Archive for May 2007

Sat May 26 17:31:38 2007

The YA librarian was passing round vouchers for a free month's subscription to Netflix and I took one, because I was curious as to how "free" a free month could be. Turns out it is free as long as I remember to cancel before the end of the month or they'll just start charging my credit card monthly subscriber fees. Not unreasonable, so I signed up. My first order consisted of Fingersmith, Steamboy, and Happy Feet.

We watched Happy Feet this afternoon and I just have to say what the fuck, people?. All the trailers I had seen made the film look like a mawkishly Disney-esque cutesy-wootsy singing, dancing anthropomorphic penguin flick (which is why I wouldn't pay money to see it). And, while it was all that is horribly, cloyingly twee and cute for the first hour, it then unexpectedly morphed into a Hitchcockian environmentalist nightmare before snapping back into Disney mode right at the end. Wtf? My brain has whiplash.




Sun May 20 18:05:26 2007

Yesterday was my last day at <rurallibrary>. They threw me a little party with cake, presents, and much picture taking before they packed me off. It's sad to think I won't be back there again as anything but patron. Sad, but also so very ... freeing.

The last few months have been really difficult. By the end of every week I felt as if I was skirting the thin edge of disaster and that some really bad shit was just waiting to rain down on me. Each week, I had one day to re-energize and get some perspective before it started all over again.

But now, every other week ends with a two day weekend. Yes. Two days off. And, even better, come the end of the school year, every week will end in a two day weekend and Fridays will be working holidays. My library closes on Saturdays in the summer which means rather than alternating Saturdays and Fridays every one works Friday. Twice as many hands on deck as usual. Do you have any idea how much weeding and collection development I can get done? It's brilliant. Even better, my library is an inland urban library which means ... no summer people! Yes! It's like I stumbled into heaven!

And, come July, I'm eligible for paid vacation. Paid. Days. Off. Holy shit. A week this year. Two weeks next year. Three weeks the year after. Wow.




Fri May 04 23:11:19 2007

There are books I covet because of their looks. Books I lust for because of their feel. Books I feel I must possess for no real rational reason at all. The Headline Review Jane Austens are one. The Penguin Steinbeck Centennial Editions are such another. There is something about the raggedy-edged pages, the French flaps, the textured-look covers with the cunning pen and ink sketches which makes my hands itch and my mouth water. Part of the attraction, I'm sure, is that I really like Steinbeck. Or did when I read him a decade or more ago. Of Mice and Men was my first Steinbeck -- read for a middle school English class. It didn't quite rock my world, but there were so many powerful images in that little book ... images which still stick with me today. I think, perhaps, this is how some people reacted to Catcher in the Rye?

After Of Mice and Men my class moved on to other Great American Works (The Great Gatsby *blurgh*) and Steinbeck was never brought up again. Being a sad and nerdy student, I went off looking for more Steinbeck and found The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights. Boy, was that as far from Of Mice and Men as you could get, topically, yet I loved it. Carried it around for weeks. Read and re-read the same passages over and over again. Wanted more, but there was no more. Cast around and found Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur which led me to the Susan Cooper Dark is Rising series which (eventually) led me to Katharine Kerr's Deverry novels which led to flirting with this guy named Nevyn on some talker called Crazylands ...

Hrm. My marriage is all Steinbeck's fault.




last updated: Sat 17 Nov 2007 08:19:03 AM EST