richardderus's fifteenth thread of 2019

1949 Buick Roadmaster convertible...*sigh*

See ya, 2019! 1949 says all the best.

I'm bowing to reality. My goal of writing 150 reviews for my blog is dead but I've just realized I'm over 150 here. My ancillary goal remains to create some sort of post about the Pearl-Ruled books explaining why I am abandoning ship; I'll set an arbitrary count of 100 of those since goodness knows I abandon a lot of books. I'm finally realizing that the Pearl-Rulers are going to count to the 150 goal because it's reviews on-site, not bloggables.







My 2018 Reviews Are Here:
Reviews 1-25 are linked there.

Reviews 26-31 are linked here.

Reviews 32-39 are linked there.

Reviews 40-54 are linked over here.

Reviews 55-70 are linked over here.

Reviews 71-101 (I misnumbered) are linked over here.

Reviews 102-110 are linked over here.

Reviews 111 - 123 are reviewed over here.

Reviews 124-127 are there.

2019's Reviews Are Here:
Reviews 1-4 are here.

My first Pearl-Ruled notice and two reviews are found here.

Reviews 7-15 plus some Pearl Rules are in this thread.

Reviews 15-19 and a Pearl Rule are here.

Reviews 20 & 21 are are here.

Reviews 22-32 are back there.

Reviews 33-38, Pearl Rules 6 & 7, and a random review are all back yonder.

Reviews 39-50 and Pearl Rule 8 got left behind.

Reviews 51-57 sont derriere.

Reviews 58-66 and three Pearl Rules are thataway.

Reviews 67-82 plus three Pearl Rules are swiftly receding.

Reviews 83-104 and two Pearl Rules estan por detrás.

Reviews 105-111, plus three well-loved reads, reside rearward.

Reviews 112-124 are back where they belong.

This thread's reviews are:

125 Lungfish is a generation-ship short story reviewed for a multi-blogger project, post 77.

126 Thirteen for Centaurus is another generation-ship project review, post 196.

127 The Christmas Deal is a silly little rom-com, post 259.

128 Logan's Run was a bad book and a pretty but stupid movie, post 261.

129 The Working Elf Blues is another silly Xmas rom-com, post 270.

130 Why Is Nothing Ever Simple? is the annual St Mary's Xmas story, post 271.

131 The Hunger After You're Fed: Who is Hector Prima? is an Expanse short story, post 273.

132 The Big Book of Movie Posters was a fun little idea executed to a middling standard, post 282.

133 A Viking for Yule ticked all the rom-com boxes, post 283.

134 These Bad Things is a horror short by a favorite author of mine, post 288.

135 Omnilingual contains laughable "science" from risible "scientists" but hell, it's almost 70 years old, in post 297.

Via Bookish, here's a list of challenges to #KillYourTBR (note that I've modified a few entries to make them possible for me to meet):

1. A book you bought for the cover
Any Old Diamonds

2. A book by an author you’ve met
The Front Runner

3. A book you’re embarrassed you haven’t read yet


4. A book that is under 220 pages
The King's Evil

5. A book that came out the year you were born


6. A book whose title uses alliteration
When Saigon Surrendered

7. A book in your best friend’s favorite genre


8. A book from an independent publisher
What About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanford, Copper Canyon Press

9. A book you borrowed from the library
The Reluctant Widow

10. A book featuring a fictional language
Friday Black: Stories (final story, "Through the Flash")

11. A novel that includes a recipe (Bonus points for making the recipe)
With the Fire on High + bonus points for making the bread!

12. A book won in a raffle/giveaway
With Walt Whitman, Himself

13. A book about going on a quest
The Burning Page

14. A book set in a city you’ve visited
Young Man from the Provinces

15. A book with a dust jacket


16. A book by two or more authors


17. A book that is over 1000 pages
Ducks, Newburyport

18. A book that’s been out for less than a month
Black Light: Stories

19. A book with a name in the title
The Other Boleyn Girl

20. A book from a genre you want to read more of
The Murders of Molly Southbourne

21. A book written by a Native American author
Heart Berries

22. A book with an asexual character
Convenience Store Woman

23. A book you were given as a gift
The Art of Dying

24. A book translated from Spanish


25. An award-winning graphic novel
Tom's Midnight Garden Graphic Novel

26. A book featuring a false confession
The Testaments

27. A book you meant to read in 2018
West

28. A book featuring a memorable companion animal
The Demon Breed

29. A book set in South America


30. A book with a cover you kind of hate (but a story you love)
Glass

31. A book by an author you’ve never heard of before
Coming Through: Three Novellas

32. A book of short stories
Lot: Stories

33. A book featuring a nonbinary protagonist


34. A book you’ve been waiting for forever


35. A book about intersectional feminism


36. A book with a place in the title
Our Man in Havana

37. A book bought at/from a physical bookstore
Elect Mr. Robinson for a Better World

38. A book by an author you’re thankful for
The Patience of the Spider by Andrea Camilleri (RIP)

39. A book with gorgeous descriptions
Night Boat to Tangier

40. A book signed by the author


41. A book set in Africa
The Making of the African Queen

42. A book about mental health
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine

43. A book written by an immigrant
Dominicana: A Novel

44. A retelling


45. A book about incarceration/internment
They Called Us Enemy

46. A book recommended by an author


47. A book with a person of color on the cover
My Sister, the Serial Killer

48. A book by an author who uses a pen name


49. A book whose title includes a verb
Thrice the Brinded Cat Hath Mew'd

50. A book recommended by a librarian


51. A book being adapted in 2019


52. A book you found in a Little Free Library

Okay, proceed.

With caution.

Well then cautiously, I proceed.

Happy New Thread, my friend!

Caution be damned!

Happy new thread, RichardDear!

*smooch* from your own Madame TVT Horrible

Happy new thread! I will, however persist in staying in place.

*peeks in and then quietly sneaks back out*

>5 mahsdad: Hey, Jeff! Happy to see you here. AND you're the first in!

>6 karenmarie: Heh, how did I know that'd be you, Horrible. *smooch*

>7 quondame: Hi Susan, well as long as you know your place all will be well.

>8 MickyFine: Caught you, Micky! Your presence is indelibly noted.

>1 richardderus: - Ooooh, purrty!

Happy new one, RD.

>11 katiekrug: Ain't it? I love that double-cream color. So satisfying.

Happy weekend! Good reads and warm hugs abounding.

Proceed with caution? This can't be Richard's thread. His would say, "Damn the torpedoes!" Or some such.

I'm looking forward to whatever you pull together for the Pearl-Ruled books and why. That should be fun.

P.S. Love the photos of the 1949 Buick

>13 jnwelch: It's just gorgeous, isn't it.

I'm sixty! One slows down, gets stodgy, as one ages. You'll find out.

Hmm...that's an idea...a Pearl-Rule round-up post...

Happy new one!

Loving the latest Buick!! Happy new one. Smooches.

>15 figsfromthistle: Thanks, Anita!

>16 Berly: I know, right?! So elegant...the fatwall tires look...well, less like a pimpmobile than they do on modern cars. It takes a LOT of work to keep them that blindingly white, I can *stiffback twinge* tell ya.

*smooch*

Nice Buick! I got nothing pejorative to say about it. Good selection, RD.

Hi Richard, happy new thread dear friend.

Woah, gorgeous vehicle toppers.
Love your new thread themes. Always amazing.

>18 weird_O: Hiya, Bill, glad to have you on the cruise!

>19 johnsimpson: Thanks so much, John, and a happy Advent season!

>20 SandyAMcPherson: Hello Sandy! Thank you, I was pleased to realize how many like the pretty old cars.

Happy Friday, Richard! Happy New Thread! Love the Roadmaster! How about those cars in The Irishman? Some stunning models. What was the black one, that De Niro was driving around in, early on? Simply gorgeous.

Happy new thread Richard!

So copy these reviews across to your blog.

>22 msf59: I don't remember, but when I watch it again I'll take more note of it. All I can say is it wasn't out of period or I would've been fuming and fulminating.

>23 humouress: I use the blog for positive reviews, La Overkill. Out of 727 published single-title reviews, and ~315 multi-titles on the Pages, I've posted three 1 or 1.5-star reviews and twelve 2 or 2.5-star ones. It's a bigger megaphone than here or even Goodreads, so I try not to crap on people who don't *richly* deserve it!

Hi Richard! I've seen you mention this blog on multiple occasions, but is there a link somewhereabouts?

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread, Richard!

>25 Ape: Yes indeed: https://expendablemudge.blogspot.com/

Come visit!

>26 thornton37814: Thank you, Lori!

>27 bell7: Thanks, Mary, it's definitely the last of 2019 and thus this decade. Whoo-ee is that a sobering thought.

Happy new one and last one, Richard. Love the convoitable.

>30 richardderus: Thanks, Shelley! I was just chez vous telling you how much I liked your fused-glass artwork!

Hi Richard and Happy New Thread. It's presumably your last thread topped by classic cars. I wonder what 2020 (wha*?????) will bring.

You ripped through that Lisa Henry series on your prior thread. They sound interesting.

It's the weekend!! And I hope Old Stuff spends it sleeping. Quietly.

*smooch*

>24 richardderus: Fair enough. But you did have quite a few high rated reviews recently. (I remember thinking - woah, Richard's in a good mood! ;0) )

Happy new thread, Richard.

>14 richardderus: One slows down, gets stodgy, as one ages. Speak for your ownself there!

>28 richardderus: Thanks! The last thing I need is another source of book bullets, but I've bookmarked anyway.

'Morning, RichardDear, and happy Saturday to you.

>28 richardderus: I follow the ordinary way of defining a decade, too, using the tens digit of the year, so 2010-2019, but there is the Anno Domini year numbering system which is a period from a year which ends on the digit 1 to the following year which is a multiple of ten, so the decade won't end until 12-31-2020. This is logical if you consider that 1 B.C. is followed by 1 C.E. (or A.D., anno domini). I know, it's almost too much before a full cup of coffee, but it is interesting, isn't it?

*smooch*

>28 richardderus: and >35 karenmarie: I had coffee and I'm still lost ...

Fortunately I don't have to pass a comp so I'm going to stay blissfully uninformed. *runs off to pull another shot of espresso*

>31 EBT1002: Old Stuff, I am pleased to report, is out of the room entirely. I don't know or care where, or why; I don't care if he's off getting drunk (a frequent occurence) so long as he's silent on his return. He developed the habit of coming in drunk and fulminating, cussing, and generally being shitty...I never said a word to him, just went to management and asked if they really wanted to be responsible for a drunk old jackanapes (had to explain that word) with a bum leg and a walker falling in the bathroom, breaking a hip...

He got threatened with eviction, cleaned up his behavior, and now I just try not to gag when his reeking carcass shambles into my space.

>32 humouress: It was a terrific year! Lots of much-better-than-usual reads published! They happen sometimes and I treasure them more and more. Kimberly King Parsons...what a joy her stories were...Therese Mailhot and her startling nudity of spirit...Robbie Arnott and his magical Tasmania, so beautifully rendered...yep, 2019 was one helluva year for reading.

