linkspam and wednesday reading
This may be worth bookmarking if you are in a CSA and overwhelmed by vegetables.
This may be worth bookmarking if, like me, you're aging and unmarried.
I found this essay by a young Rwandan woman to be amazing: honest, blunt, heart-breaking but not pitiful, and strangely hopeful about human resiliency. Do read it. (Link via MeFi)
Oh, god, if Scott Walker is elected president we're doomed.This is a detailed look at Walker's agenda w/rt labor rights, and the facts behind the assertion that killing unions is better for public budgets. The killer quote, from my pov: [A] President Walker would adopt the views of his fellow Republicans in Washington toward federal workers, which these days can be characterized as "Off with their heads." In the wake of revelations about egregious backlogs for appointments at some Veterans Affairs hospitals-backlogs caused, again, by too few federal employees, in this case primary care doctors-Senator John McCain led a campaign to make it easier to fire poorly performing federal managers, and then pressed to fire them faster. Other Republicans are campaigning to transform the Senior Executive Service into at-will employment, which would allow political officials to fire the most senior careerists without cause. Meanwhile, House Republicans are pushing to substantially downsize the federal workforce, including a plan to allow federal agencies to hire just one new worker for every three who leave. It's easy to see a President Walker aggressively championing this agenda.
In other news, have a really lovely review of the Raksura novels by Martha Wells. Everything Foz says here is true.
If you feel like getting mildly peeved, Kate Elliott started a discussion on Twitter today when she quoted someone anonymously saying, "Outside of YA it's near-impossible to find a female main character in modern adult Fantasy". I look at my bookshelves and my Calibre window, and I just shake my head at how some people can be so willfully ignorant.
This reminds me of my long-delayed compilation of epic fantasy written by women. I should probably dust that off and post it somewhere.
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I stumbled across a new show on the PBS Hulu channel, looks like another British import: The Crimson Field, about a British military field hospital during WWI. I'm a sucker for that sort of thing, so I watched two episodes. I like the cast well enough, and it has some diversity, but I'm disappointed that, unlike Call the Midwife, which involves all sorts of people trying to get by as best they can, this show has decided to create a Bad Guy. And it just so happens that this Bad Guy is the single older woman on the show, so it is kind of disgruntling for me. I may watch a few more, as they come, but (sigh).
***
Current reading: Europe in Autumn by Dave Hutchinson. I don't recall where I found the recommendation for this (possibly in James Nicoll's LJ comments), but I'm really enjoying it. In the not-too-distant future, the EU and Russia have both broken up into dozens of small political entities, and naturally as a result there's a lot of political and economic imbalance. Our hero Rudi, a chef in part of what was once Poland, gets recruited as a courier for sensitive (read: illegal) documents and materials. And that's as far as I've gotten, but the wry voice, vivid characterizations (Fabio, the master-spy, complains incessantly about the excellent food Rudi cooks for him, and rearranges Rudi's furniture every day), and blackly-humorous commentary on politics and ethnicity are really entertaining. I don't know if the narrative itself will hold up, but so far it's quite good.
Just Finished: Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater. I liked it well enough, but I wasn't really onboard with the redemption of Mr. Gray. That felt a lot too easy.
Up next: Really need to get back to Leviathan Wakes. Or Kalpa Imperial. Or Rebecca, for book club.
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Happy long weekend, for those who get one! What will you be reading/watching in your free time?
Crossposted from DW, where there are
comments; comment here or there.
This may be worth bookmarking if, like me, you're aging and unmarried.
I found this essay by a young Rwandan woman to be amazing: honest, blunt, heart-breaking but not pitiful, and strangely hopeful about human resiliency. Do read it. (Link via MeFi)
Oh, god, if Scott Walker is elected president we're doomed.This is a detailed look at Walker's agenda w/rt labor rights, and the facts behind the assertion that killing unions is better for public budgets. The killer quote, from my pov: [A] President Walker would adopt the views of his fellow Republicans in Washington toward federal workers, which these days can be characterized as "Off with their heads." In the wake of revelations about egregious backlogs for appointments at some Veterans Affairs hospitals-backlogs caused, again, by too few federal employees, in this case primary care doctors-Senator John McCain led a campaign to make it easier to fire poorly performing federal managers, and then pressed to fire them faster. Other Republicans are campaigning to transform the Senior Executive Service into at-will employment, which would allow political officials to fire the most senior careerists without cause. Meanwhile, House Republicans are pushing to substantially downsize the federal workforce, including a plan to allow federal agencies to hire just one new worker for every three who leave. It's easy to see a President Walker aggressively championing this agenda.
In other news, have a really lovely review of the Raksura novels by Martha Wells. Everything Foz says here is true.
If you feel like getting mildly peeved, Kate Elliott started a discussion on Twitter today when she quoted someone anonymously saying, "Outside of YA it's near-impossible to find a female main character in modern adult Fantasy". I look at my bookshelves and my Calibre window, and I just shake my head at how some people can be so willfully ignorant.
This reminds me of my long-delayed compilation of epic fantasy written by women. I should probably dust that off and post it somewhere.
*
I stumbled across a new show on the PBS Hulu channel, looks like another British import: The Crimson Field, about a British military field hospital during WWI. I'm a sucker for that sort of thing, so I watched two episodes. I like the cast well enough, and it has some diversity, but I'm disappointed that, unlike Call the Midwife, which involves all sorts of people trying to get by as best they can, this show has decided to create a Bad Guy. And it just so happens that this Bad Guy is the single older woman on the show, so it is kind of disgruntling for me. I may watch a few more, as they come, but (sigh).
***
Current reading: Europe in Autumn by Dave Hutchinson. I don't recall where I found the recommendation for this (possibly in James Nicoll's LJ comments), but I'm really enjoying it. In the not-too-distant future, the EU and Russia have both broken up into dozens of small political entities, and naturally as a result there's a lot of political and economic imbalance. Our hero Rudi, a chef in part of what was once Poland, gets recruited as a courier for sensitive (read: illegal) documents and materials. And that's as far as I've gotten, but the wry voice, vivid characterizations (Fabio, the master-spy, complains incessantly about the excellent food Rudi cooks for him, and rearranges Rudi's furniture every day), and blackly-humorous commentary on politics and ethnicity are really entertaining. I don't know if the narrative itself will hold up, but so far it's quite good.
Just Finished: Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater. I liked it well enough, but I wasn't really onboard with the redemption of Mr. Gray. That felt a lot too easy.
Up next: Really need to get back to Leviathan Wakes. Or Kalpa Imperial. Or Rebecca, for book club.
*
Happy long weekend, for those who get one! What will you be reading/watching in your free time?
Crossposted from DW, where there are
comments; comment here or there.