Whatta Fiasco

The first of what looks to be a set of books about vampires that never uses the word “vampire” by an author who came out of the same set that produced Emma Bull. Aside from the main character being a first class cad (but he’s a vampire after all) and the secondary characters being a bit flat, the writing is decent and the book is fun and light. I’ll be reading more by Brust but I’ll likely track down some of the Vlad Taltos books before continuing with this set.

When Ang Lee is good, he’s very good. This is one of my favorites and stands up well to repeat viewing.

An idealistic young man goes to work as a mine supervisor to avoid serving in the Japanese military in WWII. He finds himself supervising Chinese prisoners of war and endsup clashing with his superiors over how best to treat them. Things go badly. Thisis the first of a trilogy of films.

Not only did I find the missing library book, Avram Davidson’s The Phoenix and the Mirror, but I also discovered I hadn’t read it yet. Heavens! That can’t be allowed to happen! Five chapters in, it’s an excellent story. It starts with Virgil escaping from a bunch of smelly manticores underground, only to be trapped by a lovely lady into promising to make for her a speculum majorum. That would be the classical magic mirror, the one that reveals the heart’s desire. The problem is that he needs unworked ore of both tin and copper in order to make the “virginal” bronze required and neither is available. Everyone knows that copper comes from the island of Cyprus, but the trade routes there are so tightly controlled that something as bulky as copper ore simply can’t be transported. Only the refined ingots are available. And everyone knows that tin comes from Tinland, but no one–not even the merchants who transport the ingots into civilization–knows where Tinland is. Quite the pickle.

Anyhow, aside from the delights of the story itself, Davidson is having immense amounts of fun with language, playing up the classical side of things. (Not unusual for him at all.) Thus, we end up with a British author writing in 1969, deliberately using obscure language to high effect. I thought I’d give you a taste of some of the more interesting specimens from those first five chapters.

Nigromancer: If you’ve run across the term nigritude you’ll recognize this as a variant on necromancer, a practitioner of the black arts.

Transmogrification: To change in shape, usually in fantastical ways. If you’ve read any Calvin and Hobbes this won’t qualify as obscure at all, but it’s still fun to run across.

Apotropos: (Looks Greek to me.) I haven’t found an authoritative reference on this one yet but it relates to warding off or preventing evil influences.

Mystagogue: Not much mystery here, but I’ve never run across the term before. One who holds or spreads mystical doctrines, or one who interprets mysteries.

Lorimer: One who makes bits, spurs and metal mountings for bridles and saddles.

Pilaster: A rectangular column with capital and base projecting only slightly from the wall. In short, it’s a fake, ornamental column. Whenever I see this word I think of plaster and how it’s used to create fake architectural details.

Horlogue: Nothing to do with whores. This is a variant of horologue, which form may be less confusing. From context it was clear he was referring to a time keeping device.

Curile: If you consult google you’ll mostly find the phrase “curile aedile” which is of only limited use in figuring this one out. It’s more useful to know that it’s a variant of curule, a particular type of curved-leg chair/stool reserved for the use of Roman officials, which is how curile came to be a synonym for official.

Epicene: Another not terribly obscure word, but one I have trouble pinning down. Whenever I see it I’m torn between epicure and eocene. Instead it’s something related to both sexes or that is sexless. It can also refer to something that’s inappropriately feminine.

Elaboratory: Laboratories may be elaborate places, but a lab is just a very short version of an elaboratory. You can thank the French for the original.

Calker: It very much looks like a variant of caulker. It refers to those who apply oakum between the planks of a ship to make it more watertight. As a bonus, oakum has little to do with oak trees. Oakum is what you get when you pick apart old, rotting rope (hemp or jute) back into separate fibers, an activity once used to keep prisoner inmates busy. The rope used for this had normally been tarred previously in its existence. If untarred rope was used, the result was white oakum.

Caffle: Although I had a good idea of what this was from context, it was difficult to track down until discovering that it was a variant of coffle, a group of animals, prisoners or slaves chained together in a line.

Jupon: A sleeveless jacket worn over armor. It usually came down past the waist and was often quilted. It is related to the gambeson, lentner, and arming jacket. Thank the French again.

Futtering: Welcome to the world of polite obscenities. I’m having difficulty tracking down the exact meaning of this one. Suffice it to say that this is one of many relatives of our old friend, fuck. And thanks to Prurient Latin Vocabulary List, I know this almost certainly refers to some variety of vaginal sex.

Geminor: I have completely struck out on this one so far. “Meanwhile, sir, before the servants reach us with water, geminors, and napkins, to what may I help you for a savory?” To geminate is to double or place in pairs (Gemini) but I’m at a loss for what this has to do with table service. Chopsticks? A pair of forks? I just don’t know.

See? Loads of fun in less than fifty pages. Alternatively, you can come to my house and shovel some more snow. But you’ll have to hurry because, even though we got a couple of inches, it’s melting fast.

Just because I can.

I got email from the KC library today informing me that I had a book overdue. Again? Cripes. I don’t even remember actually checking that book out, let alone reading it in the past month and a half. Although I do remember picking it up off the shelf and considering it, so maybe I did check it out after all. I’m going to have to go tearing through the house tonight looking for it. (Avram Davidson’s The Phoenix and the Mirror). If I find it and it turns out I haven’t read it, I’ll have to remedy that right quick. If I don’t find I’ll just have to spend some time tearing my hair out. (Figuratively.)

