Mortaine’s Blog

This is an archive of my shorter book reviews and notes, which historically have been posted over at the 50 Book Challenge on LiveJournal, but which I’m starting to move over here. I’m posting them with altered date-stamps, but they might show up in my LiveJournal cross-post anyway. Bear with me, please.

Note: Many of these books also have full reviews available in the book review podcast (RSS).

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I am feeling SO MUCH BETTER now! Either this bug needed 5 days to run its course, or the antibiotics really helped, but finally for the first time this break, I feel normal.

Of course, just in time for my holiday to consist of a 3-day “vacation” during which I’ll try to catch up on all the work I wasn’t able to do this week. But nonetheless, at least I feel better now!

Thank you everyone for the kind thoughts and get-well wishes this week. They’ve helped my morale!

I have now seen the doctor. She gave me a prescription for antibiotics, in case it’s something that antibiotics can help with, and an OTC recommendation for a drug that isn’t OTC, and is in fact a controlled substance (she thought it was no longer prescription). Ah, well– Immodium AD for me.

Oh, yeah, and apparently about 100 people in Santa Cruz have gotten a similar sickness after attending holiday parties. There’s even a health advisory for the county about it.

PEOPLE, WASH YOUR HANDS AFTER YOU POTTY!!!

Yes, that is right– this kind of “flu” is almost certainly caused by improper hygiene. Mine, someone else’s, who knows? Handwashing is apparently the #1 best way to prevent getting the flu, common cold, and nasty stomach ailments that knock you out for 4 days over Christmas.

Click here for the movie! (MPEG-4 format)

This one deserves a little explanation. I am shifting away from the Benrik Book as my content inspiration. I’m not sure what I’ll be doing next, but for now, I’m going to focus on people being passionate about something. I enjoyed using The Book for my inspiration, but I needed a break from it. Perhaps I’ll go back to it later– who knows?

My friend Lise is passionate about her new chickens. Shortly after she got them in October, I came by with my videocamera and filmed them. This film is, arguably, funny stuff for sure, because baby chickens are inherently as funny as any episode of Keystone Cops, but without the plot.

Moving forward, my vlog might not be as funny as it used to be for a little while, but I’m finding my voice, and I appreciate you all sticking by while I do.

Also, my web host is having technical difficulties, so I’ve had to use a backup server temporarily. Be nice to it, please.

Technorati tags: geotagged geovlogged vlog videoblog

Technorati Tags: geotagged, geovlogged, videoblog, vlog

As of tonight, I have had “food poisoning” for far longer than is likely.

New possible causes: stomach flu or salmonella.

Since it’s been 3 days with no improvement, I’m going to go to urgent care tomorrow (I don’t have a “real” primary care physician).

Anyway, John and I watched this terrible movie tonight. It was pointless in the “I’m a film grad student doing my documentary thesis” way. It would have been riveting if we didn’t know as many nerds as we do, but really, 2 hours focusing on 4 white guys who get all hot and bothered about esoteric subjects is, really, not a draw. If I wanted that, I’d invite some of the gamers over and make them debate the relative merits of 3.0 and 3.5. Also, naked mole rats != cute. Unless you like, say, hairless cats. They’re cute the way hairless cats might be cute. In other words– cute to other people (I think they look like embryos, myself, and the undercurrent of breeding/reproduction/womb-envy in the whole film was just…. gah).

But then Alladin came and played fetch with me, which made things nicer.

It is the week between Christmas and New Years. I have a nearly biological imperative to go shopping. I have a definitely financial imperative to sit at the computer and write for at least 4 hours a day.

Instead, because the sofa hurts less than the computer chair (these things matter when your rear end is, well, misbehavin’) I sit and watch TV.

I’m going to go crazy. Maybe I’ll bust out the fancy pens I got for Christmas and the fancy journal I got and write bad poetry or to-do lists.