The Book of Daniel Vol. 2

New year, new me.  Maybe.  Sorta.  Not so much.

I can say that out of all the years I've lived through, 2024 was certainly one of them.  Can't say I'm optimistic about the new one either.

Anyway.  I'm hoping that in the coming year I'll use this site a little more, at least for more than just the occasional Friday Five post.

In the next day or two I'll put up my 2024 reading list, in which I nearly doubled my goal.  So there's that to look forward to at least.

Carry on. 

Haven't done one of these - or used this journal at all - in awhile.  I'll try to do a regular entry soon.

1. Do you believe that music can have a direct effect on your life?
I'll say yes, of course, although I'm having trouble thinking of a specific example and a specific way it affected me.  Plenty of cases where a song becomes associated with a specific event, place or time though.

2. What is your current favorite song?
I don't really have a single current favorite song.  But I have been playing Sea of Stars and the boss theme ("Encounter Elite!") has been creeping into my head a lot.

3. What's the one song from junior high that you can still rattle off all the words to? 
I used to be able to do all of Blues Traveler's "Hook," including all of that almost rap-like third verse, and in a pinch I probably still could.  I mean, there's probably more than a few, really.

4. Did you have a prom song? Don't be embarrassed, we all did it.
"Nothing Else Matters" by Metallica.

5. Do you and your significant other have a "song" that you share?
No S/O currently, and I didn't really have an official "our song" with the last one.  Maybe that was part of the problem.  

If I were in a situation to have an "our song" and I got to pick, Strawbs' "Grace Darling" (probably the acoustic Cousins/Willoughby duo version specifically) would be my top pick, with alternates including the Penguin's "Earth Angel," Steve Winwood's "Higher Love" and Belinda Carlisle's "Heaven is a Place on Earth."  Or maybe - heh - Michael Bolton's "Can I Touch You... There?"

1) What are your five favorite birds?
Crows are cool, what with their intelligence and all.  Penguins for the flightless category.  I guess owls and woodpeckers for the interesting noises.  Ducks.  And honorable mention for chickens; not to eat but for their entertainment value (probably my favorite interview clip of Werner Herzog is this one of him talking about chickens).

2) What are your five favorite pet-type animals?
Based on pets I've had: cats for the standard #1 - have had three total over the years (two currently).  At various points in my youth I also had goldfish and hamsters.  I haven't had them, but for the other two slots ferrets and guinea pigs (or capybaras!).

3) What are your five favorite wild animals that live in your locale?
Chipmunks - two years ago I had a chipmunk family living under my front walk.  Eventually all but one (the mother?) left the hole, but the one that stayed behind I was able to eventually get to eat peanuts out of my hand.  I saw her(?) briefly last spring but then she disappeared.  I miss her.  Anyway, for the rest I also love watching the squirrels.  Foxes, deer (as long as they aren't in the road) and beavers.

4) What are your five favorite zoo animals that you always want to visit?
Assuming it's an ethical zoo, I don't think I would really pick favorites.  They're all interesting.

5) What are your five favorite cryptids that may or may not be extinct, may or may not exist in this world?
The yeti (and his North American cousin, the sasquatch).  Fresno Nightcrawlers for my dark-horse pick (who wouldn't love a giant walking pair of pants?).  The jackalope (unless it's still voiced by Dave Coulier).  And a few of my local New York boys: Champ (the Lake Champlain version of Nessie) and the NYC sewer alligators.

I decided to try another writing contest, after not getting through round 1 of the last one but getting some decent (and a little not-so-decent) feedback on the 250-word microfiction challenge.  This time it was another through NYC Midnight, the 100-word challenge.  

Having such a small word limit is definitely an interesting challenge, especially for somebody just testing the waters of fiction writing.  It really makes you think about what words are really necessary and how to be economical with what you write.  Some of my favorite types of fiction styles  fall into categories along the lines of realism (dirty and otherwise) and minimalism (Mark Twain, Stephen Crane, Raymond Carver, Breece D'J Pancake, etc.) and it's a style I'd like to try cultivating myself, and I think this kind of thing will be an aid.

I got an odd set of prompts - "fairy tale and/or fantasy" as genre, "patrolling" as action and "under" as word-to-use - but I think I came up with something decent.  We'll see how it does.

1. Have you seen a solar eclipse? Total, Partial, Annular? When and where?
Yes.  I mean, this past Monday's partial.  I saw it from my back porch.

2. Have you seen a lunar eclipse? Full? Partial? When and where?
I'm sure I have, but I don't know any specific dates offhand.

3. Have you seen a comet? Which one? When and where?
Yes, Hale-Bopp in '97.  Seen from home.

4. Have you seen a nova or supernova? When and where?
I don't think so.

5. Have you seen a meteor shower? Which one, when and where?
Leonids, whenever they happen.

1. What is your native language?
'Murican English

2. Do you speak any other languages? Which ones?
I still have enough schoolboy Spanish left that while I can't do direct translations, and I dare not try to actually speak it, I can usually at least get the gist of it in written form.  

