L o b a B l a n c a {dot} c o m

Yeah, not only is this a late entry, but it’s also going to be a lame entry. Today, however, was all about a little dose of summer vacation. Remember how wonderful the last day of school was? Remember how awesome you felt on the bus ride home, knowing that the next three months were going to be unencumbered bliss? Remember how boredom settled in after about two weeks?

Boredom? What the hell was that about? I can actually remember uttering the phrase “I’m bored” to my father as he walked past me from another day of work. He would laugh at me and I always found that so irritating. Now I completely get it. I wish I had three months of utter nothingness stretching out before me. Now, in order to take just one day off, I have to do double the work to clear my schedule. Yeah, being an adult is kind of poopy sometimes.

Of course, right after I finish writing this, I’m going to go get frozen yogurt for dinner, so adulthood does have its perks

So, anyway, I hope you all get a chance to totally enjoy this weekend, just like we should have been enjoying our long summer vacations when we were kids. Go run through a sprinkler. Chase after the ice cream truck with a hot handful of quarters. Have a barbecue, fall asleep in a hammock, and end the evening catching fireflies. Or just sit on your butt all weekend, watching television (which, let’s face it, that’s how some of us spent big chunks of our vacations back then anyway). Whatever you do, just have fun. Turn off your CrackBerry. Don’t check your workmail. Leave the cell phone at home. Life is way too short to be a Borg drone. Whatever you end up doing though, I hope the sun is shining brightly wherever you are and that you have a splendiferous weekend!

Hmm, I just realized that I forgot to post one of my latest reads, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince for us English-speakin’ folk). I’m a bit farmisht at the moment, but I do want to mention this book, simply because it’s one of my favorite “quick reads.” I picked it up while organizing one of my bookcases and almost read the entire thing in one sitting (had to stop though; I was in the middle of cleaning).

As you can deduce, it is an incredibly fast read. It’s slightly under 100 pages long, plus it is laden with beautiful illustrations drawn by Saint-Exupéry. I contend, however, that this is not a children’s book as so many believe. It is actually quite a dark, sad tale at times, heavy with depth and complexity for what many might assume to be a rather shallow story. I’ve probably read it six times now, and each time it moves me in a different way. I suppose I’m just a girl like that.

I know that there is a movie out there based on this book. I’ve never seen it, but the little boy cast as the eponymous royal looks creepy enough on the DVD case that I think I’m going to pass on this one. However, I do remember watching a cartoon on Nickelodeon that was…shall we say, inspired by this story. I believe it was a Japanese animé, but I could be wrong. I do know that I loved that cartoon.

My latest copy of this story is the hard-back illustrated version with the translation done by Katherine Woods. I understand that a new translation has been released. I’ve also read that the new translation is not as poetic as Woods’ translation. Personally, I love a good poetry reading, so I think I shall stick with Ms. Woods’ version.

Final score: 5/5. Sometimes sentimentality trumps subjectivity, but I have adored this story since the first time I read it as a “tween” (a term I can assure you was not in use when I was actually in that age range).

When my parents moved to the Tarheel State a few years ago, they ended up with a house with a security system. My dad decided to keep the system activated. Part of the system included a little key fob, kind of like the alarm remote that comes with most cars.

One evening while my parents were sitting in their living room, watching television, there was a rather authoritative knock at their front door. My dad opened the door to a local sheriff’s deputy, who proceeded to ask my dad for photo identification indicating that he was the property’s resident and to inform my dad that he needed to check the premises.

See, it seems that while my dad was sitting in his recliner, he shifted his weight onto the alarm fob in his pocket and accidentally activated the silent alarm. Even when something like that is an accident, police are required to confirm that the people on the property when they arrive are who they say they are and that they actually belong on the property (how effective would cops be, after all, if they’d interrupted a robbery in progress but just left because the robber told them that he lived there?). It’s also SOP for the police to then confirm that the residents of the property are not being held by an actual robber and being forced to send the police away. Again, something else that makes sense.

* Not subject to change based on race, regardless of popular (or presidential) opinion.

My dad is White. I’m still positive enough to place good money on the fact that had my dad’s response been to become indignant and start talking smack about the deputy’s mother, he would have ended up cuffed and in the back of the deputy’s cruiser, not necessarily for being a rude SOB, but for preventing the deputy from doing what he was supposed to do.

