Soledad's Journal

Today I took another bag of books to the book saver wagon - only to find it closed. The lady from the greengrocer's next to it said they packed up and left an hour previously. Probably because the promised rain, as they are always there when I walk by on my way to choir practice. Well, I didn't haul all those books home again - they weighed a ton! I put them into a plastic bag and shoved the bag under the wagon. If they find it tomorrow morning, more power to them. If somebody steals them and sells them for the weight of the paper, they're welcome to it.

( Read more... )

After all this, I decided to skip choir practice and came home to catch the last third of the Great Australian Bake-Off. Priorities must be respected. *g*

... and boy, did it me a wealth of good! I got up only slightly later than usual and spent the morning with a bit of unhurried crafting.

( Boring details are boring )

In-between I also cooked Sauerbraten for lunch, had the neighbour lady over for coffee and a chat and finished reading "Sleeping Murder". As I re-watched the TV episode yesterday, I was really impressed how close they stayed to the original. I'm always annoyed when ambitious directors try to "re-imagine" the classics (which is why I don't like Peter Jackson's films... to put it mildly). When I invest time and interest into watching an adaptation, I do it because I want to see beloved characters and plots shown in a different medium.

Differences are inevitable, of course, but when someone who was a good guy in the original suddenly acts like a villain in the adaptation I tend to take it rather personally. My other major grievance in this area was the Brother Cadfael series, especially The Pilgrim of Hate. But generally, I don't understand why adaptations tend to change the very facts and characters people actually like a certain book for. Yeah, I'm old-fashioned that way.

What else? Oh, I did a tiny bit of translating - the current chapter will be finished tomorrow, or so I hope. We'll see.

... and I've been busy. I went out into town to deal with a few things I never had time for while working; like finally applying for that 60+ card with which I can get things at a lower price in some places, including language courses and gyms and so on.

I also bought the paperback version of "Lúthien and Beren", composed by Christopher Tolkien. They could only have ordered me the hardback version of "The Fall of Gondolin", as apparently no other version exists yet, but it would have cost twice as much (and a half for good measure) than the "Lúthien" paperback, so I refrained from ordering it. I'll wait until the paperback version (hopefully) comes out. I mean, Gondolin is my favourite First Age tale, but I won't pay ridiculous amounts of money for it if I don't absolutely have to.

I also managed to completely rewrite Chapter 12 of the Dwobbit fic and put together an originally not planned Chapter 13 from snippets of the already posted Ch 13 and some additional stuff from Rateliff's The History of the Hobbit. It isn't re-written yet, I hope it will work out.

Now, I think everyone knows by now how much I dislike the Jackson films, especially his concept of most of the Dwarves. Especially poor Ori and Bombur. But the Weta designs are nothing if not breath-taking, and I've found among them one that fits my idea of book!Ori (who has a seniority of several decades over the film version), so I'm willing to share.

Here it is, Ori, heart-breaker, who managed to get a warrior Dwarf half his age as his spouse:



Apologies for the quality of the picture. I took it with my iPad from the first Weta book about art and design of The Hobbit, where it was about the size of a stamp. This was the best Microsoft Office Picture Manager could do with it.

On less cheerful news, Mum's telly is broken. From one moment to another, there was neither picture nor sound. Now she'll have to watch mine until hers gets fixed; and let me tell you, mine is really small! I hope she gets back hers before her eyes roll out of her head.

I read the books back in the early 1980s and were of two minds about them. I'm the kind of fangirl who likes her genres unmixed. So, sci-fi, fantasy, post-apocalyptic stuff, all in their own places. Shannara is fantasy built on a post-apocalyptic background, and in the places when that becomes obvious, I was always alienated. But aside from that, it was an enjoyable read.

Now, when the TV-series came to Hungarian TV, I gave it a try. It took about 20 or 30 minutes - the horrible dubbing certainly didn't help. Finally, today it started on German TV, too, so I thought why not give it a second try? Perhaps I'd like it better for the second time.

Well... I didn't. The scenery is pleasant, and the young actor who plays Wil Ohmsford I could easily accept, but that's basically it. I found the rest of the casting as horrible as for the first time. I remember Amberle Elessedil being a dignified character from the books - in this, she isn't. Neither is anyone else in the elvish court, for that matter. And John Rhys-Davies as an Elf, even as an old Elf, is ridiculous. Especially in the role of Eventine Elessedil. Granted, the first book I read was The Sword of Shannara, in which Eventine was a young, heroic and dynamic Elf King, so the contrast was probably too great, but still...

I went to Bestsellers today, to order the Sherlock special and the last volume of WETA's Art and Design books to the Hobbit films. Taking a look around, I incidentally spotted The Story of Kullervo, which was the very first short story ever written by Tolkien. Apparently. I never heard of it before, although I the name of the hero is familiar from the Kalevala. The book was outrageously expensive, but it is beautifully designed, so I don't regret giving in to the temptation and buying it.

So, now I'm the proud owner of three of the Professor's books that aren't directly related to the Ardaverse and yet wonderful. the other two are The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun and The Fall of Arthur.

I foresee in the not-so-distant future the aquisition of Tolkien's Beowulf Translation and Commentary and Finn and Hengest, after which I'll probably be broke. Drat, but good books are an expensive hobby! Still, I could be drinking or smoking and it would cost more, right?

