#and I borrowed 90% of the books I read last year

[thisapplepielife]

My library book holds always seem to hit all at once, no matter how long the expected wait times were. Seven months, five weeks, twelve years. Nope! Just kidding. Here you go. All today. 📚♾️😭

I tease, but this does always seems to happen to me. I really do ❤️ my local library. And you can bet I'll never learn not to have a bunch of books on hold at once, because I always think I have them optimally staggered this time.

Spoiler: I don't.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

do you buy all your books or do you get them at the library?

god it would be so funny if I bought them all, I feel like every few months I bag on how much I dislike the conspicuous consumption of booktubers and the like with their fucking shelves and shelves of unread books and the weird "buying books is a separate hobby from reading books" shit.

anyway yeah the vast majority of books I read come from the library or are borrowed from friends. of the few that I own, most are either purchased when I'm traveling and get to visit indie bookstores or buy direct from folks at conferences or whatever, with a few that are gifts. very rarely I'll buy a nonfiction book if I know I'll want to highlight + take notes inside of it.

I'm a stats guy, so I checked my 2023 reading spreadsheet to do some math. of the 77 books I read last year I owned 8 of them. four (Catwoman: Lonely City, Giovanni's Room, The Latinos of Asia, Men We Reaped) were books I purchased myself, three (Babel, Her Body and Other Parties, Unfortunately Yours) were gifted to me at various times, and one (Black Disability Politics) was downloaded for free as a pdf with the author's blessing. so the other 69 (nice) were all borrowed either from my social circle or the public library, meaning last year's books were just a little under 90% borrowed :)

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Rosemary Kirstein’s “The Steerswoman”

I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TONIGHT (May 4) in VANCOUVER, then onto Tartu, Estonia, and beyond!

For decades, scammy "book doctors" and vanity presses spun a tale about how Big Publishing was too conservative and risk-averse for really really adventurous books, and the only way to get your visionary work published was to pay them to fill your garage with badly printed books that you'd spend the rest of your life trying to get other people to read:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/04/self-publishing/

Like all successful grifts, this one worked because it wasn't entirely untrue. No, mainstream publishing isn't filled with corporate gatekeepers who relish the idea of keeping your brilliance from reaching its audience.

But.

But editors sometimes make bad calls. They reject books because of quirks of taste, or fleeting inattentiveness, or personal bias. In a healthy publishing industry �� one with dozens of equal-sized presses, all commanding roughly comparable market-share, good books would never slip through the cracks. One publisher's misstep would be another's opportunity.

But after decades of mergers, the population of major publishers has dwindled to a mere Big Five (it was almost four, but the DOJ blocked Penguin Random House's acquisition of Simon & Schuster):

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-block-penguin-random-house-s-acquisition-rival-publisher-simon

This means that some good books definitely can't find a home in Big Publishing. If you miss with five editors, you can exhaust all your chances with the Big Five.

There's a second tier of great publishers, from data-driven juggernauts like Sourcebooks to boutique presses like Verso and Beacon Press, who publish wonderful books and are very good to their authors (I've published with four of the Big Five and half a dozen of the smaller publishers).

But even with these we-try-harder boutique publishers in the mix, there's a lot of space for amazing books that just don't fit with a "trad" publisher's program. These books are often labors of love by their creators, and that love is reciprocated by their readers. You can have my unbelievably gigantic Little Nemo in Slumberland collection when you pry my cold, dead fingers off of it:

https://memex.craphound.com/2006/09/25/gigantic-little-nemo-book-does-justice-to-the-loveliest-comic-ever/

And don't even think of asking to borrow my copy of Jack Womack's Flying Saucers are Real!:

https://memex.craphound.com/2016/10/03/flying-saucers-are-real-anthology-of-the-lost-saucer-craze/

I will forever cherish my Crad Kilodney chapbooks:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/19/crad-kilodney-was-an-outlier/#intermediation

Then there's last year's surprise smash hit, Shift Happens, a two-volume, 750-page slipcased book recounting the history of the keyboard. I own one. It's fantastic:

https://glennf.medium.com/how-we-crowdfunded-750-000-for-a-giant-book-about-keyboard-history-c30e24c4022e

Then there's the whole world of indie Kindle books pitched at incredibly voracious communities of readers, especially the very long tail of very niche sub-sub-genres radiating off the woefully imprecise category of "paranormal romance." These books are landing at precisely the right spot for their readers, despite some genuinely weird behind-the-scenes feuds between their writers:

https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/16/17566276/cockygate-amazon-kindle-unlimited-algorithm-self-published-romance-novel-cabal

But as Sturgeon's Law has it: "90% of everything is shit." Having read slush – the pile of unsolicited manuscripts sent to publishers – I can tell you that a vast number of books get rejected from trad publishers because they aren't good books. I say this without intending any disparagement towards their authors and the creative impulses that drive them. But a publisher's job isn't merely to be good to writers – it's to serve readers, by introducing them to works they are apt to enjoy.

The vast majority of books that publishers pass on are not books that you will want to read, so it follows that the vast majority of self-published work that is offered on self-serve platforms like Kindle or pitched by hopeful writers at street fairs and book festivals is just not very good.

But sometimes you find someone's independent book and it's brilliant, and you get the double thrill of falling in love with a book and of fishing a glittering needle out of an unimaginably gigantic haystack.

(If you want to read an author who beautifully expresses the wonder of finding an obscure, self-published book that's full of unsuspected brilliance, try Daniel Pinkwater, whose Alan Mendelsohn, The Boy From Mars is eleven kinds of brilliant, but is also a marvelous tale of the wonders of weird used book stores with titles like KLONG! You Are a Pickle!):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Mendelsohn,_the_Boy_from_Mars

I also write books, and I am, in fact, presently in the midst of a long book-tour for my novel The Bezzle. Last month, I did an event in Cambridge, Mass with Randall "XKCD" Munroe that went great. We had a full house, and even after the venue caught fire (really!), everyone followed us across the street to another building, up five flights of stairs, and into another auditorium where we wrapped up the gig:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulnlSRbH80Y

Afterwards, our hosts from Harvard Berkman-Klein took us to a campus pizza joint/tiki bar for dinner and drinks, and we had a great chat about a great many things. Naturally, we talked about books we loved, and Randall said, "Hey, have you ever read Rosemary Kirstein's Steerswoman novels?"

(I hadn't.)

"They're incredible. All these different people kept recommending them to me, and they kept telling me that I would love them, but they wouldn't tell me what they were about because there's this huge riddle in them that's super fun to figure out for yourself:"

https://www.rosemarykirstein.com/the-books/

"The books were published in the eighties by Del Ray, and the cover of the first one had a huge spoiler on it. But the author got the rights back and she's self-published it" (WARNING: the following link has a HUGE SPOILER!):

https://www.rosemarykirstein.com/2010/12/the-difference/

"I got it and it was pretty rough-looking, but the book was so good. I can't tell you what it was about, but I think you'll really like it!"

