One of my coworkers who goes to NC State showed me this news report today at work about, as she put it “some guy running through the library (voice drops to a whisper) IN THE BUFF”. The headline “Naked Rampage” confused me at first until I saw the video and how he was wildly throwing books off the shelves. So maybe it should be retitled “Naked Book Rampage”, which sounds like a fun time.
But maybe that’s just because I, too, am really stressed about finals. I feel your pain, Seth Pace.
November is the worst month. Ever. It’s cold. It’s close enough to the end of the semester that I suddenly become all about writing research papers. Everyone has Christmas stuff out already, so that I get annoyed by December 1st. I dislike turkey. NaNoWriMo is making me crazy. Whenever anyone asks me how I am, I can’t even muster the strength to blandly lie and just go “Bleeeeeeh”.
So, here are some little things:
1) Ever since I got my netbook (after my laptop decided to fulfill its lifelong dream of being a refrigerator by keeping its fan on at all times) I have been using Steven’s computer when he’s not home to be able to a) see everything on a freakishly huge screen and b) use Microsoft Office products. This has the added benefit of getting to fill his Pandora gadget with Lady Gaga to break up all that LOTR1-themed Euro pop/metal. You’re welcome, Steven.
2) Compiling course evaluations in my head. Some classes, thinking about writing that 15 minute evaluation, no matter how inconsequential it will actually be to the Powers of UNC, is all that gets me through.
3) The True Meaning of Smekday by Adam Rex. I am a little more than halfway through this book, and it is AWESOME. Basically, aliens called The Boov conquer Earth. They oppress us, but it’s hilarious! Observe:
Gratuity Tucci, sassy eleven-year-old, is having none of that. Then she makes friends with an outcast Boov who has decided his “human name” is J.Lo. If that doesn’t convince you, I don’t know what will. Best alien invasion ever. I can’t wait to see how it ends.
4) Coloring. And being happy that wordpress is not as temperamental as Tumblr.
5) Doing impressions of animals that are pretty much overlooked in the impressions world. Like the walrus. Or the sandpiper. Complete with exciting sound effects. The best part is leaping into Steven’s office and shouting “GUESS WHAT ANIMAL I AM!!!” I was surprised he got the walrus.
And watching this is a great way to procrastinate. And feel happy inside.
(I saw this first on Bookshelves of Doom)
So because I decided, crazily, that I don’t have enough self-imposed responsibilities on top of all the school/work/interning stuff, I’ve started a tumblr called The Crayon is Mightier to showcase my art. Yes, little known fact: I am an artist. I mainly work in crayons and coloring books. Pretty much exactly like a four-year-old except with hilarious captions. Here is a sample of my work:
Side bonus of this project: I get to teach true science facts.
Basically, I was sitting on a plane with crayons and a Planet Earth coloring book and realized that if I was going to color everything in it true to life, I would never get to use the many different shades of purple, and would pretty much run out of brown. Lame. So I decided to take it to the next level, and then share my unique vision with the world. I assume I will eventually acquire non-Planet Earth coloring books, but I’m okay making up alternate science facts for now.
Updating at midnight apparently whenever Tumblr feels like it, hopefully daily, 7 days a week. You’re welcome.
Sorry for the late update; it’s November again and you know what that means. But more about that later.
Last weekend was Halloween! I was pretty excited because I love carving pumpkins. My favorite part is scraping out the insides, but I also like roasting pumpkin seeds and finishing lightyears ahead of Steven because he is artistic and I like to stick with things I know won’t look like a stabby four-year-old got a hold of them.
Until Saturday, I hardly had time to think about it being Halloween, I was so busy with school and work and things. Also, it was so hot outside I kept forgetting it was October. But then it was Saturday, time to finally buy a pumpkin and carve it!
The only problem was, there were no pumpkins left in all of Carrboro. I’m not joking. There were gigantic bins of pumpkins outside Harris Teeter all month but they were suddenly gone on October 30th. I went to two Harris Teeters, the Whole Foods, and the Boy scouts in front of that church on Estes, all of which had happy rows of pumpkins before, all empty the day before Halloween. Is it really required that you buy your pumpkin a week in advance? I was not aware of this rule. People sell Christmas trees up till Christmas eve! And fireworks the day of July 4th! If special Halloween candy was still mad overpriced at Harris Teeter the day before Halloween, pumpkins should have been too. Alas.
So, I gave up. This year would be the year I did not carve a pumpkin. Sadness.
