ForcedPerspective

I hope it isn't anything awful

I don't know what it says, but LOOK! It's Cardbo! From Yotsuba&!5!

Chipotle Smashed Sweet Potatoes? Hmm

The people at my house really enjoy the San Marcos red and green salsas; I don't know whether our store carries the chipotle in adobo that is shown in this recipe.

I had no idea there was an alternative comic strip that was so widely carried in the newspaper!

I have a new favorite comic strip. Take a look.

And I'm sure I would be delighted

I ran across a picture of Clifton's Cafeteria in a book called California crazy and beyond: roadside vernacular architecture, by Jim Heimann. It was a fantastical cliff face and forest affair in the middle of an LA street. It opened in the Depression offering pay-what-you-can meals and free food for the destitute.

In looking for more information about Cliftons, it turns out it's still there! They mention that a few changes have been made: replacing the organ and organist with a moose (I didn't realize they were equivalent), singing waiters and canaries with Muzak (again, not really equivalent in my book) and artificial plants with real (OK, that's cool). But they still offer the guarantee: "Dine Free Unless Delighted!"

Update: more information can be gleaned from items in the Los Angeles Public Library's Menu Collection by searching for "Clifton's."

Hispaniola Reviews

Through a set of coïncidences, I read three Hispaniola-connected works in rapid succession (the middle work overlapped, I think, both of the others). I chose Oscar Wao from a list of starred Publishers Weekly reviews. While I was reading it, the folks at my house watched Muppet Treasure Island, which caused me to wonder yet again how close it hews to the Stevenson story. This time, I wondered long enough to go check on Project Gutenberg, and it was (of course) there, so I started reading it online. About that same time, my hold on Pirate Freedom got to the top of the list, completing the weird Hispaniola trifecta. Given the common connection, I'm opting to combine the reviews in one entry.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Díaz. Yes. Memory has faded somewhat, but I do recall enjoying the story, and the writing, greatly. Very character-driven, with many shout-outs to the nerd community. Much of the action takes place on Hispaniola.

Treasure Island, Stevenson. Yes. YA fiction used to be a great deal bloodier than it is now. According to Cecil, Stevenson became the standard for pirate depictions, and I have to believe that it's due to the strength and durability of his narrative. The Muppet version is admirably close, differing mostly for comic effect or brevity. The Hispaniola is, of course, the treasure ship.

Pirate Freedom, Wolfe. Yes. Reading Wolfe makes me wonder why I don't read more Wolfe. I expect it may be, as with Davies, that he's so good I have to pay a lot of attention. This was a much lighter work than his multi-volume epics, but nonetheless great for that. Not all that much of the action takes place on Hispaniola, but between the action there and the piracy, it clearly fits in this fortuitous group.

Lyre of Orpheus Review

The Lyre of Orpheus, Davies. Yes. Davies is extremely good, and I suspect it's mostly because of the large amount of attention I have to pay that I haven't read much more. I read the Deptford Trilogy some time ago (before I started reviewing everything I read), and also enjoyed it despite Davies's habit of including extensive background information (Jungian psychology in Deptford, opera in Orpheus—KCLS refers to the former work as “didactic fiction”). I was surprised to see in the KCLS listing that Orpheus was a sequel. I'll likely have to get to What's Bred in the Bone one of these days.
Davies correctly uses “whoever”, bless him, which is only to be expected from Canada's prose laureate. He does not, however, seem to have an ear for American speech: “That'll do to be going on with” is not something I would expect to hear from a Californian grad student.

Fisherman of the Inland Sea Review

A Fisherman of the Inland Sea, LeGuin. Yes. There's not a whole lot more to say about LeGuin than “yes.” This collection includes some relatively early works, and it shows to the extent that there is less subtlety than in her later works. We're not talking Tepper-blatant, natch, but she was clearly refining her craft. Sometimes my attention span isn't sufficient to the task, but Ms LeGuin is always worthy of my effort.

The Road Review

The Road, McCarthy. Yes. Since this was the first Cormac McCarthy book I read, I had imagined that the setting—which is to say, the implied event that brought the story about—had affected the style. The movie ad would go something like this:

In a world with punctuation gone mad: apostrophes only before esses (“wouldnt”, “couldnt”, “two day's time”), and quotation marks have been lost. where people and objects rest within the floor (regardless of the floor's condition) and sometimes within other objects, but sometimes atop similar objects (“in a ... sofa” “on the bed”).

But it turns out McCarthy has chosen to write that way all the time. Oy. Clearly his style is beyond my meager powers to grasp, so I shan't be reading any more of it.
Its own merits are decent, though it was really a genre work written (I imagine) by someone who disdains genre, and was therefore unwilling to thoroughly commit to it. The August 2007 issue of Fortean Times contains a review with which I largely sympathize, expressing surprise that this work has been praised by a community that rejects the genre that the work most represents (the reviewer has a different genre in mind from the one that I classed the work within, but I nevertheless believe it's a parallel argument to mine).

Have Mercy on Us All Review

Have Mercy on Us All, Vargas. Yes. This was an enjoyable, briskly moving read. The only item I found truly remarkable was the perfect use of the objective case:

Up and walked with my little boy (whom because of my wife's making him idle, I dare not leave at home) ... to excuse my not being at home at dinner to Mrs T; who I perceive is vexed because I do not serve her in something against the great feasting for her husband's reading in helping her to some good penn'orths, but I care not.