3. How difficult is it for you to learn or understand new languages?
In high school it was actually pretty easy; I actually skipped a year of Spanish (I went from Conversational to Spanish 2, doing Spanish 1 as worksheets over the summer).  In college, though, I did a semester of French and really struggled with it, so I think I lost most of my language absorption ability by that point.  I do at least still remember one French phrase from the old Muzzy commercial: "Je suis le jeune fille!"

4. If you were going to study a new foreign language, which would you want to learn?
French, Italian and/or German to supplement my art history, or Japanese so I can play Japanese games that never got English translations, and .  Not necessarily in that order.

5. How are you at reading subtitles in foreign films?
Er, perfectly fine.  That doesn't really seem like a particularly difficult skill.  I do certainly prefer subtitles to dubbing, if that's what the question is getting at.

1) What's normal March weather like in your area?
Variable.  In general, can be anything from high 70s to blizzards.

2) Are you following any spring sports?
Just my rasslin', but that's not seasonal.  (I mean, I guess spring is one of the bigger times of year for it with so many promotions running on or around WrestleMania Weekend and all.)

3) What's a summer wardrobe staple you haven't had out since last season (or if you're southern hemisphere, answer this for winter)
I'm not into fashion enough to really have seasonal wardrobes, but I do have a relatively new mesh porkpie hat that I'll probably wear more in the spring/summer.

4) What's your favorite spring break memory?
I don't remember if it was specifically on spring break - although it probably was - but one of my most memorable family vacations (early '90s, probably) was to Philadelphia.  We did a lot of the standard historical stuff - Independence Hall, Freedom Trail, Liberty Bell, etc. - but the "main event" so to speak was the Three Stooges convention.

5) How do you feel about daylight savings time?
If I had my druthers, they'd just stick with it year-round.  Either way the time change needs to go, but savings time matches my natural sleep pattern better.

I had my taxes done today and had a very positive result, which even included some good news for next year's taxes.

Also went up to my mom's for the first time in a few weeks.  In my old bedroom there I found some comic books I'd been looking for for awhile.  Nothing too earth shattering - a few early Magic: The Gathering comics, the four-issue Roadways series, a Reddy Kilowatt comic from 1963, and a few other miscellaneous ones.  I've never been a huge comics guy (I'm more into graphic novels now than I ever was in the past), but it's nice to have them back.

Also made some more progress in FF1.  Completed the Ice Cave and got my class change, then went to Gaia and Onrac and completed the Sea Shrine as well, which means three of my four crystals are lit now.  Characters up to level 21.  I think I'm getting fairly close to the end now, as I recall, and I'll play some more tomorrow, so I should be able to complete the game on my next "weekend" (if not before).

As days off go, a pretty solid one.  Off to watch a Seinfeld before bed.

1. What's a skill you'd like to learn?
Right now, I want to master using a pizza peel, so when it gets warmer I can use an outdoor wood oven.  Just can't seem to get the hang of it for some reason.

2. What's a hobby you'd like to try?
I dunno.  As I think I've mentioned before in this journal, I would like to get back into fencing sometime, and at my age it would probably be more as a hobby than anything else.

3. What's the best compliment you've ever received?
I'd have to say that some of the positive comments I've gotten from class observations from my department chairs while teaching have been some of the most gratifying.

4. What's one way in which you are awesome?
I mean, come on, how can I limit it to just *one* way.  After all, am I not an idol to millions?  Inspiration to children everywhere?  The man with the rear that makes the girls cheer?  All this and modest, too.

5. What's a gift you would like to receive (in case anyone asks)?
As I've gotten older I've become less and less into receiving gifts.  I think I'm more at a point where any material item I want, I'd rather just buy myself.  So, if you want to get me something, cash is fine. 

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
I should probably have turned in my nerd card years ago, as I've never actually read the Lord of the Rings trilogy.  Or even seen the movies.  I'm planning to go through those books via the Robert Inglis audiobook series, and although I *did* read The Hobbit in maybe third grade, I remembered exactly none of it (so I'm not really counting it as a "previously read"), and figured I should go through that first.  It's funny how some aspects come through as somewhat formulaic or cliched today, when in many ways this book was the wellspring of just about all modern fantasy stories (whether in written, screen or game form).  You can't really criticize something for reflecting trends that it *created,* right?  I'm on to the first few chapters of Fellowship now, and I have to say that I do find it a bit more interesting than The Hobbit - there is, so far, a bit more emphasis on character development in addition to plot, and I think Tolkien's writing - though by no means bad in Hobbit - improved quite a bit by the time he started the trilogy proper.  As a side note, Inglis' performance of the audio version is a gem.

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Yeah, that's a big one.  Humbert is absolutely one of the least likeable "protagonists" I've encountered in a book, and that's not a criticism since that's exactly the point.  Every time he mentioned how "handsome" he is I just wanted to punch him.  But, the writing really is pretty superb here, allowing us to see the mental gymnastics this guy will go through to justify and even celebrate his actions.  The line where he offhandedly mentions Dolores "crying every night" was a sobering glimpse of reality slipping past his BS.  I wouldn't exactly call it a pleasant read, but it was an interesting one.

