So, here I am in my cubicle at work, and a shimmering time-space vortex has suddenly appeared -- as they do -- to engulf me and send me I know not whence.
I have only one minute to grab what I can before being transported into... a vaguely medieval Europe-ish fantasy land? A twenty-fourth century starship? An arid wasteland of lurking horrors? What to pack?
Well, fortunately I have my leather messenger bag (I use it as a laptop case) and a stack of sturdy canvas bookbags (unclaimed Summer Reading prizes) close at hand. Dumping out the electronics (how could I keep them charged?) I fill them up with the easy stuff:
1. Water bottle
2. Stash of snacks and candy I keep hidden in drawers
3. Fork and paring knife (the closest thing I have to weapons)
4. Tylenol, ibuprofen, cold and flu medication, bandaids, hand sanitizer
5. Running shoes and extra socks I keep in case I'm inclined to go for a walk on my lunch break
Okay, I've got forty-five seconds and plenty of room left. As a librarian, my shelves are covered with books, books, and more books. Unfortunately, none of them are anything like Edible Wild Plants or How To Build A Boat or Assuming Command Of A Starfighter For Dummies. I doubt that my American Heritage Dictionary or Book Lust or Beyond Heaving Bosoms or a complete paperback run of Sherrilyn Kenyon's Dark-Hunter series (it was a donation! I swear!) would be worth the weight. What else do I have?
6. Roll of string, because string is always useful!
7. Scissors, because the same, and also could be a weapon
8. Magnetized bookmarks, for the magnets
9. Small box of tampons, because I really don't want to think about the alternatives
10. Altoids tin filled with shiny coins, because maybe I could barter with them
11. Small tins of and tubes of scented hand creams and lotions, because ditto
12. The two unmatched "found" earrings in my drawer -- an amethyst and an opal -- because ditto
13. The whole box of pens and pencils, including the rainbow sharpies, and a sheaf of blank paper, because the past, future, or "other" economy, the ability and means to produce a nice picture (especially a flattering but recognizable portrait) should always be relatively rare and worth something to somebody
Huh. The bags are getting pretty full and I'm running out of time. What else?
14. The sparkly fake gem encrusted boxes and doodads on my toy shelf. Maybe I can trade them to credulous natives for Manhattan.
15. Pictures of the spouse and kids. It took me this long to think of those? That's embarrassing!
16. Is there room for a packet of tissues? There is! Well, wherever I end up, at least I'll be able to blow my nose decorously.
Time's up. I sling a bag over each shoulder and grab my knit poncho and walking stick before the portal swallows me whole.
I wonder how well prepared I am for what awaits beyond me.
How about you? Look around you right now (no fair running to the kitchen or the garage or the Mad Lair of Secret Villainy if you're not already there) and tell me what you would pack!
- Let's Play A Game!
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hapaxnym- May 22nd, 17:53
curious
- Up for discussion
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- hapaxnym
- May 12th, 12:30
moody
O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing
(from Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman)
Is the proper purpose of an e-mail, or a blog post, or a comment on an Internet thread, to speak because I have something to say, or because I feel the need to be heard?
- Bringing Brownies To Work or, Robert Fulghum Was Right
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- hapaxnym
- May 9th, 18:07
rejuvenated
So, when I first started at this current job, the custom at the library was for the other people to bring in treats on your birthday.
This didn't work out too well. Sometimes, people forgot. Sometimes, people brought in things you didn't like. Sometimes, everybody brought in treats, and there was too much. There were grumblings. People's feelings got hurt. Management, in the fine tradition of "If you can't play nice, you can't play at all", threatened to ban goodies from the breakroom altogether.
Then somebody got smart, and remembered how it used to work back in grade school (hence the Robert Fulghum reference in the title) -- everybody brings in goodies for her (usually "her", this is a library after all) own birthday.
Which is why I was up very late last night baking brownies. (No, today is not my birthday, but... It's Complicated. Let's leave it at that.) I have, after many decades, FINALLY perfected my brownie recipe. WARNING: These are not wimpy brownies. These are not delicate brownies. These are not fluffy and cake-like brownies. These are deadly fudge-like brownies; these are frosting disguised as baked goods. Just washing the dishes after baking them will add ten pounds to your waistline.
