~ I would like the theater district so much better if it were NOWHERE near Times Square. I hate TS: it's like people lose their minds and their ability to negotiate public spaces when confronted with all the lights and color. On the other hand, the lower west side and Battery Park were crowded and yet still pleasant yesterday.
~ Despite my moratorium on paper books, I bought two while browsing at The Strand. I defy anyone to manage to browse there without finding something they must have. In my case, it was a narrative about Magellan's circumnavigation of the earth, and Alma Katsu's The Taker, which drew me in with this passage:
I stood there for a second, shocked. I was confused, still possessed of the phantom traces of his desire, his kiss and the memory of his hardness in my hand. In any case, he’d misunderstood me: I hadn’t given myself to him. I had declared he was mine.~ I've read rave reviews of the Shake Shack's shakes and burgers. Eh, they seemed pretty average to me, certainly not worth waiting in the line that grew out the door at lunch time. The burgers at Good Stuff Eatery are better by far.
- Dear Dan Savage: Thank you so much for describing virginity as a "garden gnome with tall whiskers that lives in the vagina" when describing how abstinence-only education skews sex education into thinking that only penis-in-vagina sex is sex, so that engaging in anal sex keeps virginity intact. (Srsly, kids, hymen and virginity are not the same thing.) "Put a penis in and it has to move away." I now need brain bleach. I do appreciate the point though, especially when Savage points out that legislators in Tennessee are likening sex to heroin. Well, done right it can feel addictive...
~ I've been invited to the staff meeting for my new (old) group. It makes the transfer seem real. Unfortunately, it's the same time as my current group's monthly meeting.
- I fail as a social being. I'm invited to a housewarming next weekend and really don't want to go. I like the wife of the couple, have never met the husband. It's more than an hour drive each way, and I've already got two other social things scheduled for the same day. I can only socialize so much in one day, okay? My patience for small talk is low, and I'm not really interested in going to a social event with people I work(ed) with on the weekend.
There were gapping plot holes and silly science and an utter waste of the hotness of ASkars' biceps. But there was also a lot of shiny!pretty, including Liam Neeson, John Tui, Tadanobu Asano, and even Taylor Kitsch once he cut his hair. Plus explosions.
Peter Berg really does seem to re-use actors he likes (Riggins and Landry from FNL -- the only thing better would've been to see Coach Taylor or Matt Saracen among the crew).
How much money did the USN pay for that two hour commercial?
Lastly, spring/summer blockbuster movies are now influencing my food choices. Left the theater last week wanting shawarma and this week wanting a chicken burrito.
~~~
Unrelated shiny!pretty: Marc Lopez and Marcel Granollers won the men's doubles championship at BNL d'Italia today before the rain swept in. Ladies' singles halted in progress, men's final on hold. Clearly I'm going to get no errands run today. But I guess I have no excuse not to prep for the meetings scheduled for Monday and Tuesday.Utterly unrelated, I posted a review of Mary Calmes' Frog over at WordPress. Not recommended.
On the motherish front: happy Mother's Day to all and sundry :)
Mom came to lunch today and enjoyed it. Just as a warning, in case you are ever cooking with stellini pasta and think it doesn't look like it will be enough, it will be. I promise. Thinking that the half box I added to the chicken and vegetable soup looked short, I dumped in the rest of the box. And now I have stellini pasta with a little bit of chicken and veg.
~~~
Also sort of motherish, Mom told me today that Grandmom, who died more than a year ago, has returned to her home. Which sounded weird when she said it and looks odd now that I've typed it. The wife of the family who bought the house, who does not wear perfume or scent of any kind, kept smelling old fashioned perfume and complaining to her husband about it. (Mommom wore Chantilly Lace, and it was the job of one of the grandkids to get her bath powder in that scent for Christmas every year.) The husband didn't know what she was talking about, until one evening when they were both sitting in the living room in front of the fire place and they both smelled it. There is no reasonable, possible way the house still smells of Mommom's Chantilly Lace: it was utterly gutted and renovated before they bought it, and they've done more work. And yet they smell it periodically now. It makes Mom happy, I think, not because she begrudges them the house but because she wanted Mommom to be able to die at home and truly believed she would recover enough to go home for her last days rather than spend them in the hospital. The idea that she could be back there in some metaphysical capacity relieves Mom.
Today, resigned to having to schlep out to the MVA on my next day off to replace, I looked up what I would need to take with me as identification: birth certificate, passport, two pieces of business mail/contracts verifying my residence. And as I was tapping away on my computer, the mail was delivered. Among the bills, magazines and random flyers was an envelope with a return address I did not recognize. And in the envelope was my license, with a note that it had been found on the platform at the Newark train station. How it fell out of my wallet, I have no idea, since I don't recall taking it out or having my wallet out of my bag while on the platform. But I so appreciate the kindness of a random stranger who picked it up and mailed it to me rather than either tossing it or leaving it there.
2. In an effort to get rid of the wheatberries and lentils in my pantry (I was feeling healthy and righteous when I bought them, okay?), I am making lentil soup. The recipe is based somewhat on this one, except I used more carrots, added parsnips, and got rid of the peppers and beet greens. it's simmering away on the stove, so we'll see how it turns out.
3. On the work front, I have a dilemma. I've been offered my dream job in my old division, no strings attached. It'd be a lateral move rather than a promotion, which I'm okay with personally because it has the same career ladder and promotion potential as my new job. Actually, it's slightly better in that sense. I got the really hard sell on why I shouldn't hold out for a promotion (that realistically they can't give me). But other advice I've been given is not to go back without a promotion, it sets a bad standard. My mentor is out of town and I need someone objective but who knows the organization to talk to about this. Friends and family can't really help much. What to do? I've got a call in to HR because I have some generic questions whose answers would make a difference to my decision. I like the new job but don't love it the way I loved the dream job when I was doing it part time....which might be the answer right there, yes?
