READIN

Friday, June 27th, 2003

Ooh boy, I just clicked on an old post from Dr. Healy and found that Larry Gonick has published part III of his history of the Universe! Gotta run out and get that. I won't use Amazon, I won't use Amazon,... I expect Coliseum has got it.

posted afternoon of June 27th, 2003: Respond
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🦋 Dream Blogging

One of the British bloggers -- I think it was Avedon Carol -- had a post up about the British response to the Academy Awards. Apparently, it was to broadcast a film by a British director whose avocation was masonry, of himself building a brick wall, followed by a mock ceremony in which he accepted a separate gold statue for each segment of the wall. Very weird...

posted morning of June 27th, 2003: Respond
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Thursday, June 26th, 2003

Way cool -- another blogroll link to READIN, this one comes from the Invisible Adjunct.

posted evening of June 26th, 2003: Respond

Wednesday, June 25th, 2003

"I have read Lolita, as you requested. It is a good book, and therefore you should try to sell it to the inhabitants of Hardborough. They won't understand it, but that is all to the good. Understanding makes the mind lazy."

Penelope Fitzgerald, The Book Shop

Can you dig it — Understanding makes the mind lazy!!! This will be my slogan from now on, or until I find a better.

...

Two bits of good news: Coliseum Books has reopened, and very near my place of employment! I have been there twice already. And, this weekend we are going to visit Eva in Craryville which means, a chance to visit Rodgers Book Barn!

posted evening of June 25th, 2003: Respond
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It often seemed to her that if she knew exactly what her financial position was down to the last three farthings, ... she would not have the courage to carry on for another day.

Penelope Fitzgerald, The Book Shop

The book is engrossing and funny. Very warm, sympathetic characterization of Mrs. Green and of Christine. The other characters seem thus far (halfway) mainly foils to Mrs. Green.

posted morning of June 25th, 2003: Respond
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🦋 Story idea

Woo-hoo! The germ, the very germ of a fiction has come to me while I slept last night! Here it is:

The story concerns two bloggers: a male programmer and a female cartoonist. The two interact for a while at the beginning of the story when he finds her site, is interested by the art, they e-mail back and forth; they add each other's sites to their links. Move forward in time, they have not looked at each other's sites for a while nor communicated, but the links remain. Fast forward a year (say) and he comes to be served with subpoena. She is under investigation by the Justice Dept. for violation of the CIPA -- she had begun a very graphic exploration of her identity as a rape survivor which includes images of her as a child deemed pornographic by Ashcroft's minions; a SWAT team has raided her residence and seized her computer with all blog data; and her referral log shows many visitors have gotten there via his link.

Not sure quite where the story goes from there; -- I am not sure how plausible the whole CIPA thing is and how much of a case they would have against her. I am thinking maybe the investigation will go away after disrupting everyone's life for a while. At which point he examines her site, finds it repellent -- he would not have linked to her if this stuff had been up when he first browsed it -- perhaps due to unresolved issues of his own? Maybe they will have further dialog, I don't know how this experience will affect her and her work, though I think clearly it would radicalize her -- I reckon she would have been kind of radical to begin with.

posted morning of June 25th, 2003: Respond
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Tuesday, June 24th, 2003

Kieran Healy has a post up now looking for reading recommendations; and the Invisible Adjunct recommended to him the work of Penelope Fitzgerald, in language ("a rare combination of irony plus compassion") that made it sound too good to pass up. So this afternoon, I stopped in at Coliseum books and after looking over her œuvre, settled on The Book Shop as a good intro. I read the first 2 ½ chapters on the train coming home and I'm hooked.

posted evening of June 24th, 2003: Respond
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🦋 Jeremy doesn't understand shopping for clothes

This afternoon, whilst zipping up, I discovered that the wear at the crotch of my trousers had grown from a purely private source of shame to a potentially public embarrassment -- yes I wear my pants until they wear out and frequently beyond, because I don't like shopping for clothes. (The crotch always seems to be the first place to go, I think because of excess fat on my inner thighs -- not working out is another source of shame.) So I said to myself, this afternoon you got to go buy another pair of pants.

