MOOP!

I just finished reading a book to which I don't have the sequel _and_ the Minuteman system doesn't have the sequel. But BPL does! So I think my new mission (should I choose to accept it) is to get a BPL library card, and then ten thousand bonus points if I can figure out how to get their ebooks onto Talia and/or their physical books delivered to the library next to my workplace instead of downtown.

***

Mission accomplished (at least with the digital card), though no bonus points earned. But I did completely read the book on my work computer --it was short! But yeah, it's definitely time for another one of these posts before I start forgetting what I've consumed.

Finished Reading Recently:

OKAY SO! When last we checked in, I had finished All Systems Red (Murderbot diaries #1, by Martha Wells) and was excited to read Artificial Conditions. I managed that sometime last week, and then today among everything else I read¹ I charged through Rogue Protocol. I don't yet have a copy of Network Effect which is #5. It's in transit to be picked up at my local library but I am very very reluctant to pick up #4, because the way I feel right now, having finished #3 about ten minutes ago, is that I could very easily read #s 4-7 tonight. They are _so fucking good_. Everyone who ever said good things about these books were telling the truth. The fight scenes are good, the feelings are SO GOOD, the complex human interactions are good, the pathos is heartbreakingly delightful, these books are GOOD.

Also last check had me finished Tamora Pierce's second Alanna book, at YTS I had enough downtime to polish off The Woman who Rides Like a Man, and today I finished Lioness Rampant. There are...some...uncomfortable colonialist narratives, huh? Also dang, I really truly love and appreciate how much of a slut Alanna is² but she kinda sorta can't pick 'em. Liam is solidly _okay_ but has some *extremely* irritating moments, and Jon just straight up suuuucks all the time. George is better now that Alanna's into him too, I guess. I suppose I have to treasure Kel as my aspec heroine of choice.

(It's actually really interesting how I don't think anything in these books is really all that much cringier than the Lackey I have on frequent reread cycles, but maybe because I haven't reread them every eighteen months in the same way, they read more that way. I think Alanna and Kero would have a _great_ time together, as long as Alanna could hold her temper. Anyways, I should probably read through all of Daine and Kel next --I reread Daine not too many years ago, but I don't think I've read First Test since like...high school, despite rereading Squire once a year oslt.)

The Unshelved Book Club recommended Geography Club by Brett Hartinger. Well okay, technically they recommended the third in the series, which sounded *great* (queer student club serve as extras in a zombie movie) but when I saw there were earlier novels, I decided to give it a try. It was actually pretty fun! The narrative voice was charming and felt pretty realistic (although gosh, when I was sixteen I definitely didn't want to have The Sex this bad) and I appreciated the way it shook out. I have the second and third books checked out, but haven't gotten to them yet.

Unshelved also recommended Stoner and Spaz by Ron Koertge. I tore through that today --it's very short!-- and followed it up with the sequel, referenced at the start of this entry. I recommend reading them as a pair. They're not anything groundbreaking, but they're funny and touching and very human in the best possible way. I like human.

When trying to find a copy of The Pirate's Mixed Up Voyage for Talia, I stumbled across a Margaret Mahy easy reader called The Man Whose Mother Was a Pirate. It was charming, as only Mahy can write, but suffered from being on my ereader. I am so pissy that there is not an ebook of Mixed Up Voyage. I know it's an obscure little unknown middle grade chapter book from 1983 but it is my Favourite Book and I should have it in every format available.

In addition to all of the above, I read a goodly chunk of the ancient webcomic Wapsi Square, which I had apparently never read very much of in the past. I basically did the first major story arc, and I'm probably not going to continue. To be clear, I read _nine years_ of the comic, I just...liked seeing that much of the story and don't really think I need another one.

Currently Reading:

I have a bookmark in In the Serpent's Wake but have not read more. Slowly creeping my way through Squirrel Girl. Still reading Unshelved in free moments at work. As mentioned above, gonna charge through the Murderbot Diaries and then get real salty when there aren't any more.

The closest book to hand right now is Howl's Moving Castle though. A reread but a _good_ reread. I love me my disaster-girl Sophie. Almost as much as I love my horrible Zaphodic nightmarechild Howl.

