Day 95: An excellent dinner of homemade pizza on a sourdough crust. Pepperoni and pineapple for me, mozzarella, basil, and olive for Prairie. Quite tasty!
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📚 Imbalance by V.E. Mitchell
35/2023 – ⭐️⭐️
This one starts with an interesting premise, as the Enterprise is sent to negotiate with aliens only briefly encountered before, the Jarada (the unseen, highly demanding aliens that were the B story in “The Big Goodbye”). But while there are hints of an interesting society, the rest of the book doesn’t hold together well. Actions are taken by the aliens that are never really explained, and Enterprise characters are either reduced to repetitious mannerisms (Dr. Crusher brushes locks of her flaming red hair out of her face nearly every time she’s mentioned) or simply badly portrayed (I know Keiko and O’Brien have difficulties, but in this book they’re both rendered nearly incompetent by their insecurities). Toss on a rather abrupt end to the whole thing, and this is one I wasn’t disappointed to reach the end of.
Year 50 Day 94
Day 94: A classic album by the best band under the twin suns of Tatooine! Amusingly, though I have three different spoofs of the Joy Division Unknown Pleasures album artwork shirt (this one which I’m pretty sure I got from Diesel Sweeties but the store appears to be down right now, Nimoy Division / Vulcan Pleasures, and Depeche Mode / Boys Don’t Cry), I’ve yet to add the original to my shirt drawer.
Year 50 Day 92
Day 92: Trader Joe’s Cocoa Truffles are really good little chocolate truffles dusted with cocoa powder. Really rich, so one (or, okay, sometimes two) is a perfect small dessert. Highly recommended.
Year 50 Day 91
Day 91: One of the advantages to my wife having the summer off before she starts teaching in the fall is that I can park in the lot next to the building I work in, instead of in the upper lot closer to the building with her office. Of course, the disadvantage to this is that the lot close to my building has no shade, while the upper lot has spot we can almost always grab that is directly under a big tree and nicely shaded. On days when the outside temperature is in the 80s or higher and the temperature inside the car at the end of the day is likely well into triple digits, I’m not sure the advantageous parking spot is really that much of an advantage….
📚 The Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons
34/2023 – ⭐⭐⭐⭐
A good second half to the far-future grand-scale space opera of Hyperion, moving away from the Canterbury Tales-inspired pilgrim’s tales to spend more time with the rest of the universe as the story progresses. Definitely best seen as the second half to a singular work than as a sequel.
NOTE: Given Simmons’ descent into right-wing politics, including Islamophobia and publicly attacking Greta Thunburg, he has earned a space on my “milkshake duck” virtual bookshelf, collecting those authors whose work I discovered, enjoyed, and might still enjoy, before later realizing that they are what I consider to be rather horrible people.
Year 50 Day 90
Day 90: The latest addition to the ridiculous t-shirt collection. We thought it would be my wife’s, but the cut wasn’t quite right for her, so I got it instead. She’s a bit disappointed, but I’m not!
Year 50 Day 89
Day 89: Started the day with another nice morning walk, this time three miles along the Soos Creek trail. Then off to a little shopping, an excellent lunch (and later dinner with some leftovers) at El Piketon, dozing on and off while watching one of the Women’s World Cup games and World Aquatics Championship events, and a convention planning session in the evening. All in all, not a bad day.
Year 50 Day 88
Day 88: Shopping in the morning, a mid-day nap, and then house work in the afternoon which had me busy and running up and down the stairs multiple times. Spining in place to get a good motion blur on the background seemed a good way to capture the feel of the afternoon.
Year 50 Day 87
Day 87: Started off the day with a nice four-mile walk along the Green River. The only thing I don’t like about having 4-on/3-off weeks during the summer quarter is knowing that I’ll go back to standard 5-on/2-off weeks come fall.