My Favorite Album

I'm going to attempt to do this memey thing called 30 Days of Song. I will not post this every day, because oh-my-pants-I'm-bored-already. Instead I'll post once or twice a week, as I feel like. So there. I am unrepentantly stealing this from Jen O. at My Tornado Alley. She rocks. I'm not sure if she stole it from somewhere, but here we go. 

A Song from my Favorite Album

Ah. Do you remember albums? They are sort of a thing from the past. Not that they don't exist anymore, but with the advent of electronic music, pay by play and single downloads, it's a thing that doesn't exist the same way anymore. Time was that an album was a collection of music that fit and was carefully crafted so that you could enjoy listening to it from beginning to end. Now, they are a collection of "sellable" hits strung together for maximum download sales. Bleh.

In any case, I have a lot of favorite albums. Hard Candy by Counting Crows in definitely in my top five. Also, IV by Led Zeplin. (I know everyone loves IV, but "Black Dog" will always win in my book.) But one of my all-time favorite albums is So Much for the Afterglow by Everclear. Firstly, I love Everclear. Secondly, this was the soundtrack to my life my freshman year in college. The title track still reminds me of someone. "Father of Mine" is eerily like someone crawled inside my head. And the 50's sounding antidepresant ads scattered between songs gives the whole thing a sad and crazy vibe. "Normal Like You" is at the center of that vibe. And it's a song that instantly takes me to a different place in my life. That always gets points in my book.



Day 1 - Your Favorite Song - White Blank Page
Day 2 - Your Least Favorite Song - Barbie Girl
Day 3 -  A Song that Makes You Happy - Birdhouse in Your Soul
Day 4 - A Song that Makes You Sad - Anna Begins
Day 5 - A Song that Reminds you of Someone - Friend of the Devil
Day 6 - A Song that Reminds you of Somewhere - Least Complicated
Day 7 - A Song that Reminds You of a Certain Event - Mrs. Potter's Lullaby
Day 8 - A Song that You Know All the Words To  - It's the End of the World as We Know It
Day 9 - A Song that You Can Dance to - Some Nights
Day 10 - A Song that Makes you Fall Asleep  - Ice Cream
Day 11 - A Song from your Favorite Band - Later On 
Day 12 - A Song from a band you Hate - Life is a Highway
Day 13 - A Song that is a Guilty Pleasure  - Loving You is the Dumbest Thing
Day 14 - A Song that No One Would Expect you to Love - Mean
Day 15 - A Song that Describes You - She Don't Want Nobody Near 
Day 16 - A Song that You Used to Love but Now Hate - Drops of Jupiter 
Day 17 - A Song that You Hear Often on the Radio - Little Talks
Day 18 - A Song that You Wish You Heard on the Radio - Grey Ghost 
Day 19 - A Song from your Favorite Album - Normal Like You (today)
Day 20 - A Song that You Listen to When You're Angry
Day 21 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Happy
Day 22 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Sad
Day 23 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Wedding
Day 24 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Funeral
Day 25 - A Song that Makes you Laugh
Day 26 - A Song that you Can Play on an Instrument
Day 27 - A Song that you Wish you Could Play
Day 28 - A Song that Makes you Feel Guilty
Day 29 - A Song from Your Childhood
Day 30 - Your Favorite Song at this Time Last Year

And this is Why...

So, that church I've been going to. They talk about Lent. Not in any specific way that would helpfully tell me specifically what they believe about Lent, but in a "Hey, yo. It's the second Sunday of Lent, let's sing some hymns about sacrifice," kind of way.

I've talked before about my weird, kinda relationship with Lent. Most years I think about it, some years I choose to give something up, then I fail because thinking about Lent is not something I'm used to.

This year, inspired by my daughter's decision to give up peanut butter (out of solidarity with her highly allergic friend and her constant and inspiring desire to ) and a very inspiring sermon about sacrifice, I decided to give up chocolate.

Here's the thing: I love chocolate. I know that's trite and who doesn't and all, but it's really and truly a thing for me. Chocolate makes me happy. Chocolate and peanut butter makes me ecstatic. But, I've been going a little overboard and I know that I need to solve my own problems and not expect some cocoa powder, milk and sugar to do it for me.

But, I had this feeling like there was a reason - some very specific reason - why I had never given up chocolate before. But I couldn't remember what it was. So, I began. And I was doing really well. I ate half a chocolate chip cookie before I remembered that there was chocolate in that thing.* But that was my only week one stumble.

Then, came the Girl Scout Cookies. 'Cause, you know, I have some Girl Scouts and sometime in January, I ordered a bunch of chocolate cookies like you do. And this weekend, I ate about a third of a box of Caramel DeLites. I'd like to pretend to be remorseful, but man, there is nothing like the first Girl Scout Cookie of the year.

