This Blog is Moving!

Long time no see, eh? Well, very good reason for that, actually. It's because for the past month or so, I've been contemplating moving. As I'm sure you realized from the title of this post.

And I did, actually! From now on this blog will be continued at mindstride.wordpress.com.

I know, I know. I've been on Blogger for under a year. Well, I'll be honest. The only reason-- and I mean the only reason-- I decided to use Blogger as my blog host is because I already had a Google account and didn't feel like memorizing a new password/username combo. I really wanted a Wordpress blog, so I've moved while I still have few enough posts to make the whole thing painless.

I haven't decided whether or not I'll close this address down-- it seems like the right thing to do, but I only intend to do so once I'm absolutely, positively sure that I've tied up all my lose ends and no longer need anything from this account.

I'm still going to tag this post, because tagless posts feel wrong.

It wins opening!

Okay! So I said I got two new crown caps. They come from a pair of Mexican sodas I purchased for cheap at a nearby Food Maxx. I've only opened one thus far, so here it is:

I used Yahoo!'s Babel Fish translator to figure out what "gana destapando" means. I had the feeling that ganar is the infinitive for "to win" (so much for those three years of high school Spanish, right?), but other than that, I was lost. Yahoo! gave me, and I quote, "It wins opening". Wow. Thank you? I know that not everything translates from language to language all that well, but translating a phrase so literally (or just poorly) that the English phrase loses all meaning is kind of appalling, really. I tried Google Translate and got, "uncovering wins", which makes about a kajillion times more sense.

Anyway, I kind of dislike purchasing drinks in order to obtain interesting caps, because as I mentioned, I don't drink soda or alcohol, so I'm not actually interested in what's inside the bottle. That ultimately becomes a pretty wasteful habit. Plus, it takes all of the adventure and excitement of finding a cap at random on say, a park bench, or a college library carpet.

In case you were wondering, I did drink some of the soda inside, because I can't bring myself to waste the whole thing, even though I don't like soda. No matter how cheap they are (they were around sixty-something cents each), I just can't pour them right out.. They are both supposed to be apple flavored. This Topo Sabores bottle didn't taste like apple in any way, shape, or form. It tasted and smelled more like cream soda. That's delicious and all, but it's not apple. It still tasted about a million times better than the "orange" soda I purchased in order to get my first Topo Sabores cap.

I'll talk about the other one when I drink it, ha.

Fiction Update: Change of Setting

I've been thinking that perhaps I should try getting my five-or-more pages a day of novel work done on a laptop, rather than on the aging desktop computer. I think it would simply be more comfortable for me, and that's honestly kind of a big deal. It's one thing that keeps me in bed early in the morning instead of getting up earlier than usual just to fit in my five pages. I stay up late, so sometimes I just can't get myself up, and I'm unwilling to sit in front of that computer, in the cold room, on a cold chair. Maybe all I need is a change of scenery when attempting to get my work done.

Also been thinking about Looking Glass. Part of the reason I haven't been working on it is that, again, I've been spending a lot more time working on the laptop than on the desktop, where the story is located. I'm going to reread it tonight to get myself back into the mood/mindset, and then pound out chapter six... seven? Six... I think. Wow, I can't even remember where I left off, that's sad. I think it's chapter seven, actually, and it's a doozy, so that's probably why I took my little break in the first place (long, detailed chapters can be exhausting). Shame on me.

The only thing I'm concerned about is backing my work up. We've got an external drive set up, but it's connected to the desktop computer (and for a good reason; our desktop could stop working any time now). But I like having an external drive to back my stuff onto immediately, and I don't think I can do that with the configuration we've got set up now. It'd be a pain getting this PC laptop hooked up to that thing, and what if there are weird compatibility issues with the copies I do save? What if I find myself unable to open them in the future, on another computer?

I guess I'd have the same thing to worry about with the copies saved via our desktop, but the desktop is a G4, and I'm planning on buying a Macbook Pro in the future, so on some weird level that makes me less worried.

At the end of the day though, I really just need to get this thing written. I'm desperate at this point. If typing the whole thing up on this laptop is what it'll take, I'll do it.

In other news: New crown caps! I'll post pics later. :)

County Fair, Bookstores, Cookbooks, and Being a Road Hazard

I don't know how these long post-less periods occur. I'm always thinking about my next post. I sign in. I check up on my account. I read other blogs I follow. I think about things I would like to talk about. It just somehow doesn't happen. I think part of it is because the next entry, ideally would be a Fiction Update, but I haven't made any progress, so there's no point to that. Instead, I'll blather on about random stuff.

