November 7

--On my way to the library (where I am right now) I passed a real live Quidditch tournament. Obviously not in the air, but hula-hoops on giant sticks, a kid with a tennis ball strapped to his ass (who I assume was the snitch), and people running around with brooms between their legs. It was, simply, mesmerizing. I really wanted to see the Beaters in action, so hopefully it's still going on when I leave.

--The university just opened this glorious new rec-center. Three floors of FITNESS. Weight machines like I've never seen, a suspended track, huuuge basketball court, etc. Thank God, because I can finally ditch swimming altogether. I don't know why - probably just how busy this semester's been - but I could NOT make myself go to the pool. I would have three-day spurts of going and working like a madman, but totally dive-bomb. I was getting incredibly creative (for me) with my sets trying to keep it moderately interesting, but no dice. So I'm in horrendous shape, and I went to the new rec-center this morning and biked for an hour on a heinous hill program at a level that was evidently too high for my current condition, since, afterward, I wobbled my way back to my room and ate a plateful of bad decisions so as to render that hour absolutely meaningless, calorie-wise. Ah, fitness.

--Saw a horrendous rendition of Romeo and Juliet the other day. So so bad. Indescribably bad. It was a professional company, I guess, too. And it was so uncomfortable because the actors were bad, their interpretation was so uncomfortable for everyone, but they wanted to create an "authentic feel" by leaving the lights on the whole time and working the action into the audience. The badness just radiated through the whole endless thing. There's a guy in our English department who, I guess, is a foremost Shakespeare scholar, and he made a speech before it started. I watched him as the play was ending, and he looked nauseous. I wanted to high-five him.

--I read this sentence on a swimming site today: "the Emerald Isle has had more than its fair share of sex perverts on the deck."

--I have so little time to read these days! I usually eat breakfast by myself before class, and that's been really the only substantial book time I've been getting. (The Gathering Storm was a huge exception. I pretty much cut out the world for two days for that book.) It took me a week to read a James Bond novel, which, if you've never seen them, are tiny. I resumed Love and War, which I put down a long, long time ago, and it's probably going to take forever to finish. (Plus, I'm only 75% sure of what's going on.) Kind of a bummer.

--In that vein, in a conversation the other day, the movies Stardust, The Green Mile, The Princess Bride, and Gone With the Wind were all brought up, and I had to be that guy that said, "No, I've only read the book" for every single one. I have seen a little of all of them, but not the whole things.

--It's Thanksgiving season for Food Network. Who's excited?

--Oh my God, please watch this with me, while we're on that subject. And this. HA, they construed "Semi-Homemade" into porn. The internet is so fun.

Books: The Gathering Storm

Long wait, well worth it. First off, it was so fun to carry this around and randomly get recognition from people across campus, like there was a small group of us scattered around the school who were all diving in at once. My roommate read most of these books a long time ago, but stopped. One day at breakfast he said something about Lews Therin, and a guy at the next table turned completely around and hollered, "I CAN'T GET IT UNTIL NEXT WEEKEND, STOP TALKING ABOUT LEWS THERIN."

I think this might be my favorite Wheel of Time book, too. Things that I loved (spoilers abound):

--Egwene's all-around badassery. Not many people seem to like her, but God, Egwene has been probably my favorite character in the series since she was introduced, and to see her come into her OWN here was so great. That Battle of Hogwarts-esque fending off of the Seanchan was just wonderful. Stilling and executing Sheriam, raising Silviana to Keeper. Such good stuff.

--Cadsuane spanking Semirhage. Need I say more?

--VERIN. I knew SOMETHING was coming with her because I spoiled myself a bit, but I genuinely teared up at the big reveal. That weird little old lady was, all along, the bravest person in these books.

--The "Veins of Gold" chapter. That, I thought, was beautifully done. A common sentiment in fantasy, and in literature period, that love is the reason to keep going, but Sanderson just got it, the "What's the POINT?" raging, and Rand's realization.

--I think Brandon NAILED Aviendha. Her points of view were great, and I'm really interested to see what she finds out in Rhuidean.

--Min is clearly going to have some role in figuring out what Rand needs to do at the Last Battle. I'm glad her role has been expanded beyond flourishing knives and boning Rand.

--Faile, I thought, became much more likeable.