Now, I guess I'm going to try to remember for the rest of the sale and then I'm going to eat a whole box of Peanut Butter Patties on Easter Sunday. Also, Reese's Eggs. Oh my, I just remembered Reese's Eggs.

*I know this seems ridiculous, but I usually make mine without chocolate chips (which is apparently called a Brown Sugar Cookies) because I don't like the way the chips interrupt the yummy cookie. Completely at odds with my chocolate love.

It's the Little Things

I've been going to a new church for the past few weeks. This church is a different denomination from the one I've attended pretty much since birth. (Funny side note: I typed demonation first. Freudian?) Anyway, theologically, it's very similar to what I've grown up with and the differences seem to be mainly in how it's practiced and how the worship service goes.

What I've discovered is that the hardest things to adapt to are the smallest. The use of the word "God" three whole times in The Doxology. Using "sins" instead of "transgressions" in the Lord's Prayer. (And kinda that I only seem to know two songs in the whole hymnal.) It's weird for someone like me who's grown up in the church to suddenly be tripping all over myself when I say the Lord's prayer.

But it's made me realize that in life, it's always the little things. I can't say that Valentine's Day was hard on me. It really wasn't. It was harder last year and this year, I barely noticed that it passed. The kids brought candy home, I got them a Valentine. Brynna made me a card. Whatevs. But Saturday night, at church, I "hosted" the Newlywed Game. A Valentine's tradition of hillarity. I never talked the Ex into playing and reading off those questions and watching one couple (hi Mom) dominate while another brought the funny with sleep deprived bickering, I realized that I'll probably never play the Newlywed Game. Probably. And even though there aren't even prizes, it was a sort of punch to the gut.

On the other hand, this weekend, I stood covered in flour (don't start the mixer too high, Jessi) in my kitchen while the aroma of fresh baked bread spread out through my house and I felt more accomplished than I ever have in any job ever. I made bread. Okay, it was just plain white bread and it was a little dense, but I created bread. From flour, water, yeast, salt and sugar. It was pretty exciting.

I am looking around my office right now and despite the gray walls, there are so many little things that make me happy. An xkcd comic I printed, an origami butterfly and a quilled black cat. My Scarlet O'Hara sign and a vase full of twizlers.

I guess what I'm getting at, in my round about, wandering, rambling sort of way is that life is made up of the little things. The thought of trying to live a happy life or keep a clean house or live in peace is daunting and scary, but it's not about wide, sweeping change. It's not about making everything perfect all at once. It's just about the little things. Piling up all the good little things you can until you can't really see over them.

Current Obsessions

Watching: Arrow, Supernatural, Walking Dead and Cougar Town (guilty pleasure)

Reading: Insurgent, Walking Dead: Miles Behind Us, 2013 Cambellian Pre-Reading Anthology, Sin City: The Big Fat Kill

Listening: Mike Doughty Sad Man Happy Man

Making: Bread, necklaces and fabric covered letters

Writing: Some personal stuff that may never see the light of day, Untitled Microfiction, this useless list post

I Wish It Was on The Radio

I'm going to attempt to do this memey thing called 30 Days of Song. I will not post this every day, because oh-my-pants-I'm-bored-already. Instead I'll post once or twice a week, as I feel like. So there. I am unrepentantly stealing this from Jen O. at My Tornado Alley. She rocks. I'm not sure if she stole it from somewhere, but here we go. 

A Song I Wish I Heard on the Radio

Let me tell you a long, complicated and semi-pointless story: I used to love Soul Coughing. In high school and college, I rocked me some "Super Bon Bon." I went to see them in college, which was my worst concert ever and I once got shoved into the floor head first and had my arm dislocated at an Offspring concert. (Actually, that was one of my best concerts ever, despite the abject pain.)

In any case, years later, I was watching my very favoritest episode of Veronica Mars. (The rich kid prom with the awesome "epic love" quote.) I kept rewinding and re-watching the scene where Logan finally (drunkenly) confesses his love to Veronica. And I realized that, like Veronica, I loved that song. Only I had no idea what it was. Some googling later and I found that it was "I Hear the Bells" by Mike Doughty. I kept thinking I recognized that awesome voice. Down the rabbit hole a little further and wouldja look at that: he's the lead singer of Soul Coughing. So. Small world, I guess. Kinda. In any case, that one song in one episode of a show, opened up this whole world that I wouldn't have known about. Because it doesn't exist on the radio. At least not around these parts. Mike Doughty, you had me at "joyful and triumphant."



