So, I just got back from the movie Sherlock Holmes . . . and it was a GREAT movie! I knew going into the movie that it was not going to be "true to the books" in any sense, but I have to say that it certainly had the same spirit of the books.

And that's what was so great about the movie: spirit. Both Robert Downey, Jr. and Jude Law played their roles with great spirit and good humor and just the right touch of seriousness. So while they did have their little spats and their own personal stories throughout the movie, those stories didn't subsume the main plot. I'd say that everything was extremely well balanced: personal stories along with main plot, as well as the larger plot. There weren't so many twists and turns that you got completely lost. You could follow everything and they explained nearly everything that dealt with the explanation of how the "crime" was committed. I only say "nearly" because there were a few handwaving moments when they didn't explain exactly how things worked . . . but I wouldn't say that was a problem. They explained exactly what they needed to in the detail they needed to. Any deeper explanation would have amounted to a science lecture and that's not what you go to the movies for.

And here's the thing: there weren't any movie tropes here. Oh, sure, good guys win in the end and such, but unlike Avatar I couldn't guess where things were going in the plot sense. So I was riveted to the pillow screen and kept involved during the whole movie. There were no slow points.

And the best recommendation I can give the movie is that at the end, I REALLY REALLY wanted to go immediately to the next movie. And there will definitely be a next movie, simply because I WILL IT! But just in case, I highly suggest that EVERYONE go out to see this movie.

And bring your pillow.

PS--Thanks to Joshua B for the last minute gift of some spare tickets!

Well, I've returned from the family gathering for the holidays, a few pounds heavier. I'll do an update on the festivities (with pics) in the next few days. But for now, HELP OTHERS! Patrick Rothfuss is holding a fundraiser for a worth cause and has a bunch of DAW books up for grabs, signed by the author and such. Go check them out and then donate something to cause! I haven't researched how the bidding works or anything else yet, but I thought I'd pass the word along.

Back home after spending Christmas down in Southern Florida, visiting my brother and his family. The girls (6 and 4) were great fun, if exhausting. Auntie Patricia came in for a fair share of admonishments "Auntie Patricia, you're ridiculous!" was often heard, as well as Camila's exasperated "Ay yi yi, Patricia!" The best quote of the week was probably "Mommy, why does Patricia love robots so much?"

Cold & snowing at the airport when I landed, and going to be brrrr cold tomorrow (high 14!) And yet I'm glad to be back. This is weather that makes sense to me, in the way that a South Florida Christmas with decorated palm trees and Christmas eve outdoor barbecues does not.

My internet access was sporadic, so have missed much of what happened on friendslist last week. But in compensation I bring a picture from our "Swamp Safari tour" -- I'm thinking this should be my new author pic.

renaissance2010
Turning to photography as a creative outlet during a valiant fight with breast cancer at age 34, renaissance10 survived and set up a photo contest to help raise funds for the Lavender Trust, a nonprofit that provides information and support to younger women with breast cancer. In the first two years, the competition brought in over £65,000 (that's $107,260.73 U.S.!), with entries from 130 countries last year. Renaissance10 recently joined LiveJournal to meet other passionate photographers and find supportive friends.

curiouscupcakes
Holy buttercream frosting! If you have a sweet tooth for sugary goodness or a wandering eye for whimsical confection, this is pure ecstasy iced in deliciousness. Hailing the beloved cupcake as the artisinal canvas of choice, you'll enjoy recipes, photos, and bountiful tips to bake up a batch, whether your taste leans toward French classics or funky and flavorful.

mission101
With New Years in the offing, it's an ideal time to reflect on past accomplishments, make peace with disappointments, and refocus the lens on future goals. This community welcomes you to create a bucket list of 101 things you plan to accomplish in the next 1,001 days. Offering support, guidance, and inspiration, this is a great way to jumpstart those pesky resolutions.

Christmas Day with Erin’s family. Our first visit to their home. Joe & Erin are back from San Leandro for the break. They move for good on New Years Day. We all are sporting spiffy North Face duds courtesy of the Joe Man. He’s handling the stress well, but confessed he is a bit nervous about the new job, his ability to handle the expectations & requirements. It’s a lot of change with a lot on the line: new job, major move to a new location, terrible job environment. We all tried to reassure him it is normal at this point to feel some anxiety and to mull the unfamiliar problems over and over subconsciously, waking, and in dreams.

