State of the Sarah
Oct. 18th, 2007 04:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
moominmuppetSince I haven't been very posty, and I know some of you worry when I'm not, here's the quick update:
We're going into our annual work hell (annual online benefits enrollment for 30,000 employees). I'm going to be working six day weeks for the next few, and likely going to be badly burned out the end of most days, especially since all of this is on top of the ongoing office dysfunction. I'm also a touch on the depressed side at the moment, although not at all badly so, and between those factors and a few other things in life, I suspect most of my free time is going to be about zoning out, recuperation, and distraction, with only a bit of socializing here and there, especially since I forgot to trim back my other commitments with patient-instructing and escorting during the enrollment period like I normally try to.
A few very quick notes about a few things, though. The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden is absolutely gorgeous, and utterly deserving of the awards it's winning. I've loved and collected fairy and folk tales since I was a child (the less Disneyfied, the better), and she has a wonderful feel for how to write them, and manages to layer and interlock her stories in a marvelously complex and engrossing manner, while moving from one style of tale to another with remarkable ease. This is a book I want to read out loud to someone, and I can't wait for the sequel to come out at the end of this month. I ordered my own copies of both from Visible Voice before the library copy was even out of my hot little hands.
Also, my Books to Read pile is getting way out of hand. I've got about a dozen library books and about two dozen of my own stacked up on the "must read soon" piles, and about a half dozen still to come in from Visible Voice and Amazon. *headdesk* Also, five Netflix, two SugarDVD, that one of the history of vibrators that I ordered a week or so ago (ah, Passion & POWER: The Technology of Orgasm), and the four-season set of A Bit of Fry and Laurie, because![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
yendi pointed out the BBC sale at Amazon, and the temptation was just too great. At least if I'm going to hole up in 'low energy' mode I'll have plenty of entertainment. Yeesh. Perhaps I could arrange for a particularly well-equipped desert isle for some period of time?
I'm currently reading What Becomes You. More on it later, but from the perspective of 80 pages in, I'm really loving it, and Aaron has just as fascinating a brain as I'd been told. I've read more transition books than the average bear, I'd guess, but this one is catching me on many more levels, even aside from the second-degree personal connection (which does, admittedly, add to the fun).
I did get to go out on Saturday withjen_tel and a friend of hers, though. Her friend and I were relatively sure we recognized each other, and I started going down the list of where we might know each other from (Preterm, LGBT Center, patient-instructing, job, etc), and discovered I'd been her patient-instructor! That was very cool; she's awesome, and finishing up her midwifery training, and it was nice to have it reaffirmed that the sense I sometimes get that this or that student is probably a really cool human being is sometimes quite accurate. Patient-instructing is a very limited amount of very focused time; it's not the appropriate place to get all social and personal, generally. It's always fun when I get to meet my students under other circumstances. So, that was cool. Then jen_tel and I went to see Across the Universe. I wanted to love it more. I should've been the prime demographic for this one, and I just didn't love it as much as I wanted to. Some really gorgeous and powerful scenes, especially visually, and some very likeable and attractive characters, but it didn't pull together as cohesively as I would've liked, I thought Hair did a much better job at a musical interpretation of the horrors and tensions of the Vietnam era, and it felt like some song snippets were a bit shoe-horned in.
Incidentally, Jen and I both wanted to just follow Sadie, the Janis character, because she was gorgeous and fabulous. However, I had some definite nitpicking about putting her in that role. First of all, Janis never made it near her apparent age or maturity. Secondly, Janis wasn't self-assuredly physically gorgeous -- a lot of what influenced her was how down she was about her own appearance, and what influenced her audiences and fans was the power of her personality and performance, not a "pretty face". That's so much of who she was, and what forces formed her, that it feels downright disrespectful to insert gratuitous model-gorgeousness into that role. Still, nits picked, Sadie was just fun to watch and drool over, more so when I ignored what she was meant to represent.
On the positive side, gratuitous Bread and Puppet puppets and Eddie Izzard always make me smile, and the lesbian character was adorable, if much, much too subtle. I suspect it's a movie I'll see again on DVD, as I'm very curious as to the special features that'll be included, and the commentary track that will hopefully be present.
