lesbiassparrow

So, I've just recalled I have a left over portion of a gift certificate at Amazon. And while I don't want to spend my own good money on these things, they feel like an ideal use for a gift certificate.

What is the most hilarious, entertaining, WTF romance novel you have read that is available for Kindle? Don't be shy! Feel free to rec things that you've never had the courage to read yourself. Vikings! Werewolves! Pirates! Goodly folk! Elf assassins! I will read ANYTHING. Bonus if it crosses a bunch of genres into one delightful melange of hilarity.

ARE A THING OF BEAUTY (almost typed 'thong of beauty' which might well be true). I was going to post on the manly hero of a A Lamp in the Desert next, but he never waxed his chest before sailing the seas to get women, so he's at a disadvantage there.

Also, I have a dreamwidth, but I haven't updated or crossposted it in ages. But it's here (http://lesbiassparrow.dreamwidth.org/) in case LJ goes down forever and ever, which is probably the only time I'd use it - there is no way I can keep up with two blogging sites.

The pictures are unbearable and I'm not even connected to the event. God knows what it must be like as a Norwegian. There is no sense to be made of this. None at all.

Courtesy of an Amazon sale I bought Season 3 of Babylon 3 (and 2, but it hasn't arrived yet) and have been rewatching it. It's as awesome as I remember and I have a hard time believing that the person who was responsible for this was also responsible for the horror, YES HORROR, of Byron and the telepaths in season 5. A season I will not be rewatching because I like to pretend that never happened, along with Tracy Scoggins taking over Claudia Christian's role. But there are some small mercies in her leaving the show; apparently the horror that was Byron and his hair was intended as a romantic partner for Susan. I KID YOU NOT.

Why would someone come up with that? It was bad enough with Talia, but Susan!!!!

ETA: I had forgotten that Season 3 brings in Zathras and brings back Sinclair. *Sigh* Into each life a little rain must fall and so forth. At least they don't bring in Scoggins until season 5. If she had hit my screen at this point I would have stabbed myself.

ETA 2: Well, I will give Sinclair his due: he is a master of the artful and annoying pause.

I will have more hilarious 'facts' about ancient Romans soon, courtesy of Maximus. But I must say that I find it absolutely fascinating that his text was written as a handbook for members of the new elite in the first century CE. Because although the Roman elite were really good at killing each other, they were terrible at replacing themselves generation after generation. The result was that under the empire they a) ran out of patricians (a real problem in Roman religion, so the emperors had to make people patricians) and b) had tons of provincial nobility who did not really have any direct connection to the manly Romans of old. Hence this book. It told you important things like ALWAYS RESPECT THE SACRED CHICKENS. And so on. If ever you were in doubt about how Scipio Africanus (either one) would have behaved in a particular situation, you just picked this one up and found out. Like a Miss Manners for the newly minted Roman senator.

Well, the man himself would have been horrified given that the Romans thought drinking beer was one step above strangling your parents in the barbarian stakes, but it still exists. And that makes me happy. Here's to Pliny!




And your Pliny the Elder remedy of the day: a wolf's liver in mulled wine will cure a cough. THE MORE YOU KNOW.

You know, if you're making a film about the earth magically spinning closer to the sun causing the world's temperature to soar, it would be more convincing if people weren't running around in jackets, long sleeves, and such. Plus your 'stars' could sweat once in a while. It's not even like that would be an expensive thing to do! I also love how they show perfectly normal traffic jams and try to convince me that these are people fleeing the end of the world.

Oh and everyone is wearing jeans. In temperatures of 140+. DID THEIR BUDGET NOT RUN TO SHORTS AND T-SHIRTS?

ETA Some mutants randomly showed up... No explanation, just turned up.

Last night I saw Transformers 3. I apologise for my money contributing to the fact that there will be a fourth film in this series. I really do. You all know how I have no taste, right, so it takes a lot for me to say this, but this is the single dumbest, oddest film I have ever seen. There is no plot. None at all. There's not even an attempt at one. Okay there's the moon and something with robots from space, but when a film doesn't even make a cursory effort to link scenes together or follow up on any plot points, then you can safely say that it is a melange of plotlessness never before seen in a 200 million dollar Hollywood venture. This film has been deplotted to an extent rarely seen outside films where some guy making balloons wanders in and out of scenes asking 'Where is the cheese? I must have cheese for my moustache!' all while water drips in the background in tune to Beethoven's Eroica.

It's like surrealist cinema with explosions. And rather creepy robots, who appear to have a rather sexualised interest in the The Girl. I can't remember her name, but it doesn't matter because her sole talent was keeping her jacket spotlessly white in the midst of Chicago being blown up and falling through buildings. And shrieking really loudly. REALLY LOUDLY. As for her acting...well, I never thought I'd say this, but I spent the entire time longing for Megan Fox to appear and shove her down a well. I should learn the actress' name so I can be sure to avoid any film in which she appears in the future. (ETA: And The Girl was also about the worst human being ever. No, really. She was worse than ( cut for spoiler, but honestly I'd be doing you a favour by spoiling you. And I'm not sure you can spoil a film that has no plot )

As for the rest, well, the film's major issue is that it takes a remarkably long time for them to start blowing things up. This is not good, because it gives you time to think (thinking which your brain tries to short-circuit as a survival mechanism). And thinking leads to you wondering why X scene has suddenly morphed into Y scene with absolutely no explanation of how you got from one to another. Or why there are no girl autobots or evil bots. Which, come to think of it, might explain the creepy interest in the girl. (And why do robots need gender anyway? And why do they have eyes and not some other sensor thingy? And where did all those people appear from? And why are they now in Africa? And....)*

The good part of the experience was that the film blanked out for a bit in the middle, so although they got it going again, I got a voucher for a free film.

ETA: You know how some people talk about how they'd give almost anything to talk to Socrates, or Buddha, or Issac Newton, or some other great thinker? I would honestly give up the chance to speak to any of these people (including Cicero) just to talk to Michael Bay about what the fuck this film was about.



*Brain runs off screaming

Lo and behold my UK DVDs arrived and they actually play in my Blu-Ray. No idea why but I am not complaining. I am rewatching the first three episodes (where sadly Sir Percy does not ever put on one single wart. Or cackle while dressed as an old woman. This is very tragic.) in preparation for the second series which I have never seen. HE HAS DISGUISES IN THAT ONE. And warts. THERE HAD BETTER BE WARTS. Hairy ones.

I really like that Marguerite has clearly got a past in this series. I know it's not as in the books, but then no woman could possibly be like Marguerite in the books and I've yet to see an adaptation that points out that she primarily married Percy for his money and his devotion to her rather than for love. Sir Percy is Richard E. Grant who has magnificent cravats and plays the fop very well.

Anyway, I'm on the second episode, the one with the evil Madame Guillotine. She kills nuns! And priests! And anyone else she comes across! You have to admit that she's thorough, which is to be commended. And this episode has Gaius Baltar in it, only he's not Gauius, he's a royalist fighting in the woods with someone's fake daughter.