Perfect cloudless weather. We gathered out on the deck around a wood fire watching the stars come out until we were too chilled to continue.

Boxing Day ferry from Bremerton to Seattle. Again flawless weather. Sixty-plus mile visibility. The Olympics starkly clear, Mt Baker easily visible at the Canadian border, Rainier to the south, all in a sweeping panorama from the ferry deck. Seattle downtown as we approached was like a dream. Air so clear and haze free, perfect light, like desert light an hour after sunrise, all day. Spent the day with Joyce’s family, her dad and brothers. Very much enjoyed neice Jessica’s tales of health care volunteering in Bethlehem last summer. She was intrigued that I could identify many of her photos from Haifa, Jerusalem, and the West Bank. Insisted I take her copy of The Lemon Tree, a book about Jewish-Palestinian relations. Will get her a CD of the 1969 Israel photos so she can compare then and now. Jessica is a senior at U of W and she faces the present highly uncertain job market.

Up early and downtown to Pike Street Market. Seattle waterfront is much changed (I’m old, I mean: changed since the mid freakin 70s). The market however is unchanged. It is such an institution change would be criminal. Condos with Elliot Bay views touted “starting in the low millions.” I’ll take a ... rain check (sorry, bad pun). Dig it: Gatesey could buy 50,000 condos cash and have spare change. The rest of us should try living within our means. Now hear this: Seattle is a real nice town, but basically it is a hick town and “low millions” is hubris. Check back with me later on that call.

Wrapped up the journey home at the Tacoma Museum of Glass. Their hotshop runs whenever the museum is open. You can sit and watch them create their artwork. It is a high quality art glass shop. Top people use the facility, teach, and put stuff on display. Today the crew was making Kids Designs. http://museumofglass.org/exhibitions/kids-design-glass/ They select kids’ sketches and struggle to realize the imaginative uninhibited creations in glass (they also seriously consider the designer’s statement. Some statements are poignant and some are funny. One was a hedgehog with “ten spikes and two eyes but the rest is normal”). It’s a wonderful idea for the kids and the artisans both. These artisans are grounded in classical technique. The kids’ designs force them to bend and break most of the rules. In their team statement they wrote building the kids designs is their favorite activity. The kids exhibit is worth the price of admission. A delightful pairing with the gravitas and technique (for example http://museumofglass.org/exhibitions/preston-singletary/ ) of established artists on display in the museum.

To a Christmas Eve showing of Avatar. The movie is a stunning visual immersion (we saw the 3d version). It has enough plot and psychological depth to be rewarding as space opera. Overall, highly recommended for the visual effects and the likely debate about the story line, good enough in total.

Visuals. The technology feels like a breakthrough. The characters are computer generated overlays of actors. The facial expressions that result are fluid and telling. You never quite forget the jungle scenes are animated, but that awareness fades if you focus on faces. It will fade anyway, from an onslaught of visual overload -- the visualization of the planet Pandora. The imagined natural world of animals plants and forests is beautifully rendered and convincing. The military craft in contrast must be miniature models. They are photo realistic. When they appear on Pandora and not in the human compound on planet, they are shown through enough smoke and haze to minimize the subtle friction of photo and animated effects.

Plot is less remarkable. A blend of Tarzan and Dances with Wolves showing noble people at one with nature and in conflict with babyish exploitative technologically superior imaginatively inferior intruders bent on destruction of people and nature. Boy meets Girl (they both have tails and are blue, bring your own preconceptions). However, the love interest is not overly goopy. It is Boy’s challenge to prove himself worthy.
Pandorans of any gender are hunters who know how to shoot and warriors who shoot, scale dizzying heights, and fly dragons. Pandoran culture draws on many other science fiction settings.

For my movie nickel, the best plot wrinkle is the character Jake (would that be Jack! And Rose! From Titanic?). In his human form Jake is a paraplegic ex Marine. Through the outsider’s exploitative technology he remotely “drives” a bionic lifeform which is a blend of his identical twin brother’s and Pandoran DNA. He has full control and sensory experience of the remote “other” body, which collapses into catatonia when the human Jake unplugs for rest back in the compound. The injured Jake is immediately drawn in to the (his?) alien Pandoran body where he has run of the planet in exuberant ways that are primarily denied his true body. Through technological wish fulfillment he proves himself worthy and is accepted by the Pandoran clan.

