2 and a half weeks
Jul. 11th, 2007 10:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tiggymalvern
Each time I go back to Britain lately, some incompetent nutjobs try to bomb an airport while I'm there and make flying back from Heathrow even more annoying than it needs to be. I'm really glad those people weren't my doctors - doctors are supposed to be intelligent and logical, and I'm fairly sure I could have put together a more effective attempt at a car bomb than Glasgow's. I would also have measured the gap between the door pillars, and bought a Mini instead of a 4x4.
We got an upgrade for the flight out to nice, wide chairs with loads of leg room and big adjustable footrests. So of course there was a fat woman who complained intermittently through the entire flight to her friend sitting next to me (and anyone else within several rows) that it was the most uncomfortable flight she'd ever taken and how she couldn't bear to spend nine hours there, and the staff did everything they could to make her happy, offering her extra cushions and alternative seats, and she was deeply ungrateful. Cattle class on the way back was full of cheerful students in a group from Edinburgh University instead.
The American embassy renewed our visas after the standard four hour period of dullness for two five minute sessions with paperwork, so I'm now free to come and go again for the first time since January. It was great to catch up with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
charles_nancy after almost a year, and looking happier than I've seen him in a long time with his new Australian fiancee :-) We had a fun meal out that night with a bunch of his friends and our strangers, one of whom was born four miles from me, and the only one of the nine who was still living in the country they were born and raised in. I love the way the world is so small now. It's the first time I've ever spent four hours in a Pizza Express! Though admittedly it took 45 minutes for everyone to show up, due to the closure of King's X and a big stretch of the Piccadilly line - in London, nothing changes!
It rained every day I was in England except two, and meanwhile my local-to-home f-list entertained me with tales of the 10-day wave of glorious sun and heat that wasn't so pleasing for my plants in my absence. But it was still the perfect time to go, because I got to watch all of Wimbledon :-)
The men's singles final was a thing of absolute beauty and awe. I love both of those guys, and they gave us one hell of a match over five sets and four hours, the longest final since Connors beat McEnroe in '82. So many rallies where the ball was smacked from line to line, where the point would have been won three times over against any other player but the ball just keeps on coming back - one rally every single one of the last six strokes should have done it. But every time either Federer or Nadal look like going under, they just lift their game and play better. So much strength and power in both of them combined with inch-perfect control and delicacy - Federer I've adored for years for his incredible grace and athleticism that disguises his brute force, and Nadal has glorious dark eyes and those beautifully-muscled arms under flawless skin that just make me want to reach out and stroke :-) Those two have to be close to the perfect humans, stamina and skill and speed all working together with the ability to switch direction in a second, and a look that comes from actually using every single muscle in their bodies every day - so much hotter to me than any guy with big pecs and a six-pack from the gym.
Roger Federer truly deserved his Borg-equalling fifth consecutive win, because he brought a genuine talent and inspiration back to the men's game that had been missing since the late eighties. But surely in the next year or two, that trophy has to be Nadal's. To turn himself from a clay-court specialist into someone who can genuinely rival the master on grass in under a year (hell, in a month since the French Open) - wow. Federer strolling out onto the court in his white blazer and cotton slacks like he's there to eat strawberries and cream instead of play tennis just makes me giggle:-)
And Venus Williams - everything I said about the two guys goes the same for her. Her opponent in the final, gutsy as she was, just wasn't of the same calibre, so it was never going to be a classic match, but to be fair, is there anyone who can match Venus on a grass court? That second week, day after day she sliced through opponent after opponent like they were so much butter left out in the sun too long, and if she's pushed at all she just pushes back harder (at least at Wimbledon she does). She's so fast, and so strong and so determined, and then when she wins, she breaks into this enormous, infectious grin and laughs all through the interviews, and she becomes one of the most beautiful, sexy women on the planet. I could watch her all day.