4. Why did I eat cookies after lunch? My stomach is not happy at all.
5. Over at WordPress I've posted about several things, including the cost per word of some ebooks and a quick review of an older chick lit book, Romantically Challenged.
Monday would normally be my day off, but it's a filing deadline, so I'm switching off days. But it has to be one day next week, because I just got a rude reminder notice from the DMV: forgot to have my car's emissions tested and must do so before the end of the month or my registration will be revoked. Okay then.
Do other people still write checks? I write very few any longer, and just recently had to re-order them. Was sure there was a box in the basement, but no. Anyway, today I sat down to write the few checks out that I needed, and one of the recipients is very much not like the others:
- Planned Parenthood
- Young Audiences/A4L
- HRC
- Tammy Baldwin for Senate
- Bitch magazine
- The Economist
That last one seems a little out of place and just slightly more conservative than the rest, no?
There's a drabble party going on with a photo prompt that I couldn't resist, even though the prompt was not my my OTP. Still, it's one I have written before, so...
And also, I am yet again trying to decide what to read. Loved The Irregulars, an urban fantasy anthology put out by Blind Eye Books with stories by Nicole Kimberling, Josh Lanyon, Astrid Amara and Ginn Hale. I liked some stories more that others and there were a few type-setting or copy editing blips, but over all I was very pleased with it and it's maybe the best book I've read so far this year.
Today's takeaways:
1. Bring a sweater, because the court room is freezing.
2. However much reading material you think you'll need, double it. I thought two weeks of The Economist would be enough, but they were not, and I was left twiddling my thumbs and making notes in my calendar. Phones (and thus the Kindle app) were turned off and watched for by the bailiff. During the trial obviously you can't have reading material, but for most of the six hours the judge and counsel were talking to potential jurors with the sound muffler on, so distraction was necessary.
3. Pack a lunch, because the little cafe in the courthouse is crappy. Or be prepared to walk a couple of blocks, bolt lunch, then walk back. Which is what you'll do anyway, minus the walking, if you try to eat at the cafe because the service is glacially slow.
Another takeaway is that I miss being able to walk to work. An extra hour of sleep, plus a 30 minute walk (or 5 minute bus ride) and I was at the court house. If I seriously wanted to change my commute, I would need to either change jobs or move and I'm not ready to do either right now.
Komen races and chapters continue to feel the fall out of the national chapter's Planned Parenthood defunding debacle. Local chapters are struggling to meet goals in terms of pledges and participants. (There's also a WSJ article about it, but it requires a subscription.)
Check out the shiny!pretty! of this tennis and soccer promo video from Nike. You're welcome.
Side note to fandom: please have someone beta your writing. And do basic research. I've read some ridiculous stuff this week.
- Blue collar rednecks playing snooker at a bar in Mississippi. No. Just no. Eight ball, nine ball, straight pool. Not snooker.
- Spanners, singlets, jumpers, mobiles, flats, uni, etc. -- all BrE or AusE vocabulary that would not fall naturally off the tongue of someone who came from a working poor background in middle America.
- Don't even get me started on "have got", "have done" (more BrE-isms), and other present perfect, past perfect, and continuous verb tenses. Once again, the character's background matters here, and the language/usage is jarringly wrong for that character.
- Two years of being a TA as sufficient professional experience to result in a professorship in the English department.
- Soap as lube for shower sex. (Seriously, don't do it.)
Speaking of HP, has everyone downloaded a (legal) copy of the ebook of their favorite Harry Potter book? I'm curious to know what the sales were for it. For me, years too late. Seems like a bit of a lost opportunity: however many sales there are now, how many were lost in the years that book wasn't available in electronic format?
I'm potentially on call for jury duty for the month of April. Not needed this week, according to the recorded message on the court's phone line. Hope I'm not needed at all.
The BioChemist and Chemist are likely NOT going to Peru this year due to scheduling issues. Apparently April and May is the best time for when they want to go, but he's got business travel then so...more time for me to translate Altair :)
My neighbor has put her house on the market; she's being transfered to California. I'm happy for her, but less thrilled to have another new neighbor.
And that's all there is from me tonight.
While gallivanting around Texas over the weekend (Baltimore to Houston to San Antonio to Houston to Baltimore in 50 hours), I tried Big Red soda pop, which I'm told is a Texas "thing". It tasted like liquid bubblegum to me. Also stopped at Buc-ee's, which is apparently another Texas thing -- they had the cleanest rest stop ladies' room I've ever seen, as well as a mindboggling array of wares for sale ranging from typical rest stop fodder to $1,000 smokers.
The purpose of the trip was a family bbq: all of my father's children gathered in a single place, which had never happened before then. Many photographs were taken with various combinations of children, spouses, etc. Since I don't have a Facebook account, I haven't seen most of them. Wow, do my brother and half-brother look alike. We'd never met and I'd only seen a picture of him as a small child, so it was startling to see how alike they are, despite differences in build and the reddish hair he has where my brother has brown. Didn't have much time to cling to The Biochemist, though. Must go back soon with no other activities planned; clinging and sushi-eating are usually involved in our visits, and although we lounged in the living room while watching tennis, we really didn't have enough time.
There's reading I could be doing. Or housecleaning. Instead I'm going to stream yesterday's SEOpen matches on my laptop while watching Daveeeed play JMDP. Vamos!
Also, over at WordPress, I posted about:
- Bryson's book on Shakespeare
- RITA nominations
- A very short bit on the new Brockmann book
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.2){kind=small}