Right now (well, actually in bits over the past three days -- I left this morning with 15 minutes left to go) I'm watching Superman The Movie: Expanded Edition, which is a somewhat strange experience, given that it's been so long since I saw the theatrical release that I'm having trouble recognizing what wasn't there before as opposed to the bits I've just forgotten. Still, for all the flaws and the bits that age poorly, I think I'll always be deeply fond of this movie. Also to be viewed sometime very soon: Farce of the Penguins, The Blues Brothers Extended Cut (*bouncebounce*), The Einstein of Sex, Bad Taste (gotta wonder how many people see "from the director of The Lord of the Rings" and get themselves into something entirely unexpected?), and Full Frontal (which has gotten mostly hideous reviews, but I'm curious to check it out anyway).
Oh, and I got Morph's bloodwork back, and he's all healthy. The steroid shot seems to have controlled his allergies enough for his skin to heal, which is wonderful, and he's not hyperthyroid, which means I'm not forking over another $40/mo in cat meds, which is also wonderful. I'm hoping I can get some more meat on his bones with the tuna before I consider putting him under anesthesia for the dental work he needs, though. It's likely that has to do with his overall weight loss, but he's skinny and old enough now that I'm nervous about putting him under, so if I can plump him up a bit first, I'll feel better about that option.
Oh, and in the time-honored tradition of such anti-contraception appointees as David Hager, On Monday, President Bush appointed Susan Orr to oversee federal family planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Fuckhead.
So, that's everything at the moment.
We're going into our annual work hell (annual online benefits enrollment for 30,000 employees). I'm going to be working six day weeks for the next few, and likely going to be badly burned out the end of most days, especially since all of this is on top of the ongoing office dysfunction. I'm also a touch on the depressed side at the moment, although not at all badly so, and between those factors and a few other things in life, I suspect most of my free time is going to be about zoning out, recuperation, and distraction, with only a bit of socializing here and there, especially since I forgot to trim back my other commitments with patient-instructing and escorting during the enrollment period like I normally try to.
A few very quick notes about a few things, though. The Orphan's Tales: In the Night Garden is absolutely gorgeous, and utterly deserving of the awards it's winning. I've loved and collected fairy and folk tales since I was a child (the less Disneyfied, the better), and she has a wonderful feel for how to write them, and manages to layer and interlock her stories in a marvelously complex and engrossing manner, while moving from one style of tale to another with remarkable ease. This is a book I want to read out loud to someone, and I can't wait for the sequel to come out at the end of this month. I ordered my own copies of both from Visible Voice before the library copy was even out of my hot little hands.
Also, my Books to Read pile is getting way out of hand. I've got about a dozen library books and about two dozen of my own stacked up on the "must read soon" piles, and about a half dozen still to come in from Visible Voice and Amazon. *headdesk* Also, five Netflix, two SugarDVD, that one of the history of vibrators that I ordered a week or so ago (ah, Passion & POWER: The Technology of Orgasm), and the four-season set of A Bit of Fry and Laurie, because
yendi pointed out the BBC sale at Amazon, and the temptation was just too great. At least if I'm going to hole up in 'low energy' mode I'll have plenty of entertainment. Yeesh. Perhaps I could arrange for a particularly well-equipped desert isle for some period of time?I'm currently reading What Becomes You. More on it later, but from the perspective of 80 pages in, I'm really loving it, and Aaron has just as fascinating a brain as I'd been told. I've read more transition books than the average bear, I'd guess, but this one is catching me on many more levels, even aside from the second-degree personal connection (which does, admittedly, add to the fun).
