Previously, in Trip's Life...
30 September 2014 - Tuesday
Marmalade is getting pretty tired of only getting gooshyfood, so it's
a good thing his mouth should be healed up by now!
Stellar Assassin (T Jackson King) is not quite as cheesy as
it sounds, possibly because it has only STL starships (although FTL
communication, which suggests that the AIs should have FTL travel) and
mostly very non-humanoid aliens. The alien mentalities are more told about
than shown, though, and the love interest alien is awfully humanoid.
Make a comment!
29 September 2014 - Monday
Still on call, but it's usually not an issue during the— oh,
thank you for calling at 6am to ask how to handle an incident you should
know how to handle, cow orker.
Poor Aspen is getting more and more fearful of me because every time
I come near her, I chase her down and fill her mouth with horrible
medicine. :(
Everybody knows,
Lizzie Borden took an axe,
Gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.
but only those who read Maplecroft (Cherie Priest) will
know why.
This is apparently the first of a series, although I'm not sure how
far it can go before getting stale or has to diverge too much from
history.
Make a comment!
28 September 2014 - Sunday
No gaming today, only work. Not hard work, since I just had to
monitor the system to make sure it was continuing to do its thing, but
it didn't finish until like 21:00 (which was conveniently when we had
the meeting to discuss how it was going, so I could report good news).
Black Wings of Cthulhu is a collection of Lovecraftian
stories assembled by S T Joshi, who may reasonably be considered to know
his stuff. And indeed, most of the stories are pretty good, and most of
them I had not seen before.
Make a comment!
27 September 2014 - Saturday
Did I go to the second session of iPad art class today? Did I go to
anime today? No, I did not. Instead I spent like 16 hours working on a
customer issue. I shouldn't complain, since my boss and cow orker were
up all night, instead of merely starting first thing in the morning, but
I am going to complain anyway!
It doesn't help that we ended up doing this morning what I said we
should do yesterday afternoon, after Other People wasted the whole
night faffing about.
Mutter grumble grrr.
Terrible anime I watched while waiting for machines to do their
mechanical thing:
- I Couldn't Become A Hero, So I Reluctantly Got A Job: A
PC in training when the war against the demons ends has to take a job
in a store selling consumer magic items, next to the daughter of the
demon king. Fan service, retail commerce, and fan service ensue.
- Momo Kyun Sword: An old couple find a baby girl in a
giant peach. When she grows up to have giant peaches of her own, she
and her pheasant, dog, and monkey join up with the Celestial Maiden
Squad to fight oni who are trying to gather fragments of the magic
peach. Fan service, transformation sequences, and fan service ensue.
What, I said it was terrible! Also unlikely to use any of my scarce
neurons.
Make a comment!
26 September 2014 - Friday
Wait, I have to go back to work, what?!
Make a comment!
25 September 2014 - Thursday
Today, I oppressed cats! Marmalade and Aspen had to go in for a
dental overhaul, which means I had to put them into carriers (not one
carrier, because Marmalade was throwing a hissy fit) and trundle them
all the way to the vet, though surprise rain. Poor Aspen was closest to
the puddles and in the carrier with the most holes, so she got quite wet
despite my almost-clever use of plastic sheeting. Sad kitty.
Fortunately, by the time they were ready to come home, it was no
longer raining, so I did not have to get Marith to come up to transport
them or anything. (Plus, they were so drugged up, they probably wouldn't
have noticed getting wet.) Marmalade only had to have one tooth removed,
but Aspen came back lighter by nine teeth. It really is very hard to be
Aspen.
Now the dented kitties have painkillers twice a day, and Aspen also has
antibiotics. Ghirardelli has great relief at having escaped the Box of Woe,
which he expressed by wanting to play Chococat Chase the whole time the
other cats were gone.
Make a comment!
24 September 2014 - Wednesday
I trundled all the way down to San Jose for Earthdawn, but Ken was
too fried from work to GM so we had to play
7 Wonders
instead. I came in second from last and third from last (out of five),
which is better than I expected.
In The Name of the Star and The Madness
Underneath (Maureen Johnson), a girl from a small town in Louisiana
goes to boarding school in London and gets mixed up with ghosts. The
narrator is pretty engaging, and I like that when ghosts destroy her school
life, the problems don't get magically resolved.
Make a comment!
23 September 2014 - Tuesday
Did something happen today? Who knows.
Steel World, Dust World, and Tech
World (BV Larson) are not great, and in fact are pretty bad by some
measures (as one expects from ebook-only publications), but I want to find
out more about what's going on in the background with the revival machines.
