Inktrails from Alaska

Book List

This list was begun March 16, 2004 and lists only what I've recently read. Actually, not all of what I've recently read, but some have been returned to the library already and there were so many of them that I've forgotten the authors. From now on I'll make a note of each!

I have to add some of my favorite books, though.

Children of Men, PD James. PD James usually writes mysteries, which I read and enjoy greatly for their moodiness and Old World slowness. This is something very different, a speculative fiction work that was wonderfully satisfying all the way through.

Animal Doctor, By P. C. Jersild Translated by David Mel Paul and Margareta Paul from the Swedish. This reminded me a bit of Stanislaw Lem and those others who write of endless bureaucracies and how an emotional human being fits into such a thing. Great characters, thoughtful writing, and a clean, cold Northern essence.

Glyph, Percival Everett. This book varies from snobby pretentiousness to very amusing social satire. A sort of reverse Forrest Gump, the protagonist Ralph is a baby who has an IQ of 450 and who writes erudite notes and reads voraciously between diaper changes. Ultimately it was a disappointment because the author relied too much on austere philosophical meanderings.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, JK Rowling. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, JK Rowling. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, JK Rowling. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, JK Rowling. The odd thing about the Harry Potter books is that for hundreds of pages you are convinced that nothing at all is really happening, and then things suddenly come together. Rowling is quite good at this!

All of the Stephanie Plum novels, the latest two I recently read. Hard Eight, Janet Evanovich. To The Nines, Janet Evanovich.

Dhalgren, Samuel Delaney. I read everything that I find by Samual Delany. This book goes right to my gut.

Solaris, Stansilaw Lem. The Cyberiad, Stansilaw Lem. Also every other book he has written. Read him.

Hackers, Steven Levy. How we all ended up with computers on our desktops, and the personalities and events involved. I could barely put it down to eat.

Any books that I can find written by Boris and Arkady Strugatsky.

Tripmaster Monkey, Maxine Hong Kingston.

The Tin Drum, Günter Grass.

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, JRR Tolkien.

The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck. This is my favorite book of all time. I have read every book Steinbeck has written, many of them numerous times.

All books written by Margaret Atwood, author of A Handmaid's Tale.

All books written by Marge Piercy, author of Woman on the Edge of Time.

2001: A Space Odyssey, Arthur C. Clarke.

Diana Gabaldon Books Outlander Dragonfly in Amber Voyager Drums of Autumn The Fiery Cross

James Joyce Ulysses Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Dubliners

Connie Willis Water Witch (with Cynthia Felice) Lincoln's Dreams Doomsday Book Remake Bellwether Promised Land (with Cynthia Felice) To Say Nothing of the Dog This is one of those incredibly enjoyable books that I recommend to everyone. Passage Brain death and the Titanic meet. I couldn't stop reading it, though it disturbed me to find out there was so much detail available about the Titanic. The ultimate mystery novel.

The Forest, Edward Rutherfurd. A long history of England with intertwining families throughout the centuries.

The Starry Child Circle of Time, both by Lynn Hanna. She's trying to be Diana Gabaldon but isn't putting the time and effort into it. By the second book it's so contrived as to be boring.

Fairy and Folk Tales of Ireland, W.B. Yeats. I read this as a child and it scared me so bad I didn't reread it until now. Why the little people/fairies/etc. make mortals cart around corpses is something I'm still figuring out. Could be they are saying, "Hey STUPID, you are MORTAL! Get your act together NOW!" Besides those types of stories, there are lots of others, and many written in Irish/English dialect. If you haven't read this, and you are into Irish lore, you have missed a classic.

The Silence of the Lambs, by Thomas Harris. I finally read this book from which the famous movie was made. Even knowing how things turn out didn't make it any less fascinating, and it is well-written, an added and required bonus if I am to finish a book. I like Clarice Starling because she embodies the person in me that is real, who has both feminine and masculine traits, not just some author's idea of what "woman" is. I get the idea that as a kid she also considered herself a person before she considered herself male or female.

