Every time, it seems, that the carapiccoladiva and I chat, the subject of Christmas in Cowtown arises. She'll be back in town for Christmas, and I am quite looking forward to seeing her. It's funny, but I'd be willing to bet that we've spent more time chatting/emailing/rare phone-call-ing then we have in person.
Anyway.
One of the delights of transferring music to one's MP3 player is that the diva transferring such music comes across music she hasn't heard in forever.
Take this, which is one of my favorite pieces of Christmas music. I'd love to perform it someday.
Enjoy! Remember that it is only a few months until Christmas...and that once October hits, this retail slave's take on matters Christmassy gets distinctly cynical, so enjoy a bit of Christmas spirit now!
I have wanted a MP3 player for YEARS. It's just always been one of those things I've put off and put off and put off; usually, such a purchase would NOT be in the budget, and on the rare occasions that it was, something else came in ahead of it.
I was told last week that I'd need a voice recorder to record my voice lessons. My financial aid check also came in on Friday. I looked at some voice recorders, and one of decent quality would run $30-$45. This was the point at which my brain said, "Okay, for another $30 you could get an MP3 player that will record the lessons, play all your music and let you listen to the local classical music station. DO IT."
So I did.
See this? Meet the Sansa Fuze.
It's mine, mine, MINE!
(Bad picture; mine is a much darker red. Whatever.)
It is currently loading my not-insubstantial music library. I am a most happy diva. Tomorrow I shall revel in any music I choose to revel in en route to school, when driving home from school, and yes, while doing any kind of typing or filing at work.
Yay for the occasional bit of retail therapy!
ETA: Just finished putting all my music onto this player. I still have some space--not a huge amount, but some. A review? Well, the user manual that came with it sucked wastewater, but there is a much better one available online, as a quick bit of Google-fu will tell you. The playlist option requires you to sync the player with your computer, which is initially time-consuming but worth it in the end--if you want every bit of music from your computer on the player. It also tries to load all pictures from your computer. I put a hasty foot down on that one, as I'd prefer not to fill up the player with every picture I've ever felt compelled to store on my computer. Still, I can see how this could be a useful tool for some folks; I might even use it for a few photos.
There is a slot on the side of this player where you can, if you should choose, insert a memory card. This memory card is available for about $20 and will expand the memory from 4 GB to 12GB...a bargain if ever I heard of one. Yes, it'll play video, too.
Now for bed, so that I can get up and try this out!
Post combined-choir practice, I headed off to SheWhoMustBeObeyed and TheMaureenCorps' place this evening. Their folks--TheLibrarian and StarTrekNut--and they have an ongoing tradition of spending Saturday night eating hot dogs and watching mind-bogglingly bad movies. "Bad" doesn't even cover it. It implies that the movie might be a "B" grade. These movies are "C" grade or worse.
Tonight's cinematographic wonder? Mega Shark Versus Giant Octopus. No, I'm serious. Go read the blurb for yourself.
Oy! Stop beating your head against the desk!
Right. The film was everything the title promises. Possibly the best scene involved the megalodon shark leaping 15,000 feet or so into the air to bring down a 747.
I spent most of the evening with Reese (two-week-old spawn of TheMaureenCorps) sprawled across my lap, snoozing in a variety of extremely cute positions.
Yeah, I'm kinda smitten.
It was a good evening.
I mentioned that I've purchased a copy of Letter From New York. Yes, it's pure Hanff, and yes, I love it.
I do not love the smell.
You see, the person who owned before me was unquestionably an interesting person. She was a lover of used books, too, and of all things English. Indeed--and this cracks me up no end--she noted on the flyleaf that she ordered this book from "A Common Reader" of London and received it on December third of 1998. Unless, of course, she used European dating, in which case she got it on March twelfth. What cracks me up about this is that the book she received (used) is the American edition, meaning that someone over there purchased it from a shop here or bought it on a trip or something similar and then sold it to the shop in London, which then sent it back over here. It's a well-travelled boook--far better travelled than its present owner, I'm sorry to say.
The thing is...Ms. Elaine M. Patrick, whoever she may have been, and may she rest in peace if she's passed along to the Great Bookshop In The Sky, smoked.
When I say "smoked," I don't think that I imply the full and wretched horror of the stink rising from this book.
You can smell it across a ROOM. You can't eat while reading it, or your food tastes like stale cigarette smoke. You have to wash your hands madly after reading it, because otherwise your hands reek and you can't bear to have them near your face. Oh, and I don't know if this is just the staleness of the cigarette smoke, but the book also smells like someone puked all over it. No stains or water (vomit?) damage, mind you. Just that sour smell that completes the bouquet of stale cigarette smoke.
And yet...I can't send it back to the bookseller with the customary stiffly and icily polite-but-disappointed note because of that inscription. Ms. Patrick, I think, would like her book to go to someone who loved it as much as she did, and I love the notion of owning an American book that was brought to England and then sent back here.