Turns out it was not Vargas (or her translator), but Pepys who understood the language (though I don't think Vargas or her translator got it wrong anywhere, either). I haven't chosen to read any more Vargas, but I have nothing against the idea in principle.

Crooked Little Vein Review

Crooked Little Vein, Ellis. Yes. It's been a bit too long since I read this to remember what I liked and didn't like about it, but it was, overall, entertaining. I am given to understand that virtually all of the bizarre practices referred to in the book actually occur with some regularity.

The true purpose of generation-making: reducing them to stereotypes

The article is entertaining in an awful reducing humans to a cartoon type of way, but the best part is this: "Ms. Looney, a certified reality therapist"

Hooray!

Theme park notes

So we went to Anaheim recently to visit the mouse (this entry has been in draft state for almost exactly two years—and here I thought I was behind on my book reviews!—so some of it was written while the trip was fresh in my mind, but most of it was thrown together based on some scribbled notes). Here are a variety of observations:

• We took Shuttle Express to the airport. On the plus side, we got the van to ourselves, no doubt due in large part to the fact that the van came to pick us up at 3am. On the minus side, we had to get up to catch the van at 3am, since they budget 90 minutes to get to the airport, and want to get to the airport 90 minutes before the flight leaves. As it was, we got to the airport well before 4am. This was a bit of a bummer, since the train to the north satellite (whence our flight left) doesn't run between 1am and 4am (or some such pair of times). Further, the food court at the north satellite doesn't really get going till sometime after five, so getting breakfast was a bit troublesome.
• We used AAA vacations, largely because I'm lazy. I'm reasonably satisfied with the package we got (though, again, due to my laziness, I didn't shop very hard to find better deals). We stayed at the Paradise Pier hotel (I wanted to get us into the main hotel, but it was booked). The monorail doesn't stop inside any of the hotels just now, but the walk to the Downtown Disney station isn't unbearable.
• Lanyards: It is helpful to have one's credentials handy, including one's fast passes (about which more anon), and a variety of trip-arranging outfits are considerate enough to include lanyards for just that purpose with their trip paraphernalia. I constructed a world in my imagination where the branding on one's lanyard was a token of pride or shame, though I can't at this late date remember what brandings were available other than the AAA affiliation that we wore. Lanyards get a hearty endorsement from me.
• Next up, a variety of recommendations I received before we went, and how they worked out:
  • Fast Passes: by all means, make use of as many as you can. They aren't completely magic for the most sought-after rides, but there's nothing like being able to go do something else for an hour or so while you're not having to wait in line.
  • Early Entry: another good thing, if it's available to you. Exploit any opportunity to minimize the lines. I recommend targeting one or two rides and sprinting there at once.
  • Fantasmic: my consultant strongly recommended this evening effects show, and I suppose it's worth the time if you have nothing else pressing, but I wouldn't go too far out of the way for it.
  • Fireworks: Fireworks are, well, fireworks, though the mouse does surely put on a convincing show. Again, if you have the time, give them a look, but don't sweat it if it doesn't work out.
• Hold on to your hat when riding anything. I lost my most favorite hat in the world on the water ride with the bears. It apparently never made its way to where a cast member could recover it, or the mouse's lost and found sucks a lot, because they never got it back to me.
• I was struck by the number of folks who remarked on my They Might Be Giants T-Shirt. It makes me think that visiting the mouse is a good way to meet folks who like what you like. My librarian got good response from her “What happens in the library stays in the library” shirt, too, but I'll leave any of those stories to her.
• Finally, I have a note that I meant to talk about the food, but I can no longer remember what I wanted to say about it. Next time, I may be tempted to go for one of the meals-included packages, since we ended up eating a lot of theme park food anyway, and it might be just as well to embrace the cruise shipness of it all.

I expect we'll visit the mouse again one of these years, but I think we'd rather go someplace with a little more history first.

Always a source of good words

Those Germans, always coming up with le mot juste:
Vorne Kurz, Hinten Lang = a mullet
Arschgeweih =“Ass-Antlers,” a tatoo near the bottom of the spine

Miscatformation

Despite the assurances of the book Der Struwwelpeter, your cats will neither warn you against using matches nor cry after you are burned to ash.

Watching movies while prostrate

So I'm watching At the Circus, starring the Marx Brothers. Groucho makes a joke about not having seen Chico since he stopped taking Scott's Emulsion. Wondering what that is, I look in up on the intertubes. Well, it's a brand of cod liver oil, still available, but not in the US, made by GlaxoSmithkline. And browsing through the list of their various worldwide brands, I also find Granufink, a German pill made from pumpkin seeds, “used to strengthen the function of the bladder and help treat prostrate disorders.” Hey! I'm prostrate right now, but I just thought it was related to watching movies on a Saturday afternoon!

Climbing cranes

A German-language podcast of a building a crane. More of those podcasts here.

Who'll get fired?

Read it before it vanishes forever: the TSA blog with open comments! Someone read an article about Web 2.0, and somebody's bum will be canned when they realize that being open with complaints may mean having to actually be accountable for them rather than just restating policy (or "policy", you must read the comments, you absolutely must!).

Some favorites so far: the elderly couple with replacement joints who are made to sit in a low chair with no arms (and no help in getting up from said chairs) to be repeatedly wanded despite having documentation about their replacement joints, the several military people who get searched on every flight, the person complaining about having their wallets searched (!!), the flight attendant with a background check to have the job in the first place who gets searched every time at a particular airport... and those were just comments on one post!