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LiveJournal for A fragment of my imagination.
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| Sunday, January 1st, 2012 |
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It was a ready year for me. Nice to have my attention span back, more or less. Some of this is just crap, of course, but who cares? 1. Nemesis – Philip Roth – 3/24/11 ( More behind the cut, it's a long list ) |
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| Sunday, October 2nd, 2011 |
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| Do any of you have any experience using Amazon's video rental service? I need to know whether you think it's better to download or to stream. | ||||
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| Monday, August 15th, 2011 |
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There have been much more eloquent critiques of this list than I am prepared to make right now, but I agree that this list sort of sucks. Nevertheless, I've read many of the books on it. This shows that I didn't do much between grade 5 and grade 12 but read science fiction. And then promptly forgot what I read. Seriously, I have no idea what half these books are about, even though I know I read them at some point. If I went back and read them now, I'd probably hate a lot of them. Having an instant forgetter is the best revenge. ( been so long since I posted here that I forgot to do this cut AND how to do it ) |
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| Thursday, February 24th, 2011 |
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| I went to Wendy's today for some chili and fries. The total came to $6.66. The guy at the cash register wouldn't even say the number out loud, and he gave me a senior discount so that I didn't get charged that amount. | ||||
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| Monday, January 3rd, 2011 |
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The original V miniseries is on tv right now. I love that dumb show. I need to order the DVDs. Classes start for me tomorrow. I'm feeling pretty healthy for a change, so we'll see how it goes. And there's a new Vietnamese restaurant in my neighborhood. Had lunch there today for the first time. It wasn't bad, but it was a bit different than I am used to. The pho was good, but I didn't get as many extra green leaves and stuff as I am used to. The spring rolls were totally different and not as good. Still, it's lots closer than the place I normally go to, so it will be fine for everyday (or sudden cravings). Random poking around has brought to my attention a Harry Potter/Sopranos crossover fic. Alas, but it seems pretty dreadful, because I would pay money to read a good fic with that particular cast of characters. Paulie Walnuts/Severus Snape 4EVA!!!! Otherwise, it's dullsville man. |
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| Sunday, October 10th, 2010 |
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I spend more time on tumblr than livejournal these days. I'm not putting much into words right now, although sometimes over on facebook, yes. And I follow lots of people on twitter, although only when I have time, which now that school has started, not so much. Anyway, if you want to friend me on facebook, let me know. Just don't leave your full name in comments, since I decided not to screen them. My twitter is elgoose. About what you'd expect. Three tumblrs: Send out a search party - http://elgoose.tumblr.com/ This is my personal one, mostly images, some text. I find tumblr to be an awesome repository of images: beautiful, moving, banal, ridiculous, you name it. I like looking. Marisa Monte - http://hellyesmarisamonte.tumblr.co About what it says. Marisa Monte, posted in English. I have mixed feelings about this one, because photos I post keep getting stolen and reposted without attribution by this one jerk in Brazil, who always does that. Always. It's sort of dumb how much this upsets me, but there you go. This blog is going slowly, piecing together bits and pieces of my thoughts and observations about Marisa. I decided against an fyeah because I do sort of want this to be included in search engines and not just stuck in the tumblr ghetto. MPB - http://emmapaybay.tumblr.com/ This one is actually my favorite, and followed by more people than I'd have ever expected. MPB stands for Música Popular Brasileira. It is a specific genre in Brazil, but I use it more broadly to include pretty much all Brazilian music. So far, mostly photos of Brazilian musicians, gorgeous, whimsical photos of Brazilian musicians. Some video links, not a lot. Mostly I just pull in things that I think are interesting or noteworthy when I stumble across them online. |
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| Tuesday, September 7th, 2010 |
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I'm about 2/3 of the way through Jonathan Franzen's new novel, Freedom. I don't think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, but like The Corrections, it's very readable and engaging. I don't know, these sorts of character studies framed in family dysfunction never really interest me that much, unless they're completely psycho, like Christina Stead's The Man Who Loved Children*. Maybe my own family was so grotesque that it takes a lot to really make me sit up and take notice. I mean, I know I read The Corrections, but it made absolutely no impression on me whatsoever. I don't remember one thing about it. Freedom might have had the same fate, but some of the characters try to engage in political analysis and activism, and that has sort of caught my attention, at least on a meta level. After reading Ian McEwen's latest this summer -- Solar -- I'm thinking