The Spinner’s Companion by Bobbie Irwin
The Cello Suites: J.S. Bach, Pablo Casals, and the Search for a Baroque Masterpiece by Eric Siblin
Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog: The Quirky History and Lost Art of Diagramming Sentences by Kitty Burns Florey
Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit by Nahoko Uehashi
Making an Elephant by Graham Swift
Seven for a Secret by Elizabeth Bear
Secret Adventures of Charlotte Bronte by Laura Joh Rowland
Moon Called by Patricia Briggs
Angel: After the Fall vol. 1 by Whedon et al.
Angel: After the Fall vol. 2: First Night by Whedon et al.
Pride & Prejudice & Zombies by Jane Austen with editing and additions by Seth Grahame-Smith
Buffy: Omnibus vol. 2 by Whedon et al.
Buffy: Omnibus vol. 1 by Whedon et al.
Joy of Spinning by Marilyn Kluger
Julie and Julia by Julie Powell
Spook Country by William Gibson
Sorceress by Celia Rees
Witch Child by Celia Rees
Fatal Voyage by Kathy Reichs
Death du Jour by Kathy Reichs
Category Archives: Books
Last-Minute Thoughts
Hmm. I wonder if I can sneak the cello into the car to take on the trip to Nova Scotia. Playing on the deck overlooking the islands of Indian Point, at dawn or sunset, with the sound of the waves rippling on the stony beach and the birds flying overhead? Yes, please.
Somebody would probably notice the lack of room in the trunk for things like duffel bags of clothes, though.
Good things that happened today: I got lovely positive feedback from the client about the PhD thesis proposal that I edited, and his thanks for a great job. I charged him my lowest rate, because I know what it’s like to be a student. I hope he contacts me when it’s time to edit his thesis.
Less than good things: Today was yet another exercise in frustration as regards the library. I left to go downtown, and remembered only after I’d gotten on the bus that I needed two pieces of ID and couldn’t remember if both needed my address on them or not. Rather than risk getting there and having to come back home empty-handed, I got off the bus a few blocks along and walked home to get a utility bill. (Walking; brilliant plan. Wasn’t that what killed me on Wednesday?) And on the way, I tripped (in flats, on a level surface, I give up) and wrenched my left ankle. So by the time I got home I was frustrated and exhausted and in pain, and gave up. The fibro wins this week; I don’t care. I could have gone out and done it all over again, but it would have taken even more out of me and I was already running on low reserves thanks to what I’d done earlier in the week. If I’d done it I would have ruined the next few days, which are set to be challenging already (long car trips and the fibro do not agree with one another). So I asked HRH if he’d take me downtown when he got home, which turned out to be a much better plan. I am duly impressed with the size and selection at the Bibliotheque nationale. I was also impressed at the twenty-minute lineup to get a card, and the ten-minute lineup to borrow books. Over 10,000 people use the library daily, the documentation says, which gives me renewed hope in the future of humanity. Also, I have my spinning books, although the book on Baroque cello revival that I wanted wasn’t on the shelf, although the catalogue insisted that it was available. I’ll have to ask at the desk next time.
The irony? My driver’s license was accepted as both proof of identity and proof of residency. Two in one.
Today is, I think, the first time I really, truly hated the fibro. Before I’ve always been understanding or chagrined that I didn’t manage my resources well enough. But today, I hated it with savage resentment. Why was this week different? Not that fibro needs a reason to act up; I know that. This week it seemed deeply unfair, however, and all the more so because we’re about to have a real vacation the likes of which we haven’t had for about seven years.
All that aside, things look good for the drive. The boy is very excited about seeing the ocean for the first time, and I confess that I am longing to see it again myself. You can move the girl out of the Maritimes, but a little bit of her will always be there.
I really, really wish I could take my cello.
Be well, gentle readers.
Accomplished
Two chapters edited of the proposal, no time wasted on research about roving or wheels, practically no checking of LJ and RSS feeds.
