| Communications Down |
[15 February 2022|11:54 am]
Tealin
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Hi LJ followers ... I've just found out that crossposting from Dreamwidth has been disabled because of an ongoing problem with LJ's automated security system blacklisting the Dreamwidth domain (you can read more here if you're curious).
I've been using Dreamwidth as my primary blogging platform for at least a decade now, when LJ looked like it was getting unsustainably compromised both technologically and politically. I kept up the crossposts because I knew I had loyal readers here who weren't, for whatever reason, willing to make the switch. But the disabling of crossposting, combined with a busy middle-aged life where I can't prioritise nursing an aging presence on a mostly irrelevant platform, means that my LJ will be defunct for the foreseeable future.
An important post you my have missed is the announcement that I'm deleting my Photobucket accounts. Photobucket was symbiotic with LJ, allowing me to post images here as LJ had no image hosting capabilities. For different reasons, but at the same time, Photobucket has also become untenable as a platform for my purposes. I decided that it was finally time to back up my images to my hard drive and cut ties. One account is already queued for deletion, the other will be going the same way at the end of this month (February 2022). This means there will be no more images here (aside from the ones hosted on Tumblr), so if you have any you particularly value, please browse through the back catalogue and save them.
This also means that the vast majority of images on my fanart website (nocturnalsoldier.org/Tealin) will be defunct. I lost access to the FTP for that domain years ago, so I'm unable to post a notice there about the changes. It will just be drifting, imageless, in the deep web. Alas poor site.
If you would like to follow me on Dreamwidth, my handle is Tealin and the blog address tealin.dreamwidth.org. You can also put it in an RSS feed or suchlike if you don't want to sign up for a Dreamwidth account.
I will slowly be uploading my image archive to Ko-Fi, so either follow there (which you can do for free) or bookmark it. When I add more pictures, I generally announce it on social media, such as the following:
Twitter: @twirlynoodle, or @WorstJourneyGN for book news
Instagram: @twirlynoodle (I don't like Instagram much so don't post nearly as often as the others)
Tumblr: @tealin
Patreon: @tealin – this is a paid subscription site, but gets by far the most content, plus you get to watch me make graphic novels about polar explorers!
My professional site, which is going to be getting an overhaul this year, is http://twirlynoodle.com/. You're probably not interested in the portfolio, but you may like the blog I've been keeping about the month I spent in Antarctica.
Thanks for sticking with me for so long! I'm sorry it had to end in such a blah kind of way – we should have had some sort of leaving do. Ah well. I may yet be back, but in the meantime I'm always happy to run into old LJ people, so if you follow me somewhere else, please drop a note to say hi! |
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| Radio Roundup |
[1 December 2021|09:56 pm]
Tealin
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I finished colouring my graphic novel on Monday, so for the foreseeable future I'll be doing the sort of work that can't divide attention with radio. Alas! I sure got in a lot of it towards the end, though.
FACTUAL
You're Dead To Me - Would you look at that, even MORE episodes of this excellent and very imbibable history podcast. New subjects include a Chinese pirate queen, ice cream, and the extraordinarily interesting life of the man who sang "Old Man River."
The Divided Brain - An examination of the role our left and right brains play in our decision making, personalities, and how we interact with the world. Neuroscientist Iain McGilchrist argues that the world has become excessively left-brain dominated and we need to restore the balance before it's too late.
In Our Time: Plato's Gorgias - A panel of experts discuss a seminal philosophical work examining power vs morality, the nature of freedom, the relationship between pleasure and self interest, and whether rhetoric holds outsized sway over politics.
Tupac Shakur, Hip Hop Immortal - I was in middle school when Tupac Shakur died, and while I was aware he was a big deal, I was utterly clueless about him. If you also wondered what the big deal was, this short documentary might help you out a bit, as it did me.
Things Fell Apart - The strapline is "Tales from the Culture Wars"; TBH I've only caught snippets on the actual radio, but they've been very good, so this is listed in order to remind me to catch up and listen properly.
