rainbow fish, wood stain and dr. who

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there.

As I've mentioned before, we've been doing a lot of House Stuff lately in preparation for house renovations; we get possession of the house in 19 days (!). Yesterday, for example, Jeff and I went looking at doors and stains and sinks.

At this point, I need to point out that despite my enthusiasm for our new house, I don't tend to be the type of person that gets excited about doors and stains and sinks. In fact, as long as they all work and don't explode on me, I don't care a great deal about what they look like.

This isn't necessarily a desirable trait. If I lived alone, I'm sure my home would be an interior designer's horror nightmare. My focus has always been on practicality rather than design, though I've always preferred bright and cheerful colours rather than elegant pale pastels or the broodingly dark and dramatic.

Trilliums in Luisa's garden.

If I moved into the World's Ugliest Apartment, I would likely notice its ugliness for a few days in a sort of irritated "where did that bruise come from" sort of way. But then it would fade into the background and I'd go on happily living my life, only remember my ugly surroundings by the shocked and horrified looks of friends when they came to visit.

If any of you come visit our new house, you will likely notice that my basement office does not match the rest of the house in style, colours or pretty much any other aspect other than the coincidence of location. Jeff and I have a deal that I can "design" my office pretty much any way I'd like without worrying about how it fits with the rest of the house. It's one of the reasons I opted for the basement office rather than a much prettier and sunnier upstairs office.

I'm SO looking forward to being able to go down into my little cave and closing the door, shutting out the rest of the world while I work on my secret plans to take over the universe. (insert maniacal cackle here)

In addition to doing housestuff, yesterday involved seeing friends we haven't had a chance to hang out with in a while. Jeff and I had brunch with our friends Alison and Jeff at Chai, a wonderful little Asian restaurant in what will be our new neighbourhood, and afterward we went across the street to browse the Sleuth of Baker Street (mystery book store) and get some Mate-Chino (my current tea fave) from the Tea Emporium.

Reid and his stepson Michael.

After a visit to Home Depot, we went to visit Reid and Luisa in Scarborough. I lusted over Luisa's garden while Jeff tested different stain colours of one of the kitchen cupboard doors from our new house; the owner was kind enough to let Jeff take one even though the house isn't officially ours yet.

In the evening at Reid's and Luisa's, we watched a recorded penultimate episode of Enterprise as well an episode of the new Dr. Who series everyone's been talking about. I had never watched the old series, and hadn't seen any of the new series; I quite liked the episode I saw, which was called "Daleks." I had to ask Reid what the Daleks were as well as what the deal was with the telephone booth. Really liked Christopher Eccleston as Dr. Who, whom I recognized as the deliciously evil Duke of Norfolk in Elizabeth. A pity he's not staying with the show.

Thanks for the advice on how to check out the IP address of an anonymous poster! (n particular: 209.60.102.107) I'm going to summarize all the useful info into an upcoming Blathering entry. If you have additional ideas, please feel free to post them in LJ or Blatherchat.

I'm very happy with Backpack so far (see my review in Blatherings) and have started using my main page as my "Today's Tasks and Projects" list. Any longer term items get spun off into satellite pages. Here's a Backpack Forum message I posted about how I currently organize my Pages, for those interested.

I'm starting to post some of my favourite photos in Inkygirl in addition to cartoons and doodles, by the way. I figure the top-right section is basically going to be my image playground, with the image being linked to its source in my Flickr photo collection. Cool to see Inkygirl visits quadrupling since I began updating again in March.

Hope you're all having a great weekend! I'm doing some more writing today but plan to take off part of the afternoon to go for a walk along the lake, or perhaps up in our new neighbourhood.

Jeff testing different wood stains yesterday on Reid's and Luisa's back deck.

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Backpack

I've been experimenting with various organizational systems for a while, especially ones I can use from any computer. Jeff recently told me about BackPack.

LOVE Backpack so far. It's fairly simple so I don't get bogged down with a zillion different hierarchical notebooks and folders, but is so much more than just a to-do list. The simplest Backpack account is free, but you can also pay extra for perks like more pages (the free account is limited to five), more space, ability to include images and files. You can keep your page private, or share it with other people.