How could I resist a pitch like that? So I ordered a copy:

https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-steerswoman-rosemary-kirstein/7900759

Holy moly is this a good novel! And yeah, there's a super interesting puzzle in it that I won't even hint at, except to say that even the book's genre is a riddle that you'll have enormous great fun solving.

Randall wasn't kidding about the book's package. The type looks to be default Microsoft fonts, the spine is printed slightly off-register, the typesetting has lots of gonks, and it's just got that semi-disposable feel of a print-on-demand title.

Without Randall's recommendation, I never would have even read this book closely enough to notice the glowing cover endorsement from Jo Walton, nor the fact that it was included in Damien Broderick and Paul Di Filippo's "101 Best Science Fiction Novels 1985-2010."

But I finished reading the first volume just a few minutes ago and I instantly ordered the next three in the series (it's planned for seven volumes, and the author says she plans on finishing it – I can't wait).

This book is such an unexpected marvel, a stunner of a novel filled with brilliant world-building, deft characterizations, a hard-driving plot and a bunch of great surprises. The fact that such a remarkable tale comes in such an unremarkable package makes it even more of a treasure, like a geode: unremarkable on the outside, a glittering blaze within.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/05/04/the-wulf/#underground-fave

[ninja-muse]

So, as you can probably guess by this post, I've decided to continue posting wrap-ups after all, but not necessarily a review every month. (This month, for instance, I read a bunch of good stuff but nothing I wanted to rave about.) I'm still tracking this stuff for my own edification and I like coming up with snappy one-sentence summaries, so if I'm doing 90% of the work already…. You'll also notice that this year, for spice and transparency, I'm adding in where I got the books from, in case people somehow though I was buying everything.

Anyway, I've had a good start to my reading year, all told. Sadly I've already had a DNF—it's a great fantasy if you're moving from YA to adult, but I wanted something more—and one book that probably should have been a DNF but I pushed through to find out what was causing the horror stuff and … didn't get a good answer. But everything else was good!

I have not, however, done well on my goal of "buy fewer books". Mislaid in Parts Half-Known and the new Rivers of London comic were auto-buys, and The History of Magic is one I've wanted to read for a while but is now effectively out of print in Canada and unavailable at the library so when it showed up to work on sale…. My last book purchase was even more accidental; a semi-coworker reached out with their recent unhaul and asked if I'd like to take anything off their hands. I'd heard of Fantomina and it seemed up my alley—17th-century romance/erotic/feminist fiction—and the price was right.

Oh yes, and my work got Bookshops and Bonedust stickers. I had no choice there either.

And that's about it for updates! Click through to see everything I read this month, in the rough order of how glad I was to have read them.

The Phoenix Crown - Janie Chang and Kate Quinn

An opera singer, an embroiderer, a painter, and a botanist are drawn together by a businessman with a love for Chinese art. Out in February.

7/10

main character with migraines, 🏳️‍🌈 main character (sapphic), 🏳️‍🌈 secondary character (sapphic), Chinese-American main character, Chinese-American secondary characters, Argentinian secondary character, secondary character with permanent hand injury and PTSD, Taiwanese-Canadian author, 🇨🇦

warning: misogyny, anti-Chinese racism including slurs

Reading copy

Bunyan and Henry - Mark Cecil

When Paul Bunyan leaves the security of Lump Town on a quest to save his wife, he learns that the tallest tale of all might just be the American Dream. Out in March

7/10

protagonist with disfigured foot and chronic pain, Black and Chinese-American secondary characters

Reading copy

Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands - Heather Fawcett

When Wendell’s past catches him up at Cambridge, Emily and he set out for Austria to search for his door. They know it won't be easy but they weren't expecting this.

7/10

🇨🇦

Borrowed from work

The Book of Doors - Gareth Brown

Cassie inherits a magical book that lets her travel anywhere. Other people will do anything to acquire it. Out in February

7/10

Black and Japanese supporting characters; fat, Chinese, and Egyptian incidental characters

Warnings for gore and violence

Reading copy

How to End a Love Story - Yulin Kuang

Helen’s YA series is getting adapted and she’s in the writer’s room. Unfortunately so is the guy involved in her sister’s suicide and she’s never forgiven him. Enemies to lovers. Out in April

7/10

Chinese-American protagonist, 🏳️‍🌈 secondary characters (sapphic, mlm), Middle Eastern-American secondary character, Chinese-American author

Warning: pre-book suicide, grief

Reading copy

Mislaid in Parts Half-Known - Seanan McGuire

When a student tries to force Antsy to work for her, Antsy and her new friends escape through a Door and begin a long trip home.

7/10

🏳️‍🌈 secondary characters (multisexual, trans boy); Japanese-American, Black, Latino, fat, and albino secondary characters, 🏳️‍🌈 author

Purchased

Rivers of London, Vol 11: Here Be Dragons - Ben Aaronovitch and Andrew Cartmel

Peter Grant investigates a series of UFO sightings that have … wings and claws?

7/10

Black-British main character, Black-British secondary character, Muslim secondary character

Purchased

In The Pines - Grace Elizabeth Hale

A woman realizes the story of her grandfather stopping a lynching may have been very untrue, and digs into Mississippi history to reckon with what actually happened.

7/10

focus on Black lives

warning: racism, lynching

Library book

Bryony and Roses - T. Kingfisher

When Bryony tries to take a rose from a mysterious manor house, the Beast who lives there makes her stay. And there might be a curse he wants broken?

6.8/10

physical TBR/Christmas gift

Heartstopper, Vol. 5 - Alice Oseman

Uni is on the horizon and Nick’s unsure what he wants for his future. Charlie wants to take their relationship to the next level, but is he really ready?

6.5/10

🏳️‍🌈 protagonists (gay, bisexual), Black-British, Egyptian-British, Middle Eastern-British and Chinese-British secondary characters, Muslim supporting character, 🏳️‍🌈 secondary characters (trans girl, lesbian, asexual), 🏳️‍🌈 incidental characters (nonbinary), 🏳️‍🌈 author

Warning: author supports Israel

Borrowed from work

Bad Glass - Richard E. Gropp

Something horrifying is happening to the people of Spokane. A young photographer sneaks in to document it.

5/10

Indian-American secondary character, Black secondary characters, 🏳️‍🌈 secondary character (gay)

warning: body horror, dubious consent

Library ebook

DNF

Sun of Blood and Ruin - Mariely Lares

Pantera fights to protect her city from Spanish colonists while hiding her true identity as a noblewoman. Unfortunately, the world might soon be ending. Out in February.

Indigenous Mexican protagonist and secondary characters, Mexican-American author

reading copy

Currently reading

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store - James McBride

The Black and Jewish residents of a Pennsylvania neighbourhood get along (mostly) but tensions build when the government decides to take a local Deaf kid to an asylum.