Then on Sunday I woke up with renewed energy for the wild pumpkin chase. So what if I would get approximately no school work done this weekend? Some things are important, and carving pumpkins is one of them. After returning from another abortive grocery store trip, I happened to notice a woman in a parking lot with a truck and some pumpkins spread out on the ground. Success!!! Kind of sketchy success!!!
She also had three less than a month old kittens in a bird cage. Scientific discovery of the day: they were the most adorable thing ever. I’m almost positive I’ve never seen a kitten in real life before, not one that young and that cute. It’s probably because I’m moderately to deathly allergic to them, so my parents pretty much put a moratorium on me going anywhere near cats from a young age. I was okay with this, because the few I accidentally encountered at friends’ houses were pretty mean. I did not really get the deal with having a pet that seemed to either ignore or hate you. I have half of humanity for that. Also, I associate them with itchy eyes, not being able to breathe, and hives. So, you know, there’s that.
ANYWAY, these kittens were ADORABLE. They were making this pathetic little mewing noise like “Why are we in a cage? Why are we so cute? Take us home with you!” The woman selling the pumpkins was like “Do you want a free kitten?” And I said, “No, I’m allergic” but while looking longingly at them, so she made me hold one. Second, lesser scientific discovery of the day: kittens are the softest things EVER. They were some kind of Siamese/lynx mix, so they were gray and white and kind of stripey. The one she handed me tried to crawl up my sweater. But then all the places its claws touched my skin became all red and raised like mosquito bites that still haven’t fully gone away, so in the end, I think not taking home the adorable creature of death was a good decision.
Still, just so you know, kittens are way cute. Still not big on cats.
Then we carved pumpkins! As usual, I was done in record time! Mostly because mine always involve only carving five or six shapes. This year I decided to make use of some skewers we had left over from the dip party to give mine hair/a strange hat. It’s unclear which: Read the rest of this entry »
Title: The Bermudez Triangle
Author: Maureen Johnson
Challenged in: Leesburg, Fl Public Library
For: “sexual innuendo, drug references, and other adult topics”
So I definitely read this book a little more than a year ago because I like other things Maureen Johnson has written. I was going to just write a blog post on it without rereading it, since I was 99% sure I knew exactly why it was being banned. Then I read the brief description on the challenged book list, got really confused by the “drug references”, and decided to bite the bullet and read it again, scouring it for the part that had escaped my memory where the three main characters (or anyone) does meth or at least talks about getting high. The good news is, my memory is actually pretty good; the only “drug reference” I could find in The Bermudez Triangle is that one of the main character’s smokes, although her friends are always trying to get her to stop. The idea that some impressionable teen girl would start smoking because of this book is pretty hilarious. The main characters also attend two parties with alcohol, although no one seems to really get drunk.
Here’s the scoop:
Nina, Avery, and Mel have been BFF forever, nicknamed The Bermudez Triangle (Bermudez is Nina’s last name) by some jealous girl that wanted into their private clique. Nina is the smart, organized, perfectionist one. Avery is the free-spirit, tough girl musician. Mel is the shy, girly one. Then Nina goes to some kind of Smart Kid Camp over the summer and falls in love with Jeremy Caves and Mel figures out that she’s gay, accidentally kisses Avery, and they start secretly dating. Natch this makes things totally awk when Nina comes back, especially after Avery decides she’s not actually gay and breaks up with Mel, Jeremy Caves cheats on Nina, and Mel’s mom finds out she’s gay and stops speaking to her. Luckily, through the power of friendship and with the help of a cute, funny guy named Parker who sadly–and kind of unfairly–never manages to get any girl, they pull through and Triangle Power lives again.
So, yeah, this book was fairly typical Three Best Friends Whose Friendship is Tested By Dating/Boys/The World, except for the whole lesbian thing, which was handled pretty tastefully. Avery and Mel kiss sometimes, and there are oblique references to “…. things.” but that’s about it. So, yes, the sexual content is about as in-your-face as drug references that are actually smoking. Seriously, Leesburg, I can totally hook you up with some YA Lit that ACTUALLY CONTAINS the things you are complaining about if you want to challenge something for real real next year. You know this and Only In Your Dreams is not the best you can do. Step it up.
I feel like this book misled me, which is a shame because I was so sure there was no way it could be anything less than totally awesome. Here’s the cover:
Zombies vs. Unicorns
I don’t know what I was expecting. Wait, no, I do; I was expecting zombies and unicorns battling to the death with humans looking on as the unlucky, occasionally gored/eaten bystanders. Then I realized it was a book of short stories edited by Holly Black (Team Unicorn) and Justine Larbalestier (Team Zombie). The stories are either about zombies or about unicorns (except for Garth Nix, who has both, which does not surprise me–you know he can’t get away from dead things–but they don’t even fight, so it doesn’t count). At first, I was impressed by the veritable YA lit author powerhouse they had assembled. The list includes: Maureen Johnson, Meg Cabot, Scott Westerfeld, and Carrie Ryan among others. But not even this could placate me for long about the total lack of zombie-on-unicorn action.