Day 1 - Your Favorite Song - White Blank Page
Day 2 - Your Least Favorite Song - Barbie Girl
Day 3 -  A Song that Makes You Happy - Birdhouse in Your Soul
Day 4 - A Song that Makes You Sad - Anna Begins
Day 5 - A Song that Reminds you of Someone - Friend of the Devil
Day 6 - A Song that Reminds you of Somewhere - Least Complicated
Day 7 - A Song that Reminds You of a Certain Event - Mrs. Potter's Lullaby
Day 8 - A Song that You Know All the Words To  - It's the End of the World as We Know It
Day 9 - A Song that You Can Dance to - Some Nights
Day 10 - A Song that Makes you Fall Asleep  - Ice Cream
Day 11 - A Song from your Favorite Band - Later On 
Day 12 - A Song from a band you Hate - Life is a Highway
Day 13 - A Song that is a Guilty Pleasure  - Loving You is the Dumbest Thing
Day 14 - A Song that No One Would Expect you to Love - Mean
Day 15 - A Song that Describes You - She Don't Want Nobody Near 
Day 16 - A Song that You Used to Love but Now Hate - Drops of Jupiter 
Day 17 - A Song that You Hear Often on the Radio - Little Talks
Day 18 - A Song that You Wish You Heard on the Radio - Grey Ghost (today)
Day 19 - A Song from your Favorite Album
Day 20 - A Song that You Listen to When You're Angry
Day 21 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Happy
Day 22 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Sad
Day 23 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Wedding
Day 24 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Funeral
Day 25 - A Song that Makes you Laugh
Day 26 - A Song that you Can Play on an Instrument
Day 27 - A Song that you Wish you Could Play
Day 28 - A Song that Makes you Feel Guilty
Day 29 - A Song from Your Childhood
Day 30 - Your Favorite Song at this Time Last Year

Five Things on Friday: Fantasy 101

So, last week, I wrote about good books for people who think they don't like SciFi. I also told a little story about my book club thinking that the book we were reading wasn't SciFi. Now, I'm going to tell on myself a little.

A couple of years ago, I was talking to a friend of mine about books and she suggested something and I said, "Oh, I don't really like fantasy." She twitched an eyebrow. "But you love Harry Potter?" "Well, yeah," I responded, "but I don't like, you know, like damsel in distress fantasy."

But, I thought about it and I realized that Harry Potter is about wizards and magic and dragons and witches and unforgivable curses and that kinda makes it fantasy. So, okay, I like that. Which lead me to try and figure out what I don't like. (For the record, I don't like romanticizing the middle ages - they sucked, people died and only on tenth of one percent weren't basically slaves), I don't like names with no vowels or names with no consonants. And I don't like damsels in distress. I like girls who put on their armor and fight.

Anyway, for people who don't think they like fantsy (like me) but who are willing to try, I present:

5 Books of Fantasy 101

1. Carpe Jugulum by Terry Pratchett
   Why it's fantasy: One of Pratchett's amazing Discworld novels, Carpe Jugulum tells the tale of a vampire vs. witch war for Uberwald. Chock full of magic, myth and legend.
   Why it's awesome: If you're not familiar with Discworld or Pratchett's work in general, the first thing you should know is that it's hilarious. Pratchett uses the fictional Discworld to explain and mock the things we live with everyday. 
2. Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
   Why it's fantasy: After stopping to help a bleeding girl on the sidewalk, Richard Mayhew finds that he no longer exists in his life: his fiance has never hear of him, his apartment's been rented to someone else and he never held his boring job. Trying to get his life back, Richard becomes a part of another London. A magical, mystical, and very dark London.
   Why it's awesome: Richard and Door (the girl he stopped to help, the girl who didn't belong in his world) embark on a wonderful journey that recalls every myth from the Greeks to Stoker. Also, Door rocks. I'd kinda like to be Door when I grow up. Except she would never grow up.
3. Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire
   Why it's Fantasy: This is the first of McGuire's series featuring the changeling, October Daye. When one of October's few full-blood Fae friends, the Countess Winterose, binds October to find her killer with her dying words, she is plunged into the Faerie politics, plots and must come face to face with the truth of her complicated and magical past.
   Why it's Awesome: Firstly, Seanan only does good work. Secondly, October, or Toby to her friends, is one my favorite characters of all time. Technically, this falls under a subcategory called Urban Fantasy and is a great introduction. Seeing how Faerie hides it's existence to a technologically advanced world is half the fun.
4. The Probable Future by Alice Hoffman
   Why it's Fantasy: Going back generations, the Sparrow family women are gifted. Elinor can smell a lie, her daughter Jenny sees other people's dreams and granddaughter Stella can see how people will die. Years ago, Elinor and Jenny fell out and haven't spoken since, but when Stella's gift becomes an undue burden, the women must come together to protect her.
   Why it's Awesome: This story of family and love (both romantic and familial) does more tells more than a tale of magic. The family, struggling to redefine and complete itself is at the center of an entire town's reawakening. 
5. Night Circus by Erin Morganstern
   Why it's fantasy: The Night Circus is born when two magicians decide to compete through their young apprentices. The circus is created as a venue for the competition, but what it creates is completely unpredictable. As the apprentices, unaware of the deadly competition they are in, fall deeply in love with one another, many others fall deeply in love with the circus, following it as it travels and being forever transformed by it's magic.
   Why it's awesome: The sweet love story at the center of the circus means that even though the circus was created for evil purposes, it becomes a source of life and magic for many people. The world inside the circus is so complete and beautiful that the entire book is a sheer delight to read. 