--Graendal's death was appropriate, because she would never have stayed to duel it out with Rand, but a huge part of me wants to believe she's still alive. I think she's too smart for even mass-balefire.

--Siuan, awwwww.

I thought Perrin's chapters were useless, but I can't stand that character. Every time I got to a Mat POV my mind screamed "GO TO THE TOWER OF GHENJEI MOIRAINE NEEDS YOU!" But alas, not to be! Mat was definitely different in this book, but I didn't mind. I liked Mat before, and his sense of humor's kind of different now, but he's still a good character. He seemed a little wittier now. Though, I must say, that "saidared it" line was jarring, and I remember staring at it for a few seconds, not able to decide how I felt about it.

I also wish Cyndane had made an appearance, since that is the one plotline of this series that I want solved more than anything else. I understand that she didn't appear, though, as poor Lanfear has been relegated to the sidelines.

All in all, much much much less to complain about than to praise. Huge plotlines resolved, and we're definitely moving toward the Last Battle, FINALLY. I think Brandon did Mr. Jordan proud!

MoRe Of ThE sAmE!

--Facebook is so depressing lately. My whole news-feed looks like this:




















Where the hell are all these sad ugly animals coming from, and why are they ALL unable to find a home? And, really, that duck should just kill itself, because no one is taking in a duck with teeth. Birds are scary enough already.

--January 6, January 6, January 6, January 6! Say it with me, people! I won't tell you what it is, since I should maintain at least that modicum of privacy on the internet, but GOD will it be good.

--You know how I-Tunes lets you share your library with other people on your network? I NEVER leave that on because of my fear of peer-judgment, but I turned it on over the weekend when I was home and forgot to shut it off. So when I was in the library Monday and went to shut my computer down, I got a memo that someone was logged into my I-Tunes Library. I can't stop thinking about it. Who was it? How long were they on there? What were they thinking? What were they listening to? I'm absolutely fascinated. I'm not kidding.

--On that note, I love when a song that you've had forever suddenly CLICKS. I've had the Folsom Prison Johnny Cash album since, oh, senior year of high school, I think, but I listened to "The Wall" at random the other day, and it just worked at that moment. My brain just liked it a lot, and I've kind of had it on nonstop loop since.

--Twitter is weird to me, because now I know which celebrities use correct grammar and which don't (cough Demi Moore), which is weird because it puts them at my level and I don't like that. Though Mindy Kaling's is really funny sometimes. But it's still weird because she has back-and-forths with Samantha Ronson. I don't know why that's so disconcerting to me.

--DID YOU HEAR that there have been stray copies of The Gathering Storm out there in the world? Like, people legitimately bought it before it was out, at a bookstore. I considered asking the store here whether they had it in stock, but I stopped because 1. I'm in there looking at the books so often (hahahaha) that they know me by face and 2. I'm pretty sure I've talked about Wheel of Time with one of the girls in there, so she'd know that I already knew it wasn't out yet. I can wait. I guess. I've pretty much stopped reading anything else. It better be good.

--The bad thing about apple season in New England is what all that fiber does to the system.

--It's been years, but I can't still decide how I feel about Mary J Blige's cover of U2's "One." Does anyone have thoughts? I'm willing to give it to her now because of her spot on 30 Rock ("My Mary J Blige foundation is celebrating its tenth year of searching for the Loch Ness Monster."), but that, to me, is one of those songs that shouldn't be touched. Like when Madonna did that cover of "American Pie." Blegh. How dare she!

--I need to decide whether law school or grad school are things that I really want to do, or if they're things I feel like I need to do. Can I get a job without doing those things? It seems that no one can get a job these days, so it's a level playing field, no matter what I've done, right? I'm really really sick of higher education. I'm not getting any smarter or more open-minded here. I'm just reading more and writing more. Which is great, don't get me wrong. But I'm not moving up, I'm moving outward, and I can do that on my own, at this point (well, for my English major. Italian's another story, of course, but that's secondary), because I WANT to do that, now. Which is what college is supposed to make you want, I guess, so mission accomplished, UMass. And the five-figure bills every year make me sick. Nothing is worth that much money. I went to an info session about getting a PhD in English lit, and the whole time I thought, "Why would ANYONE want that?" To put yourself in that much debt and kissing ass for eight years for... uncertainty of job security? Not getting to pick where you live, for the rest of your life? Nah. I'd much rather teach high school or something.