Reading in the Future:

I currently have 29 books checked out from the library, and 10 more on hold. Let's do an annoyingly fast rundown:

2 ebooks that I need to click return on
3 Murderbot Diaries
2 sequels to Geography Club
Inside Job, by Connie Willis
6 Squirrel Girl GNs
Harriet the Spy, by Louise Fitzhugh, which I've never read but Unshelved's book club had good things to say and it is a classic
The First Rule of Punk, by Celia Perez, which I know nothing about but showed up in a search for something else and it looks cute
Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel (Unshelved rec)
The Plain Janes, by Cecil Castelucci (Unshelved rec)
Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts, by Kate Racculia, which was pinned up on the school library bulletin board as part of "check out these cool books set in the area!"
Bookhunter, by Jason Shinga (Unshelved rec, and insta-subscribe because of how much Shaenon Garrity _loves_ Shinga's work)
Modesty Blaise, by Peter O'Donnell
Whatcha Mean, What's a Zine?, nonfiction by Mark Todd (Unshelved rec)
Ella Minnow Pea, by Mark Dunn, which I've read before several years ago and is SO CLEVER and I'm interested to know if it holds up to a reread
Hidden Talents, by David Luber (Unshelved rec)
Howl's Moving Castle, by Diana Wynne Jones
In the Company of Ogres, by A. Lee Martinez (Unshelved rec)
Taken, by Edward Bloor (Unshelved rec, and to be clear, I'm really more likely to grab these when they're YA or Middle Grade, because of how fast I can chug through those.)
Debbie Harry Sings in French, by Meagan Brothers, and my first ever attempt to get something through a different system via ILL. Ezri helped. By which I mean, did absolutely all the scouting work for me. And yes, it's an Unshelved rec as well.

On hold:

Both ebook and paperbook copies of Network Effect so I can do a real good murderbot diaries binge.
The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan-- I think Unshelved rec'd it, but I also have been meaning to read some of these forever, I was about five years too old to get SUPER into them I think, and I remember them being some of the hottest shit known to childkind back in my substitute days. Plus my understanding is that Riordan operates as an anti-Rowling, and sucks considerably less than she does.
Theo Gray's Mad Science: Experiments you can do at home but probably shouldn't. Unshelved rec, and I don't tend to read a lot of nonfiction, but this one seems fun.
There Are No Shortcuts by Rafe Esquith, rec'd by Unshelved and if you tell anyone at my job I am reading a nonfiction book about education outside of work hours I will fight you, don't you dare make them think that's an okay thing to ask me to do³
The Warrior's Apprentice, by Lois McMaster Bujold -- I think Unshelved rec'd _something_ from Vorksagian, and I picked this one as "this one seems to be considered a good inroad?" but I will absolutely take advice, I've not read these ones.
Your Body is Not Your Body, a horror anthology that IIRC, BitterKarella contributed to. I don't read enough horror for how much I float around r/UnresolvedMysteries and the Longform.org crime section.
The City & The City by China Mieville, rec'd by Unshelved but I know jere7my _loves_ Mieville's stuff. I'm sorta expecting it to be way too smart and indigestible for me, but I ought to give it a try
Sideways Stories from Wayside School, by Louis Sacher, which has just taken _way_ longer to ebook over to me than the other three have.
A Deadly Education, by Naomi Novik, because one of these years I will successfully read Schoolmance.

........maybe I am not allowed to add any more books to my library piles for a while ;_;

~Sor
MOOP!

1: Clayton looked at me during lastprep, as I was tearing through a novel on my work laptop and not paying any attention to other banter, and observed that I currently had three different books in three different mediums (hardback, ereader, laptop) in front of me.

2: This is tongue-in-cheek, as Pierce observes in her afterword, three different sexual partners in the course of your life is, uh, not unusual.

3: Note that I am blatantly not bothering to read the nonfiction book bought for the math department and encouraged for us all to read, except when explicitly given time in my contracted hours to do so.

(This is a mini-sundries post, covering one blog from the past few weeks, because it's awesome.)

