jon_chaisson: (Mooch writing)
When I'm working from home, I tend to listen to a lot of music via my mp3 collection, and lately I've been listening to Beck's Sea Change a lot. Partly because I just really like that album a lot, partly because "Little One" from that album keeps popping up in my head lately.

The interesting thing is that listening to that album makes me think of when I used to go to a sadly-departed bookstore in Harvard Square in Cambridge (Wordsworth Books) when I lived in MA. That store was always one of my main stops when I did a daytrip into the Boston area, usually near the end of the day after lengthy stops at used record stores. I'd spend the final few hours hanging out there, more often than not buying a few titles. The reason the Beck album pops up is because they'd played it in its entirety one of the times I was there.

It also ties in with the book I'm currently reading, Endgame 1945 by David Stafford, mainly because it's about immediately-post-WWII Europe. Why, you say? Because that was the same evening I bought The Children's War by JN Stroyar. So now that I'm listening to that album and reading the Stafford Book, I keep having this nagging urge to read Children's War as well as House of Leaves again, which are two rather large books I like reading every few years or so. The last I read both were about the time we moved here, so it's high time for me to pick them up again. Thing is, I have way too many other books before it to pick them up now! :p

This is also bringing up the fact that I've been thinking about the IWN again lately. Sure, I have two other current WIPs going on, so it isn't helping that I want to pick it up again, especially with the current political climate over the last six months. I figure that urge will die down a bit once I'm finished with the Stafford book (less than 100 pages to go at this point), but it does amuse me that I still get urges to write specific things due to what I'm reading or listening to.
jon_chaisson: (Default)
No, I'm not sick...that's just me sniffling and coughing from the insane amount of dust that's been kicked up over the last couple of hours. We got rid of a LOT more books than expected, so we now have a lot of space on our bookshelves again! [Also, we suddenly have a bit more room on our kitchen counter too, as some of the appliances there that we don't use on a daily basis are now on the shelf near the front door.]

YAY MORE ROOM! :p

Granted, this has caused my "read and get rid of" pile to grow exponentially, so I'm going to have to go through it again and thin that out as well--there are some titles I definitely don't need there, and can borrow from the library at a later date.

SO! Next step--to start making the list of the Emm n' Jonc's Big Book Purge. As said before, I'll be sending it out first to family to make sure we're not giving away their stuff. And once that's all good to go, I'll be posting the list here on the LJ. I'll definitely let you all know when that happens!

And now, off to get us some coffee!! :)
jon_chaisson: (Default)
So we're nearing the end of our vacation...sad to see it go! I keep thinking I should have done more, especially gotten around to some heavy-duty writing, but as said in my other post, perhaps it was a good thing that I backed away from it for a bit (I have a VERY bad habit of not knowing when to let it go and give it and myself a break). Besides, we did a lot of fun things, and it was fun to hang out with [livejournal.com profile] emmalyon that much! :)

On tap for today, we're hopefully going to be going through the rest of our books and do a purge--this time through hardcovers, nonfiction, and kids' books. This time out I've been making a separate pile of 'read then get rid of', which I'm currently going through. Once I type up the list and have our families go through it (just to make sure we don't get rid of anything that's theirs!), I'll post it here and we can begin the Great Book Purge that I hinted about a few months ago!

Also want to type up another RTS this weekend. It's yet another retro-thing that I've been thinking about, and when I have time I'll type it up. Hopefully you guys don't get bored with my frequent Proust-like remembrance posts...or at least are nice enough not to say anything. :p

Speaking of Proust, I made the first swing through Project Gutenberg and downloaded a goodly chunk of literary goodness that I really should dive into. There's a lot of stuff out there that I've either read only once sometime in 7th grade, or haven't read at all. When am I going to find the time to do this? Good question...but it's good to have them there. And eventually I will make it a point to read these things.

More later! :)
jon_chaisson: (Mooch writing)
So after a nice big ol' plate o' pancakes at one of our favorite local small cafes, we decided to head to the local B&N so I could do my civic duty and buy [livejournal.com profile] antonstrout's Deader Still.

And ended up buying Jo Walton's Farthing, Michael Chabon's Maps & Legends: Reading and Writing Along the Borderlands, and Last Watch, the lastest in the Night Watch series by Sergei Lukyanenko. And Carola Dunn's The Bloody Tower for my wife.

