Historical fiction, politics, cats
Oct. 2nd, 2019 04:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
enemyofperfectREAD
The Warden by Anthony Trollope.alchimie kindly recommended a couple of good starting points among his books, and I am reading neither of them, but I am reading the first book in the series they're part of. So far I'm enjoying it well enough -- it's a bit weird about women, but it gives an interesting portrait of institutional inertia and the people who favor it over, say, justice.
My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows, originally because my mother wanted to discuss it with me, although I think she's since forgotten why. I'm really not sure what to make of this book, which is about Lady Jane Grey but also... magical hijinks? This would probably be a less jarring combination to someone who was already aware of her position in English history, but reading about her execution in a foreword immediately before her lighthearted adventures made for a bit of mood whiplash. Anyway, I'm about halfway through it so far!
The paranoid fantasy behind Brexit by Fintan O'Toole, which is gorgeously written and does what it says on the tin. (Also available as a 31 minute podcast.)
James Davis Nicoll's supremely deadpan take on the gender balance of the Hugos. (Of course, many thousands of women have also won part of the Hugo awarded to the AO3, ahem.)
A rather alarming article about how much weight chess masters lose during tournaments.
And this distressing piece about researchers catching on that some people with chronic anxiety avoid relaxing because it hurts less to be anxious all the time than to feel better for a little while than then suddenly worse again. Apparently that isn't actually healthy for us? That does make sense, but I can't say I like it.
GAMED
Still Lily's Garden and StarCraft II, and also some Furistas Cat Cafe, which does not have the same view of feline psychology that I do -- I was expecting a mechanic where the cats had to go and rest between clients, not where they got antsy without attention! -- but which I cannot dislike at all, because it lets me pet cats and make them purr. They are such good cats. Sadly though, the app keeps crashing on my somewhat elderly tablet, so this is unlikely to become a personal fave.
WATCHED
More Doctor Who. I quite like Danny! "Mummy on the Orient Express" is probably my favorite episode of season 8 so far, for the courage and unexpected kindness.
The Good Place season premiere!!! Oh it's good to have this show back! I have no idea what they're doing with this season, honestly, but that's part of the charm by this point. I'm so pleased there's been conversation over at![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
the_good_place, too!
And a youtube series called The Alt-Right Playbook, which is quite cheerful about calling a fascist a fascist. I don't think I agree with it about everything, but I was really struck by the idea that what the more patriarchal strains of Christianity have in common with unfettered capitalism is a love of hierarchy. I always had a little trouble understanding why those strains of conservatism got along so well, but now it seems perfectly clear.
The Warden by Anthony Trollope.
alchimie kindly recommended a couple of good starting points among his books, and I am reading neither of them, but I am reading the first book in the series they're part of. So far I'm enjoying it well enough -- it's a bit weird about women, but it gives an interesting portrait of institutional inertia and the people who favor it over, say, justice.My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows, originally because my mother wanted to discuss it with me, although I think she's since forgotten why. I'm really not sure what to make of this book, which is about Lady Jane Grey but also... magical hijinks? This would probably be a less jarring combination to someone who was already aware of her position in English history, but reading about her execution in a foreword immediately before her lighthearted adventures made for a bit of mood whiplash. Anyway, I'm about halfway through it so far!
The paranoid fantasy behind Brexit by Fintan O'Toole, which is gorgeously written and does what it says on the tin. (Also available as a 31 minute podcast.)
James Davis Nicoll's supremely deadpan take on the gender balance of the Hugos. (Of course, many thousands of women have also won part of the Hugo awarded to the AO3, ahem.)
A rather alarming article about how much weight chess masters lose during tournaments.
And this distressing piece about researchers catching on that some people with chronic anxiety avoid relaxing because it hurts less to be anxious all the time than to feel better for a little while than then suddenly worse again. Apparently that isn't actually healthy for us? That does make sense, but I can't say I like it.
GAMED
Still Lily's Garden and StarCraft II, and also some Furistas Cat Cafe, which does not have the same view of feline psychology that I do -- I was expecting a mechanic where the cats had to go and rest between clients, not where they got antsy without attention! -- but which I cannot dislike at all, because it lets me pet cats and make them purr. They are such good cats. Sadly though, the app keeps crashing on my somewhat elderly tablet, so this is unlikely to become a personal fave.
WATCHED
More Doctor Who. I quite like Danny! "Mummy on the Orient Express" is probably my favorite episode of season 8 so far, for the courage and unexpected kindness.
The Good Place season premiere!!! Oh it's good to have this show back! I have no idea what they're doing with this season, honestly, but that's part of the charm by this point. I'm so pleased there's been conversation over at
the_good_place, too!And a youtube series called The Alt-Right Playbook, which is quite cheerful about calling a fascist a fascist. I don't think I agree with it about everything, but I was really struck by the idea that what the more patriarchal strains of Christianity have in common with unfettered capitalism is a love of hierarchy. I always had a little trouble understanding why those strains of conservatism got along so well, but now it seems perfectly clear.
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 11:19 am (UTC)The other crucial idea here is the vertiginous fall from “heart of Empire” to “occupied colony”. In the imperial imagination, there are only two states: dominant and submissive, coloniser and colonised. This dualism lingers. If England is not an imperial power, it must be the only other thing it can be: a colony.
Ugh, this. This is exactly the narrowminded nonsense about Europe that I could never stand??? When people are all like "we're going to be under the EU's thumb and I'm just like... what the fuck? Why? Why can't you be shaking hands or something instead???
“Napoleon, Hitler, various people tried this [unifying Europe], and it ends tragically. The EU is an attempt to do this by different methods,” Boris Johnson told the Telegraph on 14 May 2016, a month before the referendum.
-_____-
It helped that the tiny Falklands population that was serving this microcosmic function was almost entirely white – a “British people” that no longer existed – and that this “British territory” was an almost entirely rural landscape. The Falklands was a kind of make-believe England with no black and brown immigrants.
[low whistle] Holy shit, they said that.
...man that article was a wild ride.
Thank you for linking it! <3
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 07:32 pm (UTC)So much this. Equal relationships seem to be very hard for some people to imagine.
They're right and they should say it! But also, holy shit, yeah.
I'm glad you... enjoyed? found worthwhile? ...the article. It's so devastatingly clear about the murky currents underlying it all, I feel like.
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 07:33 pm (UTC)It really is! And, I think, also kind of, "wow, this is a really stupid thing we're going through, huh?"
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 07:37 pm (UTC)(I say this fully aware that things are equally horrible on my side of the ocean, to be clear. There seems to be plenty of awfulness to go around.)
no subject
Date: 2019-10-04 07:39 pm (UTC)