>33 Familyhistorian: Hi Meg! Thanks for the new-thread wishes. And yes, I am speaking for us all, those over the hill, on the downslide to Eternity. You'll understand when you get there.

>34 Ape: Good! I hope you get some pleasure out of reading the mountain of stuff there.

>35 karenmarie:, >36 SandyAMcPherson: Heh. That means the 21st century started on 1/1/2001, and good luck selling that one to the hoi polloi. I
I'll go with one nine-year decade and the secular version of dates rather than try to force Others to make sense. Too old to play that game anymore.

Time for the second pot.

So is Old Stuff GONE? Am I reading that correctly? Of course, I hope you will answer in the affirmative. Ugh, on that reeking carcass...ewwwwww.

>39 msf59: Not for good, Mark, or I'd have paper lanterns and streamers and confetti at the door. He got up and went to breakfast at 7.30 as usual but didn't come back to ooze cigarette-and-booze stink at me. Usually that means he's away for the bulk of the day, so I am very hopeful I've got a respite.
***
Ellen brought up a good point: 2019's theme was the cars of 1949, I've had artists as my toppers, I think there was a moment when I did writers as well. Next year I have two ideas, and as y'all're the audience I'd like to see what the preference is:
♥1960 in kulcher, with toppers of the events of my sixty-years-ago life like films and books and TV;
♥Great SF women, with reading lists, starting as early as I can find someone of note.

Fammi sapere in the comments to come.

Oh, bummer! I was hoping for the best. At least you can enjoy a Old Stuff free day.

>40 richardderus: I vote for 1960 in kulcher because I'm not seriously into SF and because it will be insight into things you think are worthy of note for that year.

>41 msf59: Oh, this is the best, Mark. The notion of playing Roommate Roulette with the inmates of this place...well, I don't *like* Old Stuff, but he's not so addled as to be incontinent, not so crippled as to need a rollator but just a walker, etc etc. What I want, of course, is this room to myself but that won't be happening any time soon.

Please vote for a topper theme! 1960 in the world, or the Ladies of SF. I want to do the one that'll be most interesting for y'all and they both appeal to me equally.

>42 karenmarie: One for 1960. Check!

*smooch*

>35 karenmarie: That's like waking up at 9am and deciding that Thursday starts at 9am and ends at 8:59am the next day. Now where's the logic in that?

I vote for kulcher! :-)

>43 richardderus: Please vote for a topper theme! 1960 in the world, or the Ladies of SF.

Umm, where is this theme stuff?

>44 Ape: Since time is arbitrary, and dates are invented, it makes as much sense as any other alternative.

>45 jessibud2: That's two for 1960.

>46 SandyAMcPherson: ...um...that's it, what you just quoted. Those two ideas are the ones I will choose from to theme my headers for 2020. Do you have a preference?

>40 richardderus: How could I choose between the first decade I viewed with somewhat adult awareness (not that I remember much, having been there) and Women who write/wrote SF. I give you credit with the ability to go wrong with either one, and the confidence that you will do right.

1960 (as in cars? ~ anything after 1950 is boring, 'cos I never liked those big fins and cars 2 blocks long).

1960's was always very divided in my mind. Pre- and post- Flower Power, yeah?

>48 quondame: Okay, that's one for {whichever one's winning} that I can use as a tie-breaker.

>49 SandyAMcPherson: No, not THE SIXTIES. Just the year 1960, the first one I was alive. It was a really interesting year, the election that led to the end of the Democrats in the White House, the Cold War ramping up with Cuban communism's scaring us, etc etc. I won't focus on cars for more than one, maybe two, threads...the first one for sure.

>47 richardderus: Everything under the sun is arbitrary, but that doesn't mean I can't be grumpy about them.

>51 Ape: Not quite so sure about the arbitrariness of physics, but point made and granted.

Ladies of SF, of course!!

>52 richardderus: Physics isn't "under the sun," so it doesn't count. ;)

Oh, and I definitely vote for Ladies of SF, but you probably knew that already.

>44 Ape: False analogy, Stephen. My point was that it’s as good a way to look at a decade as the alternative, but that there is a valid and well-recognized alternative. Mind-bending for sure, and not generally accepted, especially when the world crazy over Y2K at the end of 1999, but interesting nevertheless, at least to me.

>51 Ape: and >52 richardderus: LOL

>53 ronincats: So now we're at 2-1960, 2-Ladies, and one Dealer's Choice.

>54 Ape: I suspected, but I prefer certainty to guesswork.

>55 karenmarie: *smooch*

>56 richardderus: Besides, you can't see it, so it probably isn't even real.

>57 Ape: Brian Greene would like a word....

Brian Greene qualifies as "under the sun," and is therefore arbitrary. Check mate!

Doesn't this wreath look evil? I didn't know snow could do chthonic!

Theme vote--1960 no (I wasn't here yet). 60s yes. SF ladies yes. : )

>60 quondame: That's lot of snow!!!

>60 quondame: OK, so not southern California!

And, just asking... from where did that snow drift in? Someone's storm door didn't work. Or nmaybe it is just a screen.

>60 quondame: - Not here in Toronto, of course, but growing up in Montreal, this would not be such an shocking sight. We lived on the side of the street that the wind blew toward and this sort of thing happened, not often, but it happened. I can remember my dad having to remove the window of our screen door on 2 distinct occasions in order for us to stick the shovel (kept inside in the hallway) out the window space and shovel the snow away from the door so we could open that storm door. As kids, let me tell you, it spelled nothing if not FUN. But as an adult, not so much, especially if you needed to go out in it and had to get somewhere.

Good morning, RD!

Happy Sunday, happy coffee, happy books.

*smooch*

Ladies of SF!

Vote recap: 4-Ladies, 2-1960, 1-castable as I choose.

>59 Ape: *snort*

>60 quondame: *boggle* It's a Davy Jones Yule wreath!


>61 Berly: Heh, yep that's a scary sight alrighty all right.

>62 SandyAMcPherson: It looks like someone didn't have a storm door, so I'm guessing it was taken in one of those blizzards the southern edge of the Plains gets once in a while. I mean, look at the imprint of the door embossing on the snow! There was nothing between it and the door.

>63 jessibud2: In Montreal the snows are a LOT more intimidating than anywhere near the Great Lakes...lake-effect blizzards notwithstanding.

>64 karenmarie: Happy happy! *smooch*

>65 humouress: Counted and tallied, dear Scarlet.

>40 richardderus: I think I will go with the SF women, RD!

Happy Sunday, Richard. Getting ready to go on a shortish bird stroll and maybe another one later.

So FIVE women, 2-1960, 1-dealer's choice.

>68 msf59: Have a lovely bird stroll(s)! Sundays are so easeful...nothing much doing anywhere and the noisiest doins are self-sequestered. *happy sigh*
***

I do so love Grant Snider!

>69 richardderus: - Ha! I posted the link to this on my thread last night!

>70 jessibud2: Heh, great minds and all that.

>66 richardderus: I've missed these deep, philosophical discussions we have. ;)

Happy new thread!

>72 Ape: *snort*

>73 drneutron: Thanks, Jim!

Hi RD! I love that you have started your December thread with a convertible. ;-)

>43 richardderus: - I will vote for both themes because if 1960 win, I will learn some interesting facts that predate me and if Ladies in SF win, than I will discover new reading options, so perfectly happy with whichever theme wins.

So when you said Ladies of SF all I could think of was this Richard:



The famous Painted Ladies of San Francisco. But I guess that's not what you meant at all.

125 LUNGFISH by JOHN BRUNNER
(PDF read-only link above)

Rating: 4.5* of five

This is a Brunner story I haven't read before! He's an old favorite of mine (see my review of Times Without Number, others came before I was reviewing). So when Joachim Boaz posted the link to this story, well, I don't have much impulse control when it comes to reading....

Like Judith Merril's story reviewed below, this one takes place as things are reaching a crisis or inflection point; in Brunner's case, opposite to Merril's, the point-of-view was adult...well, aged Earthborn people, the ones who started the trip to a new world that was planned by a visionary called Yoseida, so obviously a Japanese person. This sort of surprised me. Japan was on the come-up in 1957, but it wasn't the economic and technological powerhouse it would become. But Yoseida was the money-man as well as the macher behind this effort to colonize a new world. Prescient, or very lucky? I suspect Brunner himself wouldn't know now.

Franz Yerring is the head of the ecological section of the generation ship. He's Earth-born, aging out of his position, hoping that he won't have to deliver bad news to Captain Magda Gomez about their steep decline in food and air availability looming within a month. Wish granted, Franz, the ship will now be in orbit over Trip's End around Tau Ceti in about two weeks!

Then the fecal matter impacts the rotary ventilation enhancement device in quantities previously undreamed of.

The shipborn aren't much interested in getting off the ship.

You see, this development would (in less devious hands) set the rest of the story onto the rails of conflict and strife...like Clifford D. Simak's Spaceborn Generations, reviewed in November...but no, our lad John takes that expectation and shakes it hard, until its wallet falls out and disgorges the serious gelt. There is no conflict between the spaceborn and their elders. They aren't interested enough in the Earthborns's issue, planting a colony, for it to matter enough to cause a fight.

Read the story, the real conflict is much, much higher stakes than passive resistance to The Plan. A lot scarier, too. But the problem is that the ending relies on science that seemed more plausible in 1957 than it's proven to be in modern times. The issue it raises is bleeding-edge current, and the problem it posits is also bleeding-edge current. It's a wonderful way to bring up a painful discussion in sociopolitcally polarized families. But the central premise is debatable in its form presented.

I'm getting dangerously close to irretrievable spoilers here. Let me say this to you, dear readers: The story is free at the link provided and it will richly reward the 30min you spend reading it with hours of rumination.

>75 lkernagh: Hi Lori! Ha, yes, a drop-top ride doesn't sound quite so cozy in December, does it? We can dream....

>76 brenzi: Ha! No, Bonnie, that wasn't the idea, but ain't they purty.

My vote count is SIX Ladies, three 1960, 1 to be cast.

>38 richardderus: Ha, you made me laugh, Richard. I am older than you and don't understand!

I'm not into SF, I vote for the 1960s. I bet I can remember more of it than you can.

>66 richardderus: >74 richardderus: Tissue?

'Morning, RD. Happy Monday to you.

>79 Familyhistorian: Older! Faugh, I'll believe it when I see proof.

>80 Familyhistorian: Five ladies, FOUR for 1960. I was newborn so I really can't say I have a memory of anything except the smell of lily of the valley and bright emerald green. Mama, when I asked her what those could relate to, said that the carpet in our old house was emerald green and she had lilies of the valley under the living room window.

>81 humouress: Minions tissues! That's wonderful.

>82 karenmarie: Hi Horrible! Not a chance. It's foggy, drizzly, and nasty; every part of my person aches.

More coffee and a good read, says I.

Foggy, drizzly and nasty - great reading weather, although I sympathize on the aches. More coffee! Yes, just the ticket. I'm going to get some more myself.