Anton, this spending spree is all your fault. :p
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Much cleaning today...now that the--

OH! Before I forget!! The window? Fixed. Unbeknownst to us! And amusingly so, because it was fixed from the outside. So we opened up the shades today to brighten up the room before we did our cleaning and LO! the window was magically in one piece again! So yeah, no worry about that...

Anyway...

Much cleaning today...now that the cracked wall has been respackled, sanded and painted, we put back everything that was in our little dinner table nook between the kitchen counter and the back of the love seat. Before, we had the short bookcase against the formerly-cracked wall, the china cabinet next to that, and the wine shelf/pantry cabinet up against the back of the loveseat. We both realized that this was taking up a lot of space and partially blocking one end of the wine shelf/cabinet, so we did a switcheroo...we stuffed the bookshelf under the overhanging counter (fits with about four inches to spare), the china cabinet next to (and partially blocking) that, and the cabinet in full access. Strangely enough, it feels a lot more spacious, even though we just moved three things total!

In the process I pulled a few more paperbacks to be read and then given away. We still need to go through the pile and divvy up some of the books (some titles we were going to give to specific people), but once we do that, as well as go through our nonfic, hardcovers and trades, I'll finally post the Great Jonc n' Emma Book Giveaway List. :)

So yeah, that was our Saturday.

Tomorrow? Lunch at Max's and Swan Lake at the Ballet! :)
jon_chaisson: (Mooch writing)
Well, despite my pathetic writing numbers this month (and that's my own damn fault), I've been getting a decent amount of reading done, and that's not bad. I recently reread the AKIRA reprints that came out over the course of 2001, and let me tell you, it's a quick read due to the fact that Otomo, despite filling in every conceivable nook and cranny with detail, used a LOT of near-full page splash shots in this one. Fun, if a bit squicky, but not nearly as ooky as I remember it being (and not nearly as gruesome as the latter half of the movie adaption), but I really enjoyed it.

My current commuting read is Evil Genius by Catherine Jinks, and this is really a fun book. Think Harry Potter as played by Dexter (of the Laboratory) or Dib from Invader Zim, and definitely in a Zim-like universe. Oh yes, and it takes place in Australia. It's a pretty wild ride, quite silly at some points, and extremely strange in others. Definitely worth picking up, and I'm pretty sure I'll end up getting the sequel when it comes out in paperback.

And my recent night reading is Little Brother by Cory Doctorow. I'm only about three chapters in, but I CANNOT recommend this book highly enough--it's definitely one of those YA books where you forget it's actually YA...as usual, Doctorow writes a brilliant story, this time about hacking, high school, online gaming...and being tailed by Homeland Security after a terrorist attack hits San Francisco. Though there's a lot of info dumps at the beginning (it's kind of needed for those who aren't exactly technophiles), but it's not overly intrusive. As said...not even done yet, but DAMN this is a good book.

------------

I've got way too many books to list that are next on the list, but I can tell you that I'll be going through them soon. When we thinned out our paperback shelf I made a stack of "read then discard" books, but I think I still have way too many to slog through, so they may end up being added to the Great Autumn Book Giveaway soon enough. Or donated to the local library, either way. :p
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Feeling SO much better today. Slept a lot better and took a Claritin just before heading out.

For the third year in a row, [livejournal.com profile] emmalyon and I went to SF Library's Big Book Sale over at Fort Mason, and spent a decent amount of money on random fun things we found. Emm definitely found a lot of good stuff, but I managed to find some neat things too:

Kate Elliott, The Burning Stone (Crown of Stars v3)
Kate Elliott, The Gathering Storm (Crown of Stars v5)
Kate Elliott, In the Ruins (Crown of Stars v6)
Mercedes Lackey, The Free Bards
The AP Stylebook and Libel Manual, 1992 ed. (yeah, it's out of date, but a good reference book nonetheless)

and the following CDs for $1 each:

Erasure, The Two Ring Circus
Madonna, Ray of Light
O-Positive, toyboatToyBoAtTOYBOAT
The Sundays, Reading, Writing and Arithmetic
Matthew Sweet, Girlfriend
Toad the Wet Sprocket, Fear

We then made a trip to the Target down in Daly City to return something and also pick up some more "Blood Orange" Jones Sodas (unlike the disgusting Holiday Packs, these are quite good and have a pirate cat on the box)...then over to BevMo to buy some of the indie sodas they have there (I'm currently drinking an AJ Stephans' Birch Beer. YUM!).