Jewish and Black cast, major character with chronic illness and a limp, secondary Deaf character, Black author

warning: ableist characters and institutions, racist and anti-Semitic characters

Library book

Eve - Cat Bohannon

A history of human evolution, through the lens of the female body.

reading copy

Music from the Earliest Notations to the Sixteenth Century - Richard Taruskin A history of early written European music, in its social and political contexts.

The Penguin Complete Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle Victorian detective stories

major disabled character

warning: racism, colonialism

Stats

Monthly total: 11 Yearly total: 11 Queer books: 2 Authors of colour: 1.5 Books by women: 7 Authors outside the binary: 0 Canadian authors: 1.5 Classics: 0 Off the TBR shelves: 1 Books hauled: 4 ARCs acquired: 5 ARCs unhauled: 5 DNFs: 1

[misscrawfords]

3, 35 and 40 for the book ask :)

3. Already answered!

35. What do you think of Ebooks?

Mixed feelings. I much prefer physical copies of books. However, I am a book borrower not a book buyer and my library is extremely slow at getting new books, especially more obscure books not originally published in the UK, if it gets them at all. And then there's a really long waiting list. So I see online there's a new diverse romance come out I want to read - chances of my library getting anytime soon are practically nil. I started borrowing or buying ebooks which are cheaper and reading on my phone - not a lot but enough that I finally bought a Kindle last month. Do I feel good supporting Amazon? No. But it did seem like the best way to be able to read certain books and I was getting tired of reading a lot on my phone - a Kindle has better visibility. I can also see the benefits when travelling. Don't worry though - 90% of what I read is still paperbacks. If I had a choice I'd always go for that.

40. Has there ever been a book you wish you could un-read?

Yes, actually. Two spring to mind, both from my childhood. The first was a totally age-appropriate story about a boy, possibly called Luke, whose brother had leukemia. It was one of those children/YA (I guess it would be Middle Grade these days) books with a Worthy Theme that Kids Might Relate To to Help Them With Difficult Stuff. Not my sort of book even then but for some reason I got hold of it. It really, really upset me. I started becoming terrified of getting cancer, of someone I loved getting cancer, of dying, of loved ones dying...

The second was a biography of the cellist Jaqueline du Pre that my uncle bought me as a present when I was 10. My uncle has a habit of misjudging presents but I didn't know that and while this wasn't a kid's book, I guess it looked innocuous enough. This may seem totally different to the above book but it really isn't. Du Pre developed the condition of MS and the biography went into detail about her condition and its effect on her life including her sex life (which I found morbidly fascinating without really understanding it) and eventually her decline and death. Like the above book, this absolutely grabbed me and obsessed me and scared me.

Basically, I cannot engage with fiction that deals with terminal illness, especially cancer. I just can't. I can't watch medical dramas - I can't even deal with Call the Midwife! To this day I will not read any book that has this kind of plotline or theme. All through my teenage years, I refused to read any book that didn't have a happy ending. It was only when studying Greek forced me to engage with Greek tragedy that I started to let in a couple of "sad stories". Even now I will always take happy endings over sad ones, I avoid angst and I never touch misery porn stories. I can deal with the genre of Tragedy (as in Greek or Shakespeare) because it is not so much sad as inevitable, if you get the difference. Chekhov is on a very thin line. In real life too I find terminal illness, hospitals, doctors really awful, more than is normal, I think. A lot of my friends at school wanted to become doctors - I would do literally any other career. It's my nightmare. Whether my horror of these things came before these two books or not I don't know, but I do remember they had a really profound and negative effect on me and I really wish I hadn't read them at that point in my life.

[signalwatch]

Neo-Noir Watch: The Last Seduction (1994)

Watched:  05/06/2023

Format:  Criterion

Viewing:  First

Director:  John Dahl

Well, at long last I got around to The Last Seduction (1994).  

I can see how well-meaning dopes would have cast Fiorentino in Jade on the heels of this movie, possibly trying to borrow some of the heat she brings to this film, but the two movies are worlds apart, and one is a 90's indie darling playing to a punchline, and the other is a shiny studio movie that feels like a hastily jotted-off airport-book thriller.  

The Last Seduction reads more like a Goodis novel or Jim Thompson book, with low-level crooks twisting and turning over each other and innocence is a commodity of dubious value.  Fiorentino plays a con who encourages her husband (Bill Pullman) to take part in a risky drug deal, earning a huge amount of cash.  After a bitter argument in which Pullman slaps Fiorentino, when he goes to shower, she takes the money and runs.  

Headed for Chicago, Fiorentino stops off in a small town in upstate New York, where her attorney advises her to lay-low while she runs a divorce through.  She picks up Peter Berg in a bar (who believes he's picking her up).  Berg has recently returned from Buffalo, where things didn't work out.  He's a bit bummed as he thought he was the guy who was going to get out of this one-horse town.  Now he's met someone from NYC who seems like his ticket out.

Fiorentino schemes.  A lot.  

This film was Fiorentino's big breakout and - looking at IMDB - her career peak as far as notices went.  She'd appear in films for another 15 years or so, before retiring from in front of the camera.  Berg would go on to be a highly successful producer and director, and I'd frankly forgotten he was a successful actor.

SPOILERS

It's certainly an interesting film and a great piece to study regarding "where were we in the 1990's vis-a-vis women in film?".  The movie requires a certain level of belief by the audience that Fiorentino's character isn't doing the things she's obviously doing because no one (read: women) could be capable of those things, and the audience expects that movies end with the two leads falling in love.  It's all unspoken, but it's there.  Otherwise, I'm not quite sure what we're looking at.  In any case, it's largely a movie about a very dumb guy who doesn't know he's dumb being led around by his nose by a very good looking, very mean woman (which, fair enough).  In this way, it's definitely a neo-noir - with the femme fatale pushed front and center.

That said, it felt sort of clunky watching the movie in 2023.  There's no subtlety or nuance.  There's no mystery of what Fiorentino is up to, so it's just watching Berg be a dope for 2 hours.  Which, honestly, I remember being a thing in the 1990's as being pushed to audiences so movies would work, but no specific examples leap to mind.  To highlight one character, we were fine with another character just falling all over themselves.  

But at no time do you think "well, maybe she is really falling for this guy" or "I bet he flips the script on her".  Instead, it's just watching our femme fatale go about her scheming, hoping things work out, and, indeed, it does.  The "twist" at the end is that Berg realizes how thoroughly he'd been set-up, but that's also something we see at every move.  It's more a list of "oh, yeah, I guess that did happen" than "ha HA!  Wow, what a twist!" at the end of the film.

This is not Body Heat.  By design.  We know Fiorentino is a sociopath from jump.  So...  I'm not sure, exactly, what her arc is other than "she does many things people do not expect".  Which is a story of sorts, but I'm not sure what the takeaway is other than not to be a small-town loser who gets big ideas?