>84 jnwelch: Waitwaitwait Joe! Come back! Your input is needed on:
Ellen brought up a good point: 2019's theme was the cars of 1949, I've had artists as my toppers, I think there was a moment when I did writers as well. Next year I have two ideas, and as y'all're the audience I'd like to see what the preference is:
♥The year 1960 in kulcher *NOT the whole 1960s*, with toppers of the events of my sixty-years-ago life like films and books and TV;
♥Great SF women, with reading lists, starting as early as I can find someone of note.

Fammi sapere in the comments to come.
Presently there are five votes for the Ladies, four for 1960, and one cast-as-tie-breaker, so all opinions are eagerly sought!

>85 richardderus:, OK... I'll vote for that 1960 category... making it an official tie at this point!

What a hoot this canvassing is for toppers. My thread not as visited, so I won't try that voting thingy... after all, I'm only on chapter 3 or maybe it's 4 now. Being organized for what the first 2020 top photo might be is an amusing pastime, whatever happens on the thread!

>86 SandyAMcPherson: And it's a TIE!

Sandy, it's just a fun way to distinguish my thread from so many to choose from..."oh, he's the guy with the {cars/Ladies/stuff about the Pleistocene}, better {see what's new/avoid at all costs}" and it plays to my interest in weird and unusual internet finds. I recommend it as a cheer-inducing exercise.

Oh I forgot to vote. SF not my thing so....1960 it is.

Ooop...were at SIX 1960, five Ladies, and one reserved tie-breaker.

Thanks, Bonnie!

So an hour later, my vote doesn't count? I think this election is rigged. Aren't the polls open until 8:22 p.m.?

I vote for 1960 culcha.

Well, if the election is rigged, then I'm gonna vote twice. I vote for 1960 kulcher. Again. ha! ;-)

I'm also not super interested in sf, so I'll vote for 1960.

Bcuz I r n eejit, we're at 9-1960, 8-Ladies, 1 tie-breaker.

>90 weird_O: They're open until the day Jim starts the 2020 group. Makes the break ever-so much cleaner.

>91 jessibud2: Vote early, vote often as Plunkitt of Tammany Hall said.

>92 katiekrug: Just a quick reminder...in 1960, there were no mastodons roaming the Great Plains and no remnant populations of Atlanteans trying to escape their watery doom.

Those all died out c. 1955. Don't want you to feel cheated!

>93 richardderus: - Snerk.

>91 jessibud2: >93 richardderus: In that case, I'll vote again for the Ladies to tie it again :0)

'Morning, RD! I hope you're feeling better today - maybe not NO achy parts, but perhaps fewer?

Yay for 1960. I was 7. It was a good year.

>94 katiekrug: :-)

>95 humouress: *sigh*

NINE ALL for Ladies of Science Fiction, and la cultura di 1960; one tie-breaker remains vested in moi.

>96 karenmarie: Hey Horrible! Wow...you're, like, *really* old! Almost as old as my cronesters, I mean sisters.

Was mammoth meat tasty? How many people could a mastodon tenderloin feed?

Good morning!

I vote for 1960

>98 figsfromthistle: Hi Anita! Happy Tuesday to you.

TEN 1960; NINE Ladies; ONE tie-breaker by proxy.

>97 richardderus: - Hey mister! I am Karen's vintage, too. Respect your elders, young man!

And just for that, I will vote again: 1960 kulcher! I do believe that breaks the tie....;-)

(or, you could alternate months: one month kulcher, one month, ladies, if you are in a compromising mood))

>100 jessibud2: Yes, of course Shelley, one must *always* respect the elderly. Y'all get so testy otherwise.
sheesh OK Boomer

ELEVEN for 1960, NINE for the Ladies, and I still wield my one proxy.

What a slowpoke I am! I'd be happy with either, but I vote for the SFF ladies.

I'm going to miss the cool '49 cars.

>102 jnwelch: Captain Slow weighs in, making it 11-1960, 10-Ladies...we're back in tie-breaker range!

>103 richardderus: - Well, then, I'll vote again: kulcher!! :-D

>104 jessibud2: Now yinz is just gettin greedy...no, no Nanette. Stare decises.

>103 richardderus: Hooray, for Captain Slow!!

Morning, Richard. I am not sure how your weather is there, but it is damn cold here, despite all the sunshine. At least I have some good books to keep me company.

>106 msf59: Hey Mark, it's a real downer of a day (again) with clouds, fog, drizzle...I *have* to venture out-of-doors, dammit, but the drizzle should abate by afternoon.

The upside is that fog = warmer weather, so that doesn't rot. It's almost 60°/16C today, which is way warmer than normal.

>83 richardderus: >97 richardderus: What, you accept that Karen was 7 in 1960 but from me you demand proof?

>100 jessibud2: Yeah, Shelley, I detect very little respect for his elders on this young man's thread!

Hi Richard, I'll vote for 1960 again.

Good gracious, this multivoting thing is burgeoning! We've got twelve-1960 and eleven-Ladies plus my tie-breaker proxy.

>108 Familyhistorian: I've known Horrible since the crust was cooling, so I'm aware that she once went with her band (this being before tribes were invented) to slaughter the mastodons. She's been remarkably shtumm about how it felt to be an adult when writing was invented, darn it.

Now you kids stop that squabbling! I'm not going to tell you again!

By the bye, I vote for 1960 kultur.

>110 weird_O: Hi Bill! Okay, we're up to thirteen Kulcher of 1960, eleven Ladies, and one proxy vote.

Now, kind sir, I shall have you to know that this cave has many stone tools to deploy....

I vote for the Ladies.

Okay, however many multiple voters there are, I vote that many times for the ladies of SF, cause I don't think that's kosher!

Did you see this, Richard? DAW is accepting SF&F manuscripts sans agents.
https://publishedtodeath.blogspot.com/2018/07/daw-books-opens-its-doors-to-sci-f...

>109 richardderus: Well, I can't be older than you because I wasn't around when the crust was cooling, so you have me there, Richard but, then again, I am a tad older than Karen so maybe not.

If Roni is going to vote mega times for the ladies, I'll put in more votes for 1960.

I'm just balancing every extra vote. So I've already countered your vote there, Meg. ;-)

I haven't read the above posts. I can't. I'm delicate, and s***.

I'm going to see John Waters perform locally next week, I've accidentally used Google group messages to make a rather rude overture to one of the ones who got away and invite him, and I'm ashamed to say several others, to a Christmas night dinner, and I decided to read better literature in 2020 then I have in 2019.

Being alive is kind of wonderful.

>97 richardderus: Okay, wise guy. Point taken. 66 is a good age, considering the alternative. A few aches and pains here and there including a wonky right hip that has a bit of arthritis in it and occasional sore hands from using my cell phone too much (sigh), but remarkably well-preserved for all that. Being a carnivore I did love mammoth meat, although it’s a bit gamey. A mastodon tenderloin could feed the entire group, although the men got to eat first, damn them, leaving the women and children to the scraps. I’ve been a feminist for a very, very long time…

>100 jessibud2: Yay Shelley! He’s just a whipper-snapper, isn’t he? But no to alternating months please…

Hope you have a warm and cozy day RD. Looks like you’re going to wake up to snow on the ground tomorrow morning. I want snow after Saturday – Jenna comes home Friday and we have a family party on Saturday, so Sunday would be good. *smile*

*smooch* from your age-ravaged friend Horrible

*bleurgh* Snow, the kind that's rain with delusions of grandeur, greeted my appalled eyes this morning. Not sticking, not predicted to last long enough to do more than make slushy spots that will freeze overnight into hip-breaking slippers.

NOW. About this voting-until-it-comes-out-my-way lark...remember who holds the counter in his hands, and takes Tammany Hall as his model.

*smooch*

>112 benitastrnad: Hi Benita! Twleve Ladies, thirteen Kulcher of 1960 noted.

>113 ronincats: *snort* Kosher Tammany Hall has processed your, um, quantum-tunnel of a vote.

Yes, I did see that, and have a serious expectation that they will be *so*sorry* they did this. Can you even imagine the slush pile some poor intern is going to wade through?

>114 Familyhistorian: Heh...well, now the quantum-tunneled vote grows.

As to my own personal age, I am precisely 35 and will remain so until further notice.

>115 ronincats: *snort*

>116 SomeGuyInVirginia: One can, of course, readily discern the direct causal link between perving on one's fellow admirers of America's Filth Elder and determining to read "better literature" (whatever the hell that is) in 2020.

hello Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum emergency pick-up in DC

>117 karenmarie: I'll snap my whipper at the lot of y'all! Now be have!

I'm expecting to be utterly ensconced in my reading/sleeping nook. Not quite as perfect as this one, but my very own:


*smooch*

>119 richardderus: - I have a fridge magnet that say: The Secret to Staying Young is to Pick an Age You Really Like and Stick With It.

:-)

>121 jessibud2: Ha! Fridge magnet speaketh sooth.

>115 ronincats: Hmm, you're one voice against many there, Roni. Plus you are proposing to make poor old Richard do a recount to take out the multiple votes (although, if you were on the side of the 1960 instead of SF, I would say go for it).

35 is a good age, Richard, long may you remain so.

A few nights ago I was watching Steven Colbert and he reminded me of you. He let loose with a string of old insult words and at the end of it he said ,"Yeah. Go look 'em up." It made me laugh so hard, and I thought of you instantly. And my sister whose favorite insult is "feckless twat." A quote from the Bard.

>123 Familyhistorian: Heh. My counting system resembles that of the Quantum Observer....

>124 benitastrnad: Ha! I wish I'd seen that, Benita, because it totally reminds me of me!

>124 benitastrnad:

I looked it up on the CBS web site and it was broadcast on December 9. and is approximately 10 minutes into the monologue. It is where the insult from North Korea shows up. The North Korean ambassador called Trump a "dotard."

>120 richardderus: Wow! I could picture myself, in this cozy setting. Swoons, a bit...

Hi, Richard. Home after another cold day, out on the route. 3 days down, 3 to go. Hope you had a good one.

>126 benitastrnad: One day I'll find it. CBS wants US residents to buy "All Access" which is their streaming service and, well, no.

>127 msf59: I know, right?! It's so dreamy...oh fantasy free me...

It's windy here, now at least, as well as freezyfrosty cold. Luckily the wind dried the remaining slushy places so the sidewalks won't be skating rinks in the morning. Which, honestly, I can't think why I care since I ain't goin' a toe out the doors.

'Morning RichardDear, and happy Thursday to you.

Sore throat, congestion, itchy eyes. 27F, cancelled dinner date but gotta mail packages today, blergh.

*smooch*

>129 karenmarie: *mumble*

*incoherent noise*

Feminist activist artist May Stevens has died at 95. Her Big Daddy series of artworks was incredibly powerful in awakening my personal awareness of how maleness granted privilege.

SOMEone did a lovely, kind thing. They sent me two tree-books off my Elfster list without a clue as to their identity. My old leftist's heart is replete!

Murdoch's World: The Last of the Old Media Empires
—AND—
War and the Liberal Conscience

So, if one of y'all is responsible, *smooch*

>28 richardderus: As someone who's been on LT since 2007 and the 75ers since 2010 that's a VERY sobering thought. It's been a decade? Whew!