Of, course, this is because I finally got around to watching The Guild today. But it worked. And it felt more active than frequent breaks to check news and stuff.
I’ve really been enjoying this editing job. I realised today that I am a total editing geek, because I like taking someone’s writing and focusing and refining it to be clear and tight. Cut those excess words! Put the important words where they get more attention in the sentence! Sharpen that point!
Yeah. I’m lame.
I did some basic planning for the NS trip this morning too. Bless Ceri, who said, “Why don’t you just hit a visitor’s information bureau when you get to the end of your rope and they can help you find inexpensive accommodation for the night? That’s what we did when we moved.” This takes piles of pressure off me to find three or more potential places to stop and stay throughout New Brunswick, depending on when we absolutely cannot be in the car any longer. Chances are very good they’ll be able to find a motel cheaper than the ones I’ve been able to find (because gack, too expensive, thanks). So instead I collated all the visitors centres along the route. Heh. It occurs to me that this what we did when we honeymooned in Scotland, and if we can do it in a foreign country we can do it in our own. I also checked to see if there was a yarn store where we’re staying, and what do you know, there is. Also heh. Their web page didn’t say they sold roving, but they deal with a bunch of local sheep farms, so they might have a few.
Yesterday I experienced a fibro/migraine teamup that knocked me flat halfway through the day. Urg. Fortunately today I am much better. Tomorrow I need to make a list of local places to visit while on vacation, and start a list of what to pack. I’m having lunch out with MLG and Paze, and then making my grand trek to the Bibliotheque nationale to get my subscriber card and borrow all fifteen (which is my max) books on spinning.
In weather-related news, summer has finally arrived: It’s finally hot enough to make chocolate kind of squishy if not stored in the fridge. Now if the dozens upon dozens of green tomatoes in the garden would just ripen, I would be thrilled.
Dinner!
In Which She Talks About Things Other Than Spinning Wheels
Yesterday Ceri and I knocked about various places, and it was a most enjoyable day. We had a late breakfast and then headed out to Daisy Antiques, a place my mother and I used to visit regularly when I was a kid. Not much has changed, and certainly not Daisy herself; she looks exactly the same way she did when I last saw her twenty years ago.
Ceri and I had great fun climbing all over the multi-floor shop with its never-ending series of rooms filled with lovely things. We saved the wraparound porch for last, because that’s where the antique spinning wheels were. (The porch was always the best part when I was a kid, too.) And with a bit of poking and jury-rigging we dragged them out and tested all four (well, one wasn’t testable beyond treadling because the spindle was broken) and found them all in remarkably decent shape. They’d all need work before they could be used, of course; proper drive bands made for them, sanding down or filling in of gashes on bobbins, oiling and replacing of the bands or cups holding the spindle assembly, tensioning knobs replaced, flyer hooks straightened or replaced, and so forth. But they were all pretty solid. And the price was attractive, too; Daisy said they were all around $350, but she’d sell them for two.
Then I paid for a 1927 copy of Kipling’s Puck of Pook’s Hill I’d found on a shelf upstairs; I couldn’t pass it up because when I picked it up it fell open to the page with “A Tree Song” on it (and somehow I haven’t managed to read it, and it occurs to me that I don’t think I actually own any Kipling, how odd). Daisy began talking to us about books and she took us into a locked room where she had some gorgeous little books dating from the late 17th century. Ceri and I petted them and cooed over them. And as Ceri was wearing her Great Sax t-shirt, Daisy asked if she played, and the conversation turned to music. It seems that Daisy’s son is a pro sax player.
The things one learns, really.
Daisy also talked to us about estate sales. I think she’d seen and heard us being appreciative of the things we saw and the history they held as we wandered around the shop “Have you ever been to one?” she asked. No, we hadn’t we said, and she said, “Oh, they’re great fun.” A great way to pick up housewares and furniture and books at very good prices, she said, because the point of the sale is to clear the house, not to get the best price one can for them. She has one coming up in my borough in the next couple of weeks, so she gave us her card and told us to watch her website. It sounds like fun; we’ll see if we’re in town for it.
