Month: January 2011

The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross

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You could say I’m catching up on stuff I’ve been meaning to read for a while. Much of that includes non-SF books, but there are also a lot of SF novels in the pile of books I’ve been meaning to read for ages. Among them number several by Charles Stross, but I was very curious to see what a Lovecraft/Spy-Thriller mashup would look like. (Especially since I have a specifically Lovecraft-meets-Chun-Doo-Hwan story brewing in the back of my mind now.) So, finally, I grabbed my copy of The Atrocity Archives and dived straight in! For someone like me–less well-read in …

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Everest in Yeongdeungpo

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There’s a lot of Nepali/Indian food available in Seoul, but there’s one food I hadn’t been able to find, and had really wanted to find, until last night. I met Miss Jiwaku in Yeongdeungpo but we discovered that Times Square was crammed with people, and every restaurant had a wait of at least 15 tables ahead of us. So we decided to try our luck elsewhere, and by chance Miss Jiwaku remembered an Indian/Nepali restaurant by the station, called Everest. Honestly, I wasn’t blown away by most of the food: the naan was a little dry, the chicken dopiaza was …

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Surely Not…

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Surely it’s not easier to get a Japanese pickle press in the USA than it is in Korea? If anyone has any suggestions, short of my going and buying a kimchi pot and getting some smooth stones from a river, please do fire away. (I’m looking for something with a plastic screw-press, as opposed to something that depends on a metallic spring, as I would prefer not to have metal sitting in the salty brine.

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Clawing at the Limits of Cool: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and the Greatest Jazz Collaboration Ever by Salim Washington anmd Farah Jasmine Griffin

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Clawing at the Limits of Cool: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and the Greatest Jazz Collaboration Ever by Salim Washington anmd Farah Jasmine Griffin. The University of Michigan Press (Ann Arbor, 1998.) The collaboration between Miles Davis and John Coltrane is an interesting topic, and it’s especially interesting that it’s framed as such right from the title of this book. Coltrane, after all, started out as a “junior” to Davis, if not in age then certainly in credentials and in the establishment of a personal, individual style. It’d be difficult to argue otherwise, but Griffin and Washington acknowledge this. However, they …

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Miss Jiwaku’s Film

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I’ve never really participated in a filmmaking project involving people who knew what they were doing, and who wanted to make a successful film; I did teach a pilot class where students made a pseudo-documentary, but some of the people involved had lukewarm interest in the project, and none of us were properly trained in filmmaking. However, this weekend I participated (as a camera operator) in the filming of a short film (written and directed by Miss Jiwaku). I feel like logging my impressions, as well as what I learned from the experience; but since that’s not everyone’s cup of …

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“Lester Young…” in Enter A Future: Fantastic Tales from Asimov’s Science Fiction

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So I just got an email from Sheila Williams that Asimov’s new Kindle-specific ebook, Enter A Future: Fantastic Tales from Asimov’s Science Fiction, is now available. It features stories by a bunch of amazing writers, namely: Connie Willis Allen Steele Kristine Kathryn Rusch Robert Reed Sara Genge Mary Rosenblum Nancy Kress Daryl Gregory Robert Silverberg (Author) … and, gasp, it also includes something by me. (My story in the collection is this one.) It’s pretty mind-blowing to be in such great company (again–this story seems to do that), and the collection is definitely worth the $7.99 US if you have a …

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Alley Kat, Screen Golf, and Hookers, All in One Place: Only? in Bucheon

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Alley Kat Pale Ale is pretty much the only decently hoppy beer available on tap in most of Korea, and while I’m not really a hophead, I like a few glasses of it now and again. Well, earlier this evening Miss Jiwaku and I happened by a place in Yeokgok that had a big poster showing off the availability of this very fine brew, and we decided to mosey on in and try it. What we found was beyond our wildest imaginings. Miss Jiwaku described it as a “playground for ajeoshis” and that was a pretty fitting description of the …

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As Promised: Gorgeous Renaissance Music

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The other night, I was saying how the world is so full of beautiful things that one could hardly spare the time to be interested in all of them. (It was really my over-stated reason for not having managed to read any of Kelly Link’s stories yet; the real reason is just there are too many books, and SF pushes my buttons more than fantasy, even good fantasy.) I made some comment on how Renaissance music is utterly beautiful but almost nobody listens to it, and ended up promising to play some for the people who were over at my …

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Library Access?

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UPDATE: Got ’em. Thanks to the several people (Claire, Tinatsu) who emailed them to me while I wasn’t looking! ORIGINAL POST: If anyone out there has access to either or both of these articles, I’d be very grateful for a copy. (My own employer’s library being, still, unequipped with any serious research access for Anglophones.) Drevdahl, John E.,  and Raymond B. Cattell. “Personality and creativity in artists and writers.” Journal of Clinical Psychology. Volume 14, Issue 2, pages 107–111, April 1958. (LINK.) Kaun, David E. “Writers die young: The impact of work and leisure on longevity.” Journal of Economic Psychology Volume 12, Issue 2, …

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Belgian Brewday: La Corée en a Quatre (Saison)

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For those who don’t live in Korea, the name of this Saison (Korea Has Four) is a bit of a quip; anyone who has lived here a month or two knows that for some reason, the fact that Korea has four seasons is considered very important by a lot of people here — a fact lampooned in at least one film I’ve seen, Dasepo Sonyeo (Dasepo Naughty Girls). I could get into why this is, and the reasons that such a common thing in the temperate zone attained such an important status in Korea, but this is a post on …

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