TOS angle also makes me goofily (geekily) giddy. I also have a penchant for compelling other people to look at Spock's stressed little face.
∞ I grew up a fan of Cynthia Felice's collaborations with Connie Willis, Light Raid and Water Witch and the more recent but even better Promised Land, which is hands-down one of my favourite sf novels. But it wasn't until the past few years that I had the opportunity to read any of Felice's solo work (Willis is of course well-known). Iceman was... funny. The one I picked up recently second hand - these are from the 70s, both - is called Down-Time and would actually, with very little work, make a pretty great movie screenplay, I think. In spite of some confused thematic issues and some messages about romantic love that might possibly be sketchy, the plot is really cool, the pacing and pov shifts good; it's almost a screenplay already, in fact. And the main protagonist, a short, fiesty, 50-something female military commander of common birth and risen to the rank of General, afflicted with arthritis and allergies to most common medicines, famed for her brassy hair... she's really, really cool. It's too bad Judi Dench is now too old to play her, because that is awesome casting in my head (Judi Dench with a wig of copper ringlets!). And the time-dilation part of the premise of this universe is also really interesting, and allows for a relationship of unequal age where her lover is scandalously older when they meet in The Land of Rose-Coloured Flashback, but she's twenty years his senior when they meet again for the main action of the novel. ...In spite of all these attractions of story, the novel itself isn't very good, paradoxically. The idea is there and much of the structure; but the writing itself is workmanlike, not truly prepossessing or enchanting - there's none of that glimmer of genius; and the pacing is uneven, a little uncertain. It's always both sad and intriguing to read a great story that's become only an indifferently good book. (Also, I was kind of amused by some of the similarities to the denouement of Water Witch. Someone has a thing for caves...?)
∞ I have this bad feeling about having volunteered to make roasted potatoes for Christmas... Because that's seven adults and four children, which means like... 20 potatoes. Oops.
∞ I wish someone would invent a widget to strip the vapid commentary out of RSS feeds that consist mostly of newslinks. I'm constantly at war within myself: "MUST UNSUBSCRIBE" - "No! I need the news!" And apparently, I can't just teach myself to skim...