I did get to go out on Saturday with
jen_tel and a friend of hers, though. Her friend and I were relatively sure we recognized each other, and I started going down the list of where we might know each other from (Preterm, LGBT Center, patient-instructing, job, etc), and discovered I'd been her patient-instructor! That was very cool; she's awesome, and finishing up her midwifery training, and it was nice to have it reaffirmed that the sense I sometimes get that this or that student is probably a really cool human being is sometimes quite accurate. Patient-instructing is a very limited amount of very focused time; it's not the appropriate place to get all social and personal, generally. It's always fun when I get to meet my students under other circumstances. So, that was cool. Then jen_tel and I went to see Across the Universe. I wanted to love it more. I should've been the prime demographic for this one, and I just didn't love it as much as I wanted to. Some really gorgeous and powerful scenes, especially visually, and some very likeable and attractive characters, but it didn't pull together as cohesively as I would've liked, I thought Hair did a much better job at a musical interpretation of the horrors and tensions of the Vietnam era, and it felt like some song snippets were a bit shoe-horned in. Incidentally, Jen and I both wanted to just follow Sadie, the Janis character, because she was gorgeous and fabulous. However, I had some definite nitpicking about putting her in that role. First of all, Janis never made it near her apparent age or maturity. Secondly, Janis wasn't self-assuredly physically gorgeous -- a lot of what influenced her was how down she was about her own appearance, and what influenced her audiences and fans was the power of her personality and performance, not a "pretty face". That's so much of who she was, and what forces formed her, that it feels downright disrespectful to insert gratuitous model-gorgeousness into that role. Still, nits picked, Sadie was just fun to watch and drool over, more so when I ignored what she was meant to represent.
On the positive side, gratuitous Bread and Puppet puppets and Eddie Izzard always make me smile, and the lesbian character was adorable, if much, much too subtle. I suspect it's a movie I'll see again on DVD, as I'm very curious as to the special features that'll be included, and the commentary track that will hopefully be present.
Right now (well, actually in bits over the past three days -- I left this morning with 15 minutes left to go) I'm watching Superman The Movie: Expanded Edition, which is a somewhat strange experience, given that it's been so long since I saw the theatrical release that I'm having trouble recognizing what wasn't there before as opposed to the bits I've just forgotten. Still, for all the flaws and the bits that age poorly, I think I'll always be deeply fond of this movie. Also to be viewed sometime very soon: Farce of the Penguins, The Blues Brothers Extended Cut (*bouncebounce*), The Einstein of Sex, Bad Taste (gotta wonder how many people see "from the director of The Lord of the Rings" and get themselves into something entirely unexpected?), and Full Frontal (which has gotten mostly hideous reviews, but I'm curious to check it out anyway).
Oh, and I got Morph's bloodwork back, and he's all healthy. The steroid shot seems to have controlled his allergies enough for his skin to heal, which is wonderful, and he's not hyperthyroid, which means I'm not forking over another $40/mo in cat meds, which is also wonderful. I'm hoping I can get some more meat on his bones with the tuna before I consider putting him under anesthesia for the dental work he needs, though. It's likely that has to do with his overall weight loss, but he's skinny and old enough now that I'm nervous about putting him under, so if I can plump him up a bit first, I'll feel better about that option.
Oh, and in the time-honored tradition of such anti-contraception appointees as David Hager, On Monday, President Bush appointed Susan Orr to oversee federal family planning programs at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Fuckhead.
So, that's everything at the moment.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 08:57 pm (UTC)EVERYONE SHOULD READ IT! GO, NOW! lol
P.S. You seem to read way more than almost anyone I know, but your Books to Read pile is getting out of hand?? LOL, I guess that's possible, since there are infinite interesting books out there. =) So apparently, reading fast doesn't help. XD
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 09:31 pm (UTC)*chuckle* And that's just the actual stack. It doesn't count the 200-item spreadsheet of "Books to Read", or all the other things in my house that I haven't gotten around to but am not raring to get into right this minute.
LOL, I guess that's possible, since there are infinite interesting books out there. =)
*chuckle* So very true. My grandmother's great fear in life is that she would die without having finished whatever book she was reading. It made me immeasurably happy when we went to clear out her apartment and I discovered that her bookmark was in the appendices of "A History of the Hutterites".
So apparently, reading fast doesn't help.
Not in the least. I suspect it actually makes things worse, since there are so many more ways to find out about new interesting stuff through the things I'm currently reading.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 10:53 pm (UTC)Oh yeah, heh, that's very true! My favorite authors list has also grown since I've had time to read this year. I need to read all their other books!
We're dooooooomed! Haha!
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 09:47 pm (UTC)*nod* I was bubbling about it to everyone I talked to by the time I was 30 pages in, I think.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-18 10:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-21 03:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-23 09:07 pm (UTC)