I mean, the movie feels like a comedy in many ways, with that last scene the punchline.  But it's a long walk to get there.  I see Ebert in reviews referring to Fiorentino's performance as dry-humor, and that's right.  But I don't see anyone referring to the film as a dark comedy, which it mostly feels like it is.  To me.  But I don't know how else to read how dopey Peter Berg is in the film.

That said, released in the mid-90's, we hadn't seen many women's roles that would have allowed for this sort of thing since the post-WWII heyday of noir.  And we wouldn't have paired it with overt sexuality during that window, just the deeply implied sexual whiles of the femme fatale (see: any of the big name noir films from Double Indemnity to Out of the Past).  But we knew those women were trouble, but we weren't sure how.  This movie has no secrets or mysteries other than what happened in Buffalo, which, when told, is...  silly?  Unbuyable?

I largely liked the film, with some significant caveats.  It feels like it lifts the "ABC" scene from Glengarry Glenn Ross for it's opening, and the twist reveal of what happened in Buffalo from The Crying Game, both of which would have been on the minds of movie-goers two years after they came out, and then made it into homes via cable and VHS.  

The challenge of noir is that:  there's a lot of it, and it does a lot of the same thing.  So you're going to draw down comparison by existing.  And you're never created or being viewed in a vaccuum.

There's no question that Fiorentino is great.  She is.  And I'd argue that Peter Berg gives it his all.  Bill Nunn as the private eye is good, and Bill Pullman is Bill Pullman.  The movie leans into the "erotic" bit of "erotic thriller" with an eye less to sexiness and more to grinding, angry sex, but there's no question about the seductiveness of the proceedings. 

I know I'm picking at the movie but (a) welcome to this site, and I have bad news for you, and (b) I actually mostly liked the film.  I'm just surprised less that it has the reputation it got in 1994, but that it seems like this movie bubbles up a lot in conversation, that this movie is still as relevant now as then.  What I think is that it helped lay the groundwork for what you could do with women in film and television, and Fiorentino just surprised the hell out of everyone.  But I'm not sure it holds up as noir, thriller, mystery, etc... all that well.  I do think it holds up as a vantablack comedy of sorts, if you expect to never really laugh.  And that's a feature, not a bug.  

Apparently there's a Last Seduction II (which, technically, makes this film The Second to Last Seduction) which has none of the original cast and has a 0% on Rotten Tomatoes and now I am deadly curious.

https://ift.tt/du782Ve

from The Signal Watch https://ift.tt/oTnQ5F4

[pooma-english]

90 NOUN SENTENCES EXAMPLES

Table of Contents

▪️Noun Sentences

▪️Sentences Formed with Proper Nouns

▪️Sentences Formed with Genus Nouns

▪️90 Noun Sentences Examples

NOUN SENTENCES:

Nouns are used in place of something, person, place, animal, or emotion. These nouns are sometimes referred to as noun clauses by being specified in sentences. It is very important to construct noun phrases correctly and clearly in English. You should pay attention to grammar to show what you want to convey in sentences.

To give examples of noun phrases, here are the examples:

▪️I live in the U.S.

▪️Emily is my sister.

▪️I love playing games with my dog.

▪️This cat’s name is Baby

▪️That house is very large.

SENTENCES FORMED WITH PROPER NOUNS

Your name, the names of your friends, family, or places around you are referred to as proper nouns. You can use these special nouns in sentences with capital letters. Special names are used in many daily life conversations.

Examples of proper nouns, which have an important place in correspondence, are as follows:

▪️My name is Daniel.

▪️Her name is Susan.

▪️Come, Emily, let us go for a coffee.

▪️Hello Jack! Will you dance with me?

▪️My cousin lives in Mexico.

▪️Albert Einstein was German.

▪️I visited the coffee in Paris

▪️Jack and Daniel are close cousins.

SENTENCES FORMED WITH GENUS NOUNS

Nouns that name people, places, animals, etc. in a common way are called generic nouns. These types of nouns are not used to name anything or a person. It is used in a general sense. Therefore, it is not used in sentences starting with a capital letter.

Examples of the use of this noun type in sentences are as follows:

▪️Students learn in school.

▪️Birds live in forests.

▪️I love to read drama books

▪️Emily’s mother is a doctor.

▪️These cupcakes are so beautiful and delicious.

90 NOUN SENTENCES EXAMPLES

1. He loves to play basketball.

2. They speak English in USA.

3. It wasn’t me who knocked on your door.

4. That man is not the person you are looking for.

5. She is a mechanical engineer.

6. I play volleyball.

7. They are the smartest kids here.

8. Mary and Alex invited them to the party.

9. I’m not sure about the universe.

10. You don’t teach your cat tricks.

11. I will get myself a coffee.

12. She knows she has to study for exams.

13. She wasn’t eating white rice.

14. My father will come with us today.

15. She does not loves to play piano.

16. There was no peach orchard on site of this building.

17. The dog cannot walk itself.

18. My brother didn’t come home.

19. It wasn’t me knocking on your door.

20. There are neither cars nor people on the street.

21. My father fixed the car himself.

22. I do not drink white wine.

23. My father did not even bother to answer me.

24. You are not an engineer.

25. I have got a sister.

26. Everything was ready for the party.

27. I don’t love dogs.

28. We borrowed her car.

29. We will go to the party.

30. Some people won’t eat spicy foods.

31. Everything is ready for the birthday party.

32. This is mine dog.

33. Alex isn’t telling the truth.

34. They are not from Spain.

35. I bought a new computer.

36. We haven’t been able to go to the village for over three years.

37. Brasil is not a country in Europe.

38. I don’t play volleyball.

39. I’ve lost my umbrella.

40. No one attended the parent meeting.

41. The dog can walk itself.

42. She is not a mechanical engineer.

43. Madrid is not cold in this season.

44. It doesn’t smell good on the street.

45. I don’t want to play football with you anymore.

46. My brother did not sleep well because he was sick.

47. Mary hasn’t cooked some cookies.

48. She is the best football player in the team.

49. You don’t speak English very well.

50. I lost my wallet last week.

51. My father wouldn’t let us buy a new computer.

52. You are lazy students.

53. My mom likes to paint by herself.

54. He does not catches the bus every morning.

55. I bought a new house.

56. You should definitely clean this room yourself.

57. I don’t want to play football with you.

58. I will not have dinner tonight.

59. There were 3 apples on the table.

60. She likes to paint by herself.

61. You are an engineer.

62. I don’t want to work in this business anymore.

63. They don’t know my phone number.

64. They’re not fond of rules.

65. I don’t want to hear this.

66. The girl whose eyes are blue will come tomorrow.

67. She is not my best friend.

68. I love dogs.

69. He is my best friend.

70. Everything was ready for the party.

71. He does not goes to gym every day.

72. She is my best friend.

73. She got a good grade in the Spanish exam.

74. I don’t play tennis every day.

75. She won’t go to the cinema.

76. I want to be a computer engineer too.

77. That isn’t the way to London.

78. This is mine dog.

79. Samuel doesn’t play soccer.

80. We go to the gym club together.

81. I don’t learn English with my friends.

82. There is no play with fire.

83. The day when the concert takes place is Saturday.

84. You were the boss.

85. The streets were not crowded today.

86. My friend does not like to eat dumplings.

87. I will not go to school tomorrow.

88. We went fishing after school.

89. He likes to paint by himself.

90. After school she did her homework and went to play football.

[readingdiary]

…

PRESENTS 9/1/24 - MISS MASHAM’S REPOSE - T.H. WHITE

My friend and book group leader who I visit every Friday afternoon gave me this book for my birthday yesterday. Her daughter delivered it to me in the evening singing Happy Birthday on the doorstep.