In contrast, the British Grand Prix which we recorded and watched later after the fabulous Murray/Jankovic mixed doubles win (whoever scheduled the GP for the Sunday at the end of the first week in July was an idiot, because Wimbledon will steal the ratings) only reminded me of all the reasons I stopped watching the sport. A line of cars driving round in a long procession, with the only 'overtaking' happening because of pit stops. Yawn. Even with a British driver on pole setting a new record every race he's in, it managed to bore the crap out of me. If F1 racing drivers are ever allowed to get back to the racing part, I'll start taking an interest again.
Mostly the trip was about being obligatorially sociable with relatives (and isn't it nice when sociable means sitting and watching the tennis together? XD), so I didn't go to many interesting places, but there will be a few photos later. No birdwatching apart from the ones I fell over along the way, but I still managed to fall over a life bird - I was severely boggled by the sight of three raptors with dramatically forked tails soaring alongside the M40, but a quick check of the RSPB website agreed that the red kites reintroduced to the Chilterns are doing well. Somehow my mind still associates them firmly with Wales, but it was lovely to see the persecuted return to enjoy some of their old homes.
I got to read a few books over the trip, including The Time Traveler's Wife which a friend bought me for Christmas and I'd heard vaguely good things about.
It's a very clever book, with a number of intricately-tangled plot strands that must have been hellish to deal with in the writing, and a lot of thought given to the consequences of time travel, both on the grand scale and in the tiniest details. It definitely keeps the interest all through, with a whole series of 'Ah!' moments as some hint or throwaway comment from earlier becomes enlightened. But it's not great writing - having spent a number of years telling fanfic writers that if you have to label each section with 'Clare' and 'Henry' so that the reader knows whose POV you're with, then there's something very wrong with the narrative voice, here's a published author doing the same. And there really is no narrative voice, only the authorial one. Admittedly the two main characters are from the same kind of social background, but their life experiences and attitudes are so vastly different, at least initially, that it should be obviously there in the first person, and it's not.
Some reviewers of this book have opined at length on what a wonderful love story this is, but in that respect it left me utterly cold. If the characters have no personality in the language, I'm not going to become emotionally involved in them, unlike say Captain Corelli's Mandolin, where every character at every plot level was so vividly and wittily alive they just about killed me. I read The Time Traveler's Wife once for the plot, and I won't read it again.
So as you will have gathered, I'm back home with full computer access restored, and I'll get onto my emails soonish, but still no cats to hang round my ankles. We were going to collect them last night when we got back, but the Scooby's battery died while we were gone, and the carrier won't fit in the Seven! I'llreprieve retrieve the poor things later today.
We got an upgrade for the flight out to nice, wide chairs with loads of leg room and big adjustable footrests. So of course there was a fat woman who complained intermittently through the entire flight to her friend sitting next to me (and anyone else within several rows) that it was the most uncomfortable flight she'd ever taken and how she couldn't bear to spend nine hours there, and the staff did everything they could to make her happy, offering her extra cushions and alternative seats, and she was deeply ungrateful. Cattle class on the way back was full of cheerful students in a group from Edinburgh University instead.
The American embassy renewed our visas after the standard four hour period of dullness for two five minute sessions with paperwork, so I'm now free to come and go again for the first time since January. It was great to catch up with
charles_nancy after almost a year, and looking happier than I've seen him in a long time with his new Australian fiancee :-) We had a fun meal out that night with a bunch of his friends and our strangers, one of whom was born four miles from me, and the only one of the nine who was still living in the country they were born and raised in. I love the way the world is so small now. It's the first time I've ever spent four hours in a Pizza Express! Though admittedly it took 45 minutes for everyone to show up, due to the closure of King's X and a big stretch of the Piccadilly line - in London, nothing changes!It rained every day I was in England except two, and meanwhile my local-to-home f-list entertained me with tales of the 10-day wave of glorious sun and heat that wasn't so pleasing for my plants in my absence. But it was still the perfect time to go, because I got to watch all of Wimbledon :-)
The men's singles final was a thing of absolute beauty and awe. I love both of those guys, and they gave us one hell of a match over five sets and four hours, the longest final since Connors beat McEnroe in '82. So many rallies where the ball was smacked from line to line, where the point would have been won three times over against any other player but the ball just keeps on coming back - one rally every single one of the last six strokes should have done it. But every time either Federer or Nadal look like going under, they just lift their game and play better. So much strength and power in both of them combined with inch-perfect control and delicacy - Federer I've adored for years for his incredible grace and athleticism that disguises his brute force, and Nadal has glorious dark eyes and those beautifully-muscled arms under flawless skin that just make me want to reach out and stroke :-) Those two have to be close to the perfect humans, stamina and skill and speed all working together with the ability to switch direction in a second, and a look that comes from actually using every single muscle in their bodies every day - so much hotter to me than any guy with big pecs and a six-pack from the gym.
