Friday, February 25, 2005
Is a Story Really Necessary?
TV writer and novelist Lee Goldberg relates some conversations he had recently with would-be writers. There's no reason for me to comment on them; they just crack me up, is all.
TV writer and novelist Lee Goldberg relates some conversations he had recently with would-be writers. There's no reason for me to comment on them; they just crack me up, is all.
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
Vote for your favorite landmark
You'd expect somebody called The Vintage Reader to be voting for the book locale, wouldn't you?
But no. The first movie I remember going to was at the Admiral Twin. Much later, my sister and I saw Sixteen Candles and Weird Science there as a double feature, the year I worked at a summer stock theater with the woman who played Marlene the Lumberjack (She was the lead in Irene and Little Me. I hemmed dancers' dresses and picked up actors at the airport. Our paths crossed, like, twice, but I thought it was cool that she was in a movie, so I went to see it).
But my favorite memory of the Admiral Twin is one night, the summer after my junior year in high school, when a bunch of us from the choir went out to see a movie--I can't even remember which one--and we all sat on the grass up in front and watched the movie, and giggled a lot I'm sure, and flirted with boys we knew and boys we didn't. It was just a perfect early-summer teenage night, like something out of a Beach Party movie (but without all the making out; we were Methodists, for crying out loud. You want sexual activity, you have to go hang out with the young Baptists. I've never seen such a group of sex maniacs as the Baptist kids I met through my 9th-grade boyfriend. I don't think all that gender separation is good for them. It seems to just make them more curious).
Anyway, you can vote once a day, so go vote for the Admiral Twin.
(Thanks to Braised Lambchop for the heads-up)
You'd expect somebody called The Vintage Reader to be voting for the book locale, wouldn't you?
But no. The first movie I remember going to was at the Admiral Twin. Much later, my sister and I saw Sixteen Candles and Weird Science there as a double feature, the year I worked at a summer stock theater with the woman who played Marlene the Lumberjack (She was the lead in Irene and Little Me. I hemmed dancers' dresses and picked up actors at the airport. Our paths crossed, like, twice, but I thought it was cool that she was in a movie, so I went to see it).
But my favorite memory of the Admiral Twin is one night, the summer after my junior year in high school, when a bunch of us from the choir went out to see a movie--I can't even remember which one--and we all sat on the grass up in front and watched the movie, and giggled a lot I'm sure, and flirted with boys we knew and boys we didn't. It was just a perfect early-summer teenage night, like something out of a Beach Party movie (but without all the making out; we were Methodists, for crying out loud. You want sexual activity, you have to go hang out with the young Baptists. I've never seen such a group of sex maniacs as the Baptist kids I met through my 9th-grade boyfriend. I don't think all that gender separation is good for them. It seems to just make them more curious).
Anyway, you can vote once a day, so go vote for the Admiral Twin.
(Thanks to Braised Lambchop for the heads-up)
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
The stuff that dreams are made of
I don't remember whether that phrase was in the movie AND the book or just the movie. I remember it from the movie, but to tell you the truth, I've always had a hard time following The Maltese Falcon (both the book and the movie). All those people who keep showing up in Spade's office, or in his apartment, and the tortuous plot twists, and all that talk of gunsels and Levantines and ward-heelers... or was the ward-heeler in The Glass Key?
I do love it that Hammett gives me an excuse to pull out the slang dictionary, or at least visit Twists, Slugs, and Roscoes: A Glossary of Hardboiled Slang, but for some reason it's harder for me to read Hammett now than it was when I was younger and could rip through The Dain Curse just appreciating the cool binding (it had to be close to a first edition, and I found it wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine in the old part of the library I worked in then, which I would link to here, but I would sooooo hate it if that great early edition of The Dain Curse got ripped off from the library because of this blog that nobody reads anyway) and the creepy atmosphere and the weird characters.
There was a time when I was a major Hammett fan. I read all his books I could get my hands on, as well as a non-fiction book about Hammett's San Francisco and a couple of biographies, not to mention Scoundrel Time, which led to a whole Hellman obsession for a while too. I even had a hamster named Dashiell (Dashiell Hamster, ha ha ha). But I've forgotten nearly all of it now. A couple of years ago I added A Man Called Spade to my Dell Mapback collection, and didn't even read it. My Hammett mania seems like a distant dream. That's how I've mostly missed the 75th anniversary of The Maltese Falcon.
Everybody's blogging it, and Sarah Weinman has a nice roundup here: Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind: HammettWatch, in all its glory.
I don't remember whether that phrase was in the movie AND the book or just the movie. I remember it from the movie, but to tell you the truth, I've always had a hard time following The Maltese Falcon (both the book and the movie). All those people who keep showing up in Spade's office, or in his apartment, and the tortuous plot twists, and all that talk of gunsels and Levantines and ward-heelers... or was the ward-heeler in The Glass Key?