Went to the Alameda County Fair on the Fourth of July.

I love the fair, even though I hate amusement parks (and one of the biggest draws of the fair for some people is all the carnival rides). I love seeing the diversity of the visitors (well, at least out here), the interesting booths, the warm weather, the live music (county fair karaoke FTW!), it's all just wonderful. Not a huge fan of the farm animal displays, but...

On to today. I have a like-hate relationship with big chain mega bookstores like Borders and Barnes and Noble. For one, I love privately owned independent bookstores and like to support small business owners like that. You find really interesting things on the shelves of an indie bookstore-- at Borders, all you've got are the big bestsellers. No niche genres, no out-of-print books, no obscure, hard-to-find titles, no local or small-time authors. Mega bookstores are just kind of soulless. If I had more of a choice, I wouldn't shop at Borders for everything. Maybe just periodicals. Unfortunately, the nearest private bookstore had an owner who was just... hrm. Let me explain.

It was a hole in the wall. Dark, cool. A bookstore that could fit in the palm of the main library's hand, so to speak. The labyrinthine rows of shelves reached for the ceiling. The whole place smelled like the public library, but older and dustier-- if that's possible. It was perfect. I visited twice, back in the days when I lived with my sister and walked home from campus. The first time, the bookstore owner, a tall, thin woman brown-haired woman, didn't greet me when I walked in smiling.

She stared. She eyed me as I browsed. She never verbally acknowledged me in any way, not when I walked in, not when I left. Yet she engaged heartily in casual banter with other patrons, at least a few of whom I assumed were regulars. Still, that's no reason for iciness towards a newcomer. I'm not someone who takes bringing race into matters lightly, but I honestly think she had negative perceptions of me because of that. I had two options. 1) Continue frequenting the small store, braving her coldness in order to disprove all her negative assumptions about me, and have a nice bookstore to frequent. 2) Stop attending a store at which I am not welcome. I chose the latter, obviously. Why give her any money?

The second reason the whenever I walk into a bookstore, the nearest Borders in my case, I always... always... walk out with something. I don't understand it. I can't restrain myself. A trip to Borders almost always means spending money I shouldn't necessarily be spending. Take for example my latest find: The Ultimate Book Of Vegan Cooking.

I'm almost positive that this book doesn't contain any information I don't already know. I've been vegan for a little while now, and was veg before that. But how could I resist? Look at that thing. It seduces you with its huge, full-color photos and cheapest-vegan-cookbook-EVAR price of six dollars. Veganomicon is thirty dollars off the shelf-- thus, why I don't own a copy of Veganomicon (yet). The book I bought today isn't as thick, and probably not as useful, but full color photos, for six dollars? Okay!

That's Borders for you. They have a huge "Bargain Books" section filled with relatively cheap stuff. Four bucks, five bucks, six bucks. It's typically full of how-to books, inexpensive coffee-table books, cheap kits (like a sushi kit that comes with a bamboo rolling mat, chopsticks, etc.), and imports like this one. I don't quite get how that works, because usually stuff from other countries is more expensive, but I never claimed to be an economic wonder kid. I assume these books are Borders exclusive, in this country anyway.

This new book, printed by Hermes House publishing, is from London. I will admit, that's part of the draw for me. I love books from the UK for some reason. Something about the clean design, the use of Helvetica or Arial font, the slightly different language (e.g. "sultanas" rather than "golden raisins"), and the different measurement units. My first vegetarian cookbook ever was a tiny spiral-bound thing called Cookshelf Vegetarian, and it served me quite well. I bought it out of pure, desperate need; I was new to cooking for myself regularly in general, and didn't know what recipes other than my mom's to begin with. The recipes were simple but helpful, and the pictures were gorgeous. I'll be honest, I regularly sit down with cookbooks and just look at the pictures.

After Cookshelf, I bought another cookbook from the bargain section at Stonestown Borders, purely on a whim. It's called Vegetarian Cooking and Vegetable Classics.

Interestingly, it was published by Hermes House as well. Unfortunately, it's not exactly as stellar an example of vegetarian cookbooks; it has a chapter called "Virtually Vegetarian", which includes recipes with fish and other seafood.

I kid you not.

...What?

The intro below says, "For all those demi-vegetarians who just cannot resist fish and seafood, here is a selection of starter and main-course dishes that combine unusual vegetables and herbs with fish in nutritious and flavoursome ways."

Seriously? "Cannot resist"? Really? And yeah, that's a fish filet in the photo behind the box.