It seems like there's something being hinted at.
Unmade (Sarah Rees Brennan) mysteriously appeared in my
Virtual Kindle this morning, so I had to devour it. It is as good as the
second one, although perhaps not quite as good as the first. Also, there
is doom.
Maybe it's just that it's been so long since I read the last one, but
Shadow Unit 15 (Elizabeth Bear, Emma Bull, Steven Brust,
Chelsea Polk) didn't grab me as much as previous episodes, even though
there was more than enough doom.
Make a comment!
22 September 2014 - Monday
Hi-ho, hi-ho.
Pilgrim of the Sky (Natania Barron) is a particular kind of
fantasy that I don't know the name of. It reminds me of Alis
Rasmussen Kate Elliot's The Labyrinth Gate, which only
one person reading this is likely to know. Who says reviews have to be
helpful?
Make a comment!
21 September 2014 - Sunday
Even though I am not on call, other people are too busy with lives to
game. Bah!
Something More Than Night (Ian Tregillis) tries to combine
two genres, or maybe embed one within the other, which I appreciate, but
I don't think it was entirely successful. Noir is a very human genre,
and goes poorly with transcendent beings.
Make a comment!
20 September 2014 - Saturday
Today, I did something useful, or at least productive! I went to
the Pacific Art League
(which is not a superhero or supervillain organization, as far as I can
tell) to learn to do iPad Art!
We are using Paper by 53
to start off with, since it is simple and will hopefully lead to reduced
confusion. It looks like everyone except me is already a painter and
learning iPad; I'm the only one who is familiar with iPad and learning art
stuff for the first time. I am also like the second-youngest person out of
eight.
After going through all half-dozen or so features of Paper, we painted
leaves. Kind of abstract leaves, but definitely leaf-shaped object.
- Princess Tutu 24: Apparently this show is so meta that
it glows, because there is a lampshade on it.
- Chihayafuru 3-4: End flashback, cue teenaged angst!
- Tiger & Bunny 6-7: I like that the special effects are
different, but the descriptions of surprised or terrified witnesses
would be the same.
- Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood 62: I dunno, this
doesn't seem like the kind of problem one should be solving via shounen
punching. The long-term planning that got them to the punching place
was good, though.
Next week, double finale action!
Yay art! by Avalon (Sat Sep 27 19:59:42 2014)
Yay art class! I hope it keeps being fun once you are not on call. And also it is fine to be the youngest, it just shows you can take art for a long time. =)
Make a comment!
19 September 2014 - Friday
Nothing useful was accomplished today, except maybe playing a bit of
Sil
very badly. No, even worse than what you're thinking.
At least I am not on call — that got swapped to next week.
Make a comment!
18 September 2014 - Thursday
Grr. Argh.
I don't know why I thought World Trigger (Diasuke Ashihara)
might be interesting, but the first two volumes show no promise.
Terms of Enlistment and Lines of Departure
(Marko Kloos) are mediocre military SF, in a future in which Earth is
covered in housing projects full of welfare scum too lazy to seek a
better life in the offworld colonies. Also, alien invaders that are kind
of dim.
The Godless (Ben Peek) is part of the growing subgenre of
post-divine fantasy, in which there were gods but are no longer (The
Grim Company, City of Stairs, etc). It is not
otherwise that interesting.
Make a comment!
17 September 2014 - Wednesday
We tried to get Ethiopian for gaming dinner, but the restaurant
thwarted us by not existing. We got Chinese instead.
Dave was sure we were all going to die immediately in the fight, but
in fact Isidari Taunted most of the opposition so they were ineffective
(compared to their previous state, anyway) and only got stabbed a few
more times. The villain got away, but did turn loose the dwarven prince
and only exploded bones in a few of us before leaving via a spell twice
the level any of us could cast. We'll call it a victory!
We did have to give up some legend points keeping the whole thing
secret, but surely the prince will remember how much he owes us
once he becomes king.
Monstrous Affections (ed Kelly Link, Gavin J Grant) is
pretty much what the title says: an anthology with the theme of monsters (broadly defined) plus love. I
liked many of the stories, especially the one that is a continuation of
The Turn of the
Story.
In Kokoro Connect vol 1 (Sadanatsu Anda, CuteG), a bunch of
apparently random high-school students start switching bodies. They deal
with it remarkably well, despite being teenagers.
Make a comment!
16 September 2014 - Tuesday
Oh look, Tuesday.
