Reading The Girl

Peter Griffin, of Family Guy fame, said of this film "It was his sled. It was his sled from when he was a kid. There, I just saved you two long boobless hours!". I don't normally agree with things I see on cartoon shows, nor do I usually agree with anything that goes against my normal academic sensibilities. However, this I might have to agree with. This is a film I feel is somewhat undeserving of all the acclaim and praise that the film and culture industries have rained down upon it. I can see why it was on my syllabus and why at the time the film would have been viewed to have such standing but in a modern context it doesn't do as well as some people still claim it does.

The film is, from a modern perspective, well produced, however the acting is wooden and stilted (probably due to the fact that a lot of the actors were new faces - something proudly announced by the Mercury Studios at the end of the film) and the plot is dull to say the least. It had potential and some aspects of the way the story was conveyed were really very good but the endless, meaning less metaphors get cloyingly tedious.

I just hope it makes for an interesting seminar tomorrow!

I write this with the full knowledge and awareness that it will offend somebody. Is that ok, or should I not write it? What if I am fairly certain that more people will be in agreement with me than opposition? Or if I have, in the past been guilty of any of it. Suffice to say, I don't judge the actual personal character of the people guilty of this, just their behaviour in certain, online, situations.

First of all - getting pissed off or being bitchy in Facebook statuses. There really is no possible way this can go well. In fact it normally just aggravates everyone involved and escalates the situation. This is one of the things I have been guilty of myself in the past and this is the empirical conclusion I have come to. I feel it was summed up nicely by my friend Gina's statement not long ago: "Gina Lawrence is something subtly bitchy and yet blatantly obvious to all involved" (this is quoted from memory and may not be entirely verbatim). Now this may be viewed as a hypocritical situation but I can reassure you that this isn't specifically aimed but rather something I have been mulling over for a while (and if you think it's aimed at you then you're guilty of doing it yourself! Win/win!).

Number two - the lack of forum etiquette. A long while ago I was a reasonably active member of a political debate forum. I would literally get punched by the forum administrators if I said anything stupid or deliberately off-topic. Of course, this was only possible due to the admin being my best friend. I have always been concerned with what I put into the public realm, now more than ever (resulting in me heightening my Facebook security, yet another friend exodus, stopping to use Twitter and soon an improvement in this blog to hide my identity - although my friends will always know it's me!) but some people seem perfectly happy to have conversations akin to those you would conduct on IM through a public forum. Perhaps this is just due to my grounded experience of forums being to resolve or debate issues, rather than have a chat...

On a related note - you are not your post count. It seems awfully odd to me how people I know and like and interact well with in the real world can be so caught up in defining themselves by how much time they waste online. Recently a friend (who shall remain nameless) confessed that they have three tabs open at all times and just cycle through them. It is mind boggling that such a habit can form when there is so much, even on the internet, to explore, read and learn, to say nothing of actual books, films and games to enjoy... Again I catch myself doing this every so often but it repulses me so that I will, at that stage force myself to pick up a book, or even just click on Stumble!

As I say, these are niggles, they don't change my opinion of anyone guilty of them but I do hope that, should they read this they will consider how trivial online interaction is in comparison to anything else they could be doing...

So most people say it's not a real degree. But would they say the same thing if I told them I did English and History joint honours? Because that's basically what I'm doing. I'm not really mad at them, seeing as I really enjoy my studies and for me that's what university is meant to be about. Anyway, I have 4 modules this semester; two are literature, one is history and the other is turning out to be a very bizarre form of visual culture. 19th century lit has meant that I have now read 'Moby Dick' (as you knew), 'The Pioneers' by James Fenimore Cooper and 'Nature' by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The Emerson is by far the best - the Beat Generation makes so much sense now.

My other literature module is a lot more fast paced. We have a book a week which would be fantastic if more than 3 people actually read it and had something to say in our seminars. Unfortunately this is reflecting really badly on the English Department (who aren't our greatest friends anyway) as they form a significant majority in that seminar and only three of them have made a point in 3 weeks and most of them just reiterated something the seminar leader had already strongly hinted at...