I've already tried wiping it down with a solution of vinegar and water. There was a slight--and I do mean SLIGHT--improvement.
I have read that wrapping the book in newspaper with newspaper between the pages absorbs odors from the paper. I think I'll try that tomorrow...perhaps even prop it in my window to get some sun.
Until then, I'll be reading with a clothes pin on my nose.
On a message board I frequent, a member posted a thread about one of the latest "ewewewewEW" things to be "in" at the college level.
Her son's girlfriend, while bringing some laundry to the laundry room, overheard some chitchat between some of the young...gentlemen...who also live in her building. The gist of it was "yeah, that's her" and mentioning a "large ball."
Girl in question uses an exercise ball to work out every day. She doesn't know these guys from Adam. This, quite reasonably, creeps her out.
She goes upstairs and calls her boyfriend. Boyfriend comes over, and between the two of them they find a way to locate...cameras. Several cameras. Cameras hidden in light fixtures (and other areas) around her apartment. The lenses of these cameras are the size of screw heads; in fact, at least one was in the head of a screw.
A phone call to the police later, a few officers show up and do a bit more searching. Seems there were a good eight cameras scattered hither, thither and yon about that floor of the apartment building, with locations ranging from bathroom exhaust fans to intercom keypads . All were wired to a transmitter behind an access panel in the hall. The transmitter is designed for wireless access (ie, the creeps needn't even be in the building).
Oh, and the best part about this? Not only are these girls unwilling porn stars, but if the police actually locate the scum who set up the cameras, very little in the way of charges will be filed because there are almost no laws about videotaping someone without her permission. Audio, yes. Video, no.
I'm not generally in favor of more laws, but I'd say that this sort of thing really ought to qualify as some sort of sex crime.
Ladies, add "check for cameras" to your list of items to do upon moving into a new place.
Technology, I love it so...
It's Friday, I'm not working, I've had some absolutely magnificent Chinese food (more on that later) and I have a Helene Hanff book that I've never read before.
Ms. Hanff was a lover of dogs. Though she didn't own one herself, she'd borrow her neighbors' dogs and take them for evening walks and throw them birthday parties and whatnot. When one of her favorite dogs died, both she and the owner missed him quite badly. The owner, Richard, decided to get another sheepdog, went to the kennel, and looked around.
"Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I'm pleased to report that my dinner guests will include a newly resident Old English sheepdog, and thereby hangs a tale. Richard, owner of Chester-the-sheepdog who died two months ago, drove out to the kennel last summer to see about getting a new pup. He ordered his pup but he saw a sight at the kennel that depressed him. A massive, full-grown Old English sheepdog was kept in a cage barely big enough for him. He'd been living in the cage for three months. The dog's name was Bentley, and for the first two years of his life he had lived with a family in Vermont. Then the family had to move to England for a year, and rather than quarantine Bentley there for six months, they decided to leave him behind. They drove him to the kennel, said to the breeder "Find a home for him," and drove off. Bentley couldn't believe his family had abandoned him. When he was locked in the cage, he went berserk--tearing at the steel wire and barking until he was worn out. Finally, he gave up. When Richard saw him, Bentley sat in the cage hour after hour, staring at nothing, as motionless as a block of wood. Richard pitied the dog but he didn't want him. Nobody wanted him. Everyone wanted a pup.
On a Saturday afternoon in September Richard drove up to the kennel for his pup, and when he got back he phoned me.
"Did you get your pup?" I asked. "What's his name?"
There was a pause.
"Bentley," said Richard. "I warn you. He's a nerd. He just sits. But I couldn't stand leaving him in that cage." He added that Bentley had come alive enough to go over eery inch of his new home with his nose, so there was hope.
"Bring him up," I said.
Richard came up a few minutes later, accompanied by the most beautiful Old English sheepdog I ever saw, with a thick snow-white coat and enormous white fur paws. I sat in my armchair, and at Richard's command Bentley sat alongside the chair with his profile to me. His face was entirely hidden under a mop of white fur, and he stared off at nothing. I leaned down and, talking into his left ear, told Bentley that he was the most beautiful sheepdog in the world. I told him there were lots of dogs in the neighborhood who would be overjoyed to meet him. I told him he was going to be very happy in his new home with Richard, and that all the people who lived in the building were going to admire him and appreciate him, and all the dogs were going to be friends with him. He sat, unmoving, with no sign that he heard me. Finally I ran out of things to say and stopped talking. I looked at Richard and sighed, and Richard shrugged.
And, still staring straight ahead and without moving anything else, Bentley offered me his paw.
And a Happy Thanksgiving to you, too."
(Letter From New York, p.59)
Now if that doesn't bring a tear and a smile, I don't know what will!