We were going to stop at In n' Out to have lunch, but alas it looked like everybody else on the entire peninsula had the same idea and it was PACKED, so we passed. We did make up for it by going into the completely empty Krispy Kreme in the same parking lot (some people have no taste, I tells ya...) and doing a doughnut run instead. No In n' Out burgers...is teh sad... :(

So! What else is on tap this weekend?

Going to see The Bonesetter's Daughter at the Opera House tomorrow afternoon--one of my somewhat delayed birthday presents to Emm (the other was tix for Rock n' Roll). Should be fun! :)

Also, before we put some of these new books away, we're probably going to do another book purge--which means sometime in the next few weeks or so we may be posting another giveaway list. Stay tuned!

And that's about it for now...more soon!
jon_chaisson: (Default)
After sleeping off much bad food from yesterday (my rarebit dream included waiting hours on end for a bus that wasn't coming), today is the day of kicking back and relaxing. Most of our errands are done (vacuuming, food shopping, having lunch, etc), and neither of us have plans to do much for the rest of the day. The TV is currently set to Olympics updates, Emm is making random foodstuffs, and I've got my 'puter on to get some writing done. I may do some cleaning later on, if I feel like it. (Okay, so I did a bit of cleaning in the bathroom, so all's well there, but in the process I stupidly touched a lightbulb that had been on for some time, so now two fingertips on my right hand are in pain and wrapped in bandaids, dumbass that I am... So much for that idea...)

Other than that, probably going to just kick back and relax the rest of the day. I probably should do a bit more writing (if my fingers will let me type). Also, I've got one more shelf of cds to rip onto the hard drives and then I'll be completely done. This shelf is almost all Emm's classical collection. In all honesty, I could never quite figure out how to tag classical mp3s...by composer? performer? orchestra? So I'll just go with what comes up on the auto-tagging...

---

Doing this post just reminded me of what I used to do on weekends, back before I met [livejournal.com profile] emmalyon, back when I still lived with my parents. A lot of it was spent at bookstores and record stores, of course. There was the Toadstool Bookstore up in Keene NH, where I bought many of my new-age books (partly for self-help I admit, but also for research for the trilogy) among other things. And later on, there was the double-whammy of Newbury Comics and Barnes & Noble in Leominster, both stores within a mile of each other. And sometimes, all three (with a long yet nice drive straight down Route 12 between the two towns). Plus, the occasional drive into Boston, which I did probably every month or so during the nicer seasons. Interestingly enough, I never went down to Amherst all that often during the weekends, as I would head that way during the week--on Wednesdays, new comic release day--which was something I used to do ALL the time way back in the day.

Living here in San Francisco, it's a different story. Roadtrips are good but a bit too long sometimes (the Sacramento trip wasn't too bad, but driving there is boring because it's flat and straight for most of the way), and we don't want to spend money on gas half the time. ;) Seriously, most places we want to go to are in the city and are readily available by public transit. That, and I don't spend money willy-nilly on cds and comic books anymore, for various reasons. I do miss the afternoons hanging in book stores for hours on end, and sometimes the thrill of driving through the hills of New England (as said, everything's either flat and straight here, or extremely hilly and curvy--plus, there's nary a forest around these parts, except further north or south of here). This is why I'm looking forward to our trip back east in October, of course! :)

----

On that note...perhaps some writing and cd ripping again...and perhaps a reading/writing post later on at the other LJ...
jon_chaisson: (Default)
For those of you who love Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse novels and are eagerly awaiting the HBO show based on it, check out this brilliant promotional site.

Damn, this is making me think that a Crucibles website for Love Like Blood might not be a bad idea...[livejournal.com profile] dollydelusion, I think we should record some music for it. ;)
jon_chaisson: (Mooch writing)
Next up: DC's sophomore book, coming soon off the heels of his Big Debut. Quite similar in theme to Generation X, but from the POV of someone that could easily be the younger brother of Andy from GX.