Also, admittedly, I have pretty high standards. Especially where zombies are concerned, being basically a Max Brooks-approved expert on the subject. Some of the stories were about the annoying, fluffy zombies who don’t try to kill people and mostly just make brain jokes and fall in love, clearly trying to lull us into a false sense of security for the impending zombocalypse. I disapprove in the strongest possible terms. In general, I also like unicorns to be ruthless, killing machines since–come on–they have a huge freaking weapon on their heads. If I had a horn, I would totally use it to maul people until they did my bidding.
I did kind of like Meg Cabot’s unicorn, clearly a parody, which farted a delicate floral scent and was named Princess Prettypants, and Naomi Novik’s, a shifty New York unicorn who doesn’t exactly play by the Unicorn Rulebook but, damn it, he gets results. On the zombie side, Carrie Ryan wrote an awesome, kickass-girl story in her Forest of Hands and Teeth universe, which I am already a fan of, and Scott Westerfeld went with the interesting idea of showing what teens growing up in a post-zombocaylpse world would do to be cool and distance themselves from the lame adults in their lives (hint: zombie virus is the drug of choice).
All these good points aside, I cannot get behind a book called Zombies vs. Unicorns that does not actually have zombies-fighting-unicorns action. I think it would look something like this:
—
I knew this was a bad idea the minute Francois was run through. As I watched that sharp, shimmering horn slide through his chest, I realized we probably should have never left the mall. Sure, I was sick of that fake muzak we couldn’t figure out how to turn off, and another gang of bikers was due to break in any day, but at least we were safe. I mean, besides the hordes of undead outside, clawing at the windows and moaning for our flesh, but that’s a given anywhere these days. The unicorns, though, they never try to get indoors. Not when there’s so much fresh meat outside.
Well, relatively fresh. Unicorns, for all their sparkly mystical powers, are not known for their discriminating tastes. Flesh-hungry zombie or scared-shitless human; they don’t really care which, it’s what’s for dinner. In fact, there’s been talk that they like humans even more because they usually have to chase us down first, and you know how they love showing off their billowy, glistening mane, bonus points if it catches the light of the full moon. Although that may have been just talk.
Still, after the unicorn that had gored Francois was busy licking up his blood, I climbed a tree. Unicorns can’t climb trees, right? I was less sure of myself when a few more showed up. Could unicorns fly? I knew they weren’t technically magic, having been created by our crack team of scientists to save humanity from the zombie horde, but, since THAT hadn’t turned out according to plan, I wondered what else was wrong. I tried to stay still, but they could probably smell me.
Luckily, at that moment, a faint moan wafted towards us on the breeze. The unicorns all perked up their ears, noses wet with Francois’ blood. Yes! I thought. Zombies! Maybe they’d followed us from the mall, or maybe they’d just caught my scent, or the scent of Francois’ unrecognizable corpse. Either way, maybe it would prove enough of a distraction to the unicorns that I could get away. Zombies were easy prey–but nothing about me has ever been easy.
—
Whenever I write example story-excerpts I like to give everyone French names because I think it makes everything sound more like a bad historical romance novel. The main character is called Antoinette.
Noted expert Rob McAuliffe actually included a zombies/unicorns link in the brilliant final he wrote for WIESS 101: Zombies in Fiction and Film, which is still on my desktop because reading it makes me happy. Since it includes such biting social commentary (read: is about real people at Wiess) I probably should not reproduce it in full (since Charles Lena would get pissed that his careful preparations do not, in fact, render him MVP). Here is the relevant excerpt from the end, however, when Rob and I are the only ones left alive from our class:
I begin to again crumple into a ball on the floor and prepare to die. Patricia tells me to get up, because she has one last plan. It, however, was going to require a great sacrifice, our soft hair. She explains that zombies could not possibly withstand our soft hair, and once we touch them with it they will turn into unicorns. We run back to Wiess shaking our hair at zombies along the way, filling the campus with bright sparkly pink unicorns. When we get back we cut off our hair and give it to the rest of the survivors. We are able to run around campus turning all of the zombies to unicorns. Unfortunately, unicorns it turns out also have a taste for human brains, and we are all eaten. (McAuliffe, R. 2007)
In conclusion, Rob and I totally could have written this book.
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