In any case I've read 'Sister Carrie' by Theodore Dreiser, 'House of Mirth' by Edith Wharton and 'My Ántonia' by Willa Cather. The latter was surprisingly enjoyable. I did get a little too involved in it perhaps and Jamie may have laughed at my outrage when someone insinuated Jake had sold the pig to pay his fine.

Unfortunately all this enjoyable scholarly reading has meant that my 'reading for pleasure' has taken a knock, and it's those books I want to write on here really. I mean could take you through the Naturalist movement and the Transcendentalism in Emerson but frankly you'd be bored and I'd be wasting perfectly good baking time.

As you can probably tell, this is one of those filler-posts. I do actually have far more interesting things to say but having not written in a while I need to get back in the swing!

Yep, that really is about my level right now! I can't sleep yet again and it's beginning to get old. For this reason I'm going to rant for a bit and then move on to my exciting good news!

I don't feel good. Sleep deprivation will do that to you. And there's a moth in my closet. Rant over.

Good news! I have found a flat! It's out in Wood Green and it's amazing. I move in on Saturday afternoon and I cannot friggin' wait! Ok so it's not as shiny and fitted kitchen-y as Jamie's potential house but it's a Victorian building, there are no stairs to negotiate, it has a front patio and back garden and it is cheap for its size and, most importantly, I LOVE IT! It has even made me want to stay in London rather than go to the states just for the mere possibility of keeping the place for longer (forever?!) but with my parents, I doubt that'd be an option.

I shall post pictures once we've moved all our stuff in and it's prettier!

I really need to get on with some work - I haven't cleared anywhere near as much of my reading list as I should have done. No matter, it looks as though the internet may take a while to set up in the new place so I'll use books as my entertainment! On this note, I'm going to go and chill...

For now I am back in the Shire trying to herd up enough stuff to fill some space and make like cozy in the flat.

This morning I have woken up with no little desire to buy my own domain along the lines of "readingthegirl". Not only would this mean I could do what I liked to it but I could also post snippets of my writing and various other things for people to see. Naturally this isn't a result of this blog being so wildly popular, and I can't really see any reason why it should be - but, you know, it's something I want to do.

This morning I appear to have recovered from my headache although I daren't get my hopes up too soon as they strike mainly at night. It did mean however, that I failed in my mission to watch all 6 episodes of Star Wars in one day but that was I mission I fell out of love with in the first 5 minutes of Episode 1. I was watching them in what I consider to be the 'correct' order, beginning with the original trilogy (4, 5 and 6) and then moving on to the prequels. I only have 3 left to go, a movie ruined almost entirely by the 5 second(ish) long "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO". Oh dear, well, here goes nothing!

Next weekend I shall be attempting a Lord Of The Rings film marathon as I am  ashamed to admit I have never so much as seen the second film, The Two Towers. According to my friend Martin, the two towers are based on two towers in Birmingham. What was it Martin? The Bull Ring and? Edgbaston? In reality, who cares?! It's Birmingham, no one goes there!

I'm supposed to be back on my tidying the house lark this week and I really do need to, as I have Martin coming for dinner tomorrow but I can't help feeling that lugging bag full by bag full to the tip won't really help anyone much. Life would be so much easier if I had a car for the next 3 weeks!

Wish me luck...
xSx

For the last two weeks I have been in sunny, sunny Wales. To be fair to it, at the moment it actually is sunny, sunny. Last week, when the only roof above my head was that made of thin canvas it decided to piss down almost everyday, regardless of what the weatherman said!

As much as I could complain about the weather, I do love it here. The picturesque "City" of St. David's, where ice cream and postcards are king! Speaking of postcards, I bought 4 for various people in the middle of last week and now, on the penultimate day of the fortnight, they are still tucked inside the cover of Moby Dick, unwritten, unstamped and unsent. I am really bad at postcards!

Moby Dick - now there's a "ripping yarn" as a certain '1001 Books to Read Before You Die' calls it. Is it bugger! 634 pages of descriptions of whales with the odd bit of narrative thrown in. Most of the story people popularly recall as 'Moby Dick' actually occurs in the last 60 pages, the rest is pure anatomical fact, more or less. Don't get me wrong, it is really well written, it's just so much about whales! Nevertheless I am very glad I read it, not least because it means I never need to again!

