reading, knitting, half-obscured dog pictures

Since I wasn't able to get onto the internet for several days, I've been doing some reading. Last week I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and last night I re-read Prince Caspian. I never did like the Narnia series, and I still don't like it. As I recall, Tolkein had some tart thngs to say about it as well. I was, shall we say, underwhelmed by Harry Potter, too.

I'm trying to remember what I read when I was 10 or 11--I guess that's the target audience--and I believe I was reading horse and dog stories (Lad: A Dog, Smokey the Cowhorse, things like that) and this improbable pre-Revolution pioneer series by Joseph Altsheler, the Young Trailer series that for some reason I thought was just wonderful. Also Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Books (both volumes--there's another set beside the Mowgli stories).

I didn't get into sf/f until I was maybe 12 or 13--there just *wasn't* any back then. I started off with Heinlein and Asimov--much preferred Asimov, esp. I, Robot, but I really wasn't a hard sf kinda person.

Then, thank goodness, somehow I discovered Andre Norton, who really turned me on and I read everything of hers I could get my hands on. I can still quote you big chunks of the first book of hers I ever read, Star Rangers (which is now titled something else). I loved that book--there was so much imagination in it you could take it and run with it yourself--so many untold stories, so much background just hinted at, plus the vivid characters and relationships. Great book. I loved, too, that many of her characters had esper powers that enabled them to form teams with animals (Storm Over Warlock and Lord of Thunder, for instance), and that some of her characters were of American Indian descent. Some of her characters were even *girls*!

Then LOTR came out and it was a whole new ballgame.

Man, it took FOREVER before there started being readable fanatasy after that, although I did branch out some into H.P. Lovecraft and some of the Golden Age fantasy stuff--John Carter of Mars and Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser, things like that, because my brother was reading it (I still like Lovecraft--he can scare the bejeebers out of me). There was a godawful Tolkein ripoff by the Hildebrandt brothers, Sword of Shannara, which I read maybe 10 pages of and got rid of. Then some decent juvenile fantasy came out--there was the Lloyd Alexander Welsh series and a stand-alone (not by Alexander) called Tash and the Jesters. Andre Norton started writing fantasy, too, though I didn't like it as well as her scifi--which actually teetered on the edge of fantasy (Storm Over Warlock, for instance--compare it to some of MZB's early Darkover stuff).

Anyway, I suppose my point is that, IMHO, C.S. Lewis couldn't tell a decent kids' story if his life depended on it (although I like some of his other books) and I don't see what all the fuss about Harry Potter is. Call me old, I guess.

On to knitting:

I finished the Tidal Wave socks today, yay!


Here's a close-up of the leg--I love the curving part, although as you can see from above the basic impression is of horizontals. I think Cookie A.'s Pomatamus socks might emphasize the curves more. You can get a good idea of the wonderful colors of this yarn in this picture, too.

I can't wait to wear these to work!

Some pictures of Taenzer and Timber outside this morning:

This is what she's doing with that pile of branches in the yard (and I sure wish that guy would show up and haul it off--it's been almost a week)--she drives the ball into an opening.

Then--although the ball is free here--she grabs a branch and starts tugging and pulling.

Then she wrestles with the branches a little bit before she takes off with the ball:

Meanwhile, a very young rabbit has taken to hanging out in the woodpile. This morning it was sitting right out in the middle of the grass, happily munching away, when we came out. Being a young rabbit, it panicked and ran. I had the gate open and I thought it would run past me and I could close the gate and it would be safe, but no, it doubled back and ran into the woodpile, then came out the other end. Meanwhile, Timber had seen it go in--but hadn't seen it come out (I had to go shoo it out the fence, dumb bunny)--and occupied himself for quite some time looking for the bunny in the woodpile:

"I know it went in here--"

"I can smell it..."


"Where is it??"

He's still not 100% himself--his appetite is still off, and he's developed diahrrea--probably from the antibiotics--but he's very active and seems happy, so we'll just keep working on the eating thing and I'll try to get more yoghurt down him.