Still (re)reading Infinite Jest…

and having a lot of fun, spent Sunday afternoon falling around laughing at the Eschaton sequence (and thinking about game-theory and hacks/exploits, and feeling generally kind of sorry for Ann Kittenplan (why I do not know, I giggle at her and cringe for her simultaneously)).

This morning I had a look through the twitter stream for #infsum and saw manys the link to this blog post. Which is a wonderful read for anyone – reader of IJ or not, as long as you have a funny-bone and an interest in social media/ipods and suchlike whatnots.

Go on over and have a read…

As for me, I’m still behind (tho not very many pages behind) where I should be in IJ for #infsum, but that’s ok because I started way late and am taking my time with it.

Right now, I’m about to look up some of the vocab that stumped me while I was reading last night – prognathous? fremitic? – and then settle down for more reading today.

I’m half-way through now, so normal blog service will probably resume in a week or two….

“Jennifer’s Body” (official movie trailer) [HQ]

Ok, I’m a little bit overwhelmed by the amount of bile pouring out the fingers of t’internet peeps at the trailer for the new movie written by Diablo Cody. In case you have been living under a rock with no clear broadband signal (or just don’t give a fig about pop culture) the movie is called Jennifer’s Body and it’s due for release in September.

Here be the trailer:

more about ""Jennifer’s Body" (official movie tra…", posted with vodpod

Okay… my thoughts, it looks a bit like Heathers crossed with the original Buffy movie. Could be awesome, could be painful. I’m thinking it’s probably going to be best approached with an open mind.

Reading around a few message boards (and braving the you tube comments), there’s a heck of a lot of hate going on out there…and I can’t for the life of me figure out why.

I did mention, in an earlier post how there appeared to be some sort of backlash in progress after the script for Jennifer’s Body was leaked on the web (early draft…). Today there’s nothing but razzing on Diablo Cody’s use of language (“Nobody talks like that!11eleventy!!”) and screeds about “Not going to pay $12 to look at Megan Fox’s bewbs” (I censor) etc. etc.

Um, folks, it’s a damn trailer. Get over yourselves.

On the “nobody talks like that” front, I’d advise people to go look at Heathers, nobody talks like that either, but that didn’t stop it becoming a cult classic. The same way, like it or not, Juno is likely to (if it hasn’t already attained that status). As a linguist, I freaking love movies like Heathers and Juno, because they have the power to affect the way people talk. Seriously, I did my final year thesis on phrases being imported into Hiberno-English (English as it is spoken in Ireland) from US movies. It was around the time of Wayne’s World and the original Buffy movie (oh shut up, I know I’m old), and I had a wealth of catchphrases to choose from. People start off quoting from the movie, often in a US accent, and as the phrases gain traction, the accent is dropped and bingo! the phrase is in the lexicon. Mightn’t stay there very long, but it has made it off the screen and onto the streets.

Saw the same thing happen with Juno. Expect to see it again with Jennifer’s Body, and I thank Diablo Cody for it. I can futz around with the Urban Dictionary and learn all the new phrases as they materialize, but I won’t be half as entertained as I would be watching a movie filled with phrases that make my head spin, and render my inner word-geek dizzy with joy.

On the Megan Fox thing, can I just say, I prefer it when she’s saying stuff other people have written for her than when she is speaking for herself. She is a very pretty girl, but I’d go see this movie whether her bewbs were in it or not. A blackly comic horror movie with an excellent soundtrack (Ch-ch-ch-ch-cherry BOMB!) is always something to look forward to, at least for me. And I’ve already seen Drag me to Hell (it’s pretty darn good ), so this one’s on my must see-list.

Shouldn’t people wait til they actually see the movie before they rant and rave about how crap it is? I mean, they don’t actually know yet, right?

Trolls fail at pre-emptive criticism. That’s the issue right there, in a nutshell.

Rachel Maddow video: Conservatives go teabagging

Oh the hilarity. Two of my favourite women, Rachel Maddow and Ana Marie Cox take on the newest stupidly-named conservative fad: teabagging.
Yes. You read that right.
I defy you to keep from sniggering/snorting beverages for the duration of the full report. And if you don’t know what teabagging means to everyone that *isn’t* a conservative, then bless your innocent little heart. If you want to share the hilarity, you can always just look it up on the Urban Dictionary.
No pressure though.

more about "Rachel Maddow video: Conservatives go…", posted with vodpod

Irish Crime Writers…

..are a lovely bunch of people.

Just home from “Crime Weekend” which spread itself over two days in Dun Laoghaire town hall. It was part of the Sindo Books Festival, and as a crime maven it was all I was interested in, apart from possibly getting myself arrested for throwing eggs at Martin Amis (which seemed like a probable waste of energy (and eggs), there being much better things to be arrested for).