Roger Federer truly deserved his Borg-equalling fifth consecutive win, because he brought a genuine talent and inspiration back to the men's game that had been missing since the late eighties. But surely in the next year or two, that trophy has to be Nadal's. To turn himself from a clay-court specialist into someone who can genuinely rival the master on grass in under a year (hell, in a month since the French Open) - wow. Federer strolling out onto the court in his white blazer and cotton slacks like he's there to eat strawberries and cream instead of play tennis just makes me giggle:-)
And Venus Williams - everything I said about the two guys goes the same for her. Her opponent in the final, gutsy as she was, just wasn't of the same calibre, so it was never going to be a classic match, but to be fair, is there anyone who can match Venus on a grass court? That second week, day after day she sliced through opponent after opponent like they were so much butter left out in the sun too long, and if she's pushed at all she just pushes back harder (at least at Wimbledon she does). She's so fast, and so strong and so determined, and then when she wins, she breaks into this enormous, infectious grin and laughs all through the interviews, and she becomes one of the most beautiful, sexy women on the planet. I could watch her all day.
In contrast, the British Grand Prix which we recorded and watched later after the fabulous Murray/Jankovic mixed doubles win (whoever scheduled the GP for the Sunday at the end of the first week in July was an idiot, because Wimbledon will steal the ratings) only reminded me of all the reasons I stopped watching the sport. A line of cars driving round in a long procession, with the only 'overtaking' happening because of pit stops. Yawn. Even with a British driver on pole setting a new record every race he's in, it managed to bore the crap out of me. If F1 racing drivers are ever allowed to get back to the racing part, I'll start taking an interest again.
Mostly the trip was about being obligatorially sociable with relatives (and isn't it nice when sociable means sitting and watching the tennis together? XD), so I didn't go to many interesting places, but there will be a few photos later. No birdwatching apart from the ones I fell over along the way, but I still managed to fall over a life bird - I was severely boggled by the sight of three raptors with dramatically forked tails soaring alongside the M40, but a quick check of the RSPB website agreed that the red kites reintroduced to the Chilterns are doing well. Somehow my mind still associates them firmly with Wales, but it was lovely to see the persecuted return to enjoy some of their old homes.
I got to read a few books over the trip, including The Time Traveler's Wife which a friend bought me for Christmas and I'd heard vaguely good things about.
It's a very clever book, with a number of intricately-tangled plot strands that must have been hellish to deal with in the writing, and a lot of thought given to the consequences of time travel, both on the grand scale and in the tiniest details. It definitely keeps the interest all through, with a whole series of 'Ah!' moments as some hint or throwaway comment from earlier becomes enlightened. But it's not great writing - having spent a number of years telling fanfic writers that if you have to label each section with 'Clare' and 'Henry' so that the reader knows whose POV you're with, then there's something very wrong with the narrative voice, here's a published author doing the same. And there really is no narrative voice, only the authorial one. Admittedly the two main characters are from the same kind of social background, but their life experiences and attitudes are so vastly different, at least initially, that it should be obviously there in the first person, and it's not.
Some reviewers of this book have opined at length on what a wonderful love story this is, but in that respect it left me utterly cold. If the characters have no personality in the language, I'm not going to become emotionally involved in them, unlike say Captain Corelli's Mandolin, where every character at every plot level was so vividly and wittily alive they just about killed me. I read The Time Traveler's Wife once for the plot, and I won't read it again.
