I recently finished Midnight in Chernobyl, by Adam Higginbottom, and had enough to say about it to give it a singular post separate from my book posts. As soon as I heard about the book, I put it on hold at the library. I watched Chernobyl, of course, and years ago read Svetlana Alexievich’s Voices from Chernobyl. My guess as to the sudden patter of media about Chernobyl is the combination of 30th anniversary (2016) and Fukushima being relatively recent…. Read more »
Posts Categorized: Blog
Books of 2019, Part 10
Last two of the year: Fleishman is in Trouble, by Taffy Brodesser-Akner: I read that the original title for this was Schrodinger’s Marriage, and for a second I thought “That’s much better!” before just as instantly deciding it wasn’t. It’s more clever, maybe, but less memorable, and less clever than it would be if the term hadn’t already been appropriated in clever ways elsewhere. I enjoyed this thoroughly, especially the way the narration crept in from background to foreground. I… Read more »
X can have a little Y, as a treat
I only started to see this snowclone on twitter a month or so ago – that’s not to say I’m not late to the party – and I had to go looking for its exact origin. It sounded like something out of an instruction manual for pets – “Dogs can have a little table food, as a treat” – or something along those lines, and that wasn’t far off. Doing the usual rounds of research – knowyourmeme, cheezburger, etc –… Read more »
Leveling Up
Alternate title: When one thing isn’t substantial enough for an entire blog post, mash a few things together. A dinner of side dishes, all nutrients covered! . I. Pettiness level: Calling someone by the wrong nickname Pettiness level: Taking a picture of the hair clogging the drain every time you clean the shower catcher before showering Pettiness level: Taking your mail out of the mailbox and shutting the door on everyone else’s Pettiness level: Spreading your washcloth out across more… Read more »
Books of 2019, Part 9
The Lost Man, by Jane Harper: It probably wasn’t the most restrained or prudent to read all three of a new-to-you author’s books in one week. Now I have nothing! But I assume Harper will be writing for decades to come, and if she, Laura Lippman, and Tana French can each publish a book every two years or so…well, it won’t be enough, but it will be something. This departed from the first two Harper books, which featured the same… Read more »
Dry, Dryer, Dryest
After my apartment became an OSHA violation – as in, that same day, about eight hours later – the dryer tried to set my clothes on fire. This wasn’t surprising in general, because the washer and dryer have been in the apartment far longer than I have and, to my knowledge, no one has ever serviced them (yes, this is a failure on my part. I know. I understand that avoiding eye contact with people is one thing and avoiding… Read more »
Mercureek
As much as my OCD has been mitigated by Zoloft and therapy, contamination fears still do their worst with me from time to time. Today the landlord sent someone to replace light bulbs that were too high for us to reach without a proper ladder, and in the course of his doing so two of the compact fluorescent lightbulbs that had been in there broke, scattering little pieces of glass AND ALSO MERCURY OH DEAR GOD I’M GOING TO DIE… Read more »
Books of 2019, Part 8
The Day the Sun Died, by Yan Lianke: I was initially distracted by some stylistic devices that never ended up working for me (repetition, ironic insertion of the author/his other works into the story). The repetition and some of the other verbal tics may be mainly a translation issue – not an issue with the translator but an issue inherent in translation – but my Mandarin is nowhere near good enough to say, even if I had access to the… Read more »
Halloweaned
I’ll go on the record stating that the most important all-purpose ingredient for a Halloween costume is dental floss. Floss has many excellent qualities: you probably already own some (convenience!), it’s cheap, it’s strong. It’s almost certainly a better plan to use dental floss to hang something around your neck or dangle it from your wrist than it is to attempt shenanigans with tape, glue, or safety pins. The first time I discovered the critical importance of floss was when… Read more »
App-titude
Questions: Which of the apps that I use actually accomplish what they purport to do, and which apps don’t claim to advance a user’s skills in any particular way but actually do? Considering the first question… Duolingo: The premise: advance your knowledge of a language or learn a new one. The process: short lessons comprised of a mix of vocabulary, forming sentences using a word bank, translating written sentences into English, and transcribing spoke sentences into the language you’re studying…. Read more »