I didn't like The Company Man (Robert Jackson Bennett)
quite as much as American Elsewhere, but about as much as
City of Stairs. It has a similar feel of people in over their
heads so far they don't even know a surface exists.
Make a comment!
15 September 2014 - Monday
Every other Monday morning, I realize why everyone moving to San Jose
sucks.
The Iron Trial (Holly Black, Cassandra Clare) is in the
now-standard Magic Boarding School genre, but the magic is rather
different, the school is rather different, and the protagonist's One
Unique Thing is... quite different.
Make a comment!
14 September 2014 - Sunday
How do we play Fading
Suns again? Oh, yah, I suck at interacting with humans and everyone
else is great. Also apparently my character never noticed that half the
planet is MADE OF METAL jeez. Who wrote this setting, anyway?
Make a comment!
13 September 2014 - Saturday
Grrr. Argh.
- Princess Tutu 23: Oh yah, I forgot about this part of
the story completely.
- Chihayafuru 1-2: It's sports anime about
karuta!
- Tiger & Bunny 5: You know, that's the exact same power
that Greed has, but Greed is so much more competent with it.
- Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood 61: Wow, that's a lot
of doom. Even compared to other shows I say that about!
American Elsewhere (Robert Jackson Bennett) is pretty swell
cosmic horror. (Arguably some of it is over-anthropomorphized, but it has
to fit into the brains of readers, so I will give it some slack based on
the rest.)
? by Avalon (Fri Sep 19 16:52:40 2014)
Was this my day? =)
Re: ? by Trip (Mon Sep 22 08:35:57 2014)
It is the sound zombies make, because I was pretty zombie-like that day.
Make a comment!
12 September 2014 - Friday
Yay! I made it to Friday again!
Make a comment!
11 September 2014 - Thursday
Even more customers. But also Avalon.
Yesterday's Hero (Jonathan Wood) is the sequel to No
Hero, in which the fate of the entire world continues to depend
on half a dozen lunatics with severe relationship problems and no
funding. This cannot possibly be a stable situation.
Make a comment!
10 September 2014 - Wednesday
After some mucking around with ghoul-infested buildings and creepy
rooftops and rooms full of killer bugs, the Earthdawn PCs finally made
it into the villain's lair, where he had the Prince of the Dwarves attached
to an Infernal Apparatus and
two dragon eggs. He started his villainous rant with, "I know this is
going to make me sound like the villain, but..." so we tried to give him
the benefit of the doubt, but when he got to the part about kidnapping
people and turning them into monsters that he lets loose in cities, my
character had to conclude that he was, in fact, a villain, and roll way
up on Taunt. When we have the fight next week, he will be down 11 steps
on everything, so we might not die immediately!
The Night Gardener (Jonathan Auxier) is actually pretty
spooky, for a kid's book. Also, a lot of Victorians kind of sucked.
If "urban fantasy" means private eyes vs vampires in Chicago, what do
you call City of Stairs (Robert Jackson Bennett), where
large parts of the city have disappeared because the gods who conjured
them out of nothing have been killed? (And yes, having large chunks of
your divine utopia vanish does cause the same problems that any massive
infrastructure failure does.) Also: colonialism, countercolonialism,
suppression of native culture, military secrets, completely
incomprehensible magic, and secret agents.
Make a comment!
9 September 2014 - Tuesday
Customers are still here. My brain is not here.
Spell of Desire is by Tomu Ohmi, who also did
Midnight Secretary, and is very similar. The setting is
different, but the character dynamics, not so much. Probably anyone who
likes one will like the other.
In The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the
Vampire Accountant (Drew Hayes), the eponymous vampire gets into a
lot of trouble, but not terribly original or well-written trouble.
Make a comment!
8 September 2014 - Monday
Why are there customers again? Didn't we just get rid of these
guys?
Black Rose Alice is by Setona Mizushiro, the same person
who did Afterschool Nightmare. Volume 1 contains vampires
with bug-themed powers, and also doom.
The Mirror Empire (Kameron Hurley) is non-European epic
fantasy. Actually, I'm not sure these cultures resemble anything on
Earth[*], even without the astronomy-powered magic, interdimensional
invasions, and walking plants of death. They are sufficiently strange
that I had trouble getting into them, in fact, which is pretty unusual.
I think I liked it, though.
[*] If you have references to prove me wrong, that would be
awesome.
Make a comment!
