Books

I finished "The Republic of Thieves" by Scott Lynch the other day. The latest in the tales of the Gentlemen Bastards finally introduces us to Sabetha, the phantom love of Locke Lamora who has teased us over two books. It also takes us to the homeland of the Bondsmagi and gives more insight as to their society.

Oh, and it goes into the mystery of just who Locke Lamora is.

It's an excellent story and up to Lynch's normal high standards. It was an even mix of present-day with the lads doing their shenanigans and a flashback in which we get to see the late, lamented Galdo brothers as well as the young Bastards in action with Sabetha in the mix.

Excellent reading.

I'm now on to "House of Blades" by Will Wight. Part of his "The Traveller's Gate Trilogy" (which apparently has two books out), it's a fun read thus far. I'm about halfway through. Book two is out in Kindle format, but alas I lack a Kindle and will likely wait for a dead tree version as I've managed with book one.

Then it's time to search for new reading material. The next Dresden Files book - "Skin Game" isn't due out 'till January, per Wikipedia.

Sigh.

Professor X blows minds

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The weekend is tantalizingly-close

• I put in 2.5 hours in martial arts last night. Got tossed around like a bag of meal. Got thrashed by weapons. Got to deliver as well as receive.
• Almost done with "Republic of Thieves". Holy shit this book is good.
• Good lord I have too much to do and not enough time to do it. Life, you so crazy.

Annual Tradition

The only mail I got yesterday is my ritual mail I receive EVERY GODDAMN YEAR.

Yep. Jury duty.

To the charming keeper of the juror selection list: I hope your privates are infested with hungry fire ants and your automobile consistently suffers from expensive maladies. I hope you suffer eternal indigestion and every time you encounter any form of primate whatsoever, said primate flings fecal matter at your face while your mouth is open.

I believe I have made my stance and position clear.

Novemonday

I had grand plans for the weekend. Projects I intended to make headway on. Constructive stuff I needed to get done. I had all sorts of time. I was even a good little monkey and didn't take side trips to the pub or anything.

Just wasn't meant to be.

One of my projects requires some... creative writing... on my part and I'm finding myself blocked in that regard.

I played a bit with getting git working on my machines. Now both my Linux box and my PC appear to have it running. And then my PC decided it was time to start freaking out on me.

I don't think it was related at all to my git installation (I've had that in-place for over a week now) but it pretty much threw my other projects completely out-of-whack as I worked on fixing the problem (I haven't "fixed" the problem so much as I've gone back to a previous restore point in the update cycle... that seems to address the issue).

Goddamn annoying.

The Korra of the Matter

I enjoyed "Avatar the Last Airbender" with a ridiculous passion. I still re-watch the series from time-to-time and marvel over the excellent world building, character development, and narrative style. I hold the series finale up to some of the best I've ever seen. It actually runs neck-and-neck with the finales for "Blake's 7" and "Angel" for best finale in my book.

As a fan of the "Avatar" world (not James Cameron's version, mind you), I found myself watching "The Legend of Korra" when it first came out.

"The Legend of Korra" was more of a Roaring Twenties style offering with the teenage Korra getting into her role as Avatar. Korra was the polar opposite of the goofy, pacifist Aang with her aggressive and completely non-spiritual way of dealing with matters. The first season was a fun ride, if a little compressed and suffering of both ridiculous (if not unexpected) teen angst and a choppy narrative. It expanded the world and gave us a hint of what happened to some of the favorites from Aang's era (hint: Toph never lost her badass edge).

The second season has gone in some interesting places. The narrative style is still choppy and tends to go all over the place. There's some good characters, but most of the plot elements feel unnecessarily contrived and don't flow terribly well. Where this season hits its stride is in exploring the mysterious Spirit World and the origins of the Avatar. The swimming into the mythology of the series is some truly awesome stuff and has me hooked enough to forgive and ignore the fairly ridiculous side-plots and forced-feeling side-romances.

I'll be curious to see how they'll conclude this season.

blagulgaggulFridayIsHereblahrgh

• Taiwan: On-track for best new Imperial Stormtrooper look.
• Japan: Zombies.

Caught up on "Person of Interest". Another solid episode with multiple threads coming to a satisfying conclusion. I could watch an entire show just around the adventures of Root and Shaw. They're a delightful combination of sociopathic chaos and awesome. The story twists were solid and glorious. Plus the new mystery group gets a name. Pretty damn cool. GOD I love that show!