andrew_jorgensen

I keep flirting with books - and I do not need to acquire any more books.
I have 100s of books on a TBR list as it is.

Latest? The Botanist's Assistant by Peggy Townsend

Blurb: "A murder in the science lab shatters a woman’s quiet and ordered life when she decides she must solve the crime herself in this entertaining and uplifting mystery.
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And this review via Smart Bitches got my attention.

"This is a book about a quiet, steady woman in her 50s who is dogged in her pursuit of justice. Margaret is a research assistant and she’s perfectly suited to the job: she’s methodical, reliable and devoted to science. When her boss dies unexpectedly, it is Margaret alone who suspects murder. In the way of these things, she is dismissed and not believed.

As to that disbelief: the book is frank about how older women who don’t conform to beauty standards are invisible to the greater world. When they are seen, they’re a topic of pity or ridicule, depending on the viewer’s degree of kindness. Margaret is a figure of fun to many of her colleagues. She’s a big boned tall woman and she’s called ‘Big Bird’ as a cruel nickname."

Hmm, I've not really run into that? Or no one has said that to my face? Of course I work for an organization that you could get fired for doing that.
And people aren't "pretty" or "striking" in Civil Service - that's only in the Glamour Industries, High Finance, and Advertising. I didn't think it was true in science or academia, though?

Although this review and the blurb may be enough to talk me into purchasing it. I don't want the audiobook though, I think I want the Kindle? Or I'll hunt it at Lofty Pigeons.

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Today's Question from Question a Day Meme:

20. How often do you declutter? Is there somewhere you need to declutter, but haven’t got around to it?

Sigh. Constantly. I'm waging a losing battle against paper clutter. Partly due to the insane amount of junk mail that I receive.

Ugh, how do I get it to stop?

Right now, I need to declutter a pantry, and television stand, and a end table.

Now, I just have to decide if I want to keep the ENT appointment on Monday. I'm thinking it's probably a good idea, since I've had the vertigo twice this fall - and both times associated with severe sinus congestion and weather fluctuations.

But, it's nice that it is blessedly gone now. The pills I was taking for it - really did help. Along with the nasal spray.

Already decided to switch the Personal Day from Friday to Monday. Works better all around.

Buffy S4/Angel S1 Rewatch

It's worth keeping in mind that the two shows have definitively different tones and are different genres. Angel is paranormal horror noir, while Buffy is paranormal horror romance (well, romantic horror at any rate).
Angel S1 makes it a lot clearer than I thought, mainly because the Angel fandom kept insisting it was the Classical Hero's Journey (all evidence to the contrary). I can kind of see why they thought that? And Whedon didn't help. But if anything they are undercutting that trope in Angel.

Blind Date, the 21st episode of Angel S1 - is another WRH episode, which are by far the best episodes in the season. And it is an arc episode.
The episode has all the main arc players except for Kate (who I think the writers were re-thinking as a potential romance at this point, Angel isn't really a romance? Nor does Angel really need one?). Gunn is there instead of Kate, in the thankless role of distraction - playing up the stereotypes.

What is interesting about the episode is how cleverly the writers manage to hoodwink their audience. I didn't realize they did it - when I first watched ages ago, when it aired live. I wished I had, I would have kept watching, instead of jumping in and out of it like I did - skipping episodes. When I first saw it live, and even the second time I saw it prior to seeing Season 4, I didn't see the twist. They completely fooled me along with the fandom. I thought the episode was lame and it annoyed me. Now that I see the twist. It's kind of hilarious and rather clever. And perfectly foils the characters. I see it now, of course. After having seen S5 several times, it's pretty obvious - but it wasn't then.
( how they fool their audience )

Buffy S4: New Moon Rising - there's several things the writers need to accomplish in this episode. In a way, Blind Date is easier? I liked it a lot better, because it's nice and twisty, and they hoodwink the lead characters and audience. And once you see it - it's hilarious. I love episodes like that. With hidden twists. Even if I don't see it until years later and I was also hoodwinked. I think I would have enjoyed the series more the first go-around, if I'd seen the twist and not been hoodwinked.

In New Moon Rising - they need to somehow get Adam and Spike together. Also firmly shut the door on the Willow/Oz romance, and open it on the Willow/Tara (also firmly state that this is a romantic relationship and have Willow come out of the closet to Buffy). And, get Riley to cut ties with the Initiative. (Not to worry, he returns in S5. Take the boy out of the military, but you can't take the military out of the boy - which is kind of clear in this episode.)