Last week I spent most of the week avoiding meat, just on a lark. As I had suspected, it wasn’t all that difficult or major an adjustment for me so long as I didn’t get too hard core about it. There was one restaurant meal that included a rice pilaf that was cooked in chicken stock. I knew it ahead of time and decided against asking for a substitution. If I were an ethical vegetarian it would be different, but that’s not the life or diet I want. There was only one time all week when I made a deliberate decision to eat something I otherwise wouldn’t have in order to meet my not very stringent requirements. Once. It turns out that for most of the places where we eat out, my favorite dish is a veggie one. (Vegan would be an entirely different story!) On the downside, eating vegetarian does not automatically translate into eating healthy.

So this week I decided to try something a little more drastic. This week I decided to actively reduce the amount of sugar I consume. For all the tinkering I’ve done with my diet over the past few years, every time I’ve faced the sugar issue, I’ve turned around and walked the other way. No sugar? Am I insane? Particularly given that I don’t do artificial sweeteners with the exception of diet cola at the movie theater. (Hubby and I share. He prefers diet. I don’t want a regular cola and there are few palatable options at most theaters. Water with popcorn? Oh please.) I kicked the soda habit at work years ago and finally got the regular stuff out of the house once the kids were gone. Good, yes? But I replaced the soda with coffee and tea. With lots of extra sugar. I’m not insane enough to go cold turkey on the stuff, but I’ve started cutting down quite a bit. Coffee at work is no longer getting any sugar, just creamer. I read the label on the creamer container and discovered that the number one ingredient was, yep, sugar. For some reason, just knowing that made it easier not to add even more sugar.

Anyhow, it’s only been two days and it’s both easier and harder. Easier in that I don’t really miss the sugar taste. Harder in that I can tell I haven’t replaced those missing calories. Can I really tell the difference represented by roughly two-hundred calories over the course of the day or am I just imagining it? It will take a  few more days at least to figure that out.

Oh boy. We may get our first snow of the season tomorrow night. Brr.

Update: I found the book. Um. In my library totebag. How embarrassing.

Today was a day for sharing memories and stories. A cold and somewhat rainy day, if you hadn’t known D.J. you might have been surprised by ho many people turned out. As important as it was to pay some small tribute to a phenomenal person, it was just as important to see just how much of a community had built around him. And among many other things, he is owed some credit for Five Rings Fencing existing.

It was also a day for food. We got early (for a Sunday) and made it out to breakfast with good friends. Then it was off to the grocery store to buy what we needed for the dish we were taking to the memorial service. (Whole wheat couscous cooked in vegetable broth with dried cranberries. Too healthy by half.) Then off to the groaning boards at the memorial service and talking with more good friends and the story about the little dog that jumped into the shark tank and never came out. (No, you don’t want to know.) And on the way home we were making plans to have sushi with yet more friends. More good food. More good company. And I got to deliver the matching set of stocking caps for dad, kid, and baby doll. Very cute.

Life is good, but spending a little time alone on the couch with a cat sleeping next to me is good too. Until she farts odiferously.

This is another on of those films about making a film, but done run off yet. This one features Maggie Cheung playing herself playing Irma Vep, famous jewel thief, in a fictional remake of the classic French silent movie, LesVampires. She’s in Paris. She speaks no French. The director is a washed up has been. The set is chaos. We get to see some clips from a classic Maggie Cheung movie (one I’ve seen but I don’t recall the title) as well as bits of the original Les Vampires. We even get a critique of French cinema as a concept. The entire thing is a mess but Maggie spends much of the film wearing a black latex cat suit. The only vampires in evidence are the emotional kind but the cat suits are cool. Plus we get to watch Maggie Cheung act by not acting.

It seems to have been a week for bad news. It started Monday night with word that a man I have admired much, the patriarch of the Black Archers, had lost his fight with cancer. Sad news but not unexpected. I was glad to hear he’d been able to spend his last days in the place where he wanted to be. He will be long missed and long remembered.
And the gorgeous dog they had on stage for the production of Carlisle Floyd’s Of Mice and Men? Her name was Bella and she got her picture in the paper. It turns out she was diagnosed with lymphoma just after getting cast in the part and had to be put down the day before the last performance. That was sad news.

Next was word that Mr. Maggie’s father fell and broke his hip at an age where such things are not trivial. Life is all too fragile a thing but he’s being taken care of and Mr. Maggie seems to be holding up as well as can be expected. Many good thoughts are winging their way in his direction.

This morning I got word that one of my favorite apa friends is in the process of getting divorced. At least it sounds like an amicable split, but even a friendly breakup isn’t easy. Good thoughts are going that direction too.
It also reminded me that I had intended to rejoin APA Centauri after lapsing last cycle, but the time got away from me again. Alas. So I fired off an email to the CM (where do all these nice Canadians come from?) to see about getting set up again in time for the annish. It’s about time for me to do some more writing again. That would be much better for me than getting sucked into trying to knit a sweater. I need to do some writing to get some of these words out of my head.

Enough with the bad news. Think good thoughts. Live your life in the now. Remember that eschewing (as opposed to chewing) meat does not guarantee a healthy diet. Too much yarn is much preferable to having not quite enough. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

The first four episodes of this anime series are on the disk and it takes all four to even begin to get a handle on what might be going on. A violent underground society ruled by wealthy gangs. Limb amputation is not only the standard punishment for stepping out of line here but is also a source of entertainment. A little girl who can see a possible future. A beautiful doctor/technician who not only creates amazing artificial limbs but also seems to have a thing for amputees. Lots of lingering gore and violence. The art work tries to be moody and edgy but comes off as cold and looking like a poor imitation of Lain. Satoshi Kon’s animation can tend toward this flatness, but he makes up for it with engaging and very human characters.

Book three of three. Much better than I had expected after the second one. Good strong finish. Still wish he would have fleshed out the dinosaur type aliens a little better, but the Yet Another Alien Species was a nice one.