The remote control and blurred identity of a fully sensed “other” body has at least two direct predecessors: Poul Anderson “Call Me Joe” and James Tiptree Jr (Alice Sheldon) “The Girl Who Was Plugged In”. In Tiptree’s setting the themes of exploitation by corporate interests, alienation, mind-body, psychological transferrence, are developed into an ironic structure worthy of Moll Flanders or Pride and Prejudice. Tiptree’s resolution is bleak and psychologically devastating as the “othering” requires.

Only the corporate exploitation theme is developed in Avatar. There is conflict without irony. Jake has the option to return to Earth and regain his real legs – he goes native for love and to fight the corporate-military interests. The deeper tragic side of this dark technology remains unexamined in Avatar.

Christmas Morning!  No snow this year, although it is cold.  A little foggy as well.  While I have slept in compared to a normal working Friday, I am still up much earlier than anyone else in the house.  I've read the paper, drunk two cups of coffee, and have migrated to the "office" and the computer.  It will be a quiet day until the rest of the household is up and about.

Remembering Christmasses as a child, it seems that I was always up early, even when older and when I understood the reality of the Magic.  Perhaps a bit of it lingered, as one or two gifts, apparently from Santa Claus still appeared under the tree on Christmas Morning.  On the other hand, Jessica was never one to bounce out of bed before daylight to see what the Jolly Elf might have left for her.  She has always been content to sleep half the day a way, and then to seem totally unconcerned about the gifts wrapped and waiting under the Tree.  As well, Eva usually takes her own time in getting up on Christmas.  Gift opening is usually of secondary concern to her as well, as she is more generally concerned with preparing dinner.

I hope I do not appear to be overly focused on the "present" aspect of the Holiday.  Yes, I still enjoy getting them, but as much, I enjoy giving them.  I look forward to opening the decoratively wrapped bundles of mystery as much as the next person.  But I also enjoy and anticipate the reactions of others when they open something that I've gotten for them.  And in truth, depending upon what it is and whom it is for, I might sometimes be a little nervous as a gift I bought and wrapped is opened and revealed.  It might be that at my point in life, that I enjoy the giving as much as the getting.

This year, the pile of presents under the tree is smaller than in the past.  With Jessica beginning her college education, the budget has come under review, and we thought it best to downplay the Christmas Shopping this year.  Hopefully what we have gotten for each other this year will turn out to be gifts of quality rather than of quantity.  Hopefully we will each appreciate those few items that the others give us, and more importantly, appreciate the True Reason for the Day.

On other topics:  If I've not mentioned my current reading project for awhile, it is because I'm not actually reading anything at the moment.  I finished PEOPLE OF THE WOLF a couple of weeks ago, and since have been doing a final review of my own BEYOND THE OCEAN'S EDGE.  Rather surprising, how many changes I'm making, as I had one time considered it to be pretty much in final polished form.  Yet as I go through it now, those awkward spots and those few remaining typos seem to stand out rather markedly.  I suppose the biggest difference in this "go through" than previous ones is how sporadic the marked corrections and changes are.  While I might have a page or two marked up as if they were part of a first draft, the next several pages might be devoid of any editing.  A big help in this project is that Anne Mini is currently running a series on Self-Editing on her Author!  Author! blog.  (www.annemini.com)  Already she has mentioned several areas that I find myself looking for as I go through the story.

Currently I've reviewed slightly less than half the book.  I've brought the marked pages home over the Holiday weekend and hope to spend at least a part of my time in making the corrections on the computer.  Ideally I'll have it completely done by the middle of January.  Then I'll feel much better about sending it out, both to the agent that currrently has requested it, and to any others that might.  If whatever I do in this current edit that might make it more acceptable to the industry, then going through it one more time is well worth it.

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR, Everyone!
Dave

Holiday debuggery

We know there were a few kinks with the holiday promotion. We've been working very hard to get them ironed out. If you have a paid/permanent account, keep on sending those coupons. Here's an update:

• If you were unable to send out multiple coupons at a time, please perform a hard refresh, and you should be good to go.
• If you redeemed a coupon to upgrade your account and the balance at checkout was $0 instead of $9.95 or $15, this means your upgrade did not go through (nor were you charged). We've straightened this out, so you can now apply your holiday coupon toward the purchase of an annual paid account.
• If you tried to redeem a holiday coupon and had trouble using a gift certificate to cover the balance of an annual paid account, we identified the root problem. If this happened to you, you can now use your holiday coupon together with your gift certificate.
• If the number of holiday coupons you have available suddenly goes up (instead of down), this might be due to recipients declining the coupons, at which point your pool of available coupons will be replenished and, therefore, increase.
• If you need assistance with holiday coupons or pretty much anything else (well, LiveJournal related), please open a support request and we'll be more than happy to help!

