seawasp | Reading

Kate R and I have boarded the big silver bird to travel to South America and Antarctica, the first stop being Santiago de Chile. The flight was twelve hours, and due to the peculiarities of time zones, we arrived two hours before we left. Our stay was in the CBD, NH Collection Plaza, quite upmarket with nice features and next to the World Trade Centre. The afternoon arrival provided the opportunity for a walk through the local "Parque de las Esculturas", then a hike up the famous Cerro San Cristóbal parkland to catch the sunset and return - a round trip of about five hours. It was sufficiently impressive that we returned the following day and took the ascent via teleferico (with the oversized statue of Mary that looks over the city) and descended by funicular to viist the nearby "Casa Museo La Chascona", home of the Nobel Prize winning poet, politician, and diplomat, Pablo Neruda, a person who was certainly not without significant flaws as well as greateness.

This would be the start of en epic walking trip through Santiago that would be measured at 45km for the day (yes really), which would include a visit to the beautiful Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, the Catedral Metropolitana with it's overwhelming baroque features, past the ridiculous over-sized flag at the Palacio de La Moneda, then to the Museo de la Solidaridad Salvador Allende and, on return, to the remarkable collection in the El Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino and the "Horizonte Antártico" exhibit at La Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional. El Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos, which was high on the agenda, was unfortunately closed for renovations.

Whilst far from the most visually spectacular part of the trip, the Salvador Allende museum was definitely the most emotionally significant location for me. The Allende events were utterly critical in the formation of my own political opinions when I became aware of them in my early teens. Helped by the film, "Missing", I became a voracious reader of the history. For those who don't know, the summary is that a socialist president was elected supported by a left-wing alliance and implemented a programme of nationalisation of resource industries, land redistribution, significant health and education welfare improvements, and the remarkable economic and logistics computer system, Project Cybersyn. Allende was dedicated to the idea that socialism could be achieved through parliamentary democracy; but ultimately the military disagreed (unsurprisingly supported by the United States) disagreed. A coup and the installation of the Pinochet regime resulted in years of torture and deaths of thousands of democratic activists. The Allende events is tragic and utopian, providing insights on the nature of the capitalist State, and has a lasting impact on history.

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: Lima
Current Music: Hawkwind, Space Ritual

pedanther

. The Rep Club's first production for 2026 will be a season of short plays. I have been cast in How to Survive Being in a Shakespeare Play (Director: "You're going to audition for my Shakespeare play, right?" Me: "Well, obviously"). Rehearsals begin early in the new year, with performances in March.

. The audition was on the same evening as board game club, so I arrived late and missed out on a spot in the big game. It worked out okay, though, because I got an opportunity to introduce some people to my multi-game kits, The Lady and the Tiger and Jabberwocky, and to try a game from each that I hadn't play before.

From The Lady and the Tiger, we played "Favor", in which each player bids to acquire cards that will score them bonus points and avoid cards that will deduct points (each player has a secret goal card dictating which cards have which scores for them). Each player starts the round with a limited amount of bidding tokens, so part of the strategy is making sure you don't wind up with no tokens when you really need them while trying to manipulate your opponents into spending tokens they can't afford.

From Jabberwocky, we played "Mimsy", which involves moving tokens around a circular race track according to a set of rules that we didn't entirely grasp until nearly the end of the game. It was fun, and if it hadn't been time to pack up I would have suggested we play it again now that we knew what we were doing.

. Having now read the first three of Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey & Maturin novels, I find myself back where I was when I'd only read one: they're fine, but I feel no urge to read any more of them.

. This week's episode of "The Daleks' Master Plan" was one of the rare episodes that survives in full. It's the one with the invisible monsters, ironically (but perhaps for the best, because I don't know how easy that part would have been to follow without surviving visuals). It also means we get to see Jean Marsh's acting in the scene about her brother's death.

. The recent TV series adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo is now available on SBS, and I have watched the first couple of episodes. I regret to say that I'm not greatly impressed so far, and on at least one occasion was moved to tell it so out loud.

. Around the World in Eighty Emails continues. Fogg and his companions have just set out from New York on the Atlantic crossing.

pedanther

#36: If the previous book had an odd number of chapters, read a book with an even number of chapters, or vice versa.

I Am Not Spock by Leonard Nimoy (also the November random book pick). ( Read more... )

#37: Read a book that was added to your TBR more recently than the previous book.

I had the opportunity to do something funny here, ( but it wouldn't have been fun )

So instead I read Watson Is Not an Idiot: An Opinionated Tour of the Sherlock Holmes Canon by Eddy Webb. ( Read more... )

#39: Read a book with a lower StoryGraph rating than the previous book.

A Bid for Fortune; or, Dr Nikola's Vendetta by Guy Boothby. Read for historical interest: the diabolical Dr Nikola is one of the earliest examples of a mad scientist criminal mastermind with a world-spanning organisation and a back-up plan for every occasion and a cat that sits on his lap while he ponders his evil schemes. Also, the author's an Aussie, and parts of it are set in Australia. ( Read more... )

james_davis_nicoll

I am not aware of any big name authors who got their start with a work published by Baen Books after 2006. If there are recent analogs of Bujold or Weber, I do not know of them.

neonvincent

Crazy Eddie's Motie News earned 97,885 page views and 12 comments on 30 posts during the 30 days of November 2025.