I know there is a men's clothing store of some kind on 42nd Street, across from my office; I will just slip in there on my way to the train. Hmm... "Strawberry" -- that looks to be a clothing store of some kind. [Peering in window, seeing lacy undergarments] no, wrong gender... Ah! "Kenneth Cole" should have something suitable for the office. [Peering in window, seeing lacy undergarments] What!? [Coming along to the next window where there are shirts and ties] Ah, that's better. [Ducking in the door and looking at the price tag on the first pair of pants I see] Wait, $54?! Clothing can't cost that much! I think there's a "Gap" on the next block, [Ducking back out of KC and sauntering along, sees a "Banana Republic" sign] OK, that must be what I was thinking of...

So I went along into the Banana Republic, picked up the first pair of pants I saw, was dazed and dismayed by its price tag of $118 [no lie!]; the second pair of pants, "only" $39, seemed like a great deal by comparison. After a bit of hunting I found the fitting rooms and it took me only a couple of iterations of confusion to figure out that the doors were all closed not because they were all in use and the guy standing by the doors wearing a nametag was not a hapless shopper like myself, waiting for the next free one; he was the guy with the key! and would let me in if I only asked him to!!

I came away with a pair of pants -- $40 still sticks in my craw as a lot of money for clothing -- and filled out an application for a Banana Republic charge card, which I was assured would "earn" me beaucoup "rewards". I didn't stick around to find out what the rewards would be, or how I would earn them.

posted evening of June 24th, 2003: Respond

On-the-train reading today is 60 Stories by Donald Barthelme. I found this book last fall in the train station, where somebody had left a box full of old paperbacks. The stories are great -- well about a quarter of them seem to be what John Updike would have written if he had been into experimental prose, not quite my cup of tea -- and about a quarter are just too wordy for me to find a foothole -- but the remaining half are excellent, and moving, and funny. And the occasional odd phrase that makes me grin for a few minutes.

posted morning of June 24th, 2003: Respond
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Saturday, June 21st, 2003

🦋 Window seat

I started taking measurements for the window seat I am planning to build in our sitting room's bay window. I have pretty well in mind what the thing should look like at the end, what I mainly need to do is take the measurements from the space. I have linked to the images as separate files because they are big, and I don't know how to reduce them. Here is a floor plan and front elevation:

The height of the seat (which you can't see because my scanner clipped it off) is 16"; I measured that height from a chair that feels comfortable. That is also good because it is a little over an inch short of the bottoms of the window sill moldings which will be above the seat. (I didn't draw the windows in to this plan but there are three of them, in the places you would expect them to be.) So, good: the length of the seat will be 94", and the width -- oh, now I see my scanner trimmed that off too -- the depth of the bay window is 36", and the depth of the part that is 94" wide is 14"; so I am thinking 32" is a good width for my seat. At 32", the front of the seat will be recessed a bit into the bay.

I want to build the seat as a frame of 2X4's and 4X4's, then cover that with hardwood -- 1/2" thick on the face and 3/4" thick on the seat. I'll use moldings in two key places -- the transition from the seat to the face, and the transition from the seat to the wall. Here is a plan of the frame, with rough dimensions written in:

And here is a plan of what the molding will look like (I have drawn in the window sill molding above the seat here):

I am trying to capture the Victorian style of my house in the profile of the seat. I did not draw the doors which will be in the face, because I have not figured out their dimensions yet; there will be two. I am thinking about cutting gingerbread into the doors to echo the house's eaves but I'm not sure about it -- I don't have a scroll saw and it would be a fair amount of work. The baseboard molding in the room, which will be matched along where the face meets the floor, is about 4" high.

Update: Here are some comments on the design from WoodCentral folks. They have convinced me to go with hinged holes in the seat to access the storage area, rather than doors in the face -- these will be easier to install and to use. I am nixing the idea of scrollwork in the face, too much work.

posted afternoon of June 21st, 2003: Respond
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