Semi-Random
Mar. 3rd, 2007 12:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lenora_roseColin phoned me in the far too early hours of yesterday morning to say that the company he orders from at work had a fairly small but good quality MP3 player on for stupidly cheap ($20.00). He asked if I might want one.
Welll...
So I'm playing around with getting various CDs, or tracks therefrom, converted over. Whee!
______________________
On the music front, I borrowed Mom's Blind Boys of Alabama CD. I have to say it's a damn good album, no surprise, but it's sweet in a totally different way to have it open with a cover of Tom Waits (And that sentence probably just startled the heck out of mom. There are two of them, mom. And Two others I know from other people covering them, but at least they *are* trads.) There's also a song called Give a Man a Home that is just luscious.
But the one everyone who's ever talked about talks about is their Amazing Grace, to the tune of House of the Rising Sun. And Yes, it does indeed totally rock to a degree the rest of the album only almost reaches.
______________________
Well, I got my application in on time for the U of W. Bleah. Not because there's a thing wrong with them, but just too much stupid effort. Mostly, though, I've been thinking far too much that I won't get in (Having accidentally cut my chances in half by not getting the application in to the U of M on time, and if so, what to do.
Colin wants to make a road trip in August to visit out of town events, and, *not* incidentally, dad and family in Edmonton. I did point out there might be an issue with working for me. Still, once we're onto the final days of this year, I'm calling the temp agency back to let them know my schedule is much wider open, and could they please find me a second job, even just for a month or three?
______________________
No writing this week (My writing time got taken up by the stupid autobiography requirement for the application; short but exactly the sort of thing I hate most to write.), though I've done some plotting; much studying, including starting in on St. Francis. I started by reading G.K. Chesterton's bio of the saint, on the reasoning that whether it would be remotely academically rigorous or factual (Er, not so much), it would be an easy read... well, I think I'm learning more about Chesterton than Francis, but it is pretty fun stuff. It also has several passing comments which someone clever could make into a full book. Er, thanks, I have enough...
______________________
Books read for fun lately:
Wintersmith: Good, as one expects from Pterry. A few moments that made me laugh out loud*, something the last few books haven't done, in spite of snickering in my mind. I like Tiffany. I like a book with chapter breaks. I liked especially that the opening chapter felt like he was trying something new.
Wild Mind - Natalie Goldberg has been much recommended as writing good books about writing. Interesting, but I don't think it would help me; not my method at all. Too zen, which, since she's actually studied under a zen master or two, isn't surprising. Still, she has a gift with words, and if nothing else it helped the urge to write.
Doctor Faustus - Strictly speaking for class -- or rather, for classes. Actually, I read the wrong version first; I was using the one for 16th Century lit, and it's Drama that's already started its look. Whoops. (Doctor Faustus is around in several different editions, based on different drafts and publications, and I was warned as much. But I didn't heed, and the tiny slim volume is easier to carry than the 1600-page textbook. First I discovered extra lines in one scene. Then I discovered the oppoosite problem; I had a scene and a half missing.) Either version is a right smooth read; too smooth in some ways, to hint there's more than the surface melodrama. Part of our intorduction said Faustus was usually told as a strict satire or comedy before this; the satire is still there (One of the girls in the class laughed out loud at Mephistophilis' first arrival, and as far as I could see, she was half meant to), but so's all the sadder and darker things that make this a tragedy. And I think I know where Pamela Dean got Shan's horribly too-flip answers in the play version of his story in The Secret Country trilogy. Brrr.
* Werk...
Welll...
So I'm playing around with getting various CDs, or tracks therefrom, converted over. Whee!
______________________
On the music front, I borrowed Mom's Blind Boys of Alabama CD. I have to say it's a damn good album, no surprise, but it's sweet in a totally different way to have it open with a cover of Tom Waits (And that sentence probably just startled the heck out of mom. There are two of them, mom. And Two others I know from other people covering them, but at least they *are* trads.) There's also a song called Give a Man a Home that is just luscious.
But the one everyone who's ever talked about talks about is their Amazing Grace, to the tune of House of the Rising Sun. And Yes, it does indeed totally rock to a degree the rest of the album only almost reaches.
______________________
Well, I got my application in on time for the U of W. Bleah. Not because there's a thing wrong with them, but just too much stupid effort. Mostly, though, I've been thinking far too much that I won't get in (Having accidentally cut my chances in half by not getting the application in to the U of M on time, and if so, what to do.
Colin wants to make a road trip in August to visit out of town events, and, *not* incidentally, dad and family in Edmonton. I did point out there might be an issue with working for me. Still, once we're onto the final days of this year, I'm calling the temp agency back to let them know my schedule is much wider open, and could they please find me a second job, even just for a month or three?
______________________
No writing this week (My writing time got taken up by the stupid autobiography requirement for the application; short but exactly the sort of thing I hate most to write.), though I've done some plotting; much studying, including starting in on St. Francis. I started by reading G.K. Chesterton's bio of the saint, on the reasoning that whether it would be remotely academically rigorous or factual (Er, not so much), it would be an easy read... well, I think I'm learning more about Chesterton than Francis, but it is pretty fun stuff. It also has several passing comments which someone clever could make into a full book. Er, thanks, I have enough...
______________________
Books read for fun lately:
Wintersmith: Good, as one expects from Pterry. A few moments that made me laugh out loud*, something the last few books haven't done, in spite of snickering in my mind. I like Tiffany. I like a book with chapter breaks. I liked especially that the opening chapter felt like he was trying something new.
Wild Mind - Natalie Goldberg has been much recommended as writing good books about writing. Interesting, but I don't think it would help me; not my method at all. Too zen, which, since she's actually studied under a zen master or two, isn't surprising. Still, she has a gift with words, and if nothing else it helped the urge to write.
Doctor Faustus - Strictly speaking for class -- or rather, for classes. Actually, I read the wrong version first; I was using the one for 16th Century lit, and it's Drama that's already started its look. Whoops. (Doctor Faustus is around in several different editions, based on different drafts and publications, and I was warned as much. But I didn't heed, and the tiny slim volume is easier to carry than the 1600-page textbook. First I discovered extra lines in one scene. Then I discovered the oppoosite problem; I had a scene and a half missing.) Either version is a right smooth read; too smooth in some ways, to hint there's more than the surface melodrama. Part of our intorduction said Faustus was usually told as a strict satire or comedy before this; the satire is still there (One of the girls in the class laughed out loud at Mephistophilis' first arrival, and as far as I could see, she was half meant to), but so's all the sadder and darker things that make this a tragedy. And I think I know where Pamela Dean got Shan's horribly too-flip answers in the play version of his story in The Secret Country trilogy. Brrr.
* Werk...