Fellow fantasy readers: what did I miss?

A Few Random Facts

1. Maren thinks "Call Me Maybe," is "Call Me Navy." "So, dis is cwazy, but here's my nummer, call me Navy." 
2. This misunderstanding is too cute to correct.
3. I still sing "Dixie Dandelion," instead of "Dixieland Delight" and "Reverend Bluejeans" instead of "Forever in Bluejeans."
4. I'm wearing a flower in my hair today. I can't decide if I love it or if I love it but feel super-self-conscience in it.
5. I don't know where the flower came from. I think maybe my sister-in-training left it at my house. Sorry, Morgan. 
6. We have two new staff people at work and I love them both. Partially because they bring chocolate for the sharing. 
7. I shall gain 40 lbs in chocolate before I learn that it's going to be here everyday and you don't have to hurry up and eat it before it's gone.
8. I should mention that I love chocolate. 
9. But not as much as I love brownies.
10. I should make brownies tonight.
11. I'm listening to The Offspring and reliving my youth. 
12. Except that I think I'm still young.
13. Until my back starts hurting. Or I yawn at 9:30.
14. Tomorrow is Valentine's Day.
15. Or, as I like to call it: Eat chocolate, drink wine and sprawl all over the empty bed reveling in the fact that you don't have to share it or put on high heels to go out on a date day. 

A Song on the Radio

I'm going to attempt to do this memey thing called 30 Days of Song. I will not post this every day, because oh-my-pants-I'm-bored-already. Instead I'll post once or twice a week, as I feel like. So there. I am unrepentantly stealing this from Jen O. at My Tornado Alley. She rocks. I'm not sure if she stole it from somewhere, but here we go. 

A Song I Hear a Lot on the Radio

I gave up on the radio for a long time. I'm still not a fan. I do not heart radio, is what I'm sayin'. I just think that a lot of the best stuff doesn't get a lot of traffic. A lot of the best stuff is hard to categorize. I love Pandora and Spotify and the XM on my TV. But my darling dearest, love of my life car does not currently have a working CD player. So, I'm listening to the radio. Even worse, I'm listening to the pop station that my kids like.

And, forgive me, I'm actually kinda enjoying it. Some of it's crap, don't get me wrong. But a lot of it is a ton of fun. And hey, did you know that Angry Chick Music is back in style. Really. But I digress. One of the best things I've discovered due to listening to Pink and One Direction and Philip Philips (can we all just agree to quit playing that song? It's an awesome song, but it's reaching the saturation point.) is Of Monsters and Men. And "Little Talks," which is like listening to someone's nervous breakdown, but happier. I sing this song all day long.



Day 1 - Your Favorite Song - White Blank Page
Day 2 - Your Least Favorite Song - Barbie Girl
Day 3 -  A Song that Makes You Happy - Birdhouse in Your Soul
Day 4 - A Song that Makes You Sad - Anna Begins
Day 5 - A Song that Reminds you of Someone - Friend of the Devil
Day 6 - A Song that Reminds you of Somewhere - Least Complicated
Day 7 - A Song that Reminds You of a Certain Event - Mrs. Potter's Lullaby
Day 8 - A Song that You Know All the Words To  - It's the End of the World as We Know It
Day 9 - A Song that You Can Dance to - Some Nights
Day 10 - A Song that Makes you Fall Asleep  - Ice Cream
Day 11 - A Song from your Favorite Band - Later On 
Day 12 - A Song from a band you Hate - Life is a Highway
Day 13 - A Song that is a Guilty Pleasure  - Loving You is the Dumbest Thing
Day 14 - A Song that No One Would Expect you to Love - Mean
Day 15 - A Song that Describes You - She Don't Want Nobody Near 
Day 16 - A Song that You Used to Love but Now Hate - Drops of Jupiter 
Day 17 - A Song that You Hear Often on the Radio - Little Talks (today)
Day 18 - A Song that You Wish You Heard on the Radio
Day 19 - A Song from your Favorite Album
Day 20 - A Song that You Listen to When You're Angry
Day 21 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Happy
Day 22 - A Song that you Listen to when You're Sad
Day 23 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Wedding
Day 24 - A Song that you Want to Play at your Funeral
Day 25 - A Song that Makes you Laugh
Day 26 - A Song that you Can Play on an Instrument
Day 27 - A Song that you Wish you Could Play
Day 28 - A Song that Makes you Feel Guilty
Day 29 - A Song from Your Childhood
Day 30 - Your Favorite Song at this Time Last Year

