Truly awesome crop art

 The Bride With The White Hair Lives 

American Psycho

I'm excited 'cos I got ahold of American Psycho y Bret Easton Ellis.  I read this as a teen, because it was sitting around, but did not realize what a great satire it was 'til the movie by Mary Harron and Guin Turner.  The lesbian version has depth.  Now I want to see what the original has to offer...

I'm still trying to finish Absolution Gap. It's long.  But it has moments of absolute brilliance.  And I like the gentically enhanced pig, Scorpio.  The baddies are pretty cool too.

I'm listening to the first LeCarre Smiley book on the commute.  I got hooked on audiobooks while sick and unable to hold my head up, much less hold and stare at a book for hours.  The Scottish accent of the last one was awesome, and the guy reading LeCarre's pretty good so far.  I like when they're not too slow.  I read fast...  The LeCarre starts rather slow, but the curious mystery about a guy's death is developing, with interesting character descriptions.  The telling detail...

Garage bands

Went to see a friend's band, Element 113 (Yes, they're geeks), at Geezerfest, a benefit for prostate cancer.  Lee's Liquor Lounge is a stylin' dive, and the bands sounded good, if too loud.  My rule of thumb for live shows in a small venue: turn it up to where you, the band, with your earplugs and rock n' roll vanity, think it's good, then turn it down a notch.  Or two.

State fair this week, debating my interest level.  Swine flu brews in the pig barn, but Dawes is playing the Leinie's Lodge or Soundstage or whatever.  Have to see what's on a stick...

Getting some writing done.  Slowly.

Bass

I have started reading the local fishing forecast, to find out if my nearby lake is swimmable.  So I can aqua-run.  Like aqualung but less skeevy...

Apparently it's prime bass season.  They like to freeze their little tushies off, I guess.  Mid-August and 48 at night...

You can deduce my mental state

From the fact that I am taking notes on After Liberalism, by intellectual heavy Immanuel Wallerstein, while listening to Absolution Gap by Alistair Reynolds and really actually contemplating the narrative structure of this thing I've been trying to write.  I voted.  I worked 9 hours too.  I did something productive today.  Now it's time for attention deficit to work its magic...

The Closing Ceremony

Watching now.  Wow. 

It may mean that steampunk and scifi have jumped the shark, to be so thoroughly... I'm not even sure what.  But it's actually quite interesting as a statement of "here's where we are and where we're headed." 

As a display for all the former colonies, it's...  something.  Especially the slave ship with Annie Lennox as pirate queen.

Are we that old that it was time for a Spice Girls reunion?  Wow.  Kudos to the planners for finding someone who could really pull off "Walrus" without being precious.

The men's marathon was pretty cool this a.m.  I was hoping for a surprise winner, and Uganda upsetting Kenya with only one American even finishing was definitely that.  Great smile as he cruised towards the finish.  The women's 4x400 relay with a serious new record after past fiascos while the Bahamas took the men's relay, Usain doing his thing like it's easy, the 17 y.o. bringing home gold in the first women's boxing while the U.S. men did not, and Rudisha winning the 800m with a world record were all great viewing...

It almost makes me wish I could run...

Keeping up

In a story I wrote for a Loft class seven or eight years ago, this, er, empty lot played a key role, in 2020 .  Didn't foresee the condoization of that industrial part of downtown by the highway...

The mural overlooks the parking lot by the Loft, our writing center.  And the Metrodome.  Pretty cool.

Absolutin Gap

Quote of the day: "Joan of Arc was just a girl.  Look at the bloody mess she left."

Listening to the audio book for Absolution Gap, part four of Alistair Reynold's big saga.  Chewy far future true-to-science extrapolation with a huge cast of ornery characters.  Very satisfying, and the reader handles the complexity well.

Anatomy lessons

After recovering from food poisoning, I scheduled an appointment with an ART (Active Release Technique) practitioner.  It's weird and painful, moving and pushing range of motion through activated pressure points, but it felt good at the same time.  Since then, I've been sore but feeling like the muscles are less tight.

The appointment was interesting, because I got to feel exactly where each muscle was and how they work together.  Instead of the piriformis, which was not happy, it seems I strained the hamstring right where they connect up to the trunk.  And connected back muscles, causing sciatica.  A big mess, basically.

Waiting to see if the soreness subsides.  However, this is the first week I've been off ibuprofen and not icing as much.  Running in the water at Lake Nokomis has felt good at the time and after.  So there's finally a little light in the tunnel... 

If the lake didn't freeze over by November, I'd just stick to water running... But the winter thing has not completely abated.  We just get no x-country skiing snow...  Making cross training that much more difficult.  Gonna have to hope rehab is not too heinous.

"I got up at seven, just to watch her win"

A great contest, with some real changes of fortune.  I bet that this was Kenya's year, but, no, the GF won- Ethiopia for the gold.  Russia for the bronze.  And Gelana set a new record:

"Surging into the lead in the last mile and a half and running the second half of the race more than three minutes faster than the first, Tiki Gelana of Ethiopia won the women's Olympic marathon on Sunday in 2 hours 23 minutes 7 seconds, a record for the Summer Games."

Now watching Murray top Federer in men's tennis, another well-fought match. 

The men's volleyball US vs. Russia yesterday was a nailbiter.  The women's and men's track yesterday were close races with some upsets of favorites.  Britain's Mo Farah winning the Men's  10,000m.  Pistorius moving to the semifinals in his event.  And of course, earlier, Gabby Johnson!  There have been a lot of very watchable events.  I love a good Olympics.

Distance running and feminist history

Reading about how Olymic President Jacques Rogge refuses to award the women's marathon gold medal while of course he will for les hommes, and I stumbled on this reminiscence by pioneering gay writer Patricia Nell Warren about pioneering women's marathoning and distance running.

Not surprising, but Wow.  It's good to be reminded what we ladies take for granted now...