Friday night's all right for loafing

Since Doctor Who is now airing Friday night, that evening has become my Loaf In Front of the Television Time. Who airs 8-9, and then Monk is on USA at 9. USA has also picked up House M.D., and is rerunning episodes after Monk, so I'm catching up with that show, too.I haven't followed anything on television since The X-Files went off the air -- and to be fair, I didn't even follow the last season of the series. It feels kind of odd to be getting into prime time TV again after five years of very little interest in it -- I mostly stayed tuned to the History Channel and old X-Files episodes on late-night TNT. But they are all shows that I enjoy, even though I don't have great desire to go rushing into their respective fandoms yet.So, House. I like it, I'll keep watching -- but I am struck by how very formulaic the episodes are. A patient has an unknown illness. Foreman says lupus. Chase suggests cancer. Someone mentions allergies. House insists it's something else. Cameron sucks up. Various tests are run and treatments are tried, usually resulting in a worsening of the patient. Arguments abound. Cuddy yells at House while Wilson follows him around. House figures out the correct diagnosis at the last minute. Lather, rinse, repeat.I'm all right with formulas -- they're a staple of every TV show, and especially mystery/detective stories. Monk -- also a detective show -- has the same basic plot for every episode, as well. But Monk does a better job of varying things enough to keep my interest every time. Plus, the supporting cast is better than what House has to offer, which just might be part of it.In any case, I need icons for these shows. Tomorrow I pick up paint, so hopefully I should be getting my bedroom and computer set up by the weekend, at which point I will go on an icon-making spree. Woo.

Magically delicious!

I almost let St. Patrick's Day go by without using my puking leprechaun icon!!! What was I THINKING??!For the record, I spent my St. Pat's day rather uneventfully -- went to daily Mass, cleaned a bit, cooked a bit, and watched Doctor Who. And despite receiving a dispensation from the bishop, I still refrained from meat on this Lenten Friday... I'm not much for corned beef, but I'm all about vegetable quiche.Anyhoo, happy St. Patrick's Day... even if it's almost over. Father in heaven,You sent the great bishop Patrickto the people of Ireland to share his faithand to spend his life in loving service.May our lives bear witnessto the faith we profess,and our love bring othersto the peace and joy of Your Gospel.We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Further on Dan Brown...

...and his astounding ability to mangle prose to the point that it loses all coherence.Currently I'm at Chapter 40, and I assure you I've been skimming liberally, so who knows what kind of gems of language abuse I've missed. But I'll write another post on that later (Dan Brown's "inspired" descriptions in particular are full of juicy spork-worthy goodness, and deserve their very own post).For now, let's chat a bit about the actual structure of this here acclaimed, blockbuster novel. Frankly, it's the most redundant and contrived piece of crap I've ever read. It makes Mary Higgins Clark look like a mystery-writing genius. The entire reason that Dan Brown "keeps up the pace" with his story is because he's constantly jerking the reader around. He writes stuff like, "And then, he saw it," and doesn't explain what IT is until 15 pages later, at which point he introduces some other crucial piece of information as a tantalising hint which he doesn't fully reveal until much later, and so on and so forth. This isn't an original device -- plenty of other writers have employed it, myself included -- but with dear old Dan, there is absolutely no subtlety at all. Everything about it screams, "LOOK! There's something here that you don't know and I'm not telling you so you have to keep reading to find out, nyah nyah nyah!"Case and point: We find out that Agent Sophie Neveu, brilliant cryptographer and fashion-challenged eventual love interest, had a falling out with her grandfather over something dark and secretive she saw him participating in. We get this passage on page 75:Their relationship had evaporated in a single instant one March night when she was twenty-two. Ten years ago. Sophie had come home a few days early from graduate university in England and mistakenly witnessed her grandfather engaged in something Sophie was obviously not supposed to see. It was an image she could barely believe to this day.Now, this "single instant" of such horror which caused Sophie to completely reject her beloved grandfather is redundantly mentioned again on page 108, and twice (in completely separate paragraphs) on 113. On 140-143 we get a description of what happened leading up to the moment, but when it seems the reader is about to discover what Sophie saw that terrified her so, Brown once AGAIN skirts around the revelation and uses phrases like, "she felt the image searing itself into her memory forever," and leaves it at that. Until, of course, it gets yet another redundant passing reference on 154, telling us nothing new about the event, but reminding us that Dan Brown has a clumsy upper hand, and will force the poor reader to slog through his mind-numbing prose to find out just what the hell Sophie witnessed.Of course, at this point the reader is supposed to have a feeling of intrigue and curiosity. Personally, I want to throttle Dan Brown and scream, "Just tell us, you MORON!" Yes, I know that I don't know what precisely Sophie saw (though I can guess reasonably accurately, I expect), so quit mentioning it repeatedly as though you're telling me something new and mind-blowing.Maybe it would be more tolerable if half of his little mysteries weren't so transparent. No... on second thought, it would still be unbearable.But the triumph of redundancy and wasted verbiage (thus far -- Dan might top himself later) is the Priory of Sion key. Sophie flashbacks to her first finding of her grandfather's secret society key on page 109, and a description on 110:Its large golden head was in the shape of a cross, but not a normal cross, this was an even-armed one, like a plus sign. Embossed in the middle of the cross was a strange symbol-- two letters intertwined with some kind of flowery design.The paragraph goes on to reveal that flower is a fleur-de-lis and the letters are P.S. Sophie mentions the object, and Langdon guesses what kind of flower it was; he reveals on 113 that the P.S. and fleur-de-lis are the symbols of the Priory of Sion.Sure, fine, whatever. But on page 132, when Sophie finds the key again, we have:...the chain was affixed to a familiar gold key. The broad, sculpted head was in the shape of a cross and bore an engraved (note: I thought it was embossed?) seal she had not seen since she was nine years old. A fleur-de-lis with the initials P.S.DUH. What a shocker.And then 139:"He left you a physical object?"Sophie gave a curt nod. "Embossed with a fleur-de-lis and the initials P.S."Langdon couldn't believe his ears.And the readers couldn't believe that Dan Brown apparently lost all short term memory whilst he was writing this section. But surely, this is the end of the same description, yes?NO! On the same page:Even as she drove, Sophie's mind remained locked on the key in her pocket, her memories of seeing it many years ago, the gold head shaped as an equal-armed cross, the triangular shaft, the indentations, the embossed flowery seal, and the letters P.S.Just in case you missed it the first three times. But we aren't finished yet, oh no. On page 144, Langdon sees the key for the first time.When Langdon turned the key, he felt his jaw drop. There, intricately embossed on the center of the cross, was a stylised fleur-de-lis with the initials P.S.!It's the exclamation point that really gets me. In the FIFTH description of the key within 30 pages, Dan Brown uses added emphasis in his syntax, as though the reader is supposed to be just as blown away by the key's symbols as Langdumb.Although I do have to admit that my jaw dropped along with Langdon's. But that was because the terrible, terrible writing had induced a seizure.