I do love it that Hammett gives me an excuse to pull out the slang dictionary, or at least visit Twists, Slugs, and Roscoes: A Glossary of Hardboiled Slang, but for some reason it's harder for me to read Hammett now than it was when I was younger and could rip through The Dain Curse just appreciating the cool binding (it had to be close to a first edition, and I found it wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine in the old part of the library I worked in then, which I would link to here, but I would sooooo hate it if that great early edition of The Dain Curse got ripped off from the library because of this blog that nobody reads anyway) and the creepy atmosphere and the weird characters.
There was a time when I was a major Hammett fan. I read all his books I could get my hands on, as well as a non-fiction book about Hammett's San Francisco and a couple of biographies, not to mention Scoundrel Time, which led to a whole Hellman obsession for a while too. I even had a hamster named Dashiell (Dashiell Hamster, ha ha ha). But I've forgotten nearly all of it now. A couple of years ago I added A Man Called Spade to my Dell Mapback collection, and didn't even read it. My Hammett mania seems like a distant dream. That's how I've mostly missed the 75th anniversary of The Maltese Falcon.
Everybody's blogging it, and Sarah Weinman has a nice roundup here: Confessions of an Idiosyncratic Mind: HammettWatch, in all its glory.
Monday, February 14, 2005
Whose duckydoodle, indeed?
Well, leave it to PlanetDan to find this: My Creepy Valentine.
Some of them are bizarre, some of them are disturbing... some of them are just products of their time.
Well, leave it to PlanetDan to find this: My Creepy Valentine.
Some of them are bizarre, some of them are disturbing... some of them are just products of their time.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
Under the covers
Words fail me. Just go look.
(Thank you, Booksquare, I'm forever in your debt for this one)
Words fail me. Just go look.
(Thank you, Booksquare, I'm forever in your debt for this one)
Saturday, February 05, 2005
Next stop...
I was over at It's All One Thing and read that Will Shetterly and Emma Bull, a couple of my favorite fantasy authors, were trying to name a new cat. One of the names under consideration was Maximilian, and as soon as I read that I flashed on Max, the cigar-chomping mascot of Twilight Zone magazine.
Twilight Zone was my first real introduction to short fantastic fiction. I came across the November 1981 issue in the magazine rack at the drugstore in the fall of 10th grade, not too long after it began publication. After that, I never missed an issue, and I still have them all (except for one issue from 1986 that my then-boyfriend borrowed and never returned; but I think I've got his first-or-second printing of Callahan's Crosstime Saloon around here somewhere. Considering how much easier it is to find TZ on eBay, I think it's a pretty good trade).
Some of the best names in science fiction, fantasy, and horror published in TZ. Just look at the list of authors from the first two issues: Harlan Ellison, Robert Sheckley, Joyce Carol Oates, George R.R. Martin, Tanith Lee, Joe Haldeman, Robert Silverberg, George Clayton Johnson, Spider Robinson, Roger Zelazny... and many others. Besides the short stories, there were articles about movies and TV shows, as well as a TZ episode guide. There were creepy cartoons by Gahan Wilson.
TZ was a class act all around. In the picture above, you'll note that they were asking for items with references to the Twilight Zone. I sent them a news clipping once, when I was in high school. I didn't get a poster, but they did send me a neat postcard with Max on it, telling me that they weren't going to use my clipping. I was as happy with that as I would have been with the poster.
I haven't found a lot of information about Twilight Zone online. There's a great bibliography here, and I keep intending to do a searchable annotated one, because I'm sure that many of the stories never made it into anthologies, and it would be great for interested readers to be able to get them, maybe through interlibrary loan, or on eBay. Maybe after the redesign... and the long-promised Dell Mapback database... and the redesign of my other blog... :-)
I was over at It's All One Thing and read that Will Shetterly and Emma Bull, a couple of my favorite fantasy authors, were trying to name a new cat. One of the names under consideration was Maximilian, and as soon as I read that I flashed on Max, the cigar-chomping mascot of Twilight Zone magazine.
Twilight Zone was my first real introduction to short fantastic fiction. I came across the November 1981 issue in the magazine rack at the drugstore in the fall of 10th grade, not too long after it began publication. After that, I never missed an issue, and I still have them all (except for one issue from 1986 that my then-boyfriend borrowed and never returned; but I think I've got his first-or-second printing of Callahan's Crosstime Saloon around here somewhere. Considering how much easier it is to find TZ on eBay, I think it's a pretty good trade).
Some of the best names in science fiction, fantasy, and horror published in TZ. Just look at the list of authors from the first two issues: Harlan Ellison, Robert Sheckley, Joyce Carol Oates, George R.R. Martin, Tanith Lee, Joe Haldeman, Robert Silverberg, George Clayton Johnson, Spider Robinson, Roger Zelazny... and many others. Besides the short stories, there were articles about movies and TV shows, as well as a TZ episode guide. There were creepy cartoons by Gahan Wilson.
TZ was a class act all around. In the picture above, you'll note that they were asking for items with references to the Twilight Zone. I sent them a news clipping once, when I was in high school. I didn't get a poster, but they did send me a neat postcard with Max on it, telling me that they weren't going to use my clipping. I was as happy with that as I would have been with the poster.