Liz Evans Don't Mess With Mrs. In-Between JFK is Missing! Who Killed Marilyn Monroe? Barking! Almost any blurb you read will describe Liz Evans' Grace Smith books as "England's answer to Janet Evanovich." I suppose it is a good way to sell books, and there is a slight resemblence but some nice differences, too. For one thing, these plots are a lot more involved, and the books are more detailed and longer than any Stephanie Plum novel. For another thing, Grace Smith is more my cup of tea. She's less concerned with men than Stephanie is, doesn't do the makeup thing, the clothes thing (in the four books I've read, she's still wearing the same three outfits!) and she's somewhat tactless. The thing she has in common is that she's out there being active, doing stuff, getting into a mess and many of the situations are quite funny, no doubt about it! These aren't just fluff, and the definitely aren't romances, and they are well-written.

Rich Flogging the Rich

Ten or twenty years from now I wonder if the current rash of prosecutions against CEOs and other rich people is going to be labeled a "witch hunt." No doubt in the case of Martha Stewart, it will be labeled the same, though with a "B" at the front of "witch."

Who is prosecuting these rich people? The government, which is run by rich people! I don't get it! Are they jealous of each other?

As far as I can tell, very few rich people get rich by behaving in a moral fashion. They must have the ability to use people, even step on faces, bend rules, and take advantage of others when they are down. Cheating on the stockmarket is something I assumed all these people do, given the chance.

And so what if they ruin their companies and the fortunes of their stockholders? Isn't this something that's happened for years? It's their money to spend on giant parties and several hundred pairs of shoes. Isn't that the point of being rich? You can do whatever the hell you want and it doesn't matter because you have more money than you ever had before.

New Categories Here

I've added a couple new categories: Movie Reviews and Book Reviews.

Having a lifetime of books behind me, I find that I can reread things I read thirty years ago and find them new and fresh. Either I am quite a different person than I was then, or my brain is running out of hard drive. Probably both. At any rate, I've wanted to keep track of all the books I've read for some time. At the library I browse the shelves and pull out books that look or feel interesting. Other times there are certain books that I know I want to read, and so I check them out. Anything and everything interests me. There will be one post that I update with all the books I read, and individual posts reviewing individual books.

We watch movies quite a bit, too, though mostly after they are out on DVD. We can't get cable, and satellite probably wouldn't work unless we stuck it up on an incredibly tall pole to get it above the trees. If you look at the pictures on my site (click on the cabin icon) you will see that the trees are pretty darn tall! Therefore we rent and buy DVDs and videos. Some exceptions must be made, for instance, I've seen Return of the King twice now and want to go back and see it again before it is gone from the big screen. I love the big screen, but it is expensive!

The movie reviews may be about current movies, or about movies that are old that I have thoughts about. Lately there have been collections of movies/tv shows that have come out, allowing me to see old Roy Rogers movies again whenever I want, or the first season of Gilligan's Island. It's funny how one's viewpoint on these things changes over time!

I hope you will check back and that you'll find these reviews entertaining or thought-provoking.

Solaris: The Book, The Movies

Long ago, in 1973, when I was in college, I saw a movie made in Russia. It was called Solaris. When I was young, my ability to suspend disbelief was childlike and intense. Solaris touched me deeply. It is the story of a man who journeys to a space station that is orbiting around a sentient planet. There is no population of intelligent beings on this planet, but it is an entire intelligence of its own. The name of the planet is Solaris. It is covered by a "colloidal ocean." Solaris communicates with the human beings in the space station in a unique way. I won't tell you what it does, because that would ruin some of the impact of the movie.

Recently this movie has been redone with George Clooney. It was panned by the critics and I do not plan to see it. The beauty, mystery and integrity of the original Russian film Solaris truly can't be improved upon. Clooney doesn't have the depth necessary to star in such a film.

After I saw the movie back in 1973 (it was made in 1972) it disappeared and I haven't been able to find it again until I tried Netflicks. I joined just to see this movie again, but living in rural Alaska, where cable and even satellite TV is not an option, and where we get about two and a half stations, Netflicks is a nice addition to my flexibility. I can now rent movies without having to go into town to take them back too soon. They have movies I'd never find in any video store, not to mention the ones here in Fairbanks.