Confession: My TV is Older than I Am

Kids, see that thing in the background? We used to watch TV
in giant wooden boxes and the sound came through these
dusty plastic things on the sides. That was slightly after we
walked two miles in the snow to change the channel.

I used to have a lot of buttons. You know, not buttons, like things with four holes that make your shirt stay closed, but buttons with a pin back that decorate your backpack. I had a backpack full of buttons. One that I saw a lot, but never bought said:

"Theatre is life, cinema is art, television is furniture."

The reason that I never purchased said button is that I have always liked television. Also, it can totally be art. Also, if you don't think it's life, you should talk to some of thousands of people making their living doing make-up for soap operas or holding boom mics for sitcoms. Life is relative, people.

Anyway, I digress. I don't think most people would get that button these days. Because televisions are not furniture. They are still huge, even huger in a lot of ways, but now they are flat and they hang unobtrusively on your wall or take up seemingly no space on a tabletop. Amazing little invention, the flat screen.

They are also shaped appropriately now. Just sayin'.

I am only recently becoming acquainted with such wonders. Last summer, my mommy bought me a TV for my birthday for my bedroom. Because my bedroom TV sucked. The top of the screen said, "CH 0003" and it would not go away. No matter what. Also, it took a long time to warm up and would sometimes randomly turn itself off.

Let me be clear about something here, bedroom TV is important. Firstly, because I sleep with the XM channels playing. It's better than radio because there are no annoying commercials that sound like you're being pulled over. Because being pulled over in a dream sucks. It is also important, because it allows me to sleep late on Saturdays, just turn on TV and roll over. I know, I'm super mom. Just realize, when I say late, I mean 8 a.m. Finally, I like to watch TV in bed.

So, anyway. Brynna has had a TV in her room for years. Maren got one for her birthday this year. They are both flat screen wonderments. So is the lovely in my bedroom.

But my living room has furniture. It's a hand-me-down from my grandparents. And here's the thing - it's an excellent TV. It has stereo sound that is slightly better than my fancy-pants surround sound system (that won't work with the TV.) It has a really good picture (after about three minutes) and it has never given me even a little trouble. It's just that it's freakin' huge.

It takes up a great deal of real estate in my living room. And, like console TV's before and since, it sits basically on the floor.

And honestly, all of that is fine. It's always been in the back of my mind. Someday, I'll get a new TV, one from this century. And it'll be sleek and special and wonderous. But for now, this is great. Turn it up, trust me you can't blow those speakers.

But then, this winter, came the problem with the DVD player. (Is it starting to sound like maybe I'm technologically behind the times?) See my bedroom DVD player decided that it wasn't going to open unless you punched it. (Not kidding.) And I gave Maren the living room DVD player because the kids don't get cable, so unless they are particularly interested in static, they've gotta have a player in there.

Meaning that I had no way to watch movies. So, I purchased a Blu ray player - so I'd be sorta kinda with the times. Then, my lovely sister-in-training got me a second one for Christmas. One for the living room and one for the bedroom. Score.

Well, one for the bedroom. Because turns out, the Blu Ray and the TV from the 70's won't work. You literally cannot plug one into the other. Add to this the fact that everything looks washed out on the Wii because of the complicated system of adapters to make those things connect, the fact that my stereo system won't play the audio on the TV and the general furnitureness of it and well, I think it may be time to retire it.

Which is a shame, because she had a good run. Also, she still works. Which is the rub. I hate to replace anything that's doing it's job. On the other hand, my DVD collection would like to be watched again at some point. And the kids would like to be able to read the lyrics on Sing Star.

Maybe I should just keep it around as a statement.

Five Things on Friday - Intro to Sci Fi Edition

A couple of weeks ago, my bookclub met to discuss Divergent by Veronica Roth. At some point in the discussion I used the term "Sci Fi." This was met with silence. This is not science fiction, seemed to be resounding message. I made my case that a book that takes place in our future and features technology that we don't currently have is absolutely science fiction.