Credit for this recipe goes mainly to Nina Gilbert (of the Wonderful Wombats), Ann Hodgman,and especially hapaxson, for whom brownies are Vry Srs Bsns.
( Recipe under the cut )
- Not cancer
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- hapaxnym
- May 3rd, 21:29
relieved
Not that I am a prolific poster at the best of times, but if anyone has noticed that I have been somewhat terse the past couple of weeks, that's because I've spent most of that time trying to think of something to say beyond paraphrasing Arthur Dent: "So this is it. I'm going to die."
The day after my annual mammogram, I got a call from the radiologist asking me to come in for a follow-up "to just doublecheck a few things."
This turned into a full morning of sonagrams, ultrasounds, and an MRI, plus a family history workup to make sure my risk assessment level was high enough to get insurance to pay for all of the above. (Plenty high enough. Yay?)
After being "injected, inspected, detected, infected, neglected and selected"*. I was cleared -- only to get a message to call my doctor back when I got to work. She had been reviewing the pictures, and decided that she wanted a biopsy after all.
Someday -- maybe in a few months -- I'll be able to tell the whole story about biopsies. The procedures they used was a fascinating mixture of dazzling high tech and jury-rigged make-do, and aspects of it were genuinely funny. (There is something about walking into a room crammed with computer monitors and chrome devices, dominated by a big table with a steplader and a hole cut in the middle...)
But despite being as fully informed on the various aspects of breast diseases as thirty years of preparation and an MLIS degree could make me, with full intellectual knowledge that the odds were eighty percent in favor of the results being benign, and even in the worst possible case looking at a tylectomy with full recoveyr, I could not shut up the little voice chanting "You're going to die you're going to die you're going to die you're going to die...."
Until late this afternoon. When I was informed by the doctor (in the most lugubrious accents possible; seriously, her phone messages are terrifying) for now, I'm back in the clear. The clinic is still trying to talk me into taking that *$%#@ genetic test, and suggest strongly that I come back every six months.
I guess that little voice is going to get plenty of exercise. (Stupid little voice. Go bother Antonin Scalia for a while.)
Meanwhile, spouse took us out for sushi tonight, and told me quite sternly to drink at least two glasses of wine before bedtime.
*That's not at all fair, really. The nurses and technicians were very warm, caring, informative,and even solicitous; but despite their best efforts, nobody could call it a fun experience.
- A Taxing Day
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- hapaxnym
- April 19th, 22:22
depressed
Today I had a very distraught lady come to the reference desk. It seems that her ex-husband died last year, and having no other living relatives, made her the executor of his will. She, being a much nicer person than I would have been, accepted this responsibility, and did her best to discharge her duties.
Unfortunately, she had no idea how to do this. The "estate", such as it was, consisted mostly of debts, a mobile home she managed to sell at a short sale, and *maybe* some unclaimed bank accounts in New Jersey; she's still trying to figure that out. In good faith, she filled out a tax form for the estate, but in her ignorance used a personal tax form and her husband's personal ID number, instead of a 1041 (small business, estates, and trusts) form and the estate EIN.
She turned to the bank who held the mortgage; she received a brusque brush off to "consult your lawyer or accountant". The prices the storefront tax-preparers quoted just for filing an EIN were far beyond her means (there wasn't going to be a refund for them to skim, you see). She turned to VITA (who provide a wonderful desperately needed service), but they couldn't help her with those forms. She called the IRS, who were very nice, but kept referring her to their webpage; this was a woman who had never used a computer in her life, let alone having a personal internet connection.
So in desperation she turned to the public library. The help I could give her was minimal; I could find and print off the forms and instructions for her (I paid for them out of pocket, since she got panicked and started to leave upon hearing of the ten bucks or so of printing charges), but I only knew which were the correct ones because I had done the same tasks myself. I could highlight the sections in the instructions that I knew were important, but not interpret or explain them to her (that would put me in the position of providing "tax advice", which could get me fired; even highlighting them put me in a sketchy position). I reassured her that although she (or the estate, but she was paying for it) would probably be assessed interest for late payments, it "probably wouldn't be very much, all things considered" (also a borderline thing for me to say, but she was so scared.)
