"I'm not dead yet... I feel happy..."

[felis_ultharus]

We are now a house of the Plague, although it doesn't seem to have hit me as hard as it hit Matt. I was feeling queasy yesterday, but so far no vomitous offerings have been made at the porcelain altar.

We had to cancel the Lughnassadh event yesterday since three of us were unwell. I just did a small, quiet, personal thing to mark the holiday.

Otherwise, I'm still slogging slowly through Susannah Moodie and her Freaky Neighbours, also known as Roughing it in the Bush. I'm only one-third through it. It has all the hallmarks of early Canadian literature: violence, death, snowstorms, dark forests, suicide, and abused children, and yet it still manages to be boring.

Comments

[ubergreenkat.livejournal.com]

Susannah Moodie and her Freaky Neighbours

classic! i love it!

[jenjoou.livejournal.com]

wow, it's still boring? That takes skill... not a skill that I would want to have mind you. ;)

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

It does seem to be all about her neighbours, though as a professor of mine noticed, the neighbours are all foils to show just how wonderful Susannah is.

Her neighbours are fascinating, though -- from the Evil Americans (Old Satan, Emily Satan, Uncle Joe, and Betty Fye) to the suicidal hunter Brian. She's good at painting character portraits. Very funny.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

All Canadian literature requires violence, death, snowstorms, dark forests, suicide, and abused children. Some do it well, some don't.

foi_nefaste did a CanLit course where everything on the syllabus had a rape scene. I believe some of those were boring, too, if I recall correctly.

We, as a country, tend not to write light and fluffy things.

[jenjoou.livejournal.com]

I've noticed. All the books in my Canlit class had all those things too. Some were good, some weren't but at least I had a much better teacher than foi_nefaste. Not only rape scenes.

It's interesting though considering how many comedians we have... :)

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

All Canadian literature fits into one of two categories:

• A depressing exploration of the eldritch depths of the human soul. This usually involves snow somehow. This is the Sinclair Ross/Margaret Laurence mode.
  
• Cynical, biting comedy about the place where the author grew up. This is the Mordecai Richler/Wayne Johnson mode.

So we have our comedians in CanLit, too. Of course, there is no comedy written on the prairies, because it's too miserable to allow it. And besides, laughter was downsized in Alberta to balance the budget.

[ubergreenkat.livejournal.com]

ha ha ha ha ha

[seal7.livejournal.com]

:( Get better soon!

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I think I already am getting better. It seems to have been mostly a 24 hour thing. Matt seems better, too.

How have you been doing?

[seal7.livejournal.com]

Mm, I'm glad it was a quickly passing thing.

I've been doing alright mostly. Nothing exciting.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

That's good.

Thanks again, by the way. I loved the music. That Franz Ferdinand song especially is now one of my favourites, and now goes through my head at all hours :)

[seal7.livejournal.com]

^__^ I'm glad, it was the one I most doubted you'd like.... since the sound is pretty... noisy somehow.
Want some more Franz? :P

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

That would be wonderful ^_^

*looks around, tries to see if there's anything you'd like*

Do you like the Hidden Cameras?

[seal7.livejournal.com]

Take Me Out

40'

Michael

And I've never heard of the Hidden Cameras >_>

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

Thank you. I got them without any trouble this time.

If you tell me how to use that yousendit program, I can throw some Hidden Cameras your way. Not surprised they're unknown out there. They're not even well-known in Canada, and they're Canadian.

[seal7.livejournal.com]

Well, you just go to yousendit.com, select a file (you don't need to enter an email address or anything), and then click 'send it'... then you wait till it's done, then it'll give you the link to get the file. Tha's all.

[felis-ultharus.livejournal.com]

I can't find the original disk to make copies from. The only one I have in electronic form right now on this computer is their most popular (though I have to admit, it's definitely not my favourite):

One weird little song -- "Doot Doot Plot" by Hidden Cameras

http://s44.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2KVO1Q76NONJL2DUH1BD7T43S4

[seal7.livejournal.com]

Hmm...