Lights at the end of the tunnel

You know, the way look at life, I always kind of need little checkpoints along the way. I don't know if everyone else is like that, but I always have a date or an event or something that I'm looking forward to, even if life isn't terribly stressful at the present. But right now, when it IS, I've got a whole mess of things, big and small, that I'm inching my way toward. I've gotten to the point that I set a minimum task list for each day, like: you need to do this assignment and this paper, read this play and these essays and these poems, start thinking about this, set up that, go to this meeting and that appointment, mail in this form. And so, as all that washes over me, I've got the following points of relaxation to look forward to:

1. 30 ROCK PREMIERE THURSDAY. I've got so much to do this week in particular that I might not even be able to watch it right away, but God, it will be good to have some Tina Fey back in my life. Hope it's funnier than SNL has been.
2. THE GATHERING STORM RELEASE: I was not excited when Knife of Dreams came out, I'll be honest. I was fairly disenchanted with the Wheel of Time at that point. But having muscled my way through them again and loved it through and through, I could not be more excited. Sometimes I get so excited for books that are coming out that I can't focus on what I'm reading. It's so like that right now. I'm trying to read Villette and all I can think about is Egwene and the Seanchan.
   
3. SWIM MEET: The annual swimming showdown between my older brother's school and one that a few of my friends from home swim on. I might not go - have I mentioned that this is a busy month? But it's always a good time. Scary to think it's the last one!
4. THANKSGIVING AND CHRISTMAS: As longtime readers know, I start thinking about these monumental holidays once September's over. I've already started. That Mariah Carey song, "All I Want for Christmas is You"? Yeah, broke that out already. Privately. It's too early to share this with the physical world. But still.
5. JANUARY 6, 2010. OH MY GOD.
   

Idiocy

I have an Italian assignment to summarize a novel and then write an alternate ending for it. For some reason I perused my collection and chose Jane Eyre. (Dumb. I didn't realize how complicated that plot was until I had to summarize it in another language!) As I sat at my computer gnashing my teeth over what to do, my brother came to my aid:

He: What happens at the end of that book?

Me: Uh... the guy goes blind and she has a baby.

He: Okay, I got it, make the guy have a baby and the baby go blind.

Books: I'm Down

Mishna Wolff's memoir about growing up as a white girl (or, as she puts it, "White white white white white white white white") whose father genuinely believes that he is black. The book jacket tries to pass it off as a story of not "quite fit[ting] in with the neighborhood kids" as a white girl in a black neighborhood, and then struggling to fit in again when she transfers to a preppy, almost-all white school. That's all in there, of course, but it's really about a father-daughter relationship, one that is particularly tempestuous.

The book was a little unbelievable at first, to me. She was writing about herself as a six-year old as if she were transcribing her six-year old's thoughts, but these weren't things a kid would think or say. I don't know, I can't find a great example, but in the first 30 pages or so, her thoughts kind of jarred with her age. It improves very steadily after that, though, once Wolff finds her footing, to an extent, among the black kids of her neighborhood. It's very funny, actually. I chuckled quite a few times as the book went on. Like, here, for instance, talking about how her prep-school gym teacher suddenly tries to bring in some "street":

He faced a class of elementary school students in a pair of shorts so short that the only reason his junk stayed in was because they were also skintight. His polyester shirt was half unbuttoned to show off his insanely hairy chest. His upper lip disappeared into his well-combed mustache as he described the break-dancing "moves" we would be working on. He almost drooled on himself as he pointed to three large poster boards, with step-by-step instructions on how to do the six-step, the backspin, and the worm. I could tell by his excitement that he was sure he was blowing our young minds in the only way a PE teacher can -- by bringing the street into our curriculum.

She writes about not fitting in very well, and for her, it's double-sided. She kind of straddles a line between acting "white" because of her school and "black" because of her upbringing, so she NEVER fits in ANYWHERE. She's also great in writing about maturity. You see things through her (kid's) lens so long that, at one particular moment, during a fight with her step-mother, when she finally sees things from another perspective, you're taken aback. At least I was. Like, oh, that crazy bitch actually has a POINT. There's a REASON she's a crazy bitch, sometimes. I felt her grow up in that moment.