Dresden Codak is supposedly an amazing comic, and I really do mean to read it sometime. Somehow, I started reading the tumblr of the author, as he was talking a lot about making comics and art and stuff.

More recently, he decided to take on DC and their reboots. He presented the top 10 best superhero or villain reboots. And then the top ten worst. And then he decided to put his money where his mouth was, and offer up his own designs for five essential reboots.

His reboots feature both drawings of the new design, in his beautiful style, and a quick run through of the new background of the character and notes on what their story would be. It's great fun to hear a more updated, and especially realistic, version.

Anyway, all that spiraled out of control, and he found himself making extensive posts rebooting The Justice League, The Legion of Doom and Batman.

These are all awesome. I don't even read superhero comics, and I found his commentary to be absolutely fascinating, from both a storytelling and design standpoint. If you like art or storytelling or comics, definitely go check some of these out.

Oh, and to finish it all off, he (I assume) wrote a satirical piece in which DC rebooted his characters. It's a hoot, especially the constant use of the word "strong" to refer to "as little clothing as possible" --but only for the women.

I've been reading a ton about the DC reboot, because it is interesting to me as a comics reader, and as an activist. Aaron Diaz has definitely been doing some of the better snark on the topic. I recommend it immensely!

~Sor
MOOP!

WEBCOMICS I READ, because it has been a *very* long time since I made any variation on this post, and because Dan4th¹ was asking the other day.

So, this is pretty much my "Sweet, Sweet, Daily Comics" bookmarks folder. Maybe later I'll add on the "Sweet, Sweet, Daily Blogs", and if I decide that it won't freak people out too badly, the "Sweet, Sweet, Daily Porn".

(It's worth noting that most of these things aren't daily. Learning how to use an RSS feed worked wonders for my reading habits. It's also worth noting that this is the SSDC folder, and no, not everything is a comic.)

xkcd --Stick figure art about science, math, romance, and language. Honestly, if you've not heard of it by now, I'm gonna be a little bit surprised at you.

Questionable Content --One of my favourite webcomics ever, and very plausibly one of the ones I've been reading the absolute longest. --I started following it well over 1200 comics ago. Slice of life, twenty-somethings. Don't let the early art scare you off. Also, I more or less talk like this comic, so if you ever wanted to know where I got my annoying habit of ALL CAPS EQUALS FUNNY or somesuch, look no further.

Narbonic (with commentary, for a spoiler-free run of the comic, go here) --Narbonic is EASILY one of my top five comics, ever. Also, it is going to be my birthday present to myself, once I stop being lazy and actually order it. I should do that, and soon, because *man* do I love this comic. It is full of MAD SCIENCE!, and has pretty much become my canon for such things.

Skin Horse --the current project by the woman who wrote Narbonic (and a cohort), it has slightly less mad science, and slightly more crossdressing. It's a sequel only in that they have the same "feel", and also well worth reading. Alsoalso, Oz references.

Order of the Stick --The comic to read about D&D. Cute, colourful art. Definitely in my top five.

Something*Positive --Cynical as all fuck, swears a lot, really really good, top five.

Multiplex --set in a movie theatre, nice clean art.

UglyGirl --Holy shit, this is one of the loveliest comics I have ever read. It's a really good high school outcast comic, and it has QueerBoy, and ee!

Shortpacked --set in a toy store, by the guy who did It's Walky. Cerebus'd successfullyish with the pulling of the Drama tag.

College Roomies From Hell --Kinda partially belongs on the "ones I don't currently read" list --it's been a really long time since I've *cared* about CRFH. But yeah. Slice of life *college* aged comics, as opposed to twenty-somethings.

Menage a 3 --Man, I do not even know. Like...half the characters annoy me in vague ways, and it is hella trashy. It just still hasn't lost my attention. Plus, you know. Tits. (NSFW)

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal --SATURDAY MORNING BREAKFAST CEREAL! SHIT YES! Totes funny comic, sometimes in my top five.

Girls With Slingshots --further adventures in slice of life twenty somethings! Girl centric. Also, pretty unabashed about masturbation and sex and boobs, which is all kinda nice.