But it made me think about how we define science fiction. Wikipedia defines Science Fiction as such:

Science fiction genre fiction imaginative but more or less plausible content such as settings in the future, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities. Exploring the consequences of scientific innovations is one purpose of science fiction, making it a "literature of ideas".^[1] Science fiction has been used by authors and film/television program makers as a device to discuss philosophical ideas such as identity, desire, morality and social structure etc.

To me, science fiction isn't about crazy technology or aliens or space or time travel. It's about humanity. When you read something that takes place thousands of years in the future on a spaceship made out of a giant tree, the way people act and react is the same as the way people act and react now. What makes us human is transcendent of setting. Which gives SciFi the ability to explore really large issues like religion, philosophy, war and government without being preachy. The best science fiction holds a mirror up to what we are doing right now and asks, "Really?"
Which is, of course, why I love it.

And why I decided that what this here blog needs is a list of

Five Sci Fi Novels for the Person Who Thinks 
They Don't Like Sci Fi

1. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

• Synopsis: Ender's Game is the story of Ender Wiggin, a rare third child, whose birth was allowed because of his genetic value as a soldier. When Ender, as a relatively small child, is taken to Battle School, he is forced into harder and harder "battle games" to train him for a future at war with the Formic, an alien insectoid race. 
• Why It's SciFi: Well, aliens. Also, the school is in space. There's lots of future technology and it takes place in Earth's future. 
• Why You Should Read It: At the end of the day, Ender's Game is about children and our society's tendency to exploit them for the "greater good." Whether that good be as soldiers, workers, or entertainment value, we are missing the larger question of "Does the end really justify the means?" 

2. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

• Synopsis: In a world where knowledge has been devalued and books outlawed, firemen actually use flamethrowers to burn any house found to contain them. Guy Montag, a fireman begins to question his vocation as a fireman and the society around him when his neighbor, a bright young girl is killed and his wife, a woman deadened by her addictions, shows no concern over the event. 
• Why It's SciFi: It's the future and in fact, the author spells out very specifically how our world became that world over the course of mere decades. There is also futuristic technology, mostly focused on entertainment, but also including the completely fire resistant houses that allow this crazy flamethrowing world.
• Why You Should Read It: Bradbury claimed that the book was about television and the downfall of the written word, rather than censorship, but it works on multiple levels. Watching Guy awaken and start to live for the first time after reading is one of the greatest joys a reader can experience.

3. I am Legend by Richard Matheson

• Synopsis: Robert Neville is apparently the sole survivor of a parasite that causes the infected to act like vampires. As he kills vampires, studies the parasite and seeks companionship, the world around him is changing.
• Why It's SciFi: Future, pandemic started by war (and implied viral warfare). What makes this vampire book SciFi instead of horror is the constant presence of science as Robert tries to figure out what made him immune and if anything can be done for those around him.
• Why You Should Read It: What starts out as a simple survivor story, grows and morphs and finally asks, "What makes us human anyway?" Clearly, the answer cannot be as simple as genetic composition, so what separates us? 

4. The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell

• Emilio Sandoz, a Jesuit priest, accompanies a crew on a voyage to a planet populated with two disparate intelligent races. After forty years, Sandoz is finally returned, alone, disfigured and psychologically damaged. As he relates his tale to the church that sent him, he must heal from the pain caused to him and the great pain he and his companions caused to a foreign world.
• Why It's SciFi: Aliens, space travel, future. This is pretty clear cut.
• Why You Should Read It: This story is heartbreaking and terrible. It's almost difficult to read, but for all the right reasons. It's a beautiful telling of "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." As the explorers try to help the indigenous people, they actually cause great unrest and imbalance to their world, resulting in a truly horrific outcome. Finally, Emilio realizes that their initial assumptions about the culture were fallacies anyway. It's an allegory of "advanced" civilization trying to "fix" less "advanced" cultures. It is also a good hard look at the mission field. 

5. "The Minority Report" by Phillip K. Dick

• In the future, rather than punish people for crimes they have committed, thanks to "precog" humans, criminals are punished for the crimes they would have committed without intervention. When Officer Anderton is identified as a would-be murderer, he begins to question the validity of the precog reports.
• Why It's SciFi: Precogs are created with technological enhancement and their visions are "watched and reported" by computer systems. 
• Why You Should Read It: First of all, you should read it because it's by Phillip K. Dick, one of my favorite authors. Chances are that if you've seen a SciFi movie in the last couple of decades, it was based on one of his short stories. Secondly, the story here is about human nature and free will and the question is whether or not it's okay to remove free will to diminish violence. Which is a wonderfully sticky wicket. Also, there is a larger underlying story about the dehumanization of the precogs for the "safety" of society.