And, yes, I understand the racial divide in this country. I’m actually even aware of it from the opposite side of the argument, as I grew up a minority in a predominantly Black city in a predominantly Black county. Racism just as easily flows from Black to White as it does from White to Black. I can also inform you that, yes, the word “honkey” is used outside of movies, and it is a suitable insult, both alone and when combined with other derogatory names aimed at one’s gender. So, do my experiences grant me permission to make assumptions about all Black people based on unfortunate run-ins I had while growing up? Wouldn’t that be “acting stupidly”?

I’d be interested in President Obama’s take on this question, since he deems it appropriate to provide his feedback on these matters. For the record, Mr. President, when you send my invitation to the White House, I prefer Guinness. I can even teach you how to pour a proper Black and Tan if you’d like me to. Just don’t call me honkey. I really don’t like it. Cracker, however, is acceptable, but only after the first beer.

I feel as though I may have been Jedi-mind-tricked by Richard Dooling. Mr. Dooling is the author of my latest read, Rapture for the Geeks: When AI Outsmarts IQ. For the life of me, though, I can’t come up with much to say about this book. It’s like my mind has already been wiped: “These are not the droids you’re looking for…and this is not the book you just read.”

The book started out with a wonderful bang: It was funny, engaging, captivating. Then it started to stray from the path of interesting and entertaining—and that’s when my cruise control kicked in. I think that’s why I don’t remember much about this book even though I just finished it two nights ago. I don’t think I was really absorbing most of what I was reading. Even the geekiest of geeks can only absorb so much geekery in one dose.

Mr. Dooling crams an awful lot of geekery into this book, without much in the sense of structure (how do you structure a flood?). There is a lot of interesting stuff here—factoids, trivia, and all kinds of tasty flotsam for geek consumption. My brain just couldn’t process it all. I guess it all got sent to the same bin where my brain stored all that it “learned” in high school geometry, algebra, and chemistry. You know, that giant, echoey hallway where all the voices sound like the sad trombone noise that adults make whenever they speak in Peanuts cartoons.

Final score: 2.5/5. I was very excited about reading this book. I think my excitement far exceeded the pay-off. Plus, a personal gripe: Don’t use a narrow, single-spaced 10-point sans serif font for your nearly-300-page book. My eyes are very angry with you right now, Mr. Dooling.

How sad is it that I’ve been sat here for about 10 minutes, giggling over this:

In case you don’t have the same horribly dirty mind that your humble hostess has, it’s the trackback link that’s left me laughing: “YOU ARE IN: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.”

See, now I’m laughing while typing this. As much as I love Hillary, I don’t want to be quite that close. Besides, shouldn’t I at least buy her dinner first?

Dirty minds aside, if you all missed Secretary Clinton’s appearance this past Sunday on Meet the Press, then here is the transcript from her appearance. Thank you to A2, both for supplying the link and the laugh.

I came here to the den early this morning with a completely different mission in mind. And then I became so wonderfully sidetracked by this video. This is Craig Bevan. He’s a singer, songwriter, and podcaster from jolly old England. I know that one day I’m going to point at a poster for his latest international tour and tell everyone around me, “I’ve been his fan from the beginning.” Of course, they will all roll their eyes because it will have been the umpteen-bajillionth time they will have heard me say this. But I don’t care.

This is the voice that gods summon to soothe their weary hearts. Here, the talented Mr. Bevan is covering a trance song by iiO that I’ve heard a hundred times before if I’ve heard it once. I love trance. I love Craig’s cover of this song WAY more.

So listen. I’d say listen and enjoy, but I already know you’re going to enjoy this. Yes, he’s just that awesome

Hey, guys? Anyone oot there? Unlock the door, eh?

I’ve already given you a Flashback Friday entry on a Canadian import that was just so very, very wrong. Now it’s time to do one on a Canadian import that was VERY right.

If there was one thing that I think pushed me the most in my crusade for cable television when I was little, it had to be You Can’t Do That On Television. All the cool kids on my block were always talking about this show. We even would sometimes “play” YCDTOTV (yeah, I don’t really know how to explain this one other than to say this involved sitting in our friends’ dad’s fishing boat, playing different characters from the show [I was always "Moose"] and shooting each other with a water hose…these were far simpler times, eh?).

Needless to say, my crusade was successful (probably more so because my dad wanted the Discovery Channel, but I like to think I was just that convincing a debater, even at the young age of 10). Those daily visits to the Childrens Television Sausage Factory were a bit like ABC Afterschool Special by way of Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Each show focused on a topic like divorce or personal hygiene in a “very special” way that only a bunch of Canadian kids hanging out in school lockers, Blip’s Arkaid, or Barth’s Burgers could possibly do. It was simple, silly fun and, other than a sliming or watering (or the occasional pie to the face), no one ever was hurt…just left in need of a shower.