Tweaks

• There were some initial glitches displaying results on My Guests, but we've worked them out. We hope you'll check out who's been checking you out!
• Some of you reported formatting issues using the Rich Text Editor (i.e., line breaks were being removed incorrectly). We've implemented a fix! Thanks so much for your patience.

Give a little extra!

We're pleased to report that we've already sold over 100 virtual red ribbons in honor of National AIDS Awareness month. Remember, for each charitable vgift you purchase for $2.99, we'll donate 100 percent of gross proceeds to IAVI.org (the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative) to fund the development of an HIV vaccine. Once again, we thank you for your generosity.

Celebrate with holiday vGifts!

Stop by the Virtual Gift Shop and share some holiday magic with your LiveJournal friends.

Photos of the week

We're back with more dazzling pictures from around the world. Congrats to marlenemcc, who has been awarded a virtual blue ribbon as the winner of our fourth photo contest. We hope you'll click over to LJ_Photophile poll and tell us your picks in pics!

For more fantastic user content, we'll meet you under the cut. ( Read more... )

Curtains

Thanks, again, for reading. Here's wishing you the very merriest of holidays. We'll see you next year!

Gifts bought, wrapped, mailed? CHECK (Plus a bonus round of 4 birthdays within 2 weeks of XMAS)
Cards addressed, mailed? CHECK
Charitable donations sent out? CHECK (A llama from Heifer for the kids, plus donations to food bank, homeless shelter and Doctors Without Borders.)
Holiday get togethers? YES, YES, YES and MORE TO COME.
Post-Christmas plans for seeing SHERLOCK HOLMES? YES!

Okay, bring it on. I'm ready.

i_hope_that
For many of us, the holidays can be kind of rough. If you're searching for a network of understanding friends, this ultra-nurturing community encourages you to express your heartfelt wishes and offer other members encouragement and acceptance. Not for the terminally snarky or emotionally-challenged, this is a good-spirited place to lend comfort and support.

diygifts
Feeling crafty? If you've got a few last folks on your holiday gift list, this is a great place to seed your creativity and generosity. You'll also discover wonderful DIY tips to decorate your home and entertain guests. Offering a no-frills-no-skills attitude that welcomes the cash-challenged and arts-phobic, you're sure to get ideas and make friends in the process.

cooking_club
A fun and friendly community dedicated to those who love to cook, whether you're a meat-and-potatoes type, an aspiring gourmand, and/or a vegan. In search of a brilliant dish to use up those weekly leftovers? Post your ingredients and you'll be whipping up a feast by dinner. You can also share favorite recipes. For Type A chefs, you can spice up your culinary repertoire with exciting cooking challenges.

I’ve finished Zombie Raccoons and Killer Bunnies, edited by Martin H. Greenberg & Kerrie Hughes and overall it was an OK anthology. A few stories stood out, and those I’ve denoted with bold titles. A few of the stories were disappointing, either with an ending that wasn’t as satisfactory as I would have liked, or with an ending that just didn’t make sense to me at all. There were some good chilling stories in here, along with some fun humorous takes on the theme, so a wide variety overall. If you like “creature of the night” stories, then you’ll find a couple of good reads in here, but in the end I was a little disappointed overall.





Table of Contents:

Death Mask by Jody Lynn Nye: This was a zombie raccoon story, where the raccoons come up against a farmer who doesn’t agree with the idea that you need to commune with nature. It was an OK story, but I had a hard time getting used to the voice of the farmer character, which threw me off.

BunRabs by Donald J. Bingle: And this was a killer bunny story . . . told from the POV of a chicken. *grin* The chicken’s POV of the world in general is hilarious, especially their take on modern day conveniences (and how they use them) and the mythology they’ve developed about rabbits and how they incorporate some of our own traditions into their worldview. A fun story.

for lizzie by Anton Strout: A cute little story set in Anton’s “Simon Canderous” universe, although it doesn’t feature Simon as a character. The main character is an archivist, dealing with a certain lack of social skills when dealing with the opposite sex . . . along with a rather ferocious little book wyrm.