My friend was 90 last November and this summer is 20 years of book group. She is a great fan of children's literature and reads it at times of stress. When my husband was first diagnosed with leukaemia at the beginning of last year I chose three children’s books from her collection to help me:

Jenny Spring - Ruth Clark

Four Plus Bunkle - M. Pardoe

The Borrowers - Mary Norton

William the Good - Richmal Crompton

I have heard of Miss Masham’s Repose and know it to be a favourite of my friend’s but I never knew it was by T. H. White. I remember the Christmas my mother gave me The Sword in the Stone and how I devoured it.

*****

[joshuawithers]

From Apple IIe to AI: Embrace the Wave or Risk Irrelevance

I vividly remember all of my earliest computer experiences. I remember borrowing computer magazines from the school library that contained basic code, and then taking it to the Apple IIe in the back of my classroom. I would spend hours typing in code just to run another program. I also remember building a spreadsheet to help my dad run his business, and printing our own greeting cards with personalised messages on our black-and-white, dot matrix printer.

Even back in the 90s, there was talk of this coming artificial intelligence wave. Funnily enough, my entire experience from the very first day was about artificial intelligence. The simple fact that I could press the letter ‘a’ on a plastic keyboard and then see that letter appear on the computer screen in front of me, or even get printed out by a printer, was, in my humble opinion, a form of artificial intelligence. This might be an oversimplified view, but whether it’s displaying the letter ‘a’ on a computer screen or using ChatGPT, it’s all about computers computing.

In 1999, Bill Gates published a book called ‘Business @ the Speed of Thought’. I read it maybe a year later, and the foundational principles of “using computers for a real purpose” have stuck with me ever since. One idea was that a sandwich shop could use just-in-time ordering for sandwich ingredients based on previous order histories for different days of the week, taking into account seasons, weather, and trends - a task that a computer in 1999 could perform with some effort, but a task a computer in 2023 could handle effortlessly. This resonates with Steve Jobs’s idea that computers are like bicycles for the mind, an idea based on the fact that the fastest and most productive animal on the planet is not a human, but a human on a bicycle.

I think one of the things that really separates us from the high primates is that we’re tool builders. I read a study that measured the efficiency of locomotion for various species on the planet. The condor used the least energy to move a kilometer. And, humans came in with a rather unimpressive showing, about a third of the way down the list. It was not too proud a showing for the crown of creation. So, that didn’t look so good. But, then somebody at Scientific American had the insight to test the efficiency of locomotion for a man on a bicycle. And, a man on a bicycle, a human on a bicycle, blew the condor away, completely off the top of the charts.

This simple principle - that humans are more efficient on a bike, and that the human mind is more efficient when using a computer - has proven true in my life every day for the last 30 years.

Quickly replying to enquiry emails on my iPhone from a toilet cubicle at my last job before becoming self-employed was a key factor in my early success.

That’s my encouragement to anyone skeptical about the 2023 “AI wave”, including ChatGPT, large language models, transformer models, AI, generative art, etc. It’s just what computing is now. Embrace it and exploit it to your benefit. Whether it’s for play or for work, use these technologies to not only stay ahead of the pack, but to keep up with the pack.

A fellow wedding celebrant argued on a post of mine about AI that anyone using this technology should be de-registered. My counter-argument is that any celebrant (or entrepreneur) not using this technology will self de-register within a few years, sinking into irrelevance and inefficiency due to their refusal to adapt.

AI’s right of reply

As an AI developed by OpenAI, I’d like to add that I’m designed to assist and augment human capabilities rather than replace them. In the case of a wedding celebrant, for example, I could help with tasks such as drafting vows or organizing schedules. The idea isn’t to detract from the human element, but rather to enhance it, freeing up time for more personal interactions.

The notion of de-registering those who use AI perhaps stems from a fear of being replaced or a misunderstanding of AI’s role. AIs are tools, much like computers or smartphones, meant to assist humans in various tasks and should be seen as such. Adopting AI and other technological advancements can lead to increased efficiency and enable people to adapt to the fast-paced world we live in. It’s about integrating technology into our lives and work in a way that benefits us all.

View the chat thread with ChatGPT to see how ChatGPT helped me with this post.

[sarah-aliterarylife]

9 Books I Loved As A Child

A super quick post for a Friday!

Here are a few books I loved during my childhood :

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.

A picture book originally published in 1969, The Very Hungry Caterpillar is the story of a caterpillar who eats a lot of food!

I loved this book, and it may have contributed to the fact that I now spend about 50% of my day thinking about eating. Of course, as a child I didn’t pick up on the subtle healthy eating messages it contains! (the caterpillar munches his way through lettuce and other vegetables with no issues, while sugary foods give him a stomachache) I still get peckish whenever I see it in a bookshop!

2. Peace At Last by Jill Murphy.

“The hour was late and Mr. Bear was tired. But he could not sleep – however he tried and wherever he tried.” I was obsessed with the tale of Mr. Bear trying to find a comfortable place to sleep, and lost count of the amount of times it was borrowed from our local library. I came across it again a few years ago on a holiday to Devon, sitting in a cupboard. Naturally, I couldn’t resist a quick re-read!

3. Each Peach Pear Plum by Janet and Allan Ahlberg.

More food!!

4. Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl

I read most of Roald Dahl’s books as a child, but this was my first love. I am reliably informed that as a little girl, this was my bedtime story of choice every night for a long time! In fact, I love it so much that, one long day during the first UK lockdown (when you might say I had some time on my hands) I sat down with a cup of tea and re-read it from cover to cover. And I fell in love with it all over again.

5. The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter

I’m a big Beatrix Potter fan, but Peter Rabbit was my favorite, closely followed by The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies. It has everything a children’s book should have – an intrepid hero, a fearsome villian, a moral (you should always listen your parents), not to mention a cat that gets locked inside a greenhouse! Last year I was lucky enough to visit Hill Top, Beatrix Potter’s home in the Lake District, and it was a magical day that reminded me of the simple power of her books and how much they still enthrall children and adults alike today.