My Cardboard Life --The art on this one is amazingly charming. It's a very sweet comic.

Playing With Dolls --Side project of the girl(?) who does Templar, Arizona --fantastic little Sims-drama-trainwreck comic. Really *really* funny, does not update nearly often enough --I have seen maybe one update in the like...year since I started following it.

Dar! --Fantastic autobiographical comic about a lesbian and her husband.

Tailsteak --Guy-who-did-1/0's current comics project. Does not update often enough, but is awesome. By the by, if you have not ever read One Over Zero, go read NOW! It is *definitely* in my top-five.

Snowflakes --Written by the guy who does SMBC, set in an ophanage. Still trying to decide how I feel about it, but I think I enjoy it.

The Bare Pit --Set in a nudist resort. Technically NSFW, though brilliant in that it's pretty much completely a G or PG rated comic, solong as you ignore the fact that most of the people in it don't wear clothes. Also does a fantastic job of having people who are shaped like people, and not like supermodels and movie stars

Belm Blog --My friend Dave's blog. Lots and lots of stuff about music and cooking.

Rixosous --My friend Susan's blog. Lots and lots of stuff about...stuff. Currently a lot of theatre.

Cracked --Cracked was originally a humour magazine (similar to Mad Magazine), has now become one of the collectively funniest sites on the internet. Updates with two or three new lists a day, and yes, yes you should go read everything.

The Funny Music Project --The Funny Music Project. Free downloads twice a week, some of which are fantastic. Lots of filkish things. Big archive of listenable music. Createdish by Rob Balder (Guy who did Erfworld)

Shirt.Woot --It's like woot.com, only it does shirts. Where I get a lot of my wardrobe, actually.

11 Points --Just a funny little blog that makes me giggle. "Because top ten lists are for cowards"

Happle Tea --Happle Tea is drawn by one of my roommate's boyfriend. It's cute. Lots of giant animals.

Two Lumps --Kitties! That's about all I have to say on that.

Surviving the World --A cute scientist guy writes lessons on a chalkboard every day. Tooootally worth archive binging

Girls Only --a comic about a feminazi high school where the main characters are four boys who pretend to be gay in order to get special privileges from the girls (EEE YAOI OMG sort of thing) I have no idea what I think of it yet, and vaguely feel like writing a post just about it sometime.

Little Mell --About the character Mell, from Narbonic, as a child. Like everything associated in any way shape or form with Shaenon Garrity, it's a good thing.

Shrubmonkeys --Entertaining autobiographical comics

Hark! A Vagrant! --KATE BEATON WRITES COMICS ABOUT HISTORY AND THEY'RE AWESOME!

Amusing.org --I have no clue what's up with this. Seriously. It just...is something to check every day.

Least I Could Do --About a group of twenty-somethings. Main character gets away with everything ever. Lots of sex. Is funny.

Poly-Rhythms --My friend Foster's blog about polyamory and whatnot. So...yeah.

So Damn Bright --I don't even know --something I just picked up along the way, and haven't hated enough to drop yet.

Kingdom of Loathing --Gahhh. How old were we when KoL was the Big Thing? Tenth grade, maybe? Yeah, I was digging around on my computer, and found something about it, and started playing again. It's a browser based adventure game. Highly entertaining, quite worth playing a bit. Also very excellent in that it limits the amount of time you can play there.

The current count for that folder is 41 --the ones I didn't link here are Craigslist (which I read for the best of list), El Goonish Shive (which I don't read anymore) the Nerdfighters wobsite, and a close friend's secret blog.

YAY COMICS!

~Sor
MOOP!
(1/12)

1: Unrelated to everything ever, I keep wanting to drop the capital from Dan4th's name. This is certainly jere7my's fault, and yes, I find it weird that I have two separate friends whose names I don't consider to be properly spelled without a numeral.

So, a proper report of the last few weeks!

On the fourteenth, I got my drivers license, because I am rad.

On the fifteenth, I flew Home and went to ( Arisia )

Nineteenth was Monday of Arisia. While packing, I think to check the internet, find out what time I can move into my dorm. I mean, last year I could doso just post Arisia, it seemed sensible to expect the same out of this year.