And for this pitiful degree of assistance she was so grateful that she almost cried.
I'd like to feel good today about providing public service; but I'm too swamped with horror and shame that practically every third person I see on the street today could, without warning, suddenly be thrust in this woman's shoes.
I'm certainly not anti-tax. I'm not even close to anti-IRS. But I can't help but think that there must be a better way.
(Gaah. Book review-lets will have to wait for tomorrow. I'm too dispirited tonight)
- Shorter John Chrysostom
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- hapaxnym
- April 7th, 23:38
- chipper
Game over: Love Wins!
- BRCA and me; or Another Reason To Care About the ACA
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- hapaxnym
- April 5th, 15:48
angry
So yesterday, I went in for my regular screening mammogram.
When I say "regular", I mean "once every five years", because that's what my health insurance (a relatively generous plan, as US plans go) covers -- even though my doctor would prefer that I get one every year, because of my family history. More about that in a bit.
For those who have never had a mammogram, it feels roughly like lying down behind the family car, and having the driver back up over your boobs. Nonetheless, let me say this before anything: If you are a woman over the age of forty, please schedule regular mammograms. It may save your life.
You can read more about that here.
So, back to family history.
( Possibly TMI )
- Passion Sunday; or, Trashing the Decor
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- hapaxnym
- April 1st, 14:58
scared
And the curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom. (Mark 15:38)
Today is Passion Sunday, aka Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week, when we stand in silence and listen to the Passion story.
This was the penultimate line from the Gospel reading, and it occurred to me, as I listened, how utterly threatening it was.
The "curtain of the Temple" is of course the cloth veil that separated the "inner sanctuary" from the "holy of holies", the chamber where dwelt the Divine Presence, the chamber which no one entered save the High Priest, and he only once a year. As described by Josephus, it was a rich and beautiful fabric, scarlet and purple, embroidered with the astrological signs of the heavens.
Of course this curtain is rife with symbolic meanings as well. It is the infinite barrier between Heaven and Earth, the Sacred and the Profane. It is the firmament that prevents "the waters of the heavens" from inundating the earth. It is the gilded planks of the sacred Ark, protecting us from the awesome destructive threat of the unmediated Law. It is the clouds and darkness and fire that surround the Divine Glory, the face that "none shall look upon and live." It is the "veil of flesh" that the Eternal Word graciously adopted, before appearing to us in Bethlehem.
It is for our protection, our shield, our defense. But now,
the curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom.
But it is not only we who benefit from this curtain. It spares the Holy of Holies from being contaminated by us as we are, leaving only the gauzy reflection of who we ought to be. Without the veil, all will be exposed to the Sacred Purity: all our failures, all our smallness, all our dirt and grief and pain.
The naked corpse of the homeless teacher, tortured and broken and executed, and those who saw their dreams and hopes crushed with him.The murdered boy in the street, wearing a hoodie and clutching his Skittles; and the frightened bigot who shot him.
The aliens hiding in our midst, desperate and isolated; and we who eat what they cook and live where they built, but refuse to see them.
The one percent in their glass office towers and penthouses, and the majority of the ninety-nine percent who vote to keep them there.
The starving and the sick, the beaten and the spat upon, the angry and the terrified and the hopeless and the dead, and all of us who justify their suffering, lest unfairness and misfortune take offense and choose to visit us.
How can any omnipotent Creator not reject Creation, not be lost in bitter Self-condemnation, once
the curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom?
Yeah, I know what the Good News is supposed to be here. I attended Sunday School, I've heard dozens of sermons on the image.
With the Atonement achieved, there is no more barrier between the worshipper and the Worshipped. We no longer require priest or mediator; we can all stand alone, unafraid, in the presence of the Living God.
Swell.
I'm an Episcopalian partly because I like priests and mediators. They went to priest school; they've got the special red Prayer Book; they know the ritual dance and the sacred language; they've got the capes and the pointy hats. It's their job to stand between me and the Mysterium Tremendum.
