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Books update...
After Sean Stewart's Perfect Circle(which didn't have the happiest ending, but at least our hapless narrator was beginning to get his shit together), I went on to Poul Anderson's The Corridors of Time. This was picked as being a)one of the thinnest book on my to-be-read shelf, and b)one of the slowly dwindling set of books that I bought over thirteen years ago and still haven't read. I'm not Poul Anderson's biggest fan, but he has done some good books, like Tau Zero, and I still have a few of his that I haven't read from my rabid-used-book-buying days.
It starts out promisingly enough, with a man, Malcolm, wrongly convicted of murder being approached by a mysterious woman who promises to have him acquitted. She ends up involving him in a time-war, sort of like the one Fritz Leiber set so many stories in, except that the sides are truly distinguishable, and true changes to recorded history are impossible. Malcolm ends up on the side of the woman(Storm), a dionysian matriarchy, fighting against the technologically-oriented patriarchy on the other side. All too slowly, Malcolm begins to realize that his own side is not particularly that of the angels, and eventually manages to extricate himself from the conflict and start up a middle ground.
Since then, I've been rereading the Harry Potter series. I'd gotten out Philosopher's Stone a while ago, and once I actually reread it, it seemed quite natural to go on to the second one. I'm up to the fourth one now, and I imagine I'll get through the rest of the series before Half-Blood Prince comes out, with maybe a break to read something else in between. Goblet of Fire is the one I remember the least of, probably because it hasn't been made into a movie yet, and Order of The Phoenix came out more recently. One thing I'm noticing as I read is how often Rowling makes Harry into an outcast, with maybe one or two friends sticking by him, through forces beyond his control. And how rarely he actually manages to make any progress against the Malfoys of the world, who seem firmly entrenched in the society, what with him being in his early teens and all. Order of The Phoenix was, IIRC, a bit of an improvement that way, and hopefully the last two books will continue that trend.
Edit: Forgot to mention that we're also reading Philosopher's Stone to Simon. He's even trying to read it on his own, though how much he's getting out of it is debatable. He's started incorporating it into his lengthy story/monologues, though he keeps getting Gryffindor and Dumbledore confused, as well as Snape and Slytherin. (Although now he's transplanted Hogwart's to Neopia, so I keep saying it should be Slotherin...)
We rented a few movies this week, too. We got "Brother Bear" and "Scooby-Doo" for the kids. "Brother Bear" was surprisingly good, actually, despite how the latter-day hand-drawn animated movies have been dismissed compared to the computer-animated ones. "Scooby-Doo"...well, I'd have to say that Linda Cardellini as Velma was the best thing about that movie...though Matthew Lillard did a very faithful Shaggy. I wasn't particularly impressed with Sarah Michelle Gellar as Daphne, possibly because she just seemed not quite Buffy-like enough. Or, rather, she was, but not in the right ways--in the martial arts moves, but not in the character.
For adult movies, we saw "Ocean's Twelve" and "Vanilla Sky". Well, Nicole didn't watch the last half of "Vanilla Sky". I won't give it away for anyone who hasn't seen it, but let's just say that my Wild-Assed Guess was proved right, and I actually liked the second half better than the first half. Now I'm almost curious to see the original Spanish version, "Open Your Eyes", which has Penélope Cruz in exactly the same role...
"Ocean's Twelve", on the other hand, was a major disappointment. It felt like they edited out most of the plot, but left in the comedic byplay between the vast array of characters that we couldn't keep straight anyway. I mean, we remembered Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, and George Clooney, of course, and Elliott Gould and Bernie Mac, but there were three or four that we just couldn't keep track of. Meanwhile, the plot was excessively tangled, though once again my WAG was proved right. The extended Julia Roberts segment in the middle may have been the best part of the movie. But all in all we could've done without this movie.
After Sean Stewart's Perfect Circle(which didn't have the happiest ending, but at least our hapless narrator was beginning to get his shit together), I went on to Poul Anderson's The Corridors of Time. This was picked as being a)one of the thinnest book on my to-be-read shelf, and b)one of the slowly dwindling set of books that I bought over thirteen years ago and still haven't read. I'm not Poul Anderson's biggest fan, but he has done some good books, like Tau Zero, and I still have a few of his that I haven't read from my rabid-used-book-buying days.
It starts out promisingly enough, with a man, Malcolm, wrongly convicted of murder being approached by a mysterious woman who promises to have him acquitted. She ends up involving him in a time-war, sort of like the one Fritz Leiber set so many stories in, except that the sides are truly distinguishable, and true changes to recorded history are impossible. Malcolm ends up on the side of the woman(Storm), a dionysian matriarchy, fighting against the technologically-oriented patriarchy on the other side. All too slowly, Malcolm begins to realize that his own side is not particularly that of the angels, and eventually manages to extricate himself from the conflict and start up a middle ground.
Since then, I've been rereading the Harry Potter series. I'd gotten out Philosopher's Stone a while ago, and once I actually reread it, it seemed quite natural to go on to the second one. I'm up to the fourth one now, and I imagine I'll get through the rest of the series before Half-Blood Prince comes out, with maybe a break to read something else in between. Goblet of Fire is the one I remember the least of, probably because it hasn't been made into a movie yet, and Order of The Phoenix came out more recently. One thing I'm noticing as I read is how often Rowling makes Harry into an outcast, with maybe one or two friends sticking by him, through forces beyond his control. And how rarely he actually manages to make any progress against the Malfoys of the world, who seem firmly entrenched in the society, what with him being in his early teens and all. Order of The Phoenix was, IIRC, a bit of an improvement that way, and hopefully the last two books will continue that trend.
Edit: Forgot to mention that we're also reading Philosopher's Stone to Simon. He's even trying to read it on his own, though how much he's getting out of it is debatable. He's started incorporating it into his lengthy story/monologues, though he keeps getting Gryffindor and Dumbledore confused, as well as Snape and Slytherin. (Although now he's transplanted Hogwart's to Neopia, so I keep saying it should be Slotherin...)
We rented a few movies this week, too. We got "Brother Bear" and "Scooby-Doo" for the kids. "Brother Bear" was surprisingly good, actually, despite how the latter-day hand-drawn animated movies have been dismissed compared to the computer-animated ones. "Scooby-Doo"...well, I'd have to say that Linda Cardellini as Velma was the best thing about that movie...though Matthew Lillard did a very faithful Shaggy. I wasn't particularly impressed with Sarah Michelle Gellar as Daphne, possibly because she just seemed not quite Buffy-like enough. Or, rather, she was, but not in the right ways--in the martial arts moves, but not in the character.
For adult movies, we saw "Ocean's Twelve" and "Vanilla Sky". Well, Nicole didn't watch the last half of "Vanilla Sky". I won't give it away for anyone who hasn't seen it, but let's just say that my Wild-Assed Guess was proved right, and I actually liked the second half better than the first half. Now I'm almost curious to see the original Spanish version, "Open Your Eyes", which has Penélope Cruz in exactly the same role...
"Ocean's Twelve", on the other hand, was a major disappointment. It felt like they edited out most of the plot, but left in the comedic byplay between the vast array of characters that we couldn't keep straight anyway. I mean, we remembered Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, and George Clooney, of course, and Elliott Gould and Bernie Mac, but there were three or four that we just couldn't keep track of. Meanwhile, the plot was excessively tangled, though once again my WAG was proved right. The extended Julia Roberts segment in the middle may have been the best part of the movie. But all in all we could've done without this movie.