( Most read, commented on, liked, and shared posts during November 2025 behind the cut. )

Current Mood: busy
Current Location: House in the woods at the edge of town
Current Music: Dinomite Twins Twitch Stream

james_davis_nicoll

So, I asked on Bluesky:

Aside from Larry Correia, are there any big name Baen authors who debuted at Baen, after Jim Baen's death?

(So, Tim Powers wouldn't count because he debuted not at Baen and also long before JB died)

I got three names: Chuck Gannon, Jason Cordova and Mike Kupari. Gannon actually debuted at Baen in 1994 but only two (I think) short pieces, after which there was a long delay until his novels began appearing. I don't know the other two but SF is huge and it's perfectly possible for me to overlook BNAs. Still, granting all three, with LC that makes four... and in 2028, Toni Weisskopf will have been running Baen for as long as Jim Baen did.

This could, of course, be the natural consequence of the Del Monte approach.

[added later]

neonvincent

This was informative, but I found it too mechanical and backwards looking for Gingerbread houses at Disney World and Disneyland for Gingerbread House Day 2025.

Watch on YouTube

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: House in the woods at the edge of town
Current Music: Guild Wars 2

james_davis_nicoll

I got much better at spelling his name once I realized it contains "lie".

Embattled CPC leader's Christmas card list gets one name shorter.

james_davis_nicoll

Where to start reading — or rereading — Varley's many series and stories.

Looking Back at the Work of John Varley, 1947-2025

james_davis_nicoll

The visitors might be Bird Island's salvation or simply the next step in its doom.

The Wayfinder by Adam Johnson

elainegrey

This week in review

Monday night delivered cookies to Dad, bringing Carrie Dog with us, and we had a nice short visit. He has too many things beeping that he cannot hear, and will not replace filters in his fridge, and Christine is concerned about all the cables squeezed in between fridge and wall. Do not unplug your hearing aid charger to see if it stops the beeping you cannot hear, Dad.

Again noting to self, promise me you will regularly wear any hearing aid you need.

The car with new tires and repairs was rear-ended on Tuesday when we were taking cookies to my sister. We are both fine and healthy. Good thing we didn't bring Carrie, Christine noted, as the waiting by the road stretched on and on. Sister came, and we sat in her car during much of the waiting and had a good visit. Most humorous was the Highway Patrol listening to us respond to "what happened", then, "Let me interrupt, you were rear ended, right". Me: "Oh, you wanted the short story."

Our insurance company encouraged us to file directly with the at fault party's insurance. Nope. I believe Christine underscored that it would be more efficient for them if we did that, but not us. We take the car to dealership today. I suppose it's a gamble because the repairs may be more expensive there and that could tip to totaling it? But they will have parts.

Once a long time ago, Christine's first motorcycle was knocked over in San Francisco, breaking the mirror and scratching the paint. Her insurance was going after the at fault party with a vengeance, so the vintage paint repair and original mirror replacement cost totaled the bike-- and she ended up with a much fancier, powerful bike afterwards. (Can't remember what replaced the Honda.) I assume you only get a win like that once.

Wednesday i had my hair done, advised that it was time to reverse all the accumulated highlights and add back my natural color. Because i like the pink she has been using, i think she added way more pink than she had been, but that makes up for the "cool medium brown." Apparently my hair now has more dimensionality. I could not really explain why i get it done, but the pink is fun. I do wait about four months between visits.

Bruno has come out on his own in the morning and sometimes later in the day, racing out of the room and in the evening making like a bolt for under the couch. He knows in the morning that he's got the place to himself. I think he races just in case Marlowe is waiting to ambush him around the corner. We've had some success sedating her with the gabapentin but i can't bear to keep her that way. She is a feisty miss. I'll leave her food alone today, work a half day with Bruno, then this afternoon Bruno will sleep. Tomorrow i'll sedate Marlowe so it will be easier to have Bruno out during the day sharing space.

leecetheartist

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Current Mood: sore

allezhop

It occurred to me a few days ago that my aunt will probably be traveling with a cane, and when I looked up whether that could be a problem (it's not), I realized that a wheelchair might be a necessity at the transfer airport. Charlotte is a big airport (compared to the one we depart from): not L.A. big, but the gates can be pretty far from each other.

There’s no reason not to request a wheelchair or at least a shuttle between gates, since it’s free and would drastically reduce the stress and physical exhaustion on our travel day. We are arriving the day before the cruise and staying at a hotel, so I’m hoping Jacksonville airport will be easy enough to navigate to get a rideshare to the hotel. That won’t be a rush, but you never know with connecting flights. (Even with a 2-hour layover both ways, there’s no telling.)

I would call now, but I do feel like I should talk to Aunt K first. She’s a capable adult and I know in her shoes I wouldn’t want people to assume things about my disability. So I’ll chat with her tonight and see what she thinks, and then maybe call Delta (departure) and American (return) tomorrow after work.