Written for an audience of one

FOR LADA
Four months. Dozens of chapter icons. Innumerable character names. And a full 5,994 pages.

Last night, for the first time since last year I didn't have a Wheel of Time book to read before I went to bed. I have finally read the entire series by Robert Jordan (save the last one which he is not writing -- because he is dead). I no longer have to nod happily and tell people "yes, I will get around to those some day" while I silently think "piss off". I started Book Three towards the end of October and finished Book 11 on Wednesday at approximately 1:30 in the am. I had previously read the first two of the series years ago in college and hated them.

So what was the verdict? Why undertake such a mammoth read?

I finally got down to it for 3 reasons:
1) to honor the memory of Mr. Jordan (alias James Rigney) who I had come to admire in the past year
2) I was getting in the mood for a new fantasy series since Tad Williams and George R.R. Martin have been keeping me in a holding pattern
3) I was fucking sick to death of being nagged by family members

I still hold that the first two books sucked balls from what I can remember from them and I did go into the rest of the series with perhaps not a bad attitude, but admittedly a bit of derision and dismissiveness. But even so, I would say that overall I enjoyed them thoroughly and had a good experience. Quite a few times I found myself peeved that I had not prepared in advance so that the next book was on hold at the library when I finished with one. I even bought a paperback of The Shadow Rising in the airport Borders so I didn't have to wait until the next day for the library's copy. I became interested in a lot of the fan chat online and found myself skimming around message boards much to some people's chagrin. I found myself frequenting a particular artist's blog for weekly updates on his incredibly well done character portraits. So all in all, I would say I am a fan, if not a rabid, geeked-out one.

There were some issues of course. Many times I found myself laughing out loud at some rather silly sequences and some things were just too over-the-top, even for the genre. Many of the characterizations and descriptions became rather repetitive. By Book 10 I'm fully aware of the struggle that is seizing saidin. I don't need it described in depth each time. As I understand it, Robert Jordan's wife was/is his editor for the books. I question her objectivity and wonder if she fills this position for other novels. Much of the content could have been drastically cut down and pared to a more concise and fluid narrative. Also the author was quite sloppy at times with his event chronicling; his timeframes seemed to jump a bit up and down the line. However, a lot of my problems with the books were mostly superficial; like I said I enjoyed them and he's clearly made his publisher a very rich man so what do I know?

Maybe eventually I'll try Jordan's other books. I believe he does Revolutionary War fiction; that could be interesting. Probably have to stay away from his Conan stories however. I'm just not too sure how I feel about anybody but Howard writing about that wily Cimmerian. All in all good reads; I'll pat myself on the back for slogging through them all at once. All too happy to be done with them and moving on though. I think I need to cleanse my palate with some nonfiction or horror stories.

A COLLECTION OF OTHER POINTS OF INTEREST

- Is Rand al'Thor the worst protagonist of a major fantasy series? I think so. In the beginning he is the prototypical Luke Skywalker/Frodo Baggins archetype pulled into events bigger than his simple background (LET'S HOPE HE CAN SAVE THE WORLD!!!). He grows a bit, becomes somewhat interesting, but by the end of Book Six he has become incredibly dull and one-note and stays that way for the duration. I found myself dreading seeing that black & white dragon chapter icon. He never surprises the reader; he always reacts just how I expect him to. The series has become less "how will Rand save the world" and morphed into "who will soften Rand's steel heart and make him remember his inner child?" In a series where almost every character, male and female, has to one-up everyone else for the title of "Most Hard", Rand takes the cake. Snooze...I know in the end Rand is going to pull a Harry Potter "dead but not really bait-and-switch", but I would just prefer if he stays dead and his three wives have to "console" each other.

- Biggest flip-flop between two characters: Egwene and Min. Starting out, I really liked Egwene and was interested in her story arc. Could the simply, naive country girl survive the harshness of the world amongst all these guys and safeguard Rand at the same time? Conversely, I hated Min. I saw her as a really lame, shallow tomboy character out to steal Egwene's man with an amazing convenient plot device power. Now Egwene has become the female version of Rand for me. I still typically like her chapters for the politics and powerplays and because I really dig Suian, but I can't like Egwene at all. I can't get past her "I'm a strong woman so I need to be a raging bitch" attitude and her haughty airs. I hope she and Gawyn have a romantic reunion on the battlefield of Tarmon Gai'don; they slow-mo run to each other's arms, make out, and promptly get mowed down by a battalion of Trollocs. Min, I like. She's got sass, she's got spunk, she's got the sexy librarian thing going with her nose always in a book and she makes Rand's chapters easier to stomach. And while the three girls get to "share" Rand, it's been more like Min loaning him out to Elayne and Avi for one hookup each. Rock on Min.