I couldn’t attend last night’s session (and so missed Tana French, which I am still bummed out about) but today’s line-up was unmissable. There was John Connolly (who needs no introduction), the charming Declan Burke (who wrote “The Big O”  among others – and if you haven’t read him you’re missing out!), the quietly witty (well, actually, pretty hilarious) Brian Mc Gilloway (there must be a post here somewhere about the Inspector Devlin books, if not I’ll rectify it), the nice-and-normal-seeming-until-she talks-about-killing-the bad-guys Arlene Hunt, and the smart and funny (and very down to earth) Alex Barclay. 

I caught most of Declan Hughes interviewing John Connolly which was extremely interesting, though I’m sad to say I missed his reading from his next book “The Lovers” (though my colleague Karina assures me it was “listen through your fingers, truly chilling” stuff) (yay!).

The panel discussion with the four mentioned above was about sex and violence in crime books – subtitled “How far is too far?” and started with each of the authors reading an excerpt from their work that was heavy on the violence/sex. Actually, only John Connolly opted to read a sex scene, and bless him, his mammy was in the audience, so he flew through the scene (despite an unempathetic audience member telling him to slow down) with a face that was pure scarlet. I felt for the man, kudos for bravery.  They then went on to discuss the ethics of crime writing, the controversial comments by Ian Rankin last year (controversial, but also kinda true) about women crime writers and the gross-out factor, how hard/easy it is to write violent scenes, or sex scenes etc. All very informative and interesting. 

Nobody asked them to name books that they felt went too far – which may have been fun to hear, instead questions were about the concept of evil (um, I think that was it) and whether writing scenes of depravity affects them physically (I kid you not, there’s always some delicate flower out there…).

Afterwards I had a nice chat with Peter who has a really cool crime blog here (and I will be checking out those Scando writers you told me about, thanks again!) and a few words with Declan Burke (his blog here (it even links to mine *is chuffed*)), who is a lovely bloke. John Connolly signed a book for me and threw in some nice extras, and Alex Barclay and myself had a chat about fortune tellers (of all things) and she promised to send me out a proof of the new book (which is surely above and beyond the call of duty, but I’m not complaining!).

All in all a wonderful afternoon – the festival seems to have been a great success, so I’m already looking forward to next year, but more than that I’m looking forward to reading the new books from all the people on the panel today. Ah, bliss….

Oooops! (part one in an occasional series)

From a proof I finally finished plowing through the other day:

“She was wearing a white bathroom” (er, sounds uncomfortable)

“He was on a collusion course with a train” (if you must use big words, pick the right ones)

These are a couple that stuck in my head – I’m not going to name and shame – but I’ll be keeping a record of any other howlers I come across and posting them up here in batches, so you too can experience the joys of uncorrected proofs.

Some gems from the Christmas rush….

All in a similar vein:

1. Customer at till with gift card receipt, but no gift card. Demanding we accept the slip of paper as payment. Nope.

2. Customer comes back with a magazine 3 hours after buying it, looking for a refund. We don’t refund magazines. Otherwise people would use the place as a library – moreso than they already do.

3. “I want to use book tokens to pay for these but I left my tokens at home. Can I take the books now and bring the tokens in tomorrow?”

“Er, no.”

“Why not?”

“…”

Because we’d never see you again and I’m not as dumb as I look.

4. “Here is my receipt for an audio book I bought 2 weeks ago. I want a refund.”

“Ok, can I have the CD and I’ll process that for you now.”

“I didn’t bring the CD. Why would I have to?”

“…” Even after I called a manager to talk to him he still didn’t grasp the concept of returning goods.

5. “I bought this book 2 weeks ago and I want a refund. I have the receipt.”

“Er, it was the your free book in the 3 for 2 promotion. I cannot refund you anything.”

“Why not? I don’t want it anymore.”

“But you didn’t pay for it.”

(Indignant) “Yes I did. Are you accusing me of stealing?”

“No madam, I am not. But if you’ll just look at the receipt you’ll see that you paid for the two *other* books and we gave you this for free. Therefore you’re entitled to a zero cent refund.”

“But the sticker says €10.45. Give me €10.45.”

“You didn’t *pay* €10.45. I am sorry if I’m not making myself clear, perhaps I can have a manager explain things to you?”

Customer flees. Nice try.
6. “Where is your DVD section?”

“We don’t have one I’m afraid.”

“Why not?”

“Because we’re a bookshop. We sell books.”

“Don’t be a smart alec. There *are* bookshops that sell DVDs. I’ve *seen* them.”

“I am aware of that, yes, but we are not one of those stores.”

“Well where are your music cds then?”

“We don’t sell music cds either I’m afraid.”

“Well, what do you sell?”

“Er, books?”

“Stop being smart! I don’t want books!”

Well why the frig did you come in here then?!?!?!?!