6. The Twits by Roald Dahl

Sorry Tim Burton, I don’t think you’ll be making a film of this one any time soon. Mr and Mrs Twit are a spiteful, unkempt old couple who play the most vile practical jokes on each other. I re-read this book as a child many times, but as an adult I really can’t remember why I loved it so much, as they really are horrible to each other! From a glass eye in a mug of beer, to a truly disgusting serving of Spaghetti Bolognese, I’m amazed that in our modern world, certain well- meaning people haven’t lobbied to have it banned.

7. The Mallory Towers series by Enid Blyton

I am aware that there are controversies surrounding the novels of Enid Blyton. However, the Mallory Towers series is considered wholesome enough for the BBC to make it into a successful television series, and that’s good enough for me! The 6-book series is set at a girl’s boarding school in Cornwall, and stars Darrell Rivers, who joins the school in the first novel and eventually becomes Head Girl in the final book. Darrell and her friends partake in all manner of post-war girl’s school fun, including midnight feasts, lacrosse, a pantomime, and trying not to fall foul of their housemistress Miss Potts!

8. The Sweet Valley High / Sweet Valley University series by Francine Pascal

Good Lord. This one is a definite step onwards from Enid Blyton! For a short time in the mid-90s, I was slightly obsessed with the Sweet Valley High series. It appealed to the same part of me that also loved Neighbours and Home and Away. The Wakefield twins and their scandalous (for 1997) antics enthralled me. I laughed out loud when I reminded myself of some of the plotlines!

For instance : Elizabeth Wakefield was almost murdered by her boss, stalked by a doppelganger (who turned out to have a twin who was also a psychopath), and was held hostage by a man with a bomb. And she was the sensible one! Jessica Wakefield on the other hand, dated a werewolf (take that, Bella Swan!), joined a cult, and eloped during college with a man who was violent towards her.

Riveting stuff, when you’re 14.

9. Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaardner

Philosophy for a teenage audience. Sophie Amundsen is a Norwegian teenager who is introduced to the history of philosophy by an unknown author, who sends her letters on the work of individual philosophers and the Big Questions. We begin with the question “Who are you?” and the novel progresses from there. This novel fed into my early interest in philosophy, and my decision to study philosophy at A level. Sadly, that didn’t last. I hated every second, and dropped the subject after one year. Philosophy remains the only school subject I was ever truly bad at. I don’t think my brain is wired that way! I actually re-read this book in full a few years ago. It blew my 30-something mind, so goodness only knows what it did to me at 15!

Which books did you enjoy as a child?

If you're enjoying these posts, please visit my website - A Literary Life – A journey through the books of my life. (wordpress.com)

Or you can follow me on Instagram :

Sarah Mears (@sarah_a_literary_life) • Instagram photos and videos

I'd love to connect with you!

[pinkribbonsyndrome]

Very long oops--

Omg where do I begin with my deep twewy lore—

So surprisingly I actually kinda just one day stumbled upon it, I think I was like 6 or 7, I had an excessive love for reading and was reading stuff way above my grade level since I didn’t really like hanging out with people my age or really any age— later figured out I’ve had very severe social anxiety at a very young age, big yikes— but due to that, most of my time was spent reading books and playing visual novel games on the 3Ds I’d borrow from my cousin who was living with us at the time due to some sort of exchange program, anyways he’d let me play games on there and it was all cool all dandy, mostly just Pokémon, Mario, basic stuff etc etc

on his last day staying with us, he gave me his 3ds and took me to some discount game store and I practically begged him to get twewy bc I spent the whole time I was there admiring the really pretty boy on the cover (I bet you can easily guess who—) and it was on clearance or the seller was really trying to get rid of it or something, so he ended up buying it for me along with some other games that also became big parts of my childhood. I got home and I played the game but stopped after week 1 day 2 because the combat was difficult and I decided to watch a let’s play instead. Fell in love with it to the bone, though I seriously misunderstood certain story aspects and features of the game. But it soon became my life and soul. My sheer passion in life!

Years go by and I’m like 9 and I decided that school is too difficult, I’m gonna be a dropout and play games in my room all day. I still went to school bc uhm I was only 9 — but I definitely did not like it. 90% of my free time in and out of school was spent replaying twewy wich really helped me open up more to the people around me— though it definitely made me become a little emo since I was still not getting the bigger picture of the game and well Neku was my boy, my kindred spirit trapped in a game I could never be apart of! Should probably mention I never finished watching after week 3 day 3-ish for some reason. So find my surprise the big twist happens and I’m shocked to my core. The guy, the reason I bought this game, the one who I had given my heart and soul to as one of my very first ever fictional gender envy’s, BETRAYED ME! I was upset, i was fuming— but in the best way- I had never played something that made me feel so many things all at the same time and soon after it became my favourite thing again but even more full forced.

So ever since then, twewy has always been the game I fall back to whenever I have a rough patch in my life and whenever I feel alone. I’ve lost a lot of friends and found myself seeking its comfort, I made a ton of them through the advice I learned from that game, and god I’ve learned a lot about myself through it aswell- it’s always been a big staple in my life, I genuinely could not imagine my life without it, it feels like it’s always been there for me— and I don’t plan to forget about it or lose interest in it any time soon

twewy fans when and how did you find out about and get into twewy

For me the way I found out abt it was very silly it was through flipnote Hatena LOL. Flipnote animations weren’t the only thing on there and one thing popular artists there liked to do was post Question Games. In which they write down fun questions on each individual page of a flipnote and post it unlocked (meaning anyone can download and edit it) and encourage their followers to add their answers and then upload it for the creator to see.

Around early 2010 ish I found one of those from an artist I liked so I downloaded it and near the end of the flipnote the creator put in a quiz of naming random characters from animanga and games and having the person filling out flipnote write the name of the IP the character was from to test their Knowledge. A lot of them were from popular shows but the final one (which the creator called a Bonus Round) stumped me it was asking me to name what IP the character “Daisukenojo Bito” was from and I had No idea. Later after I posted my answers I went looking at other ppls flipnotes that were uploaded as a response and I found one where the person knew Every character from the quiz section (though in hindsight they probably just looked up every name online) and I saw the answer to what Daisukenojo Bito was from: The World Ends With You.

Just the title alone caught my attention bc I found it really cool. I thought it might’ve been the name of an anime or something so I looked it up and went on the Wikipedia page and got really interested to see it was a DS game. I tried to read through the article but everything (thankfully) went over my head and the only thing that Stuck in my brain was the one screenshot showcasing the dual screen battle system in the Combat section of the article. I was curious so completely on a whim I downloaded the game onto my TTDS card just to have it on there and started playing it a few days later. Then my life was changed forever lmao

anyways pls tell me how you got into twewy I’d love to knowe 🥺🙏

[skeptiquewrites]

LOOK i'm sticking loads in just in case other people shnake in before me. so any one (or more if you're so inclined!) of 9, 10, 15, or 17 for the writer ask meme, please?

Hello, Tacky! You're the first, so you get the full suite.