But near the end, it actually touches on something that struck me. For a while she feels no sympathy for her rich friends because SHE knows what REAL problems are. (Poverty.) Your wealthy parents give you anything you ask for but don't spend much time with you? What's the big deal? You've got MONEY. But she eventually realizes, when she walks in on a girl cutting herself, that EVERYONE'S got problems. It's pondering: these people are materially SET; why are they so unhappy? Of course there's no answer, but it's an interesting thing to think about.

Easy read, and not bad. And, of course, the cover! Ahaha.

Despite the painful heat in her bottom

-- I like what I'm doing, sure, but sometimes - well, all the time - I wish I could squeeze in a class that isn't English or Italian. I think that, say, a plant-science class or something would do wonders for breaking up my routine. I just feel like I'm waist-deep in the same thing, all the time. Too much! But it's been a damn good year, so far.

-- There was an advanced showing of Whip It last night, and though I wasn't terribly invested in seeing it, it featured both Kristen Wiig and Ellen Page, plus Juliette Lewis. So I was sold, because I love the former two so much, and I like the latter from that I Love the 80's show from VH1. And it wasn't great, but the theater was filled with just me, my friends, and a legitimate roller derby team (I KNOW), which made it much more enjoyable. We were also invited to a roller derby party and got free T-shirts that say, "BE YOUR OWN HERD" across a picture of a roller skate. I live for free t-shirts, so, a successful evening.

-- I'm nearly done Knife of Dreams, thank God; somehow I enjoyed Crossroads of Twilight more than I seem to be enjoying this one the second time around, though, I must say, the KoD chapter "Honey in the Tea" is my favorite chapter in the entire Wheel of Time, even more than the last chapter of Winter's Heart. I've read it twice already and I've only just gotten to it for real today. And then, I haven't gotten to the good parts in KoD, yet: Rand still has his hand, and Morgase hasn't done that thing with channeling the flag, yet. But really, the "bad books" (PoD, WH, CoT) were not bad at all this time around. In a way, I liked them more than the hugely sprawling middle books.

-- While I'm still in the spirit of reading long and complex things, I might try for War and Peace or Ulysses or Anna Karenina or something next. I should read I'm Down, since my sister wants it, but I won't see her for another month, so she can wait, I guess.

-- We're reading part of The Decameron in one of my Italian classes, and the word for wild boar came up, and someone asked what it meant. We're not allowed to explain things in English, so someone said "Come Pumba!" And my professor then told us that he GRADUATED HIGH SCHOOL WITH THE MAN WHO IS THE VOICE OF PUMBA IN THE LION KING.

-- A thing I hate about college: the sinks and toilets on a Sunday morning. Someone last night shaved his head into the sink and then threw up on it. Really? Really? That's not even annoying to me because it's gross, so much as the sense of "Oh, someone else will clean that up" that people who do that kind of thing have. That drives me crazy. Clean up after yourself, d-bag.

-- Much to do! Have a good one.

HA

Please look at the book I bought most recently. I do sometimes go into the bookstore and just grab one based on its cover, but none has ever pulled me to it quite like this one. My dad gave me and my sister a gift card, and we were wandering around trying to find a book (this was the day before I left for school). And all of a sudden she gasped and said, "THAT one."



I'm almost done with Wheel of Time for now, though I'm in Crossroads of Twilight which will undoubtedly take me forever. But I can't WAIT to see what's between those book covers!

Yawn

--I've saved up nearly all the money I've made this summer, thinking I'd use it to pay my bill from school. I've got a nice scholarship, so my balance is never very big, but between fee increases and the shitty weather we had all June and into July, I couldn't quite make it by the date the bill was due, even with these killer fifty-five hour work weeks. So we took out a loan, and I bought myself a new computer. A cheap little black Dell Inspiron, nothing fancy, but I hope it'll last me through the end of college, at least. I didn't NEED it desperately, but my shitty Acer has been treading on thin ice since about the second I bought it, and there were about a dozen little things on it that needed fixing, so I figured I might as well get a new one now, while I can afford it. I'm gonna more-than recoup my losses between my last three paychecks, anyway.

--I, computer illiterate, somehow managed to transfer my I-Tunes to the new computer successfully, which I always thought was impossible or illegal or something. Admittedly, I used Apple's step-by-step guide, pictures and all, but still, I'm proud of myself.