It's a very plotty episode, so not the best. Much like S3 - the arc episodes aren't as good. The problem here is Riley/Adam and the Initiative, while in S3 it was the Mayor/Faith (although I liked the Mayor/Faith better than Riley/Adam - I like S4 better than S3, mainly due to the characters, and the situation).

That said - this episode is among the better arc episodes, and works better than a lot of the previous ones did in hitting all the crucial points. Not sure who wrote it? Ah, Marti Noxon. (Jeannine Renishaw wrote Blind Date Angel s1). Explains a lot. Noxon wrote Willow/Tara the best.
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1. Someone decided to "Monopolize" to be read or TBR reading lists. Basically they created a Monopoly version of a game to figure out what to read next from their home libraries.

Welcome to the internet - where you get everyone's opinions on things, and find out about weird game ideas that never occurred to you.

I don't know, sounds time consuming. Some people have a lot of free time on their hands, or don't watch as much television as I do. Granted television is pretty much all that my Vertigo will allow at the moment. Reading just aggravates it. This (DW) isn't as taxing - I can skim.

2. Buffy S4 and Angel S1 Rewatch - eh, Where the Wild Things Are is actually, gasp, better than War Zone. Both shows are attempting to be more diverse and failing miserably. Buffy S4 has Forrest, who well...just no? On a good day he's a chauvinist, on a bad day, a misogynist. War Zone picked the wrong family member to join up with Angel, it should have been Gunn's sister. Who was more interesting, and less obvious. I mean, they called him "Gunn" - how stereotypical can they be? I can't quite decide if they meant it ironically - it's possible? Except he kind of works as the proverbial "gun" on the show. Also Angel desperately needs more badass female characters. These are both weak episodes but for very different reasons. Gunn's sister didn't have an obvious name, and had character.

( War Zone, not the best episode )

Where the Wild Things Are - is written by Tracey Forbes, who also wrote Beer Bad, (& I think Something Blue) and possibly owned the kitten that Willow and Tara adopt, and we never see again. It's a mixed bag. The whole thing flops, but there are separate bits that work - actually everything that is not connected to the Initiative, Riley, Adam, or Buffy works in this episode. Xander/Anya are further developed, and the writers appear to notice their relationship is too much about sex, and in a nice twist have Anya upset with Xander for not wanting more of it. In previous seasons - Xander was dying for it, but once Faith takes advantage of him, he calms down. (I don't think he and Cordy ever slept together. It's pretty clear Faith was his first from their comments on it.) Also, more development of Giles - we get to see Head sing finally. But the skeevy sweaters have got to go? And the best scenes in the whole episode are actually between Spike and Anya, and Spike and well everybody. He's stealing every scene he's in. He's on for about ten minutes and steals all of them.

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Been battling a sick sinus headache from hell all weekend and got really sick last night with it. ( TMID )

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Not wanting to watch anything that requires too much concentration or movement. I watched Grey's Anatomy's Season Finale, and have been watching per yourlibrarian's rec on tv talk, "Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, the Last Movie Stars" - a documentary on HBO MAX directed/edited by Ethan Hawk, and the Newman children, along with someone else. It surprised me. It's not just a documentary, but rather a series similar to what was done with Billy Joel. And Hawk, who was given the task during the pandemic, decides to approach it from the angel of well, a fellow actor, director, and artist - not a gossip columnist or journalist. Which from my perspective - makes it far more entertaining and interesting. And looks at how the personal lives of the actors interacted with, informed, enhanced, and at times got in the way of their work - and how the work often got in the way of their personal lives.

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Be prepared for more on this, since I liked it. Oh, Ken Burns documentary, The American Revolution is on PBS tonight. You know the guy who did The Civil War documentary, Jazz, and Baseball. I've discovered I like documentary's well enough depending on the subject and how they are done. I don't like watching people talk to me through a television or computer screen, but over video footage or film footage - works really well for me.

I grabbed it from dirtygreatknife.

The rules: bold the ones you've read, italicize the ones you tried but couldn't finish, and underline the ones you loved. (I changed it from intend to read to couldn't finish, because intent changes on a daily basis).
( 100 Books )

I've read a lot of them, can't remember half of them. And many I was assigned to read in school.