|
Saturday, January 27, 2007
"Please, Alex, Can We Have Some More?"
Title: Sound Bites: Eating on Tour with Franz Ferdinand
Author: Alex Kapranos
“I eat with these guys every day. Their eating habits are as familiar to me as the songs we play at night. Paul always covers his plate with a napkin when he’s had enough. It’s as if he’s laying a sheet over a half-eaten corpse. Nick is oblivious to waiters. They stand at his elbow until somebody nudges him to point them out. He then looks startled, as if waking from a coma; confused to find himself in a restaurant. Whenever Bob takes a drink, he has to push his upper lip back from his teeth with the rim of the glass. He shakes his fork between bites. Eating also involves triangles in some way, but I’ve never quite worked out how. Andy tends to stare at his plate, grey with anxiety, worrying about how the foreign stuff will poison him this time. Apparently, I chew too much and frown when I’m enjoying food.”
Alex Kapranos, lead singer and guitarist for Franz Ferdinand, has written a book. But it’s not about music. It’s about food, and the many weird and unique dishes he ate while on tour. There are descriptions of eating potentially fatal fugu (blowfish) in Osaka, slurping oysters in Seattle, sipping chestnut soup with bacon ice cream in Madrid, and of getting a “bowel-dweller” from eating street food in Mexico City. Ranging from the appetizing to the nauseating, these little vignettes all have one thing in common – they’re funny and non-pretentious, full of the delight and wonder of experiencing new flavors. And they’re all written in a prose style that is lyrical, entertaining, and often quite surprising. Although short, this is a book you’ll have to read slowly and savor. Kapranos is a song-writer, and it shows.
Sound Bites is actually a collection of articles Kapranos originally wrote for a British newspaper, the Guardian, supplemented with new material about his childhood and the years he spent working various jobs in restaurants, waiting to become an internationally acclaimed rock star. I learned about the book when he was interviewed by Terry Gross on Fresh Air, and was sufficiently impressed that I immediately ventured forth to purchase it. But the two bookstores closest to me didn’t have it, and the nearest in-stock library was in New Jersey (as Kat discovered for me.) I fumed and I raged for two weeks before finally discovering it downtown. It was worth the wait and fuss.
Generally, I’ll like a book if I like its author, and I like Kapranos very much. He’s witty, intelligent, self-deprecating, and at times devilishly evil. While onstage one night, he asks 6,000 fans back to his hotel for a party and tells them to bring fast food with them...just to spite a snooty hotel manager who’d sneered at him earlier for eating in the lobby. “It was a puerile thing to do,” he writes, “but it turned out to be quite fun. … Revenge is a dish best served not cold, but fast.” Kapranos is also allergic to peanuts and faints at the sight of blood. Reading his essays is like having a really fascinating conversation with a long-lost friend over a few beers pints at the local bar pub.
There’s also a lot more in Sound Bites than just food. Kapranos ruminates about the history of the places he visits, the personalities he meets, and the everyday grunge and glamour of touring the world with a rock band. For example, I did not expect to find here a near-perfect description of an afternoon spent reading in a bookshop. But here’s how Kapranos describes it:
“The [other customers] are mild and grey-haired, wearing warm, ramblers’ fleeces. The dichotomy of good bookshops makes them a powerful environment: gentle, dusty places containing the extremes of human thought. I am reading about incestuous cannibals. I wonder what the ramblers are reading. It could be tragedy, violence, passion, or needlecraft. Nothing in their expressions gives it away. They quietly sip their coffee without raising their eyes from the page.”
Incestuous cannibals. How could I not dig something like that?
And finally, it has to be said, this book is…well…sexy. But that shouldn’t really be surprising. Music is sexy. Food is sexy. And lank-haired young men from Scotland who play guitar and write lyrically about hamburgers are definitely sexy.
And I won’t share with you the scene where Kapranos eats bull testes in Buenos Aires. That you’ll just have to read for yourself.Labels: essays, food, non-fiction, rock 'n roll
posted by Elizabeth at
5:11 PM
2
comments
"Soldier. Hero. Lover. He's so dangerous, he's off the radar."
Title: Crazy Kisses
Author: Tara Janzen
Kid has spent the past year running around the Columbian jungle killing drug kingpins to avenge his brother's torture and death. They all want to catch "el asesino fantasama" and track him down after he ends up shot a few times and in the hospital. Also, Kid works for the same people as Christian (see this book).