Solaris is based on a book by Stanislaw Lem, the "grandfather" of science fiction. I highly recommend all of his books. The Cyberiad is an absolutely hysterical book of short stories about the universe as run by robots. Not surprisingly, the robots act quite a bit like people. I used to read thise book to my son for bedtime stories and he still loves to remember stories of Trurl and Klapaucius, the two robot protagonists.

Lem is adept at writing what really matters. His stories and novels are about people, regardless of the setting, whether it is in the future, or within a frightening maze of bureauacracy. After I saw Solaris I began reading any books by Lem that I could find, and I have never been disappointed. (Lem is Polish, but there are good translations available.) He writes about the questions, "Who are we?" and "What is real?" and "What is important?" These are not easy questions. His books are not "what if" science fiction. They are built on deeply human questions. It is up to the reader to figure out the answers, too. Lem isn't giving anything away.

This is the problem with Hollywood making a Lem story into a movie. Hollywood wants to write "what if" stories, and that's not what Solaris is about.

The Final Verdict

"The cells sent are consistent with chondrosarcoma."

When I asked the vet how long he had, he said "Anywhere from a month to six months." This kind of cancer only spreads farther in the body 20% of the time, but the tumor does tend to keep growing locally.

Stevie spent the afternoon playing with the Pig, (another dog) playing a game that went like this: Run to the end of the property, bite the snow! Run to the other end of the property. Bite the snow! Repeat!

Stevie Story Part 3

Well, he's had two days of antibiotics and he seems to be getting better. He never was feeling bad himself! He has been a little upset about the bloody noses, but that has stopped, and even when he had them he'd run around and frolic in the snow just like any other day.

He hasn't had a bloody nose for over 24 hours now, and I can say I'm feeling a lot better!

Test results from tissue in the sinus are coming via FedEX either today or tomorrow. Stay tuned...

Stevie's Nose

Stevie is having problems. He's an old dog, and you can expect that, but his problems are not the usual old dog problems.

For one thing, he doesn't look or act anywhere near his age, which is 15 or 16. Most people think he's about six or seven, and few would doubt that to see him go galumphing through the snow, chasing squirrels, and wrestling with the other dogs. He's the amazing un-aging dog, and we'd like to keep him forever.

He got too rambuctious and broke a toenail right through the entire quick. He had a bloody nose, too, from (we thought) rubbing his nose so hard on the floor to lick his sore paw, which must have hurt in the extreme. So I took him in to have the toenail taken care of, which meant having him knocked out. Since we had to do that anyway, I had them clean his teeth, and remove some truly hideous "old dog bumps" that looked like miniature brains growing out of his skin, two of which were on his head. I kept expecting those things to grow eyes and greasy little mouths. They were nasty.

He wasn't even at the vet's more than a day, but came home with a dog cold virus neverthelss. Seems like every time I take one of my dogs to the vet, they get a cold virus. And they've both had bordatella (kennel cough) vaccines, so that's not it.

Even though he got over the cold, it seemed like he never got over the cold. He kept wheezing and then finally, over the last three or four days, started sneezing so hard his nose started bleeding again. Then he'd sneeze again and spray blood and sometimes dog snot all OVER the room in varying sizes ranging from speck to goopy blob. Yesterday morning his nose wouldn't stop bleeding, and I had to drive into town over icy, windy roads, trying to hold a paper towel over his nose so he wouldn't cover the car, and me, with blood.

We made it to the vet okay, and his nose finally stopped bleeding, though there was still a drip now and then. The vet said it could be an inflammation and we had two choices: 1)leave him there and have them knock him out, irrigate his nose, take a skull xray, and look up his nose with a, erm, up-the-nose tool, or 2)give him some antibiotics and see if that solved the problem.

Option 1 would cost about $150, I was told. Option 2, which I took, was $100, it turned out. The Clavamox that the vet prescribed and sold me cost $75. I complained that it was more than people medicine, and I knew that because I don't have any insurance myself! Turns out that this Clavamox is the latest and greatest thing, same thing as Augmentin for people, which is ultra expensive.

This morning I woke up at 4:30 AM because Stevie was sneezing super hard again. I got out of bed and got him situated on the couch on my black, nylon jacket and then covered the whole area around him with paper towels. If you know Stevie, you know he's one of the most cooperative dogs you've ever met. He was this morning, thank goodness, and he stayed on the couch and let me blot him, and we waited the episode out together. At 7:30 I headed down to town with Stevie dripping beside me, and I dropped him off for the aforementioned Option 1.