Here are some examples of how you can use Backpack, including a wedding planner and organizer, organizing a craft project, keeping track of your favourite wines and wines to try, organizing and preparing for a meeting, conference session itinerary, new feature ideas & brainstorms with screenshots. Yes, you can organize all of these without the use of a computer, but Backpack lets you collect links to useful resources (including images), e-mails, files, information all in one place. Could save a lot of printouts and filing space.

I've already set up an Urban Tapestry Projects page for Jodi, Allison and me with a to-do list (and who is responsible for each item) and notes about our upcoming Filkcontinental Guest of Honour gig in Germany, Urban Tapestry site maintenance, etc. I've also posted one of the cartoons I've sent to Filkcontinental for use in their PR material or Web site. I'm starting to use it for some of my writing projects as well.

I like the fact that I can e-mail a copy of any page to myself with one click; helpful when I'm going offline for a while, or just for a backup. I like the fact that I can e-mail items TO my page, and that the e-mail address can be changed at anytime with one click. I like the clean look of the user interface. I like being able to use Textile formatting language.

I like the fact I can use this from almost ANY computer with online access, not just mine. I say almost because the layout is somewhat screwed up when I use Internet Explorer 5.2 for the Mac. Works fine in Safari, though.

There a bunch of things that need improving (but are being worked on), like the automated Reminders system and some flexibility in ordering the various sections of the page (as far as I can tell, the To-Do list HAS to appear at the top of the page, for example). It would be useful to have some kind of multi-level hierarchical filing system for list items...but I have to admit that there's a certain appeal to a simple list format; I can save the more complex, in-depth outlines for other systems. I'm also still somewhat wary of relying completely on a virtual organization system; their servers had major problems coping with the sudden popularity caused by their press releases a few days ago, for example, and I was unable to access my info. Since then, I've been e-mailing myself with backup info quite frequently just in case it happens again.

Anyway, I've already upgraded to the Basic membership, which enables me to have more pages and to be able to use images and files.

Anything that means less paper to clutter up office sounds good to me. Love the Backpack user interface, love the idea, love the potential, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the product continues to improve. For more info about Backpack, see the Web site.

If anyone else out there has an online organizational system they like, I'd love to hear about it.

Other telecommuting resources I've found extremely useful in my work:

• MaxEmail: e-mail fax service. I've used this frequently for sending and receiving faxes; I don't need an actual fax machine anymore.
  
• GMail: my public e-mail account (I have lots of accounts to give away, so if you want one, please let me know).
  
• Goldline: long-distance service I can use from any phone, including a payphone (though there's a small extra charge for the latter).
  

Things are getting busier re: houseprep. I spent some time this past week researching bathtubs and utility payment plans, and this afternoon we're going shopping for tiles.

21 days until we get our house.

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Orson Scott Card and Star Trek

In case you missed my LJ post, Orson Scott Card has a somewhat controversial commentary in the Los Angeles Times about Star Trek. It begins: "So they've gone and killed 'Star Trek.' And it's about time." Here's a link to the article.

You can see the (sometimes a tad heated) discussion after I posted the article link in my LJ comments board. Have to admit I bristled at Card's statement in the article: "The original 'Star Trek,' created by Gene Roddenberry, was, with a few exceptions, bad in every way that a science fiction television show could be bad."

For what it's worth, I like some of Card's writing, especially Ender's Game. And I do see where he's coming from in this article: Classic Trek was cheesy, may not have had the best acting, and the characters didn't get a chance to grow. But I loved it anyway; it was always my favourite Star Trek series; there were some gem episodes in there which I'll never tire of watching in repeats, like City on the Edge of Forever. As for some of the less stellar episodes, well...for me, at least, the cheesiness is part of the charm. :-)

I watched the other ST series when they first aired, but not consistently. I don't think I've seen all the shows in any one season of any of the newer series. So while I'm not upset by the fact that there isn't going to any new Star Trek shows being churned out, I don't agree with Card's blanket dismissal of the original series or of its impact.

I liked Star Trek before it became popular. I like Star Trek even now that it's no longer the cool kid. I'm excited about seeing the Firefly movie and admit I inhaled the entire Buffy the Vampire series in three months...but I do enjoy going back to those Classic Trek episodes on DVD from time to time and watching the old crew in action. It may not have been as well produced or consistently well-written as some of the newer sf shows, but I think it's a huge mistake to ignore the accomplishment and craft of the original series.

As Allison posted, "Orson Scott Card is right in saying that 'Star Trek' needs a rest. He is utterly wrong in dismissing the importance or relevance of the Star Trek phenomenon."