Exploding Library: Jean Rhys - I had to read Wide Sargasso Sea in high school and have to admit I didn't 'get it', but I definitely god comedian Josie Long's portrait of the author and her less famous, but possibly more personal book, Good Morning, Midnight. Fun! Educational! Enthusiastic!
FICTIONAL
Fantastic Journeys - Four short stories that fall somewhere in the fantasy/scifi/magical realism spectrum, but otherwise very different from each other. I link "The Green Door" by H.G. Wells every time it comes around, but the others are also quite good and worth a listen.
Small Gods - Radio adaptation of Terry Pratchett's magnificent comic drama about religion, philosophy, and an unwelcome revelation in a desert theocracy...
Resurrection - On the surface, this Tolstoy is your typical "nobleman deflowers vulnerable maid who goes on to a life of vice, nobleman grows up and tries to make good" story, but mostly it's Tolstoy taking a good hard look at what was wrong with mid-19thC Russian society, a lot of which is sadly still relevant.
The Strange and the Sinister - Short horror stories by someone trying for, and not quite reaching, M.R. James, but they're quite good on their own terms.
FUNNY
Penguin Diplomacy - I linked to Double Acts last time, but last week's episode is the one about a stuffy Brit and an eccentric Dane and the marital habits of penguins on Skarstenø (or is it Goodwill Island?). Sometimes I wonder if this episode was a personal gift.
I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue - The daftest of panel games is back for another glorious 28 minutes.
Here's What We Do - Another Double Act. A silly heist and some character development, which is all very well on its own, but this one gets bonus points for taking place partly in my favourite Cambridge pub. |
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| Comedic Banking, 2021 Edition |
[8 September 2021|10:17 pm]
Tealin
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Every year I come around to do taxes again, and every year I encounter another surprising way in which one of my American banks flails at basic functionality. Past adventures include Inability To Get Wire Transfer Info Correct Despite My Spelling It Out For Them, ItGWTICDMSIOFT II: Déjà Vu, and Seriously: The Bit You Had Wrong Was Not The Tricksy Address But The Simple 5-Digit Zip Code?
This year, we've so far had the online banking website overload my RAM and crash my browser – two different browsers – and a two-factor authentication code email saying 'We will NEVER ask for this code!' despite only getting the code sent to me because they are literally asking for it.
They're actually not that bad a financial institution for day-to-day banking on their own turf: If I were buying a house, or saving for my kids' college tuition, or whatever else it is normal people do with their banks, the services they offer are competent and comprehensive. They just fall to pieces outside of their comfort zone, especially in the unimaginable circumstance that one of their customers lives abroad.
I would close my account there, except that I need a card with a US address to file my US tax return (despite being officially, legally, an expat) and theirs is the only card in my collection that has a US address (my parents'). Or at least it would, if they had sent me a new card when my last one expired. So I have to chase them up for a replacement, which I can only do by long-distance phone, from 9-5, five hours behind me, or via the chat function, which seems to be staffed by one overworked person on a coffee break ... |
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| Radio Roundup |
[31 August 2021|12:36 pm]
Tealin
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As you may have gathered from the lack of posts, things are a bit busy around here. Luckily, in the last couple of weeks, they've been busy in a "listening to lots of radio" kind of way. So here are some programmes that have caught in the baleen of my brain, or which I intend to sift this week:
FACTUAL
In Our Time: Animal Farm - Experts discuss George Orwell's Stalinist satire-cum-cautionary tale; best paired with the reading linked below, but whether as an apertif or a chaser is up to you.
FICTIONAL
Animal Farm - A full unabridged reading of George Orwell's Stalinist satire-cum-cautionary tale.
The Great Scott - Astonishingly, not that Scott, the other one. Radio 4 undertook to dramatise his oeuvre, slimming down each tome to fit in an hour slot. In some cases, the adaptations are a bit "free", but I've trusted all the names on the writing team for years now and they do at least deliver an intelligible radio drama. Very much the cheater's guide to Sir Walter, but I don't see myself doing it the hard way anytime soon ...
Nuremberg - A massive dramatisation of the effort to bring to justice the architects and the footsoldiers of the Holocaust.