I haven't found a lot of information about Twilight Zone online. There's a great bibliography here, and I keep intending to do a searchable annotated one, because I'm sure that many of the stories never made it into anthologies, and it would be great for interested readers to be able to get them, maybe through interlibrary loan, or on eBay. Maybe after the redesign... and the long-promised Dell Mapback database... and the redesign of my other blog... :-)
Just one more...
Changeling Legends from the British Isles, a collection of interesting changeling lore.
Changeling Legends from the British Isles, a collection of interesting changeling lore.
More faery fun
See what happens when you do a Google search on "faery changeling"? You find all kinds of wonderful things, like the aforementioned elf-lad, and now this excellent poem:
The Changeling, by Theodora Goss.
From the faeriest place... well, anywhere, Terri Windling's Endicott Studio.
See what happens when you do a Google search on "faery changeling"? You find all kinds of wonderful things, like the aforementioned elf-lad, and now this excellent poem:
The Changeling, by Theodora Goss.
From the faeriest place... well, anywhere, Terri Windling's Endicott Studio.
Flower fairies
A nice page about children's book illustrator Cicely Mary Barker, probably best known for her delightful flower fairies.
(via the wonderful site of an elf-lad)
A nice page about children's book illustrator Cicely Mary Barker, probably best known for her delightful flower fairies.
(via the wonderful site of an elf-lad)
The HGTV Effect
One of my favorite things to do on Saturday mornings is to scan real estate listings online. Sometimes I look in my town; sometimes I look in towns where I think I might like to live. It makes Mr. Vintage Reader nervous, but hey, it's a hobby. During college, pre-Internet, I worked for a real estate brokerage during the summers. I got to prepare the weekly listings book for the agents (in Word 2.0 for DOS!) and sometimes write the property descriptions for the Sunday paper, such as "DOLL HOUSE! You'll love this 3/2 Cape Cod's cozy kitchen, overlooking immaculate gardens. It's a charmer!" Back then, that was about all you got in a real estate listing, unless there was a picture (they used to send me out to take those too. It was a great job for a house freak like me).
These days the vast majority of real estate listings--especially if you look at individual real estate agencies' web sites instead of Realtor.com--have lots and lots of pictures of the interiors of the houses. I love to look at the interiors of the old houses, of course, but sometimes I look at the newer ones too, although I typically don't like them. I think they look cheap and thrown-together, without any character or charm.
But.
I've started noticing that new builds from the last few years look nothing like that. The kitchens have real wood cabinets and granite countertops. The light fixtures don't look like standard builder's-grade stuff. There are tile floors, big windows, and a fair amount of actual charm.
I attribute it to HGTV and the explosion of home-dec/home improvement programming on TV. While some of the shows focus on quick, cheap, DIY decorating that I'm betting lasts about a month before everybody in the house is so sick of it that they tear it all out and go back to where they were before, there are a lot of them like Ultimate Kitchens that often show some really, really neat things.
Now, I've still got plenty of environmental concerns about new builds. I still think it's wasteful to build new developments, edging further out into the wilderness, upsetting the ecosystem and ensuring yet more car travel, as older properties and developments go deeper into disrepair. But at the same time, I can't help looking at some of these listings and thinking wouldn't that huge laundry room be nice and wow, look at that awesome Jenn-Aire downdraft range.
One of my favorite things to do on Saturday mornings is to scan real estate listings online. Sometimes I look in my town; sometimes I look in towns where I think I might like to live. It makes Mr. Vintage Reader nervous, but hey, it's a hobby. During college, pre-Internet, I worked for a real estate brokerage during the summers. I got to prepare the weekly listings book for the agents (in Word 2.0 for DOS!) and sometimes write the property descriptions for the Sunday paper, such as "DOLL HOUSE! You'll love this 3/2 Cape Cod's cozy kitchen, overlooking immaculate gardens. It's a charmer!" Back then, that was about all you got in a real estate listing, unless there was a picture (they used to send me out to take those too. It was a great job for a house freak like me).
These days the vast majority of real estate listings--especially if you look at individual real estate agencies' web sites instead of Realtor.com--have lots and lots of pictures of the interiors of the houses. I love to look at the interiors of the old houses, of course, but sometimes I look at the newer ones too, although I typically don't like them. I think they look cheap and thrown-together, without any character or charm.
But.
I've started noticing that new builds from the last few years look nothing like that. The kitchens have real wood cabinets and granite countertops. The light fixtures don't look like standard builder's-grade stuff. There are tile floors, big windows, and a fair amount of actual charm.
I attribute it to HGTV and the explosion of home-dec/home improvement programming on TV. While some of the shows focus on quick, cheap, DIY decorating that I'm betting lasts about a month before everybody in the house is so sick of it that they tear it all out and go back to where they were before, there are a lot of them like Ultimate Kitchens that often show some really, really neat things.
Now, I've still got plenty of environmental concerns about new builds. I still think it's wasteful to build new developments, edging further out into the wilderness, upsetting the ecosystem and ensuring yet more car travel, as older properties and developments go deeper into disrepair. But at the same time, I can't help looking at some of these listings and thinking wouldn't that huge laundry room be nice and wow, look at that awesome Jenn-Aire downdraft range.
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