Meet It Is I Set It Down*

I have much to catch up on, but I wanted to make note of this one thing, for my own future reference. 

Any time we have someone stay, the "guest" bed is an air bed (which it's about time to replace, so if anyone has a brand to advise for or against, hit me up), and in the past, I have had to wrestle the damn thing to get the air out after, so that I could pack it away again.

This morning, I didn't feel like fighting it, so I turned the gauge thing to where it would let air out, and walked away.

I just came back into the office, and all (or almost all) the air had come out. I was able to easily fold it, and roll it down, squeezing out the last little bit. It was approximately 105% easier, for less effort. How about that! I hope that I will remember it for next time.

*You knew I was an English major, right? This is from Hamlet. Because of course that's what sprang to mind when I was thinking of writing about this.

Explain

So, yeah. We're (mostly) fine here, but there have been Things. 

• Like Mom was just in the hospital for five days, and is home now and slowly getting better but yeah. 
• Things. Like my brother arrives Saturday, which is a good thing, but still a thing I need to get ready for. 
• Yeah. Mostly that. Just a lot of things within those things.

Overall, fine! But posting might be light for a bit. 

New Katherine Addison, yay

I've been a fan of the author Katherine Addison since The Goblin Emperor came out; to quote myself, "excellent world-building, with its own language and speech conventions that are conveyed without confusion (or without much, anyway)." And as much as I love it, I have been equally-if-not-more pleased by her subsequent related-but-not-directly books, The Witness for the Dead and The Grief of Stones (not to mention her supernatural take on Sherlock Holmes, The Angel of the Crows, which is also great but very different). The books are great, and the audio versions are wonderful: honestly, I think I would struggle a lot more with the names of people and places, except that I can "hear" them from the many times I have listened to the books. 

Anyway! As a member of her Patreon, I saw recently when she gave away a few copies of the new book in the series, The Tomb of Dragons*, which comes out in March, and though I wasn't quick enough to win one of those, she next gave away advance copies of a new novella, The Orb of Cairado, which is in the same world but with different characters, and comes out in January (Subterranean Press is printing a limited, signed run). And guess what, I won! 
*One of the reviews on Goodreads states, "The Tomb of Dragons did not disappoint me in the slightest, except that it ended" which is very promising!

It arrived yesterday:

I liked that she signed it with both her name and her pen name (that's Sarah Monette).

I read it (of course), and I quite liked it, though I would not at all suggest jumping in with this one if you haven't read the series. You could read the books about Thara Celehar without having read The Goblin Emperor first, though I would argue you shouldn't, but in my opinion, you'll really want to understand how this world works before reading this novella. If you have read the others, then yes, I recommend this one!

I Did One Thing

In the spirit of both "just one thing" and not letting the perfect be the enemy of the done (I know, I'm mangling that), yesterday I ordered my holiday cards. As in the past few years, I used a Groupon to get half off cards at Staples, and in fact my order was ready to pick up last night, when my knitting group meets, right next to Staples. So now I have the cards, and they can wait until after Thanksgiving to be addressed, but I have them. Phew.

You'll see them on Christmas day here, as is my habit! In the meantime, perhaps you would enjoy this total piece of randomness.

I know, I'm a Shakespeare nerd, but the idea of Hamlet and Othello switching plays and each taking care of business very competently just tickles me.

One Tiny Silver Lining. Really: Tiny

It's not that I didn't know what I was getting into, politically speaking, when I moved to Florida. My mother had mentioned many times how she couldn't understand how people who were otherwise so pleasant were so very different from her, politically. This has only become more true in the last decade, and it really is unnerving to live here sometimes. One can feel very alone, a blue dot in such a red state.

However, the local paper this morning listed all the vote totals for Florida, and while it doesn't change the end result at all, it made me feel just slightly better about living here.

Yes, he got over six million votes, but she got over four and three-quarter million! That is not nothing.

And one of those is me. 

The Thing Is Though

J's comment on my post yesterday made me think of this cartoon.

This is from Emily's Cartoons*; I found her years ago from her take on Harry Potter, way back before JKR was revealed to be such an awful person (sigh), but her non-HP stuff is also very funny.
*That link is to her shop, but she's also on Instagram and Facebook and has a Patreon page.

I am actually not doing that this time, I really can't talk about it, but I've definitely been there in the past, so I wanted to share this anyway.

I also want to share something J put up today, because boy does this nail what I'm feeling:

Yeah, Yeah, I Know. Let's Talk Books Instead

I can't talk about the election results yet. I don't know when I'll be able to. We fight on, but for today at least, for my mental health (and my blood pressure), I'm pretending it didn't happen. 