So as you will have gathered, I'm back home with full computer access restored, and I'll get onto my emails soonish, but still no cats to hang round my ankles. We were going to collect them last night when we got back, but the Scooby's battery died while we were gone, and the carrier won't fit in the Seven! I'll
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no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 02:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 01:40 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 02:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 02:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 03:08 am (UTC)I grew up with it - the IRA bombed our nearest big shopping hub in Manchester twice. You curse the buggers all ways for the inconvenience, and when it's rebuilt, you go shopping again. It sucks for the people who're in the wrong place at the wrong time, but you're always far more likely to die in a car crash on the way there.
I suppose it depends on what you're used to, but for the Brits it's same old, same old.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 03:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-12 06:18 am (UTC)It would help a lot if the UN would do what people once hoped they'd do instead of sitting around in a lot of meetings having endless discussions about how unfortunate things are, but that's also a very different rant....
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Date: 2007-07-12 06:39 am (UTC)It would help a lot if the UN would do what people once hoped they'd do instead of sitting around in a lot of meetings having endless discussions about how unfortunate things are, but that's also a very different rant....
*nods* I think our government really exploited the shock reaction. IMO, if we'd just treated terrorism according to the criminal laws, its popularity as a political tactic would have probably been less than it is now, simply because the terrorists would not be jihadists fighting a war against our culture (talk about a way to inspire them >_< ) but, as they were pre 9-11, ordinary murderers tried and imprisoned just like anyone else who thinks killing people is a good idea, no matter what ideology inspired it.
IMO, if we'd only done that and given them no more legitimacy than we give someone claiming "God told me to take a gun to work," we probably would have less of a potential terror problem.
And for everyone who says "the criminal law system couldn't have handled all of Al Qaeda?" Think of what would have happened if we'd poured half of the money we've been shoving into Iraq into all of the criminal law system, from police to courts to everything else. And think of how unpopular terrorism would likely be if terrorists and planners of terrorism knew that if they didn't die, their end would likely be not being shot down on a battlefield fighting the West, but being rather ignobly tried for murder and conspiracy and whatever else.
/political rant off
So, on an unrelated topic, I have a community to pimp to you. Since you seem to like the snarky friendship pairings like I do, and if you like Heroes (not sure if you do?) have you checked out http://community.livejournal.com/hiro_ando/ ? I'm very much into them as an established-relationship couple now, since they're seriously one of the most subtexty and yet oddly beautiful couples I've seen since I fell so hard for shipping W/V. Go and take a look around ~_^
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Date: 2007-07-13 03:14 am (UTC)I adore Hiro and he's definitely slashy with Ando, but for me to get into a fandom, I have to like the source rather more. Heroes was fun entertainment with a nicely rolling plot when I had nothing better to do, and it had a few really good well paced eps; it just never grabbed me with that can't-wait-for-the-next-one-to-find-out feeling. And I think a big part of that was the dialogue - while the plot was fine, the writing rarely rose above soap opera platitudes. If the 'snark' is low quality, that's just not a hook for me. The creators should have taken their plot and given the script-writing duties to someone who can make characters real.
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Date: 2007-07-13 04:05 am (UTC)Word. You said it a lot better than I could here, and yeah, the war on terrorism, to me, makes almost as much "sense" as the "war on drugs." In fact, the "war on drugs" makes more sense since, technically, you *could* eradicate large-scale drug production and trafficking with severe enough measures (though that wouldn't stop determined enough people from making/growing their own drugs or finding alternate ways to get high), while terrorism is far too nebulous to pin down. Technically, an "illegal drug," which is one of the most nebulous definitions, is a lot easier to define than a "terrorist."