A book about hair products, road trips, French 'girlfriends' and one of the luckiest job interviews ever... )

Next Up: Life After God
jon_chaisson: (I'M IN YR NOVEL)
Okay, so I've been meaning to post this for some time now, so this may take awhile...

First off, I've been reading two books at the same time on average lately, and one of the things I've been doing is reading Douglas Coupland's stuff in chronological order. I've read some of his stuff before, and have always liked it, but after awhile I'd stopped reading them (usually due to reading other stuff) but still buying them when they came out. And not including some of his rarer stuff (like City of Glass, School Spirit, Terry, and the Japanese-language-only God Hates Japan), I believe I have everything of his, almost all of them first editions. Sometime late last year I read his Souvenir of Canada books, which were, of course, VERY Canadian in mindset and fun to read. And recently I picked up Life After God and Postcards from the Dead, both of which I thought I had but apparently did not.

So I figure, why not start a Book Report series here on RTS? I might move these to [livejournal.com profile] die_joncswerk later, but for now I'll keep them here...

Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture )

COMING NEXT: Shampoo Planet
jon_chaisson: (Default)
...I'll be doing a mass mailing this weekend, so sometime in the next week you all should be getting your books! It occured to me that I'll be spending a good chunk on postage, but then again I'll be mailing it all 4th class media mail, so it shouldn't be too bad. No worries, it's worth getting the books outta here!

I do still need the snailmail for [livejournal.com profile] bonniers and [livejournal.com profile] liret. I think I have everyone else's!

Thanks again!
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Wow...didn't think we'd be getting rid of so many books! Hopefully we'll be getting some of these books mailed out sometime this weekend. Will post to let you all know whose stuff has been sent.

By the way, I still need addresses from [profile] bonniers  , [profile] liret  and [profile] abennettstrong  . No rush, but just so you know I still need them! :)

Again, thanks from both me and [profile] emmalyon  !




I'll keep this going a little longer, so if no one wants these, they'll be given to the local library.
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Thanks for all who have posted to get some of the books off our hands! We're giving away a lot more than I expected! So now, the trick is that I will need to find time to stop at the main post office up the hill sometime after work (it closes at 5:30, which gives me about a half hour to work with), so it may be a few days until I mail stuff out. But fear not, they will be mailed! :)

For those of you who missed the ginormous post the other day, the most updated version can be seen at this post right here. There are still a lot of titles left, so act now! [/Billy Mays]

One last thing, I'm not sure if the livejournal email I posted is good, as I tried emailing myself using that and got no response. So if you're going to send out your addresses (or already have via that LJ email), please send it to joncwriter at yahoo dot com, that way I know I'll get it. Thanks!
jon_chaisson: (Less LJ More Writing)
Okay, so in one sense it's been a productive day, errand-wise. Did the laundry, cleaned the kitchen, emptied the trash, washed down the bedroom windowsill (which had some pretty nasty dust on it), cleaned out a few drawers of my bureau, got rid of a few old shirts, and posted the book list on LJ.

As well as played chauffeur for [livejournal.com profile] emmalyon when she went into work this morning, stopped at the PO for some package pickups (yay, we have Naruto dvds and Paprika!!! And many Diesel Sweeties shirts sent by [livejournal.com profile] rstevens! And many shiny things from Wyrding Studios!)

And also remade the bed, tidied up some of the things on my nightstand, and already pulled and boxed some of the books to be sent out for people.

....

But did I get any writing done yet today?

Nope.

*rolls eyes*
jon_chaisson: (Mooch writing)
[livejournal.com profile] emmalyon and I are getting rid of a handful of books, just as we did a few years ago, and we'd love to give them to you if you want them! We'll take care of all the shipping and whatnot (Media Mail ROCKS), all we ask is your address if we don't have it already. You can either post here or email me at joncwriter (at) livejournal (dot) com (it gets dropped in my Yahoo account) with what you want, and eventually (yeah, we're bad that way) we'll mail it out to you!

I'm putting the list under the cut as it's a bit long. )

Oh, and if anyone is brave enough, we also have the Jones Soda Holiday Packs from 2005 and 2006 if anyone wants them! If no one wants them, we'll post them on eBay just for the hell of it to see if anyone wants 'em.

...and the flavors, for those who dare... )

Again, let us know either by LJ or by email, and we'll set them aside for you!