At this point, he's back to hooking up with Nikki, an artist he's been in love, or at least lust, since before he went arround picking off the bad guys. The kingpins track them down to Colorado. Nikki's favorite model, Travis, is in love with a former street urchin, essentially (Jane).
When everything goes down, the bad guys kidnap Nikki to trap Kid. Jane's former minions help her, Travis, Kid, and the rest of the good guys save the day. Nikki and Kid get married and go back to having sex on the beach all day long. Jane turns down Travis because he's too good for her, and he's sad. Probably gets resolved in the next book.Labels: hunky armed forces or government operatives, romantic "suspense", trashy romance
posted by ket at
12:06 PM
1
comments
oooh! pretty!
Title: Whirlpool
Author: Elizabeth Lowell
Laurel, a jewelry designer, has a shady father who's some sort of CIA operative who always sends her neat jewels from around the world. This time he sends her a Faberge egg, which is supposed to either not exist or be part of a traveling exhibit of Imperial Russian art - he was supposed to intercept it and she'd be safe and out of the loop, but she got it first, though he took it back and left.
Cruz is a former FBI agent who now works for a private firm; he was made a scapegoat during some big to-do a few years back; he also lost part of a finger doing some other thing. He's hired to help get the egg back.
There's a crazy sex-addicted septuagenarian multi-millionaire involved, as well as the Russians. Nobody believes that Lauren doesn't have the egg anymore. Cruz helps save her and gets the egg back where it belongs, then leaves her because he thinks it's best for her. She tracks him down and then they head off into the desert to look at fault lines, because that's his hobby.Labels: hunky armed forces or government operatives, romantic "suspense", trashy romance
posted by ket at
11:57 AM
1
comments
I don't really remember this one.
Title: In Plain Sight
Author: Tara Taylor Quinn
I'm not sure if I finished this one. I definitely started reading it over a month ago. Attractive, single prosecutor lives next door to former FBI agent who's now saying he's an author. She attempts to take down the local white supremacist, he helps protect her and the foster child she's trying to adopt. Her mom commits suicide. Her brother's sort of shady. And it probably all works out in the end. Ta-da!Labels: crap, hunky armed forces or government operatives, romantic "suspense"
posted by ket at
11:54 AM
0
comments
this is just the start of a string of total winners...
Title: Edge of Fear
Author: Cherry Adair
So apparently I'm reading this trilogy in reverse order. Whoops! Too bad I'm just reading the books as I find them at the library...
This is the second of a trilogy about a set of brothers who have magical powers and fight terrorism. My review of the third book can be read here - you may want to check that out, as I'll probably skim over some details.
Caleb's special power is the ability to manipulate time! He can go backwards, and can take people backwards and they never know it happened!
Heather's a regular person who happens to be the daughter of a wealthy banker for terrorists who is now on the run because $48 billion disappeared and they want to kill him. Caleb and the other magical-terrorist-fighting-people want to find dad to take down the terrorists, so he's sent to Heather to use her to find him.
It takes a few tries, but he manages to pick her up in the grocery store. Then they go to Starbucks, make out, go home, have sex, and he leaves, confident that she doesn't know where her father is hiding.
They find dad other ways. Heather's pregnant. Caleb goes and marries her, then takes her to dad, not telling her how or why or who or anything. A giant clusterfuck ensues. Dad gets shot and dies, and it turns out her dead mother, who he may have killed, was the one who hid the money.
Um, various other terrorists kidnap Heather. Caleb almost dies a few times. Heather does die, but Caleb uses his healing powers (his other special power) to bring her back from the dead. And their unborn child is a very powerful wizard while still in the womb, who apparently takes orders from mom. Heather forgives Caleb for not telling her everything, and some magical old bracelet helps with the curse-breaking, and they all live happily ever after.Labels: hunky armed forces or government operatives, romantic "suspense", trashy romance
posted by ket at
11:32 AM
2
comments
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Actually, sir, entirely suitable
Title: An Unsuitable Job for a Woman
Author: P.D. James
“‘What is there to be frightened of? We shall be dealing only with men.’”
Admitted, I’m an endorphin junkie. Unless I get my fix every day or so, I get cranky and lethargic. Generally, running is sufficient to give me that happy floating feeling. But sometimes a really amazing book will do just as well. An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, written by British mystery author P.D. James, was one of those books for me. I’ll be feeding off the energy it gave me for days.