...heh.

"Hey mom? It says I can move in at noon. On the twenty-fifth."

Luckily, I had a handy dandy Magus who I could beg into giving me crash space for a week, so I did that.

Twentieth through the twenty fourth, I hung out with Magus, caught almost all the way up on Doctor Who (just need to watch the Christmas Special!), had a grand old time of things, and did a few other things, like harassing j7y more (it is a hobby! Also, we watched Mighty Boosh!!) and babysitting. And maybe I had a teeny tiny breakdown somewhere in the middle of All That, and had to spend a little bit of time righting my brain.

Twenty third was Friday of ( Vericon )

The twenty-fifth I skipped Vericon completely, moved in eventually, hugged my roommates, and got dragged to a lesbians house to watch a movie called "Wristcutters: A love story". I kinda want to write fanfic about that setting, though I think I'm not emo enough. Good movie though, very light and fun and reasonably fluffy. And romantic, of course.

The twenty sixth was today, and I'll report on all my classes once I've had the other two. Can I just say EEEE, CALCULUS! though?

And now food and dance. Ta!

~Sor
MOOP!


1: Conner? Connor? *shrugs*

Gyuh, I haven't even finished the conreports for the last con, I can't already have 'em for this one!

Anywho:

Vericon is awesome. Eeee, holyshit, I now have original Randall Munroe and Jeph Jacques art up next to my original Randy Milholland. I also now own something incredible, which is secret for the time being.

Anyways. The Vericon Masquerade.

It was a bit like prom, if prom had been filled with geeks and the DJ had known what he was doing, and all the music was fabulous.

*thinks a minute*

I take it back. It was nothing like prom.

But I was completely sold on the idea of a bouncy geek club-masquerade dance thing when the DJ played 'Yatta'. And then I was COMPLETELY sold on the idea, when the very next song was "The Homecoming Queen's Got a Gun"

Ahem: Eeeee!!!

Things of note: I taught a guy to waltz to "A Little Priest" (And missed my clone terribly while doing so), I learned how to 'chain' (grab hands, run in a really big circle, repeat), I watched Dr. McNinja and Pheonix Wright dance together (I lawled) I got a chance to do the dance from the music video of "Birdhouse in your Soul", I danced to Skullcrusher Mountain and Code Monkey, I pretty much agreed to join HRSFA*, I joined in a wonderful congo line for "King of Spain" (Yay Moxy Fruvous --thanks Eric! (As opposed to OtherEric or Eric (in elevators) or Eric the tomato or Eric-who-likes-my-hat, or Erik)

Other stuff happened too, but afterwards it was a general 'lets go sit in this building and chill for a while'. I wound up teaching Fluxx to a bunch of people, which was nice.

And, while it is definently trickier to go to a con without anyone else I know, by the end of tonight I was discussing sex and drugs with random people, so I suspect I'm doing it right.

Anyways, I'm going to try and go to sleep, but I suspect I won't get very far, what with the clone thing. Also, Jeph is built like a linebacker (even though you'd suspect him to be built like Martean), Pete is terribly nice and easily confused (I signed this book already! Yes, when my mom bought it for me. Now you're signing it for ME!) and Randall is still comprised win and more win. And sex.

That's all.

~Sor
MOOP!

*Harvard Radcliffe Science Fiction Association. Harvards skiffy club. I'm totally allowed to join, even though I'm not a Harvard student, which is really good as I think if Lesley tried to start a skiffy club, there'd be like...eight of us. Total.

Food:

I have been having rediculous dreams recently, with far too much Good Food. FAR too much. Last nights dream involved amazing potato soup that I could add chunks of other delicious things to. Hella nommy.

...It also took place in an airport. I can only presume that my brain is telling me that it's time for me to go through some sort of major transition or something. Bla bla bla. With potato soup.

Comics:

Been somewhat of a comics fiend recently. Caught up with UglyGirl the other day, and El Goonish Shive. Am currently plodding my way through Sluggy Freelance, and rereading Shortpacked. Woo comics.

