Vampire romance... more like TRAMPIRE ROMANCE!

I just rekindled my two-year-old tradition of sitting out in Bryant Park during lunch and getting tan! I'm so dark right now I look like a... well still like a vampire, but maybe one who's slightly embarassed.

Anyway now I'm back at work and I'm soaking wet and smell like a slaughterhouse. I also think I'm all uneven because I was more interested in lying on my stomach and reading my book than lying on my back and getting color on that side.

Yeah, I'm totally obsessed with this book even though it's annoying and exasperating and I'm 10 years too old for it. I'm reading Twlight by Stephenie Heyer, who can't spell her own name so she decided to write a novel about a teenage girl with no distinguishing characteristics except vague bouts with depression--that is to say no distinguishing characteristics--and the vampire boy she loves, played by Cedric Diggory in the upcoming movie.

Anyway it's awful because the girl is essentially in lo--well let me just copy/paste the comment I left on my friend's blog because i know you all care SO MUCH what I think about this book you'll never read. I encourage you to skip it.

I find it really exasperating that Bella lets Edward treat her like he does. He gives her nothing but cryptic non-answers and then gets mad at her when she doesn't do exactly what he wants, and she just sits there taking it like some idiot girl who cares about a boy more than her own self-respect. Essentially she's staying with him for being "pretty" and "mysterious", and we have enough vapid teenage girls in the world who already ascribe to this sentiment that we don't need Stephenie Meyer encouraging them.

He also lashes out at her for his own faults. If he's really SO dangerous and cares about her SO much, he's being incredibly selfish by imposing himself on her all the time, yet when he gets tempted to eat her or whatever it is, somehow it's her fault for not leaving him alone? I don't THINK so, buddy.

I also have a problem with the fact that he is drawn to her unpredictability. Of COURSE he finds her unpredictable. She's the only person he can't read. He's never had to PREDICT anybody's actions. So it's not that she's especially unique (because she's not), it's just that he doesn't have the usual early warning system telling him what to expect.

BLAH so it annoys me. Maybe I'm too old for the book. BUT, considering I read over 300 pages in one sitting and have so many feelings about it, it's obviously doing something right.

My favorite part is that it's in the first person so I spend a lot of time pretending I'm gazing into Cedric Diggory's eyes and admiring Cedric Diggory's beautiful muscles and kissing Cedric Diggory's.... hm.... I'm definitely reading the rest of the series.

In conclusion, you should all read this book because it's ACTUALLY rather good even though I happen to hate everybody under the age of 21.

Not everyone in the book, I mean everyone in the world.

That is... unless that under-21er reads my illustious blog, in which case I don't hate you, but I seriously question your intelligence for enjoying a blog that a 4-year-old would scoff at. And possibly pee on. Do 4-year-olds still wet themselves?

Whoa, gotta go.... just overheard a bombshell...

Sunday and the Ramayana

Sunday lovely Sunday. This is what every weekend should be like. Brunch at a French place, a documentary and MoMA, and nice walk in the park. Best Sunday ever, and pretty much what I plan on every Sunday being like from now until October.

I went to bed at 11:30, woke up refreshed, and got to work at record earliness today, which means I get to leave early and be in the sun some more! Between 4:30 and my hair appointment, I hope to finish this book that I've been reading for a THOUSAND YEARS! It's this for this and there's like a billion words in it, and I made the mistake of making it a subway read, meaning I only read it in 10 minute spurts on the subway so it never ends. Previous subway reads have been short things, I don't know what's wrong with me.

Anyway, yesterday I was reading it and it felt real appropriate because the story was ending (but the book has like a 70 page denoument) and spring was coming and everyone was cheerful and happy with the monkeys and the animals. So I guess it's timed well with the arrival of true springtime.