I've read some good books recently, so I thought it was time to share them here! 

First up is a fantasy book I got an advance copy* of, Miss Amelia's List, by Mercedes Lackey. This is in her Elemental Masters series, which is the kind of series where the books are related but don't have to be read in sequence; I haven't read them all**, and this is book 17, but all you have to know is the basic principles. As her website describes them, the books "are a mix of historical fiction and fantasy, with a big scoop of fairy tales stirred in. Most of them are set in the late 1800s-early 1900s."
*Thank you to DAW for the ARC! #MissAmeliasList #NetGalley
**My favorite of those I have read is Reserved for the Cat

I really enjoyed this book; Amelia is a believable and realistic character, comfortable with her power while coping with her anxiety, and her cousin Serena, though less fully developed, is often unexpectedly competent. It was interesting to look at Regency England from the perspective of American characters, which I haven’t seen a lot of.

Looking back at the ending, it felt a bit rushed: reading an ebook, I’m not always aware of how close to the end I am, and it came as something of a surprise to realize we were there, at the climactic events and then the end. There is some implausibility to how things wrapped up, but I actually can see how it could have been even more so and wasn’t, so although that’s a backhand compliment, I do mean it well. A book I’m glad to have read, though not the one I would recommend for jumping into this series.

~~~~~

Next up is a different kind of fantasy book, basically a romantic comedy book with shapeshifters! I know, sounds implausible given how dark a lot of shifter stories are, but when you have a bunny shifter, it's hard not to make it cute, and that's Emmy! Somebunny to Love, by Zoe Chant, is in the Virtue Shifters series, which I will definitely be checking out more of. Light, fluffy, intelligent, happily-ever-after: what's not to love? I don't need dark and gloomy right now. Good silliness is called for.

~~~~~

Lost & Found by Jane Glatt is something that I find refreshing: a book with an older woman protagonist! While I do read books from younger perspectives (see my recent adoration for Prince of Fortune), there's something about putting an older woman front and center that pleases me. This book is mostly not a fantasy (rare for me these days, right?), with one twist. As the description starts out:

"Homeless. Broke. Shunned by friends and neighbours. This was not what sixty-two was supposed to look like for Barbara Baker.

As a member of Toronto's exclusive Rosedale society, Barb was a fixture on charity committees and an accomplished hostess whose dinner invitations were coveted by Toronto's elite. Her comfortable life ended when her husband's criminal activity was discovered—he'd been stealing from everyone for decades, using her exceptional hostess skills to reel in new victims."

As Barb starts to figure out where her life will go from here, with help from her best friend, something unexpected happens, which I won't spoil except to say that's where the fantastical element comes in. It may not be 100% plausible, but I found it very entertaining, on a night when that was just what I needed.

Note that while I didn't think of this as an advance read, according to Amazon, it's not out yet. I bought it as part of something called The Never Too Old to Save the World Bundle, which runs for another 15 days, according to the website. It includes 10 books, if you're willing to pay at least $20, which I was.

Read any good books lately?

Too Early for Christmas Music, But

I have no idea why this song came into my head this morning, but I have to share this silly Christmas song with you. Please forgive me.

Love it!

Powerful Words

I'm not someone who venerates actors as special or extra-important, but that doesn't mean that a person who is an actor can't say something that strikes me. And in this case, when Harrison Ford endorsed Kamala Harris, this is the part that hit me: "Kamala Harris will protect your right to disagree with her."

The election is almost here. Soon, soon, we will know soon. 

Although, as the Globe warned:

I appreciated this, in the Guardian the other day, in the "tell it like it is" sense of appreciation:

But most of all, this ad made me laugh.

Given the way the Bruins had been playing going into the weekend (short answer: very, very poorly), I was starting to worry about my election night plan of watching the Bruins game. But they won yesterday and again today, so I'm more comfortable with the idea. Certainly no guarantees, but at least if they play well, it will be entertaining. I'll just need to put down my phone and tablet, and keep my hands busy with knitting instead of doom-scrolling.

All right, having rousted her highness off my lap:

It's bedtime.

A Few Images: Voting, Supporting Journalism, Maggie

I turned over the Sandra Boynton holiday calendar today, and had to laugh. First, for the overall sentiment.

But also for what's on next Tuesday and Wednesday:

Hoo boy, yeah. I feel that already. (Did you vote yet? Please do!)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meanwhile, with all the nonsense coming from journalism in the US these days (I almost want to say "journalism"), I decided to subscribe to The Guardian, to broaden my reading.

After I created my account, they offered me these newsletters:

My, that last one is ... specific, isn't it?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Finally, Maggie needs to get her share of time. From the lap this morning:

She does know how to spread out.