I just finished An Unsuitable Job tonight. Being lazy, I usually let several weeks go by before writing up a review. But since I don’t have anywhere to be tomorrow or any particular reason for getting up early (insert frustrated and bitter grin *here*), I figured I’d write my review of An Unsuitable Job tonight, and try to capture a bit of that magic that comes immediately upon the completion of a wonderful new story. Otherwise, it'd probably fade by the morning.
The heroine of An Unsuitable Job is rather unorthodox. She’s Cordelia Gray, a 22-year-old who has inherited an ailing and debt-riddled detective agency from her partner, Bernie Pryde, who recently committed suicide. Bernie was very considerate in deciding what technique to employ in furtherance of his determination to “chuck it all” -- he slit his wrists instead of shooting himself. This way, Cordelia can take possession of his unlicensed gun without being pained by any unpleasant associations.
A survivor of foster homes and a convent school, Cordelia is used to fending for herself. She’s determined to carry on Pryde’s Detective Agency for as long as her funds will permit. Fortunately, it isn’t long before her first case arrives. Mark Callender dropped out of Cambridge University to become a gardener, and he was recently found in his cottage hanging by his neck. His father, famed scientist Sir Ronald Callender, isn’t interested in challenging the verdict that his son committed suicide. Instead, he hires Cordelia to discover why exactly Mark made the decision to plunge willing into that good night.
As expected in any mystery, there’s a lot more to Mark Callender’s suicide than facially apparent. Family secrets, love affairs, illegitimate children, sexual deviancy…Cordelia stumbles upon all sorts of twisted darkness during her investigations. The book starts rather slow, but speeds up until it literally gallops at breakneck speed trough the climax, and a lot of bodies pile up rather quickly. Explosions! Car crashes! Revenge! There’s no lack of action here. And for the climbing junkies of this blog (ket and reyn), there’s a chilling scene of a character, who was thrown into a well and left to die, scrambling their way out. The description of the tortuous process is suitably gritty and painful. It definitely had me cringing.
Still, the true reason I enjoyed An Unsuitable Job so much is because I connected with it on several personal levels. Initially, I was drawn in by the fact that much of the action takes place in Cambridge, where I studied for a summer. It was wonderful to be taken back there by James’ prose, particularly when it’s summertime and carefree frolickers are punting their way along the Cam. Many of my happiest dreams involve punting along the Cam and eating strawberries.
I also enjoyed how James shows Cordelia determinedly sticking to the task she has undertaken. Book stores and meadows beckon, but Cordelia grits her teeth and doesn’t shirk her responsibilities. She spends much of the book pestering those who knew Mark for information about him, and I have a feeling I’m going to be thinking about her quite a bit in the next few weeks for inspiration. In short, Cordelia’s gutsy refusal to back down is an excellent lesson in how to “network.”
Finally, there is the slow connection that Cordelia feels herself forming with the deceased himself. In many ways, it’s Mark who supports her most throughout her troubles, and in some manner Cordelia begins to see herself as the guardian of his memory. I haven’t talked about it much on a personal level, but those of you who know how I spent the months of November and December will probably understand why I found this to be a particularly touching and intriguing theme throughout the novel.
Yes, novel. To borrow an entirely over-used cliché, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman “transcends” the mystery genre. It’s literate, thrilling, and thoughtful without being pretentious. It was my first foray into the world of P.D. James, but I can safely say that many such similar excursions can be expected in the near future.
posted by Elizabeth at
11:26 PM
0
comments
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Madeleine L'Engle
Title: A Swiftly Tilting Planet
Author: Madeleine L’Engle
In this fateful hour
I call on all Heaven with its power
And the sun with its brightness,
And the snow with its whiteness,
And the fire with all the strength it hath,
And the lightning with its rapid wrath,
And the winds with their swiftness along their path,
And the sea with its deepness
And the rocks with their steepness,
And the earth with its starkness
All these I place
By God’s almighty help and grace
Between myself and the powers of darkness.
The Murry family is gathered in their kitchen for a cozy Thanksgiving dinner when the phone rings unexpectedly. It’s the U.S. President for Mr. Murry, and the unthinkable is on the brink of happening – a South American dictator, Mad Dog Branzillo, has his finger on the trigger of a nuclear weapon. There seems to be little that can stand between him and his goal of worldwide destruction. While the Murrys struggle to digest the news, Meg’s sullen and silent mother-in-law, Mrs. O’Keefe, begins to recite the words to Patrick’s rune (quoted above). Breathless upon finishing, she then looks at Charles Wallace and gives him the incredible charge of using those words to stop Branzillo.