At 4:00 I picked him up. He wasn't even woozy from the anesthetic! I was glad to see that, because it took him two days the last time to be himself again. But when the vet took me into the examining room, I knew that it wasn't good.

"Normally you can't see too much in skull x-rays, but," and here he shuffled through a whole bunch of x-rays, "you can see here on the left side that it's black, lots of air, and that's good, " he said, pointing to Stevie's left sinus. I looked at the left sinus. It looked like a cobwebbed cave. A very cobwebbed cave.

"It's cancer," I said.

"Probably," said the vet, "but we should send the tissue out just to know for sure. He might have a fungal infection, those can look like this sometimes..." he trailed off and I knew he was just saying something to make it seem less painful.

The vet took a deep breath and said, "And that isn't all. When I have an animal sedated like that, I like to give them a good palpating to make sure everything is okay. Stevie's pancreas felt round and enlarged. I had the other vets check it, and they thought it was very much like a tumor, almost certainly a tumor."

He went on to tell me that the pancreas can get benign tumors, but it sounded a lot like the talk about the fungal infection.

"Did you take a needle biopsy?"

"No, usually you just get red blood cells and it bleeds a lot." Plus I bet it would be pretty darn painful for Stevie, I thought.

So we agreed to send the tissue blown out of Stevie's nose to the pathology lab, which cost me another $100. Today's bill was $270, total. They did take back the super expensive Clavamox and let me put him on Cephalexin instead ($15), but that victory, as you can understand, was a bit hollow.

So that's the story. It's not a funny one, or a clever one, but it is a true one. Unfortunately.

Dog Tired

Got home late last night after the jam. It took a while of internet surfing to get myself back into sleep mode. Driving through the snowy, icy roads in the dark, making sure I don't hit a moose is a wide-awake activity. (They hit back.) Even with Stevie "helping" me drive, it pays to be careful. Sure enough, there was a moose just stepping off the road not too far from home!

Back home at last, Stevie and I entered the cabin and found Pig and Sofia all whirly-happy to see us. Mark was asleep upstairs and I wanted to make sure he wasn't awakened by any noise. The dogs finished sniffing each others' butts ("Oh yeah, I remember you") and I settled down at my desk to check email and basically doodle around on the computer until I was sleepy again. Sofia, a young husky-coyote mix, (very smart girl but the first dog I'd guess was an alien) didn't just lie down again like the other two dogs did. She kept rubbing against me as I sat in my office chair, kind of like a cat.

Speaking of the cat, he made his appearance right away, so that I had two animals rubbing up against me and twining and twirling around my legs.

Sofia and Kittykittymaomao have an interesting relationship. Sofia has an extremely driving hunting instinct, and the moment she first saw Kittymao she thought LUNCH. Over the last year she has learned that instead of lunch, Kittymao means PLAY.

You don't know what cabin fever is until you've had a cat locked up in a small cabin for six months. Kittymao tumbled down the stairs to greet me and the dogs, but then started racing up and down the stairs and chasing his tail like some orange shag Taz pillow gone wild. He gets very, very bored in this little house all winter. Maybe that is what drove the cat to become a playmate in stead of lunch, but now if Sofia isn't home in the evenings, Kittymao comes downstairs and meows for her. If the kitty is outside on a warm winter day (we'll get to the Alaskan definition of "warm" one of these days) Sofia looks all over for him.

Their play consists of several games, one of which I call Cat in a Box. It's really Cat Under The Bed, but it is the same idea. Kittymao goes under the bed, and Sofia jumps up on top. She bounces around in anticipation, while the kitty decides where he's going to pop up. She lays near the edge of the bed, paws hanging over, eyes bright, face eager, and then suddenly Kittymao pops straight up the side of the bed, eyes wild and fur flying, whaps at her with his paws and disappears again. Sometimes he'll pop up three times or so before hiding again under the bed.

This is extremely funny to watch especially if you are IN the bed with Sofia. You can see why she loves this. You'll be laying there and suddenly just the HEAD of this crazy-looking orange, wild-eyed animal pops up!

