newspaper

Hamilton is playing in the background.

The lyrics feel ironic now. More so then they did in 2015, which is saying something I guess.

Particularly the Mad King's refrain:

I've considered getting tickets to see it live. But I'm not sure I can sit for three hours in those seats?

Slept fitfully at best. Sciatica down both legs was bothering me due to IBS issues. Doctor referred me to physical therapy - but there's little a physical therapist can do about a sciatica resulting from IBS and knee issues resulting from arthritis. (I should know - I've seen physical therapists five to six times, about every five years it seems, sometimes every two. Not even sure my insurance will cover it now.) I know which exercises to do. I have six different analgesic creams. No, my problem is IBS, which has pretty much always been my problem.

I feel this need, after being on various social media platforms this morning and yesterday, to remind folks to be mindful, to be kind, and just because they can walk about and march and protest, doesn't mean everyone can or feels capable of it. There's something about posting on the internet that brings the self-righteous bully out in folks? I get that we may to persuade everyone to join us? But be mindful that not everyone can do the same things.

Found this excellent piece of advice on Face Book:



Yesterday, while taking my walk at lunch - largely to walk out the sciatic nerve and cricks in my knees and legs - I stumbled upon a large crowd hollering and clapping and cheering in front of the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. This area attracts a lot of New York Street Performers - due to the fact that it is a large and for the most part unencumbered plaza.

So I found a portion of the crowd that was rather thin, and less rambunctious, and peer through the people to see what was happening. At the center of the crowd was a little girl, pale freckled skin, pink palsy shirt, and jeans, bent over and very still. Brownish blond hair sweeping down on either side of her face. She moved every once and a while, to lift her head. People were clapping near her, and there was a line of white men of varying sizes and ages lined up in her realm of vision - they may have been family members, most had beards, and were relatively young and sturdy and looked for the most part like tourists. Next to them was a man with dreadlocks, dark skin, and bright colored red and orange and black t-shirt and shorts, clapping and getting them to clap as well. As the crowd complied and clapped as well, cheering, music roared to life, and then another man in dreadlocks and a similar outfit, ran and did an acrobatic flip over the little girl's head.

I cringed, and walked away. Unsettled. I'm certain they wouldn't hit her - or come close. She's probably perfectly safe. But I found the whole thing oddly unsettling all the same.

Off to do stuff. Here's a picture:

Somewhat sleep deprived, but hanging in there?

I'm still in a reading slump. It may be somewhat affected by the amount of technical information I have to read at work daily on a computer screen. Very dry technical and legal information. Things like how many cubic yards of Permeable low-density cellular concrete (PLDCC) is required for a job, and what a credit should be in cost savings for not installing that many cubic yards. Add to that contractual information, which is a lot less interesting than the technical data, not to mention editing financial documentation and legal documentation.

Yeah, that may have an effect. And it probably explains why I am doing lots of fantasy audio books. Finished Crooked Kingdom - the sequel to "Six of Crows", which was a long, but ultimately satisfying conclusion to Six of Crows. I kind of fell for Kaz Brekker and Inej. The others, I was ambivalent about. Similar to the television series Shadow and Bone, actually. Although I think it would have been better if it had just focused on the Crows. The audio book works because it has different narrators for each characters perspective in the books, of which there are eight, two villains. Some are better than others - the Inej narrator is by far the best, and I kind of wish they were reading Kaz's pov instead of the guy reading Kaz's.

Struggled to find something to follow it with. Tried Peter Watts Blindside, a sci-fi novel about a group of oddities who are sent into space to confront an alien presence. Part philosophy, part morality, part hard sci-fi. It was dirt cheap, but also hard to listen to. The Narrator is good, but it's not holding my attention. Nor did Susannah Clark's follow up her popular novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel (which I also tried to read, gave up on, and watched the mini-series instead), Piransi. What is it about? I have no idea, I gave up after two chapters. Here's what I found on Google: ( Read more... ) Which I guess explains why I gave up on it? My brain has no room for it.

Finally decided on Graphic Audio Dramatization of another of the Kate Daniels novels, which basically have an entire cast - it's like listening to a radio play of your favorite books. And I've forgotten most of the story by now, so...

These are rather cheap - just cost me $9.99 a month. Because I have a subscription and with that you get a credit each month, and I had about five credits. So, I have about fifty books to listen to, plus free podcasts, etc.

Am plodding my way through Remarkable Creatures - I don't get why people recommended it as delightful and funny, and a happy book? Right now, it's very depressing, no one is happy, all the characters are trapped, frustrated, angry and lonely, and it just keeps jumping points of view. I thought it would just be two points of view? But noooo, it's about four to date. It may be more. Each time I think it's done with character pov, it adds another one. (Reminds me of Eternity Station in that respect, also GRR Martin). And outside of Tova and the octopus, I'm not really interested in them, and want to go back to Tova and the octopus. I've decided that maybe Cameron is Tova's missing son, but that doesn't quite work, so maybe not.
Look, I don't need to read a book - to get frustrated, trapped, angry and lonely...or mundane. Escapism it's not. We'll see how long I stick with this.