>76 brenzi: SF Ladies--love that!! I vote for the ladies of SF again.

And I get an extra point for below....



Happy Holidays!!

Is it time to put up the Chthulumas tree?

>134 Berly:, >135 quondame: - Hey! Are you two trying to bribe the vote counter?

>136 jessibud2: I would say so (but love that Christmas tree!)

'Morning RD! Yay for Elfster books.

>133 bell7: It's been a decade, indeed. In every construction of the term!

>134 Berly:, >135 quondame: Heh. Good thing I'm elozable.

>136 jessibud2:, >137 SandyAMcPherson: As it's working, we're not going to call it bribery. It's, umm, it's a recognition of fellowship! Yeah, that's the ticket.

>138 karenmarie: Hiya Horrible, yay indeed for Elfster books. It's a lovely surprise though I'm a wee bit anxious that no one's claimed responsibility.

Happy Friday, Richard. I hope you are doing well. Nearly, done with my long work week and now looking forward to 2 days off, plus my current reads are keeping me happy and distracted.

I call this pie the "Ladies of Science Fiction and Fantasy Special" I hope you like it!

>140 msf59: Hi Mark! I'm stressing because I'm behind schedule on three reviews I wanted to drop tomorrow. It'll be Sunday now, but it bugs me, even though I'm the one who sets the deadlines.

>141 jnwelch: Ahhh. A perfect off-gamboge custard on that key-limer. I can't tell for sure, but I'll bet those are ginger-snap crumbs, they're just that slightly reddish color that a good snap is.

>141 jnwelch: - I spy with my little eye another vote-counter bribe...er, fellowship, whatever. Maybe I'll just drop another vote for 1960, the year of birth of our illustrious book reviewer (among other talents...) ;-)

'Morning, RichardDear! Self-imposted deadlines are the worst. I hope you get everything done without any additional stress.

It's yucky and rainy out here, has been since yesterday about the same time. My first cup of coffee is history, and it's time to start the day - brekkie, present wrapping, baking, visiting. I love it all, but will have to try hard to carve out some reading time.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

>143 jessibud2: They're only bribes if I refuse them....

>144 karenmarie: Yucky here, too. Foggy, dank, rain later, but not icyfreezy cold or windy. Just...soupy. I don't like the dank days, they make the aches worse.

*grumble*

I've had several reviews show up in their early form lately. This is a repeating problem with Blogger. I'll finish and schedule a review...it'll look *fine* when I check it at midnight...then, come 6:30, it's the unedited, often blank form of the review I first uploaded.

Grumble.

So that means I've gotten better about saving the final, tarted-up version of the review, the one I edit on Blogger, back to the Word doc. Better, you'll note, not *good*, as I'm prone to forgetting that step. Of course Google doesn't care, there is absolutely no help and no person to query. "Report Issues" says a lying little button. What happens with that info is unknown but it makes not one tiny particle of difference to the user.

Grumble.

They're only bribes if I refuse them.... My first laugh of the day - thank you!

I'll take Ladies of Science Fiction for $800, Richard.

*****

>139 richardderus: Let's Hear It For Elozable!

https://roggenwulf.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/wwp-weirdwords-elozable/

“This word is past obsolete,” says Hertnon. “It is dead and buried. So can we, should we, attempt to breathe life back into it? I’ll answer that question with three more: Do you know anyone who isn’t amenable to flattery? Is it more concise to say ‘elozable’ or ‘amenable to flattery’? Is there any reason why we shouldn’t attempt to breathe life back into a word that uniquely describes such a universal human quality?”

Can I still vote? 1960 kulcher please.
Sending love.

>146 jnwelch: Heh! Glad I am of service.

>147 Morphidae: Among the many, many, many words that English needs to revive, nay revivify, this one's one of the urgent cases.

Hey Morphy! *smooch*

>148 Matke: Voting's open until Doc starts the new group, Gail, so there's plenty o'time. Happy Weekend, my dear!

I'm a bit late to the voting booth but I would also vote for 1960 in kulcher. 1960 was a very good year. Heh.

>150 EBT1002: I *completely* agree. *smooch*
***
Well, that was fun! My lunatic surfing addict YGC came to surf *in*the*fog* (good waves, sounded like the sea was having conniptions) and then we spent a pleasant few hours canoodling. (The hot shower in my room had nothing to do with his stopping by, nope not a thing.)

My mood is vastly improved even though no joint hurts one bit less. Having someone who wants to spend time with me, and enjoys surprising me in this good way, is a delight.

Happy Saturday! Hooray for the "canoodling" and lovely surprises! Just what the doctor ordered, I am sure. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. I am definitely looking forward to the next couple of days off.

1960. That is all.

Has anyone mentioned that the '49 Buick was Rainman's car? (I confess I've had to skim a lot of this thread, 'cause of being so far behind...and even older than RD, btw.)

If you're doing any year it has to be 1965! *shakes her fist at the sky*

>152 msf59: And a new can opener to replace the one I whined to him about being broken. I whined about it to Kath as well...now I have three can openers instead of one broken one.

>153 laytonwoman3rd: Noted.

It was indeed! I'm so happy someone noticed!

Oh, were you on one of the mastodon-hunting teams like Horrible?

>154 Morphidae: The year of the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley? Not on your tintype!

Mastodons were a BIT before my time....but my memories do go back to 1960, at which time I was being educated in a one-room school...

I'm going to go for the SF ladies as, well, there can ever be enough ladies scientific, fictional or actual.

Have a great weekend, RD.

>156 laytonwoman3rd: ...they had ROOMS! Gracious goodness me! I thought that's why y'all did those cave paintings...teaching aids. No?

>157 PaulCranswick: For the ladies, eh? I clutch my pearls at this turn-up.

>157 PaulCranswick: I'd auction off those pearls and buy me some books.

... I don't understand. Richard insults all the ladies who voted for 1960 and you all go and plunk in another 1960 vote. Is that a strategy?

>155 richardderus: The what?

*sighs and heads off to Google - again*

Good Morning, RichardDear. Chocolate cake at 7 p.m. leads to wakefulness at 2 a.m. Thank goodness there are no official plans today.

Yay for surfer boy canoodling.

>159 PaulCranswick: Ha! Good plan.

>160 humouress: A strategic refusal?

>161 Morphidae: *preens* I are uh edjookaterer.

>162 karenmarie: *smooch* Hope all's well chez vous.

>158 richardderus: No....just the one. (Was that not clear?) The only paintings on the walls were of George Washington and Abe Lincoln. We had really nifty huge maps that pulled down on rollers, though...I never had another lesson in geography after fifth grade, when that school closed.

>151 richardderus: I am so glad you had that wonderful surprise by YGC. It's probably worth the joint aggravation. *smile*

I will not try surfing while we are on Kauai (I tried it once in Florida when we were much closer to 1960 than to 2019) but I do hope to watch some youngsters catching waves.

Meanwhile, here in eastern WA we have 3 inches of fresh snow on the ground and I can barely see the house across the street through the fog. It damn well better clear up before our scheduled departure at 5am Wednesday.

>164 laytonwoman3rd: Amazing. Just...wow. Archaeology will do handstands as a collective discipline to learn that there were maps back in woolly-mammoth days!

>165 EBT1002: His *desire* to visit me, and to chat every day or two, are far more important than I'd like to admit. It makes me feel so contented to know he's interested enough to keep me in his life's loop.

Ugh on 3" of snow and fog! It was very windy here today and I was huddled by the heater for a lot of it, but it blew the fog away so there was a benefit to the lower temperatures.

Slightly belated weekend *smooches* and hoping all is well with you, Richard.

We're due for some snow on Tuesday and I'm eyeing the weather either hoping for a washout or that it all goes away before I have to drive in to work. We'll see...

I'm south of the snow line. For once I'm glad since I'm planning to travel.

'Morning RD!

Coffee and quiet reign here right now, but the daughter will get up soon and then it will get busy.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

Very belated happy new thread, Richard dear!

My vote is for 1960!
The trouble of double votes can be avoided by making a poll. At the moment the code escapes me, but I am sure others can give directions.

Good morning, Richard!

Carrot cake muffins?

>170 FAMeulstee: Re polls, I had this help from someone ~

https://www.librarything.com/topic/177029#

Scroll down to the poll explanation. And I agree, it was a great revelation for collecting opinions.

Yeah, one person, one vote.

I try not to complain about my health too much. This latest bout of trouble is affecting my ability to function. Sleep apnea has come & gone most of my life, but now is so bad I fall asleep in the middle of typing! I see the correct doctor on Wed the 18th to get a sleep study.

>174 richardderus: Aw, bummer, RD. Sending all the healing & remedy vibes I can muster!

I am enjoying the day off, a mix of reading and daily tasks. I am going to get out for a bit of owling, just before dusk. Wish me luck.

>174 richardderus: - {{Richard}}. Deep breaths (if only that were enough to fix everything, I know)

I"m glad you got the sleep study set up, but I'm sorry you are having to go through this. I hope it can help you. xx

I know those CPAPs look like hell but I've never spoken with anyone who had one, and didn't have really bad claustrophobia, who didn't love it and sleep better with it.

Ack-shully, you could totally Cthulhu that puppy out...

>178 SomeGuyInVirginia: I second that...my sister-in-law and my nephew are both using a CPAP now, and they swear by it. According to my brother, this is the first time he's known his wife to sleep more than 4 hours a night in 35 years.

Wishing you a good sleep study this week and some relief from your apnea! My mom uses a CPAP machine and said it's made an amazing difference. I hear the masks do take some getting used to though.

>160 humouress: Yeah well, by now we’re used to the insults and if we didn’t vote for 1960 we’d be stuck with SFi. Another vote for 1960, Richard.

I hope the exploration of your sleep issues comes up with some help quickly.

Another CPAP user, I slept like a log the first night I got it. I took to it right away and have used it religiously every night for a good decade now. This was before I was homebound. I had been falling asleep ("micronaps") while driving. Scary stuff.

>167 bell7: Thanks for the well-wishes, Mary, I'm not really tip-top just at the moment. I hold out hope that this will start to change on Wednesday, when I visit with the pulomonologist.

>168 thornton37814: Good heavens yes, the snow line is, in my own world, the "STOP HERE" line for travel. Have a safe journey when it happens!

>169 karenmarie: *smooch*

>170 FAMeulstee: Thanks, Anita! I'm not sure a poll would've engendered such a vigorous discussion...I'll take this method!

>171 jnwelch: OOOOO

Yes please!

>172 SandyAMcPherson: It is a very orderly solution, indeed.

>173 Morphidae: ...but the GOP doesn't think all votes are equal, so why should I? After all, we're told that a majority of our country thinks they're doing a great job so they must be.

>175 msf59: I'll go look to see if owling was productive soon, Mark.

>176 jessibud2: It's actually almost never a bad place to start. Lots of good comes from mindfulness of one's breathing, and it is a rare case indeed where a few deep breaths are harmful.

>177 katiekrug: I got the appointment set up, and it's there that the sleep study will be scheduled, so one step back from the desired result. I'll still accept this as a net plus, since I didn't have the pulmonologist appointment before now.