Abusing the shared computer in the school library again (godawful keyboard, by the way), since Help Guy still haven't found his way to us from next door. *sighs*

Anyway, Bestsellers (the English bookshop in the inner city) has worked its magic and my brand new Season 3 Sherlock DVDs have arrived yesterday. So far, I only had the time to watch "The Empty Hearse". My spoilery review is behind the tag, for people like myself who live on Mars.

( So, Sherlock again... )

Also, I got myself the Torchwood novel "Another Life" by Peter Anghelidis. Mostly because I needed the whole background about the Bruydac for "Director Jones". Not a bad novel per se - the author writes Gwen as she should have been, instead of the unsympathetic idiot as she appeared in the series, but I can live with it. What got me really bored was Owen and his VR game - I leafed through those parts. Unfortunately, they were rather long. Tosh was great. Alas, Ianto got largely ingored.Just like in the series. But the book is useful for my writing, so I'm not complaining.

Sooo, we're back, thanks for the good wishes. Dresden was wonderful and Berlin was - well, interesting. The Pergamon Museum was beyond amazing, but other than hat, I don't think I'd ever want to return to Berlin, while I'd use any chance to see Dresden again.

We got back last night very late, as we got into a 2-hour-traffic jam beyond Prague. Today I had to go to Bestsellers, the only English bookshop in town, where I fetched my shiny new US-version of Sherlock - the Case Book. It's great, has lots of background material to both seasons and very, very funny.

But: while I was waiting, I spotted two other little gems on the bookshelf. The one is The Fall of Arthur by the Great Professor Tolkien himself (edited, as usual, by his son Christopher), the other one a medieval mystery titled Hill of Bones by a group of authors who call themselves The Medieval Murderers and wrote the book together. I'm particularly looking forward to that one - it takes place at the end of the 12th century, also only slightly beyond Cadfael times, so it might prove helpful, aside from (hopefully) being a good read.

I also ordered 7 (!) Miss Marple novels - basically those who mostly take place in St. Mary Mead or in another village. I already have 5 of them, so my collection is going to be almost full. The only ones I didn't order were A Caribbean Mystery and Nemesis. I may buy them later, but they won't be of any use for my story Precious Like Rubies, so I'd rather spend my money on them later.

I must ask them if they accept orders for DVDs as well, although it's rather unlikely as they're not selling the things. It would be so nice if I could order the original, British editions of the 3rd series of Sherlock, or the extended edition of The Hobbit, or the second part of the movie, or older Dr. Who stuff - ah, well, one can't have everything.

Thanks for the good wishes; we had a wonderful time. I'll tell you more and probably add a few photos, at least those about the Old Smithy - so wonderfully Dwarvish!

I also broke down and bought Volume 1 of "The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey Chronicles. Art & Design," which has the most amazing Dwarf desings, some of them a lot better than the end results in the film. The Dwarf women are espacially breath-taking; I'm actually reconsidering my aversion against them being bearded... to a certain extent anyway.

Volume 2 shows then the end results, the make-up and costume stuff, tells about the individual characters, the language and accents of various races and so on. Unfortunately, we had way too much luggage with us already, and even if I were ready to spend the same amount of money again (which I would, although it's a rather expensive book) I simply couldn't have dragged it home with all the other stuff. And Mum isn't allowed to lift anything that weighs more than two pounds, so she couldn't help.

No, I haven't got the current bug, and it seems to have run its course, more or less. Kids are coming back to school in spades. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, you decide for yourself.

But: I've been having the most bewildering symptoms that prove that a) I'm either getting ill, or b) I'm getting old. My ears freeze. I kid you not! My earshells, while feel reasonably warm to the touch, are freezing. I have the feeling most of the time that they are ice cold. They are not. I checked them. Mum checked them. They don't feel any colder than the rest of me.

It's really, really weird. It reminds me of a short story by György Moldova, about a young man whose fingernails hurt. At first they thought he was simulating because he didn't want to go to the Army (it was mandatory in our country at that time). Then they put him into the madhouse, where already were three Christi, two Buddhas and a guy who only knew that he was a dove, but whether the Holy Ghost or the one from Picasso's paitning, he couldn't tell.

Well, the madhouse has been closed years ago, for economical reason (which is why so many madmen are running around free over here, most of them acting in politics), so I'm not in that particular kind of danger. But my ears still feel bloody cold!

I've lent the novelization to the pilot episode - a book I got from the_wild_iris to one of our eight-grade students. I got him hooked on Merlin, because he looks exactly as Bradley James must have looked when he was 14. We have this little insider joke that I call him my Prince - and he laughs his head off.

Anyway, I'm very impressed. He actually faced the challenge to read an English book, and one that hadn't been dumbed down to the level of foreing people who're still learning the language. He says that the first 30 pages were brutal - he had to look up every second word. But after that, words started reapparing, and now he's actually enjoying himself.

I'm very proud of him - and a little proud of myself. Considering how much this generation dislikes reading, for a 14-year-old to start reading a book in a foreign language and not giving up when he had to face the first difficulties, it's quite the feat. And I'm not even his English teacher.