I'd read the Faire Folk book - but it's bigger, and not an e-book, so not conducive to reading on subways.

CNN Aired An Exclusive Live Broadcast of the Broadway Play: Good Night and Good Luck - adapted for the stage from the film of the same name. The reason they aired it is made clear upon the airing - at the very end, Edward R Murrow, the CBS News See it Now broadcaster who famously took on McCarthy, during the Black List and McCarthy Hearings, stands front and center in front of a screen displaying multiple screens of the news. He states in a halting speech, enunciating each word, with a slight tremor to his voice, "we've seen what happens when power goes unchecked, that's not the question before us now, the question is - what will you do about it?"

I was thinking as I was watching it live on MAX (I no longer have access to CNN), that evil is like a spider, sitting in the dark corner of the room, smoking a cigar, wih a red top hat and tails smirking. And asking in a whisper of a voice, low and barely audible, "what do you want?" And indicating with a smile - "come into my parlor my dear and I shall give it to you, with a price of course".

It's insidious, and shadows egos. Self-importance. Self-righteousness. Power. Fame. Fortune. Wealth. Beware the righteous, and the self-important, and most of all the arrogant and narcissistic hunting awards and acknowledgment and power.

I don't know what I personally can do to check the power or stop it. I've been pondering it. I can write, I can post, I can draw, I can paint, I can do my job at a public agency. And I can hope people listen.

People aren't very good at listening? Have you noticed that? Too busy thinking about themselves or what they are going to say next or how they'll respond. Too filled up with thoughts to hear...ones that lie outside of their own minds and brains. I tell people a story and they tell me their own back again, and mine....slides off unheard, lost somehow within theirs? The meaning gone. And they tell me theirs and I tell them my own, and it happens all over again from the other side - with their story being lost.

I did social group therapy once - and we were for the most part forced to listen, but everyone tended to flounder at it. Either they'd ask pointed questions, correct the person's choice of words or syntax or speech (which isn't listening by the way - it's judging, and helps no one), interrupt, direct the conversation to themselves, provide advice, try to fix whatever it was, dismiss it as already solved or playing the victim, but seldom did they listen.

And once on a fan discussion board - we fell into a discussion about writing carefully, and I thought - no that's not the problem here or not that alone, we also need to learn how to read carefully. And people don't? Too busy reading quickly, flying through or past the text, to see it clearly let alone truly comprehend it? Now, for example, raise your hand if you just skimmed this passage and oh so many others? Be honest? How many have you skimmed, jumping over words and phrases and reacting to a sentence here or a paragraph there - but not seeing the whole? I know I do. Try a little experiment, if you will? Read just one paragraph of a post, or the unhidden bit. Then take a moment, and read the rest later, has your opinion of it changed?

We live in an age of content overload, and we surf and read and look at so many things simultaneously. Texts fly by. Our memory of them fleeting or garbled. And more often than not - people just read blurbs. If I post something with information below a "cut tag" - how many will read what's below the tag, and just respond to the top of the post? Losing the point of it. Or respond to the post, without reading the comments below? We don't read carefully - and most mistakes are made because of it. They were on the discussion boards. 90% of the arguments online are the result of "miscommunication" or the inability to politely ask for clarification prior to snarking, judging or condemning.

I think the flaw in the human brain is a tendency to assume everyone thinks the same and perceives things the same? When no one does? And well...a failure to communicate as a result?

**

You'll have to excuse me, I'm exhausted. But the weather is shifting, and I'm hurting less all of a sudden - which means the arthritis isn't being pinged by the human weather vane.

I'm also frustrated with my fellow humans. And perhaps with myself and my own limitations. And a touch depressed, no more than a touch, as a result. But hey at least I don't hurt as much as last night. So maybe the back brace is helping?

It's a warm spring evening. The sky has cleared of clouds, and it's sliding towards dark, from twilight. Nine PM on the East Coast. But I can still see puffs of cloud moving slowly across the pale blue sky, lit from within by moonlight. Our swiftly turning planet in the vacuum of space, surrounded by stars and galaxies which far too many of us take for granted as we bumble upon it babbling and gurgling at one another as is our way.

Yes, it's that time again - for the weekly Good News Report from the American Resistance and it's Global Allies in the War against Fascism, Cancer, Disease, and Climate Change, or just trying to fight for kindness and general well-being overall.

As always, mileage may vary on what is good news, or good news may well be in the eye of beholder. You can also call it the Hope Report if you prefer.
Whatever floats your boat, as my father used to say.

( the Good News Report )

***

Reading: When Leaders Attack Judges as Enemies, the Global Authoritarian Play Book and How to Stop It

Haven't accomplished much this weekend. It's been cool, and mostly overcast anyhow. I did spend a lot of time looking out on the treetops outside my living room window, and listening to actor podcasts.

The news, sigh. I don't know about you? But it is depressing me. And kind of makes me route for a sizable meteor, a tornado, or a green dragon to take out Washington, DC. Never felt that way before. I'm actually terrified of reading the news. Is it just me or has the world just gotten scarier since technology took off? Bad techies. Life would have been so much better if we paid techies and marketing folks fifty cents an hour or very little at all, and sanitation workers, tree planters, forest rangers, and climate change scientist more.