All of these stories are Science Fiction in the broad landscape, but as all science fiction does, tell the story of the human experience. 

So, fellow SF readers, what did I miss?

Conversations with Kids

Maren: Mommy, are you awake?
Me: Yep. What's up?
Maren: Crawling into bed with me. I woke up and there was a bad noise on the radio. Then a man said that there were going to be tornadoes. But tornadoes aren't real are they?
Me: Well... Yes, but we're not going to have one this morning. They are going to the South of us.
Maren: I mean, they're not really real in this world. Right? They're like witches? Only real in another world, but not in our world?
Me: Um. Yeah. Like witches.
___________________________________

I was standing outside the car pumping gas and had left the car on Accessory so that Brynna could listen to the end of her song. 

Brynna: Mom, don't date. Okay?
Me: Uh... Hold on. Finishes up, gets in car, turns off radio. Okay. Why don't you want me to date?
Brynna: It seems really complicated. There are all these rules. Did you know that you're never supposed to split a check? I don't know what that means, but it seems like something you would do and it's against the rules. It just seems really hard.
Me: Whuh... Oh, was John Tesh talking on the radio after your song ended?
Brynna: Yeah, and it just seems pretty complicated.
Me: Okay, then.
___________________________________

I almost hit a deer with my car. Luckily my car has excellent headlights and brakes and I managed to get stopped and let the thing wander aimlessly around the road for a while.

Maren: You did a good job, Mommy. Good job not hitting the deer.
Me: Thanks.
Maren: You stopped 'cause you didn't want to kill the deer, right?
Me: Yep.*
Maren: Good. Papaw kills deers. I don't think you should kill deers.
Me: Well, you know, Papaw is a really responsible hunter and he eats the deer he kills. Killing some of the deer also keeps the population under control so that they don't starve to death.
Maren: Yeah, but if he kills a baby then the mommy will be so sad looking for her baby.
Me: Papaw doesn't kill babies.
Maren: Well, if he kills a mommy then the baby will be sad looking for it's mommy.
Me: You kill deer in the fall when the babies are all grown up. Baby deer don't stay babies for long.
Maren: I still think it's sad. I don't want to eat a dead animal.
Me: Okay, well, you know that cheeseburgers are made out of cows and chicken nuggets are made out of chickens and bacon is made out of pigs, right?
Maren: Yeah, but somebody else kills them.

*Actually, I stopped because I didn't want to tear up my fancy new Jeep. Deer are stupid. I don't really care all that much if they die.

Decorating Breaking Point

My first house was a tiny Florida stucco house with a semi-open floor plan. (Please note, I'm not even sure that's a real term. It was kinda open, is what I'm getting at.) The living room, dining room and hallway were one continuous space with very little clear definition. I painted it yellow. When I say yellow, I want to be clear. I painted my house the color of the sun. The color of daffodils, the color of number two pencils, the color that Crayola calls "yellow." It kinda glowed.

And I loved it. I adored it. I got denim furniture covers and chambray curtains and had white accessories and IT WAS THE HAPPIEST ROOM ON EARTH. And I loved it.

Until I didn't. And there was a specific moment. An instant in which the switch flipped from love to loathe. I had just had a huge fight with the Ex. We were calm again, sort of made up. In that uncomfortable space where you're really over it, but you're afraid of setting the other person off again.

"Are you still mad?" the Ex asked.

"I hate the yellow," I growled. Honestly, I don't think I knew I hated it until the words were out of my mouth, but I knew in that instant it had to go and it had to go now. NOW. We immediately left to get paint chips.

We painted the living room "gypsy rose" and "pine needle" and I loved it so much that I insisted on the same colors when we moved. And I really jumped in. Since we moved, I've gotten all new living room furniture that matches, I've altered my whole room to the feel of those colors. I've really worked at it.

And I'm not finished.

And Saturday, I realized that I hate it. Again.*

Since I had (finally) gotten all the Christmas totes back to the basement and reclaimed all my floor space, I decided that it was time to rearrange the furniture. I love rearranging furniture. As I plotted and measured and tried to decide if I could live with a bookcase on the "wrong" end of the wall, I burst into tears. Because no matter where I put the damn furniture I was still going to hate the colors, the plaid sofa, the "farmhouse" look that I've been going for the last three years or so. I hate it. With the passion of a thousand suns. I want it gone right this second. Even though this time last year I was smitten with it. It's got to go.

Only this time, we're not talking about a coat of paint and some new curtains. We are talking about every piece of furniture, every item on my walls, every everything, because I have invested in this look.

I can't even properly explain how desperate I feel about this situation. It has to go. On a budget of zero, but it has to go. Because this, no matter how clinically insane it is, this is how I live. I love it until I hate it.

