Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!

[cleolinda]

I will never complain about November again. We have had the most gorgeous, diamond-bright sunny weather with, I think, one slightly drizzly day this whole month. It's not as cold as I'd like (or, really, at all), but Seasonal Affective Disorder has been postponed for another several weeks at least. Huzzah!

Meanwhile, my sister is sort-of-not-dating a burgeoning alcoholic, we gave my step-nephew stephew a stubby little interactive lightsaber for his birthday, and my mother's cooking has been cursed all weekend--the caramel brownies didn't turn out too well, the pancake recipe she tried (in lieu of mix, which we ran out of) was crap, and then she forgot about the chicken on the grill and came back three hours later to find no survivors. Woe.

I dreamed last night that the book sold 58 million copies, and that this was "pretty good." Meanwhile, it seems that one of your esteemed fellow readers was at a Neil Gaiman signing the other day and gifted Unca Neil with a copy of the book. The funny thing is that I think he may have heard about it before--Vladimir, who is one of his translators, may have mentioned it to him when I was still writing it.

(Unca Neil mentions that Sci Fiction is going down, which is a damn shame, particularly since I hadn't even heard of it until today. If you read no other story, read this one--or these ones, rather.)

Oh, also: apparently the book is mentioned in the Observer today, wherein a number of titles (the Bible in txt-speak, the Odyssey in haiku) are accused of, basically, causing the downfall of Western civilization. (I had no idea obliterating our cultural past could be fun and profitable!) Fortunately, I think (if I'm reading this Very, Very Serious article correctly), my book gets off the lightest, because the reviewer admits that I'm going after "James Cameron and Mel Gibson, not Shakespeare and Dickens." Also, he concedes the hilarity of the results. That's a direct paraphrase, people.

(What I find funny is this idea that condensing the movies might possibly destroy our cinematic past, when the reality is that if you're not a movie buff, you're not going to get a lot of jokes. In fact, I'm pretty sure there's a reference to The Birds in there that no one got, because I didn't do a good enough job of framing it. Despite the subtitle about the book being for people who can't be bothered to watch the movies--which was not my idea--I'd say that the real point isn't that the movies take less time [hey, ask the Total Film reviewer]; it's that certain absurdities rise to the top when you boil off all the window-dressing. Like the fact that Frodo falls down every five minutes, or that there's a battle of Stirling, and a battle on a bridge, but no actual battle of Stirling Bridge in Braveheart.)

Anyhoo: forgive me if the linkspam is slightly stale; it's been accumulating over the last few days.

sigma7: "In slightly better news, Sony gives up, for now. Slashdot responds. We finally won one, gang."

_digitalangel: "i'm not sure how much this has to do with anything, but MIT study shows that tinfoil hats actually incease some radio frequencies. so maybe dom and elijah really ARE sekritly gay together?" Shhhhhhhhhhh, they'll hear you.

Pat Robertson Warns Pa. Town of Disaster. Because they rejected Intelligent Design for their schools. Yeah. Also: "Robertson made headlines this summer when he called on his daily show for the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. In October 2003, he suggested that the State Department be blown up with a nuclear device. He has also said that feminism encourages women to 'kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.'" Actually, I find that becoming a de facto sapphic Wiccan has made me much more pro-capitalism. I mean, you gotta buy your moon almanac and your dolphin-shaped dildos somewhere, right?

Poll: Most Americans Say Bush Not Honest.

Kuwait bird flu is highly pathogenic strain, says official.

French rioting spurs British haughtiness, introspection.

Moustapha Akkad, the Syrian-born filmmaker and producer of the "Halloween" horror movie franchise, died Friday from wounds sustained in the triple hotel bombings in Jordan.

Internet holds only future for newspapers, experts warn. Well, who wants to buy a paper when the news is already out of date?

Four People Injured at B5 Concert in Minn. Who?

Finding Said to Boost Proof of Goliath.

Lemur Species Named After John Cleese.

RIP Ginny the Dog, Rescuer of Cats. The accompanying picture is your day's recommended dosage of awwwww.

Networks cancel '7th Heaven,' 'Arrested'.

"Nip/Tuck" Ads Slashed.

Thief Robs Banks While Chatting on Phone.

Memoirs of a Geisha doll. From the people who brought you the Chicago dolls, the very Wicked-looking Glinda and Wicked Witch dolls, and the terrifying Harry Potter doll I linked a while back.

Katie Holmes, Stepford Housewife.

The Atropa's Cottage drama, now with bizarre, veiled threats to sue the BPAL boards for libel. I wasn't going to mention it at all, because the woman seemed very nice and had excellent customer service (I will admit to ordering a sampler pack to be more informed about the whole brouhaha, and... I'm sticking to BPAL. But excellent customer service, yes. Ghirardelli squares were involved), but this claim of libel is just too much.

Speaking of which: bpal_feedbackuser: A community to check out sellers and buyers before they can swaplift you.  

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to read some more of the periodic table.