What follows is a quest through time, as Charles Wallace joins forces with a unicorn named Gaudior and travels “Within” several individuals who lived in the near vicinity of the Murry family’s star-watching rock. His goal is to discover and change a “Might-Have-Been,” the moment when, if things had happened differently, nuclear apocalypse could’ve been adverted. He visits prehistoric times, the early colonial years, Civil War America, and the mid-20th century, when he meets a golden, blue-eyed girl who may be closer to him and his sister than one would initially suspect.
A Swiftly Tilting Planet has always been my favorite L’Engle book. I loved the way history was intertwined with the plot, and was inspired enough to do a little research into Prince Madoc and the (legendary?) early Welsh settlement of America. It’s something of a modest little epic, and L’Engle’s writing is more mature and polished than in previous works. At many times, the language approaches the lyricism of poetry. And while the pacing in A Wrinkle in Time and A Wind in the Door sometimes felt rushed, the plot in A Swiftly Tilting Planet moves leisurely enough that the reader is able to sink into the lives of each of the individuals that Charles Wallace travels Within.
But what really impressed me about A Swiftly Tilting Planet during this re-read is how L’Engle approaches the subject of sorrow. The characters Charles Wallace enters all suffer in some way or another, but she handles their pain in a manner that is truly elegant and touching, never melodramatic. And it’s real-life sadness, too, not the kind of flashy emotional torture one finds in lesser works of juvenile fantasy/sci-fi. The relationship between Beezie and Chuck, particularly, tore my heart out this time around. ("When the time is ripe, Chuck will let you know. From the other side of darkness, Chuck will let you know…”) I’d be hard pressed to name so-called “adult” books that handle sorrow in a more respectful and genuine manner.
In conclusion, if you’ve previously read A Wrinkle in Time but never ventured further into L’Engle territory, by all means read this book. You won’t be disappointed. Definitely don’t be like my roommate, with whom I had the following conversation this evening:
Roommate [slurping Coke]: “What are you doing, blondie?”
Me [distracted]: “Er…uh…book reviews. Ever read Madeleine L’Engle?”
Roommate: “Who?”
Me: “El-engle. A Wrinkle in Time. You must’ve read that in school.”
Roommate: “Didn’t she write some book about an elephant?”
Me: “Um…there’s a unicorn. Definitely no elephants, however.”
Roommate: “Whatever, same thing.”
Me: “You should flee before you’re melted by my withering glare.”
Go read.
P.S. - Love the snowflakes.Labels: fantasy, sci-fi
posted by Elizabeth at
11:00 PM
0
comments
A Wind in the Door, Madeleine L'Engle
Title: A Wind in the Door
Author: Madeleine L’Engle
“She stood beside him, looking at the brilliance of the stars. Then came a sound, a sound which was above sound, beyond sound, a violent, silent, electrical report, which made her press her hands in pain against her ears. Across the sky, where the stars were clustered as thickly as in the Milky Way, a crack shivered, slivered, became a line of nothingness.”
About a year has passed since the events of A Wrinkle in Time. Meg Murry’s father has been reunited with his family, and Meg herself is finding school slightly less vile than usual. But not everything is well. An unexplained phenomenon has been discovered in the universe -- a “cosmic scream” heard just before a star vanishes completely, apparently in violation of the law of conservation of mass and energy. Deep inside the human body, mitochondria and the farandolae who live within them are also “screaming,” an occurrence that may be connected to a recent rash of respiratory failure deaths.
And Meg’s little brother, Charles Wallace, is chronically pale and breathless.
The story begins when Charles Wallace informs Meg that “there are dragons in the twins’ vegetable garden.” Meg doesn’t quite know what to make of Charles Wallace’s bizarre statement, but before long she finds herself once again on a quest with paranormal companions, fighting the forces of darkness. The red-haired Calvin O’Keefe comes along, as does the dandruff-inflicted elementary school principal, Mr. Jenkins. But Charles Wallace is missing, because this time it is his life they are fighting for.
