Birthday! Books!
Apr. 22nd, 2008 09:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pyatToday I am 34!
I share a birthday with Robert Oppenheimer, Lenin, Nabokov, and Chris Makepeace of Mazes and Monsters.
Generally speaking, my 30s have been much more interesting and engaging than my 20s. I am healthier, by and large happier, and seem to have settled into a career that did not actually exist when I entered university.
I have many of you to thank for that current happiness – new friends and old, and most especially![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
velvetpage who continues to surprise and thrill me after nearly nine years of marriage and fourteen years of being a couple. I have two intelligent and adorable daughters, a reasonably sound house, and an interesting job. There are many blessings to count, and count them I do!
I have no specific plans for today, beyond sushi withcommanderteddog and maybe watching a movie this evening with velvetpage. This suits me fine – I had cake on the weekend, and got presents from my older sister and my parents, as well as some gift cards, etc., from Erin’s grandparents and aunt and uncle.
***
Since last updating my reading list, I’ve finished:
• Post Captain, by Patrick O’Brian (1972)
• The Mauritius Command, by Patrick O’Brian (1977)
• The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Murakami (1997)
Post Captain was quite good, but the Mauritius Command was a trifle disappointing, though still solid. I’m not going to seek out any additional books by O’Brian unless I received specific recommendations, as I think I’ve read the best ones. I may have simply overdosed on Napoleonic-era sailing stories.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was my 17th book of the year thus far, and probably the most memorable. The story reminded me a bit of the anime film Paprika, at least in its quality of blurring lines between reality and internal fantasy. It also sparked me to do a lot of reading about Manchukuo and Mongolia. Wind-Up Bird had a sort of extraordinary cadence to it that drew me in and pulled me along for all 600+ pages, without ever losing my interest. I highly recommend it.
I also finished listening to my fifth audiobook, The Princess and the Goblin, written in 1872 by George Macdonald. Macdonald was a very influential fantasy writer, and served as fictional angelic guide for C.S. Lewis in The Great Divorce. This book was quite readable (listenable?) and the reader on Librivox has a clear voice with a cute accent. I am wondering if The Princess and the Goblin was the work which established the rule that all goblins in British fantasy novels should talk and act like boorish Cockneys.
I share a birthday with Robert Oppenheimer, Lenin, Nabokov, and Chris Makepeace of Mazes and Monsters.
Generally speaking, my 30s have been much more interesting and engaging than my 20s. I am healthier, by and large happier, and seem to have settled into a career that did not actually exist when I entered university.
I have many of you to thank for that current happiness – new friends and old, and most especially
velvetpage who continues to surprise and thrill me after nearly nine years of marriage and fourteen years of being a couple. I have two intelligent and adorable daughters, a reasonably sound house, and an interesting job. There are many blessings to count, and count them I do!I have no specific plans for today, beyond sushi with
commanderteddog and maybe watching a movie this evening with velvetpage. This suits me fine – I had cake on the weekend, and got presents from my older sister and my parents, as well as some gift cards, etc., from Erin’s grandparents and aunt and uncle.***
Since last updating my reading list, I’ve finished:
• Post Captain, by Patrick O’Brian (1972)
• The Mauritius Command, by Patrick O’Brian (1977)
• The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Murakami (1997)
Post Captain was quite good, but the Mauritius Command was a trifle disappointing, though still solid. I’m not going to seek out any additional books by O’Brian unless I received specific recommendations, as I think I’ve read the best ones. I may have simply overdosed on Napoleonic-era sailing stories.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was my 17th book of the year thus far, and probably the most memorable. The story reminded me a bit of the anime film Paprika, at least in its quality of blurring lines between reality and internal fantasy. It also sparked me to do a lot of reading about Manchukuo and Mongolia. Wind-Up Bird had a sort of extraordinary cadence to it that drew me in and pulled me along for all 600+ pages, without ever losing my interest. I highly recommend it.
I also finished listening to my fifth audiobook, The Princess and the Goblin, written in 1872 by George Macdonald. Macdonald was a very influential fantasy writer, and served as fictional angelic guide for C.S. Lewis in The Great Divorce. This book was quite readable (listenable?) and the reader on Librivox has a clear voice with a cute accent. I am wondering if The Princess and the Goblin was the work which established the rule that all goblins in British fantasy novels should talk and act like boorish Cockneys.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 01:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 01:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 01:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 01:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 01:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:54 pm (UTC)What topic shall I write your birthday poem about? :-D
no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:56 pm (UTC);)
I dares ya!
How did your interview go?
no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 02:58 pm (UTC)Happy birthday!
no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:05 pm (UTC)Thanks, Bahr.
no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-22 03:17 pm (UTC)Or anyway, I certainly have trouble remembering life before the Internet.