3 things: Quote of the Day, Father's Day 'brunch,' and smoke shop news

[edenfalling]

1. History is a vast early warning system.
---Norman Cousins

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2. I arrived safely back in Ithaca yesterday evening, after a Father's Day brunch at an Asian restaurant in Chatham. (Its name escapes me, sorry.) It was an odd meal since we had very lunch-oriented dim sum, but I only got up at 11am, so I was eating breakfast!

The various dumplings were wonderful, but the spring rolls, while perfectly serviceable, were simultaneously too greasy and too crunchy, and the cabbage inside was overcooked.

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3. Work today was... um...

Okay, see, two of my coworkers, MS and BW, do not get along. I think the animosity is stronger on her side than his, but I'm fairly sure it's mutual to some degree. Since I was nominally in charge (in our manager's absence), it was up to me to keep things running smoothly, and I'm not particularly good at hitting the right tone. Especially not when I'm tired and it's raining.

Then, once I got home, MS called me, kinda-sorta at BW's behest, to get guidance on dealing with a large instant lottery payout. And then they called me back a minute later, to clarify another point.

I understand that you'd want to be sure you weren't screwing up such a large amount of money, but... how hard is it, really, to get the cash from the deposit out back in the safe, ring half the payout on each of the two registers (this is to make sure it can all be paid back into the deposit by the end of the shift while leaving enough cash in each drawer to keep the morning cashup person from tearing her hair out trying to calculate negative money), and make a note explaining what you've done?

...

Yeah.

I am officially done with this day.

Tomorrow I will attempt to write stuff. Or maybe review Jim Butcher's Code Alera series. Something vaguely productive, anyway. (ETA: There's a mini review in the comments.)

Comments

[tjalorak.livejournal.com]

Code Alera = the awesome. Love that series!

Hope your day goes better tomorrow.

[edenfalling]

It was an interesting reading experience for me. I'm glad I waited until four books were available, because if I'd only had the first book to judge, and hadn't previously read and loved Butcher's other work... I would have finished Furies of Calderon just to resolve the plot tension (which Butcher is always good at), and then never bothered to read the sequels.

You see, I find the first two books... thin is probably the best word. Amara's story threads don't meet up often enough with the others, Isana annoyed and/or bored me at first, Fidelias was just a little too much surface and not enough depth, and Tavi was a cipher until he joined the legions. It was very odd, since Butcher does so well at drawing vibrant characters in the Dresden Files. I kept waiting to be drawn in, but while I was hooked on the plot -- the 'how is he going to raise the jeopardy this time?' factor -- I couldn't connect emotionally to the characters no matter how hard I tried.

I chalk some of the problem up to a learning curve -- he has to balance character stuff with world-building in a way that he doesn't in the Dresden Files -- and some to, well, a bad balance between plot arcs and character arcs, a need to set up dominoes to knock down in later books, and a tendency to tell things instead of showing them internally. Too often, Butcher tells readers that Tavi suddenly knew or realized something, instead of taking us through the process, or giving Tavi's own emotional reaction to a blinding flash of insight.

But the third book is significantly better, and by the fourth book I finally felt I had enough of a handle on Tavi to be actively rooting for him instead of just watching his adventures with semi-detached interest.

I will refine this ramble and hash out my thoughts on Butcher's world-building some other time. :-)

[tjalorak.livejournal.com]

Look forward to it. :)