It's not so funny if you are trying to sleep. Kittymao often tries to start these play sessions in the middle of the night. The Cat in a Box sessions are often followed by mad chasing sessions back and forth and around and around the cabin. Once again, not so good in the middle of the night!

Yes, folks, just another reason people call their cats "That damn cat."

So here I am, in the quiet cabin, man asleep upstairs who has to get his rest, and Sofia and Kittymao about to start another crazy session of furniture-whomping play.

I wave my hand at Kittymao and make him retreat up the stairs. This doesn't help because while Kittymao races back up the wooden, uncarpeted stairs, Sofia decides to go with him, and they start galumphing around upstairs. I wait a few minutes, hoping that she'll jump up on the bed, curl up and go to sleep, but soon I hear the unmistakable noise of the Chase Game. I need to get her downstairs before it becomes the Cat in the Box game!

Of course this situation isn't making me very sleepy.

We keep a jar of dog cookies (biscuits) on the TV, so I get one, break it in half and give some each to Stevie and the Pig, saying, "Who wants COOKIES?" just loud enough for Sofia to hear but not to wake up Mark. They chew them gratifyingly loudly and I'm standing at the bottom of the stairs with a cookie in my hand when Sofie appears, and comes eagerly to me.

I give her the cookie. Instantly she gets a goofy look in her eyes and starts tossing the cookie all around, pouncing on it and throwing it and killing it over and over. Ever seen National Geographic's footage of wolves or coyotes pouncing and tossing mice? That's exactly what she looks like.

At this point I give up, get the leash and tether Sofia to the coffee table for the night (with her dog bed there). Unless I do that, no one is going to sleep tonight!

After about an hour spent quietly on the computer, I'm ready for bed. After I'm snug and warm, I crash out. Ahhhh.

Around 4am Stevie comes upstairs and curls up and goes to sleep. He does that sometimes just to be near me. The bed is too high for him to jump up on, which is a good because he's 70 lbs. and large! But he'll stay nearby to be close to me.

He's been getting over a dog cold virus that was going around Fairbanks, and has had a stuffy nose. In fact last week I rushed him to the vet because it sounded like he was having an asthma attack, but he wasn't, thank goodness. It was just that small, snurffly head cold.

You know when you are almost over a cold and the runny nose problem you had is now a thick snot problem? It's almost gone but it's so thick you can't blow it out?

That is exactly what is causing Stevie to have some pretty good wheezing when he sleeps...in fact, I woke up out of a dead sleep to what sounded like a teakettle. It took me a while to figure out what the hell it was. Finally I got out of bed, grabbed Stevie's nose, and wiggled it. The teakettle noise stopped. Stevie thought I was nuts, but he wasn't whistling anymore. I went back to bed.

And woke up again, this time with a teakettle PLUS a very realistic bird whistle noise. This was LOUD. Sighing, I got out of bed again, wiggled his nose and then blew on his nose. Remember, this started at 4am.

Stevie was beginning to figure this was just one of those weird things people do, like sticking things up his butt periodically (his eyes glaze over at the sight of a thermometer---I finally bought an ear thermometer just for him).

I got back to sleep, finally. And wouldn't you know it? This time it was a great imitation of BAGPIPES that woke me up.

Geez, now I know what it is like to sleep next to me when I have bad asthma.

Back out of bed, wiggle his nose, blow HARD into his nose, shake his head a little, pet him, reassure him I'm not crazy, and back to bed. And this time the Nose On Parade finally quieted down.

Just in time to get up at 6AM.

Cute Li'l Clamshell

There are several things that go with me everywhere: my dog, Stevie, my violin (most of the time), and my little old graphite clamshell iBook.

I bought this computer when burglars tore down the door of my store, not to steal jewelry, not to steal violins, harps, or expensive musical instruments. They weren't interested in imported whiskey flasks, or the money in the till. Nope. They tore down a security door and a very thick entry door to steal my iMac and printer. They didn't even take the cables.

That violation prompted me to say "never again!" and I bought a used iBook that went home with me every night. I also installed a security system.

