quotidiana
Jun. 26th, 2020 02:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nnozomiDaily life: Some good things. At the alternative high school they’re letting me help out with the non-native-speaker class a bit: five kids from Iraq, Iran, Vietnam, and China, at first glance a delightful mix of bold and shy, thoughtful and silly. I’m looking forward to it. All three of the schools where I volunteer have now settled down into the school year a bit, which—if nothing else terrible happens, knock wood—is a relief.
Also my veranda plants are coming into their own in defiance of my black thumb: rows of beautiful jade-green grape tomatoes (like Oliver Melendy’s monarch cocoons) which are finally starting to ripen, two ACTUAL EGGPLANTS (okay, just cute little globular purple things so far), half a dozen perky vertical chile peppers, and even the habanero has finally wised up to its purpose in life as a fruiting rather than just flowering plant.
Music: Among other things, the Grosse Fuge. So splendid. I wish it were possible to hear it with the ears of Beethoven’s contemporaries, to discover just how avant-garde it sounded. (I recall doing well in a 20th-c. music class in college where I ended up citing Beethoven in every paper I wrote. You’d think he had a time machine.)
Books: On the futurism theme, I’ve been rereading some SFF near-future mystery novels by Lee Killough; they’re basically a lot of fun, well-worked-out plots and fantastic worldbuilding with tons of integrated, believable details. However, the technology of 2080-as-imagined-in-1990 does not stand up to that of 2020; apart from the no mobile phones thing, the detective calls in to the records database for some information, and the computer delivers it to her…by sending a robot with a tray of hardcopy.
Chinese: You know what I wish Duolingo had is a “random review” function where you could get a lesson’s worth of questions selected at random from all the lessons completed so far. There’s a lot of vocabulary that is slipping through the cracks in my brain.
My so-called listening practice continues to be mostly Zhu Yilong-related; I was amused to notice that in propria (public) persona he’s just as prone to say 没事 (I’m/it’s fine) as Shen Wei and Luo Fusheng are, oh dear.
Writing: Making slow but steady forward progress; the love interest is now established as endgame in my head, even though they haven't even, like, called each other by first names yet, never mind held hands, kissed, etc etc. Music stuff keeps on slipping in around the edges which I'm sure it shouldn't.
I don’t think my fic titles are worth doing the whole meme, but I did want to show my work for two I’m kind of proud of (includes spoilers, if you can have spoilers for a 350-word ficlet). “The People Who Get Opportunities,” in which Karen Marlow pays her respects to Miss Hillyard of Shrewsbury College before going (precipitously) down from Oxford to marry, has a title from a line Miss Hillyard says to Harriet Vane in Gaudy Night: “I have noticed that the people who get opportunities always seem to choose the wrong ones.” In context she’s referring at least in part to Harriet’s failure to decide (yet) to marry the right man when she has a chance to; I thought it was a nice commentary on Karen’s decision in the opposite direction.
Also there’s “a language without an army,” which is a riff on the linguists’ joke that a language is a dialect with an army. The fic (by far the shortest and least upbeat Guardian fic I’ve written) is about how Shen Wei would cope if Dixing had its own dialect, and I wanted to use the reversed joke to emphasize his isolation and his vulnerability (and Dixing’s/Shen Wei’s selfhood).
Photos: Three variations on hydrangeas (these are a couple of weeks old, they’re in fuller bloom now), a tiger lily, a cloud tree (I don’t know its real name), and our umeshu, also from a couple weeks back.
Be safe and well.
Also my veranda plants are coming into their own in defiance of my black thumb: rows of beautiful jade-green grape tomatoes (like Oliver Melendy’s monarch cocoons) which are finally starting to ripen, two ACTUAL EGGPLANTS (okay, just cute little globular purple things so far), half a dozen perky vertical chile peppers, and even the habanero has finally wised up to its purpose in life as a fruiting rather than just flowering plant.
Music: Among other things, the Grosse Fuge. So splendid. I wish it were possible to hear it with the ears of Beethoven’s contemporaries, to discover just how avant-garde it sounded. (I recall doing well in a 20th-c. music class in college where I ended up citing Beethoven in every paper I wrote. You’d think he had a time machine.)
Books: On the futurism theme, I’ve been rereading some SFF near-future mystery novels by Lee Killough; they’re basically a lot of fun, well-worked-out plots and fantastic worldbuilding with tons of integrated, believable details. However, the technology of 2080-as-imagined-in-1990 does not stand up to that of 2020; apart from the no mobile phones thing, the detective calls in to the records database for some information, and the computer delivers it to her…by sending a robot with a tray of hardcopy.
Chinese: You know what I wish Duolingo had is a “random review” function where you could get a lesson’s worth of questions selected at random from all the lessons completed so far. There’s a lot of vocabulary that is slipping through the cracks in my brain.