>178 SomeGuyInVirginia: HA!! That's a wonderful sleep mask to pull out on your bedmate's birthday or something.

>179 laytonwoman3rd: They're wonderfully successful medical devices, and I'm not unwilling to use one at this point because improvements have made them less gas-mask-y. I sweat like a nervous fish, so the masks would simply result in my death from dehydration or drowning.

>180 bell7: I'll be at the pulmonologist this week, and that doc will schedule the study, but steps in the proper direction are welcome.

>181 Familyhistorian: Insults! Why, anyone would think that celebrating the extreme superannuation of the persons of female persuasion whose lives encompassed immense environmental and cultural changes...how many can claim to have already survived the end of an Ice Age?!...was in some way unkind or unnecessary! *hmf*

>182 Morphidae: I micronapped my way into a broken toe while doing my steps in my room. Yeah, no thanks, not when there's an actual solution to the problem.

>186 richardderus: I found that having a lightweight linen hanky to put between the upper mask and my forehead helps me. There's not much to help the part around the noise. My bearded husband had to go with the nasal pillow version, which I tried, but the angles it required didn't work with how I slept.

>166 richardderus: "It makes me feel so contented to know he's interested enough to keep me in his life's loop."
I totally get that.

>188 quondame: That's a good idea! Thanks, Susan.

>189 EBT1002: :-)
***
THE FAR SIDE IS ONLINE AT LAST!
https://www.thefarside.com/2019/12/17/3

Another fan of sleep apnea breathing machine--good luck at the docs!!

'Morning, RD!

My sister uses a CPAP machine and loves it.

I hope today's visit with the pulmonologist goes well.

*smooch*

Morning, Richard. Happy Wednesday. I hope you can find some answers at the doctor's office today. Fingers crossed. I am blessed, with very few sleeping issues. Knock wood...

Pulmonologist: after Christmas. No visits here until "sometime in January." I could, of course, go to the hospital; nothing would change, I'm not dying or injured (yet), and an appointment *might* get made...in January. Plus I'd spend literal hours doing the thing that causes me the maximum amount of pain, ie sitting.

So.

Well, hell.

Sorry, RD :(

126 Thirteen for Centaurus by J.G. Ballard

Rating: 4* of five

Subtle cruelty is a human constant, isn't it? Read the story at the link in the title.

Easily the most horrifying moment:
p21 "...with few intellectual pastimes—there were no books aboard the ship—"
***eeeaaarrrgh***

>194 richardderus: Ugh.

>194 richardderus: Oh my..Awful

{{Richard}}. Hang in there, my friend.

Oh, Richard, I’m sorry you have yet another physical obstacle to deal with.

A few years ago I had a sleep study (which isn’t nearly as weird as one might think, but do bring your own tranquilizer or sleeping aid). I wound up using oxygen when I sleep.

It helped a lot, I might add.

Sending you love

I'm sorry to hear about the delay. It seems like it takes forever to see any type of specialist nowadays. For ENT, it takes 4 - 6 weeks, longer for my psychiatrist (except in an emergency), a nephrologist - 4 weeks. It's crazy and not just you. Not that that helps. :(

It's 20°/-7C and windy! I am not even getting out of my warm li'l nest if I can possibly help it, although I had to get up a while ago to start some dirty rice and ham...a cold piece of fruit wasn't gonna cut it, and oatmeal, while filling, wasn't satisfying. I'll have an early dinner instead.

One tiny benefit of its being so cold is the absence of Old Stuff as he retreats from our always-cool space. One major downside to both the micronapping and the cold is I can't focus on reading...so Prime and Netflix ho! I'm a fan of The Expanse and The Man in the High Castle, so Prime's getting its exercise.

>191 Berly: Hey Berly-boo! I'm shocked at the sheer number of people whose lives are bettered by this simple device.

>192 karenmarie: And another!

>193 msf59: Men generally are less likely than women to have regular sleep issues. Another privilege we didn't earn.
***
I'm generally a good sleeper, in the sense that I don't often have trouble falling asleep and don't *normally* do more than the prostate pee at 3 or 4 in the morning, so this bout of apnea is really troubling me. I've always snored, but this isn't the usual thing. It happened a lot when I was very heavy. After I lost so much weight I wasn't having apnea often...I could tell because I would, like now, respond strongly to the change from snoring to sleep apnea.

I can't even begin to express the wildness of this sensation of waking up while walking! Makes me extra reluctant to go outside, so hooray for it being too bloody cold.

>195 katiekrug: Yeah, it rots, Katie.

>197 bell7: Agreed, Mary.

>198 brenzi: Pretty darned awful indeed, Bonnie.

>199 jessibud2: Thank you, Shelley, it's nerve-wracking.

>200 Matke: *grumble* The obstacles are always frustrating, aren't they, Gail? *smooch*

>201 Morphidae: Thanks, Morphy, for *getting*it* from the inside.

Adding my sympathy for the sleep apnea and the "won't see you now" doctors, Richard.

I had s.a., and an operation to get my septum undeviated and to open me up worked. All gone. I did do a sleep study, and now have a passionate hatred of them. There's got to be a better way - we're in a wireless age, and they should be, too. I did try a CPAP, but it wasn't for me.

I've always been a good sleeper, too. Those free dream movies are too hard to resist.

Sorry to find out about the delay, Richard. I hope you are able to get an appointment directly after Christmas.

The one thing I did do was get a desk fan to blow air at my face. It can get a little warm. It also helps people, like my mom, who feel claustrophobic with the mask on.

I go through periods when I simply don't sleep. The worst was when I was 6 ft tall, weighed 165 pounds and had 11% body fat. I wasn't doing any stimulant other than coffee and the occasional diet Coke, and I would go days without sleeping. it was at that time that I swore that I would inject heroin directly into my heart if that's what it took to sleep. I mean, I had gym sessions to get to.

Now I'm a chunky middle-aged mess and the doctors all glom onto my extra pounds. When I tell them that, yes I'm sure that that is a contributing factor, I'm also sure that it's not the root cause. Most sleep specialists simply will not listen to this. If yours won't, you should get another sleep specialist. I took the sleep test, I thought it was complete b*******. My sleep apnea score was 11, which they interpreted as mild. I did sleep differently on the CPAP machine but I was not able to tolerate the claustrophobic aspect of it. I'd wake up in the middle of the night gasping not because I couldn't breathe but because I felt like I was drowning under all these tubes and gizmos.

I'm lucky in that I found a doctor who gets that and is willing to prescribe sleep medication. Of course, one of the downside to a doctor prescribing sleep medications is that I have to tell him that I will lose those final pounds.

So here we go 2020, I know my way around a gym I just hope I don't break or strain something while I'm there this time. Or keel over, that would be way bad! Or that my shoulder pops out, or my knees pop out, or, frankly, I fart every time I bend over. All very embarrassing.

ETE

>208 SomeGuyInVirginia: Im not a great sleeper either, Larry, but stress seems to make me snooze for some insane reason. Never have I had a year with so much personal stresses and strains and never have I slept so well!

On electoral systems it is most common that we prefer the system that produces or is most likely to produce the result we most prefer. In the UK we have our two party system and so operate a first past the post electoral mess that ensures or should ensure a Labour or Conservative government. This means that where a party is regionally strong it will garner seats but if the vote is spread fairly evenly across the country they get sod all. This has lead recently to the sad rise of the Scottish Nationalist Party (and the near demise of majority government) and the fact that the Liberals and the Greens with fairly solid and widespread support have next to no representation.

In the USA you effectively have a popularity contest between two often unsavoury individuals every four years and complicate this popularity contest by constructing an electoral college that skews the result. Gore and Hilary both won elections they lost - madness.

Have a wonderful weekend RD and enjoy plenty of sleep but keep remembering to wake up.

>208 SomeGuyInVirginia: I have the suspicion that at my weight and 71 years the reason I have two working knees is that I do not ask them to do much, and never anything more stressful than getting me up 1 flight of stairs a few times a day. I have so many younger friends who push themselves into all sorts of fun and service and have artificial joints.

Soviet Santa says "Happy Yule!" Solstice Greetings to all. Read more here: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/soviet-santa

>211 richardderus: Thank you for distributing yule lore. So many variants on old stories given new life again and again. Kind of suitable concept for the season. e.g. The Bear and the Nightingale

>209 PaulCranswick: madness indeed

Greetings to my fellow biblio-geeks! It has been a privilege to chatter here with you.

A winter solstice is the moment in time when the Earth's tilt away from the Sun is at its maximum and the Sun's maximum elevation in the sky is at its lowest. Thus the ice crystals form magical lighting effects ~


Sundogs and a sunrise on the Winter Solstice

Is it winter solstice today? I hope so as I am finding the early darkness hard.

Have a wonderful weekend, Richard!

>215 Familyhistorian: Depending where we all are in the particular time zone of the world, today/tomorrow is technically "the solstice". Where I live, the sun coming up tomorrow morning marks the first day of winter.

>211 richardderus: Richard, I owe you an apology, I think. I hadn't properly paid attention and was inadvertently following your attractive Soviet Yuletide image with my Solstice sundogs image. I hope you don't feel I diluted the effect of that interesting connection to the myth of the wintertime deity. The link was very educational about the tie in to Norse gods and other "Santa/St.Nicholas" predecessors.

>205 jnwelch:, >206 Familyhistorian:, >207 Morphidae: I'm actually eager to get the damned thing done! I expect it to be unpleasant, so at least it's not going to be a surprise.

>208 SomeGuyInVirginia: All very embarrassing indeed, but, well, so is being human, no?

>209 PaulCranswick: Our Electoral College was designed to prevent the hegemony of the cities over the countryside. Now, frankly, it's a big problem so suck it up, Ruritanians.

>210 quondame: Artificial joints have their charms, I'm told.

>212 quondame: I've found the Yule lore much more interesting and involving than the later legends have ever been. I need to get to The Bear and the Nightingale one day soon.

>213 mckait: Hi Kath!

>214 SandyAMcPherson:, >216 SandyAMcPherson: ?? No apology needed! It's gorgeous!

>215 Familyhistorian: Yeup, Solstice is just about 11pm.

I love that The Far Side is on line now. Gary Larson is a Coug, by the way. :-)

>219 EBT1002: ...that explains so very, very much...

Happy Solstice.Richard dear!

Early morning greetings, RD! I'm enjoying some quiet time before Bill and Jenna get up and the day begins.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

-Kingfisher. One of my favorite birds and this illustration is from the wonderful The Lost Words.

Morning, RD. Happy Sunday. I hope you are doing a bit better and getting some rest. Gorgeous weather here in the Midwest. I hope it is coming your way.

>221 ronincats: Thanks, Roni! It's the perfect Midwinter's Day today...sunshine, cold, lightest breeze possible. *happy sigh*

>222 karenmarie: Happy to see you, Horrible dear, and may the clamor be contented today. *smooch*

>223 msf59: Ooooooooo

That is one noble-looking not-seagull. The illustration is gorgeous! Thanks for the restful wishes, sadly I am still dipping in and out of consciousness all night long. It means I fall a tiny bit "asleep" for what are flashes called micronaps. Makes me chary of going out of my space for very long at a time. If I fall in here, I am sure I'll be found!