It's really a beautiful story. I thought it would be tedious and horrible like reading the Bible, but this prose rendition is really appealing. There are lovely episodes all throughout, and the good people feel like really good people. The virtue and honor and honesty portrayed in this story had a purity to them that's really unique. This is a world where everyone helps everyone and gives without getting and strives towards a happier community. I don't know anything about Hinduism or the culture in which this mythology was created, so all I can say about the Ramayana is how it affected my Western, non-religiously-affiliated mind.

All the virtue depicted in this story, all the reasons people gave of themselves and helped others, was due to this universal respect that everyone (everyone not evil) shared. It's an affect that is really inspiring, perhaps because it is woefully absent from our own reality. The bad (evil) characters in the story were considered such because they were selfish and lacking in respect for the lives of others. It wasn't about wishing ill on anyone, it was about taking without consideration.

Another major theme in this story was forgiveness, and the act of granting it when it is needed. Misdeeds, fault, and blame aren't absent from the story, but when a character has acted inappropriately and genuinely asks forgiveness, it is always given. Always. There are no grudges or endless bitternesses. Our silly notion that forgiveness has to be deserved or earned isn't even a passing thought in these characters' minds. I think there's a lot we can take from their example.

Maybe the reason the characters in this mythology were so positive and giving was because -- and maybe I'm imagining this -- they all seemed acutely aware that they were part of this huge story. It's really hard to explain what I mean, but it seemed like they knew their lives were epic. At many points in this book, the characters would sit and relate past stories about other characters, and as the book went on, they'd be telling stories about things that happened earlier on in their own timeline. And they would tell these things in the same fashion as the main tale itself. It was stories being built on stories with every character being part of countless histories all interwoven and stretching back thousands of years. With an awareness of this huge epic that involves yourself and every person around you, I believe it would be difficult to be hateful or self-serving. Stories are one of the most powerful things that keep communities and cultures cohesive. We're all aware of our own, but I think we often forget that we're a part of each other's. What this book represented to me was the power of what could happen if we all worked towards forming a huge communal epic where everyone's actions are a part of the story and everyone, no matter who, can be a hero.

Hmm... that got a little sappy and heavy-handed.... sorry.

Super cute!!!

Normally I don't say anything about the silly books I read because most of the people that care about books for young people are young people, and they don't read my blog, and if they do their parents should punish them or better yet send me nasty e-mails about exposing their impressionable niblets to gayness and language because anybody who knows anything knows that parents in America prefers blame over responsibility. Also, parents may be concerned I influence their children to use ridiculous run-on sentences.

Since I never get any of those angry messages, I figure nobody cares what I have to say about the Artemis Fowl series (cute), David Wiesner's illustrations (beautiful), or the oeuvre of Garth Nix (brilliant). But between last night and today at lunch, I read Kiki's Delivery Service by Eiko Kadono, which is just the darlinest little book I ever did read.

It's about this little witch who turns 12 or 13 or so, and she has to go off by herself and start a life in a new town, so she picks this big city. Unfortunately, she's been lazy and bored all her life so the only thing she learned how to do was ride a broom, so she sets up this business where she carries shit around for people. The rest of the book is all about her little adventures helping people out.

Half the things that transpire leave you thinking "What? That would never happen. And nobody talks like that." But then you remember it's Japanese and somehow that makes it alright. Also, Kiki is 13, right, but she really comes off more like a 10 year old. Not in a whiny way, though... just that she's not all learning about sex and death and love like young people in young people novels so often do. She's just kinda traipsing about on her broom la la la la OOPS, I dropped the stuffed cat I was supposed to deliver, I'll just give the kid my real cat instead, try not to breathe, kitty, so he doesn't know you're real. Also, if for some reason you have children, this book is totally episodic and would make a perfect nighttime read-aloud over about a week and a half. (There, I've said something useful.)

Maybe it's because in the book I read before this, a 12 year-old boy was pushed out of a 10th-story window, paralyzing him because he saw a woman fucking her twin brother and plotting the death of his father.... but the innocence of Kiki's Delivery Service was really refreshing. Now I'm at home watching the movie version (Hayao Miyazaki) which looks to be as fabulous as everything he's ever done.