there's a trend afoot: novels about the Looming Catastrophe. It's probably been afoot for a while and I haven't noticed, and a sample size of two isn't exactly compelling evidence. Still, there are some common threads. One thing that the Franzen and McEwen books both have in common are some perfectly unattractive -- even repulsive -- middle-class male characters who end up for one reason or another, trying to save the world from the Looming Catastrophe (global warming in McEwan and overpopulation in Franzen). Novels about do-gooders, whether the characters be sincere or hypocritical, sort of make me cringe. It's hard for me to understand why these are good characters to tell stories about. Either they will Learn Their Lesson (TM) or they won't, but in either case, the flailing impotence of their attempts is painful to watch because I keep waiting for the Moral to arrive. The point. Both Franzen and McEwen threaten with the possibility of moralism and as I read, I kept waiting to be disappointed by such stupidity. I still haven't really figured out the point to Solar, and maybe it exists solely as a character study. It's a pretty interesting one, centering an a completely unlikeable character, a Nobel Prize winning physicist who has the personality of an alcoholic womanizing game show host. But why encase the character study in an There is something essentially cynical in both novels, I think, in the way they tie the failure of the possibility of political/social redemption to such deeply flawed characters. It's like the desire to do the right thing for it's own sake just can't even be imagined anymore, at least not by major novelists. Only jackasses try to do the right thing, for completely the wrong reasons, and are doomed to failure as a result. Like life, I guess. Or the Obama administration. At any rate, the net effect is quite depressing and disempowering both. Maybe I need to try some Jodi Picoult next. *I read this for the first time earlier this summer, based on an essay by Franzen in the NYTimes. Easily the most disturbing and thought-provoking book I've read in years. So yeah, consider this a recommendation, but only if you are willing to read a book without feeling all happy all the time while you're doing it. In fact, if you want to feel at least vaguely repulsed and disturbed while reading, with occasional eruptions of being completely upset and devastated, then this is the book for you. **Which it may yet in Franzen. I haven't finished it yet, and the book is ripe with the potential for Life Lessons. |
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| Thursday, August 12th, 2010 |
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| Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010 |
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Wow, I haven't posted much here in a while. I've been all over facebook and tumblr and twitter for the past few months, some postyness and some voyeurism combine to give me a happy dose of social media. I've been social in the meat world, too, surprisingly enough, and that's been quite nice, but I'm tired now. My favorite new toy is a tumblr I started, posting mostly photos of Brazilian musicians. It's called MPB, which is the abbreviation for Música Popular Brasileira. It's made me start thinking about the links between rock music/pop music/entertainment and photography both as art and journalism, but I haven't come to any interesting conclusions yet. One thing that sort of amazes me is all these brilliant people, and all these lovely photos, and hardly anybody outside Brazil knows about them (for some given value of "hardly anybody"). There are the usual suspects like Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil and João Gilberto, who are all deservedly well-known, but then there are so many more who aren't when they should be. I suppose we have the ghetto known as world music to thank for that, in some ways. The sheer volume of music produced and the language differences add to the barriers. And yet, the intertubes can break those down with a little searching and perseverance. And so I contribute to the raucousness in a small way, delivering bitty doses of what gives me pleasure. I haven't been this interested in American music in years. And now for something completely different that you might not think I'd like, but I really love: ( Bossa Nostra by Nação Zumbi (Zombie Nation) - youtube behind the cut ) |
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| Tuesday, June 8th, 2010 |
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I'm done with school as of today. Here's a meme that ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.2){kind=small} microbie and florence_craye both did. I swiped it.1) What author do you own the most books by? Either Sigmund Freud or Charlaine Harris. I'm too lazy to get up and count. Wait, I also have a ton by Richard Powers. And Kurt Vonnegut. ( oops sorry, I should put this behind a cut ) |
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| Wednesday, May 19th, 2010 |
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| w00t w00t w00t! Found a connection for Brazilian magazines with features on Marisa Monte! w00t! | ||
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| Saturday, April 17th, 2010 |
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Ten things I love that are yellow. I made them not all be food or flowers, but it was hard. Via microbie, who gave me a color. Added aggravation: it was impossible to upload photos to lj for the past forever. ( yellow! ) If you want a color, just ask. |