Spend a lovely day.

Chose it for you because of the image, but Susan Cooper wrote one of my rare 5 star books in her The Dark is Rising fantasy series as well!

Have a great holiday, buddy. We're off to Galveston, in that state near the border that I believe you're familiar with.

'Morning, RD!

Coffee, early morning quiet again, ramping up to a busy day. I'm plowing through The Black Ascot by Charles Todd, no joy. But I'm determined to finish it so that I can read the ER copy of A Divided Loyalty. I've decided that I'm done with the series after the review to keep the ER gods happy and will cull the 20 of 21 that I own.

*smooch* from your own Madame TVT Horrible, although I don't think I've given you any BBs lately, have I?

Goodmorning, Richard dear!

The first day of winter (for us on the 22nd) was rather warm (9° C) and wet. We got soaked on our walk, as the rainradar had predicted two dry hours, so we didn't put on our raincoats. It started to poor down when we were halfway :-(
Today looks better, we will be heading to the library to return some books and to see what to take home. I'll have to restain myself from taking to many books, as I carry them home in my backpack.

Sandy - thanks for posting that beautiful photo for Solstice.

Roni - thanks for reminding me of Susan Cooper and her "The Longest Day" (going off for a re-read.

Hope you have a wonderful Christmas!

Hi, Richard - Just stopping by to wish you a Blessed Yule - or Happy Festivus, whatever holiday you're celebrating this year. :)

Hi RD! I hope you are doing okay and that you get to have a chance to visit with Rob over the holidays.

Feliz Nochebuena! Have a happy Christmas Eve to all my friends who celebrate.

***
The ability to feel happiness is not dead in me yet: My 10th-annual (re-)read of The Cable & Deadpool Yuletide Special can still elicit guffaws. Deadpool getting teabagged by Danny Ocean...I mean, what twisted old queer could possibly resist that? Not this one!
***
Rob and I spent a lovely day together yesterday. He came out to windsurf, the idiot!, and as usual had a hot shower and changed here. My greatly unloved roomie was having some sort of dermatological surgery so we had the room to ourselves for a few blissful hours. Being a line cook, he isn't off on Christmas; he wanted to come get me for an overnight after work, but I really can't feel comfortable being out of my own space when I can (and do) fall asleep for seconds at a time while doing anything. After I zonked out on him twice in one conversation, he got it yesterday.

One stern lecture about not putting off the pulmonologist appointment one second longer than necessary later, he went back to Brooklyn. I'm happy we got to spend time alone together, and content that he's aware of the extent of my problem...I'm not trying to pull the wool over his eyes, or exaggerate the problem to avoid a confrontation or just ease him out. While he never said he felt those things aloud, his...um...possessiveness was noticeably dialed down as the day wore on.

I'm happy to know I have so many lovely friends in this world.
>225 ronincats: Thanks, Roni, it's a beautiful image indeed.

>226 jnwelch: Thanks, Joe! I hope all the world's your oyster this Festivus.

>227 karenmarie:, >233 karenmarie: *smooch* Thanks, Horrible! Your aim wasn't quite as precise this quarter, thank GOODness.

>228 FAMeulstee: Gelukkig Kerstfeest, Anita! Be kind to your back, restrain your bibliogreed.

>229 magicians_nephew:, >230 magicians_nephew: It's a beautiful image indeed, Jim. And reminders of Susan Cooper's pleasures are always welcome.

>231 ChelleBearss: Thank you, Chelle!

>232 Storeetllr: Thanks, Mary! Good to see you here. Are you happily settled in these Northern climes?

Have a comfy, caring, and very

Merry Christmas!

A Good Yule to you, Richard. May you be peaceful and calm tomorrow.

>235 quondame: Thanks, Susan!

>236 Matke: I appreciate the kind wishes, dear Gail, hoping you are as well.

Enjoy the holiday, Richard! I did go "owling" this morning. No luck there, but discovered another cool, place to hike and bird. Beautiful winter day in the Midwest.

Merry Christmas Richard from both of us and Hannah dear friend.

Wonderful that you got to spend time with Rob in the festive season, Richard. I hope that you have a Merry Christmas!

Merry Festivus for rest of us. :)

Hope you have a cool yule!

I'm glad you got some good time with Rob to celebrate the season. We are surviving the wind and rain on Kauai -- they are predicting flash floods and possible power outages tonight. Oh well, we have books and well-charged kindles. And chocolate covered macadamia nuts. :-)

Merry Christmas, Richard!

>238 msf59: Thanks, Mark! I got a cold for Christmas. Yay.

>239 johnsimpson: Thank you most kindly, John, and the sentiment heartily returned.

>240 Familyhistorian: I am delighted that he visited, Meg, it made a blah day into a good one.

>241 mahsdad: Festivus greetings, Jeff! Shall we grumble and cuss and eat pints of store-brand ice cream in our tighty whiteys?

>242 EBT1002: STILL RAINING?!? That's not a lot of fun for y'all, but you're certainly taking the Weather Goddess's grumps in good part.

>243 harrygbutler: Many thanks, Harry, and the same to you and yours!

Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Solstice, some other tradition or none at all, this is what I wish for you!

Merry Christmas RD!

Thank you for keeping me company in 2019.......onward to 2020.

calm and I could use some friends over here in this new joint...

The 2020 Group is up!

Happy Holidays Richard! See you in 2020!

>246 ronincats: Thank you, Roni, what a perfect set of wishes!

>247 SomeGuyInVirginia: *smooch*

>248 PaulCranswick: What a ride 2019 was...I need a barf-bucket for the end of it, though.

>249 drneutron: I've done it, Jim! First 2020 thread is up.

>250 The_Hibernator: Thanks, Rachel, and I will see you shortly!

Happy Boxing Day and/or Feast of Stephen and/or Kwanzaa!

Best wishes this holiday season!! See you in 2020!

Happy Friday, Richard. I hope you are feeling better. Chilly and cloudy at the moment, but our weather has been fantastic, so no complaints here.

I know my current thread is becoming cumbersome, but I am trying to hold out a couple more days, before starting my 2020 thread.

Belated Crimble greetings. Hope it was a happy and booky one.

>253 Berly: Thanks, Berly-boo! *smooch*

>254 msf59: Thanks, Mark, it's a daily uphill trudge at the moment. I'm not dead yet!

No reason not to start the new one & keep the old one, y'know...just sayin'

>255 BekkaJo: Thank you, Bekka! I enjoyed my holiday exactly as it was.

'Afternoon, RD!

Hang in there.

*smooch*

>257 karenmarie: Horrible. How are you.

I had therapy this morning, the brain kind, and was amazed to discover that my therapist has seen Akhnaten, the Philip Glass opera. We spent most of the time geeking out about music we'd heard, so that was fun...and I drowsed once.

127 The Christmas Deal by Keira Andrews

Rating: 4* of five

What a fun read this was! I needed light, relatively undemanding reading...beats expected and delivered, an ending without angst, sentences that don't slap your nose off and command your undivided attention...I got all that, a sweet bisexual tough guy realizing he can fall in love with a man, and build himself a happy family to boot.

Not entirely happy, to be fair...there are people in the world who love their hate more than they love anyone or anything else. But those jackasses aren't in the story, just the book, so it was okay.

It took me four days to read this slim volume, which should tell y'all what you need to know about my powers of concentration. Not good. Need that apnea issue solved STAT.

As I read this, I imagined the Hallmark movie of it. It's damn near perfect...with the few serious (NOT for the eww-ick homophobes among us!) sex scenes snipped, of course...and couldn't be more suitable to their need to make *serious* amends after caving to a few screaming lunatics when an ad on their network offended the religious belief that kissing is Just For Straights. No lip-lockin' lesbos on the teevee! That's wicked and wrong and will force Almighty Gawd to Frown and Smite.

But the Holocaust didn't? Starving people, freezing homeless vets, don't? Families separated by cruel and evil political policies are kosher with this Almighty of theirs? Guess so....

So Hallmark caved after a LOT more people got mad at 'em for being spineless worms. They issued a statement about it that was weak-kneed in the extreme, which made even more people mad. So what they need, if they want to get ahead of the nasty PR dumpster fire they're kindling, is to make them a queer Xmas movie. And this one? It's about perfect. Family trouble, bad choices haunting the main characters, a Cinderfella transformation for both leads. A ratty teenager whose misery about his life changing for the worse is handled by shouting and cussing and being cruel, so exactly like life; hijinks ensue. A supporting cast of endearingly daffy stock characters...the Office Goof, the Overbearing Boss with a Heart of Gold, the Earth Mother/Fix-it Lady, the Old Dad in the Chair...you know. Old wounds heal, new wounds scab over, and the strong structure of love carries the whole weight of the action with creaks and groans but no catastrophic failures.

It's a romance, that's not a spoiler.

Double-digit w-bombing starts past the 50% mark. I still can't believe anyone, anyone at all still less an author of more than ten books (like Keira Andrews is), thinks using the w-verb is a good idea. No one winks in real life, not least because it's cheesy and makes the winker look lame and mildly stupid. The winkee is entitled to smack the winker, or so say I, and I stick to my guns: Stop this! Wesist the wink! (And "Welease Wodewick" while you're about it, Biggus.)

I still recommend the read to any and all whose spirits are dragging, whose ho-ho-ho has transmogrified into you-dirty-ho and whose taste for fun with family needs a bit of smut to make it work, in the Tim Gunn sense. Now it's time for my nap, to dream dreamy dreams of dads with sons coming home from Harvard and carving the turkey for the whole famn damily. Just like it oughta be.

>234 richardderus: Nice to hear that you had some quality time with Rob.

Hopefully, you can see the specialist soon! Doctor waiting times are extremely frustrating.

128 Logan's Run by William F. Nolan & George Clayton Johnson

Rating: 2.5* of five

I remembered this book fondly. The summer the film came out, I drove my licenseless buds to the Village Multiplex in Pygge, my 1968 Bonneville. (We'd passed the book around our Scooby-group, drinking it in.) There Michael York cheekboned his way into my, um, heart shall we say, and the rest of the film...and the entirety of the book...faded into insignificance.

Netflix loses the film on January 1st. I figured I'd rewatch it, while I give the book another go; after all, they're part of my formative years, so as I enter the last laps let's look back to the track, eh what?

You would think that, by now, I'd know better.

The book is just plain bad. The prose rises to the dizzying heights of serviceability a couple times, all the way up the slope of passable; the bulk of the 150pp are spent on the Plains of Puerility. A pair of fortyish numpties wrote about a world in which they'd be dead twenty years. It went about as well as that makes it sound. It's sexist, of course; it was ground-breaking for its day because the hedonism of its society isn't particularly concerned about who you do since there are no children born of sexual congress. Makes the property base of marriage pretty useless, so marriage simply isn't.

