(no subject)

People who condemn anything--book, movie, tv show, song, whatever--without first actually seeing it make me roll my eyes.

People who believe a movie sucks because it isn't the book in perfect form? That makes me roll them so hard I can see my own brain.

Yes, adherence to source material is desirable. But not all books can be filmed exactly as written, for a multitude of reasons, and--more importantly--if you can't bother to see it first without condemning it, then you're as bad as the guy who made the changes you so despise.

Hell, sometimes the movie is better than the book--I enjoyed A River Runs Through It so much I bought the novel... which I hated.

Anyway, just my opinion, mileage varies.

Meme-ness: 7 things.

These seven interests come requested by graphxgrrl. If you want to play along, comment; I'll pick 7 of your interests for you to write about, you post with these instructions in your LJ to keep spreading the fun.

Atevi
I'm a huge fan of CJ Cherryh's anthropological science fiction. The way in which she explores alien-ness in much of her work appeals to me; she creates truly alien aliens, with very different values and attitudes. My favorite of these are the Foreigner books.

The premise is that, hundreds of years ago, a lost colony ship built a space-station over an inhabited world which was just entering its version of the steam age. When the ship and its "Pilots Guild" left to try to find a way home, the colonists who had been left behind said "Fuck this" and used old re-entry capsules to go down to the surface. Due to human-alien communication mistakes, a war began. Fast forward to the "present," and the humans live on an island enclave. The hero of the book, Bren Cameron, is the only human allowed onto the Atevi mainland, where he is the ambassador and translator to the Ateva ruler. An assassination attempt begins the first trilogy. The books are equal parts adventure and an examination of what it means to stand between two cultures, especially when one chooses to belong more to one than the other. I also just like the Ateva mindset and culture; they're weirdly preoccupied with numbers and balance.

Easy grade pro
The best grading program there is. I love it. Unfortunately, I'm no longer allowed to use it, as my boss has forced me to use one that SHE likes better (without ever having bothered to try mine).

Old books
I love the smell of them, and I love the idea that the book I'm reading was held, and read, by a person decades or (in the case of a couple of my books) centuries ago. I like to grab up books with their writing in it. It's just... nice.

Paragon City
I play City of Heroes, a superhero-themed MMORPG. It's fun. It takes place in Paragon City.

Sharks
Ever since I was a kid, I've loved sharks. They're sleek, powerful, really cool, and really dangerous. My dad used to fish for shark on our cruiser, and once when he'd caught one he tried to get me to touch it. Just as I reached out, the damned thing flicked it's tail, and I went down hard on the deck. ouch. I love the silly things to death, so much so that I love to watch Shark Week on the discovery channel.

Theatre
What can I say? I love theatre. I like doing it, but I love watching live performance. I don't see as many as I'd like to, partly because of money, and partly because who has the time? My preference is for drama, which my beloved isn't so much into, rather than comedy. Give me a tragedy any day.

日本語
That's nihongo,, or the Japanese word for "Japanese language." It's my second-language-of-choice, though I'm woefully non-fluent. I was much better a coupe of years ago, but lost the knack with it after two years of no classes. Hopefully someday I'll study it again.