Faith in Our Fathers by Alexander B. Potters: The idea here is that young child who can heal with his hands in upset because his pet cats keep disappearing. His father tells him it’s the fisher cats (who aren’t fishers or cats) that keep taking them, so the boy decides he wants to find these fisher cats and goes in search of them. He finds something more instead. It was an interesting story, written well, but at the end I wanted more. I wanted the story to do more, especially since there was so much potential for more in what was presented in the story. With that said, though, this is the best story in the anthology so far.

Bone Whispers by Tim Waggoner: The creature in this story is a rather large and supernatural groundhog, haunting a cemetery. The story revolves around a man returning to the cemetery to confront the groundhog, who had a run-in with when he was twelve years old. I felt like this story needed a little more development, with the connection between the groundhog, the man, the boy, and the groundhog’s hole (and the cemetery) fleshed out more. It had a creepy ending though.

Watching by Carrie Vaughn: And here we deal with pigeons. A man proposes to his girlfriend after taking her to Venice . . . only to have her say no. This sets the man’s life onto a whole new track as he sets out to backpack across Europe, discovering pigeons the entire step of the way. Only the pigeons aren’t exactly what they seem. The first half of the story was interesting, and the character drew me in, but then the story takes a hard sharp turn (perhaps even a hair-pin turn) in the middle and becomes a completely different kind of story altogether. This wasn’t a bad thing and the ending itself makes you smile, in a sort of funny/gruesome kind of way.

The Things That Crawl by Richard Lee Byers: This story doesn’t single out one particular type of creature, it sort of deals with snakes, lizards, alligators, etc, in general. And this is the most well developed story in the anthology. I connected to the main character, a detective who has an alcohol problem, so has been demoted and has relocated to the coast of Florida where, after a hurricane passes through, discovers that the local wildlife isn’t behaving as usual. He picks up on this and puts the pieces together (he is a detective after all), but the conclusion is, of course, too supernatural for the average person to believe. He ends up being forced to deal with the situation himself. Again, a very well-written, cohesive story with a rounded plot, rounded character arc, and a beginning, middle, and end.

The White Bull of Tara by Fiona Patton: This is a story centered around the White Bull of Tara. It begins interestingly enough—fairy cows are breaking through from the fairy realm to munch on the Druids’ garden and a pack of siblings/guards are tasked to stop the incursion. They figure out who’s causing the problem, and why . . . and then the story just kind of dies. They don’t really do much to stop the incursion from the fairy side, but the cows stop coming. Instead, the White Bull’s rival comes through and has his way with the local herd. It just felt like the story fell apart to me, or skewed off in a different direction from the first two-thirds of the story, and so the ending didn’t feel right.

Dead Poets by John A. Pitts: I don’t think I understand this story at all. I REALLY, REALLY liked the idea introduced at the beginning: the main animal here is the shrike, a bird, which (I didn’t know this before reading the story) apparently captures its prey and impales it on thorns on hedges and such around its nest. A cool factoid in and of itself. When, in the course of the story, the main characters finds that the shrike pestering her garden has started impaling pixies as well as rodents and such, the story jumped into a whole new level of interest for me. I seriously thought this would be the coolest story in the anthology . . . but then it completely fell apart near the end. Great setup, great idea, great animal . . . but nothing is done with it in my opinion. It kind of just trails off.

Super Squirrel to the Rescue by P.R. Frost: This story was cute, as the title suggests, with only a little touch of “evil creature from the night” to it. In this case, the evil creatures were crows, a whole murder of them, tormenting a neighborhood. Every attempt by the people to eliminate them was ignored and ridiculed with cawing. It required a rather supernatural squirrel to come to the rescue!

Her Black Mood by Brenda Cooper: This time, the creature of the night was much darker, a black toad created by the main character who can paint wooden carved creatures to life. However, she’s in such a black mood due to her life that this toad, when she paints it alive, comes out rather evil, with teeth and a lust for blood. Brenda Cooper captures the black mood of the character perfectly (we’ve all felt like this at some point, I’m sure) and the toad comes across as evil indeed, but I felt the resolution of the story could have used a little more umph. It made sense (unlike some of the other stories in this anthology), but I felt that so much time was spent on creating the situation and background that there should have been a little more time spent on resolving it all. It took 10 pages for the setup and making the toad as evil as possible, but only 2 pages to resolve the entire situation. A little unbalanced, but definitely a good read.