But the big draw, the martial arts bits, are tame and tedious 50 years on. (It came out in 1967, the film in 1976.) The action scenes are mildly fun. The story's versions of Logan and Francis are in a whole father/son dynamic that never gets much of anywhere because, well, you did see the page count, right? The ending takes place in Space. I won't say why, but it is the trippiest piece of dumbfuckery I can imagine. These guys were tripping when they wrote the ending, there's no other excuse. End it does, however, so I shook my head and started streaming the film.

Rob was here that day. He hadn't heard of the book or the film. He flipped through the book a bit and quietly reshelved it after about ten minutes. "Ready to see the film?" I asked; "not really" was the honest reply. Luckily Michael York is there from the get-go, cheekbones a-jut and body firmly and revealingly encased in a spiffy dark costume. I heard no further nose-sighs from little spoon...until a scene where Logan/Michael dials up a sex worker and gets, on his first try, a man.

"...?!!?..."

"Hey, even *I* had older mentors," I said. "Wait for the robot butcher scene. That's when we get to see Logan and Jessica naked!"

And that is pretty much it. The naked scene isn't him naked, it's just her, and some artfully obscured extras who earned that paycheck; a bit disappointing, but obscured by the fact that the film takes a turn for the idiotic from there on out. We ended up wondering what the hell was the point of this exercise, how far breaking ground can go in keeping a creative endeavor in active circulation. I think it's time to let this one slide into the background and we should pack it away in shredded copies of the awful book it was inspired by but doesn't much resemble.

H Richard. I just scrolled back a bit but can't seem to find where I read you complaining a bit about the so-called *future*, 2020, etc. Maybe it was on someone else's thread, but it made me chuckle. And even more so after reading today's C&H. You must be best buds with Calvin:

https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2019/12/28

:-D

>261 richardderus: I seem to recall possibly watching the movie in my teenage years but it's quite fuzzy and you're not making me want to rewatch it or read the book. Ah well, nice to confirm sometimes that I don't need to read every book out there.

'Morning, RD!

Coffee imbibed, beautiful too-warm day ahead.

*smooch* from Madame TVT Horrible

Morning, RD! Happy Saturday. It is supposed to creep up to 50 later, but it is damp and chilly at the moment. I can hardly, complain, though...Enjoy your day.

>262 jessibud2: Heh. I'm with Hobbes on this one, I don't think we're doing so great with the tech we've got!

>263 bell7: I actively discourage the idea of watching the film. You're too nice a person for me to want you to suffer like that.

>264 karenmarie: Hey Horrible! It's about 48° here, which is unusually warm, so it's the same stuff for me.

*smooch*

>265 msf59: Hi Mark, it's nice to have the warmth to look forward to but that damp and chilly bit stinks. Have a great Saturday!

Hi, Richard. I hope you've been having a good holiday season despite the apnea. I'm glad you found a good Christmas read; I just read Capote's A Christmas Memory for the first time, and it lived up to all the LT love.

>259 richardderus: Yeah, Hallmark didn't cover itself with glory in that debacle, did they? It sounds like they are proving adept at digging themselves deeper too. But it really says something that even Hallmark thought it was time to feature a kiss between two people of the same gender.

>260 figsfromthistle: ANITA!! I am so sorry! I didn't see your post between my review postings. Thank you for the kind wishes.

>267 jnwelch: It's a lovely little story, isn't it? Capote did short excellently well. (Wordplay optional, sort of.)

>268 Familyhistorian: It was their ad buyer who decided the campaign from Zola, the wedding planner people, should be aired; there was ONE lesbian (not fags, please note, never ever show men kissing or The World Will End!!) couple out of (IIRC) six ad spots with three to five couples per spot.

They're exactly as homophobic as they've always been, also as racist (any black- or Latino-led Xmas rom-coms on their schedule? No), and sliming meaningless smarm over these deep fissures of the corporate character won't hide them.

129 The Working Elf Blues by Piper Vaughn

Rating: 3.5* of five

In my quest to distract myself from the unpleasantries of micronapping, I decided that short Holiday-themed reads would enable me to focus and remain engaged long enough to finish them and thus get the accomplishment rush life has so sorely lacked this month. This one was a Yule gift from a Goodreads friend, so it's perfect for the project.

Garnet, an Elf in Santa's workshop, falls in love with an orphaned, lonely Human named Wes. How that happens is best experienced blind, so no spoilers. I will say that Wes's sterling character means to me he should've been snapped up ages ago, but too many people in today's world are more interested in the wrapping paper than the gift. Wes's troubled youth and gruff exterior blind people to his goodness. Garnet, being Elvish, doesn't suffer from that problem; and he has the advantage of being able to, umm, monitor Wes's actions when he is nominally alone so he sees Wes as no one else can. Doesn't half squick me out, but the creepy surveillance of the Santa State bothers me less than the fantasy of loneliness rewarded with love and understanding. Short, quick, charming, and *perfect* for Hallmark's Xmas movies.

Low heat throughout and thus little equivalent queerness to épater les hétéreaux (pardon my Fractured French). Worth the time and the minimal money it costs, if only for the lovely (if hammy) way Author Vaughn presents Wes's borning happiness with his new love:

Hope, a dangerous emotion for a man so used to loss, had kindled in his heart. He wanted to believe that look he sometimes saw in Garnet’s eyes, the one that promised love and commitment and forever. He wanted to allow himself to feel those things in return without the constant dread that something would go wrong and spoil it all. Would there ever be a time when the fear left him, when he could simply experience happiness sans the paranoia?

130 Why is Nothing Ever Simple? by Jodi Taylor

Rating: 4* of five

Charming, trenchant, tendentious, and only two w-bombs. The annual Christmas Jump at St Mary's Institute for Historical Research is, this time, going to the Battle of Bannockburn. YOU know, the one where Robert the Bruce whupped the tar outta that faggy (as we're reminded rather more often than I feel is actually warranted) King Edward II and ended his designs on Scotland's Royal Seat. Haw.

Edward II was, in fact, a numpty. Bad politician, worse general. But you couldn't leave it at that, could you, Author Taylor, bringing up Gaveston and the presumptive manner of Edward's purported murder. Oh well, pobody's nerfect, and the stakes in this outing were really high: Guthrie's last jump faGawdSake, and Elspeth (his light'o'love) facing up to her debilitating anxiety about making time jumps. Oh, and some fascinating new bounty hunters, people I had no idea would exist, arrive; the Time Police take another bollocking; and in spite of White Nationalist idiots, History prevails and the continuity of the timeline is assured. (I myownself don't believe there is only one timeline, but her house, her rules.) In short, another hit from the bong of the Chronicles of St Mary's.

All joy and delight of the Yule log's light and heat, St Mary's Disaster Magnets. Author Taylor's given us a lovely gift as usual!

Happy New Year filled with much wonderful reading Richard. That's what we all want I think.

131 The Hunger After You're Fed: Who Is Héctor Prima? by James S. A. Corey

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Amazon Prime series The Expanse is based on James S.A. Corey's extensive novel, novella, and this solitary short story, future history of Earth under a world-governing UN, rebellious-now-independent colony Mars, and the Asteroid Belt, just the Belt in most all references, standing in for the Third World. Now in its fourth season, with a fifth due this time next year, the world it posits is run by the rich through the mechanism of the UN; the rich have learned, somehow, from the nightmarish passage we're living through that they'd better embrace social democracy (NOT democratic socialism! THEY ARE WILDLY DIFFERENT THINGS!) or shit gonna hit the fan for 'em all, so there's something called "Basic Assistance" that keeps people alive and reasonably healthy since there are just too bloody many of 'em for any capitalist OR socialist economy to keep gainfully employed.

But what actually is Basic (as it's referred to in the whole book and TV series)? It's never defined. It's just...there. While that's great for world building...how many of us go around ruminating about how our bank cards work?...it leaves the obsessive fans (hi guys!) with waaayyy too much latitude to eff things up in fanfic and its attendant flame wars. The battles over the recent Star Wars films' stories being "canonical", ie within the original created universe's parameters, should've reached all y'all's ears by now. A lot of that mishegas is rooted in different kinds of fans...curatorial versus transformative is the root polarity...battling for "control" of the IP, or "Intellectual Property," in which the fan in question has invested their emotional energy and often social identity.

So Author Corey (a writing partnership) did something very wise back in 2016. They created this extremely short story to address, without explaining using the dreaded infodump, the economic, social, and emotional reality of Basic and its billions of clients:

I’d worked cleaning out brambles and hauling contaminated gravel from an old power plant for extra money to fund my dream of sitting across from the man, of telling him how much his words meant to me. Of breathing the same air.

In eight pages, the ultimate problem of human existence is laid bare: Why?

By which I mean, why exist, why strive, why wake up? No one sees you, no one cares, you are a biological machine for turning food into pollution.

So when someone *does* see you:

This age, this generation, traded its demons for the void. When I was young we were poor, and we are poor again now but differently. When I was young we were afraid to starve, to be without medicines or homes, and the teeth of it gave us meaning. Now we fear being less important than our neighbors. We lost our junkie’s need, and we don’t know what to put in its place. So we make art or food or music or sport and scream for someone to notice us.

It is shocking to me, living on the modern equivalent of Basic, that this solution is death to something good, not just bad things.

We should nourish our children not just with food but with what food means. What it used to mean. We should cherish the memories of our poverty. Ghosts and bones are made to remind us to take joy in not being dead yet.

Don't miss reading this free online short. It means something no matter whether you're an Expanse fan or not.

>272 brenzi: Thank you, Bonnie, and the sentiments are heartily returned. I agree about that being what we "all" (here, anyway!) want.

>251 richardderus: Muchas smooches, Riccardo. I wish that you find joy in 2020. I phrased it that way so that there is magic in it. Your friend, Larry.

>275 SomeGuyInVirginia: Thank you, sweetness! I'm pretty adept at finding joy...equally clumsy at losing it. But 2020 has some real wonderful possibilities. May your move to whichever place you decide to go to go well!

Hi Richard. I took an LT break to concentrate on Yule cooking and visitors. I send best wishes for successful resolution of the apnea difficulties.

I wrote a somewhat snarky review, maybe even *two* snarks, the other day (Sheri Tepper and a Christine Thompson. I could do that touchstone thing only if I get the titles correct...). They're on my thread anyway and the book work pages (not identical). I think I was a bit crabby because of expectations, you know? I really wanted to find these books engaging and at least satisfactory, if not great reads. I am becoming somewhat curmudgeonly about awarding stars. I wonder if I am simply way outside the box on my reading, because the other reviews are so laudatory. It is difficult not to feel influenced, isn't it, when, say on Goodreads, it is all 4 or 5 stars and there I am, out in left field.

I'm ambivalent about starting a 2020 thread, not because I feel lukewarm about the 75-er group, but because I was so entertained (addicted!) and L♡VED all the discussions, that I was horribly neglectful of the textile work I *should* have completed this year. But Hell, the reading was such a blast! LT threads are so tantalizinga ~ also, so many book bullets.

Enough of my grousing!
I want to wish you the best for the coming year. Just so you know, I think I will be mostly lurking.

>277 SandyAMcPherson: Good luck with that lurking thing...it ends up with a thread and a bulging TBR in my experience.

But hey! Maybe you have superior willpower to mine.