Welcome to Night Vale by Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor
This is tied-in to the well-known podcast of the same name, and captured a lot of what makes the podcast good in an extended written form.  The weirdness is on point, and the quality of the writing is excellent.  The biggest criticism I can think of is that of the two lead characters, perpetually-19-year-old pawn shop proprietor Jackie seems a bit more roundly developed than recently-fired-mother-of-a-shapeshifter Diane (or shapeshifter son Josh), and I almost wonder if splitting them off into two separate stories might have allowed both - Diane in particular - to get a bit more depth added.  That's ultimately a rather mild criticism, though, and I'll definitely read the next two Night Vale novels at some point.  

The Moonshine War by Elmore Leonard
A quick read involving a feud over premium moonshine whiskey during the Prohibition era.  The main emphasis is on action rather than character development, and that's fine for a novel of less than 200 pages.  Frank Long, who begins the story as a Prohibition agent trying to take the whiskey - but perhaps more for his own benefit than the governments - is probably the most interesting character, as his arc takes him from ostensibly working for the law, to bringing in a group of criminals to try to aid him, then turning against them (when it becomes clear they're going to turn on him) and joining main character Son Martin in defense of his product and his home.  Martin himself is a bit wooden, and the story begins with a boy who pops up a few times during the plot as sort of an observer figure, but really doesn't need to be in the story at all for it to work.  A decent quick read nonetheless.

Here is New York by E.B. White
A thin volume in which White discusses the character of New York City in the late 1940s, admitting up front that even by the time the book was first published aspects of it would likely already be outdated as the city is in a constant state of flux.  It's a neat little slice of life for that era, though, and the final pages in which White talks about the ever-present danger NYC is in due to the constant air traffic over the city - no doubt taken from the then-recent crash of a B-25 into the Empire State Building - seems rather eerily prophetic in a post-9/11 New York.

Cell 2455, Death Row: A Condemned Man's Own Story by Caryl Chessman
A memoir and one of several books by Caryl Chessman, who was convicted as the "Red Light Bandit" and ultimately went to California's gas chamber in 1960.  He recounts the series of events in his formative years that turned him into a criminal (though he maintains his innocence for the Red Light crimes, he fully admits to his criminal past prior to that), and asks difficult questions about the society that creates criminals like him, and about the punishment thereof, up to and including the death penalty.  It's a thought-provoking read, and the prose is legitimately very good - Chessman had actual talent as a writer - and it's somewhat haunting to consider that it was written by somebody who was actually slated for execution in his near future.  On that last point, I'm somewhat reminded of the self-portrait of John Andre, drawn on the eve of his own excecution.

Ten from Infinity by Ivar Jorgensen (Paul W. Fairman)
A short pulp novel from the '60s.  The premise is interesting - ten men, identical in every way, mysteriously appear around the country.  In execution, it's very much an average book.  The writing is OK, the plot is OK, the execution is mostly OK - but it's nothing that will stick in your mind for long after it's over.  In many ways I guess it's exactly what you'd expect from a pulp novel like this.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin - Lost Years by Kevin Eastman & Tom Waltz
The first Last Ronin book (compilation book, that is, or first comic series if you prefer) has received a lot of hype, but I think that's generally deserved; it was certainly a different side of the TMNT franchise as it went even darker and grittier than the Mirage comic series, let alone the friendlier takes like the '87 cartoon, the Archie comics or the live-action movies, and had a lot of surprisingly emotional moments, especially if you have any attachment to certain characters.  Lost Years is pretty much more of the same, in a good way.  It's a combination prequel/sidequel/sequel that fleshes out the original Last Ronin a bit, and goes a long way to setting up the next generation of turtles that it looks like will be further developed into a series of their own.  Lost Years is basically to The Last Ronin what the El Camino movie was to Breaking Bad - not at all essential to enjoying the original series, but it's well-done and nice to have around.

The Box: An Oral History of Television, 1920-1961 by Jeff Kisseloff
This was a project to get through.  That's not a shot against it; it's such an interesting topic, and the insights from people who were there in TV's early days are invaluable.  But at 600+ pages it was definitely an on-and-off reading process for months (since mid-2023) to get through.  I admit that there were a few sections that I did skim a bit (especially once it got into the mid-50s, since I've read more about that era already).  But definitely interesting stuff and a book that will find a permanent home on my entertainment history shelf.

Fish Men Fear… SHARK! by Jerry & Idaz Greenberg
I bought this two or so years ago off the used rack at a local cafe.  I mainly wanted it for the title.  I mean, as scary as sharks may be, the fish men surely have greater concerns nowadays, right?  Of course, it's really meant to suggest that the sharks are fish that men fear, but I do find the awkward phraseology amusing.  Anyway, it's just a little 50-page book about sharks from the '60s, mostly made up of photos accompanied by some rather basic text.  Nothing earth-shattering, and I'd imagine that at least some of the science has been revised since it was written, but it's reasonably interesting with some decent images.