My trip to Maine...

Back from vacation - and downloading pictures to the computer. Not sure what I'll do with them. May post a couple to the journal. Don't know, what do you think? Do you want to see my vacation photos? Hee, my journal - you don't get a choice. Well, you do...if I post them they'll go behind a cut-tag as always. My motto in life, I inherited from my Granny - I try not to impose my moral views, values, or beliefs on others. You can do whatever you like as long as you don't tread on people or me. (I said it's my motto, not that I'm always good at following it.)

While overall - I enjoyed my vacation, am quite happy to be back. Six days with family is more than enough. And mine isn't that dysfunctional. Actually, I'm not sure we are dysfunctional at all, except according to Momster.

( Where we stayed )

( fuss and bother regarding getting to and from the airport  )

( the 77 year old woman chatted with on plane ride home and the 30 something from Bar Harbor on way to, two people who are not travelers and lived in one state their entire lives )

( Observations about Maine, whalewatching, scenic tours.. )

Didn't buy much, a couple of earrings, and a signed copy of The Lobster Chronicles by Linda Greenlaw. Linda Greenlaw wrote the Hungry Ocean, and is a former Swordfish Fisherman and Captain. She's written four books now, including a mystery novel - which Dadster picked up at Sherman's Book Store - the oldest book store in Maine. Since 1833. Dadster's current hobby is to hunt down the books of regional mystery writers in every place he visits. He will buy a few of them and take them home to read. As he puts it - you can't find regional writers elsewhere, they don't tend to publish them outside their region or very broadly. Dadster and I had a lengthy chat about the publishing industry - a constant source of frustration for both of us.
My hobby, far less rewarding than Dadster's, is to hunt for books published by the professional writers on my flist/live journal. Most of them are sci-fantasy writers, which means I never find them in bookstores. Bookstores, that aren't the big chains, have maybe one small shelf dedicated to sci-fantasy. And all the books on it are by the usual suspects or pop sci-fi pulp novelists who have appeared on the NY Bestseller list. Terry Goodwin, Orson Scott Card, Tolkien, CS Lewis, Brooks, and a few newcomers like Butcher, someone named Kristen Britain,
Lois McMaster Bujold (not a newcomer, but her fantasy stuff was there but not her sci-fi),
Greg Bear, and David Webb. Ellen Kushner, Catherine Valente, Caitlin Keirin, et al were nowhere to be found. Of course. I've only found those at The Strand or via Amazon. So, like I said, Dadster's hobby is far more lucrative then mine and proof that if I want to get published and make a living at it - not to write in the sci-fantasy genre. Not that I do, but just saying.

Okay off to eat lunch. May post photos later.

Seasonal Photos...

It's beastly hot and humid today in NYC, so I'm tucked away in air conditioned apartment watching Leverage. Or half-watching it as the case may be. John Schneider and that gal who played one of the female hunters on SPN is guest-starring. Schneider is actually a good singer.
He's made quite the career of guest-starring as bad guys lately. Maine was in the 70s and 80s during the day and 60s and 50s at night. Also as you can see from the photos below - beautiful.
Reminded my bro and his wife of Nova Scotia - where they got their BA in art. Reminds me of Cape Breton - amongst my favorite outdoor places in the world.

Seasonal photo download:
( vacation photos from Maine and a photo of a blizzard outside my bedroom window in Brooklyn, way back in March. )

Cultural musings...books, tv...the usual

Watched the season finale of Doctor Who this morning, was impressed. One of the better season finales. It is viewed mainly through the pov's of Ameilia Pond and her lover, Rory.
As another person wrote, I forget who, this version of the Doctor - is written mainly through the perspective of his companions. While the previous two versions, 9 and 10, were written mainly through the Doctor's eyes. Changes the series a bit, makes it a little less chauvinistic or sexist in character, and a little less preachy. I'm finding that I prefer Moffat to RTD as a writer at least in regards to Doctor Who. RTD did a better job with Torchwood in my opinion.
( very vague spoilers for The Big Bang - the Doctor Who finale. )

In other news, finished A Dark Matter by Peter Straub, which was disappointing. I think I'm going to dump my Peter Straub's at work - we have a little bookshelf in the kitchen for books that people can take home and read. People bring in used books. Usually mysteries and thrillers. Straub is not as good a writer as Stephen King, which is saying something. And no where near the ability of Donna Tartt. He's easy to read, requires little effort, and the fact that he has published nineteen novels, won several awards in his genre, sort of explains why no one takes genre seriously. That said - his biggest accomplishment and most noteworthy one is most likely his wife's - which is, the creation of the READ TO ME program - advancing literacy amongst children and adults. For that accomplishment, not his writing, I applaud his wife and his ability to support her for it. Also he does provide a good airplane read. Airplane books are books that you don't have to pay attention to and can finish in one sitting.

While I no longer review or really mention fanfic (for reasons I won't go into to preserve my sanity and yours), will state that a 28 page Buffy/Spike fanfic about Spike hunting a soul, was actually more engaging and dealt with the complex themes of good and evil far more effectively than Straub did in A Dark Matter. This depresses me for a lot of reasons. 1) The writer who wrote this story is fantastic but getting a book published is so painful that she'd rather write fanfic than attempt it. (She's write, I've finished a novel and hate the publishing process and am dragging my feet - it's like having a root canal.) 2)Straub is so successful that he can write poorly and no one cares. There were mistakes in this novel that people online would bitch and moan about it if it occurred in a fanfic they were betaing. 3) Popular taste is well, not my cup of tea. So, I've decided that I will only buy best-selling novels on my kindle for dirt cheap prices. Or not at all. They don't deserve actual book status. Actual book ownership status is being reserved to books I want to own and writers who earn it.