Some of you may also be aware that before she sought musical retribution (against, apparently, Dave Coulier, of all people ) on a dance through the desert in black leather pants, Alanis Morissette was on YCDTOTV. I don’t remember her, but A) I think I had stopped watching by the time she became a cast member, and B) I think she was only on five or six episodes.

What brought this show to my mind this week was actually some sad news that I read at my favorite Canadian correspondent’s blog. Les Lye, who played every single adult male role on YCDTOTV throughout its entire run, passed away at the age of 84 on July 22. Whether as Christine McGlade’s constant foil, Ross, or Barth, the purveyor of the scariest burgers that side of the Canada/U.S. border, Les was a wonderful comedian and a major player in this awesome part of my childhood memories.

Now, if you check out the official YCDTOTV site, they discuss some of the spinoffs, including You Can’t Do That In Comics. I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up, but I used to save these strips every month from our cable guide. I’m willing to bet that I still have most, if not all of them, rare though they might be. I even think I know exactly where at my parents’ house they might be located. Guess I’m going to have to take a closer look next time I go home…

So, keep looking up whenever you find yourself muttering the dread phrase, “I don’t know,” stay clear of the borscht at Barth’s, and enjoy this, the mother of all slimings!

I’m about to commit what some might call tantamount to geek treason. I’m about to trash an Isaac Asimov book.

First, though, I’m going to make a somewhat shocking confession: Prior to now, I have never actually read an Isaac Asimov novel.

Okay, I’ll wait while you all digest that.

…

Yes, I did just admit that I was an Asimov virgin until now. Well, not completely. You can’t be a geek, especially a TNG geek, without knowing Asimov. After all, our favorite android possessed a “Soong-type positronic brain.” Positronic brains came straight from the brain of one Mr. Isaac Asimov, father of the three laws of robotics:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

This is all moot, however, since none of this relates to the Asimov book I did read, The Stars, Like Dust. Apparently, this is a recent re-release. It was positioned on the New Arrivals shelf at the library, all sparkly new and, strangely enough, without a protective plastic cover. I quickly snatched it up, taking its presence as a sign that it was time I delved into something Asimovian.

I should have gone to find I, Robot instead. This was not at all what I was expecting—although, thinking back now, I’m not really sure what exactly I was expecting. What I found, though, was a story that was predictable, irritatingly misogynistic at several points, and the ending…oh the end quote was painfully nationalistic (although, I can’t say that I wouldn’t have been slightly America crazy if I was a Russian-born author who was now trying to make it as a resident of my birth country’s Cold War rival).

I know, I know. It was predictable because so many people have ripped Asimov’s style throughout the years. He is considered by many to be one of the early scions of science fiction storytelling. I wholeheartedly acknowledge and accept this as truth. He laid the foundation on which so many other sci-fi authors, directors, producers, screenwriters, etc. have built their own livelihoods. I respect Asimov for this fact and know that my favorite genre owes him a great debt.

That being said, I kind of view this first Asimov taste to my first viewing of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. This movie was heralded here in the States as being ground-breaking for its breathtaking CGI-enhanced martial arts work. I totally agree. However, I only saw this movie after I saw its successor at the time, House of Flying Daggers. This latter movie owes a HUGE debt to the former. In my eyes, however, the latter is the superior movie. It took the former as inspiration and then took that inspiration to a whole new level, even higher than the first.

I think that’s how I need to look at this particular Asimov story: the inspiration that has led so many others to greater, higher sci-fi climes.

The Stars, Like Dust is part of Asimov’s Empire series. I don’t think this fact in any way detracted from the story, as it stood on its own quite well. Also, the book was written in 1951, so the fact that he wrote a female character even half as composed as Artemisia oth Hinriad was in this novel is quite exceptional. For 1951.

Final score: 2.5/5.

I want to give this a perfect score. I want Asimov to be at the top of my list of favorite authors. This book, however, was not the book to place him there. I’m not giving up though. Next trip to the library, I’m going to delve a little deeper and see what else they have from Asimov’s impressive oeuvre. And if anyone out there has a recommendation for what I should look for, let me know!

Not really a whole lot to say right now, but I love this photo of my cousins’ dogs. Aren’t they too adorable?