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Disappearing Act by Eleanor Ross Taylor No, the soul doesn't leave the body. My body is leaving my soul. Tired of turning fried chicken and coffee to muscle and excrement, tired of secreting tears, wiping them, tired of opening eyes on another day, tired especially of that fleshy heart, pumping, pumping. More, that brain spinning nightmares. Body prepares: disconnect, unplug, erase. But here, I think, a smallish altercation arises. Soul seems to shake its fist. Wants brain? Claims dreams and nightmares? Maintains a codicil bequeathes it shares? There'll be a fight. A deadly struggle. We know, of course, who'll win …. But who's this, watching? |
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| Monday, April 12th, 2010 |
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| Sunday, April 11th, 2010 |
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I'm reading Emma for my English class and I hate it. I've read it before and hated it before. So that, at least, hasn't changed. The first time I read it was in the first few foggy weeks of my sobriety (what was I thinking?). It was long and confusing and nothing happened. I hated it, but was too stubborn to give it up and look for something I could comprehend, like a comic book. Many years later. It's still long and very tedious. It isn't confusing and not really boring, but not much happens. The reason I hate it is because Austen is so damn good at what she does. She draws her characters with such a fine hand, and there is not one single solitary person in this book that I don't want to push in front of a truck. They're all insufferable, and reading about the nothing that happens except the interminable conversations is driving me mad. Yes, I realize that the interminable conversations and insufferable personalities was exactly the point of Jane Austen. She was tortured by it her whole life and chose to share that with the world. Thanks, Jane. I guess it was what she had to do to keep from throttling somebody. I know exactly how she feels. |
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| Monday, April 5th, 2010 |
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So far today: I made an appointment to get my taxes done and an appointment to get my mammogram. Can I go back to bed now? |
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| Wednesday, March 24th, 2010 |
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| Thursday, March 18th, 2010 |
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I have wanted to write about Tim Maia for a long time. He was a Brazilian soul singer whose career stretched from the seventies to the nineties, ending with his death in 1998. He is one of my absolute favorite composers and performers. He was completely nuts in many many ways. It's hard to find decent video footage of him, partly because of the state of a lot of old video archives in Brazil, partly because he could be so undisciplined as a performer. Racional Vol. 1 is one of the most compelling albums I have ever heard, flying saucer cult worship leading to a concept album to end all concept albums. ( more background ) ( Youtube links for listening, songs with accompanying animation or fan slideshows ) Since it was a studio project, I think it's just as well to listen to the cuts. I think there is some footage of performance out there, but to me, the album is the canon version, so to speak. |
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| Tuesday, March 16th, 2010 |
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LJ: makin' rude changes behind the scenes again. Fuckers. In other news, prednisone makes me feel better, at least until it doesn't. I actually got a lot of sleep last night and hope to again tonight. It's bizarre feeling wired and exhausted at the same time, and then on top of that, I"m completely confused by daylight savings. It's after 9:00 now, but it feels life 6:30 or so. Off to Reynoldsburg tomorrow, for the first trip of the year (not one that I've missed making). Sam and I have an appointment to get Fred's final income tax return done, and that's about the last big deal before we close the estate. I finally got those damned shared of Wendys/Arbys stock sold - it was epic. If you own a few handfuls of stock, be nice and give it to charity before you die. You will save your executors untold headaches and get a deduction. Srsly, 21 shares of stock was THE nightmare asset in this estate and that includes the fucking house. Well, maybe the stock comes in second. March 31 would have been Fred's birthday and then the anniversary of his death is in April, so I'm getting sad about that again, too. Ugh. History final on Thursday that I am somewhat prepared for now. That may be all I get, but I will at least take it and only have two incompletes to deal with, which is to say, two papers to write, but at least not in a rush while I feel like shit. I am looking forward to getting through the next couple of days. |
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| Monday, March 15th, 2010 |
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So I was feeling better. The antibiotics ran out. I got worse again, but a least not as bad as where I started from. I'm back on antibiotics. And prednisone now too. It's making me feel sort of oogy. And very wide awake, in a buzzy sort of way that precludes any real concentration on anything much more complicated than dumb games on Facebook. I've been rewatching my Buffy DVDs. That seems like about the right speed for my brain these days. The show doesn't hold up over the years as well as I would have hoped. At least in my opinion. Of course, even mentioning a Joss show could end up in mass defriending from one faction or another, so forget I said anything. |
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LiveJournal for A fragment of my imagination.
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