*muffled chortles*

>278 richardderus: ## Wap @#!, and she got him with a pillow aside the head.

*muffled chortles* indeed. 😧

Good reviews, Mr. D. I need to get back on the Jodi Taylor train, and I haven't read James S. A. Corey, but that one tempts me.

I hope you've been enjoying the weekend, and the pagan holiday season.

>279 SandyAMcPherson: *ow* Okay, okay, I retract the chortles!

And replace them with snickers.

>280 jnwelch: Great place to start wit Corey's work. It's a wonderful way to appreciate why these top-class folk that the series looks *up* at can't get what the Little Folk who're doing the actual work care about.

And then there's the Prime series...which I heartily recommend...to delve into next. Or instead of, as I did it.

133 The Big Book of Vintage Movie Posters: Volume One
Rating: 3* of five

This was a Smashwords freebie...I think it's a great idea for a book, though lacking in depth; there's no attempt to summarize the films whose posters were chosen, no hint of the criteria used in the selection of the posters, and the era covered is pre-World War II meaning that many (most?) modern perusers will be at a loss to know what the heck they're looking at.

Since I got a Fire tablet for Yule *swoon* I am delighted with the quality of the color images. I'm also perfectly ready to use Wikipedia to look up articles about the selected films, though that gets cumbersome since the titles aren't in text form under the posters. The list is at the front of each category.

As an example of what I'm advocating, one poster is for the 1931 pre-Code film Corsair, which (according to the text on the poster) is based on a novel serialized in Liberty Magazine called Corsair, A Pirate in White Flannels by one Walton Green. The film is available on YouTube, stars one Chester Morris and a lady not unknown to me, Thelma Todd, sultry star of pre-Code goodies whose nickname was "Hot Toddy."

The story is incredible today: A high-school grad gets a job on Wall Street, finds it so morally repugnant to be fleecing little old ladies that he quits, becomes a bootlegger in the Prohibition era, and involves his girlfriend in a scheme to pirate the bootleggers's cargos to sell to his own clients.

Hm.

Well, anyway, that's what I wanted...just the hyperlinks and the bones of the story; a little about the poster's main charms would be nice but since I'd be able to look at it on the same page as the text it wouldn't really matter all that much. As it is, I had fun reminiscing about the actors whose names and histories I knew and, occasionally, the film if I'd seen it.

But it coulda been so much more.

133 A Viking for Yule by Jamie Fessenden

Rating: 4* of five, because it's Yuletide

So sweet little (he's like 5'4") punkin Sam, a bit player in Author Fessenden's prior book A Cop for Christmas, gets his own love story! Jackie, the series (loose, but still counts) non-resident Auntie Mame, whisks Sam away on a world tour after some terrifying stuff happens to him (revealing what is a spoiler for the first book). True to Auntie-form, she hurls him at any number of eligible gay men in the various countries they visit. His timidity and inexperience with the world's many ways of being are, by the time the pair wash up on Iceland's shores for Yuletide, worn into a certain facility if not comfort with the strangeness he's now expecting and encountering.

But there at the international airport is Arnar. Long blond hair, studly muscles, surly attitude...even towards his "Aunt Jackie," whom he's known most of his life. And, if Sam's sharpening gaydar is any guide, a Friend of Dorothy's. Lovely! In every sense. Well, except the whole surly part.

Arnar, for his own part, is mourning the end of his relationship with Stefan (never met but despised by all Arnar's friends). He's hurting but he's a man, so he Notices Sam, being utterly charmed by his ears (of all things)...just not ready to let go of his sadz over the jerk Stefan.

The usual hijinks ensue, as they must in category romances. The Icelandic countryside and December weather play huge roles in the action. The elements are a big part of Arnar and Sam's falling in love with each other. The adventure that, as is ordinary for men, serves to bond them to each other, is largely dependent on weather. It is December in Iceland, after all. And the trope of hero-faces-down-fears is very much present.

But here we come to the crux of my problem with this lovely little bagatelle: By the numbers-ness. I don't believe for a second that, in this book's first draft, these men were the ages they're presented as being, ie thirtyish. They act like early-to-middle twentysomethings. They have packs of friends, just like early-to-middle twenties folk do; they have sullen fits, which frankly know no age but are usually less prevalent in the thirtyish bracket. They Have Adventures, not planning to do things that'll put them at risk like one does in the earlier twenties; they make HUGE life decisions on a whim, and that my dears is a dead give-away that they're nowhere near thirty. Sam has his sole remaining family member, ill and frail Grampy, to care for and about. He has also gone on an around-the-world trip for pretty much a year, at Jackie's behest and on her dime. I don't know about y'all, but that would make me wonder about the sanity of a thirtyish man; not a hair turned in a, say, twenty-five-year-old's case.

And the ending. Hm. While we need the de rigueur HEA, this one strikes me as...forced. It'd be a great last scene in a film. There's an epilogue that contextualizes it, but that's just it...it needs context.

Still! I can't say I read these books for their monumental and earth-shattering insights into character or innovations with the style-book. I read them for fun, and because I can tick off the trope boxes, I don't need to work at comprehending what I'm reading. This is a huge help to me while I'm in the process of getting this miserable apnea problem handled.

So! The new theme is up! Y'all got plenty interested when I asked which of the two themes, the Ladies of Science Fiction or the year 1960 in the world's doings, so I'm happy to announce the decision:

It's the Ladies of Science Fiction...AND 1960 in Kulcher. Each month I'll alternate between the themes. This thread, it's Andre Norton, and I focus on her 1960 book Storm Over Warlock. January's thread(s) will all be Ladies. February's will be the year 1960 in some way or shape or form...whatever is bright and shiny and catches my eye. A lot happened that year in politics and film and business, so...well...it's fertile ground.

Come take a look!

I decided I'd do this year-ender I saw on Katie's thread.

Fill in the prompts using titles of books you've read this year...

Describe yourself: Black Sheep

Describe how you feel: The Autumn of the Patriarch

Describe where you currently live: The Silent Patient

Your favorite time of day is: Starlight

If you could go anywhere, where would you go: With Walt Whitman, Himself

Your favorite form of transportation: Night Boat to Tangier

Your best friend is: Young Man from the Provinces

You and your friends are: An Orchestra of Minorities

What’s the weather like: Black Light

You fear: Disasterama!

What is the best advice you have to give: Hope for the Best

Thought for the day: Why Is Nothing Ever Simple?

How you would like to die: With the Fire On High

Your soul’s present condition: The Hunger After You're Fed

What is life for you: Rain and Embers

Excellent meme responses, RDear. *smooch*

>285 richardderus: Terrific responses...Why IS nothing ever simple??

134 These Bad Things by Danielle Dutton

Detail from Fanny Vandegrift Stevenson, Tent, California (about 1880). The Indianapolis Museum of Art, Bequest of Ethel A. Baird.

Rating: 5* of five

Danielle Dutton, Author of one of my all-time favorite six-stars-of-five reads, writes about 5,000 words of existential dread. She does it with her accustomed panache:

To begin with, they were camping. This whole story happens at night. It’s the first night of their first camping trip of the season. It’s only mid-March but hot as June, so they booked a site at a campground in the Ozarks. Actually, she booked the site, picking this park because it boasted three promising trails they could choose from in the morning: one that took them past the remains of old mining operations for barite, one with dolomite bluffs, and one that wound through a field with Mississippian petroglyphs. “The location of mysterious prehistoric rituals,” she read aloud from the website. But they couldn’t leave until after their son’s swim practice on Friday, itself after school, so they didn’t get to the campsite until basically dinnertime.

Quotidian details about a fsamily camping trip and prefiguring the eerieness of the experience, which I can't reveal for spoiler reasons; suffice it to say that the borders between memory, dreams, and observed reality are not impermeable and are highly prone to permeation by particular psychic, psychological currents.

Fear is always the starter motor for most people.

Go read it at the link above. Author Dutton's delicious Margaret the First didn't drain the wells of creative abundance, blessedly.

>286 MickyFine: Thank you most kindly, Micky! *smooch* back

>287 laytonwoman3rd: *heavy, heavy sigh* Dunno. But it damn sure ain't.

'Morning, RD! Best wishes for the last day of 2019.

>285 richardderus: Well done.

*smooch* from your own Madame TVT Horrible

>290 karenmarie: Thanks, Horrible, have a lovely end-of-2019 day. Let's hope 2020 is less disgusting than 2019 was.

I enjoyed those meme responses, too, Richard. I liked the idea of departing with The Fire on High. :-)

Enjoy these last smidges of '19; there's a major sense of "good riddance to bad rubbish" for the past year amongst the folks I know. Mostly because of you-know-who and his band of squirrelly gents, and their frustrating effects on all our lives.

>292 jnwelch: Thanks, Joe, it's a real relief to see the back of this year. The kakistocracy will make it to the end of this term, more's the pity. I'm seriously hopeful that they won't have any further access to the piggybank after that.

Heh. Well, on present trends....

Disasterama - is definitely to be feared, too bad it keeps on happening. Hope 2020 is better!

Goin' to dowse the star here, Richard. See you next year.

135 Omnilingual by H. Beam Piper

Rating: 3.5* of five

Silly, old-time fun.

There's no point in pretending the science is anything other than dated, the sexism isn't appalling, and the "scientists" are at all credible. These yahoos would be tossed out of a real university when they leaped to their first unsupported conclusion with the focus and intensity of an impala pursued by lions.

But the "girl" scientists get proper credit and support from the male bosses, which makes a nice change from the reality we live in.

And that's a wrap on 2019's reviews.

>294 Familyhistorian: Heh, indeed it is, Meg. A very poignant book by a queer guy my age who lived in San Francisco at the end of the disco era. Pretty good read, overall.

>295 weird_O: Next year in Jerusalem, Bill.

This was a *stellar* reading year! For the first time ever, I have two six-stars-of-five reads this year: Black Light, a debut story collection that gave me so much pleasure I read it twice (ever rarer occurence that), and the wrenching, gutting agony of Heart Berries, a memoir of such honesty and such vulnerability that I was a wreck after I finished it. I went back and forth a dozen times, first Author Parsons was the sixer, then Author Mailhot; neither book could possibly "win" for long because I couldn't get either book out of my mind.

I handed out 34 5- or damn-near-5-star reviews out of 155 reviewed books; that's 22% and that is a LOT. Many, even most of these (10+) were for short stories, for end-of-beloved-series novels, or for story collections. But hold on to something heavy: TWO, yes that's t-w-o dos due deux zwei два were...POETRY COLLECTIONS. Sarah Tolmie's The Art of Dying and the late Frank Stanford's collected poems, What About This: Collected Poems of Frank Stanford. Both were peak reading experiences. Another was cultural monadnock George Takei's graphic memoir They Called Us Enemy, which could not be more important for young people today to absorb.

What a beautiful year it was, to bring so many delights to my door. I hope, greedy thing that I am, that 2020 will repeat this performance. For all of us, really...honest! I didn't just add that on the end of this summing-up to make it sound less solipsistic.

>297 richardderus: And it is on order at my library although it won't let me put a hold on it. But it is on my radar.