After heading out to Ariadne we had lunch together in the little tea shop behind the quilting store in Pointe-Claire village, and then I had to flee in order to try to get the day’s work finished. The service at lunch was very slow, which didn’t help.
Over lunch, Ceri and I talked about Worldcon (she’s not going either, which relieves me and makes me feel less guilty about choosing to miss it), and we touched on different things about writing and process and general approach. And I thought of two ways I could start Orchestrated, and Ceri suggested a different spin for one of them, so after the boy was in bed and I’d had a bath I curled up in bed with my notebook and wrote out two possible openings for it. Reading Graham Swift’s Making an Elephant was inspirational, too. There were a couple of turns of phrase in it that sent my mind off in new directions and pulled the what-if along a different route. It was nice to be interested in it again.
And now, out for lunch and groceries and bank and stuff.
Stuff; Or, What I Did Today
The boy’s 49-months-old post is up and backdated. Thanks to Debra, I have a better idea how to use iPhoto and Preview, and so I could actually provide photos for the post. (I’ll get there, Mac.)
I’m currently editing a PhD thesis proposal for a biochemical engineering student whose native language is not English. It’s required me to look into the world of scientific style manuals, as opposed to the humanities style manuals I’ve absorbed over the years. Very interesting, though, and quite enjoyable. This is only one brief section of others that will come, too.
The boy left Blackie the bunny at home this morning, so I seized the opportunity that he has denied us for months and said, “INTO THE WASH, you innocent, horribly bedraggled thing!” Even soaking wet, I could see how clean Blackie was as I transferred him from washer to dryer. Four months of preschool grime really adds up on a best-buddy stuffed pal. When I took him out of the dryer, Blackie looked practically new. Aside from the four months of aggressive love that have marked him eternally, that is. I hope the boy is happy to see Blackie all shiny and clean and recognizes that he has survived the experience with cheer and aplomb, although part of me expects tears because I threw the rabbit in the wash without the boy’s permission.
Ceri and I were supposed to go antiquing and then to Ariadne this afternoon, but she was felled by a visit from the evil Migraine Fairy. I ended up messing with Garageband on my lunch break instead, and discovered that the Mac Mini doesn’t have a microphone jack. You need something like the iMic USB connector through which to run your microphone. So no sound clips of the 7/8 cello for you, Gentle Readers. I re-ripped a couple more albums and practiced the cello this afternoon instead. And I discovered that the Bibliotheque nationale downtown has tonnes of books on spinning, books that I’d otherwise have to buy. I’ll head down there either this week or next and get a library card, then take a pile of them home.
I really hope HRH is in the mood for Rock Band tonight.
In Which She Makes A Regretful Discovery
So this past week, I remembered that hey, wow, Worldcon is coming up! And the only reason I remembered was because we realized that the trip to Nova Scotia is rapidly approaching, and Worldcon starts the day before we come back. This tells me something important.
Now, we didn’t buy our memberships ahead of time; money was tight, and since we were going to miss at least a day we figured we’d buy weekend or day passes. And then we waited because I wanted to see what the schedule would be like, so I’d be sure to buy the pass for the day I wanted most. And the schedules were only recently finalized, which drove me nuts, although I’ve participated in large-event organization before and I know how hard it is to pin this stuff down early.
Except now the time’s almost upon us, and I’m slowly realizing something. The only reasons I want to go to Worldcon are:
1. The biggest damn F/SF industry party is going to be IN MY TOWN and to miss it would be just stupid. I’m never going to get to travel to one anywhere else.
2. I want to attend signings of a handful of authors.
And really, that’s it. And can I really afford to pay for passes when I’m not going to really do anything? (Really.)