Stories:

I need to write more. No, STJ doesn't count, that's *lifefic*.* I need something original. Maybe rewrite some of the 2006 novel...

Life:

Off to go play with play-doh now. Talk to you lot later.

~Sor
MOOP!

*Albeit excellent lifefic. Also, I may just start liberally stealing ideas from it and writing an adventure story of what happens when people accidentally go into the past and meet theirselves.

xkcd made me laugh out loud for the first time in a while now. Not to say that Randall's lost his touch or nuthin, he's just been doin' a bunch of the smart-kid jokes that I don't get.

(Actually, Making the world a Weirder Place made me giggle like a giggle-fiend. So it hasn't been that long since there's been one that I could "get". Wow, that's so not something I have to worry about when I read Garfield. God bless internet comics.)

In semi-related news, one of the computers in a cafeteria had the Interesting Life comic set as the background! And I TOTALLY DIDN'T DO IT!

So that means that there's at least one other xkcd fan at Lesley, who's devoted enough to do things like leave it as a background. SQUEE!

...Back to room cleaning.

~Sor
MOOP!

EDIT: In other news, Randall is pretty much an amazing artist. No seriously, look at that last panel. The stick figure guy is clearly getting up to go get the crisco. I do not know a lot of people who can put that much expression and body language into stick figures. You can tell what's going on in every panel, and they're all just a bunch of lines.

He's cool.

Eric Burns of Websnark is the wins of the day. Awwwwww!!

Also, meme, stolen from OlderSisLauren:

Reply to this post, and I'll tell you one reason why I like you. Then put this in your own journal, and spread the love!

That is all.

~Sor
MOOP!

So, I've been busy rereading the archives of xkcd, which *continues* to be the most amazing comic...ever.

And *damn* I want a "Just shy --Not Anti-social!" t-shirt. I may have to get mum to order me one when she gets home. Because that is a beautiful shirt.

*************

So, music babblings. I was gonna do the "Movie soundtrack meme" but it turned out quite lame. SO you get some percentages instead.

I have, at this moment in time, 2980 songs. Which is a good deal of music --9.11 Gigs, or about 6 and 2/3 days.

Of this music selection:

03.22% is Weird Al (96/2980)
04.97% is random, generally Indie, music that Tho has sent me (148/2980)
24.23% is showtunes (722/2980)
03.42% is TMBG (102/2980)
01.84% is related to RHPS (55/2980)
01.51% turns up when I enter the letter "Q" into the searchbox (45/2980)
07.45% is the H2G2 related (radioplays, movie soundtrack, and Marvin songs.) (222/2980)
01.64% is Schoolhouse Rock (49/2980)
03.46% is some sort of Christmasish Music (103/2980)
08.52% has never been played (254/2980)
00.70% has been played more then 100 times. (21/2980)
00.17% has been played more then 200 times. (5/2980)

Any other percentages you'd like to see?

...You know what this reminds me of? My LONG SINCE DEFUNCT project where I was assigning songs to peoples elljays for...some reason. I think it was so I could be "I'm bored. Who's elljay am I gonna read the whole of today?"

At any rate...that activity crashed messily. Haven't touched it at least half a year, maybe more -I've still got Tho unlisted, for crissakes, and he's CERTAINLY rectified that particular musical problem. (((Hum, "Only Anarchists are Pretty" or "Up Against It"? Oh, questions...)))

...also, why is Ms Hecabus listed with Mrs Robinson? I'ma gonna assume she was quoting from it at one point...or...something. Yeeeeeeah. Like I said, WOEfully out of date.

...I'm out. See ya kids later.

*notes a line in the second Narbonic comic's commentary.*
*Laughs and continues*
*notes when Shaenon went to Vasser*
*process*
*process*
*dig out paper and do some calculations*
*process*

...

Magus!! Did you go to college with Shaenon of Narbonic fame?!? Or is flux affecting me again...

~Sor
MOOP!

(((On a similar note, Nonhuman Student Orginization is the best name for a club since the MIT assasins.)))

(((Yes, you shouldn't give me webcomics history. It makes me know too much random crap, like why exactly Davan calls Aubry "Monkeybutter")))