My so-called listening practice continues to be mostly Zhu Yilong-related; I was amused to notice that in propria (public) persona he’s just as prone to say 没事 (I’m/it’s fine) as Shen Wei and Luo Fusheng are, oh dear.
Writing: Making slow but steady forward progress; the love interest is now established as endgame in my head, even though they haven't even, like, called each other by first names yet, never mind held hands, kissed, etc etc. Music stuff keeps on slipping in around the edges which I'm sure it shouldn't.
I don’t think my fic titles are worth doing the whole meme, but I did want to show my work for two I’m kind of proud of (includes spoilers, if you can have spoilers for a 350-word ficlet). “The People Who Get Opportunities,” in which Karen Marlow pays her respects to Miss Hillyard of Shrewsbury College before going (precipitously) down from Oxford to marry, has a title from a line Miss Hillyard says to Harriet Vane in Gaudy Night: “I have noticed that the people who get opportunities always seem to choose the wrong ones.” In context she’s referring at least in part to Harriet’s failure to decide (yet) to marry the right man when she has a chance to; I thought it was a nice commentary on Karen’s decision in the opposite direction.
Also there’s “a language without an army,” which is a riff on the linguists’ joke that a language is a dialect with an army. The fic (by far the shortest and least upbeat Guardian fic I’ve written) is about how Shen Wei would cope if Dixing had its own dialect, and I wanted to use the reversed joke to emphasize his isolation and his vulnerability (and Dixing’s/Shen Wei’s selfhood).
Photos: Three variations on hydrangeas (these are a couple of weeks old, they’re in fuller bloom now), a tiger lily, a cloud tree (I don’t know its real name), and our umeshu, also from a couple weeks back.
Be safe and well.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 07:21 am (UTC)My tea ended up on my monitor. How very dare you. :D
Agreed on Duolingo! The review options for earlier material could be better.
The "language without an army" encapsulates my daily struggle to get my students to write in their native Scots... for centuries it was the language of official documents and now it's treated like some inferior dialect of English. :(
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 01:57 am (UTC)It's in the book! I can't help it! Apply to the author! (Technology apart, the worldbuilding is actually very consistent and interesting; many have done worse.)
The "language without an army" encapsulates my daily struggle to get my students to write in their native Scots
Oh, wow. Would be glad to hear more about this any time you want to write about it. As I'm sure you know, everyone here in Japan uses regional dialects in daily speech, but anything formal is in standard/Tokyo style. I always keep an eye out for novels set outside of Tokyo where people actually talk in dialect... .
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 09:38 am (UTC)the love interest is now established as endgame in my head, even though they haven't even, like, called each other by first names yet, never mind held hands, kissed, etc etc.
Sounds like slooow burn :D ?
Also there’s “a language without an army,” which is a riff on the linguists’ joke that a language is a dialect with an army. The fic (by far the shortest and least upbeat Guardian fic I’ve written) is about how Shen Wei would cope if Dixing had its own dialect, and I wanted to use the reversed joke to emphasize his isolation and his vulnerability (and Dixing’s/Shen Wei’s selfhood).
I ADORE that fic and I find myself thinking about it a lot ;;; *pets Shen Wei*
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 02:00 am (UTC)Heh, I guess so, or just two very oblivious people ;) In another few thousand words they're going to find themselves more or less in the middle of the sharing-a-bed trope, though...
I find myself thinking about it a lot ;;; *pets Shen Wei*
You're very kind to say so and from another language-oriented person it means a lot. (Poor Shen Wei, there is no end to the things we put him through.)
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 12:48 pm (UTC)Awww! So charmingly retro.
Makes me remember that part of a German sci-fi series (written in the 60s) where giant faster-than-light space ships ... delivered messages via pneumatic tube. :D
a language without an army is an excellent title, btw.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 02:02 am (UTC)It is! It's funny in context, because the worldbuilding otherwise really is skillful and consistent. I expect thirty years from now people will be saying the same thing about technology in novels written now. (And who knows? If an enemy shot from the opposing spaceship knocks all your electronics out, the pneumatic tubes presumably still work.)
and thanks for the kind words about the title ♡
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 02:11 pm (UTC)Oh lordy, sooooooo much 90s SF doesn't hold up tech-wise. It's bad when an RPG had a better handle on the possibilities of future tech than most (any?) of the New Wave writers.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 02:03 am (UTC)sooooooo much 90s SF doesn't hold up tech-wise
Very true. I figure as long as the book is still fun to read they can get away with it...
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 03:18 am (UTC)I adored that fic. *^^*
no subject
Date: 2020-06-27 04:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-06-28 09:21 am (UTC)I will probably do the titles meme, if I find the time today, just so I can navelgaze a bit more. ;)
The hydrangeas are gorgeous!
no subject
Date: 2020-06-28 01:50 pm (UTC)