FUNNY
Andy Hamilton Sort of Remembers - The comedy memoir of one of the first voices I learned to recognise on Radio 4, most famous (to me, anyway) as Satan in Old Harry's Game (which he also wrote).
Paul Sinha's General Knowledge - If you like trivia, or unexpected connections between things, or finding out that what you think you know isn't the way it is at all, this is a thoroughly enjoyable half hour.
The Hudson and Pepperdine Show - It's not often you get a female double act leading a Radio 4 comedy, so drink up.
Radio 9 - The first series of Radio 9 had me in stitches, but they only ever seem to repeat the second series, which is a bit more twisted. Even so.
The Pin - Bite-sized sketch comedy
Mark Watson Makes The World Substantially Better - Each episode, a different virtue is considered comedically. Wholesome and musical standup.
The Museum of Everything - Don't forget to visit the GIFT SHOP [heavenly chorus] I can't think what separates it from so many other sketch shows, but an inordinate number of catchphrases and running gags from this show have entered my reference library.
John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme - No stranger to this lineup, but two special reasons for including it again:
1. No less than seventeen episodes are currently available! So much happiness!
2. Series 9. Give it time.
FRANÇAIS
Efter fire år lærende dansk, j'ai retournée à la français, en gros part parce que j'en aurai besoin bientôt. Mon français est assez mal que je ne comprends pas beaucoup en parle, mais c'est assez bon pour m'ennuie si le sujet n'est pas interressant. Alors, pour improver mon comprension, j'écoute à Aujourd'hui l'histoire, un balado de Radio-Canada – trentaine minutes, chaque jour, sur plusieurs sujets d'histoire; toujours different, toujours interressant, toujours en français, et facile à entendre. Je veux les comprendre, ça m'encourage! |
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| Rolling Book Report: to p.203, and out |
[5 May 2021|09:43 am]
Tealin
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Maia granted an audience to the Count Bazhevel and Osmin Stano Bazhevin on a cold, bleak afternoon when the clouds were nearly the same colour as Maia's skin. Because the Count Bazhevel had annoyed him with his scheming, Maia chose to receive him in the Untheileian, even though Osmin Bazhevin's status as the dead archduke's fiancée would have permitted him to use the Michen'theileian or even the receiving room of the Alcethemeret. But he hoped dourly that the frigid expanse of the Untheileian would encourage the Count Bazhevel to be brief. oh my god I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't care I don't CARE I DON'T CARE I DON'T CARE
And that's the exact spot where I gave up.
( Analysis and Problem SolvingCollapse )
I could go into more detail, and project how my version would play out based on the foundation I laid, but UGH I am so tired of thinking about this – now I've got it out I can finally get back to what I should be doing, rewriting the Gospels grinding out the last batch of colour keys on the never-ending one-person book assembly line ... |
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| Rolling Book Report: to p.86 |
[26 April 2021|08:50 am]
Tealin
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Here's an idea:
If the point of what you're writing is bewilderment on being dropped suddenly into a maelstrom of political intrigue and unfamiliar names and faces ...
... why not start the book in a simple, accessible style, focusing on welcoming the reader in, be it through your protagonist's personality or lived experience or emotions; something relatable that the reader can get their teeth into easily ...
AND THEN slam them with the fantasy names and bewildering formalities of the court at the same time as your protagonist, so even if you're not actually much good at communicating their internal life, you can recreate the same feelings in the reader and they can sympathise that way.
In other news, there was a flash of personality for one line on p.65. Either it was an accident, or I know who the author's favourite character is and have a hunch who won't survive to the end. RIP in advance, appropriated Ponder Stibbons. |
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| The Rolling Book Report, or, Tealin Looks A Gift Horse In The Mouth |
[22 April 2021|05:57 pm]
Tealin
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I stopped doing my book reports in large part because I more or less stopped reading ... This happened about when I cleared my 'easy fiction' stack and moved onto the super dense French philosophy stack, oddly enough. I have dabbled in a little fiction here and there: Hans Christian Andersen's original fairy tales, surprisingly a slog; Light Perpetual, binged in two days and had a hard cry at the end.