While neither as famous as A Wrinkle in Time nor as epic as A Swiftly Tilting Planet, A Wind in the Door remains an excellent read. This is the book that taught me the meaning of the word “fewmets,” and the evil that Meg and the others encounter is genuinely frightening. Like all of L’Engle’s books, Wind is dark and complex, while at the same time remaining refreshingly optimistic concerning the power of laughter and love. The action of the final chapters is rather abstract, but this does nothing to detract from the power of the book’s ultimate conclusion. Yet another story to revisit during a cold and rainy day.Labels: fantasy, sci-fi
posted by Elizabeth at
8:02 PM
0
comments
Monday, January 08, 2007
Actually, they didn't even HAVE a butler.
A Murder is Announced
Agatha Christie
The great old dame of classic mysteries is always highly entertaining, but I think the mystery itself isn't even that big a deal. I'm always a bigger fan of the mysteries you can solve based solely upon the clues dropped in the book, and many of the characters work at it in this story. Unfortunately, it does lead to one of the characters becoming a secondary victim.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
In the local gazette, an ad is placed announcing that a murder will occur at 6:30 that night at Little Paddocks (isn't it great when houses have names? Especially when they're not particularly ostentatious houses like Monticello? I grew up in a tiny ranch house called Orchard Hill, and that was after most of the orchard was gone.). All the neighbors notice, and become very excited about it, and say wonderfully inane things like, "oh, I DO so love a murder!! Do you think Henchy will be there? I hope I'm not the victim!" mainly because they think it's one of those delightful murder mystery parties.
Oh, but then somebody dies, and somebody else is superficially wounded, and panic sets in. It's awesome. And Miss Marple doesn't even show up until chapter 5 or so, and happily sets about asking questions that cops can't ask, then giving the cops the answers. It was a little disappointing because unless you were a contemporary of Christie, you don't stand much chance of solving the murder yourself (ok, there were three murders and one more attempted by the end of the book, but still). Even then, she and the cops share information that isn't divulged to the reader. Cheap shot, if you ask me.
You still gotta love this book. She has a very odd wry humor which often manifests by ridiculing unapologetically stupid characters or their country ways or their city helplessness. The characters themselves are very nearly caricatures, and it's easy to imagine them as over-the-top actors in some cheesy BBC production (I suppose there should be some sad commentary here on how I can't read a book without making a movie in my head, but dammit, the whole POINT of a good book is that you can see it all happening in your head, so I'm letting that slide) rerun on Saturday afternoon PBS.
Anyway--twists, turns, dead bodies all over the place, shady post-WWII egg trades, identity theft, army deserters, secret liaisons, screaming accented "mittel Europeans," rampant xenophobia, fingerpointing, name calling, and a completely random dog. Oh--and don't forget the funny way everyone talks, like the entire chapter full of policemen substituting "pussy" for "woman" in a thoroughly non-derogatory manner.
You can't help but laugh!Labels: mystery/detective, series
posted by reyn at
2:27 PM
2
comments
Sunday, January 07, 2007
A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L'Engle
Title: A Wrinkle in Time
Author: Madeleine L’Engle
"To put it into Euclid or old fashioned plane geometry, a straight line is not the shortest distance between two points."
On a dark and stormy night, Meg Murry flees her attic bedroom to take refuge in her family’s kitchen. Her genius baby brother, Charles Wallace, sits there waiting for her. Soon joined by their scientist mother, the three are cozily sipping cocoa and eating liverwurst when an unexpected knock comes at the door. Enter Mrs Whatsit, a wild old lady wrapped in layers of clothes. The storm has blown her off-course, she explains cheerfully, before turning to Mrs. Murry and calmly saying, “By the way, my dear, there is such a thing as a tesseract.”
A tesseract, as one character later explains, is a way of “wrinkling” time and space so that one can travel faster than the speed of light. Before long, Meg, Charles Wallace, and their friend Calvin O’Keefe are whisked away by Mrs Whatsit and her two equally mysterious companions – Mrs Who and Mrs Which – on a quest to find the Murry’s physicist father, who disappeared a year ago while performing classified research for the government. The quest takes the children on a wild journey throughout the stars, and they learn that there is much more at stake than they initially suspected. An ancient evil is at work throughout Creation, an evil that – if not resisted – threatens to destroy all existence.
A Wrinkle in Time is a favorite childhood book of mine. I’ve always liked the prickly Meg, as she struggles to deal with both adolescence and the gossip about her family. And the lanky, red-haired Calvin was one of my many literary crushes. Charles Wallace is mysterious as a preternatural child genius, and Mrs Whatsit and her friends are lovable as only supernatural beings playing at being batty old ladies can be.
