Books, tables, weekly dose of randomness

Let's see. I finished The Strain by Del Toro and Hogan. It was good. Definitely the first in a trilogy (I believe). This initial story was sort of wrapped up, but there are certainly story lines left hanging and characters in dire situations. Briefly, it's a vampire story with a bit of a medical bent. Not so briefly? Well, we follow Eph Goodweather of the CDC as he's called to investigate a plane full of dead people. He provides the medical background mentioned earlier while Abraham Setrakian provides the vampire background. (He's the hunter, not the vampire) They either use or at least nod at most of the accepted vampire myths while tweaking a couple (it's a virus and teeth are not involved in the blood drinking). It will be interesting to see where the story goes, I look forward to the next one.

I also made it through The Magic Thief: Lost book 2 of that series. I really like the way these stories are told and this one is another fun little romp. Conn, the titular magic thief has lost his focus stone and proceeds to try and speak with the magic by blowing things up. Good lad that Conn. Sarah Prineas relates the story in a nice easy going fashion that will have you done with the book in an afternoon. Again I look forward to seeing what happens next.

I've burned through a couple of the Kindaichi Case Files books. They're always fun. I really need to track down some of the ones I've missed.

The letter 'r' has run across some lovely tables. If Dad wants to make that first one in the video we'd take a couple. Although I can't imagine how careful you'd have to be putting that one together... Yikes. Talk about measure twice cut once. I'm not sure I'd ever get out of the measuring phase on that one.

Weather has finally turned very much summer-y. Too hot. ^_^ I miss the rain. Although parts of the garden don't. I think our cucumbers and watermelons are doomed. Peas and beans seem ok though. As do the tomatoes. We finally have some serranos, although the poor jalapeno seems to have gone on strike... We blame the monster of a tomato plant we've got next to it.

Kids have been enjoying the pool (thanks littlest sis), although lovely wife is about to throw the lot of them in it and leave them there. Apparently they think she's some sort of pool toy.

We managed to survive the 4th without setting anything on fire (sounds like we're one up on Dad in that respect) although that can certainly liven things up. We had good food and decent fireworks. If I ever have to light lightning flashes again it will be too soon. That and snakes. Why did it have to be snakes...

At any rate the summer marches on. Which is good.

Books and sock animals

piggy,
originally uploaded by dkun.

Finished The Magic Thief the other day. Great book. Young adult story about, wait for it, a thief who learns to be a magician. Clever eh? It's a fun little story that I look forward to seeing followed up. Easily read in a day or so. Give it a try if you like YA adventure stories.

One of the other books we got from the Library was on sock animals. You can see McK's pig here. Lovely wife is currently working on a Totoro for moi. (Note to favorite niece, that means "me" in French. That's the language of France. It's a place where French people live. Also, French can be a salad dressing. (Although not a very good one.) At any rate. Relatives may discover sock animals under the tree at Christmas. For they are cute.

Snagged Mega Man III on the Virtual console the other day. And Secret of Mana. Mega Man III is an exercise in old school platform torture. Oddly enough I'm finding that strangely compelling. And G thinks it's great. Weird. Secret of Mana is a 1-3 player RPG from Yore (the time period, not a company. Squaresoft made the game). Should be good. Look forward to torturing lovely wife and kids with it. (Strangely Super Mario Galaxy has come back into vogue as well. I've actually gotten quite a few stars with Luigi. It's a pretty great game.)

Spaced is an humorous British comedy. Lots of geeky pop culture references. And Simon Pegg.

Ladron Que Roba a Ladron was a fun Spanish heist comedy. Also recommended if you run across it. I enjoy a good caper flick and this one didn't disappoint. Favorite niece should watch it. In Spanish. With subtitles. And then send me a report on the effects of Infommercials on Immigrants and other subsistence communities.

Well. I think that's enough of a catch up for now. Go watch the new Harry Potter trailer. It's far more interesting.