I have a favorite sushi restaurant. It is somewhat near TCU, but if you catch it at the right time it's still pretty quiet, the sushi is most yummy, and their "sushi happy hour" (a fair number of rolls half the regular price) happens from 7 PM on every night. The service is excellent, and so long as they don't have folks waiting they don't care if you sit there and finish your book after you've eaten. Excellent!
Thing is, it is near TCU, and it does have a bar. This means that occasionally you'll have a bunch of froglodytes infest the place. Fortunately, I can get into a book so thoroughly that anything quieter than a small nuclear explosion is unlikely to keep my attention away from the story.
I went there the other night, and commenced my usual "bite of sushi/read a page/bite of sushi" routine. About fifteen minutes later, my attention was caught by a slamming noise as I reached for another bite of sushi. Looking up, I saw a clan of froglodytes engaging in a sake-chugging contest--they'd chug the sake, and slam the table once the portion was chugged. Eh, well, so long as they aren't driving thought I, as I turned another page.
A few minutes later, I was distracted from my (quite excellent) book by screams of pain. Startled, I looked over at the other table and saw one of the guys writhing on the floor while clutching at his face and howling. I briefly considered walking over to the table, and then decided that his friends, who were half-carrying him out, probably could handle it. My server came over and apologized for the noise. "What happened?" I asked.
The server got a decidedly I-hate-people expression on his face. "I believe he may have been overserved."
"Indeed?" said I, a bit drily.
"Well, yes."
It turned out that the mental deficient in question had decided that the sake he was chugging wasn't giving him enough of a buzz. Therefore, when the next round came up, he asked the server for a couple of straws. The server, slightly confused, obliged. The customer then stuck one end of each of the straws in the glass of sake, placed the other straw ends in his nostrils, and snorted the sake.
Y'know, it's moments like this that make me seriously reconsider my views on Darwinism.
I've mentioned a time or twelve my fondness for Helene Hanff's writing. She's one of those people that I have every intention of buttonholing in the hereafter for at least a millenium or so. Blunt, witty, and a lover of good books: what's not to like?
The only thing that makes me sad about her books is that she is dead, and so, presumably, no more books are forthcoming from her. (Though if any author were to reach into the Now from the Beyond and dictate books, it would be someone with her personality. And she'd demand that the dictatee have a martini heavy on gin, light on vermouth and a cigarette at hand.)
I had thought that I'd done a pretty thorough search for her books, and purchased all of her non-childrens' books. (She wrote a historical series for children. Even she considered it dull.)
Yesterday, however, I was deeply and horribly bored whilst at The Bookstore. I was trapped in Durance Vile (more commonly referred to as the Music and DVD department) by the whim of a foul and evil manager. When a bookseller (I'm a BOOKSELLER, dammit, not a music seller, and certainly not a DVD seller) is trapped in Durance Vile, there is little for her to Do. Traffic is either nonexistent or larcenous.
I was idly searching for books on our inventory system, and for the heck of it I looked up Helene Hanff as an author. Yep. 84, Charing Cross Road; The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street; Letter to New York; Apple of my---wait, what was that??
I'd never heard of Letter to New York...and it wasn't in the juvenile inventory.
I looked at the very brief description. Evidentally, Ms. Hanff gave radio broadcasts with BBC New York for some time, and this is a collection of her scripts--yes, written by her--describing little bits of life in New York at that time.
Needless to say, Letter to New York got tacked onto my semester's textbook order this morning.
The scene: a hospital room. TheMaureenCorps, a proud new mama, is sitting on the bed. UbiCaritas, SheWhoMustBeObeyed and OptimusPrime (only adult male in the room) are trying to wake up baby Reese, as it is feeding time. Reese is deeply uninterested in anything except sleep, causing his mother to mutter remarks about why he can't take this point of view at 3 AM. Reese has been circumcized earlier that day.
The nurse comes in and asks how everything is going. We explain that all is quite well, thanks, but that Reese hasn't eaten in three hours or so, and thus we're passing him around, tickling his feet, and generally trying to remind him that Food Is A Good Thing, and rather necessary at frequent intervals when your stomach is the size of a marble.
"Well," says the nurse, heading back to the door, "he might sleep a bit extra today. Between the drugs from the circumcision and the sugar water we gave him during the circumcision, he'll be a bit sleepy anyway."
She then gets behind the door, but pokes her head back in to say, "Besides, remember that the poor kid has had brain surgery." A fast exit and short pause follows this statement, before OptimusPrime's "HEEEEEEYYYYY...." and chortles from every female in the room are heard over at the nurse's station.
TheMaureenCorps: "You're gonna blog that, aren't you?"
UbiCaritas: "Oh, you bet."
Courtesy of shewhomustbeobeyed, I give you one of the more accurate customer demographic visuals I've seen in a long time.
(For those of you not in retail, anyone who ever says "The Customer Is Always Right" falls into the red portion of that graph.)