9. Do you believe in ghosts? This isn’t about writing I just wanna know

I don't believe in ghosts, but I do not go out of my way to antagonize them. I firmly discourage messing with resting places or taking things from them or displaying human remains but this is mostly a moral stance to do with respect. I have no problem walking through cemeteries. My friend called this approach Pascal's Supernatural Wager

10. Has a piece of writing ever “haunted” you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

Other people's writing haunts me constantly. I think that's how I love a piece of writing; it leaves impressions on my heart that linger on for years after I read it. It shapes me though I've moved on. I'm reminded of a line or a turn of phrase or an image when the weather's grey or I'm late or a song is playing. My own writing haunts me less. I think about it but don't feel as tied to it once I'm finished writing.

15. Do you write in the margins of your books? Dog-ear your pages? Read in the bath? Why or why not? Do you judge people who do these things? Can we still be friends?

I haven't written in any of my books since undergrad, which I mostly did in pencil so I could sell it back to the bookstore. I don't dog ear pages because people love to give me receipts and bookmarks. I do read in the bath, but nowadays that's only on my Kobo ereader which is about 90% of my reading. I love books, but I don't love books as objects for their own sake where I want them to be pristine. I buy secondhand when I can. I don't have any feelings about what other people do with their books, but I think it's rude to treat a book you borrow from a friend or the library badly.

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.

My current WIP is my Bodice Ripper. It's about Harry who has had his last seven exes marry the next person they date after him, including numbers 6 & 7 (both named Terry) marrying each other. Harry, in a panic, lies that he's dating someone and everyone guesses it's Malfoy. Who's in town for the wedding for the first time in ten years? Surprise.

I always try to have some lightheartedness and humour in all my fics, but this is me really trying my hand at a Richard Curtis style, Romantic Comedy (tm). I didn't intend to do it, but I prompted and couldn't stop thinking about it. Too early to say what won't make it in!

weird writer asks

[rgr-pop]

ok first of all here is the pile of books next to my bed, which i’m avoiding coping with post semester

last book i bought: notwithstanding gifts or class, i think must have been the flint public library book sale? most of the library discards from this shelf, plus others:

since then i may have purchased my copy of deviations too, i don’t remember. i really desire to purchase some books! borrowed: i think probably sidney fine’s violence in the model city and heather thompson’s whose detroit? (near the top of my need to purchase for myself list). WAIT actually since then i checked out sexual personae because my coworker is having a phase (!) and i was like you know what why not lmfao. but i haven’t cracked it open yet. many books coming and going from the library, i’m sure you can imagine :). i rarely borrow books from others but i have borrowed matias’s george condo monograph for most of a year intending to reference it in something i swear someday i will write about matias’s paintings was gifted: lmao well uhhh i received in the mail several books from somebody down bad when i stopped talking to him :| including invitation to vernacular architecture, philip guston’s collected writings, and a 90s yiddish vocabulary zine... also recently was given andrew cornell’s unruly equality from [sweats] someone else i’m not currently talking to. some other gift highlights from the last year: greg burnett’s book on guston’s the studio from matias, my yiddish textbooks from sarah, and (still harping on this) the saddam hussein romance novel from ben (all people i am still talking to)

gave/lent someone: several items i’ve accumulated for a few of you reading this who i haven’t seen (surprises). got atulya war in an irish town for st patricks day on bri’s suggestion. we’re weeding at work so i keep bringing people books they didn’t ask for... tons of poetry and craft books to lucas, abbie hoffman stuff for matias, etc., every labor history that i don’t want myself, stack of like sicilian mafia and who knows what i need to mail to aria, etc... started: i suppose the only book i can recall starting that i intend to finish is black reconstruction, which i am reading, but i’m not going to book club, because i have “quit” lol

finished: i suppose gayle rubin’s deviations could go here or above because i read most of the whole thing this semester and intend to return to what i’ve skipped. the only whole entire book i read for class this semester was aaron lansky’s outwitting history. i believe i finished conversations with friends in the very beginning of january but no fiction since then--one or two novels would be a lot for me in a year. i’d be interested in trying to squeeze out her other two by the end of the summer, but i would maybe rather move onto another something scandalous or buzzy (or several-years-old buzz, maybe moshfegh? whatever it is it has to be easy lol) gave 5 stars: i have never in my life reviewed a book but the most recent book i have stanned and recommended is, again, deviations!

gave 2 stars: this semester i read maybe 20 articles and most of a book by m*chelle c*swell and wrote a paper about how she’s why we’re doomed. answer to this question is LIS scholars are a punishment from god

didn’t finish: going to throw clive barker’s inhuman condition and jean genet’s the thief’s journal here because i kept picking them up this semester but i cannot allow myself to “read.” also a bit of women in love. 

tagging @sister-emeritus​ @madmoths @milkshakemotel​ @bookbroken​

[thenightling]

Hate to say this, but leaving the children of former aristocrats/royalty alive when remaking a society through revolution only weakens that revolution. It leads to problems when determining who the next ‘legitimate’ ruler is. One rich toddler is not worth more than one hundred poor, starving toddlers just because history puts emphasis on their name and face. You’ve been brainwashed by individualistic propaganda. AND If you really grew up in poverty, you would be disillusioned by the whole ‘children aren’t responsible for their parent’s sins’ logic because it only ever gets applied to privileged children, never to the poor or oppressed. You’re the one that needs to read your history over again (and stop parroting capitalist propaganda lmfao ie:commies need to read a history book) if you cannot even understand the basic frameworks of revolution or why too much sympathy towards the oppressing CLASS leads to failure. Stop bitching about commies making MEMES online and actually go do something for your community.

Okay, this level of callous justification for MURDERING babies is why I'm about to take anonymous asks off yet again. When a third of the anons I’m getting are just insults and telling me to kill myself, another third insisting no children died during the French revolution “And I have a PhD in the French revolution so I would know!” and then a third literally telling me why children deserve to die because of who their parents are...  I’m done.  

 This is too sick. Congratulations. You made the poor person disgusted in other poor people.

And yeah, I did grow up in poverty.  An Apartment complex on Newbridge Road, North Beilmore, NY, Long Island, across the street from a lovely crack house.  Feel free to Google the neighborhood if that was enough clues for you.  Section 8 (that’s welfare) housing.  My mother was seventeen when she had me.  She raised my brother and I in that apartment and we had three other people unofficially living with us.

“If you really grew up in poverty..” I hate no scotsman arguments, especially whey they are PRO-MURDER CHILDREN because of their class.   WTF?!   What the fuck is wrong with this website?!  Seriously!  

I’m not showing “too much sympathy to the oppressive class.”  I’m showing sympathy to ALL any child.  A human baby is a human baby, no matter where they are born or who their parents are.   

Seriously, i am currently temporarily homeless and staying in someone’s back room.  And this reply, this reply is so fucked up, so evil, it’s chilling.

