screw you

1) Monday of this week, I finished Junot Diaz's The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, which did not disappoint. Diaz goes from large scale description to the intimately personal with such grace and incorporates diverse elements and genres in a way that is incredibly calculated but at the same time impossibly fluid. If you are going to read only one contemporary lit book, read this one. A lot of what the text treats on is trite on one level but the narration and perspective on it transforms the matter from dross to sublime. Plus you will all have fun picking up the variety of nerd references stretching from alterna comics to Lovecraft to anime and back again. The way he talks of El Jefe as Sauron with his cronies as Nazgul, while also telling you about the gruesome details with all the gritty certainty of realism. It's about the Dominican Republic, about growing up a fat nerd, about growing up Dominican in the US, about families and their intricacies, about superstition and fate and free will.

2)So I've been watching Tru Calling and Tuesday night I finished the first season and found myself totally being sad that there are only 6 episodes left. And it wasn't just because Eliza Dushku is gorgeous either. The premise (Eliza Dushku's character Tru works at a morgue; dead people ask her help, and she then relives the day in order to save them.) is a little suspect, but the larger storytelling, the cast as a whole, and the way the show handles tricky issues, really won me over. At first I was just excited to see Eliza Dushku play a responsible, college graduated, who hopes to go to med school, and takes care of her dysfunctional siblings, instead of just being the generally sexy rebel. But Tru is a good character for her own merit, flawed enough to not be annoying, but someone you can really root for. She has serious enough tragedies to feel relevant but all in all things don't seem to have been totally horrible for her or anything. She has a nice apartment, a college degree, and is pretty and easy to like. She wasn't raped or abused. But her family is messed up, her mother was murdered in front of her eyes, and whether she will ever make it to med school is in question. They make the wise decision of having Tru's brother and her boss/assistant play a bigger role than her love interest. Both characters are interesting and very different from each other. I'm not as crazy about the female supporting roles. Tru's cokehead executive sister is satisfying to watch but hardly original, and her best friend Lindsey remains ultimately a stereotypical and shallow (though not mean spirited) girl whom Tru can never confide in. People react reasonably to Tru's interference, not just suddenly believing some random girl they don't know. Tru's fragmented and damaged family comes across realistically and sympathetically. Her relationship with the other characters on the show and the problems her special talent bring to her life are believable. The thing that makes me the most sad about the fact that the show was canceled is that I am really starting to care about the mythos of the show and the mystery surrounding Tru's mother's murder (which took place 10 years before the show begins).

3) Wednesday, I decided to go to the new Costco in the town just north of us (so new that the street it's technically on hasn't even been finished yet). It's a good 10 feet wider than all other Costcos I have been in. Kyle went with me and we got there at about 7:30. Standing in line, I suddenly had a craving for one of their hot dogs. Maybe it was only having had a modest bowl of Raisin Bran, but I was really excited about the idea and Kyle was too. Seriously it's probably been almost a decade since I've had one. I overheard the cashier asking the people in front of us if they wanted anything from the food bar and though that was convenient. She didn't ask us though. I almost said something but then was like whatever I'll just get it at the actual stand. So we waited another 15 minutes to get to the front of the line only to find out that they were CASH ONLY. Our options where:
a) Stand in the original line again to pay with a card, then stand in the pick up line.
b)Get money from the ATM and stand in the food line again.
c) Give up.
We gave up mostly because I was annoyed. Why would they have a new thing be cash only, and if it was why did the bitch cashier not give us the opportunity? We were profiled! Plus I was starving so I felt like crying. So we went to KFC because we were trying to think of somewhere we don't go often. Plus they have delicious biscuits.

4) We all like to laugh at writers like Anne McCaffery and for good reason. Their books tend to be all the same, at least after the first few. But honestly she was my gateway into fantasy (well my parents read some to me, but hers were the first ones I read for myself). I've read so many of her books that I have a hard time remembering which ones they were vs. the ones I haven't. And I enjoyed them (mostly for the cheesy but implied porn romance plot lines). So tell me, what redundant writers have you read so many of that you no longer remember the individual titles? I'm thinking fantasy authors but any other genre is okay too. I also read a ton of those "The Cat Who blah blah blah" mysteries. And on the kid/ya front I read a ridiculous amount of: Nancy Drew, The Nancy Drew Files, Christopher Pike, Sweet Valley High, and The Babysitters Club. My favorite professor once referred to how we approach these things as consumption reading, differentiating it from when we take time to look at a text and judge it's merits. So tell me flist, what kind of literary junk food have you gone through in your time?

1)Apparently I totally missed the boat on the 35th anniversary of Roe v. Wade (2 days ago). However, I wanted to say that there is no issue that gets me as stirred up as that of a Woman's Right to Choose. I've always felt strongly about it and I feel like I've chronicled that elsewhere in this journal but it can never be strongly enough or too often. I ma probably going to do a more thinky post on the subject in the near future but I just wanted to take a minute and mark the occasion and say that I hope 35 years from now the jugement will still stand and that finally somewhere in there people will stop trying to undermine and tear it down. I hope 35 years shows me a better world for everyone but especially for women.


2) At Jeremy's suggestion.... we have put everything Eliza Dushku is in that is available on Nextflix at the top of our queue (yes even the bad horror movies). The first thing to arrive though, was Tru Calling and I have really been enjoying constant Eliza on my screen. The last two nights Jeremy has raided on WoW and I have sat like a foot from the TV screen and basked in the glory. Oh Eliza Dushku, I love you and your pretty hair and shiny lips and utter hotness.

1) 2 Weeks and 3 Days Until my GRE Subject Test for Literature in English.  I am in no way prepared.  Please ask me more questions.

2) I am not stalking Alan Rickman and Eliza Dushku; because, hey I really don't need to make an ass of myself in front of famous people I am actually impressed by. Also: work.

3) My sister has named her new kitten Mr. Ernest Worthing... no one said we weren't a nerdy family (Just be glad that that we didn't go with Ziggy Stardust or Buddy Holly or Biggie Smalls or any of the other ideas that were popular).

4) This weekend my cousin Rachel got married.  My cousin Matt was a bridesmaid... he also caught the bouquet.

5)I have pretty pretty nails (pink and whites and shiny light pink on the toes with white flowers and purple rhinestones). They make me feel... classy.

6) Possibly I never mentioned ( how pretty my undergraduate school is. ) That's a fairly accurate representation of the school's buildings and grounds... not just the one perfect view or something.