...more to come

By the power of construction paper and pink frilly lace!

Ok, I'm not a big fan of Valentine's Day. It completely double-fucks you by being a forced, commericialized holiday to be endured and passed rather than looked forward to while in perfect synchronicity it makes you feel insecure and devalued if you aren't spending it with someone you have a chance to make out with at the end of the night. I don't even know who St. Valentine is, except that I think he was a martyr who got literally ripped apart by Celts.

Once again, like every year of my sexual maturity, I have no significant other or date today. The closest I've ever come was getting dumped a couple of days before February 14 my freshman year of college. It's typically a good pencil-me-in-depressed date on the calendar. However, this year I have received a Valentine's gift that ranks a close second behind my first eye-opening volume of Lovecraft stories for best V-Day gift ever.

Yesterday I received in the mail from my mother via some dude in Michigan....

...A COMPLETE VINTAGE HE-MAN AND BATTLE CAT!!! Other than a bit of smudge on the face, dude and plastic green tiger are in great shape and come with all the requisite accoutrements. Thinking about taking him to work to set up in my hell-cube. I am also informed that Castle Greyskull is on the way and that my entire childhood He-Man action figure collection will be recreated for me after I stupidly sold them all for 25 cents a pop. What a fucking rad suprise...thanks Mom!

And to add to that, Uncles Steve and George gave me another great present in the finally-released trailer for Indy IV.



I have to say that this may be my most anticipated film this summer with the recent tragedy connected to Dark Knight. Either way though, I'm pumped and looking forward to it. I'm 10 years old again today. Enjoy your chocolates; I've got to get back to geeking out.

Super Ash Wednesday

I was just in the car coming back from the store and I was listening to NPR (when am I not?) and they had these three foreign journalists based in Washington D.C. talking about the current primary season and American political scene and how it was viewed by their readers back home. They were from Germany, France, and Poland.

German guy was great. Question was: "How do your readers back home feel about the possibility of a female President with Hillary Clinton? Does that intrigue them or have special significance to them?"

German Guy: "Vell, not really. Two years ago, vee elected a voman Kanzler and Great Britain did many years ago. Zo...zat does not affect us zat much. Man...voman...makes no difference. She can still be a strong leader, and vee do not expect to see her crying on television every 4 weeks."

Oh...I had a good laugh at that one. Those crazy Germans. Lump in Gov. Schwarzenegger in there as well after his mini-press conference yesterday in Cali about his and Maria's differing political viewpoints. He finished with a joke about how when he took his marriage vows and promised to be with her through sickness and health, her Democratic leaning was her sickness. The guy gives phenomenal lines even when he's not in a Jim Cameron movie. I'm up for amending the Constitution.

But listening to that interview on the radio gave me some perspective. All three of these foreign journalists talked about how no one overseas understands when Americans --voters and candidates both -- talk about how Washington is broken and the political system needs change and a break from corruption and special interests. They went on about how our system is perceived as the "perfect" model of democratic government and how it's been so incredibly stable for some 200 years. They couldn't understand why we seemed to need so much political change and upheaval.

It was just so refreshing and vindicating to hear these intelligent political writers describing our government as so great, so well-oiled, and so transparent to members of the media. I thought about it a minute and considered goverments in places like Italy and Kenya where there have been major issues recently and I just felt really lucky and extremely proud. No one here was running around with machetes and torches when Obama suggested that he may have won more delegates than Billary this morning. And our legislators don't get into fistfights and throw shoes like they do in Italy and Japan when people disagree. At least not anymore...I think.

But I did my civic duty yesterday. I voted for McCain in the Republican primary even though I support Barack for the whole shebang. Unlike Georgia, we in Mass. aren't able to choose which ballot to vote on the day of and I just couldn't bring myself to change my registration to Democrat, even for one election. I figured Mr. McCain would need my vote more anyhow, with Romney not too long removed from the Governor's post here. Needless to say, I wasn't the deciding vote by a long shot. I was also bummed that the Massholes couldn't rally for a win for Obama. That kind of surprised me; I figured the Kennedy/Obama lovefest would have helped swing it to him but I suppose I overestimated the influence of two of America's suckiest senators.

I was feeling a bit glum after last night and when I woke up this morning and saw California results in Hillary's favor, but after many hours of work listening to political analysis and really devouring the numbers I have regained confidence and feel good about the chances of YES WE CAN. But just in case, I said a little prayer to Jesus in Mass this morning to help me reject sin and to help America reject Hillary during this Lenten season. So we should be covered there.