As far as ploughing through my reading list goes, I'm not doing as well as I would have liked. I'm only half way through my second book - 'Sister Carrie' because of the break I felt I was owed after 'the Dick'. Even so I did read 4 books whilst in Croatia a couple of weeks ago. These were: 'Good Omens' by Neil Gaiman, 'Slaughterhouse 5' by Kurt Vonnegut, 'The 13(1/2) Lives of Captain Bluebear' by Walter Moers and 'The Time Machine' by H. G. Wells. I really did enjoy all of them but, as with most books I read, I now feel obliged to read everything by each author (something I am well on my way to doing with Neil Gaiman).

My boyfriend Jamie has suggested I write about him to add some variation to my blogging. I don't really know what I can say that isn't going to sound either lame or dismissive. I miss him, I wish he was here, in the sun, rather than at work and I can't wait till I do see him again which is going to be in about 2 and a half weeks time I hope. Anyway for now I shall content myself with writing postcards and hopefully come up with something better to say about him next time!

xSx

I have just finished reading the two things I had wanted to complete today - 'The Call of Cthulhu' by H. P. Lovecraft and 'Coraline' by Neil Gaiman. At first glance these may seem odd bedfellows and yet there are some similar nuances that made their combination so utterly strange I actually had to turn the lights on in the corridor to retrieve a crisp, cold can of coke (something I rarely do due to being unafraid of the dark and lazy).

I began with Cthulhu (partly because I had already begun yesterday but also because I expected it to be more terrifying and 'Coraline' to act, therefore, as a sort of light relief). It was a download from the awesome manybooks.net - a site which deserves no small amount of praise and when I am rich I shall be giving them money. On my eReader the short story, typically around 35 pages in paperbacks, reached 71 electronic pages and I polished them off in what I can only estimate to be about an hour (it would normally take me much less time but the announcer on my tube home today was very vocal and kept disturbing me). That said, it does deserve a special kind of attention; I am sure that most of you who have heard of it will regard it as a classic and I am no different. The writing style is unmistakably Lovecraftian, a combination of Victorian detail and mythical, mystical imagery. Written from the perspective of an anthropologist relative to the Professor Angell, in the first person, it brings to mind the techniques exemplified in the earlier novel 'Dracula' by Bram Stoker. I do not wish to bore you with details and I certainly do not want to reveal anything that may be considered a 'spoiler' so, in no uncertain terms I shall merely say "read it"!

'Coraline' has an entirely separate purpose, for starters it is a childrens book. Again it was a reasonably quick read - an hour from cover to cover - and by virtue of its length, is quite enthralling. I do not believe I would place it on quite the same level as either 'Neverwhere' or 'Stardust', but it is certainly comparable to American Gods and better, in my humble opinion, than his latest addition 'The Graveyard Book'. I am yet to see the film but I know that there has been some contention over the artistic style and the mood of the book. From the trailers alone I would say that the film has the right mood but is slightly too shiny - stop motion is perfect but Tim Burton should have done the sketches! Mind you, I am a Tim Burton fanatic and thus my opinion is not unbiased. I would be intereted to hear what others think of the book in relation to the film.

Both of these were enjoyable reads and, despite it being a childrens novel, I feel that 'Coraline' inspired a little more fear in me than 'Cthulhu' - perhaps because my expectations were lower, or because it was written from a childs point of view (and we all know how they love to be scared - Moomins, case in point) I am not sure exactly. My next literary conquest shall be...either the remainder of 'The 13(1/2) Lives of Captain Bluebear' or 'Good Omens'.

xSx

I finished my exams on Friday, I am now free until September!

This leaves me with the quandry of what to do with the next three months... A good proportion will be used travelling (Croatia, Paris, Wales!) and of course I have the standard back-to-uni stuff to do (including a decent sized reading list) but that still leaves some time to do something impressive. Unfortunately today I achieved a strange form of employment; after having to go to my parents for even more money, I suggested that I would try and make some of it up by cooking and cleaning for them over the summer. My mum took this a few steps further - I am now a housekeeper with the additional duty of selling random crap from the garage/shed on eBay, and I get to keep the profits!