And here I go actually agreeing with you again. Oddly enough, the only thing I like about the show *is* Hiro and Ando. This is one of the first fandoms where I consider my couple above the canon or the fandom in what I love the most, and I feel weird about that. Like I'm being a stupid fanit or something, and I know I'm showing my weeaboo here, but honestly? The show would have been *better* if it had just been about Hiro and Ando, with everyone else as supporting characters. Of course, that truly *would* be too hot for a mainstream US TV series. . . > _
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Date: 2007-07-13 08:10 pm (UTC)Ha. The same way you can eradicate illegal trade in animal parts, right. You can slow but never stop it, because as the risks go up, so does the price and the profits, and somebody's always willing to take the risk.
Prohibition didn't work for booze or gambling, and it won't work for anything else that large chunks of the population want to do.
Hiro and Ando were by far the highlights of the show. They and Peter Petrelli were I think the only characters who came across as actually real. And Charlie, oddly, for someone who was in it so little, and much kudos to the actress for it.
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Date: 2007-07-14 05:16 am (UTC)Prohibition didn't work for booze or gambling, and it won't work for anything else that large chunks of the population want to do.
Agreed. In that the way I mentioned it, I meant you could "technically" eradicate it (e.g. the documentary I saw on methamphetamine use in Thailand: the stuff's still used, sold, and made, but no one will admit to it openly and that's possibly even more dangerous) but you could never truly eradicate it.
Terrorism, IMO, is even more of a slippery beast than "drugs" because it's based in ideas and an ideology connected to deeply felt religious beliefs. And while you may eventually be able to convince someone not to smoke pot or drop acid on pain of death, forcing them to give up their religious beliefs, no matter how "crazy," turns them into a martyr and the person doing the forcing into a persecuting inquisitor. To totally eradicate terrorism or its possibility of occurring, we'd have to control thoughts and expressions of dissent and so on to the point where we'd completely destroy everyone's freedom, and doing that would inspire rebels who are, you guessed it, terrorists in their own way.
That's why I really think we as a world can't declare a successful war on and can never be rid of terrorism, because we *can't* rip out and stomp on the roots of it without destroying a lot of healthy and normal things like free speech, freedom of association, political dissent, political rebellion, and so on. It's a quite tangled mess that goes a lot deeper than the "terrorist or freedom fighter" debate.
Sorry for the rant. *laughs*
Hiro and Ando were by far the highlights of the show. They and Peter Petrelli were I think the only characters who came across as actually real. And Charlie, oddly, for someone who was in it so little, and much kudos to the actress for it.
Word. Honestly, this is my problem with anything that has a ton of "main" characters (from fics suffering from OC overload to Chrono Cross to whatever) is that usually only a few characters, if any, get any development or anything past being a trope or stereotype or one-trick pony, and the rest can barely be dignified with uniqueness. Better two, three, four well-written characters than enough to populate a small island with who are written badly.
no subject
Date: 2007-07-15 12:17 am (UTC)Which is the same reason you'll never stop crime of any kind. The price you'd have to pay to do it wouldn't be worth it.
I'm with you on the 'excess character disease' too. A really good writer can actually make it work, but most of the people writing for TV aren't really good writers, and the ones that are are sharing duties with a bunch of others, not in control of the whole show.
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Date: 2007-07-12 05:47 am (UTC)Give my love to the kitties.
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Date: 2007-07-12 06:27 am (UTC)It definitely helps when the competent ones kill themselves deliberately - at least they can only do it once! The IRA had a long history of blowing themselves up too, and they didn't even believe in a hundred virgins, or whatever the latest incentive scheme is.
The kitties are now home and happy, if somewhat hot and sprawled :-)
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Date: 2007-07-12 05:02 pm (UTC)I finished Yellow! At the end of volume 3 I was so agitated, what a cliff hanger! Oh the angst! I wasn't sure about the series after volume 1, but I ended up enjoying it a lot. Those boys are hot.
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Date: 2007-07-13 02:51 am (UTC)I thought the angst in Yellow got a bit overblown myself, I would have preferred a plot that didn't stretch my ability to suspend disbelief quite so badly. But the guys were cute, and it's definitely worth a read once :-)