7 September 2014 - Sunday
That was not really a very focused session of Immortal
Empire, but we did find out more about the Doom From Beneath. And the
bunyip has not visibly betrayed us yet, except by sending us into a
Nigh-Bottomless Shaft of Death, and we kind of volunteered for that.
Little green goblin guys and magma-pumping plants, just what we
needed for this matri-nation ceremony!
Make a comment!
6 September 2014 - Saturday
I watched the rest of 11 Eyes, and it mostly made sense.
The ending could even be read as polily ever after, if you squint.
That's got to be one of the oldest pickup lines in the book, though.
- Princess Tutu 22: Look, it's the machina!
- Sherlock S3 3: I know it's completely not in genre, but
I wanted to see memory palace hacking.
- Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood 58: They can do that?!
I didn't like volume 7 of Wandering Son (Shimura Takako)
quite as much as some of the previous ones, because it is more standard
drama and has less of the unique elements. But it is still good.
visual entertainments by marith (Thu Sep 18 21:33:56 2014)
snk Will Princess Tutu dance a pas de deux with the deux ex machina?
Yes, memory palace hacking would be neat, and I wouldn't put it past them to do it at some point. A bit Inceptionlike.
Make a comment!
5 September 2014 - Friday
Friday is Friday!
Make a comment!
4 September 2014 - Thursday
It's like Wednesday, but with Thursday meetings.
The Living End (Craig Schaefer) is the third book in the
series that started with The Long Way Down and
Redemption Song, and the conclusion of the plot arc (or maybe
the conclusion of the first master villain). It am very pleased with the
idea behind the villain's plan.
The Winter Long (Seanan McGuire) is the 953rd book in the
"October Daye" series, which shows no sign of giving the main character
a break. This time, the villainy goes all the way back to the first
book, so I may have to reread the series from the beginning. That's a
lot of books, even it's all Seanan McGuire!
City of Dark Magic (Magnus Flyte) is not quite
SF-for-a-mainstream audience, but it does feel like a mainstream
humorous novel with SFnal elements -- like Christopher Moore or
something, but with more music history and the occasional
defenestration.
Make a comment!
3 September 2014 - Wednesday
Bah, Monday. But at least Friday is close!
In Indigo Springs and Blue Magic (A M
Dellamonica), a group of friends find a magic well and it destroys their
friendship, some of their lives, and almost the world. Which is really what
you should expect from vast magical power, right? But it is
unquestionably magic, which is always nice.
Make a comment!
2 September 2014 - Tuesday
Today is an important observance for my people, which is why I took
it as one of my six floating holidays for the year. We call it Slack
Day.
Apparently, an important part of Slack Day is sitting under a cat
while watching Crunchyroll.
The main character of Irregular at Magic High School
continues to be Batman, only with more chicks.
I still like Aldnoah Zero, although it would be nice to see
the princess do more. On the other hand, the things she is doing are
fairly princess-like — she is not an action hero.
Sailor Moon Crystal is finally up to Sailor Jupiter, who
was my favorite in the first anime adaptation. She is still cool.
11 Eyes has the protagonists kidnapped into a pocket
dimension where creepy monsters that remind me of Rahxephon
sing at them, bizarre villains who seem to feel they're perfectly in the
right to kill them, and random acts of fanservice.
Black Bullet is in the venerable Monster Invasion genre,
although a little more post-apocalyptic than some, with the obligatory
young girls with monstrous superpowers to fight the monsters.
Gunslinger Girl × Claymore?
important observance day by marithlizard (Fri Sep 12 04:37:59 2014)
But did you claim it properly by giving a knife to HR and making the ritual request?
Re: important observance day by Trip (Sat Sep 13 12:08:18 2014)
We have a spreadsheet for that.
Re: important observance day by marithlizard (Sun Sep 14 00:12:21 2014)
So, you just type the ritual phrase "Cut me some slack, man" into the Reason column? Bah, these modern observances, they just don't have the same zing.
HR rituals by Avalon (Sun Sep 14 18:39:59 2014)
Well if you just put 'cut me' then it would go better with the knife...
Re: HR rituals by marithlizard (Mon Sep 15 01:20:27 2014)
I was imagining "cutting some slack" acted out as cutting off a length of a piece of rope or something. Hi, I'd like to request about one day of slack, plus an ergonomic keyboard, thanks!
..Then again, perhaps it would be a bad idea to give HR ideas by putting the verb "cut" anywhere in a sentence about the workforce.
Make a comment!
1 September 2014 - Monday
Oh man, we're leaving Roseville and I forgot to swim!
Cat report: 12 paws!
Make a comment!
| 