Current book? The Lobster Chronicles by Linda Greenlaw - this is a memoir of Linda Greenlaw's experience as a lobster fisherman in Maine. She had left a seven year career as a swordfish fisherman and the Captain of a Swordfish ship, to fish for lobster. To do this - she moved in with her parents, in their 60s and 70s, and bought a boat. The book details her life as a lobster fisherman over a two-three period, the lives of the people around her, and what it is like to live on a small island in Maine, with only 47 people - most of whom you are related to. It was between this book and a chick-lit book that Momster tried to foist on me, entitled, The Way Life Should be - about a thirty-something New York event planner who meets a goregous sailor via an online dating site, gets fired from her job and decides to move to Maine and in with him. He turns out to be jerk and she has to find her way amongst the locals. Getting a job in a coffee shop and cooking, because of course she's a great cook trained by her Italian grandmother and the book is littered with recipes. It's well-written, but read one of these books, read them all. Plus the glamorization of small-town, island life and domesticity, gets old fast.

Realized something while away on vacat with family, that I come from a highly opinionated and critical family. But I think most folks are, to some degree or another. It's a plus and a minus.
Like all things.

Still trying to wean self off of Farscape addiction. The more I think about that show, the more brilliant it is. It is amongst the few shows that fully explores the effects of violence on the human soul. Crichton is driven nearly insane by it. Aeryn almost loses herself and her life. IT also discusses how the best of intentions can be turned against you whenever violence is involved. Farscape makes it clear that regardless of the justification - all violence has nasty and irreversible consequences. This is oddly being echoed by a rather violent and up to now, whitewashed soap I've been watching - GH, where the hitman is increasingly being depicted as an anti-hero, not a white knight, someone who puts vengeance and his own desires before everyone and everything else and justifies his use of violence as a means of protecting who he loves, forget about how it warps them and himself and everything around him in the process.

Hmmm, apparently, I'm editing the church newsletter this week. Should probably get to it.

(no subject)

Finally gotten around to watching Season 2, True Blood on DVD. Have come to the conclusion that watching two actors get naked and have sex on-screen does little for me. I'm not voyeuristic in the least. Or rather, watching Anna Pacquin and Stephen Moyer have sex doesn't do much for me. Just watched their sex scene and found my attention drifting to editing my church newsletter instead. Porn, meh. Granted, the characters of Sookie and Bill in the books didn't turn me on either. I found him annoyingly paternalistic, and her simpering to the degree in which I wanted to kick her. Eric and Sookie were more entertaining, partly because Sookie wasn't simpering with Eric. She actually told him off, and took control. But, Eric's a bit of asshole, a controlling one at that, she'd have to be a complete idiot to be simpering with Eric. This is in the books. I have no idea at this point what they'll be like in the tv series. Bill's more entertaining and less stiff in the tv series, will say that much. Eric? A bit more sociopathic, if that's possible. No, what saves the tv series - at least in the first season, were the characters Tara, Lafayette, and Sam. The vampires weren't all that interesting. Rumor has it - that Eric and Pam start to make their presence known in Seasons 2 and 3, and the series truly takes off, so we shall see.

It's not holding my interest in the same way Farscape did, the characters are sort of grating and, a bit stupid - most seem to be driven by their libidios and little else. Plus the dialogue is less than stellar - feels like an overwrought campy soap opera. It's campy fun, but oddly?
I enjoyed the less pornographic and far more subtle Vampire Diaries more. That could change of course.

Reviewing and Rec'ing things for other people is dicey. First off - people don't have the same tastes. So you have to think about their interests, what do they tend to like. For example - if your best bud watches shows like CSI, NCIS, Two and a Half Men, Community, Parks and Recreation, The Office, and to your knowledge has never watched or voiced an interest in anything remotely of the gothic variety. In fact they make fun of vampire literature, and
Trekkers. I'd say you probably shouldn't share your Buffy the Vampire Slayer DVD collection with them. However - they might enjoy Battle Star Galatica Version 2. But unlikely. If your best bud hates sitcoms, specifically physical/slapstick humor and sexual comedies, and has stated as much? Don't recommend Cougar Town and Two and a Half Men - they will look at you as if you are deranged. If they are burned out on the mystery genre, think government conspiracy stories or stories about aliens are silly, and weren't fans of The X-Files, it's probably a safe bet that they will not like Warehouse 13 - no matter how much you adore it. The trick is to figure out what the other person likes, and how their interests differ from yours. Most people just give other people stuff they love, forgetting that the other person may hate it.
This is why gift-giving can be hard, people often give other people things that they themselves want, not what the other person actually wants. The result? The person who received the gift, often feels as if the other person doesn't know you at all. What do you say? Thanks.
But...uh, could you have just given me a funny card instead? Of course not. You say thanks.
Then either re-gift it, or donate to the nearest thrift store.