Ninja Rats on Harleys by Elizabeth A. Vaughan: The title pretty much says it all. *grin* A fun little story with evil rats and possums, a heroic mouse, and two flatulent dogs. Oh, plus a few humans. An interesting and enjoyable read, with just the right amount of humor thrown into the danger. But again this story felt unfinished. Unlike some previous stories in the anthology though, this one felt complete in and of itself, but also felt like the start of something much bigger. At least, I felt like I could have flipped the page and started another chapter when I reached the end. A good story overall though. Definitely entertaining.

Bats in Thebayou by Steven H Silver: Alien bats, anyone? That’s the main creature in this story (plus mosquitoes). Earth has been invaded by alien bats . . . we just don’t know it yet. The story flips back and forth between an alien bat perspective and the human perspective of two campers in Thebayou. I’m not sure this was effective overall, since I was much more interested in the alien bat perspective and not interested at all in the human perspective. But again, the ending was unsatisfactory to me. And aside from the main creature being a bat, there wasn’t much in the way of “creature of the night” feeling to this story.

Twilight Animals by Nina Kiriki Hoffman: This story was well-written, with a main character who could at this point in his life be labeled a “loser.” He’s hired to watch over his brother’s house while his brother and family tour Europe for a month. Since this guy’s in college, he decides to do some research on the neighborhood, ostensibly for a paper for school. Of course, he begins seeing things during his studies that just aren’t natural, in this case, a peculiarly large possum population. The ending is also peculiarly reminiscent of another story in this anthology, which is kind of bizarre. But overall a good story.

The Ridges by Larry D. Sweazy: The last story is about foxes . . . sort of. I can’t say much about the storyline without ruining it, so I’ll just say that the storyline here was good and it didn’t end the way I thought it would as I read it. I had the right idea, in general, but the author twisted it around into something different than what I’d expected by the end. Not really a “creature of the night” story in true form, although it certainly fit the theme of the anthology

So I spent ANOTHER few hours today transcribing the student evaluations for my second semester at Oneonta. There were more evals this time, probably because it was the first time I'd taught a couple of the courses and I admit that my perception of what the students would be able to handle was skewed at the beginning. I adjusted as the semester went along, and most of the students complained about what I'd expected at the beginning, but also noted that things changed as the semester went along. So I think, overall, the evals were good ones. I've got two more semesters of evals to transcribe now, and when I return to classes in January, the Fall 2009 evals should be waiting for me to transcribe.

But I say again, GAH, and ask, "What's the point?" I mean, I could copy the evals and put them if the administrators really do want to see them all, but I don't honestly think that they really do look at these things when they get together to discuss the portfolios. Sure, they may look at a few of them, but am I seriously expected to believe that they're going to look at the hundreds of evals I've gotten, when they probably have 50 other portfolios to look at after mine?

In any case, here are some of the typos I found during this batch. And these are just errors in spelling. I'm not even attempting to take note of the grammar errors involved.

The winner by far in the spelling wars was "quizes." I probably saw it spelled that way over 50 times. People just don't believe in z's anymore, apparently. The others, in no particular order:

"reconize"
"calculatos"
"assesments"
"metrial"
"calculters"
"calcalters" (This was on the same one as the previous word, so the student was trying to figure out how to spell it correctly.)
"explination"
"proffesor"
"resonable"
"suprises"
"ridculously"
"theroms"

And may I add that, as a writer, it is EXTREMELY difficult to type those words spelled incorrectly into the computer? Both here and when I was typing up the evals. But I push onwards. Probably not until after the trip home for the holidays though. Tomorrow I'm hoping to write some on my own stuff.

Which is another way of saying that I'm not at all ready for Christmas.  Why is it that time accelerates between Thanksgiving and Christmas?  I've been planning to get Christmas Cards sent out since before Turkey Day, and guess what?  I still haven't done it!  (Hopefully the majority will be ready later today and in the mail tomorrow.)

Shopping is not that big of a crisis this year.  With the added expenses of a college student in the household, and additional vehicles, we've cut back on what we buy for each other.  Jessica has been shopping on line for Eva and I.  Yesterday I spent the afternoon at the home of the new Treasurer for Spokane Authors and Self-Publishers.  On the way home I stopped and found one of the items Eva had on her wish list, as well as something for Jessica.  In that regard I could conclude that my shopping is done.  Still, during the upcoming week I'll no doubt make an effort to find cards specifically for them.  And I'll need to pick up some egg-nog.  I've already got the magic "special ingredient."  Yeah, I went shopping for "Christmas Spirits" a week or so ago.