Reviews

1. Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler : I finished this on Friday. It took me forever, and I'm not sure I'd recommend reading it now? It's a science fiction novel about the consequences of climate change, with the federal government selling off lands to corporations resulting in societal collapse in the year 2025. A group of hardy and diverse souls decide to walk north to find land, jobs, or a place to live and pick up people along the way. Butler focuses on community building and kindness of strangers. While there is violence earlier in the novel, towards the end, it is less so.

The novel ends in the year 2027, and the next one Parable of the Talents begins in 2032, with flashbacks.

There's a romance, between the 18 year old heroine and a fifty-seven year old man in the novel that I found kind of odd, considering I'm fifty-eight.
Also the novel was published in 1992, and takes place in 2025-2027, so...

Some of the things in the novel she gets right about the future - we do have the beginnings of climate change. California is suffering from heat waves and wild fires. We do have an insane federal government that is trying to cater to corporations. What we don't quite have yet is slave labor, keep in mind this is Octavia Butler - and most of her novels tended to focus on slave labor, mainly because she was an African-American Female Science Fiction Writer in the 20th Century. Also, Butler doesn't quite understand state government. So, she gets an alarming amount right, but also quite a bit wrong, which gives me hope at least, if only a smattering.

It's a scarier book now than I think it was when it was originally published. And perhaps a more timely one. I recommend but with the caveat that it is unnerving, and disturbing in spots. I have the sequel, but am taking a break from it. It was slow going. I may like it once the current administration in DC is gone. Not sure I can read more of it now - hits a little too close to home and I'm terrified enough by the news.

2. Murderbot - started watching on Apple + and it's better than expected. It seems to follow the novels rather closely and Alexander Starsgaard is pitch perfect casting for the Murderbot. It's funny in places and charming in others, just like the novellas were. Murderbot is adapted from the novella All Systems Collapse along with the other novellas in the Murderbot series by Martha Wells, which were initially published as e-books and audio books several years ago.

It has a widely diverse cast, and focuses on a group of hippie research scientists/geologists who purchase a cheap refurbished security protocol bot to take with them to a planet for a research expedition. The Corporations who control the rim planets they are visiting, require that they take a bot with them, so they take the cheapest available, Murderbot.

Murderbot - which is what the Bot calls itself, the government name is security unit, has hacked into its own system and basically watches television most of the time, when it doesn't save the stupid humans. We see most everything from its perspective. It has a rather funny running commentary, and we get parodies of space operas as the television shows it's become invested in.

(Murderbot reminds me uncomfortably of AI, to be honest. ( Read more... )

3. Andor S2 - I've seen one episode. It was good. Took a little while to get into, but well paced. It kind of throws you into the heart of the action without much lead in. And much like the previous season, there is a lot of hoping about between story threads and characters. Took me a little while to figure out where the characters were and what was going on.

It's a series about the beginning of the Rebellion against the evil Corporate Empire, and I'm not certain it's the best series to watch now?
Hits a little close to home in spots. Such as the bad guys discussing how they need to get a mining planet that specializes in silk clothing, to provide them with it's rick minerals for energy and fusion. The trick is to get the people to rebel, and they can invade and take over. And I'm thinking, this reminds me a lot of what is currently happening in the US government at the moment. I think I would have enjoyed this episode more if Kamala Harris had won or Obama was still President, just saying. As it is, it was giving me the heebie jeebies.

I do like the series, however, so will continue with it.

***

Currently reading:

* Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, which is about an old cleaning lady at an aquarium who befriends a giant Pacific Octopus. I was told this was a happy book, or comfortable and funny read by folks online. They asked to rec happy or funny or comfort reads, and a lot of folks rec'd this one.

( Read more... )

On the Kindle.

* The Fair Folk by Su Bristow

"It’s 1959. To eight-year-old Felicity—who lives on a dying farm in England—the fairies in the woods have much more to offer than the people in her everyday life. As she becomes more rooted in their world, she learns that their magic is far from safe. Their queen, Elfrida, offers Felicity a gift. But fairy bargains are never what they seem. As an adult, Felicity leaves for university. Unfortunately, books are not her only company at Elfrida and Hobb—the queen’s constant companions—wield the ability to appear at any time, causing havoc in her new friendships and love life. Desperate, Felicity finally begins to explore the true nature of the Fair Folk and their magic. Her ally, the folklorist Professor Edgerley, asks, “What do they want from you?” The answer lies in the distant past, and in the secrets of her own family. As the consequences of the “gift” play out, Felicity must draw on her courage to confront Elfrida, and make the right choice. Interwoven with traditional stories and striking characters, The Fair Folk poses questions about how we care for our children, our land, and our love-hate relationship with what we desire most."

Reading in large paperback. Well-written and deliciously creepy in places.

*. And almost done with the audio book version of Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo, the sequel to The Six of Crows.
( Read more... )

Heavily references Slavic and Eastern European Myths and Folklore, which I find nicely innovative, most things are Western European Folklore.