Me: I came over to visit my schnooky puppy an’ snuddle her little puppy self and kiss her puppy nose. Mumsy: Why are you like this? Me: Oh, hey, Mumsy, you should do a guest review on my blog! Mumsy: No. Me: Yes! Mumsy, you should! What about all those reviews you do on GoodReads and LibraryThing? I could just– Mumsy: No! They’re no good! Me: Oh, Mumsy. The bar that has been set by me is oh so very very low. Mumsy: Oh I don’t want to. Me: Come on! It’ll be fun! I’ll be all, Heeeeeeere’s Mumsy! And…
45 CommentsCategory: Misc.
Why does everyone always get raped in fantasy books? That’s what I want to know. I was all excited to read Daughter of the Blood, which Memory and Ana both said was wonderful, but see, if I had just glanced at Amazon and seen the plot synopsis that said “Sexual violence pervades [this book]”, I would have known in advance that it is not for me. As it was I was doggedly determined to finish it, and I got all through, and nothing got resolved because it’s the first in a series, and, and, and I am sad. I really…
48 CommentsThe jacket copy on the Gene Wolfe books at the library assured me that Gene Wolfe’s most famous books are a series with the word Sun in them, but failed to explain to me which book was the first of that series. Yes, I could have looked it up on the library computers, but I was only getting his books in the first place because he was right there under W, and Sexing the Cherry was not, so I couldn’t be bothered expending a lot of effort. Again I say unto you: It is not a good strategy to get…
18 CommentsI know! I’m so fickle! But: This does seem to be the pattern with me and the new kid. My heart is hardened against him like the Pharaoh against Moses, and I watch the clips with glowery eyes and my arms crossed, and I think angry thoughts about the new kid and his myriad inadequacies. And then, in the midst of all this, he goes and does something really Doctory and causes me to love him (briefly). But I think this clip from “Vampires of Venice” has put paid to all my negative expectations. Well, that, and the fact that…
16 CommentsThis weekend I drove down to New Orleans to visit my sister. I do not like driving to unfamiliar places, and driving in New Orleans, as you will know if you have been there, is not set up in such a way as to prevent a bewildered girl from getting lost. For that reason I have not managed to pay a solo visit to my sister since she moved to New Orleans two years ago (that reason and also the cats she has, which I am allergic to, but mostly I am just a bad person). We thought we would…
17 CommentsI do not appreciate the suggestion that Oscar Wilde’s cleverness consisted in paradoxical epigram. I will accept gracious tributes to Wilde’s way with epigrams, like Dorothy Parker’s: If, with the literate, I am Impelled to try an epigram, I never seek to take the credit. We all assume that Oscar said it. Thank you, Dorothy Parker. You have lovely qualities and could bang out epigrams with the best of them. I will not, however, sit idly by in the face of any slighting reference to Oscar Wilde that implies that he was not as witty and charming as he is…
22 CommentsBut first, can I say? The puppy is monster-sized now. Every time I stop by my parents’ house, Jasmine M. Puppy has gotten huger. At the start of February I already thought she was massive, if fluffy: Monstrous, right? Can’t possibly get any bigger than that? Already the world’s largest ever puppy? Aha, but this is before she got groomed. I talked to my mother the day after Jasmine got groomed, and I asked her how the puppy looked, and she said tragically, “They groomed her like a poodle!” (Which is what she is.) And then my mother said, continuing…
49 Comments