Someone has just bought me a novel and sent it with very high recommendations, so I am embarking on reading it, and I thought I'd write down some thoughts while I do so because, frankly, at about 50pp in, that's pretty much the only thing encouraging me to keep reading. The thing is absolutely plastered in raving blurbs, so either there's something I'm not getting or it's a slow burn. I look forward to finding out, she said rhetorically.
For fun, I'm not going to tell you what book it is. Maybe you have read it and can guess. Maybe this will start some interesting conversations about the abstracts of storycraft. Maybe this will drive you absolutely crazy and you will badger me until I tell you. Isn't life exciting?
( Up to p.53Collapse ) |
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| Radio Roundup |
[20 April 2021|09:06 pm]
Tealin
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I've been throwing links into a rolling Radio Roundup draft practically all year, then they expire before I manage to code it and post it. So, here is a very random collection of listening, helped significantly by an increase in the number of programmes being hosted either permanently or on extended 'loan.' Not much comedy this time around, but the drama department is BACK.
FACTUAL
Conspiracies - We all know conspiracy theories are taking over the world, so this really excellent series exploring the modern history of conspiracies and the analysis of patterns between them comes none too soon. I've listened twice already and that won't be the last!
Dante 2021 - Dante Alighieri died 700 years ago, a year after finishing his most famous work, The Divine Comedy. You know, the one with the circles of Hell and all that. This two-part series looks at what this splendid work of the medieval imagination has to say to us today.
You're Dead to Me - The history podcast for people who don't like history (or who do like history, but also jokes) has released a whole lot more episodes of its signature 'expert meets comedian' cocktail. All fascinating, fills the hours nicely!
Blood and Bronze - Caravaggio has a reputation as the Bad Boy of the Renaissance, but he's an amateur next to the mad, bad, and dangerous to know OG, Benvenuto Cellini.
How To Resist Richard III - The charming, manipulative, narcissistic sociopath rising to a position of power feels like a modern phenomenon, but it's exactly what Shakespeare exposes in his play, which might also give us some clues as to how to stop them.
Bad People - Of all the new BBC Sounds podcasts, this one feels the most podcasty, being hosted by two chirpy and empathetic millennials. Its light conversationality is belied by the subject matter, however, which is criminal psychology! I binged the whole series in two days.
John le Carré - Spy novelist John le Carré died last year; this is an affectionate and comprehensive profile by his longtime friend and neighbour, Philippe Sands (who also presented the excellent The Ratline, which you may remember my going on about some time ago).
Yuri Gagarin - Looking into Soviet Russia's most charismatic cosmonaut, the first man in orbit, and (history has yet to prove me wrong here) the Birdie Bowers of the Space Age.
NARRATIVE NONFICTION
A new section here, as there are some excellent productions which blend history and drama:
Peking Noir - An intelligent, resourceful Russian flees the Revolution and sets up in the underworld of inter-war China. Historical research is complicated by their turning up sometimes as a woman and sometimes as a man. A compelling blend of detective work and drama attempts to thread together the fragments of a fascinating life.
The Battersea Poltergeist - A similar blend of sleuthing and dramatic recreation, a blend frequently found on TV but never, as far as I know, pulled off as successfully as this investigation into the weird case of a poltergeist in 1950s South London. One of a very few radio shows I've been unable to listen to after dark. Do listen with good headphones as the sound design is phenomenal.
Bomb Happy - I've been sitting on this link since Remembrance Day and haven't listened yet, but mean to. If memory serves, it's a dramatic reinterpretation of WWI PTSD in the soldiers' own words, but delivered by modern actors. The trailer was really promising. Maybe we can see about it together.
FICTIONAL
Scarlet Pimpernel expires soon- In my middle school French class, we watched the old film (in English), and it was never made clear that he was putting on the fop persona as an act, and I thought it was the stupidest story ever. I am pleased to say that this radio adaptation is clear as a bell and really fun. Secret agent rescuing people from the French Revolution, in case you didn't have to sit through the old film on a 21" TV all the way on the other side of your middle school French class.