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book meme

Rand passed this to me. He knows I don't usually do this sort of thing but I owe him for the last time I inflicted something similar on him.

Plus I can't say no to Rand. :-)

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?

I've opted to skip this one since it seems to overlap with a later question.

For Illustration Friday. Topic this week: "Ambition."

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

No.

The last book you bought is:

Me and My Sister by Ruth Ohi

The last book you read:

Adult fiction:
Fool On the Hill by Matt Ruff (thanks, Parki!)

Kids' fiction:
Me and My Sister by Ruth Ohi

Nonfiction:
The Cartoonist's Workbook by Robin Hall

What are you currently reading?

For pure enjoyment:
Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman
Good Poems by Garrison Keillor
Anne Sexton: A Biography by Diane Wood Middlebrook (thanks, Rand!)

For work and self-improvement:
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne & Dave King
Die unendliche Geschichte by Michael Ende (thanks, Gary!)
Perspective! For Comic Book Artists by David Chelsea (thanks, Kate!)

Because I want to see how many times I can push my sister's book in this entry:
Me and My Sister by Ruth Ohi

Five books you would take to a deserted island.

Emergence by David Palmer
The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson
SAS Survival Handbook by John Wiseman (thanks, Kaarel!)
Good Poems by Garrison Keillor
Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury
Me and My Sister by Ruth Ohi (ok, so that makes six...but Ruth's book is very compact so wouldn't take up much room!)

Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 persons) and why?

Anyone who is interested in doing this meme is free to do it. Most of the friends whose answers I'd be especially interested in reading don't usually do memes, and I felt guilty enough last time. :-)


From my 2001 Japan trip photo archives: Being served sukiyaki at
a ryokan in Kyoto. Read my Japan trip report starting here.

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Writing, Inkygirl, my famous sister

For those that missed my post on the weekend, ice-out has officially been called for last Thursday. Jeff has updated the Ice-out page.

I was amused by the photo above, which Steve Brinich took while walking through his neighbourhood. I checked out their Web site, but it looks like OHI is an acronym rather than a last name. Darn, thought I found a new relative. :-)

Knowing that housestuff (we get possession in 26 days!) is likely going to be cutting into my writing time, I've been focussing on fiction writing lately, with a goal of getting Puck's Hollow finished and sent off to my agent. This is the novel I wrote for Nanowrimo a couple of years ago before my tendinitis hit, and I liked it enough to want to edit/polish it for publication. With the various setbacks I've encountered since (including a sprained elbow and a detached retina), it's been a bit of a struggle and it's sometimes been hard to stay positive throughout. Viavoice was fine for nonfiction, but agonizing for fiction writing.

BUT things are getting better, and continue to improve.



My article in the current issue of Country Connections magazine.


Now that my tendinitis has improved enough so I can do solid stints of writing at a time, I'm VERY keen to get this book finished so I can start/finish editing other fiction projects. I carry my laptop around and work whenever and wherever I can; I take soundproof headphones with me to block out whatever chaos is going on. I set my computer alarm to force me to take arm breaks every 30 minutes. I've been spending much time offline, and (as some of you have already become aware, I know) my personal e-mail and blog-reading have fallen behind. Thanks for your patience.

I still comb the freelance writing job boards for opportunities and update Inkygirl when I do. If any of you have writer-type friends, please do tell them about Inkygirl; I've only recently started to update regularly. Inkygirl is a weblog for writers who work from home, and I post telecommuting jobs for writers, resources, writing-related editorial, cartoons and Painter experiments (the latter is part of my ongoing prep for illustration work).



By the way, Joy Kogawa's Naomi's Road has been rereleased with a brand-new cover and interior illustrations...by my sister! From Amazon.ca's reviews: "Based on her award-winning adult novel, Obasan, Joy Kogawa's Naomi's Road takes younger readers on a remarkable journey into the life and times of six-year-old Naomi Nakane as she grows up in the shadow of one of the darkest moments in Canadian history."

While you're ordering Joy's book, of course, you should also buy a copy of Ruth's new book, Me and My Sister, which is only $5.95 on Amazon.ca and Amazon.com.

Ruth just got back from her book tour in Ottawa and is getting interviewed by YTV as I post this Blathering, by the way. I believe she'll be appearing on a show called This is Daniel Cook. I'll post more airing schedule info when I know more.

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