I get sick to my stomach when I have to talk to the Mayor. Now you're telling me to report to the Creator of the Universe, the Ground of Being, the Desire of Nations.
Can't I cure cancer first? Or at least catch up on my monthly pledge? Please, give me a minute to change my shoes?
The curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom.
It's getting too bright in here; the light is hurting me.
We can fix this.
I know how to sew; or there's safety pins, clothespins. We can patch that thing up in a jiffy. We've got flags, robes, slipcovers, old socks, anything will do.
You can't make me go in there.
The curtain of the Temple was torn in two, from the top to the bottom.
What if I go in, and I'm not who You wanted to see?
What if I go in, and You're different from what I expected?
What if I go in, and there's Nobody there?
- Boosting the signal
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- hapaxnym
- March 21st, 15:36
thoughtful
This is an amazing observation, and it is one of the best justifications for the current trend for dystopian YA fiction, and one of the harshest condemnations of our society's treatment of QUILTBAG people, that I've ever seen.
Money quote:It's actually difficult to think of many dystopian novels that persecute their protagonists to this extent. And that's the real horror. We are a dystopian society, and we don't even notice.
I'm going to have to re-think the entire genre.
- ARCS! Git yer red hot* ARCs right here!
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- hapaxnym
- March 14th, 18:55
busy
*well, some of them a bit luke-warmish.
I get a LOT of books to review, mostly Young Adult Speculative Fiction. It's unethical to sell them or add them to the Library, but I don't want to just throw them away, either. I let my children and friends and co-workers take first dibs on what they want, and the rest pile up on my bookshelves -- until I decide it's time to Make Them Go Away.
So. Here's the deal. I've posted a list and a brief (somewhat snarky) description of the unclaimed titles I have on hand. Something pique your interest? Send me a private message with your address and I will mail it to you (continental USA only, please; but if you're elsewhere deprived of reading material in this big beautiful world, let me know and I'll try to work something out).
All I ask in return is a brief review. Nothing fancy or formal; just your thoughts and reactions about the book. This will help ME out, since it's good to have a second (and third, and fourth...) opinion to check my own reviews against.
So, Here's this year's accumulated loot:Ellen Jensen Abbot. THE CENTAUR'S DAUGTER.
Sequel to WATERSMEET, but provides enough backstory to be accessible on its own. A competent-enough if somewhat generic fantasy, with the highly controversial moral of “PREJUDICE BAD!"
Zoe Barton. ALWAYS NEVERLAND.A sequel to PETER PAN, but one in which the "Wendy-girl" is a modern smartmouthed American pre-teen, who thinks it would be much more fun to fight alongside the Lost Boys than serve as a substitute "mother.”CLAIMEDKevin Boreen. HIGGINS HOLE.An undersea fantasy / adventure / satire for the middle-schooler who thinks that the first Star Wars trilogy needed more Jar-Jar Binks, and that heavy-handed fish puns are the height of sophisticated humor.CLAIMEDElizabeth Bunce. LIAR'S MOON and STAR CROSSED.The first two in a projected trilogy, with a well-realized medievalish fantasy world and one of the best YA female protagonists I've seen in a few years: Digger, adolescent thief and spy, who is clever, resourceful, observant, no more noble and heroic than she is forced to be, and hiding any number of EXTREMELY dangerous secrets. I hate to let these two go…CLAIMEDJanet Lee Carey. DRAGONSWOOD.
Sequel-ish to DRAGON'S KEEP, but stands entirely on its own. A dark, painful fairy tale where the lovely prose cannot hide the grimness of the events it relates, where parents abuse children, faith torments believers, rulers betray their subjects, and true love doesn't conquer all – but is worth prizing anyway.
Sarwat Chadda. DARK GODDESS.
Sequel to DEVIL'S KISS, and fairly dependent on the events of that novel. Billi Sangreal and the remnant of the Templars are off to Russia this time, to face off with (who else?) Baba Yaga. More horror than fantasy, but great fun if you're in the mood for some cathartic bloodletting.
Catherine Fisher. THE RELIC MASTER TETRALOGY: Dark City, Lost Heiress, The Hidden Coronet, The Margrave.