Last week I mentioned the extreme cold the Inland Empire was shivering through.  A day or so after that post, the weather changed.  Long johns were discarded and the number of jackets being worn was pared down to one.  It warmed up considerably and snowed.  It stuck around for most of that day, but with temps in the 40s for the next couple of afternoons, it's about all gone.  We've had rain and fog over the weekend.

Suppose I should finish this, take a break from the computer, and read the Sunday paper.  It wasn't here when I first got up, so I went on line instead. Here's hoping you all have A Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year! If you celebrate other Holidays, I wish you the Happiest and Most Meaningful of those as well.

Dave

OK, so holiday shopping is upon us, so I thought I'd reiterate some of the holiday deals I mentioned earlier this year.

First, I thought I should remention that all three of the books are available on Kindle now, for all of the Kindle lovers out there. Here are the links to the kindle versions: The Skewed Throne, The Cracked Throne, and The Vacant Throne.

All of the books are now, as far as I know, available in all other electronic formats as well. Go forth and download them!

And now for the dead tree versions. I'm currently running a few holiday specials, one for hardcovers and one for paperbacks:

Hardcover Deal: You can buy all three hardcovers of the books for a total of $30! That includes shipping.

Paperback Deal: You can buy all three paperbacks of the books for a total of $20! That includes shipping as well.

If you're interested in any of these deals, contact me at jpalmatier@sff.net and we can arrange payment and get address info, etc. Individual hardcovers and paperbacks are available as well at $15 and $8 respectively (shipping included). Just let me know what you're interested in! All prices are for the US shipping only. I can give you a quote for international shipping if you get in touch with me.

Happy holiday shopping everyone!

*********************

Unplanned trip downtown today for a free concert by Vancouver Madrigal Singers. They are passionate gifted amateurs, about as good as amateurs can get (some professionals in the mix?), and the little gallery had wonderful acoustics. Warm and direct. About 10 performers and fewer than 40 in the audience. Lute, recorders, some more-obscure instruments as spice for the mostly a capella program. Just a dash of commentary on what we were hearing. The leader got laughs for her enthusiastic extolling of Sweelinck, as she intended, but it turns out Sweelinck is a big deal. The first to write in fugal style with the theme originating in a single voice then building polyphonically (I researched that later. They are more entertaining than this present scribbler).

The program was demanding on their skills. Renaissance music is complex and transparent, rhythmically elastic and harmonically adventurous. There is a sense of discovery and new possibilities. Some church motets started mixing languages ... or the composer would set the text theme in a few bars, and then launch off into polyphonic scat singing on alleluah or hey nonny nonny. It wasn’t all church after all. There is Christ and then there is wassail (also boar’s head: the rarest dish in the land).

Nice serendipity at the solstice.

So, as part of my day job, and part of the tenure-track position I'm in, I have to submit a portfolio every couple of years to get rehired for another couple of years. One of the things they asked when I got my first packet back was that I include ALL of the written student evaluations (I'd assumed they couldn't possibly want ALL of them, so selected a few at random). At the time I shrugged and said, oh well. I'll just copy them all and stick them in.

But no. Apparently this is not all that they want. What they want is the original copies in the Master portfolio and then in the subsequent 6 smaller folders that you must also submit, they want TYPEWRITTEN TRANSCRIBED copies of all of the evaluations. And not just all from the past year. They want them all SINCE YOU STARTED WORKING THERE.

Now, in the normal course of events, a professor's classes at this college would consist of maybe 15 students each. But I don't teach normal classes. I teach math classes, and have taught the Gen Ed courses for the most part, which means my average class size is around 25. And generally these students don't just put down "great class" or "class sucked" as an evaluation. I somehow end up getting paragraphs for my evaluations. I generally view this as a good thing though, because it shows the students cared enough to say something about my class. And I like getting feedback. But . . .

So now I have to go back and transcribe all of my previous evaluations for the past 4 semesters. That's about 14 classes. 25 evaluations per class. Paragraphs of words. You do the math (I'm on break).

But I want to be hired for another 2 years, so today I broke out the evals and the word processor and began. I got through one semester (4 classes). It took me nearly 2 hours. My back hurts and I really wish that students would learn how to correctly spell "recammend" and "quizes" and "perfessor." (We have to transcribe them verbatim, errors and all.) So I'm putting the evals away for another day now and getting myself some chocolate, damn it!