I revisited A Wrinkle in Time over Christmas in an effort to capture the old holiday spirit. My mom always gave me classic fantasies as a girl, so for me Christmas always means shining new books, adventures in unexplored worlds, and staying up late so that I could breathlessly finish those last amazing pages. And as always, A Wrinkle in Time worked its magic, as I read it curled up on my parents' couch Christmas day, sipping hot chocolate. I find the book as wonderful now as I did when a girl. Not even the pervasive Christian content troubles me, probably because L’Engle’s particular brand of Christianity is a liberal one that embraces joy – and not damnation.
In fact, it is L’Engle’s emphasis on the importance of joy that I find most enchanting. Even when circumstances are their most dire in A Wrinkle of Time, hope remains. Despair is the true enemy that the children and the three Mrs Ws are fighting, and as long as there is laughter somewhere in the universe, darkness will never triumph.
Read it (again).Labels: fantasy, sci-fi
posted by Elizabeth at
10:10 PM
1
comments
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Morality is for sissies
Mark Twain's Book For Bad Boys and Girls
Edited by R. Kent Rasmussen
I found this in an otherwise innocuous personal library while house- and dog-sitting for a friend's family. They went to Puerto Rico, I ate all their leftovers. All I would need to do to earn Samuel Langhorne Clemens' approval is cause irreparable damage to their home and get them to pay me for the favor.
Rasmussen (hereafter Razzie) has collected a short stack of writings culled fom Twain's extensive career. Some are full and unedited short essays and speeches, some are excepts from longer works, including his unpublished half-million-word autobiography. It seems that of all the subjects upon which he wrote, his favorite was himself. There's no telling how much of it is true, but many of the stories of his own life found their way into his fiction as well. Even some of the selections in this book are repeats of others, one telling the autobiographical side, the next how Tom Sawyer did it.
Remember--this is the work of Mark Twain, trimmed down and distilled to the finest of his advice to America's youth, and riddled with tidbits like "It is better to take what doesn't belong to you than to let it lie around neglected," and "you should never do anything wicked and then lay it on your brother, when it is just as convenient to lay it on some other boy."
It's not a morality guide so much as advice on how to enjoy misbehavior as much as possible, tongue-in-cheek mockery of real morality guides such as those to which he was subjected in Sunday school, and reminiscences of what he got away with doing--laced with recounts of what happened when he was fingered. Good stuff, full of his dry wit. And it kept me busy for a couple hours while it rained.Labels: essays, humor
posted by reyn at
2:05 PM
2
comments
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Got a problem? Mullet over.
There's a backstory to why I got this book for Christmas, but all we really need to know is that when I was still living with Dad, I was frequently called upon to save the day by my aunt. Her pump would crap out on her, or the lawnmower wouldn't start, or (on more than one occasion, believe it or not) one of her cats would get lost in the heating ducts and I'd go over there and solve the problem. So she thought it might be useful fo rme to have a book like
What Would MacGyver Do?
Brendan Vaughan
Vaughan set up a website and posted ads in several magazines asking people for real-life "MacGyverisms," where they had improvised their way to a unique and creative solution to whatever problem they had been facing. Cool idea, and there are some great stories, but as even Vaughan notes, there are some great MacGyverisms in bad stories, and some lame MacGyverisms in great stories. Though he claims to have weeded out a lot of both of these, as well as some lame MacGyverisms in bad stories, it seems like a lot still slipped through the cracks on him.
Not that the book isn't entertaining--I even laughed out loud a couple times, and for somebody who was reading a good portion of this over the weekend while curled into a ball and tensing up to ward off the cold frosting the inside of his apartment, that's a pretty strong statement. But there were entire chapters where the MacGyvering of a situation (I'm going to try to use that name in as many parts of speech as possible by the end of this review) was nothing more than saying something clever at the right time. And a couple stories involved people who were obviously doing WAY too much work in their "clever solution," like the guys who tag-teamed sucking water through a garden hose to siphon it out of a pool. Guys, listen--the hose just needs to be full of water, ok? Throw it in the damn pool!! Get all the air out under water, bend one end of it to hold the water in, then move that end downhill. It might--might--be a more elegant solution than trading spit on the end of a strange garden hose you found laying in the dirt at this rented house. I'm just sayin'. And with all the stories posted by pseudonyms, you'd think the guys smuggling cannabis in from Amsterdam would be among them, but no--proving that being clever is not a permanent state.Labels: compilation, essays, non-fiction
posted by reyn at
7:27 AM
2
comments
|
|
