Starry Wisdom

I meant to post about this first one the other day, but I am lazy. I’ve talked about the fruitcakes I made a few times. I sent six of these out in the middle of December. Five of these quickly reached their intended recipients and I was quickly rewarded with words of thanks and information that they had all been enjoyed greatly. One of these I hard nothing about, but my assumption was that it was being held while the recipient was in Chicago for the holidays, and then as soon as he returned home, I was out of town – I figured signals were crossed.

Now imagine my surprise when I get an IM from nvrlnd on Friday informing me that all the packages that had been on hold while he was in Chicago got delivered to him that day, including the fruitcake. Luckily, a fruitcake is nothing if not imperishable, being heavily basted in brandy. Therefore he was able to enjoy it that night, albeit a month late. Maybe I should make more next year, they seem to be well received.

The second story is much shorter and much sillier. I went to get coffee this morning, and the guy in front of me ordered a “vente caramel macchiato, nonfat, decaf, extra-hot, no whip, caramel on the side, light foam”. And then, when the drink came, it wasn’t exactly as he wanted. I bit my lip to hold in a chuckle.

Well, toastiest has gone and tagged me. So, despite personal misgivings (more on this later!) I will follow the instructions below:

Ground Rules: The first player of this meme starts with the topic “5 Guilty Pleasures” and people who get tagged need to write an LJ entry about their 5 Guilty Pleasures as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose the next 5 people to be tagged and list their names.

1) Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwiches with Potato Chips – Ideally the chips would be Jay’s brand, but you can’t get them here. Also, this implies actually putting the chips inside the sandwich. It’s so yummy, but I’m also sort of embarrassed that I still consider it to be so at 30.

2) Military Science Fiction Novels – One would only need to look at my book list to find this out, but still, I had to admit that I am a bit ashamed of getting joy out of reading David Webber and John Ringo sometimes…

3) Christopher Kimball’s “Cooks Illustrated” Editorials – Oops, another reading one. Chris Kimball is a complete and absolute tool, and his editorials are complete mush and drivel, yet I can ‘t stop myself from reading them with each new issue.

4) Jumping in Elevators – I can’t resist taking a leap at the bottom or top of the trip, assuming I am alone in the elevator. The fact that I need to be alone is testimony to the guiltiness of this pleasure.

5) Livejournal – How could I not be ashamed to be involved in a place riddled with meme’s such as this? Also, I really hate the meme concept, but that’s neither here nor there.

And now, to add insult to the injury of doing this, I have to tag five others to continue this. I’m thinking I will get a lot of angst out of this list: dixieflatline, nvrlnd, quarex, ronebofh, stega. You five have been tagged, do with this as you wish.

Disney + Devo = Horror. Tremble in fear!

Credits (is that the right word?) to nvrlnd for pointing out the videos.

Jellyfish are taking over Japan!

Here is nvrlnd‘s comment on it:

(10:34:18) nvrlnd555: See Japan! This is what your tentacle fetish gets you!

I thought I might point out a few highlights of the fifty some books I read in 2005. In no particular order, here are some books that I think are worthwhile for others to read:

• Mysteries of Pittsburg by Michel Chabon – I’m two for two as far as really enjoying Chabon’s books go. I should probably try some more.
• Altered Carbon by Richard Morgan – I think this was the best SF book I read in 2005.
• Candy Freak by Steven Almond – Fun!
• Stiff: The curious Life of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach – Strangely fun.
• An Anthropologist on Mars by Oliver Sachs – I like his books. I wouldn’t start with this one, but it’s interesting.
• The Plot Against America by Philip Roth – The best book I read in 2005.
• The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold – I put off reading this for a long time because The Spirit Ring, which is unrelated, was so mediocre. I was a fool.
• The Miserable Mill by Lemony Snicket – I just randomly picked one in this series. You should start at the beginning though. They are fun little books, at least to me
• The Case of Charles Dexter Ward by H.P. Lovecraft – This is probably one of his most accessible works for the modern reader, and a pretty good story overall. If you’ve never read any Lovecraft this would not be a bad place to start.
• Bully for Brontosaurus by Stephen Jay Gould – I read two Gould books in 2005, both collections of his “Natural History” magazine columns. I think this was the more interesting of the two, because of 1) the essays on the Voyager space mission, 2) the chiding of my favorite Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia, and 3) the goofy marginalia in the library copy that I read

Of course, you can view the complete list of books I read at books.chazin.net.

Addendum – I’m looking for books to read in 2006. Suggestions would be appreciated! Note that I read a fairly varied bit, so almost anything would be considered.