Dan Brown = Le Suck

Langdon had always considered the Tuileries to be sacred ground. These were the gardens in which Claude Monet had experimented with form and colour, and literally inspired the birth of the Impressionist movement.*headdesk*Dear Dan Brown:Although the term "Impressionist" was derived from a work by Claude Monet (Impression, Sunrise, exhibited in 1874 along with a number of other works by artists such as Sisley, Renoir, Pisarro, Morisot and Degas), the inspiration for the "birth" of the Impressionist movement would more accurately be attributed to Eduard Manet, if anyone. His work reflects a changing manner of painting, with visible brushstrokes and sketch-like, atmospheric style. The rejection of his Luncheon on the Grass by the Paris Salon in 1863 in part led to the creation of the Salon des Refuses (Salon of the Rejected), through which Monet, etc., were able to exhibit their works in the next decade.Also, Manet did a ton of sketches of the Tuileries Gardens, and one of his major early works is Music in the Tuileries.Please take an art history course.Thanks ever so,Pained ReaderPS: Claude Monet experimented with light, open spaces, and brushstrokes WAY more than form.PPS: Monet also studied Turner in England, whose work is also clearly a foundation for the Impressionist movement.PPPS: You suck.Now I remember why I didn't finish The Da Vinci Code in the first place. Urge to spork... rising...ETA: ...an arrow-like widow's peak that divided his jutting brow and preceded him like the prow of a battleship. As he advanced, his dark eyes seemed to scorch the earth before him, radiating a fiery clarity that forecast his repuation for unblinking severity in all matters.Okay, be honest now: who else has an image of a guy with really pointy hair sticking straight out of his forehead and lasers shooting from his eyes? And WTF does that last clause really mean, anyway?lizbee, I do prefer Phryne.

Depression...

Depression is such a quagmire. It takes hold of you and sometimes it seems like the more you struggle to escape, the faster you find yourself submerged in the anxiety, the hurt, the self-doubt.The real problem is when you stop wondering how quickly you can get out of the bog, and start wondering how long it will take to sink into it entirely.

Well, ...

Well, the moving day is Monday, March 13, after which I shall be officially relocated to the greater Houston area.Naturally, I've tons of packing and preparation left to do. But what else did you expect?Tonight I quit all the packing and trashing and organizing to go out for sushi with Hope and Dawn -- our last night of sushi together, at least until I come back to visit. It was fun, but sad as well.Saturday is my last day at Starbucks South Lamar, and though I plan to have a great old time telling off customers on their cell phones, I'm not looking forward to it as much as I once was. I'm starting to get really nervous and melancholy about the move. I love Austin, I love the friends I have here, the life I have here. I know that it's time for a change for me -- but I am so very upset to leave everything in this town. It's been my heart and home for the first of my adult years. In a way, I finished growing up here.Everything seems kind of topsy-turvy in me right now. I don't know how everything is going to go from here, whereas before I had a vague plan in my head. I'm not lost, per se, but the path ahead of me is a bit obscured in the fog, and I'm not at all sure what lies in the distance. I just have to trust that God knows and will guide me; that he's prepared the right way for me, if I let him lead me there.That is my biggest struggle in the Christian life. I can't hand myself over, I can't easily trust in God's will. I want to completely plan, control and manipulate my situations too much, and I have difficulty dealing with what life hands me if it's not what I want -- particularly if something in which I invest a lot of time, emotion or thought doesn't come to fruition. I'm sure this is true to some extent of everyone, but it's especially prevalent in my life. I have to fight it consciously, all the time, to remain remotely at peace.I am still fighting though.I have an appointment with my therapist on Wednesday so I can talk some of this out before the move actually happens. I think it unwise to let it just sit and fester the whole time.On another medical note, I'd like to take a moment to rant about the medication I'm on for my complexion. The stuff dries out my skin like nothing else -- never in my life have I peeled or flaked like this: I'm shedding skin like a snake. And it's painful! And my skin is all tight and weird-feeling! And my lips are chapped ALL THE TIME!And to make matters worse, I don't really see much difference, aside from the excessively dry, flaky skin. The price of a clear complexion is entirely too high.

I had a glance at the calendar, and I'd like to know:

Man, why does my birthday always gotta fall on Good Friday? *grumps*