This does mean, however, that I get to explore all the random crap my dad has decided to hoarde and amongst which may be enough electrical components that my trusty soldering iron can be put to good use...
I would also like to do some writing. There are a number of projects that I started throughout the year and due to stoopid Uni work had to be postponed. Most importantly my 'Charlie the Chapter's Mouse' series and my short story 'Cherry'...
I have also just found out that there is a sale on classic sci-fi movies at amazon and so I may have to ear-mark some earnings for this...

Anyway, with all this to do I must get cracking...
xSx

So my last post demonstrated how angry I was at Epson and their refusal to acknowledge that their site was rubbish. I will now show you highlights from the subsequent interchange:

First they replied and ask me for my operating system/exact details of the problem (as in my rage I had forgotten to include them!). So I did, stressing that I SHOULDN'T have to change security settings to access a download from a supposedly professional company and that the problem WAS NOT confined to my current computer or internet connection, here is what they said:

Ok, first, I have heavily formatted this, and yet you can still tell they need some lessons on paragraph construction. Secondly, with the exception of pointing me to a different site, the advice was eactly the same despite me having already said that their suggestions don't work. Thirdly, they keep telling me they can download and install them, but that isn't much help to me. Finally and most infruiatingly, they clearly have not listened to me at all. If the problem isn't confined to this computer or connection then how would it be to do with my ISP? And I already said I owned a CD so why are they trying to flog me another one? I was so mad I replied straight away:


"Yes, I keep hearing that YOU have no problem downloading and installing these drivers. All I can tell you is: I have fiddled with my firewall and internet settings to the point of compromising my computers security without any luck (I told you this in my first e-mail), my browser is up-to-date, and most importantly it is not only me who has this problem (as I said in my last e-mail). I couldn't access these downloads at my boyfriends, my home, university, on my other laptop, on my father's laptop, on my home desktop. As a professional company I am disappointed that you can't have downloads as effective as any other site I wish to use.

And, as I detailed in my first email, I have a CD, but it is not here and this computer does not have a CD drive. And frankly, if you offer a free download serivce I would expect it to work. I cannot stress to you enough that this is nothing to do with my computer or internet service."


In the mean time I tried the American and Australian sites. The American one was almost as broken as the UK one but, after some search on the Australian site (they use different product codes for some reason) I managed to download, install and use my printer, HOORAH! Is it not ridiculous that I had to access a server on THE OTHER SIDE OF THE GLOBE to do something so simple?

As a final stab I sent them this:


"Well here's a thing - I have managed to successfully download and install both scanner and printer drivers from the Australian site (and I've successfully printed a document) WITHOUT altering a single setting on my computer. Perhaps you should consider modelling your website on theirs?

Thank you for all your help,
Miss S M Robinson"


Yes the last bit was intended sarcasm! And the age of hating Epson is over (until the next time I have to go and buy a Cyan ink cart just to print in black and white).

xSx

I have been having an ongoing problem with Epson. Their Support website is supposed to enable me to download the necessary printer drivers easily on to my netbook without needing the CD (which I have left, and lost, at home). It doesn't. It just doesn't work. The download won't even initialize unless my firewall is switched off (which in itself is stupid) and even when it does Mozilla only manages to download a grand total of 0 bytes.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I tried to get them to help me but they arrogantly stuck to their 'our website works absolutely fine, you're doing something wrong' line whilst simultaneously patronising me because, let's face it, I'm a girl and cannot possibly understand computers. I got so irritated with the guy that I stopped trying to get him to be helpful but now I would like to be able to print out my lecture notes without having to transfer them all to my other laptop first. So today I sent Epson another e-mail, to the tune of this:
Ok, so it wasn't quite bitchy enough but I think I'll wait for them to tell me the same thing the last guy did before I start to shout at them. If they were in any way professional, everyone would be able to access their site without having to entirely compromise their online security first. There are many things I would like to do to Epson Support, let's see if they can avoid them...

xSx