I have my posts set up to share on Facebook automatically. I connected my WordPress to Facebook so I could share my writing with family and friends.Continue reading “Facebook cramps my madness”
Tolkien’s translation of Beowulf
Will finally be published on the 22nd May 2014.
Book Review Indices Up To Date
Finally!
I’ve spent the last 45 minutes or so getting the Index up to date. I’m going to try to update them every three months.
I feel like I haven’t reviewed an awful lot of books since December.
And now I really am going shopping.
Time for tea
A cup of tea that is. 
I’ve spent the morning reading (see previous post) Continue reading “Time for tea”
Review: ‘Steam City Pirates’ by Jim Musgrave
Steam City Pirates
Pat O’Malley Steampunk Mysteries
Jim Musgrave
English Majors Editors and Publishers, LLC
Pub Date: Dec 1 2013
Like Alice’s rabbit, a strange “mechanical-like man” leads 1869 New York Detective Pat O’Malley down into the world of steam power. A group from the future calling itself the World Scientific Advancement Society for Progress is living secretly beneath Central Park. These pirates are inventors whose only goal is to keep the Earth in the Steam Age in order to save it from a future nuclear holocaust. Five alien assassins from other universes are ordered to kill O’Malley and his group, and each alien has a unique ability to do the job. As the Steam City Pirates build a steam-powered amusement park on Coney Island, O’Malley and his group are hunted down in the streets of New York City. The future of the world is at stake in this mystery and adventure featuring a twisting plot, steampunk time travel, steam men duels, crafty inventions, and monsters from other planets.
Continue reading “Review: ‘Steam City Pirates’ by Jim Musgrave”
Frisian Chieftain Radbod: ‘I’ll See You in Hell’
Beautiful piece of embroidery and an interesting look at seventh century European politics.
In the best known legend about Frisian chieftain Radbod (d. 719), from The Life of Wulframn of Sens, he stuck his toe in the baptismal font and asked a profound question: would he see his ancestors in the afterlife? Told that his kin were in hell while he would be in heaven, Radbod refused the rite. He would rather spend eternity damned with the ancestors he loved rather than be in paradise with the Franks he hated.
We have no way of knowing whether this particular story is true, but it might reveal Radbod’s reasoning for considering conversion but staying with his pagan gods. Both decisions had more to do with politics than spirituality.
Sixteenth century embroidery depicting the legend in which the Frisian chieftain Radbod refuses baptism at the last moment (public domain image via Wikimedia Commons).
Around the 690s, Radbod had been fighting with Frankish Mayor of…
View original post 421 more words
Let’s Talk About Class: Hierarchies of Taste and Gender
I found this interesting and thought I’d share.
Posh man: I ain’t one
Recently, I found myself at a wine-tasting session with a friend, only to be confronted with the embarrassing reality that I had no idea how to act “appropriately” in the situation. The whole thing wasn’t helped by the fact that I was wearing an outfit much like Julia Roberts circa Pretty Woman, as I sometimes care to do (it’s a great look). Trying to “be myself” rather than affect a more refined countenance turned out to be quite the faux pas in terms of the disdainful/pitying/embarrassed looks I got from other patrons. While on the one hand I was rather “f*** you” about it, it also later resulted in me crying into my pillow.
Ladette to Lady: teaching us how not to be working class
Later, I came across this article about the UK’s Education Secretary Michael Gove, and his comments that
View original post 938 more words
First Extraterrestrial Waves Ever Spotted On Titan
The history and future of the Universe in four minutes: Brian Greene at TED2014
Review: ‘The Season of the Witch’ by Natasha Mostert
Portable Magic Ltd.
Jan 31 2014 (Originally published 2007)
Continue reading “Review: ‘The Season of the Witch’ by Natasha Mostert”
Everything Is Better With Dragons 