A reprint of Fisher's earliest series, a perfectly acceptable middle grade quest adventure type story. Most interesting, however, for the hints of the themes that will come to the fore in her later work: lost civilizations, baroque mechanisms, the power of legends, the necessity of choice, the coexistence of wildly diverse microcultures, metafictional commentary, and flashes of gorgeous imagery and poetic prose.
Alexandra Harvey. STOLEN AWAY.
A valiant but messy effort to stuff all sorts of traditional fairy lore – fairy brides, Summer vs. Winter Courts, changelings, shapeshifters – into a modern American setting.
Pete Hautman. THE OBSIDIAN BLADE.Don't let the slow start in a bucolic small town fool you; once it gets cranking, this time travel / science fiction / mystery /thriller is impossible to put down. First in a projected trilogy, so 'ware cliffhangers.CLAIMEDErin Hunter. SEEKERS: RETURN TO THE WILD: Island of Shadows.
This is what – sixth? seventh? in her series about the unlikely friendship between a black bear, a grizzly, and a polar bear on a Quest, but is a perfectly accessible starting point, since it essentially re-sets the series back to zero.
Michelle Knudson. THE PRINCESS OF TRELIAN.
Sequel to THE DRAGON OF TRELIAN, and in every way a more mature work. This is mostly a character piece, focused on the parallel arcs of Meg, the princess accidentally bonded to a dragon, and her best friend Calen, the apprentice mage whom nobody seems to trust.
Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill. CONSPIRACIES.Second in the SHADOW GRAIL series, set in an aggressively evil anti-Hogwarts. Spirit and her friends seem torn between the pop culture diversions of the one percent, and fighting the evil magical forces that are threatening to kill them all. CLAIMEDAlister McGrath. THE AEDYN CHRONICLES: DARKNESS SHALL FALL.
The conclusion to the series that McGrath obviously wants to be the new Narnia, but with none of the charm or imagination and three times the preachiness. I can't honestly recommend this to anyone, unless you're morbidly curious about the only book I have ever publicly in print called "evil" and "potentially life-threatening."
Jen Nadol. THE VISION.Sequel to THE MARK, and just as thoughtful and provocative, but nearly a standalone. Cassie attempts to grapple with her discovery that she is a descendent of the Fates by moving to Chicago and investigating death in all its forms. Subverts nearly every cliché of YA paranormals, not least by its mature and open-ended approach to serious ethical conundrums.CLAIMEDGarth Nix. A CONFUSION OF PRINCES.It's pretty sweet to be the Prince of an inter-galactic Empire – unless every one of tens of millions of other Princes are out to kill you. Space battles! Political intrigue! Engineered warriors! Techno-wizardry! Assassins! Pirates! Rebels! Duels! Secrets, lies, sex and True Love! If I only had two spare inches on my bookshelves, I'd never give this one away…CLAIMEDSarah Prineas. WINTERLING.A middle-grade fantasy rooted in Celtic folklore and pagan sensibilities. Most refreshing are the abundance of strong female role models, embodying nearly every archetype. No thrills, just solid storytelling. CLAIMEDVeronica Roth. DIVERGENT and INSURGENT.If you loved THE HUNGER GAMES, you wanted to read this yesterday. Same flaws: preposterous worldbuilding, Mary-Sue heroine, a bit of a cheat on the moral dilemmas; same virtues: lovingly realized grim dystopian future, gritty violence, a touch of romance (but NOT a triangle!) and truly edge of your seat, addictive suspense. CLAIMEDMarie Rutkoski. THE JEWEL OF THE KALDERASH.Third in the KRONOS CHRONICLES, and easily the best of the trilogy. It's so *refreshing* to have a fantasy series set mostly in Eastern Europe, with fascinating real-life Renaissance personages, and a hint of steampunk to boot.CLAIMEDAnd because I'm just that swell, I'll toss in the two of the manga I mentioned in my previous post :
A DEVIL AND HER LOVE SONG and THE EARL AND THE FAIRY. After all the nice things I said about them, how could anybody pass them up?CLAIMED