And yes, I DO know history despite what this site has convinced itself about me.  I always scored in the high 90s on World History tests and (during times we “borrowed” cable from a neighbor) grew up on a steady diet of shows like Highlander the series (which was surprisingly historically accurate for a fantasy show with flashbacks), and History Channel and History 2 (before it went defunct).

The American Revolution (which succeeded where the French one lead to eighty years of chaos) did not require murdering the British royals or their children.  And Velvet Revolutions don’t require killing anyone.   

Listen up, anon.   My stepfather was Jewish, my brother is Jewish.  During the holocaust Hitler convinced the German people that Jewish people were the oppressive class and “even the children need to die” and that they were at fault for all of their country’s unhappiness. “The oppressors and their children need to die” takes a whole other meaning if you remember who, in the last hundred years, said those words...

What really chills me about this is I'm not sure if this person realizes or not but they just accidentally paraphrased “The Final solution” and “why the Jewish people (including their children) had to be executed.”  Remember, Hitler convinced the German people that Jews were the oppressive class...   It’s where modern antisemistism created the conspiracy theory that a cabal of powerful, wealthy, Jewish people secretly rule the world.  This isn't anti-classism, it was a dog whistled anti-Semitism.  

https://www.ajc.org/translatehate/conspiracy-theory

https://www.ajc.org/sites/default/files/pdf/2021-10/AJC_TranslateHate-Glossary-October2021.pdf

This person was trying to talk about the French revolution and oppressive classes but accidentally paraphrased Hitler, who tricked a lot of Germans into thinking Jewish people were their oppressors.  Ironic that they think I’m the one who doesn’t know world history. 

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Mein-Kampf

Once you accidentally paraphrase Hitler to justify child murder you lose ALL footing with me.

If people like the above think I’m stupid than I shall happily be their idiot.

“You can’t have grown up poor if you are not pro-murdering the babies of the oppressors!” is a hot take I want nothing to do with. 

 I’m not okay with killing ANY children!

[princesssarisa]

Favorite color: Pink, sky blue, red.

Last song: "Belle" from Disney's Beauty and the Beast.

Last movie: The new Disney short "Once Upon a Studio."

Currently watching: Halloween Wars and Halloween Baking Championship on Food Network: guilty dessert porn pleasures.

Other stuff I watched this year: Lots of filmed opera, various Sleeping Beauty adaptations, assorted animated childhood favorites, and bootlegs of the musical Les Misérables.

Shows I dropped this year/didn’t finish: My full-series rewatch of the beloved '90s cartoon Recess. I got through 2 and a half seasons, but then lost interest. I still love the show, though.

Currently reading: Robin McKinley's Beauty: A Retelling of the Story of Beauty and the Beast, for about the tenth time, to make sure I don't subconsciously borrow too much from it as I write my own retelling of the story. When I finish, I think I'll read Northanger Abbey for the first time – @bethanydelleman has inspired me to do so.

Currently listening to: The playlist I've created for the Beauty and the Beast retelling I'm trying to write.

Currently working on: See above; also, endless revisions to my completed unpublished novel An Eternal Crown (a retelling of The Magic Flute), and an attempt to reshape my reviews of the different adaptations of Cinderella into an actual nonfiction book.

Current obsession: Fairy tales, childhood nostalgia, classic literature, and opera, as usual.

I'll tag @bethanydelleman, @comma-after-dearest, @faintingheroine

Thank you for the tags @a-partofthenarrative @forestscribe4 & @ofbeautsandbeasts! 🥰

Tag someone you want to know better!

Favorite color: green, mustard yellow

Last song: Desperately Wanting (Better Than Ezra)

Last movie: Naming a few since they're related - Renfield, Dracula (1931), Dracula: Dead and Loving It

Currently watching: Never Have I Ever, 90 Day Fiancé: Before the 90 Days, 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way, going to start the new season of Castlevania soon!

Other stuff I watched this year: A LOT of DCAU - Superman: TAS, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, Young Justice.

Shows I dropped this year/didn’t finish: Breaking Bad, made it to the middle of season 2

Currently reading: Recently finished Rebecca, about to start The House in the Cerulean Sea

Currently listening to: Lots of Gordon Lightfoot, Gin Blossoms radio on Pandora, Olivia Rodrigo's GUTS, Melanie Martinez's Cry Baby

Currently working on: Hanging things on my maximalist office wall, organizing the bedroom closet

Current obsession: Always POTO 😅 and enjoying the gorgeous early Fall weather we're having

Tagging: (no pressure!) @laqueus @silverfoxstole @tearosesarts @ladystormcrow @carpeossa @ilibrim @jamiepage19 @britishchick09 @the-shark-is-a-mammal & anyone else who'd like to play!

[breesays]

Shots of Self Care

I've been writing over on Medium but based on the OTHER articles I'm reading  over there, it eventually will cost money (for my readers). Here, the obstacle is a login. There, only a limited number of free articles per month, even if I personally don't choose to paywall it. THE DILEMMA. There's also Substack?

Free time/me time is so scarce I feel like I'm doing the equivalent of pounding shots when I get it. QUICK - PEDICURE. QUICK - MASSAGE. BETTER SQUEEZE IN A NAP (that's not how naps WORK, even). TIME IS SAND SLIPPING THROUGH MY FINGERS BUT ALSO ONLY ON SATURDAY AND SUNDAY.

Since I last updated Me and Des DID go on vacation and I DID go to my first post-COVID concerts (MCR and Midtown at The Forum, Paramore @ The Belasco) but the true alone time only comes during my 15 minute commute after I drop him off at preschool and when I go to pick him up. It's kind of a driving meditation. I can't work, I don't respond to calls or texts during that time. I just drive.

I tried making a little ace related content on tik tok (here). Mostly related to being an unknowing ace growing up in the '90s and the music that sent me running for the hills. Next up: “Kiss Me”

I took professional photos with Des. Before I booked it, I tried to make a "mama and me" Google album like I had for him and Tim, and about 70% of the photos were him sleeping on me. I'm not in my best shape but I reactivated Rent The Runway to borrow an outfit. I know future me will be thankful.

Podcasts: The One You Feed, 10 Percent Happier, Hear in LA, The Ladygang, Huberman Lab.

Music: Yeah Yeah Yeah's "Cool It Down"

“I feel different today, different today, different today, I do...”

My GoodReads. I gave Daisy Jones a second chance because I like how Carrie Soto was written. Pet is my favorite book of the year.

Desmond is getting over double pink eye (or is it just pink EYES) and a cold, that was preceded by an ear infection. He has needed to fall asleep ON me every night for the last 2 weeks. The night I am writing this, I asked them to go to bed without me. I'm doing teeth whitening strips. (Another shot of self-care!)

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On the night of publishing this, Desmond is in San Diego with his aunt and cousins, and Tim is driving down. This is my alone time. This is my writing time. But, obviously, I have to make a playlist first.