But the lesson that I have learned this time is that I need to anticipate my fickleness. I'm just not sure how.

*In my defense, the yellow lasted about three years and the gypsy rose has lasted a little over eight. I'm getting better. More than double. Maybe this next incarnation will make it sixteen. 

Five Things on Friday - BBCAmerica Edition

Once upon a time, I visited London. I spent 28 days in the City that totally sleeps, but does it classy-like, and even though I mostly wandered around and tried to shove a whole city into my brain, I also watched TV. Like as an experiment. Because I'd never watched TV anywhere but America. (Full disclosure: I also went to McDonald's once, saw a completely American movie, and drank fancy-imported Jim Beam. I am clearly not right.)

So, I watched British TV and here was my takeaway: that's some weird pants. One night, I watched a reality show competition about strippers. I should point out that this was in 1998, so the rest of the world had not yet run out of reality show competition ideas. One night I watched something that was quite possibly in Welsh. I'm guessing because I couldn't understand a single, solitary word of the whole show. But people laughed a whole lot.

So, when my cable company first added BBC America, back in the day, I was torn. On the one hand, I loved Monty Python and on the other hand, competitive stripping.

What I have discovered, however, is that no matter what other stuff is on the telly across the Pond,  the Brits kick our pants in genre programming. Thank you, BBC America and Supernatural Saturday. I'll even forgive you for your inclusion of Battlestar Galactica which is neither British nor supernatural.

Five Genre Shows that Prove Brits Do It Better

1. Doctor Who - I'm pretty sure that my love and adoration for Doctor Who and its titular Doctor (especially in his tenth and eleventh incarnations) is fairly well-documented. *swoon* I'm gonna be honest, though, I've never really gotten the original series. I mean, it was fine, just a little goofy. The Doctor of today, however, is pretty amazing.The best of what Science Fiction has to offer, mixed with a dash of horror (the Angels are scary), a touch of magic (always explained), and genuine human drama - all mixed together into a glorious, gloopy mess.

2. Being Human - So, SyFy, that glorious non-name-having network that sometimes has amazing success and sometimes fails miserably, is in its second season of the American version of this show.  The basic premise, a vampire, a werewolf and a ghost share a flat, sounds like the set up to a joke. But the actual show, about what makes us human, and how sometimes we just aren't, was brilliant, simple and easy to replicate. What wasn't easy to replicate (take note SyFy) was the pain. Watching the British version of Being Human is terrible. Heart wrenching. Amazing. You want, more than anything else for that hour of programming, to save these characters. The American version: you want to know what happens next. Which isn't bad. I mean, honestly, the American version is good. I watch it. It's nice. But it just doesn't live up to its namesake.

3. Primeval - I didn't think I'd find anything at all interesting about this show where dinosaurs slip through holes in time and find themselves in our world. But then I realized that Andrew-Lee Potts was in it and I'd watch him read a telephone book. In the end, though, Primeval was a wonderful marriage of science, politics, espionage and adventure. And despite all this, it was also whimsical, occasionally goofy and never-ever took itself too seriously. This should also be a note for American science fiction producers: sometimes you have to acknowledge the ridiculousness.

4. Bedlam - Bedlam is a flat-out ghost story, taking place in the partially-renovated-into-apartments Bedlam hospital that is kinda famous for treating crazy people horribly. Now, I don't know about you, but you couldn't pay me enough to live in Bedlam. I would, however, pay good money to hang out over night and see what I could see. In any case, the best thing about this show, in my opinion is that is strikes a perfect balance. Part season-long drama with a big bad, a continuing story, relationships and supernatural interference, part monster-of-the-week goodness, the show is always moving, never sitting still and the cast is, shall we say, fluid.

5. Torchwood - I debated about including Torchwood because it's a spin-off of Doctor Who, but in the end, it's just so totally different. Focusing on Captain Jack Harkness and his band of misfits, the  show pits our heroes against all manner of aliens. Who are mostly terrible. As opposed to Doctor Who, where they are mostly misunderstood. Also, this is not a show to watch with the kiddies. Unless you like explaining bisexuality and flaying to your children in the same paragraph. That's fun.

I have a theory. My theory is that because most of these shows only have a dozen or so episodes a season, they can be bigger, crazier and follow every weird idea totally down. Also, because the actors can have other lives, the shows become about those crazy ideas instead of the actors. Each of these has loved and lost more than it's loved and kept. Being Human has not one actor from the original season still ticking. Doctor Who built its concept around an evolving and changing cast. I think we're afraid that losing a beloved character will mean losing viewers, but what it really means is higher stakes. And when the stakes are this high, you can't help but watch. That's my theory.