EDIT:[livejournal.com profile] qahawthorne has claimed her share, so I will strike those out, and will do so with everyone else as they comment/email.

EDIT II: Just so you know, any unclaimed books will not go to waste...we will be donating them to the local library! ;)

EDIT III: If anyone's emailed their address to me using the livejournal (dot) com address, I may not have gotten it. You can send it to joncwriter (at) yahoo (dot) com, and I'll definitely get it. :)
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Saturday:

Pats & Giants. Beer & Chips. Nuff said. ;)



Also on Weekend:

--laundry
--possible B&N run (we're eyeing the new Keith Olbermann book as well as Order of the Phoenix)
--writing
--more end-of-year items to be posted, both on [livejournal.com profile] joncwriter and [livejournal.com profile] die_joncswerk. Looking back, forward, up, down, about music, writing, life, politics, and other things in life.


New Year's Eve:
Quite possibly staying in, watching movies and/or anime, and I may do a bit of writing as well.
jon_chaisson: (One Piece Luffy smile)
...one of the reasons I've been quiet on LJ today (aside from a YouTube onslaught earlier)(btw, I came very close to posting Wham's "Last Christmas" but held back for sanity's sake),
is because I've been playing with my new Microsoft Zune that [livejournal.com profile] emmalyon got me! I've been spending most of the afternoon and into the evening loading it up with mp3 goodness. By far one of the coolest things I've gotten! Thanks, Emm! :)

Other nifty things Santa brought me...
--a Canon LiDE 25 Scanner for which to scan all the writings/drawings/maps/etc that I've accumulated over the years. I've been wanting something like that for quite some time. Thanks to my sister for getting this! :)
--Beatles--The Complete Scores...a very unexpected yet very cool gift! Of course, my first move (aside from cracking the spine when I opened it up :p ) was to look at the score for "Revolution 9". Very interesting indeed... ;)
--More books: Cartographia: Mapping Civilizations (ooh, shiny!!) from one of my sisters, Damn, Why Didn't I Write That? and How to Start a Home-Based Writing Business, both from [livejournal.com profile] xanti_angelx (thanks!!!)
--The dvds Avant Garde: Experimental Cinema Volume One and Volume Two, both from another of my sisters. Neat stuff!
--lots of clothes from both sides of the family, much needed in the new job!
--gift certificates galore! w000t!

Thanks to everyone who sent all the neat stuff! :)
jon_chaisson: (I'M IN YR NOVEL)
This quoted from E.E. Knight's blog regarding going to see It's a Wonderful Life with a bunch of librarian friends:

Librarians are really a fun-loving bunch, especially when they get together in groups. They're like Shriners, only really good at cataloging and able to toss off lots of obscure trivia. Plus they spend odd hours in the improvement of their minds by extensive reading of erotic classics.

:p
jon_chaisson: (Default)
Not much happening again...just taking a brief break from the projects I've been working on to poke my head in and say hey to everyone.

[Writing] Doing a bit more work on the LLB rewrite at the moment. More bits that are taking awhile to work on, but this is a good thing as I get to throw in more backstory that is desperately needed, and it fits in there so nicely... :)

[Music] Finally finished going through my mp3 folders (it was pretty chaotic), and moved a few to the second external drive to open up more space for the first one. Am now in the process of putting the songs back onto my MusicMatch. Future ripping of cds will probably make a little more sense in the future if I first put it on the main C: drive and then move it to the right external afterwards.

[Shopping] Emm and I went to the newer Westfield Mall down on Market Street this morning and bought a few more things for Christmas gifts. The newer mall is a lot nicer and visually a lot more pleasing than the older half (formerly known as the SF Shopping Centre--the one that has Nordstroms), kinda reminds us of Short Hills Mall in NJ. And it has a theater too! :)

[Books] I declare Brave Story by Miyuki Miyabe to be an EXCELLENT book. Very similar to the later Harry Potter books, in that the subject matter is more for the older kids (and there are a few rather gruesome scenes as well) as well as its 800+ page length. Highly suggested, though!

[Work] Might be hearing about the job opening soon, hopefully Wednesday. And more news that I'll share later in an f-locked post.

Other than that, not much happening...just another boring weekend! :p

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