--I started the prologue of Lord of Chaos and immediately got tired. I used to PLOW through these books when I was fourteen, but now I see the thickness and all the tiny print and the hundred-page prologues and I need to pop a caffeine pill before I can get moving. So took a temporary halt to read Craig Ferguson's Between The Bridge and the River, which was absolutely wonderful. I loved it. It was so witty, and random. I couldn't even really give a plot summary. Three totally different story lines which only lightly intersect in the middle and end of the book, but there was something wondrous about the whole book. I'm excited for his new book coming out next month, though I believe that's going to be autobiographical. Also read MacBeth over a couple nights, which I also really liked. I've never been crazy about Shakespeare because it's forcefed to you with the attitude of, "GROVEL, this is IMPORTANT LITERATURE." That kind of thing immediately turns me off, so when I read one on my own, of course, it was better, without that hanging over me. Can't decide whether I want to resume my Wheel of Time reread yet, or if I want something else first. I do want to read another James Bond novel or two soon...

--I bought new pillows! One of them smells bad, and I'm leery of that because its packaging was open at the store, but phew! Getting new mattresses and pillows and stuff, you never realize how bad your old one was until you get a new one. I'm sleeping fantastically these days.

--That's pretty much it. All I do all the time is work right now, so I've got nothing to post about. Cheers, and hope your life is more interesting than mine.

Wheel of Time Reread Thoughts

--You know, I poke around a forum for A Song of Ice and Fire, and I was reading a thread today about the infamous Red Wedding scene, and how visceral and powerful people's reactions were to it. I started to remember how I felt exactly the same way, reading that scene, literally saying out loud, "No, no, no!" And I realized that I've let my views of both ASoIaF and Wheel of Time be colored, a bit. With the former, I'm irritated at George Martin, and so I become irritated at the books. With the latter, the books get so bad that I forgot how much I loved the earlier ones. I guess that was a long way of saying that I don't have to hate the WHOLE thing just because I hate Path of Daggers and Crossroads of Twilight, ya know? Or I can still like and read aSoIaF, whenever he chooses to put out the next book, without liking what's apparently going on in-process.

--Two thirds done with Fires of Heaven. Love it because there's NO PERRIN anywhere. I remember liking Perrin on my first read. This time around? I cannot stand him. I like Faile fine, and I like Berelain, who'll eventually tag along with him, but Perrin is so BORING. Nynaeve, Egwene, Elayne, anyone who can channel basically except Rand are all fine in my book. Mat's bearable. Thom and Moiraine are always fun to read - very much anticipating the showdown at the end of this book. One of my favorite scenes in anything, ever. I'm trying to remember, though - what happens to Juilin, later on? I know RJ never lets anyone just fall by the wayside, but I can't for the life of me remember where he goes.

--I want to see RJ's notes on the Old Tongue so badly. I don't know if he has an actual system to the language, or if he just glossed over it, but I try and try to see how certain things could be gramatically reconciled, and I just can't. How can Lanfear mean "Daughter of the Night" while Serenla means "stubborn daughter"? The only common factor is the "La," and since I assume that syllable would be nominative in both cases (or at least the same case), can you then have "nfear" as an independent word? I don't think so; can an n ever be followed by an f, in any language? Unless the "n" is inserted to make it phonetically pleasing, but what's wrong with "Lafear?" And in turn, if Car'a'carn means "chief of chiefs," then why is there no "a" in Daughter of the Night? I mean, I guess Car'a'carn could be partitive, or be more along the lines of "chief among chiefs," which could be the difference, but then what exactly does Tel'aran'rhiod mean? I put too much thought into this.

--I like it at this point of the series before everyone becomes a bumbling fool. That scene where Moghedien catches Nynaeve, and Birgitte takes her out, then Moghedien retaliates? I forgot how good that was. I started writing a post about the way I divide good WRITING and good STORYTELLING (went unfinished because it just trailed off), and that's a perfect example. I reread it all, and there's nothing there in the WRITING that I can pinpoint, but something about the way RJ crafted this series makes me hold my breath sometimes. It's just plain good storytelling. I can't wait until Egwene gets raised to Amyrlin in the next book, I LOOOOOVE that scene.