The storefront has closed (though the webstore remains, see "Celtic & More" link) and this little baby has served me well. It has gone all over Albuquerque, to Amarillo and back, to St. Louis, and Pagosa Springs. It has done the Alaskan Highway! It has been dropped a few times, gotten damn cold, survived damp and humidity so low that we had to keep a fire extinguisher on hand in case the dog scratched himself and suddenly combusted.

The door to the CD player falls off every once in a while. But I click it back on, no problem. A tiny little screw fell out of there, and I saved it for a long time, but have no idea where it goes, and my young Mac geek friends tell me it's probably redundant, anyway. The power supply's wires have been wrapped up so many times that they had split and become bare. A couple weeks ago a friend of mine got out some silicon and we swathed the bare spot with goo and let it harden into a rubbery safety coat.

I've worn the letters off most of the keys. My boyfriend, a two-finger typist at best, looked at it and said, "How do you type on this thing??" With the help of a Sharpy pen, the letters were reinstated, but they've worn off again, of course. Lucky for me I took typing in highschool, even though I refused to become the high-heeled and panty-hosed secretary they insisted so many of us girls become. I'm comforted that if I ever go blind, I will still be able to type.

The graphite cover is smeared and smudged, stained and rubbed raw in places. It's a mere 366mghz, and has only 5.6 gig of hard drive. It's maxxed out at 320MB RAM, has no read/write anything, no firewire, no infrared, just your basic USB, ethernet, phone and sound ports. The Wacom mouse and drawing pad that I use with it are in equally worn-out shape: the mouse feet are worn OFF, the mouse pad itself, the drawing pad, has a whole layer simply GONE.

I just discovered how to put Quicktime movies on the web. I am learning how to write Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). I am doodling around with cgi/Perl. Besides writing, and designing websites, and using massive amounts of computing resources for Adobe Photoshop, Image Ready and QuarkXPress. And there are a whole bunch of things I want to do, but can't, until I get a read/write drive, more hard drive, more memory, and a quicker processor.

It's time for a new system.

I'm saving up. If you need a website built, documents layed out, pamphlets or business cards designed, or you have an editing job. Let me know.

A Mouthful

Nothing freaks me out like my teeth. Once you lose your baby teeth, that's it. Your adult teeth grow in and you never get any more! If you blow it with your teeth, not only do you go through what still resembles medieval torture, but you are stuck with all kinds of ingenious but primitive devices that you have to clean and then stick into your mouth with the oral equivalent of shoe goo. Sure, you can have artificial teeth implanted in your jaw. And this is neat, if it weren't for the fact that they literally screw them into your jawbone. During this procedure, when the dentist says to the assistant, "Drill," he means Black and Decker! Then there is gum surgery, where they take the new gum material from cadavers and put it in YOUR mouth.

I only hope they also balance the blood and bile humors at the same time. And cut my hair.

Every so often my teeth break, crumble, or snap in my dreams. I wake up and run my tongue over my teeth frantically, trying to make sure that they are all there, it was just a dream. It's such a huge relief to find all those very imperfect and somewhat yellowed babies in there. When I asked a psychologist about this, she said that dreams of crumbling teeth symbolize extreme regret.

Maybe. But I think it's more a fear of doing something wrong, than regretting it. Or fear of regretting it, which would inevitably follow doing something you can't take back. I don't think it means you actually regret something, I think it means you are damned afraid you will do something that you can't go back on.

Ask any old person for life advice. Every single old person I've asked has said, among other things, "Floss your teeth. Take care of your gums."

I've got several gold crowns, numerous fillings, but I have all my teeth. Every dentist I've seen has said, "Yes, do not worry, you will keep all your teeth." This is very reassuring.

That doesn't mean I don't worry that I'll screw my life up irreparably. I'm not an ultra-careful person. I'm not an anal-retentive control freak who gauges every move so as not to make a "mistake." I take chances, some pretty big ones! Such as moving 4,000 miles across the US and Canada to Alaska, for starters. However, even a risk-taker like me worries about making mistakes, and I bet that was something you didn't know. I'm only human.

I want my son to pull those gold crowns out after I'm dead and sell the gold. Why should some funeral director get all that gold? It's my son's inheritance! There's enough in there to buy him a new computer, at the least. Hmmm. I need a new computer right now....hmmmmm....