Mabinogi - The great work of Welsh mythology comes to life in this fresh and compelling adaptation. I've only listened to Part 1 so far, but I've read the book, and it's an adept treatment of what could be overly precious or grandiose.
Going Dark - The theatres in London have been shut down a few times before 2020; once was when the Puritans took power in the mid-17th Century. This is the story of how some of those actors saw out that time.
Dance Til You Bleed - An omnibus of five lesser-known Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales, in their original form!
Sorrows of Young Werther - The original Emo, Werther suffers the torment of unrequited love and sets about ruining his life over it. Goethe's novel was hugely influential to the romantic movement, and if you've read about Beethoven at all you've probably heard of it. Now you can hear why.
The Meaning of Zong - The story of an atrocity that profoundly influenced Britain's abolition of the slave trade. This was a stage production adapted for radio, and sometimes suffers for it, but it has some moments of pure magic, so is worth being patient with.
Dot and the Russian Dossier - More secret agent hijinks, this time in wartime England, sort of if Wodehouse tried to be John le Carré but with a lot more ladies. Mainly I just love the pace and the arch way everyone is played. More Fenella Woolgar on the radio, please.
FUNNY
Keep Calman Carry On expires soon- Comedian Susan Calman is a very tense person, but has friends who are good at relaxing, so she sets out to learn from them the secrets of their success.
Just A Minute - After the passing of its eternal host, Nicholas Parsons, the mind-blowing rhetoric game is back with a series of guest hosts. The episode linked is the one I managed to join as part of the remote audience, which was fascinating. It turned out pretty well, despite some significant technical difficulties; I had worried they were going to scrap it. I don't know if they're trying out hosts to find a permanent one or if it will be a rotating chair from now on, but it's nice to see the show still [figuratively] on the road.
THE PLAYLIST
There was a real drought in interesting radio plays, but whoever's taken over as commissioner has brought a little diversity back. Here are some unknown quantities I intend to investigate in the near future:
Devoted - Mostly for the cast, this one, but it's a dramatsation of the six months a writer spent in hospital with Covid.
Scenes from a Zombie Apocalypse - "A persuasive modern horror story" according to the blurb; mainly it's on my list because the director is one of my dependables.
Writ in Water - A play about John Keats' last months
The Elder Son - A Russian farce
Marais and the Soul of the Termite - A South African naturalist meets an untimely end
Voodoo Macbeth - Orson Welles' all-Black staging of a Shakespeare play
Heart of Darkness - updated Conrad
Wasteland - a rubbish comedy, by a good writer
Star child - a gently comic take on the Nativity |
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| Hiatus |
[30 March 2021|09:25 am]
Tealin
|
Well, I managed to keep up posts through teaching, but coming out of teaching I have a small mountain of stuff to catch up on, some of it time-sensitive. So, even though it is Holy Week, i.e. Super Lent, I have to put the remaining GOP Gospels on hold until I have a little more breathing room in my day. For Holy Week I particularly wanted to go through the Passion story, but I need to approach it in a more organised fashion than the scattershot random passages I've done thus far – and pick only six episodes to 'translate' – and I need a tad more concentration to get that ball rolling. I hope I will come around to it in the next week or so, but at present the demands on my time have more consequences than my self-indulgent socio-political exercise.
Thank you for your patience, and please poke me if I am inactive for too long! |
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| GOP Gospel: By Their Fruits Shall Ye Know Them |
[27 March 2021|04:45 pm]
Tealin
|
Day 33 of my Lent project. For background, please read this.
A reading from the Gospel according to the GOP:
"Beware of false prophets, who come appealing to your natural sense of goodness and love, but seek to deceive you into the way of sin. You will know them by their ignorance of scripture, for one can only know the will of God through the Word of God. The righteous man can quote chapter and verse, but the unrighteous dwells in darkness. Many are they who would seek to use your better nature to corrupt you. Corrupt enough people this way, and the very structure of society will crumble and fall. But a society founded on scripture will not fall.
( Matthew 7:15-20Collapse ) |
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