I was much more excited about Worldcon last year. The excitement has really faded until now, a couple of weeks before the convention itself, I’m at the point where I can’t be bothered about it. And I feel guilty about it, because, well, see item 1 above.
As a corollary, I present opposing arguments:
1. I hate large gatherings of people, with a biting, burning passion.
1a. I hate meeting new people.
2. We have no friends coming into town for the event that we’d be wanting to spend time with there.
3. My areas of writing have moved out of F/SF and into mainstream, specifically YA mainstream. (Okay, there’s the Pandora book which is urban fantasy, but it’s the exception that proves the rule.)
It’s kind of telling when the workshops/panels/ sessions that interest me the most are two or three of the signings, the knitting circle and the spinning workshop, the bookbinding/conservation workshop, and a panel on YA or folklore or music here and there. I don’t absolutely need to go to these; I’d be going to them because they’re being offered and I’d need to do something because I’d paid to get in. That’s the wrong reason entirely.
It’s a lot of money for something I’m not passionate or excited about. And it’s hard on the heels of driving home from NS, too. I know what my decision is going to be, unless something major happens to change it.
Notes
I think all the e-mail addresses are working now. All I need is to go back to the PC one last time to make a second backup of the mail profile, the address book, and whatever else I think I need. Of course that means unplugging the Mac, which I am, understandably reluctant to do. Then ADZO has given me permission to hand the PC over to whatever charity refurbishes hardware for places that need computers, like other charities and churches and so forth. I want it out of my office by tomorrow. I want the space under my left-hand writing desk reclaimed!
I’m fumbling through the first few days of adjustment quite well. What keyboard combinations do I use to approximate this or that desired function? How do I sync the new Touch and the computer? Why has all the info on my Touch vanished after syncing? (Oh; one can only sync the desktop to the iPod. Well, that’s odd. It would make sense to be able to do it both ways, as the iPod acts like a PDA you carry around, so in my mind one should be able to upload changes from it to the main system.) Some things need to be double-clicked, some don’t. I’ve set up Open Office for now, till I get iWork. The screen resolution seems to have finally settled thanks to determined effort on my part to try every single possible resolution plus tweaking sharpness and interweave and mumblemonitortechspeak. My main problem is that everything is easy. Too easy. There’s a tiny bit of my brain that’s chittering away, saying, “But you don’t know how it works.” To which I say, “Yes, absolutely. Which means that it’s magic!”
I’m going to sound like a broken record: I can’t get over how quiet it is. I can listen to music playing in the next room with no difficulty. I am so relaxed, it’s slightly anxiety-inducing. It boots up incredibly quickly. The boy is very impressed that it makes “the WALL*E sound” when it’s turned on.
Today I went to the license bureau to pay for my next two years’ worth of driver’s license fees (why yes, my birthday was four days ago, why do you ask?), had a very enjoyable breakfast with ADZO, and went to the library to pick up an armful of reference books on Macs and how to understand the inner workings of iTunes (because things I expect it to do or recognise don’t happen), some graphic novels (who knew there was a whole section of English graphic novels in the back corner?), and a new book on writing by Graham Swift called Making an Elephant: Writing From Within. I’m always very excited when an author whose work I analyzed in my thesis comes out with something new. Which reminds me, I think David Lodge released a new novel recently. I’ve already read A.S. Byatt’s latest.
I am trying very hard to not think about how much money I have spent on major purchases in this past month. The new cello and computer have both been a long time coming, of course. I’m just twitchy about that much money going out within that small a timeframe.
Astute readers will have noticed that the monthly post about the boy hasn’t gone up. July’s like that: there’s the concert, then recovery, then my birthday, and the first two weeks just don’t really exist properly. And then this year there was the computer stuff, too. I’ll get to it next week.
To work! Which in this case is reading. And re-ripping the albums iTunes claims don’t exist. And there ought to be some more cello work, too.