Whose idea was it to publish a vegetarian cookbook with an entire chapter on fish and seafood? I understand that they're trying to appeal to pescatarians. That's fine, but that's not vegetarianism. It has no place in a vegetarian cookbook, especially considering the fact that many if not most vegetarians are so for ethical reasons, and so the idea of not "resisting" is out of the question. If pescatarians want to learn recipes with fish in them, there are countless omni-centric cookbooks for them to choose from. Why pick a vegetarian cookbook for such an outlet? It defeats the purpose of the book. One picks up a vegetarian cookbook to get away from flesh. By that logic, I guess the vegan book I picked up has a chapter on eggs and dairy called "Pseudo Vegan"-- because some vegans "cannot resist" omelettes and cheese. Makes no sense. Nice work there Hermes House, -1 for you. Now I've learned to look through a book thoroughly before purchasing.

Something scary happened to me on my way back home. I was at a red light, and I was turning right. I paused, and prepared to make a right turn on red, which is legal after a stop, right? Right. So I look to my right. Three lanes, all clear. Left? Three lanes, all clear. I also assumed that the light would change soon, and that the people heading straight (in the direction I was coming from) would soon have a green light, thus making my turn completely clear and care-free.

Then I made an error in judgment. There were no cars coming from the direction that had the right of way, so I assumed I'd have enough time to cross all three lanes of traffic during my right turn, and wind up in the far left lane.

Wrong!

All of a sudden I see a Honda Accord off behind me and to my left in my peripheral vision, just clearing the intersection. It was careening towards me, and technically, it had the right of way.

Oh crap. Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, I thought midway through my turn, still in the middle of the three lane road. I gunned it and accelerated so fast I thought I'd hit the concrete road divider I was heading toward.

I've gotten too lax behind the wheel, and I think part of it is because breaking rules is part of what I deem "aggressive/defensive driving". I know there's no logic behind that, but it's true. In person, I'm not a confrontational person. I don't speak loudly, (though that's partly a physical thing-- I just have a soft voice) and I always try to maintain a certain degree of calm courtesy with others. So I think people don't always take people like me seriously when they first meet me, or actively try to take advantage of people like me. I feel like behind the wheel, I can't afford to be the person who's not driving defensively and/or aggressively.

But I'm beginning to see advantage to the paranoid driver I was when I first started. Being constantly on-edge means I'm less likely to put myself in a situation where I could get knocked around by some other car, like I did today. That is all. No more shortcut-driving, or whatever I'll call my current state. Just plain, simple careful driving.


That's all, I guess, for this massive beast of a post. Good day all.


P.S. Yeah, I know about the bad Paint job on those pics, esp. the first one. I'm working on a PC today, so *shrug*.

Empty Bottle Blues

Happy Father's Day, all! Love you, Dad.

I actually planned for Sundays to be Fiction Update days (or other regularly scheduled stuff) and Thursdays to be random, but darn if being all off schedule with my posting hasn't screwed around with the order of stuff. My last entry was a FicUp, and since I've still made no progress, another one would be redundant and boring. I would talk about Father's Day, but aside from the fact that this Father's Day has been very low-key, I generally don't have much to say about it this year. So instead I will talk about an obsession, because obsessing about things is what I do best.

Bottle caps.

Question: How do you collect beer bottle caps if you don’t drink alcohol?

Fiction Update: Stalling...

Things are slow. I've gotten back into my old habit of telling myself that I'll get up early and pound out my five daily pages of novel, and then failing to do so. I have, however, received all my books in the mail (finally) and will continue to read them for inspiration. 

I've also gone back to reread a little of what I've written recently, not just within this novel, but all of my fiction. As usual, this gets me really motivated. I am reminded that these works are worth finishing.

When things get more interesting, these fiction updates will be less boring. In the meantime, I will continue to enjoy the delicious chocolate cake I spontaneously baked tonight.

 

 

Road trips, anklets, and other things of note

Yeah, yeah, I know. No Fiction Updates, or updates of any kind,  in a while. It's due to a series of things occurring at once. The first of those things was the last Thursday I actually posted. I had too many (good!) things on my mind for days afterward to bring myself here. Then, I actually went on a small trip with my sister. I figure I'll talk a little about that.

A couple of Mondays ago, back between around May 31st and June 3rd, I was actually out of town. I went down to Southern California with my sister and niece. A couple of weeks prior she asked me if I wanted to just drive down and hang about. I love both spontaneity and road trips, so I gleefully agreed to go with her.